September 2021

PIANO RECITAL

Maddy had her first recital as a teacher. She and her 4 students all played. They did a great job. This was Audrey's first piano recital and she did great. 

UPTOWN JUNGLE

The kids had a blast climbing, jumping, swinging, shooting, spinning, and sliding at Uptown Jungle. Our Phoenix Pogo passes have definitely been worth it!

HUFFLEPUFF

On a trip to IKEA, Audrey fell in love with what she called "the Hufflepuff room."

GRAVITY EXTREME ZONE

Jared, Abby, Maddy, and Nathan all completed the ropes and zipline course while Brooklyn, Audrey, and I had fun jumping and playing in the foam pits.

FUN AT HOME

Brooklyn and Audrey had fun taking their stuffed animals to the zoo (the papers all had pictures of animals on them.)

In Audrey's ancient history class she learned about Joseph of Egypt. She had fun painting herself a coat of many colors. 

Nathan has been learning about cells in his biology class so he made one out of LEGOs. 

Audrey's loose tooth was perfect for her cowgirl look. 

Brooklyn and Audrey both want to be dentists when they grow up, so they made a deal that they could pull out each other's loose teeth. Here is Brooklyn pulling out Audrey's loose tooth with Jared's help. She did great!

THOMAS' 9th BIRTHDAY

 We celebrated Thomas' 9th birthday this month and Audrey wrote this sweet acrostic poem for him.

August 2021

KENZIE'S WEDDING RECEPTION

Kenzie Lewis, a YW (now adult) from our ward in TX,  married a man from Arizona. They had a reception here and they asked Abby and Maddy to play for it.

The girls worked hard preparing beautiful piano and harp music to play.

Maddy even played Canon in D as the bride walked down the aisle for her ring ceremony.

Both the girls did a beautiful job and were paid well for their time making this their first paid musical performance. 

There weren't a lot of single women so they had Abby and Maddy join the group waiting to catch the bouquet. You can tell they aren't really excited about the prospect of getting married soon since Abby has her hands in her pockets and Maddy held her arms behind her back.

In addition to connecting with the bride's family again we were also able to visit with our good friends the Bakers and the Gibsons (two other families from our ward in Texas who have since moved to Arizona).

CUTE KIDS

Audrey helping Brooklyn read Elephant and Piggie.

Nathan made this cool Duplo ship during family scripture study.

Brooklyn and Audrey love matching at church.

HAPPY 19th ANNIVERSARY

For our anniversary this year we felt it was safe to leave the kids for a few nights as long as we didn't go too far so we could be available in case of emergency. We decided to stay at the Red Rooster Inn in Scottsdale which is just 20 minutes away. I would highly recommend it. 

After swimming and relaxing all day, we enjoyed going out to explore both Old Town and North Scottsdale in the evening. 

We enjoyed going out for delicious vegan food every night.

We had a large, private pool all to ourselves. It was absolutely perfect.

We enjoyed staying in our own little Casita.

We enjoyed learning to play Pickleball in our own private court. 

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL PICTURES

Brooklyn wanted a picture with her umbrella too.

Brooklyn still loves riding the bus everyday. She has a super fun new bus driver.

Audrey is excited to homeschool this year. 

Nathan is excited to homeschool as well.

Maddy skipped 8th grade and is starting 9th grade at Jefferson Prep this year.

Abby will be doing 10th grade at Jefferson Prep.

AZ ON THE ICE

We took an ice skating trip on the kids' last weekend before school starting. Audrey is getting a lot better and didn't fall quite as much as last time.