Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Springtime Updates

Once again, I'm doing some catch-up mass blogging. Despite the fact that I seem to be having trouble keeping up on regular blogging, I'm not giving up! I will blog!

Here's some stuff that we did over the past couple of months:

In March our school hosted a Medievil Feast for the 6th graders. Luckily I was able to use costumes from my friend's awesome collection in her basement, so I could help Bitty get a really cool dress.  I ended up with a pretty cool one myself. I couldn't help it. Alert - nerd parent on the loose!



Bitty won a prize for her awesome dancing skills.


The kids got to eat a very Medievally feast of roast chicken, cubed cheese, whole loaves of bread and grapes, all with their hands. Oh, and about a gallon each of ginger ale, which they drank out of goblets they fashioned themselves.



Also in March, our neighborhood celebrated the 100th birthday of a seriously awesome lady by the name of Velma. We had two celebrations - one smaller group of just the church ladies and then one whole-church gang including anyone who had ever lived here and loved Velma. What's amazing is that Velma is still just as sharp as a tack, no kidding. She's getting pretty bent over, but she doesn't miss a thing, still lives at home, cared for by the residents of her home which has been divided into apartments. What an example of a life well lived.




What other major holiday besides Troy's birthday happens in March? Why, St. Patty's day, that's what! I'm terrible at celebrating this day. I know many moms have very elaborate holidays with leprechaun footprints and treats or gifts or whatever. I just can not muster the energy for that kind of thing, which is ok. Last year, if you remember, all I managed to do was make some green pancakes and that did nothing but cause my little Skippidy to start dry-heaving on sight. This year I was super excited because I actually rounded up some green clothing for each child. It was a St. Patrick's Day miracle I tell you! Not only did I actually do something, but each child liked what they got and wore it that day happily.




Last month Cap finally broke up with his cello, seemingly for good. Maybe in years to come he'll revisit the cello, but for now, he's done. I'm sad about this, but we told him he had to choose another hobby to pursue. He picked the guitar. I love how much happier he is. He is loving the fact that he's becoming what he has called "a stereotypical teenager." He has a guitar, a tarantula and posters in his room. He's hoping to add an amp and an electric guitar at some point. Teenagery indeed, and awesome.


The girls are spending a ton of time outside perfecting their skills on their wheels.



 Skippidy got invited to a cute friend's baptism, and it made her pretty excited about her own upcoming baptism.

My dear dad had an art show that was very succesful. I had the great pleasure that evening of hanging out at the park outside the library and meeting a giant dog I thought about dog-napping but I didn't think I could sneak him away without being noticed. Louie, in my heart, you're my dog.




My girls had a great time participating in the Storybook Character Day at school. It was one of those super fun days that I totally forgot about until the morning of, when the girls STARTED talking about who they wanted to portray. Luckily, we were able to throw together some quick costumes and I thanked my lucky stars that both girls were happy with their five-minute ensembles. Skippidy played a young dragon sitter, and Bitty played one of my favorite fantasy characters, Harry Crew from The Blue Sword. That made my day. Thankfully she thought Cap's old Ben Kenobi costume was a close enough look to make her happy. Yay!



The 4th, 5th and 6th graders at Wasatch were able to put on a Dr. Seuss play. Bitty, as always, loved every second of her rehearsals and performance. She just loves the stage. They were able to perform on the stage of the local middle school, which was great because the seats had much better viewing and were much more comfortable. Great night!





So there you go. More stuff that kept us really busy. It's been a good spring, to say the least.

Traveling Troy

When you see a big plate of homemade biscuits and gravy at our house, it can only mean one thing. It's someone's birthday! Most like Troy's or Bitty's, but definitely a birthday.  March 3rd marked Troy's 47th birthday and we of course started the day out right. Thank you, Aunt Tonja, for the best biscuit recipe EVER.




I discovered that Troy shares his birthday with some ladies who I feel bad for because they're so ugly: 


The kids had the day off of school, so I tried very hard to get Troy to take the day and go to the aquarium with us, and he really did his best. The kids and I wandered around for a while, and even took this delightful picture of a "sleeping" turtle. At least, we hope it was sleeping.



