new family pics by dave

hey everyone, it's that time of year again. time to have our family pictures done and show off our beautiful family to everyone!!! here they are. colby is 8, rebekah 6, caleb 4, and rachel just shy of 18 months. yahoo. where does the time go?? sheesh!!

thanks to dave, for taking our pictures for us, on such short notice, and even doing a little touch up work on them for us. we really appreciate his expertise in this area, and letting us benefit from it!! :)

it has been a great thanksgiving weekend. kris and heather and their families have been down since sunday, and we have been having a very fun time. we haven't done anything super exciting, just enjoying spending time together. and a big thank you goes out to all the crowther girls for entertaining my kids and heathers. thanks to jenna, kellie, alissa, and katie!! we love you, and the kids love you. it has been a good chance to get to know these wonderful girls better. i keep telling kris that she can loan me one every month or so!! it makes such a difference to have older and helpful kids around!!

nathan's birthday is today, so i want to say how grateful i am to have him in my life, and that we can be together as still like each other!! he is truly my other half, and i love him more every day. thanks for being my best friend and love of my life!!

right now we are having a tailgate party watching the byu game. have a good weekend everyone!!

time really flies

ok, per heather's request, i am officially back to the posting world. although i really don't think that anyone else cares!! for those who don't know, we were asked, not so nicely, to vacate our home, and we had less than a week to do it in. we were told on saturday, found house on tues, and moved sat, mon and tues. we were officially in on wednesday, when the tv was turned on!! :) it's been a crazy, rollercoaster of a month so far. we didn't have enough time to prepare and pack properly, so basically everything was thrown together into the nearest box if we wanted to keep it. this eliminated a lot of clutter, but the stuff i thought we would sell or donate, ultimately ended up in the dump with all the rest of the excess. we were told that the house was fine, but the yard needed to be completely cleaned up. if it wasn't nailed down, it had to go. so another 2 hours and a few meltdowns after we thought we were done, we actually were done.

so now we are in our new house. it is almost half the size of the previous one, but does have a pool and little grass area with a side porch for the kids to run around on. they have a toy room, and were able to bring their beds, which is all they cared about. kids are amazingly resilient!! we are back in my old stomping ground now, my elementary school is literally around the corner. it's a little crazy being back in the old ward, but enough people have moved in and out that it is a very different place. hopefully we will fit in soon. the kids have a hard time not knowing all the neighbors and having many places to run. but they will live, i'm sure. we are all very blessed, and we just keep reminding ourselves all the time of that fact!! nathan's work is less than 3 miles away, and as long as the car runs, the kids school is less than 10. so we are happy.

i just tried to get new pictures with my camera, and it is black!! aah!! i will cry if it is broken!!

lost addresses!!!

hey everyone, i accidentally deleted my listing of everyone's blogs on the side of the page!! if you don't see yours on here, can you please send me a link to it!! i am sad that i am missing out on so many people's stuff! there are fun pictures and stories out there i'm not getting!! thanks

colby's stuff

well, this post is kind of about colby today. i posted the pictures backwards, so we'll start with tonight. colby earned his bobcat award for cub scouts, and he's only been a scout for a month!! we are so proud of him! for earning it, dad got to paint his face with different colors and places representing different qualities they want the scouts to possess. it was very cool to see!

he kept his eyes closed, like he was afraid dad would stick the paint in his eye!

then we have colby's baptism. he was baptized on saturday the 17th, and confirmed an official member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It was an amazing day. here's the happy parents with him!

he was baptized at the same time as his 2 cousins, logan and katie. here they are with their baptizers (josh is katie's older brother, and was able to baptize her, it was awesome)



dad and colby

the crazy kids, logan, colby and katie, waiting for the big event!!

we are so proud of all of you guys!!

too much!!

wow, there are a lot of things going on around here!! the older kids both had their birthdays, so we had seperate family parties, and a together, friends party. rebekah got a cabbage patch doll, and rachel loves it. here she is putting on the shorts and undies from the poor doll!!

rachel coloring on the sidewalk with chalk, and rebekah drawing in her new journal

rebekah's new bike, that is a little too big, but she loves anyway!!

rachel and her pony tails that barely have any hair!!

yummy, corn on the cob!!

i was so sick and miserable for colby's birthday, poor kid. here i am trying not to die while he opens presents. thanks everyone!!

such a big girl, eating cereal!!

boogie rachel, boogie

rachel has learned that when we sit down to watch our new favorite show, the big bang theory, it is her cue to dance! she absolutely loves the opening song, and comes running from wherever she is in the house to come watch it. i've gotten videos of it before, but this is way better than any of those. the quality isn't very good, but you get the gist. this girl can boogie!!

