I am alive, I'm not sure what the deal is but I can't seem to blog and and live at the same time,  I thought I would have all this time once school started but in fact I'm busier then before not sure how that worked out.
we are all doing well, Cameron is finally doing radiology and seems to like it so far, we love having him around a bit more , he works from 8am to 5pm Monday through Friday.  we love having him around in the evenings and on the weekends.  he wont get any call until January, because, frankly he doesn't know enough to be left alone.  
Katelyn started Kindergarten and loves it.  last week she lost one of her top front teeth so she is official now.  she has an adorable smile.  she likes her teacher but doesn't have much to report on her day when being quizzed after school.  so currently the only thing I can get out of her is she like playing flush the toilet on the playground which I think involves sliding down the twirling slide and then running up the ladder to go down again as fast as she can, she plays with a few girls in her class... I;m pretty sure she didn't come up with that one on her own.
Dallin is in preschool, he has the same teacher Katelyn had last year.  He is gone all day everyday and I have the same internal debate that I had last year with Katelyn, I hate that he is gone all day, but I love his teacher and he absolutely loves school, LOVES it.  and it's free,  but he's gone all day and I'm not ready for that yet. but he loves it.  he is super obedient at school.  they have a school rule that while walking in the halls they have a bubble and a bear hug meaning their arms are folded and they have their month is closed with their cheeks puffed out like they have a bubble in their mouth and even if everyone else in his class is goofing off he just looks straight ahead with a bubble and a bear hug, and that's just the start, he is such a good kid,  I can't believe how big he is.
Grant gets to hang out with me all day,  we do fun things like puzzles, visiting the sick and afflicted, coloring, more puzzles, tons and tons of errands he is so excited with the kids come home from school, he misses having them around.  he loves saying the prayer for every occasion even if someone else has already started praying, he jumps in and finishes it before they get the chance.  he is a funny boy.
I am busy with RS stuff,  it's like a job, I had no idea how busy the Relief Society president was.  I don't think you can really know until you've been there.   if you have a RS president, give her a hug or send some flowers or something, she is likely putting in a lot of behind the scene hours.  I'm also trying to get the house in order.  I'm trying to go room by room and redecorate or as is the case in most rooms, decorate, and then organize.  I'm kind of stuck in the office, I've succeeded in dumping and sorting the huge bins of dress up clothes and stuffed animals but I didn't get them put away before the kids got home from school one day over a week ago and currently the entire room is covered in stuffed animals, costumes and other random closet things.  the neat little stacks long since been completely demolished.  I haven't really done anything with it since.... thankfully we can close the door to that room when we need to.
anyways life is good
I have pictures but can't get them off of my camera so that will have to wait.

ice blocking

I'm not sure who came up with ice blocking perhaps someone was bored one day, and thought I know, why don't I sit on a chunk of ice and ride it down a hill. however it happened, Katelyn is grateful that it did, she loved riding down a hill, high speed on a block of ice.

 most of the time she made it about half way then the ice would slide out from under her and she would chase it down the rest of the way.

my Uncle Andy contributed these ice block seats, yes someone actually invented seats for this sport,  I kind of think it's cheating, what's the fun in ice blocking if you don't freeze your bum?

Sarah Homecoming

 My sister Sarah came "home" from her Mission in August,  she served in the Salt Lake City Temple Square mission and will be living with Becky in Salt Lake until she goes out to BYUI in a few weeks.   we were all excited to see her and hang out with her before our Durtschi/Larsen Family reunion.

(above my sisters Sarah and Becky)

Sarah and Mom

 Sarah and Me

 our niece Chris, she is Stephen's oldest daughter, and Sarah

our niece Katie she is also Stephens oldest daughter... yup twins.

 Stephen, my brother, not sure what the face is all about...

 Dallin holding his cousin Kimmy... or Abby... I've been told how to tell them apart but I can't remember.  but in any case she is one of David's twins... yup both of my brothers have twin girls.

 Jared, Stephen's son.  

 Melissa, David's beautiful wife

 Amy, my sister, she and I are 15 months apart, we did everything together.

David's other daughter... or it could be the same one, like I said, I stink at telling  them apart.

