The Lion King

"Stunning."
Mindy Hymas, mom

"It was AWESOME! I loooved it!"
Skyla Hymas, 8

"The animal's movements were amazing! "
Sierra Hymas, 11


The reviews are in and Lion King tops the list! It was one fabulous girls' night.

Calvin & "Frobbes"

I don't know why because he can't possibly understand the humor, but Karsten is obsessed with these books. He has David and I read it to him. He has his sisters read it to him. He reads it by himself. He laughs at them. He calls Hobbes "Frobbes".

My worry is it's his training manual...

Art-Attack!

My son does not like to draw, color, doodle, or do anything that requires him to use a writing utensil. So you can imagine my happiness when the other day, he started coloring!!!!

My fridge is so happy!!

Fabulous Fall

The air is chilly and the leaves have changed. It's gorgeous!

Celebrating Sierra

Sierra is 11! It's hard to believe that she's getting that old and harder to believe that I've been a mom for 11 years. (Shouldn't I know more?!) We had a wonderful time celebrating her today!

She came home from school to have a package from her best friend in the whole world waiting for her, and what a package it was! Adri had sent her a "party in a box" complete with confetti, party hats, goody bags, and more. It was so cute and so much fun for ALL the kids to open. We sure miss those guys! Adri knit her a beautiful scarf (featured on the left) with a note attached that said, "I made you this scarf. It took a lot of time and a lot of yarn." It was so cute of her.

She also had packages from grandmas and grandpas and aunts and uncles too and the day was so busy she didn't even get to open her presents until 9:30! Talk about patience! But we were too busy playing frisbee golf (a family favorite) and eating pumpkin pancakes at her favorite restaurant, IHOP. YUM!

We are so lucky to have Sierra in our family! She is smart, funny, thoughtful, and strong! She's really turning into an independent and beautiful young lady and I am so proud of her! Thank you to friends and family for making her day so special!!

Frisbee Golf

I love these action shots!

Watch out - Skyla is MAD!

Nice throw Karsten!

The birthday girl makes it in!

This is serious business!

Friends

One of the best things about moving back to Alaska is getting to hang out with these two women. I love Debbie and Jacquie! I not only got to hang out with them, I got to hang out with them at a resort for an entire weekend! (Thank you David, David, and Tom!!!!) It was so amazing. We didn't stop talking the entire time. We talked the entire time hiking, the whole time we were swimming and in the hot tub, all through dinner (which we had to wait to get a table even though we were there at 4:30 - there was already a line!!), all through the night even though we thought we'd watch a movie, the whole time driving, all the while shopping... we burned some serious calories just talking! I was so uplifted and felt so empowered and full of parenting ideas after it all. I've really been struggling with some things about my kids (mostly that they are growing up and I am trying to keep them little) and the insights and knowledge that these women were able to give me were so invaluable. I am a new mom today!


Here are some pictures of our fabulous dinner at the Double Musky Inn. Debbie is such a jokester pretending she just got a crouton for dinner. We split my monster steak. It was named the "Best Steak in America" by Jill Cordes of the Food Network. That might explain the wait...

Domestication

In our 14 years of marriage, I have never seen David mow a lawn... until now. I wouldn't agree to rent this house due to the size of the yard until he agreed to be fully responsible for it. I think it helps that his "responsibility" includes driving a riding lawn mower.

Failed corruption

Try as I may to corrupt my children (we ditched stake conference on Sunday), they will not be tainted. This is Skyla having primary. "Brother Hymas" aka Karsten also helped - mostly with comic relief, but he did play a few good songs with his portable keyboard player. (Which Skyla quickly pointed out to the "children" that that was an example of non reverent music.) She helped the children give their talks and even pray. It was so precious.

Thank you primary leaders for such good role models for my children!!!

Girl Topic

Me: "Karsten, do you like playing with girls?"

Karsten pauses, and with a perplexed look on his face replied, "You mean like Aspen?"

Cheap Entertainment

A movie wasn't needed tonight as we had quite a show in our back yard...Two bull moose fighting it out. Our swingset barely survived!

Alaska Top Three (so far)

1. The Alaska State Fair! Can you say gigantic vegetables, cute baby chicks, and the yummiest fair food ever!

2. Blueberries! Yes, it's blueberry pickin' time. We don't come home with very many but the kids come home full and oddly enough with blue mouths. Skyla won't even eat blueberries unless they are handpicked in Alaska.

3. Camping! We were very depressed that we did not get to do any camping this summer, so for Labor Day weekend, we loaded up and headed out. We didn't tell the kids where we were going and we found this awesome campsight!

It's actually our backyard. We drove all around until our kids were lost and then we drove up to the back of our house. The girls were laughing but Karsten was MAD. He started yelling, "I hate this campsite!" But when he realized that we can have a fire and smores even in the backyard, he was fine. And then when David pulled out the bow and arrow and BB gun, he was better than fine. We couldn't have felt more in the wild because our neighborhood has moose and bears! And when I realized I forgot the salt, it was no problem. I think we're onto something...