First week of September

Monday: There was no school. So, it was almost so boring because of kid's homework...yet turned out terrific because we decided to go to Red Butte Gardens and it was FREE!!  Oh yes, I was happy. There were legos to look at, lots of pretty plants and it was nice to get out of the house.

Tuesday: School....Helped out at Heartland with the fundraiser also helped translate the school newsletter for Spanish. Soccer practice for William.

Wednesday: School. Soccer practice for Caleb.  Went to the AP European History meeting for kids who are interested in going to New York in March.  Sounds fun and expensive.

Thursday: Made lots of freezer meals.  Soccer practice for Peter.  Then I started to freak out after practice when Peter told me that sometimes his vision blacks out.  Only for a few seconds, like he is blinking, no fainting or anything, but it does black out!  WHAT!

Friday: Made lots more freezer meals.  Took Peter to the eye doctor after school.  Doctor pronounced that Peter has healthy eyes.  Not sure why his vision blacks out.  Could be dehydration, migraine, low blood sugar...but it is not his eyes.  That was terrific news!  It was seriously such an answer to fervent praying on my part all day long!  Now, on Tuesday, we go to the regular doctor to see if he has anything to say.

 Saturday: Rob headed to the cabin to get some painting done.  So, I was solo-mom at soccer.  Watching 3 games at the same time meant I hardly watched anyone but walked from field to field trying to watch.  After soccer we headed down to the Payson Temple.  While Caleb and Peter did baptisms...

William walked around with me and we took Haley's baptism pictures.  William is a little stud and so sweet to just chill while Haley and I walked around, and around, and around, getting the photos she wanted.  I think they will turn out great.

Aug 26-Sept 2

Always going. So, I will try to remember the important stuff.
Monday: School
Tuesday: School, soccer practice
Wednesday: Rolled my ankle before school!  You do not need to see the picture.  Suffice it to say, I immediately being icing it and being gentle, Friends of Scouting was that night and I had to be able to walk!  By 6pm my ankle seemed fine,  a small bump but I was able to run around just fine.  Yeah! Also on Wednesday, Peter is moving on up in scouts, whether he enjoys it all or not, he is getting there.  Caleb also received 2 more merit badges and his Silver Palm!

Thursday: Finished a terrific table runner after many hours of sewing. Phew! 2 soccer practices
Friday: School, Caleb came home so excited from work.  He was "promoted" from a sub at Heartland to a more permanent position!  He was very excited.  Plus - mowing lawns and some homework
Saturday: Soccer Saturday.  3 games for the boys- a win, a tie and a loss. Got our last snowie of the year and it was tasty! Then watched more soccer that night by Real.

Sunday: Taught Haley's primary class.  Family Home Evening for Haley's baptism countdown - 6 weeks to go and we talked about repentance.  She loved the activity of trying to clean the egg off (dirty egg representing our sins or mistakes making our spirit unclean, when we repent we are washing those sins away but we cannot do it all without Jesus Christ, then the clean egg represents us clean and prefect - ready for Heaven).

Back to School week

I think most of us were ready to the return.  But we were not ready for those early mornings, nor was Caleb ready for homework on the first day! 

Monday: So long ago, I cannot even remember.  It was busy I guess. Oh wait, I remember.  We took Peter to the doctor for a followup on the ole' golf ball to the head incident.  The doctor pronounced that Peter was, "Really lucky and unlucky all at the same time."  But looked good considering what happened.

Tuesday: Caleb's first full day.  First day taking the bus, homework right off the bat and work as usual. Peter had his 7th grade orientation which he came home saying it was really confusing and a lot of people.  While the two older kids were at school; Haley, William and I took a trip to the zoo.  I think that was our truck's last full day of cooperating, because wait for it....

Wednesday:

 Caleb woke up, "Dark and Early" for early morning seminary.  He really liked the class and will hopefully survive all these early mornings.

Haley, William and Peter all had first days at school, for the whole time.  No one came home complaining about school.  Peter just said his eye really hurt.  Miracle time!  I went to pick up Caleb from school.  Our truck had been giving us some grief the past few days.  The battery was telling us it was not charging.  Well, as I was nearing the pick-up spot for Caleb our truck just about gave up the ghost.  Sputtering, loosing speed.. all that.  Caleb hopped in the truck and we immediately began praying that our truck would make it home.  As we got closer and closer the truck's control panel went wonky.  Lights were coming on that should not, everything went down to zero!  Like we were driving, the engine was working, but it said we had 0 gas, were going 0 miles an hour, had 0 RPM!  Nothing, but the truck was still going.  We continued to pray, pulled into the driveway and said a prayer of thanks for helping us get home!  That was a miracle.