David, my brother, he is 2 years older then me and we did not get along as kids... we pretty much couldn't stand each other until he graduated from High School and then magically we decided the other wasn't so bad. and now we get along great.

Wait a minute....

I'm pretty sure this was Katelyn's idea, I asked the kids to get their jammies on and then went back to doing the dishes when I was done this is what I found...  it's funny how excited kids get to play a joke on us.  

Left Stranded

11 months ago we bought a van, we got a "great" deal on it. the only problem is it doesn't actually work sometimes, those times being while I'm driving it. ok, not ALL the time we drive it but often enough. We have had to get the thing towed 4 times since we bought it and that doesn't take into account the problems we have had that don't require towing. Friday night Cameron and I went on a date, after dinner we got in the van turned the key... nothing... thankfully there was a battery and brakes type place across the parking lot so we walked over and asked if they could help, they got the car running we drove into the shop and found out that the alternator and battery are dead, we replace the battery and then the alternator which was still under warranty because we had it replaced less then a year ago.  The very next day I was driving to meet Cameron for lunch and   it completely shut off while I was driving in the parking lot,  there are a lot of ways this could have been much worse, I could have been driving on the freeway trying to get to the airport for example.  So needless to say we are currently looking for a new van.

Gone Fishing

If you ever find yourself scrambling to move out of the way so you don't get whacked with a fishing pole while trying to keep a hot dog hooked to the end of a fishing line, you might be taking your kids fishing for the first time. that's what I found myself doing this Saturday as we attended the annual children's fishing competition.  they provided the fish, poles and bate, all I had to do is bring the children.  The kids loved it and had a great time. The family next to us appeared to be veterans and caught one fish after another.  But thankfully we didn't catch anything... I'm really not sure what to do with a dead fish.  We even won a prize at the raffle, a new tackle box, complete with tackle. so now next time we go fishing, with Cameron hopefully, we will be all prepared with real looking fake bugs even.

a happy Daddy

 anyone who knows him can probably guess that Cameron is amazing.  As far as the children are concerned, he is the life of the party.  he's not one to stand back and do boring grown up stuff, no he had to be on the floor wrestling, tickling or rolling over unsuspecting children who are always a bit surprised to see a grown man act more like a child the an adult.  That's one of the many things we love about him. This year for Father's day each of the kids got to pick out what they thought was his favorite treat... or maybe they just picked their own favorite treat...  and I got him a waffle maker and stuff for the garden... not the best present... but hey I'm working on that.
Cameron thank you for being a wonderful husband and father.  We love you!

making cookies

Katelyn and I make some pretty amazing sugar cookies if I do say so myself, the only problem is you can't just make 5 cookies, and the longer these cookies sit on the counter, taunting us, tempting us to take a bit, the harder it is to resist... fortunately, we also love delivering cookies to unsuspecting families. sharing the love, and the calories...

Watching our Garden Grow

I never thought I would be much of a gardener, as a child I remember one of the most dreaded chores was weeding the garden, I was never thrilled about the dirt, bugs or heat which put a damper on the whole gardening thing. . but I'll be honest, now that we have a house and a yard I was pretty excited to finally have a garden, and I get so much joy walking to check on the garden every morning, and every time  I can see a noticeable difference in the produce growing there.  it's so fun!

we decided to start planting the first week of March while my mom was here helping out after my mastectomy.  the kids were thrilled to help plant the seeds and make cute markers for each type of plant.

a month later at Easter our plants were beginning to outgrow their little homes but we didn't have the ground ready to plant yet

While I was away for a weekend with my old roommates Cameron transplanted the rose bushes that were against the back of our house. and that began the process of getting the ground ready for our plants that were quickly outgrowing their little pots. 

the hardest part of this was digging up the grass and breaking up the hard soil so it would be ready.

Cameron put lawn clippings over the dirt to keep it from drying out as fast.

The first week of May the plants had grown a considerable amount and our squashish plants even had big yellow flowers. and yes this is the best picture I have of it at this stage and yes Grant insisted on being center of attention in this shot.

by the end of May everything was growing well.

