Blah, Blah, Blog -Friends- and Dam Relay

So I have been away from blogland for some time again. Did you miss me? Well, I had 3 kids playing in various sports-volleyball, basketball, softball x2 (I coached a team), soccer, oh and ballet.

(This is -L- in her ballet recital, Snow White.)  Yep, I am one busy Momma! Not to mention, the end of the school year adds concerts, school programs, field days, recitals, etc.

 You know what I am talking about. Summer vacation has arrived, but we have yet to experience any summer weather.  The garden is planted and sprouting up, but with no heat and lots of rain, I am not sure how the plants will do. I am crossing my fingers hoping that we will get some of our own veggies come August and September. We are down to one kid in one sport now. -E- is playing on a tournament softball team and I am coaching. It is lots of fun. I coached her during the regular season, too. The team did great. Here is -L- hitting the ball.

It was her first year playing. She enjoyed it too, but coach pitch games sure seem alot longer than other games.

We met up with our good friends for a few hours at a park in UT. They were visiting from IL. It was so good to see them. The kids didn't miss a beat, even though its been a few years since they have seen each other. We miss them terribly and were happy to have even just a couple of hours to spend with them. We will take anytime we can get!

Ponygirl

Sweetums

Little Man

Aren't they just the cutest kids!

Luckily, these two cuties have moved from IL, to join us here in ID. They only live about an hour away.

While we were in UT, we popped in to see my sister, who gives the best haircuts ever! So -L- wanted a short bob. It looks really cute on her.

This next event really deserves an entry of it own, but hey, I'm on a roll. It might be another few months before I finally blog again.

Back in February, my sisters and I decided to run the Teton Dam Marathon Relay together as a team. We called ourselves the Bedard Sis Pack. It was a way to motivate us to get in shape and lose some weight by exercising. In February, June seemed a long way off. It came up pretty quickly! Audra announced her pregnancy  a little bit later and wasn't sure she wanted to run in the race, so my mom was going to take her place. The week before the race, Audra decided she would do her leg.

The day of the race came. The kids made signs for us and my parents "painted the bus and drove the team" (name that movie). We weren't sure if we were prepared, but we set a mile time goal that we would each try to reach, and we did! I got on the bus at 5:30 am to ride to the starting line. The morning was cool and breezy.  I had the first leg, 4 miles.

Megan had the second leg, 5 miles.

Audra, 7 months pregnant, had the 3rd leg, 4 miles.  She said she was going to walk, but the competitive drive in her kicked in and she jogged half of the time.

Michelle was leg #4, also a 4 miler.

She missed the third mile marker along the way, and couldn't believe she was all finished.

(These supportive family members were probably blocking the mile marker.)

Crystal had the hardest 4 miles on the 5th leg of the relay. It was mostly uphill, but she was a happy runner. 

Kelly got the final leg. It had some uphill and down. She ran while she was rocking out to some tunes.

We all met Kelly at the 26 mile marker so we could run the last .2 miles together and cross the finish line together. It was a fun way to finish the race.

We ended up taking 6th place out of 9 female relay teams. Not bad for our first effort. Our finishing time was 4hours 32minutes and 56 seconds. I love my sisters and really enjoy spending time together with them. We have a great time whenever we get together.

The cousins also have fun getting together.

 

Our family has also set a goal to attend the temple together once a year. We missed Chris (Audra's husband) and Casey (Kelly's husband) this year, but hopefully they will be able to attend with us next year.

A staring contest

Here is a picture of our 4 year old. She is a happy, smiley, loving child.

 One day, we decided to have a staring contest. Her eyes got big and wide, and so did her mouth.

 The bigger she tried to open her eyes, the bigger her mouth. As long as her mouth was open, her eyes stayed wide. She also was jumping in place, and giggling.

Needless to say, I lost. I was laughing at her funny expression. She was hilarious. I wish we could get her to open that wide for the dentist!

The greatest 12 year old I know

I can hardly believe that my oldest daughter turned 12!

She was quite excited for her birthday this year. I made cupcakes for her class, (I think this will be the last year for that) and birthday dinner and cake. She didn't have any requests for dinner, just something yummy and not seafood! She doesn't like any type of seafood. Her birthday cake request was ice cream cake, so I called up my sister, who had the best ice cream cake recipe I know of, and Emma loved it.

She also got to go to her first Young Women's activity on her birthday. Her youth leaders came over and welcomed her to the group that afternoon and she was off to the activity that night. She was very excited.

