Today was Uncle Ben's homecoming, so as I put on Lincoln's sailor outfit my mom had given Tyson a few years ago, I called Susie and told her to put Addy's sailor dress on her, so here are the pictures we took after we had dinner at the flat. I thought their facial expressions were funny along with some looks that were similar. It was a nice day outside so a few of us sat out on the grass enjoying it.
Ben came home last night and it was a great reunion. I snapped a few shots of the handsome return missionary. It was great to see the excitement of the kids as they kept saying, "Uncle Ben, Uncle Ben!" and were caught up in the excitement of the adults but really they didn't know who or what the excitement was all about, 
but they were on that bench jumping up and down with great energy. I say that because even after Ben came into the building the kids were still over there shouting out towards the airplane, "Uncle Ben, Uncle Ben!" So the first picture is of the twins and Tyson. Heidi's shadow is in the background. Ben sure does look happy, but after seeing him come home from 
being released as a missionary it brought me back to memories of the feeling of some kind of displacement after officially being released and having to take of a missionary tag that identified you as a representative of Jesus Christ for 18 months/2 years. Its a challenging transition to go through. It was funny to see him old baby Addy and just love on her and say, "I haven't been 
able to hold a baby for two years." and then hug her some more. Good thing there were plenty of babies born while he was away so he could love on them when he returned. I snapped another picture of the twins, Tyson, and Sequoia. They were all so cute.
Surprising that I still know how to post one of these. I'm planning on recapping on a few months back, but I'll be doing that when I can find more time, but as for now I'm just going to pick up where I left off. My camera broke for a while so I was without it, which is kind of a bummer since we have missed quite a few months since Lincoln was born. I have some catching up to do on pictures with him, but I managed to snap a few from last night to this morning. We went out to the flat yesterday to help Adam with office stuff and then my mother-in-law, Phyllis, had asked me to program some of her children's phone numbers into her new house phone so she would have them at her fingertips. It is kind of funny that the phone only had 10 slots for numbers, we had to do some figuring as to which numbers Phyllis already knows and the ones she needed saved since she has 16 kids, she was well over the limit. Not too many people have to worry about that when buying a new phone:)
On the way out to the flat I was telling Tyson that he would not get to ride the backhoe with Adam unless he went potty in his potty (yes, it is that time). He replied, "No potty mom" and of course I returned the reply, "No potty then No backhoe!" Tyson responded, "I potty." I knew I would get my way when the backhoe was involved. Sure enough we took his potty out of the car and he went and then straight to the 
backhoe for his reward. Adam was good to go along with the reward. We had to get home for the kids to eat lunch and then Tyson and I walked Scierra, the neighbor girl to school. It's funny everytime we have taken Scierra, after we drop her off, Tyson will ask a few times the rest of the day, "Where's Scierra?" I best get back to getting housework done. Adam's brother, Ben comes home from his mission today, so another Stout boy will be available for any good young lady to sweep off his feet :) These pictures are of Tyson and Lincoln in the tub last night and then early this morning after Adam was about to head to work, he managed to have Lincoln and then Tyson wanting him, so I couldn't help but snap a picture of Adam being in great demand by his boys.
After spending the morning/afternoon out at the flat and doing business stuff, we came home to try and continue working on the potty training. To try and get Tyson's mind off of the tractor-backhoe movie I tried to have him help me figure out what we should do for Family Home Evening, as we are trying to do better at that, and I came up with the idea for us to all help make chocolate chip cookies for a lady in my ward whom I Visit Teach, and it is her birthday today. I just want to say real quick how much I love visiting teaching. Tyson likes coming with me to this one particular lady because she thinks he is such a joy and gives him these little cans of juices each time we come. We made her a card and Tyson left his own little markings as well. The bummer of it all was that she was gone, as probably expected, so we left them on the door. While out delivering the plate of cookies, we assisted Adam in passing out invitations for the Elder's Quorum end of summer social on Thursday. It was nice for Adam to be able to deliver his earlier in the week then last minute.
One of the funny things for Adam and I to see during FHE was when I asked Tyson what song he wanted to sing and of course it was , "The Daddy Song", and as I started it, Tyson just sang the rest of the song without Adam's or my help. I have seen it before, but it was a surprise to Adam. It was also funny that even though Adam is sitting right there, Tyson has to do the hand motions to himself as that is how we are usually singing the song, so I had to direct him to go over to Adam to climb on his knee (although Tyson just went over and patted Adam's knees), hug him tight, pat his cheek, and give a great big kiss. And the cute thing that he added on his own, was after giving Adam a great big kiss he came over to me and gave me one too. What a loving boy.
Here he is! Seconds after he came, do you see those hands!
Big Hands and Feet, after his cleaning!
Hello Daddy!
Tyson met his within the first half hour! Here are the Stout Boys!
