Ultrasound

April had her ultrasound yesterday and everything is fine. We did not find out what we will be having because we like the surprise. However, April is think it is a girl, she has not been wrong in past, I hope she is.

Any name suggestions?

Melanie's Sealing/Wedding

We had a bonfire the night before

The San Diego Temple, simply beautiful.

Trevor and April, Melanie and Brandon, Kim and Chris and Stuart

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Together forever
sealed for all time and eternity
Awesome

Together forever
sealed for all time and eternity
Awesome

Our blessed eternal family at the San Diego temple.Brooklynn, Brendan, and Lauren at the temple. The girls look so cute in their white dresses, and Brendan couldn't have been more handsome that day. They loved the temple.
Brooklynn and Lauren where flower girls and Brendan was an escort.

Then the party got started that night!

Lauren, mom, Aunt Mel, and Aunt Kim all smiles!
Dancing Feet..
Dad and Mel can't get enough,

Dad can move it!!

Sea World

Sea World has to be the best theme park I have ever been to!! Everyone loved it.
We fed the Dolphins and the Bat Rays which was the coolest. We went to most of the shows and all of the hands on exhibits. I think you need 2 days there in order to do and see everything, but what we where able to do was great, loved it.

Las Vegas

We stopped in Vegas on our way down to San Diego for Melanie's wedding. We stayed at the Tropicana, one of cheapest on the strip and has a inside pool which was not as warm as we anticipated. We walked around for a little bit and went to the Mandalay Bay to check out the shark reef aquarium, awesome!!

Sledding at night

We took the kids sledding after Trevor arrived home from work. Lauren was a little timid at first but in no time she was carrying her tube up by herself and diving on the tube going down by herself. Brooklynn and Brendan had great time as well and we had to bribe them off the hill with hot chocolate.

Summing up 2008

Obviously, we either do not have the time to stay on top of our blog or it is not a big enough priority. Anyways, we had some fun times. During our vacation to New York, Trevor and April went to Bar Harbor, Maine to celebrate their 10th anniversary. It is one of the most beautiful places we have been to.

April LOVED the lobsters that she ate for each meal. The food rivaled the scenery. If you ever have the opportunity to go to Bar Harbor you must get there. We would suggest to drive up route 1 so you travel through the small towns that dot the coast.

After the vacation we had to return to real life. Brooklynn started 2nd grade and Brendan started preschool (his 1st year).

























Brooklynn played soccer, she is not a big fan of all the running but we like to see her get some exercise.










During a fall break for Brooklynn's school we went to Vernal, UT to see the dinosaur stuff. We left on a Wednesday after Brooklynn got out of school. We arrived in Vernal arround midnight and being a small town we expected to get a hotel with no problems. But, after checking every hotel and motel we where getting nervous about finding a room. The situation that we where unware of is during the week Vernal is booked because of all the migrant workers that stay up there work and return home for the weekends. We where told that coal mining and oil drilling is big there (gee, I wonder why with the dead dinosaurs and stuff). Fortunately, as we pulled into the last hotel they just had a cancelation and we grab the room for 100.00 bucks on a weeknight in Vernal (what!?!) anyways we where happy to have a warm soft bed.














In November we had our family picture taken for our Christmas cards and had Thanksgiving in Logan, UT with the Shirks.
In December Grandma Hales passed away and everyone was able to get together and visit which added more time to spend together during the holiday season.

Our New York Vacation

Our family just got back from a great and much needed vacation to upstate New York, Trevor's family has a cabin on a lake there in the mountains. Trevor's parents live in Queensbury which is about only 30 minutes from the lake. We had two weeks of fun, at first the kids were a little scared of the water, but after a while they all became familiar with it and started to jump right in! Brooklynn who is seven now, got brave enough to go tubing, and did a fantastic good holding on to the rope. She became very comfortable in the water that she started to jump off the dock without any help from anyone else. We spent the fourth of July at the Loon Lake, and did fireworks right off the dock. It was a spectacular sight to see the sky over the lake filled with those bright colors. The kids had a lot of fun playing with the sparklers. During our vacation time our little Lauren turned 2 years old, and we celebrated her birthday on the lake with Grandpa and Grandma. Her birthday this year was an

"Elmo" (Sesame Street) theme, Grandma made her an Elmo cake that she just loved. The time went by too fast, it is unbelievable that she is already two years old! We had fantastic weather throughout the two weeks, only raining once.

On that rainy day we had a great time bowling with the kids, grandpa, and grandma. The whole group played a pretty good game, thanks to no gutter balls allowed (we had curb blockers up the kids). Our old neighbors from West Valley in Utah (who now live in Indiana), came up for a Loon Lake experience. The kids ar all pretty much the same ages, and had a blast playing in the water together. We enjoyed roasting Smores by the campfire, and the boys played in the woods shooting things at night with their water guns. One our second to last day in New York and at Loon Lake, little Brendan caught a fish. This was a perfect end to a great trip at the cabin.