Cochise Stronghold and Kevin and Kim's Family Update

Trying to update the blog. It has been a while since I posted pictures because the battery compartment on our camera busted so I couldn't take any pictures for a few months. Aaron (the two year old) accidentally dropped the camera from the shopping cart. I had taken the camera to Wal-mart to print pictures and he got his hands on it without me realizing it until he dropped it. Sad day! Anyhow, we saved money for a new camera and just bought a new one about one week ago. Now, you will all be burdened with picture overload as I feel I have to make up for the amount of pictures that I missed.

I will post some pictures of our visit to Cochise Stronghold. It is very close to my mom's house in Sunsites, 10 minutes maybe less. Yes, it is that close! We cleaned up the house on Saturday morning, and on the spur of the moment, we decided to pack a lunch and go for a hike! The area around the Stronghold is beautiful and there are breath-taking views of the Dragoon Mountains. It is a bird lover's paradise. All kinds of different species. We enjoyed viewing and listening to a woodpecker as we were eating our lunch. We saw several deer, which, of course, our young children thought were Santa's. We saw lots of deer tracks as well so the kids are sure now that Santa is checking up on them. We also were able to go on a trail and read the various historical data of the happenings in the area--the famous Indian chief Cochise. We went for a little hike up the mountains and our kids enjoyed climbing all over the different rock formations in the area. We found several small caves that the kids enjoyed exploring. It was a great place to visit and I highly recommend visiting it the next time you are in the area. At the stronghold, there is a nice campground, firepits, bathrooms, picnic tables, and of course different trails you can go on.

Elijah is cutting new teeth so he has been a little bit fussy, but that has not prevented him from being mischevious. He loves to play cars and throw balls. He has a good arm for a one year old. You can tell he has a lot of brothers that play with him. Eli will sit and play with cars for about 30 minutes before he goes off exploring somewhere else. He enjoys emptying my kitchen cupboards and stealing Aaron's toys and running away with them. Aaron is so soft hearted that he will not steal the toy back from him and just whines, "Mommy, Eli took my toy. Let's get him!" Aaron is such a sweet little 2 year old. He is pretty much completely potty trained now--does not have many accidents. This helps with our budget--not having to buy so many diapers. Aaron loves to read books and would probably sit and listen to stories all day. We can always find him with a book.

Benjamin is getting excited for his birthday! He knows it is getting close because we are starting to pull out Christmas decorations. Kevin's grandparents down the street put up a beautiful life-size Nativity every year. It was just set up this weekend. Benjamin says, "Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus are out now, that means it's my birthday!" He is counting down to the day he turns 5 and is old enough to go to school with the big kids. Benjamin does pre-school with mom and we have a friend come over once a week to play with him. He has had a lot of challenges due to his hearing. He developed auditory processing disorder because his ears did not hear well until he had the tubes placed in his ears and tonsils and adenoids taken out at age 3. Apparently, according to my doctor, children learn very important early vocabulary sounds and major communication skills just prior to turning 3. This is the time frame when the largest amount of social skills are developed. Benjamin missed out on that and is playing catch up. He still has difficulty hearing if there is a lot of background or loud noises. He has difficulty with large groups and learns best in small, individualized groups. His disorder is similar to autism and is many times misdiagnosed as autism, but we really feel the problem is an auditory processing problem. He still does not hear every sound in his right ear and is being re-tested in January for his hearing problems. Best treatment I am told is individual attention, or very small group. The doctor said the tubes tend to adjust the hearing over time so we will check that out. Here is a website with some general information about his disorder if you are interested. He brain and ears do not process information correctly. http://kidshealth.org/parent/medical/ears/central_auditory.html Benjamin also suffers from Tourette's Syndrome, as does Jacob. Benjamin has the type of Tourette's where he has tics, vocal sounds, throat clearing and will all of a sudden loudly say a word (not a swear word. He doesn't know any. It's usually poopy or you girl, which is funny if it's not your kid). The yelling out a word scenario most often happens when we are around a large crowd, like at church or in primary or at a school function. Not often. His behavior is different week to week and he has triggers that tend to make him be more effected. It's embarrassing, but understandable. I feel bad for him. I have to do a lot of explaining to people that don't understand sometimes, mainly in Primary. He does not really yell but rather speaks it louder than his normal voice, which is not that loud due to his hearing. If you sit near us, you will hear it occasionally. It mostly happens when Benjamin is out of his comfort zone--in large groups. Jacob only has the type of Tourette's that involves tics and a lot of throat clearing.

