Soccer

We have finally jumped on the bandwagon. I'm officially a soccer Mom! Ryan was on a U6 team this year and had a blast. When we were asking him if he wanted to play soccer this year; we actually went online and showed him videos of youth soccer so we were sure he knew what we were talking about. (got that?) This year was pretty simple. 6 kids per team 1 practice a week and games on Saturdays. The games are 4 on 4, 4 quarters, 5 minutes each. The field is tiny- it could easily fit in our backyard.

Wording is crucial when it comes to coaching 5 year-olds. It's not "Be Aggressive," it's "Be the first to the ball." Ryan definitely got the hang of it and really enjoyed playing, especially since he loves to run.

Notice where the ball is and where Ryan is looking. I think I said "Ryan, where's the ball?" more times than I can count.
Tyler ended up being the Assistant Coach this year and had a good time. He said he was glad that he was one of the coaches because it gave him an excuse to run around and tell the boys what to do. Soccer is NOT a spectators sport for Tyler.

Ryan lounging during a water break.


Casey is always excited to be included in snack time. After he eats anything he holds his hands like that until he washes them.

Of course, Grandma and Granddad came out to watch a game.

Here's the whole team getting some pointers from Coach Kenny.

Ryan what is your favorite part about soccer?: "When I kick it someone and they kick it in the goal."- Ryan had a lot of assists this year and 1 goal.

Random Photos and Ryan's First Day of Kindergarten

Ryan and Casey love pretend play. We have a LOT of boy costumes and they love to mix and match. Here is Casey as Ninja Lightning McQueen.

And Ryan as Indiana (Jones) Lion.


Sydney and Bumpa. I think this is the last photo I took of Bumpa before he passed away in November.


This picture perfectly displays what she thought of tummy time.


Ryan on his first day of Kindergarten. He loves school and is awesome at making friends. For the first month of school he would come home and say that he "made a new friend today," but he could never remember their names. I really like the way that they've set up Kindergarten. It's half day and he's an early bird. Let me explain- early birds attend from 8:30a-11:55a and late birds attend from 10:40a-2:45p. Each K class has 30 students but half are early birds and half are late birds. So, the teachers only have 15 students during math and reading lessons.

Ryan and Casey sitting on the classroom rug listening to a story.

Utah Summer 2010

At the end of July we headed to Utah to visit Tyler's family for a few days. We've decided that trips to Utah are more enjoyable in the summer. Lagoon and boating are much enjoyable than snow. We loaded the kids into my Mom's big SUV at 3:30am for the drive. We still squeeze our 3 kids and 3 5-point car seats into the back of our Corolla. There was no way we were going to make the drive cramped like that, so we road in style, Thanks Mom and Dad!!


Sydney was an awesome traveler at 2 months old. I think all 3 kids were asleep at the same time for roughly 30 minutes.


Our first stop was Lagoon. Here is Ryan and Casey with Halle and Alaina. Because of these 2 girls, I will never have to buy clothes for Sydney. Hurray for hand-me-downs.
Ryan loved it and was so excited and actually wanted to do "The Bat" again with Mom. I was impressed.


We kept telling Ryan to pull the bar in to go higher, and he kept yelling "I know, but I don't want to."


Sydney is one lucky baby she was Katie on my side that is 2 weeks older and Devin on Tyler's side that is 3.5 weeks older. Jennifer and Tara were actually due on the same day but Devin was impatient, actually I think Tara was the impatient one. :)

We bunked with Mia and Nate for the trip and I don't think Casey took this off the whole time we were there. It was definitely the inspiration for his Halloween costume.

Ryan really blossomed as a swimmer last summer. He's awesome. The water at Willard Bay was so warm. We were there for 7 hours and I don't think Ryan ever got completely dry.

I think this picture is actually our first family photo. Pretty sad considering Ryan and Casey have their eyes closed and you can barely see Sydney on the bottom.

It took some MAJOR convincing to get Casey on this thing. "Uncle Mark will not make you fall off, he will make sure you stay dry."

Daddy liked to relive the glory days of Lake Powell Trips, he enjoyed hanging off the back among some other old tricks.
I think this one speaks for itself. So cute!
Exhausted after another 5 minutes of skiing- single ski of course.

Daddy taking Sydney from the boat to the shore.

And here is the whole reason we went in the first place. Tyler's nephew Taylor is currently serving his mission and we went up to play before he left. We love you and miss you Taylor!!

Sydney's Blessing/Ryan's Birthday/ Farewell to the Hicks

Sunday, July 18th was a very eventful day. We blessed Sydney at church. We celebrated Ryan's 5th birthday, and we said goodbye to the Hicks family before they moved to New York State.



My adorable baby in her blessing dress from Aunt Mia and headband from Aunt Martina.


Here are some farewell pictures that we took to help the boys remember them. But I think we see them more often now, over the web cam, than we ever saw them when we were on the same coast.


These boys LOVE their Aunt Jenn .

So precious

When they moved we inherited some things that didn't make it onto the truck. Such as the rockin' Eeyore the boys are riding together.


Uncle Dano is a favorite around here. He must have walked Casey up and down the stairs this way a dozen times. He always gets a work out when he comes and visits.

Uncle Daniel getting in some practice. He's going to be a daddy in about 3 weeks, but he likes the color blue.


Here we are getting ready to sing to Ryan. The boys live for birthdays and are always asking whose birthday it next.

Beach July 2010

It's a Miracle!! I'm blogging. I'm going to attempt to post about some past activities so you won't be completely shocked at how big Sydney is now. And for those of you who have seen her lately you can admire how little she used to be.

Jennifer with Baby Katie. Katie was born just 15 days before Sydney. Every time I see her on the web cam these days (since they live in New York now) I think how much fun it would be to see how Katie and Sydney would interact with each other. We miss you guys!!

Casey is our moody child. It was really windy the whole time we were there and Casey didn't want to put his feet in the sand. So this wagon was the compromise. I think we coaxed him out of it one time in 4 days.

Tyler doesn't waste anytime getting comfortable in the sand, with no kids around. He the master builder.

Me and Sydney hanging out at the Beach House. We were only 3 houses from the sand, but the temperature difference was amazing. I would say at least 10 degrees.

This was taken Sunday morning, so no swimming this day. But just look at Payton's hair to see how windy it was.
Best Buddies/Cousins

Oh Casey, we love your faces.

This one wasn't at the beach, but I had to include it.