Spring, summer, winter or fall????

The weather around here has been so unpredictable. One day it feels like spring, then summer and today it feels more like fall/winter. I am SO ready for the warmer weather but I do appreciate days that are cooler so I don't feel so guilty that I am not outside getting things done. My latest landscaping project includes planting 15 trees/bushes. It took me 5 hours of labor intensive work. Rachel came home from school as I was coming in the house and she couldn't believe that I worked for that long without taking a break. My children work outside for 30 minutes and think that they are going to perish. Most of the trees/bushes went out behind our gated pipe where there was just dirt and weeds. It took me at least an hour to place the trees where I wanted them. The burning bushes from Costco weighed about 100 pounds each. I swear they put cement in the pots. I plan to cover the dirt with a ground cloth and then put bark or rock over the top. I haven't planted anything in the garden or any flowers yet. The weather is so funny right now.
We would like to build a new enclosed shed some where on our property this year. Some possible locations we have considered is where the open shed is now (Alan does not want to tear it down - we always need more storage space), out in the dirt by the chicken coop, over the existing basketball court (I vetoed that one quickly. Alan said that we could shoot hoop indoors but I know a project will always be in the way) and the last option which pains me but really is the best is to tear up 1/3 of our new grass and go back behind our house. If we do go for option #4 I want to rent a sod cutter and roll up our wonderful grass to plant in other sparse areas of our lawn. It is such beautiful grass. It makes me want to kill off some other sections of my yard and start over.
We are gearing up for May and all the end of the year school events. Melissa finished up with Club Volleyball last weekend and is trying to complete her science fair project now. Zach has a few more weeks of track and then he will be done with that. He is going to work for Paul Lloyd this summer. We are excited for him. The girls are getting ready for their piano recital on May 16th. Rachel has a TaVaci concert the next day on the 17th. Abigail is so ready to be home all day again. She loves school but really likes her free time. Allison loves it when the kids are at home. She is Abigail's best playmate. She is going to be moving downstairs with Abigail this summer and Rachel will get her room. I am not sure if I am ready for my baby to be moving downstairs. Abigail is apprehensive and excited for it because she will get to be the big sister but Allie really does make messes in no time at all. Allie is growing up so fast and is such a delight. She stands in Melissa's closet and tells everyone to stay out because she is showering. She tries to wiggle her eyes like Melissa by moving her head side to side. She loves dollies and stuffed animals. She loves books and changing clothes a hundred times a day. The other day she was looking through some photo albums and told me that she wants that and that dress back. I told her they were too little but that didn't seem to matter to her. Well I need to get some housework done so goodbye for now!

Volleyball, volleyball, volleyball

We had a fun day watching Melissa shine yesterday during a volleyball tournament in Jerome. She tried out for a Club Volleyball team last fall and made it. We have been traveling to SLC and Boise to watch her play. She has gained a lot of experience and confidence in the last 5 months. She is a well-rounded player and can play almost any position. We love to watch her play and it was nice to have a tournament in our hometown. She had her spike of the season at this tournament. Her coach said it was like watching a college volleyball player in slow motion! Her aunt and uncle Angie & Mark came to watch her as did aunt and uncle Jaime & Steve. They loved watching her!!! Thanks for your support!