This always seems to be a great weekend as family get together for easter egg hunts, picnics, bbqs and just spending time outdoors. As for a few happenings to recap the week I am now at my weekly appts. and found out last Monday that I am dialated 1 cm. The time is getting closer and I'm about as prepared for a new baby now as I was a month ago (which is basically not saying much). I've been very busy with the every day happenings in life. Monday I also put some time towards analyzing our wheat supply as the word was going around of a price increase this past week. It worked out great as we had already made our house payment and I could put some money towards getting a year supply in buckets for the three of us. I know I need to still prepare more for others around us as well. I was telling my mother-in-law that it has been a little discouraging because I have felt for a long time the need to have food storage and have really wanted to, however after all the bills are paid for and not even entertaining the personal wants or extras, I never seem to have enough to get even the smallest amount to start with. I feel that we are just getting to the point financially that we can set money aside for that purpose and I am very excited about that. Thursday, we watched the twins for Heidi and it was cute to watch them and Tyson standing at the window watching the neighbor girls. Whoever was standing in the middle of the threesome would put their arms around the two on either side of them and then they would all start jumping up and down. It was fun to watch them together. Saturday morning we headed over to Snow Canyon high school to watch Dwayne's b-ball game (he is a guy that Adam baptized on the mission). I videotaped it for Dwayne and gave it to him when him and some friends came over to Stuart's Sunday for Lizzy's b-day. After the game on Saturday we went over to Shelley's inlaws and had a bbq/easter egg hunt since it was really windy and miserable in Hurricane and on Smiths Mesa. We did a little easter egg hunt for Tyson after church on Sunday in our yard of dirt, mostly so I could get pictures since my camera ran out of space yesterday. It was a great Easter Sunday.
This past week was different as Tarek came last Sunday night and stayed until Thursday morning. It was fun to have him around and I've noticed that it does make us get out and do more than we normally would. I'm sure he gets tired of waiting around for us, but he practices patience. Last Sunday was Adam's mom's birthday, so we went out to the flat and ate a yummy dinner that her and Heidi had made. I also tried to make a cake mix with the variation that you sometimes find on the side of the box realizing that I actually had most everything except the sour cream, so I mixed and prepared the ingredients at our house then took my mini bosch mixer over there and used Phyllis' sour cream. Everybody seamed to like, so I may try that again sometime. We had an enjoyable evening visiting with everyone. Monday night I planned for us all to go over and pick pecans up off the ground from Adam's aunt Angelyn's trees. She wasn't going to get to them this year, so we thought it would work well for getting us out and doing something as well as gathering some food storage. Caleb and Tippy joined us as Stephanie was still sick. When she had made it over the following day and Tippy was pointing out our buckets of pecans, Stephanie asked, "What are you going to do with those?" I replied, "WE are all going to crack, shell, and then store them." She got a laugh out of that comment. I just have to get a nutcracker and then we will be on our way...I hope! Wednesday afternoon I talked Adam into changing his work plans a little, by taking Tarek, 
Tyson, and I with him to St. George to drop off a flatbed trailer for one of the suppliers to load with tile, then to go do an estimate, and then go with us to see my dad's cousin Byron (shown in picture) and his wife Barbara as they were visiting there son in the area. Their son, Mike, had been wanting Adam to take a look at his skylights and a few broken tile, so we had a short great visit and Adam was able to get those few work things done. We couldn't stay very long as we had to get back over to the supplier to pick up the trailer before they closed. On our way home Tarek was asking Adam what he thought about still going and riding four wheelers and by the time we arrived home the plans had changed from the boys going riding to all of us girls coming along, when 
Jaymie (Adam's partner Matt's wife) didn't want to spend another night home and Matt told her to meet up with the boys in the sandrail, to which she didn't want to go by herself and when the invitation came for me to come along I accepted as long as it wouldn't put me into labor. I'm not quite ready to have this boy a month early. So Susie came and it took some talking to get Stephanie to come and all the kids. We had fun with the exception of waiting a little too long for the boys to show up as they managed to get lost and none of us having had any dinner, but the sand dunes are always pretty and it was something Stephanie and Caleb hadn't seen yet. Friday, I put one thing on my list to absolutely get done and that was to clean inside and wash the outside of Adam's truck. It did take me from around 10 am (by the time Tyson woke up and ate breakfast) until 3:30 when I headed to the car wash. Of course I had interruptions throughout, but that's about all I accomplished. I did get over to Heidi's to help her put on a quilt to be tied and trace some squares for the jean quilt I am trying to make for Adam for camping. It's been a busy week and I would imagine it will only get busier as I'm aching to sort and clean areas that have gathered stuff and been neglected. Adam was a great help to take care of the laundry room yesterday morning and to move a few things out of the office as I tackled that area. I'll work my way around the house, so we'll see how it goes.
