Easter

 Yay, Easter was nice weather this year. We went to my parents house and had a big meal outside. That way if we spill, it's no problem. We started by dying eggs.

 Gram, Seth, and Maddie

 Max and Mary

 Maren's hair looks pretty cool in this action shot. 

 Maren, and Collin Dewey and Maddie and Max

 Joshua has a twin (James), but Seth and Joshua look like twins here. They were quite happy drinking their Yoohoos and talking about who knows what.

Easter Sunday clothes. We actually didn't buy any clothes this year except Maddie bought her own skirt with her birthday money. Seth for some reason wanted to wear an open vest to look like Indianna Jones, Max looks handsome in his suit and Tanner is wearing is Great Grandpa's suit jacket.

Houston, We Have a Problem

While in Houston for Max's karate, we only had one afternoon of free time. There's a lot to do in Houston but I really wanted to go to the NASA center.

                                                Seth sitting by the door of the space ship replica.

 This is the view from the front seat of the Shuttle. I think the windows are too tiny but maybe they don't want a lot of windows in space.

                                                    Our friend David trying on a helmet.

 Then we got on a shuttle and toured the campus. They have tons of employees.  We got to see a huge robotic spider they're getting ready to send to Mars.  We also stopped at "Rocket Park." Everything is so huge. They had to eject each part of the rocket at different times and ended up with just the small top in order to get into space.

                              This shows just how huge the thrusters are. There are 5 on this rocket.

Black Belt, YAY!

Max has been getting ready to go to TX, the last 6 months (actually the last 5 years) to get his Black Belt. Jon, Max, Seth, and I all flew down on Thursday and came home on Sunday. We left Tanner and Maddie home to fend for themselves which they liked, plus Grandma lives 4 houses away. On Friday morning we went to the Dojo to practice for an hour. It was very huge and impressive. Then we went to the Space Center (which I'll blog about next). On Saturday we had the big test. It started at 10 and ended at 3, with no lunch break! It was a tough test but I guess it has to be. They were exhausted by the end. It was a neat experience to see how far Max has come. He said he learned "that I'm stronger than  my mind tells me I am."



                                                                               
           Age 6. March 2007~                                                                Age 11. March 2012

                                           

                                 At the end of the ceremony, everyone putting their Black Belts on.

There were 11 Black Belts from the Utah Dojo.