Josh and Pam's Family Blog: April 2008

Here's the stories behind the pictures. :) We went to St. George a few weeks ago, E had a dance competition. We got to stay at a hotel which is always an adventure! Luckily they had an outside pool at it was actually warm in St. George; warm enough that C and Dad got a sunburn! We didn't even think about taking sunscreen. We spent Friday playing at the hotel and swimming. Little J was set on "hiking" at some point that weekend. That's all he could talk about. So we took the kids to Slick Rock Park. It's a really fun place. They have climbing walls and lots of rocks to climb up and over. They also have a little stream running through the middle so you have the water adventure too. The kids love going to this park. E had been studying rocks and geology in school and was quite sure that she had discovered gold dust in one of the rocks. It was a rock formed out of compressed sand and it made a really fine powder that would sparkle. When we were getting ready to leave the park she said, "Oh...I wish I could take home all of these rocks and study them." It was cute.

Then Saturday we spent the morning doing go-carts, mini golf, and arcades. Dad dropped off E and I at the dance competition and they went back to the mini golf, go-cart, arcade center. The boys had fun, but I just LOVE the dance competitions! E's team is undefeated for the past two years. When they danced this time, the girls were a little off so I was a bit nervous that they would have their first loss. Then one of the teams they were up against came out and they were all older girls - like 3rd and 4th graders - E's team is K, 1st, and 2nd. So then I was sure that they would have their first loss, but when the winners were announced, E's team did it again. They took 1st place and are still undefeated!

The pictures of the kids in Sunday clothes were some very exciting news..E's little friend got baptized. It is a family that their mom was baptized when she was 11 but only went to church for about a year. Around Nov. her 12yo daughter wanted to start going to church so my friend started dropping her off for church. The 8yo daughter wanted to go with her sister so my friend started dropping them both off. One day it hit her that she needed to be there with her girls - so they all started going to church. The 12yo was baptized a few months ago and E's little friend was baptized last weekend. E got to give the talk on the Holy Ghost at the baptism. It was really cute.

The other pics are from a school carnival. C and A had lots of fun jousting and boxing with each other. They had fun with it, but also got pretty aggressive with each other. I lost track of them at one point in the carnival and found them in the field wrestling. Boys.... :) J got the face painting with a batman sign on his cheek. He was pretty excited about that.

We are looking forward to a GREAT summer! I think I'm more excited about school ending then the kids are. We just got Lagoon passes and went last Saturday. It will be VERY fun!

I thought I'd post some recent pictures. We have a Nikon D70 at work that I occasionally borrow. I sure do love that camera. The problem is that it makes our Nikon Coolpix seem like a piece of junk in comparison, so I never take pictures with it. The other problem is that I can't buy myself a new camera because I am stuck. I can't justify the cost of the camera/lens I really want (the D300 with the 18-200 lens, about $2200!!! or maybe I'd settle for the D60), but I can't buy a cheaper camera knowing what I could have. So until I get some inheritance from some long lost relative I guess I will keep borrowing the D70. Anyway, here's the pics (click for larger images):