Baby Alea and Snow

Alea is just over 2 weeks now and starting to wake up more and become more alert. It is fun to see her eyes more. Brinlee and Spencer love her to pieces and cannot stay away from her. They shower her with hugs and kisses every minute. They are always checking on her and they have been such great helpers. It is so nice that they are old enough to understand what I am asking them to do and that they are able to do it for me. We are enjoying being able to slow down a bit.
We also just got our first snow and the kids immediately wanted to go play in it. They loved making a snowman. I have to remind them that the snow it cold and you need to wear a coat and long pants, since they think it is fine to wear shorts still. It seams that somehow kids don't feel the cold.

The arrival of our Baby Girl

Announcing the arrival of Alea Cora Keeler. October 29, 2009, 7:04 pm, 7lbs 6oz, 18 inches.
We are so happy to have our little girl here.
She is such a little bundle of joy.

Trunk or Treat

Our ward had a trunk or treat the other night. We decided we better make sure to go since it may be the only Halloween thing we get to do with the kids because of the baby coming this week. We made up Spencer's costume as Obi Wan from Star Wars. We put one of Budd's shirts on him and a belt and it actually looked good. Then we thought it would be fun to give him a beard. After we drew it on him with an eye liner pencil, he went to look at it in the mirror. Then we heard him start crying in the bathroom. We found out that he thought it was going to stay on him and he was mad that he had make up on him. It was kind of funny that he freaked out about it, but after Budd talked with him for a while, he decided it was ok. For Brinlee's costume, Budd had a coworker who makes costumes and let us borrow this witch outfit for her. They had fun dressing up and playing games at the Trunk or Treat.
Playing games

Brinlee and Yuu

Pregnancy

I wanted to get a few pics of the kids with my big pregnant belly before we have the baby. The kids always love to come up and kiss my belly. They are so excited for their new sister to come. We thought it would be fun to get some pictures out in our back yard, that is so beautiful right now, with all the fallen leaves. We are hoping our little one will come in the next couple days.

Pumpkin Carving

Last night we carved pumpkins for FHE and the kids really had a lot of fun. We have a Mom and daughter, Satomi and Yuu, from Japan renting our basement and we invited them to do it with us. It was fun to watch them since they had never done it before. The kids loved getting their hands all slimy as they cleaned out their pumpkins. They kept making funny faces and sounds... eeewwwww. Budd got the manly idea to use his drill to make perfect circles. Turned out to work great.
The kids were so proud of their pumpkins and they loved putting candles in them and setting them outside. What a fun time.

Brinlee and Yuu with princess pumpkin head
Cleaning out the gooey insides
Budd using his drill to carve holes. It made it much easier to make circles. Notice Brinlee plugging her ears.
eewww slimy...
Cute kids with cute pumpkins

Family conference

This past weekend my whole family, except one brother, got together for an all day event on Saturday. My brother Garret and his wife came up with the idea and it turned out great. It was a day filled with learning and fun. We learned how to make our own applesauce and bottle it and the men did oil changes on the all the cars. We played our famous "pickle volleyball" in the nice fall weather while the kids played at the park. Later we had a Wii competition. We also had discussions on fiances and resume building. We had a great dinner made with many things that my brother and his wife had canned from their garden and wheat that they had ground. It was amazing. We learned some great things and had fun being together and building memories. We are planning on doing it 2 times a year. What a fun thing to look forward to.

Making Applesauce
All the girl grand kids reading with Grandma.

Go Soccer Princesses

Brinlee has been playing soccer on an AYSO team this Fall with Daddy as her coach. It has been a lot of fun to watch her and the other girls learn how to play. They play 3 on 3 and have a small field. It is a great way for them to learn. They chose the name "Orange Princesses" for their team. How perfect is that for 5 year old girls. Brinlee is so cute running after the ball. She scored her first goal and it was so exciting.

Family Getaway

After spending every spare hour on the basement and finally finishing it and then having our renters move in, we decided we needed a break, just to get away from the house. So we decided to go to Park City over Conference weekend. It was so beautiful up there with the leaves changing and we stayed at a nice resort, with swimming, a playground, and many other fun things to do. Being 8 months pregnant I couldn't do much, but it was just nice to get away from home and to relax. We enjoyed swimming with the kids. It was their favorite part of course. We also enjoyed sleeping in, watching conference, driving up to the top of the mountain, and shopping at the outlets. It was a fun weekend and greatly needed.

