David Family

The Guam finale!

2010-06-30T02:23:00.000-07:00

After 3 incredible years we've had on this little pacific island, we're finally packing our bags. Guam has been an incredible experience and adventure and we're grateful for the time we had here. We're going to miss a lot of things, including....
Giant Coconut crabs.

Actually the girls probably won't miss school projects like this leprechaun trap, but we threw it in anyway.

The ocean though we will really miss. Emma's excited to jump in.

If the water's warm enough for Emma, you know it's warm.

Jordan & Andie want in too.

We took family pictures right before we left, the girls loved it as you can see above, little posers we have.
Mom, Dad, & Jordan

The US fencing team came to visit..and Emma's taking it seriously.

Gymnastics is life!

A few days before we left we went to the ocean one last time to do some sunset snorkeling. Andie's either contemplating the significance of the moment....or just trying to get a very tight fin on that she's outgrown over the last 3 years.

Emma sometimes prefers the maskless approach

Andie

Kind of fitting that our final Guam pictures involve a sunset. Jordan jumpin into the sunset pretty much says it all.

Before we say goodbye to Guam, we have one final video to show you...actually a compilation of short videos taken over our years here showing our kids Guam adventures. Just click on this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gg9T_Tkn3g

We'll miss Guam for sure, but we're so excited to be headed back to Utah, back with family, back in the mountains, back home!

We should close on our new home in Kaysville in mid-July so if you're in the area come visit us.

Phillipines girls trip

2010-04-22T04:15:00.001-07:00

I work as a Kindergarten aid at the Elementary School on base; one of the kinder aids in our group of 5 is Phillipino and invited all the Aids to take a Vacation to the Phillipines! And being the spontaneous, crazy girls we are, we said yes! So, Niah, me, April, Leslie and Ghia had a Ladies weekend out. Here we are in the Guam airport.

After arriving in Manila, we hopped in Ghias sister's car and loaded all of our empty luggage on top of us (because alas, we came to SHOP!) and headed 2 hours away to a mountain bed & breakfast called Sonya's Secret Garden. Can we say Beautiful?!

They made us get our own very fresh, very organic eggs for breakfast. mmmmm

We stayed in 4 bedroom villa. Yep, I am spoiled! Someone please come and open the door for me... Oh and what time was my second massage again?

Our villa entrance..
Looks like a hotel right? Nope this whole thing is ours!

A volcano in Tagayte
Then on to Makati, near Manila, This was the view from our 5 star hotel room. Oh yeah, did I mention this is all SHOPPING?!
Buying Pearls at Greenhills.
The Makati Shangri-la hotel. Vicki, Ems, Ghia, April, Niah, Leslie, Michelle, Golnara
Thanks Girls for a wonderful trip and thanks Hubby for the vacation, watching the kids and not canceling my credit cards!

Gone fishin'

2010-03-09T02:59:00.000-08:00

Happy March from Guam. Everyone's doing good. Here's the latest from us:
Jordan fishing near the Navy base. A lot of casting and tangled lines, not alot of fish...but they had fun.

The girls were so excited to get their hair cut

Andie

Emma

We went back to Haputo beach. No the girls are not in Jr Baywatch tryouts, they're just excited to get their bucket of sand to their castle.

Jordan & his buds hangin in the waves.

Sometimes in life you gotta take the bull by the horns.

And hug your mom.

We visited an old Spanish fort on the cliffs off the western shore.

The David girls hangin at the fort

Some Jedi wear black cloaks, some wear sparkly red slippers.

The girls love dragging out the old costumes

Guam was fortunate enough to get a visit from the Marine's Drum & Bugle Corp. They were awesome.

The official silent drill team were great too.

The beach you see is Asan, the site of the American landing to re-take the island from the Japanese in 1944...sort of the "Normandy of Guam".

Finally, James got to meet his new niece on his recent job hunting trip to Utah. Ruby flanked by proud parents Jeff (James' little bro) and his wife Rachel. Ruby is just one more little reason we are SO excited to be moving back to Utah this summer. Just over 3 months to go!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

2010-01-24T03:23:00.000-08:00

We know we're a little late, but better late than never. The first picture below is taken at a beach called Haputo, and is basically our postage-free version of sending you a Christmas card:

" Wishing you a warm holiday season...and we know warm!"

We just had to rub it in for our last winter here before we join you all in the frigidness. In all sincerity we do hope you had a great holiday season. Below are more pics:

Just before Christmas the girls made gingerbread houses.

Christmas morning. The girls were so excited for their bikes. Jordan was at the point where sleeping another hour or two might have sounded better..

The girls got new dresses, make up, and new bikes....and of course had to trial all 3 at once! Here Andie in her streamlined pose.

And Emma shows us "No hands"

Jordan playing Halo:Risk w/ friends David & Jacob

Finally, after months of anticipation, they finally got a Basketball league going here. Jordan was so excited to play....but when he heard his team was going to be the Lakers he about reconsidered. After realizing not every kid can be Jr Jazz, he embraced his inner Kobe and began

Shooting free throws to warm up before the game.

So far they have him playing point guard, which he likes alot.

The hike down to Haputo where we took the Christmas card photo.

The David girls

We found cool sea life that day; including a giant yellow puffer fish and this blue starfish that Andie's holding.

Jordan's main Christmas present this year was SCUBA certification. Dad was so excited to finally be able to dive with him. Here on his last training dive at San Luis beach here on base.
Small tank, but small lungs meant 45 min dive no problem.

Dad & Jord ready to go. You can see in the background where the water turns deep blue about 50 yards out. That's where the water goes from a few feet deep to over 100, called the dropoff. We went there but the deepest we dove was about 50ft)

Finally, though he doesn't show it Jordan was so excited to be able to go on a real boat dive w/ Dad & his 2 best friends. Here he and friend David get ready for Dive #2.

Finally, Andie and Emma ride off into the sunset on a Carabell.
Being towed by a tropical Santa!

That's it for now. We're so excited that it's 2010. We can't wait to move back home this summer and having you see us in person instead of this blog. But until then we'll keep 'em coming.

Another winter in Guam

2009-12-11T17:42:00.000-08:00

We've been having a pretty good winter so far here. Actually we do miss the snow, the kids are so excited for next year, but no sense wasting our final months in the tropics, so here are some recent highlights of our little island life:

Jordan & his friends prepare for night spear fishing.....more on that later in the post, but first:

We're still not even close to exploring all the island, so we recently checked out this beach on the north tip of the island called Ritidian with our friends the Summers.

Guam may have warm water, but the coral shelfs mean no waves, or at least only rare, small ones. But there were this day and Emma bravely leads her friends to face the fierce wave action

Jordan: 5th grader, basketball junkie, and recently....Baywatch Jr lifeguard!!

Jordan and Emma hangin out w/ the Summers kids.

Andie soakin up the sun.

Recently we took the boy and cub scouts ocean kayaking. Jordan & Dad gear up.

More kayaking

We wrapped things up with a race. Jordan ready to take off.

Not exaclty a race for the speed junkie, but a good workout!

And just last nite Jord & Dad once again made it down the the Acfalle's, a family in our branch that live on the southern beaches of Guam, to go night spear fishing. It was awesome. Jordan and his friends were in pure heaven. Jordan caught 4 fish of his own this time, and ate twice that many!

Jordan & his friend David hold an eel his Dad speared. Bro Acfalle is on the right. He grew up doing this and is amazing at it. He caught the vast majority of the fish.

Jordan hold his very first spear-caught fish. Dad found the fish with the underwater flashlight (it's pitch black out there about 500 yards out to sea), while Jordan dove underwater with a sling style spear and got him about 6 feet down. He was so pumped.

The whole gang. It was basically a father & sons branch activity. Needless to say we at well that night.

Finally, we conclude our post with 3 "random" pics from our recent adventures.

Guam is known for it's large Rats. The kids were going nuts, so excited to discover and chase it...unlike our lazy cats. Twinkie (pictured here) and his Sis Daisy took a more....casual approach.

Better balance out the rat reputation with something positive, so Guam is also known for it's rainbows. We almost see these daily. Here is one in our housing unit as Shell was testing out her camera.

Finally, Andie & Emma sometimes struggle with the concept "go to bed". One night Mom & Dad heard them playing when they were supposed to be sleeping and caught them doing this, which apparently is "playing possum". I guess possums don't need as much sleep!

That's about it for now. We're looking forward to Christmas and will no doubt post holiday pics soon.

