May Showered!!

The craziness of April flowed right into May.

First, there was a super fun field trip with Bridon to the Biosphere II in Tucson.

Then a great mother's day put on by the boys

Many fun activities to get ready for Girls Camp.

And finally, end of the school year parties and fun.

Me taking a picture of me and Bridon at the Biosphere Field Trip.

Bridon and some of his crazy friends - Ben and Max - stealing Bridon's Nachos.
It was a long bus ride there and back, but we had a good time.
And thanks to my friend Wendy a little less boring.


The boys sure did mother's day up nice for me.
Bridon made me a cool power point presentation on the computer.
Danner made me a trophy that said "Best Mother Award"
Beautiful flowers, sweet notes, breakfast in bed, the works!
It was a great day.


Kyler's graduation day at Bounce Jungle.
What a cute group of boys!!!

April Showered!

It has been many, many months since I have posted. I have a lot to catch up on.

So here is April in a nutshell:

Football games

Easter

13th - Coleson & Kyler B-day party

17th - Coleson's B-day, Bridon leaves for 1st Turkey Hunt

(which is why we had b-day party on Monday)

18th - Kyler's B-day
24th - Tommy's B-day - jester's, dinner, night out!

Wow! You better go have your dad clean your teeth!

Cousins buried Danner.

We told them they couldn't cover the head.

Can u find Danner's head?

Well this was our Easter picture this year.

No Sunday Best this year.

Kyler won the egg rolling contest at the Bowen's this year. He still talks about how he beat everyone in the egg rolling contest and can't wait to beat everyone again next year. Nice trophy Kyler!

Kyler and Coleson's combined birthday party.
The beauty of having a 2 and 4 year old who don't care if they have their own special day yet. I am afraid that might have to start next year with Kyler turning the big 5.

"I love Chocolate!!!"

A little April shower on these cupcakes.

*****

This month's moments:

Easter - This year was a little bit different in the tradition of the Bowen family. We usually do Easter baskets and Easter Egg hunt on Sunday morning. This year we did our Easter Baskets on Saturday so that we could focus more of our time on Sunday on the Savior and the true purpose of Easter. It was really nice. Hopefully a new tradition in the life of the Bowen's.

Bridon's first Turkey - Bridon's first Turkey hunt was a little frustrating for him because he got a shot and missed at 10 yds. After that, he and his dad shot the gun again and realized the sites were way off. If the sites had been on, he would have shot a turkey on his first hunt. He's excited to try again next year.

Tommy's birthday - For the first time in many years, Tommy wasn't hunting on his birthday. It was fun to have him around and spend the weekend with him. Probably a little selfish on my part. He would probably prefer spending the weekend with me on a hunting trip.

April Fools

Bridon came home from school today looking very upset. I asked him how his day was and he said in a very sad voice that he got in big trouble and was getting a 3-day in school suspension. I said, "Ha! Ha! very funny, April Fools. He said, "No mom, for real, and he pulls this slip out of his backpack. I look at it and my heart drops. I said, "are you serious Bridon?" Then I started to read it. It said that he had used Abusive language with his teacher. I knew instantly there was no way Bridon could ever use bad language and I said, "Oh, Bridon you had me for a second there."

**********

Then the fun began. Tommy is always getting the best of us. So Bridon and I decided we were going to team up and get dad. We whited out that he used abusive language and marked something else, more believable for Bridon. Then we got him! We had him going for quite a while. He was worrying about what we should do as a punishment for Bridon and everything. We love you Dad! April Fools! We got you good!

Who's the Man

Caroline had these pictures on her blog, and I couldn't resist I had to steal them. On Wednesday of Spring Break (3/18/09), we took the kids swimming at Caroline's pool. Tena said she would pay whoever could stay in the pool the longest a dollar. After what seemed like forever (10-15 min.), Tena started to worry about them being in the cold water for too long and said she would pay them all a dollar. So, they all hopped out and warmed up on the trampoline. Then off to the Dollar Tree to spend their loot. The Dollar Tree just opened across the street. It is the newest favorite place for all the kids in the neighborhood. Kyler didn't quite understand what the Dollar Tree was though. He thought it was a place to go and get dollars, not to spend them.

Old favorites

12/9/08 - Kyler got hurt and I asked him how bad it hurt. He said, "Like 8 miles away."8/31/08 - When we were at the cabin for Labor Day weekend, Kyler woke up on Sunday morning and came in the kitchen. His Uncle Bill asked him, "Kyler, how did you sleep?" And Kyler said, "Like this," and he laid down on the ground to show Uncle Bill how he slept.

5/24/08 - We were all in the car and Kyler said "I went to Disneyland." Danner said, "No you didn't." Kyler said, "yes I did." Danner said, "What did it have there?" So Kyler started telling him all about the trampolines and other things that were at an open gym that he went to with some friends. It was great - what a 3 year old thinks Disneyland is.

4/13/08 - Today after church we were talking to the boys about what they learned at church. We started talking about resurrection and the spirit world. I told Danner, "Remember when we were talking about how Grandma McBride was probably waiting in the spirit world to be resurrected?" He said, "She hasn't been resurrected yet?" We told him probably not, you have to wait your turn. Bridon said, "What if she got a Fast Pass?" (We just got back from Disneyland three days ago and in Disneyland they have what are called fast passes so you can get on rides faster)

Just a Day at the Park

Last week a few women in our ward took our kids to the park. Wow! What a bunch of cute kiddos.

Tena brought some bread for the kids to feed to the ducks. That was a hit.
Coleson and Emma.

