november birthdays

My kids are growing up! I keep trying to talk them out of it, but they just won't listen. Unfortunately, it seems to be out of my hands.

Chase turned 6 years old on November 4. I had to think about that for a minute, just now. Is he 5 or 6? He is definitely 6 and he is proud of it.

Chase allowed me to take one picture of him when I came to his school for his birthday lunch. However, there was a stipulation to that, we had to go around the corner so no one could see me take it. Apparently, having your mom take your picture when your in kindergarten is EmBaRaSsInG!

Chase really has changed and grown so much over the past couple of months. He is such a self-motivated little boy, as soon as he gets home from school he pulls out his homework folder and finishes the entire week's homework packet in a matter of minutes. He is a perfectionist when it comes to drawing and writing. He is so inquisitive about everything around him. He loves to play sports, his very favorite being football right now. He also loves to try new things and he makes me so proud. Parent teacher conferences were a few weeks ago and when I went in to meet with his teacher she said "Well this is going to be the most boring parent teacher conference ever, because I'll I'm going to do is sit here and gush over how wonderful Chase is for the next 10 minutes." On his report card she said this "Chase is a member of the 100 club. Chase is a leader. His peers look to him for advice, assurance, and direction. He is a great contributor to our class. It's a joy to work with him."
He is still a huge tease, (not sure where he gets that from), but he really does have the hugest heart. Chasers we are so lucky to have you in our family. We love you a whole lot and then some.
Chase getting ready to take his new bike out for a spin.

Chase's birthday wish this year was "I wish I was a real football player!"


On 11-11-11 our Easty Peasty turned two! I have always felt like once my kids turn 2 that's pretty much the end of the baby stage. However, with Easton being my youngest, I am trying to hold on to his babyness a little bit longer. I still rock him before he goes to sleep at night and for his naps, just so I can get in those much loved cuddles. And thankfully he lets me. Easton is obsessed with Cars, in any form. But especially Cars the movie and Cars 2. The first thing out of his mouth in the morning usually is "I watch Cars 2, Mater?" He also loves riding his scooter and wiggle car outside, he can really get that wiggle car going. A few weeks ago he was out in the driveway cruising around on it when I noticed a trail of blood all around the driveway. I pulled him aside and looked at his feet, he had huge cuts on the tops of both of his big toes, but that wasn't about to stop him. He's a pretty tough kid too. Kind of has to be since he's the youngest of 3 boys. Last week at Chase's soccer game, he wanted to be right in the middle of it and was dribbling the ball all the way down the field and sneaking into the teams huddles. Some of my favorite things Easton says these days are "WHOA! Awesome!", His giggle that is almost identical to Gus-Gus's from Cinderella, "Ka-chow!", "open it," and "Stop it!" He is full of personality and can always make me smile. Easton you are a joy and we all just think you are the cutest 2 year old BABY out there.
"I'm two!"

To say that Easton absolutely loved his new birthday bike and scooter would be a understatement.

Birthday cake

Cort made Easty's cake. He is such a talented guy. He pretty much did it without a pattern, just eyeballed it. He is amazing!



Happy Birthday to two of the cutest and sweetest boys I know!

proud moment

Taylor's gymnastic studio did a in-house meet a couple of weeks ago. I was so proud of her. Taylor loves gymnastics. She has such a passion for it. I am so glad that she has found something that she loves to do. When we first moved to Arizona I tried to get Taylor involved in dance, as well as her tumbling, but she didn't want nothing to do with dance. Instead she wanted to start doing full gymnastics, with the bars and beam. I love that she knew exactly what she wanted to do. It was so fun to go and watch her at the meet and see all the new things that she has learned. I am amazed by her and her determination to keep getting better. You are awesome Taylor!

This is HALLOWEEN!

Wouldn't be Halloween, if we didn't carve us some pumpkins

Or go to the pumpkin patch

All dressed up! Me and my boys

This picture might look a little familiar. I have one with Talan and Chase both in this costume in this exact pose. All of my boys have wore this costume now. I guess it's a tradition of some sort for us. I absolutely love it.

