The Joys of having a Dog!

The kids sure are excited to be back out of doors. I got a kick out of watching Andrew and Katie enjoy the sun. Poor Katie when around the block about 15 times and by the time evening came she just crashed and slept. Andrew really does enjoy taking care of this little pup. It has also been fun to watch Joseph try and train the dog to do little tricks.

Oh the days of carefree life, how nice would it be to return to those days? Imagine where your biggest concern is making sure your brother doesn't get more ice cream or a longer turn on the Wii... oh wait, we didn't have a Wii when I grew up (Atari 500?). I definitely remember the endless hours of playing with my Dad's dogs and puppies, good times.

Dark-Eyed Junco

Having been overwhelmed by House Sparrows and wanting more variety to my feeder this year; my brother Craig recommended a new blend of bird seed without as much millet.

Today when I got home from work, I noticed a lone Pine Siskin slowly eating from my feeder. As I approached the window, I noticed about 8-10 Dark-Eyed Junco birds below the feeder eating away. Most of the seed from the feeder had been completely eaten. Shanda mentioned that this group of birds had been at it most of the day. At times, attacking each other as they gobbled up the seed.

Hardly able to contain myself I grabbed my "Birds of Utah" book and quickly identified the Dark-Eyed Junco's. While admiring them, I was surprised to see a House Finch stop by for a quick grab. The Finch wasn't as trusting, and only stayed long enough to fill her beak once.

I raced outside with my camera, but between the snow fall, and not being able to zoom in close enough the pictures I took weren't the best quality. I wish I could have opened the dining room window to sit and wait patiently for a good shot.  It is amazing to me how well they blend in with the surroundings... except when they are sitting on snow of course.

Do We Dare Hope... Spring?

I took the opportunity to walk home from church today, as I had to finish the "Friends of Scouting" collection. I was amazed that when the sun was out I was actually hot, and when the sun was covered by the clouds I was actually cold! I suppose this is how Spring in the Rocky Mountains goes. Later in the day I took the picture above to catch the first glimpses of growth in Shanda's flower garden.

Valley of Fire

Our return trip home from Henderson, NV took us through Valley of Fire.  (Thanks again to Aunt Addie, Uncle Daryl, Aunt Donita and Uncle Stan for hosting us).

Valley of Fire has become a fun spot for my family and this marks the third consecutive year and fourth trip for our family.  I love that the kids can burn excess energy climbing and allow their minds to wander as they explore the beautiful rock structure.

We were pleased to meet up with Tami Clove and her boys for a small part of the time, we wished we could have spent more time with them.

I'm hoping that one of these times we'll be able to get a camp site and spend the evening, but until then, these 3-4 hour time slots in the valley will have to do.

After the fun of climbing and exploring we pushed back through to Ogden, making just one stop in Cedar City and pushing through to home.

Horseback Fun

Lots of fun.  Look at Maleah, the ham!  All the kids had the chance to ride, and Joseph got several chances to go around on Cody and Shanni.  Uncle Daryl is awesome to make all of this happen.  Shanda took some pretty good pictures...

Some Pictures from the day...
	Goofy Kids, not sure what they are doing here, but the looks on the faces of these boys, priceless!
	Princess Rider
	Andrew looking like a genuine Cowboy while riding Dixie, quote of the day "Cody, I really like you... you're a great horse! Cody, you are in a movie, only you're not a horse."
	Here I am on Apache.
	Here is Joseph and his friend Matthew Neyland.
	Matthew got to ride the horse without being led.  He was really excited about that!

New Camera, horay!

Well, thanks to Circuit City going out of business I just picked up a nice new camera (Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5) on the cheap!  So this is us driving to Vegas and I have the camera on a tripod on the dash.  Joseph is eating some yogurt (thank you Uncle Lamar), and Shanda is intently driving down the road :).  We are really excited about the new camera and hope that with the ability to take better pictures there will be more of a reason to write a blog every once in a while.

The Dishwasher

Here is an amazing and fun story of Christmas cheer for my family. Shanda and I had decided that we were going to work to get a dishwasher by the end of 2008. After some disappointing months we decided it would be best to wait until sometime in 2009 to get it. Well, just prior to Christmas we returned home from a family party and discovered that some good soul out there left a dishwasher on our front porch! There was a note from Mrs. Claus that said the dishwasher had only been used for a couple of years and that she got a new one for Santa's elves. Needless to say we were elated! Shanda was moved to tears, the kids pretended to faint, and I was dumbfounded as to who could have been the one to help us in such a way.

Regardless, to whoever you are... we are indeed very grateful! Hardly a day goes by where Shanda doesn't mention how nice it is to have a dishwasher! I honestly think that she is the happiest woman in Ogden.

