Quin's Golf Swing Comparison

Ok, so please indulge me for a moment while I chronicle Quin's golf swing over the past two years. The kid loves to golf, and would be happy if I just let him play all day long (although, I was a little disappointed while we were watching the PGA championship today when I asked if he wanted Tiger to win or the guy from Korea, and he flippantly said he didn't care, and then fell asleep on the couch. I tried to think of what I could do to instill in this careless 4 year old some passion for the game, but then I fell asleep too. Maybe when he's 5 he'll get with the program). Anyway, here are the swing clips - he is 2 years old in the first, 3 in the second, and 4 years old in the last one, which is when I took him to play his first 9 holes on a full-length course last week. He hit every shot (teeing off from the reds) until it was in the hole, and even got up and down from the green-side rough on one hole, as well as a few 7-putts. We had a great time. It may be time to call Butc

2007


2008


2009

4-wheeling

We went up to the cabin in Kamas for what has become an annual 4-wheeling LaPray family reunion. We had a great time, and were able to zip around on the 4-wheelers for a bit. The boys wanted to go on rides non-stop.

Spudman Triathlon

We did the Spudman triathlon a couple weeks back, and had a great time. This was yet another race we had heard about for the past few years, and were looking forward to participating in now that we live in Utah. The race is in Burley Idaho, and is an Olympic distance triathlon (1 mile swim, 25 mile bike, and 10k run). Kevin's best buddy Dan was doing the race as well, so he and Hillary were up in Burley as well, and hooked us up with some sweet lodging at their cousin's house (thanks Duncans!). The race was as good as advertised, the weather was perfect, and the course is super fast. It helps that you swim down stream in the Snake River, and the bike and run are completely flat in dry 65 degree weather - perfect conditions. Sarah did great, she finished 15th in her age division (out of 111) with a time of 2:30, and Kevin finished 99th overall (out of over 1300) with a time of 2:14.

Before

After

Stuart Falls

Over the weekend of the 4th of July, Sarah was playing in a golf tournament with her mom, so I took the boys, along with my dad and brothers, and we went to hike Stuart Falls, near Sundance on Mt. Timpanogos. We had a great time, due to all the rain the forest was very green and lush. Weston was a trooper as usual, but just wanted to get in the water once we got there. I let him put his feet in, and seemed ok with the fact that it was freezing cold.

Wasatch Back

We had heard about this team relay for the past few years from the Ross clan, and finally got the chance to run it with them this year. It is a 188 mile relay from Logan to Park City. There are 12 people on a team, split up into two vehicles. It takes between 24 and 30 hours to complete, and you just have to eat and sleep where you can along the way. Sound Fun?? It was a blast. Kevin had just returned from Japan on Wednesday of that week, and given the redeye flight and the race night, he estimated that he slept 16 hour between Wednesday morning and Saturday night (give or take 10 hours, as it's hard to tell how long you actually sleep on a plane or during the Wasatch Back). In our van besides me and Kevin were Dan, Mike, Brint and Natalie Ross. Check out this youtube video put together by Dave Neyman, one of the guys on our team, he did an incredible job!
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whWTU4kd1UA
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk1zZR5-8CI

Kale's 6th Birthday

We celebrated Kale's birthday a few days late, as I was still in Japan, and missed Kale's, as well as my own birthday. Sarah once again made a masterful rendition of the movie "Up" into a cake, she is a pretty darn good cake-maker. Kale had some friends over, and a fun time was had by all.

Japan

Kevin took a business trip to Tokyo, Japan in June, it was his first time there. He was there for a week, and worked quite a bit, but also got to see some of the sites. It is a 12 hour flight each way (direct from SLC), so the flight is not fun, but he said he had a good time. He got to go to some of the cool places in and around Tokyo, and his hotel was about 1/4 mile from the Imperial palace. He went running three of the mornings around the palace, which is pretty cool. He went to a mountain about an hour outside of Tokyo, where you can (on a clear day) see mt. Fuji. This was clearly not a clear day, but in the background mt. Fuji is there behind the clouds.

