Summer Family Update

So this month I thought we could do a general family update of everyone and our recent adventures this summer.


Whitney is of course 12 now and went to Girl's camp this summer. Our stake decided to rough it a bit by tent camping (with indoor showers and toilets) and they had a great time. Whitney was put with all the other first year girls and had a lot of fun meeting new people her age. Here favorite parts were a skit where she was Milly Mays (sister to Billy Mays), doing tie dye shirts and making/eating hobo dinners. She is also now in to texting and facebooking so feel free to drop her a line.







Katelyn is loving drawing and doing crafts this summer. This summer some of her masterpieces included a poster of a deer she made for Faith in God requirments, a volcano made of tin foil and a paper cup, and making gak-think slime. She even went to art camp this summer stretched her own canvas to create a painting!



Lauren has decided that she likes jump off the boat. Seems like everytime that we stop the boat there are serveral requests to jump in the water. Lauren was a little scared at first but quickly decided that it could be very fun. Last Thursday when we went out she even asked for the ski rope and swam all the way to the end of the rope. Then asked me to start to boat and drag her around the lake with just her life jacket on--I abliged and her and Whitney had a great time! This was the girl that informed me at the beginning of the summer that she was not going to go on the tubes until she was 8 years old.






Dustin is still refusing to go on the potty. We have tried star wars guys, and candy and every thing else you can think of. We have even tried guilt, by saying "your sisters go on the potty" you can't go to preschool if your not potty trained. So Kelly decided to wait till the girls are at school. Well cross your fingers that we can get him potty trained!

Kelly has taken to running recently. Over the last five years plus she and a good friend have been speed walking several times a week. I asked her about running a 5k race with me and before I knew it she told me that she had run a 5k and I think a 10k just to see what she could do. She was quoted (or liberally quoted) as say "I don't need no stinkin' race to run a 5k. I can run it on my own and I don't have to overpay for a t-shirt that I will never wear." Turns out I'm not that practical so I'm still looking to overpay for a t-shirt that proves I actually got off my duff.

Todd (me) has been busy attending every youth camp available including LDS Encampment, Youth Palmyra trip and even Girls Camp. I also recently went on my annual golf trip and managed to play 90 holes of golf in two days. Yea, it is a bit crazy and obsessive but that is what the guys golf trip is all about. We even tried some "Happy Gilmore" drives on the 90th hole and it turns out that I hit two great drives with that shot and beat the 6+ previous drives I tried with the more conventional swing.

Hope you are having a great summer. We have one more month and are looking foward to more great adventures.

Palmyra

The youth in our ward recently took a trip to visit the church history sites in upstate New York and Kirtland, Ohio. Since Todd is the YM President, I got to tag along as a chaperone. Also, as hard as it may be to believe Whitney is 12 now so she got to go too. It was a great trip. We left Thursday, July 9th in the afternoon and got back around 10:30 p.m. on Tuesday, July 14th. That may not seem like a long time, but we saw a lot of things. The first day we visited Niagara Falls in the morning and then attended the Hill Cumorah Pageant in the evening. On Saturday, we were able to go to the Palmyra temple. An interesting thing about the Palmyra temple is that it is the only temple with a clear window. The window looks out over the Sacred Grove. The view was impressive. After we went to the temple we visited the Smith Farm. On Sunday we had the privilege of having Sacrament Meeting in the Sacred Grove. That was the highlight of the trip for me. We also visited the Grandin Building, where the first copies of the Book of Mormon were published, and the Whitmer Farm. The next day we drove to Kirtland, Ohio and visited the sites there which included the Kirtland Temple, Whitney Store, Isaac Morley Farm and the John Johnson Farm. I've been to quite a few church history sites. I've been to Nauvoo, Salt Lake City, Martin's Cove, Winter Quarters and more, but none of them made as deep an impression on me as the sites we visited on this trip.

We also had an opportunity to visit with my sister Cecily and her family who came from New York City to see us (and the pageant too). My little nephews made me miss Dustin who was at home with Grandma and Papa. By the way, my parents were awesome for coming out to Minnesota to watch the younger kids while we were gone. As Lauren likes to say, "You Rock!!"

Emily Johnson, Emily Chandler, Whitney and Ashley Hatcher on the top of the Hill Cumorah.

Whitney, Emily C., Emily J. and Cara Reiffer at Niagara Falls. Don't you love the fashionable ponchos. They kept everyone so dry. NOT!

Todd, Kelly, Tyler, Cecily, Scott and Ben at the Smith Farm.

Whitney and her friends in the Sacred Grove.

Todd and Kelly at the Palmyra Temple.

