Family: Isn't It About Time?

It was that time of year again. The second week of August brings forth the Madsen Family Reunion. This year we were lucky enough to have the reunion up in Heber at a church owned sight.

When we got there we headed to the ropes course. We didn't get any pictures of it, but we swung on ropes, balanced on wires, and went on a high swing. The swing was admittedly the best part, and although I was a bit chicken at first to go on it since it looked a little high, I braved my fears and swung. The same cannot be said for everyone in our family.

After the rope swing we went to the campsite where the oldest grandkids talked about grandpa. We all loved this part, as it was a great opportunity to reflect on the man that grandpa was. What amazing people grandma and grandpa madsen are.


Later that day we headed to the lake to do some canoeing and paddle boating. The lady in charge of paddle boats told me no teenagers could ride and dejected I started to walk away. Then I rembembered, I'm 20! There's no teen in that. What a wonderful discovery. In the paddle boat I was joined by Cassidy and Mom. Cassidy was against all three of us getting in the same boat since one of us wouldn't get to paddle. Once realization sunk in of the circumstances surrounding that statement, she was quick to volunteer herself for nonpaddling duties. Lazy, smart bum.

Everyone else in the family was in canoes. We witnessed a race in which Parker tried to row so fast he succeeded in getting his parter, Tanner, thoroughly soaked. Somebody should probably teach him how to row. Until then you've been warned to not get in the canoe with him. After we played some horseshoes and Brandon showed us all why he is the king of horseshoes, destroying all competition.

Look at her just basking in the sun

We had a fun-filled day with all the family and after bidding fond goodbyes we were on our way, squishing four people in the backseat. I volunteered to drive both ways so I successfully avoided that. While driving down the twisty mountain we discovered Brandon and Shelby were in front of us. Being the strange people they are they thought if they stuck their arms out the window, their car would take flight. Sad to say they failed. But we all rewarded them with their efforts by stopping at Granny's for some shakes. Boy was the place little, and packed. A sure sign of.. something I'm sure. We opted to eat outside to avoid the crowds. Mom investigated the house for us and provided a thorough description of the condition of the bathroom. Suffice it to say, I don't believe the workers there are properly trained in cleaning bathrooms.

And one amusing story before I go, to tide you over till the next time someone posts. I came home from Vegas two Sundays ago and was a bit out of it (Shelby can confirm to that). While grabbing a snack I saw a small mound of bubbles forming under the dishwasher. I chose to ignore it. After all, I had nothing to do with it and I was tired, plus I figured the solution would resolve itself. However, on returning for another snack (I was a bit naseous from the bus and airplane ride ok) I discovered the mounds were becoming bigger. This time I dutifully sounded the alarm by telling mom there were bubbles. She didn't believe me at first, but finally came to see for herself. We turned off the dishwasher and decided Tanner must be the culprit. Tanner came upstairs and pointed out what he had put in the dishwasher, which was the liquid dishwashing soap, not dishwasher soap. Because of that our dishwasher was now full of bubbles and Tanner was the lucky one who got to clean it out. We tried to muffle our laughter for Tanner's pride's sake, but sometimes it would escape and we'd get bubbles to the face for our carelessness. Some people are just so touchy.

Trying to force Tanner to get in the picture

Also one more random thing. It was recently Daniel's picture so here are a few pictures from that. Also happy birthday to Makana! I hope it was a wonderful day.

Cute newlyweds!

Oh Say Can you See

This fourth of July was rocking. We made our way to Pepperwood to get free breakfast. What a breakfast it was. Donuts, sausage, and bacon, all a fat baby could want. Some of us opted out of breakfast and instead took four capri suns to drink. I'm pretty sure that's what we were supposed to do.

Others that risked the breakfast felt it was necessary to exercise by playing tennis. And play we did, for TWO hours. If you weren't aware tennis apparently is the "it" thing in our family now thanks to Lexi and PK. Everyone had a fun time playing and Daniel and Tanner were caught in a fierce two hour battle. Little side joke that I feel is appropriate at this time.
Dad: Lexi likes tennis so much she was watching Wimbledon when I left this morning.
Cass: Who is Wimbledon?
Tanner: Did she just?
Me: Yes
If you don't get this joke, like a surprising amount of people (including Lexi), ask the next person you see what the Wimbledon is.. not who.

See this bench? Yeah this is where I resided for most of the two hours. But don't worry I did teach the young ones a thing or two about how to hold a racket correctly.


After enduring, I mean enjoying, tennis we got to play sand volleyball! My team won all three times. Less you begin to think that it was because of me we won I'll let you in on a secret. Parker was on my team. We all know there is no way anyone can lose with him on your team. Try it. I dare you. Daniel wanted vengeance, but every demanded rematch his team would lose. Just swap your little wifey for PK, Daniel and you'll be good to go.


TRADITION!

This is right before embarassment struck for Daniel

On Monday we had fun blowing up fireworks. Parker put army men on all the rockets to see what would happen when they were lit, while I was a mature twenty year old and threw snaps at Tanner's head, laughing in delight each time one exploded, and Lexi danced around in smoke coming from the smoke bombs. Keep in mind when looking at these pictures, we get weird when fire is involved.

In other news, TDF has begun, meaning dad is glued to the TV for the next three weeks. If you don't know what the acronym TDF stands for, don't worry you weren't the only one. I'll give you a hint. It occurs once a year and involves bikes. Speaking of obsessions, mom believes that Glenn Beck is her secret boyfriend. In more meaningful news Lexi was really brave this past week and gave her friend, Jordan, a Book of Mormon with her testimony written inside. She is a great example to the rest of us. Hopefully we can all take the challenge to preach the gospel. You'll have to call her and have her tell you what she wrote.

