We are all so excited for Becky to get Married in a couple of weeks. My sister Christine and I hosted a bridal shower for her last weekend and it was a lot of fun. I'm always looking for excuses to use yummy fancy recipes that I can't justify making for every day occasions, so this was so much fun. Christine is amazing with decorations and everything turned out great.
Here's Becky with her future mother-in-law and sister-in-law.
Here's Becky with my Grandma Crowther.
Here's Becky with Mia and MaCall who were the servers at the shower. They did a great job and were so excited to help and be a part of this grown up girl party.
And here's Becky with her day's spoils.

Here's some more pictures of our vacation. The cousins playing in the pool and sprinkler is a must every summer.


Jeff gave the kids a pinata that was left over from his class reunion.



My Dad set up the tent and let Mia and Mason sleep in it with him one night. They made it till about 2:00 a.m. and then ended up on the couch. My Dad did it again with Mia, Landon and MaCall. The older cousins seem to do better. They made it all night.

Benedict/Patterson Reuion

I wanted to do a few posts before we get home to Denver so that I don't have 6 weeks of vacation photos all at once to post. So here are a couple of photos I took of our first weekend in Idaho. Here is Mia and Jared on the motorcycle at the Benedict/Patterson Reuion. And then Jared holding the kids during the fireworks that night.

We had a wonderful weekend with Jared's family. The people who organized the reunion went all out for the kids with games and prizes and water fun. Plus we had fabulous food, so who wouldn't love that weekend.

Another Baby!

YAAAAAYYYY!!! #3!!!


(May 17th)
(Warning: too many details may be listed here, so read on at your own risk) Jared has made fun of me so many times over the last year when I've taken a pregnancy test WELL before it would even register even if I was pregnant. So, I was really determined to wait this time....I didn't quite wait the suggested time, but I was close....It didn't do me much good though because even though it was a fancy early pregnancy test that was extremely expensive it came out very inconclusive....Jared thought it was for sure negative and I thought it was for sure positive (wishful thinking on my part since you really couldn't tell). So I waited a WHOLE 24 hours before testing again....this time with my back up stash of cheap-o tests and this time it looked pretty positive to me, but still not as dark as the plus sign on the box....but I was convinced and immediately decided that I FELT pregnant (suddenly I was a little queasy and tired and I could smell things that weren't there(I was convinced that our flour smelled horrible and after I had Jared and two of our neighbors smell it Jared came to the conclusion that I am going insane because no one else could smell it).....I have a very persuasive subconcious). Anyway, 48 hours later I took a third test and this time the plus sign was as dark as could be!

It took me about two minutes after getting a positive reading to sit down to the computer and start looking at baby names.....I went through an entire website for boy and girl names and made a big list of my favorites and then made Jared look at it. (For the record he said that he liked all the names I picked out) Poor Jared he's got 8 more months of my obsession and craziness! Jared was very excited and even more excited when he realized he would be able to take paternity leave during next busy season! Well, I guess thats our news, but I just wanted to share our excitement with everyone!

P.S. I can't stop smiling and couldn't be happier, but did I mention that I'm terrified of having three kids!!!!!




OK, so I wrote all that a few months ago right after we found out, and we thought it was a little early to tell the whole blogging world, so now that we have told our families, I can add to the email and give you all an update since I've been to the doctor and heard the heartbeat and everything. I am three months along and am due in January. Jared has since told me he does not like the names I picked out on the day we found out I was pregnant, and I have since gotten very attatched to them. I guess we'll just have to wait till the ultrasound in August to see what the sex is and then we can fight about names. Until then, I am just glad to be pretty much done with the yucky stage of pregnancy.

We finally got out of the city and went camping last weekend. It was so nice to get away and spend time as a family. The kids couldn't have been happier exploring and getting dirty. The weather was perfect, we had a beautiful location and great friends....what more could we ask for.

Mason and his friend Elana playing baseball.

I don't think the kids actually ate any of the marshmellows they cooked, but they enjoyed trying to cook them anyway. They ate their fill of raw marshmellows and then tried to get Jared and I to eat all their attempts at the roasted ones.

Potty Training

I am so proud of Mason. I was so worried that since he is a boy he would be really hard to potty train, but he has done great. The first two days I wanted to pull my hair out or give up and then again every time he popped in his underwear, but since then he has had hardly any accidents. What a big boy! I love being done with diapers!

The last remaining mormons in building M

We have had the most wonderful three years living in building M. Our best friends in the world have been a few feet away from us night and day. I have over the last year watched them all pack up and leave us and we are the last remains of what use to be a building full of mormons. I am feeling particularly sorry for myself, and I know that the kids are going to miss their BFFs too, so I made a slide show that no one except Tifani and Stacey are probably interested in, but none the less here are some recent pics of the building M kids.

We will miss you all!!!!!

Mia has had a busy and fun couple of last weeks of school. She had a wonderful field day where they got to compete in all sorts of races and relays. Mia favorite part was getting to smash water balloons on a chair and getting her teacher wet.


I got to go with Mia's class on their end of year picnic. It was really fun to see all the kindy's just playing and working together the whole morning. Mia has made some wonderful friends and really enjoyed her first year in school.


Mia also had her end of year program where her whole class sang songs for about 45 minutes straight (my arms were killing me after holding the video camera up for that long). Two of the Kindy teachers really focus on music and have taught the kids tons of songs this year, so it was really fun to hear everything they've learned. I was so glad that Mason loved it because he sat there the whole time and clapped after each one for Mia. I was worried that with Jared out of town I would be chasing him the whole time and not get to video, but Mason was a dream! The picture is kind of blurry, because it was dark.
I can't believe tomorrow is her last day. I am so proud of her!