Aryn's 12th Birthday!

Today Aryn is 12. The last year of peace before she is officially a teenager, ha ha ha! We are so lucky to have her, especially with the rough start she had. She was born February 21, 1997 at 4:08 in the morning. And she looked just like a mini Clark. We later found out that she had broken a rib while being born. We cringe every time we watch a home video of us hugging and squeezing her! When she was just 13 days old she was admitted back to the hospital with a bad case of RSV after she quit breathing completely. Here oxygen levels were so low that the second they put her on oxygen you could see her color change. The doctors told us if we were lucky we brought her in when we did, because she probably wouldn't have survived the night. She was hospitalized for 5 days, and has no complications from it. She has been healthy and happy since then! Aryn LOVES the Twilight series and is anxiously awaiting it's release to dvd next month. She does great in school, and has lots of friends. She loves to run and ride her bike, and play softball. And most of all she loves animals. She has such a soft spot for all of them, just like her dad. Here are some pictures of her 12 years so far....

She was about 6 months old in these:

One year old:
When she was 1, she placed 3rd in the Art City Days baby contest:
About 3 years old:

Aryn & her second cousin Lexi:

She loves camping and fishing, but doesn't like hiking much:

She love her dog Durango:


She was about 10 here:

And last night she had her birthday party, here are some of the pictures:

Happy Birthday Bear!

Clark's dream come true.......

I walked in the door tonight and Clark was watching tv. As soon as I walked in he started pointing at the tv with a look of pure joy on his face. This was the commercial playing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zhgsz5DH7Mo

Apparently he thought this was really a new flavor of Doritos. It was such a let down when he found out it was just a joke.

Kind of Random.....

It's kind of funny how sometimes life just sneaks up on you and makes you realize how lucky you are. Monday was a day off and since we have 4 animials, I decided it was time to clean the carpet. Once it was all done, I was really proud of myself. I had just finished putting everything back and Caleb walked up the stairs and I looked at him and said "I'm so happy!" He didn't know that I was happy about how the carpet turned out, but his response was "Good!" And I thought, he doesn't care why I'm happy, just that I'm happy, and I realized how lucky I am.

Aryn's sock hop

Aryn's first blog:

On Friday the 13Th I had a sock hop and the first thing i did was run down to pick up my best friend charlamane and we were still in our pj's and we spent an hour getting ready because we had to dress up like we were from the fifties and then we were running late so my mom gave us a ride and then we were so excited but we had to wait though the spelling bee, reading groups, keyboarding and then it was finally lunch time and we were so happy it was so funny because me and chance and charlamane and chandler saw all these boys singing on the playground and then the bell finally rang and we went in and pass out the Valentine cards and then it was the sock hop and me and charlamane and chance and chandler went to the drive in movie(our class room ) and watch i love Lucy and then went to musical records then hula hoop contest then karaoke then hand jive then dessert chandler shoved a whole sugar Cookie down in his mouth then we went to root beer floats and i got two scoops of ice cream and i shoved both down in two bites then we went to the last one the bubble gum blowing contest and then the day ended.

Me & Charlamane:

Chandler, Sergio, Chance, Charlamane & Me:

Brandon:

The girls & the annoying singing boys:

Tagged! 10 Things that Bug Me

Okay, I've been tagged, and I'm sure I can come up with at least 10 things that bug me. So here we go.....
If you know me at all, you can guess number 1!

1. Waiting
2. Excuses
3. Clutter
4. Laundry
5. Driving in the snow
6. Did I mention waiting?
7. Commercials
8. People who drive slow on the freeway
9. Grocery shopping
10.Restaurants that are cold.

Aryn the photographer!

Aryn got a digital camera for Christmas this year and she has been taking photos like crazy. We have a few dozen pictures of her posters of Edward (go figure) and a million of Durango. Tonight she took this picture from our deck, and I think it turned out really good. Who knows, maybe soon she'll be doing weddings!Durango, her favorite dog......

Aryn and her best friend Charlamane:

Flanger the cat:

Batman!

And me typing this blog!

Right now she says she will do any photo shoot in exchange for Edward paraphernalia!

Christmas, getting published, and a new school??

It's been awhile since I posted, so I guess it's time! First of all we had a great Christmas, the kids got everything they wanted and claim it was the best Christmas ever! Now that they are getting older, everything they want is more expensive, but they kept the lists short this year. We spent Christmas Eve at Clark's sister Abby's house where Santa visits every year. This year was great because he had the kids make pledges to their parents to do better this year! It was awesome! Here are the kids:

Aren't they sweet? Actually that's not a smile on Caleb's face, he's gritting his teeth trying to hold Aryn down, but I like to pretend....

This is Clark and Abby, and I think you can all tell they are related!

It's pretty blurry, but you get the point!

And here are some Christmas morning photos, see if you can guess who Aryn is obssessed with...

Caleb got his laptop

And Clark got, well, Ozzy! He was so surprized and excited...

And I think I take the same picture of my dad every Christmas morning!

This is one of my favorite pictures. It is some of my Christmas, and if you look really closely you'll notice a Garmin Forerunner to take on my runs and burn the calories after I eat BOTH boxes of chocolate....
Okay, so now that I have done my required Christmas post (even though it's really really late), here is the other news at our house. Caleb is going to get published! He wrote a short story last year, and his English teach found a publisher for it! The assignment was to read a book, and write a short story picking up after the story. He chose the book The Shining. It is called Five Days in Death, and of course I think it is awesome! His teacher is also looking into getting a paper he wrote on the book Ivanhoe published as a teacher's aid for teaching the book. The other Caleb news is that he got a letter inviting him to UCAS. UCAS is a high school which is held on the campus of UVU. It is accelerated and he would graduate with his high school diploma and his associates degree. They only invite 120 kids from the county, so we are really excited! Okay, enough about Caleb, on to Aryn. Well, all I can tell you is she is still obssessed with Twilight and Edward, and she's read all the books 3 times! It's crazy! But she has really brought her grades up at school, and we are so so proud of her!