These are pictures from the house that we stayed at while we were in Palmer and the views were amazing. Silly me I didn't get an actual picture of the house, but we stayed at a facility called ACT ministries with Craig and Crystal and another family that were there for the wedding as well. The kids had a great time playing together and it was nice for the adults to have some relaxation and fellowship.


Aaron and Jenna were married at 3pm on August 23, 2008. It was a beautiful cerimony and we were glad to be able to attend. This young couple will be joining our short term staff on camp when they return from their honeymoon, and we look forward to having them. Chad and I enjoyed seeing old friends, this time around Chad was the photographer because I had to stay in the back with Heidi, who did not feel the need to sit still or be quiet. The funny thing was that there were about 10 of us in the back by the end of the wedding trying to keep our little ones under wraps!!

After the we went back to where we were staying and enjoyed a peaceful night with just our family, as the other families left after the wedding to go home, and after we had the kids in bed Chad and I watched the Olympics and spent some alone time together. At about 9:45pm we here a banging noise and I went to the window and there down in the valley was the fireworks display being put on by the fair! We could see everything but the smallest ground fireworks. It was fun to watch and I enjoyed the whole show, which lasted for about 30 minutes or so. On Sunday we cleaned up the house and then drove home so Chad could be rested for work the next day. We had a great time and were thankful that we could take a break from our everyday routine. We even saw a beluga whale on the way home, but of course there was no where to pull off and take any pictures, and it doesn't work taking pictures at 70 miles an hour so again I have yet to get a picture of the whales :).

Our Day of Fun

On Friday, the girls and I drove to Palmer, AK for a wedding that was to be on Saturday. We left Soldotna at about 11 am because while we were up there we planned on going to the Alaska State Fair. I thought that since we took so many bathroom stops along our drive that I would take some pictures of the drive from Soldotna to Anchorage. The first pictures are of Swan Lake where you turn from the Sterling Hwy. to the Seward Hwy. to head to Anchorage. In the fall there are usually several swans that visit until the weather is too cold!

These next two pictures are taken at bird point, on the turnagain arm about 30 miles away from Anchorage, looking across the ocean to the mountains on the Kenai Peninsula.

When we arrived in Palmer, we met up with Chad, who had come a day earlier for the bachelor party, and we headed to the fair! We also took our friends James and Jim, who were up for the wedding, and they turned out to be great for keeping our children entertained. Emma and Madison rode on their shoulders for a good deal of the time that we were there which made it easy to keep an eye on them while we walked around amongst all the people that were there. We went through the animal exhibits and went on a couple of carnival rides, and I did it with them!! I must say I have not been on a carnival ride in over 10 years! While we were doing the rides James was busy playing a catch the rubber ducky game and won this beautiful little penguin! Isn't it cute :) The kids...and the bigger kids all had fun and were ready to go back for another day of fun, but as you know it gets a little expensive!!

So here are all the rooms that I painted in a two week time period. Just thought you would like to see how it turned out. The walls used to be painted an off white color that any dirt that dared touch it showed up on it and was very difficult to clean as well....so I went with darker colors.


This is our living room and we did this in bamboo.


This is the color of the bathroom finished...it is rustic red

Our kitchen/dining room we painted Manhattan Red

In the laundry room we painted it first a bright yellow which was awful....so I went back to the drawing board and finally picked out this light avacado green.

I had a great time painting and seeing everything done. I had help with the living room, but I did the rest myself!! Chad thinks that the bathroom is too dark now but I rather like the color in there. I am really happy with how the red looks...and because there was not really a lot of wall space to be painted in that color it did not make it too overwhelming. If I had done that in the living room or something it would have been too overdone!! The bamboo color turned out great too and it makes the room warm and cozy!

My next project is the master bedroom and bathroom, but I am still having a difficult time picking out my color scheme for in there. I had thought a deep brown and something else like light green or blue but not sure yet.

My kids have been begging me for days to go swimming, and finally it was a nice enough afternoon to go so we invited our next door neighbors, Katie, Jordan, Zechari, Alison, and Dani along with their mom Crystal to go with us! They all played for about an hour and it was nice to sit and enjoy the sun. Dani (17 months) and Heidi (16 months) were a little afraid of the water and needed a lot of coaxing to get in and play, but after 30 minutes they sat down and played in the mud! Hopefully we have a few more days of nice warm sun so the kids can do this again.

My precious little girls.....who are not so little anymore.

We all went to Homer, AK for a little bit of relaxation and some fun at the beach! Emma and Madison had a great time running into the waves, and Heidi kept running away!

Today I woke as my children did at 7am and I gave them all baths and then we put our pj's away, made our beds, and got ready for the day. As I went downstairs there was an aroma of cooking bacon and eggs, which was quite surprising since Chad had left at 6:20am to go drive the vans for hockey camp until 6:15pm tonight, and there is nobody else here that would have been cooking! There he was though, on a 30 minute break fixing us all breakfast! It was such a blessing to me becuase during pregnancy the thought of having to fix food becomes a very hard task to accomplish. Most often I don't feel like eating anything, and so trying to come up with something to fix for that day is a chore. What a wonderful treat it was to have him home cooking for us.

Cleaning House!

