Our fifth FIRST birthday!

Delia's 1!!!
 

For her first birthday, we had a tea party. Finger sandwiches, chips, grapes, and apple slices.

  Here is her tea party cake.

 And her tea party dishes.

 J.J. asserts his growing up capabilities.

 Delia ate her cake (a little). She mostly just grabbed the cake by the handfuls and then acted disgusted before she shook her hand like a wet dog to get off the yuckies. Needless to say, we had our hands full without cameras for this part.

 

Here she is opening her present from grammy and pappy Ford.

Originally this was going to be an Alice in Wonderland whimsical tea party party. I had cut and frosted and fondanted :) a mad hatter shaped bottom layer and it was sitting on the counter while Conference was on. While we were listening and watching the leaders of our church speak, someone sneaked downstairs and got their grubby little hands on the cake. I won't say who... but I think you call can guess anyway. Ah, ah, ah-chooase!

The Pitts or not the Pitts...that's a good question.

Well, here we are in our new home. Everything went so smoothly, it was incredible. After finding out that the home we were going to rent in Pitt got plucked out from under us while we were driving there, our real estate agent also called and told us that our buyers in Utah backed out. Then of course, I got a raging ear infection on the drive and Jar had barely slept for a few days. We got to camp out in some awesome people's home for about 2 1/2 weeks, but now we're in our home and ready to stay.

 Of course we're all completely unpacked and the house just looks perfect (besides the cracks in the wall and all the bugs and stains on the carpet, etc). Well, we don't have our clothes in dressers (I still don't have one...hehe), but we'll probably never have our clothes put away anyway. We also don't have a place to put our computer or our TV...oh and we don't have couches or benches yet either. But besides that, our house is a disaster, so I think we're doing pretty well.

 Beautiful rivers here...and LOTS of greenery. I think Mom Ford feels right at home with all the growingness that goes on here, though I can't say the heat and humidity are her favorite.

We had a great time with Aunt Melanie, who saved my skin countless times during my math camp week. And if you think that sounds bad, you're probably right. Though, truth be told, I really quite enjoyed myself. Been a long, long time since I did both addition AND multiplication in one equation. :)

 We found an awesome park near Pitt (this is what everyone calls the University of Pittsburgh here) with Grandma. The kids loved trying to get me dizzy and vice versa.

 McD's with Grandma. Mmmmm...ice cream!

 First day of school for Ryan and J.J. 1st and 3rd grades - I still have a hard time believing it. Look at those angelic faces! You would never know they were moaning and complaining about their new school and having no friends here. (Don't worry, this week they turned a corner and are beginning to really like school). J.J. found out that he gets swim time in school as they have an indoor pool that 3rd graders and up get to use.

 Yep, I think they're ready too. Chase already has the backpack and everything for when he leaves for school in 12 months. He says he won't take it off until then...

Another shot of the park we found. Apparently, Pittsburgh is full of parks like this. Rated one of the best places in the U.S. to take kids...so everyone should probably come visit.

Delia and her new pal. This visit both Delia and Clawson have become quite attached to their Grandma. Clawson loves to tell Grandma he loves her and plays fun little games with meanings clear only to them. Delia and Grandma snuggle quite a bit. Don't leave, Grandma!!!

We love and miss everyone!!! Don't forget, Pittsburgh is rated one of the top places in the country for kids to come visit (lots of museums and zoo and parks and, well you get the picture). Plus we're not that far from many church sites. AND we actually have somewhere to put family when they come stay.

I'm just sayin...

Rolling Rivalry Bike Ride

September 17, 2011

Jordan and I rode the first annual rolling rivalry bike ride. It started in Salt Lake City at Rice Eccles Stadium and ended at Lavell Edwards Stadium in Provo. It is a 100 kilometer ride aka Metric Century and is about 63 miles. The total elevation climb was 3,258 ft. It took us about 3 hours 40 minutes. There were about 80 riders and we came in about 7th place. The ride is a fundraiser for a local foundation called Angel's Hands. It is a foundation that raises money for families who have children who have rare diseases. You can go to rollingrivalry.com to learn more.

Jordan and I at Rice Eccles Stadium. The start of the ride.

Jordan and I at Lavell Edwards Stadium. The elevation climb was difficult. We climed over the point of the mountain in Draper and came down in Alpine. Jordan was the better rider. He is quick to get up hills and fast to get down. Nice of him to wait for me so we could finish together.

