Happy Memorial Day!

Hi Everyone!! It's been a very eventful couple of weeks, and we've had some fun that I wanted to share with you all!

I have observed something that I find very interesting. Phoenix, while being in the middle of a desert, is actually very heavily farmed. There are many different crops being grown here. The fields that I drive past each day have cabbage and corn. When we first moved here, the cabbage was being harvested, and the corn fields were just being ploughed. I've watched these corn stalks grow from just seeds, to being nearly 3 feet tall in the short couple of months that we've lived here, and I feel like we've grown as a family, just like those seeds.

We've all had to step out of our normal "boxes" to make this new place feel like home, but I think we've reached that point. Ben and Claire have been doing well, learning so many new skills and things that they never knew how. Ben grew from not swimming at all, to jumping into the pool by himself! Claire has begun talking more and more each day. Sometimes she talks so well that I mistake her talking to me for Ben talking to me. Josh and I have both had to make new friends, and get out of our comfort zones that we've been so securely tucked into for so long. It's really paying off, though- we love our ward, and our neighbors. We've been planted, and are starting to take root!

For the holiday today, we decided to take a drive and see some parts of Arizona that we hadn't seen before. To my Dad, Val-- you would really have been proud. We found such a "gold mine" of fun waiting for us at the other end!

Final decision: we drove to Payson. We didn't really know what we were going to do there, we just were going to see the forest, and hopefully cool down a little bit. It was a couple of hours' drive from Surprise.

When we got there, we ate at a little mom-and-pop Cafe(mmmmm), and found out that only 10 miles from where we were there was a state park, Tonto Natural Bridge! So, we went there, not knowing what we'd find. There are pictures below, but again due to my ignorance of how to properly post pictures(some day I'll figure it out, I promise), they are all at the bottom of this post again.

We first hiked to a small waterfall, which was so neat! It wasn't very big at all, but it was beautiful. I forgot my camera, so we didn't get pictures of that, but once we came up I grabbed it out of the car, and we went out to the first viewpoint of the actual natural bridge. (Picture 1 below)You may not be able to tell from the picture, but there are people standing underneath the Natural bridge. We decided to find the trail, and hike down.

The hike was difficult- steep, and a lot of rock-hopping to get to the bridge. Ben loved it! He hiked up to a cave with Daddy (see pictures 2 and 3 below), and decided he's a natural-born mountain climber.

We also encountered a few of my favorite friends here in Arizona-- little teeny lizards!!! Not only are they so cute, they also eat the bugs that I so detest. (picture 4)

We hiked as close to the natural bridge as we could with small children, and Daddy went to see it up close. There is a waterfall that comes down the other side of the bridge itself, and it was beautiful! Sorry, no pictures of that one. However, while Daddy was gone, the kids decided to have some fun, and throw rocks into the stream. (picture 5) I found out later that there is a rule of the park that no rock should be thrown anywhere. . . The final picture (picture 6) is Mommy, Ben and Claire when we got as close as we could to the natural bridge. Ben and Claire were pretty tired! We all had so much fun together! We can't wait to go back again!

Finally, Happy Memorial Day!! I'm feeling sentimental today. We're usually with Mom and Dad Evans out in Tridell, visiting with Grandma and Grandpa Bartlett, but due to the recent move we were unable to be there this year. I have always enjoyed going to the Tridell Cemetery for the 21 gun salute in the morning. To anyone who reads this blog and is currently, or has been in the past a member of the U.S. Military, any branch at all, we want to say thank you. Nobody can say that enough! Thank you for defending our country. We love you, we pray for you, and we thank you!!

Adventures begin!

Hello again! I'm writing tonight to tell you a few of the happenings that have occurred since we moved to Phoenix.

Before we moved to Phoenix, I was warned to watch out for spiders, cockroaches, snakes, and scorpions. All of these particular pests are my worst enemies- I have never been able to look at them or even think about them without shuddering! So far, we've not had a real problem with any of them. We've only encountered two scorpions, one was dead and one was dead after Josh took care of it! See the picture below, courtesy of my niece Makayla who tried (and failed) to get me to come out on the back porch to see it (*shudder*).