I have decided that it was time to get the painting done in the downstairs of our house. I had help painting the living room but I did the kitchen, laundry room, and bathroom. I love how paint can really change a room, especially when they started out off white and showed all the dirt! All of that entailed moving furniture and appliances etc. and cleaning underneath all of it....yuck! I even cleaned my carpet and it is almost white again!!!! Now we are rearranging the girls, so they are all sleeping in one bedroom together, and the other room that Emma and Madison were in will be the play room. Our fourth bedroom will be used for guests and the new baby. So far Heidi has adjusted really well to having two other people sleep with her in her bedroom, which I am glad for. Our next transition will be for her to move into a regular bed and the baby will get the crib. Should be very interesting!!!!

I did an exterra race :) !!!

I am very excited that I did my first exterra race. Yes, it was just the swimming portion which was a 1/2 a mile but I had such a great time and am ready to get started training for next year....kind of. I will definately improve my swim time for next year that I am sure of. This year I did the 1/2 mile in 20 minutes, about twice as long as the fastest swimmer. I can still swim while I am pregnant and plan to go 2-3 times a week to keep in shape during the next 4 months. After the baby is born in January I will be working with the same trainer in her fit for life training program and then the trialthlon training group starts in April. I am still going to try and do a couple of fun runs/walks while I can and hopefully the weather will be a little nicer to go on more walks with the kids outside. My new favorite motto is "all you can do is tri" which comes from all the triathloners out there.

pals forever!

pals forever!
Originally uploaded by snyderalaska

Tri training!

Well...I only have a week and a half before I finish with my triathlon training, and then the xterra tri called the Hammerman is upon us. I am on a team (who knew you could be on a team for triathlons?:) ) and am doing the swimming portion of it. The swim is 1/2 a mile, the bike is 14 miles and the run is 4.1 miles. I have decided that extreme mountain biking is not for me! There is sooooo much knowledge involved in when and how to shift gears for certain hills and riding conditions and then just being able to power through the last part of a hill was all to much for me....especially this year. I am currently one week shy of being 5 months pregnant! So all of the tri training has been a big big stretch for me. I am really excited to do it again next year so that I can really train without the worries of pregnancy too:). We also found out on Monday that it is 90% sure a boy! We are very excited and so are the girls because they really wanted this one to be a boy. Our due date is around the 19th of November, which I can hardly believe is only 4 short months away. How our time does pass so quickly!

Swimming!

Emma and Madison just finished swimming lessons today and it was amazing how quickly they picked up swimming. Emma started out not being able to even kick very well and ended with the ability to swim for an extended period of time all by herself!! Madison was very good as well and can almost swim by herself. With a few more times in the pool I think that they both will be great swimmers!! Today as an end of lessons treat, they all got to jump off the diving board and Emma and Madison were of the few that just got up there and jumped!! They both had so much fun and learned a lot, and I really enjoyed seeing them swim.

My garden is looking great so far this summer. It has been relatively cold so far so I am hoping that as summer continues that the weather is a little warmer for good produce #'s. I think that I am getting the hang of greenhouse growing but only time will tell. I have been ventilating better and I didn't plant any peppers in there so hopefully the aphids will stay away!

Home again!

We have made it home and we are so happy to be home! Heidi did a lot of dancing the night we got home she was so happy. It made her a happier kid instantly, she definatly was not ready for that much change and that many new people in her life. Emma and Madison were ready to see and play with their friends. The snow greeted us again as we landed in Anchorage and then the long three hour drive home. Since then it has been in the 40's and the snow seems to be melting now. Camp is really soggy though, so there is lots and lots of mud for the kids to find!!! I am getting my plant stand set up so I can get my seeds planted before it gets too late. I hope that we have a warm summer this year. I would really like to have a great producing garden this time around. I also started my tri-athalon traing yesterday and so far so good. I still have 12 weeks to go, but I am looking forward to to it. The coaches are great and really push you to the max. At the end of this training we will be doing 2 different tri-athalon races so it is really exciting. I was going to do another tri. race but it was full the very first day sign-ups were open, so now I am # 298 on the waiting list and my chances of getting in are slim to none. Better luck next year I guess:)

April Fools!!

It is the start of spring and so far all I have seen in states that normally have spring at this time is snow, sleet, wind, and rain. In Alaska however it is warm and sunny!!! IT is always like this when we go on vacation. In March we were privilaged to see the marriage of Chad's sister Hollie and our new brother-in-law Sean Ford. We then promplty came down with the flu and did nothing for the next 4 days. We were able to see the sights and some friends before we made the long journey back to Montana and into more rain and snow!! Tomorrow is Heidi's first birthday and so we will get a small cupcake for her to destroy and maybe eat! Chad heads back to the reality of work on Friday the 4th of April and the girls and I will travel back the 15th of April. We have been so thankful to see old friends and even meet new ones.

January is over already?!

January started the begining of my life training with my trainer Angie and it has been eye opening, and amazing. I am so grateful for the opportunity to do this because it was exactly what I needed. I am now working out 5-6 times a week and I am getting full body workouts that really tax me. I have already lost 5 pounds and now as I get my eating to where it needs to be I think that it will come off even faster. Chad is also starting to write his food down in a food diary and working out more consistently.
We are battling the cold weather right now as our temperatures are 15 below zero for a high. As the week goes by it is supposed to get back to above zero, so we can get outside again. Chad has been working on getting the shop cleaned, hanging up metal sheets on the wall, and replacing some old work benches with metal ones. I am spending a lot of time working on my food diary getting all the food facts written down, and trying to get into a better routine for the girls. We are still doing school with Emma, and starting to teach Madison how to write and say the sounds of the alphabet. Heidi is standing by herself and can walk but doesn't want to unless someone is close by to hold on to. She is our destructive child!! She loves to tear everything she can apart, and her favorite thing to do is growl at us. She is a little ball of energy.