Memorial Day in Vernal, and then finish the school year

Vernal has been on the list of places we wanted to take the trailer for a long time now.  Dinosaur National Monument seemed like a quiet, but interesting park.  My parents loved it when they stopped by one year.

And then I found out that our friend (the girls' violin teacher) grew up just a couple of miles from the park.  So we planned a trip out there on the same weekend.

And then Christopher's brother found an investment opportunity out there that he wanted to check out, and decided to join our trip for one night with his family.

And then, as we were all driving to meet up at the Visitor's Center that Saturday morning, Jasmine's preschool teacher from last year texted the other friend to tell her that she happened to be in her hometown to visit Dinosaur for the weekend and was thinking of her.  By total coincidence.

We ended up with quite a group!

The first day of the trip ended up being more "chatting with friends and arranging when to meet up next" and less "see what the park has to offer", but that was just fine.  We re-visited some spots on Sunday, and visiting with friends was totally worth it.  We swam at the pool the cousins were staying at, hung out in the visitor's center, had lunch at a cabin in the park, and then met up to hike to an arch.

Kaitlyn's favorite part was playing with the twins.  The curly-haired one likes to zip away from the group quickly, and Kaitlyn spent a lot of time chasing her down!  But they really enjoy playing with her.

The hike up to the arch didn't go perfectly.  The trail is not marked, so we got a bit confused, and it was the hottest part of the day, which was probably a mistake.  The arch was really neat, though!

We went to church with our friends on Sunday and relaxed, and then tried a longer hike on Monday.  We bought a trail guide for $1, which was totally worth it.  It gave us 16 stops along the way with something to read about each time.  Jasmine was really excited to try and read the big giant words, and wouldn't even let Kaitlyn trade her for shorted passages. 

It wore her out, though!

I loved that Tyler read a book the whole way home, too!  We got back in time to visit with family at Grandma Skarda's house on our way home.

And then we had just one last week or so of school!

Kaitlyn performed in her school's talent show.  A group of them wrote a comedy skit to perform, Studio C style. (I used my phone to take a video from the back row, so this grainy still shot is all I can do.)

There was dance festival day, of course. (Jasmine is second from the end.) Kindergarten had a percussion routine to "Happy".

And Fourth Grade danced to "Believer", which Kaitlyn loved.  She is really into Imagine Dragons right now.

And then we had a Kindergarten program to end their year.  I am pretty sad about this one moving on, to be honest.  We have had a few years of her being my buddy while everyone else is at school and work, and we are going to miss each other next year when she is gone all day.  And Mrs. Orton is fantastic, so we'll miss her.  Not to mention, Kindergarten is one of my favorite ages.  They are independent enough, but still adorable, and soaking up new things like a sponge.

They had an adorable play about seeds that grown into flowers.  The "seed" masks were so hilariously cute!

Jasmine got the "Jane Goodall" award from her teacher for being so excited to learn about the world around her.

Tyler had a couple of extra school days after the girls were done, but since they were a field day and a half day, he didn't mind. 

I wish I had a better picture of his last day of Elementary school, but that's okay.  His school doesn't have a "junior high" and "high school" distinction, they just group into "Elementary" and "Secondary".  So next year, he moves up to the Secondary level.  He won't be changing classes and using a locker like some of the kids, it looks like, but hopefully it will be a good experience for him.

Quiet, and then into May

April was pretty quiet around here, which was nice.  Part of that was because Christopher was traveling so much.  He left to Amsterdam and then Germany for work on March 9.  From then, he was gone 7 of the next 10 weeks.  I got to travel with him for one of those weeks, and many of his trips were "leave Monday, home Thursday", but it still became pretty routine to run the show by myself around here.

 Amsterdam . . .

Alamo . . .

Jamaica . . .

He saw a neighbor on his mission when he went to Nicaraqua.

And my parents drove to see him when he was in South Bend for a week.

I would have been more jealous, but usually, not flying on a billion airplanes and hanging with the kids instead is actually the better life anyway.  It did mean that we didn't get up to much, though. 

Until May.  May gives you no choice.  The end of the school year is always chaos.

Jasmine had her Singer's Club performance.  This time she volunteered to memorize a speaking part, and she did a great job.  Okay, she turned away from the mike before she was done talking, but she spoke clearly and not too fast, which is most of the battle. 

And she LOVED singing and dancing for the show.  And having her hair done!  I didn't feel qualified to get her hair to stay in a high ponytail, so I enlisted help again.  Jasmine was fascinated by the helmet-like feel to her hair.

Please ignore the pencil I forgot to pick up.

At my last meeting with Tyler's teacher, I had to take a picture of him with his best friend, Yoda the Lizard.  Yoda "licked" Tyler's neck, which made him really giggle.

We have been talking about paving this side of our driveway since we moved in.  In fact, our neighbors told us that the previous owners were talking about paving that area for years as well.  We finally hired someone to do it, and it is so awesome!  That would have taken us weeks of work, and while it cost more to have it done, it was done in one day. The first picture was in the morning, and the second one was that afternoon.

Kaitlyn worked really hard on her chair test for her violin concert.  I like that her teacher gives them that goal to work on, but allows them to tape themselves at home, so that it is less pressure than performing for the director one by one (which is how it works in real orchestras.)  I didn't even have to push this one at all!  It was just her saying "wait, I can do that better" while I recorded.  And she got third chair!!  Her orchestra is 4th-7th grade, and so there were only two upperclassmen that beat her.  I was really proud of her.

