Summer Basketball Camp

This summer was a bit crazy in the mornings, but by 11:00 we were bored out of our minds. The kids did swimming and basketball camp. I never did get any swimming pictures-but being the first year, they decided they didnt want to compete anyway. I was ok with that since I was doing it mainly for the excercise-well, they were doing it for the excercise. Maybe next year.
The boys did the Mesa high school basketball camp and they LOVED it. Caleb and Tyson are sports junkies and loved every minute of it. Noah had fun, but he was kinda forced to go. We are trying to make him a bit more athletic, but truth be told-he would rather be at science camp.


This is the boys with one of the many coaches.
(I love Lani loungin in the background)

Caleb was so pumped and ready to go!!!

Tyson is quite the competitor. He is the one child who lives, eats and breaths sports. All he wants to wear is sports clothes, jersies, basketball shorts. Hes crazy.

Caleb is the kid with the natural athletic ability. (He takes after his mama!) He was built to play sports and does well at every sport he tries. He is quite a bit more laid back than Tyson, but he follows Tysons every move and that usually includes one sport or another.

It was funny to watch Tyson and Caleb play on the same team because if Caleb got the ball he would immediatly look for Tyson to pass it too. When Tyson got the ball, he would take it straight to the hoop. (shows the difference in their personalities)

Here is the only shot that Tyson made the whole game.

And, here is Tyson asking Caleb why he didnt give HIM the ball.

This is the younger age group. I still had my zoom lens on and I didnt have time to switch to my regualr one so I wasnt able to fit in the whole group. Whoops.

Noahs team won their game and he wanted me to take a picture of the scoreboard. So, here it is. Noah played all of 2 minutes. There were so many kids and they all had to take turns.

He had a great warmup...

And some pretty good blocks in his 2 minutes

But this is what he did for most of the game.

But he got pretty good at mastering a few tricks =)

Noah hates sports and would rather be doing anything but, but he knows that we are having him do sports regardless because its good excercise and its good competition and interaction with other kids, so he is at least a good sport about it.

I really, relly enjoyed this camp and I cant wait for it again next year!!

Noah the Builder

One of Noahs favorite things to do is to build things. He loves to put together, take apart, create new things and make stuff up. He has one of those creative brains-im not sure where he gets it from.

For his birthday, he got this new k'nex set and started building that day.

I think he stayed in his pj's for 3 straight days and just stuck to it until it was done

This was the final result. It was a machine with a motor that he put together that brought balls to the top and then droped them down into a maze of sorts. I looked at the directions and I seriously dont think I could have done it myself. (I guess thats not really saying much)

We plan on Noah designing and building our dream home-seriously, he is that good!!

Easter

Unfortunatly, this is the only picture I took during easter time. This was a chemo week for me, so I wasnt up and around. I was able to get my easter shopping done before chemo and then I got up out of bed long enough to put the baskets together. We didnt do dresses or church clothes this year, so I wasnt too conserned about the before church picture. Stacy was in town, so her and my mom made it a fun day for all the kids. Hopefully next Easter will be a happier time...I plan on it!!

( This is also the first picture I took with my broken camera. Bill took it to Tysons football game and broke the flash somehow. So, the next few posts have horrible pictures. I still havent gotten it fixed, but I learned how to shoot without a flash-in most situations anyway)

Spring Football

Tyson is our super sports obsessed boy. He loves all things sports and he seriously lives and breathes sports.
We decided to try out some flag football this year and it went pretty good.

I was only able to go to 2 games the entire season because of the chemo and how sick I was, but Bill went and took some pictures for me (although right after this game he came home with my camera...broken) The first few games were still pretty cold and it actually rained on them a few times.

Unfortunatly, sweet boy pulled a muscle or something-we still arent sure what it was because the Dr's didnt know. Apparantly, its pretty hard to pull muscles in kids his age, but nontheless, it sidelined him for about 3 games. Poor guy was super bummed

But after a few weeks of rest he was ready to head back out on the field. He grabbed a few flags and ran as hard as he could, but mostly he just chased the kid with the ball.

