Terrible Twos!!!

Apparently Daniel had two birthday parties! The first one I was NOT invited to! I guess I should take that as some sort of hint but who knows. Sure looks like fun though! Grandpa and Grandma Mather and some of his cousins came over the weekend before his birthday and they had a great time.

Here is Daniel having our families traditional breakfast meal. A pancake with strawberries and whipped cream.
Here is Daniel being the center of attention and loving it. Either that or he is just thinking of the things he could do with fire!!!
Daniel had a great time blowing out the candles, but his sister thought he might need some help and nearly shoved his face in to the cake. That did not go over well!


LOCK UP YOUR DAUGHTERS because with that smile and those eyes things are going to get interesting around here!

Taking Flight

We officially have pets!


Kendly with her parakeet SKY.
Sydney with her parakeet SPARKLES
Daniel loving them both

Let it snow!

After 11 years of marriage my wife finally got to experience a white Christmas. I always bragged about all the snow that we had growing up and every year we went to Pinetop there was nothing. So NOW she finally believes me! Here is my family at Sky Hi Retreat doing some sledding. Only problem is Machelle is about 6 months pregnant with our second son so she did more watching than riding.

What a beautiful bunch of kids!

Kendly could not wait to get in to the snow. She busted out the sled in the front yard to get some practice in.

Sydney was fearless after the first wipe out!!! Here she is taking on the biggest jump on the mountain and landing it! Yea Jen pushed her!!!



Daniel had a ton of fun in the snow. As paranoid parents we had him in a snow suit that would make Ralphie (A Christmas Story Reference!) proud. He would fall over and could not get himself up. I had a ton of laughs just watching him.


While trying to get action shots I was laying under a jump. Here is Russell (well his legs at least) taking the jump and believe me it did not end well. Notice the separation of his body and the sled!!! I am still amazed that there were no broken bones after some of the dumb stuff we did!

Dancin' Daniel

My boy loves to dance. Anytime he hears music he comes running. His latest thing is to make this funny face and dance around. I got it on my phone so the quality is not great but it is pretty funny.

Anatomy of a Family Picture

Well Machelle under took the job of getting our kids to pose for our annual Christmas card. It was a lot easier before Daniel arrived. As much fun as he is, getting him to sit still for 2 seconds is not easy. Here is a few of the attempts that did not make the card and the one that did.





FINALLY one we can use! Not all smiling but all looking in the right direction. Machelle probably took about 25 pictures and in about 23 of them Daniel was doing something crazy!

BIG 9 YEAR OLD

WOW if she is 9 how old does that make me!!! Kake just turned the big 9 and we had a good time for her birthday.


The kids got her some sand art and a few calvin and hobbes comic books because they are her favorite.
Kendly is learning to play the piano and doing quite fantastically. So Grandma and Grandpa Mather got her the High School Musical sheet music to practice. Now she can learn her favorite songs on the piano and drive her father crazy with the teeny bopper music.
Kendly had a great birthday with her pink cake. Machelle put trick candles that kept re-lighting and boy did they burn. We could not put them out. We all went light headed and almost set off the smoke alarm trying to put these things out.

Alright the funnest thing that happened was Machelle and I told Kendly that I was going to take her to the mall and get her a mp3 player. Machelle and I had discussed letting Kendly get her ears pierced and we decided that her 9th birthday was the day. I took her to the mall and we were walking through JC Penny's and I asked her what she wanted. Right at that moment we were passing an ear ring display and she said " I would love ear rings, but I would have to pierce my ears." So I said " Do you really want to?" That took her back a bit and about 10 seconds later she said "Are you serious?" To which I replied "Yup if you want to." She squeezed my hand and said "CALL MOM!" I said "No I am the DAD and I said you can do it!"
Her legs got weak and she got butterflies in her tummy. She begged me to call Machelle for the next 10 minutes while we walked through the mall. We walked in to Claires and talked to the ladies there. We picked her birthstone which is a blue topaz and loaded the ear ring guns.
Now if you know Kendly she is about the purest kid and also does not handle pain all that good. So when she was in the chair she was starting to panic and I thought she was afraid of the pain and I was telling her to be brave, and she leaned in and said in a low voice "Dad can you call mom please, she said that I could not do this till I was 12." I took her hand and said "Honey your mom and I have already discussed this so she knows. Her face beamed and she said "LETS DO THIS!" She was so brave and did not even wince a bit when they pierced her ears, but her eyes did go pretty wide!

FOOTBALL!!( or the bane of my wife's existence)

My name is Dan and I am a football addict. Don't try to help I am to far gone!

My wife puts up a sign every year that says " We interrupt this marriage to bring you football season!" and that basically gives you the picture of who I am. I have been coaching for about 7 years. I am currently coaching at Desert Ridge High School. Jeremy Hathcock was hired there last year and asked me to come coach with him. We just lost the game for the region title, but we did make the playoffs as the eight seed and are looking forward to trying to make a title run. If anyone wants to follow our team log on to JAGPRIDE.COM

Jeremy and me after half at MaryvaleGetting the Jag's pumped for the game!Kendly doing a Jag Cheer! She is quite the cheerleader and really impressed some of the older girls that were teaching her.Sydney was real excited to do her first cheer camp. She looked so cute out there and showed a lot of Jag pride!Yep already working on the arm strength! Hey a guy has to have a retirement plan. Daniel loves to come on the field after games and throw the ball around with dad. With watching so much game film Daniel can't help but see a lot of football. Every time he sees football on the T.V. he screams "Football dad football YEAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!