TImp cave

Matt wants to turn our kids into extreme hikers so we decided to hike to timp cave last week. Kelty did the whole thing by herself (she actually has pretty good endurance) but walker only made it 1/4 of the way up and then had to be carried (it's a little harder for a boy that thick:). I have never hiked to timp and was pretty suprised at how the whole trail is on a cliff!!! Other than high risk for fatalities the hike was really pretty and the weather was perfect, and the cave looked like the inside of a persons ear full of earwax. If you haven't been on this hike i would highly recommend it but its like a refrigerator in the cave, so remember to bring a sweatshirt or you might have to buy a pretty sweet timpanogos cave hoodie from the gift shop.

Cool park

These are some pics i took at the new AWESOME park in Spanish Fork. It's about time southern utah valley got a cool kiddie attraction.

Camping in moab

My kids are always so full of energy (its exhausting for me) so hiking to the arch was easy for them. Walker hiked all the way there and almost all the way back...he did not want anyone to help him or hold his hand.
In the morning after a long freezing night's sleep i looked over at walker and found him with this big strawberry in his mouth, just staring at the fire pit (totally out of it).
These are some pics of my dad's first experiences rock crawling on the Razor. He did not understand the concept of going nice and slow up the rock so that you grip to the rocks...he gave it a full throttle kick and ended up riding up the rocks on just his back two wheels.
It was a fun weekend (not really relaxing) but fun. My children just love camping, hiking, getting dirty, and playing with bugs & flashlights.

Back to school

It was kelty's first day of her second year of preschool. Kelty loves school, the poor girl is going to have to go to 3 years of preschool because she barely misses the deadline for kindergarten. She chose her curious george shirt to wear for the first day and she let me do braids (rare occasion). I will never forget my preschool experience...i still remember going to Mrs. Ginger's basement and fighting over the pink cup at snack time and singing the ice cream flavor song with my head sticking out of a big ice cream cone cut-out.

Mrs. Shaw

Well, for the past 2 weeks I have been helping my little sister Megan (A.K.A. Mrs. Shaw) pull her classroom together. She got hired 4 days before school started so i came to her rescue and drew these cute animals for her room and i thought my theme "It's a Zoo in Here" was very appropriate for any Special Ed room with 13 students ranging from kindergarten to 4th grade and a first year teacher that was hired 4 days before school started! I have never had the opportunity to teach special ed students but Megan has roped me into teaching a couple times a week (since she does not like teaching in front of a class)...and i love working with meg's cute little students. Seriously it has been the most rewarding experience to work with them (I have cried occasionally because i care about them so much). If any one has some extra time on their hands you can volunteer to help her class anytime, cause she really needs the help! I think i really would love to teach my own classroom someday....and i will be taking my animals with me:)

Raspberries

Picking fruit just never gets old...kelty loves it. Houston was too hot all summer so we never got to go berry picking, so the raspberry patch in Mapleton satisfied our berry picking needs.
Walker was such a mess afterwards that the owner of the farm just had to take a picture of him.

Beautiful bride

I came home early from Texas to go to my cousin Jamie's wedding. I like to think that i was the one who brought this lovely couple together... last year at about this same time i invited Jamie to go boating with me and one of matt's sales buddies, thus on the boat that day was her future husband SCOTT(he is a red head BTW)!!! I am so happy for them and the lemonade served at the wedding was well worth driving home early for, i devoured 6 cups of pink lemonade. Congrats to Jamie and Scott, and welcome to the Little Bankhead Compound.

Waterpark

The kids loooooved this! We went to a waterpark by our house and the kids went down this waterslide over and over. Kelty has become quite the accomplished little swimmer. She is very determined (competitive almost), she taught herself how to swim(she would not let me help in any way shape or form). The last time that the office dove for quarters she dove down and collected more quarters than i did!(I gave up after 50 cents) I was never a good swimmer so it was best that she learn on her own. If she would have learned from me, she would be plugging her nose and there would be no diving!

Goodbye Grandma...

I went to my grandma's funeral today and it was beautiful...38 great grandchildren letting their balloons go in honor of Grandma!

Friends

Walker and Kelty were in heaven playing with Ellie and Cody at the pool when we visited them last weekend. They were in desperate need of quality friend time!