Hooper Family

Dance Recital

2010-08-30T17:14:00.000-07:00

G participated in her first dance recital on Saturday. She had so much fun performing and I was shocked that she did not have any stage fright.

Birthday Photos

2009-12-01T19:28:00.000-08:00

The cuties posing together.

Our Little Preschool Graduate

2009-06-16T18:45:00.000-07:00

D graduated from preschool in May and is on his way to Kindergarten. He is all signed up and excited for school to start. Here are a few pictures from his graduation ceremony.
D's teacher was the woman in the middle, Mrs. King, on either side of her were her assistants from the morning and afternoon session. D attended the afternoon session in the winter and the morning session in the summer so he got to know both of the assistants but I was only able to catch Mrs. King and Mrs Cohen for a picture.

After the ceremony there were treats and I tried to get a picture of Matt and the kids but D decided that he was done and would not open his eyes. Oh well.....it is still a cute picture.

Family Vacation

2009-06-01T17:55:00.001-07:00

We just got back from a family vacation to visit M's family up in the Redding area. We stayed with M's Aunt and Uncle and every morning when we went to leave, the kids had to pick a little Pansy for mom.

M has definitely trained the kids well, they love to get flowers for mom. Our first outing on Tuesday was to take the kids to Turtle Bay which is an exploration type museum for the kids. We visited the bird enclosure and were able to feed them using some bird seed glued to a stick. Here are a few pictures with the birds. G was afraid to actually hold the stick but she loved to see the birds.

The next stop at Turtle Bay was the Butterfly enclosure. They have many types of butterflies in the enclosure but here are a few pictures.

After the butterflies, we headed over to check out the Tryanosaurus named Sue exhibit. Outside the exhibit was this cute dinosaur that I just had to have a picture of the family with.

I just loved that it's chosen mode of transportation was a green moped. Here is Sue and other photos from the exhibit.

Right next door was an Lego art exhibit. I think M and I enjoyed it more than the kids because they have not played with too many Legos yet.

They too had to have their own dinosaur.

We then walked down to the childrens garden where we found an adorable little house for the kids to play in and around.

Wednesday, we took Grandma with us to visit Burney Falls.

Here is a picture of the family in front of Burney Falls.

D was being a pill and did not want his picture taken so all we have is the back of his head. After the falls came the part of the trip that freaked me out a little. We went to a 1/4 mile long lava tube named the subway cave. I guess I really don't like the dark. At least not that dark.

After freaking mom out, we stopped at Hat Creek to let M do a little fishing. The kids found a patch of grass in the creek that they decided should not be there so they "cleaned" the stream.

They then proceded to "clean" the shore by throwing as many of the rocks as they could into the stream. After a little while, a thunderstorm came up and dropped a little rain on us.
Thursday, we decided to take M's sister on another hike to a waterfall. This one has a name that I am sure I will misspell but here is my best guess, Mossbrau falls.

This picture does not do them justice but we got there at the wrong time of day and it was hard to get a picture that was not affected by the sun. To get the falls, we had to hike 1 1/4 miles along the railroad tracks.

We saw 4 trains during our trip. This one scared me because D was down and we were all walking along the tracks when I looked up and saw a train coming our way. I had G on my shoulders and grabbed D by the arm and basically flung him off the tracks. My heart was pounding. The train then proceeded to stop before it reached us but of course by then, the panic had already done its damage.

Once we reached the falls, we did have a fun time taking off our shoes and soaking our feet in the freezing cold water.

That was the last of our fun outings but I just wanted to include this picture of M's dad and his grandchildren because it is so sweet.

Our next vacation is already planned, we will head off to Utah to visit the North rim of the Grand Canyon and my mom. Stay tuned.

Pay It Forward

2009-03-18T08:15:00.000-07:00

I have been seeing this going around on a few of my friends blogs and it looks like fun so I have also decided to get in on this.

Pay It Forward
Pay it forward SO--Here's how it works-the first 5 people to leave a comment on this post will receive, at some point during the year, a handmade gift from me. What it will be and when it will arrive is a total surprise! The catch is that you must participate as well. Before you leave your comment here, write up a pay it forward post on your blog to keep the fun going. Then come back, let me know you're going to play, and sit back and anticipate the arrival of your gift! Remember that only the first 5 comments will receive a gift from me, so be quick!

New pajamas from Grandma

2009-03-08T16:35:00.000-07:00

Grandma Nancy sent David and Gabrielle some new pajamas which were too cute.

Family Photos

2009-03-07T20:04:00.001-08:00

We had new family pictures taken tonight. Here they are...

FINALLY!!!!

2009-02-21T15:58:00.000-08:00

After weeks of going up and down I finally made it. I have now lost a total of 101.4 lbs!!!

Miscellaneous Stuff

2009-01-15T12:09:00.000-08:00

I got behind in posting event pictures of the kids last year so I thought I would do some catching up. First, here are a few pictures of the kids during Halloween. David looks just thrilled to be in his costume...and of course, Gabrielle looks adorable as usual. (Mom's just a little biased)

David received a toy guitar for his birthday and I just thought these pictures of David and Gabrielle rocking out were too cute. David sure can move those little hips.

Finally, we have some from Christmas time. The night we put up the Christmas tree, David decided that he was going to sleep under it so he made himself a bed and was all set.

The kids also had tons of fun getting their hands dirty decorating cookies for Santa.

Weight Watchers

2009-01-03T13:31:00.000-08:00

Just weighed in this morning and it seems that this cold and ear infection I have been suffering with did me some good. I lost 2 pounds which brings me to a grand total of 97 pounds. I am hoping to get to that 100 pound mark in the next few weeks.

