Disneyland Trip/Grandpa Varney

Golden Knights game with friends!

Sami dressed up as the cutest 100 year-old for the 100th day of Kindergarten.

Trey had Great to Be 8! He’s getting baptized this year!

Grandpa Varney passed away on January 20 and it makes us so sad. We will miss seeing him when we go to Utah. We were able to go up to the funeral and it was sooooo good to be there with family. The funeral was great and spending time at Grandma’s house with all of my cousins was just the best. We headed up to Orem late Thursday night. We picked up Michele in St. George (which made for a fun car ride!). Friday was the funeral, burial, luncheon, and everyone hung out at Grandma’s that night.

Saturday was Emily’s birthday and so some of the cousins kidnapped her and took her to breakfast.

Saturday we went to the BYU Bookstore with dad and hung out more at Grandma’s before we had to leave. We already had tickets to Disneyland for Monday and Tuesday so we had to head home late Saturday in order to leave Vegas on Sunday (and we made it back for Tori’s blessing Sunday morning!) I love my Grandma and Grandpa Varney so much and I am lucky to be their granddaughter. I know it will be a happy day when we see Grandpa again! When Kenny heard the news about Grandpa he said, “aw man, I’m gonna miss that old guy!”. We loved sitting and listening to Grandpa tell stories. We loved getting him Sodalicious when we were up there and I loved his fun personality.

We had the best time at Disneyland! Genie Plus is amazing and we paid extra for some of the rides but it was 100% worth it. We hardly waited in line and it was such an enjoyable experience. The kids were good ages where we didn’t have to worry about anyone wandering off and they could ride all of the rides (Sami was only too short for Incredicoaster). She actually loved all of the rides (although on Guardians of the Galaxy she clung to me and Kenny the entire time- she had no idea what she’s getting herself into on that ride haha). Kayli is a roller coaster fanatic and Beau loved them all this time too. Trey loved Jungle Cruise most of all of course. We had so much fun going with the Cahills and we didn’t want to leave!

Downtown Disney and celebrating Elise’s birthday…

Disneyland…

California Adventure…

We came back to a jam packed week and lots of catching up on homework and tests. It took a few days to get caught back up on life. The elementary school had a Masquerade Ball that Trey and Sami went to and had fun dancing there. Beau had hockey practice so he couldn’t go but he said he wouldn’t be caught there haha.

I got to help in Sami’s class for their Cardiology Day! They were heart doctors and did lots of activities involving hearts. It was the cutest day and I just love her teacher for going above and beyond to always make Kindergarten so much fun (and she’s in her 44th year of teaching and uses a walker and still does so much!)

Beau lost a tooth but that’s not the story. During sacrament meeting, he was telling me his tooth was bleeding. I told him to go get a tissue. He left and came back with a nasty, bloody tissue. I sent him back out to go clean up his mouth and maybe pull out his tooth. The sacrament started and he still wasn’t back. A few minutes into the sacrament, a Bishop from another ward came walking in with Beau (who did NOT look good) and asked if I was his mom. He then told me that Beau had been in the bathroom trying to pull out his tooth and he passed out! I got up and walked out with them. Kenny saw this happening from the stand and since he didn’t know what was going on he got up and walked out too. By now people were wondering what was wrong with Beau! Luckily, the Bishop (who happens to be a dentist) was in there and saw Beau working on his tooth, told him he was a dentist and that his tooth was ready to come out. He saw Beau not looking good so he stayed luckily and was there when Beau passed out and caught him. I sat out in the foyer with Beau for a while until he felt better. It makes for a good story now! Funny thing is… a few weeks ago Grandma Eliason was cutting Kayli’s hair. She had Kayli stand up while she cut it really fast. A few minutes in, Kayli passed out. Luckily, Kari caught her! Our kids have never passed out before and now we’ve had two incidents in the past couple of weeks.

For Valentine’s Day I just tried to make it a little special with hearts on their doors, a festive breakfast, a gift for each of the kids, a fancy dinner, and cookies to decorate. With 4 kids in school it was a lot of work getting them all ready for their class parties. We had lots of Valentines to make and boxes to decorate.

Kayli and Kenny went on an overnight backpacking trip with the youth in the ward. Kayli had never even been camping before and was the littlest one out there carrying her pack and everything. She did great though! She kept jumping all over the mountains! They did 7 miles roundtrip and it got very hard at the end. They were exhausted. I’m so proud of her though for doing something hard and uncomfortable. She did it! They are doing more smaller hikes in order to be ready for a 30-mile hike in Zion in June. She’s determined to do it!

More Knights games… and so fun to get on the Knightron.

Beau’s hockey team came in at 17-0 at the end of the regular season. They have already proven to be the best team in the league and they are so much fun to watch. Beau works his butt off on defense but also scores goals. His whole team does amazing. They play in the semifinal game next week and are hoping for the Stanley Cup this year after their unlucky loss in last season’s Stanley Cup game. But anything can happen and they are working so hard and practicing lots so they get the win this time! His coach also got them into a Las Vegas tournament at the end of March that we are really excited for!

Kayli has been improving in volleyball so much! She is turning into a good little defensive specialist and can now serve overhand! I love that she loves this sport that has brought me so much joy over the past 25 years! Her team won their last tournament!

Trey just started piano lessons! He loves it so far and even practices without being reminded. We are so excited to be with Sis. Visher in our ward who is just incredible. She is the smartest music person I know and our family has come to love her so much. Kayli has been taking lessons with her for a few weeks and Kathy has worked her hard! But it has been so good for Kayli. It’s also nice that she lives like 1 minute away from us! This pic is of him getting dropped off for his first lesson.

Beau has been working very hard on the Great American Award. It’s a 5th-grade award for students who memorize the Gettysburg Address, the Preamble, the Pledge of Allegiance, the U.S. Presidents in order, all 50 state capitals and abbreviations and correctly label them on a map, and maybe even more than that. He’s also been doing an after-school online reading class. He gets right on every day and I’m pretty sure his teacher has learned more about the Vegas Golden Knights and hockey than she ever cared to (she lives in Missouri) haha but likes the class and is learning some cool things.

Sami is becoming a little reader and I love it. She loves school and homework so she was excited about her at-home animal report. She worked so hard on it. It was pretty cute to watch her work on it every day.

More fun pics…