We love the beach

Another fun day at the beach.  Julia and Sawyer did a lot of wave jumping... 

and a lot of ocean soccer!!

Ryan found an awesome seashell!!

While the little kids were playing soccer, Dad and Ryan were playing a lot of football.

Dennis had a lot of fun using the boogey board in the waves.

And I enjoyed taking pictures and relaxing while everyone was having fun for many hours!!!

We are going to miss going to the ocean sooooooooooooo much!!!

Bass Pro Shop!!

We love going to Bass Pro Shops.  This particular Saturday they had a lot of Easter stuff going on.  I took advantage of the FREE pictures with the Easter Bunny.  I am not sure how many more years I am going to get Ryan to willingly sit by the big bunny! 

The kids (and Dennis) love to get different types of jerky whenever we go there.  I think it is nasty and refuse to try ostrich and alligator and all the wild animals that they will eat.  Instead I get some yummy fudge!!

It is quite amazing the amount of time we can spend in a store being entertained, without even shopping!!

1st grade egg drop

The 1st graders had egg drop event.  They were instucted to put a egg in a ziploc baggie and then put it in some sort of container that would keep it form breaking.  Dennis help Julia with the engineering of the packet.  Julia had a lot of great ideas and Dennis did mostly what she told him to do. They cut two big sponges in the middle, put the egg in there with some cotton balls and then taped them together.   I helped her with the decorting, her favorite part. 

Here is Dennis practicing the night before.  The first attempt broke, but they made it better....and......

Her egg made it!!!  She was so happy!!!  There were only 5 in her class of 19, that did not break, so I would have to say that she had a pretty good egg protection.. 

School Musical

Ryan's school choir preformed the musical, "It's a Kid's life".  They had to try out for parts and spent many months preparing.  Ryan got one of the main parts as Grandpa.  He had a lot of speaking parts and one solo.  I am so proud of my good singer boy.  He has a great voice and loves to sing.  I am so glad that even though he was called a sissy for being in choir that he sticks with it.  He is gifted and I love that he loves it. 

Ryan did not get glasses, he is just dressed up as "grandpa".  The shirt is borrowed, because it is grandpa-ish, according to 3rd grade kids.  The funny thing is that Ryan chose the shorts to go with it thinking that it matched good.  When his choir teacher saw him she said she loved that his outfit didn't match, very much like a grandpa. Ryan was confused, but decided that his teacher must think like his mom, because I never think he matches, according to Ryan.

The choir preformed parts of the musical at the fine arts festival.  I have no pictures, because those are part of the ones that were ruined on the virus infected sd card.  SOOOO MAD!!

Also, Ryan had an art piece chosen to be displayed at the festival also.  When he gets the piece back I will take a picture and hopefully add it to the blog. 

Pinewood Derby

Well Ryan's first experience with the pinewood derby last year was not the greateet.  So this year he was not as excited, but was determined to do better.  He designed his own car and really did the whole thing himself.  It is a TX Longhorn skateboard.

Thankfully, he did do a lot better.  He was able to win some of his races and he came in 6th overall.  He was a lot happier this year then last year.

His car recieved the "most creative" award! 

Census 2010

Ryan learned about the Census at school and was really interested in it, when it came in the mail.  So i decided to let him fill it out.  He love doing it and was so mature while he was doing it.  I hope he remembers this forever, not to mention that we are going to counted as Texans for the next 10 years!!!

Easter 2010

The annual picture of the kids together in their Sunday clothes for Easter.  Sawyer is going through a stage where he cannot just stand for a picture, he has to be doing something with his hands or posing wierd!!  We spent Easter at home.  It was General Conference weekend, so we did not even go to church, just stayed home and watched conference.  We had an annual easter egg dyeing contest, Dennis won all honors, as he was awarded the prettiest and ugliest egg.  Our neighbor Hela was the judge.  Unfortunately I do not have any pictures, because my sd card got a virus and will not let me view the pictures from April, luckily, there were not that many, but there were some important ones!

