2018- Week 16(Apr 16- Apr 22)

It was that horrible time again for Arena Scheduling at the High School. This causes me and the girls more anxiety then any thing else all year. Luckily this is Ashtyn's senior year scheduling and seniors get first priority. Ashtyn is planning a very full load next year with four concurrent enrollment classes and chemistry on top of that so she is going to be a busy girl. Her scheduling went well and I was done in two minutes. My girls like me to do it for them so that all the pressure is felt by me. Whitney's went almost smoothly. One class she wanted ended up being full so I had to switch her to a different teacher, but in return a spot opened up in ceramics which she really wanted to take so we were able to get that. Another year down.

I worked the handcarts at work this week. I have been trying to study as much as I can about the treks so that I can share correct information with the groups. We are given a script to follow but sometimes there is extra time so I will share more details or if someone has a question I like to be able to answer it. Well this week all of that was put to the test when one of the groups I had come through had a mom who happened to be a direct descendant of James Willie from the Willie Company. I shared what I thought was accurate and then at the end she raised her hand and proceeded to tell the kids that she needed to clarify what I had said because it wasn't' all true. I felt so embarrassed! I tried really hard to not let my embarrassment show because what she was telling them was really interesting and I'm glad to know the facts now. She felt really bad that she had stopped my presentation but I told her that I'd rather have that happen and learn something new then to not have someone speak up and find out later that I wasn't teaching it correctly. It was a good experience in the end but I will just stick to the script from now on- ha ha.

My Bishop's daughter is getting married next week and I was invited to her shower. Her name is Whitney and she and my Whitney could be twins- their looks, personalities, everything. She is darling and marrying the nicest boy ever who also has the most beautiful voice and has been sent all over by the church to sing at things. It has been so fun and so surreal to watch girls that are just barely older then my girls start to get married.

Jeff went on his annual golf trip to St. George this week. So the wives and I went out to dinner on Thursday. Not many of them could make it because of other obligations- which I always find interesting because I am the kind of person that will drop anything to spend time with a friend, especially one I only see once a year. I sometimes feel like I am the only person in the world with that kind of personality.

Thursday night was also our ward Relief Society Birthday Social. The golf wives dinner got over at six so I headed straight over so that I wouldn't miss the "French Dinner" they were putting on. It was so fun! I actually got to help with the decorating and it turned out so perfect. Of course I love all things French so this was right up my ally. They served chicken cordon bleu, salad, fruit and bread galore. My friend Kendra bought every single piece of bread the store had and they gave each sister a full loaf of french bread wrapped in a dish towel for a favor. They played French cafe music and we also did a service project at the end where we tied blankets and made little gift bags for the new River Heights Branch in our stake. This is made up solely of an assisted living center so we wanted to do something nice for the residents. They also had each of us draw a picture of ourselves and then we went around and wrote one word on each person's to describe them. It was fun to see what people wrote about me.

On Saturday Whitney and I went to the Barnes and Noble to pick up a book I had ordered. I just love that store so much. I could live there if they'd let me. Books are my favorite thing and I love to read just about anything. We found some great clearance books we just couldn't live without.

Whitney had to teach the lesson in Young Women's this week. It was on Why Do We Need the Book of Mormon. She made brownies and had visual aids and a video she showed. I wish I had been able to be in there and hear her lesson. She wasn't feeling well on Sunday and was such a trooper to still go and do her lesson. We ended up taking her to the insta care after church because she felt so bad and found out she has a kidney infection. Jeff was also sick on Sunday.

2018- Week 15(Apr 9- Apr 15)

Monday started off very rough when at 6 AM Whitney woke us up to tell us that the kitchen floor near the fridge and cabinets was completely covered in water. We grabbed some towels to start mopping it up and try and figure out where it was coming from. Jeff ran downstairs to see if anything had leaked through the ceiling into our new basement and found water pouring out of one of the can lights. We have one small drop down section where the heating vent runs and about a six foot by six foot section was mushy and wet and the water was pooling all along the edge and dripping as well. Jeff started poking holes in the ceiling with a screw driver to get the water to drain. We called our contractor in a panic and he told us to shut the water off to the house and he would send a plumber ASAP. What a nightmare. Luckily the carpet had not been installed because there was a massive puddle that spanned the whole width of the room on the floor. We had all of our buckets and pans lined up trying to catch the water. The plumber came over and we cut a section out of the ceiling so he could see where it was coming from. We determined it was the water spout in the door of our fridge where the leak occurred. Both the water and ice maker stopped working a year ago but we had never shut off the valve in the back so water was no longer going into the fridge. Once we shut that off the leak stopped. We ended up having to replace two big sections of the drywall on the ceiling and they scraped off the whole length of the edge and replaced that as well. Water did not get under the baseboards or on the entertainment center which was great. It set us back a day with the construction but they were able to fix it quickly. Our contractor was awesome especially since the night before he had been up at Primary Children's Hospital with his five year old daughter who got diagnosed with diabetes. I think I am going to be very paranoid of any water now. For FHE we taught the kids what to do if the toilet starts to overflow. 

