Birthday Girl!

 On October 28th Grandma Jeannine Adair turned 81 years old!

In the morning we surprised her with balloons and a present.  Jeannine's most favorite present to receive is a gift card to Deseret Book, so that's what we got her!

 That evening we had a nice dinner to celebrate.

 And then an awesome hamburger cake.

I thought it was cute that our Japanese exchange student Kyosei chose the cake that looked like a hamburger.  Hamburgers are SO AMERICAN!  He'll probably go home to Japan and tell everyone that we love hamburgers so much that we even decorate our deserts like hamburgers!

Jeannine has been living with us for almost 9 months now.  And you know what they say, time flies when you're having fun!  Well I guess we are having a blast because the time has seriously flown by! 

Jeannine is extremely easy to live with!  Since she has been here I've had people come up to me asking me how it's going.  They always seem so surprised that I enjoy her being here!  I guess she's not the typical mother in law.  That or else I'm just not the typical daughter in law.  I love having her around and feel it's such a blessing to have her here with us.  I like being able to know how she's doing.  I always said that I would rather her be irritated with my children than be lonely.  And I definitely think she's not lonely here.  Irritated with my children?  Sometimes maybe, but not lonely!

Happy Birthday Grandma Adair!

We sure love you!

Kyosei Hata

 This is Kyosei!

 This is our second year participating in the Japanese exchange student program.  We absolutely love it!  They come for just one short week and during the days they are with their school class doing their own thing but we get to entertain in the evenings and on the weekend.

 One day during the week they go to Jr. High with the kids.  This year since I have 2 kids at the Jr. High, Ethan took Kyosei around to all of his classes and Bradon was assigned to another boy.  It's such a good experience!

 We tried to do lots of fun things with Kyosei.

We took him to Trafalga fun center.  We did some rock climbing and played laser tag!

All the boys had football practice while he was here so Kyosei played a lot of soccer and whiffle ball in the backyard with Reagan and Talan.

 One night we went to the "Thank You Dinner" and program that his school put on.  We were sitting in the very back and couldn't see the program very well but we still had a good time.

 On the way back to the car Talan held Kyosei's hand.  I thought it was so cute!

This is a side note story, but on the way to the 'Thank You Dinner' Talan had fallen asleep in his car seat.  The new hit song Gangnam Style came on the radio.  I turned it up and Talan from his deep sleep, opened his red bloodshot (had been sleeping) eyes and immediately crossed his arms out in front of his body with his hands in fists and began bouncing them up and down.  You know, the Gangnam Style dance!  We all dyed laughing!  This kid has always got the moves!

 One day Kyosei announced that he wanted to fix us dinner.  We headed to the store hoping to find some off the ingredients he needed for the meal.  I was surprised that not only he wanted to cook for us, but that he knew how!

 He cooked us tamagoyaki (cooked eggs) and yakisoba (a noodle dish kind of like the chow main noodles at Panda Express).  It was all very good!  Talan eat with chopsticks.

 I always worry that our exchange student might be hungry.  They are always so polite that I worry they wouldn't say something if they were hungry.  One night just before bed Kyosei came upstairs to say goodnight.  He asked me if he could have something to drink.  I asked if he wanted milk.  Then I asked if he was hungry.  He admitted that he was hungry so I began looking for something he could eat that was quick and easy yet filling.  I looked in the pantry and say some top ramen.  I asked, "Do you want some Ramen noodle?"  You should have seen his excitement!  The poor kid was starving!  I quickly made some ramen for him and then asked, "Do you want a fork or chopsticks?"  He quickly replied, "Chopsticks!"  He sat at the island and ate his ramen in the most polite Japanese like way possible!    He held the bowl right up to his mouth shoveling the ramen in slurping all the while!  Carsten looked at me and then looked at him with this look of, Oh My Gosh!  I had to explain to Carsten that in Japan slurping is polite.  

 We took Kyosei to Salt Lake City.

We taught him how to throw a football inside Dick's sporting goods.

 Talan demonstrated!

 Bradon showed him how to try several pairs of sunglasses on at the same time.

 We went to the Apple store.

 And we went to Temple Square.

