Risenmay Reunion 2013

Oh the Risenmay Family Reunion! It was a blast! This year the reunion was in a small town in Utah. The reunion lasted for a whole week but we headed up a little earlier to enjoy 4th of July and be a part of the pre-reunion festivities. On the 12 hour drive there, we decided to stop at the visitors center at the St. George Temple. That temple is really gorgeous. It is so white, it's blinding. The flowers are also so pretty, so I had to take the shot below. The picture doesn't do it justice however. In the visitors center there were two missionaries, one from France. I took French for a little bit at school and told her my favorite sentence (I think it's really pretty): Aujourd'hui vendredi. She laughed because it means 'Today is Friday'. She said it in a real French accent and of course my point was proven that it is a really pretty sentence. 

Well, we stayed at Matt and Katelyn's beautiful house and had a wonderful time. We played freeze tag with a ball, and don't touch the ground on the swing set. We even saw someone walking their goat!

 We visited BYU campus and ate burgers on 4th of July along with the stuff on the last post. We went to a fancy movie theater with mexican food, burgers, crepes, and a lot of other selections. We ended up seeing Despicable Me 2. For some reason Maverick was crazy about chicken. In their yard we found a cool snake that wasn't dangerous.

 On Saturday the women ran to Costco and got all the food and drinks for the reunion! It took hours to get food for 37 people. After the big run we drove up to the cabin we were staying in.
It was awesome. It had a movie room (which we gladly watched Duck Dynasty in), a hot tub, a massage chair (spent a lot of time in that), three floors, a ping pong table, dart boards, and a lot more! It was super fun! It was the perfect size for all of our families.

 The First day of the reunion was Sunday so we all got ready and headed to church. The church had really pretty stain glass windows inside. Going into the church, all of the Risenmays were probably half of their ward. It was kind of funny. After church we played a lot of ping pong and had F.H.E. taught by Grandma and Grandpa. It was a very interactive lesson with presentations and pictures with stickers. That day everyone got birthday presents for the year and some of the boys got helicopters that if they got to fly through an obstacle course in the garage, they would get 20 bucks. Few succeeded. 

 On Monday we chilled at the house and played lots of ping pong. I mean A LOT. Later we played Minute to Win It. (every night someone was in charge of a game or activity everyone could play) There were challenges involving cookies, ping pong balls and peanut butter, stacking cups, and other doable but challenging challenges. Team One (I was on that team) ended up winning!

 The next day we went on the Alpine Slide and ate snow cones and stopped at the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory. The Alpine Slide is a long slide where you can go really fast. It was fun! Later we went to a Big Top circus. There was a girl swinging by her ponytail, a trapeze artist, uni-cyclists, lions and tigers, little dogs, and other fun stuff to watch. It was all super cool, but those Big Tops are really hot. 

 Later we played Fear Factor. We cracked eggs on our heads, tasted baby food, stuffed marsh mallows in our faces, grabbed marbles out of ice cold water, and did other gross stuff. And then, there were the food challenges. One for the kids and one for the adults. The kids won 20 dollars and the adults one 40 dollars. There were sardines, tomato juice, lemons, pigs feet, hot sauce, green beans, spam, and other disturbing food. Walker and Rulon won the kid contest. Ephraim won the adult one. I got out on the Spam. I

 The day after that we went to Temple Square. We stopped at the Joseph Smith building and watched a movie. We also stopped and gazed at the Salt Lake City Temple. Throughout Temple Square there were lots of water features and Bode was attracted to every single one of them. That kid is a water baby. 

 We stopped at City Creek, had some McDonalds and frozen yogurt and played at the mall's dinosaur themed play area. It was pretty fun. Later that night it was our turn for the game night. We did a Risenmay Family Quiz Show that I put together on IMovie. There were home videos with quotes where you had to guess who said it. There were also little activities where you had to name different things the fastest and other challenges where  you had to recreate an old dance. Team Grandma ended up winning by one point!

 The next day all the kids were playing Ghost in the Graveyard in the movie room/exercise room when I tripped and someone hit me on accident and I got a cut near my eye. Luckily, we have John who is a doctor. My cut got glued and is healing! Every reunion someone gets hurt. That day everyone went to an aquatic center and got ice cream afterwards. That night the adults played Duke and the older kids went in the hot tub. We saw a bob cat!

 On Friday everyone went back to the aquatic center and the same ice cream place. That night we played 3-Deep which is really fun! Everyone gets handed a piece of paper with a word on it that is part of a category. Three pieces of paper make up one category. For example: red, blue, green. To mix up the papers someone says 'mingle' and everyone passes their papers around. Then after that, you yell out your word and try to find other people who fit in your category. You want to find them fast! Also on your paper is either the letters T (top), M (middle), or B (bottom). Once you find your other two partners, whoever has the B on their paper sits on the bottom, M in the middle, and T on the top. You do not want to be the last team to sit down. The last team is eliminated and it goes on with fewer people until there are three people left. It is really awesome!

 On Saturday, everyone had to back home. The reunion was super fun and I can't wait until 2015!

4th of July

I know. I know. I'm not good at this. Last post was in November. But, whatever. I'm skipping to 4th of July!
I hope everyone had an awesome and festive 4th of July. We headed up to Utah days before and stayed with family. The Risenmay reunion started on the 6th so we decided to head up a little earlier and enjoy some cooler weather up there.
On 4th of July we went swimming at the McCustians for hours, played on swing sets, watched some movies, ate Hi Chews (they are reeeeeaaalllly good), played tag, squirted each other with water guns, and flung ourselves onto bean bags. We had barbecue and watermelon (one of the best food combinations there is in my opinion), salad, and onion dip and chips. We chilled for awhile and hung out with family.
After that, we started to have fun with some fireworks in a parking lot. In Utah, the big aerial fireworks are allowed so of course we had to buy some. Unfortunately, I didn't get the greatest pictures of the big ones since we did those pretty early. But, I did manage to snap these:

We had a big variety of fireworks. We had the big ones, the color ones, the tank ones, the ones that spin, sparklers, those ones that you throw and then they pop, and lots more. We ended up saving fireworks for the next night.As all of the fireworks were going off, Brooks was chilling with Lisa on the sidewalk. Brooks surprisingly loved the fireworks. 

