Our little critter adventures

Our mommy hummingbird;

We have this adorable hummigbird that has been visiting our house lately. We found out a month ago why. She was building a nest. The nest is about as big as a tablespoon. It is adorable!! Well, 3 days ago we found a little egg in that nest about the size of a pea. The kids LOVE sitting out there, and watching the hummingbird, sit on her nest, or fly around. The nest is in a little tree in our front yard. The tree is small enough, so that we have full view of the inside of the nest. Today, we found a second little egg had joined the first one. We are SO excited to see them when they hatch :) It is so much fun to have a little friend in our front yard.

The story of Mark Twain;

Mark joined this family about 2 weeks ago. He is adorable and fun to play with. Okay, I know what you must be thinking, but don't worry, he is a lizard. Brett and Ali were very dedicated to that little lizard. Everyday they would go out looking for little critters for Mark to eat. He was Ali's pet, and was WELL taken care of. Everyday he practically only got around 2 hours in his cage. Ali would put him on her shirt\leg\arm or hand, and just let him sit there for hours while she would read. Or, he would be put on our ficus\fake tree in the corner to 'rest'. After having him for 3 days, he still hadn't eaten. Ali was not happy at all about this, and couldn't figure out why he wouldn't eat the darn beattle. I walked in on her, and this is what she was saying "Eat you dumb lizard!!" She then tapped him on the head as a punishment. (Poor little lizard) We learned later that day that he didn't like beattles, and then after that he ate daily what we gave him. Ali was pleased, and apologized to the lizard for smacking him :P Mark stayed with us for around 3 weeks, he was let go 3 days ago. Bye Mark!

The story of Wink Blink Doughty (May he rest in peace;);

Wink the frog\toad was caught at Brett's father and son's camp out 2 weeks ago. He endured much after that. He has; fallen from atleast 5 feet, been put on the kids spinning toy, taken for walks, gotten his "exercise" in our neighbors pond (Sorry neighbors!), and has been in my hair. (gross!) He was an adorable frog, and definitely fulfilled his measure of creation. :P He escaped (died?) 4 days ago. After a few tears, the kids finally decided it was for the better. Good bye Wink!! Nice knowing you!!

The story of Pipsqueak Bolt Spy Doughty;

Pipsqueak was my personal favorite. He was a gecko. He was also hilarious!! Let me explain his name to you. Well first, Brett chose the name. That should be enough, but Brett had funny reasons for them all. Pipsqueak, because he would squeak, when you picked him up, or when he was mad. Bolt because he would walk very slowly with his tail up, and then out of the blue he would take off at full speed (which was very fast), Spy because he was sneaky and sly. (I guess he reminded Brett of a spy) and Doughty because he was part of our family. He was lost in our house 3 days ago. Watch our family for a stray Gecko!!

Well, thus ends the tale of our animals. We are back to just having a hummingbird in our front yard. (and some stray cockroaches... yuck!) Good bye all our critters! We love you!! ;)

Elevation :)

Elevation was SO much fun. We went camping for a week. We got there on Monday and left on Friday. It was amazing. :) We went repelling, rock climbing, swimming, playing in the river, ascending, ate crawdads, played cards in our tent while it snowed out side, sat around the fire, took naps in the sun... Etc.

Here is us washing the crawdads before we ate them.... Yuck!

Ascending was really hard, yet really fun. They give you things to help pull yourself up with.

Rock Climbing!

Rock climbing was amazing, and I wonder why I haven't ever done it before. The easier ones are 5-3's. I started off on a 5-7. It was kind of hard, but not hard enough. So, I moved onto a 5-10. My teacher couldn't even do a 5-10, and only one other kid could do it as well. It was REALLY hard, but totally worth it. When I made it to the top, the view was incredible! I was hot and sticky, but it was so awesome.

My awesome teacher\mentor Dan Ralphs. I have reallu enjoyed going to school and having him as my teacher. He is so awesome, and I really admire him.

All of us on the last day. It was COLD!

Me and Kami

Us in our tent; Hailey, Kami, Jameson and Me

More rock climbing

The trip was so much fun, and it would be hard to explain everything we did. When I got home though, I can for sure tell you that I was grateful for my shower and bed! :)

A letter from Jordan

Here is a letter from Jordan. I will have to get better at posting them. :)


Hi family, how are you all??? We get to call home next Sunday for mother's day so I will call at around 1pm, if you have church then email me back and tell me what time I can call. This week was pretty adventurous, Never a dull moment in missionary work! We were teaching one of our investigators outside on a bench and we noticed alot of smoke so we ran over and there was a big fire!! I guess someone left a cigarette outside and it caught their couch on fire. The flames were higher than the apartment it was crazy. So we ran into her house and threw buckets of water onto the fire until the firemen got there. I forgot my camera again but next week maybe I will remember :/. Anyway the people who lived in the apartment were happy with us. And then last night we were stopped at a stoplight and a guy hit us at an estimated speed of 35-40 mph which totaled our car and the car in front of us. Got some cool pictures of that as well. The trunk was smashed right up to the back seat where I was sitting. We are all fine, It happened so fast I just remember hearing a squeal from the guys brakes and then I closed my eyes as glass flew everywhere. Thankfully they make the glass in a special way so it shatters really easily and doesnt cut too bad. Elder Jackson and Fryhoff have some whiplash and sore backs so the hospital was happy to prescribe lots of muscle relaxers and pain meds. They are pretty doped up right now but I'm fine, I don't have any whiplash or anything. We were wearing our seatbelts but we have some awesome guardian angels!! I had to get out of the other door because mine was busted in and I had glass in my shoes and hair haha. The guy who hit us was DUI or diabetic, I heard both from the policewoman but he wasn't in good shape. Right when we got hit an LDS off duty cop ran up because the guy who hit us was still pushing down the accelerator because he was in shock or something. So he jumped in the car and put the emergency brake on. He apologized later for the language he used trying to get the guy to turn off the car. He was like staring straight forward with his hands on the steering wheel shaking, blood on his neck and chest. I hope he's ok, an ambulance took him away on a stretcher. I think we are getting a new car today. The zone leaders were going to drive us to the mission office to get a truck but someone let the air out of their tires last night. So we have some Elders in our district driving us around right now until we can get a new car. Thanks for your prayers! They definetly are working. We had some cardboard "Armor of God" in the trunk that we liked to use for object lessons with kids. This time it got put into real use! We have some really awesome investigators right now, they are really receptive and keep committments which is awesome. We are trying to find an apartment for Candy to move into that is close to her work and doesnt have a male occupant so she can be baptized. Enrique has to work every Sunday so he can't go to church but he's way solid. He reads his Book of Mormon and asks great questions. Missionary work is way awesome! My spanish is improving, I can understand more of what the natives are saying. A new law got passed down here so that police can arrest suspected illegals and deport them. Our investigators were afraid to go to the temple tours at Gila Valley because they didn't wan't to go through any checkpoints. What will we do if all the spanish people get deported or move? I really don't want to be an english missionary. English people are like opposite of the Hispanics. But next transfer is the cuttoff of what mission I will be in. I could go to the New mexico mission. But I have to go , have a great week, love you! Elder Doughty