Hunter Family Update

Alright...so here is how is goes for the Hunters. I am not a big time blogger. I love to read everyone else's blogs....they all look so great! I find that I have limited time..so for me..I like to post a couple pictures every few months just to update, for those who care, what we have been up to as a family. No fancy fun stuff here. Just pictures and words. So when I post it will be a review of the last few months or so. Here is what we have been up to since the first part of June 2008. Welcome one and all!

What My Kiddos Are Into...

So here are my kids' interests for this year.

Nathan: Age 8, 3rd Grade, Oak Meadow School, (private school...public schools in NM are a whole new post...legendary for dropouts, not meeting the NCLB standards and on and on..coming from Utah Nate was in a charter school and was several grades ahead when we got to the public school here!) Nathan is taking lessons and is preparing to start the Four Corners Competetive Swim Team....he is following in his dad's footsteps, including Bryce's size 13 flippers! We LOVE the olympics and watching Michael Phelps (Nate's hero), really has Nate pumped up during his swimming classes, as he races all his teammates. He also has a new found love of Golf, thanks to Wii Sports. We live right across the street from an excellent public golf course, Pinon Hills, and Nate and Dad go at least once a week. Next, Nate and Emma are both taking Suzuki cello this year! I am so excited because I love the cello and I'm excited because they are so, so excited. We were really lucky to get spots because, the violin classes here have a five year waiting list! It's quite the time commitment. They have private lessons once a week, and also group lessons once a week. They also have several performaces throughout the year with the violin class, and get to perform at various functions throughout the community. I love how Emma's cello looks like a violin on a stick! Nathan is also learning piano and he is learning recorder through school. He is also loving Cub Scouts!

Emma: Age 4, preschool, Casa Montessori. Emma is so excited for school, that actually starts tommorow! I have heard excellent things about her school, so I have high hopes for good things this year. She is also in swimming classes, although she will not be on the swim team for a little while. In addition to learning cello as above, she is taking classical Ballet and tap and is really a graceful little dancer!

Mom: Age...., okay, so I have decided to meet a long term goal for myself and I am going to school! My major is a BA in English Language and Literature. For those of you who know me, I love classic literature, such as Jane Austen, and bascially my degree includes reading the classics and then writing about them. Bryce thinks it sounds like the most boring thing in the world, but I think it's fantastic! I am really exciting about this for personal enrichment to my life!

Hotel Vacation Anyone??

Okay..so maybe some of you do this as well. We found out that our kids' favorite part of the vacation is the "Hotel". So we take a few mini vacations a year, and now that we live here, we drive about 2.5 hours and go to Albuquerque, and stay in a hotel. The kids love everything about it. The swimming, watching movies, breakfast in the morning, the ambiance of the hotel..everything. We went to the Embassy Suites and because of the olympics the kids each got a Panda Bear from Build a Bear, just to sweeten the deal. The other picture is of a huge hot air balloon inside a mall in Albuquerque. The hot air balloon fiesta is kind of their claim to fame. I thought it looked pretty cool so I snapped a picture. Also..for those who noticed, yes, Nathan is obesessed with his Glacier Park T-Shirt!!

Aztec Ruins

So it turns out that we live in a mecca of ancient native american ruins. We live within 1 to 2 hours of; Mesa Verde, Salmon Ruins, Chaco Canyon, and Aztec Ruins. Although we have not yet made it to the big one, Mesa Verde, yet; we did make it to Aztec. It was really awesome. It was where the ancient Pueblo Indians lived back in around the 11th century. Very cool and highly recommended! Our next trip is to go to Taos, New Mexico. The Pueblo there is over 1000 years old and amazingly still inhabited. Some of the people living there still live traditionally without water or electricity. You are able to tour it and see how they live first hand. Living here is pretty cool, because there is so much culture and history from both Native Americans and Spain, that sometimes it feels like another country!

The Bar "D" Wranglers

Next, we met up with some friends and went to the Bar D Wranglers in Durango. For those of you who have heard or seen the Bar J Wranglers out of Jackson, it's the same chain. We had some fun riding a train, playing cards, and having a "chuckwagon" supper along with some very fun and lively music and entertainment.

Nate's Broken Arm

Nathan did end up having pins placed. He actually had them taken out about a month ago and he is now back to normal function!