We had our own little egg hunt in our backyard.  I think that the easter bunny hid about 150 eggs.

The easter bunny just threw some out on the lawn that were really easy to find.

Sawyer came down stairs that morning, looked outside and said with a ton of sarcasm, "the easter bunny did not hide the eggs!"

I guess next year the bunny will have to do a better job.

Later that day we went over to the Svedin's house for dinner and another egg hunt.  They were a lot more clever in the hiding of the eggs and the hunt took a lot longer.  Also instead of candy in the eggs, they placed pennies, and then had a toy shop to buy little toys with their pennies.  Super cute, we might adopt this little tradition!!

Ryan was not feeling great when we took these pictures.  He had a little stomach virus, that Julia had the week before and Sawyer had the week after!  It was a great Easter holiday and we are so grateful; for our Savior and His resurrection, so that we can live again with Him!!!

Swim season

We entered the pool this 2010, on March 27th.  It was definately warm enough outside, but the water was still a little cold.  Dennis and I just put our feet in the water and Sawyer was not as crazy as the other two so he tested it out and then stayed on the side.

Ryan and Julia, however, loved it and stayed in the water for a long time.  The mostly floated on the top, so even though they thought it was warm enough, their actions prooved it was still a little cold. 

After swimming the kids put on a show, displaying their various dance moves.  Too FUNNY!!!

March Madness

For our March event, we went to the NCAA South Regional finals here is Houston.  It was fun, we were really far away, but the excitement of being there was a lot of fun.  WE left the kids with a sitter and I guess Sawyer had a belly ache, so after numerous calls from the sitter, we left the 2nd game at half time to head home.  The joys of parenthood!!  Although, we did decide that with the tickets we had, it is better to be at home watching it on TV.  Next time we stay home, or we good really good seats!!

I'll I want for Easter is my two front teeth

The first day of vacation, Julia lost her right top front tooth.  It was a very dramatic event.  We were at a Jack in the box, having dinner and Dennis decided that she needed it out.  The decision was made because she would not eat her burger, since her tooth was hanging out and it was hurting her.  So Dennis took her to the car and after a lot of pulling and crying, she came it bleeding a lot, but minus a tooth.  She was very happy, a little nervous that the tooth fairy would not find her, but learned that night that the tooth fairy is very generous on vacation.  The last day of our vacation, her top left front tooth was ready to be pulled.  Julia was a lot more brave this time, and there was a lot less blood.  It was kindof neat that she lost one on the first day of vacation and one on the last day of vacation. 

Goodbye Good 'Ole Texas

If it was any other person's blog, besides us, this might come as a surprise.  But, since it us, the Updikes, I am sure no one is suprised that we are moving again!!!  When we moved to Texas, we knew that it was just a pit stop to Tulsa, Ok, but we thought it was a 3-4 year, minimum, pitstop.  Well things with Dennis's job changed and instead of 3-4 years, they want him in Tulsa now.  So.... need-less to say we are "on the road again".  It is bittersweet for me, I never in a million years would have thought I would love TX this much.  It is a great place to live, and did I mention that I live in my dream home!!  Well it actually belongs to someone else now, since we sold it the first day it was on the market!!  We are moving to the Tulsa, Ok area the middle of June, which makes, I think, 5 summers in a row that we have moved.  Since Dennis and I have been married for 10 years and with this move it will make the grand total moves to.........13
That is afwul.
Well this should be the last move for a very long time!!!

vacation 2010-last day

WE began the long drive home Friday night and went six hours.  We woke up the next morning and drove a few hours and stopped at Pensacola Beach.  We had planned on going to Biloxi again, but it did not work out, so this is where we ended up.  Again it was not a hot day, but Dennis and the kids were able to play in the water.

The waves were pretty big, almost a little scary for me.  Dennis and Ryan spent a lot of time jumping waves.

The sand on this beach was so AWESOME!!  It was white and soft.  I had never seen anything like it, it was lkindof spongy!!  SO BEAUTIFUL!!!

