La Otra Mujer

For those who may not have seen this yet, this is Ben's "little" project--the Dogpatch Express. He is fortunate that he decided to build my grandpa's plane, or this would not have been brought into existence for many, many more years... (He is a smart fellow.)



Here's what it looked like on the day it arrived:The wing, in the midst of its creation:The first attempt at painting:The nose art:

Any questions?

Saturday Nights

This reminds me of Saturday nights with my sisters, sitting around getting curlers in our hair. I laughed so hard, I cried when I saw this. I'm still giggling now!

Caytie Lady

Our little Cayte is 17 months old today, ALREADY! I haven't put many pictures of her on here yet, so here are a few shots to show off our cutie...
With Grandpa on a hike in Antimony, UT

Thoroughly enjoying Daddy's birthday cake!

Sneaking someone's post-soccer game bribe :) (Don't tell Gracie...)

We love having this little ball of personality in our family!

PS--we'd love to see any posts with pictures of you all, too!

Deep in the Heart of Texas

A couple weeks ago, Ben had a free day at work. (He was going to go help in Galveston after Hurricane Ike with our ward, but the trip was cancelled.) What better thing is there to do with a free day, then to check the kids out of school and go to the State Fair of Texas? Scott and Emma were enchanted with the idea that we could take them out of school for such a fun thing, and everyone was a good sport for a long, fun, mildly hot day of walking around the huge fair. We saw "Big Tex" (above), a daredevil show, a dog trick show, and a puppet show. We saw lots of arts and crafts, a huge sand sculpture of Egypt, played with a children's farm display, and ate some of the required fair food. The corney dogs were not our favorite--too hot outside, not cooked inside. The fried cheesecake was delicious! The line for the Country Fried Bacon was too long.

This picture does not do the size of this pig justice. It was the LARGEST pig I have ever seen! It was easily longer than Ben is tall. Granted, my pig perspective is fairly limited, but I did hear that it has won records for being the largest, or heaviest, or something-est pig around.

Here are the kids after the puppet show. Scott was inspired to become a puppeteer when he grows up, after he becomes a paleontologist, and a mad scientist that finds a cure for cancer with his potions.

Something funny from the day... We passed a booth selling saunas. Scott saw them and was telling the girls that they were elevators. We told him no, and what they were. He asked what a sauna was. I said that they were for people to go inside and get all hot and sweaty, to help their bodies feel better. He said, "Oh, so they're like microwaves for people." Made us laugh...

Soccer girls!

I've had to wait a while to post these pictures, because one of my little soccer girls has been rather reluctant to play...and therefore rather hard to take pictures of! But we got some good ones, so I thought I'd share what Emma and Gracie have been up to on Saturdays.

Emma is the smallest one on her team (and any other team), so she has to work extra hard to keep up with everyone. But she has really loved doing it! She is on the Hamsters team--all girls, all in Kindergarten. One of her teammates is in her class, which is really fun for them. I've been proud of how she works, when the shadows in the grass are not stealing all her attention.

Gracie's team is the Stingrays. They are all 3 years old. There are two girls, including her, and the rest are boys. This week Gracie got to kick the ball to start the game!

Go, Gracie, go!

OK, so the truth is, this picture below is how Gracie spent most of her games. It took much persuasion (and a little bribery) to even get her to play enough to get the shots above. But she actually learned a lot in her practices, and likes to play soccer at home with us.

The best part of the season, of course, was spending time with Daddy, who was the assistant coach for her team. Go Stingrays! Go Hamsters!