We enrolled Ben in pre-school where he apparently learned to drive. (Who knew?) We were driving to Jarred and Amanda's one day, and a car stopped in front of us for the red light. When the light finally turned green, this car remained stopped for about 15 seconds (a frustrating amount of time for any driver behind it), during which I honked about three times. Ben said, "WHAT was that guy THINKING? Does he think that a GREEN light means STOP? Everyone knows that green means GO." (Hee hee)He's also found some new expressive words ("TO-tally", with emphasis and everything), and decided that he's a super hero. I've also attached a picture of something that he's very proud of- his first plant ever! When he waters it in the morning, he says, "You're such a good boy, plant! Keep growing!" He makes me smile!

Claire is learning and growing so much! She amazes me every day. She has so much energy, I can't believe it sometimes- she jumps or runs almost everywhere she goes! And she has this funny little run-- it's almost like she's prancing on her toes. . . She is still so dramatic, too. Tonight she stood up on one of our kitchen chairs, and it tipped over. Forty five minutes later (the tears had stopped for quite a while by then) she started sniffing and whimpering again. I asked, "Claire, what's wrong?" "*sniff, sniff* I fall down," she whispered. She's also very stubborn. When she gets mad and hits me, sometimes it would be easier to pull one of her teeth than to get her to say she's sorry!

Josh had more training for work this week. This time, rather than going to Cincinnati, they took him to somewhere quite exotic-- Salt Lake City!! Ha ha. Josh is coming home tomorrow, and we're so excited- the kids have been asking for him all week! We've missed him so much. Josh had a hard time getting his drivers license changed to Arizona. Apparently a social security card isn't enough, and we ended up having to send off for a new birth certificate for him to prove that he's a citizen of the United States! When I went to get my drivers license, I really couldn't figure out when the picture taker was going to take the picture (most people have the courtesy of giving you a 1, 2, 3, but apparently not so in the AZ MVD), so I've got this strange look on my face like, "Are you gonna take it now? No? How bout now? No? Now?"

Well, that's it for now- here are a couple pics!

Phoenix

Hello from sunny Phoenix! Since we moved in, we've enjoyed such nice weather, I can't complain one bit! It's really nice- we like our neighborhood, and our ward is incredible! They've been kind and reached out to us from the day we moved in. The elders quorum, and I think a few of the young men in the ward literally unpacked our entire 26 foot truck in an hour and a half!! We're mostly settled, just a few boxes that we still don't know what to do with. I really like our house-- I LOVE the kitchen!! I've never had so much space in a kitchen, and it's proved very valuable! I've also never before had the luxury of a Master bathroom. I'm definitely loving that! All the bedrooms are upstairs, along with the "office" which is really just the open loft at the top of the stairs. Hopefully the pictures below will do it justice.

Ben and Claire have finally adjusted. They've had a rough go, not understanding the distance between Phoenix and Salt Lake, or why we had to move. We took a trip back to Utah a couple of weeks ago for James and Janelle's wedding (Josh's younger brother). When we got into Utah County, Ben realized that there was snow on the mountains. "Mom, how can that be? There's no SNOW in PHOENIX." After which I explained that we weren't in Phoenix anymore (we'd been driving all day, so how could we have been?). Claire still sometimes asks to go home, but that gets asked a lot less frequently now. Ben and Claire really make me laugh with all the funny things that they say- every day brings a new bout of laughter to our home. Ben has begun the 50 questions about every little thing lately, which I'm extending my patience as much as possible with. It's good he's curious! He's beginning to do very well in Pre-school, and apparently HATES soccer. We will definitely NOT be enrolling him in soccer come fall. Claire's speech has improved so much that I can't believe it- every day she surprises me with the things she says, and even questions she asks! She's really excited to go to school (too bad she's still got 3 more years, hey?), and we're planning to enroll her soon in a dance or gymnastics class, to take advantage of her energy, agility, and flexibility. Both of our children amaze us every day, and we love them so much!

I don't have too much more to say. I'm really glad to have our family all together again. March was a tough month with Josh in Phoenix, and me, Ben and Claire still in Salt Lake. We've been very blessed, and are feeling very grateful right now for the support we've received through this huge change! We definitely couldn't have settled in so quickly without the help of our family- Thank you all, and we love you so much!!