The Hoyt Family

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Giveaway Contest

We all love giveaway contests.. Check out my friend Shauna's blog here to enter her contest for a really sweet prize!! Plus she is the sweetest person and her blog is a very good read..

Monday, July 13, 2009

Oh my gosh I am such a lucky girl.. I just won my friend Jodi's Pamper Me Give Away Contest!! Yeah I am so excited!! Oh ya Oh ya uh hu uh hu!!! Woo hooo Yipeeeeeeee.. I so needed this...I cant believe I won. There were so many entries for this.. this is the 2nd time i have won a contest of hers.. I must be living right!! Thank you to all those who went in and voted and said I sent ya... Muah!! We are still waiting to hear if she won her sego lily day spa contest.. She won popular votes so she is just waiting to see if she won over the management teams votes.. Good Luck Jodi!!!

It's been a crazy couple of weeks.. We had Steve's mom and dad and brother and wife and their 5 kids come visit us for the 4th of July.. It was great to see them.. It had been 2-3 years since we saw his brother and his family.. We hadn't even seen their 2 youngest so it was really good to see them again.. We took the kids to a near by lake to go fishing and they had the time of their lives.. As soon as they would cast out they would start getting bites.. That is the best fishing for kids.. They dont get too bored that way!! We did some BBQing in the afternoon and since we are still pretty new we didnt know where all the firework shows were so we just got a few and did our own show.. The pickings were very slim out here. They only had a few to choose from so it wasnt all that exciting, but I think the kids still had fun just playing with their cousins..

Jessie and logan started swimming lessons last week and have been having a blast doing that and this week Jessie and Austin will start summer school.. They are not to happy about that but I think it will be beneficial for the both of them.. Jessie is back in horse lessons and loving every minute of it.. She is such our little cowgirl.. Her very first lesson she got to do some jumping which she never has done before and that just put her on cloud 9.. She has been riding Western for the past year and now has taken an intrest in english style so we will see how it works out..

Steve is still very busy with work as always and I am trying to make some major decisions right now on top of being a mom still and running kids everywhere.. I have once again been pondering on the idea of becoming a Firefighter/EMT.. I really only want the EMT part of it but out here it is all 1 job.. Where my kids will be in school full time starting this fall I will have more time so I have been seriously considering going back to work part time.. I have my medical assistant degree but wanted to expand a little.. I have thought about going back to school and getting my RN but am not to thrilled on the going back to school part and the waiting list to be accepted.. Plus the money it would cost.. With doing the firefighter position they pay for your training so I am really trying to decide if this is something I could handle.. I am very strong so I dont think I would have any issues there but I dont have great knee's so I worry about the work causing problems in that area.. I have already had surgery twice on 1 knee and am still having problems with them... I dont mind seeing blood and guts I have always been into watching the er shows and medical stuff on tv so I dont think that would bother me either but I do worry about some of the scenes I may see on some of the calls I would go on.. Having to see a child who has been run over or who has died in some way may hit a little too close to home and I worry what effect it might have on me.. I heard that it is a very rough and stressful job. I definently dont need any more stress in my life so I am really torn on what to do.. Does anyone have any opinions advice or experience that would like to share?

Also I have started up regulary running again (no wonder I am having knee problems) and have been seriously contemplating on running a half marathon in Sept.. I only ran a 5k last year and have had many problems since then with running and injurys.. I just love running and my goal is to run a marathon someday.. My knees and shin splints in my leg have really been a problem and ends up taking me out of the game alot, plus I am so chicken when it comes to new experiences I'v never done before. I have no clue where the city the race is in. I'm not familiar with the area or how to even go about doing it and wish I had someone who has done this before that could kinda show me the ropes.. I dont even really know how to prepare.. But I have read some running books and have done a little research and just started today on a training schedule to help prepare so now all I have to do is make up my mind on whether to do it or not and hope that my body will cooperate with me..

Decisions Decisions..

So anyways that is what we have been up to lately..

Monday, June 29, 2009

A New Neighbor

Over the past few weeks we have heard this growling and hissing out our window late at night. We figured we knew what it was but last night we got confirmation.. Steve spooked our new neighbor up into a tree so we were able to get a good picture of him..