Watch out girls, he's quite the lady's man.

Spring Break

The first day of Spring Break a friend of my dad invited our entire family to come to the Herpetology Exhibit in Phoenix. In the picture above: Geordan, Hunter, Ty, Bridon, Coleson, Bryce, Danner, David, Brayden, Madison, McKenzie, Kyler, Jason, and Grandpa.
They got to feed, pet and ride on tortoises. They saw all different kinds of turtles and tortoises.

We even tried to get Coleson to surf on top of one of the tortoises, but he wasn't too happy about that.

Cousins Bryce, McKenzie, Ty and Hunter

Coleson was pretty scared of the Tortoises, but somehow he wasn't too scared of this humongous beast. They also watched the volunteers there feed some of the crocodiles. Bridon and Danner loved every minute of this. Especially when they got to hold the snake. Bridon would follow the snake around with whoever was holding it.

Bridon and his cousin Jake.

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Some other things the boys were able to do during Spring Break were:

1. Have a sleepover with some cousins

2. Go to Jump and Shout with friends and cousins
3. Go to Peter Piper Pizza and on a hike with some friends.

4. Went to the movie Inkheart with friends.

5. Went to a Space Museum with some friends and then came back to their house to help make space ships out of big refigerator boxes.

I know it looks like all we did was play, but the boys also worked hard and helped me out a whole lot during the week. It was fun having them home. Thanks for a great week boys.

Football

Well football has begun again. This is Danner's first year and Bridon's second. We really have a good time watching the boys play football.
Coleson and Kyler keep us busy and entertained at the Football games. Below Kyler has caught a lady bug and is showing his little friend Ashley

Pinewood Derby

Pinewood Derby was on March 7 this year. Bridon picked and a pretty cool style for his car. Tommy has always let Bridon do whatever he wanted with his car for the pinewood derby. The first year was pretty much trial and error. The second was all about winning. And this year it was all about the style of his car. Bridon's car was pretty cool looking, but there was a little too much weight on the back. Anyway, to get his car to race they had to turn it around backwards. After that, it didn't do too bad.
Bridon was not in uniform this day. He recently lost his shirt, book and neckerchief.

Valentines Day

Over Valentines weekend we were invited to go to the Breinholt's Cabin.

We had such a good time. It was a quick trip. We traveled up Friday night and came back Saturday night. Friday night we hung out, ate good food, and watched a movie. Saturday the Breinholts took us snowmobiling. Tommy and I had never been before. It was so much fun.

Lindsey, Jaime, Angie ready to be some snowmobiling mamas.


Tyson, Tyson and Tommy (lookin' good)

Thanks for a great weekend Breinholts. We had a blast!

Family Pictures

Just before Christmas my cousin Annaka took some family pictures for us. Needless to say, the past couple of months have been crazy and I am just now getting some of these posted. She did an amazing job. She is just starting to do it professionally and I was so excited to have these done. Thanks Annaka. You are awesome. She really captured my kiddos so perfectly.

Bridon, age 10, isn't he sooo cool.

Danner, age 7, watch out girls.

Kyler, age 3 1/2, have you ever seen such a sweet face.

Coleson, 19 months. So serious.

I love this picture because it is the perfect Coleson look.

"Sometimes being a brother is even better than being a superhero!" Marc brown

I love this picture because when I look at it reminds me how Kyler was being so grumpy and unhappy about pictures and then Bridon took him and put him on his shoulders and started playing with him. From that point on Kyler was great about pictures. Bridon is so fun and really knows how to be a great big brother. Thanks Bridon for being such a sweetheart.

I don't think I have to tell you why I love this picture, but I will explain anyway.

Kyler and Coleson weren't being very happy about pictures and so to distract them the other boys started roaring like lions. This is Coleson looking at Danner like "You're a crazy brother!" I love it. I am so glad we got pictures of Danner missing his two front teeth. It is soo cute.

Wow! I could eat those two up they are so cute.

Bedtime

One of my favorite times of the day is when we are putting Coleson to bed. Kyler insists that we sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" every night. Coleson is getting to where he knows some parts of the song. He always sings "old ball game" really loud. As soon as the song starts all of the boys come running in to sing to Coleson and give him goodnight hugs and kisses. I love how sweet they are with Coleson and that they come running when they know he is going to bed.

The Rainbow

I just love how kids think. I really wish that I could think the way that they do.

The other day Kyler saw a rainbow in the sky. He said, "Mom look it's a rainbow!" He was so excited to see the rainbow. And then a few minutes later he stops and says, "Mom, what does it feel like to touch a rainbow."

Snow Trip

The day after Christmas (while Tommy was off hunting) the boys and I packed up and went with his family on their annual snow trip to Pinetop.

Coleson did actually put a jacket played in the snow a little. We dragged him around on the sled and rode him around on the quad. . .

but mostly he stayed nice and cozy warm inside the cabin.

Kyler loved playing in the snow, throwing snow balls, riding the quad, and riding on the sled. That is, he loved riding on the sled until everyone started playing the bomb the sled game. He did not like this for sure, as you can see below. In this game, the sled is pulled by the quad and as it drives by everyone tries to jump on and push other people off the sled

A very fun game for sure. . .

but can result in some bodily harm as you can tell by Danner's head.
Below, Bridon and Danner and Bailee.

The boys are inside the igloo that them, their cousins and Aunt Carolee and Uncle Bill dug out of snow pile in front of the cabin. It was pretty amazing. It not only had a front door but a back door with a little slide down area coming in the back door.