A year later...

Well, it looks like almost another year has passed before I came back to blog again.  I post on Facebook sometimes, and I guess I didn't realize it had been a whole YEAR since I tried to actually blog something!

This time my renewed commitment will be due to Steve & Afton Baxter's mission.  I figure if they are going to write us once a week to keep us updated, I should try to do the same.  In reality, "write blog post" has been on my recurring Sunday to-do list for a few months now, but I really don't look at my to-do list on Sundays!  Maybe this will be the time that sticks??

This last week I've felt more accomplished than usual.  I got some projects off my list that I've had for a long time, including Ruth's princess towel.  I think I need to go back and add some jewels to the crown though, since it doesn't look as good as it did in the tutorial online...

Most elementary schools have a special playground that is just for Kindergarten, which I think is great.  Except Tristan's school didn't have the rubber flooring installed until last week.  It was KILLING him.  He'd get in the van every day when I'd pick him up from school and say "Had another GREAT day... but the playground isn't ready yet."  He was VERY excited when I picked him up today because it was the first day they actually got to play on it!

I also got school pictures back last week.  I don't pay for them because I can get individual shots of the kids when we do family pictures, but I loved what came back this year.  Tristan was "star student" during the week of school pictures, and I guess he forgot to take off his crown.  And I have no idea what's up with Ben's smile.

Last Saturday we went hiking on the Bell Canyon trail with some ward members.  We didn't go very far because it was very steep and hard to carry a 40 lb child.  We stopped at a large pond (small lake?) and some of the kids took off shoes and waded in a little bit.  When they got out, we discovered leeches.  Luckily there weren't too many to pick off the kid's feet.

October 15th

Wow, what busy times these are....

First of all, October 15th is when all personal extensions expire for our tax clients.  As of this morning, we had 31 (THIRTY ONE???) clients that thought they were going to give us the info we needed to complete their returns.  Neil is going to take tomorrow off, but then we jump right back into quarterly payroll filings.  Now, I do most of those, and since it's not year-end reports yet, it will only take me a couple solid days at the office.

Ben is doing great in the Chinese Immersion program.  On the english side of learning, he had his first spelling pretest, words like "fix", "in", "it", etc and since he got 100% on it, they sent him home with extra words to be tested on, like "suffix", "quick", "into", and "appendix."  He said he got 100% on the real test yesterday. :)
We asked his Chinese teacher for extra/harder math homework (I can't handle the simple math he is working on....) but since they learn the math AND math lingo in Chinese, she didn't think it was a good idea.  She suggested he do extra math at home in English and also explain his homework to me in Chinese.  He said he couldn't explain HOW to do it, but he was able to say "7-4=3" all in Chinese, so that was great!

Tristan is doing great too - we opted not to do preschool because he can already read and do simple math.  I do need to have him practice his writing more, because he wants to write questions for me to answer but he doesn't know how to form the numbers very well.  I also need to get him signed up for tumbling!  He would be great at it :)

Ruth is as mobile as ever and likes to empty whatever she finds - tupperware cabinets, silverware from the dishwasher, toys from the bath, shoes from the basket....  you name it.  She is adorable and super fat.  She is 13 months old but has to wear 24 month clothes because not even 18 month stuff will fit, for the most part....

Neil and I have been working on a health challenge for a while, and while I'm not very good at the "no sweets" part of it, I have made sure to be more consistent about exercising, eating better, drinking more water, and reading scriptures.  Unfortunately, Neil hasn't been as good about it, and now we're both paying the price.  He was over his weight at his PT test in September, and they said they wanted him to lose 3-8 lbs between then and Oct 26th.  It wouldn't have been a big deal if he had kept up with it, but now he's up 6 lbs from that Sept weight, and he has 13 days to lose 9 lbs.  I made him a list of things he should do to make sure he's keeping weight down, and hopefully that will help him.  Going to bed by 10, eating slowly, only a small (as in, 5 peanut M&Ms or a mini candy bar) treat per day, exercising 2x day, more water, etc....  I told him I didn't know that I could commit to cutting back that far on treats, and I wouldn't exercise at night with him, but otherwise I'd do everything else.  I'm sure it will be good for me in the long run, I do have plenty of weight to lose....  But no one ever likes making those kinds of changes!

80 lbs of chicken bottled!!  Ok, so a bit of it was put into some freezer crock pot meals...  But wow!

Sometimes when you read the bible, you get really confused.  What is Genesis 38 all about??  They didn't put that in the musical!!  Good thing tho, it's not for kids, or anyone else for that matter...  I shall have to do more digging to see if I can understand it!

On another note, the mobile baby got herself into this situation today.  She was not at all thrilled.

She also 'fell' ie climbed out of the tub today.  She is too big!

Arrow of Light

Back when we lived in AF and we were joint Cubmasters, I found this idea somewhere online and had my bestie Jess design it for me.  I have probably made about 15 since then!  The boys could probably care less but the parents LOVE them :)  We had 4 boys receive their Arrow of Light tonight and it was great!

Primary Program

It's always fun when the primary kids do their program.  I always wish I could just sit and watch, but I think I have played piano for every program I can remember!!

The program was wonderful, and the only thing I would change would be that the chorister had a poster for EVERY song, even the ones the kids obviously knew.  I was a little disappointed about that, but the kids did great with their parts and music was great too!

Hungry again

Sorry Ben, you had dinner and 2 cookies, you don't need anything else...

But then I'll be so hungry I'll eat 65 bowls of cereal!

Ok, sounds good!

Wait, that will take forever.  Maybe 6 bowls...

I love his logic :)