PEACHES!

A couple of Saturdays ago, Tyler, Emalyn, and I canned 28 bottles of peaches.  Took us about 4 hours.  Tyler and Emalyn peeled, pitted, and sliced the peaches and I helped a bit with that and did the canning.  We are very very proud of our accomplishment, so we had to post pictures of these peaches.

 

In the past, I've just canned by myself.  It was so much more fun with my kids, and it went faster, AND they gained a much bigger appreciation for the work that goes into canning and sense of pride in their accomplishment.  So here's two photos of our canned peaches:

 

We removed the turtle's shell!

Just a random photo, showing off one of Russell's new talents...hair.  He seriously loves doing this.  Just giggles and giggles.

 How to remove a cast:

 

• Turn on a movie.  Baby Einstein is preferable.
• Lay down child with cast in front of said movie.
• Get out tin snips, a.k.a. monster scissors.
• Cut through the chest bar of the cast by using a see-saw motion with the tin snips right next to your baby's skin.  Make sure another person is holding child's hands so they don't get in the way of the monster scissors.  This may seem dangerous.  Having your husband do it, all while repeating, "He's ok, he's ok" over and over, helps to ease your mind.




• Make sure you do not move in front of the T.V. screen.  This will negate the effectiveness of the movie.
• It may seem like it's not going to work for a while.  Just keep on sawing. 
• After you get that one off, move on down to the bar across the lower stomach.
• 
   
• Repeat steps 4 and 5, until you cut through all the layers of the cast.
• 
   
• Have your husband show off his rippling biceps by grabbing each side of the cast and pulling until there is enough room to slide one arm out of the cast.



Do you see the tin snips there on the floor in the back ground?

•  And you're done! Celebrate with a great big hug, and dancing and cheering.  And a great big sigh of relief, that no one got hurt.
• And then celebrate the next two weeks with lots of baths! And outings to the swimming pool!

First day of School!

Tyler might be getting too "cool" for these first day of school pictures...but I'm not.  Sorry kiddo.  He's a big fourth grader this year.  It's weird...I remember fourth grade REALLY well.  How can I have a kid that old?!!!



And our sweet Emalyn is a 3rd grader this year.  And she's pretty cool too-notice how she "magically" got her number 3 sign to stay up?  Seriously, how cool is THAT?!! Again, I can't believe how old she is getting either.  They just keep growing up...and learning...and getting more beautiful everyday...

And this face just says it all about our Krysta.  She started preschool this year.  And if you can't tell, she's pretty excited.  Really really excited.  No tears from this one on leaving mom and Russell behind.

Although, there were plenty of tears from Russell at being left all alone with Mommy.  We're not too sure about these kids just growing up and leaving us alone with eachother...

All dressed up...we're going there someday

Our neighbor hosted a Princess Party the week before school started for all the neighborhood girls.  Emalyn and Krysta love any excuse to dress up and show off how beautiful they are.  This is also the first picture we took of Krysta's new haircut.

 We went to the Brigham City Temple Open house with my mom and my sister and my nephew.  The drove north, and we drove south, and Brigham City was pretty close to the middle. 

It was quite the expedition, once we got there, because we brought a stroller for Russell to use (they lifted their "no strollers" policy for us) and my mom was in a wheelchair due to a broken foot.  We were taken on a wrong turn in the middle of the tour, and skipped the second floor (still not sure how that happened...), but thanks to my mom and Megan's quick thinking, we did another detour and did end up getting to see the second floor after all. 

It was beautiful.  I love temples.  Temples are normally closed to everyone except members of the Church with recommends, but when they are first built and before they are dedicated, there is an open house where anyone can go in and tour these beautiful Houses of God.  Most of all, I love the spirit in the temple.  You can feel a quiet sacredness that brings peace to your heart.

 

After the tour, we took pictures of each of the kids in front of the temple.  Wyatt and Russell wanted to run out into the road you see in the background, so we had to work quick to get these pictures.  Which probably explains why I have no pictures of anyone besides my own kids. :)

I am glad I took my kids.  I think they will remember what they felt in there, and want to go back someday.  Thanks for helping make it possible Mom and Megan!

Scott's Owl Beading Ceremony (i.e. I finished my ticket from Wood Badge!)

From L-R: Tyler, Ryan, Kirk, Scott, Paula, and Debbie.  This is Scott's Owl troop.  He went to Wood Badge (Boy Scout leadership training camp) in June 2011.  He and all the other members of his owl troop finished their tickets by July this year.  That is a huge accomplishment.  So on Aug 13, we went to their beading ceremony.  Here, they all took turns explaining different parts of their flag (the strange pole that Kirk is holding in the middle there).

 It was a really neat ceremony to be a part of.  Scott's troop has stayed close this past year.  We've had a few barbecues, and picnics at eachother's houses.  Lots of communication through email and phone calls and visits.  Mostly on their part though.  Scott is a very hard person to get a hold of, and I've got to admire their dedication to keeping us part of the loop. :) 

 

I remember when we went to the first dinner after Wood Badge was over last summer and meeting everyone in his troop.  They all had such wonderful things to say about my husband.  I was a very proud wife.  It was wierd to meet people who knew my husband so personally, where I knew nothing about them.  But I've since gotten to know them, and they are all wonderful people.  I feel lucky to know them.