We got the dishwasher installed thanks in large part to my father. Installing the dishwasher required the removal of a cupboard and 4 drawers. Shanda was quick to reallocate everything and make the room, and working alongside my father we tore out the drawers and completed the install. My dad was great to help make sure that cabinetry didn't look disturbed, sort of like it always was designed to have a dishwasher there. This required matching a stain to the original oak for some pieces we had to add back in, and going down to the Ellis Mill to get some quarter-sawn oak for the skinny cabinet on the right.

Happy Thanksgiving... Papers are done

Amazing it's 12:13am and Shanda and Joseph just finished the Thanksgiving papers. The Standard Examiner got the bundles out in a hurry, so just as I was drifting into a deep sleep, I hear Shanda asking me to get up and help her roll the papers. Somewhat perturbed I got up and helped her put the three sections together and bagged the papers as Joseph and her delivered them. I guess it is nice to have them finished... I just wish I could fall back asleep.

I suppose I could go read my Income Taxation textbook... that should do the trick.

Day at the Temple

Shanda suggested that we get some pictures of the Ogden Temple with the kids. So after church today, we grabbed the camera and went downtown to take some shots. The kids were good sports, and we enjoyed being on the Temple grounds.

Joseph


Matthew


Andrew


Maleah


Brooklyn

Long Run

Runner's World has a really cool training log that allows you to track your training program. I just started using it really like the features and service it provides. It's nice to have something like this that can keep me going with my workout. I'm happy to report that from the beginning of November I've run just over 43 miles.

Yesterday I may have gone overboard a bit as I ran 10 miles. It was a great run, a little slow but still I finished the run. I don't recall the last time I ran that far, but it was a LONG time ago. With all the running, I just hope to see some of the pounds shed off. It amazes me to do all these workouts, trying to eat right, etc. and not see a single pound fall off. Maybe when it happens it will be like a dam break.

Needless to say, I feel like Frankenstein today with very stiff and sore legs. I hope that by tomorrow, they'll loosen up enough to run some more.

Maybe this is why the weight isn't coming off, did someone say eggnog?

Let's see if I can figure out how to do this...

So it's been a bit since I last posted a blog. I guess you could say either life's been too busy to think about blogging, or there hasn't been anything interesting enough to blog about since August... hmmm... I really don't know. My theory is a new memory card is to blame. Prior to our trip to Seattle we wanted to make sure we had plenty of space on our camera to take all the fun pictures of the kids. Before we had the memory card, we would frequently have to download the pictures off the camera, which gave me an opportunity to view them and then make a post about them. I just downloaded almost 400 pictures off the camera... so you could say it's been a while. Now looking through that folder there are a bunch of pictures I could have posted over the last few months, but now it seems anti-climatic to comment on them now.

Oh well, I'll try to do a better job, but first did someone say pie?

Final Day in Seattle

With an early start on the day we quickly packed up all our gear and prepared to check out of the Red Lion. With our van at Aunt Irene's home and our final ticket from the City Pass yet to be used, we left our bags with the bellhop and walked down through Pike Place Market to visit the Seattle Aquarium. This stop on our tour was probably one of my most anticipated. I really wanted to do the harbor tour and the Aquarium prior to coming to Seattle. The harbor tour was OK, it would have been better without the rain, and the Aquarium certainly lived up to the hype.

Dropping down through Pike Place Market we purchased a bag of freshly made doughnuts for breakfast, and then viewed some of the shops. While I stood in line for the grub, Shanda and the kids walked over to one of the fish shops and watched as the guys working with the seafood were happily working tossing large salmon through the air.

The Seattle Aquarium was full of all kinds of exhibits. I think the kids were sort of tired at this time, though they all said they had a good time. The aquarium was about the right size and we spent roughly 3 hours viewing the fish. After the aquarium we walked down the waterfront to a great little lunch spot the Alaskan Sourdough Bakery. We enjoyed a couple bowls of clam chowder in sourdough buns, and some great oatmeal raisin cookies and chocolate brownies. After lunch we connected with Aunt Irene as she was awesome and helpful by bringing our van to us. After she picked us up, we returned to the hotel and picked up our bags, then on to Aunt Irene's home. We are SO VERY greatful to Aunt Irene for helping us this week. She welcomed us to the city with open arms and opened her home up to us, where we spent several hours talking and getting to know her better. She took time out of her busy day to help make sure we made it in to our hotel OK, and also she helped us by bringing our van to us Thursday afternoon, which allowed us to maximize our time in the city and maximized our chance to see as much of Seattle as possible.

After leaving Aunt Irene's home, we drove a few hours in to Kennewick to spend the night with Uncle Charles and Aunt Bette. We were warmly accepted with a wonderful dinner and very nice accommodations. It was fun to visit with my uncle and aunt. We have great respect for both of these guys and were again impressed by them.

The meals prepared by Aunt Bette were wonderful! After eating out for a week we all felt like a home cooked meal was the perfect end to the week. I was VERY excited that Shanda was able to get a digital copy of Aunt Bette's cookbook. It's always fun for Shanda to try something new.

Here are some more pictures from the day...