Double Duty

This was Arianna's first year to train for the Wellsville Mile. They worked all year, and towards the end she finally started to enjoy it. The scheduled date for the race was postponed due to a threat of rain. Unfortunately, the day that it was rescheduled for turned out to be a downpour! The day started warm and only partly cloudy. By the time the kids were ready to race they (and all those who came to support them) were soaking wet. They were shivering and Ari's cute glasses were in serious need of some windshield wipers! Regardless of all of that, Arianna did a wonderful job! She came in with a time of 10:32. That's awesome for being completely soaked! Great job, Ari!!!

Here she is at the start. Notice her jacket was almost completely on.

Here she is sprinting to the finish. The red jacket is barely on her arms!

It's hard to see her in this one, she's just behind the middle orange cone. Race completed!

That afternoon, after drying off completely, we went to Kali's Preschool Program. They treat it as a graduation though she still has another year of preschool. Her teachers were Mrs. Paskett and this year she had a co-teacher, Ms. Stephanie. I had to fight Kali most of the year to go to school. She loved it while she was there, just didn't want to make the break. But by the end she was doing great and is looking forward to going back!

Teacher Paskett does a fun carnival after the program. The kids had a blast!

Busy May

I'm finding May to be even busier than December. With performances, recitals, games, school programs and graduations. It's all good stuff, just busy. This Saturday we had two stars shine brightly!

Jake played Rec. soccer this Spring. He's found something he loves! Before the season began, we got a call telling us there weren't enough coaches for all the kids signed up. Rory was great and jumped right in (with little knowledge of the sport), to coach Jake's team. They had a great season! Jake loved to be right in the middle of it all and even played goalie a few times. My boys both did a great job this season! Way go, Menn!!!

JAKE DOING WHAT HE DOES BEST!

GOALIE (aka JAKE) AND COACH (aka DAD) DISCUSSING THE GAME

Arianna had her TaVaci concert in the evening. She started with the first solo of the night! Unfortunately, all of our video clips are long and I don't have the ability/knowledge to put them on the blog. She did a wonderful job and certainly in her element on the stage. Thanks for keeping us entertained, Arianna! We love you!

HERE THEY ARE PERFORMING THEIR BILLY JOEL MEDLEY

JERI CHENEY HAS BEEN HER TEACHER FOR A COUPLE OF YEARS. SHE'S LEAVING THE PROGRAM AND WILL BE GREATLY MISSED!

ARI AND HER PROUD MOMMA!

Five Reasons to Celebrate Mother's Day

To My Beautiful Children,

I find it impossible to describe in words the ways I love each of you. Merely putting my feelings on a blog or writing them down makes that love feel trite because of my inability to describe the depth to which you fill my heart. As each of you were born I worried that I'd have less love for the others, but what I found was not that my heart was to be compartmentalized into pieces, but was given the ability to stretch, expand, and grow with each set of blue eyes that joined our family.

I look forward to the day that each of you hold your own babies. I pray that I will be there to look in your eyes when you finally begin to understand the love I have for you and the eternal gift you have given me by calling me "mom".

Love,

Mom

Trip to the Zoo

We were happy to have Grandma Mann come from Washington to visit all of us Utahns in April. We took a rather beautiful Spring day to go visit the zoo with Grandma, Blaine and Necha.

PROOF THAT WE ARE A BUNCH OF MONKEYS...

Easter Clothes

Grandma Farr never ceases to thrill us with her creations. Easter was no exception! Here are the kids in the Easter church clothes. Thanks, Grandma! (I'm adding all of the pictures Rory attempted to take - It seems we couldn't get just one that all of them looked good in, so we're just going for a collection to get the idea.)

Spring Break in St. George

The Farr Family decided to get together over Spring Break in St. George. We all (well, almost all of us - we missed you, Brianna and family!) met at Great Grandpa and Grandma Page's house. Because our family has grown so big, there are no longer enough beds to fit the entire Farr family. So, Rory and I brought our trailer. This was the first time we've taken it that far. It was a very long ride (can you say - 7 miles to the gallon?!?!), but once we got there it was all worth it. We got there kind of late on Friday night, got all set up, and went to bed.

Saturday we attempted to listen to conference and had a visit from the Easter Bunny! The kids had a blast looking in all the rocks for the eggs with their cousins.

That afternoon we went to Snow Canyon. We kind of parted ways with the family with some going to the dunes and others going on a hike. Our family and Jordan's decided to go on a hike. It was so much fun. The kids were in heaven hiking the beautiful rocks! We could have spent hours there, but the little ones were worn out.

Ari really did have a great time, I think the actress in her was "acting" exhausted in every picture. ;P

Lest you wonder if we have 6 children now, the cute little brunette in the center is Bostyn, our cousin. If we could pass her beautiful brown eyes for blue, she'd be adopted!

We did other fun projects like tie-dye shirts and painting bird houses. We also painted Easter eggs. Unfortunately, we didn't check our battery charge on our camera before leaving the house. So, we missed the rest of the pictures and trip.

Sunday morning we went on a very special Easter Walk and talked about Christ and the special meaning of Easter. We enjoyed a wonderful breakfast, and again did our best to listen to conference.

We watched the weather all weekend, thanks to a storm that was coming. Sunday afternoon we decided, quite unexpectedly, to leave before the snow hit. Traveling with the trailer in the winds and snow wasn't something that we wanted to chance. It cut our trip ridiculously short, but we had fun while we were there and got home safely.

Miranda's a Winner!!

Miranda entered the Reflections Contest last fall. She decided to enter in the 3-D and Visual Art divisions. We finally got the results and she did great!!! Above she is pictured with her dragon she made for the 3-D entry that won at the District level and went to Region. She is also holding her Visual Arts entry that won at the school level and went to District.

Here is a photograph of ther Visual Arts picture that she handed in. She did it all in pencil.

Miranda, you never cease to amaze us! Your talent is a quiet one, not generally surrounded by applause, but you deserve it none the less!