On Your Mark, Get Set......

McKay turned 8 just in time to participate in the pine wood derby! Rik had to brush off his "mad derby-car making skills".... it's been a quick 5 years since we had to make the last one with Kayden. McKay's car placed third out of 15 cars, but if you ask him what his favorite part of the whole night was, he'd tell you it was carrying and posting the flag, and saluting cub scout-style.

Did You Check a Wrong Box?!

Kayden has been receiving all sorts of college mail over the last little bit, which is exciting and scary all at the same time. Last week though we got a letter that said:

Dear Parent,

Your daughter, Kayden has just been nominated to attend the National Youth Leadership Forum...

The whole letter was all in "her" and "she." We thought that was a little weird, but then the next day we got this letter:

Bahahaha!!

Easter weekend was busy, but nice. On Saturday both girls had volleyball at different schools in Sugar City, McKay had wrestling in Rexburg, and Kayden had a two-day track meet (I just keep telling myself, "Almost done.... almost done.....") Sunday the kids woke up to a one-word treasure hunt to find their Easter stuff. They each had 5- one word clues, like "window, cupboard, mirror, picture, etc. and they just had to wander around and check them all until they found their next clue. Easy for me, time consuming for them!

I took all the kids shopping for their Easter clothes this year, and was surprised that they all wanted COLOR. And not pastels.... BRIGHT COLORS and lots of them! I guess I don't blame them with the drab, gray winter we've had!

Kayden was mooching food at.... I mean "supporting" a friends mission farewell, so I had to snap a picture of him later than everyone else... and really he wanted me to take a picture of him doing a yo-yo trick (his yo-yo is in his left hand). He makes a handsome BOY...



McKay had his baptism interview Sunday morning before church. He gets baptized April 30th at 10:00. He's SO excited!!

Birthday Boys

McKay turned 8 on Friday!! He was so excited for his birthday this year. We did a little friend birthday party Friday after school. He was also the "Star Student" in his class last week. He had to fill out the "Star Student" paper and fill a box with things that he likes. I loved that on the paper he said that his wish was to go to Hogwarts (incidentally, this is also Malia's wish!) He also wrote down that his real name is Amitai McKay Finlayson, but he wanted to make sure that everyone knew he didn't like to be called Amitai.... only McKay.

For his birthday dinner he wanted tacos, and he wanted dirt again for dessert. We got him a ukulele for his birthday. We've been listening to him strum away all day. McKay gets baptized April 30th. He can hardly wait!


Kayden turned 17 today!! Holy smokes those years have gone fast! He wanted to go to Billman's for dinner tonight, and he asked if I would make chicken enchiladas and strawberry shortcake for tomorrow. Here's a picture of Kayden and Kristen at Billman's. Yummy!! Rik got him the bone carving, and Kayden picked out the shirt when we were birthday shopping last week.

Piano Recital

Malia had her Spring piano recital last night and by some miracle I remembered the camera (that's not 100% true..... I initially forgot, and ran back home to get it.) She played three pieces, but I couldn't remember how to record on the camera (that's what you get with lack of use), so I missed the first song.

(Sorry for the poor picture quality.... I downgraded the quality so it wouldn't take 3 days to upload!)

Spring break was absolutely heavenly! We didn't go anywhere, but tried to do something fun as a family everyday. We fed the ducks down at the river, went bowling, swimming, roller skating, out to eat at Texas Roadhouse, and shopped. But most of all we relaxed. I think Tangled may have been on some type of repeating loop on the TV... I watched that show so many times in a row! We also slept and caught up on some household projects (I'm so THRILLED with what we got done on the house!) Less than seven weeks of school left (not that I'm counting....)

All Sorts of Illegal.....

Kayden came home the other day and told me he had signed himself up to run for student body secretary. So the night before he was supposed to hang up posters, we decided we better start brainstorming on some campaign ideas. Since we were short on time, we decided that there are many, many creative people out there... let's just use their ideas!! Kayden's slogan was "Vote Kayden Finlayson. Insurance for a Great Year!" And then we used lots of insurance ads and slogans: "15 minutes of voting for Kayden could save you 15%," "There's no discount for agreeing with me" (picture of Flo, the Progressive girl), "Vote for Kayden! It's so easy a caveman could do it," "Mayhem is coming!! Vote for Kayden," "This is the money you could be saving if you voted for Kayden".... you get the idea. 50 fliers, 5 posters, 400 handouts with candy, 1 banner, and a video speech later.... Kayden won!! Here's the stars of his video speech:

I'm sure this campaign didn't have any copyright issues.... We found all the images free on the internet, and no, I did not photocopy dollar bills because I couldn't find any fake ones that worked..... nothing illegal going on here....

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A group of us went down to Salt Lake last weekend for the Young Woman's Conference. This is our third year going down there, and Taisha's first. We did a little shopping, ate at The Old Spaghetti Factory, and then headed over to the Conference Center. We love this tradition!

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Today was the last day of school before Spring Break!!! I'm beyond happy!! I even made dinner and hour and a half later than normal AND I'm watching TV even as we speak... and I remembered how to turn it on! (I run a pretty tight ship lately, with not much wiggle room.) Yippee!!