Well, if that was not enough action for one day; we had Friends of Scouting that night - where a lightening storm almost kept us at home but then things calmed down and we knocked on doors.  Then scouts and more scouts.  Long day.

Thursday: School, bus for Caleb and Rob tried to fix the truck up and fixed the washing machine, again.

Friday: Same ole, same ole.

Saturday: First day of soccer and William scored a goal!

Sunday: Church and 7 weeks till Haley is baptized.  We talked about Faith tonight.  Had a really good lesson, kept most people's attention for the whole time. Came across the cool idea to talk about Lehi's dream with legos.  And I came up with my own faith is like a seed image with Christ in the background being our ultimate goal after our faith and works.  Good times and now Rob is in Arizona for work and we are ready to start a new week.

Try this again....

So, we dropped off the face of the Earth for a while.  Summer got busy and fun and who has time to sit down and type all this out? :)  So, I will try to document life again here, for the sake of remembering good times and our little family.
Week of August 12-19:

 So, of course this picture is not from this week, but it does document what has been consuming many of our thoughts and prayers this week.  The Coal Hollow Fire!  Our poor canyon.  Fortunately, those amazing firefighters are tough and brave and the fire is now close to 44% contained!  Thank you!

 It was Wacky Week for our family, so we tried to do some fun things.  This was at the Museum of Natural Curiosity.  We were supposed to make some sort of paper tube structure to hold up all these books.  Peter and I successfully did it.

 While C, P and R were in the Mt. Timpanogos Temple, H, W and I went to explore a little park.  We found a black bunny and got very excited.

 Rob's phone takes much better pictures than mine. :)

 Since we could not be at the lake (so sad!) we stopped off at this little pond.  The kids enjoyed that very much!

Haley's 8 week countdown to baptism started yesterday!  I  made this shirt for her and we played baptism bingo, I think they all enjoyed it.

Not pictured but needs to be remembered.  We had our Wacky Wonky Dinner, super fun and lots of work.  My favorite mystery food names were: tiny globes of wonder (grapes), farm on a playground (chicken, bacon slider sandwiches) and sweet mud (chocolate milk). The kids found a birds nest in our tree and have enjoyed climbing up there to see the birds.  The Easter in August Wacky Week day was super fun with the egg hunt.  Finally, the miracle of the week but also the most scary.  We were at Rob's work party and walking along the perimeter of a golf course.  Out of no where, Peter got hit on the right side of his head (temple area) with a golf ball!  He was flattened to the ground immediately, crying in pain and an enormous goose egg had formed.  Prayers began and we got ice on his head.  By the time we got home the goose egg had gone down but we were still really worried that some internal damage could have been done.  Constant prayers, icing it and meds for him...he seems to be ok.  He has just suffered a black eye and a constant headache, but nothing worse.  So blessed and never want to experience that again.  Thankfully he has a hard head.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day was great!  These kids were sweethearts to me and each other all day!

 I received a fitness tracker, a really cool key chain (made in scouts) lots of sweet notes and cards and multiple hugs throughout the day.  My favorite was when all the kids were heading out to church (at different times, mind you) and each time before they shut the door they called out, "Happy Mother's Day, MOM!"  Such awesome kids!!

Nothing better than the simple kindness and sincerity of my kids to make me feel happy.

Where have we been??

Well, busy, that is where we have been...but to be more specific

 We have visited the temple a few times.

 Went to see the new red pandas, so fun!

 The brown bear listened to Caleb's coaxing and swam in the water!

 Haley had her puppy sleepover

 We have gone on walks, mainly to get Caleb and Peter ready for the temple walk.

 We took care of some friend's dogs for a day or so.

Peter was recognized as Student of the Month and Heartland!!

Caleb took the Spanish AP test!!! Man alive, the wait is going to kill us to find out the results!

Spring Break - the rest of it....

So, we started Spring Break off in Payson, because Haley's sweet teacher invited the whole class to her reception down there.  I think Haley may be the only one from the class that actually attended.  Haley was loving all of it.  Peter and Caleb went to the Payson temple for 45 minutes of it.  But the rest of the time, Haley's big brothers were patient and supportive of staying there until the very end.  Yup, we watched them dance, eat the cake, do the bouquet, and leave with everyone cheering.  Haley loved it all!  Her brothers, were not excited about the long drive home. :)

After the Provo City Center Temple these kids needed to unwind, just some fun.  Well, I thought it would be a good idea to take them to a brand new pool and play.  Unfortunately, the rest of humanity at Provo felt the same way.  That swimming pool was so crowded!!! OH MY!  Caleb was so burnt out from the temple that he did not even swim.  He just read a book.  But the other kids had a lot of fun at the pool.   It was just what they needed!

