Sweet Soccer Skills

Ashton and Thaddaeus have been playing soccer this season to their great excitement. I thought I would highlight some recent pictures and videos of their last few games. Steven and I have really enjoyed watching them on the field.

Here are the highlights...

Here is Thad's sweet soccer moves video. Check out his three best moves! Sorry it is sideways, I wasn't thinking about format when I took the video.

Can you believe they played in snow? We can we got over an inch the day before. The foothills look amazing though!

Getting some passing practice.

Warming up and staying in line with your team.

Here is some video of one of Ashton's games. It is actually really exciting to watch the little guys. You'll hear us cheering them on!

Now that is some intensity mister!

The joy of running around after a ball!

Snow in October?

We had the earliest snow fall on record, more than an 1" before Columbus Day! Wow! So of course being the snow bunny that I am I went out in it and enjoyed as much as possible! As my personal moto goes, "Drink tea and think snow!"

Here are the highlights...

Who doesn't like catching snowflakes on their tongues?

Steven humoring me in the snow! I love him so much.

Ashton enjoying the wild weather.

Even Bailey came out.

Here is the video I took of all the snow. Can you believe how much we got? The flakes where huge. I was in heaven!

Pioneer Days Hobbit Style!

Well the time finally came for Steven and I to get the wood split and garden beds tilled before Winter sets in.

What an exhausting, but satisfying job this was. As the saying goes "Wood heats you twice".
We experienced this first hand and were thankful for the cool weather over the weekend as we spent all day outside working.

Here are the highlights...

Lets Get Splitting!

The equipment was delivered just after 9:00 a.m. After the delivery persons showed us how to operate the equipment the work began.

Here is where the process began that brought us to this point of needing to rent a splitter. Idaho Power downed two large Locust trees that were interfering with the power lines.

Here is Steven in our wood filled back yard just after we moved in this April.

We started splitting the wood by hand after a handyman and Steven got some of the wood down to more manageable pieces. We attempted to do it pioneer style, but there was just too much to do by hand and that is when we decided to rent a splitter to get it finished before winter.

Let the hauling begin! We moved all the wood up front to be split.

Hobbits truly are amazing creatures!

Steven starting the splitting process.

I took a video of the splitting process. Steven did a full 6 hours by himself while I worked on the Garden. He is so amazing!

Ashton was a great help stacking, cleaning, and keeping track of the kindling pieces.

After 8 hours we finally finished! Go team Lawrence! All in all we ended up with 6 rows of wood a car width wide under our car port to burn over the winter. That doesn't include all the wood we had previously split by hand earlier in the summer. I don't think we'll be the least bit chilly this winter!


The Victory Garden!

Victory as in WWI, not the Garden show. I started with the Garden project in hopes of finishing first and then helping Steven finish splitting the wood.

I am very glad I didn't get a bigger tiller as I would not have been able to control it. Here is what I started with. What a mess!

A minor delay as we had to deal with a visitor. This was the first black widow I have ever seen.

After a few passes with the tiller, things started to take shape.

The back part of the Garden. I am so excited to start composting!

Here I am plugging along. As I like to say... "I am strong like bull"!

I started the hard scape as well. No where near done, but a good start nonetheless.

As you can see we had a full and productive weekend. We are plenty sore to remind us of our efforts!

Birthday Fun Ashton Style!

Happy Birthday Baby!

I can't believe Ashton is 5 already! We started Ashton's birthday out right with me waking him up at 3:10 am by singing him happy birthday. It was so sweet. At the end he said cha cha cha and then fell back to sleep. The bad part was two hours later he woke up and was throwing up on the stairs, so I had to help him get cleaned up and settled down. No fun getting sick on your birthday.

We kept breakfast simple in hopes that it wouldn't upset Ashton's tummy more. We had birthday waffles with candles and all! Here is the video of us singing happy birthday.

As you can see the birthday waffles were a hit!

Ashton got some really fun gifts. Thank you to Daddy, Grandma and Grandpa Lawrence, Aunt Mindy and Uncle Andy, Grandma Bea, and Grandma and Grandpa Casper for thinking of Ashton. He really enjoyed all the fun things! Ashton is excited to go shopping with his gift card. I hear he may be getting a lot of hot wheels! Ashton and Thaddaeus will also be joining the Chess Club at school as a gift.

Ashton wanted to bring cupcakes to school for his class, so we made vegetarian vanilla cupcakes with orange icing! YUMMY! As you can see Ashton couldn't believe there was only 1 left!

We'll continue the celebrating this weekend at the Hagerman Fossil Bed National Monument. Look forward to seeing you if you can come with us!

Red Rocket turns Party Wagon!


With a full car load we set off to Hagerman to visit the fossil beds. We battled some weather along the way. It prevented us from going out to the beds them selves but the visitor's center was so full of information and activities that I don't think we missed out at all. The staff was so amazing and really made every effort to make our experience both educational and memorable.

Here is the main exhibit area where actual fossils are on display from the local fossil bed. This is one of the prehistoric horses that have been found at the site.

One of the rangers explaining some of the exhibits on display.

One of the Rangers talking about how these large cats that would attach the horses and other smaller mammals in the area at that time.

Thad is getting attacked by one of these fossils, like a cute little bunny!

Trinity is showing Ashton some fossilized teeth. She may have a future in teaching. She is such a smart young lady.

Everyone getting ready to practice digging out a man made fossil!

Even Ranger Steve joined in the fossil excavation!

Here are the birthday cupcakes I made for the party. My long neck dinosaur was a little cramped on the cake pan.

Our troop leaving to go home. We stopped at the look out point for the fossil beds. Great view!


Thank you Amrta & Sara for letting your families come and celebrate Ashton's birthday with us. We really enjoyed the whole trip! We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends!