My trip back East...

My Mom invited me to a girl's weekend in New York City. I accepted after Merril bought me the plane ticket for my birthday. I went with my Mom, my sisters, and a few other cousins and relatives. We took the red eye to JFK and took right off. We went to the Empire State Building,

St. Patrick's Cathedral,

and looked at Grand Central Station. We went to a show that night called Anything Goes, a show about love, set in the 1930s with lots of swing music and tap and ballroom dancing. It was great!

The next day I did a session at the Manhattan Temple, which is so small but beautiful, and then headed off to visit my friend, Emily. We hit a museum but mostly just gabbed and played at the park with her two cute girls. I took this picture of them before I left and headed back to Manhattan, where I hooked up with my family again.

The next day we went to Hoboken, NJ to visit Carlo's Bake Shop where they film the show, "Cake Boss" on TLC.

That was super fun!

There wasn't a line so we walked right in! There was general mayhem that accompanies a lot of people in a small space but I loved looking at the shelves of pastries.

I bought 2 chocolate strawberries, a chocolate mousse cake, a berry tart, an M & M cookie, 2 sugar cookies and a chocolate almond biscotti. I spent $21, which is fairly average pastry shop prices. I took some of it home to my kids but I ate probably a 1/3 of my purchases.

Then we walked around China Town and Little Italy back in Manhattan for a while until it was time to catch our plane home. I fell into bed at 4:00 a.m. and woke up at 7 to give my kids hugs and presents. Wahoo! Fun times!

We're jammin...

No, we're not listening to Bob Marley but I did make 28 cups of strawberry freezer jam yesterday.

It's Jack's favorite. I like to think I'm saving money by making it but I don't really think that's the case. But this post is actually about something else: my obsession with saving money and reusing items. It might be a disease or at least a clinically treated neurosis. :) For example, I saw a bag of compost on the side of the road all shredded from falling out of the back of someone's truck. I totally stopped and carefully eased into the back of the Jeep so I could take it home. I've picked up 2 very nice beach towels, a swim noodle, and a kid's play tent as well over the years. I also save things that might come in handy someday. I wash and save sour cream containers to put beans in after I cook them and then freeze them. The size of butter tub I've been using lately is the wrong size but I've still washed and saved them. Yesterday I found a use! I didn't have enough plastic lids to go on my glass jam jars. (I wash and save the lids from mayonnaise and miracle whip jars because the lids screw right onto regular mouth mason jars perfectly!) I started covering the jam jars with aluminum foil but wasn't satisfied. Instead, I took the previously mentioned too-big butter tubs and cut a circle. Then used the plastic circle underneath a regular mason jar screw band. Now they can be stacked in the freezer!

I just like to save money and keep stuff out of the landfills if I can. Hopefully it never takes over my life.

I love technology...

Technologically, I feel like we, as a society, are quite advanced. So it irks me when things take longer to solve than I feel it should take. For instance, the BP oil spill took 70 days to cap. 70 DAYS! I scratched my head, dumbfounded, while day after day barrels and barrels of oil spewed into the ocean and a solution eluded us. Really? Someone hasn't figured this out after a day or so? Ridiculous.

However, I'm pleased when technology surprises me. My cell phone was "misplaced" around my house and Merril wasn't home to call it. So I run to my office computer and Google "can't find cell phone, call it" and up pops a website called "Where's My Cellphone?" A free service that allows cell phone users to enter a phone number, select the time to call (Now!, 30 seconds, 1 minute, etc.) and hit enter. The website says, "Your phone is ringing. RUN! Go find it!" After finding my phone and answering it, an exaggerated game-show host voice says, "Thank you for using Where's my cell phone!" and hangs up. Of course you can donate but it's not required.

So, with so many good technologically advanced tools in the world, some things just shouldn't take as long as they do.

Yeah for Easter!

