Emily's interest in photography

Last year Emily decided that she was very interested in photography. She asked for a camera for Christmas. She got a beginning camera and has loved it! She uses it often with Brittany as her main subject. Their favorite poses are dance or wedding pictures. She also takes some of herself. Here is a small portfolio of some of the MANY pictures that she has taken. She enjoys taking some of her pictures and put them into a magazine picture. Another interesting note about Emily (13 1/2), she had very straight hair until about a year ago. She now has curly hair and she is really enjoying it. She sometimes straightens it still, but she really enjoys wearing it curly. She is also taller than I am. I think she'll be the tallest girl in the family.

I took the above picture of Emily, but she took the rest of the pictures.

She also likes to take a few silly ones!

Amber

Amber received a 1/2 tuition scholarship from BYU for her first year. She did excellent and received a 3.91 GPA! She applied for a scholarship again and this time received a full tuition scholarship! We are proud of her and she definitely deserved it. She worked so hard this past school year in hopes for a scholarship again for her second year. (This cute picture of her and some of her good friends was taken at a BYU basketball game.)

The 4th of July!

Brittany and Tyler made a pinata at our backyard neighbors home last month. They painted it red, white, and blue and decided to break it open on the 4th of July. They were so excited. Even though we don't like how close behind us their house is, after many years of empty fields behind us, we love having this family close. They have a daughter Emily's age, a daughter Brittany's age and a girl a year older than Ty and a boy a year younger. Tyler enjoys playing with both of them. they all three had a lot of fun on the 4th with them. They went swimming together, decorated cupcakes, and broke the pinata.
The kids thought scooter would be cute in a 4th of July hat and they were right!

Emily and Brittany, sisters and best friends! They really do have a lot of fun together. They play daily and if one is gone with a friend the other can't wait until she returns.

In the evening on the 4th we went on a family bike ride and picnic. After the picnic Amy and Cory's family came over for homemade raspberry ice cream and home fire works.

Tyler, Jack, Lauryn, Emily, Brittany, and Sydney

Fun with sparklers!
Mike fell asleep while the kids were playing with sparklers! The younger kids piled all these blankets on him.

Girls Camp!

This year Girl's Camp was a Stake camp. The Stake leaders did such a good job preparing it. The theme was "No Strangers Among Us". Every ward in the Stake picked a country to represent. Ours was Tonga. Other wards chose Germany, French Polynesia, Italy, Denmark, Madagascar, Mexico, and the Stake leaders chose the USA. Ashlee was asked to be one of the Stake YCLs. She was involved in much of the planning. The girls got to participate in a fun "Amazing Race." They traveled to the different "countries" (ward camp sites). At each country they did a camp certification requirement and an activity from the country. When the girls came to Tonga (ours) They learned knot tying, bed rolls, or emergency shelters and the activity they did was a Tongan music stick game. The other activities in the "amazing race included canoeing and a zip line. The ward YCLs traveled with the girls in groups and the stake YCLs ran part of the Amazing Race. Ashlee ran the zip line. She loved it and had a lot of great leadership experience.

Mike, me, and Emily during our 8 mile hike. The girls had an 8 mile or a 4 mile hike to choose from. Ashlee was asked to lead the 4 mile hike. I heard she did a great job. She planned team work activities at the top that everyone enjoyed.

The last night of girls camp we did a culture night. All the wards planned a skit or dance that represented their country and then we all sampled desserts from the country. Our ward did the Hakka. It turned out great! The dessert sample we brought for everyone to try was coconut bread. I got the recipe from the Polynesian Cultural Center when we were there a few years ago. (I was assistant camp director and was assigned to do the all the food for our ward.)

While performing the Hakka, the women have designs on their chins.

While we were getting our designs painted on our chins, a few of the girls had a lot of fun with the paint and added eyeballs. Emily's eyes are closed in this picture.

All of the girls in this picture have their eyes closed and have painted eyes on their eyelids. It looks quite real doesn't it?!

Canyon View ward girls and leaders performing the Hakka. Mike said he was amazed by the performance! We are all wearing pink and yellow tie-dye shirts. In this picture it looks like some are shirtless, but of course none of us are!

Ashlee at EFY and on her 50 miler

Ashlee went to Utah State in Logan for EFY. This was her 3rd and last time going. She loved the classes and had really fun counselors. She didn't enjoy the food, but the rest of it was so great that it made it her favorite year.

Savannah Slater and Ashlee

(Savannah moved here from Arizona about 5 years ago and she was Breanne's- Ashlee's cousin- best friend. Soon after moving here she and Ashlee became very good friends and about a year later discovered this connection.)

Whitney, Erika, Ashlee, Savannah enjoying EFY together

Ashlee returned from EFY on Saturday, June 20 and left the following Monday for her High Adventure 50 Miler with her Venture Crew. They did all 50 Miles over the course of 5 days in the beautiful mountains near our home. The hiked, mountain biked and rode mules to cover the 50 miles. (They actually went over and ended up with about 56 miles.)

They enjoyed many breath taking views. Beautiful mountains!!

Ashlee, doing a handstand on the top of Box Elder.

Ashlee and her friend, Lydia, kissing the top of Mount Timpanogus from The peak of Box Elder. They also climbed to the top of Lone Peak.

Mike and I got to join them on their last day. (Mike, Ashlee, and I are in the center of this picture.) We went up Thursday night, camped with them and then biked with them the next day. We were going to bike and canoe, but it was too cold and and so we just biked further. We biked down from the Alpine summit and then down Provo Canyon. It was so much fun. I discovered I really enjoy mountain biking. It was pretty muddy because it was lightly raining and so it was a little slippery. It was beautiful though, we felt like we were biking through a rain forest.