Later that night we headed over to another house that lived across from a big elementary school that does an outstanding firework show. The streets were lined with cars and people were everywhere. We had  candied popcorn and root beer floats along with glow sticks as we watched the firework show. It was pretty cool. After that we decided that we should probably head home and go to bed. It was a pretty fun 4th of July if you ask me.

Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Brooks

 Man. I was so on top of this blogging thing a few months back. I had caught up, and was posting weekly (sort of). I have failed again. I did not post for a little over two months. Way to go, Aubrey. Huh, I'm going to briefly go over what happened in each month. (Oh, and if you didn't already read it, go look at the post before this, it's about our cute little Brooks)

September passed and we came to October. The month went by very quickly. Let's just say it wasn't one of the most exciting months that we had had that year. We decorated for fall and put out our cobwebs, and signs.We bought our candy and spread it out for a little bit of sweet decoration. We also got out costumes. I guess, this was where the month picked up. I was a Greek goddess, Walker was a ninja (for the third year in a row), Maverick was a skeleton, Ainsley was a vampire, and Bode was an Angry Bird. Which he was very proud of. Ainsley was also proud of her costume. At first when we asked her what she wanted to be that year, she said a flower. She quickly changed her mind to a vampire. But not just any vampire, a very creepy, scary, and freaky vampire. I had been a vampire a couple years back, so we decided to just use that costume. But it was too big, so Mom decided that she was going to pin it and hem it. We didn't have many pins, so Mom had to go to the store. Ainsley really wanted her costume finished, so she asked every single day for Mom to get it done. It got annoying really quickly. But, on Halloween we had a lot of fun. A couple nights before, we went to the church's Trunk or Treat and got a bunch of candy. So, it was even more fun to get more candy. We went trick or treating for thirty minutes before we called it a day.

Halloween passed and Thanksgiving came. Thanksgiving took a lot of planning. Especially, because we had a newborn baby. My Grandma Clark came down to help with the baby so therefore, she would be help in making Thanksgiving come peacefully to our home. We decided that we were going to make a homemade centerpiece. The Mayflower. We cut out some cardboard in the shape of a boat and painted all of it brown (we ran to Michael's to get our craft supplies). We then got a different cardboard box, cut it to fit in the boat, then covered it with wet brown construction paper. We made three little holes in the box. Before we did that step, we cut out different fall colored construction paper, punched two holes in it and stuck a straw in (we taped it so it wouldn't move). It made a great centerpiece:

We also made cute watercolor leaves which you can see in the above picture. (sorry for it being blurry) Everybody watercolor painted fall colors onto sheets of computer paper. Even Bode helped with the project. We let it dry, then drew leaves onto the papers. We cut them out and voila! We were done with the leaves. Also, we made cute pieces of paper that said 'Thankful For' on them that were then folded to hold a gold napkin and out silverware. Now for the cooking. We made lots of food. We made green bean casserole, seven layer dip, deviled eggs, orange rolls, turkey ( of course ), pies, and a lot more. A cute thing that we made was found on Pinterest. Pilgrim hats!

It was Reeses peanut butter cup miniatures, oreos, and icing. They were fun and very easy to make. Everything for Thanksgiving, turned out really nice. We played outside and ate lots of food. Now, it's time for Christmas!

He is born!

  The newest Risenmay baby boy has finally arrived! He was born on November 19, a 9 pound 2 oz. and 21 in. long baby. Yes, a very big boy. And, he is a twin to Ainsley. He has really dark brown fuzzy hair (Mom hopes that he'll keep Dad's hair) round head, and chubby thighs. Very chubby thighs. Oh, and his name is (drum roll) .................................................................................................................Brooks Brad Risenmay. And he totally pulls off the sweet name. He is very calm and doesn't cry a whole ton. And on his first night home, he gave Mom six hours of sleep! Way to go, Brooks. But, last night he woke up every two hours. It's a work in progress. :) At least, Bode and Ainsley have coped with him being here. When Mom and Dad pulled up in the garage to bring Brooks home, we all ran out to see him. (My Grandma Clark came down to help with the new baby, so she had been watching us at the time). As soon as they got Brooks out of the car, and Bode got a clear view of Brooks, Bode said (and I quote) "I don't want a brother. I don't want him to take my blankie and my bed". He went inside after that. Ainsley then looked at her new brother and said "It's a boy! We already have a lot of boys." They are better now. Bode now thinks that Brooks is funny. When he cries  it sounds like a kitty meowing and Bode thinks it is hilarious. He likes Brooks now. Ainsley on the other hand, doesn't really seem to pay much attention to Brooks. She is an even child (she was the 4th kid), so she does her own thing. Anyways, Brooks is a sweet and serene (hopefully he stays that way) addition to the Chris Risenmay Family.

Back to School!

 I may be posting this a little late, but school has started again! In the Risenmay household, this is both good and bad. For instance, Walker gets to see his friend who goes up to Montana for the summer when school starts but, he has to do a lot of reading and has to give up his addiction to video games (for those who are interested, he has...kind of...quit). For Maverick, he gets to talk to his friends and play on the playground but, he has longer days at school that are full of math and grammar. Ainsley, well, there really is no downside to her story. She goes to pre-school for three hours and grows plants, reads animal books, paints, draws, builds with blocks, learns to write her name better, talks to her little crush :) (we'll get to that later...), and make things like this:

 Yep. I won't forget who drew that one. For Mom I have two words when school starts: "Sorry" and "Bode". He is just a big ball of energy and naughty. He has trashed the bathrooms, broke some of our Ikea vases, filled the bathtub with water and decided to throw all of the clean towels in with soap for a little scrub, and even  scribbled on the walls with PERMANENT marker. Luckily we have some paint left over from the house makeover. But, as naughty as he is, he is the cutest thing ever! He'll sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in the sweetest voice, help wash the windows, play with the dog, and attempt to do his hair.
Hopefully you get my point. Anyways, we have already been in school for about a month! Woo hoo! I can't believe that I have survived all the homework thus far! There has been a lot of homework, well, I can't say a lot. More than I used to is better wording for this situation.But, school has officially started (those first few weeks of school don't really count because you don't learn anything).
 Apparently autumn has officially started too. Though, down here, it doesn't really feel like that. It was 106 degrees today. Ugh... It'll start to cool down soon, maybe. We've tried to stay inside and keep ourselves busy:

 Mom went furniture shopping for the house, again. We played "Hit the Target" with my stretchy headbands. You can tell how that ended up, on the chandelier. And we even did science smell experiments. Some of the "fragrances" didn't turn out as expected. But, at least we are not just watching TV.
 I'm not saying we don't go outside. Believe me, we have had our share of outside. Maverick and Ainsley had their soccer games today (Luckily Walker and I start our games later) and apparently Ainsley and Maverick are pretty good.

