Jaiden's Second Grade Program

I enjoyed listening to Jaiden sing in her second grade program today.  It was all about Life Cycles.  She was particularly excited to be a butterfly and do a "butterfly dance" in one of the numbers.

 

Science Fair Winner

Congratulations to Janelle (age 9) for winning Second Place in the Science Fair for the Third Grade!

Baton Dresses

My sister, Jeni, and I took Baton lessons from our neighbor when we were kids. We marched in parades and performed throughout the area.  (In the group pictures my sister is the second one from the end and I am the third from the end.)  My mom recently found our little red performing outfits and sent them home with me when we went to Salt Lake this past weekend.  My girls had a fun time dressing up in the outfits and doing a photo shoot!  (Here are a few pictures from 1978). 

Jeni and I were around the same ages of Janelle and Jaiden when we wore them but they looked SO short on the girls (they look short on us too!) that I ended up having Jaiden wear the bigger one.  Jenna didn't want to be left out of the fun and so I put her in the smaller one.  She was so cute dancing around the house and doing little poses!

Session Director Training

Rick and I left the kids with Janika tending overnight for the first time while we went to the EFY Session Director Training at the University of Utah Institute in Salt Lake City.   The kids were fine and everything went smoothly at home while we were gone.  We left Friday morning and so I hired a babysitter until Jared got home from school and then he took over until Jase got home and then Jase took over until Janika got home from her rehearsal around dinner time.  The boys also took over for Janika Saturday evening so that she could attend the General Young Women's Broadcast.  We recently got a little white 2000 Hundai so that Janika will have a car to drive when she gets her license.  We took that car up North and it did great!  It was nice to be able to have that long drive with NO kids along!   We chatted, did a little work on lessons, and listened to a book on CD.  We like Mary Higgins Clark mysteries and so we listened to one of her books on the way up and back.

I really enjoy going to this training each year. It was a little more difficult this time, however, just because I had been fighting this stupid illness for two weeks and still felt under the weather.  I kept popping Ibuprofen every four hours to mask the symptoms and that really helped.  I was also constantly sipping water and chewing gum trying to keep my cough at bay.  I didn't sleep well since that is when the coughing always intensifies.  But even though I wasn't feeling my best and didn't sleep well, I was surprisingly alert during the day and I was able to  enjoy the training.  It is always fun seeing some of our friends each year and I so enjoy spending time with my husband and being able to hold hands all day!  Saturday night after the training we met my mom and dad and my brother, Shane, and his wife, Alicia for dinner before heading back home, so that was fun! 
 

Soccer Season

Janelle had her first Soccer game today.  They are the "Dragonflies."  It ended up being a tie:  2-2.  It was unseasonably cool though and so some of us were huddled in a blanket on the mini bleachers while the rest of the kids were off playing at the playground.  Next week should be back to our normal warm temperatures!

Bubbles

Janelle decided to do her Science Fair Project on Bubbles this year.  She did some Internet research looking for good home-made bubbles recipes and then chose four recipes to test.  She made the recipes a couple of days ago and tonight for family night (after Janelle gave a very nice lesson) the house and yard were alive with bubbles!  The kids all had a lot of fun with this although it left our kitchen floor sticky and yucky!  Pretty much all of the pictures are of Janelle because it was her project and I was taking shots of each bubble attempt with each different recipe to see which worked the best!

 

Newest Deacon

We now have another Priesthood holder in our home.  Jared was ordained a Deacon during his Priesthood meeting on March 11th and he received a beautiful blessing.  Today (March 18th) he was invited to share his testimony in sacrament meeting.  I was so impressed by his beautiful heartfelt testimony.  He said that he knew the Book of Mormon was true because we read it each night as a family and during one of his interviews with his dad he was encouraged to go and pray about the Book of Mormon to see if it was true.  He said that after praying about it he received an answer that it was true.  I couldn't help but notice a few people dabbing at their eyes during his sweet testimony.  Today was also his first time passing the sacrament.  I know he was a little nervous but he did perfectly!  We are so grateful to have Jared in our home! 

 Jase was also ordained to be a teacher last December. I wrote about that previously but forgot to take a picture and so I will include one now.  We are grateful for these boys and know that they will make wonderful missionaries some day!   

Leprechauns

The Leprechauns came and brought the kids candy in their shoes!  Happy St. Patrick's Day!  

