A little bit about our family.......

I have had (surprisingly) a lot of requests to update my blog. I guess this is more of a disciplined commitment than I realized. Right now I do not have new pictures to upload......I will by the end of next week...so I decided to write a little bit about who I am and who Tom is. I know that most of the pictures I upload will be of the boys you will get to know them better in time.

Most of my memories come from Price, UT. A small town in UT. I loved it. I always promised myself that my boys would be blessed with the same opportunity. But some how life hasn't quite worked out that way for us. I am a graduate of Carbon High School. I was a DINO. Don't knock it because I loved it. I had the small town, great friends, awesome ward and just incredible people who helped mold me into the person I am today. I give them credit for the good things about me.

I graduated from the College of Eastern Utah, also in Price. That is where I met Tom.

Tom grew up 2 hours away from me in Moab, UT. He graduated from Grand County High School. He went to CEU in Price for 1 year and then went on a mission to Harrisburg, PA. After his mission we returned to CEU where we met.

During his freshman year his best friend became David Dayton. David is also from Price. It is funny how many times Tom and I crossed paths because he did so much with David and helping Carbon Highs debate team. Tom knew lots of people from my graduating class. We often wonder how things would have turned out if we had met then. It would have been fun to write him on his mission. He thinks he was too much of a nerd then.

Tom and I got married in 1992 (I know we are old). After we graduated from CEU we went on the the University of Utah. After graduation we took our 8 month old baby and moved to communist China (what were we thinking?) through a BYU program. We lived in Qingdao for 1 year. We had an incredible experience. It was the first time my heart had ever truly loved a group of people. It was the most Christlike love I had experienced up to that point in my life.

We also had an opportunity to travel to Beijing and see things I never thought I would see. We have had the opportunity to go back and have been amazed by the changes and how fast China is growing in every way possible. It was hard to leave. I knew that many people I had grown to love....I would probably not see again in this life time. Our Tanner-man had learned so much by the time we moved back. He was walking and talking some (20 Chinese words to 10 English words) and had a huge personality. So taking a baby to China turned out okay. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, but for your first and not knowing what you don't know is a plus.

We moved back to our home in Salt Lake. Tom worked at American Express and went to grad. school. Once he had his MBA his best friend some how talked us into moving to Taiwan with him and his family. We did pray about it and we know it was where we were meant to be. This time we took our 6 year old son Tanner and our new little Spencer who was 4 months old. This time I had a better idea of what I was getting into. I feel like we were more prepared for a baby this trip. We moved to a smaller city on the island called Jia Yi. It was awesome to be able to attend a ward while we were there. We also had a temple in Taipei.

We were able to learn a lot of Chinese while we were here. Tanner had the opportunity to attend first and second grade at a Taiwanese public school. The first month his teacher told us she was concerned about Tanner because he was speaking to anyone and didn't seem to be picking up the language. The next month she said her problem was that he spoke to much and couldn't believe how fluent he was. We have video of him bearing his testimony in Chinese. It is pretty cute. Spencer refused to speak Chinese, Taiwanese, Thai or English. He decided to wait until we moved back to the states to talk. He was just letting us know early on that he would do things when he was ready. Tom learned some Chinese but not a lot. I was able to learn a little more because I was able to go out on splits with the sister missionaries. They taught me a lot.

Again we made some wonderful friends. It was a time for us to grow leaps and bounds as a family. We had our trials. But we have lots of fond memories and lots to be grateful for.

We lived in Taiwan for 3 years. It is something that our family thinks of often. We love to talk about good times we had there. We love to talk about the people and trips we took. One time I got stuck taking the boys to Hong Kong to renew our "green cards". We left Jia Yi at 4 in the morning by train. Got a taxi to the the Kaohsiung airport and then flew to Hong Kong. Luckily we were able to get our visas within a few hours. The boys both got sick with high fevers. After getting our visas we moved our flight up and flew back to Koahsiung. I did not have it in me to find a train or bus back to Jia Yi. So we grabbed a taxi and he took us all of the way home. Tom was being sweet and knew we would be tired. Not knowing that I had bumped our flight up, he hired a driver and was on his way to the airport to pick us up. So we passed each other going opposite directions, both planning to surprise the other. When I got home, I was shocked when Tom didn't answer the door. Then I realized I didn't have keys. I went down to our doorman and he said Tom left about 2 hours ago. I called Tom's cell phone. He said, Kim I have been looking all over for you.....where are you? After a confusing conversation we realized what had happened. Luckily we had a spare key at a friends in Jia Yi. He let me in. It was a long day. But we got our visas for another year.

After 3 years of living in Taiwan it was time to come back. We moved back to Murray, UT. We lived there for 3 years. Almost 2 years ago we bought a home in Draper. I love it here. We do get a little bit of the small town feel but we live close to the big cities.

I am not going to edit this so you get grammatical and spelling errors. Sorry. I'll try and be better at updating this.