Australia

2009-11-02T03:30:00.000-08:00

It took 8 years, but we finally got away on a vacation WITHOUT THE KIDS!!!! Our friends watched the kids for a week while we lived it up down under. We didn't mess around on this trip, we wanted to pack in all we could....never thought an alarm clock would be used so much on a vacation but we're so glad we had all these experiences. First up, just 10 hours off the plane and we were up on the beautiful Tulley River doing some whitewater rafting. The pic is pretty small but we're there in front. Our guide took us on an "extreme" trip, meaning he'd flip us on purpose, take us over waterfalls etc...it was awesome. One thing we loved about all our guides, whether river rafting or horseback riding, is that they aren't afraid to take it up a notch. Our horse guide found out Shell's pretty experienced, and I kept my mouth shut, so she let us ditch the slow group and we ran the horses across the fields etc. Sore....yes, but adrenaline rush?......oh yeah.

Shell getting ready to ride.

The boomerang we purchased was made by this Aborigine. It works great!

At the same ranch as the horseback riding they also had 4-wheeling. Here Shell and our guide tear it up. He was crazy...taking us off cliffs and full throttle thru the trees......it was awesome.

We each had our own ATV so we never rode together, but it makes a nice pic.

At the ranch the animals are all friends. This pig and dog acted like 2 puppies...it was hilarious.

You can't do Australia without experiencing the Great Barrier Reef. It took 2 hours each way to get out there, but well worth it. James dove while Shell snorkeled, but both of us saw some great stuff. The boat, as you can see, did not disappoint.

Shell & the snorkelers..if you look closely can you see a shark fin in the background?............good, we didn't either.

Near our hotel there were several large mango trees with what we thought were loud birds residing...turns out they were huge bats! They were incredible to watch. Quite a sight after dark when they're all flying. For better pics, we took this about 1 hr before sunset so they're still sleeping. Some had mangos wrapped up in their wings.

One of the favourite parts of our trip....the food! Guam doesn't exactly have endless choices, so we felt like kids in a candy store with all the selection. Aussies know how to BBQ no doubt.

Our hotel rented out these tiny smart cars for a pretty good rate. We felt like clowns piling into a toy car but it took us where we wanted to go.....like to church and up the coast on Sunday.

Real men don't need hummers to prove they're bad..........but it sure wouldn't hurt...see that black cap near the back??? Yeah just throw a banana or a gum wrapper, or even just sneeze in it once a week and you're good! Actually we were surprised how much gas it still took. (sorry greenies!)

We see plenty of beaches at home but this still impressed. Beautiful coastline drive between Cairns and Port Douglas

The boardwalk near our hotel.

We wanted to get inland as well and this trip took us quite a ways into the mountains and the "tablelands" as they call it.

Tons of rainforests around Cairns.

Shell couldn't get enough of the roos.

More rainforest/waterfall

Cool trees in front of a hotel on the coast. And that was our vacation.

We also just published another post below this to update you on the kids, so keep on scrolling down.

Autumn / Halloween '09

2009-11-02T02:44:00.000-08:00

As always, things don't cool down or slow down when autumn hits in Guam. The kids are busy back in school, but there's always time for extra-curriculars. A few weeks ago when Dad came home from deployment, the girls each got a Dad-daughter date. They were so excited...doing each other's hair, putting on makeup (scaled back by Mom for the final cut). Anyway here's the pics of that: Andie's date

Emma's date

The kids are always playing outside, and so we're bound to have conflicts with the local hornets here called "boonie bees". These things are AGGRESSIVE!!! Jordan & the girls have all been stung multiple times, but this one to Emma's eye takes the cake. We were thinking of taking her to the Eye Dr but we don't know any good ones so she just toughed it out....(she's all better now).

This year we simplified the pumpkin carving and each kid took a section of the same pumpkin. So the next 3 pics are the same pumpkin rotated with each "artist" pictured along side:

Jordan (he had a blast but I guess it's not cool to look excited)

Andie of course had to mix in some hearts

Emma was very proud of her Jill 0' lantern

FINALLY trick or treat time. Jordan & his friends love Lord of the Rings and decided to all be Nazguls. The girls of course wanted to be like big brother so they joined along too. No more fairies and princesses for this family!

First, a "hooded" pic.

In the same lineup. It was yet another hot, humid nite, so these thin robes were the way to go. You can always tell the new families to Guam cause they still have the "stateside" costumes (lions, wolves etc)....yeah that lasts about 3 houses before dehydration kicks in and the kid is walkin around in a t shirt and shorts.

Talisay branch also had some activities. Here Emma is carrying a spoonful of dogfood....don't ask.

And Andie went fishing for swedish gummy fish on a platter full of whip cream

Finally, our final Navy Ball. It's fun to dress up.....once a year.....and we wanted to be sure and catch this one as it will be our last one. For those who may not yet know. We will be wrapping up our commitment to the Navy and moving back home this coming summer. The Navy has been good to us and a great experience but we don't want to miss out on our kids growing up around family so Utah it is Summer 2010!

Navy Ball 2009

Our front yard during a full moon.

Until the next post.....

James' Deployment

2009-09-29T15:47:00.001-07:00

Our blog took a hiatus over the summer, but we're back to catch you all up with 2 new posts. This first one will summarize James' deployment, and the 2nd will get you caught up on Shell & the kids' summer.

Before I get to the pics, let me explain the purpose/background of this deployment.
I was deployed for 14 weeks on a mission called Pacific Partnership 2009, or PP09. Basically it's a multi-national humanitarian mission to the equatorial and south pacific consisting of medical, engineering, and community relations. I was of course part of the med team which provided very basic dental, eye, and medical care, and the engineers basically did extreme makeover island edition projects like renovate schools, build bridges etc, while the 3rd segment did various community relations projects etc. The purpose of the PP missions is several fold. First off, it's a humanitarian mission to help those in need and give the US some good PR in the region and strengthen our relationships with the other nations we partnered with. The majority of the effort was US Navy, but we were joined by Austraila, Canada, Singapore, Japan, Korea, France, & New Zealand. Another purpose is disaster relief training. When the tsunami hit SE Asia in '04, the US Navy went in but found that coordinating disaster relief was tougher than it seemed and it didn't go so well, so they wanted to start annual missions to practice and serve local populations at the same time and thus PP was born. Obviously PP09 is the 4th such mission. Like I said, in all it was a 14 week mission, including alot of at sea time and basically 2 week stops at 5 different islands plus a short stop at a 6th island for R&R. Our 5 mission stops in order were Samoa, Tonga, Solomon Is, Kirabati, and Marshall Is. Enough background, let's get to the pics: REMEMBER YOU CAN DOUBLE CLICK ON ANY PIC TO ENLARGE.

June 17, departure day. I boarded the ship that would take us thru the whole mission, the Richard Byrd here in Guam and my fam watched from the dock pictured behind me as we set sail out to sea.

We basically had double the normal crew on our ship, so they packed us in tight. Here is a pic of my stateroom, meant for 1 but housing 2 of us. I can't complain though, submariners are packed in alot tighter than this.

You can see no land in sight in this pic. That's how it was for the first 13 days for me at sea heading to Samoa. Here you can see another ship pulled up along side us and a helo is taking supplies from 1 ship to the other, called a vert-rep. Pretty impressive to watch. They boats don't stop, they actually tie to each other while cruising at about 10 knots.

It was great to work with people from all over the world. Pictured next to me on the left are 2 Japanese docs, followed by US Army vet team, and the 2 on the right are from New Zealand and Canada. Not pictured but included in the mission were: Chilean and Singanpore docs, a South Korean Dermatologist, and many others.

Leaving our ship each morning to go to shore. Our ship was too big (d/t the coral) to get close to shore, so would usually sit about 2 miles out, so we'd take these small speedboats to shore each morning and back to the ship at night.

Sometimes to get from the small boat back onto the Byrd we'd have to use this Jacob's ladder. It was easy if the water was calm, but when the waves were high you'd have to time your "jump" A couple people had some close calls but overall not too bad.

One of our corspsman demonstrating the process.

SAMOA

Out of the 6 islands, Samoa was probably the most beautiful. Our first clinic was accross the island from the dock so we had very long but very scenic drives to start the trip.

More Samoa

Our 1st clinic site, Lalo-Manu. We hadn't put up or Optometry sign yet but we were just left of Pharm.

The crowds start to form, waiting to be seen. Everyone was pretty much always busy, throughout the mission there were always far more people wanting to be seen than we could handle, but no doubt Dental and Opto were in highest demand.

At the conclusion of this clinic, the staff thanked us by performing a song and dance and giving us all Lava Lava skirts. Hey, i'm secure in my masculinity....but don't dwell on the pic all right, we got more to see.

The Byrd carried 2 helos, french made PUMAs, which took me to many a mission site. They were operated by pilots and mechanics from Blackwater, pictured here.

Definately want to enlarge this pic. This is a small island off Samoa called Apolima. It's an old volcano, you can still notice the crater shape, and they settled a small village there by the mouth of the crater there. About 10 of us flew by Helo in for a one day remote clinic. Me, 1 dentist, a few docs, and support staff. I got to do alot of these remote missions cause there were only 2 of us eye docs on the mission.