These pictures were taken last week and our Garden is growing out of control, all of the vine type plants, watermelon, cantaloupe, cucumber, and pumpkin have reached far beyond their roots and we have had to redirect their vines so that they didn't overtake all of our grass, our corn is taller then we are.  we also have zucchini, tomatoes, snap peas, pole bean, Alaska peas, regular peas, onions, acorn squash, butternut squash and basil. unfortunately our corn and cantaloupe have had a bit of an aphid problem so they are struggling right now but everything else is doing beautifully.  I love having a garden

check out those watermelons, up until a week ago we thought that was our cantaloupe plant but then these little guys started appearing, currently there are 5 watermelon growing.

our corn is just about ready to harvest, we planted 18 plants and I think we will get about 18 corn, some have 2 ears but some don't have any,  the corn is in one of the more shaded locations so we think that could have been the problem, but the aphids didn't help much either.  oh well, we live and learn,  we still love our little garden.

We are Family....

On mother's day I decided I wanted a family picture while everyone was still in their church clothes so we headed out with our tripod and fumbled around with it for a while when our neighbor's daughters came out to take out the garbage,  they were in town for mother's day and one of them just happens to be a photographer.   noticing our struggles with the tripod she offered to take our picture.  sadly our kids don't seem to care who is  behind the camera these days and this was the best shot. still a million times better then we would have gotten left to our own devices.  Thank you Neighbor's daughter who shall remain nameless... mostly because I don't think I ever caught her name in the first place...

3 months?

Really? has it been 3 months since I last posted?  so sorry about that.  we have been pretty busy these last three months. (I still can't believe it's been that long since I've posted)  I am the Relief Society president in my ward and have been since January, I like to think that I can still do all the things I use to do but as I'm writing this I have answered 4 RS related phone calls and gathered table decorations for a fruneral lunchon I'm hosting tomorrow, it's late and I was tempted to go to bed after the 4th call but I know that if I don't finish tihs it will sit in the drafted posts for another 3 months or longer.  So here I am...

Katelyn "Graduated" from preschool last week.  she has LOVED it and besides the lice she has brought home, not once but twice...  I have enjoyed watching her expirence school.  she is home now and we abslutely love having her around,  she and Dallin play constantly together, they love being together.  Grant gets to tag along most of the time but he's always the "baby" or the "puppy" in their games so he doesn't have much of a staring roll, but  I think for now he perfers it that way.   SHe has had two visits from the tooth fairy but that's for another post.

Dallin is our little comidian,  he loves making faces, silly noises, falling and ocasionally bonking his head to make people laugh, which may be suprising to those we meet while we're out and about because he wont even look at people let alone say hello.  He likes to askes lots and lots of questions, he wants to know why everything is the way it is. tonight during family night he asked "Why did God put ants on the earth if they bit us and hurt us?"  He is convinced that we are going to have another baby soon and is constantly talking about "when we have our baby this and when we have our baby that,  I've explained to him countless times that mommy doesn't have a baby growing inside her yet,  this of course leads to all sorts of questions about how babies get in their mommy's tummys in the first place... fun times....

Grant is gets cuter evreyday.  He still hauls his blanket and two puppies around everywhere he goes and likes to show off his two front teeth.  He is simply the sweetest little boy.  don't get me wrong he denfinately has his two-amd-a-half-year-old moments, but he is always the first to cuddle me and say, "I yove you mommy"

he loves saying the prayer every chance he gets and if ever someone else starts saying the prayer he quickly rushes to say it before the other person can finsh... not one of his most reverent habbits but we still love him. He is growing way, way too fast.

Pre-K Graduation

apparently graduating from preschool has become a pretty big deal complete with caps and gowns and the whole 9 yards.   I can remember in kindergarten making a cap out of cardboard and black construction paper and we thought that was pretty cool. Times have changed.

Katelyn meeting her teacher, Miss McDaniel and the principal Ms Coppin.

the photo shoot

there are two classes in this shot, no Katelyn did not have all those kids in her class.

At the end there were refreshments in the gym for the families and many of her class mate got presents from their families, Katelyn asked why we hadn't gotten her a present. and I told her, "it's fun to celebrate all the fun times we had in preschool but you still get to go to school for a long time and sometimes we don't get presents  for everything we do."

Katelyn and Miss McDaniel, I have loved Miss McDaniel she is such an amazing teacher, Dallin is looking forward to having her next year.