May! The end of school and so much more!

Here is Hunter with his cool soccer medal. Hunter's and Tucker's look the same, Hunter desired to be silly/grumpy for the picture :)

During the school year I traded babysitting with other moms so that we could both help out in our children's classrooms. Here is what one afternoon looked like in our house.

Thanks to an awesome neighbor I got to go with Tucker on his field trip to the zoo! I love being able to hang with my kids in and out of school. It was dinosaur themed, and is until the end of the summer. We had lots of fun finding the various dinosaurs and seeing all the animals. It rained on us for a little while but we missed most of it because we were in the smelly reptile house looking at all the snakes, frogs, spiders, etc.

This was Tucker's favorite bird :)

Thanks to another neighbor I was able to go with Hunter on his school field trip to the Aquarium. We have not been since it has moved and it was fun to go and experience it with him. 

Hunter had fun touching the rays. It was fun to watch them try to touch them and then pull back as the animals got close. 

They all thought it was fun to see this bird cracking a shell to eat its nut.

Everyone thought it was funny that these two penguins were walking around with their flippers out

Here is Hunter measuring up with the various penguin sizes

Hunter got to touch a hissing cockroach 

I (or one of the children) discovered a wasp building a nest on our window sill. Thankfully it was still in the beginning stages and so the nest was small and there was only one wasp. I informed Bryant and we went to work destroying it with hairspray and fire. It made me feel like a teenager watching him with his pyrotechnics.

I took the children to the Payson Temple open house. I am a firm believer that all temples are beautiful on the inside but this one seemed a step above the other we have been in recently (and we had 2 to compare to)

Here is a picture of Hunter standing outside of it while we were waiting for everyone else to finish using the bathroom.

Connor is showing off his skills of walking while holding on to something. All of the children were super excited for him too!

May also means the children's book festival. The children were so excited to see this photo op because we had just read the book with this unimaginary friend in it. 

We also got to attend my great Aunt's wedding. It was fun to witness their sealing the Provo Temple and join with everyone in celebrating their special day!

In true Ogden fashion there was a great a DJ and lots of dancing. I was sad that Bryant and I never got to dance together. We just have too many children. I was constantly rotating between the 5 of them and needed a break to sit down every now and again. Plus they didn't play many slow dance songs while we were there and the children were having some bowel troubles that caused us to leave earlier than initially anticipated. 

May also means the end of school dance performance for Tucker and Hunter. I showed up almost an hour early to ensure that I got a front row seat right in the middle. Then it decided to down pour! I left our stroller outside "just in case" the rain dispersed before the scheduled performance because I knew I would be slow getting back outside with my three munchkins. Well the rain did disperse and everyone was very fast at getting outside before us but I did get my seats, Connor's chair was quite wet but the sun-shade saved most of the seating area so I was able to strap him in. 

Here is Hunter before his performance. He insisted on wearing as much orange as possible to look like an orange gummy bear for his song. 

Hunter was not very good at making sure that I could see, it was his first performance so I don't blame him. He is the kid in the orange beanie that comes in and out of the picture and he was dancing to the Gummy Bear song.

Here is Tucker before his performance. 

He danced to I'm Happy. Thankfully he was right in front so I got lots of him :)

Connor now know how to climb up on our kid slide. Ironically, he is not very good at getting down without help so he gets "stuck." This is actually quite convenient because he enjoys being up there for half an hour at a time and I am able to work on other tasks or not have to worry about him crawling into the street. 

Gunnar needed his picture taken on top of our picnic table because he thought it was amazing that he could climb up there with something in his hands. 

We celebrated Hunter's birthday early this year so that he could have a party with friends from school. Ironically, none of his school friends RSVPed or attended the party. He still had plenty of friends from church come and we had lots of fun with water guns, water bombs, and the splash pad. 

This was Connor's first exposure and he really enjoyed it!

And in case you had forgotten what I look like, here I am!

Hunter got this rocket for his birthday and wanted everyone to see it. Coming at you!

We also had a crazy hail storm come through. The children were all super excited that it was hail and were surprised that it hurt to get his by the hail stones. 

