Tyler's Baptism Pictures....Finally

Tyler was suppose to be baptized on my birthday with the rest of the kids in the Stake, but because we had so many family members here over the holidays,we were able to have our own little baptism so many of them could attend. It was such a great day.



Brent and Tyler before the baptism. I think Brent really enjoyed the one-piece jump suit:)
Isn't Tyler so cute? It's kind of hard as a mom seeing your kids grow up but this day I couldn't have been more proud to be his mom!!



Grandpa and Grandma Duncan and Grandpa and Grandma Adams





The Duncan Fam (the whole Clan)


What a big day!! Clint and Jordan and Emmi surprised us at the church, we didn't expect them, it was such a fun surprise. It had been awhile and Clint and grown out his hair and it was pretty funny because some there didn't even recognize him. My cute mom kept saying, "what is up with your hair?" She obviously doesn't do change well seeing as she has hade the same "hair do" since we all can remember:) We love you mom and Clint I actually like the hair!!




The Whole Gang!!!!


The Adams Family (all but Aunt Heidi)

Thanks to everyone who came and shared this special day with Tyler. I know he really appreciated your love and support.

January....Never been my favorite!!

OK, so January has never been my favorite month. It's always been kind of a let down. Nothing exciting to look forward to, so sick of the snow and cold. I have always been an outdoors, sunshine kind of a girl and I gotta be honest by January I really kind of start to get a little stir crazy, as do the kids. Sydney keeps asking, "When is the sun going to shine, so I can go swimming?" I kind of feel the same way. If it were up to me I might just skip Jan and Feb altogether but that would mean skipping by birthday and this birthday was a good one:)!

Brent and I went out to dinner and a movie (that may not sound that exciting to some, but it is always so nice to get out and go have fun together and act like we are still young!!) My cute niece, Britney, volunteered to babysit, which is big seeing as she is a junior and that is probably the last thing she wants to do on a Sat. night. She is such a cute girl. She decided it would be fun to make a cake with the kids and surprise me when I got home from our date. They made me the cake and my sweet Sydney was so excited to show it to me she just couldn't get to sleep. So when I came home she snuck out of her room and told me all about how they were so excited to surprise me. It is amazing the older I get, I realize it is the sweet little things that mean so much to me. So thanks goes out to Brit and my kids for the great surprise and for making my 32nd bday one to remember!!

The December Madness

Mckay loved having Tyler and Syd home during Christmas break!!

Uncle Mark, Ty and Syd

We had quite the gang over Christmas morning

Sydney, doll baby Jesus, Tyler, baby Jesus (Ellie), Dallin 

Grandpa D., Syd and Ty at Grandma's Christmas Eve sing-a-long

Tyler and Syd loving Christmas morning. I think McKay liked the pink  barbie jeep the most.

The WIGGLE -ATOR, this was the favorite toy from Grandpa and Grandma A. This really is such a fun toy for all ages. Sometimes I sneak a ride on it:)

Grandma A. sledding with Tyler. It was freezing!

Our attempt to make a ginger bread house!!

Tyler's party watching the Utah Flash, sitting on the front row.

I think McKay thought it was his birthday, he was just

excited to be part of the party!!

Tyler and some of his old buddies from Provo.



I know I am once again way behind on blogging, but I had to blog about our crazy month of December because we had so many fun events:

-Tyler turning 8!! (That made me feel very old)

-The Hawkins twins baby blessing, an amazing event considering it took 9 years for these sweet babies to get here.

-Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - lots of fun at the Duncan Christmas Eve Party, and we were lucky enough to have most of the Adams and some of the Duncan's over to share Christmas morning with us.

-Our little trip to Zermatt in Midway. Lots of eating, swimming, sledding, riding Ty's mini-racer down the long halls and freezing on the way home when our car heater broke:)

-Tyler's baptism. What an amazing day. Almost all of our family (both sides) were able to be there, some to our surprise (Clint and Jordan and Emmi) and some that traveled so far. Thanks to all the family and good friends that were there, it was so neat to have so much wonderful support, I know it meant a lot to Tyler.  Todd took all the pictures that day so as soon as I get them I will post some pics of the baptism.

-Little Ellie's blessing. (We had lots of spiritual blessings this month that we felt so lucky to be a part of.)

