old

Kara was whining and complaining about her upcoming birthday.  She was excited to celebrate a birthday and to get presents, she just didn't want to turn 18. 

 

 She kept saying her "fun" life would be over.  

She kept saying she didn't want to become an adult.  

She kept saying, "what's there to look forward to after 18?" 

She kept saying, "I am going to be SOOO old!"

So, it was actually quite simple for me to decide on a theme for her big day.

My daughter, at the tender age of 18, was officially

 OVER THE HILL!

She started out her celebration of this dark and dreary day taking a big ole Calculus AP test.  How fun is that? After she recovered from all those numbers swimming around in her head we made our way to Tepanyaki, where we usually end up on her birthday.

Tonight I think she actually caught the shrimp.
Not bad for an old lady.

She managed to unwrap several presents despite her gnarled arthritic 18 year old hands.

She gummed down some cake and ice cream with her 2 besties.

And she even hobbled over to be measured for the very last time on the measuring stick.

(Her notch hasn't changed in the last 4 years.)

This girl, my baby, now joins the ranks of us old women.  

She is 18.  She is an adult.  She is old.

But, what she doesn't realize yet, is that her life is just beginning.  That the best is yet to come.  That she has so so much ahead of her.  She doesn't realize that becoming an adult is exciting and full of adventure and more fun than even she is used to.  

Nope, it's actually not that bad to be over the hill, speaking from experience, especially when you are as outgoing and happy and beautiful as this 18 year old of mine is.

Happy Birthday Kara, you old bag, you!
 

I love you to pieces!

the removal

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

Along with a little sushi to celebrate!


(And we are going to enjoy every minute of this beautiful smile, for six months at least, until he gets braces put back on again.....will it ever end?!)

the big sale

We went to the first meeting in January, not really knowing much about this "Heritage Tours" Senior trip.  But by the end of that hour long meeting, while sitting on the stairs in that cold high school cafeteria, I was certain of one thing.  

Kara had to go. 

I had felt the spirit very strongly that night and I had to hide my tears from the other parents and students and even from Kara. 

 I just knew she had to go. 

 And as I sat there I became determined that I would do whatever I had to to make that possible.  

The price was $2,500. 

 Steep, especially for the unemployed.  

I laid in bed that night racking my brain for a way to make it happen.  I could work at Hobby Lobby until I had saved the money.  Babysitting?  Weeding?  I thought seriously about having Trevor, Kara and I sell our plasma. 

And then in the wee hours of the night it came to me. 

I would have a garage sale.

Now this was not going to be just any garage sale.  Oh, no.  This was going to be spectacular, if a garage sale can earn that sort of adjective.  My sisters and I are frequent garage salers.  It is a past time we love and hate at the same time.  We are often times frustrated with false advertising (don't claim it is HUGE when you have one card table with some knick nacks on it!).  We hate dirty garage sales and we love organized ones. We also have an issue with prices.  If it is a garage sale it needs to be cheap people!  We don't really care how much you paid for it originally or what fancy store it came from.  We pretty much want it for a dollar or less. 

This was my chance.  My chance to hold the perfect garage sale.  Clean, organized, well advertised, loads of stuff and dirt cheap.  I had never had one before (Trevor is kind of against them, he believes all

excess should be donated to DI) but with Trevor's blessing, just this one time, and with the help of my sisters we were up for the challenge.

First, I contacted everyone I knew.  I asked them if they had anything sitting around that they were going to take to DI.  If they did I would take it off their hands for them.  I explained my purpose, pleaded my case and.the response was completely overwhelming.  For the months preceding the big sale, my garage was stuffed and stacked with more items than I could have ever imagined.  

My basement looked like a clothes store had exploded. 

 I was overwhelmed with gratitude for my friends and family, for their kindness and generosity.

In the 2 weeks prior to the sale, my sisters and I worked for hours and hours each day.  We sorted all the clothes into gender and sizes.  We cleaned and sorted and taped up tons of toys, making sure all the parts were there.  We bundled gobs of bedding sets.  We washed strollers and bikes and fish tanks.  We tested TV's and electronics and labeled everything.  We divided all of our merchandise into categories, kitchen, bathroom, decorations, holidays, outdoor, etc. We sorted books, hundreds of them into different genres (are we crazy?).   And then we priced every last item.  And we priced them cheap!

