Nauvoo, Illinois

Boyd and Sheri (Eric's Parents) are serving a mission in Nauvoo right now. We had the AWESOME opportunity to go back there in August and visit them. We had an incredible experience and are so thankful we were able to go. Our testimonies and famly were strengthened! What a blessing.

Eric and I had the opportunity to do Baptisms for the Dead with Kylan. It was the first time we had been in the temple with one of our children. It was very humbling and very spiritual. We were there around three hours. I can't wait until all five of us are in the temple together! I pray for that constantly!!

The first night we were in Nauvoo we surprised Grandma Schiess. She is in charge of one of the musicals there and we snuck in during the performance. It was really fun! Grandpa Schiess came and met us there. We were so excited to see them!!

I think this is a darling picture!

One of the Sister Missionaries there let Chloee try on her beautiful bonnet and shall. Doesn't she look beautiful sitting next to Grandma?

Swimming In The Yard

My kids have been awesome this week. Usually we are on their cases to get things done around the house, but they have been so cooperative this week. It is so nice! Yesterday after working in the shop, cleaning the cars (I have a story about that in a minute) and weeding the garden, they decided to go for a swim. The water started clean and ice cold. Our dog Oreo decided to take a swim with them. EWWWWW! It was so gross, but they didn't seem to mind. In fact Ghavan loves Oreo, so he invited her in!!! One of those things I have to say "It doesn't matter", walk away and pretend like I don't care. I am so thankful for soap and water!
Obviously Ky thought it was pretty funny when Oreo jumped in too! She (Oreo) is very obedient and gets out when we tell her, but then she jumps right back in!
I just realized I didn't get any pictures of Chloee in the pool. I started taking video right after I got these shots. Shoot!

OK, Now For The Cleaning The Car Story

I really debated about putting this story on here, because it may show neglect on our part and we really don't want to go to jail. Actually, this would fall more on Eric's head I think. He was raised on a farm and was driving a vehicle at a young age. The boys have driven the riding lawn mower before. Eric taught Ky how to move the vehicles at an early age and thought it would be a good idea to let Ghavan pull the car forward. He needed to vacuum it and the extension cord wasn't long enough. Eric gave Ghavan a great lesson on where the brake and gas pedals were and let him go. I was in the shop working when all of the sudden I heard Eric yelling. I looked out the shop door and saw the car coming right toward me. Thankgoodness I was looking through the open door (so I was protected by the wall). Eric was chasing the car from behind still yelling. All of the sudden I saw our shop shake as the car ran into our shop. It bent the door pretty bad and put a big old crack in the shop wall. I went running out to look at the damage and saw Ghavan just sobbing. I jumped into the car to see if he was ok and he was SCARED TO DEATH! He thought the gas was the brake (easy to confuse when you have never driven before). Thankgoodness he wasn't hurt. I think he bumped his lip because it was hurting a little, but there was no blood. He just hugged me and cried after. I took this moment to tell him how much his Heavenly Father Loved him and that is why he was protected. I also explained that is why we have Family prayer every morning asking our Heavenly Father to protect us and keep us from harm. We were spending the day together, so our whole family was outside. Our dogs were running around too... and nobody got hurt. After he quit crying and the day went on, we started cracking jokes about it. Ghavan said "Well Mom, I might as well make a joke about it so we can laugh!" That's my Ghavan.

The cracked Wall!

I didn't want Ghavan to be afraid or be scarred for life about driving, so after he ran the car into the shop, Ghavan and I sat in the car for a minute... I told him we needed to back the car up. His side of the car was right next to a fence that is by our drive way and there was no way he could get out. He yelled "No Mom". I looked him in the eye and told him he could do this. I told him to put his foot on the brake. (I showed him again which pedal was the brake. I didn't want him confused again.) I shifted it into reverse and he slowly backed the car away from the house. We got out of the car and all was well. After it happened I thought to myself.. "This will be one of those things we laugh about someday". I just had no idea it would be so funny so soon. Eric took the kids fishing this morning. After family prayer I said to Eric.... (so Ghavan could hear) don't let Ghav drive the boat. We just laughed. Oh, The Joys Of Raising Kids!!

Oh... by the way - No damage was done to the car!!! Whew!

Ward Family Trek

Our Bishop had a great idea a year ago.....

A Ward Trek- Old & Young

It was an amazing experience for our family. The spirit was so strong and we gained a greater appreciation for eachother and for the wonderful Saints who gave so much and suffered so greatly to bless our lives. We met a the church on a Friday morning at 9:00. Everyone was dressed for the occasion... skirts, bonnets, farming clothes etc. We drove up Black Smith Fork Canyon until we reached Hardware Ranch. We each were able to take a 5 Gallon bucket of the things we would need. Thankgoodness we were able to send our tents, sleeping bags, pillows and all of those wonderful luxuries in the large snowmobile trailer that was provided. We put some clothes, snacks and extra shoes in each of ours. We met with our three companies, ate lunch and learned about the area. Then.... it all began.

