The Davidson Family

End of Another School Year and Birthdays!

2011-06-16T16:36:00.000-07:00

Well we have survived another year of school in the Davidson household (Even though I had the year off, I ended up teaching full-time in the last two weeks. ;) ) Ashlynn had a wonderful year in Kindergarten. She made a lot of friends and learned a lot from her teacher Mrs. Rustici. I am so glad that we decided to keep her in the neighborhood school where we used to live. It might be a little out of the way, but it is so worth it. Ashlynn has had such an exciting year of learning, discovery, and many eventful field trips. I know that she will probably always remember this year as one of her favorites.

The Kindergarten students put on a special Mother's Day concert. They added a couple Father's Day songs in at the end for all of the dads. The teachers really went out of their way to make a memorable year for the students.

Our kids really love their uncle Eric.

Ashlynn's birthday party was Hello Kitty themed. We had a lot of fun with family and friends. The kids enjoyed getting wet in the pool, squirting each other with water guns and surprising each other with a splash from a water balloon. We found out just how many kids our little pool could really hold.

Inside the kids all helped Ashlynn open her presents. Everyone wanted to help so we ended up taking turns and having one person at a time hand Ashlynn presents. Our house became almost to quiet after everyone left. We love having big parties at our house and love the sound of all of the children running and laughing.

Last Day of School

Warren's little preschool group met a couple times a week in the mornings for a couple of hours. Even though he started attending at the tail end of the year he learned so much from his teacher. He loved going to Mrs. McRae's house. Thanks Afie! I have never heard the kid say so much than when shared everything that he learned during the day!

Ashlynn's last day of school. They were almost not allowed to go because they both had pink eye over the weekend and at the beginning of the week. I am so thankful for the prescription drops that cleared up their eyes so that they could go. My mom actually took the kids on the last day of school to all of their festivities. Richard and I both had to work during the day, so Grandma was able to share the day with the kids.

My Grandparents came into town the same week as Richard, Ashlynn and my birthdays. It was so nice to be able to visit with them.

Oh yeah and I turned the big 30 this year! I still don't feel that old and am just enjoying where I am in life being a wife and mother.

Ice Cream cakes are the best!

Easter

2011-06-16T15:51:00.000-07:00

I have to start my updating all the way back in April. Ashlynn friend had an egg hunt just before Easter Sunday. The kids and I have been able to go for the past few years and always have fun. My friend always has activities and egg dying for the kids. She is so creative. For Easter the "Easter Bunny" came in the morning. We then had a real hunt had in the backyard. No more hiding the eggs inside the tiny living room. The kids had a great time searching the yard for the eggs. Richard really got into playing Easter Bunny and hiding them. We later went to my aunt's house and had a nice family dinner.
Having memories like these give me time to reflect on what is truly important in life and what my true blessings are. I thank Heavenly Father every day for my wonderful family and people the people in our lives. We are truly blessed.

What have we been up to

2011-04-17T23:00:00.000-07:00

I made Ashlynn a fun play dress for school. She loves it. It was a nice change from all of the pants and shorts that she wears. Just a few days ago Ashlynn class along with a few other classes from her school went on a field trip to the Pima County Fair. She was able to make a jump rope, see farm animals, drive a remote controlled train, watch a shark show and so much more. She and I had a wonderful time.

The kids have a swing set!!!! My parents gave the kids a swing set for their birthdays. We spent the day putting in together and finish just before we had to start the bedtime routine.

Warren turns 4!!!

2011-04-17T22:44:00.000-07:00

Warren turned 4 this year! I am so proud of my big boy, he is such a joy to be around. Warren is your typical boy that loves sports, teasing his big sister, laughing, telling jokes, superheros, and being happy.

This year he told us that he wanted a Star Wars Birthday, so that is what we did. We had planned a nice, big outdoor party with family and friends to share this birthday boy's big day. Well as it turned out, the day of the party was the only day so far in April or the end of March to be cold and rainy. Needless to say we all ended up a little crowded in the house. Warren had a blast playing with friends and cousins. The pictures below are from his party and his actual birthday. Warren wanted to go to Taco Bell and play at the mall on his birthday.