I can't figure out how to put videos on here, but here is a youtube link that we sent to her teacher: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6Tm6KCigiA

Jasmine also did a great job at her concert.  Our half an hour of violin lesson time is now a 25/5 split so that she gets a little instruction, and I can really see a difference.

I was asked to make lanyards for the teachers at the girls' school for teacher appreciation, and I'm glad.  I have made bulk gifts for teachers before that I never see or hear about again, which I get.  Not everyone likes homemade gifts, and gifts in general are always hit and miss.  It does get disheartening to think about that when you are part way though a marathon of mass production.  But I was totally surprised.  I saw a clear majority of these lanyards in use over the last weeks of school!  I was really touched.

I don't have the best pictures of this, but the last session of ice skating for the school year was a shortened one.  Five weeks instead of seven. That meant a lower cost and lower commitment.  I asked Tyler if he would like to try lessons, and he said yes!  That totally shocked me.  He has never liked group physical activities like that.  And I will admit, he had some tears and frustration after the first lesson.  But he did a great job.  He got a little bit better, and he discovered how to make ice balls by shaving the ice off and scooping it together, which he really liked.

In fact, I signed myself up for lessons, too.  So we had four of us taking lessons at the same time each week.  The girls had taught me enough that I passed my level off, no problem.  It was fun!

Happy Fool's Easter!

April Fools = Easter = General Conference!

This was an unusual convergence this year.  Kaitlyn in particular thought it was a terrible one, since she had been hoping to prank all of her friends at school.  I was also disappointede that there would be no Easter dresses, since we would just watch conference in our pajamas at home.

Oh well. We found ways to make it fun.

We had the annual cousin egg hunt the day before.

And then we headed up to the cabin to dye some eggs for the bunny to hide. 

I just noticed there is a Christmas stocking in the background. Yikes.

The next morning we found eggs, and listened to Conference, since we forgot the TV box at home.  It was actually a really eventful Conference- lots of changes!

And then I made "grilled cheese" and "cake" for dinner.  It was actually angel food cake with "cheese" frosting in sandwich form, and the cake was meatloaf with colored mashed potatoes.  I thought it was amazing that the kids were in the small house while I was making it all, but they were still quite surprised!  I fooled them!

The kids each got a little stuffed peep from the Easter bunny, and Tyler made all sorts of little spots for them.  They got a couch made out of dominoes . . .

And when we got home, he made them an entire house, complete with a couch and bed inside.

That week was spring break.  So of course, on our week off from ice skating lessons, we went ice skating with cousins.

And our other project for the week was creating more computer stations.  We had one computer for the kids ever since Tyler was about 4.  But lately there had been more and more squabbles over whose turn it was, so we got a second one.  We built the desk to have room for two, after all.  What I didn't think through was that two was worse than one.  Instead of one "chosen" child on a computer and two left out, two got the happy spots and only one was left out.  So we needed to take out the center cabinet and make some leg room.  The IKEA desk I got fit perfectly under there, though that chair had to go.  Once Dad came back from his work trip, he got the third one set up, and it has been great.  Each kid has their own space, and their computers have their own time schedule as well.

We were sad that we didn't get to go anywhere, since Chris was out of town, but at least we were productive!

Bits of Winter Things

Time for all of the bits of pictures and stories that aren't big enough for their own post!

The girls got to wear "crazy ties" one day.  Good thing Daddy had two Christmas ties that sing!

I think I'm getting better at crazy hair day? A bit?

We picked up Tyler from his first campout with the Deacons and went sledding in our neighborhood one day.  Even tiny hills get exhausting quickly!

We rearranged the girls' room recently.  We didn't need the train table anymore, but the "dollhouse" bookcase has been put to good use.

Kaitlyn had an assignment for school to report on an assigned county in Utah.  Lucky for her, we were driving through there for our trip to Bryce Canyon, so she got to see it first hand!

Chris took Tyler and Chewy up to hike the G one warm day.  He said they did a great job!

And I took the girls to an Olympics kick-off at the rink.  We really enjoyed watching the Olympics this year, and the rink had a great party to celebrate it.

We went to a hockey game, and Jasmine asked me to take this picture to send to Uncle Dan.  She thought he should be there, since he took us to our hockey game in Ohio. :)

We haven't had a TV in our room for years.  Most of the time, I didn't miss it, but then we got one, and . . . it is kinda awesome.

We also got a new little vehicle for the cabin.  This one has 6 seat belts!  We might get snow treds for it sometime, but that will cost half again as much as the vehicle did.

It was a great day for a snow-shoe wander!  We hadn't done that in years.

I asked Mrs. Orton if I could come in and teach the kids about Pi day, which was fun.  They got to color their own hats to wear.  And Tyler decided to make our family matching hats to go with them.  Mine said "I luve you Mom" and Kaitlyn got one that said "Katlin si awesome!"

One of the perks from Christopher's traveling job is that he gets a free companion ticket every year.  It might not seem to exciting for me to join him in LA for a week, but we had a great time!

We hiked around Griffith Park, which was right near his job that week.

I got to check out a three story Target with no children to bother me. :)

We tried out the VOID virtual reality, and we even saw a show down in Laguna Beach.

I don't often "use" Tyler's diagnosis to get us into stuff, but there were free Jazz game tickets for the opening of their "sensory room", and it was awesome.  My neurotypical girls were just as into that room as my Autistic son, for the record.  Tyler found this weighted doggie friend and wanted to snuggle with him the entire night.

It was a really great winter!