Natasha & Joshua In Idaho

We live in a beautiful city called Idaho Falls in Idaho. We met in college in a class we were were taking. We have six kiddos ranging in age from 17-5. Josh is a family doctor and I am a stay at home mom. We have a lot of fun as a family. In the summer, we love to hike, mountain bike, camp, rock climb and roller-blade. We enjoy long summer nights and building a fire in our fire pit and roasting marshmallows and having smores. In the winter time, you will find us snowboarding, skiing, ice skating and sledding. One of our most favorite activities as a family is read-alouds. We love to snuggle and read awesome books. Currently, we are reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory together.

We live in a really great neighborhood. We have an elementary school we can walk to right down the road. We have a lot of kids around us and we have them over for playdates. We have a large backyard with a swing-set, trampoline, basketball hoop and lots of trikes to ride around on. We also have a very fun basement with a ping pong table, foos-ball and basketball shooting game. All the kids have rooms upstairs and we have a room perfect for a nursery for another sweet little one.

We would love to tell you a little bit about our kids. Asher is 17 and loves to run. He is up at 6 am every morning to get in his run. He loves to serve and is currently in the Dominican Republic doing a humanitarian service project building a school for kids. Brinley is 15 and loves to craft. She even has her own craft room for all the projects she is working on. She is mom’s helper and wants to be a NICU nurse someday. Carden is our soccer guy. He is 12 and loves to be out playing sports. He loves Legos. He is also super good at yard work and mows the lawn every week for us and our neighbor. Addy is our cute little red-head. She loves to make bracelets and play outside with her two younger siblings. Emery is full of energy. She is 7 and loves to play dolls, barbies and play outside on the swing set. Nixon is our youngest. We call him our little bear and love to cuddle with him.

We have a lot of fun family traditions. Two times a year we love to gather the family and watch General Conference. This is a broadcast where we hear speakers share messages about God and Jesus Christ. We then gather for a delicious meal of crepes topped with fruit, Nutella and whip cream.

Christmas is another time full of fun traditions. We drive around and look at Christmas lights, have Gingerbread contests, do secret acts of service, snuggle, read Christmas books together and enjoy all the festivities that come by attending concerts and plays.

In the summer months, we have a tradition of floating the river near our home. We do a few hikes up in the Tetons each summer and enjoy taking the kids to the lake and swimming pools nearby to float and play. We also have family reunions every summer.

Birthdays in our house are a big deal! We enjoy making special breakfasts, doing a favorite activity the child loves and ending with a special dinner of their choice. Fridays are family movie night, and we often make pizza together to celebrate the weekend.

We also have close ties with both sets of grandparents. Recently we had Josh's parents here. They helped us plant a garden and plant 3 new peach trees in our backyard.

We feel led to adopting because of a deep sense that there is a baby out there who our family could love and care for. We have a deep desire to give more to another child and bless their lives with all the love we have to offer. We love kids and pray we will be blessed with another one.