Jamouz Mountains (not sure about the spelling)

I have no clue if that is really how you spell the name of these mountains. We took a day trip and went exploring. It was raining a lot of the time but we did get to get out and see a lot. It would be fun to camp there!

Sandia Mountains

The firs week we were in AZ we did a lot of traveling. We went to overguard AZ and stayed in a cabin with Brandon's family the first half. Then went to Albuquerque to visit my brother Jimmy his wife, Beth, and little girl, Kennedy. These are Pictures are from when we went on the Worlds Largest Aerial Tramway to the top of the Sandia Mountains in Albuquerque. It was kind of scary going up but had a beautiful view.

Paigey's First Birthday Party!

We were scheduled to fly out early in the morning to AZ and of course we acidentally slept in. Brandon turned off his alarm when it went off but he didn't wake up. The funny thing is this is not the first time this has happened. About a year ago we did the same thing. As if that wasn't bad enough, we had our friend, Jonathon ("Mr. never late") pick us up both times. We woke up to him knocking on the door. Anyway, we did get on the plane but we didn't look the best. Shealee and Paige did well on the airplane. Shealee was entertained by the ipod and Paige was happy climbing all over the place and looking out the window. We had a big family party at Grandma and Grandpa Hoopes house. Thanks to everyone for the gifts, food, and your company. We had lots of fun!

A tad late but... Happy First Birthday to Paige!

These pictures were actually taken the night before Paige's Birthday. As you can tell she didn't enjoy being in all that fluff(especially notice the bottom picture!) and she for sure didn't want to be posing for any pictures. In the post above it tells more, but in short, we flew to AZ on her Birthday and had a party for her that night.

Yummy!

Who knew one little baby spoonfull of pudding could make such a mess? I guess it is a cute mess though!

Picture time!

As you can tell, I had a hard time getting any good pictures of them together. At least it makes me laugh when I see these. They were being so funny. I'll have to try to get some beeter ones in another photoshoot.

These were a few of my favorites of paige. My baby will be 1 year old on July 19th! Just 5 more days! I can't believe it!

Here are my favorites of Shealee. She will be 3 in October. So I guess that makes her 2 years and 9 months.

Sealed for Eternity at age 105!!!!

MEET SISTER PENMAN!

For those of you who have not met or heard from me about sister Penman, this is her! I'm sure you wouldn't belive it but she is 105 years old. I was one of her visiting teachers when I was in the 3rd ward. I have enjoyed getting to know sister Penman for the past 2 years. She is an AMAZING woman! She's been through much and has seen many things in her life! It is so neat to hear all her stories. With much help from my mom (okay she did all the work.) we were able to pull some of her family history together. The ultimate goal was to eventually get Sister Penman to the Temple to be sealed to her husband and parents. There was lots of work being done by more than willing volunteers to prepare for this special occasion. Thanks to everyone! Now you may ask, is that possible for a 105 year old woman to take a 3 hour trip to Columbus spend a few hours at the Temple and then drive back all in the same day? Well............

I told you she was AMAZING! She did it! She had been talking about making this trip for the past several months and it happened! As if this story couldn't get anymore exciting... The night before we headed off to the Temple, Sister Penman discovered something awesome! With out any planning or realizing at all, the date that was picked for her and her husband to be sealed in the temple (June 28, 2008) just happened to be her and her husbands 85th wedding anniversary! It was so wonderful and amazing to be able to participate in somethig so special!

Our favorite Sumer time activity...

SWIMMING!

Shealee and Paige love to swim in their little swimming pool. This was a fun night! We played around in the yard and swam a little bit. It sure is nice to have a yard to play in. We have also been having fun going to the little splash pool at the Public Pool. I'll have to take some pictures next time we go. Right when we get in the gate Paige tries to squirm out of my hands to get into the water. When it's time to leave Shealee always puts up a fight. They both LOVE it!