 That's a stream of water you see coming down.

Daisy had to go to the vet to get her teeth cleaned- have I ever mentioned how expensive it is to own a dog ha ha. I love how concerned the kids get when Daisy has to go to the vet. They sure do love this dog so I'd say it's worth the money.

Carpet was installed this week, the paint was touched up, we had our final inspection, they finished all the hardware, the tile was grouted, the new counter top was installed and they put up the crown molding to finish the entertainment center. The last thing that will happen next week is they will come back and seal the grout on the tile. We are so so happy with how everything turned out.

 This is the size of the section they had to cut out and replace.

 The correct counter top.

 You can hardly tell where they repaired the ceiling.

Ashtyn picked out this cute shower curtain- I didn't love it at first but I think it looks great in here.

Ashtyn tried out for Madrigals next year and she found out on Friday that she made it! Jeff was a madrigal in high school too so she can carry on the tradition. They have a fun tradition of kidnapping them at 4 AM and taking them to a fun breakfast party. Ashtyn's friend who also made it knew about this and told Ashtyn they were coming on Saturday morning which kind of spoiled the fun but did allow her time to clean her room and wear cute pj's to bed ha ha. They called my phone to let them in and then they came into her room and sang. I wish I would have videoed it. They blind folded her and took her to Andrew Jones home- he lives in our ward and was a madrigal this year so Ashtyn knows him. They had breakfast and talked and sang and she thought the whole thing was cringy- ha ha. I think she secretly liked it but is too cool for acting goofy. I said you'd better get use to it and jump all in so you can have an amazing experience next year.

Speaking of Ashtyn here is another one of her amazing pieces of art.

At round table for scouts this week I learned a really fun game called bear hunt. You attach cinnamon bears to 2 ft long strings. One person is the hunter. He holds a pot lid and rolls the die. All the others are bears. They hold the end of the string and place their cinnamon bear in the center if a table. All players stand around the table holding the end of their 2 foot string and all cinnamon bears are in the center of the table. The hunter is also at the table where he can roll the die and holds the lid at the ready. He begins rolling the die and as soon as a l or a 6 are rolled he tries to put the pot lid down on the bears but the players holding the strings try to snatch

their bears out before they can get caught under the lid. The hunter gets a point for each bear he catches and each player that doesn't get caught gets a point. Keep track of the points. The player with the most points at the end wins the game. After several attempts give another player a chance to be the hunter and the hunter can have a turn at being a bear.

The basement was finished just in time for Ethan's birthday party. He planned the whole party- invitations and all himself this year. He invited 30 of his closest friends ha ha and they played games and talked and hung out. There were girls and boys and after they all left the basement smelled horrible like stinky teenagers. I took Whitney driving to get away from all the noise. We went to the Stake parking lot to practice parking. I'm not sure if I mentioned before that Ashtyn hit a car when she was parking at our church one week so we are going to practice parking a lot more. We finished the basement so the kids could have their friends over and we wouldn't have to hide in our room but he had friends all over the place so we still did. 

There is a person I follow on Instagram named Seth King. He writes late notes for his kids when they are late and they were so funny that he started to publish them for us all to enjoy. This week he had a contest to have people submit ideas for a late note and you could win a prize. The funny thing is we've been trying to stay off of Instagram more than we are on it and I just happened to get on the day of the contest so I submitted an idea my neighbor and I had actually been joking about a few days before and guess what- I won! He selected my idea and I won the prize. It's a pretty awesome prize too so I can't wait. You can read all about it in these pictures.

We have been reading the book Wonder together as a family. My goal was to finish reading it before the movie came out last year. In my mind I pictured us all curled up in our bed each night reading together. Really immersed in the story- laughing together, crying together. In reality I kind of had to beg them to come and sit and listen to at least one page as often as I could. I know they liked the story but my family isn't the warm and fuzzy type as much as I wish we were. Well we finally finished reading it this week so since Jeff had gotten the new TV installed we decided to watch it downstairs. We don't have furniture yet and man are we way to old to sit on the floor- but we did and the movie was darling. Not nearly as good as the book but what an incredible story. 

Sunday was family dinner with the Shaw's. It was a few weeks late this month because they were on a cruise with the Jensen clan. We celebrated Ashtyn and Ethan's birthdays.

2018- Week 14(Apr 2- Apr 8)

This week was Spring break and we spent it waiting for workers to come and calling each night to see if I had to go in for jury duty. We had planned to go to St. George but couldn't because so much was going on. So it ended up being a pretty boring week. Ashytn and Ethan went to see movies, Whitney went to Park City with a friend for a few days and Ashytn and I went shopping once but other then that we didn't do much..

I have loved that we didn't hard boil the eggs for Easter. I've been able to still use them and they are pretty darn cute.

Every day someone came to work on the house. We got our entertainment center finished, the counter top was installed, it was the wrong counter top and they didn't have the one we ordered any more so my brother and I went and picked a new one, all of the door hardware was installed, all of the light fixtures are finished, Jeff finished installing the speakers and we bought a sectional for downstairs. We are down to just one more week before it is finished.

