The end of April

Sunday, fun times with friends (The Kjars) is always a good idea!
Monday, Kids + homework = nagging of mom and grumpy children, boo!
Tuesday, AGGGH! No matter how hard you try, it just does not work out sometimes. Pinewood Derby car, did not perform well. Homework ambitions kept us up till freaking 10:15pm because of procrastination, and those goldfish!!!!!  Someone tell me why I feel such stress about keeping them alive and such guilt when they are near death? AGGGHHHH!  Plus, the laundromat has lost is coolness, we just want our washer and dryer back.
Wednesday, bleh.
Thursday, in good news: William had his homework done so he could do whatever he wanted - yeah. Caleb got something done so he could go to the Salt Lake Temple - progress.  Mother's Day Fundraiser, what have I signed up for!?!
Friday, a lot of sewing going on around here, I think I have vacuumed three time today.... plus, Caleb attended his final keeper camp at the U and Peter got 100% on his spelling test!
Saturday, the end is finally here and it ended happily!  A win for each of the boys in their soccer games, wahoo!  Caleb got a well deserved shutout, 3-0!  Not to mention, Rob bought us a new washer.  Found a great deal and by next Friday, we say goodbye to the laundromat (hopefully).  YES!

6 Weeks to Baptism

This Sunday we talked about repentance.  Haley had a really cool activity in preschool one day where the lesson was on teaching them how to brush their teeth.  They used dyed eggs, toothbrushes and paste.  We applied it to our repentance lesson.

 The white egg represents us when we come to earth, clean and perfect.  But as we go through life we make mistakes and our spirit is not longer as clean as it should be.  In order to make us clean again we need repentance.  But it takes work.  The kids saw that they had to work hard at brushing the egg with the toothpaste to get even some of the stain off.  So, we talked about how, with faith in the Savior and the atonement, we can do our part by repenting and trying to come clean and live righteous.  Then the Savior comes in and makes the rest of us clean because of His atonement.  It was a cool lesson.  William really liked the activity.  And my favorite part was when Haley was brushing her egg she saw that it was turning white, she exclaimed, "I getting righteous!"  Such great kids.

April 17-23

It was a busy week regarding soccer.  It was an unexciting week because nothing super fun happened.  It was a bummer week because our washer broke along with our dryer.  So, we had to pay at the laundromat to get our clothes clean and dry.  And with soccer every day of the week, we also took hot chocolate to 3 of the last 4 soccer games for Caleb.  Those boys play their hearts out and deserve the hot/warm chocolate after being drenched for an hour and 20 minutes. Other news, Peter has his pinewood derby car near completion (without the use of fancy tools; just a saw, sandpaper and paint).

Countdown - 7 weeks to go

So, I will do a better job of documenting William's baptism countdown.  With Caleb and Peter I was here and there.  With William, I will do better.
Last night we talked about faith.  How it is the beginnings of a testimony, William found that to be cool.  Of course we talked about how faith is like a seed and Alma's experiment upon the word.  Then we planted a seed to watch it grow. There was a lot of crazy interrupting and people just being too silly for my desires of a spirit filled, teaching moment night. However, we talked about how just as a seed needs constant care of watering and sunlight, our faith and testimony needs constant care of the scriptures and prayer and all the like.  It was good, maybe not as great as I envisioned, but still good.

Moments to remember

So, I am not sure how many people out there really read this blog.  I know that I keep it up for our little family to remember things in life.  So, I was trying to figure out, how can I remember the "star" moments of my kids.  Those cool things they do each day or week that make them shine?  I have tried in the past, little notebooks or journals....but those usually fizzle out and get lost or forgotten.  But this, I think it might be a bit more permanent and help us remember.  So, here goes: week ending 16 April 2016;

Rob got a new car (because of a crash, oops) with the help of Pa.  He is a blessing to us.
Caleb is one tough soccer kid.  He goes through periods of discouragement with soccer, but keeps trying.  He played a VERY WET game on Wednesday, never gave up and made some great saves! He got pulled out at the last minutes because his ankle got crunched on a save and he was none too happy about that.  However, they came back today (during our third really windy game of the day) to win, 3-2!  Caleb held it good, made great saves and they did great.
Peter can be cranky but such a great addition to this family.  He did not want to do his homework this week, but after we tamed the protractor and got to work, he finished.  The best moment of doing homework with him was when he said, "wow, that is an obese angle."  What he meant to say was it was an obtuse angle, but obese made the moment so much cooler.
William tried something new for dinner this week, did not like it but still ate it.  He also had a ball starting off his baptism countdown, but fully expected that we would be doing an activity each day of the week during those 8 weeks.  Hummmm, I might need to come up with additional learning moments to keep him satisfied.  Today, during windy game #2, William scored a goal!  Such a power kick from the side and it went in!  I ruined "silent Saturday" with my exclamation of joy, but oh well - he scored!
Haley is generally so patient when it comes to mommy helping the boys through school work or soccer.  She also loves her one on one times with Caleb each Friday morning when he has late start.  Haley's star moment today came when she happily spent 4+ hours on the soccer field, cheering on her brothers, then she watched the Real game from the computer tonight.  Her only wish, that they would have played Sandoval.  She is cool.

Sometimes things work out

There is just too much to catch up on.  So, we will start from here.  First off, the fact that I got this photo to show up here just proves that sometimes things work out.

This little man, used to be the easiest.  Now he gets tricky sometimes.  But he is still such a sweetheart and we love him dearly.  This past Sunday we started his 8 week countdown to baptism day.  Wow, it is so close!  He is already prepared and knows his stuff.  But hopefully in the next 8 weeks we can make baptism seem a little more special, important and help him understand a tiny bit more the greatness of this event.  So, he got his 8 shirt (as pictured) and loved it.  Then we played baptism BINGO, where we have all the Gray family's photos on bingo cards and we read about their own baptisms.  It was a hit!  The kids all enjoyed hearing about their family member's baptisms, and remembering their own.  So glad we get to share that with them.