March 2015 on FB

March 1: Yesterday we saw the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. Today our plans are to go to the Shenandoah Valley to see the Luray Caverns! I'm loving this trip with Ammon, my sister, and her family!

March 2: I woke up at 5:30 this morning in Washington D.C., but by 5:30pm, I was home in Salmon, Idaho! I'm so grateful for technologies in transportation that make that possible!

March 4: Working in Kindergarten definitely has its perks! This week in Kindergarten we are celebrating Dr. Seuss's birthday, and have had dress-up days every day. Today was "Wacky Wednesday". I wore rolled-up pajamas pants, a tutu skirt, an inside-out jacket, mismatched earrings, and toddler-sized piggy tails in my hair. I loved it!!! And I completely embarrassed all my boys in the process!!! They told me when they saw me this morning that they didn't want to be seen with me during the day, but unfortunately for them, that didn't happen. They told me tonight how their friends were all talking about how ridiculous I looked. SUCCESS!!!! I totally nailed the look of "Wacky Wednesday"!!! Props to you, Dr. Seuss, for making weird people like me feel acceptable just the way I am (despite what my boys think)!

March 6: [posted by Josh] Got some awesome skiing in yesterday. Not a bad way to spend the day "working "! (he drove the school ski bus to Powder Mountain)

March 7: Took the whole family to the theater to watch "McFarland, USA". I highly recommend it--we all enjoyed it! (I even cried FOUR times, it was THAT good!)

March 8: One of our crocus plants finally sprouted today for the first time--we planted them 2 years ago and were so glad to see one bloom!

March 11: Just got the assessment evaluation back for my U.S. & World History college class; and I PASSED!! After sacrificing and studying and laboring over homework, it is always such a good feeling to know when I pass a class!

March 13: Took Micah on a date tonight. We went to the 28 Club, and he had his first Prime Rib and loved it! He ate every bite of the entire meal!! My favorite part of dinner was when the waitress came over to him to pick up his menu after we were done ordering, and he didn't know what she was putting her hand out for, so he shook her hand!! What a gentleman, and such a sweet gesture! Totally made me smile!

March 14: Today is Pi Day (3.14.15), so we just had to get some coconut cream and chocolate cream to share with friends. Thanks Marie Callendar!

 March 15: Took the twins skiing at Lost Trail yesterday. It was their 2nd time going this season (they just learned how to ski last year), and yet Jonah still managed to beat me to the bottom EVERY single time; which both filled me with pride (for his increasing skills) and embarrassment (for my decreasing skills)!!!

March 17: Guess who didn't get pinched at school today?!! I just got patted a lot instead (the kids all wanted to feel the boa)!

March 19: Ammon got 2nd place overall today at his first High School golf tournament!!! Woo-Hoo!

March 21: Spring Break=Spring Cleaning! I spent the majority of today helping Jonah and Micah deep-clean their bedroom, remove all their too-small clothes, go through grow boxes to get their next size clothes out, and rearrange their furniture. They were good little workers, and it feels nice to have at least one clean room in our house!

March 22: Reached a milestone post on my blog today: number 1111! (It makes me feel like I'm #1 with all those ones!)

March 23: I feel like spring cleaning has been successful! Today, Kanyon helped me clean out his room. I'm proud of the boys for getting rid of stuff they don't use: we took 3 big bags of stuff to donate to Rags & Wags, and I can't believe how much garbage we hauled out of their rooms too (our trash can is overflowing now). I'm happy we got it all done in 2 days; so now we can enjoy the rest of spring break!!

March 29: The last 10 days of spring break have been nice: spring cleaning the house, spending time with friends, and working on my college class. But yesterday and today have been the best part for sure: going camping in sunshine-y weather! I feel so rejuvenated!!

moments that made me laugh

Random moments (that I took a picture of to remember the moment by) from January and February that made me laugh:

My friend Amanda's birthday was in January. One night, John, Amanda, Josh, & I went out late to Bertram's Restaurant. We didn't order a meal, instead we ordered fries--LOTS of fries. We got regular fries, beer-battered fries, and fries with gravy. And after we ate all the fries, we ordered more fries. It was quite ridiculous, actually. And when we got full on fries, we ordered dessert (because it WAS Amanda's birthday celebration after all). But since we were all too full on fries, we had to share the dessert between us. The whole night made me laugh, because we were being so silly and it was late and I loved every minute of it!