Well to start off the Summer we got a 2 week pass to Lifetime Fitness. Mom tried very hard to get us to go every day. The first step was Rock Climbing. Wahoo!! Yay for Rock Climbing! Parker was the champ at it. I think he creamed each of us. He even got to do the rope one too. We would race each other over and over again, until our arms ached.

Next was Raquetball. Gotta admit, really exciting and fun sport! And we even got an action shot of Parker about to hit Tanner smack on. Ouch. Mom was the best at it, and killed everyone that tried to play her. She was a monster! Well, now we're all sad, because are pass has ended. Now what are we going to do?

Graduation and birthdays, June sure is the best month

Let's be honest with each other for just a second. If you had to choose your favorite month it'd be June right? Of course right. Who doesn't like the letting out of school and the beginning of summer? Not to mention all the other exciting things that happen. To start out this fantastic month of June Tanner graduated! (Feel free at this point to breath a sigh of relief you've been waiting to breath for three years). His principal made us regret ever thinking about even going to the ceremony, as he bored us with his speech for forty-five minutes. However, it was a great ceremony and Tanner, being the SBO he is, got to sit up front and look important. Because of that his name was read last, so poor Shelby and Brandon sat through all the speakers but had to leave before Tanner's name was read. After the ceremony we rewarded ourselves for surviving by heading to Brickoven to eat some tasty pizza. Here Tanner is looking quite dignified in his cap and gown.

Look at how excited he is. He can smell the freedom awaiting him.

After Tanner's graduation the next big event was my (Kelsi's) Birthday. Sadly, it was on a Fast Sunday, but boy was it still a fun day. The married ones were kind enough to come home and share my special day with me. On Saturday night to celebrate we all gathered around to watch the original Winnie the Pooh. If you are a Hansen and still haven't seen it, we can change that. Unless of course your name is Makana and you hate happiness, I mean Pooh. My birthday was a fantastic day overall filled with family and longings to eat. We also had Tanner's scavenger hunt. Lucky boy found money in a hollow turtle. Who would've thought.

Then six days later came JD's blessed day. We weren't there to celebrate it but I'm sure it was just as wonderful. A happy June birthday to you JD. You're awesome and that's why your birthday is in June. Hopefully the newest addition to the family will come in June to add one more reason that June is the best. Peace out from So Jo, the most righteous city in the world.

He is ready to parT.

As you can see we had a model of dad's head matted on the wall in honor for father's day.


I blew them out in the first try. Bet you can't guess what I wished for. Also look at my cake. My brother-in-laws made that for me and it says Happy Birthday Kelsi. I have great in-laws.

For Memorial Day we decided that we hadn't gone hiking for quite some time and being the adventurous family that we are we decided that it would be a great activity. So we toted all us up there, ninth month pregnant woman included. Despite her protests that she would birth her baby while hiking, Shelby was a good sport and beat everyone up and down the mountain. We all looked like fools. The place we hiked at was the same place we went to everytime when we were little. Everything was the same, except for the millions of bikers there that would run us off the trail every second. Darn people who think they have to exercise all the time. We ate lunch by the river for traditions sake, and Tanner pushed Brandon into the river. We'll miss him. Afterwards we came home and had a barbeque.


The river there was gorgeous! Breath-taking!

Where'd Lexi go? Oh no! Can anyone find her?

Going mountain climbing on Memorial Day with the Family.

What are you doing Brandon? Ha-Ha. Pointing at what?

Cassidy's wonderful surprise party for her birthday! How fun! We went over to Daniel's to surprise her and came back here and ate cake and ice cream!






Kelsi's gift she was given from Cassidy. Pictures from Russia, and Cassidy also painted a picture of a building down in Russia.
Then Cassidy got a cute dress and a purse/bag from Shelby and Brandon, which they made.

Here we are right after a Easter Egg Hunt, with all the candy we found! YUM! We love candy! But most of all we love going to find it all in the back yard!





Then here we are at Grandma's house for the Sunday session of General Conference. Everyone came down and we ate lunch and watched General Conference. We had lots of fun. But look at Daniel's big foot in the way!













Here we are on April Fools day. Of course, mom is the little prankster and I'm sure she got everyone in the entire family. Well, to start the day off she makes cardboard pancakes that Parker and Tanner fell for. Then everyone fell for the salt on the toothbrushes, except Lexi because I was gone. (: HA! Then in the toilet it read, "You soon will be flushed with cash." No one wanted to go potty. So Tanner flushed all the toilets before so he'd know it'd be safe to go. Then realized it was a nice joke and that there was money in the toilet paper. At dinner, surprisingly there wasn't anything disgusting. It was actually good! But April Fools day as we all know is probably mom's most favorite day of the year!































Having a blast bowling!!! We love to bowl!! Tanner got first, 2nd: Parker, 3rd: mom, and last, the best of all the game was Lexi! Wahoo!! Go team Hansen!! We did awesome!!





















Look how cute Tanner is right before he's going on a date. So handsome!
Awe, look at that cute green family of ours. This was on St. Patrick's day eating a wonderfully prepared dinner by mother. Like always she prepares ALL green dinner, which we love! Mmm... It was delicious! Cass made these amazing, yummy rainbow cupcakes! They were rainbows with clouds on top of them!! Just like the gold underneath the rainbow!! Everything was very yummy! Oh, and mom was taking a video and she didn't even know it!! Ha-Ha, funny stuff! (: