Friday, January 08, 2016
Mikayla's First Week at her new school
Mikayla started her first week at her new school this week. I had a meeting with her teacher today and she is doing very well. Her teachers are impressed with her. She has completed two weeks worth of assignments in just one week. I told her if she keeps it up, she may have all her work done in March! I asked Mikayla if she likes her new school and she said "yes." I said do you like it because you don't have to go to school everyday. She said "I actually wish I could come here more." That was good to hear. I went back and forth for a couple of months before making this decision. I wasn't real sure how it would all work out and if it was the right thing for her; but I am glad we chose to do it. We no longer have to worry about insane amounts of homework and assignments she doesn't understand because she wasn't taught the material at school. Her new teachers are very friendly and helpful and actually take the time to teach her and help her with her assignments.
Thursday, December 31, 2015
Closing out 2015
2015 is coming to a close and we are getting ready to welcome in a new year. As we welcome 2016, we will be starting it off with some changes.
Mikayla will start a new school in January. She will be attending a school that is part school, part homeshool, part independent studies. She will attend school 3 days a week for 10 hours a week and the rest of her schooling will be done at home. She has done very well in school and has always made the honor roll. Since August she has already read over a million words. She loves to read. Mikayla has been very helpful around the house and with the rabbits.
Ashlee started her first year of seminary and highschool this year and is doing well with both. Although, she doesn't like having to wake up so early in the mornings, but she sets her alarm and gets herself up and ready every single day. She is taking a couple honors classes and is doing well in all her classes. She has an A in seminary and over a 4.0 GPA in school. We hope that with the start of allergy shots she will have a healthier year this year and will feel better too. It's hard to believe, but Ashlee will get her drivers permit this year too. She has several jobs that she is doing and is saving away her money to buy a Jeep some day! Ashlee has also been very helpful around the house and with the rabbits.
John ended his rabbit partnership with his friend as of 12/31/15 and we will try to make a go of the business on our own. The business is very time consuming and 2015 has been a very rough year. It was to the point where it wasn't worth the amount of work for what the business was generating and having to split that with two people. I am a bit hesitant about how it will all work out, but John is confident it will all be fine....John still doesn't care too much for his job but he likes the hours, as long as it isn't harvest!
I will start working full time now as of January. My mom who is the office manager where John and I work, and the manager, are both retiring. So I have my hands kind of full. I am trying to learn my mom's position, while at the same time helping and teaching our new manager. It's going to be an interesting and probably stressful year. I am not sure I am cut out for this, but it's what has to be done. I worry about working full-time and not being able to be there as much for the kids and our family, but I hope things will work out. Both girls have been huge helps at home and that has been a lot of help to me. I hope and pray I can do this! I have lost lots of sleep at night over this.
Mikayla will start a new school in January. She will be attending a school that is part school, part homeshool, part independent studies. She will attend school 3 days a week for 10 hours a week and the rest of her schooling will be done at home. She has done very well in school and has always made the honor roll. Since August she has already read over a million words. She loves to read. Mikayla has been very helpful around the house and with the rabbits.
Ashlee started her first year of seminary and highschool this year and is doing well with both. Although, she doesn't like having to wake up so early in the mornings, but she sets her alarm and gets herself up and ready every single day. She is taking a couple honors classes and is doing well in all her classes. She has an A in seminary and over a 4.0 GPA in school. We hope that with the start of allergy shots she will have a healthier year this year and will feel better too. It's hard to believe, but Ashlee will get her drivers permit this year too. She has several jobs that she is doing and is saving away her money to buy a Jeep some day! Ashlee has also been very helpful around the house and with the rabbits.
John ended his rabbit partnership with his friend as of 12/31/15 and we will try to make a go of the business on our own. The business is very time consuming and 2015 has been a very rough year. It was to the point where it wasn't worth the amount of work for what the business was generating and having to split that with two people. I am a bit hesitant about how it will all work out, but John is confident it will all be fine....John still doesn't care too much for his job but he likes the hours, as long as it isn't harvest!
I will start working full time now as of January. My mom who is the office manager where John and I work, and the manager, are both retiring. So I have my hands kind of full. I am trying to learn my mom's position, while at the same time helping and teaching our new manager. It's going to be an interesting and probably stressful year. I am not sure I am cut out for this, but it's what has to be done. I worry about working full-time and not being able to be there as much for the kids and our family, but I hope things will work out. Both girls have been huge helps at home and that has been a lot of help to me. I hope and pray I can do this! I have lost lots of sleep at night over this.