The Beach Trip

My family just LOVES the beach. The week before school we took a trip with the Broadheads down to San Diego where we rented the top floor and bottom floor of a beach house for a week. Can I just say, everyone was so relaxed and everyone had a blast. We were a minutes walk away from the Mission Beach and a minutes walk away from a really fantastic pizza shop and Mexican Food place. The house we stayed in was really nice and had pretty trees and flowers surrounding it. You could smell the sea and the best part about it was, there was no stress. There was no alarm clock buzzing off early in the morning. There was no rush to go and do something.

We sat in our chairs under an E-Z Up and read books or just watched the sunset go down. We made sand castles. We walked down to the boardwalk. We collected sea shells, rode our bikes down the street by the beach, and even skateboarded a little on the Broadhead's skateboards. Now Walker decided that he wants a skateboard of his own and is saving up. We went boogie boarding (even my pregnant Mom) and caught some awesome waves. We snatched up sand crabs (the ugliest creatures on the planet). We played paddle ball. We watched the sunset. And all the while, managed to catch some great shots. (I'll have to put some more on later)

We did a lot of fun stuff on the beach. However, we did go some places. We decided to head over to the San Diego Zoo and watch the animals and surprisingly, almost all of the animals were up and about, doing their thing when they usually just sleep. Specifically the koalas. We saw a lion and lioness walking around yawning.  We saw the jaguar cubs playing around with their mom and we saw the rhinos roaming. We even saw a monkey that looked exactly like Bode. 

We had a fun time at the zoo. But, later in the week my parents and some of the others headed to the temple which is beautiful. The Broadhead boys babysat the Risenmay clan. 

 I don't want to forget it so I'm going to have to say it, the beach meals were the best! We had pulled pork sandwiches, watermelon, corn on the cob, steak, potato salad, potatoes. All the food tasted really delicious. Especially the tacos from Sarah's Mexican food down the street from our beach house.

Everything was so fun, except for four things. 1. Some of us got sunburned.(those did turn into good tans though) 2. Some of us got rashes. 3. Maverick had a stomach ache (Maverick had some Tums to make his stomach feel better and said they tasted like candy so, Bode decided he would try some) and 4. The weather was so nice that we didn't want to leave

The Cake Color

As most of you know, Mom is pregnant and is 7 months along. Another thing most of you know, is that my Mom likes to be surprised when finding out the gender of her baby that she usually guesses wrong (Out of all five children, she has only guessed right once 1/5). Dad on the other hand, would rather just know. For me, my Mom just decided to find out as soon as possible. And for Dubya, they found out as soon as possible. But, for Maverick, my Mom and Dad made a deal. Dad could find out, but was not allowed to tell Mom, tell others, or even give hints. If he slipped, Mom would get full naming rights. My Dad kept the secret for nine days. Nice Dad. Both my Mom and Dad were surprised for Ainsley. Go figure. For Bode, they found out as soon as possible and now, Mom found out through a cake.

Mom let Dad find out what the gender was for the sixth Risenmay baby. Dad then ordered a cake from Costco filled with frosting that was either pink or blue (pink for a girl, blue for a boy). We were going to get the cake and invite a lot of friends over to cut and eat it to find out whether I was going to have a baby brother or a baby sister. Well, we did just that. I will have a baby.........................................brother!
There will be four boys and two girls in the Risenmay Family!

Mom's Birthday

Today is Mom's birthday and in order not to forget one tiny detail, I'm going to blog about it! I hope I don't forget anything and I hope you'll understand it. For you to understand it, I'll have to start from a few days ago. So, here I go:

A couple days ago Mom and Dad were talking in the kitchen about what Mom wanted for her birthday. She named a few things. A bread machine was one of them. She made sure to emphasize that that was what she really wanted and Dad didn't give anything away (like saying he was going to get it). We like to keep everything a surprise at our household. Anyways, Dad went to a store and got a bread machine. He was sure to go somewhere that wrapped it so she could not see her present. The wrapping paper had pineapples on it, a certain wrapping paper that could only be found in one store...
At dinner that night, Dad announced that he had gotten Mom's present. Mom already had some, oh what's the word, thoughts about what it was. Dad brought the gift inside and set it on the Living Room's sofa. Mom eyed the present and noticed the wrapping paper.Of course, she had to make a comment because she knew exactly where that wrapping paper came from. And Dad took all the credit for wrapping the gift. She knew he didn't wrap it. She also knew what it was.
Well, skip a few days and we're here. This morning all the kids rushed downstairs to a decorated room (Dad) and got to work. (Mom was getting ready and was told beforehand that she could not come downstairs until told by me)We drew lots of colorful pictures and stapled them together to make a book of art. We made tiny flowers that could go into a small decorated paper vase. We made toast for Mom. We fixed a few decorations. And  we worked on a little scavenger hunt. 
The Scavenger Hunt: The kids and I came up with an idea where Mom would go on a little hunt for the book of art. We stuck a note on Mom's plate of toast that said "After you eat this...Go downstairs and find your first clue to a scavenger hunt made just for you". We also stuck a little clue on a present downstairs and it led to another clue hidden somewhere in the house. Along with these notes were the flowers we had made previously. She was told to put them in her paper vase. One clue led to another, and another, and another. Finally, it led her to one of her presents.
After Mom had completed her little scavenger hunt, she opened Dad's present. Of course, it was a bread machine! She loved it even though she already knew what it was. She went to the other present and also thoroughly enjoyed those. It was a nice way to start off the day. But, we had to go over to swimming lessons, it was the last day of the first session. So we got treats. One of the biggest ones was that Bode wasn't grumpy during the swimming lessons! What a surprise! Anyways, we went downs slides and went home. We took showers and got ready to go to Souplantation for lunch! It was delicious.
Now we're home and Mom is taking a nap away from the screaming Bode. At last, some peace and quiet. Happy Birthday Mom!


