Yesterday, I took the kids and we went with our naighbors to the Splash Park in Belgrade. All the kids loved it, especially Jaci. We took lunch and hung out for about 2 hours, by the end of the day, all my kids were wiped out, but it was fun to see them do fun and silly stuff in the water....this is my kind of water park.
This year for Dylan's birthday (on the 19th), we were able to go to Colorado and celebrate it with his grandma and grandpa in Colorado. (andy's parents). It was so much fun to see him grin from ear to ear with his Star Wars Birthday cake and all the presents that he got. His brother has been able to celebrate his birthday in Colorado a few times and Dylan wanted to do the same.
For dinner, he requested a hot dog in a bun, mashed potatoes and gravy, strawberries and bananas in a bowl, red jell-o, and broccoli. It was delicious, Thanks Grandma.
Justin wasn't able to be there since he had to run things here in Montana, but he could tell that Dylan was very happy and it was hard to decide who was more excited about his presents, Brayden or Dylan.
Dylan getting ready to blow out his candles.
Dylan enjoying his marbled Star Wars cake that had Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker on top fighting, with light-up light sabers.
A green scooter, so he can ride around the neighborhood and everyone will know that one is Dylan's.
For Father's Day weekend, I asked to have a family trip to Billings to play with the fam. We stayed at a fun hotel that has a great kids swimming pool. We swam and stayed up and watched "Chronicles of Narnia" with the kids for the first time. Saturday we went to the new Cabela's, and the mall, and the zoo. The following pics are from the zoo. The bear was the best. Bruno the Grizzly was active and playing in his pond. The sign said he was in mating season. Since he was "frustrated" to not have a mate, he paced and played all day trying to get rid of his energy. It made for a good show anyway. The kids enjoyed it.
I wanted to let my dad know that he is a wonderful father. He has always worked so hard at being the best example possible. It's amazing to see that he is working still on being an even better example to me and my children. Have a great day! We love you!
We need to catch up a bit. I'll cheat and use a slideshow. The kids had fun with the Grandma Paula and Aunt Jenna and Krissa. They came up to see Brayden's last t-ball game. They also went to Virginia City - an old ghost town not far from here that has been renovated complete with a train. They had a lot of fun!
We were excited to have my parents and sisters up for the day. They came to visit Tuesday night and we had dinner at Famous Dave's in Bozeman (always a favorite of mine). After dinner they came back to our house to play and visit. The kids put Grandpa to work. Today, Dad and I went to work while everyone else played. They drove down to Virginia City and had a lot of fun. They rode the train, had ice cream and a picnic, and saw some old-western history. Thanks for coming up and playing. We had a ton of fun!
I thought I would add this one too. Jace was cute trying the ramp with her trike. She is a determined little girl.
The boys got brave this week and tried the neighbors little bike that doesn't have training wheels. After Dylan figured it out, I took the training wheels off his own bike and he was off. Brayden couldn't be out done. So Brayden proceeded to try on his own and finally figured it out. Unfortunately, they did it all on their own so no cute pics of me running behind them with arms stretched to the sky celebrating as ride off into the sunset. I am proud of them either way! They are still trying to master the bike jump though. You'll notice Jace has to keep up with her brothers too.
The Three Forks Elementary put on their annual spring concert this last Monday night (5/11). All the grades from K-5th performed few songs they had learned over the school year. It was fun. The kids were very proud of their work. Watching the video back, Brayden tells me who in the video he can't hear singing. Everyone's a critic!
We took a temple trip to Billings this past Friday. We found out that some friends were staying at a hotel with a pool and a slide. So we got a reservation and headed over there right after work. Once we got there the kids had to get to the pool as fast as possible. The kids took some time to get used to swimming. By the end of the night, Dylan was paddling around the pool and swimming from side-to-side. I took Jaci on the slide. She told me know the whold way up. After we made it down she said "again daddy". She finally got brave enough to go down by herself while I caught her at the bottom.
The next morning, I went to the temple with John Blanchard and Brandt Peterson. We enjoyed our session and then took our turn with the kids. It was a good experience planning a temple trip. We took the temple for granted in IF. It feels good to plan time to travel to Billings and sacrifice more of our time to visit the temple. We hope to make a good habit of going every month.
We also ventured over to Bozeman on a Saturday afternoon to visit the Museum of the Rockies at Montana State University. Montana is a very active place for finding dinosaur fossils, which is the focus of this museum. They have tons of bones of Triceratops and T-Rexes. They had a Montana history section and a hands-on section for the kids. It was a lot of fun. We got a season pass for the family, so we will be making a few return trips. 
The last one is the kids with "Big Mike" the greeter outside the entrance.
I don't know where we have been on this blog, but we have been slacking. We are loving Montana. Behind our house is a large field with 3 horses. One night during dinner about a month ago, I noticed they were close to the fence. I went out and fed them a couple of carrots and man were they excited. The kids grabbed some more carrots and came running out. We also fed them apples on a separate day. They have since become our buddies.