Many, Many miles of walking. We had an incredible company of people and we truly became a family during those couple of days. I think we walked about four miles the first day. I think we made it to our camp around 4:00 p.m. There were so many things I learned on this trek. One of them was that we just had to keep going. One foot in front of the other and one step at a time. And I think everything I learned was so comparable to our day and age. Through this life, regardless of the tough things we are given, we need to continue one step at a time. We all drank a lot of water and were constantly reminding each other (out of love) to DRINK! In the above picture, we had stopped for a minute to drink and take a breather. It was very hot at this time and we were so blessed to have a cloud drift right over our heads. It gave such relief to the heat. We reflected the entire time as we experienced different things as to how the pioneers would have felt. We knew, no matter what that our trek would end after two days. We knew that there was a Rhino (ATV) right behind us just in case.... and it was used!! Those dear Saints didn't have that.
When we got to our camp ground we all just sat for a while. Drinking and eating was a must!! We were divided into three companies. We were company #1 and had a great group of people. We all jumped right in helping eachother. Pitching tents was necessary and as soon as we got them up... it began raining. It was humid, hot and dirty and it was incredible. Eric and I cooked dinner for our company. It was a wonderful Dutch Oven dinner with chicken, potatoes, carrots and was DELICIOUS! While we were preparing our meal, we noticed many men on horses circling around our camp. Our camp had many ideas of what was happening, but didn't find out until the end of the trek. (I will tell later) After dinner we had a fireside with music and speakers. Eric played the guitar with two of our great friends and sang a song he wrote for the trek. It was great! After the fireside, they excused us to go back to our camps for a testimony meeting. It was so spiritual and touching to hear everyones feelings about the experiences we had already had in such a short time. Now by this time I was getting really nervous. My dear friend (who was in charge) had prepared us for the next day by telling us it would be very hard! Much harder than the first day and we would also be doing a woman's pull. For some reason I felt weak and very afraid of my physical ability. I don't think I have ever felt that before. I prayed that night before going to sleep that the spirit would help me to feel confident and not afraid. My prayer really helped calm my nerves. We started the next morning with a Wonderful Breakfast and the with the teardown of our camp. Then we were off. This picture below is a picture of the Women's pull. As we were walking along the trail, two men on horses came and asked all the men 12 and older to follow them. The US Government needed them for the war. We had minutes to say goodbye and we watched them walk away. As the man was telling the men they needed to leave, tears just ran down my face. It was so easy to put myself in the shoes of these dear sisters who crossed the plains many years ago. In a matter on minutes, their husbands and sons were taken. And who knows if they would have seen them again. We also had many children on this trek with us. We had an extra four children who were walking with us. Their mother couldn't make it on the trek so they came with their dad. When they took him and their older brother... they became our children and they were so good. - I kept tripping on my skirt, so finally I just tucked it in the front. I had my really cute swim shorts on underneath. WootWooh!

As we came to the top of the hill, all of our sons, husbands & fathers were singing hymns for us. It was so tender and the spirit was amazing. Eric took a picture of Ky and it is priceless to me!

I Love Our Family So Much!

I was part of the first handcart that walked the women's pull first. It was exhausting. There were four women and two kids. Ghavan was one of them. I remember looking him in the eyes and telling him we needed all the help he could give. And he gave all he had. The idea was that after we made it to the top, we would continue down the hill helping all the other carts behind us. I was able to help with one more, but that was all I could do. We had two amazing sisters that were in our company who were able to push 4 and 5 carts up the hill. It was Awesome! This doens't look too hard at this point, but this was the easy part! There were so many HILLS! We were very concerned with Eric's health. His back disease has been getting worse and he lives with a great deal of pain every day. But we have decided to give all we have to our family and the Lord will bless us. We knew this would be an amazing experience for our family.... and it was! Eric surprised himself and me. He did an incredible job and I was so grateful we were there together. This is a picture of Eric and the boys pulling the handcart. Our great friends Mark and Linda Perkes were in our handcart with us. Mark was awesome! It is hard to see him, but he is pushing in the back. His wife (on the side of Ghavan) was one of the sisters who helped push several carts up the Women's pull hill. They both just ran in the RAGNAR race and boy, were we grateful they were with us.

Chloee was so good! As I watched her during this trek, it was so easy to imagine what the little children did while crossing the plains. She picked flowers and played with sticks. She cried because she was exhausted and didn't want to walk any more. She wanted to be carried and wanted to know when we could go home. I can't help but imagine how hard that was for the mothers then. What did they tell their children? How far did they carry them when they could barly walk themselves? This experience truly changed my life.... for the good.

