my first quilt

I've only been working on this quilt for 10 months...on Monday I finally finished it!!!  I LOVE it and Jared said it really "lightens up the room.  I agree.

Happy St Patrick's Day

I have been feverishly working to finishing sewing these St. Patrick's Day decorations befor the actual day. I DID get them done in time, but just barely.
I really liked how they turned out. And even though I didn't get a lot of use out of them this year, at least I'll be able to get them out for next year.
Jared and I had a fun St. Patrick's Day. We like to celebrate this holiday because it was the day we got engaged. So, 8 years ago, on a gorgeous, fog-less day, with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background, Jared got on one knee and proposed to me. It was definitely a day to be remembered. This year we just went out to dinner, without the kids--our first date in...a long time.

Colorado Springs--what a beauty!

All the kids having a kiddy picnic--they got along so well!
Us kissing with 'kissing camels' in the back ground.

The perfect family picture spot. This one is frame-worthy, I think.
The whole gang in Pres. Charsley's home.
We just had the FUNNEST weekend in Colorado visiting the Ororio family. Cesar is one of Jared's old mission companions. They were companions for only 3 weeks in the MTC, yet Cesar is the only companion that Jared has kept in touch with. So, the Osorio family and the Bigler family have a lot in common--we were both married in the same year and our children were born within months of each other.
On this fun-filled, long weekend we went to the Colorado Springs Zoo. It has surpassed Santa Barbara as my favorite zoo. All the animals were so active and they had an amazing variety. Then we went to this fun little arcade in the old downtown are of Springs--it's what the natives call Colorado Springs. On Sunday, after church we went to Garden of the Gods. It's a beautiful state park with really neat rock formations all around. And it is HUGE--it seems everything in Springs is huge. We finished the visit off by visiting Jared and Cesar's old mission president and his family. He is from South Africa, but after the mission he moved back to Colorado Springs. So we looked him up and arranged a visit. And what a neat family! It was fun to sit around and hear all the reminiscing!
The drive out to Colorado was beautiful! But the drive home was dangerous!! We drove through a bad storm--we did a couple of 360's, on the freeway, no big deal. I am so glad we went, but I was even more glad that we were home safely!

San Luis Obispo county visit

One of the days that we were in California visiting Jared's family, we took off to visit our old stomping grounds. We went by our old trailer, visited our former landlords, had lunch with some friends from our old ward at an old San Luis favorite (Firestone) and then drove out to Morro Bay--I needed some salt water taffy! Morro Bay is my 2nd favorite place on this earth! We went to The Rock and watched the tide go out along with some sea otters. We saw some hermit crabs, that Samuel was scared of. We even saw a sea gull catch an octopus!
Then in the evening we went to an Eagle Court of Honor. Two brothers who Jared had as scouts while he was Scoutmaster, were getting their Eagle and wanted Jared to be there. They asked Jared to be a part of the program and they even BOTH gave Jared their Mentor Pins. It was a very neat program and I'm so glad I got to see it. Jared got a little emotional when he was giving the Mentor Pins--I'm glad I got to see that too. It was obvious that he felt all those years of hard work and time spent on being a Scoutmaster had paid off in that one night. And he felt good about seeing the whole scouting experience through with these boys, from start to finish. While living in San Luis we became close with this family too, so, of course, it was so good to see them again. We really miss our friends from SLO and we miss the beauties there too.

Ojai hike

One of the days that we were all in Ojai we decided to take a hike. It was an easy one so the kids could do it and it was so FUN!! It was nice to get outside and exercise as see the kids playing so well together and having a good time. We hiked along a creek and the kids--big and little--were crazy enough to get in. I waded in a little and the water was FREEZING! We hiked in, had lunch, and found a good swimming spot on the way out. Jared even found some fossils! Do you ever have those days that you would like to relive? Well, this was one of those days for me!

The Santa Barbara Zoo

The Santa Barbara Zoo is the best zoo I've been to! It's in a beautiful location and has an impressive facility with a wide variety of animals. We went there with some of Jared's family while we were visiting and a fun time was had by all!!! Sam's favorites were the elephants, penguins and the giraffe. Quinn seemed to really like the flamingos and the monkeys. I liked the bald eagle the best--I'm sure that was the favorite for Jared too, next to the California Condors. The kids and the dads took a train ride and we had lunch at this really neat park in the zoo. That green thing that Sam and his cousin are on was this big mound with astro-turf on it and the kids would slide down on cardboard pieces. Plus, no waiting in line, they would just pick a spot, sit down and slide. We all had such a fun day!!!

The beach in November!?!

We went to California to visit Jared's family over Thanksgiving. We had such BEAUTIFUL weather! I had forgotten already, especially becasue when we left Vernal it was 20 degrees outside.
One of the days we were there we went to this great park on the beach. This slide was a huge hit with all the kids...
and the dads.
We didn't bring Quinny's swim trunks, but he really wanted to get in the water, so we improvised.