 

Jaiden's Fashion Party

Jaiden was invited to her friend's "Fashion Birthday Party" today.  All of the girls were supposed to come dressed up.  Doesn't she look darling?  Apparently she got sick at the party though and threw up.  What?  The weird thing is they called our house and asked for Wendy.  I wasn't home and so Rick just gave them my cell phone number (he didn't know who it was).  I was at the Relief Society Birthday Party with my phone on silent and so I didn't get the message.  Why didn't they just talk to Rick and have him come pick her up?  So he didn't find out until he picked her up from the party an hour and a half later.  Apparently she felt better afterwards though so maybe it wasn't the flu but just some fluke thing.  I hope anyway.  I always feel terrible when one of my kids throws up somewhere besides home and some other person has to clean it up -- especially when it on the carpet....ugh!

Relief Society Birthday Party

Today was the Relief Society Birthday Luncheon.  Our Relief Society Presidency did an AWESOME job putting this all together.  There were several different tables with a host for each table who put together the place settings and table decorations.  Each table had its own unique flavor and design.  Angie Roos was the guest speaker and spoke about the importance of the temple and temple covenants.  We enjoyed her presentation!  Sister Mary Richmond put together a delicious meal of ham roast, funeral potatoes, salads, specialty drinks and desserts.  She also gave a presentation on the many symbols that adorn our temples throughout the world.  She made beautiful temple bundles for each sister as a special gift.  Our Relief Society President, Melissa Julian, took photographs (which I will post later when I get some copies from her).  Here are a few pictures that I took.  A big "thank you" goes out to the many hours of work that our Relief Society sisters put into this lovely event!

Spring Break Sickies

For Spring Break we went to Las Vegas for a couple of days.  Monday we drove straight to the Natural History Museum where we checked out all of the exhibits and then checked into the Hotel.  We stayed in a nice big quite at Homewood Suites.  There were two king beds in separate rooms, a roomy master bathroom with a jetted tub and nice-sized shower, and a big living room with a full table and chairs, two couches (couch bed) and big screen TV's in each room.   We said that we needed to sleep nine people and so they carted in three roll-away beds for the last three kids.  We loved that fact that breakfast AND dinner came with the hotel stay.  The pool was really nice too and we all went swimming after dinner.  

The only problem with our little get-away?  Everyone was SICK!!  A few of us had been suffering flu-like symptoms a few days before the trip and then in the middle of the night Monday night, the coughing began -- first one child, then another, and then another.  Rick was ready to pack up and head home the next morning.  I figured that they would feel better once they got up though and didn't want them to miss out on the Childrens' Museum.  It really was awesome.  None of us had ever been there before and there were a ton of cool activities to do. The kids were really cute -- each of the older kids picked a younger sibling to take around and they had as much fun as their younger partner.  There were some interesting little shows and tons of cool science tricks.   All of the kids seemed to be feeling fine -- except for Jenna.  She was still pretty out of it from her rough night, but then the medicine started to kick in and she got excited about all the neat sights and was able to enjoy the visit.  After the museum Rick put Jenna down for a nap (she never naps at home -- except when she is sick) and I walked the kids across the busy street to a Jack-in-the-Box for lunch. 

Janika and the kids headed to the pool (more to tan than to swim).  We took it easy that night since no one was feeling very well -- coughing, fever, lethargy.  A nice movie would have been nice but the cable left much to be desired and they were charging $17.99 just to watch one of their "pay-per-view" movies.  Ridiculous!  Rick and I took most of the kids to a conference room for an "Uno Tournament."  Jase creamed us all.  Josh is now totally enthralled with the game and wanders around looking for someone to play it with him.  Wednesday we were planning on visiting Ethel M's Chocolate Factory and then going to Chuck-E-Cheese's for pizza but everyone's flu symptoms seemed even worse.  We get a lot of looks anyway walking around with so many kids, but when at least half of them are coughing all over the place -- that is just down right embarrassing.  I shooed them out of the breakfast area and sent them to our room to eat.  We decided that dragging a bunch of contagious kids to two more public places was not a good idea and headed home -- in spite of their complaints and protests.  Oh well.  We did still have fun -- and it could have been worse I suppose.  But it is kind of a bummer over Spring Break to have this gorgeous Spring weather and instead of being outside enjoying it, we have listless kids feeling miserable and camping out in front to the TV all day!  Most of them seemed a little better today though so I think tomorrow they will be well enough to head out to the park and enjoy some sunshine!

Children's Museum in Las Vegas