Accident Prone Nate

This past Monday, Nate was riding his bike down a small incline in our neighborhood. He decided to use his feet as brakes and he went down. Right away I could tell his arm was broken. We went to the ER and sure enough he broke it and broke it bad. He completely snapped the radius right off. In the ER they put him under and reset his bone and just put a splint on. We are going to see the Orthopedic Surgeon in the morning to find out just have bad it is and if we need pins or what. We had to wait clear until Monday because there is only 1 group of orthopedics surgeons here and we couldn't get in until then. Bryce and Dr. deKay, (Bryce now works in a practice with 5 MDs, and deKay is the owner), had access to the hospitals computer in their office, so they pulled up the x-rays, and luckily the growth plate was not damaged! That is a huge relief. But we will see tommorow if we are going to need surgery. There goes Nate's summer fun..I had to call and cancel the golf class he was in, swimming, and woodworking. At least we got a bunch of fun stuff in on the 4th!

Accident Prone Nathan

First..back in April he chipped his bottom tooth with his bike handles. We had a cap put on, but it just came off. The Ortho says there is nothing we can do until we get his top teeth straightened out because he has a cross bite. So we are looking at braces already in the next couple months!

Fishing

This is the way that Nate likes to fish.

Fishing

Emma loves fishing with her Barbie fishing poll, butterfly bait, and using her "sparkle box".

Nathan and the Ladies...

Nate thinking he is pretty cool. We tease Nate all the time because where ever we go...he always seems to get a little "girlfriend"....all his best friends in the neighborhood are girls. We love to tease him about this and make him blush!

Durango

I love this picture of Emma...Whenever she sleeps in the car, this is what she looks like. My mom would look the same way whenever we would travel and she would fall asleep.

We Love Durango

One of our favorite things about New Mexico is that we are only 45 mins to Durango, Colorado with mountains, hiking and tons of outdoor activities, we are in Durango at least 3 weekends out of the month....this is a picture of us on our way to Durango for July 4th to go to the cabin, do some fishing, horseback riding, hiking, and swimming and soaking in the thermal springs. We didn't take a picture of what Dad looks like while riding in the car.

The back of our house...we had scafolding on for about three weeks..

New Stucco...

This picture you can see the difference between old and new stucco....

New Stucco and New Landscaping

When we bought our house..I really did not like the Curb Appeal or the Stucco. When we had an inspection done, the stucco was falling right off the house...so we negotiated a deal where we would buy the house only if the seller would pay for a new stucco job. So..I got my new stucco color after all! This is a picture of it in the process, it just got done and we also have a new door...I will post that all later!!

Nathan Got Baptized in March

Emma riding "TOWA" in Santa Fe

Spring in Santa Fe

We went to an awesome resort and spa in Santa Fe in April for a little mini vacation. Santa Fe is such a fun place. The kids went to a kids camp and got to ride horses and do crafts, while Bryce and I went to the spa and did some horseback riding as well...

Returning to the Land of BLOGGGG

So I have decided I'm not much of a blogger..it's been MONTHS since I have done anything, and I have not taken that many pictures so here is a little what we have been up to....

Snow in the Sunny Southwest!

Looking out over our backyard!

Farmington is located in a high desert at about 5500ft in elevation. So it has seasons. All the locals told us that it NEVER snows here, and if it does, it will all be melted by the end of the day. On Super Bowl Sunday we had a huge storm in and drop about 4 inches of snow! Everyone told us that Farmington has not seen a storm like this in over ten years. We were excited to move here to escape all the snow we got in Logan. Did we bring it with us????

Our professional moving crew!

I have the best nephews in the whole world! My nephews Jeremy, Scott, and Tyler(starting with the 2nd to the left) drove all the way down from Salt Lake City (7 hours) to help us unload our moving truck. They also helped us load it in Utah. Also the guy on the far left is there cousin who lives here! Small world! He and some of his friends were also there helping us move in.

The kids explore the new house!

I decided to start a blog because I read Laura's (my cousin) Christmas card and after visiting everybodys blogs it seemed like a great idea since we just moved to New Mexico and it's a great way to keep in touch with everyone. I am new to blogging, (just like I am now just learning how to text message), so I am not sure what it all entails, but I'll give it a try!

We made it to New Mexico! What an adventure so far! My niece and her husband moved into our old house (now Trevor's house), and they needed to be there before we moved out! So we all lived in boxes together for a week. On January 11th we moved into our new house in Farmington and Annalece and Emma were here together for 1 week while Bryce and Nathan went back to Utah to train the new doctor who bought our business. Next, Annalece and Emma had some major Bryce and Nathan withdrawls and came back up to Utah the next week to be together as a family while we finished closing everything up in Utah. Last weekend, (January 26th), we all moved down together for good and we are all settled in. Bryce has been working his new office for one week and it is all going incredible! We are so excited to be here and feel very thankful for this opportunity and adventure. We are loving New Mexico! The town is so laid back and all the people are very friendly. Nathan has already started school and it is right down the road from our house. Amazingly his teacher is Colten Dye's (Tyler's friend) wife Shay's friend, (hopefully you got all that). She is from Utah and just graduated from SUU!