-The annual Jones Breakfast on New Year's Day. We always love this little tradition and have lots of fun, but I have to admit I think by this point we were all a little exhausted:)

All these fun events and memories really topped off the great year we had. 

So here is to a new year with a million new things I want to achieve, starting out with trying to stay on top of things, even though we are already 2 weeks into January!!! Oh well one day at a time right?!?

Duncan Christmas Party

Wow,  I feel like we already had Christmas! We had our annual Duncan Christmas exchange last week and as always had so much fun!  Grandpa and Grandma D. really spoiled all of us this year!! The grandkids love this special night and love that they get to open gifts early.

They look so forward to their Christmas P.J.'s from grandpa and grandma and once again they loved them and looked so adorable in them:)  Then all the cousins exchanged gifts, the noise level was way beyond loud. It was a little crazy but the kids loved it!  This year we went caroling to some older folks to start the night off.  Andrew and Tyler (8 and 9 yrs old) said how they felt the spirit while we were caroling. I thought it was very sweet!  The party went on and on and we all went home very tired and paid for it the next day.  

Once again we missed Paul and Kristen and Clint and Jordan and their families- Can't wait to see you guys!

Thanks dad and mom for another wonderful Christmas party, the food the gifts and for sharing the true spirit of Christmas with our family!  We really feel blessed to come from such amazing families:)

Better late than never... Right?!?

By this point we were FREEZING!!


Do you love the keys hanging out of Brent's pocket, nice touch.


Aren't they so cute?


Sydney loves to pose for pictures unless of course something is bugging her then she throws a little tizzy:)


I just had to get some sympathy, he was not into this photo session can you tell?

OK, to me, the idea of family pictures always sounds like way too much work!! So every year I think to myself, "I would really like to do family pictures in the fall with the beautiful leaves etc," and every year fall comes and goes and I always miss that perfect moment!!! So this year I really tried to plan it and had it arranged with my cousin who was going to take them, but once again something came up last minute and I had to cancel. So here we are two months later still trying to capture that family picture moment!!! Over Thanksgiving my brother-in-law was coming into town with his fancy camera so I thought we should try to attempt some sort of family picture one more time. Let's just say it was quite the adventure!! Here are some reasons why you should not wait until November to do family pictures outside and/or maybe not even do family pictures period:)

1. It was 25 degrees outside, possible the coldest day of the year so far, and it was very difficult to get anyone to smile because we were all FREEZING!!
2. There was no color left in the grass or leaves! I am not sure why I thought there might be??
3. We had all lost our tans we had acquired in the summer
4.Trying to get a 2 yr old to hold still when he wants to be sliding on the slide or jumping on the tramp was oh so fun.
5. Convincing a second grader that it is not funny to put his bunny fingers behind his sister's head in a real family picture.
6. Listening to our drama queen complain about how the sun was too bright and bugging her and that her fingers were numb!!

After all the complaining and stress, it is always fun to see the end results, the good and the bad. I figure at least I will have a Christmas card picture right?


Well the next day we enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner at my Aunt Jeans. It was such a Castleton style Thanksgiving, with the cute name tags by our plates, the 3 pieces of candy corn so we all could name 3 things we are grateful for and last but not least the Castleton program!! For all our family that missed it, it was your typical Helen show. I love my mother's enthusiasm for life. Besides being a wonderful cook, she always knows how to throw a great party. So thanks mom and aunt Jean for the great thanksgiving meal. I dread the day when I actually have to make the entire Thanksgiving meal. For now I will be forever grateful.

P.S. CONGRATS to Paul and Kristen and Dallin on their new baby girl. Little Ellie. She is so cute! Way to go guys. We miss you all!

Halloween Night!!

What a cute cheerleader, it's looks so natural doesn't it?


Our little chicken!


Tyler made the perfect skeleton


We met up with our friends, the Planks. What cute kids!


The scary witch with the kids at the Jones Spooky house.

Ok, I have tried to prolong the scary, gory costumes for several years now but I finally gave in. Tyler was a very ugly bleeding skeleton and he absolutely loved every minute of it. Sydney was this adorable little cheerleader and she loved that and McKay, well he didn't really have a choice, he was a hammy-down chicken and I thought he looked pretty cute! He didn't really care what he was he just loved grabbing handfuls of candy out of his pumpkin.

