Cleaning up

After dinner today we were all doing our kitchen jobs to clean up. I finished Cutie with his and left the room. A few minutes later I heard a little voice say, "Mommy I'm helping clean up, come see!" so I went in the kitchen and look what I found Stephen was making his family home evening treat. Cookie dough, yum!

Big Decisions!

OK, I got the pictures in the wrong order so you'll have to see her grow younger! My baby is growing up! Here she is a senior in high school trying to decide what to do with her life. Decision making has not always been one of her strengths but I think she was inspired by a talk in our sacrament meeting a couple of weeks ago. The speaker quoted someone(I don't remember who:S) saying that one of President Hinckley's strengths was being able to make decisions without looking back.

She came home from church that day with her decisions made. She's not going to California for the summer. As fun as it would be it wouldn't make much money. She's going to stay home and work at the pool to make money to pay for college. How practical! Just like her parents;)

And the college of choice is.....(drum roll please)......Snow College! She was offered an academic merit scholarship and a talent scholarship(for violin) there. The tuition is very low and for someone who isn't sure what she wants to study I think it will be perfect. I'm really proud of her for making these choices and going forward with them. Juice, you're wonderful!

Three days...Zero kids!!!

We have been contemplating when we could get away for a few days since our 20th anniversary is coming up. Juice graduates from high school on our anniversary so that week is not really an option......so......with the kids out of school for spring break last week we decided to take a little trip. We went down to southern Utah(where we've never been before) and did a little exploring near Bryce Canyon National Park. It is amazing! We didn't even go into Bryce. There is so much to see all around it.

Then we went to St. George for two nights. We went and saw the temple there and walked around some of the historic sights. There are a few fun things to see there. On the way home we went over to Zion National Park. We didn't go in there either. This was kind of an exploratory trip to see what's down there. We've been talking about taking the family for years. I must say that no matter how many pictures you've seen it is just not the same as being there.

I wasn't sure I really cared about taking the kids to see these places. After all you can see pictures of all of it in books and online right? But after being there we are planning to take another trip with the whole family next year:)

I'm going on a picnic and I'm going to bring......

Allosaurus, Bee, Cap, Dory---and added later a Dragon, Elevator, Fireworks, Gorilla, Horse, Igloo, Josiah, Klaus, Lollipop, Mouse skeleton(is that like an owl pellet?), N and m(m&m's?), Ostrich meatball, Porcupine, Quiskey, Rabbit meat, Sasparilla & Seth, Tat, Underfire, Viper--incredibly deadly(not really), Wagoon, X-ray of an X meatball and a Xylophone, Yolk from an egg, Z-------(I don't want to play this anymore!)-----Zizzer Zazzer Zuzz!

by Silly Guy, Superstar, and Cutie on the way to Grandma's house this morning!

Sounds like a very exciting picnic! They might not be eating very much!

Double-digits!

Happy Birthday Silly Guy! He turned double-digits today--the big 10! And what a lucky birthday it was. There was no school for a teacher work day so he got to come with me to pick his birthday balloons and the balloon lady gave him an extra for his birthday.

Later we went to the bank to open a savings account for him. We weren't able to actually open the account because we didn't have all of the necessary documentation, but when the lady found out it was his birthday she reached into a box and pulled out a frisbee which she gave him for his birthday.

He had requested that we rent the movie "Bolt" to watch tonight so I reserved it at the Redbox. When I went to pick it up I saw that it wasn't due to be available for rental until the 24th but it was there anyway.

All of these lucky things plus the beautiful weather so he could ride his bike and set up the trampoline made for a very happy birthday indeed!

The flag of the United States of America!

For as long as we have lived in Logan whenever we see the temple the kids would demand that we sing "I love to see the temple." What a great tradition. Now it seems we are starting another one.

Every time Cutie sees an American flag he gets so excited. He hollers, "Look! It's the flag of the United States of America! Let's sing it!" And so we all sing the national anthem. I don't know where he got this streak of patriotism, but I think it's a good tradition too!

Is it spring yet?

Well, it's been awhile hasn't it? Winter is just so busy and wintery! We were beginning to think the snow really was going to all melt pretty soon when we had a huge snow storm last Monday--20 inches in some parts of Cache Valley! It's really crazy. Silly Guy was telling me how the snow had better be gone for his birthday on the 20th. At the time I thought maybe it would be, but now I don't think it will be. It's been so cold too--the last two mornings have been around 10 degrees when the kids were leaving for school!

Juice is gone on an orchestra trip to Las Vegas and then Anaheim & L.A. They just left 24 hours ago but I miss her--I'm a lone woman among all these men! (Of course I pretty much rule here so it's not so bad;) I will really miss her when she leaves for the whole summer in June and then for college(I hope) in September.

When the swim season was over I told Sonny Pie to join some clubs and find something to keep him busy so he wouldn't be grumpy all the time.(He gets incredibly grumpy when he's bored!)
He took that and decided to go to a friend's house every day after school until dinner time. I hope he's not wearing out his welcome over there. At least it's a friend who shares his standards. He's not likely to get in any trouble there.

Silly Guy is sooooo excited for his 10th birthday next week. He always wants to be older. I keep telling him to enjoy where he is. He'll never be nine again! He's enjoying playing the cello. A couple of days ago he spaced out and forgot to go to his orchestra class. He came home and said that when he realized he had forgotten he almost started crying---in school! (That is so unlike him to show any emotion in public. He's always been very shy.)

Superstar is as exuberant as ever. He never does anything half-heartedly whether it's a happy, sad, or angry heart. He loves being a cub scout and doing math. He saves his math homework for last every day because it is the best he says.

Yesterday I took Cutie to register for kindergarten! He's so ready and excited. We had to wait in line forever, but he didn't seem to mind at all.

All in all we're feeling very blessed as spring approaches. Stephen still has a job despite layoffs at his work. We're preparing for hard times ahead as we've been counseled by the prophets. We don't know what hard times we may face but we know that if we keep our faith and obedience strong we will be all right!