Matthew is now 7 years old and will be baptized next year in October. He wants to be baptized on Halloween because he thinks it would be cool to get the real Holy Ghost on a day meant for scaring people about other types of ghosts. It is perfect that Matthew's birthday is around Halloween (October 30th. So is Kyra's.) Matthew loves candy so this works out great for him. We go to the school carnival every year--haunted mule rides, games, jumping castles, bbq, cotton candy, popcorn, caramel apples, and lots of fun! Here is a list of what our kids were for Halloween--Andrew (scary guy. He helps out with the haunted mule ride and had a scary mask and had to wear black. Jacob--Two face from Batman. Half of his body is a normal suit, the other side of the suit is part leopard, jaguar, cheetah, zebra and tiger. I had to make his outfit. Matthew was a ninja and bought his outfit at a yard sale across the street for 10 cents. His was my favorite costume because it was cheap and I did not have to make it. :) Benjamin was the character Hiccup, a dragon trainer from the movie "How to Train Your Dragon." Benjamin and Aaron were Benjamin's dragons from the movie. Aaron was Night Fury and Elijah was Terrible Terror. On Halloween eve as we were getting children dressed, Andrew was running away from Jacob who was chasing him and went into his bedroom and slammed the door. Aaron was standing right there and had his hand in the door. His poor fingers got smashed and crushed very hard. He broke one of his fingers and majorly bruised two other fingers. His fingers looked horrible! Andrew felt absolutely horrible and said, "I don't deserve to go to the Halloween Carnival." It was an accident. He was punishing himself more than I could ever punish him. Needless to say, he does not slam the door anymore. We all did go to the Halloween Carnival still. We just got there a little later than we would have liked. Aaron had to be super glued back together and was sore for quite a while, but I have to say his fingers look so good now. One of his fingernails fell off and is now growing back. This was not our first broken finger experience. Matthew broke his finger the second week of October. We went to Phoenix and he was playing air hockey against his brother and his dad. He moved his hand off of the hockey puck and it got slammed so hard that it broke his finger. His fingernail is very black and will probably fall off soon as the new fingernail begins to come in. Life is exciting with 6 little boys!

Jacob is 8 years old. He was baptized on his birthday, the 4th of July. Jacob is full of energy, excitement, and has a curious nature. He is very intelligent and listens to every single word you say and follows it to the tee. He does a lot of play on words. He has memorized the Preamble of the Constitution of the United States and the Declaration of Independence. Jacob has a soft heart for animals. I think he likes animals more than humans, especially lizards, frogs, toads, chickens, and other creepy crawly creatures. Jacob became a cub scout in July. He has earned his bobcat badge and is almost finished with his wolf badge. We recently went to the International Wildlife Museum in Tucson for a cub scout expo. There are all sorts of different "stuffed" dead animals to observe in the museum. Our kids love it. They call it the dead animal museum. Admission was free on cub scout expo day for any cub scout and his family if they came in their uniform. There were lots of exhibits and there were different stations you could go to in order to pass off a scout requirement. We had a great time!

Andrew is 11 years old now. He is almost finished with his Faith in God award. He recently entered regular boy scouts in September. Before becoming a boy scout, Andrew did earn his Webelos badge, Compass Point with each point earned, religious knot, all 20 activity badges, and his Arrow of Light, the highest award you can receive in cub scouts and transfers to your boy scout uniform. We are so proud of him! He is a great example to his brothers! Andrew is involved in school sports. He finished cross country at the end of September. I was impressed with his endurance of a long run. He enjoyed running 5 miles. Personally, I don't. Currently, Andrew is playing basketball for Pomerene School. He LOVES it! Andrew has loved all sports ever since he was a baby--basketball, football, baseball, you name it--he loves it! Andrew's team has won about 8 games and lost only two--one loss was to St. David and the other to Naco (they have tall players in Naco).

Kevin and I stay busy chasing boys! Kevin travels throughout southern Arizona to client's homes to ensure the clients are receiving proper care. He can be found in Benson about three days a week, Wilcox about once a week, Pearce/Sunsites/Elfrida twice a month, Safford/Thatcher twice a month, Bisbee and Sierra Vista quarterly, and meetings in Phoenix quarterly. He stays busy with work and he teaches the 11 year olds in Sunday School/Primary. I appreciate everything he does for our family. He works so hard for our family and we are lucky to have him in our lives. I could not raise these boys without him! I stay busy teaching piano lessons, cleaning and re-cleaning the house, doing loads of laundry and piles of dishes, chasing children, teaching pre-school, teaching little boys to use the potty, changing diapers, playing with kids, cooking meals, baking cookies, picking up children from activities and taking children to doctor appointments. I'm wore out just writing down what I do on a daily basis. I have the best calling in our church--playing the piano for the children to learn and sing songs. Love it!

