zermatt storrs family reunion 2007

a few from zions

all of these pictures crack me up.

3 amigos - the 3 amigos sitting there. you go from dirty to cleaner to cleanest. someone has taught makenna to cross her legs. cherisse and i are proud parents because ethan is sitting, and sat long enough to take a picture. makenna being the oldest of the 3 sat down, i am not sure if she did it on her own or was instructed to, either way she set the example. i know that no one told her how to sit, but very proper.
april and ashton - april making sure that ashton is clean for the ride back home. ethan on the other hand i think rode home wearing his banana Popsicle as well as some pizza.
mom and popsicle - mom asking something about the ingredients in the Popsicle, if it is safe to be in the tree, how many credit card points were tallied up with the purchase of that camera, who put all of the farm equipment in this little park, if there was a travel agency in the hurricane, if i knew that i had a bogie in my nose, how much money lauren wanted if mom could pop that zit on the back of her neck, why it would be a good idea for all of us to move back up to move up to oregon, upset by my answer to someones question as to how many days she has been in the same clothes, or many other possibilities.
shasta lauren - lauren on her 4th shasta soda. gotta try them all.
ethan & adrian - ethan having fun with poopy papa. dad making sure that the hat is still protecting the wisps of hair that are still attatched to his scalp.
nighty night - last but not least dad trying to get some old man afternoon sleep. just a little nap. as i remember this was short lived. at one point he was all sprawled out and relaxed, so relaxed he let one of his little friend slide out. we all had a good laugh. nothing like dad to break the silence and wind. just helping everyone feel comfortable and relaxed.

spider webs

Makenna informed me this morning that "Grandad has spider webs on his head."
I asked her how she knows that, and she told me that there was a spider there when he came to visit last time. Makenna said that she doesn't have spiders, but that Grandad does.
Maybe his hair is thinning or something like that, but I thought that it was hilarious! Nothing beats "poopy papa", but I thought this came close.
P.S. I love that Kenzie wanted to come to Makenna's birthday party, and that she thought she could just hop in the car and be in Utah, just like that! So cute!

april

real easter

In case this is the only Easter entry i think you should all know that lorenzo, ernesto, smiths and me (luke) were all at wendy's house in utah while all the frantic kiddies hunted out the plastic eggs littered over the yard. Little Kenna battled for the most eggs and I believe she won with her official total of "ONE HUNDRED" ...that's what she told me. It was a fun Easter with a wonderful church lesson about the TRUE meaning of easter followed by lots of food, candy and pastels. The time I had was equally as good as the potato salad which was Reeeeal very mmmMMM GOOOOd.

BREAKING NEWS: lauren is scared of soccer balls. AND spiders. Both of which will make her cry. Quote "Whay did God make spiders??!! Cry Cry sob sob sniffle sniffle Hold me Ernesto!!!"

MORE BREAKING NEWS: Post Easter pictures have been found of Makenna counting her "ONE HUNDRED" eggs which were actually audited and found to be only 52...and then "chief egg inspector" MOM looked them over for supposed salmonella, razor blades and rabbit droppings??? ...She then ordered kenna to "PAY dUEs" and give MOMmy her 30% commission to cover gas, birth, and the wicker basket handling fee. The blurred image makes it apparent that even then shutter speed of the camera wasn't fast enough to catch the tyrannical transaction. (I love you April and thanks for letting me stay with you. It was a lot of fun. I want a rematch of Memory next time I'm there.)

Disclaimer: the views expressed in this entry are purely objective and may or may not be based on actual facts. Actual facts are inherently boring so this entry is derived from pictures. pictures are the dots which i connect via my explanation. Photo journalism or libelous tabloids?? you decide.

in the lens of kenna

i (luke) had a week between semesters and i spent the majority of my time at the Smith house in NSL. Of course kenna and I played every game she owned. It was a lot of fun and I finally beat Rachel's high score of Pacman. I got progressively better and now I wiped rachel off the entire high score LIST. that's right I ended the week with 140 something thousand and rachels previous high of 45 thousand is no longer in the top 10. Pooint is...i gave four-year old and 30-year smart tennakenna my camera and these are some pictures she caught which i think deserve some merit. my favorite is the window screen.

claires trip to utah

Obviously, here are some of the sienna-na-na-na. Pretty bad-A mormon mommy mini van. You'll have to get an interview of April for these -- but this is the Smith's new ride.
seating for 8
266 HP
double overhead cam
42.9 in. front legroom
40.2 in. rear headroom

119.3 in. wheel base

smiths @ the coast

cousins

here are some pictures from the Gilbert house that was a huge hit with the kids as they were able to go shopping and interact with a bunch of different things. also at the entrance there is a huge wooden chair that served for some funny pictures.
the slide was a big hit for the kids to play on and to fall off of. as time went on they got a lot more daring as to the approaches as to how to go down it. i think overall the kids played well together and there were a few moments of discipline but overall it went well. damon was nice enough to share his house and toys with makenzie and ethan. ethan had never seen so many big trucks and boy toys. and to think that this is just the beginning of the crew that will run around the house in the future.

cheese

here is the trip that we took up to the Tillamook Cheese Factory. After leaving Lincoln City we headed up north on the 101 toward Tillamook and drove through a couple of small towns including Cloverdale.
you walk in through the gift shop, well for those that did not go on this adventure with us and did not participate, or have not been there. then you go inside to look at the machines and factory. they were in there cutting the cheese and putting it into bags. there were a few displays upstairs and from that vantage point you could look down to where they were moving the cheese around on conveyor belts, cutting it, weighing it and so on. it was then back down stairs for some samples. at the end of the self guided tour they have the squeeky cheese that you can sample. if you did not end up going through that line twice then you need to checked. the kids were not too interested in the cheese as they were the other sweet treats that were ready to be gobbled up. the favorite of all was the ice cream that had makenzie and makenna in a race to see who could put that thing down first. ethan was not to be out done and would not let that cone leave the 2 foot radius from his mouth or his alarm would sound.

the oregon coast is not a beach

so here are some pictures that i found from our trip to the coast. those who could not make it i hope that seagulls come to your bed in the middle of the day and poop on your pillow.
what is better than the Oregon coast, besides any beach in Hawaii. you know that it is a coast and not the beach because there is no stripping down to any bathing suit nor getting any sun.
it was raining the whole way out to the coast and back for that matter but we pulled into this beach, roads end state recreation site, and the rain stopped. i think that was the only break in the rain all day long. so we walked around on the damp beach and tried to keep the kids dry.
Rachel kept falling down and she did not have a change of clothes so, not really how bout makenzie and Ethan. i only say this because Cherisse and i were one to one with them and Makenna was doubled up as nanna was in the car with Ashton. Luke was a little mopey but i think that was only because he missed his lady. like usual the parking lot was full of seagulls, no bread maybe next time. not much to do on the Oregon coast except walk around and take some pictures.
i would say overall it was a fun trip. we then headed up north after making the pilgrimaged to the Oregon coast outlets. hitting up the norm, gap, old navy, quiksilver, dress barn, and Columbia. (one of those does not belong, which one is it.) i think Lauren had a fun time. Rachel and Emily had a good time. i think that mom was a little bummed that we did not take her up on her deal for some safeway gas, and then held her debt card hostage for the remainder of the trip. did not make it to Mo's, but i am sure that was good like usual.