Warren picked out this game at the store. It a Star Wars version of pin the tail on the donkey. All of the kids had a turn and even a couple parents.

Oh my gosh...

2011-03-28T18:12:00.000-07:00

I have not been updating the blog very well this year or taking very many pictures. I really need to change that. This post will be an update to now. I can't believe that we are almost in April. Enjoy some of our moments this year so far...

This picture was actually taken back in the fall at a Tucson Unified School District Day at the Zoo. We had a lot of fun, but it was full of people young and old throughout the district. We found Ashlynn's school's booth next to the Zebras.

I love this picture because it is one of those moments that makes me proud to be their mom. They are such best friends.

This is Warren and my cousin Jacob.

This is my uncle John and Ashlynn.

This beautiful cake was made by my cousin Jessica, she has such great talent. This cake actually is designed from an ornament. I'm so jealous of her talent.

We went to Heather and Jeff's house to decorate gingerbread houses. This was a fun night for everyone. The kids had a lot of fun putting all of the candies on the houses.

We tried to use all of our lights this year on the house. It was nice to be in a place that we could decorate again. Warren and Richard are in the picture too.

More to come because I have a lot of pictures to go through.

Goodbye 2010 and Hello 2011!!

2011-01-01T18:32:00.000-08:00

Let see...

In October we had Woody and a purple fairy at our house for Halloween. We also hosted a party with a few close friends of ours and had a blast. The kids enjoyed playing games at Ashlynn's school too.

In November, we said goodbye to cross country season and had a small awards ceremony. It was very nice and Ashlynn is showing her medal in the picture above.

Day after Thanksgiving we put up our Christmas decorations. I let the kids put on all of the ornaments and they did pretty well. We did have to rearrange some of Warren's ornaments.

More to come. These are all of the pictures that I had on the computer.

Busy, Busy, Busy...

2010-10-17T18:20:00.000-07:00

A lot has happened this week.
Lately, I have been somewhat busy with one of my new projects which is food storage. It is something that I have always felt important in my life, but now close to home because we have had to use ours out of necessity.
Anyway, I became a consultant, something that I said I would never do, for Shelf Reliance. So far it is slow starting, but I am signed on for vendor fairs and have started having parties.
My next project started this week, I became the librarian at Ashlynn's school. I get paid to be surrounded by children's books and students twice a week. I can't be more excited. Ashlynn is pretty excited to have her mom employed at her school again. So far I have just been volunteering in her class. And last, but not least, my new calling. I just became the 1st counselor in the primary. I guess the Lord has answered my prayers full circle, in wanting to be close to my children and work with other children.
I will still substitute teach once or twice a week.

Richard has finally finished retraining at the Rail Road. He is on an extra board. This just means he actually works when others call in and he is paid for being available 24/7. He is also working hard in his classes at Pima. They are all online so that he can stay home if he needs to or work.

Ashlynn is doing well in school and has a new love. She is running in a school cross country group. The TUSD schools get together in the fall and have cross country meets every week. She has already shown great improvement from one meet to the other. This last meet she was 101 in about 200 girls, K-5 grade together.

Warren is doing great, when I am home we try have some preschool time. He is willing at times and at others not so much. He loves going to sister's class and participating during the morning routine. He is making many new friends in his nursery class. There are a few boys in his class that he really gets along with.

This week we have finished putting up our Halloween decorations on the front of the house. Most of them came from previous years so we really didn't buy any, as we have in the past. In the process Ashlynn has decided on being a fairy and Warren told us that he wants to be Woody from ToyStory. I love how the older the kids get the more they are involved in the holidays that are coming. I can't wait for Thanksgiving and Christmas at this rate.
My brother also had his Court of Honor this past Friday. There is an Eagle Scout in the family. I am really proud of him. He is really involved with being a freshman at the UofA.

