Surprise!

School is rough! I'm only in 1 class but it's Anatomy and it's HARD! When I got out of the car I was just looking forward to being with my family. When I walked in the house, Jake and the kids were hiding and jumped out and yelled, "Happy Valentine's Day!" and this was what I found on the table...

Ahhh, I LOVE my family!

I enjoyed the early festivities with hugs and kisses, a few pieces of candy and a few cookies! and then we had to finish making valentines.

The kids were off to bed and I told Jake I needed to watch some mindless television. Rushed to get jammies on and then cozied on the couch to watch "Once Upon a Time." :)



Final Grade

K, I know you think I'm crazy but on this last exam I got 78 out of 80 pts! Totally worth taking it, that was my best exam grade yet!
Final Grade in the class...931.5 pts out of 900.17 pts possible! An A! But I say it's an A++ :)

back to blonde...

What's new at our house?

MY HAIR! :)

Havasupai!

This last weekend I had the privilege of going with my dad and Tori and Sophi to Havasupai. Havasupai is an Indian Village (Indian Reservation) at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. We went along with Bingham's, Larry and Diana and Casey and Carly and Mark and Shelly Reeve. We left Wednesday and stayed in Peach Springs for one night, a small town that is off route 66 and was inspiration for the town Radiator Springs in the Pixar movie Cars. We hiked down the canyon and into the village on Thursday and after getting settled in our room in the lodge we got our bathing suits on and hiked to the first waterfall. Beautiful!!! The water is a turquoise color. The Indian word Supai means "the people of the blue green waters" and it is so true. The color of the water is breathtaking. We found a water hole to swim in and Sophi and I decided to go down some tiny rapids. They were tiny with huge damage. I went down feet first how I've been taught and my upper left thigh and lower right leg got majorly scraped up. I stopped myself on this big rock and climbed up and then I was stuck. Then came Shelly, and I was freaking out because I knew she was going to hit all the same rocks that I hit. She did get a little scraped but not as badly as me. Then Tori was on the bank and she asked "okay how do I get down there" and I said "no, you do not want to come through these rapids, I'm stuck can you help me out?" She reached for me from the bank and helped me out. THANK HEAVENS! I asked the girls, Didn't you here me screaming as I was getting scraped by rocks? and they said yes we thought they were screams of joy! :) Friday we hiked to the other two waterfalls past the first and again they just took my breath away. My dad was a great photographer as usual, he takes pictures of everything. :) Thursday and Friday night Dad, Tori, Sophi and I played several grueling games of hand and foot. Saturday we hiked out in the morning and drove home. The village was so interesting, dirt everywhere with horse poop everywhere too. No cars, just horses for transportation and we saw one tractor and a helicopter that would make trip after trip getting supplies to them. We saw him bring several trips of hay for the horses. There is 1 diner to eat at and the food was extremely average, good fry bread though, everyone liked the fry bread. There was a tiny grocery store with Wheaties that cost $10. There was an elementary school, for high school the kids have to go out of the canyon for the 4 years. A great trip, a great experience, so happy to be a part of it, loved being a part nature and enjoyed every minute of this beautiful world God created for us!!! Thanks Dad and Tori!

And so it begins...our adventure!

The hike down we stopped every 5 minutes to take pictures, so beautiful!

These mules carried our bags and others down to the village for us, good horsies!

This is the lodge we stayed in, it was a good home to us for 2 nights.

The famous and very necessary helicopter...

The first falls we hiked to on Thursday... (me, Carly, Sophi, Dad, Tori and Mark)

The roaring rapids :)

Waterfall #2 (I'm terrible I only remember 1 waterfalls name)

This took our breath away, Sophi kept saying "you've GOT to be kidding me!" Waterfall #3
This was Friday, we continued on to Mooney Falls and then came back here and went swimming, we (Shellie, Sophi, and Casey and I) swam behind the waterfall :O so scary, so exilarating, so glad I did it, what an experience!!