She is such a caring, loving, wonderful daughter. She is beautiful and talented. We feel blessed to have her in our family.  We love you -E-.

Other changes for -E- came along after her birthday. Another B--Braces. She is still sore and eating only mashed potatoes, soft bread and oatmeal, but is handling it just fine.

Skiing for the first time

I finally took -L- skiing. She was eager to learn. She has been hearing about skiing from the older two kids over the past few winters. Unfortunately, the ski school program through the public school was discontinued this year. So, -N- and -E- got snowboarding and skiing lessons for Christmas. I told -L- I would take her up sometime during the season.  I decided to take -L- last week, just to give it a try, and she loved it! Another ski buddy for me. :)  Of course, I only took her on the rope tow for the first day. She mastered it very quickly.  The day started out overcast, but then the sun came out and it was a beautiful day. Most of the time, I felt like I was shouting out food orders: Pizza, pizza!  French fries, french fries! Our next trip to the slopes she will get to ride the big lifts.

First Haircut

My baby, who is 4, finally got her first haircut. I have never wanted to cut her hair. She still lets me brush it (most of the time) and put braids and pony tails in. It is so long and beautiful. She did cut a chunk out about a year ago, but it wasn't too obvious.

I told -K- that only her Auntie Kelly could cut her hair for her, so she has been waiting for Kelly to visit us.

She sat so still, I was amazed. Kelly cut about 4 inches off the bottom.

All smiles when she was done.

No rest for Kelly when she visits us, She also cut Spalding's hair, trimmed -L-'s bangs, trimmed -E-'s hair, and colored mine. Thank you, Kelly!

The kids are elved!

We had lots of fun making the kids into elves. We hope you enjoy it!

So it's not more than 2 months

Sorry blogland, yes, today marks two months since my last post. So sorry. We have been a little busy, I have not forgotten about you, but have been selfishly reading all your posts and not writing any.  So a little run down of two months worth of our lives.
We had some friends come over for a dutch oven dinner in late September. They came to the US from Mauritius for their son's wedding. Our family dressed up in Indian clothes. The girls love to wear these outfits.

Spud harvest came and went in October. We went to my parents house. It was a relaxing break. We had our Church Super Saturday craft activity. I was in charge of three crafts. It was a busy Saturday, but lots of fun. I finally made my "Pay it Forward" gift, so Crystal, Megan, and Monica go one of these cute photo cubes. It was one of the projects we did.

We also celebrated a birthday. My baby turned 4! What would I do without her?

The kids had a fun Halloween. I told -N- he is too big to Trick or treat, dressing up is fine-no more begging for candy. He took the news just fine, only a few friends teased him about it and his sisters were generous in sharing their spoils of the night.

November went by too quickly. Another birthday. Can't believe -L- is 7! She brings lots of laughter to our house with her sense of humor.

 I took pictures of the kiddos. They are growing up way too quickly. Sorry to tell the rest of you this, but I have the most beautiful kids.

My parents made a special trip to our house. Spalding was made a High Priest in our church ward and my dad was able to ordain him. It was a quick trip and lots of driving for them, but we appreciate them for coming. My cousin also stopped by on her way to her sister's house. It was fun to see them. It snowed the entire time we were at church so we got to play in the snow, and it hasn't melted yet.

Thanksgiving was great. We went to our friends' house. We enjoyed their company and the food was wonderful. It has been a long time since I wasn't the cook, so it was very relaxing for me.

Spalding went shopping in the wee a.m. hours on Black Friday. He picked up a few items we were looking at. I slept in. I have done most of my Christmas shopping online this year. It has been awesome! No lines, great deals, and most of the time I have got free shipping right to my house. That afternoon, we put our Christmas lights up around the house.

We went and got our Christmas tree. It is lots of fun to go in the mountains and hunt for the "perfect tree".

 I was amazed once more at how wonderful my kids are. They worked together, had fun, and it was a terrific day. Spalding was quite proud of the tree.

On the way home we stopped here:

We ordered a Big Jud burger. It's a one pound hamburger, the size of your plate. If you eat the whole thing, they put your picture on their wall. Four of us split one. None of us are daring enough to try to eat the whole thing. -K- bragged that she ate her whole "big Jud" burger from her kids meal and we didn't.

Now our tree is up and Christmas is coming quickly.

I still think it should be summer, but this morning at 7 am the thermometer said -4.  BRRRR! Definately December!