Finished Preschool room

Preschool Room before
Preschool after

The finished product

Wow! We finally finished our basement that we have been working on for the past 4 months. It has been a huge project that seemed like we would never be able to accomplish. In the end we have become amazed that we could actually create a living space with our own 2 hands and hard work. We have had a lot of help from family and friends and are truly grateful to them for all their time and effort to help us. We would have never made our deadline without them.
This whole project started when a women in our ward said that a Japanese Women and her daughter wanted to come and live here for the school year, but would like more of a place of their own. We had been wanting to make an apartment anyway, so this was the perfect opportunity to actually do it, and we felt it was worth while since it would bring in rent for a side income.
Then in the middle of our project for the apartment, I was offered to take over a preschool for someone who got a full time teaching job. We felt good about the opportunity to teach in our home and have another side income, so we said yes. I only made this decision after asking my sister in law, Meg, if she wanted to do it with me, so that she could teach one class and I could teach the other and she could help when my baby comes. She was very excited about the idea, so everything fell into place. This meant finishing an additional room for the preschool on top of the apartment we were already working on. We only had 4 weeks to complete this room and then 3 more after that to finish the apartment. I was stressing the whole time that it could not be done, but after we finished the preschool room on time and I saw that it could happen, I had faith that it would all come together. Wow, what an accomplishment. Hats off to my husband Budd, who worked every spare minute to make it all happen. I was amazed at his skill and inventiveness to make everything work, when problems arouse.
Here are a few pics of the before and after. The before are actually when we had already done drywall and mudding, but I forgot to take the pictures when it was just studs.
We are so happy with how it turned out and feel blessed to have these two opportunities in our basement.'

Apartment kitchen/front room before:



Apartment Kitchen/front room after

Bathroom
bath

Family in AZ

We had a fun trip to Aspen Grove with Budd's family the first week of June. Two weeks later we found out that Budd's Mom, who has had lung cancer, now has brain cancer. We of course rushed down to Arizona the next day to be with the family. We had a great week with everyone. We were able to have a lot of neat experiences and spend a ton of time with family. The neatest thing was when all of Budd's siblings and their spouses and Mom and Dad went to the Temple and did sealings. We had such an amazing spiritual experience all being there together. We were also able to spend a whole day together with the entire family swimming and playing and getting family photos. The rest of the week we spent mostly at Budd's parents just hanging out and being with them. The kids really enjoyed being with their cousins and swimming a lot. Brinlee even started to learn to swim without floaties and she was so excited. She even put her head under water for the first time and learned it was fun. That was a big deal for her. We really had a great time and created precious memories!

Girls Camp

I was called as Girls Camp director this year, before I knew I was pregnant, and ended up going 61/2 month pregnant. But I really had a great time. Even though I was stressed to leave a sick husband and kids behind, it ended up being a great break for me. We went to Star Valley Wyoming for 4 days and it was so beautiful. We were able to go river rafting one day and it was a blast except that is started raining while we were going down the river. It got really cold and I ended up with a horrible cough. But it was worth it for a great adventure. I had so much fun getting to know the girls and to just spend time with the girls being fun and crazy. We had some really neat spiritual moments also as we went on a sunrise hike and posted our flag of virtue, did a blind folded ropes course, and had many devotionals. What a neat experience it turned out to be and I think it was more for me than the girls. It was something I really needed. I was glad it all turned out well and all the planning paid off.

Summer Fun

Here is an update of our summer. It sure flew by. In July we had a Japanese women (Chiho) and her 5 daughter (Rina) stay with us for a month. We did a lot of fun things with the kids on the weekend, like going to children's museums, swimming, and much more. Brinlee loved having a friend all the time and she and Rina became the best of friends. Chiho was very nice and helpful. Since I am pregnant she would hardly let me do anything and she helped make dinner and clean the house every night. What a treat for me. We had a great experience with them and really do hope to be able to go visit them in Japan in a few years.