As a family we are having a lot of fun and trying to stay busy. I hope that everyone is having a great time being alive as well.

Various pictures of events that have happened recently! Enjoy!

2010-09-27T21:09:00.000-07:00

This is a picture of Ashlynn taken down in St. David helping make tamales. She loved being a part of the process this year. We actually made quite a larger number of tamales from the small amount of corn that we had. We had a nice visit with Grandma and Grandpa Davidson and Grandma Burns.

Warren and Ashlynn were rockin' out in the living room and Daddy got a picture of it. Down below Warren is trying on his new helmet and pads before riding his bike for the first time.

Before we launched rockets this last time, we bought one for each kid. They were thrilled to make there own rockets. We sat down at the dinner table the night before the launch and built about four rockets. Ashlynn was able to color hers. For those of you that don't know we launch rockets a few times a year out past the Desert Museum, in the middle of nowhere. It's always a lot of fun and the kids are really getting into it with Richard, my Dad and I. My cousin, Jacob, even comes out with us.

This was such I sweet moment I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to take a picture. My sweet boy.

Ashlynn is involved with a cross country running club at school and is having a blast. She is actually performing quite well and is taking it seriously.

We have started painting the house. We started with the living room. For now it will stay white. Choosing paint colors with a person that mixed paint for five years is not easy. It looks a lot nicer in the living room. We have plans for the kids rooms next. Warren wants "Cars" red and Ashlynn wants "Disney Princess" pink.

Miss Lillian was blessed on Sunday and they came over to spend some time with family. We enjoyed having one of our first family parties at the house. Warren wanted to hold Lillian so bad and then kind of changed his mind when she started crying.

As you can see we have been trying keep ourselves busy. :)
Love,
Richard Beth Ashlynn and Warren

We have moved!

2010-09-07T12:15:00.000-07:00

We had a pretty relaxing summer until the end. We ended our summer with Ashlynn going into Kindergarten, Richard going back to the Railroad and moving into a house.
Ashlynn has loved going back to school. We are so blessed to have children that love to learn and want to go to school. She is doing so well and loves to help her teacher. This week will already be her third and she excitedly wakes up every morning to go to school. We do miss her during the day.
Prayers have been answered and for now Richard is back to working with the Railroad. It's like he wasn't ever furloughed. I think that they miss him over at AutoZone. He has already taken classes, and been out on the road three times.
Warren is enjoying the time that he can spend at home with Mom and Dad. We are looking for a preschool that he can attend. I have enjoyed spending one on one time with Warren. He is a very active and talkative little boy when sister is at school.
As for me, I have become a substitute again. Although, with the move I have not taken a lot of jobs. I like staying home, but we don't know how long Richard work at the Railroad will last. The slow season for the Railroad is coming. Until I can start working more I am just enjoying the time I have at home to spend with Warren and getting settled in.
As far as moving, we moved into Richard's Grandma's house. We moved in at the end of August. The kids now have a yard to play in and we do not have to share walls or roofs with our neighbors. It has been the best. Moving Ruth's things out and moving our stuff has been quite the challenge, but we are starting to feel somewhat settled. Pictures are to come of the progress.
We hope that everyone had a wonderful and safe Labor Day Weekend!
Love,
The Davidson Family

2010-06-08T09:46:00.000-07:00

Wow, a lot has happened since I last posted. I resigned from my teaching position at Tucson Country Day School and, after what I have been through, I did not think twice about it afterward. I prayed a lot about it and came to the conclusion that I needed to do what was best for my family. I plan to sub in the fall and volunteer in Ashlynn's classroom. I am having a great summer so far with birthdays, graduations (Congrats again to Eric and Chelsea), family visiting, and being a full-time mommy.

Richard had his first semester of college this past spring. He found it took a lot more time than he thought. He realized that he would like to take a few more in class classes this year and not all online classes. He is working a lot this summer, but we still see him more than we did this past school year. He is such a strength to this family and keeps me grounded.