Apolima village

They threw a big feast for us. This was a common occurance on the mission. Despite their humble circumstances, these people insisted on nothing short of a grand feast to welcome us. I didn't know what half of it was, but most of it tasted good and we all lived!

The entire eye team for PP09. On the left is Jackie Anderson, Optometrist out of Hawaii, and right, our sole Opto tech Niel Calpo also out of Guam. Normally these PP missions have an eye team of about 5 docs and 5 techs, with a total med staff of over 150. D/t some last minute mission problems which I won't go in to, we were severly reduced in our manning down to a total med team of 50 and of course our eye team of 3. At first the higher ups didn't think it'd work and the whole thing almost got cancelled. But we pulled it off. Final stats: Total med pt's seen: >22,000. Total Opto pt's seen: >6,000.

On my last day in Samoa I was able to see the Temple. Turns out the only way it worked is our mission driver, pictured here, happened to be LDS. (The odds weren't too bad seeing as about 1/4 the pop of Samoa and actually Tonga too are LDS). Anyway i'm glad it worked out. You'll also notice John isn't exactly small. Let's just say i'm glad these islanders are friendly!

TONGA

For island #2, Tonga, we were glad to have the Australians help. They provided personell as well as 3 of these small ships pictured called LCH's. They helped carry cargo/supplies back and forth from shore to the Byrd (also in the pic way in the distance). We actually stayed on these one nite when the weather was too bad to get back to the Byrd.

Most islands were 2 weeks total, and in those 2 weeks we'd work at about 3 diff clinic sites of about 4 days each. But here in Tonga this was our clinic site the entire time. It was actually pretty nice cause we were only yards from the beach and had a cool breeze almost the entire 2 weeks which was HUGE because the heat was the biggest enemy on this mission. I think I sweat more in these 3 months than my previous 33 years.

Kid with corneal/lens damage and obviously really bad vision in his left eye d/t trauma, usually from playing with a sharp stick or rocks. Tragically, this was all too common. I soon realized why when I observed these kids at play. Say what you will about American kids and always being on the XBOX/TV/COMPUTER. It may be lazy, but it's also safe! All these island kids who don't have toys, electronics, they (esp the boys) usually resort to chasing each other with sticks and there you have it.

I also saw several albinos on this mission. These twin girls were really cute, but tragically the albinism can also affect vision as well as your skin and this was the case here. These girls could basically read the big E at the top of the chart.

I had to laugh seeing these boys playing with hermit crabs. They'd set them down and try to get them to fight each other. I could totally see Jordan and his friends doing the same thing.

Most places threw farewell/thank you parties for us. The Tongan's are great people and this was one of my favourite places.

Lobster is plentiful in the Tongan waters, so it's cheap and abundant here. This farewell feast consisted of all the Lobster you could eat. Yeah, basically heaven on earth it was.

Near the end of the mission I was able to SCUBA in tonga, and saw great sea life, including one of those plentiful Lobsters! Yeah i'm thinkin they're a little more appetizing well cooked and drowned in butter, but that's just me.

NEW CALEDONIA

We took a break in the middle of the mission to stop at a French owned island called New Caledonia for 4 days of R&R. I've never been to Europe, but it seemed like a cool mixure of Europe and the tropics. Man was it $$$ though. Probably better places to vacation I would say.

Like I said the island is French owned, so the French military has a presence here. I just had to snap this pic of one of their sailors so you could see a French Navy uniform. Need I say more..........

I was able to dive here in New Caledonia as well. It was amazing.

Pictured are a ray and a turtle, but I also saw sea snakes and several sharks, and the coral variety is way different from Guam so well worth it.

There were at least 20 turtles here, and they weren't afraid of divers so we were able to get pretty close.

SOLOMON ISLANDS

Setting up the first clinic site

Some of the locals

Endless crowds. This line is just those waiting for Opto. Dental and Med lines are in far background. It sort of became a psychological game. If we stayed in our clinic room, and saw as many as we could until closing time, it was mentally alot easier than walking out and seeing this. With self selection, I guess we could take comfort in the fact that those who really needed to be seen were willing to get up early enough to be near the front of the line, which often meant them showing up before 5 am.

On a day off I did a cultural tour. These villagers reenact the traditions of their ancestors. These were the warriors who rushed out to "confront" us visitors to their village.

One of the highlights of the Solomon Is for me was getting to retrace my Grandpa's journey here 66 years ago. He too was in the Navy, but his experience was of course alot more dangerous as he landed on the Solomon islands during WWII as an engineer (called a Seabee). This is the WWII memorial in Guadacanal, one of the major strategic sites of the war.

This is a guy named John Innis leading us on a WWII battlefield tour. This guy knew his stuff, taking us step by step thru some of the major battles of the war. Here we are at the site of a battle called Bloody Ridge. Pretty powerful experience to think what our grandparents generation had to do for our freedom.

KIRABATI

Kirabait, like the Marshall islands, is not a real land mass like most islands like Hawaii or Guam, but actually something called a coral atoll. Basically it's the rim of an ocean floor ancient volcano that just broke the surface in which coral grew on it. So these island are basically just a coral surfaced volcano rim. They can be miles long but often not much more than the width of a football field. The picture above is typical of almost all of Kirabati. Because it's just coral, there's few natural resorces. The people can't exactly plant crops, they get their water from the rain, and have almost all food shipped in, and there aren't really land fills for the trash or outhouses. These people aren't bothered by litter like we are, so the island sadly is just full of litter and the beaches are their toilets! This sounds harsh, but we were glad to be done with our 2 weeks in Kirabati. The whole place just stinks. The people were very nice though like the other islands and i'm glad we were able to serve them.

D/t short life expectancy and Utah like reproduction practices, about 60% of the population of this and all the islands we visited are under 15. All of us docs certainly saw pathology we'd never seen before out here. This little girl has a soft tissue mass growing on top of and sort of out of her intact left eye! We did not have surgery capabilities on this mission but in her case surgery may only be of cosmetic benefit.

Another, more remote clinic site we set up for 2 days.

We got used to working in less than pristine clinical conditions. Here dental sets up clinic on the porch of an old village building.

Kirabati also had some WWII history. This was a Japanese HQ post in Tarawa that as you can see got taken care of by the American invasion. The Japanese were really good at hiding out in caves during American invasions and we learned the hard way that they weren't always eliminated when we thought an area was clear. We suffered great casualties when the Japanese would hide in caves and bunkers like this, then come out after dark and attack. The solution: we began just filling any caves we found with gas fumes and then throw a grenade in. American casualties dropped after the change in strategy.

As mentioned earlier, Kirabati wasn't the cleanest place. Well some places were. I had many co-workers on the mission come up to me and say: "well David, the only clean places on this island are your Mormon churches". We also drove by a very large and well kept Moroni High school campus. A great blessing to the local members.

MARSHALL ISLANDS

Walking to our first clinic site of the Marshall Is, Ebeye. Ebeye is a small island only .3 sq mi, yet has over 16,000 people, giving it the second highest population density in the world next to calcutta, India. Like many other places we visited, people and especially kids everywhere.

Our second clinic site. Like many others, it was hot and old with no running water or electricity, but by this time in the mission it was just another day at "the office".

Many of these places were so hot that the sweat would just pour down your face. Some guys preferred to combat this with some headbands. I guess the heat and the headband caused a few of the guys to get a little crazy.

Opto clinic space. There were no tables left but adaption was the name of the game.

Ariel view of the Marshall islands as we rode a Helo out to our final 2 sites.

If you enlarge this pic, On the closest island you can see some buildings in the center. This was a small village we saw in one of the final days on the mission.

One kid likes us being there, one doesn't.

Kids wait in another small island village outside our makeshift Dental/Opto clinic on the last day of the mission.

We were happy campers here. We were getting back on the Huey to go get ready to go back on the Byrd to sail home!

I emailed Shell from the boat to tell her when we'd be pulling in to the harbor so they ran to the beach and took this pic. I could see their photo flashes from the deck of the boat, and if you enlarge the pic we were standing right behind the 2nd orange life boat. We were so stinkin excited knowing we were minutes away from being together again after 14 weeks.

The moment we'd been waiting for. Emma had to be first.

Emma wouldn't let go, but Mommy needed a turn!

The staff from Naval Hospital Guam came to the dock as well. There were 3 of us from Guam returning. Myself, Calpo (pictured earlier), and a dental tech named Herndon. Alot of friends showed up too. It was an awesome day.

Finally, back home with the family! The sign Shell had made says it all!