(me, Sophi, Dad, Tori, Shellie, Mark, Diana, Casey and Carly) (Larry was behind his awesome camera that was in a waterproof case)
Okay I know the name of this one...Mooney Falls...TERRIFYING :)

You had to crawl through caves...

and hang onto chains to get to the base of this waterfall! Made me a little nervous...

so happy when I reached the bottom! :)

This is a great story...Sophi and I went in the store to get some Powerade for our hike out. The girl behind the cash register had some great earrings on and we saw her with different ones on the day before, so cute! Sophi and I leave and discuss if we should ask her if we can buy her earrings, we decide YES! We go back inside the store and Sophi says "can I buy your earrings?" She grabs her ears and says, "I don't know" with a huge smile on her face. She takes them out and says "okay". Sophi gives her $20. Sophi bought Indian earrings right out of the ears of an Indian. :) I ask her if she makes them and if she has more, she does make them and she had more at her house. I asked her if she could take us there and I would buy a pair too. She did, she took us to her house, walked along the dirt road and under some barbed wire and she brought out about 4 pairs of earrings, Tori and I both bought a pair and I told her that next time I came down I want to see her earrings for sale in the store, she smiled. Her name is Alta but people call her Donna, she has 4 kids.

The LDS church

The hike up and out, STAYING STRONG!

When I got home I found this card that Sierra had put together for me and her whole class at school signed it :)

(inside)

My kids are so cute, when I told Ashton I went to an Indian Village. He said, "you saw Indians? Are they nice to people or do they try to fight you?"

Sierra said, "Were there Cowboys there too?"

Today is my birthday...

and it was a great day, it's been a great week. I've pampered myself and my mom has helped. Earlier in the week I went and got my eyebrows waxed, to save money I have been tweezing my eyebrows for over a year, A YEAR!!!! It was great to have someone do them for me. Yesterday I went and got a new hairdo and my mom scheduled and paid for me to get a manicure and pedicure. It's been a long time for both of those too. Feels great and yet wierd to have my fingernails painted and I love a great pedicure, hot pink is my color of choice and I just love how they look. Thanks mom!!!!

The kids slept at my mom's house with Norris and Brenna, they built a huge fort in the living room and they all slept in it. What a great Uncle and Auntie! I got to sleep in on my birthday. I got up at about 8:40am, but I didn't get out of bed until 9:00am. Brenna, Sierra and Ashton made me breakfast at my mom's house and brought it down to me. I had homemade waffles made from scratch and they were delicious. Thanks so much to the 3 of you!!! Love you tons!!!


Then we headed to the beach! I love the beach and was excited to spend my birthday there. Sophi came with her boys and mom-in-law (Charlene), and sis-in-law (Trisha) who were visiting for the week. Norris and Brenna came with Brenna's mom and dad. Marshall and James came and Jake came with me and the kids. We all had a relaxing and play filled day at the beach! :)

Jake was throwing the football with James. He threw it with me a little bit too! :)

These guys had a great rally going, they made it to 103!

This was my favorite part of the beach birthday, Sierra out in the water with Norris!

Norris is surfing...

and then he asked Sierra if she wanted to try!

She is SURFING!!! She is so cute!!!

Ashton told me "I want to surf with Uncle Norris!"Here he goes...

Let's do it again...

There's another cute surfer in the water...

What a great day!!! When we got home the kids went to my mom's and Jake and I went and had sushi, it's half off at GEISHO and it was so so yummy!!!! Went back to mom's and had some freshly baked cookies and played a game that Brenna taught us with mom, Chris, Norris, Brenna, Sierra, Jake, me, James and Marshall and later Norris' friends, Scott C. and Adam R., came and joined us. We were all in a circle passing signs, really fun!!!! We laughed alot, I love those fun games. Came home and put kids to bed and watched "Mr. Woodcock." I had a great birthday and I told Jake, I'm not a year older, I'm a year wiser. :)