 Saturday, last day of Spring Break and we ended it with a WIN!  Caleb and Peter started it off by going to the Jordan River Temple to help with shoe coverings.  Then C, W and H all had soccer games.  After some lunch, dinner with Steve and Jonny we all headed to the Real game.  Yes, we got wet.  Yes, we got home late.  But oh my, it was so much fun!  SO MUCH!  Each of the kids had on field opportunities.  P and W were able to see themselves on the big board.  Caleb (in the photo above, not seen because of the flags) had the cool chance to carry one of the Dream Flags out on the field while they had the team come out and do the National Anthem.  It was raining the entire time, but they had so much fun down there.

 Then, my little Haley?  She was a member of the Dream Team!!  She was so excited!  Not only that, she got to walk on with Justen Gald!  Oh my, so lucky.  Only thing better would have been to be with Rimando.  While watching them battle it out to finally take home the win Haley said, "I think I have a  new favorite player (Glad)." 

It was such a fun night!  We went prepared!  Ponchos, blankets, coats, snacks... it was awesome!

Spring Break - I Love to See the Temple!

Spring Break saw a lot of time at the temple.  It was wonderful, sometimes very long, and a great experience!  By the numbers:

We drove 406 miles

Visited 9 different temples

The boys were in the temple a total of 8.5 hours

They did 154 family names for Grandpa Gray

Now when you look at it, that would be less than 1 hour per temple.  But do not be fooled.  Some temples were super fast, like Salt Lake, only a half hour!  However, our longest temple: Provo City Center.  A whopping 2.15 hours!!! 

 We started off in Payson, because Haley's teacher had her reception down there.

 Bountiful with Jonah and Jonathan!

 While the boys are in the temple, Haley and William try and find ways to stay entertained.  Example: using the camera.

 Brigham City

 When we arrived at the Brigham City Temple and I saw that Logan was only 24 miles away, I thought, "Well, might at well do Logan today too."  It was worth the long drive. Beautiful temple and great day to be outside.

We of course made time for our Temple Treats!

Salt Lake Temple

 More photos by H and W.  They really were all so sweet and patient on this temple trip.  Mom ended up taking the time this trip by talking with two ladies about the temple, the church, missionary stuff.  They were troopers.

 The boys at Salt Lake

 Bridget went with them to the Draper Temple

 Entertaining ourselves in the truck because this was a cold, windy day.  Haley and William made themselves cardboard cameras.

 Oquirrh Mountain

 Last day of temple trips and it was a doozy!  Provo Temple.  The day was so rainy that we got out of the truck a few times, just to not go crazy. 

 The boys loved how the mountains looked with the clouds.

OH MY GOODNESS!  Provo City Center temple.  Had I known it would take so long I would have taken Haley and William somewhere else to wait.  But how were we to know that it would take 2+ hours for those boys to be finished!  We were all so tired after this.  But I will say, our week of temple trips had its advantages.  Time together.  Very little bickering.  Feeling the spirit.  Good memories.

State Science Fair!!!!

Busy, busy kid and smart and awesome!

I counted it up. This week Caleb should have attended 27 periods/classes.  I think he only made it to 12 of those 27.  WHY?  Well, he participated in a math competition at school, where they placed 2nd!  Go Caleb, he was one of the captains!

Then, State Science Fair!!!  Long and awesome day!

 This was the new and improved board.

 Bright and early at school to catch the bus to BYU, 7:15am.  Notice something missing?  Yeah, his glasses.  Had to run those over, quick quick.  Oops

 Made it! He had a great time!  He was judged by 5 different people.  He was able to do the ropes course 3 different times.  They would have had pizza for 2 different meals that day.  However, the pizza place at BYU ran out of dough for the dinner crowd.  So, Señor Bertoch bought them Chick-fil-A for dinner.  22 hungry teenagers devoured their dinner.  They also were able to go bowling and then attend the award ceremony that evening in Provo.  Bertoch said that West Jordan Middle was the 2 most awarded school at the ceremony!  They have amazing teachers and kids!

Where Caleb came home (at 9pm) with this award!!   Yeah buddy!  He had a terrific experience!  His voice was gone because of all the talking and fun, he is much more sick today with a cough and so tired.  But he was so happy with the time he had at science fair!  Now, for all that make up work to do during Spring Break. ;)