Friday, December 25, 2015
Christmas
Christmas morning we opened gifts and John made Crepes for breakfast. John has always wanted to try crepes and Teresa happened to give us a crepe mix and a crepe pan for Christmas so he put it to use.
The girls got clothes and shoes, things they were in need of. Ashlee bought Mikayla some targets for target practice and a hat. Mikayla bought Ashlee a new selfie stick. John and the girls got me some clothes that are current with fashion trends trending now (my wardrobe is really out dated). My mom got me a bread machine for Christmas. Hopefully I can finally make bread and have it turn out right! The girls bought John some headlamps to use at night when he is feeding along with some Carmel Milky Ways. The girls and I got John a motion detector for our driveway. Hopefully we can catch those dang theives that keep breaking into his truck!
We hosted Christmas Dinner at our home this year. We had my Mom and Terry, Adam and his family, and Grandpa Billy and Kay over. We shared a quick video about Christmas, enjoyed dinner and exchanged gifts. It's always nice to get together with family, but it always seems like our time together is short.
We hosted Christmas Dinner at our home this year. We had my Mom and Terry, Adam and his family, and Grandpa Billy and Kay over. We shared a quick video about Christmas, enjoyed dinner and exchanged gifts. It's always nice to get together with family, but it always seems like our time together is short.
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Family Temple Trip
Ashlee has been asking for some time to go to the temple so she can take the names she has done family history work on and do baptisims. Life has been crazy and we haven't had the time so a few weeks ago we decided we would make a trip in the month of December and since Mikayla turned 12 several months ago too, we could go to the temple as a family.
We were able to join in with a small group of youth from Jackson and do baptisms with them. It was a nice, spitritual day, and being that it's December, we got to see the temple all decorated for Christmas.
We were able to join in with a small group of youth from Jackson and do baptisms with them. It was a nice, spitritual day, and being that it's December, we got to see the temple all decorated for Christmas.
Friday, December 18, 2015
Last Day at Ballico
Today marked the closing of another chapter in our lives and in a couple weeks we will open a new chapter. Today was Mikayla's last day at Ballico School. In a couple of weeks she will start a part school, part homeschooling, independent study program and we will see how that goes. This wasn't something we were planning on having to do, but feel that this will be better for her. She does well in school, but she and I are both frustrated with her teachers and we don't feel like she is being taught what she needs to be taught.
Last year Ashlee had the same teachers and she didn't have a good school year either. Ashlee just had to "suck it up," deal with it, and get through it. Unforunately for Mikayla though, she would have had the same two teachers next year too for 8th grade and we just felt that we needed to make the change before she got too far behind.
Last year Ashlee had the same teachers and she didn't have a good school year either. Ashlee just had to "suck it up," deal with it, and get through it. Unforunately for Mikayla though, she would have had the same two teachers next year too for 8th grade and we just felt that we needed to make the change before she got too far behind.
Thursday, December 17, 2015
Allergies
Ashlee has has sinus infections and strep throat 4 times in the last year and two other times she had sinus infections and pharyngitis. In the last year she has been sick and needed antibiotics 6 times. After her 5th time of being sick in 7 months I decided it was time to take her to the ear, nose and throat doctor to find out what's going on.
The ENT saw her every 7-10 days for about 2 months, looked in her sinuses several times with a camera, did a CT Scan on her sinuses and a few cultures. He came to the conclusion that her tonsils were fine, but the problem was in her sinuses. Repeat sinus infections turned into a fungus.
We spent a month on edge wondering if she was going to have to have surgery. Towards the end of October she was seen on a Monday, by Thursday they had received some of her cultures back and asked us to come in the next day because surgery would probably be the following week. Thankfully when she was seen the next day, she had made improvements from when the doctor last saw her on Monday; so the doctor decided to double her medications and recheck her in another week. The plan was to try to avoid surgery, or at least try to get her closer to a school break, so she could have surgery without having to miss so much school. If surgery was needed she was going to miss about 2 weeks of school.
The doctor came to the conclusion that allergies were causing sinus infections, sinus infections were causing strep throat and the sinus infections were turning into fungus in her sinuses. In Decemeber when allergies tend to be lower, she was allergy tested for 86 different allergies and had several postitives. Ashlee is allergic to grass, weeds, pollen, mold and dust. All things that are in the environment and especially bad in this valley that we live in. The allergist and ENT both recommended that Ashlee begin allergy shots.