One day at the end of January, Kanyon came home from school with a paper totem pole that he colored. Each piece of the totem pole lifts up, with space for writing on the back. Apparently, he learned about each animal, and then was to write about someone he knew that had attributes similar to that animal.  This is what he wrote: "Jonah and Micah are a raven because they are smart, big, fast, and remember people. I am a fox because I'm fast, sneaky, and quiet. (he didn't write anything for the butterfly, but the next part is what really cracks me up...) My mom and dad are a whale because they like swimming and they way alot." I laughed so hard when I read that!!! I've never been compared to a whale before, but it's nice to know what my kids REALLY think about how I look ;)!

At the beginning of February, there were some posts on facebook from some of our family members who had seen men with toddler ponytails/man buns on the BYU campus. Josh was super curious as to what the guys looked like. We couldn't figure out if they had super long hair and just pulled it all the way up on top for the ponytails, or if they had medium length hair and pulled up what they could. We just couldn't visualize it! Then I went to a dance company's performance in Salmon, and there was a guy in the group who had a man bun on the top of his head, so I took a photo so Josh could see. The guy had short hair on the sides and back, but it was longer on top so he could do up his hair into a bun. A few weeks later, Josh was getting his hair cut. It hadn't been cut for several months, and it had gotten pretty long. He wanted to see if he could pull off the toddler ponytail look before it was cut. I laughed so hard when we pulled it up; I'd never seen Josh's hair like this before! Doesn't he look adorable?!!

I really, really wanted to get the game Telestrations for Christmas, but unfortunately I didn't. We played it for the first time over Christmas break at the Forsgren's house, and just loved it! They're pretty good illustrators, so it was fun to see what the Forsgren boys' pictures looked like. Then our friends the Hobbs' came over to our house in January, and brought their new game Telestrations with them. We played all together with our kids, and had a hilarious time depicting the pictures that the kids drew! In February, Josh & I went over to their house one evening, and while we were there, we decided to play the game again. Josh and I are both terrible artists: he doesn't like this game because he can't draw, but I love this game because I am SO bad at drawing that it's actually hysterical! I love playing with people who have similar artistry skills to mine, because then I don't feel so dumb--which is why when I saw this picture, I laughed SOOO hard! Gina thought I was making fun of her skills when I laughed, but I truly wasn't; I just love that she draws like I do! For some reason, this picture of an alligator just makes my heart sing!

(P.S. I remember trying to draw a frog once for a 1st grade class that I was teaching music to a few years ago, and they all laughed at me, because they said it looked nothing like a frog, and multiple kids said they could do a better job! And I'm sure they were right!!!)

the best baptism

Kanyon was baptized a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints on Saturday, February 21, 2015. His baptism began at 11am. We'd been working for a few weeks on arranging the program, and organizing the meal afterwards. We thought we had everything all lined out, but the morning of his baptism, things didn't go according to plan. 

 It was yucky weather and snowing that morning, and my parents and sister Trina, who were planning on coming, called and said they couldn't make it due to weather. My sister Trina was going to sing a song with me, my mom was going to say a prayer, and my dad was going to be a witness, so I worked on filling in all the program gaps that morning. The Bishop was supposed to drop off the church keys to Josh that morning so that we could go in and turn on the font (which takes a few hours to fill), and set up chairs. He forgot, and ended up turning on the font himself but we didn't know it. Josh got a hold of another member of the bishopric and spent about an hour in town tracking him down, unlocking the church, checking on the font, and going to the grocery store to get the items that my mom was going to be bringing, but no longer could. Josh and I had both planned on working on food details that morning so the meal would be ready immediately following the baptism, and we were both running behind with the changes that occurred, and were both stressed that it wouldn't all work out. But amazingly enough, it did! And it all exceeded our expectations and hopes. It was an absolutely wonderful baptism!

Barb, the primary president, had come to visit Kanyon earlier in the week and brought him a baptism towel and a new tie tack as baptism gifts. Kanyon was so excited to use both on his special day! The towel was even embroidered with his name in it!

 

Josh practiced with Kanyon that morning so he'd know what to expect when they were in the baptismal font. They both looked so handsome and happy before the baptism began!

This was the program outline: Myron Baldwin conducted, Camille Williams played the piano, and Aunt Janet was the chorister. The opening song was "I can't wait until I'm 8", and Tiffany Entrikin gave the opening prayer. Malachi gave the talk on baptism, and did an awesome job! He gave Kanyon a Kit-KAT bar, and talked about the covenants we make at baptism that include "Keeping the commandments, Always remember him, and Take his name upon you" (each of those things starts with a letter that makes the acronym KAT). Then Kanyon, Amanda, and I sang the song "Baptism" as a special musical number. Kanyon was willing to take my sister Katrina's place in singing with me, and I surprised and delighted. He couldn't remember all the words to the song, so we worked on it a lot that morning in preparation, and Amanda agreed to sing with me last minute so there would be harmony in the song. I was so proud of Kanyon: he did an outstanding job!!