Sunny Sunday

What a beautiful day today! I worked outside most of yesterday and now I am sporting a nice farmer's sunburn. While outside we found out that our son busted our gated pipe by driving over it with the four-wheeler. He was in charge of getting the area behind the gated pipe cleared of weeds and leveling the dirt and I gave him the option of using the four wheeler to pull out the stubborn weeds. Well he took that as an open invitation to do whatever he wanted to get the weeds out, including driving over the top of it! Sometimes I wonder if there are any brains inside his head. (BTW I ended up finishing the job and tweaking my shoulder while roto-tilling. I was going to plant shade trees back there but with the low riding power lines I am going to plant more fruit trees!) We ended up leaving the project midday and spent the rest of the afternoon and evening in Murtaugh. My nephew Jayden was baptized and confirmed. Amber fixed awesome tamales and homemade tortillas. Yum-m-m! My mom also turned 39 again yesterday! Happy birthday mom!
Today we went to Stake Conference which was good but after the first hour my bottom was getting very sore on the hard metal chairs. We miss sitting in the reserved seating when Leon was stake president. The last hour seemed to crawl along and Allie was ready to leave about the time President Tateoka got up to speak. He mentioned an e-mail from my father-in-law as being called as a sealer in the Temple. I am excited for my children to have the opportunity to have their grandfather seal them in the temple when they get married. How special that will be!!! After the talk Melissa commented on how she missed her grandparents. What a great example they are to us. We love the constant e-mails and pictures!
Tomorrow I get to drive the kids to school. It is quite the process and one I am not looking forward to figuring out. The new schools are great but they did not think out the driving thing very well. It is so bad that they need a police officer there to direct traffic! Alan cannot drive because he is called to appear for jury duty in Boise on Monday at 8:30 a.m. We are both dreading it and hope that it is just an up and back trip. They tell you to have enough clothes to stay for a week. We have got too much to do right now without the added headache of him not being here!
This week is our kick-off temple celebration with the youth. I am excited and hope that the youth will be excited and stay excited over the next 4 months. Zach is already complaining about it and it hasn't even started! Wish me luck in learning the 50's dance (my body doesn't move like it used to). Apparently the leaders are supposed to learn the dance also so they can help teach the youth. Yikes!!!!

Fun At the Park!

Fun At Storybook Park

Yesterday my sister Jaime and I hauled all the girls, my niece and her son Lucas to Burley. There is an awesome park there called Storybook park. It is a park with all kind of tunnels, swings, and slides. You can drive a boat (up the mountains according to Allie), climb in the mouth of a shark or you can climb to the top of a fort. This park was a huge undertaking and involved the whole city and was started by just a couple of moms that wanted a nice park for their children to enjoy. My sister-in-law Laura told us about this park and since we had the day off from school we thought we would check it out. Definitely worth the drive! It makes me want to get involved and get something like that created here. Any takers out there????

Relaxing Weekend

I can't even remember the last weekend that I was able to sit down and watch all four sessions of general conference. It was so enjoyable! We usually have some game to attend on Saturday but not this year! Everyone was here except for Melissa and she was at a volleyball tournament in Boise. We are so grateful that there is one other girl from Jerome that plays and so we carpool to and from practices and switch off going to the games.We only have 2 more tournaments. One in Jerome on the 19th and then one is SLC the first weekend in May. She has really loved playing volleyball but we are ready for a break from the traveling.
My mom came down on Friday for a few family things. We went out to dinner at a Sushi restaurant in Twin Falls and meet my sister Angie and her family there. I was really excited to try out authentic sushi. I am a big seafood lover and I knew that if my sister and brother craved it so would I. I ordered the buffet so I could try whatever I wanted and eat as much as I wanted. A large plate was brought to me with lots of different kinds of seafood wrapped in seaweed and rolled in sticky rice. I tried about five different kinds and I just couldn't take it anymore. I pushed the plate away for others to eat and ate off my niece's plate. It is just not right to eat raw salmon. Yuck, and double yuck.
I have been in a major purging mood lately. I went through and totally organized my computer room. The room is complete with labels and drawers for everything. It feels great to know where everything is! My second purge was my storage room downstairs. I got rid of a lot of things that I thought I might use again someday (such as old decorations, clothes, etc.) It felt so liberating and rewarding to send things to the D.I. I also went through all of the kids drawers and took out clothes that no longer fit and got out the Capri's and shorts. Now if it will ever stop snowing we might get to get some use out of them! I also recently painted and got new furniture downstairs. Everything is neat and tidy and has a place. If anyone has a magic potion that helps kids put things away when they get them out please let me know. I have tried everything and nothing seems to penetrate!
Speaking of my kids they are all doing great. Zach is practicing football 2 times a week before school, he also participates in open gym for basketball once a week and he runs track after school everyday. It is great for him to be busy. He had way too much time on his hands this last winter. He is looking for a job this summer. I find that he doesn't tease his sisters as much when he is busy. Melissa is keeping busy with volleyball and school. She was pleasantly surprised to receive the top math award for her team. Hannah is doing great. Her back seems to be healing nicely. She is back to doing P.E. in school and jumping on the tramp and running around outside. I told her P.E. was fine but she needs to sit out when they play dodge ball. She doesn't need to get hit in the back! Rachel is performing with a singing group in May. She gave us a sneak peak of a song that she will be singing with her group during FHE. She has such a beautiful voice and I hope that she overcomes her fear of singing alone in front of others. As soon as she hears anyone make a snicker she immediately clams up. Abigail tolerates school and can't wait for summer. She has the best score for the number of sounds she can say in a one minute in her class. She is my Scooby-Doo lover and rushes home each day to watch an episode. Allie is done with the nap thing now. (sigh...) She is too busy playing with Abby to take a nap. She does get very tired in the evening and has to go to bed early now. She talks about going to school and playing with Brigh-Brigh on a daily basis. She also asks me everyday if we are going to the store. She knows that she can usually get a treat out of me if we do!
Alan and I are trying to exercise more frequently. My legs are quite sore tonight but it is a good kind of sore. Now - if we can just keep it up. My mom is determined to lose 10 pounds before our cruise in June. She is already skinny but continues to work away at it. Jane and Leon also look great. It must that daily walking and conditioning that they do in Chile! They are so inspiring!
We are looking forward to spending more time with my family this weekend. My nephew, Jayden is getting baptized and I get to give the baptism talk. He is such a cutie. Have a great day!