september silliness

dad and the kids snuggling in bed, watching teen titans, their new favorite show. they get a new show they like, and pretend they are the characters. for the next few days, i was woken up being asked, who is the green guy, what is the girl's name?? thanks dad!!

the kids are in a music class, called let's play music. it is a 3 year program, and to make things easier, they all started this year. they are learning the scale, hand signs for each note, rhythms and lots more. they love it. here is caleb practicing on his bells for class.

and our new favorite pasttime is my new wii game, the american idol karaoki edition. my sisters and i play it, and here, we actually got nathan to join in! he did well, despite telling us repeatedly that he couldn't sing. simon does not agree!! although, i did win most of the rounds..... it is awesome to be critiqued by paula, she loves everything you do!! i will be auditioning for a real person this week, let's hope they like me as much as she does! wish me luck!

dad and the kids

it's kinda like i only like rachel and caleb, but that's not true, they are just the ones home with me all day. i take lots of pics when i'm bored!! i love this picture with dad and the kids. they are so adorable!!
and rachel in this white tennis dress that aunt kirsten gave abby, and now we have, is so cute!!





























the kids in the bath after swimming. we do this a lot just to get the chlorine off of everyone. they are silly kids!!

rachel brought her bike inside and has been riding it a lot. it's very cute!!

getting ready for a nap with daddy. such cuties!!

marne's childhood pics

this is me ready for church. mom always took pictures of me standing in the entryway when she thought i needed a picture taken. it is a family joke now!! i posted it to show that i can look cute, i think i've just forgotten!!

ok, so some of these are really small!! the first picture is of my uncle jimmy judd, the previous sheriff of cochise county, who was the judge at the time. me and my sisters, monica and tatiana were there to observe him in action for a class we were taking.

then, these are of me and my friend, allison. we were silly teenagers.

tattie took me to see riverdance after graduation, and here we are standing outside of the theater. it was awesome!!

high school graduation after tattie got off her mission. with chelsea, and my parents.

and me, at age 4 and 6. nathan thinks these look like rebekah. i don't see it!!

i had fun sorting and organizing my pictures from my own album this weekend. i am in the process of making my own scrapbook. everyone in the family has one but me, even dad!! it's nothing fancy, but at least explains about all the weird pictures i have!! it's been fun to take a stroll down memory lane. how time flies!!

kids are back

isn't rebekah full of it? this was after school the first day.
here is rachel loving on grandma after church. she runs up and wraps her arms around grandma's legs begging to be picked up. then she hugs and snuggles. it's awesome.

poor caleb had a toy taken away or something here. he really didn't want his picture taken, but i am a mean mom and did it anyway!!

rachel posing and playing in her cutie outfit














this darling little munchkin has been getting into all sorts of trouble now that the older kids are back in school!! the other day it had been quiet for too long, so i went searching....this is what i found!! little twerp was up on the shelves eating chips!! good thing she is so cute!!

i am a bad mom and forgot to take a picture before the kids left for school. so here is one after they got home!

nathan has decided he has been a trucker for about as long as he can stand, and is going back to school to try to better our lives. he will get his computer networking certifications in 3 months or so, and hopefully get a job soon after.

oh, and NO we did not keep the dog!!

summertime fun

wow, ok, so i uploaded these backwards, so i guess i'll start here and work back. this morning, this little puppy was following grandpa around in the backyard, and she has made her way into the kids' hearts. we'll see if her owner shows up, or what happens next. the kids have already named her cocoa, and said we are keeping her. we'll see.

rachel sat on the counter while i was doing the dishes yesterday, and found daddy's soda there. she loves soda, and was very happy to sit there and guzzle it for him!!

she had one of my sandals, caleb's shoes, and goggles. could she be cuter?

my birthday was rather a disappointment this year. i had been sick for the whole week before it, and saturday wasn't any better. i was dizzy and weak and nauseated for longer than i ever remember being. it wasn't pretty. thank goodness, sunday i started feeling better! now if i can just keep my strength up. yesterday i might have done too much, and didn't feel well for an hour or so. but thankfully, that didn't last long!

after taking a bath and getting ready for bed, rachel was in the living room playing. i put the boys in the tub, and after a minute, i hear screeching and yelling from the bathroom. when i went in, this is what i found. apparantly rachel decided she wasn't done in the tub!! silly girl.

swimming with cousins and grandpa mcnelly. it's been really fun having the pool up and running again!!

i have 2 portable high chairs, thank goodness. the twins eat dinner here at least once a week, so we started lining all 3 of them up like this. isn't it funny to watch all these tinies eating??

hopping on the trampoline