I get to speak in my Mom's branch in Sunsites at church in January. Since Dad is a high councilman, it is his turn to speak there in January. When he speaks in church there, he is asked to bring someone to speak with him. Mom has done her share of talks there and she is the secretary for the Stake Relief Society--so that makes her unavailable sometimes. Anyhow, dad thought it would be neat to have me speak in Sunsites with him since Mom is in that branch and I know some of the people and many of them know of me. I actually don't mind speaking in church. I am looking forward to it. I think I like it because that means I don't have to wrestle my boys during church (yes, this week felt like wrestling). Kevin will be in charge while I talk, and hopefully my mom and Kevin's mom and/or Tamra (if they are available) can help him out. Kevin's dad asked Kevin to sing a solo when we go to Sunsites. He loves to sing and has a gorgeous voice. He is also looking forward to that. Kevin would rather sing than give a talk any day.

Sorry this is so long but I felt the need to update. I will add some pictures in a different post. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Kevin and Kim's Las Vegas Trip

At The Tank at The Golden Nugget

At the top of the Stratosphere

At the top of the Eiffel Tower at Paris Hotel

At a waterfall at the Flamingo Hotel

At the doors of the Las Vegas Temple

So, here are some pictures from our Las Vegas Trip. We had so much fun together! I added more pictures to my facebook so you can check those out if you want. On the way up, we stopped for a bathroom break at the Hoover Dam and took a few pictures. Kevin and I were able to go to the Phantom of the Opera on Monday (our anniversary) which was fabulous. The one in Vegas has a lot of special effects. We also went to a show called Human Nature, courtesy of a time share presentation. Human Nature includes 4 Australian men who sing Motown songs, some of which were a cappella. There were fabulous! We also had a free buffet, courtesy of a time share presentation. We stayed at four different hotels, yes I said 4. Kevin is a hotel hopper. He likes to check out as many hotels as possible (I would never do that with children--not moving their stuff more than once). The first hotel we stayed at was The Flamingo, right on the strip in Las Vegas. Excellent location--middle of the strip right across from Caesar's Palace. Nice room. Had a lazy river and a small water slide, also flamingo wildlife habitat--quite beautiful actually. Outdoors there was a little garden area that was fun to walk around. The second hotel we stayed at was the Stratosphere. It is the hotel that looks like the space needle. I think this was the best deal overall. It is a good location, just a few blocks from the strip. Large pool and jacuzzi, Nice rooms, cheap price--It was $30 a night. The third hotel we stayed at was the Golden Nugget in downtown Las Vegas. It is off of Fremont Street, older hotel, but still quite swanky. The pool at the Golden Nugget has a Shark Tank. The water slide goes right through the tank which is filled with fish and small sharks. It was awesome! Our children now think we are cool for the time being. It was quite powerful, actually. Kevin's glasses fell off as he came out of the water slide from the force (He had those eyeglass holders on). He had to snorkel around to try and find them. Luckily, he found them. This hotel had a nice large jacuzzi, and the pool stayed open until 2 a.m. The other hotels we stayed at the pools closed at 6 p.m. I guess they want you to go out and gamble. The fourth and final hotel we stayed at was the Hard Rock Hotel. We were actually upgraded to a suite, which was very, very swanky. It was black and silver colors with red accents. There were two bathrooms, a living room with large, flat screen t.v. and awesome stereo system and a silver couch, a bedroom area with a large flat screen t.v., and a bathroom with a jacuzzi tub. All throughout this suite, were items that if you even picked up an item, it was charged to your hotel bill. Water bottles were $4.50, candy bars $5, Alcohol $50-$100, Intimacy kits $25 (yes, I said intimacy kits). It was all weighted. Of course, we didn't dare touch any of it. We could never stay at this kind of place with our kids--they would touch everything. This hotel had three sandy beach pools, a lazy river and water slide, and three jacuzzis. The light fixtures were cymbals, music note carpet, records and rock star memorabilia throughout the hotel. They even had leather elevators. It was pretty sharp! We enjoyed every moment together and created lasting memories! It was a nice, relaxing break and I think, well deserved after 14 years. We had an absolute blast!

