First day...FAIL!!!

On the first day of school, I accidentally slept in!! I woke up just 20 min. before we needed to leave for school. I frantically packed lunches while the Kids ate breakfast and got ready to go.
I managed to get one picture before we rushed out the door.

It's going to be a great School year!

Welcome Tina!

A couple of months ago, a friend of ours mentioned a need for host families for several exchange students who needed homes for the school year. I told her I would think about it, and talk to Adam, but when I casually mentioned it to Adam, he didn't seem to keen on the idea so the subject was dropped and forgotten about. When I saw my friend in church a week later, she asked me if we had thought about it, and I told her we decided not to host. She kindly thanked us anyway and that was the end of it....but not really. The thing is, right after I told her "No" I felt like I gave her the wrong answer.  I couldn't get the thought out of my mind! It kept nagging me and it kept me awake at night. I told Adam how I was feeling, and together we decided we needed to look into what was involved and expected of a Host Family. Over the next couple of days we studied and prayed about it and talked to the trio. I asked my friend if I could see some of the applications of the students wanting to come. The very first application I saw was for a girl named Tina from Norway. As soon as I saw her picture and read her application, I knew we would be her host family.  The next several days were spent filling out our own application and completing background checks. After a home inspection visit and a little more paperwork, we received the news that we would get to host Tina! We found out later, that Tina had another host Family all lined up, and was excited to come to Snowflake, but the mother of that family found out she needed surgery and would not be able to host after all, so we said yes at just the right time for her!  Tina wanted to come live and study in America so she can improve her English, and experience the American way of life!

Her First day in AZ, and she made the front page news! The large picture is her and I hugging while the girls looked on. In the lower left picture she is in the background with her hand covering her mouth .
 It was an emotional greeting for all of us.

On August third, we welcomed Tina to our family! She will be with us for the next ten months.
We love having Tina in our home. She is very sweet and helpful.  She enjoys school and has already made some friends and enjoys playing volleyball after school. The trio adore her, and the attention she gives them.
She is adjusting to our routines. Some of our routines, (family scripture study, and prayer, and church) are a little harder for her to adjust to, but we can tell she is trying and we appreciate her efforts, especially since we told her she doesn't have to join us if she is uncomfortable, but she usually does anyway.
Right after she arrived, we went down to the valley to visit family and do some school shopping. She enjoyed the mall and often expressed how big everything is here.
 We let her drive our buggy around for a bit so she could practice driving and she LOVED IT!. She is hoping to be able to get her drivers licence while she is here and have it transferred when she returns to Norway. (I believe it is more difficult and costly to attain a drivers licence in Norway which is why she would like to get one here.)

We look forward to taking Tina along on our adventures and showing her more of our beautiful country.  

Adorable!!

Check out this sweet little guy!! The kids held him for a bit, then we let him go so he could find his momma! He was so cute!

Little Makover

We have been busy getting ready to host an exchange student for the school year. Her room is upstairs where all the walls are painted a different primary color so to make things easy for myself, I decided to have her bed and furnishings be black/white so it would be easy to coordinate .  I wanted her to have  a little desk in her room for her studies, but we were on a tight budget. Luckily I found a sweet desk at a yard yard sale for just $12.00!! The bottom drawer handle was already black, so I painted the other knobs black to match and gave the desk a quick white wash. I found the chair at my favorite thrift shop for $3.00!!! Yes, it was UGLY, but I also managed to find two yards of black corduroy for a  $1.00!! With a quick spray of white paint and a little work with my trusty staple gun, I managed to makeover the chair in less than an hour. I am happy with how it turned out.

Quist Family Campout!

The whole Gang!! Thanks for the picture Suzi!

On July 22nd we drove up to Greens Peak for a family reunion. My Parents and all of my siblings (except Angela who is serving a mission) were there. When we arrived, we weren't too sure we wanted to stay. Right after we started setting up camp it started pouring rain!!! It rained hard for over an hour. But once we finally got everyone's camps set up and a fire started the rain let up and we were able to enjoy some nice weather. The trio had SO much fun with all of their cousins. They played 'Kick the Can' for hours every day and never got bored. We went on Buggy rides, made a zip-line, went on a hike, played games, visited around the campfire and made so many wonderful memories.

Kick the Can!

This Guy wandered into our camp just as we were getting ready to leave!