Look mom, my "Darbie" can do the flying trick!

hummmmmmm... Where does she learn these things? (the wierd thing is Shealee can still do this but it is a little harder for Brandon to hold her out. Paige is great at it also.)

Paige 11 months

I just thought these pictures show Paige's personality here around the home. As you can tell she loves to waive. When ever her cieling fans are on in her room she gets all excited and waves at them. I think she thinks they are waving at her.

Tub time!

Shealee and Paige love taking baths! It's so nice to actually have a bathtub in our house. Our last one didn't have one. it's also nice that paige can sit up on her own in the tub and not fall over.

Black eyed Paige

Okay so here's the story, Paige was on the bed with Brandon and the phone rang. Since the phone was right next to him on the night stand he answered it. We were in the process of selling our window ac units on Craigs list and it happened to be a guy that was going to buy one on the phone. Brandon got busy talking to him and forgot Paige was on the bed still. The next thing you know we heard a big thump on the ground, followed by a cry. not only did she fall off the bed but I think she hit the dresser as well on the way down. (I included some pictures so you could see how high our bed is.) Brandon fealt so incredibly bad(he's probably not going to be very happy I shared this story). A couple days later she had a pretty high temperature (nothing to do with the fall. Just a nasty virus) so I took her to the doctor. Right when he walked in he looked at her and said wow, does she have a black eye?!? (I was kind of worried what he would think when he saw it) he said she would be fine but it would take a few weeks to go away. I am really suprised though. It looks like a lot of it has gone away already and it has only been 1 1/2 weeks. you can click on the picture to see her eye a little better.

Remembering Grandma Huffaker

This past weekend Brandon and Paige were able to go back to Arizona for Grandma Huffaker's funeral. Shealee and I wish we could have been there but it just wouldn't work with how expensive plane tickets are especially so last miniute. Brandon said it was an amazing funeral. He said there were so many great stories told. I found these pictures from a few years ago.(I think Brandon and I had only been married for a couple months.) We all went to her house for a nice dinner. We were glad we got to visit her before coming back to Ohio in January. It was also nice to talk to her on mother's day. She was such an amazing lady.
a few things to remember her by:
HAPPY
LOVES her family
proud of her family
Perfectionist (everything has its place)
biggest suns fan ever!
strong testimony
a great friend(had lots of them)

fun to talk to!

Mesa High graduate :-) (I had to add that one for Bran!)

AWESOME GRANDMA and GREAT GRANDMA!
the list could probably go on and on...
WE LOVE HER AND ARE GOING TO MISS HER SO MUCH!

Uncle Dustin changing Paigey poo poo's diaper

I thought this was so funny. Brandon went home to AZ last weekend and this was the only picture he took. Dustin and Anna are expecting their little baby girl in July. Way to go Dustin! You'll be doing plenty of that. We can't wait to meet little Julieann next month. Shealee and Paige will finally have a cousin on the Arnow side. Yeah! Horray for girls... that's all that seems to be coming on both sides of our families.

Cedar Point and the MONKEY!

Brandon, Bryce, and Jonathon all went to Cedar point just before their break ended. For those of you who haven't been this is an amazing amusement park with some record breaking roller coasters. They all seemed to have a great time! They all deserved to have a good time after all the hard work with Dental School this last year.

Meet the Monkey. Isn't he cute? This is the monkey that some of you may have already heard about. Brandon thought it would be cool to bring a big stuffed animal home for the girls. I guess they saw a kid carrying it and asked him where he won it. He said they could buy it from him. The kid said $10 and Jonathon said no, how about $5. They went back and forth a little bit. Some how Brandon finalized a deal and they ended up getting it for$6. Anyway, Brandon brought it home and sat it in the family room for Shealee to find when she woke up. When Shealee came down stairs and saw that thing she jumped into our arms and cried. She didn't want to even get close to that thing. After some talking a persuading she thought it would be okay to keep him as long as he was far away from her. We've had him for a couple weeks and she is still afraid of him but she is getting better. She won't touch him but at least she doesn't scream every time she sees him.