Cute Connor

The following are pictures of Connor throughout April. I can't help but love this little guy. He is truly a joy to be around! Now if I could just get him to sleep through the night and eat solid food. He will happily eat jarred baby food but refuses to eat anything with texture. He often gags and looks at me like I am trying to kill him when I feed him anything but baby food. I find this ironic because if he finds it on the floor inside or outside he will put it in his mouth and chew indefinitely on anything!

Here is proof that Connor does occasionally get a bath. He is such a good sport and puts up with showers most nights hanging out with whichever sibling is in the shower at the time. On this particular night he was enjoying gravity and seemed surprised every time the car hit the ground after he dropped it over the side of the tub :)

Because Connor is so mobile these days, his brothers and sister have taken to locking him out of their fun. Tucker and Hunter have master climbing up the walls so they scale the wall to get over the fence to get more toys when needed. Connor is not such a fan of this game because he realizes he is being left out of something!

Connor was rather upset about being trapped under this chair. I pulled out the camera and wah-lah He remembered how to crawl in hopes of getting a hold of the camera.

Seriously! I cannot get enough of this smile!! He continues to be such a joy in our lives!

And here is a picture of Brylee and Gunnar out in our front yard. I love all of our green grass!

Soccer Mom!

It finally happened...I was a soccer mom driving around in a mini-van and it wasn't as bad as I built it up in my head to be when I was so much younger! We tried out the city soccer program this spring and Tucker and Hunter had a blast! They both want to do it again in the fall. I enjoyed the season but was grateful when it was over and I got my weeknights and Saturdays back. I was better at getting Hunter to do his homework during those weeks than any other time during the year but I was worse at helping Tucker. The house seemed to fall apart and I rarely had any desire to clean it up Saturday afternoons after two soccer games. Dinners were tricky with practice for Tucker on Mondays from 5-6 and games on Tuesday for an hour starting at 4:30, 5:30, or 6:30 and then again on Thursday for Hunter with the same time options. There were some really cold games! It rained at only one game and thankfully Bryant was there and able to take the children to the van while I watched Hunter play. It was fun to see both boys learn the game and gain skills as the season progressed.

In the beginning, Tucker was a very defensive player. He would watch the ball as it was coming towards him and then back up indefinitely waiting for an opportunity to kick it towards the other side of the field. As the season progressed he learned to be a little more aggressive but always seemed to let the other kids take charge of the ball. In his final game he assisted another player in making 3 of the teams 5 goals. He was a little sad that he never actually scored a goal. Thankfully, this other teammate recognized Tucker's help and complimented him on his passing and help in making the goals. Tucker was great at staying in his position and working hard no matter where he was placed.

Here is a clip of Tucker at his first game.

Here are some additional videos of Tucker throughout the season

Here he assists in a goal

And some pictures of Tucker

Tucker usually played with a beanie, gloves or shirt on under his jersey. It was silly but it made it really easy to pick him out of all the kids

Hunter too was happy to wait for the ball to come to him as he played at his games. He was very concerned that there was no goalie in the kindergarten league like the 1st grade league and so he took it upon himself to watch the goal. He did not like to venture too far away just in case the ball came back across the short field and the other team scored. Hunter's team did not have a coach initially and non of the parents were willing to step up and coach. I had never played soccer before and had 4 other children with me at all the games by myself usually so I was certainly not eager to step forward. Thankfully, the girl on the team is in our ward and her mother warned her husband that he might have to coach the team. We had a lot of 4:30 games which was difficult for him because he had to leave work early to be with the team. I am very grateful for his willingness and ability to coach the team. Bryant was a little sad that his work schedule is not at all flexible so he could not have attempted to coach the team.

Here is Hunter at his first game. I learned that I am a bit of a screamer after my first two games and I'll let you know that I toned it down after that and found it fun to see that Bryant too likes to provide direction from the sidelines :) I told Hunter to get in front of the ball, and in so doing distracted him while in harms way and he got hit on the head :'(

Thankfully this did not ruin his season and he was able to go out and play hard the rest of the season. Here he is at one of his earlier games in the season.

Here are some additional clips of Hunter. If you still want more, come visit and ask to watch them because I have more :)

Here he is at his final game :)

I had to take a picture of him with his jersey on backwards :P Silly boy

Both boys got an awesome looking medal which they proudly hang on their walls. I'm so glad that they could both have such a good experience and have a desire to try again with the next season :)