Happy Anniversary Bill and Marci!

Happy #18 Anniversary to Bill & Marci! Well done kids!

Happy Birthday Becky!

Happy Birthday to my sister-in-law Becky! I love you!

MK & KL

Martin & Kendal and Lindsay & Keith came to visit last night for dinner and then we sat around and talked about funny sacrament meeting memories. We heard some good ones.

Elliot & Martin (it could have been such a great picture)



(Kendal is trying to hide from the picture)

South Mountain Hike

On Friday, Lindsay and Keith showed up unexpectedly for a visit while I was in the middle of my white trash day. Stella had a friend over earlier in the day and we still hadn’t cleaned up from the fun. Not to say that they made the whole mess . . . there was an unidentifiable smell in the kitchen that I was too busy to find until they showed up and looked a little harder. Stella smelled like a foot and wasn’t wearing clothes and I was still in my exercise clothes (still hadn't exercised) and hadn’t showered. Lindsay and I had just spoken a few days earlier about filthy houses, so I was mortified! So Saturday morning I spent thoroughly cleaning the regular stuff and most of the stuff that doesn’t usually get done. It wasn’t perfectly clean when they came over last night, but I’m fairly sure that they weren’t cringing when they walked through the door.

To take a break from cleaning, we drove to the top of South Mountain in Phoenix and had a little picnic lunch. We got our muscles burning by chasing Stella around and making sure she didn’t jump off into any ravines while chasing birds. She’s a good girl.

Raegan JoAnn Ward

See, I love it when people know how to get their baby announcements out. My old roommate, my first roommate from Ricks College, Corey Nichols Ward just had her 3rd baby last week. She has a daughter and son and just had her baby girl Raegan on April 17th. She weighed 7 pounds 2 ounces and was 20 inches long.

Corey and I were room roommates my first year of college. She was already dating Ryan Ward when the semester started and was engaged at Christmas. She got married in April right before the semester ended, so that makes them married for 10 years! Ryan is a cowboy from Teton, Idaho and Corey was from Idaho Falls. They were awesome, both kind of quiet, but just so great! Corey and Ryan made a surprise appearance (8 months pregnant) to my wedding reception in Weiser and I was so happy to see them! What a great friend! Congratulations Ryan and Corey (and I can’t remember your other kids names, for some reason I have Kaylee in my head).

Tiger Lily

I just caught Stella dancing like Tiger Lily on Peter Pan. She's so cute, even if she does dance on the table sometimes.

The Zoo . . . again . . .

Stella and I went to The Phoenix Zoo today for Play Group. We also saw a sleepy tiger, sleepy lions, warthogs (they are so ugly), baboons socially grooming, gazelles, and swimming otters.

GIRAFFE
The giraffe is the tallest animal in the world and can run faster than a horse. They built a new viewing area for the giraffes where the kids get to climb a sort of tree house to be as tall as the giraffes and a deck sort of area to get closer to them down below.

RHINOCEROS
Elliot was reading Stella this book we got from the library about zoo animals and it says, “The rhinoceros has an unusual horn on its snout. It is really not a horn at all but tightly matted hair. Sometimes a rhino’s horn is torn off in a fight. No problem. It will grow back.”

NOT A PRAIRIE DOG
Emily made fun of me because I called this a prairie dog. I can’t remember what it’s called. What is Timon on The Lion King? It might be that.

CHEETAH
The cheetah is the fastest animal (up to 60 miles per hour), but can’t run for very long because it gets tired fast. Kind of like me, only I’m not fast.

WILD DOG
I thought this was a hyena, but it’s a wild dog from Africa.

FLAMINGO
I think it’s amazing how they balance their whole body on that tiny stick they call a leg. They warm their other leg by their body and then switch. The book says that the pinker their feathers the better their diet is. If they don’t eat very well, their feathers will be a dull white.

STELLA
The cutest animal in the zoo! She did so well following the rules today!

ZEBRA
The zebras didn’t smell very well. This is the closest they’ve ever been to the front since we’ve been to the zoo.

On the way home as we were reviewing which animals we saw today, I said, “What else did we see at the zoo today?” Stella’s response was, “Friends!”

Bailee

Oh my, look how cute this girl is! This is Maeser’s baby girl with her new teeth!