 (Top Left hand corner) some decorations, (top far right hand corner) the bread machine, (above lower left hand corner) cards, (lower left hand corner) the clues and the vase, (lower right hand corner) Souplantation.

Camping!

Do you like tall trees and tents? Have you ever heard of hobo dinners? Do you like making (and eating) smores? Now, if you answered yes to 2/3 of those or more, let me ask you this question. Have you camped before. Your answer is probably yes. Our family went on a little camping trip ourselves the last day of school. Here is how it went:

On the last day of school we had Kindergarten promotion and 5th grade promotion. Because these events were held during school and ended before  school let out, we were able to leave early. Walker, Maverick, and  Mom and I went home early where the other kids were found playing with our good friends who were kind enough to watch for them for four and a half hours while Mom and Dad were gone from home. We already had our clothes packed along with the toiletries and Mom had just run to the store the night before to get food for the adventurous one night camping trip. The dinner for that night was going to be hobo dinners: potatoes, onions, meat, carrots, cream of chicken, salt and pepper, put into an aluminum sheet, folded up, and cooked over the fire. We were also going to have a dutch oven lava cake. And for breakfast the next morning we were going to have a quiche: eggs, ham, and cheese delicious breakfast. So, Mom got the ingredients for that.

Another thing that had happened the night before, Dad and Mom got out both of our tents (we can't fit our whole family into one anymore) and our cots and sleeping bags and aerobed (noticng later that we needed a mattress not an aerobed, so on the way to the camping site we had to pick up a mattress).

After that last day of school we gathered our dutch oven, the salt and pepper, the lanterns, the plastic utensils and cups and plates and bowls, and other stuff like that and put them in big containers and then stuffed everything we needed (including pillows) into the trunk and car top carrier. We dressed appropriately and headed off to the camping site (we had to stop at Target to get something :D). 

We got there and unloaded everything. We saw the Mattssons, the McRae's, the Dean's, the Broadhead's, and the Bruner's too who were right next door. They  were going to be our neighbors!We set up the small tent and put pillows, a mattress, and the sleeping bags in there. Then we set up the big tent: 4 sleeping bags, and 2 cots. While Dad was doing this, Mom was setting up a prep table by a wooden table which held a lantern and a big bucket full of supplies, and next to the wooden table were two crates full of food and supplies (did I mention we had two coolers). While Mom was doing this, Walker and I were playing tennis bounce and badminton (we broke the plastic ball in half), Maverick and Ainsley were visiting the neighbors, and Bode was playing the Grape Game. The Grape Game is where he would take grapes and roll them on the backside of the car: the thing that has a bunch of ridges and is there so you can step up and touch the trunk handle. Anyways, you can tell we had a great time.We played games and Bode got himself really dirty!!!

I helped Mom make the hobo dinners! It was really fun. After we put the ingredients inside the aluminum sheet and wrapped it up tightly, we put them in the fire. Dad had to flip them halfway through. 

They were really good! They smelled and looked good. Another thing that looked good was our campsite. Here is what it looked like:

Anyways, back to the story: After we finished eating our hobo dinners it started to grow dark so we headed over to the neighbors camping area. Everybody we knew was over there. We made smores and Mom made a delicious lava cake. It was good. After some good stories at the campfire, we headed off to bed. It was cold!Bode went to bed first and Dad had to stay in the tent for a long time before Bode finally snoozed off. Everyone went to bed thinking that the night was over. But it wasn't. Before long, Bode woke up and also woke up everybody else in the big tent: Mom, Dad, and I. He was playing on Mom's iphone. Apparently he had found it and was playing games and watching videos. He didn't go to bed for a long time after that. We had to switch around the whole tent until he went zzzzzzzzz. At least the other kids got a good sleep :)

We woke up and played some more and Mom made a quiche that was scrumptious. We talked with the neighbors and played horseshoes. We went to the park and then played some more. Before we knew it, it was time to leave. We packed up and headed home. We were very sad it was over. The camping trip was pretty fun!

For those who don't know...

This blog post is for those who don't know...Mom is pregnant (4 1/2 months along)! And believe me, I am not fibbing! This will really be the sixth kid. We do not know this sixth kid's gender however. Personally, I think it is going to be a girl. Walker and Maverick think it is going to be a boy. What do you think? Comment, we want to know! Also, do you have any name suggestions? (We'll have a poll up soon, so tell us so we can consider it!) We're stuck with the girls names. Here are some of our names:

Girl Names:

Coselle (Cozy)

Pepper

Linley

 Laine

Bellamy

Boy Names:

Tag

Crew

Guy

Thanks!

Quick!!!

Uuuugh. Okay, I haven't been very good at keeping this blog up to date. I have to admit it! Tonight, I'm going to try to quickly skim through the months that we haven't talked about yet. If there are any big events that I feel need to be described in detail, those will be talked about in future blog posts. Hopefully, I'll get this done and you will understand it. Worst case scenario, you won't understand it, but I'll give it my best shot. Anyways, let's get going:

  January: The weather where we live was pretty nice and I enjoyed it, considering that it's usually 115 degrees outside. We played on the trampoline, a nice routine after school. Homework, sun shining, a little rain, and Ainsley's birthday. Ainsley was very happy and got many presents that she really enjoyed. She played, and had a nice time!

  February: The month of February was very relaxing! Nice weather and valentines. Don't forget the candy! It was a very happy and exciting month!

  March: March was also a very nice month. Bode and Maverick had birthdays that they thoroughly enjoyed. Bode loved his cake! St. Patrick's Day came and our milk turned green. So did our scrambled eggs! Overall, it was very nice. (please excuse the horrible computer drawing :D)

    
  April:  April was great! There was spring break and we got rain!!!! :) Yay! Easter was also very spectacular.

   May: Oh, May! What a hot, hot, may. One day, when we were driving back to school, I looked at the temperature inside the car and it was 120 degrees! But, at least the flowers looked pretty. 

 June: We're caught up! Can you believe it (snicker, snicker)? This month has been very (hot) good! School is almost out and summer is almost in! I'll post soon! 

We just caught up, again! Hooray! I'll post soon!