 Then later that evening we celebrated Grandma Adair's 81st Birthday!

I took Kyosei to the grocery store to pick out a birthday cake.  He picked the hamburger!

 We taught him how to give shots.

 And then we said our goodbyes!

It amazes me how quickly these little exchange students steel our hearts!  In one week they become family!  

For me one of the funnest things about kyosei's visit was getting on Google earth.  He showed us where he lived and then using the street view he showed us how he gets to the train station every morning.  It brought back a flood of memories!  Oh how I love the Japanese people and Japan!

Ethan's Eagle Project

 Since David has been the President of the American Fork Youth Football league we have learned that the league in years past hadn't been getting rid of the oldest most worn out equipment as they have bought new equipment each year.  After handing out equipment to 330 plus football players we were still storing over 200 helmets, 200 shoulder pads, and a countless number of pants in our storage unit. 

One of the coaches in our program named Spencer Reid, approached David about a non-profit organization he is starting to help youth football in American Samoa.  They are in need of old football equipment to be donated to their organization.  Spencer Reid is from American Samoa.  He played football for BYU and then went on to play in the NFL for I think the Panthers.  He has a son that's Bradon's age and they have played on the same team for a few years.  

Anyways, we thought this would make the perfect Eagle project for Ethan.  So we rounded up some boys in the ward needing service hours and headed to the storage unit.

 

  We lined up helmets,

 

 Sorted through the equipment,

 Jeannine and I cleaned helmets.

 And then they loaded it all up.

A week or so later the deacon's quorum had an activity making large wooden shipping crates.

 Our Japanese exchange student Kyosei was with us at the time and so we got him in on the action as well using a nail gun!

 We determined that wearing a helmet without inside padding or a face mask can make anybody look stupid!!!  Thanks for being willing to demonstrate that for us Brother Budge!

The boys loaded up the crates with equipment,

And then topped it off!

Now Ethan just needs to collect donations to pay for the building supplies, finish the paper work and then his Eagle project will be done! 

"That's our prophet!"

 

Last Sunday at church while Talan was sitting in sharing time I notice his teacher started laughing.  She turned around and looked at me and I knew that Talan must have said something pretty funny!

She got up, walked over to me and whispered in my ear.

She told me that she was sitting there holding this picture of President Monson.  Then Talan leaned over and asked, "Who's that a picture of?" She told him that it was a picture of our prophet, it was a picture of President Monson. 

Talan then said, "Oh yeah!" in a real confident manor!

"Yeah, we want him to win because we don't like OBAMA!"

I had to laugh too!

I love the way this kid thinks!  He says some of the funniest things, and with such confidence!  But yeah, I can see the resemblance between Mitt Romney and President Monson!  They are both very spiritual men that have the light of Christ with them.  Not to mention they both wear suits and ties!

I don't dare to inform Talan that the election is over and that President Monson didn't win!  Either did Mitt Romney!  Unfortunately that OBAMA guy (that we don't like) is going to be around for a few more years. 

Reagan's Cheer Performance!

    Every year American Fork High School Cheer puts on a Cheer Clinic for the little girls.  Reagan was so excited about it this year!  It's a 2 day clinic and then they get to perform at half time at the varsity football game.

 I cropped these pictures from where we were sitting so they are a little blurry, but Reagan's in the middle with red long sleeves.

 They danced to the song, Call me maybe.  

They did a few cheers and a human pyramid.  

Reagan is a base on the bottom right.

 It was super cute and Reagan loved every minute of it!

Cheerleader door bell ditch!

Late one Sunday night after everyone in the house had gone to bed the door bell rang!  Oh my gosh, who could it be?  I went to the door and opened it up to find a poster on our door!  A mysterious cheerleader had door bell ditched us!  I thought it was cute so I went down to the basement and made Ethan come take a look.  He liked it!  We left it hanging on our front door for the rest of the season.

Notice Ethan's tan line.  He's pretty proud of that tan line!  That tan line represents hours and hours of playing football!  

GO ETHAN!  

And Go CAVEMEN!!!

Carsten Christopher Adair's 11th Birthday!

 Carsten knew exactly what he wanted on his cake this year!