This is a picture of one of the families that Angel's Hands helps to support. The little boy in the chair has a rare bone disease. He was a cute little guy.

Nice ride Jordan! Hopefully we can do it again!

Presents for Baby

The boys got their new little baby.......................(fill in the blank) and their mommy/wife some pre-birth gifts.


They even pitched in some of their own money. J.J. picked out some cute little shoes.
And of course some new onesies were in order as well as some a balloon to celebrate.


And mommy needed some flowers to help her get through the rest of the pregnancy.

What sweethearts! They're going to be great big brothers and a super awesome daddy!

Run, Bike, Swim for your Life

So I may have received an email asking why I have not blogged about the triathlon Jaren and Jordan did together. I have now repented and am showing you why I didn't really think about blogging some of this. Oh, don't worry, you'll see...

So here's Jaren at the beginning of the race. Can you see him? Yep, right there. You see him now? What do you mean, no? He's right there...right behind the girl. You can totally see one of his arms, you know, in between the girl and the guy waving his hand. I can't believe you missed it! Don't worry though, we got an awesome shot of him when he was about a hundred feet from finishing the run part of it.

Yep, I told you...AWESOME! I don't mean to brag, but I think I might be the best action photographer I've ever seen. I asked the kiddos to keep an eye out for me for Jordan after Jaren ran past, and J.J. was completely on the ball for me. He said, "Mom! There's Uncle Jordan!" I said, "Where?" J.J. - "He ran past us! We missed him!"

The picture above is all right. I managed to get the sun shining right into the camera and Ryan's tongue out, so it wasn't a total loss.

This picture isn't quite as good. I accidentally got their faces showing in this one.

In all seriousness, these guys did great! They practically finished one on top of the other. Jaren was a little bit faster of a runner and swimmer, and Jordan wailed everyone on the bike. Way to go guys...we're proud of you! (P.S. You two are the best dog paddlers I've ever seen!)

A Happy Halloween to you!

We had a lot of good times this Halloween. All the cousins got to hang out at the Pumpkin Patch and (from what I hear) had a ton of fun together!

These poor kids probably couldn't wait to get finished with this picture below. Every single one of them is squinting in pain. What great sports!

We also had a great time with carving pumpkins too. We got a really fun book that the kids were able to put faces on the pumpkins by dotting the paper with permanent markers. Ryan ended up coloring the entire paper that was taped on his pumpkin with a red Sharpee. You can see on his pumpkins face the remnant of the ink that seeped through the paper. This activity was right down his alley!

Chase was very excited to have a cat. He kept saying, "cat...meow!"

Here are the outfits Jaren put together for our family this year. I think he might have been more excited about the army men thing then the boys were. He thought the hand grenades and bullets were super cool. Do boys ever grow up? :)

Here they are...our all american heroes!

Grandma Ghostie's Haunted House

This Halloween, we're trying to make the season last a little bit longer. We made a haunted house that our Grandma Ford likes to haunt sometimes at night...

Our kids really got into the spirit of this little activity once they understood what they would be getting in the morning at times. They even helped me decorate it with spiderwebs. I think they did a pretty awesome job.

It wasn't easy to lift that house with all those spider webs keeping it down though!

I'm not sure what it is about this picture that makes me think they're excited about what they got the first night...I can just feel it in my bones (buns for those who have seen Murder By Death).

Something I thought was great was how J.J. decided that he wanted to build his own haunted house that the Grandma Ghost could visit at night in his own room. He made this house out of lasagna boxes and colored ghosts and monsters on the outside.

He loves the windows on his haunted house. They gave him a sneak peek into knowing whether the Grandma Ghost visited his very own creation. (He likes the idea of Grandma being able to get inside the house by floating through the walls.)

Another good find!

One of the funniest parts about this is that J.J. didn't make the connection that Grandma Ford was the ghost that haunted the houses, although I thought he knew. We called the Grandma Ghost to let her know that J.J. had made his very own haunted house for her to haunt as well, and at first he acted kind of shy. I wasn't sure why until he said, "Hey! This is Grandma Ford, not Grandma Ghost!" He thought he caught her being sneaky. :) Well, she is pretty sneaky sometimes!

Thanks Grandma (Ford) Ghost for the fun and very sneaky surprises! You can haunt our house anytime!!