Blue belt!!!

Haley and Anna are now officially BLUE belts!!!! 

Congratulations girls!

Weekend at the coast

We went to the coast again with two of Eric's partners and their families.

I am still getting used to Oregon's idea of what a beach is, but the girls didn't care it was freezing... they had a blast!

Joe literally sacrificed his clothes and comfort to walk out and get starfish for all the kids. He was the hero of the day...

Needless to say the kids were all thrilled.  Fyi- we did put them all back in the water so they wouldn't die.

We did a couple of little hikes along the coast...

It was stunning and beautiful, but scary to stand on the edge of a cliff over the ocean.

Youth rafting trip/ the new ward

We have lived here for two and a half years and that entire time we have belonged to the same ward/ church congregation and have watched it grow and grow and grow. We really love and appreciate all the people in our ward as they became family. While we were on our long road trip the ward was split and we were assigned to attend a new ward with all new families where we only knew a very small number of the people. We were devastated to say the least. 

Shortly after we started attending our new ward I could tell that this ward change was inspired and really a good thing for our family.  

The 1st time I started to see what a blessing this was for our family was when Haley went on the youth rafting trip. The youth in the new ward did a big rafting trip down the Rouge river . She has great friends that are just like her and she adores the new bishop. 

Do you see Haley in the middle with the blue rash guard holding a gun to the back of the bishop? Right after I took this photo she soaked him with freezing water. He is very playful and such a good sport. Someone took a photo as she was squirting him and he has it blown up in his office. They all crack up about it, but honestly I did not see the gun before or I would have told her to put it down.

06

Say WHAT?

While driving to the river to go rafting Eric was talking about being safe because we would be in 3 different kayaks. Lucy was complaining... 

"WWWWWhhhhyyyyyyyeee are you giving us SO much rules?" Lucy

"Dad's just telling us to stay in eyesight." Haley 

"Dad, can we please just take Lucy home now?" Ruby