Ashlynn graduated from preschool this year. She can't wait to be in Kindergarten. I love the fact that she wants to be in school and learn so much. I am proud of my smart and beautiful 5 year old. Ashlynn had her 5th birthday and shared the day with lots of friends and some family. The day after this she lost her 1st tooth. What an exciting time for her.

Warren is happy to have his sister at home all of the time. He has a playmate a lot closer to his age now. He is talking and showing his personality more and more everyday. He loves the library and wishes that he could take all of the books home every visit. We have gone to the storytime there and he just loves the stories and songs. He is such a lively person with happiness at every turn.

Our summer has been full of reading, spending time with family, movies, and lots of fun.
Our family has our ups and downs, but with the Lord all things are possible. I truly believe this. Well, I guess that's it for now. Here are some pictures to show what we have been up to.
Love,
Beth, Richard, Ashlynn, and Warren

2010-03-31T09:17:00.000-07:00

I haven't been on here in a long time. I wanted to spend my Spring Break catching up on other things that have been neglected. One of them being my house and the other the blog. I am putting up some pictures that will let you see some of the things that we have been doing in the beginning of 2010. Went went to my twin cousins 16th birthday party, have had some fun at home, and at the bottom are a few pictures from Warren's Birthday Party. My cousin Jessica is the cake decorator. Warren was so excited for Cousin Jessica to make his cake. Once the cakes came that is all he wanted.

The twins and their cake up above.

I love taking pictures of sunsets. This is just one of my latest. I took when we showed the scouts dutch oven cooking.

Winter Wonderland!

2010-01-08T19:14:00.000-08:00

At the end of my Winter Break we drove up Mt. Lemmon and played in the snow! The kids had a wonderful time. The pictures will come later... I don't remember where I put the camera at this moment.
Beth

Christmas!!

2009-12-30T07:27:00.000-08:00

This Christmas has been filled many blessings and gratitude. Thank you all. We were able to spend a lot of time with my family this year. We did miss spending time with most of Richard's family. We did have the chance to spend time with Heather, Jeff, Chris and Emily Christmas evening. The kids all had a blast playing with each other. I know that Richard and I had a nice time just being with family.
This is a picture that we took after church on the Sunday before Christmas.

We also took our annual family photo. Warren didn't want to be in another picture so much.

I just had to add this picture of Ashlynn and Richard.

Warren really got into opening his presents and finding out what was coming next.

Ashlynn always had this look on her face when I took her picture. It was a good look of shock, she seemed to really like her presents.

Warren loved his Bat Cave that my parents bought for him. I have found him many times since Christmas in his room playing with the Bat Cave.

Ashlynn testing out her new hoola-hoop at Grandma and Grandpa Anderson's house.

What's goin' on?!?

2009-12-07T20:09:00.000-08:00

Lately our family has been really busy or sick. The flu, a couple of colds and some tummy bugs have hit our family. Now that that has settled I thought that I would play with the blog. The following pictures are from Ashlynn's Preschool/Pre.K. performance, my brother Nick's visit for Thanksgiving and our Tree. My student's will be reading poetry this week and Ashlynn will have a pajama day at school. Richard is working hard and only hears from the Railroad every now and then. Ashlynn is really growing up fast. She loves being popular at school and I can't keep track of all her little boy friends. Warren is so curious and full of energy. Sometimes I think he stays up all night and plays in his room. No not really, but it feels like it at times. I don't think I have ever seen so many Thomas the Train cartoons in my life.

Halloween!!

2009-11-01T19:17:00.000-08:00

Ashlynn was a pink pirate.

Warren was a firefighter.

We had a fun night trick or treating in a neighborhood near Grandma and Grandpa Anderson's house. The kids really enjoyed going from house to house and getting more candy.