It was long, hard, dirty work.

And believe it or not, we loved every minute of it.

(This is the toy section)

We were up until about 1 a.m. getting ready the night before the big sale and then up at 5 a.m. to get it all set up.  In the dark we pulled out tables and laid out clothes and golf clubs, and power tools and dining room sets and beds and desks and weight sets and skis and snowboards and costumes and cribs and area rugs and lamps and potty chairs.

And by about 6:45 the people came.

And we were officially open for business.

We always had the customer in mind so we also provided baked goods and donuts, soda and water.

(Can you see the line of strollers?  I think we had 15  for sale!)

And you want to know what else we had.  We had lines.  I am not kidding.  There was usually a line of about 5-10 people waiting to pay.  I kept looking at my sisters and mouthing the words "we have a LINE at our garage sale!"  At one point we had 30 cars up and down our street.  We even had Silas working his Spanish magic with all of our Spanish speaking customers.  

It was amazing.

We each overheard several people say that this was the most organized, clean garage sale they had ever been to.  

My little clean organized heart was bursting with pride. 

And as a true and real answer to a humble prayer we far exceeded our needs for Kara to go on her trip.

This trip that I knew she needed to go on.

And I couldn't have done it without the help of so many people.  I am indebted to my good ward and neighbors, to Kara's friends who spent hours helping us, to my kids and husband who practically went without a mother and wife for almost 2 weeks, and to my sisters who worked, literally as hard as I did.  

I am so thankful.  So very thankful.

After it was all over and we had hauled the last thing to DI, swept off the driveway and re-fluffed the grass, Brandon said to me, "Mom, that was totally fun! Can we do it again next week?"

My answer was a tired to the bone, exhausted......"NO!"

 

A blast from two pasts

While cleaning out my closet a while back I happened upon Grandpa Rex's mission journal.  I have no idea why we even had it and what it was doing in my closet.  I flipped through it and a thought came to my little head.  I headed downstairs and grabbed Trevor's mission journal and on a whim decided to act on my little thought.  This little whim turned into a very meaningful, insightful and spiritual evening for our family. 

I love when that happens.

My little thought was this: 

Let's take these two mission journals and have each of the kids look up their birthdays in both of them and read what happened on those days, the future birthdays of their still in heaven children and grandchildren.   We gathered in the basement one Sunday night and we opened up these precious journals from the great Germany Hamburg mission and the mighty Colorado Denver mission, and the birthday reading began. 

Here is what we learned:

First of all we were delighted to find out that both missionaries served over a Leap Year.  And not only that, but both missionaries dutifully wrote in their journals on February 29th.  Now that's pretty lucky.

February 29, 1964- "Leap Day"  The lessons in German were coming slow.

February 29, 1988-  It was a P-day and dad listened to Chariots of Fire on his walkman (the kids laughed for about 20 minutes picturing dad rocking out with a walkman, that is once we explained to them what a walkman was)  Also, an investigator claimed to have seen the first vision movie by ESP.  He claimed Joseph Smith had a sunburned face and he floated over a field.

March 30, 1964-  It was a P-day for Grandpa.  He toured older parts of Hamburg Germany.  He also wrote a letter to Nancy and said, "I still wonder about her sometimes." 

March 30, 1988- Dad was up at 5:00 a.m.  He saw the Denver Temple, met his new companion, wants to work at the M.T.C. when he gets home (which he did for 3 years) and wrote in bold letters "I LOVE MY MISSION!"

May 16, 1964- Grandpa practiced his songs for the mission conference.  He claims his solo was flat.  He also taught a "4th" and someone decided quite suddenly to be baptized.

May 16, 1989- Dad greeted a new set of missionaries, played the piano, conducted a meeting, visited an investigator and ate free at Burger King.  He said, "The church is true! I love my mission!  I am so blessed!"