After the song, Josh baptized Kanyon, and Uncle Tim and Grandpa Edward were the witnesses. Here they are fresh out of the water, and Kanyon is clean inside and out!!

While we waited for Kanyon and Josh to put on dry clothes, everyone who came wrote their thoughts to Kanyon on cards that the primary presidency laminated and gave to Kanyon the next day at church (which he just loved reading!). Then Gideon gave the talk on the Holy Ghost, and talked about all the gifts and powers that the Holy Ghost brings. Following the talk, Josh confirmed Kanyon. Then Jan Phillips gave Kanyon some more gifts from the primary presidency: another tie tack, a multi-colored pen, a bookmark, and a journal. Myron gave closing comments, we sang the closing song "I am a Child of God" (per Kanyon's request) and Grandma Kathy gave the closing prayer.

It was such a nice baptism, and we felt the spirit so strongly! The talks and the special musical number helped bring the spirit to the meeting, and we were so glad to be supported by family and friends on Kanyon's special day! Everything had worked out, and Josh and I no longer felt stressed: rather we felt so much love and support!

Kanyon wore his new tie tack at his baptism that the primary gave him, too:

And since that day, he has proudly worn this same tie with ALL 3 tie tacks on it that he got at the baptism: the scriptures one from the primary presidency, a soccer ball one that was given to him by the Hobbs family, and a Shield of Faith one that the primary presidency gave him after he was baptized!

After the baptism, we headed home and made sure everything was ready for the family meal. We had a baked potato bar, drinks, and desserts. The meal was delicious and filling, and the company was pleasant and relaxing!

Kanyon was so happy that his cousins Joel and Isaac came to the baptism, because he got to play with them the night before and that morning. Unfortunately, they couldn't stay very long after the meal. After we ate, Kanyon opened up his Baptism gifts from Josh and I. We gave him a new set of quad scriptures, a new canvas scripture bag, and a baptism activity book. 

Kanyon has been a different boy since he got baptized, and we are so grateful and blessed for the choices he has made and for the young man he is becoming!

Lotsa 3-Point Shots

Ammon was on the High School JV basketball team this winter. Now that our school has dropped to the 2A division in Idaho, our basketball team consists of just Varsity and J.V. (no more C team). There's a big group of boys that are Ammon's age that have played basketball together since 5th grade, and they were all on the J.V. team together. They are all freshmen now and they made up the entire J.V. team. Unfortunately, most of the schools we played against had older J.V. teams, so that meant our freshmen boys played against juniors and sophomores in almost every game during the 3-month season. Our boys played good, and we were very proud of their abilities, but because of the circumstances, they finished with a losing season. They won just 2 of the games, and were super close in 2 other games (which was SO exciting to see!!!). 

Ammon started off the season with some cool, new basketball shoes that he ordered online. He also wore his sports goggles that he got last year (which are shaded and look like sunglasses). 

Halfway through the season, one of his new shoes broke where the laces are held, and he got some new athletic shoes. Also, after having his glasses come in contact with the basketball multiple times, I finally convinced him to try out contacts (which he said he NEVER wanted to wear, but surprisingly really likes them!). He wore his new shoes and new contacts the second half of the season. 

Ammon's main contribution to the team was his Sa-weet 3-pointer shots. He aced at least one in almost all of the games! It was always so thrilling for us when it happened!

The first game was a home game against Butte on December 5. He nailed the 3-pointer!

The second game was another home game against Teton. He had another 3-point shot that swished right into the basket!

The third game was yet another home game, this time against South Fremont. 

He aced this 3-point shot again!

Then our next game was the first away game of the season and also the first game after Christmas Break; we played against South Fremont again--during which Ammon's shoe broke. Josh drove the bus for it, but I stayed home with the other boys, and I was kind of glad because I'd never experienced an earthquake before and kind of always wanted to, and we felt an earthquake in Salmon that day, from the epicenter east of Challis! 

The 4th game was a home game against Challis and WE WON!!! We were all so happy to have finally won our first game!

The next game was another home game against North Fremont.

The next game was at Teton on Jan. 10. Josh drove the bus again for it, but I was unable to go. They barely lost in overtime 48-46. That was an excitingly close game!!

The following game was at Butte. It was during this game that Ammon hurt his knee, and couldn't play in the last quarter. 

See that ref? We can't stand him. 