We had a pretty good weekend..Friday morning as I was getting breakfast going and noticed a ton of cars lining the street I live on. I couldnt see what was going on until I saw the sign in front of our neigbors house.. I guess once a year out here they have 1 day where the whole subdivision does garage sales.. They put it in the paper and and put signs out.. I hadnt heard anything about it.. I decided to run home and see what I could hurry and throw together for a sale.. By the time I got set up it was already noon.. The sale goes from 9-4 on friday and saturday.. I think we missed out on the rush of the crowd but still did ok.. My kids wanted to sale lemonade so I let them put a table up and manage the lemonade table.. Because of missing most of the crowd we really didnt make much on friday and of course I didnt get anything done that I wanted to but we still had a pretty good time..

Sat I got up early to get my run in before the sale started and I had a really great run.. For more on that you can go here to read about it..

Austin had his last championship playoff game for baseball Saturday morning as well. Unfortunatly they lost and they were done for the season, but he was in good spirits and had a great time playing.. They were having a huge baseball picnic and games for all the teams on Sunday and we were worried that he would be really upset not being able to be a part of it with his team because of it being on sunday. To our surprise he really wasn't to dissapointed.. We are very proud of him for understanding the reason why we dont participate in those kind of activitys on sunday..

It was just before 9 and we had people showing up already.. We had found a few more items to put out for the sale which was good.. I had made a deal with the kids that whatever money we made from the sale we would take them to the carnival/fair they had going on. They were pretty excited about that.. We took them out to the carnival and then out to eat we had a wonderful family night.. Allie had one of her new friends from school come with us and then spend the night and came with us to church.. Our allie is such a great little missionary. She is always wanting to bring someone with her to church activitys and meetings on sunday.. She is a great example to the rest of us..

That was our fun weekend and look forward to this coming weekend.. Steve's Mom and Dad and brother and his wife and kids will be coming to visit for the July 4th weekend. We havn't seen them for a very long time so it will be a nice visit.. Of course I am not looking forward to cleaning my house up all week.. LOL

By the way I hope its not too late, but my friend Jodi (check out her blog it is awesome)who is such a wonderful lady has been entered into a contest for a years worth of pampering from sego lily day spa.. She could really use all your vote's so go here to help her out.. She is very deserving of this... Once you have voted go to her blog under the pamper me give away contest and let her know I sent you to vote. This gives me another chance at winning her contest. Then just follow the directions on there and you will be entered to win...

Thanks everyone..

Thursday, June 25, 2009

More Summer Catch Up.

This first part was supposed to be at the end of my post but I added the pictures in last and didn't want to move them and screw up the size and not be able to click on them so pardon my screwed up backward posting...
First A Small tribute to my dad's for father's day.. I'm a little late but thats ok.. My dad passed away 6 years ago in July.. Oh how I miss him.. He was a farmer in utah.. Farming was his passion. He loved being outdoors, up in the mountains hunting and camping.. He loved animals.. He had lots of goats, pigs, deer, dogs and horses at his farm.. The kids loved to visit and pet all the animals.. He also had many orchards of cherries, peaches, and apples. Him and my step mom ran a fruit stand in Perry and worked very hard.. He also built a housing development with my grandma in Perry called Hill Haven subdivision. He worked very hard all his life.. My dad is my hero.. I looked up to him alot.. I wish I could have been around him more.. We didn't get to see him much growing up but the times we did were so precious to me.. I always had the best times camping with him.. He had me riding a 3 wheeler by the time I was 5. And he didn't even kill me when I backed the 4 wheeler up right through someones camping trailer and put a huge hole in it, or when I would be miles away and run out of gas and he would have to come get me.. He taught me how to water ski.. He had me skiing with him when I was about 4 or 5 as well.. He would have me stand up on his feet and wrap 1 arm around me and off we would go, and he would tell me when to plug my nose when we were going to go down in the water..I think I got my thrill seeking from him.. We were always doing dangerous, fun, exhilarating things..
Unfortunately he died way to soon. I would give anything to see him again and talk with him. There is so much I wish I could have said before he died.. The thing that gets me through is knowing that we will be reunited again. Happy Father's Day Dad I love you you will always be my Hero.....