August 18, 1964- Grandpa tracted, taught a 1st discussion and wrote letters.  He and his companion also took "goofy" pictures with their cameras.

August 18, 1988  P-day for dad.  He went running and played tennis.  He delivered a birthday card (it was his idea to give birthday cards to all the members of the ward) and had a lunch appointment.  He ended the day listening to a tape from Joel and being grateful for the good friends he has.

September 1, 1964- Grandpa got a letter from Merlin and Sally telling him that they were "in love"  He was on a spiritual high after receiving that letter from home.  He also said he knew Nancy was the one for him (how do you feel about that Grandma?)  He closed with this quote, "I could have kissed the whole world!"

September 1, 1988- "We are puny, unpowerful wastes of time here on this earth as missionaries!"  That's how his entry started.  He was very discouraged, very down, very depressed.  A hard day in the Colorado Denver mission, that's for sure.

October 28, 1963 Today was the first official day of Grandpa's great mission in Germany.  He was up at 6:00 a.m.  and was instructed by Richard L. Evans and Boyd K. Packer.  He also attended a foot care class.  He was very excited to be starting the best 2 1/2 years of his life.

October 28,  1988- Dad carved pumpkins at a members house after their dinner appointment.  They gave them a gallon of apple juice to take home and a bag of candy with a $20 bill inside.  Dad was thrilled.  He also did more birthday visits, handed out BOM's and phamplets and studied.

November 26, 1964-  Grandpa attended a district conference on this Thanksgiving day.  He thought a lot about his family who were probably cutting up the turkey as he wrote.  He, wrote, "I am thankful for my many many blessings, especially my family and my testimony.  MY CUP RUNNETH OVER!"

November 26, 1987- Thanksgiving Day!  Dad went to a members house for a Thanksgiving feast, then went to another member's house for another Thanksgiving feast, then went to yet another house for a final Thanksgiving dinner.  Yep, that's our dad!

Together these two great missionaries journaled over 1,460 days. 

 

And out of those 1,460 days we chose only 7 special days to read.  And even though we only read 14 entries, we learned.  We learned a lot.  My kids learned that missionaries get up early, they tract a lot, they need to take care of their feet, they are asked to play the piano, they may get to celebrate certain holidays or they may not.  They learned that learning a language can be hard, that girlfriends may not last, that the spirit testifies and converts people.  They learned the importance of writing and receiving letters, that good friends and their examples are still important, and that some days on a mission can be very very discouraging.  They learned how important members are to the missionaries, that companions can be frustrating, that you can do fun things on p-days and they learned what a walkman was. 

 

 But most importantly, they learned that their Grandpa and their dad were valiant missionaries.  Valiant missionaries who worked hard, never gave up and who testified daily of the truthfulness of this glorious gospel.  Valiant missionaries who truly loved their missions.

And to that I say:

 

Hoorah For Israel!
 

And Hoorah for journals!

 

april random

It's great fun to have 2 neighborhood teenage boys who, with their own money, bought creepy camouflage, head-to-toe Gilly suits.   Every once in a while they come sneaking down the street, hiding in people's yards and scaring unsuspecting children.  We were the lucky ones this month.  Never a dull moment around these parts.

Alyssa watches everything her older siblings do.  She noticed all their scripture charts and tracking systems and went and made herself one (It's on the wall behind her, along with the Articles of Faith poster of which she has almost memorized already).  She also made one for Ash. 
Gosh, I love this girl.

I love her so much that I reluctantly agreed to go on the ever-anticipated 3rd grade ice-skating field trip.  I was told I would not have to skate.  I was told wrong. It was a modern-day miracle on ice, comparable to the 1980 Olympic hockey team,  that I got this old body out on the rink.  And I didn't even fall, not once.  My ankles were sore for a week.

 

Bug catching season is here! 

 Hours of fun with those little dollar store bug catchers and death trap tweezers. 

 Poor bugs never stood a chance.

This month we enjoyed some Sunday afternoon reading time.  We had a thing where every Sunday night after dinner we gathered some library books and read them on the porch. 

 It was too nice to stay inside.

