Sunday, April 18, 2010

Posts

I have a whole bunch of pictures uploaded with titles to each post but no words on them. I am in a posting funk again and maybe it was because I tried so hard to get caught up that I overloaded myself and most likely you with too many posts. I have a love hate relationship with my blog. I love that my family all over can be involved with our lives. I hate it when I just have no words to share. Maybe I will post them all with no words...just the titles and you all can figure out what is going on and make up your own captions? Really I just need to get out of my funk and move forward. What is your opinion?

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Track and Field Day


Track and Field day was fun for Sariah and I to attend.
Here is Justin's teacher Ms. G racing all the boys in the class....Justin is the one in the orange shirt. Justin is one strong little man and his team won all of the tug of war contests between the 3rd graders.

Sariah had a lot of fun cheering with me for Justin. She would say "Go Justin Go!"

My cute sister Laurel is also a third grader and Sariah got to spend sometime with her during the event.

Goodbye Utah


3 Generations....Sariah squished in the middle. Seriously I think they are going to be bestest friends.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Fun with the Balmanno's



I got to visit with some of my old college friends while in Utah. They are not old it's just been 12 years since we were in college together. I actually new them before there oldest was even a twinkle in their eyes...now she is 13.
I didn't take any pictures of my friends ... I just forgot. But I got the kiddos.
Here are the kids running around with the wagon and the dog. Sariah loved playing with these guys.

Thanks for letting us come over for dinner and play. We need to get together more often that is for sure!

Wing Night

There are some people who just make you smile every time you are with them. When I worked up in Park City one season I made some friends who do just that, make me smile! 2 of them still live in PC and one now lives in Idaho. When they heard I was coming to Utah and they wanted to do a wing night just like the good ol'times. Matt drove down to PC from Idaho and they all drove down to Orem to see me.
We had a blast hanging out for a good 4 hours. Seriously, I haven't laughed so hard in such a long time. The weird thing about this group of people is that none of us are even remotely close in age, 2 of us are mormon and 2 of us aren't, but we have sooooo much fun together because we have the same sense of humor and goofyness. I love these guys and can hardly wait for our next wing night reunion.

Beautiful Deby and MattLovely Lou and I....Lou actually got carded for the first time in years at this fine establishment.

Mormon gals and their Diet Dr. Pepper

The Budweiser Water crew. :)

All 4 of us in front of the wings place being silly.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

The Reason


This lovely couple is the reason why I went to Utah for an extended weekend.
This is my best friend from High School, Leeonna with her husband Carlos.The wind was blowing like crazy and blew straight up my dress right when the picture was taken, so my dress looks a lot fuller then in should be.

Cousin Lovin


Seriously these 2 cousins are going to be best friends. Sariah could not stop giving Abe hugs and loves. They are so cute together, I couldn't stop taking pictures of them. Love Abe's face

Will you share your M&M's with me.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Airplane! Trip to Utah

Sariah and I got to leave on a jet plane to go visit Utah for an extended weekend.
Sariah was so excited to finally go on a plane that while we were at the airport she watched the planes intently. She would say, "Big Plane, Sariah's Big Plane?" Then I would ask her where we were going to go on the big plane and she would respond with, "Tallie and Ebe" Ebe would be her cousin Abe.
While in Utah we stayed with my cute sister Tallie and her little family. Sariah instantly wanted to follow Abe around every where....
Here they are pretending to take a nap.

Abe isn't really asleep.

Neither is Sariah.

This year my mom is getting 5 new grandkids. The one pregnant lady who is missing from this picture lives in Texas and actually had her baby boy a month early in February. All the pregnant ladies are so cute and so excited. My mom is getting 4 boys and 1 girl out of all the grand babies this year.

My brother Hugh wanted to be a part of the picture so he pretended to be pregnant too.

Left to Right: Cynthia is due in May, Tallie is due at the beginning of June, Sarah is due at the beginning of July, and Julie is due at the end of July. Aren't they all so adorable.

Sariah playing with some of her cousins. I took this picture to show how long my nephew Kent's hair has gotten....he is the one sitting on the floor with long blond hair.

Cute relaxing pregnant ladies.

My Mom and Dad Kent, with Tallie's hubby.

The first day I was there we celebrated my brother Kent's birthday...here he is blowing out his cupcake candles.

This gal knows what the good stuff is...she only eats the icing.

Kent enjoying his cupcake with the long hair.

Happy Craziness


What happens to your 8 year old after he has had some sugary treat?
This is what happens to mine....happy craziness!He gets a little bit crazy and my once boy who doesn't want his picture taken starts posing.

Justin my little man, even though your happy craziness might not come at the right times....I love it, almost as much as I love you!