 

Scott had contracted pink eye the day before, and his eyes were really red and puffy here.  Poor guy!  No, he's not crying.  Although he felt like it.  He says he has a lot more compassion for anyone who gets pink eye now.

Lori was one of the counselors there, and they all asked here to "bead" them.  Here is Scott getting "beaded".

A very proud troop!

The Adventures of Weirdo-Guy

This is a movie that Tyler and Scott made, from a book that Tyler wrote.  Tyler does the narration by himself and all the artwork is Tyler's too.  To be able to hear all of the narration, it's best if you turn up the volume on your speakers ALL THE WAY.

 

KFR 2012-Day 2 & 3

Day 2 of the KFR:

 

Russell got a hold of this bat in the back yard and just went around beating the bushes and the trees.  And losing his pants, as you can see.  Not even the cast can make some of them stay up.

That night, the adults went out to eat.  I was pretty nervous about the babysitter, since we'd never left Russell with a babysitter since he got his cast on, but he just slept the whole time she was there.  And I was glad I went, it was great to be able to talk and spend time with my siblings and their spouses.  I really missed Dave & Belky, and Ryan.  So sad that they couldn't make it.

 

The last day of the reunion (Day 3), we had a nativity with the kids.  They did such a good job.  My dad read the bible, while the kids acted it out. 

Krysta and Josh were Mary and Joseph.



Kayli, Emalyn, and Natalie were angels

Jared, Bryce, and Tyler were wise men

Here is everyone, with Kylie and Matthew also as shepherds.

There were some really reverent moments and some funny moments.  But it was one of the best nativities I've ever been apart of.

Thanks, Mom and Dad, for a wonderful reunion!  It was great to see everyone.

KFR 2012- Day 1

KFR = Ketcheson Family Reunion

DAY 1:

We arrived just in time for lunch on day one, so we missed the morning activities, which we heard were super fun. And we enjoyed the cookies throughout the rest of the reunion.  Mom and Dad were in charge this year, and they chose a "Christmas in August" theme.  So the morning cookies were Christmas cookies and gingerbread men.

After lunch, we took the kids to the dollar store to pick out presents for their cousin (they were each assigned a cousin to give to).  Then we came home and wrapped them, and then that evening we watched them all open their gifts.

Emalyn gave this gift to her cousin Natalie.

Krysta LOVED this Mermaid doll

Tyler gave to Joshua

Emalyn got a jumprope from Kayli-just what she wanted!

I just had to post this picture of our little cousin

We've literally "enjoyed" this whoopie cushion every day since the reunion...oh joy.  Imagine my happiness in explaining to the PT that came last week that we really don't have digestive issues...

That night, we had the KFR talent show.  Mel and her kids started it out with a skit to introduce next year's reunion that they're in charge of.  Each of them portrayed one of the "original" Ketcheson's.  It was SOOO FUNNY!! 

I took NO PICTURES of my kids during their talents!! I'm kinda upset about that, but I guess I was busy helping them do their talent.  Krysta played "twinkle, twinkle little star" on the piano, Emalyn jumproped to a rhyme, and Tyler and Scott made a movie about Weirdo-Guy (I'm going to post Tyler's movie on this blog, but not in this post).

Cheryl's family did an awesome lipsync to a song about Nebraska

And little Lanaya fell asleep while her mommy was dancing around with her in her arms. 

This is my mom and dad.  Soooo cute! They did a lip sync to a "choir" song.  They had so many props (stacked on that bar stool in between them) that they had a hard time finding the right ones.  They won for best preparation! And my mom is wearing a boot-she broke two bones in her foot a couple weeks before this, and still hosted the reunion.  My mom is such an amazing person!

Josh did a really cute lip sync too!

These two were awesome.  I took some really fun photos of them doing their lip sync too.  They did such a good job performing.

I didn't get pictures of Meg and Weston's talent either! Boo!

We had a lot of fun that first day!

I Like to Look For Rainbows...

Emalyn was baptized Aug 4, 2012. 

We had a lot of family who came up (or down) to Idaho Falls to celebrate with us.  She got both sets of grandparents (Grandma and Grandpa Jensen, and Grandma and Grandpa Ketcheson) there, also Scott's sister, Carolyn and her husband Jeremy and their kids and Scott's brother Jaron and his wife Heidi and their kids were able to come.  Amy's s-i-l Melanie and her kids (Ryan couldn't come due to work) and Amy's sister Megan and her husband Weston and son, and Emalyn's cousins Kayli and Bryce from Nebraska were able to come.  We couldn't believe how many people were able to come be with us.

Scott and all of the kids staying at our house (except Russell and Wyatt) slept out in the tent in our back yard.  From what I hear, it was really fun. I love that Scott likes to do that kind of thing with his neices and nephews.

Enjoying the tent before all the beds were set up.  A total of 10 kids were out there Saturday night. 

And then the baptism day came.  It was so nice, all of the family there, and celebrating Emalyn's special day.

Emalyn in her baptism dress

Dad, Emalyn, and Mom

Emalyn was baptized by her dad

One of Emalyn's friends, Hannah, who came to her baptism

We are so proud of you Emalyn.  You are a very special girl.  We love you very much!