Adventure - First day of school

Yesterday, was the first day of school and holy cow, was our first grader ever excited. She woke up at 5:30am ready to go. When she got home, she was equally happy and excited. Her description of her day was an emphatic "AWESOME!!!".

I had a huge twinge of guilt from the not so healthy lunch I packed her. This child is so finicky. In my defense, I did pack carrot sticks and she did eat them. They balanced the fruit roll up and chips and string cheese and cheese and crackers I also sent, right? And, of course, the milk she bought was healthy. I did make a new rule last night. She must take at least one bite of the snacks at nutrition break.

This morning did not go as smoothly as yesterday. She was still a little tired and I spent about 15 minutes trying to make her shoes and socks fit perfectly. Each of my girls has had this issue at this age so apparently I am really bad at putting shoes on kids?? Or I have really fussy kids??


And doesn't Danielle look cute?

Adventure - Beach babies

My second adventure to North beach this year included two adorable beach babies (and their parents). Jim and Alesia came up for Jim's 10 year high school reunion and so I had grandbaby time, the beach, and perfect weather. Do I need to mention that I also had my camera ??!!

Harley is getting to have a hilarious little personality. This was the first time I saw him intentionally tease Sydney. She had arranged her princesses along the TV stand and he would run up to them looking as if he had the intent to destroy her kingdom. He would then stop, pause, and stare her down mischievously . She would scream, "Haaar-weeey." He would then run to me and fling himself on top of me, content that he got the reaction he wanted. A moment later, he would repeat the whole process.

Sydney's new phrase was "This is no faiwwwrr" and was used very effectively with running down the hall and slamming the bedroom door. Apparently, not that much was very fair at Grandma's house that evening.

Adventure - Epic Relay

On August 10-11, Jack participated in an Epic Relay from Cache Valley to Jackson Hole, Wyoming. It was course of 206 miles with 12 runners per team. Each team member had 3 runs varying in skill level and mileage. Jack's first leg was from Preston High school to the Riverdale LDS meetinghouse so the kids and I drove down to cheer him on along his route. His team placed 49th out of 82 teams and finished in 33:36:28. He really loved participating and is hoping to compete again next year.

Adventure - Bear Lake

The lake is beautiful this year and as full of water as I ever remember it being. Living 20 minutes away, you'd think we would go frequently. However, last week was only our second time this year. On the weekends, North Beach is a zoo. This weekend, there was a twenty minute wait just to enter the beach.

This trip to the beach was so fun. I let the kids each take a friend and then we found more friends near us at the beach. I probably snapped pictures for 2 hours, working on rules of composition, practicing shooting in manual mode, and shooting with different depths of field and focal points. The down side was that I was shooting at 1:00 in the afternoon with direct sunlight which produced some very harsh shadows. The kids were mostly oblivious, having too much fun to care if they were being photographed. I'm definitely hoping to go out one more time before school starts.

Published twice!

In April, I decided to take an online class by Christy Tomlinson called "The She Art Workshop". It is an altered art course using a variety of media and textures on canvas and I loved it. The course had a Flickr account set up to display and critique each student's work. There are over 2100 pieces of work exhibited. Was I surprised when I was contacted by the online magazine, Ready, Set, Create to have my first piece published in an article about the workshop?! My She Art girl was published in the August issue.


One of my goals this year was to make a book from my last blog, a journal so to speak. I finished it through Blurb which was very easy to do following Blurb's format. However, I wasn't thrilled with the quality of the photos in comparison to other books I have done on iPhoto. Overall, I'm still so glad to have it done.

Adventure - 4th of July

This year was one of my favorite 4th of July's! Jack ran the KVSI Fun Run early that morning. Then we headed to a chuckwagon breakfast in Montpelier to support the Lion's club. Josie, Grant and their family were staying with us, so the kids had some serious water activities that included the pool, hot tub and trampoline. Soon, it was off to the parade where the kids rode on the Ward Primary float. The Primary float was parked next to a Mardi Gras float, so consequently the kids were draped in necklaces before the parade even began, That evening, we watched fireworks from the park and lit a few fireworks in our yard for the kids afterwards. Do you love Michael's expressions? He makes me laugh.

My 2011 Word

If I were to choose a word that reflects our family life this year, it would be Adventure. The last 6 months have been full of family fun and we have yet many things planned. In the next few posts, I will be sharing some of these adventures.

Adventure - Island Park

From June 30-July 3, we rented a family lodge and had our Christensen family reunion. The lodge was perfect, and included a bunk room with 4 sets of bunk beds, a hot tub, and a game room. The kids spent a lot of time on the air hockey table along with some of the more competitive adults. Jeff and Kim brought their camping trailer and stayed in the campgrounds near us. Some of the highlights of our stay were rafting the river, fishing, and Jim and Jeff's dutch oven dinner. My biggest regret was not getting a picture of all of the cousins together, as well as one of all my kids together??




Part of our purpose in going to Island Park was celebrating my mom's 70th birthday. We also celebrated another birthday of our sweet little girl, Lily, who turned 3.













On Saturday, a 5K run was held in Island Park and Jack, Danielle, Sal, Meg, and Beckam participated. Sal and Tanner hit the golf course on Saturday as well. And one of the highlights was having a round of "Minute to Win It" put together by Meg. Thank you to my family for coming and supporting me in having this reunion. I loved it!!!!!!!