The next game was at home against Firth. We don't like their team or their school. 

The next game was at Challis. We already beat this team once, and the boys were hoping to beat them again, but they lost this time. Ammon hurt his knee again during this game, and was out the whole 2nd half of the game.

Two days later, they played at West Jefferson, and it was another super close, very exciting game. Ammon was a starter in this game, but I was doing some errands and shopping in Idaho Falls, and totally missed the first quarter, and unfortunately didn't see that!

Our next game was at home against Ririe, and once again Ammon was a starter during the first quarter, and I missed it AGAIN because I had some work meetings I was at and didn't make it there until the second quarter.

Their next two games were away at Firth (ugh!) and North Fremont. Then they played their last home game on Feb. 11 in Salmon against West Jefferson. This time, we beat them and WON!!! It was so close: we won by just one point! Unfortunately, I don't have any photos of this game because the coach "forgot" to play Ammon. It was the first game he had never been played, and I was so upset about that! He handled it much better than me. Also, remember the ref I pointed out in an above photo? He kicked Josh out of this game for "excessive hand gestures". All Josh did was stand up and clap loudly, and then make the "I'm watching you" gesture (by pointing at his own eyes then pointed at the ref), which the ref felt was threatening. Josh has paralyzed vocal cords, so he uses exaggerated hand movements because he can't yell (which I told the ref after the game). We were both SO irate during this game, and couldn't even enjoy the win!

The final game of the season was at Ririe on February 11. I drove down to see it, and was so glad that I did! Ammon started and ended the season with awesome 3-point shots to contribute to his team's score, and I am so proud of his ball-playing abilities.

He was coached by Boyd Stokes again this year. Boyd coached them as 8th graders last year, and his two sons coached them the previous year when they were 7th graders. We were so glad to have him coach them again, he is an awesome coach! Although the boys didn't have a winning season, they sure fought hard, and we look forward to the awesome seasons they will have when they are upper classmen!

Valentines Day 2015

It was rather simple getting ready for Valentine's Day this year since Jonah and Micah are now in 5th grade, so they don't give Valentines cards anymore. I didn't even have to help make a Valentine's Box this year for any of the kids, since Kanyon's class made their own at school. For the hand-out treats, I bought a large box of fruit roll-ups at Sam's Club for Kanyon and I to attach to our Valentine's Cards, and we worked on it one night together. Kanyon had Despicable Me cards for his class, and I had SpongeBob cards for my 2 kindergarten classes. We went through and wrote our names on the cards, made sure we had one for every child in each of our classes, and then stapled a fruit roll-up to all of them. I liked that it was so easy this year!

Valentine's Day was on a Saturday this year, so we celebrated it at school on Thursday the 12th (we have 4-day school weeks). Kanyon's class Valentine's party was at the end of school day, but they could hand out their cards that morning. I wasn't able to make it back for his party because the Kindergarten class (where I work) was having a party at the same time, too, so I took a few photos of him that morning instead. 

Kanyon with the giant heart-shaped Valentine envelope
that he made & decorated. Each student had one on the end
of their desk to put the valentines cards in. 

Checking out to see how many he has received so far!

In Kindergarten, each student also made a bag, but they were a lot smaller, and the kids each took turns handing out their treats and putting them into the other students' bags (as they were holding onto them). They thought it was a lot like trick-or-treating, which was a fun way for them to give to each other.

I love Valentine's Day, but the kids are SO hyped up at school whenever there's a fun party, and after having two hyped-up classes (the morning and the afternoon) do their parties, I was exhausted at the end of the school day (and was SO glad it was a weekend)!!! Kanyon felt the opposite: he was so excited when he got home, because he had a container full of cards and candies (which of course were all eaten by the very next day)!

Eight is Great!

It was Kanyon's turn to have a friend party for his birthday this year (we alternate years between friend and family parties). I have decided as I've gotten older that I would rather PAY for my child to go somewhere with his friends for his birthday rather than PLAN a birthday party and have kids come over to the house. The cost is so worth it to me, because there's so much less stress involved! For Kanyon's birthday in February, he invited two friends (Keagan and Aiden) to come with us to Blast Off! Family Fun Center in Idaho Falls the Saturday before his birthday. 

Since it's a 2 1/2 hour drive away, we got some movies to watch in the suburban so there would be something to do while we drove down and back that day. Jonah and Micah also came, so the backseats were full (which is why we had to limit his friends to just two). We had a wonderful day!!! We left Salmon around 9:00 that morning, and when we got to Idaho Falls, we went to Sam's Club first because I had a little bit of shopping to do. I bought some of the hot deli food for the boys there and they ate lunch as I shopped, so it all worked out. Then we went to the Fun Center, and we had a great time! I was stress-free, and simply enjoyed watching the boys having a fun time together! 