Summer recap

2009-09-29T15:12:00.000-07:00

We took the summer off from our Blog, so here's a recap of our highlights from Summer '09.
As always, the major event of the summer in our family is the triple birthday bonanza. Jordan's b-day is July 8, while the girls are July 5, so each year we usually just combine the parties into one crazy event. Here we had the slip and slide out for the b-day bash. As always it was a hit. Here Jord demo's proper form for the approach:

Present opening time: the girls love their new dresses and basically refused to wear anything but these for a couple weeks.

Jordan relishes his new skateboard. He took "skate camp" for a week this summer and loved it. It payed off too. He can now do the half-pipe and other tricks pretty well.

A 10 yr old and two 7 yr olds! I don't know what they're wishing for right now but Mom & Dad might wish for them to stop growin up so fast for cryin out loud.

Jordan approves of the ice cream cake

So does Emma along with her friends.

There's a huge tree in our neighborhood like something out of swiss family robinson that has a swing and a climbing net etc. Needless to say it's a popular kid hang out. Andie swingin away here.

Grandma & Grandpa check out the tree too. Havin Gram & Gramp Patty visit was the highlight of the summer.

Emma loves the swing too

Takin Gram & Gramp to the beach.

Jordan was in heaven when Grandpa took him fishing. Tons were biting, but nothing stuck until this poor guy met his match with Jordan's pole.

Andie also enrolled in Grandpa's fishing class.

And quickly masters the art of the cast....sort of

Emma preferrs spectator. Actually she fished too.

Andie also was part of a big base community play this summer, a version of the Jungle book. She had to try out and was so excited to make the cut. She's the monkey on the front far left.

She practiced hard for it and had a great time.

Finally, sis congratulates her with flowers.

That's it for now. We're all back in the full swing of fall with the kids busy in 5th/2nd grade, and Shell back at work at the school too for another year. James got a few days off post-deployment but opens clinic back up in a few days, nad James and Shell are looking forward to going on a little couple's vacation to Australia in a few weeks. We'll keep you posted!

Suds, Sports and Stuff

2009-05-30T23:17:00.000-07:00

The kids are counting down the days to summer vacation (9 & 1/2 and counting), but they've had plenty of fun activities to get them through these final weeks of school. Just last week for Memorial Day, MWR had a big family fun day with a waterslide, an obstacle course, and of course a giant pile of bubbles.
Thankfully, this time the large pile of bubbles was not due to Dad accidentally putting dish soap in the dishwasher. Girls in the foreground, Jordan in between them a few feet further back.

Jordan and the Copeland boys soakin up the suds

more suds...

This waterslide was FAST, which is of course just how Emma

likes it.

The girls and David Copeland conquer the obstacle course.

It was like 93 degrees, but that didn't stop Mom & the girls from

gettin a workout in. Here they're working out to "Zumba".

We also recently had a tri-family softball game with the Bunch's and Copelands. The kids are really into baseball lately and often play in the backyard; but this day we took it to a real field and the kids had a blast.

Andie shows good form...

and Jordan

Emma goes for a more.....creative approach

She was intent to get a hit though and finally did!

We also took some time Memorial Day to remember the troops. We took the kids to Asan Beach, which was one of the landing beaches here where the Americans invaded to liberate the island from the Japanese. In the foreground are obviously American flags, with Guam flags in the background. We are so grateful for those who fought and gave their lives for their country. Freedom truly isn't free.

Andie at Asan Park

Emma

Later that week we took the kids on the Talofofo Caves hike. One really cool thing about this hike is that the trees are a natural butterfly habitat. You can see probably 10 or more in the picture below. Their wings are dark blue but they look like small black triangles in the trees above our heads.

Andie holding one of the many butterflies on the hike

We also recently attended a Luau at our district building last nite (like a Stake Center). The girls love to put the plumeria flowers in their hair.

Finally, all these week's activities wore Emma and Twinkie out!

That's it for now. We're just waiting to see how the next few weeks go. James is scheduled to deploy next week for 4 months, so Shell & the kids may get to come back to the states for a month or two. If you're in Utah and want to see us, just email us at jmdavidfamily@gmail.com

Spring has sprung....

2009-04-11T23:03:00.000-07:00

Like we could tell what season it was here, but hopefully it's springing for all of you at least. So here's the latest pics from our March and early April. Enjoy!

April showers bring...out the umbrellas. The kids weren't too adventurous though, they went for zero risk of getting wet by having their picnic under umbrellas in the carport.

Jordan's been practicing his "ollies" and other skateboard tricks. This won't make ESPN, but it makes our blog...

Nice air...I think that's a millimeter of air at least.

The girls recently did science experiments for school.

Here's Andie's experiment. She's measuring the water to see how much it warmed up after being heated by a single peanut!

Emma analyzes the seperating of colors by capillary action....ya know, standard first grade hobbies. Actually Mom and Dad didn't really know how a first grader's supposed to do a science fair....more like parents do it-kids watch.....kinda like pinewood derbies!

The girls may be outgrowing their dolls, but they still make good use of their doll furniture. In this case they make up a bed for our cat Twinkie in their doll crib. Twink actually loved it and took a good nap here. Everyone's a winner.

Now it's outside to the trampoline. This things been worth it's weight in gold. The kids love it, and Dad and Mom often get in on the action. Here Dad, Andie and Jordan form the famous bouncing ring of death. The victim this round was Emma, and since she's the smallest she usually goes the highest....

Just teasin. Dad actually threw Emma up this time, but they do still bounce pretty high.

Now Mom gets on to bounce the kids. But in this case, she's the one who ends up getting bounced

But Mom gets revenge!!!!!

And then everyone makes up.....so sweet.

And not so sweet, as Jordan finds out, is the taste of his hard boiled egg

decorated Easter weekend. How will he like it????

Not exactly a favorite........

Easter also brings the famous Navy Base egg hunt, hosted by creepy bunny man. You'll remember this guy from our blog last year. It's like 90 degrees outside so this guy is either some young sailor being punished for doing something stupid...or a true dedicated American hero.

The girls line up for the egg hunt. Notice their long hair. They've never had a real haircut before, just minor "trims", but later that afternoon after this picture was taken Mom took them to get their first professional haircut, and here's how they turned out:

Emma

and Andie. They both loved it, and love that it can do that flip out thing that Mom does with the curling Iron.

Easter Morning 2009

Finally, we wanted to show a picture of the Jimenez family, taken Easter Sunday. Not pictured is the oldest boy, Alexis. For those who don't know, 16 yr old Alexis passed away from an accident at a youth activity a couple weeks ago. It's been a trying time for our whole branch here, but we're getting better, and the family is amazing. They had us over for dinner recently to tell us that they're at peace. They've started smiling again, as you can see here, and we're all happy and grateful for the great blessing of knowing a young man as incredible as Alexis. "The gospel brings peace" has whole new meaning for us.

Thailand!!

2009-02-27T17:01:00.000-08:00

We returned from our vacation in Thailand this week and it was amazing. We spent 3 days in Bangkok, the massive capital of 10 million people, followed by 4 days in Chiang Mai, a beautiful city in the mountains up north. It's a great country with very nice people, good food, and beautiful scenery, like the first picture below of us rafting on a river outside Chiang Mai, but the rest of the pictures below follow the chronical order of our trip so we can take you thru it beginning to end.

River rafting on the last day. But going back to the beginning.....

When we first arrived in Bangkok we wanted to explore the massive city and shop their street markets. This mini taxi called a toot-toot is very popular. These guys don't exactly obey all traffic laws, and use their small size to weave between traffic. Who needs amusement park rides when you can live on the edge with these things?

Our first full day there we visited Dream World, sort of Thailand's version of a mini-disneyland.

Pictured here was a really cool (literally) attraction called snow world. Basically they crank the A/C up so it's like 30 degrees, and that's real snow in the background. Obviously it's a huge hit cause many of these southeast asians have never seen snow, but our kids were almost just as foreign to it as it's been since early 2007 that our kids have experienced winter.

These are little speedboats called longboats that took us thru winding canals in Bangkok. They would pull up to a market right on the edge of the river called a floating market. They don't miss out on any opportunity to sell you stuff in Thailand.

These wood carvings/storyboards were incredible. The carving behind us isn't even close the the biggest or most detailed one we saw. The "rookie" carvers use a drawing over top to guide them along, but the experienced ones can just see it in their mind and carve away.

A 2 hr drive out of Bangkok took us to this bridge you've probably heard of: The famous Bridge on the River Kwai. You can see on the far left how the sections are curved, and the ones right over Jordan's head are shaped more square. It was the square section that was bombed by the allies in WWII and repaired later.

Royal Palace in Bangkok. Thailand still has a king, but it's a constitutional monarchy so, like England, the royalty has no real power, but back in the day Thailand was known as Siam, and the movie The King & I is about one of the past kings of Siam. Lots of gold, lots of statues.

More of the palace....