YW Activity - Making your Scriptures Personal

I am totally excited for our YW personal progress activity Wed. night. We are working on making our scriptures more personal. The girls seem excited about this and I have found some great tips on the internet and my sister Jaime is coming to share a color coding system that she uses to mark her scriptures. I also found a great website where an incredible lady took mega time to design scripture stickers using the Gospel Art Kit pictures. For my YW I printed off the SM tags, footnote pictures for the D&C and the Book of Mormon and the GAK correlating tags. I am not copying off the Old and New Testament pictures for the girls because the adhesive vellum is a bit too expensive for our meager YW budget. I found the adhesive vellum at Michael's. I have always liked the cute pictures that marked scripture passages but I could not bring myself to pay the money for them. Doing your own is a bit cheaper and as a side note the Book of Mormon & D&C footnote pictures can be printed on the same sheet of vellum, just flip it over. If you are interested in the website to download this information it is: http://www.meckmom.com/2007/11/24/gospel-art-kit-scripture-sticker-tutorial/

Some ideas to make your scriptures more personal that I found on lds.org are:
1-Write on top of the pages what stories are being told ex. Pages 10-12 Noah is commanded to build the ark. Younger children could also draw pictures to help them remember the story such as a boat, rain, clouds.
2-Keep whatever marking system that you use simple and be consistent in your markings.
3-Hard-lead colored pencils and fine tip, ball-point pens can be used for marking.
4-Write off to the side of marked scriptures a short annotation (which is a short, explanatory comment) about the passage. You can keep a scripture journal and reference all passages that relate to certain subjects, for example reference all scriptures relating to the Book of Mormon.
5-I started doing scripture chaining last year using the study guides given out in Sunday School as a reference. Most weeks have a list of scriptures to read that relate to each other. I would start with the first one and then reference the 2nd in the margin and then keep going until the last one which I would then reference the first one. (Note: This year's study guide doesn't seem to have as many chains as last year.)
6-Another idea that I found to be interesting but I have not tried as of yet, is to buy a roll of unexposed black and white print film, and using a small paper punch, punch out a number of small round tabs. You simply moisten the emulsion side of the film, and stick this round tab to the edge of the page to mark either special scriptures, scripture mastery scriptures, or books of scriptures if your scriptures are not already tabbed.

If you have any other creative ideas that have worked for you be sure to share them with me! Thanks!