It wasn't busy at all when we first got there, so they were able to do all the activities without a line. 

They went through the jungle gym twice:

Can you see all 5 boys here?! (Aiden is hiding his body!)

They played 9 holes of glow-in-the-dark miniature golfing (which is the main reason why Kanyon wanted to go to Blast Off):

This was the hardest hole: trying to hit it up the ramp and
into the basketball hoop at the end

They were each given 10 tokens, so they played arcade games until all their tokens were gone, and then they turned in their winning tickets to receive prizes.

Kanyon won 300 tickets on one game!
It kept shooting out the tickets for over 5 minutes straight,
and it made him so excited and happy!

They bought candy with their tickets

They played 4 rounds of Laser Tag which ended up being their favorite activity there. The first and second time we didn't have to wait in line, but the longer we were there, the more people came, so the last two times they had to wait to play. 

They also went climbing on the rock wall. There were three different sections on the rock wall, and three levels of difficulty on each section. Micah and Jonah accomplished almost all of them. They are really good climbers! Kanyon and his friends did good climbing on the easiest climb on each of the three sides, and made it to the top as well. 

We left around 3:30 (none of them wanted to leave yet, though), and made it back to Salmon after 6:00. It had been a really nice day, and I was so glad that we went!

The next day was Sunday the 8th (the day that we had to talk in church), and although it wasn't Kanyon's actual birthdate, we celebrated it with the family that day because Josh was going to be gone to golf meetings on Kanyon's birthday.  He requested steak and mashed potatoes and creamy corn for his birthday meal. Grandma and Grandpa T., and Uncle Tim and Barb and cousin Anika joined us for dinner, gifts, and dessert.

He was SO excited that he got to open his gifts
before his birthday!!

Grandma P. always wraps her gifts SO well before she
sends them in the mail, so they require scissors to open!

He's been asking for a new laptop for 2 years. He was
EXTREMELY happy when he discovered that he
FINALLY got a "half-laptop/half-tablet" for his birthday!
He'd been saving up for it, so he contributed to part of the expense.

He couldn't figure out what this was. He thought it was a
toaster!! It's actually a dock/charging station for his iPod
because he's always losing his chargers!

He loves the Despicable Me movie, so when I saw this shirt,
I knew he had to have it because it reminded me of Kanyon!!

For his birthday, he got clothes, the "half-laptop/half-tablet", air soft gun
& pellets, iPod charging dock, scout book, money, and chocolate bars.

I totally never thought about getting him a birthday cake or ice cream, so on Saturday night right before 9 (when the grocery store closes), I suddenly remembered and ran to the store and found a cake and got him some vanilla ice cream to go with it (his favorite food--he literally goes through like a gallon of it a week lately). There wasn't much variety at the store, but we found something that would work. It was a "Frozen" themed cake, but we took off all the cutesy stuff and I added candles all over where the frosting was messed up so it wouldn't be noticeable!

On his actual birthday, February 10, he took mini cupcakes to share as his birthday treat with his class at school. After he helped me hand out all the cupcakes to them, the class sang happy birthday to him before they ate the goodies!

As an 8 year-old, these are some of his favorites--
Food: chicken nuggets and steak
Color: turquoise
Friends: Keagan, Abby W., and {girl}friends: Hestyn, Rudi, Brylin, and Scottlyn
Games: Telestrations, Chess, and Minecraft
Sport: golf
School subject: art and math facts

He is doing good in school, although he doesn't enjoy going lately, but I don't know why. He is good at reading and lately likes the Captain Underpants and Diary of a Wimpy Kid books. He is excellent at math, and loves when math homework is the 100 facts you have to complete in 5 minutes (he ALWAYS completes it WAY before time is up!). He has recently started drawing and coloring pictures on the backs of his math work, and he likes art more (he used to hate it in kindergarten). He plays basketball a lot, and likes shooting hoops at home and at recess, and has become quite good at it! He's also been learning to balance a lot more recently, so he practices on the skateboard and took snowboarding lessons this winter. He loves golf, and wishes he could play it all the time. He was getting antsy at the end of winter, because he just wanted the snow to melt so he could play golf again!  He doesn't jump on the trampoline as much anymore, and he recently sold his small indoor trampoline because he no longer needs it.  He likes writing notes to his girlfriends, and to do nice things for them. Also, he's started going to scouts now that he's 8 and he absolutely loves it!