Sawyer had a lot of fun it in, digging, digging and digging.  The others had fun burying Sawyer.

Ryan bulit a nice castle, that he housed little creatures in.

Julia and I did a lot of watching and enjoying the weather while we buried our feet in the great sand.

It was a great vacation!  I was glad to be home in my own bed, but I must admit I love going places, vacationing, so of course, I am ready to go somewhere again!!

vacation 2010-day eight

Hollywood Studios

Friday morning we went back to Hollywood Studios.  We had a lot of fun.  Sawyer loved the the Honey I Shrunk the Kids play land and kept asking to go back there.  My favorite thing, we finally figured out how to make the fast pass and babyswap work to our advantage, therefore we did a lot less waiting in lines. 

Ryan loved the Toy Story Mania, a giant size vidoe game ride.  Julia loved the awesome rockin roller coaster and the Tower of Terror.  Dennis loved the the car show. 

Again, more characters and even some we got to see, but not meet, we just ran out of time!

Good bye Disney World.  We

really hope that we get to return again someday!!

vacation 2010-day seven

Day Seven=not the best day!

We started with breakfast and then the kids and Dennis went to get on the bus headed for Hollywood
Studios, while I went back to the motel room to get more insulin for my pump.  When I got to my motel room, all my insulin and pump supplies had been stolen out of our little fridge.  It was a nightmare, the motel did not want to really help.  I could not get ahold of my doctor to get another prescription and my levels were already climbing.  It was awful.  Finally by 4 that afternoon, we got a prescription called into a Walgreens, pick it up and headed to Hollywood Studios that night.  This was suppose to be our last day at Disneyworld, so we did not want to waste it.

We saw the Beauty and the Beast show and rode a few rides. 

We decided to extend our passes an extra day and come back in the morning.  The trip had been so good up to now and we did not want this incident to put too much of a damper on our trip.

vacation 2010-day six

                           Animal Kingdom

Disney World has 4 parks, and Animal Kingdom was where we went on our second day there.  This was our favorite place.  The details here were amazing.  e.i.. at the africa section the whole area is just like it would be there, even the power lines.  So Awesome!!!

We saw even more characters this day.  Sawyer stood in more character lines while the bigger kids waited in line for their favorite ride, Mt Everest. 

There were lots of fun things to see and do.  We went on a jungle safari, played in a dinosaur maze, rode a water rapid ride,(only I got went, I was the only one that did not want to get wet!),  rode more rides and saw lots of very fun things. 

This is from the Bug's Life 3-D show.  Sawyer was so cute, he would try and reach out and grab things and was very scared when things appeared to come toward him.  It was a fun show.  At the end the announcer says that the roaches can leave first and you feel little bumps on your chair that felt like the roaches crawling under your bum.  It was a little scary for Julia but a lot of fun!!

vacation 2010- day five

Disney World-Magic Kingdom

Here are the kids in anticipation.  Right before the park opens a train brings Mickey and friends to the front and they do a little show.  Sawyer was in heaven.  He was so excited to see Mickey Mouse.

I think Sawyer's favorite thing to do was see the characters.  He also got a lot more time to stand in lines while the big kids were waiting in line for rides.

Sawyer stole a kiss from sleeping beauty, or she stole a kiss from him.  It is hard to say since Sawyer liked it sooooooo much.  He kindof likes girls a lot and a pretty princess tops it all.

The rides were a lot of fun.  The kids thought they were not all that thrilling, but the stuff to look at while on the rides was awesome.  Not a lot of pictures of rides, since I was riding them.  I love that a lot of the rides were family friendly so we could all go together.  Though, the rides were great, I loved walking around looking at stuff, the disney detail was amazing!!

A few fun things we saw!!!!

A family snap shot on Tom Sawyer island.  We used the disney photo pass for most of our family photos, but every once in awhile someone would offer to take a picture!

It was a long fun day!!!!!  On our way out VERY late that night, Julia was so cute waving goodbye the disney characters at the end of the parade!!