After Bangkok we headed up north to Chiang Mai. It was awesome to feel cool mountain air again...we almost thought we were back in Utah. This pond is part of a nite safari up one of the local canyons. Lots of animals come out at nite so there was plenty to see.

All that touristy walking left the girls needing a pedicure.

The kids favorite part of the vacation: zip lining thru the jungle tree tops. This place was featured on the amazing race apparently. At the beginning when we were harnessing up a few of the other patrons asked if the girls would be too scared to go......they didn't ask for very long.

The girls go together on this run. There were about 18 lines in all.

Tons of markets. This one went on for over a mile.

When riding on an Elephant, you always feel like you're chair is going to slide off. They're sure footed beasts though, and it was fun.

They loved to "reach" up for snacks along the way. Here Jordan feeds it another Banana.

The elephants were amazing, they drew several paintings right in front of us.

Posing with the kids...

Bamboo rafting on a river outside Chiang Mai.

After all this playing we put the kids to work. Here Andie is guiding our raft along.

3 big monkeys playing with 1 little monkey.

This guy moves a little fast, but he's got good taste!

Thailand is famous for their silk, so we visited this factory in Chiang Mai. We thought the kids would be totally bored, but they were actually fascinated, and for good reason. They showed you the whole cylce, from the silk worms all the way to the finished product. Yeah we're easily entertained.

Finally we wrapped up the vacation with a little white water rafting. The river was low so it was safe enough to bring the kids. Not exactly heart pounding adrenaline rush, but we're glad we got to go as a family.

Decent rapids here..

Emma shows her approval of the trip. She speaks for all of us though. The rafting and the whole trip was awesome. Hopefully the kids are old enough to remeber this. But if not, at least we have the pictures to prove it.

PS. Thailand info: Roughly the size of Texas. Population 65 million poeple. Thailand means free land, and it is a free country surrounded by more repressed states such as Vietnam, Laos, & Cambodia. People: nice, love kids.

Don't try this at home!

2009-01-25T02:40:00.000-08:00

Living in a year-round warm climate brings it's subtle lifestyle changes, no chance of a white Christmas, no scraping your car in the morning, but a huge bonus for the kids is 12 months of outdoor play! Kids in the states work hard all summer on their skateboard moves, bike stunts, and pool tricks all to watch the skills go rusty as they sit inside all winter. Not here, 12 straight months of outdoor play = plenty of time to perfect outdoor skills, taking them even to....the extreme!!!
Exhibit A: Jordan spent weeks building courage, and speed, for perfecting his bike jump. He pretty much hauls full speed now from the top of the hill in the background. Typical jump starts here and proceeds as follows:

Mid air now.........

Smooth landing...pretty much every time now, wasn't at first. We had a few scapes and bruises,

but according to Jordan...well worth it.

Next up, Jordan demo's the ever popular back flip into the ocean. Good starting stance....

The arms get you started.....

Then the legs help you swing around to complete the backflip for......

The perfect landing...

The same hill used for Jordan's bike jump is also home to Andie & Emma's extreme rollerblade

challenge. They also love the jump, but Dad holds their arm when they go off it. They prefer smooth speed to catching air anyway....

Emma slowing down for a better pose..

Extreme nitetime lawn gymnastics.......all we can say is ouch. Andie loves practicing her splits.

Finally, the most extreme stunt of all....allowing the deadly Guam tree frog to climb your neck!!

Actually it's harmless, the kids were excited to find this in our yard the other day.

Well that's enough adrenaline for today. The kids weren't excited to go back to school after the long winter break but excited to go to Thailand next month. We'll post the pics on that after we go in late February.

Christmas Card 2008

2008-12-22T02:27:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Instead of sending a big long summary letter/family report with our Christmas card, we thought we'd just use our blog...so here it is, the David family 2008 summary (for those who may be new to this blog, the best way to catch up is simply scroll down thru our past posts)...a few minutes into that and you'll feel like you're right here with us.......without the 15 hour flight! But for those that like the traditional end of year summary, here ya go:

Emma: Enjoying 1st grade, primary, losing her teeth, and especially gymnastics (click on video link for a demo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPryG413OSk). Picked up roller blading recently. LOVES swimming, reading to Mom & Dad, and chocolate. She's our little daredevil. Jordan & Andie will ask her to try a scary thing out first (like jumping off a high waterfall, or even getting a shot at the doctor), and she almost always does.

Andie: Also enjoying 1st grade (in same class as Emma). There's no bad time to practice gymnastics for Andie. She'll do cartwheels EVERYWHERE. Click on this link for her gymnastics demo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7kfY6PGk20 . She also loves singing, her and Emma break into spontaneous duets constantly. It's been a big year for loose teeth. She's probably missing half of them now. She loves to help cook dinner, and speaking of heat, she and Emma love it here because it's one place on earth actually hot enough for them. The school cranks the A/C so much at they wear sweatshirts in class, but outside is just right.

Jordan: He's got 4th grade all under control. When he's not in school, he's usually outside on his skateboard, bike, razor scooter, or in the water anytime he can. We're waitin for gills to sprout on this kid anyday. He loves swimming, snorkeling, and in July when he turns 10 he's really lookin forward to getting SCUBA certified so he can dive with Dad. He loves his guitar, drawing, and playing XBOX. The highlight of his year however, was his 2 minute stint as the lead singer of the rock band Smashmouth (scroll down this blog a couple entries for all the details) but here's the link to the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKLjZKeIY9w

Michelle: She likes long walks on the beach looking for the kids, followed by cleaning a van full of sand. She also enjoys getting caught in the rain... which happens often here, usually in the grocery store parking lot or getting the mail. When not sipping pina coladas, she's busy working with special needs kids at the elementary school and doing the Mom thing. It hasn't all been work though; she had the vacation of her life in October when she spent a ladies only week in Bali with 2 of her friends here. Scroll down to the next entry for all those details. She and James also celebrated their 10th anniversary this last August.

James: Enjoying his work at the branch clinic here on base, which feels like a small town practice because everyone on base goes there. He also loves exploring the island with the family, including the waterfalls, hikes, and of course the ocean. He was thrilled to get SCUBA certified a few months back, and looks forward to going with Jordan this summer. He's also had fun working with the young men/scouts in his church...rock climbing isn't as easy as it used to be!
Coincidently, he also celebrated his 10th anniversary this year!

Before we conclude, here are a few recent pictures for your viewing enjoyment:

Taking "rockin around the Christmas tree" to a whole new level! The girls w/friend Tori.

Jordan got this cool remote control helicopet/hover thing. He loves it.....

Daisy doesn't. It freaked the cats out bigtime.

Shell with Santa's elf.

A couple days before Christmas we went to Inarajan pools, which are seperated by the

ocean by those rocks you can see in the distance. Here Andie's jumpin off the platform.

Emma takes a turn....

One of those perplexing perspective pics. Is Jodan diving off the platform or doing a handstand on the grass???? Quite a mystery......

Mystery solved

Jordan and Andie

Well, that's the scoop. We've had a great year and a wonderful Christmas. We are so grateful for all of you, our family & friends back home, and for our savior and his gospel. We truly feel blessed and look forward to all the adventures 2009 will bring. We'd love to hear from you too. Our email is jmdavidfamily@gmail.com Merry Christmas and happy 2009!

Love,

The Davids

The Ultimate Girls Vacation--Bali!

2008-11-22T02:51:00.000-08:00

At the end of September I was able to go to Bali for 8 days with 2 of my best friends. Ladies you've gotta try this!! Its one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Let me paint a picture for you; 1000's of shops in a row (you barter for EVERYTHING), amazing 2-4 hour massage/spa treatments for 20$ and awesome activities like riverrafting and biking through the mountains and villages. The next few pictures will take you through my amazing trip.

We were on our way to go riverrafting when the road closed down to let this funeral processing through. This picture is of a hand made casket, when they get to the burial site it will be burned. At the head of this tower was 8 white oxen.

508 steps down to the river, so beautiful!

This picture was taken from our river raft. The entire mountain side was hand carved. It went on for miles!

This was taken while we were biking through the villages. The entire family/extended family lived together in compounds. They are so poor but happy. This was their school bus.

One of the many schools along our bike trip. They loved to see themselves on the screens of our digital cameras after taking their pictures.

This is Gabby and she is smiling for you. She is very talented; she played the harmonica and took a bow afterwards.

Elephants feel like a giant hairy pig. This is LaNita Copeland and Me on Gabby.

yep she stinks.

James bugging me about how much money I am going to spend at the shops just around the corner. No, actually this is at the monkey forest. 100's of nots so shy monkeys surrounded us. They can open your purse!

This woman was selling us peanuts to give the elephants. 1$ for 2 lbs of nuts. Isn't she beautiful!

Cooking School. So stinkin spicy gave us "Bali Belly" Good but holy moses.