Sadly, Troy's work day never did let him join us. So instead we had his folks over for dinner and a couple of presents - Troy's mom is so cute. She loves to give him his childhood faves. Lucky Charms and Goldfish. No one was allowed access to a single Lucky Charm and I was proud of the kids for not even asking. Daddy's cereal! Troy did have a gift picked out - a new camping stove - but it took a few weeks to get the right one selected and purchased. It took a couple of false starts and returns but eventually, long after his birthday, Troy became the owner of a great stove. The big car-camping kind. Not the little backpacking kind.


So hooray for Troy, whom I just love all to pieces. Really. He's the best.

Oh yeah, the traveling part. Shortly after his birthday, Troy began a series of weeks away from us as his company sent him (over and over and over again) to the grand town of Casper, Wyoming. I think it was six or seven weeks in a row. We really missed him and are all glad that he's working more locally now. I will say that now that my youngest is a 2nd grader, having Troy gone on a business trip is slightly easier than it was five or so years ago. But still, we are all so glad he's home. We did a LOT of FaceTime in the evenings. FaceTime always makes one look extra attractive, don't you think?


Monday, May 01, 2017

Passing Through Winter

I'm looking back through my photos and finding a bunch of fun stuff we did over the past couple of months as we did our best to survive the winter months - I think I'll post a whole bunch of pictures so we can remember the fun days.

We had our church's annual chili cook off in February. Right now Skippidy has the absolute cutest Primary Teachers. One of them kept hearing from her how much she loves cooking. And so she invited Skippidy over to help her make chili. I forgot to warn her that although Skippidy loves cooking she very rarely eats the things she cooks. Just because she loves chopping vegetables does not mean she loves eating them. So that picture is a big fake. She's never going to put that chili in her mouth. That night, however, I tried the chili and it was delicious. It had sweet potatoes.


At the end of February came one of my favorite holidays of the year - Oscar Night with The Becky. How we look forward to this one Sunday night a year, even though more and more often we have seen very few of the movies up for awards. That's ok. We're there for the spectacle. The montages. The outfits. All of it. We plan our menu far in advance - this year it was ramen with all the fixings. (If you've never had it, try adding sliced roast beef, basil, bean sprouts, a poached egg, lime juice and sriracha sauce to your ramen. It's AWESOME.) We shooed the kids away, curled up in our jammies, sipped fizzy drinks and watched all four hours. Like I said, one of my favorite holidays of the year.






We had a lovely visit from the St. Georgians over their spring break, which comes a wee bit earlier than our does. In St. George it is already spring when we still have winter. If they waited to do Spring Break until we do it up here it would already be summer there.









Peter and I visited my mom. This was such a long time ago now and she's changed so much since these pictures it's kind of crazy to see her. She was talkative, smiling, and still loved getting up and around. That's all changed a lot now. I'll post more about that soon. I promise.




Also my friend Elyse had the MOST delicious baby. She's just a round little num num.


Bitty had the chance to meet an author at her school, and I'm kind of mad at myself for not going too. There wasn't a huge group there, just these kids, and it turns out I've read a few of this woman's books and really loved them. Her name is Jennifer Nielsen, she wrote the Runaway Prince series, and those were great books. I'm so happy Bitty got to go, wish I had too.


Also in February was the Pinewood Derby. We have long since stopped having a scout of our own at this event, but we were there to support for a couple of reasons. For starters, I have been called into the Stake Primary Presidency, and the breakfast that morning was up to me. It wasn't too bad except that I set my alarm incorrectly and ended up waking up one minute after I was supposed to be there. I can't believe I got there as quickly as I did and actually pulled off the huge breakfast anyway. It wasn't perfect, but it was good enough. I am getting tense shoulders just thinking about being late that morning.  Secondly, Troy always helps one of our friends' kids with his car. The kid has done well every year that Troy has helped him but never won the whole kit and caboodle until this year. Tate finally took the trophy - it was great! 


So there you go. I have not perished, I'm sill around. Things have been a wee bit stressful lately and so blogging has not been upmost in my mind, but I will get caught up.