But really that comes as no surprise because Carsten's pretty opinionated and seems to know exactly what he wants most of the time.

We've got a little representation of all his favorite teams this year.

Arizona State, Oregon, Utah State, and American Fork!

And we couldn't forget #1!  Carsten is always #1!

This year Carsten said that he didn't want to have a party with his friends.  This totally surprised me!  But I wasn't complaining, no party is a lot less work on my part!  So I decorated his cake and took it to his football practice to celebrate!  I even brought my camera to document the event.... 

 And these are all the pictures I ended up with!

So well documented!

Well Carsten, I wish I had a picture of you on your special day but picture or not, I love you still the same!  

Carsten is one entertaining kid!  He's full of energy, and full of fun!  He's got a cute sense of humor and keeps everyone laughing.  He loves music and he's got swagger.  This kid is always up on the latest and greatest music, clothes and shoes.  

I love you bud, Happy Birthday!

Bradon Kendall Adair's 13th Birthday

  For Bradon's 13th Birthday he wasn't interested in having a party but he was interested in having a double chocolate cake from Costco! 

 

 Since David and I were gone on his actual birthday, his Grandma Adair took him along with the other kids out to dinner.  He chose to eat at Chili's. 

He was more than happy to get the most awesome birthday present EVER from Grandpa Haws.  Notice it sitting right next to him!

And notice his finger.  He tore the tendon in his middle finger at football practice.  While playing football?  NO!  He was cracking his knuckle!  David and I received a phone call from one of his coaches saying that Bradon had hurt his finger and that we should come take a look at it.  We raced over to his practice and he was practicing just fine.  I thought, "Well it can't be hurt very bad!"  They called Bradon over and had him take the tape off of it.  The top part of his finger just flapped there.  He had no control of it at all.  He couldn't lift it up or pull it down.  It just dangled!  It wasn't painful, and he could practice just fine as long as it was taped.  So since we didn't have insurance at the time, we put a little splint on it and waited 3 or 4 weeks for our insurance to kick in.  Our splint job turned out being exactly what the doctor would have ordered.  When we took him into a real doctor they put an even better splint on it that would hyper extend it and a month later it was as good as new!

So now we have a 2 teenager family!

Bradon is such a good kid!  He's helpful and kind and has a huge heart!  He's all his siblings favorite brother which says a lot about him.  He's had a rough year learning that life isn't fair.  It's no fun being a type 1 diabetic!  My heart breaks for him!  It's surely something I wouldn't wish upon anyone, but Bradon's a pretty tough kid.  I know that he'll figure it out and learn to live with it and become stronger because of it!  I love you Bradon and Happy Birthday!

A not so QUICK TRIP to AZ!

Just as soon as U of U joined the Pac 12, David was planning his trip to Arizona to watch his SUN DEVILS whoop up on em!  As BYU fans, there is just something real satisfying about watching Utah get there trash kicked!  And get their trash kicked they did!

Our quick trip however didn't turn out to be so quick!

Since David took this new job with Crexendo he's been driving a lot of miles!  And since Crexendo gives him a car allowance he decided to get a new little car that gets good gas mileage to drive around town in.  He ended up finding a little used BMW.  It's a cute little car and drives great!  On the way to one of the Utah States football games David and I stopped in Bountiful to purchase the BMW.  After making our CASH purchase we hopped on the freeway and about 15 miles down the road it BROKE DOWN!!!  LUCKILY we just so happened to know someone who lived in Bountiful that could come rescue us.  An hour later we discovered that it was just out of gas.  The gas gauge just wasn't working right!  Okay no big deal, we can just have that fixed, or at least that's what we thought!

So before making our weekend trip to Phoenix we took the BMW into the BMW dealer and had it looked at.  A thousand dollars later, David and Talan and I were on our way to the valley of the sun!