I ended up not having to go in for jury duty at all which was great but that just means there is a higher chance of me getting called in again.

Saturday was our Stake baptism and my counselors daughter was the only one from our ward to be baptized. Her name is Katharine and they call her Kat so I gave her a Kit Kat.

When we were out shopping for couches we ran into our friends at two different stores. We ended up sitting and talking at the second store for a while and joked that next time we should order pizza and have them bring one of the TV's over for us to watch- ha ha. We compromised on the couch. We didn't want something light colored and it had to be stylish but also soft to sit on. We also didn't want to get a power recliner because it will be floating in the middle of the room but our friends convinced us that we could hide all of the cords under the couch and just have one extension cord coming out the side. We just loved this couch so much. The fabric is a dark kind of denim blue and so so soft. We only ordered the two end pieces as power because that is all they came in and the rest are all normal so there are only two cords. They also gave us a free pink basketball so it was a win win. 

I know that it will look great down there.

Jeff and I both had to go to ward council on Sunday which was kind of fun.

2018- Week 13(Mar 26- Apr 1)

After my mammogram I got a call that they needed to take further images of my left breast. The tech had told me that I had really dense breast tissue and that I would most likely get a call like this. When your tissue is dense it shows up as white on your scans. Cancer also shows up as white so they usually do multiple scans and ultra sounds just to make sure. So this week I went in for another mammogram and also an ultra sound. I went to an actual hospital facility this time that had more sophisticated equipment. It was really high tech and they showed me my scans right away and exactly what they were looking at. I have a mass in my left breast so they wanted to check it out. Right after the mammogram I had the ultra sound and they told me they would give me my results right then because they have a radiologist that reads the reports instantly. The mass I have is right up against my chest wall so it was really hard to see. They determined I either have a simple cyst or a fibroadenoma- both of which are benign.

Jeff wanted to try our hand at installing our own laminate flooring. We figured this would save us a lot of money and it is a skill he wanted to learn so Monday night we had Miles come over and help us get started. It was a very small area only about 11 ft X 11 ft so we thought we could get it done in a few hours. Miles wasn't able to stay long but he helped Jeff put in the first two rows and then I came down to help. About every third piece would give us a lot of problems and would take forever to get to click into place so it was slow going. Pretty soon it was starting to get dark and there are no lights down there yet so we had so use a lantern to work with. You have to stagger the pieces so that you don't have seams that line up so it looks more natural so we couldn't just use full pieces each time. It was hard work to be on our hands and knees for so long. In the end it took us a total of nine hours to complete the job, which to me was not worth the money we saved. We didn't get to bed until early the next morning and my back was in rough shape after getting up and down and bending over all night. I was pretty grumpy about the whole thing and we will not be doing that again- EVER! It did turn out nice and we love the floor we chose.

We bought Jeff a new car this week so we could give his old one to the girls- not to keep but to use so that I don't have to be in three places at the same time. It has been nice that they can now drive themselves. 

We participated in March Madness and all of us ended up losing.

My cute Ethan turned 14th this week. He has really changed the last year and has grown up so much. He is tall and  his voice is deep now- which is so sad. I don't want him to become a man just yet. He woke up to his birthday notes but I had forgotten to get balloons so we hung up the birthday sign instead. He got a headset for his XBOX and a gold membership that he can use to play with his friends. He was pretty excited. That night Jeff took him to dinner for his birthday at you guessed it- Chick-Fil-A. He is planning to have a murder mystery party in a few weeks. Here are 14 things we love about him:

He is so smart

He is kind and compassionate

He speaks Chinese like no other

He is super creative and always coming up with some new idea

He is constantly writing and I find stories and whole books he has written. I have no doubt he will one day publish a book.

He is a natural born leader and kids follow him

He is a friend to everyone

He doesn't care about looks and is confident in who he is

He still loves to cuddle with me

He is very protective of us

He loves animals

School comes so easy to him and he loves to learn

He has a love for God

He is self motivated

He can be a little stubborn but always does what we ask

Look how much he has grown in a year.

I had to work all week and I really love Spring time at the park. It is so beautiful. The park is officially open now so there were lots of people. A cute boy named Xander came into the school and I taught him how to write his name in the Desseret Alphabet. He kept asking me questions and told me he wanted to stay with me all day and do school. It was cute.

Whitney did my makeup for Easter.

This picture doesn't even do it justice. She is pretty great at makeup. Both the girls are.

We have been looking so forward to General Conference. This conference will be one I will never forget. The power and unity I felt during the solemn assembly was so amazing. I already have a deep love for President Nelson. I know he is called of God. All of the talks really resonated with me this time too. I can't think of a better weekend to have conference then on Easter. It made it all the more meaningful for us. It was also neat to hear so many new changes and temples announced. 

We dyed eggs and made our traditional resurrection rolls. We invited our cute neighbors the Garrison's over for dinner. They are like grandparents to us and they don't have family in state so we try to take care of them. It was a wonderful weekend together.