Austin turns 13!

Last month we officially became parents of a teen! Austin just wanted a low key family party.

His favorite gift was his new really nice hiking boots for the 50 miler this summer!

We also got him a coulpe of other things. My favorite was a book called "Do Hard Things" written by teens, for teens to inspire them to greatness while still in their youth. I think even adults should read it!

We are not huge cake fans at our house, so we make Recess Squares instead and they were a hit.

Austin has always been such an amazing kid. We love having him in our home. He is so helpful, kind and hardworking. He is extrememly intelligent too. And he really loves playing with his youngest brothers. He has out grown his love for legos, but I think he'll always be drawn to computers. Who knows, maybe he'll take after his dad when he grows up? That day seems less and less far away.....

Dancing! End of Year recitals for Ashley and Evan!

Ashley and Evan danced with "Extreme Ballroom" this year and had a blast!

"Nintendo Blues"

"Walk Like You"

"Ghostbusters"

"Hip to Be Square"

End of year review on the big screen! Larger than life!

Flowers!

Evan won an extra award for "The Most Improved"!

Mother's Day!

Mother's Day started with eggs benedict and fresh fruit. Yum! We also had dinner at my moms, and dessert at Justin's moms. But my favorite part is my gift. This picture by Simon Dewey entitled "Let Your Light So Shine". It's beautiful and it will be placed in the center of my home to symbolize that Christ is the center of our lives.

Choir concerts and Rare find.

The 6th grade classroom is Egyption themed. So instead of "time outs" they get "tomb outs". Or in this case, istead of "star of the week", they do "Rare find". Ashley told about her family, some of her special items like her crystals, her avatar camp poster, and some of here crafts. Then the kids get to ask questions. She answered that she loves to sing and dance. Her favorite color is purple. Her favorite dessert is cheesecake. And her hero is her mom! :)
Evan enjoying his choir concert.

The overly expressive Miss Emily at her choir concert.

Easter

So we had and egg hunt at Bear World, then went to one at Grandma Harts. The Easter bunny also came to our home with a few eggs and chocolate bunnies for all. And we always get new Easter garb for church! I made the girls and I matching hairbows too.
Too late for this year, but I found a program to do once a day for the 7 days leading up to Easter that focuses on Christ and the true celebration of Easter. I'm excited to do it next year!

Bear World!

The day before Easter we went to Bear World and had such a perfect day! It was the first really good weather we had. The animals were so amazing! They had everything from wild turkey, to Bison, to the bears and wolves. We took lots of pictures, but I'm way behind of blogging so I'm just showing the highlights. The animals really do come right up next to your car. At one point we thought a bear was actually going to climb on the hood! And a wolf was so close I could have reached out and touched him! Of course you have to leave your windows up though.

Then we got to go pet the baby bear cubs! That was an incredible experience! They kind of purr like cats only the sound is a bit different and much louder. They were adorable!

After that the kids got to ride their amusement rides and had a blast. Then we had a picnic lunch we packed and brought with us. And then it just so happened that they were having an egg hunt that day, so we participated in that too. Chase won a prize. Evan got alot of candy. Emily didn't get much so Evan gave her his candy. This sharing attitude then remained the rest of the day and they kept doing nice things back and forth for eachother. It was just one of those day when everything was perfect! Everyone got along all day and everything was so fun!
A white wolf sleeping right next to the road.

The petting zoo had deer!

Just one of dozens of bears! They had so many all over the place!

The baby bear cubs! They had about 10 or so.

New Camera!

So our camera has been broken for about a year. It's been ducked taped together and only takes pictures about half the time (or less). We've been borrowing a camera my mom won since Dawson was born so that we could have baby pics of him. But the quality hasn't been that great and she wanted it back, and tax refunds came so here we are! Our cat, Abbot.

The camera has Smile Detection...taking the picture when your subject smiles. You don't have to push a button.

It also has this fun color detection built in!

Pictures taken at Chase's dance class through the glass. Not too bad!

Baby Dawson was bouncing around and the pictures weren't blurry! Fun! He sure loves his bouncy saucer!

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