Another basement update

The basement has made a giant step forward and is finally nearing completion. A big thank you to Dad for coming up a second time and helping me finish the ceiling drywall and the girls bedroom doors.

 This is the pocket door leading into the tub/toilet area

The mirror added to the vanity wall (still missing a couple of covers)

 The family room

 More family room

Still more family room

The hall leading to the girls room and the bathroom

(I got lucky that wall was exactly 8 ft long)

I have made a little more progress and have started the mudding and taping.

First day of school

Another year is here that means First day of school pictures.

 Alex

 Ben 

Cenna

Ariana

I don't know where my kids get there looks from (not me that's for sure) but they sure are photogenic.

Basement progress

The basement finishing project has taken a large step forward. Thanks to the assistance of Dad, Chris and Garrett. The framing is complete, bathroom is 95% (need to install the toliet and mirror) They even started the drywall on the ceiling. Here are some pictures of the progress. The bathroom should be completed soon and I will then get to start the drywall. 

(Oh ya wall outlet covers too)

Fat Man + Fat Suit = Cracked Skull

We had an Employee appreciation Carnival at Lowe's this past week and they happened to have Sumo Suits. Alex and I decided to give them a try. As you can tell they are slimming sumo suits. During the sumo fight Alex fell backward without her padded hair/helmet and hit her head on the mat. Unfortunately the mat was only 3/4 inch think and didn't stop her head from hitting the concrete. 

After a short visit to Alta view hospital we had to take her up to Primary Children's hospital and they found a skull fracture. After a 3 day hospital stay she got to come home but has to take it easy for the next 6-8 weeks so as not to cause further injury. The moral of this story is that Sumo wrestling is never a good idea when it involves a 90 lb teen and a 320 lb fat man.

Easter 2012

Happy Easter! I hope you all had a great day. I know we did. Here is a picture of the kids right before we left to church. (don't mind the chalk on the side, I was trying to avoid it, looks like I missed)

Broken

So we got a call from the school, to inform us that Ben was in the office with a bloody nose. We got up to the school and Ben had an ice pack on his nose and a paper towel. When we asked him what happened he told us that he was outside playing tag and he ran into another kids throwing a football. We took him down to the Instacare and they confirmed that his nose was broken. Because it was such a clean break they didn't need to do anything to it, and there isn't anything we can do but wait for it to heal. 

1st Birthday/Turning 4

Cassidy has officially had her First Birthday, and she turned 4.

These are of her opening the haul this year

A Snow White castle playset From Romney Grandparents

 Fairies from Mom and Dad

A dress (and Book not in picture) from Barlow Grandparents

 Apparently the haul was good as she didn't stop playing and reading all night.

Cotton Candy

So Santa brought the family a cotton candy machine, and I being the wonderful dad that I am thought it would be a fun Saturday evening activity to make some cotton candy. 

My kitchen has never been that sticky. 

These little machines spray it everywhere. The kids of course enjoyed it and wanted more. After the second batch of flying glittery sugar flew into the air I decided that we were done and if we ever do it again it will be done outside and not in my kitchen.

Christmas Dinner

How was your Christmas Dinner.

We stuffed ourselves so much we couldn't move.

fyi (the dog is Nigel Mile's and Jessica's Dog)

Christmas eve

The annual Christmas pj's 

Turning 6

And another one hits 6

 Elann and our neighbor threw a surprise party for Ana

 Here is Ana with the presents from grandma and papa Barlow

Here she is with her gifts excited and happy

Halloween

I was called and chastised for not posting Halloween pictures, 

and even though I defended myself I cannot deny that 

my brain skipped a beat somewhere and made me 

believe that I had already posted them.

 Here is Cassidy the Cheerleader

 Ariana The princess

 Cenna as Professor McGonagall 

 Ben is a King

Ales was an Ice Queen

The makeup didn't turn out as well as i'd hoped

David went as a Lowe's Employee for the 5th time in a row and Elann was a tired Mom.

Scared

We were watching a movie as a family and Cenna fell asleep. This is the result.

Zoo Time

We went on a little family expedition to Hoogle Zoo this weekend. All of the kids were able to enjoy it this time. The last time we came Cassidy was only one and didn't really know what was going on. Unfortunately part of the zoo was closed they are trying to fix up the section that normally has the bears and big cats in it, so we didn't see any bears and only one cat.

Here are some pictures from our trip.

All of the tigers were sleeping

Sanpete Staple

This monkey kept jumping out of his little cave to sit there and stare at everyone.

We arrived at the Elephant Paddock just in time for the afternoon show. This baby elephant did some really neat tricks we just didn't get our camera out in time. To finish the show the trainer gave the elephant a whole pineapple and he ate it leaves and all.

This giant tortoise was sleeping when we arrived but soon woke up and moved over to eat. 

His body was huge big enough for any of the kids to ride and his neck was really long.

We had a lot of fun and look forward to going again next year when they finish construction.

Alex and the Viola

Alex had her first Orchestra Concert recently, for those of you that didn't know she is in orchestra and is playing the Viola. The concert went well. About what you would expect to hear from an orchestra made up of 7th graders that haven't played before.

School Project

For those of you not aware I am currently back in school. In one of my classes I had to create a collage of pictures using photoshop. The teacher asked us to be creative so this is what I came up with.

If you click on the picture so it is larger you can see that the Lego Characters in the bottom dream are actually Elann and the Kids chasing me, and the top dream is Ben reaching down to move his sisters around on the Lego set, while they run away. I haven't received my grade yet but will say that during the presentation of it, the entire class broke into laughter and seemed to like it.

Exciting weekend

So I get a call at work around 6:30 on Friday and I can hear 

Cassidy screaming in the background and Elann asking me to 

hurry home because Cassie just fell down the driveway.

So I arrange to get off and leave for home getting stuck in traffic 

for the Real Salt Lake soccer game. So it takes me a little while to 

arrive and this is is what I find.

One little girl with a goose egg that is bigger than a golf ball

and just a little smaller than a baseball. So I put her in the car grab

Elann and we drive back up to the ER. After checking her out 

the doctor decides that she is okay but that she needs to 

stick around for a couple of hours for observation. 

Sometime around 9:30 we finally get to leave. Of course the 

whole time we are there Elann is worried, while Cassie is 

happy as can be and excited about the stuffed animal the 

nurse gave her. 

On a positive note Real won the match.

Fat + Speedo = No

These are a couple of reason I do not post pictures of myself in swimwear

This last one was my favorite one

I hope you enjoyed these and maybe laughed a little

Here we go again!!

Another school year is upon us. Here are the first day of school pictures.

Alex going into 7th!! 

(Are we even old enough to have a 7th grader??)

Ben going into 5th grade!!

Cenna going into 2nd grade!!

Ariana going into Kindergarten!!