As we were just pulling into North Las Vegas we had just over 1/4 tank of gas left.  David thought that we had better get gas at the first exit we come to with a gas station just in case.  I mean this was the first time we had gone this low since having it fixed!  And then it happened, it DIED just before we got to the next exit.  Which just so happened to be an exit that had nothing at it!  We were on the outskirts of town at an army base or something.  Once again LUCKILY we just so happen to know a few people who live in Las Vegas.  I called Heather Gibbons, but unfortunately she doesn't answer her home number anymore due to the outrageous number of political calls she receives and I didn't have her cell phone number.  Then I called my cousin Rachel Mangum, but she didn't answer either.  David called his cousins that live quite a bit further away from where we were and they were more than willing to come rescue us but then I got a brilliant idea to call my uncle to get my cousins cell phone number.  And her cell phone she answered!  So to put a positive spin to this little mishap, I got to see Rachel and Jeremy for a few minutes!  They brought us some gas and we made it to the gas station.  Funny thing though, we have a 16.6 gallon tank and it only took 11 gallons.  Wow!  Our gas gauge works after all!  So what did we just spend a thousand bucks on?

The next morning we hit the road again.  This time in search of a small one gallon gas can to fill and place in the back end of the car "just in case!"  The car ran fine but then just as we were rolling into Phoenix it started acting funny and blowing out big puffs of white smoke.  As we took a deep breath we thought, LUCKILY we know a few people in Phoenix that can rescue us!  We made it to my parents house and had my dad take a look at it.  We called the BMW dealer in town and then headed over to drop it off so they could take a look.  LUCKILY my dad has an extra truck just lying around that we could borrow for the weekend.

 Mom and Dad watched Talan and David and I ran around town enjoying our weekend.

Fifteen hundred dollars later we picked the BMW up.

On Saturday we met at Freestone park for a picnic with my family.  It was fun to see everybody and hang out for a little while.

The sisters!

Kristen, Staci and myself.

Talan and Kristen's little boy Clark.  

Clark is just a few months younger than Talan.

Kristen's Ella, Talan and Staci's Abe.

Talan and Abe are 18 hours apart in age and every time we have gotten them together in the past they have fought!  I prepped Talan about the importance of being nice.  Staci prepped Abe about being nice.  But my mom and  Kristen decided that they were going to have a 4 year old off!  So my mom prepped Talan on his addition skills in prep of the face off!  But what do you know?  They got along just fine!  As you can see from this picture, Talan is pretty entertained by Abe.

Christopher's Lani and Talan.

Lani is super shy!  She's Cheryl's little shadow!

Kristen getting a goodbye hug!

David and I went to the ASU game and ASU didn't disappoint!

It was a beautiful thing!

Talan had an absolute blast with his Grandma and Grandpa Haws.  

It was a special trip and he knew it! 

So we said our goodbyes and headed on the road for home.

We got as far as Anthem when the STUPID BMW started loosing power!  At this point our positive outlook was struggling to stay positive.  But LUCKILY we weren't too far out of town and we could be rescued once again!  My dad met us in Anthem at an auto parts store.  We changed out some spark plugs and thought that we were on our way.  My dad followed behind us as we headed back toward his house but changing the spark plugs had seemed to have done the trick so David waved him off and we exited the freeway to turn back toward home.

And then just before the Anthem exit again it started acting up.  David got off the freeway and then it lost ALL power!  David and I got out of the car and pushed it through the intersection, over the freeway and as soon as we started going downhill we both jumped back in and coasted to the nearest gas station.  We called my dad and he once again came to our rescue!

I can't remember what they did to it this time but we were able to drive it back to my parents house.  And Talan's wish came true!  We got to have another sleep over at Grandma and Grandpa's house!  But another night at Grandma and Grandpa's house would mean that we wouldn't be getting back home for Bradon's 13th birthday!  I felt so bad!  Grandpa must have felt bad too because he gave me his old Kindle to give to Bradon as a birthday present!

The next morning we took it back into the BMW dealer and several hours and $600.00 later... IT WAS FIXED!!!  No really, it was FIXED!!!  So for a grand total of $3,100.00 in repairs our cute little BMW runs like a champ! OH YEAH!

We took off late in the afternoon knowing that we would need to stop somewhere to sleep on the way home.  We decided that we would stop in Kanab.  When we got to Kanab every hotel in town was booked with no vacancy so we kept on going.  We pulled an all night drive and eventually made it home safe and sound!

So there you have it!  

A fun, yet not so quick trip to Arizona!