One of the many dance shows we saw. Different

Did your heart beat just speed up? This is one of the millions of outdoor shops. The purses hanging there are hand woven and the vases are hand beaded. We watched as a 12 year old girl sat and made a beaded purse. Oh and those purses are 3$.

I had so much fun and am so thankful for a loving husband that took care of the kids for a very long 8 days (for him) The combination of the scenery,culture, and people was literally paradise.

Hey now, he's a rock star......

2008-11-07T15:33:00.000-08:00

It's not too often that big name celebrities find their way over to Guam, but we were psyched to have Smashmouth here in concert this week. Jordan and his friends wanted to be right up front, while Dad stayed back. Near the end of the show we were shocked to see the lead singer of Smashmouth Steve Harwell reach down in the crowd, and pull Jordan up on stage! Yes, our very own son was a rock star for about 2 minutes. See the pictures and video below to see for yourself. His friends were almost as excited as he was. They were heard saying: "Dude, Jordan, you're island famous now." Jordan's shirt was drenched with both his and Steve's sweat, so Jordan refused to wash it.......but Mom vetoed that resolution. Needless to say Jordan said it was the "best night of his life". Here are 4 pictures of the event followed by a link to the video, so ROCK ON!!!!
He's a little freaked out when he's first pulled up on stage.

Startin to find his groove.....

Then Steve hands him the microphone...not quite sure how to take the reigns as the very temporary new lead singer of Smashmouth

Finally, they just decide to finish the song together. To see the video of this, just click the following link.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=GKLjZKeIY9w

PS. In case you're wondering what song you're listening to, Smashmouth broke from their own music for a couple Van Halen cover songs. This happens to be the end of Van Halen's "Aint talkin about love". This new version in no doubt now our favorite!

2008-11-02T02:48:00.000-08:00

The kids rejoice that we FINALLY found the watering hole! We have this book on hiking in Guam, which gives directions/descriptions of the fun places sort of "off the beaten path". We found awesome waterfalls to jump off last year (see our Dec 07 blog) from this book, so we tried it again. It was 2 miles each way on a very hot day, so as you can see above the kids were psyched to finally make it.

Near the start of the hike when we were sort of.....lost you could say. Seriously, the book gives weird directions, like "turn left at the abandon dump truck" We thought the author might be joking.....

He wasn't. We finally knew we were on the right path in the maze of tracks and fields when we saw these trucks.

Anyway, when we finally made it, the kids were ready to play. It's a deep natural swimming hole, and it even had a rope tree swing. Here Andie is swingin away

And of course Emma had to give it a shot too.

Jordan's turn

We also went to Spanish steps again a few weeks ago, here we are hiking thru the jungle with the Bunches and Copelands to our favorite snorkeling site.

The girls prefer to play on the beach and look on as family snorkels in the background.

Halloween 2008: The girls w/ Tori Bunch as fairies ready to spread happiness and peace.

Jordan and the Copelands and Dillon Bunch.......not exactly spreading happiness and peace

Fairies and bad guys all came together in the end though to show off their sweet haul of Candy.

They still kept a fair amount even after the "parent tax".

Finally, we attended the Navy Ball a couple weeks ago. The girls were so excited to see Mom dressed up to go to a "real Ball" (they were thinking of the balls they've seen on the disney movies etc). They wanted to go so bad. Anyway it was fun to get dressed up and be with friends in a formal setting like that.....once in a while at least.

End of summer, start of school

2008-09-20T22:14:00.000-07:00

Guam is known for it's water sports, and thankfully our friends share our commitment to make the most of our time here. Pictured above are the girls with their friend Tori Bunch and her mom Marilee. The Bunches and Copelands are almost always in our pictures cause they're great friends of ours. We all live in the same neighborhood, go to church together, and play together. For example James was getting SCUBA certified this weekend with the Copelands while Shell and our kids played with the Bunches on their waverunners. Marilee Bunch and Lanita Copeland are also going with Shell to Bali in a few days for a "girls week out". It's just one big party down here.

Jordan with Jacob Copeland being towed by a jetski. Another Utah family, the Langs, brought their waverunner too, so there was plenty of fun to go around.

The girls, again with Tori, on a Carabell, basically a water buffalo that has a strong history here on Guam. These animals were the backbone of farm labor etc for many years here.

Jordan with Dillon Bunch and Jacob Copeland on the same Carabell. The owner (in background) was really nice and loved taking the kids around for a ride.

After the animal ride, we went to Inarahan pools, which are seperated by the ocean by a few

large rocks. Here Jordan is coaxing Andie to take a leap off the 12 ft high platform

She didn't need much coaxing.

Joran & the Copeland boys. You can see the ocean in the background. These pools were alot of fun, but on the other side of the island so we've only been here once.

One of the many new events with the girls getting older is them wanting sleepovers. Lanita bought these for Tori and the girls for her birthday.

Slumber party mania

The big event of last week was Emma's first tooth coming loose. She was wiggling it constantly, so excited to finally lose the first tooth like her sister had before her. Well Andie was excited too, and 2 impatient girls aren't gonna wait for mother nature, so Andie went ahead and ripped it out for Emma.

Andie's "extraction" was successful. Emma was pretty excited (as you can obviously see) to finally join the lost tooth club.

But we can't forget the biggest event of all this month....the start of another school year! This was taken on the first day of school in our front yard. You can see by the picture that they don't have far to walk (school pictured in the background). It's not just the kids that enjoy the short commute, Shell works there too and walks to and from school with them each day.

That's it for now!

Birthday Mania '08!

2008-07-18T15:17:00.000-07:00

Triple birthday '08 was a big success! For those who may not know, all 3 of the kids have a birthday in the same week in early July. So between that and the 4th, there's a whole lot of celebrating to do! We decided just to throw one big party for all 3 of them. It was complete pandemonium, but Mom & Dad breathed a huge sigh of relief the next day knowing we got all the birthday parties done for the year in one day! Since the kids were turning 6 and 9, we just sort of shoved a 9/upside down 6 on there. We just hope they're not wishing for another party!

Emma's just a little excited to get to that moment of moments....the opening of the presents!

Exreme slip and slide racing.... we just set everything up in the back yard

We rented this huge inflatable slide. You can get tons of stuff like this from MWR (Morale, Welfare & Recreation, an organization that specializes in entertainment for military families)

Gettin ready for pinata. This is taken from our backyard, you can see the new playground they

installed in the center of sort of a large, shared back yard. It's nice cause they have a playground for about every 10 or 15 houses throughout the complex.

Feel the pinata.......BE the pinata.

Forget Mom & Dad, all this partying just wore Twinkie out! The poor guy recovers

with a little comfort from Andie. Well, it was crazy hosting 8 million kids and you'd think we had a typhoon hit from the massive cleanup underaking, but it was a blast and we can't believe we now have a 9 yr old & two 6 yr olds! That plus our 10th anniversary next month and we're startin to feel.....not as young. That's all right, we're havin' a blast watchin our kids grow up!

Utah trip '08!

2008-07-03T17:26:00.001-07:00

Guam doesn't have a monopoly on fun in the sun, the kids were happy to put on the swimsuits in Utah for a change, with cousin Jaden at the Gateway in Salt Lake.

Our trip to Utah was outstanding for many reasons, the best of course was spending time with family. Here we are with James' fam at Wolf Creek. Pictured w/ Shell are James' parents, his sis Court, and nephew Brandon

We got to spend time with almost all of Shell's fam too (her little bro is in grad school in Ohio and couldn't make it), but everyone else was reunited. Here we are at the entrance of Timp cave.

James' Dad celebrated a birthday up at Wolf Creek. All his kids are pictured: left to right: Mike, Court, Jeff, and James (youngest to oldest).

Shell was way excited to meet her 2 new nephews, who live in Utah but

were born after we moved to Guam. Shell's mom Kathy holds Landon and Memphis

Jordan and uncle Mike up at Gram & Gramp David's in Holladay

Shell's little sister Christy w/ hubby Sterling and Shell's older brother Aaron in the background

The girls with cousin Audrey

Shell w/ James' sister Michelle.

After family, the next best thing about Utah is the mountains! We couldn't get enough, but we tried to go on many different hikes up several canyons around Salt Lake.

Here is Emma up Milcreek canyon.

Mount Olympus is always a great sight to see when we come home. James and his fam grew up at the foothills of this mountain as the Davids have lived here (w/ Jordan pictured here in the front yard), at this home in Holladay for almost 35 years.

On the Timp Cave hike in American Fork Canyon

More of the Timp hike

Andie riding a horse in American Fork. This was at the parent's place of some good friends of ours from Ohio State, Jeremy & Erin Lamb. It was great to see them and many other friends on our trip.

Finally, what's a Utah trip without Lagoon?

