Gunner's Birthday

Well Gunner has survived to be 11! We had a small party with cousins (my favorite kind) he is now enjoying his gift of getting to play football.

For his special day he wanted pancakes with chocolate chips for breakfast, we had banana bread with chocolate chips for after school snack, and he wanted Arby's for dinner. Fine with me, less mess. We had a giant chocolate cake for dessert! It was a great day for Gunner! And to top it all off... surprise, this new pet tortoise Albert.

Gunner is a fun kid, he has so many talents it's a little unfair. If we can just guide him in the right direction he is going to be amazing!

Gunner loves to sing, play piano,(not practice) play video games,(really he would do this all day if you let him)play with his cousins,(he idolizes his cousin Conner who is just the best example for him) hang out with Alert, read,He is loving football, he loves babies, and peanut butter and Jelly sandwiches.

Piano recital 2011

In September Ashlynn and Mason performed in their annual piano recital. They both enjoy their teacher Lori Mecham. And I have to say Grandpa Gillespie would have been proud that they had their pieces memorized.

On a side note... the woes of having your daughter old enough that she won't let you fix her hair for her. It's cute, but I would have opted to see her face!

Grass head and a loaf of bread.

Just a few things Rigdon has done at the best preschool in the land.

Gunner, Arrow of Light

Gunner earned his arrow of light in September. He is on his was to Boy Scouts.
Andrew did a wonderful job on his face. He has such talent.
Shaking hands with Brother Egbert.

This happened on the same day that my sister Emilee went through the temple for the first time. We decided to divide and conquer I went with Emilee, and Andrew went with Gunner. It worked out well.

When you have a large family that's just the way it works out sometimes. I wouldn't change it for the world.

Somehow I missed these...

I was looking over my blog and realized I never posted the kids first day of school pictures!

What a slacker!So here they are. Ashlynn's first day of junior high! She was very nervous but trying to hide it.
Gunner, Mason, and Sienna just tickled to go!
And Rigdon patiently waited for his first day of preschool.

They all love it! So far it's going great!

Finally the rest of the trip.

We some stand up paddle boarding, of course you are thinking that's not standing... but you have to kneel till you get to the place to stand.
Our instructor (her name was turtle) took us down a little stream, which also had many turtles swimming around. It was beautiful and fun!
Oh look! Standing! We did it and were pretty good at it, if I do say so myself.
Sunday we went to church with the Evansons, some friends who have a house in our neighborhood but are working in Oahu for a few years. Then we went to check out the Temple. It was breathtaking.
This is the view from the front of the temple looking to the ocean.
I love these giant trees!
Andrew working our rental car.

From one temple to another. We drove around the east side of the island to check it out and found the valley of the temples. It was a cemetery and a buddhist temple.
Also very beautiful.

Then we checked out the point, a place where you can do some cliff jumping. We did not.
We randomly ran into Shauna Evanson, for the second time.
Finished off our trip with a day of snorkeling before it was time to get to the airport and back to real life.
It was wonderful to be away and free from responsibilities, but we were ready to see the children and get back to our comfortable bed.

shark encounter.

Andrew and I braved a shark tank on Friday in Hawaii. I have to say I was more nervous about the scuba than the sharks. Strange, I know.

They used to throw stuff in to draw the sharks but have since stopped. THey said that the sharks are naturally drawn to the boat motors. they just turn on the motor and the sharks come because most boats are fishing and it's an easy meal for them.

Had I had this knowledge before we did the dolphin encounter I would have been nervous about jumping into the ocean to check out the dolphins or snorkel. Obviously that boat had a motor and we were just dropped off...

It was a little eerie to be the one in the cage while the sharks swam around and checked us out. There were three 6 foot long sand sharks circling.
I have been trying to load the video onto here but blogger doesn't seem to be cooperating. I tried facebook and it loaded right up. I'll keep working on it. It's so much more cool than just the still pictures.

By the way there is a big open window along one side of the cage that is plenty big enough for a shark to swim right in. Is that really safe?