Ward Family Pictures

And yet another post...(I've done quite a few over the past three days)...


The girls looked so cute in their new dresses (which you can read about in the last post) and the whole family was at my parent's house that I requested we get a few snapshots of the family. I just have to share my cute family!


The kids were a little on the hungry side, so patience was low, but we made it through the shot...too bad Bryant was doing his famous cheesey grin and spazzing with his hand...and I have a dumb burp cloth on my shoulder that nobody reminded me about until after we took all the pictures...oh well!

My parents, sister, brothers, sister-in-law and my family (we are the only ones with children at the moment)

I thought this was a cute random picture of me and my little girls

My brother Stewart and his darling wife Danyiel, they are each on their last leg of school at ISU-yeah!!

My sister, Lanae and my sister-in-law Danyiel with my girls and me--everyone had pink, white or brown on and we matched so well we had to have a picture! The "Ward" (my maiden name) girls!

Thanks family, for putting up with my request. I think we got some great, quick candid shots!

Kids will be kids...

Another post. I am just catching up on life and since this will become a book sometime in the future, I am writing all the memories.

We had so many random moments to capture the kids on film this past month, I couldn't resist sharing some of my favorites.

Sarah thought it would be fun to play in the dirt and throw it up in the air and let it land on her, what she didn't realize is that the snot and slobber would collect it all-this was the funniest site ever! She's pouting because we couldn't stop laughing at the site of her!

My sister discovered a random talent of Sarah's-she can suck her lip to her nose, pretty cool huh?

We went to the BYUI Gardens this last weekend and for all my might, I could not get Bryant to act normal or even look at the camera without doing something cheesy, this is the best one of the three older kids together.

See what I mean? okay, he's looking at the camera, but he's in spaz land-HA!

My sister was in town, so she went with us and took this picture. I love the surprised look on Kayelynn's face. Sorry you can't really see Lydia...she was sound asleep and I didn't want to wake her, I know it's a little selfish, but...it's the best excuse ;)

I think Lydia looks so darling in this hat...and I love that she is spazzing out with her tongue...my little doll

Here she is looking like an angel or maybe she's looking at one?

My sweet friend Sarah, made these matching outfits and bows for all three girls. The girls LOVE them and want to wear them daily. I just think they are adorable!!! Thanks Sarah!

Sarah Birthday Party

I have posted a lot today and some yesterday-I told you I would finally find some time to just get it all posted...if not now it just won't happen.

Sarah turned two on the 24th and had a great birthday. For a while she didn't understand why we were making such a big deal, but after we sang I think that she figured it out. If you ask her how old she is she'll tell you she's "four"...it's really cute!

We had a small little party on her birthday after Jake came home from work and then we had a fun big family swim/birthday party that Tuesday. She got a new carseat and some fun toys and the new Ariel movie-she is a lover of "mermaid", so that was to be the "theme" of the night. I do not go all out, but I at least like to have the cake resemble a "theme".

her "ding dong" cake on Sunday, she thought that was pretty cool

testing out her new carseat, cake on face and all!

her "Mermaid" cake-the decoration came with a bracelet-I thought it was cute!

She loved her birthday and her gifts

Thank you to everyone that helped celebrate Sarah's special day. She has enjoyed every gift daily :)

First Day of School

I know I've already posted about this day, but I finally have pictures and want to share the excitment-the kids could not hold still! Even Sarah joined in the excitment-she gets to have mom and Lydia to herself for over an hour!!!

Sarah loves being like her big sister-she had to wear a dress too!

Her "special" school dress, she refuses to wear it anywhere but school :)

Bryant can't even smile real, he's so excited

Bryant wants to watch out for his little sister...too bad they are at different schools ;)

waiting to go into the classroom...I so wanted to go in and take a picture of him in class, but I didn't want to be a hovering mother, so we took some outside and I think he was A-okay with that idea.

getting off the bus, since we missed getting on the bus-I think this is his favorite part about school

waiting for the bus the second day, which we also missed...apparantly we are the FIRST on, not the last...

They each enjoy school so much. I just wish our district didn't have the first Monday as inservice days for the kindergarten teachers-which means he doesn't have school that day, but oh well-he enjoys it no matter!

Lydia Blessing

During the reunion we were able to bless Lydia. It was intended to do it on the Sunday in my parent's ward, but when my dad called his bishop Saturday evening to make sure we were still on the agenda, we were told that we couldn't do it-they were forming a new bishopric and the Stake President wanted all the time. We decided to bless Lydia that night in the backyard with all the family already there. The only emotional part about it was that because it was so last minute there were few people able to participate in the actual blessing since they did not have their suits with them, but they were still there. We had to do a quick shift and call the family members on my mom's side (both my parents are from the same area) and let them know that we would be blessing Lydia within 45 minutes. Although she was grumpy, we still assembled under the circus tent at 9:30pm for the ordinance - because it was so late and the kids had played so hard I did not make them change into their Sunday best, there wasn't time to bathe them first.


Although it did not go as originally planned, it was a sweet experience to have her blessed surrounded by family and knowing that we would have a special story to tell her. Looking back it's fun to note that she was blessed on August 16th-her one month birthday!

I believe the Lord has a lot in store for our little bundle. She was given many promises and many tips of encouragement to get her through the trials of her life. She will be a remarkable child of God. We love her!




grumpy, but beautiful!

proud parents

the whole family, so far the only family picture we have of us all

I thought this was sweet, my grandpa was holding her and they just connected, look at those curious eyes!

