Merry Christmas 2012

 

 

Merry Christmas 2012

   As this this year comes to a close, we wanted to take the opportunity to wish our family and friends a Merry Christmas. What an awesome time of the year, to reflect on the Birth of our Savior and look upon his life. We have been blessed this last year and would like to share some of our happenings with you.

   This year Joy had her Eighth Birthday on March 10 and was baptized by her father. Also on this day, Lewis was blessed. We had a lot of family and friends in attendance and had a great time visiting with all those that came for this event.

   Our next adventure came in the month of May, when Dale and Amanda went to the Bahamas as reward from Home Depot for the great performance of his store. While in the Bahamas, we had the opportunity to attend church. This was an awesome experience and a chance for us to see the culture outside of the resort. While in the Bahamas we snorkeled, parasailed, played on the beach, went to the water park, took a tour of the downtown, toured the aquariums, and ate some great food. We loved the seafood, which included grouper, conk, red snapper, and lobster. We enjoyed fried plantains, pineapple upside down spice cake, and mango sorbet. We are grateful to Grandma Bjarnson, Flint and Jan, and Sam and Sarah, Isaac and Jenny, the Sullivans and Ruddys for watching our kids.

   In May, Joy competed in the 1 mile fun run at school. Joy did an amazing job and was first place among the girls she competed against in her school with a time of 7 minutes 56 seconds. We finished off the month with a trip to Mesa for Cooper Rogers’ baptism. What a month!

Our summer never slowed down. Dale went to scout camp for week with his scouts. Amanda and the kids spent that week in Phoenix with her parents. In July, we had a whirlwind trip to Utah where we visited grandparents and cousins, and had a great time. While there we rode the train to downtown Salt Lake. Eli thought that was the greatest thing in the world and talked about that for weeks. He still loves trains! From Utah, we drove to Colorado for the Jack Family Reunion, where we had a great time with more cousins. The highlights of the reunion included: the kids hand fishing trout out of a large trough; The Jacked Cook-off Challenge; and the whole pig, which was smoked overnight and then devoured.

   School began in August, with Joy in third grade and Lucy in kindergarten. Both girls absolutely love school and have great teachers and friends there. That leaves Eli and Lewis at home with their mama. Eli at first missed his sisters, and this took some getting used to. Eli and Lucy took tumbling this fall and both have enjoyed this, especially Eli who loves to roll and play. Eli and Lucy had their recital yesterday for tumbling. It was Eli’s first recital and he hammed it up and enjoyed every minute he got in the spotlight. Joy and Lucy played soccer this fall with Dale coaching Lucy’s soccer team. Both girls enjoyed this and Joy made the All Star Team.  Lewis turned one in November and is a happy little guy. He quickly crawls to the door when daddy comes home and says ‘Hi.’ Lewis is close to walking but has not gotten up the courage quite yet. It won’t be long before he is running, jumping, and playing with his brother and sisters. Amanda went to Time Out for Women in November with her mother and a good friend. She left the kids for the weekend and had a good time.

We hope this letter finds all to be well and we hope you all had a great year! We love you!

Love, Dale, Amanda, Joy, Lucy, Eli, and Lewis Rogers

                                                                         The Rogers 2012

Bahamas

We absolutely LOVED it in the Bahamas and would go back again in a heartbeat. The food was good, the weather and island were beautiful, the people were very friendly. If you get the chance to go there, I'd say GO!

Dale para-sailing. After getting over the initial nerves (he saw knots in the rope he was attached to) he loved it.

It was fun getting all dressed up in the evenings and getting to chill and enjoy ourselves.

Salad, blackened grouper, conch fritter, fried plantains. YUM! We ate good there! The fish was so fresh and yummy!

The Atlantis Resort. We were on the bottom floor on the west tower in the Royal Towers.

The sand was white, the water was clear and such a pretty blue color. It was a little trippy to see the fish next to me when we were swimming in the ocean. When we were on the beach we could even see a fish swimming along the shoreline.

The resort has some cool aquariums and tunnels that go beneath them. This shark is about 4 feet long. There were all kinds of sharks, fish, and stingrays. I have more pics posted on facebook.

Merry Christmas/Happy New Year!

Wow! This last year has been a very busy one. To give a rundown of what we’ve been up to, last spring, we sold our Altima and our Bronco and bought a Yukon XL and a Chevy Silverado. We miss our Bronco, but are glad to have newer, more reliable vehicles. Last May, Dale was promoted to store manager at Home Depot, we celebrated our 10^th anniversary, and announced we were expecting baby #4. In July, we went to Colorado and had a blast at the Jack Family Reunion. The kids are always asking if we could go to Colorado because they love it up there so much. On November 21, we welcomed Lewis D. Rogers to our family.

Dale is enjoying being manager and has grown in his position. It’s been fun to watch him set career goals and to meet them. He is still the assistant scout master and loves it. Every time he comes home from a scout camp he says, “That was the best campout we’ve had.” Dale is a great daddy and a wonderful husband. It’s been a great 10 years married to him.

Amanda is still the Sunbeam teacher and loves it. She is incredibly busy with the house, yard, and children. She loves to drive up Mt. Graham every chance she gets.

Joy, 7 yrs, is doing very well in school and enjoys being with her friends. She is a good example to everyone around her and is a huge help at home. She occasionally complains about being the oldest because she has to do more chores, but mommy just says, “I know the feeling.”

Joy and Lucy were in the dance recital yesterday and they each were very confident and performed very well. Mommy and daddy are proud of them. They both played soccer last fall and Lucy was excited to have her daddy be her soccer coach.

Grandma Rogers said it best, “5 is alive.” Lucy, 5 yrs, loves playing with Joy, Eli, and with her friends. She will sit for hours doing crafts and playing with dolls. She’s become more outspoken and confident and likes to do everything by herself.

Eli, 2 yrs, is as handsome, busy, fun, destructive, hilarious, messy, and smart as ever. I hope to report by next letter that he’ll be potty trained. Eli is all boy and loves to play outside and is always dirty and getting slivers in his feet. He helps himself to the refrigerator and pantry. He knows how to turn off and on the computer, VCR, and DVD player and start his own movies. He’s the biggest pest to his older sisters and often gets locked out of their room. Dale says Eli has more girlfriends than any little boy he knows and is constantly being stopped in the hall at church by girls, both young and old, who want to say hi to him. As crazy as Eli makes our lives, we love him to pieces and wouldn’t have him any other way.

Lewis, 4 wks, is growing fast and lets the whole house know when he’s not happy. He’s got a lot of really blonde hair, a good set of lungs, and a big appetite. He’s lots of fun to cuddle with and as long as he’s fed and clean he’s a pretty happy little guy. He’s great at going back to sleep after eating at night, so mommy isn’t too exhausted. However, that alarm still goes off too early for her liking and we are very excited for Christmas Break to begin. Lewis’s brother and sisters love to hold him and we have enjoyed having a sweet little baby in our home again.

We have been very blessed this year and give thanks to our Savior for all we have. We miss our dear friends and family we don’t live close to, but have also made lots of new friends this last year. We love living in Pima and have wonderful neighbors. We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Love, Dale, Amanda, Joy, Lucy, Eli, & Lewis Rogers