Kale looses his first tooth!

Kale finally lost his first tooth. It was a long time coming, and it took quite a bit of working and convincing from both of us, but a pair of pliers did the trick. Sounds sort of gruesome, but that is how my dad always did it.

Kale's Baseball Team

This year Kale played coach pitch baseball with the Highland Riverdogs!! He played tee-ball last year, and we hoped the transition to coach-pitch would be smooth. He did really great, and was one of the best hitters on his team, and a pretty good thrower too. We do need to work on catching the ball, however. Kale had a great time playing on this team with a bunch of his friends from the ward and from his kindergarten class.

Zoo Trip

The boys went to the Hogle Zoo with some neighbor friends, it was awesome.

Kale's new cast!!

Kale had his first ER visit on the 3rd of July for a broken arm. He was jumping off the tramp and his feet slipped out from under him and flipped him over. He must of caught himself with his right arm, because he cracked both bones down near his wrist. You could definitely tell it was broken. So he spent a week in a white cast wrapped in an ace bandage. Then on Tuesday he got it rewrapped and got to choose a color. The blue reminded us of BYU blue so we drew a Y on it. He now carries a sharpie around with him for everyone to sign it. Then the doctor said in two weeks that he can get a water proof cast!! He is really excited about that.

Family Pictures

My sister in law's sister started taking pictures a little while ago, and is really good. I wanted her to take pictures of my boys, and she said let's just do the whole family when I come up. So she came to our house and it started storming right when she got there, but we went over to "the cove" were Kevin had heard it didn't get as windy. So we raced the storm and ended up getting some really cute pictures of the boys and our family. So here is a link to her blog where she has posted a few of our pictures. She is awesome. Thanks Shanna!!
http://shannamichellephotography.blogspot.com/2009/06/meet-abbotts.html/

Overheard this weekend....

"I know Sunday is a special day, but it's not special to me!"

-- Quin, looking out the window after his request to go outside and play on Sunday was denied.

Salem, UT Triathlon

Kevin did the Salem Sprint Triathlon this last weekend. He did awesome. It was 1/2 mile swim, 13 mile bike and 3 mile run. He placed in the top 20 in his age group. And average just over a 7 min/mile run. He is amazing! Way to go Kevin!

WOMAN OF STEEL

I competed in the Women of Steel Triathlon in American Fork. It was really fun. It was a 300 yd pool swim, 12.5 mile bike and 3 mile run. I finished in 1:17, so I was really happy about that. This is my neighbor Kim that did is with me.

Spring Break in Arches

Kale had Spring Break last week, but Kevin didn't (why no spring break for the gainfully employed?? seems like a great idea), but we wanted to do something fun so we took off Friday morning and went down to Arches National Park. Moab, Arches, Zion, Canyonlands, etc. are less than 4 hours from where we live -- truly incredible.


Gotta love these kind of pictures...the boys thought this was the coolest thing in the world. We must have 30 different shots like this with various arches and rock structures. That last one is Kale at double arch.

Our family underneath the most famous arch in the world. There were a ton of people up there, but we got a moment alone with the arch.

The boys with Delicate arch in the background.


Kale and Quin framed by an arch. This is the small arch just before you get to delicate arch.


The boys loved climbing up any rock, canyon, crevasse, etc. that they could find. I was a bit worried about them being scared of the heights or steep drop-offs, but it was just the opposite. I was the one scared as they had no fear at all, and were constantly getting closer to the edges than I wanted them too. They are good little climbers, they could climb to places that I couldn't get to.

Just thought I'd throw this one in, I thought the arch framing the tree looked kinda cool.

I thought this one looked cool, looks like a mushroom cloud.

This video is at sunset, in our campground (Devil's Playground - inside the park). I took this up on one of the fins near our tent. I captured a common moment on this trip, when I would turn around and notice Quin and/or Kale mere inches away from a 30 or 40 foot drop, and the danger never even crossed their mind.

More bars, in more places....

So we decided to take some family pics after church last week. I guess Weston was pretty tired. This picture could fit in the background of one of those AT&T wireless commercials...This was the only one where all three were smiling. I convinced myself that Weston was smiling, you can too.

So I had to post the funny pose picture too. My, we're creative...

It has been a strange spring. Sunny and 70* one day, then 8 inches of snow two days later. Really. So, on Easter Sunday the boys looked nice and the weather was good, so we snapped some pics. Here are the three boys on the front porch in their sunday best.

Happy 1st Birthday Weston

I can't believe that my baby is one. It has been an eventful year that has gone by quickly. We had a great party for his birthday. We invited both our families up to our house for the celebration. We ended up with 25 people. It was a great time. Thanks everyone for coming and bringing presents!!

Weston trying to figure out what to do with an entire cake.

Don't worry he figured it out and enjoyed it.



This is Weston crawling around at his party. But he did end up taking his first steps that night at the party. He was excited and very proud of himself.

Happy Birthday Quin!

Our little Quin turned 4. He was so excited. He LOVES LOVES to golf. So we had a little golf themed party for him. I went to the party store to try and find some golf stuff. I walked in and they had a little clearance section, so of course I checked that first, and they actually had a lot of golf stuff. The invitation were cute but didn't need them for the two kids were had already asked, the golf banner said Good Luck, decided against it, there were a bunch of $.50 napkins that said Happy Retirement, but were cute. I really doubted any of the four year olds would notice. But decided I shouldn't be that cheap, so I put them back and Quin quickly confirmed my thoughts, "NO I want those. Those are for my birthday." Luckily as I bend down to pick up them back up I found one that had the golf theme but no words so we went with those. And then was really excited to find the chocolate golf balls on the way out in the candy section. When I was making the cupcakes Kevin suggested that we teed them up. I think they turned out really cute. It was a really fun day.

Kale's first time skiing!!

Kale and I had a fun time last Saturday, just the two of us went skiing. We just went up and did the free rope tow at Sundance. He was a good sport and tried hard. I had no idea what I was doing. I hadn't even been on skis in years. But we had a good time.

Happy 30th Birthday to Me!!!

The Top 30 reasons I am 30 and still GREAT . . .



1. Just Kidding

I told Kevin while we went snowboarding for my birthday that I was going to blog about myself for my birthday. (I thought it was funny) He just asked, "is this a hint that you want me to do that for your birthday." I said no I was just trying to make a joke. I guess it is true the older you get the less funny you are. :(

I don't know if going snowboarding after a year off is a good idea for your 30th birthday. There is nothing like snowboarding to make you feel old!!!

Cute Cousins!!

My boys have been having so much fun living closer to cousins. They have got to have quite a few "cousin sleepovers." They love it! This is a picture of one weekend when we got to have Jaxon and Alyssa stay for two nights. Alyssa and Quin really bonded. They are so cute.

Isn't it ironic. . .

We have a T.V. yet all three kids crowd around a tiny portable player to watch, instead of asking mom to put the DVD in the player that is purposely up high out of their reach. I guess I should be thankful they take care of themselves, Right.

Kale having fun in the backyard.

The boys have been enjoying the snow here in Utah. They keep wanting to go to the big sledding hill in the neighborhood, but not wanting to take Weston, I keep telling them they have to wait for a Saturday. So, they decided to make due with the small steep hill in our backyard. After falling down it a few times with their sleds. Kale sat, and thought, and contemplated a solution.

And like any 5 year old boy, figured that the angle divided by the height, and by golly it came to him. JUST JUMP!!

Quin having fun in the backyard.

READY!

SET!
("Do it, I did it." Taunts Kale)
(Actually if you know Kale it probably was more like I'll do it if you do it and don't break anything)

GO!!!


Sarah Enjoying the Backyard!


Sorry, no pictures of me jumping or sledding. But I really have been enjoying this view!!