Dog days of school

Jonah finally talked me in to letting him take Rookie to show and tell. Rookie was in heaven with all the kids. I helped Jonah share a lot of facts about Pugs. The kids loved hearing all about the crazy and funny things Rookie does.

Star Student

Alexa was voted a Star Student this month for caring. Her teacher wrote a sweet note about how kind Alexa is. She is one of my favorite people!!!!

Halloween

We went to our local farm and pick ups some pumpkins. Sadly the kids were not that in to it this year. They are growing up. We didn't even get our pumpkins carved and they didn't seem to care.

Our witchy came back to our front porch this year. She brought much amazement to the neighbor kids as she worked on her brew.
Poor Caleb got super sick and had to miss the big Halloween party that the mutual kids had planned.
Alexa was a Chinese girl.
And of course Jonah, being a boy, wanted to be some gross thing in a black cape.

Disneyland in October

Disneyland during Halloween is AWESOME! I loved all the decorations. The kids had not been to Disneyland since they were super little.
On our second day my sister, Meghan, joined us. Our favorite ride was The Tower of Terror. Jonah's face was priceless the first time we rode it. He was horrified. But when it was all done he wanted to ride it again!
It rained two out of the three days we were there. It made the lines short but it made us soggy and cold. I was so proud of the kids because they didn't complain once!
Notice all of Alexa's buttons. She cracked me up because she had to wear all of them each day. We went about a week before my birthday and the kids insisted I get a birthday button. Alexa thought it would be funny if she wore it with my name on it. She got such a kick out of people saying to her "Happy Birthday Lindsay!".

Silly Bands

Do your kids have to wear 50 of these on their wrist????

Bird House

Jonah had to build a bird house for scouts. He and Steve worked together on it. Jonah loves to spend time with his Dad. The older Jonah gets the more he acts like Steve. I love it!!!

Teenager

I did a horrible job of taking pics on Caleb's 13th birthday! We had a small gathering of family and friends. I still can't believe we have a teenager in the house. I hope we all survive the experience :). Caleb is a smart, spiritual and happy boy. His brother and sister adore him. He is loyal and kind to all he meets. I am so lucky to be a part of his life.

My Students!!!

Steve started the Executive MBA program at The University of Utah in August. The program is geared toward working professionals. He attends one day a week. It has been a huge adjustment for our family. The first few weeks were pretty rough as we adjusted to not seeing him very much. He is loving school, is learning a ton and we know this will be worth it in the long run.
Caleb started 7th grade! I know I was more nervous about it than he was. Don't you remember how awkward junior high was. I wanted to protect him from those crappy experiences. But I had no need to worry. He is loving it. He is taking 9th grade math and english. He is earning A's in both of those. Next year they will provide more AP classes for him.

Have you missed me???

Wow it has been months! I guess you could say I boycotted blogging. I became disenchanted with the idea. Some times I feel like woman who have blogs try and portray that they have the perfect life. ..."Look at my perfect kids, my perfect home, my perfect husband". It's all a bit fake don't you think? Even though my kids and husband are just about perfect! But I was totally impressed with a friend of mine who showed me the book she made from printing up her blog entries. Loved it and I want to have a record of our family.

back to school

The kids last year in 2nd, 4th and 6th grade.
Alexa and Jonah started 5th and 3rd grade today. How time flies!!! And my oh my how they have grown!

Get out of my hair!

One afternoon in Yellowstone Alexa and Jonah were driving me nuts...so I sent them in to the woods with my camera. They had many pictures of their stuffed animals. But the following flower pictures were all them as well. I just cropped them and played with the color. Very good I must say!

Yellowstone

We spent Pioneer weekend in Yellowstone. This big guy above was by far the best part of the trip. He chose our campground as his hang out the entire time we were there. He ate and slept. He as a beauty!

Starting the morning camp fire. It got so cold at night. Too cold for me. I had a break down the first night and told Steve I am never camping again!
Old Faithful
Muddy Pots


The Dragons Mouth

tile project

My poor husband....we go to Lowe's for a few screws and we come back with a tile project!!!! This tip picture is the back splash before. The following pics are us working on our little project. Steve said he is calling the cable company and having all the home improvement channels blocked!

wow!

Being the primary secretary allows me time to sit in the hall on Sundays and read the Ensign. I was blown away by an article in the June issue that talked about good use of the internet. The following statement changed me. I am devoted to being fully present in the moment and living in the moment.

Limit Your Time
Rebecca Renfroe, from Idaho, USA, used to blog and read others’ blogs almost daily. Her mind was always in “compose” mode—mentally writing a blog about what she did with her children instead of just doing things with them. She realized there had to be a balance.
She says, “The Spirit helped me to recognize that having a blog was not the problem—devoting too much of my time and energy to it was. I had literally been giving portions of my life away: trading away quality time with my children and my husband, trading away time for serious, in-depth study of the scriptures, and even trading away hours of sleep that affected my ability to serve others, to be sensitive to the Spirit, and to maintain a healthy lifestyle.”
Sister Renfroe learned not to let good things get in the way of better things, as Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles counseled: “Just because something is good is not a sufficient reason for doing it. … Of course it is good to view wholesome entertainment or to obtain interesting information. But not everything of that sort is worth the portion of our life we give to obtain it. Some things are better, and others are best.”1

Weekend project! www.allthingsthrifty.com

Found this little number at The DI for $10! Steve says he is sure his parents owned it in 1974! You know they do say one man's trash is another man's treasure. I feel like I really turned it in to a treasure in my eyes!

I didn't sand. Just sprayed on a base coat, a couple layers of spray paint and then added an antique glaze. I wanted the table to be higher. I found these legs at Lowes for only a few bucks each.

Then I added a glass round and put it in the spot that had been waiting for it!!

8 is great!

Today was Jonah's big day...he got baptized. His sister and cousin sang and Caleb gave a talk. He was baptized and confirmed my Steve. It was so nice to have all the family in town.