Well we can't say enough how amazing our trip back home was. This summer marks half way through our Navy obligation, and after 4 years of grad school in Ohio and 2 of our 4 Navy years in the bag now, it's exciting for us to think that we may be returning to Utah (or at least a neighboring state) for good in just 2 short years. Until then, it'll just have to remain our favorite vacation spot!

Yellowstone / Tetons

2008-07-01T22:45:00.000-07:00

Emma sadly learns what Jessica Simpson still hasn't, that Buffaloes do not have wings...but she still want's em for lunch...with BBQ sauce.

Grandma and Grandpa Patty with most of their grandkids, and some type of wildlife in the background

One of the many rotten-egg smelling steam pots.

Old faithful, strangley reminding us of gas prices.

Michelle K Patty, daughter of Bob & Kathy, is pleased (most of the time) to announce her almost 10 years of marriage to James R David, son of James & Helen David. Reception will be held any night we can get a babysitter, and we would be registered at Target, but since that doesn't exist on Guam, you can just send us cash.

Andie, on her first summit..without oxygen!

Jenny lake, Teton Nat'l Park. We took a boat across the lake, then hiked

a couple miles into the Teton Forest, it was cold, but beautiful.

These pictures are a summary of our Wyoming trip with most of Shell's family. The kids had a blast in Yellowstone. We could've spent a week there but only had one day. We then stayed in Jackson hole and hiked the Tetons. It was a great trip as part of our vacation back home. We're so glad we got to spend so much time with family and it was great Bob got to come up from Houston for this trip.

You can't handle the tooth!

2008-04-12T22:22:00.001-07:00

She lost it and didn't even know it! While swimming yesterday, Andie was showing us how long she could hold her breath under water. She popped up out of the water, smiled and we noticed right away...her tooth that had been loose for days was gone! She and Emma then immediately commenced an underwater search and rescue mission diving to the bottom of the pool over and over to look for it, afraid the tooth fairy wouldn't pay up without the tooth. Well, she paid.

Another Sunday morning ready for church! Actually General conference, which is 1 week delayed from Conference in the states so we can watch it recorded at the usual times. 6 pm priesthood/10am general session etc. The kids are slowly starting to pay a little attention....

It's gonna be on a poster somewhere it's so action packed!

That kid in the purple isn't running for the ball....he's running away

he's so intimidated!

# of goals the other team scored............zero.

# of attempts the other team took at the goal..................zero.

Jordan was a little dissappointed at the lack of action this game,

but he did stop 3 goals a few weeks ago. This was his second run at goalie this year. They rotate the position to every kid on the team.

The famous crossed-leg defensive stance...the other team will never expect it!

Finally, click on the link below to see Andie & Emma in their first dance recital held at kids day yesterday. The video lost some of it's quality on Youtube, but the girls are far left.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4c8wuwMlog

Work, Church, School, Play......

2008-04-02T23:01:00.000-07:00

The new elementary school being completed this summer.
This is taken from our street 3 houses down from our house.

Morning assembly at Mt. Carmel, the Catholic Elementary

where Shell teaches. She often subs many different grades, but

usually works as a teacher's assistant to a Kindergarten class.

Shell's kindergartners. She loves them, but worries too as this and all local schools here are way behind the states. I guess if they're all equally behind and never move off island....

James clinic/office. It's small, but gets the job done.

They finally got the A/C working again after 2 months,

so that makes the day go a little smoother...and the patients a little happier.

Same room, different angle.

Clinic from the outside. The branch clinic is home to

about 3 family physicians, 1 optometrist, a small lab,

x-ray room, pharmacy, and immunizations clinic.

The best part.....it's half mile from our house.

Talisay Branch. This is a beautiful building. It's great

except during a hard rainstorm...it's so loud on the metal

roof you can't hear the sacrament talks......then again.....

Talisay chapel again...it sits up on a hill, there's

a great ocean view and mountain view, and is made up of

several detached small buildings with open hallways inbetween.

Jotrdan's science experiment: He collected water samples from 1)ocean

2) the bay, and 3) an inlet/pond area. We then baked the water jars for

hours and hours until it evaporated, and we measured the salt in each

jar by comparing their weight to the weight of an empty jar.

The inlet water was dirty (center), but you can see the salt in each jar.

Mccool elementary. This was old barracks converted to a school. We're excited for

the new school which is alot nicer....and will be a 30 second walk from home, whereas this is about a 5 minute drive off base, actually just down the street from our church building.

James was able to take the kids to school the other day cause he spent the day there

screening the kids. He's been there several times with a few eye clinic corpsmen seen here, but today was Kindergarten day! About 100 5 year old's is enough for 1 day...but it was fun

But there's always time for play! The kids wanted to make a super-bed for the cats to sleep in.

Surprisingly they loved it as you can see....I guess heat doesn't bother a guam cat!

2008-03-23T03:26:00.000-07:00

The cutest little chef's since Ratatouee

Yeah this Easter Bunny's freaky, but in 95 degree weather....he's also dedicated!

This is a "build your own boat" contest...this one's made of cardboard and duct tape...don't aske, that's just how we do things on Guam. Anyway this was held at Sumay Cove, just a few hundred yards down the hill from our home.

Shell doing Emma's hair and makeup to get ready for school

I took Jordan on our scout camp this last weekend. This was our shelter right on the beach on the east shore of the island. We camped here to claim this spot for the branch activity the following morning. It's a sunrise service held each year the day before Easter, talking about the Resurrection as the sun rises over the ocean. Pictured is Jordan and his friend Jacob

The back view of the same shelter. Most of the year camping on Guam means a night of hot, sticky humidity. But if you're on the east side of the island when the tradewinds come in during Feb-Apr, there's actually a cool breeze all night...wasn't bad at all.

The other cool thing about beach camping Easter weekend is the full moon, here Jordan, Jacob and I do some moonlight swimming/snorkeling. With the full moon it was actually alot lighter than the picture depicts.

Life goes on here. We have the Copeland boys living with us for a couple weeks while their parents are back in the states. The girls have just exploded in their reading ability in the last month. It's great cause they get so excited at their ability it's actually fun for them now.

Shell celebrated her XXst b-day yesterday, which was spent watching Jordan's soccer game, pretty much the Saturday routine this month and next. The word of the week is a tie between 2 words invented by the girls. Emma's "enorgous" and Andie's "hopperflop", describing "very large" and "a bug that hops from one flip-flop to the next", which happened on our walk tonight.

When Shell was cutting up pork the other day, Andie came in and asked if it was werewolf meat.

Other than that.........

Guam monkeys: cute...and clothed!

2008-02-10T02:31:00.000-08:00

Emma loves climbing the tree in our front yard (as do the other kids). She and Andie already had the reputation of being monkeys in human form BEFORE Guam, but something about a tropical island just brings it out even more.
The next 2 pics are at old WWII Japanese cave defenses here on base at Dadi Beach.
Jordan practing away on his guitar. He has sore fingers, but is having alot of fun with it.

Finally, on Friday nighte Andie & Emma had a "girls night in" with Mom and Lanita doing hair, nails while watching Alien vs. Predator.....or maybe it was Barbie:swan princess, which worked for Jordan and Dad cause they went night spear fishing! There is a member of our branch here who lives on a bay in the south and goes out at night with an underwater flashlight and a spear to go fishing. He took Jordan and I and a couple other boys and Dads. It was incredible to be out there, the stars were the brightest I think we'd ever seen, and your 500 yards off shore in the pitch black 20 ft deep water wathching the flashlights below with a snorkel mask. As if Jordan wasn't already in heaven, we then took the fish and fried them up (talk about fresh seafood). We were eating fish at 1 am, and Jordan had about 3 or 4 of them himself. Our camera wasn't working but we'll try to get pictures of it from our friend. That's about it for this week.

Scootin' through another week.

2008-01-19T21:55:00.000-08:00

We haven't posted in a while because it's been a little busier here lately. Shell is working full time for these last 2 weeks, will go down to half time starting next week as a teacher's assistant at a Catholic Elementary School in the area. James was called as YM prez and Asst Scoutmaster, and the kids are fully back in school after Christmas break, while Jordan started soccer and guitar lessons. The girls start dance in a couple weeks. They also like to take their scooters to the bus stop as you can see. Shell and James had their first Scuba class yesterday, held in the pool on base. Jordan will get to join in on the scuba action too his last year here, as 10 is the minimum age.
The second picure is Talofofo Bay, on the eastern side of the island near the waterfall hike we did Christmas eve. Picture 3 shows you why we're all suffering from lack of sleep-the kittens always crawl into our beds at night wanting to play. I think the girls were so tired they actually didn't notice, but they love to pounce Shell for some reason, so she takes the brunt of it.

Finally, a Christmas morning pic, with Jordan showing his enthusiasm for his new skateboard.