The food was incredible. We only ate one meal a day--we saved up for the buffet. After the buffet, we were stuffed for a while. Best buffet we went to was Planet Hollywood Spice Market Buffet. It had cuisine from around the world. You wouldn't believe that the item we kept going back for was their fresh fruit--no joke. They had the freshest watermelon and honeydew we have ever tasted. They also had this incredible fruit dip that was made with cream cheese, honey and apricots. I am going to have to figure out how to make it. I learned that I make food way too boring, and am going to experiment more when I cook. I have so many recipes to figure out. The Spice Market buffet also served custard, rather than ice cream. Fabulous! We also went to some cheaper buffets, some of which were actually comparative in food quality to the Spice Market Planet Hollywood. The station buffets--Main Street Station and Boulder Station--had excellent food and excellent prices. It was $8 each. We usually had 2 for 1 at most of the buffets, so it was really cheap, which we love! Excellent Chicken Broccoli Salad at Boulder Station. Yum! Makes me hungry just talking about it. We went to Pink's Hot Dogs, which is specialty hot dogs. We had a Vegas Dog and a Showgirl dog. The Vegas dog had chili, onions, guacamole, jalpenos, tomatoes. The Showgirl had tomatoes, onions, relish, and sauerkraut. There were delicious. I brought home the menu so I can experiment with hot dog toppings. We also went to a sandwich shop called Capriotti's. I had a turkey, stuffing, mayo and cranberry sauce sandwich--called a Bobbie. Kevin had something with a lot of sandwich meat on it, but it was also very good. I don't remember his as much, but mine was fabulous! We actually did not spend very much money because pretty much everything we went to was 2 for 1. We caught a meal deal at midnight--for a quick snack--that was a burger and fries for $2. Kevin and I split that because we were still quite full from the buffet, just wanted a snack. That was cheap!

Did we gamble you ask? Well, this is what we did. Many hotels offered a certain amount of money in free slot play. So, we would only play the money given to us by the casino and then cash out when it came ahead. We did not spend any of our money. It is sad to see how many people become trapped at the slots trying to make some easy cash. There is no easy way to make cash, it's hard work! Anyhow, we actually came ahead. Since we were using free slot money, I think we made about $25 in cash and spent none of our own. We did a lot of swimming and sight seeing. Kevin and I enjoyed walking around all the shops and hotels. Most of the hotels in Vegas are themed. We took a picture with one million dollars. The picture was free and how often do you get to take a picture with one million dollars? So, we did not even spend money on pictures--most hotels offer to take a fancy picture for you for about $16--this one was free and they took two pictures and printed them for us! We went to Circus Circus Adventuredome and rode the rides there, went up the Eiffel Tower, up the Stratosphere tower--the one that looks like the Space Needle, but most importantly we ended our trip going to the Las Vegas Temple, which is quite beautiful on the inside. We liked how the women's and men's bathrooms had an exit that led right to the chapel. The endowment room was also where the veil was and the celestial room connected right to that--very organized layout! The celestial room was beautiful--all white with some green plants and a large picture of the Second Coming of the Savior! It was a wonderful time and we appreciate all of you who helped watch our children so that we could spend some quality time together. I have realized that I am so grateful that Kevin and I are sealed together forever because forever is really not long enough! We enjoy spending time together and I am so grateful to my husband for being such a phenomenal man!

Tombstone Desperadoes

Matthew posing at the wild west town.

This is Andrew at the tombstones of Tom and Frank McLaury and Billy Clanton. Tom McLaury was shot by Doc Holliday.

We went to Tombstone on Saturday, May 8th. Andrew was doing a school report on Doc Holliday so we decided to research it a little more. We had a great time! Kevin took Andrew to the O.K. Corral while mom and the youngest 5 went to the petting zoo and wild west town--a little more their speed. We also saw a rodeo show. Jacob liked that they had used rescued animals. One of the horses had gasoline poured on him by his owner and had burn scars near its tail. Our family had the flu this past week. We thought we might have been finished with it as no one had thrown up for two days in a row, but Jacob threw up in Primary. Kevin took him home and also had a case of the flu. Poor guys! So far, the flu has taken 5 of the 8 of us. Andrew, Matthew, and mom have not yet had the flu.

Congratulations to Jason and Kelly! We look forward to meeting little Ezra--so happy for you! Happy 60th to dad today!
I had more pictures but I was having problems downloading them. Will try to add more pictures another day.

We caught these desperadoes in Tombstone and locked them in jail.

They were a wild and crazy bunch!