We started the night by going over to the Jones Spooky house! Heather J. makes a pretty scary witch and her house was one of those really cool halloween houses that Tyler wishes he had:) We also heard about their neighbor that gives out a dozen Krispy Kream doughnuts to each kid, can you believe that? My kids thought it was pretty cool! We then went to our wards trunk-or-treat and ended up in our Provo neighborhood at some friends. Halloween is such a kids night but of course we can't forget about Brent's birthday and to celebrate we went trick-or-treating once again!! What a guy, Happy birthday to my amazing man!

Annual Pumpkin Carving Party

First thing I have to say is that the Duncan party just wasn't the same without the favorite pumpkin carving guy, (no Clint I am not talking about you:)) We all know I am talking about Paul!! Ever since Paul and Kristen have moved the kids dads actually have to participate in the carving process. We always have so much fun at Grandpa and Grandma Duncans pumpkin carving party. It started with Grandma's corn chowder and chili, she is such a good cook. We always make carmel apples, and Aunt Heather made chocholate covered bananas this year, it was all so yummy!! The kids love getting together with their cousins and coming up with their own pumpkin faces. Of course we missed all of you who weren't there. Thanks to all for a great party!!

BYU Heaven

Ok, so we are a little bummed that the BYU game has ben post-poned for this week but Tyler is still living on the high the he got from last week's game. Tyler and his cousin Andrew had the chance (thanks to Jonny P. and the Pestana gang) to go with Brent to the BYU game last week. They sat on the 40 yard line on row 13, which was very cool, but the best part is that before the game they got to go down on the field while both teams were warming up!! Ya it doesn't stop there. Then they got to go have lunch. After they sat down and looked under their chairs, (i have never sat in an actual chair at the game, I was a little bitter:))they each were given a treat bag with pop, popcorn, candy etc. Needless to say the kids absolutely loved every minute of the game and I don't think they even realized that it was raining and freezing. Tyler has been talking about the game all week and how cool it was.
THe only down fall about this awesome experience is that now the kids have turned the downstairs room into a football field using blue tape for the yard lines with a blue taped letter Y in the middle, they even went as far as to tape certain yard lines with white tape to show first downs. OH these boys, I just love their enthusiasm for the little things in life!!






Ok, so I told Brent to take some pictures, I guess I need to be more specific on what kind of pictures. These pictures were the only ones he took because he forgot the camera so he had to use his phone.

Fall Break Fun

First of all I have to tell Jen, my sister, Congrats on an amazing run/time in the St. George Marathon!! She rocked, she ran it in a record time for her and an insane time for anyone else: 3 hours and 27 minutes. Can you believe that, way to go Superwoman!



This last weekend the kids were out of school for fall break and of course in my mind we had to do something fun right?! Well it's a good thing that we have fun friends that plan fun things and parents that have a free condo in Midway, so we took advantage. Luckily the Planks are our fun friends and they invited us to go up Southfork in Provo Canyon for one last hot dog/smore roast. It was absolutely beautiful and the kids had a blast. Jeff even busted out the dutch oven, it was yummy!! Thanks again Planks!!









Then the next day I just wasn't in the mood to be stuck at home with the kids saying over and over, "We're bored, or so and so did this for fall break etc." You know all the fun lines that we all said when we were kids:) So we decided to head up to Midway. Brent's parents have a condo at the Zermatt and we love to get away and go play. It is so funny, my kids think it is their very own place and they love that they have their own little room with their own TV. They just think it is the greatest place! It is so gorgous and so peaceful and it always feels so good to get out of the house and away from laundry and some of those oh so fun things that us mothers get to do daily:) We enjoyed the last swim of the season in the sun and just relaxed, it was great to have some down time with the family.





Also my last big news is a big CONGRATS to Dave and Tirza(Brent's sister) and the Hawkins Clan. They had their long awaited twins. A healthy baby boy, Brock Eli (5 lbs), and a healthy baby girl, Reese Michel (5 lbs 5 oz.) We are so happy for them and wish them lots of luck with 4 kids under the age of 5.




Well I think I could've made about 4 blog post out of this one but o-well, here it is to staying on top of blogging! I will get better right?