While on this trek we had three people become very sick. Two Moms and one Dad. It made things very real to us. Several families had babies under the age of one. It wasn't uncommon to hear babies crying while we were walking and it made it all so REAL! When we got toward the end of the trek we came to another large hill. On this hill were several men on horses blocking our path. Our bishop told us they were the men from the night before. They were spirits (acting) from the other side that had come to watch over us and protect us. They began taking some of our friends. They walked up quietly and took them with us. After they left, the bishop told us that each of those people who left, represented people who died along the way. We continued on our way and as we reached the end of the trek, there were our friends who left. They were with others from our ward who could not make the trek. They were in two seperate lines along the path we were walking on all dressed in white temple clothes and singing. They were there to welcome us! It is hard for me to tell this story, because unless you were there I am sure it is hard to imagine what it was like. Please let me tell you how amazing it was. Our family was so blessed to go on this trek together.

I almost felt guilty when I got into my suburban and drove home. I jumped into a wonderful shower, put all our filthy clothes into the washing machine and made a wonderful spaghetti dinner. I had all the food right there in the pantry. And then I made Chocolate Chip cookies..... just because I could. It is the simple things in life that truly are blessings. Happy 24th to everyone..... and please remember those who came before us. They truly truly were amazing and very precious children of God!

God Bless America!

We kept things pretty simple this 4th of July. The 4th was on a Sunday this year. We did fireworks at our house that night - just Eric, myself and the kids. I just love our family!! We went to Tori & Jer's for a BBQ monday night for Family Home Evening. We lit fireworks after we stuffed ourselves with porchops and dutch oven potatoes. Thanks Tori & Jer! YUMMY!!! You know, Eric and Jer are just too funny together. If any of you know them, they are just so funny. Ok, so add a little bit of fireworks and a fire torch - oh, you can only image. They had a very good time. I said to Tori "The fireworks really are for the dads." We just laughed!!
Now that's the spirit!

Chloee & I playing with sparklers.

Ghav and I - I'm really not choking him... just hugging him!

My baby will be 13 in November. I wish he would stop growing.

Fishing In Mantua Lake

Eric took Kylan and Ghavan fishing in Mantua. They had a total blast. Look at all these fish they caught. They took Eric's dad's boat again and loved it. I am so grateful for the memories we are making. They are priceless!!

Take Me Out To The Ball Game!!

We went to a Salt Lake Bees game this summer and it was so much fun. We took Mel, Kenny & Taya and Tor, Jer and the Kids. I have only been to that field two times. The first time was when Ghavan was a baby. I remember walking into the stadium and it was breathtaking. The field is so green and the atmosphere is awesome. Growing up on the ball diamond watching my dad and then spending many, many hours there playing myself, it definitely has a soft spot in my heart.

All Chloee Wanted was cotton candy and an Icee!
$10.00 later..... Yummy

Ghavan ate Nacho's and an Icee!!!

$10.00 later.... Yummy!

Kylan ate Ice Cream Dots & an Icee - $10.00 later - Yummy

It is a very good thing the tickets were free, because we spent all our money on treats. Eric and I shared a pretzel, drink and popcorn. It was GREAT!!!

This is our favorite Maddock family. Jer, Hal, Tor, Detaber (detmer) & Ri

This is our favorite Jacobson Family - Kenny, Taya & Melly Mel

Eric and his girls. He has a very big space in his heart for these three. Chloee, Taya & Halle

Just Goofin Around! It is what we do best!!!

Rilee & Chloee - Best Friends!

Fishing At Hyrum Dam

Eric's dad let us take his fishing boat to Hyrum Dam. All the kids and Eric Fished. I was a long for the ride. I haven't been in a boat since I was a very little kid. I have a real problem with motion sickness. I get sick even when I drive sometimes. I took a dramamine and woohoo....

I didn't get sick. I really enjoyed it.

Ghavan.... what a cheeseball! I think he was more along for the ride like me.

Ky is the serious fisherman. He was sitting on the front of the boat.

That is kindof scary to me...

Chloee - What an angel. She is always willing to just go with the flow. She loves everything!

Eric let all of us have a turn driving the boat. It was really cool.

Making Smores In The Back Yard

Makin' Smores

Look at Ky's face. You can tell that is going to be one heck of a great bite! We love smores. We put a fire pit into out back yard last year and have spent many hours out there.
Chloee is eating a really big bite!

You know, I can't tell what Eric is thinking at this very moment, but he sure is cute!

The Hotel Room

The hotel was very relaxing. We watched movies, rested and definitely spent some good quality time together. By the end of the trip, we were feeling a little too close!

It sure made our home feel alot bigger when we got home!

Ghav... I just love you!

Ky... I just love you too!

The boys were watching baseball. Chloee and I watched A Cinderella Story instead. We just put the head phone on and enjoyed the show!

Eric is relaxing after a long day at his conference.