Graduation

We had a couple of graduations this year. Lauren graduated from preschool (so thrilling) and Whitney graduated from elementary school. Our school district is transitioning to Middle Schools next year so Whitney's class was the last class of 6th graders at her elementary school. It was actually kind of neat. She loved her teacher and had a really good year this year. Mrs. Lehman, her teacher, will actually be teaching 4th grade next year so Katelyn might have her at least for their class switches. Katelyn's teacher is going to teach 4th grade next year too so they are putting most of the same kids in her class again. I guess the consistency is supposed to be good for learning. It all makes me feel kind of old. I can't believe I have a 7th grader and my baby girl is going to Kindergarten. Next year it will just be me and Dustin. How lonely for us.

Piano Recital

Last Friday, among all the many other end of school activities, Whitney and Katelyn had a piano recital. Luckily their teacher only has about 10 students so it didn't take too long. Katelyn's song was quite a difficult song for her, but I think she did pretty well. It was 3 long pages to memorize. Whitney's was difficult, but only one page so she had to play it twice.

Dustin Turns 3!!

Dustin celebrated his 3rd birthday on Saturday. He was so excited! He was very specific about the things he wanted. He said he needed a grass trimmer. He already has a lawn mower and he follows Todd around the yard when he is mowing. I guess it only makes sense that he would need a trimmer to help out with that too. The other "need" was a motorcycle that makes sounds and lights up. He was thrilled to get both as well as other fun gifts. This year he chose to have a pirate cake, but only after we talked him out of a racetrack cake. He wanted the same cake he had last year and it took a while to talk him into trying something new. Then to top it all off we got to take the boat out for the first time this year. It was a great day!

Washington D.C.

Todd and I were able to spend a few days away in Washington D.C. this month. We could have spent even longer if we had more time. There is so much to do and see there that we were amazed. We were also amazed at how much we were able to see without our kids. We visited a few of the Smithsonian Museums (Natural History, American History, National Archives and Air and Space). We toured the Capitol. We saw the Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, Washington Monument and the various war memorials. We didn't get to tour the White House, but we took a picture and went to the visitors center. On Sunday, we spent most of the day at the United States Holocaust Memorial. It was all incredibly interesting, but definitely not a place to take small kids. We would to take our family back when they are a little older.

We forgot to take the camera so all of the pictures were taken with Todd's phone. Sorry, they aren't the best. The picture of Todd blowing a bubble with the Easter Island statue was especially for Lauren. If any of you have seen the Night at the Museum movies you may understand. In the first movie the Easter Island statue says, "Dum, dum give me gum, gum." Lauren thinks that is hilarious, thus the bubble blowing with the statue. Also, it was neat to see the second Night at the Museum movie after having just been to the Smithsonian.

Not only did we have fun, but I think that we both gained a new appreciation for our founding fathers and all those who have sacrificed to make our country what it is today.

Cinco de Mayo

We had a fun weekend at the Cinco de Mayo celebration last Saturday. They say that St. Paul has one of the biggest celebrations in the country with roughly 100,000 people visiting the street area where they have the feastival. Our favorite part is the parade and the Salsa Contest. Here is what the kids thought of the Festival (sorry I didn't bring the camera so I used a picture from the website).

Whitney's favorite part was the parade and the jalapeno eating contest (more on that later). There was a lot of cool stuff like Aztec dancers that had cool shells (aka nuts) on their legs that made noise as they danced.

Katelyn's favorite part was the trampoline-bungy jump ride. She was harnessed into the bungy so once she got the hang of it she was doing front and back flips. She also won a Twin's bobble-head at the Twins booth.

Lauren's favorite part was when they were throwing candy as part of the parade. And boy do they give out plenty of candy. She also went on a trampoline/bungy jump ride that she really liked.

Dustin liked the big fire trucks in the parade. He also like the fact that his sisters gathered candy and shared it with him while he sat in the stroller. Dustin won tickets to a twins game for he and his dad!!!

My favorite part was the Salsa Contest and the Jalapeno Contest. For the salsa contest you get to rate several local business' salsa according to the hotest, the smoothest and the most unique. My favorite are the hotest but this years standout was a cherry salsa that I voted for the most unique. I also entered the Jalepano Eating Contest this year. There were 10 contestants in the contest and you had to eat 1 jalapeno and wait 1 minute and then eat the remaining 9 as fast as you can. These were the big 4+ inch jalapenos right off the vine and they were smoking. Once the contest got started I cruised into the lead by downing the jalapenos as fast as I could chew them. Believe it or not they didn't seem that hot to me. I soon realized that the contest was between me and another gringo standing next to me. Everyone else didn't really get past 2-4 jalapenos. It was fun having my cheering section in the crowd with the kids and some friends from church.

As it got down to the last few peppers the hardest part wasn't the heat but the fact that my jaw was tired from trying to quickly chew so many jalapenos. The contest came down to the last pepper and it was a photo finish -- unfortunately the judges decided that I came in second by a millisecond. So I just missed taking home the shiny flaming trophy but I did get to have a flaming experience later in the day... It's nothing I didn't already experience on my mission...