November and December

One moment we caught up. The next moment we're falling behind. Tonight, I'm going to try to catch up the blog again and then hand off to my mom. She's a little better at maintaining this job than I am. Well, the last time we left off was during October. Tonight I will be telling you about our 2011 November and December. So here I go: NOVEMBER: Oh, what a month. All everybody is thinking and talking about is Winter Break which is still in a little while. Another thing they're talking about is Thanksgiving. Our family always goes all out. But, I'll reach that point in a short amount of time. We started off our month with excitement and candy from Halloween. It was pretty much normal. Weird! We had soccer practices, piano practices, school (which is almost out now!), fun, and a lot of family. Well, moving along out of a normal life into our normal life comes Thanksgiving. One of the first things we did was start getting out the decorations. Wreaths, little statues, centerpieces, towels. Stuff like that. Personally, I think it looked really cool. But, one of the funnest things we had planned for Thanksgiving was going to Washington. We were going to have Thanksgiving with family. So we packed our bags and got in the car. Sheesh! Long drive if I say so myself. At least we're okay drivers. It's not like we're not entertained every moment. We usually read, watch movies, play on ipad, play on iphones, play on ipod touch, listen to my ipod shuffle, play games, and snooze! But, once we got there the real fun had just started. It was sooooo nice! The first day we got there there was a nice cool rainy breeze. We unpacked our bags and played with cousins. For the next few days we chillaxed. We started to plan Thanksgiving dinner. Pies, stuffing, turkey, rolls, special drinks and more!!! On the night before Thanksgiving we made a quick casserole and went to sleep . We woke up and started to cook, play soccer, and play two hand touch football. Then, we set up tables for the kids and adults and dished ourselves. FUN! One thing I especially remembered about Thanksgiving was feeling like I was going to explode with all of the food I had eaten. That's probably the only holiday (besides Christmas)that I feel that way. Sadly, it was time to go home and say goodbye to cousins. We had a great Thanksgiving and we were very grateful to spend time with our crazy family! DECEMBER: Well, we got home and relaxed, prepared for Winter. We tried to get into the holiday spirit by putting up our Christmas decorations and chillaxing outdoors in the nice seventy degree weather. We have so many Christmas decorations. Statues, wreaths, garlands, towels, centerpieces, ribbon, wrapping paper, ornaments, and fake presents. Don't forget the eleven foot Christmas tree that we got that year either. It was sooooo tall. We could actually fit all of our ornaments on there! :) We strung on lights, ribbon, ornaments, school projects, candy canes, and more! It was sooo fun decorating. For the rest of the couple of weeks we did our normal and unusual schedule. We had a Robotics tournament, soccer games, birthday parties, piano lessons and more! All fun and exciting! Finally, Christmas had come and everybody was overwhelmed. Christmas Eve everybody made sure to clean up the house (so Santa Claus and the reindeers wouldn't hurt their feet), hang up their stockings, lay out a plate of cookies and milk and carrots, and track where Santa had made his stops. Then, all of the kids went to sleep. When they woke up, they ran downstairs and opened presents. We got lots of cool stuff! We went to church and had a great time also! We got back and played with our presents remembering the true meaning of Christmas. The fun hadn't ended yet. There was still New Years! New Years Eve was fun! Only a few people stayed up that long though! It was cool! Happy 2012! (Pictures will be posted soon!)

Getting Into the Spirit

We've caught up! Can you believe it? I thought we never would. But we're here. It's like a miracle. And we're here in October. The year has gone by sooooo fast. Well, we're getting into the Halloween Spirit. We set up our spooky decorations which are sprinkled throughout the house. We've got metal gargoyles, fancy beaded place mats, candles, awesome centerpieces, small statues and fake pumpkins. In a week or two, when Mom and Dad get back from Italy (they left) we're going to carve pumpkins and turn them into jack-o-lanterns. We just love getting into holiday spirits and decorating our house. We don't overdo Halloween, so we don't make it scary. We make it kid-friendly.
Some of us already know what we're going to be for Halloween. But, none of us have our costumes yet. We're going to be an angel, a ninja, a superhero, a witch or princess, (we don't know about Bode yet) and then our parents are going to be parents. How exciting! We've got a whole variety.
Have you ever carved a pumpkin? If you have you either LOVE taking the guts out of the pumpkin or you absolutely despise it. I LOVE it. I take a big ladle and then start spooning it out onto a tray. My dad, mom, me and Walker LOVE taking the guts out. Maverick, Ainsley and Bode DON'T LIKE taking the guts out at all. When they get their fingers all sticky they just get grossed out and decide they're finished. But, after we get the guts out we start to drill in the faces. I don't like to use stencils to do my pumpkins, that;s why mine always looks a lot rougher. But, I'm still happy all the same. At least I get to use the drill.
While Dad carves Maverick and Ainsley's pumpkins they have to go out of the room because they can't bear the noise. Maverick said this "The noise reminds me of bees. I hate bees." I have no idea how it reminds him of bees. Maybe it's the buzzing noise they make that's like the humming noise of the drill. Whatever it is, they just don't enjoy it.
Everyone's favorite part of Halloween is trick-or-treating. Our family will trick-or-treat for an hour then go back home and get our candy bowls and start handing out candy. We have this special bowl with a skeleton hand in it that whenever it senses something moving in front of it will move its hand forward and try to touch it. So, whenever someone tries to grab a candy they'll get spooked. We, being nice, obviously don't do this to little kids but, do it to older kids that will immediately get it's supposed to be a joke. So, watch out if you pass by our house.
The morning after Halloween each kid in our family organizes their candy into piles. We've got a pile for each kind of candy we have. We divide them and then trade certain candies for other ones. That way, we've got a good way to get good candy while giving away bad candy that others like. It's a win win for everybody that way.
You may guess that we eat our candy after we do the trading. And, you're just right! This is how we do our Halloween every year. And this is how we like it. That's why we're doing it again this year!
But, Mom still thinks that Halloween sales aren't over yet, they aren't! She heads to Target and hits the sales! :)
HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Time Traveler: September

There's not that much to say about September except that school started and it is slowly changing into cooler weather. Those things are both good things but they are not overly gigantic things. They're normal size. It happens every year and we're used to it changing like that. September was nice for our family. It was normal and nothing so out of the ordinary occurred. There is only one thing that I can think about: Mom and Dad getting ready to leave for Italy.
You may already know, that now in October they are there. Trying their best to understand Italian. But, them getting ready to leave in September is all I can put my finger on. Some of the trees here turned orange and red, that's one I guess. But, it's not massive.
Since there is not much to say this post will end soon. But, before I'm going to go I'm going to announce that we have officially caught up in our blogging! Yay!