There's a great skateboard park just down the street on base here with a halfpipe and ramps for him. The girls take their bikes there too and have a blast. That's about it for now..(thank goodness).

Dreamin of a Wet Christmas??

2007-12-29T02:37:00.000-08:00

No Parachute! Andie jumpin off #3 Waterfall

Jordan & Emma 18 feet down over #4 Waterfall

Jordan w/ 2 friends at Tarzan falls 2 weeks ago

View from top of # 3 Waterfall

Emma & Shell dryin off at the falls

Jordan and his friend Jacob in pool #3

Since we couldn't go sledding, or make a snow angel, we started a new Christmas tradition....jumping off waterfalls! Most of these pictures are from Waterfall Valley, a short hike we took Christmas eve morning to a dense jungle with a series of 4 falls, the 3rd and 4th of which fall into pools deep enough to jump in. It was a blast, but don't worry, it still doesn't beat a white Christmas.

Christmas was great too. The girls love their clip on earings, and Jordan is most excited about his skateboard and Guitar (starts lessons next week).

We hope your Christmas was outstanding. Happy new Year!

Our Humble Abode

2007-12-23T00:41:00.000-08:00

Our first family 5K run!

Kitchen: slightly messy just to irk Shell

Dad's office: yeah right, there is no office, this is girl's room

Jordan's room.

Master Closet; yes the other wall is just out of the picture on the left

In living room looking into Dining area

In entry looking into Living Room

Welcome to our humble residence. It's small, it's government housing, it's 100% tile, but it's home for the next 32 months. We actually don't mind it. The neighborhood's great, there's a park in the backyard, tons of kids, new school going in across the street, and the ocean's 30 seconds away. Hopefully some of you can see it all in person.

Let's see, not a huge week of news....Emma cut one of our kitten's whiskers and hair, Andie had a nasty 24 hr bug, but is fine now, we did our first family 5K run! (the top picture) Jordan ran the whole way in 34 min. Mom stayed back with the girls and had to run with them on her back near the end. They hold races all the time here so i'm sure we'll do more. Also this week, we were able to see THE UTE'S BOWL WIN ON ESPN, even us Guamanians get cable and thus were able to see the big game! (oh yeah, BYU won too). The kids are ready for Christmas, but Santa's definately gotta ditch the red coat if he's coming here.

Growin' Gills

2007-12-06T23:58:00.000-08:00

With all the time the kids spend in the water, gills will probably sprout anyday. Of course playin in the water is pretty much all there is to do here (at our hotel when we first got here and at Spanish Steps beach below)....comfortably. Sure you can go bikeriding, or just run around out on the playground, but in constant 90 degree heat and 400% humidity, you basically need an IV and a gallon of water when you come back inside. The kids are adapting pretty well though. The Navy housing here actually considers it an emergency if your A/C goes out. We lost ours a couple weeks ago, but they had to respond within 2 hours.....it was a long 2 hours!

Guam's got nothin on this!

2007-12-06T02:52:00.000-08:00

Yes, we've talked up Guam on our previous blogs, but don't get us wrong. Even with the snorkeling and lush greenery, it can't compare to Utah. To say we miss the mountains would be an understatement. These pics are from Little Cottonwood and Milcreek hikes. Of course we miss family and friends most of all. As the year comes to a close, we have to say the highlight of 2007 was our trip back home to Utah in August. We had a nice long trip there, but it wasn't long enough. We are hoping we can pull a miracle with these military flight schedules and possibly return this summer. Until then.......

Hot enough for ya??

2007-12-06T02:10:00.000-08:00

November, January, July, it doesn't matter, it's ALWAYS hot here. The first picture is a family photo attempt that didn't quite make the final cut for the Christmas card because it was so hot and bright (taken at a beach here on base). Pic #2 is the kids keepin cool at Spanish steps.

Remembering Grandpa

2007-11-27T02:59:00.001-08:00

We are so grateful we could make the trip back to Utah in August for many reasons, especially because we got to see Grandpa for what turned out to be the last time. (Pictured here w/ Grandma, Jeff Rowell, Dad and Uncle Lynn). Grandpa David passed away last week in Salt Lake City. This picture was taken at what was probably the biggest, and first in a long time, David family reunion. We are so grateful we all got to be together for this and that he could see his whole family together. When I think about Grandpa, I remember the great times like golfing with he and Dad and Jeff, running to his house for breakfast on Saturday mornings, but I also can't help but being reminded of him just by being here. Over 60 years ago Grandpa too was sent by the Navy to the South Pacific, but his experience was far different. Because of him and thousands of other sailors serving in such dangerous circumstances, I can bring my family here to a peaceful island paradise, a free island (which for 4 years of WWII was occupied by the Japanese under pretty horrific conditions). Grandpa, we thank you for your service to this country, but we'll remember you for your sense of humor, your love of sports (go Utes!), but most of all your love for all of us. We'll miss you Grandpa!

Swimsuits and pajamas....all you need!

2007-11-27T02:43:00.000-08:00

From June in Virginia to August in Utah continuing through November and beyond in Guam, it's one long summer for the kids. I don't think they realize they may not feel cold until 2010, but they're enjoying it now. The girls are pretty much professional dog paddlers, but they're slowly learning to swim, and it's even easier w/ fins and a snorkel! We had so much fun seeing everyone in Utah this August too, and wanted to put a picture of that up. More pics of our Utah trip coming soon. Despite the warm weather here, one thing that does not feel summer like is the early sunset. It's dark here in Guam by 6:15 every night, all year round, so outdoor play can be cut short, especially on a weekday. One of the many little things we're getting used to.

2 additions to our family.....again!

2007-11-26T02:55:00.000-08:00

Thankfully this round of double family addition is a little easier adapting to than the famous 2002 fiasco! Yep, instead of twins, we brought 2 kittens into our family. Twinkie is the orange one being held by Emma, and his sister Daisy is being held by Andie. Yes there are midnight feedings and expensive formula, but, like any family, the key is pawning the work off on the "older" kids! Actually they love the kittens, probably too much. Either they'll grow up to be very people friendly cats, or they'll become the anitsocial felines of death! (like Smoke)

WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

2007-11-26T02:36:00.000-08:00

This is a crazy hike that starts down a cliff with steps carved out of the rock by the Spanish when they settled the island. You go from cliff, to the thick jungle seen here, to a beautiful lagoon with some incredible snorkeling. You can't help but feel like Indiana Jones on this one with all the spiders and creatures. This is also only 2 miles from our home on the base! Speaking of our home, we finally moved in 2 months after arriving and it's small but we have our stuff back! When the kids opened their own stuff again after 3 months of seperation it was like Christmas. The kids are really enjoying living here. There's a playground in our backyard, tons of kids, and we're a mile from a great beach. Dad's favorite part was being able to buy a grill, and know he can comfortably use it 365 days a year.

First Day of School/Jordan saving the day

2007-11-26T02:19:00.001-08:00

As if the kids didn't have enough changes recently, the girls also entered the world of school by starting Kindergarten a few days after arriving on the island. Kindergarten here is all day too, which according to Emma is way too long. Mom, with her newfound freedom however, thinks it's just about right! Jordan is the big 3rd grader now, but still has time to capture giant hermit crabs for the good of all mankind.

A little taste of Utah???

2007-11-25T03:38:00.000-08:00

This was our first "hike" on Guam, which actually has decent mountains. It's different from Utah hiking; think more thick jungle, bigger spiders, and alot more sweating! Hiking and mountain biking are big here though. Its so fun to be hiking and run into a spider web the size of Oregon and a banana spider as big as your fist. Whaoooohooo! We just love that!! (as Andie and Emma would put it, Sick!) The kids love all the creatures of the outdoors here. Every night at dusk there are are tons of frogs in the yard and everywhere. Frogs: cool, Boonie Bees: not cool. They are large, aggressive little stinks, Jordan got stung 3 times last week. So if they make a "Bee Movie" about Guam bees it'll be Jack Nicholson, not Jerry Seinfeld doing the voice!

You live where??

2007-11-25T02:23:00.000-08:00

We arrived on Guam Aug 27th. This was the view from our first hotel room, overlooking Tumon Bay, the vacation hotspot on the island. The water is only about 2-3 ft deep for about 200 yards, so it looked like people were walking on water because they were so far out. We wanted our main photo to be of the water because that's our favorite part of Guam so far. It's warm, clear, and we've had a blast as a family swimming and snorkeling, and as Jordan puts it, looking down into the Marianas trench for undiscovered sea creatures! Even the girls have learned how to snorkel, and we've seen starfish, crabs, octopus, and a bunch of fish. Being the only non-Japanese at the Hotel was fun too, except our breakfast buffet featured more squid than sausage (guess which family member was good with that!), all part of the adventure we guess.