Thank you everyone for supporting us. It was an interesting experience to decide to do the blessing away from Jake's family who all lives in the same town as us. My immediate family is asked to travel for every blessing, but I've never asked extended family because I know they wouldn't or couldn't come. With the experience the majority of my aunts, uncles, cousins, and both sets of grandparents were there. Jake's family was not able to make it, but even if they were to have planned on it they would have missed it since we had to change the date, time and location last minute. Thank you for understanding our decision, we appreciate the sacrifices made on both sides of the family.

REUNION

So much happened in the month of August that it will take a few posts to get it all in, as said in the previous post. But I finally have some pictures...beware this is a long post, as most of the probably will be.

I decided to take a wild adventure and independently take the kids across the state to Boise for an extended vacation before school started. We were to go for a family reunion anyway, but I decided to go about 6 days early to help my mom prepare her home and yard for the big event - my parents were in charge this year. The trip over was the longest I think it has ever taken...a 4.5 hour trip turned into a 6.5 hour trip. Lydia is NOT a carseat lover, nor is she a very good traveler...she wanted out of that seat and therefore we stopped every hour for about 15 minutes to get her "stretched" and fed and content for another 40 minutes ;) It was not an incredibly horrible trip-thank goodness for the built in TV/VCR, but not one I think I will venture to do independently again soon.

Jake was able to hitch a ride to the reunion via my brother who went to get him in Pocatello the Wednesday before the reunion started, so the trip home was better...Lydia wanted out of her chair, but it did not require us stopping as frequently...

The reunion was spectacular! My parents planned a lot in 3days and we all enjoyed each other's company and had a BLAST. My parents used to have a small pasture on the south side of their property. My dad recently converted it to a "park". He planted grass and trees along the edges to make for a great grassy field. However, the trees are too premature to bring very much/if any shade, so my dad has this enormous "circus" tent that he put up to cook and eat under. It took quite a bit of men to get the thing together.

Circus tent

Thursday:
Main event: travel to Emmett (at the old church orchard, turned mint and potato farm; funny story, Jake's dad grew up in Emmett and knew this place well, his grandfather oversaw the orchard) - go skeet shooting and have a picnic. I am proud to say that I hit about 90% of the skeets thrown. Jake didn't do too badly himself. And the kids each got to shoot a paint ball gun for target practice. They didn't do to badly either. We had our traditional corn feed and enjoyed homemade icecream-my favorite!!

the crowd waiting to leave for Emmett

Justin and Gunnar teaching gun safety

Kayelynn with paintball gun

Sarah shooting the paintball gun

Bryant concentrating really hard

Aiming for the little "skeet"

Grandpa Ward enjoying the view of posterity

It was a scorcher!

The kids finding refuge in the shade of the haystack; Kayelynn, Conrad, Bryant and Tanner

Getting things ready to launch

Dad and Grandma Ward shooting

Famous corn feed; what you can't see is that all that corn is cooked in a garbage can! YUM!

Friday:

Main event: train ride in the mountains; rafting down the Payette River; dinner along the riverside. By far, this was the most exciting day! The train ride was admittedly a little boring; the train felt as if it were going 5 miles/hr. when in reality it was about 20mph. Since it was the end of summer there wasn't much to look at - it was all dry. However, once we got to the river it was a blast! Mom volunteered to watch Lydia, Sarah and Kayelynn while Jake, Bryant and I floated the river. I have never had the experience and Lydia was to sleep the majority of the time, so I took advantage of the opportunity. The float trip was 2hours and so fun. I thought for sure Bryant would chicken out and scream and cry the whole way (he tends to be a mightly big woos sometimes), but after that first rapid he was hooked!! My grandmother, who is 75, rode with us and she enjoyed every minute of it!! They had professional photographers staged three times down the river and then you can preview and purchase any exciting memories captured. Since we had such a large group they made us a GREAT deal, so I actually have photos from the river, but for some reason they won't post. The dinner was delicious, simple BBQ hamburgers, but it was tasty and the dessert was heavenly-brownies with fresh strawberries and homemade whip cream (I think we were all so hungry anything would taste good, but it was all you can eat, so it was even better).

Famous location

We got shuttled on the bus to the train

Bryant's first bus experience-he thinks this is awesome! (now I know how he is on the bus to/from school)

all of us gathered around the photographer, previewing our rafting photos

My mom and the girls playing by the river while we rafted

Saturday:

We took the day low and slow. We just hung around the house chatting, playing games and relaxing. In the early afternoon we went to a neighbors house and swam for a few hours and came home to a miniature luau. My dad has a friend in the ward that is Hawaiian and he marinated beef, pork and chicken for us to cook. It was heavenly!!! We had some rice and mounds of fruit. Delicious!! We had homemade ice cream again.

Playing a matching game about the cousins

Nature scavenger hunt

Water fun, of course

My little adventurer at the pool-once she went off she wanted to go again and again

Kayelynn and her aunt Danyiel

relaxing in the shade before dinner

little hula girls-Gretchen and Zoe

Luau food-yum!!

We had so much fun. We came home with two days to spare before Bryant and Kayelynn started school. We are still talking about it!

Thank you mom and dad for such a wonderful time! Can't wait for your donut feed in October!