Sunday, April 11, 2010

New Additions in the House March 21st


I love craigslist for many reasons but the reason why I love it today.....we got a beautiful dining room table and big screen tv for a major deal. Here you can see both purchases....we got them from the same owners. I actually had been looking for a dining room table for some time on craigslist, waiting for the perfect find. When I found one in our price range and it looked from the pictures to be in great condition I emailed them immediately. The table is solid wood and so beautiful and so very heavy. When we went to pick up the table...did I mention that it came with a credenza too...the couple who we got it from asked if we want to buy their tv.
James of course had been wanting a big screen for a long time and asked them how much they wanted. They said make us an offer...which he did and they accepted his $200. Seriously, it was a great price for such a big tv and we love having it.
We brought the couch in from the garage so we could have a place to sit and watch tv. The doors were still in the picture and have yet to be put back in place since they are still not painted....that is another post at another time.

Gretchen, Mark, and Hank come for a visit!!

Gretchen and Mark had a good friend get married in Arizona during the month of March and got to come visit us! I was so excited that Gretchen was coming to AZ for a visit, that I forgot to charge my camera battery before she got here. The only pictures I got of their weekend visit, were of us at the park when they first got here and then right before they left. We had so much fun while they were here and can hardly wait for them to come back and visit.

Gretchen took this picture of Hank and Sariah in the tunnel together and I love it!!!Gretchen also took this picture of Hank on the slide. He is such a cutie...and no I did not pull is arm out of the socket.

Here is Sariah in her favorite place at the park....right in the middle of the twisty slide. She will climb up it and look around to find who she wants to play with....right now I think she was looking for Justin.
Sariah and Hank got to swing together.

Justin loves his soccer ball and will play with it over and over again. He loved that Gretchen played soccer with him multiple times while she was here.

One of the great things that we did with Gretchen and Mark that we didn't take pictures of is when we went to Organ Stop Pizza. I blogged about Organ Stop Pizza a year ago when we visited it for the first time. There are some great pictures of the Organ from our first visit.
Gretchen asked me before they came if I knew of a good pizza place. Mark and Gretchen like to visit local pizza joints whenever they are in a new city, trying to find the best pizza. Since we are cheap and always get our pizza's at Sam's club I couldn't think of anything local to be the best pizza. Organ Stop Pizza is not the best pizza in town but is my far the most entertaining.
Mark and Gretchen loved it. I so wish I could of had a working camera when they saw the Organ for the first time. It was a great night.

Gretchen and I managed to spend the saturday morning before they went to the wedding, jumping around garage sales while the boys installed the microwave in my kitchen. We found many great things and both only spent $25 for a whole bunch of stuff.
Here is Hank playing with a chair Sariah earned for being so cute. The lady gave it to Sariah for free. You can also sort of see the little kids table I got for $7 in the background.

Right before they left to go back to California
Gretchen, Hank, and Mark

They bought be beautiful flowers before they left as a thank you for letting them stay with us for the weekend.

We love the Lewis family and are so glad they spent some of their trip with us!
Please come visit us again!!!!!

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Mesa Arizona Main Steet Sculpture Photos


During spring break we got together with my cute little sisters and some of Patty's nieces' and nephews for a tour of downtown Mesa, Arizona. They have these awesome sculptures/statues positioned all along Main Street. We went on a hunt to take some pictures with the sculptures/statues.

Here is cute Brynn with her cousin Phoebe. Our first set of statues that we found were of a Grandma sitting on a bench and what looks like her husband standing up with their lunch in the middle. Justin and 2 of the other Stark cousins are sitting on the lunch. When we walked up to the sculpture I sat Sariah down on Grandma's lap and she freaked out. She was totally not a fan of the stiff looking people.

But when I told the kids to make a crazy faces, little miss Sariah joined in and did a great job. Menleigh looks like she is getting tooo personal with Grandpa.

The Momma Bear feeding her cubs some fish.

Justin is pretending he is one of the cubs.

I don't even remember what this one was...but they all have such cute faces.

This was a huge shoe and the kids really had a good time trying to get on to it.

Cute little Zeke was to tired to be in the first few pictures and he took a snooze in the stroller.

This is the sculpture I wanted to see. I think this pink chair is so awesome. I should of made them take a picture of me in it...but I was too busy taking pictures of the kiddos.
My little sisters looking so cute. The lighting wasn't the best with it shining in their eyes.

My kiddos looking so little in the big pink chair.

Isn't he just the handsomest?

Is Menleigh kissing this guy too?

As you can see some kids started opting out of the pictures toward the end of our wal.

Peek-a-boo

I see you

Loved this one of Patty looking at the scrapbook with the kiddo sculpture.

Two cuties taking a break.

This pig was lots of fun....Justin jumped right on top of him.

We love Brynn!

Once again Sariah was afraid of the statue and her Honey had to show her how to kiss the pig.

Wahoo Sariah kissed the piggy.

Then she lovingly picked it's nose.

Looked at his toes.

Found his tail.

And gave him a love goodbye.

Our last sculpture for the day were these huge people. This was by far my favorite shot of the big kids in front of the tall people. They are sitting on top of the suitcase and I am on the ground.

Here are all the kiddos at the feet of the big people.

Funny facese

Brynn is so short.

Thanks to everyone for being good sports on our photo shot of Main Street. I had a lot of fun and the kids enjoyed Mesa Frozen Yogurt afterwards.