Happy Birthday!!

Today was my birthday. I woke up to a nice text from Jared. Janelle left this morning to head back to Provo, but before she left she gave me a sweet note for my birthday that she had written and I was able to give her the missionary book that I had made for her. She arrived home one year ago on my birthday! It is hard to believe that she has been home a year already! The book took me months to make since I did a lot of editing on it, but it turned out really nice! 

Rick prepared a nice dinner for my birthday and Jenna walked all the way to Albertsons, over a mile away, with her friends after school to buy me some flowers. I thought that was really sweet of her! I was also able to have a video call with Jaiden, which is always nice! 

I wanted to go see the Musical Revue at the high school and tonight was the only night I had available, so I decided to go with Jenna. Rick wasn't interested and didn't understand why I wanted to go see it, especially on my birthday, since none of my kids were in it. But I thought it would be fun to go with Jenna and maybe it would get her interested in auditioning next year. Josh and Bridget came too and met us there. I am glad I went. The in the show did a great job and it was fun and entertaining! 

 

Newest Madrigals!!!

 Jenna made it into Madrigals!! Way to go, Jenna!! Jenna tried out with her two friends -- Anna and Grace. I was so happy and relieved when all three girls made it!!! It is going to be a fun year!! 

YM/YW Temple Trip (Jenna)

I got to go on a temple trip with the young men and young women. It was so much fun and I’m so glad that I went. It started on Friday morning when I woke up at 4:30 to go to the St. George Temple. We met up at the church and then drove over there and did baptisms. After that we drove home and got ready for school. Me and Clarissa ditched last period and went home to get ready to leave. We drove to the church again and we saw a huge bus. We put all our stuff in it and started to drive up north. The long drives were surprisingly so much fun and me Andrew and Clarissa and Audrey and Sadie and Ethan all sat by each other and kept switching seats. Once we got to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple we went in and did baptisms.

After baptisms I did Audrey, Clarissa, Sadie, Olivia, Adri, Maya, Ellie, and Eva‘s hair. That was a blast, then we drove to the church and ate dinner then drove to the places that we were staying. That night was super crammed with all the girls sleeping on the same floor with one bathroom, but we made it work. That morning we ate breakfast and then left to drive to the Provo city Temple. I did all the girls' hair again and we went to the park to eat pizza and play some games. On the drive back, we watched movies, took pictures or videos and listened to music. Each temple was so different but they all had the same feeling inside of them. I felt such peace. I am so glad that I could go. I love knowing an easy way that I can gather Israel! 

The next day I received this sweet text from one of Jenna's Young Women leaders! 

Alyssa's Bridal Shower

This morning Josh and I left at 6:00 am so that I could drop him off to State Madrigal and Ensemble at Provo high school at 10:00. Everyone else left on the bus yesterday right after school, but Josh had a soccer game last night that he didn't want to miss. So I offered to drive him separately. It also happened to by Alyssa's bridal shower today and so I dropped him off in Provo (he had slept the whole way, ha ha), and then hurried to Highland to catch a ride with family to the shower. 

Alicia drove and those of us who went with her were me, my mom, my aunt Nelva, and Kim. We enjoyed a nice visit in the car and enjoyed visiting at the shower. Scott and Amy have done so much with the house -- it looks totally different! They have done a great job remodeling and it looks amazing. They had added a huge covered back porch in the back yard. I would love something like that for our house! I was glad that I could come to the shower and visit with everyone. We are so happy for Alyssa! 

Go Josh!!

 Nice little article and video featuring Josh from the soccer game last night!! 

https://www.stgeorgeutah.com/news/archive/2024/04/27/ggg-spo-region-9-boys-soccer-snow-canyon-dixie-tied-on-top-of-the-table-desert-hills-wins/

Ellen's Graduation from SUU with Masters in Professional Communications

Ellen just graduated with her master's degree in Professional Communications! Congratulations, Ellen!! 

Jase and Ellen left for our house Thursday morning. Their van  broke down in Spanish Fork and they had to bring it to the shop and take Ellen's mom's car instead. So they arrived much later than usual. Friday morning they headed to SUU with the boys. We left shortly after and met them there. Ellen's parents and sister, Lexie, and her husband also met there. It was difficult keeping the boys entertained during the ceremony. Lexie got some darling pictures afterwards and then we all met at Pizza Factory for lunch! We are so proud of Ellen for this huge accomplishment! 

Josh: Senior Ball!!

Today was the last high school dance for Josh! I am glad that he could take Allie Lemmon, from our ward. She had asked him to a girls' choice dance earlier in the year, but he had already been asked. They went with Josh's friends Adam and Caleb Parkhurst, and Cameron Hugunin. Adam took Sarah Lyman, Caleb took Emily Condie, and Cameron took Taylor Peterson. They started off with pancakes at our house. A couple of the kids were gluten free, so I was glad that we had some gluten free pancake mix available. 

After breakfast they went to Veyo pools and to a place to try and catch crawdads. They even brought hotdogs to try and catch them. They said they only saw one, and that the Veyo pools were a little cold, but they still had fun. Then they brought their dates home to get ready and then met at 6:00 for pictures. I told Josh that Tuacahn at 6:00 would work because the sun went down behind the mountain about that time (I had been paying attention when going to Jenna's dance concert). But Cameron suggested a place in Kayenta. It was kind of in the middle of nowhere and there were two round-abouts next to each other. 

Josh had asked me to take the pictures, so we all drove to Kayenta, but it was really hot and sunny with no shade anywhere. It would have been a nice location had we done the pictures later, like at 7:30, but they wanted to do pictures before dinner. Also, some random lady came hiking up the road and said, "Do you know this is private property?" So anyway, we ended up going back to Tuacahn anyway. They didn't want to take pictures by the waterfall, and so we took them in the middle of the road, which actually looked really cool, but we kept having to move every time a car came. 

We got some nice pictures though. We had to take the rest on the bike trail instead of the road because we had to keep moving, ha ha. The kids all went to the dance and had a fun time and then went to Cameron's house for games. I came home and stayed up until midnight downloading and going through the pictures -- editing a few, deleting some, and putting an album of around 300 pictures together to share. I will put a few on this post. I am glad that everyone had a good time! 

Southwest Dance Concert: Jenna

I thoroughly enjoyed watching Jenna's dance concert the past three nights! She was really excited when she was asked to play the part of Nali and she did a terrific job! She looked so graceful and beautiful! Jenna's friends Clarissa, Grace, and Anna all came to watch her along with their moms, Allison and Amy. We all went out to Dairy Queen after for ice cream and had so much fun!