Look at that blue sky and green grass.

There is nothing like the Spring in Utah.

Skyping!

We skype cousins in Oregon.

We skype cousins in Hawaii.

We even skype cousins in Orem, even though we see them all the time.

This time we were skyping cousins in Norway, which can be very tricky with the time difference.

They were going to bed, we had just gotten up, but everyone was happy.
Isn't technology wonderful?

And that's a wrap for April.....finally!

True Princesses

Last year Ashlyn really wanted a princess party, but she had too many "boy" friends so we opted for a Candyland party instead.  This year there was no getting out of it. 

A Princess Party she wanted. 

 A Princess Party it would be.

We sent out the invitation inviting all maidens in the kingdom to come to the party.  At the party they would undergo several tests to determine if they were indeed true princesses.  They were instructed to come dressed in their rags (normal clothes).  This was apparently uspetting to some. 
"But mom, I don't want to wear rags!" 

When the maidens arrived they were each given a bag of pink play dough.  They were then instructed to make it "royal"  They could choose between all colors of glitter that they sprinkled on their play dough and then kneaded it in to make it sparkle.  They also each choose a gem to mix in.  Their sparkly princess play dough was then placed in their goody bag.

The first game was Snow White's pass the poison apple.  They passed around an apple to music.  When the music stopped and they were left holding the apple....

...they had to take a bite. 
And if they were a true princess, well, then this would happen:

And wouldn't you know it, all of those maidens fell to the ground - very dramatically, actually - eyes closed, arms spread; they were very serious about this princess testing.

Test #1 was passed with flying colors.

The next test was Ariel's underwater gem hunt.  They all sat around this bowl filled with soapy water.  I told them that they each had to reach into the water and try to pull out a gem.  If they pulled out a gem they were a true princess.  If they pulled out a black rock, they were not.  To get them started I took a turn.  I reached in and pulled out a black rock.  They gasped and felt very sad for me that I wasn't a princess.  (I actually was holding the only black rock as I slipped my hand in) 

After my mishap they were all very nervous when their turn came

But against all odds, they all found gems.  It was a true princess miracle.

Next they had to pass the Rapunzel-frying-pan walk.  They put on the Rapunzel hair, grabbed the frying pan...

...and carefully carried the pink balloon across the room and back.

It was difficult, yes.  That hair is heavy and the balloon light; it could have very easily floated out of the pan, but they pulled through and another test was successfully completed.

After reading them the story of the Princess and the Pea they attempted this test.  Could they sit on each of these pillows and guess where the pea was?

Yes, yes they could.  An obvious sign of a true princess.

We then prepared for Cinderella's glass slipper test.

If the shoe fit, they must be princesses. 

And sure enough, every one of those dainty feet fit slid right into that glass slipper. 

Their final test was from Jasmine and it was my favorite.  They had to take a jewel...

...and without touching any other treasures, tiptoe through the course and...

...gently deposit their jewel in the magic lamp.  And after some close calls, they all completed this difficult test.

Having successfully passed each and every test to determine who was a true princess, their fairy godmother arrived, tapped them all on the head and transformed them all.

From plain maidens dressed in rags to the beautiful glorious princesses that they really are.

And then it was time to celebrate.

To celebrate this princess. 

This little princess and all of her royal friends. 

 It was a grand celebration indeed.

 

Some notes:

*I did provide a new apple for each round of the pass the apple game, so there were no germs being spread around.  That would have been very un-princess like.

*The Rapunzel hair was Sarah's masterpiece for a Halloween costume.  The girls were dying over it.

*When I did this party for Alyssa on the Cinderella game I had a pair of dress up shoes from the dollar store for each girl.  They got to take them home as part of the goody bag.  Wouldn't you know that this year the dollar store didn't have any dress up shoes.  So, I dug through the dress-up bin to find my glass slipper and just used that on each girl.

*All of the jewels and beads are things we have collected over the years.   They are stored in a treasure chest in the playroom and are played with almost daily by my kids.  And that Aladdin genie lamp? Well, that is probably the best fifty cents I ever spent at D.I.