Liam Karl Hillyard

My cousin Julie and her husband Todd had their baby boy on February 16, 2007. He weighed 7 pounds 4 ounces and was 20 1/2 inches long. Since everyone is still learning that baby announcements, marriage announcements, graduation announcements, etc. must go through me, they are just getting around to sending me a picture of their little guy!

Julie sent Liam’s baby announcement movie, but I can’t get any pictures off of it. Here is the picture she put on her blog (look at my links) of Liam’s huge feet! Hopefully she’ll update the blog so you can see more pictures of Liam. Congratulations Todd and Julie!

Unwilling

Here’s what you get when you have a child unwilling to stay in her bed and two parents who are unwilling to put her back in bed.

Tess Louise Anderson

Erica and Doug (my cousin) had their little girl, Tess Louise Anderson, on April 5th! She was a little early, but Erica wasn’t complaining! She weighed 7 pounds 12 ounces and has lots of dark hair.


Stella absolutely loves her and I’m pretty fond of her too! At least 2 of Tess’s brothers adore her and the other one is still checking her out before he makes his final verdict, though reported quick little kisses here and there are in her favor. Congratulations Doug, Erica, Chase, Trey, and Ben!

MOVIE REVIEW – Glory Road

Not impressed at all! I guess I was expecting another “Remember the Titans,” which it totally WASN’T! It’s about this girl’s basketball coach who gets hired by a college that has a crappy basketball team that never wins. So he goes out and recruits several black players and keeps some of his white players. He tries to teach them the play “his game,” and you’d think that they’d listen and learn respect and somehow this would turn into a good story. But eventually the coach just lets them play their own game their own way because they are losing during ONE game (they were undefeated). It’s based on a true story from the 60’s, so I can understand the horrible situations that these players must have had to endure with the prejudice against them. The coach gives this big speech about not letting anyone TAKE anything from you that you don’t give them, and then turns around 20 minutes later and talks about TAKING something from someone because they’re not going to give it. Instead of learning about teamwork, they all just turned it into a game of “we’re better than you, so let’s show them” sort of thing. I didn’t like it at all.

POST correction for Jeffrey

My Mom has corrected me regarding Jeffrey’s graduation from POST several weeks ago. Here is her email:

“I was looking at your Blog and came upon Jeff’s graduation from POST. He spent 10 weeks there because he received a new position in the Sheriff’s dept. He’s been a Detention Officer (position of Corporal) since he joined the Sheriff’s dept. He applied and tested and got the job as a Road Deputy. Because he has a new position, he had to attend POST to learn his new duties.

He’ll have a brand new Explorer and just this week he received his rifle and shot gun so went practice shooting yesterday. He isn’t a Police Officer, he still a Sheriff’s Deputy. He works for the county not the city.

Adam works for the City of Chubbuck as a Police Officer. Jeff works for Washington County as a Deputy Sheriff. Jeff covers all three cities within Washington County . . . Weiser, Cambridge and Midvale.

He is so well thought of in the department, as is Adam. My buttons burst every time I hear good things about my sons. For that fact, all my children!”

Reagan Jane Fosburgh

Our friends Lynnae and Joe Fosburgh had their teeny-tiny baby girl almost 2 weeks ago. Reagan was 3 weeks early, so she was only 5 pounds. She’s super small and even the preemie clothes don’t fit her. The car seat and bouncy chair look so enormous when she’s in them!

Lynnae and Reagan are both healthy and happy! In fact, 2 days after Lynnae had Reagan, I called her to see if I could help with meals or her other 2 kids . . . but she was already cleaning her own house and back into her little routine. I keep telling all of my friends to stop impressing Elliot after they have babies or else he’s going to expect me to actually move earlier than 6 weeks after we have our next child. Congratulations Lynnae, Joe, Tyler, & Emma!

McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park

Stella and I went to the McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park today for Play Group. Elliot has taken Stella previously, but I’ve never been. It was so much fun! The carousel and train rides are only $1 and there were plenty of playground areas and picnic areas. We’ll definitely be visiting this park again!

Stella loves trains! Her daddy is so proud!

Stella loves Kaitlyn

Rachel (Stella's great friend!)