Every week for a year Ashlee will get an allergy shot. After the first year, the hope is that she can go to having shots every other week and she will continue to have shots for the next 4-5 years. Hopefully these shots work and she can be healthy again. The doctor said that Ashlee has lived with allergies for so long, that she doesn't even realize anymore how they affect her, her activity level, sleep, etc. She has just accepted the way she feels as being normal, and doesn't really know anything else.
This is what her back looked like when they did the allergy testing. Her left shoulder area that is really red, started to turn purple as the test went on. Grass is her highest allergy. She was in tears during the test. They poked her 86 times with this needle like tool. John was allergy tested several years ago and the doctor he went to used a different method. I think Ashlee's doctor is "old school" and used a different technique on her.
The ENT saw her every 7-10 days for about 2 months, looked in her sinuses several times with a camera, did a CT Scan on her sinuses and a few cultures. He came to the conclusion that her tonsils were fine, but the problem was in her sinuses. Repeat sinus infections turned into a fungus.
We spent a month on edge wondering if she was going to have to have surgery. Towards the end of October she was seen on a Monday, by Thursday they had received some of her cultures back and asked us to come in the next day because surgery would probably be the following week. Thankfully when she was seen the next day, she had made improvements from when the doctor last saw her on Monday; so the doctor decided to double her medications and recheck her in another week. The plan was to try to avoid surgery, or at least try to get her closer to a school break, so she could have surgery without having to miss so much school. If surgery was needed she was going to miss about 2 weeks of school.
The doctor came to the conclusion that allergies were causing sinus infections, sinus infections were causing strep throat and the sinus infections were turning into fungus in her sinuses. In Decemeber when allergies tend to be lower, she was allergy tested for 86 different allergies and had several postitives. Ashlee is allergic to grass, weeds, pollen, mold and dust. All things that are in the environment and especially bad in this valley that we live in. The allergist and ENT both recommended that Ashlee begin allergy shots.
Every week for a year Ashlee will get an allergy shot. After the first year, the hope is that she can go to having shots every other week and she will continue to have shots for the next 4-5 years. Hopefully these shots work and she can be healthy again. The doctor said that Ashlee has lived with allergies for so long, that she doesn't even realize anymore how they affect her, her activity level, sleep, etc. She has just accepted the way she feels as being normal, and doesn't really know anything else.
This is what her back looked like when they did the allergy testing. Her left shoulder area that is really red, started to turn purple as the test went on. Grass is her highest allergy. She was in tears during the test. They poked her 86 times with this needle like tool. John was allergy tested several years ago and the doctor he went to used a different method. I think Ashlee's doctor is "old school" and used a different technique on her.
Tuesday, December 01, 2015
Favorite Things Christmas Mingle Relief Society Activity
We wrapped up the year with our last Releif Society Activity of the year tonight. We had a Favorite Things Christmas Mingle. In the past the ward has had a progressive dinner type activity and traveled to a few different homes. I wanted to do something a little different, while at the same time still create that cozy, cabin, homelike atmosphere.
Here is what we came up with.
We seved dinner family style, no buffet line! We used plastic disposable plates and silverware that looked like the real thing, but could be thrown away. I asked a few sisters in the ward to talk about why the Christmas season is special and important to them and to share any family traditions or memories they had. Every sister that wished to participate in our Favorite Things Gift Exchange brought a gift and we had a gift exchange. Gifts could be something they bought, something they made, their favorite recipe with some ingredients, etc. The possibilities were pretty much endless in order to accomodate everyones needs. The evening was well attended. Our biggest activity so far. I planned for 50 and we had like 49. We only had enough left overs left for another plate!
John was awesome. He helped dish out the food, washed dishes, bused the tables, helped decorate and clean-up, he was wonderful. Without his help those of us on the committee would not have been able to enjoy the evening, but because he helped, we hardly had to do anything. We got to enjoy ourselves along with everyone else.
Here is what we came up with.
John was awesome. He helped dish out the food, washed dishes, bused the tables, helped decorate and clean-up, he was wonderful. Without his help those of us on the committee would not have been able to enjoy the evening, but because he helped, we hardly had to do anything. We got to enjoy ourselves along with everyone else.
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