Talan's preschool party

School Halloween parade

Talan and Easton peeking into Taylor's classroom after the parade

Chase at the parade. When I asked him where the best part of his costume was, (well besides himself) his hat? He said it itched, so I took it off..

Chase's class had a pumpkin carving party with the dads. So fun for both Chase and Cort.

Taylor bobbing for doughnuts at her class party

Frankenstein aka Chase

Family photo

Trick or treat! Our neighborhood really knows how to celebrate Halloween. There were parties going on all over the place tonight. We hit up two of them. After we ate at one of them, the kids took off trick or treating with some friends. I snapped a quick picture of them when they came to our house to trick or treat. I love how Taylor has no problem having Chase "tag along" with her and her friends. If there was an award for best big sister I would give it to her!

Trick or treat

Spooky greetings from our family to yours! Happy Halloween!

VEGNO!

VanEpps Girls Night Out

SO much fun! My favorite time of year, with good food, great people and lots of laughs. Does it get any better than that??? I think not. Love my Arizona family.

flag football

A friend from Chase's class asked us if Chase wanted to play flag football this fall with him. Chase was so excited and couldn't say YES he wanted to fast enough. So even though he's still only 5, (you are suppose to be 6...sadly though he will be soon enough!) and the youngest one on the team, we signed him up. He is loving it! He is so competitive and aggressive by nature when it comes to sports. And in true Chase fashion he smiles the entire time he is on the field. He is really in his element out there.

St George and Conference weekend

Last weekend we headed north, so Cort could run the St. George marathon. We also spent the weekend watching conference, shopping at some of my favorite Utah stores, met up with a dear friend, and just enjoyed being together. It was a wonderful weekend.

My little monsters our first night there. Love these kids in these jammies! Seriously it's my favorite! Absolutely love this time of year.

Before we left that Saturday morning to meet Cort at the finish line, Chase and Talan were writing him little love notes. I couldn't find the bulk of them, but I found these three. The first one of Chase's was torn up. He probably thought he messed up on one of his letters. He is such a perfectionist!

The kids anxiously awaiting for Cort to come in. They were so cute! Talan and Easton started to get a little restless, but Taylor was the first one that spotted Cort coming in. He ran all 26.2 miles (can't forget the .2!) in 3 hours 41 minutes. And it has to be said, he did it without really training. Are you kidding me! I couldn't run that fast if my life depended on it.

Just finished! Sooo proud of you Cort! You are amazing. He now wants to run a Ultra Marathon. I know, I know he is out of control!

At the finish line. Cort with his very own personal cheering squad

After the race we headed back to our room and watched conference. I love conference weekend. I look forward to it for weeks before it happens. Every session, there is always a couple talks that stick out to me and I tend to think those were the best ones and everyone must totally agree, that those were the best! But then as I look around at other people's blogs and talk to others about what their favorite talks were, I realize that everyone else's favorites are totally different than mine and are based on what they needed to hear at the moment. Just like mine are. President Monson talk was definitely a favorite for me, as was President Uchtdorf's, and Elder Anderson. Can I have too many favorites?? It was all so good and as I listened to each of the talks I knew they were inspired and my testimony on the importance of conference was strenghtened.

Love this picture. Love this kid. Love this talk.

During conference, Taylor and Chase turned over The poster they had made for their dad and colored the entire Saturday afternoon session. No lie. Who knew one poster paper could provide so much entertainment. I think I will go buy a stack of them to keep on hand!

Conference bingo. Always a must.

It just so happened that my cute friend Ang happened to be in St. George that weekend too. What are the odds! We met up with them at the Tabernacle there, which to my surprise had a carousel, that Easton kept trying to escape too, and the coolest Red rock water feature for the kids to run around on. They loved it and I loved seeing Ang and catching up with her a bit. Ang is the type of person who just makes you feel good when your around her. Wish we could of hung out a bit more.

Me and Ang

Easton trying to get a drink. Gross. Where is this child's mother??

photos from my phone

Anyone who knows me knows I love pictures. Particularly pictures of my kids. :) As a result, I love that my phone has a camera and recorder on it, so that I am able to capture even more moments of us living our everyday lives. Is 10,000+ pictures on my computer, extreme? I don't think so either. :) When I look back through these pictures all they do is make me smile.