Rachel and Kaitlyn

Shirley Temple

So I’ve hooked Stella on Shirley Temple and I’m pretty happy about it. I remember my first Shirley Temple experience was when my parents, Lindsay, and my cousin Stacy and I were on our way to Utah to see Adam off at the airport for his mission. For some reason, every time Stacy was in the car with us, something went wrong, and this trip was no different. Our car died around Glenns Ferry, Idaho but we made it to a fairly deserted road in front of someone’s house. Dad knocked on the door and asked to use the phone to call my sister Marci who lived in Twin Falls, which wasn’t too far away. The lady who owned the house invited us all in and her ADORABLE little daughter who couldn’t have been much older than Stella is now, wanted to watch her Shirley Temple movie. I can’t remember exactly which movie it was, but I was hooked from the beginning! Stella was really upset when we had to take her movie (Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm) back to the library the other day, but now we have another reason to go to the library more often!

Ka-Bloo-Wee!

Do you hear that popping sound? . . . well, it’s just my mind blowing!

So here is my friend Geniel with her almost 6 month old son Wes . . . this picture was taken just a few weeks ago. Geniel is just over 4 months pregnant. Well that’s not even what blows my mind! Get this, Geniel, who also has 2 daughters (Dylan is 5 and Victoria is 3), just found out that she’s having TWINS! Wrap your mind around that one! Dylan told her that when she was pregnant with Wes that she had a dream she was going to have twins . . . well, she was close . . . 3 kids in one year kind of beats twins! I haven’t even talked to Geniel yet, but 20 people have already told me about it and how excited they are! If you feel so inclined to start sending diapers and formula, I’ll ask Geniel what kind she uses!

Jeffrey’s Graduation from POST

After several weeks of training, my brother Jeffrey graduated from POST (Peace Officer Standards and Training) Academy on the 16th of March. He graduated 4th out of 47 in his class. He’s been a sheriff’s deputy for quite some time now, but decided that he wanted to be a police officer instead. Congratulations Officer Anderson and your family!

Two Officers and their Ladies (Becky, Officer Jeffrey Anderson, Jenny, Officer Adam Anderson)

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter from the Dibble Family! Because of new varnish that was just applied to our cultural hall at the church and our inability to use the room for meetings, our Bishop made the command decision to skip Sunday School and just have Sacrament and Relief Society/Priesthood. An added bonus was that there were no extra meetings because of Easter so Elliot got to come home from church with us!

Here are my little fake-asleepers!

The Easter Egg Hunt

Notice the growth in my garden in the background. Stella was gathering eggs by the arm full!

She didn't waste any time enjoying her find!

My friend gave Stella this little kitchen set (her kids were done with it) and Stella got this new chef get-up in her Easter basket!



Stella was a little unwilling to cooperate while I tried to take adorable Easter pictures of her . . .



. . . there it is!

The Gregory Family

Finally! Uncle Roger and Aunt Terri and the family came for a visit! It was Morgan and Landon’s Spring Break, so they came from Sandy, Utah to visit. We always have the most fun with their family when we are in Utah, and it’s no different when they come here! I’ll have to learn their secret to raising such great, loving, funny, well-adjusted kids! Of their other 3 kids who are equally great, Trevan (who is married to Kennan and has adorable baby Jude . . . see Kennan's blog on my links) had to stay home and work, Cameron is on a mission in California, and Brennan I think is still at the MTC waiting to head out to California on his mission as well. Seriously, all great kids.



We spent Thursday night at the Dibble’s and had a little barbecue. The kids played around outside and then we all had a huge plush ball fight in the living room. Elliot and Landon took it a little further and longer into the family room where there is stuff to break . . . it didn’t stop them. It was so much fun to see Elliot play!

Stella couldn’t get enough of Landon and he was so great with her! She hasn’t been carried around so much since she was a baby. She was very protective of him when they were throwing the balls around and wanted to make sure Daddy wasn’t hurting him.



Friday night, after Elliot and I got back from the wedding and dinner, we went to the Dibble’s to pick up Stella. We played SET and SNATCH (Dibble favorites) for a long time (Morgan cheated). I swear Aunt Terri and Mother Dibble were a little “late night drunk” because they’d just bust out laughing at the silliest things!

Saturday we had our ward barbecue in the morning and then later went to the Dibble’s again for another barbecue. Uncle Roger was attacked by most of the kids, all of which wouldn’t give up the fight . . . soon Adam planned a sneak attack, which back-fired and ended with Adam, Ray, and Landon all pinned at the same time under Uncle Roger.



It was just so much fun to be outside with family and laughing so hard! I wish The Gregory Family would stay!