Kerry took a picture of my family and I on Christmas eve that I actually like of myself. I guess this is all worth it. Here is the picture Kerry took.

Weight Watchers

2008-12-28T08:51:00.000-08:00

Well...I managed a 0.4 lb weight loss over the week of Christmas which has brought me to 95 lbs exactly. :-)

David's 4th Birthday Pictures

2008-11-28T13:00:00.000-08:00

We had David's pictures taken for his 4th Birthday on Wednesday evening. Here are the pictures of my handsome boy...

I think my favorites are the ones with David laying down but he does look rather handsome in that suit. He is really funny because he has to wear a tie to church every Sunday now. Matt tried to just put a polo shirt on him a few week ago and David would not go without his tie.

October Trip

2008-11-07T10:28:00.001-08:00

We took the kids to Utah to visit my mom and to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. We took the kids to Zion National Park where the kids were able to get out a do some walking. Here is David peering out the window of the bus window.

Here is a family picture at Weeping Rock. (Me down 90 lbs!)

Later on in the week, we took the kids to a little pond up the canyon from my mom's house which is called kids pond. It is a small pond that they have tried to reserve for kids under the age of 12 to fish in. It was lots of fun because David and Gabrielle both got to reel in a bunch of fish. We ended up catching ~12 fish is less that an hour.

For our anniversary, we went up to Brian Head and on our way there, we stopped for a quick snowball fight with kids in Cedar Breaks National Monument. Here is a picture of Gabrielle at one of the lookouts.

Gabrielle's 2nd Birthday Pictures

2008-10-30T12:21:00.000-07:00

Here are Gabrielle's 2nd Birthday Pictures. The first day we tried to have them done, she was permanently attached to my lap and would not cooperate so we had to reschedule for the next day. She has hit her shy phase but we did manage to get a bunch of cute pictures of her.

More Puppy Photos

2008-10-26T09:49:00.000-07:00

I have not had a chance to blog for a while but Kerry asked if I had any more puppy pictures so here are a few more pictures of Max.

Max was shown recenly at a dog show and he won best puppy. Here is one of his win pictures.

Max will be headed to Las Vegas in November where he will be shown at the National Dog Show.

New Puppy

2008-09-18T11:36:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of Max, our new puppy. He is a pure bred Australian Shepherd. We are going to share ownership with the woman that sold him so that she can show him at dog shows.

The kids love to play with him and he is such a sweet puppy.

Camping

2008-09-17T08:44:00.001-07:00

We took the kids camping in August and here are a few of the pictures of the little ones.

It is amazing just how dirty the kids can get ... It doesn't help that there was a pile of ash right next to the camp from people taking the ash out of the fire pit.

A Day at the Zoo

2008-08-14T11:24:00.000-07:00

In May our daycare provider asked to take a Friday off so we decided to also take the day off and take the kids to the Santa Barbara Zoo. Here are a few pictures from the trip.

The one of David with the Lion in back of him was pretty funny because the lion opened his eyes right as I was taking the picture. The rest of the time the lion was asleep. There are so many pictures of David because it was hard to get a good picture of Gabrielle because she was tired most of the time.

Gabrielle Attitude

2008-08-12T10:57:00.000-07:00

This is just classic Gabrielle attitude...

Beach Pictures

2008-08-06T16:21:00.001-07:00

In June, we decided that it was time to get the family out of the house after Matt's appendix ruptured so we went to our friend Christine's home in Port Hueneme. (Becky also wanted to go to a restaurant on the beach that has the best fresh fish and chips) The kids had lots of fun. This trip was probably Gabrielle's first time to get to really play at the beach. The kids would not go near the water this trip because it was overcast and cold the whole day.

Daivd "Flipped"

2008-07-25T16:14:00.000-07:00

In March, David received his first injury that required a doctor's attention. It all started at home where Grandma Nancy had given us an indoor boucer shown in the picture below.David had climbed up onto a set of shelves that are approximately 5' high and was jumping off of them onto the bouncer. He was initially jumping off onto his tummy and then soon discovered that he could scare his parents if he started flipping off of the shelves onto the bouncer.

Later that week, our day care provider was sitting all of the kids down around the table for snack time and went around the corner to get the food. As soon as she got into the kitchen, David was behind her. As she turned around David stated that "He flipped" and she saw the blood flowing from David's head. She grabbed and towel and placed it on Davi'd head. When she pulled back the towel, she could see bone of David's head. She immediately tried to get ahold of Matt and I but was unable to find us at work. She made arangements to have someone watch all of the other children in her care and took David to Kaiser. When they arrived, David had to tell the ladies at the check-in counter that he had an owee and he was more concerned with blood on his shirt than the gash in his head.

When I finally caught up with Laura and David, this is what I found.This little incident has slowed David down a little but not much... At least he has not flipped since.

Introduction

2008-07-22T18:30:00.000-07:00

This is my first time with this whole blogging thing so here it goes. We are the Hooper family which consists of Matt, the dad, Becky, the mom (composer), David, the son, and Gabrielle, the daughter.

Here is a picture of Matt attempting to do the dishes with the kids "helping". Since I am the composer of this, I get to wait to post a picture of myself until after I get a good picture of me which shows all of the weight I have lost....76 lbs at this point...

We have recently moved into a new home out in Antelope Acres and I could not find a picture of the outside but here is a picture of the real reason we bought the new house (at least the way Matt tells it).

Well...I like my new kitchen anyway but it is amazing how quickly even a bigger kitchen can get so dirty so quickly when cooking for 4.