Taylor was reading to me the other night after a long day of playing with friends, tumbling class and school. About 5 minutes into her reading, she stopped. I looked over at her and this is what I found...Taylor fast asleep.

Easton loves swimming. Recently, we taught him how to swim with a life jacket on. The other day while we were all out swimming together, I looked over at Easton and saw him sitting on this rock. He loves this side of the pool for some reason. Probably has something to do with me NOT liking him over on the rocks away from everyone else.

Cort took the boys to a Diamond Back game a couple weeks ago. It was fan night and everyone there in attendance got replica rings of when the Diamond Backs won the World Series. Cort gave his ring to Taylor. A girl in Cort's class wanted to buy one from him. So Cort told her that Taylor might be willing to sell hers. The girl said she would get her a gift card to Justice if she did. When Cort asked Taylor, she didn't even hesitate. Taylor ran upstairs and got the ring and gave it to Cort. She was so excited and talked about it for the rest of the night and the next day. The following night me and Taylor made a night of it while the boys went to the Bass Shop, us girls went on a little shopping spree.
Taylor trying on clothes at Justice. I swear anything would look cute on Taylor. :)

The boys with their dad at the Diamondback game



Chase has a couple stuffed animals that are like his pets. Seriously. He takes them on bike rides, car rides. There is Ly-Ly the lion, Turtle, and Sonic the hedgehog. The other day Chase and Talan were heading down to a friends house to play and Chase wanted to take Sonic with him. I told him NO cause I didn't want him to get lost. Chase was so sad and Talan being the wonderful kid that he is, did his best to try and comfort Chase. Love catching my kids in moments like these.

Easton is quite the little troublemaker these days. I know I've said it before, but times that trouble by 10 and you have Easton at the age he is now. He is constantly into everything. The other day I made smoothies, put some in a sippy cup for him and ran upstairs to do something when I came back down this is how I found Easton and his smoothie.

With Taylor and Chase gone all day Talan and Easton have become best buddies.

Out on run with mom. They love to turn around in the stroller and sit on the bottom of the stroller. They think it's hilarious. And although it makes pushing them a lot harder, I can't help but let them when they are so happy doing it.

Hanging out in the backyard drying off after swimming

Feel the love


Easton thinks he is so big and jumps at the chance to do anything that he sees his siblings doing. Easton trying to ride Talan's new bike.

Me and my Taylor being super silly after the boys were fast asleep

Horsie rides with dad. Talan and Eastons very favorite!

The other day while playing Lego's, Chase made me this sign. Isn't he the sweetest? Yesterday as I was getting ready to leave his class at school after volunteering all on his own he came up to me and gave me the biggest hug and said "thanks for coming mom." Also, every time I drop him off from school he turns back at least 3 times with the hugest smile and waves good-bye to me. And then when I pick him up he comes running while waving at me. He really has the hugest heart. Right back at ya Chasers! I love you too. A lot.

Talan loves to make this face. Doesn't surprise me at all.


Easton and me hanging out after all the other kids had gone to bed. Love spending one on one time with our kids.

Chase is doing soccer again, and he still is a walking scoreboard, keeping track of how many scores each team has and how many he has made. And he still smiles from ear to ear the whole time he is on the field.

Story time with Easton and Talan. I am thinking Easton might still be a little too young for story time, he was all over the place! We will try again in a couple months. However, I was able to get a shot of him during the 5 seconds he did sit still while we were there. Love how he practically sat on top of Talan and how Talan was so excited to see him.

A dear friend of my mind from Utah recently moved to Oregon. Utah will never be the same! We aren't even there anymore and we miss them being there. But, I am so happy for her and her family, this is where they have always wanted to be. And I look forward to visiting them sometime very soon. Before they moved though we met up with them in St. George over the weekend. A good time was had by all.





This is what being in a 2 bedroom condo for the weekend with 11 kids under the age of 8 does to a person. HA! We had such a great time. So grateful for good friends in my life. Love you girls!