This age is so funny because they still dont know what they are doing and they just follow the ball. Pure entertainment

He felt like he was pretty tough stuff when he played-that was only like 3 minutes out of the whole game.

He has only played one other sport in his life but he was only 4 and he wasnt into it at all. At this stage all he really wanted was the trophy...

...And he finally got one!

Did I mention that his team didnt win a single game? Oh well, its all for experience and he got plenty of it. He loved it and I think it will be something he sticks with for years to come!!

Such a handsome little dude!

Noahs a Golden Scholar

Last year, Noah was chosen as a Golden Scholar for his school for 4th graders.

He got to be honered for all his hard work and good grades along with a bunch of others from his school and other schools in the area

He got to go on stage and receive an award.

He was only in his class for 4 months but still managed to be at the top.

We took the whole family and went to show our support for Noah.

(I think the other kids just came because they knew there would be desert at the end of the night)

Noah, we are so proud of you. You have worked hard and done what you were supposed to do even though you had to start at a new school and move to a different state and deal with your mom having cancer. You always strive to do your best and you are such a good example to your brothers and sisters.

We love you Noah!!

Calebs First Day of Preschool

Its funny going back and finding these pictures on the camera. Caleb has a pretty bad speech problem and was lucky enough to get into the preschool speech program. In Utah, he was in a speech preschool that was only 2 days a week for 1 hour and I was with him the whole time. He had some pretty severe seperation issues and we knew this was going to be hard. He had to ride the bus and go everyday for 2 1/2 hours-but I also knew it would be totally worth it. He needed this. I had already talked to the teacher and told her my concerns and then she told me what to do on the first day. I was ready.

Avery got to come with us on the first day. The plan was to take him on the first day and then try the bus the next day. One step at a time.



He looked so big with his backpack . I usually dont have a hard time with my kids going off to school, but Caleb has always been my little buddy and I was sad to see him go.

I walked him down the hall and to his classroom. He lined up outside with the other kids and then his teacher walked them all in. I stayed in the hall, and when Caleb noticed he flipped out. He started freaking out and pure panic set in. His cry is like a really, really loud siren and I could hear it all the way down the hall. The teacher told me to just wave and say goodbye and she would do the rest. She was awesome!

That is seriously all it took. Just that one day of panic. He realized that school is fun and I was always going to come back and get him. I think he had one more day of a few episodes here and there, but it was amazing what that school did for him.

The second day was bus day. This is the one that I was DREADING. I had been hyping up the bus for like a week and kept telling him how cool it was to ride and none of the other kids got to ride the bus and it was so fun. But I knew that it was going to be harder for the bus driver to keep control of him and I was soooo nervous. I just knew that he was going to fall on the floor and I would have to drag him up the steps.

Seriously, not even a moment of hesitation. He gave me a kiss and a hug and walked right up those steps and sat in his seat. I had tears in my eyes. I had never before seen him do something like that without a fit. I was the proudest mom that day.

This school has been a lifesaver. He has almost completly come out of that shell. He was only in it for 2 months so not a whole lot of time to fix the speech, but I know that will come this school year.

We are now into our second week of preschool and he gets to go to the same school as all the other kids. He still rides the bus and LOVES it. His cousin Tyler is going to start there next week and he cant wait. This school is the BEST!!!

Tyson lost his FIRST tooth!!

Its always such a fun thing when your child loses his first tooth. All experiences have been different with each kid-and Tyson was no exception. He had had this loose tooth for like a month, but he didnt want to pull it. He wanted it to fall out all on its own-like when he ate an apple or something. Tyson is funny that way.



Bill had been trying to pull it for weeks and Tyson wouldnt let him come near. It was literally hanging by a tooth thread. Stacy and her family were visiting, and while Bill was busy with something, Tyson let her pull it out. Bill was dying-it was so funny





The kid was so proud. He loved the blood.

(I love the dirty fingernails. Such a boy!!)

Such a sweet face. I love his little chicklet teeth!

Congrats Ty on your first tooth!

(What he liked even better...The money under his pillow)