Update

2009-10-10T17:27:00.000-07:00

There is not a lot new in our life. I realized that I should update the blog more often. I love this! I hope that you like the music while you are looking at pictures. The music in our blog is chosen very carefully and it may not make sense to you, but it means so much to us. I hope everyone is doing well during these times.

Apple Annie's!

2009-10-10T16:23:00.001-07:00

Today we went to Apple Annie's and pick out some really great pumpkins. The kids had a blast. Warren and Ashlynn both wanted to carry their pumpkins to the cashier, but all we heard was "Mom too heavy."

2009-09-30T14:14:00.000-07:00

Well it's been a couple weeks again so I guess we should update. There hasn't been much new going on in our lives. We did have a good time going down to Benson to get together with the fam to see Vance off. We forgot our camera so no pics from us but some were taken by Vance and are on facebook. Ashlynn has been having a great time learning Spanish in school. I was able to go volunteer in her class last week for food tasting. they learned about the food pyramid and on each day had different foods to try. We took hard boiled eggs. The kids loved peeling them but not eating them. Well I don't have much else to say so see ya when I see ya.

RD

Tracy's Buggin Us

2009-09-14T12:10:00.000-07:00

Well when we first started this blog we warned you that we were bad at this. So here I am typing that We will try harder to post something. Tracy cornered me on face book and said we should post daily. I think it will be more like weekly or monthly but we'll try.

To catch up from the last few months. I was called to be the Scoutmaster and got to spend a week at camp Lawton on Mt. Lemmon. I really enjoy working with the boys. Beth has started back to school. She is teaching 5th grade. Ashlynn is having a great time in Pre-K. She didn't get in the class with all her friends but has made many new ones this year. We figure by the time she's in high school she'll be the most popular kid in Tucson.
Warren is doing great he loves the fact that he can stay home with daddy. That about sums it up. Hope you all are well. Live long a prosper. Hann Til Ragnaroks. Peace favor your sword. May you find shade and water. See ya.

Random pictures

2009-06-16T13:02:00.000-07:00

2009-06-04T15:13:00.000-07:00

Richard and Beth Davidson
August 8, 2002
Mesa Arizona Temple
This is our start. We met at the Institute on the University of Arizona campus. Richard and I both sang in the Institute Chorale. Only a couple years later we were married for Time and All Eternity. Now we have two wonderful children, Ashlynn and Warren.

Family pictures

2009-06-04T13:37:00.000-07:00

May 30th and 31st- We had family down our way because of a funeral for Richard's grandma. Here are some pictures that we took that weekend. We had a wonderful time seeing everyone and always look forward to spending time with our family.
Some of the kids climbed on Ashlynn's bunk bed and had a party. I think the group picture looks pretty good considering how many people are in it. All eight siblings!

Ashlynn's Preschool Performance

2009-06-04T09:23:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures of Ashlynn during her preschool graduation performance. We now have a Pre-K'er. (Pre-Kindergarten student) She can't wait to go back to school. I hope this attitude towards school stays. For weeks Ashlynn sang all of the songs around the house and in the car for the performance. In the alphabet song she was the letter D. Then the kids sang different patriotic songs.

2009-06-04T07:36:00.000-07:00

We went camping in the Chiricahuas at the end of April. We did not stay very long, but had a lot of fun while we were there. We found an area that was near the top of the mountain and all to our selves.

Ashlynn is an egg

2009-03-26T22:57:00.001-07:00

Well Beth and I both are not very good at doing this. I'm gonna try a little harder.

So today was Ashlynn's preschool performance. They did a Skit based on the book 'The Hungry Caterpiller'. It was pretty cute. I'll see if I can get the video uploaded or something. other than that our lives are the same just work and school. Well I've run out of stuff to say. So I'll post some more later.

RD

We have jumped on the blog bandwagon.

2008-12-27T20:28:00.000-08:00

I am going to try very hard to maintain this blog. I am not good at sending letters or pictures. I hope that this somewhat makes up for it.