And to my other best dad in the world.. He got me when I just turned 1o. He got the raw end of the deal I think.. He had to raise me through the toughest part of my life.. Being a teenager and a girl when he only had boys was probably a nightmare.. He was a police officer in Utah for 30 years before he retired.. He is also a Viet Nam Vet.. Now imagine how fun that was for me growing up Not!!! we didn't have the best of relationship growing up.. I had to get pretty sneaky when it came to sluffing school because at the time I was in High school he was the juvenile cop so he was always there.. And I would get so embarrassed when the kids would come up to me and say oh man your dad just busted me.. I would literally turn my head and pretend I didn't notice him when I saw him.. What a daughter hu? And of course he did background checks on all my boyfriends, always found me when I wasn't where I was supposed to be, made me do the jobs over again if I didn't do them right the first time, taught me to turn the water off when I was brushing my teeth so I didn't waste, and turn the lights off when I left the room. No talking on the phone past 9:00 pm, taught me how to mow the lawn, shoot a gun, parallel park, and much more. He was always there at my colorguard performances and parades cheering me on and helped make me the person I am today.. I hate to think how my life might have turned out without him. He brought us back into the church and I will always be grateful for that.. He's a little OCD, he stays up at night worrying about everything and tries to solve the worlds problems, but he's the best grandpa and dad anyone could ask for and I am grateful that I have him and I didn't kill him off through those teenage years.. Happy Father's Day Dad.. Love you!!

Now on to whats been going on in my neck of the woods lately!!

I have gotten a bit behind on my postings.. We have been running non stop since school got out with different things going on and projects we want to accomplish.. And here I though summer was for fun and relaxation??

We attempted some clean up around our yard to beautify it.. I doesn't look like much from the Pict's. but if you saw the before Pict's you would definitely see the difference.. We cut back alot of trees and foliage around the back yard so you could view the walkway to the pond better and just took back the edge of the greenery.. We are only renting right now so we cant do to much to it.. If we owned this I would go to town and take out all the smaller trees and foilage right down to the water so it looked really cleaned up but still had the big trees for the shade and some of the natural preserve running along the pond..

This whole stoned path was really covered in foilage and tree branches ect. so we really cut back this area quite a bit..

Picture of the pond in our back yard.. It's only about 3 feet deep and full of moss, Lilly pads and tons of turtles, frogs and snakes eeewwwwww!! My kids have a blast down here catching the frogs.. When I was down here on the waters edge with my legs straddled one in the water and the other on land trying to cut down some of the foilage a big water snake slithered right between my legs.. I froze with fear.. I just hate snakes.. I always have been since I was a little girl, and was chased by a rattlesnake when I was fishing with my brother.. He had to pick me up and run with me on his back. It was a real frightening experience..

We don't really have any flat area up in our yard to plant a garden so we decided to try and till up some ground by the pond and make a garden there.. The ground was pretty hard so we brought in some top soil and tilled it in and gave it a try.. Our only problem is we have lots of wildlife out here so we had to fence it in hoping it would keep the animals out plus we have to carry buckets of water down everyday to water it because we have no way of getting a hose down this far so its kind of a pain but if it goes well and we can harvest some food from it it will be worth it.. It's not much but it's at least something.. Before we could get it planted and fenced we had a bunch of turtles rejoicing for the nice tilled up dirt and they came and dug holes and laid tons of baby turtle eggs all over in our garden.. Unfortunately I think a raccoon or chipmunk or some kind of animal found them out and ate them for the next day we found lots of broken apart egg shells, however they didn't get them all so we covered up what eggs were left and planted around them and then fenced them in so I guess we are harvesting baby turtles as well.. We didn't have a garden in NJ so I am really missing my home grown veggies.. So far we have only lost a couple plants so we will see.. We were really late getting it in so I hope it produces before winter hits..

We took Logan to get a new haircut.. He4r hair was getting pretty long. It had been a year since we cut it so she was in need.. I think it turned out really cute..

We also used up some wood pieces we had left over from our move and made some garden boxes out of them and put them up on our driveway.. I think they turned out pretty good for being free... And the plants are really doing well so far..

And on the 23rd my baby turned 5. Can you believe it!!! My how the time has flown by.. It's hard to see the last one growing up.. I just wanted to keep her little forever but she just seems to change everyday... She is the only one of my kids who got my blue eyes and blond hair.. She really looks like my side of the family.. My dad died right before I got pregnant with her but I know she knew him and spent time with him before she came.. She is so much like him in so many ways.. I see alot of him in her...

For a year now since her last birthday she has wanted these Diamond Castle Barbies.. I have not been able to find them in stores so I had to look on ebay which of course because they are now discontinued they cost an arm and a leg.. But at least we found them and got them so she was excited as ever..