Taylor turns 8- Angry Bird Style

We dedicated our lives to swimming lessons this summer and it really paid off.  Taylor took swimming lessons last summer and never did put his head under water.  We tried private, group, bribes, being nice, being mean- NOTHING worked.  We are so proud of him.  He's doing really good. They both have the best teachers.  We drive 30 min. to get there- but it was SO worth it!  Taylor was working on coming up for a breath even when he didn't need one so he can be ready to start swimming in the deep end. 
Lauren took lessons for the first time and is doing Awesome!  We are so proud of her too!  It's such a nice feeling to know that your kids can swim!

For our Grandparents who live WAY too far away

Happy Sabbath

Our Little Dancer

All the little Gift Givers before the concert and during the concert when they were not dancing. I think Lauren had more fun in the dress up room playing princess with all the other little girls more than dancing on the big stage.

After the concert
It was so fun to have Aunt Jer visiting so she could come watch Lauren dance!



Lauren has LOVED taking dance this year. She takes it with her friend which has been fun. This is a video of her dance concert at the end of the year. The performance was based on the book The Quiltmakers's Gift. Lauren was a gift giver.

I was SO thankful for my friend who had her video camera going both nights and got Lauren here and there. The night before, I charged my camera and was all ready. I took it to Taylor's last baseball game that was in the morning. I taped maybe 10 min. so I knew I had plenty of battery. Well, when I took the camera out to start taping, the battery was dead. It had been on all day. So thank you, thank you to Jackie for this video!

Keep your eyes peeled at these times for Lauren. Just look for the only girl with out shoulder length hair! :) Times are- :13 the 3rd girl to run out, 1:36 by the older dancer, 1:51 right behind the older dancer and to the left. a little, 4:00, and 4:22. At the very end you hear Taylor yelling, "Lauren!" He yelled good job and she was looking for Taylor and running. She ran right into the girl in front of her. She was so excited to see us sitting in the 2nd row cheering her on. Taylor- the literal thinker he is- totally thought you could yell and cheer for her just like Lauren does for him at his baseball games. Makes total sense, right?

Lindsey's B-day video

There's a reason why I just post pictures and not videos. You don't see and hear all the craziness that REALLY happens! But this is a must for grandparents to see! So enjoy!

Lindsey turns ONE

We love our little 1 year old!

Lindsey turns ONE today! We celebrated her birthday last weekend up in Logan with our family up there.


She totally wanted to dig in!

I just LOVE her smile. She could could hardly stand it!

First bite was a junior mint. She wasn't so sure of it at first, but then ate all 3.

She's lovin' it!

Meet our Little Bum Scootcher

At 11 months, you might ask if Lindsey is crawling? Um... No.

Pulling herself up? Um... No.

Just bum scootching!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

5 Months? Really? Already?

My favorite part of the day- getting Lindsey from her nap or in the morning when she wakes up. She holds her head up and just giggles. Then she lays her head down and waves her arms and kicks her feet as fast as she can. It's pretty much adorable!She prefers her burp cloth over her face. I'm always taking it off and putting it by her face. She has never cried in the middle of the night when she wants to eat. She just smacks her lips and I'm a light sleeper so I always hear her. Just recently she just coos until I come get her. So cute!

Our not so little Lindsey is growing up way too fast. She is such a fun baby. I just want to keep her in this stage. We love her to pieces. However, only Taylor can get her to really belly laugh. And he really doesn't even do anything. It's fun to see those two interact. Taylor usually doesn't have a soft, gentle bone in his body. Yet, with Lindsey, that's all he is. We just love it!

LOVE it!

Getting Ready for Sunday

Taylor has been memorizing the Articles of Faith for Primary and passed off number 3 last week. After Taylor says it, Lauren says, "My turn". So Taylor has been "whispering" them in her ear and she says them. It gives me hope that they can actually work TOGETHER!!

He kept forgetting "and ordinances" so I dramatized it a bit when we were practicing so he would remember it. Of course, that's how he says it now! :)

Fish Lake

We had a great time at Fish Lake with Uncle Clark and Aunt Charlene! They are so generous to let us invade their cabin for a weekend. Lauren and Taylor LOVED throwing rocks in the lake. Taylor went fishing for the first time too. Taylor and his cousin Garrett were talking on the phone the other day
Taylor- I went fishing at Fish Lake.
Garrett- Did you catch any fish?
Taylor- No, just seeweed! (He thought it was great!)

Jerry Pence Reunion 2008

We had a great time in Duck Creek last weekend! We did a lot of hiking, eating, laughing, dancing, visiting, more eating and exploring caves. Duck Creek Village had a July 4th parade that was so fun. It lasted about 10 min. and then it turned around so we could watch it again. It mainly consisted of kids on 4-wheelers- all decked out with decorations. In Duck Creek people do not own cars- just ATV's. We had a wonderful weekend. But then again, anytime you get 6 grand kids under 6 years- it's always a party!!

We love Kevin and Talia and LOVING that they are living in St. George!! We've been home 2 nights and we've been with them both nights! Fun times!!

We Did It!

We went to the STAR Center and now we are back! We loved it! We couldn't have done it without Gma & Gpa Gardner, Tif, Mark, Lexi, Meagan, Tyler and Andrew. We are so blessed to have such a great family who supports us. Thank you so much for making our trip so fun and SO enjoyable.
Taylor's OT, Melaine, was awesome- she worked hard with Taylor everyday and still came to work each day with a huge smile. We loved her! Taylor loved her! And she's from Iowa- what's not to love?? Now we are trying to figure out life without her. She taught us a lot about Sensory Processing Disorder, but more importantly, she taught us a lot about Taylor! We have a plan to continue here at home. Our lives have changed in that now we have the knowledge to help Taylor. Helping him consists of

• buying a swing set with certain swings to swing and climb
• sitting on a therapy ball flat footed
• walking on uneven surfaces (huge pillow with foam)
• lots of obstacle courses for bending and climbing
• home ball pit
• walking backwards flatfooted pulling something
• walking on balance beams
• daily visual schedule and visual clock to help with transitions, etc.

Lots of heavy work- pushing, pulling, climbing and transitions!
We saw a lot of improvement at the STAR Center with physical things such as gravity issues and walking flatfooted. We are anxious to see more as we are home and back to our normal lives.
Here are some pictures of our whole experience in Colorado. It was a great one!

EDIT: Taylor wore headphones for his listening therapy along with his occupational therapy. Listening therapy (LT) is a therapeutic program to improve the neurophysiological foundation for integrating sensory input by using specific sound frequencies and patterns to stimulate the brain. Like occupational therapy, LT is based on the theory of neuroplasticity, which refers to brain changes that occur as a result of experience.
The pic of us eating a snack on the freeway was on our way home. We sat on I-70 for 2.5 hours while they cleaned up a really bad accident.

Animal Sounds

Why do we teach our kids not to behave like wild animals- yet we teach them all the animal sounds? Probably because it is SO darn cute!!

Love for Reading

So fun to see them both LOVE Books!

An all time favorite Game

Sesame Street

Just so cute to hear how Taylor says the names and how excited he gets!