Time Traveler: JUNE - JULY - AUGUST

Did you notice that we skipped May? May was our usual schedule: soccer games and practices, piano practice, going to the movies, reading books and, and all that kind of stuff. That's why we're going onto June,July, and August...Our life gets a little more sparked up here. I'll give you a small preview of what you're going to experience: more birthdays, school's out,some vacations and a big mess, wait several big messes. Yep, here we go...
JUNE:
The beginning of June is always exciting. First of all, you're understanding that school will be out with a matter days. You're sensing the hot weather which indicates summer. You're always feeling that excitement of just wanting to run and relax. All at the same time of course. Although you don't feel like this if you're an adult because you've already felt it years back. But, hopefully you still remember it.
For us the first days of June were exciting, awesome and overwhelming. Planning trips, getting homework finished, turning in the last donations for Box Tops, calling the family, and agreeing to take it all in. Luckily we finished that and school was out!
We got home and celebrated with delicious, cheesy pizza and crazy bread. We also had orange soda to top it all off. 180 days of 6 hours in school is very tiring. Let's see 180 x 6 = 1080 We spent a little less than 1080 hours in school. We needed a celebration.
The next few weeks were relaxing and nice besides the occasional naughtiness which always seems to appear in this household. Bode drew all over the walls, did some splashing in the toilet, spilled several soda cans over some books and got sand stuck on my lollipop. During those weeks we went to the movies, drew chalk on the sidewalk, played with Indy and made cold fudge mint brownies.
Then, it was Mom's birthday! We got her some cool presents and made some papers for her. We made her a birthday card and served her breakfast in bed! Hopefully she liked it! It was awesome for us, hopefully awesome for her! :) Then, we moved to the next day when we started our drive to Northern California. We had already packed up our suitcases and were in the van ready to go to Oregon. We were planning on stopping in Northern CA and then driving to Oregon.
You might not know but us Risenmay's are really good travelers. I mean, really good. Even Bode is! We can stay in a car for six or seven hours and not need a rest break! We use our time very wisely also. We read, watch television, sleep or play games that don't involve small itty bitty pieces. We never really get bored. That's exactly how our 8 hour trip driving to Northern California was. Awesome!
So we drove up with all our bags and suitcases and decided to stay at relatives. We were planning on staying the night and then leaving in the morning. Just a quick stay is how you could describe it. But, it was eventful. We saw our cousins, interacted with their bunnies, and went to the park. The next day though, was a different story.
We got up at seven, had breakfast, got into comfortable clothes and then drove the ten hour drive to our family's house in Oregon. We were still great travelers but, since we had drove a very long ways before we were a little tired of being stuck in the car. Luckily, we got to Oregon and only had to take two stops. But, it was just LOUD!
It was very noisy in our car. We had music playing, Bode, snoring, and the regular talking. If you add it up in your head and form it into a scale this is what you get: ( the answer is in red)

0 ---- ------1-----------2-------3------4----------5-----------6--------7--------8-------9-------10 100
JULY:
At least noisy is better than crying, yelling and screaming right?! Well, what matters is that we made it. We first stopped at our hotel then went over to our family's house. Almost all our family was there. We were greeted and immediately started to play with all of our cousins outside in the front yard. We were playing, volleyball, basketball, soccer, scooters, and a lot more! That night I was going to be spending the night at their house on a mattress in their living room. It was surprisingly nice! We were in the middle of watching a movie when we snoozed. We woke up and had crepes, got dressed, got ready for the day said hello to the family walking in the door.
That day, we were going to go to a huge water park in Oregon. We drove there and had soda ready, pizza and lots of water! We played in the mud and water pretending to play this very fun game and then decided to walk around. We did of course. After a couple of hours two of my cousins and I got tired. We wanted to ask if we could walk home since we were old enough and it was only twenty minutes away.

Our mom's said yes, but said we had to ask our dads. They were on the huge soccer field where the grass was very hot. When we were close we realized we didn't have our shoes on and we didn't feel like walking all the way back to go get them. We walked on and then started to run because it was very hot. We asked and then darted back. They said yes. So, we walked home.

We got home and watched TV. It wasn't until two hours when the others got home. It started to get late and we realized it was the 4th of July. We got out a ton of fireworks and started doing them on the ground. We had sparklers and these fireworks that spun. We had fireworks that made really loud noises and some really cool other ones. After that, all the older kids decided we wanted to sleep on the trampoline outside.

We got out blankets and sleeping bags and tried to go to sleep. About two o'clock or three o'clock in the morning I decided to head back inside. It was freezing cold! After a couple minutes I heard other cousins start to pile in. It was obviously cold for them too. One of our cousins wouldn't get off the trampoline so he had to be carried off. That was fun. Later in the day we drove two hours to the official reunion at our beach house.
The beach house was stunning. It was three stories high. The top floor was beautiful with some bedroom. The Middle floor had several bedrooms, a kitchen, a front room (which had a TV with several couches), a garage, and a balcony which you could walk down to get to the steps down to the private beach. The bottom floor had a kitchen, a bedroom, beds, air hockey table, pool table, that table with the people you control, and XBOX and a patio which led down to steps down to the private beach.
We made all our sleeping arrangements and slept that night there. We woke up and wanted to go down to the beach. It was so much fun! Later we came back and watched I Shouldn't Be Alive on Animal Planet. So cool! Watched about five episodes! We had very fun stories to tell our parents. We went down to the beach again and played bakery. We then slept on the floor of the room. (we stayed up to about 1:00 AM every night and then woke up at seven and decided to go down to the beach at 8:00 in the morning. That was fun!
One morning I was playing air hockey with my cousin and looked through the clear glass door to the patio and saw a real raccoon playing with our sand equipment. Being me, I screamed, pointed and then ran upstairs. That day, all the girls went to the outlets and bought some stuff!
We had a very fun time throughout that week! I will never forget that reunion. But, it finally came to an end. Our family drove back to our family's house in Northern California. We stayed there for a week and had a very fun time.
Walker had a birthday, Walker got baptized, my cousin and I did a singing concert, we played with their bunnies, went on a water slide, noticed their bunny was pregnant, went to Fentons and had the best time!
After that week, it was time to go home. We drove home, got home, and our normal lives began again. Our fun normal lives started back up. The rest of July was hot, but very enjoyable. Then August started up:

August:
The summer was going by very fast. We were going to small, but fun places like a little water pool thing, a cool gypsy store, Pawly Pool, and more! But, finally it was my birthday. My friends and I went to this cool beauty parlor place and got manicures, our hair done, and our make-up done. After that we went to lunch! We opened presents, ate a really goo mud pie cake, and decided what we were going to sing for the Talent Show. It was so fun!
Then, it was Mom and Dad's anniversary. They went out to dinner and had Mexican food and had a great time.
Then, school started! Summer was over! We got out teachers ( :-D ) and had a great first day of school. It was so fun! Summer was fun! Everything was fun! I'm sorry I'm making this so short. But, I'm so eager to get caught up and tell you everything!

(photos at top are just pictures of random events during summer)

Time Traveler: April- Those Funny Moments

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I was looking back through pictures on our computer and realized I needed to blog again! Here I am. But, what made me think of it was all of those random pictures in April. Ya, there's me with a real, live, slithering boa constrictor. Ya, there I am with that weir expression. Ya, there's mom walking in the pantry to find Bode sneaking some cheetoh puffs. Our family is just that. And this is us, casually strolling in April.
In April Mom took all the kids except for Bode and Indy and Ainsley to the circus. Let me just say, circuses are not just clowns. It's like a competition for flexibility. These people can splits while standing on the head eating popcorn. I don't know if it's just me, but if you've been to a circus, you've experienced the awe, surprise and fear. All examples of these emotions are hear:

Surprise: Picture number 2 (do you see my face?)
Fear: The one where we are holding a snake
Awe: The girl doing the splits on her head

That night was fun! Smoothies, icees, popcorn. There were a few tricks in the circus that scared me half to death. There was a man on a large circle with a hole in the middle. It was raised 50 feet into the air and it was spinning upside down when he was on it. He almost fell once! (we didn't get a picture of him because we were afraid that we would take a picture and he would be falling down at the same moment)


On top of the circus there were those little moments that made you smile. Mom quickly snapped a picture of Bode sneaking some Cheetoh Puffs. Man, he does love his snacks. (I told you, he eats!) He would run away with the snack upstairs and we had to try to catch him before he got his orange hands all over the furniture. :( Luckily, we catch him soon enough and we haven't had to clean up a major mess with that. Hopefully I didn't just jinx it!
On top of that we had Dad's birthday. He didn't want anything special but, we gave him some ties and work shirts! Hopefully he appreciated it!

That's our story of April. And I hope you learned to never hold a snake (they're slimy)!

Time Traveler: March

We're in March again. Can you believe it? Because, this is just another episode of the TIME TRAVELER. We're going to have a summary of March all right here in a little less than 3000 words. :) You're going to read about holidays and the little things. I shouldn't call it the little things, because the little things make up your life which somehow ends up being the big picture. So come on an adventure with us going back in time to March.

March: Birthday time! Two birthdays in one month. Can we pull it off? Well, we did, so you know the answer. It's like a story right now. You may know the ending, but you want to know all of it, they're journey. That's how it's going to be. So hope you like it!!!

March 6, the first birthday. Can you guess who it is? Probably not. Because there is five us and you just can't keep up with all the different birthdays. Maverick's birthday! Maverick wanted a "cool birthday one that just wants to make you say ooh la la!" Those are the words of my brother. Word for word. Ya, regular talk around here. Well, this is how is "cool" birthday turned out. And, I hope you say "ooh la la." by the end of this. :)
The night before your birthday is probably the hardest. Not for the parents or friends but for the actual birthday child. It's hard not bragging that you're going to turn one year older and not saying that you're going to have the best birthday ever, even better than the other kids. That's how Maverick was. Nervous, maybe. Excited, of course. Bragging, oh yes! I wish I had enough to explain the feelings of every birthday kid. (psst...that includes adults too)
Maverick, the night before his birthday decided to see if he could find where his hidden birthday presents were. Like every year, no success. Our parents just hide it in places that you would never ever think. Like, on the top shelf of their room closet where we can't see, under some enormous, heavy boxes and on the playroom closet shelf. But, it's changed every year. So, of course we're tempted to look for them.
Maverick was walking around trying to see if he could get just a tiny hint of where they were hidden. Nope. He asked if he could stay up. Nope. He knew that our parents would be hanging the birthday decorations. But, no, the same answer every year. He decided to go to sleep up in his bed.
The next day he woke up bouncing everywhere so excited that his pajama bottoms fell down. He rushed into Mom and Dad's room and asked "Can we go down now? Please?" Same as every year Dad had to grab the video camera and mom had to get her phone. Then, we darted down the steps of our lovely, nicely-furnished house. He was first into the room, first one to yelp with delight and the first one to notice the crepes dished out on plates. He ran to the center of the front room and twirled with satisfaction. It was everything he dreamed of.
Finally, everybody reached the front room and sat down for breakfast. Crepes, with cinnamon and toast hits the spot. If you know what I mean? Maverick was singing a song he learned in preschool while he blew out the candle on his crepe. Maverick had four crepes, stood up and announced that he wanted to open present.
There were presents set up on the table on a Buzz Light-year tablecloth. We all walked over to where the presents were standing and let Maverick open his many presents. He got toy cars, clothes, stickers, candies and much more. He was very grateful to have an exciting birthday.
We went and had lunch then ran on over to the park!!!
When we got home we were exhausted, but we still decided to play with this toys. Maverick didn't mind at all and started to pretend that he was Darth Vadar. Later in the day we had dinner, played some more, read some books, played the piano, played some more and went to bed. Good night!
Wake up, wake up! It's Bode's birthday. C'mon C'mon. Let's go. Let's go. That's all our parents heard that morning in March. Bode didn't know what was happening. But, of course the rest of us did. Birthdays meant special places, treats, and lots of fun! Anyways, Bode sort of fed off the energy of the rest of us and by the time we running down the staircase Bode was laughing and clapping with all sorts of excitement. Oh the Risenmays. How our family rocks the mornings. Already starting off with a good day. (well some days)
Bode ran into the room, saw the streamers and jumped up with joy. He noticed the food on the counter and clapped. And then he spotted the presents. He immediately darted over to the table and started to rip the striped wrapping paper.
I have to admit it. He got some pretty cool presents. Some toys, some clothes, some grins some toys. :) He was happy, everybody was happy, the dog was happy. What more could we ask for?
The rest of the day except for the evening was a bit of a blur. Rushing, playing, giving Bode a bath. Normal stuff. He didn't really understand his birthday, that is until the very end.
We put him in his high chair and put a cake in front of him. If anybody knows Bode, they would obviously realize that this was not going to end well. Guessed from our family, it ended in pure cake.
Yep, hopefully you understood that I said cake. The kind with the frosting and decorations. Ya, Bode smashed it while eating it. There's a picture above of what Bode looked like with his cake in the very beginning. It actually came to an end. Bode ate the whole cake :) Ya, weird that a kid could eat that much, including a baby. At least he enjoyed it.

