Cooper's First 17 Miler

This hike was incredible and miraculous to me for a few reasons:

• Cooper did it at 4 1/2 years old!

• My Mom did it! (on her 53rd Birthday... yay Mom!)

• I did it! (6 weeks pregnant!)

• Jesse did it! (this was his first time on this hike, he was a champ and carried other people's packs a good deal of the time)

• There were possibly armed and dangerous men all over that mountain and we weren't mugged, taken hostage or threatened in any way... more on that later.

For this hike we start in Grass Valley and hike up to Mill Flat (Day 1: 5 miles), then we hike from Mill up to the Browse overlook and down to Whipple Valley (Day 2: 5 miles), The last day we hike down Whipple to the Pine Valley Campgrounds (Day 3: 7 miles). So for now, here are some pics taken on our miraculous hike:

At the Trail head, packs on, ready to go!

A few miles in, Sara found raspberry bushes, she picked enough to cover the bottom of her cup and at for dessert that night we put them on Mom's birthday cheesecake:
The first day we hiked 5 miles from Grass Valley to Mill Flat, but it was nice to be done for the day!
I was just glad to take off my pack:
I brought freeze dried blueberry cheesecake for Mom's birthday cake and we sang, I even remembered to bring 1 little pink candle to stick in it for her! ( it was worth the extra .01 oz of weight!)
Sara packed up Monopoly Deal (our new favorite game) just so we could play a few games:
Cooper burned 3 fingers on the fire... I think he has a healthy respect for campfires now:
The 2nd day we hiked up to this outlook over Browse... breathtaking as always!
MandaSara at the outlook:
Jesse strapped on my mom's pack for the last 3 miles of the 2nd day. When he would put Cooper on his shoulders for a few miles he was carrying about 105 pounds! Woot Woot!
Mom Made it to the lookout too!
Mom hiking through North Valley:
Eating dinner in Whipple Valley:
Ready to go on the last day:
Every time Cooper stopped for snacks he had to take his cow out first:
Jesse: "I think I can see Pine Valley from here!"
Me: "I think I can see Central!"
Cooper: "I can almost see Jesus!"
All done! So after we finished the hike I saw a mexican dressed in work clothes just looking into the bushes, when we got home we saw in the paper that there had been a huge marajuana sting on the mountain while we were hiking and there had been gunfire as the police had apprehended 5 suspects. SCARY! Anyway... none of us got hurt and we all had a good time. Jesse can't wait to do it again with Leila :)

2010 Washington County Fair

Marshall loved the food: Too much:
Leila loved the music:
Cooper loved rides with Daddy:
Sara loved the ferris wheel: (I pretended to love... but screamed on the inside and sometimes outside like a small child. )
Fast forward to the next morning, Parade!
Amanda on drums:
Sara on Clarinet:
Then Demolition Derby time with Jimmy and Jen: (and Cooper) The derby was 10x better with cooper there because he was in complete wonderment and ecstatic the whole time... loved it!

200th Post.... Surprise!

I was thinking of something special to do for this 200th post of my blog, but I couldn't think of anything more spectacular than to announce that we are expecting our 4th child! I'm barely 5 weeks along and I'm not quite sick yet (I'm sure that part will come soon!). The baby should be here sometime in April, I'll keep you all posted!

Pioneer Day

What is Pioneer day with out the small town parade?
And cupcake walk....

And shoving the cupcake from the cupcake walk in your face...

And then riding around in the stroller for the rest of the day with said cupcake still on your face...

And painting your face!


Eating watermelon, rind and all!

And using your tickets to dunk your own dad in the dunking booth!

That was our pioneer day... hope yours was good too :)

Time for a Bath!

I put Leila in the tub and went out to put her clothes in the hamper. I come back to find Mr. Marshall in the tub too, clothes and all! If you look closely he has a red mark on his forehead from bonking it as he dove head first into the tub.
I guess I'll save myself the hassle and put him in next time whether he needs it or not!

Sleeping Angel

This guy is crazy busy when he's awake, so when he's sleeping it's sort of blissful (for me and him!). I thought I'd share with you my sleeping angel:

Missing Daddy

We each had our own ways of missing Jesse while he was gone. I stayed up late on the computer every night because there was no reason to go to bed, Cooper would ask me if Daddy would be home when we returned from any outing, Leila would bring me the phone and ask to call him, Marshall would wander around the house saying "DA!" trying to find him. We were all excited when we went to the airport to wait for his plane.
And since he got back I haven't been able to separate them :)

Tennis Anyone?

Cooper started a quickstart tennis program and goes 2 days a week. They mostly play little games to learn different tennis skills. He's the youngest one in the class and couldn't be cuter :)