Time Traveler: Valentine's Day

Woo Hoo! We've made it to February 2011! Can you believe that we started to catch up in August 2010! We're almost there! We're so close. Just a little bit more. Let's see if I can do this all in one night or should I say three hours? Is that possible? Eight months in three hours? I sure hope it's possible because I don't know if I'll be able to find another time slot to keep working. Time just work slower!!! It always seems that if you're trying to get something important done time goes by quicker and when you're bored it goes really slow. How sad.
Well, let's not blab on and on and on about how I need to catch up when we can be blabbing on and on and on about the actual event. Valentine's Day!!! It's not the biggest holiday in the whole world but, certainly it is a holiday. Especially one that you celebrate a lot in school. We usually hang up small wreaths on our door and that's it. We also make Valentine's cards with candies for our classrooms. That's usually it. And that's exactly what happened this year for Valentine's day.
We went to Super Target to get the kits for the Valentine's Day Cards for the classrooms. I chose animals, Walker chose sports, Maverick chose a T.V. character and Ainsley chose Hello Kitty. Bode chose a sucker. We got bags of candies for our classrooms and got groceries and then went home.
We did our Valentine's cards and then put them in bags with the candy for the next day. We headed to school the morrow. We did small activities in our classrooms like coloring pictures and watching a video of how other people in other states celebrate Valentine's Day. We learned how it got started and read a book in the library called The Night Before Valentine's Day. All in all it was a good sweet day filled with hugs and kisses.

Time Traveler: Ainsley's Birthday

Happy Birthday To You Cha Cha Cha
Happy Birthday To You
Cha Cha Cha
Happy Birthday Dear Ainsley Happy Birthday To You
Cha Cha Cha

Kings and Queens and Princess too
Want to wish you all that's new
So Hey Hey
What do you say?
Happy Birthday To You

Happy Birthday Ainsley! This year Ainsley turned one year older. She had a very special day.
In our family on your birthday you get to do whatever you want to do. You get to choose what you want to eat and what you want to do for your birthday. Ainsley just wanted to chillax. She wanted crepes for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch and burgers for dinner! And, she wanted to head to the park for some play time. She's easy to please on her birthday!
The night before we put up decorations for Ainsley's birthday. There was a Mickey Mouse string of letters and some ribbon, there was a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse tablecloth and we even laid out some presents on the table. She did not want to open the presents until after they had breakfast. She helped make some scrumptious crepes with cinnamon and an amazing fruit salad to go along with it.
Ainsley then decided that she wanted to open presents. She got a fake guitar, some clothes and a lot of toys. Up until lunch we played with all of her toys in the playroom. Then Mom made PB&J sandwiches for lunch. Ainsley ate them while watching her favorite show, Olivia. We all then decided to head for the park right down the street.
She played soccer, played on the jungle gym, played Catch and played with Indy, our German Shepherd. She seemed to have a pretty good time. By the end, Ainsley was red in the face and was ready to go home. She immediately walked up to her room and took a nap. When she woke up she wanted to take a bath.
We put her in the bath with a lot of bubbles. She looked like she had a beard. She played with a small toy boat and got out. She then went downstairs to find Mom making dinner. Dad was grilling the burgers outside while Mom made the side dish. Ainsley decided to go play on the computer while our parents finished up dinner. Then they called 'DINNER TIME!' We all scrambled to come get a seat at the island. Mom dished our plates and handed us our dinner. We ate it and it was very good. We all said thank you and went to go jump on the 2 year old trampoline. 15 minutes later Mom called us back in for cake. We sang Ainsley Happy Birthday and she started to eat her piece of cake.
Hopefully she enjoyed her birthday! I know I certainly enjoyed it...

Time Traveler: New Years

10
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CONFETTI! Happy New Years

Do you just love changing years? 2010 - 2011! I love it because of all the fun about staying up til' 12:00 AM and sleeping in until 10:00 AM. Other family members of mine don't love it that much. They'll stay up until 9:00 PM then decide that they're going to crash. Usually it's only three people staying up. Me, Mom and Dad. We'll play board games and watch TV and try to entertain ourselves. And, when we're not we're stuffing ourselves til' we feel like we're going to explode or literally exploding fireworks.
This past New Years was very fun. We got out all the pies and cakes and this soda called Martinelli. We put the soda in fancy cups. We put out blankets and pillows and then started to stay up. This is the timeline:

8:00 PM - Getting out all the food and drinks

8:30 PM - Putting the Hawaiian grass skirts on

9:00 PM - Bode goes to bed

9:15 PM - Ainsley falls asleep on the floor

9:30 PM - Refilling drinks

10:00 PM - Exploding some fireworks

10:30 PM - All the boys including Dad (except for Bode, he already crashed) go to bed

11:00 PM - Mom and I play board games

11:30 PM - Watch Disney Channel

11:45 PM - Mom falls asleep on the couch

11:58 PM - I wake Mom up

12:00 AM - HAPPY NEW YEARS

12:05 AM - Start to clean up

12:15 AM - Mom and I bring Ainsley up and go to bed


We had such a fun time!!! I feel so welcome to be able to be in the year 2011 !!!