We had a jam packed weekend with Easter Egg hunts, brunches, BBQs and sunshine! We went to 3 egg hunts hosted by family, wards and friends!

Bucket heads are requisite in our family.

Showing off the prizes from the hunt!


We celebrated Merril's birthday this weekend as well! He's 33.

We dyed eggs, of course.

I especially liked Maxine's starry night sky.

This morning we hunted for eggs!

We had a breakfast of hard boiled eggs and toast before dashing off to church at 9:00 a.m.

Okay 9:04 a.m. The egg hunt threw us off. I might have been able to get us there on time but I refuse to get up earlier than 6:30 a.m.

These are their Easter outfits! This is after church so the hair was already coming out and shoes had come off. I love to make a matching tie for Jack. It's so easy and I got the pattern and instructions online here! Ties are all about cutting the fabric on the diagonal and after that, it's a cinch! The dresses worked out fine. Maxine's was too big, then I took in the sides and it was too small so I ripped out the zipper and got an extra 1/2 inch and it fit perfectly. I had to sew her zipper 3 times! The first time I sewed it in backwards by mistake so the zipper handle faced the inside of the dress (woops), second time was perfect but I had to pull it to gain an extra 1/2 inch, third time wasn't as pretty as the first two but oh well, I was done. I wasn't about to pull it again and sew it a fourth time. I think I'm over my fear of sewing zippers now. :)

Happy Easter!

Yeah Kites!

We went to a local kite festival that rewards children for reading and Maxine earned a free kite. A few days ago, it was perfectly windy and we tried out our kites.

Juliet's kite was caught in a tree for a minute but rescued.

Jack's kite ripped a little in the wind and was fixed with tape.

Maxine's kite flew like a champ until it got stuck on a neighbor's roof.

It was a nice day!

School Lunch...

The other day, the little kids and I decided to have lunch with Maxine at school. Yum! Spaghetti!

Spaghetti with meat sauce, garlic cheese toast, and a veggie mix (broccoli, cauliflower and carrots), and then anything on the salad and fruit bar. Maxine opted for cold peas from the salad bar and Jack and Juliet wanted bananas. But this isn't about whether lunch was good or not. It was about how much food gets thrown away!! There were kids who only wanted noodles, no sauce, chocolate milk, no veggies and maybe some applesauce. Then they ate 2 bites and threw the rest away. Frustrating. It made me thankful that my kids eat pretty well.

Jack is my fussiest about vegetables. (He has issues with green peppers, mushrooms, and celery but will eat most everything else.) I wish there was a way to say to the lunchroom kids, "Okay, get a little of everything, try a bite or two, and if you still don't like it, don't eat it." But that's not the lunchroom workers's job. Oh well, I've still got a little while before Jack is eating at the school. He might need me to make him peanut butter and jelly everyday. :)

Is it Christmas???

Okay so it's not Christmas. But it snowed on Friday and Saturday and I was determined to keep my apricots and peaches from freezing. One website recommended putting Christmas lights on the trees because the light gives off heat. I don't know if it made a difference but my fruit didn't freeze.

The kids liked the snow. I was a little cheesed.

Here's the apricot tree with lights and a big plastic bag. Like a little greenhouse.

I might have an unhealthy obsession with my trees. The crop is going to be soooo good this year!

The King's Speech with a new rating...

I originally wanted to see the movie, "The King's Speech" until I found out it was rated R. Bummer. Don't watch those. So I figured I'd wait until it's shown on tv in a few years. While looking at movie listings, I noticed that a theatre in our town has a PG-13 version of "The King's Speech" playing!!! So I googled it and producers of the movie decided to release a tamer version (less swearing) in order to draw in more families. Personally I'm thrilled and will try and see it soon!

Working on Easter...

I wanted to make cute skirts for my girls for Easter. I had the idea in my head and was very excited about it. Then I told Maxine and Juliet and Maxine informed me that she required a dress. I came up with a dress with straps that I liked and pictured her wearing a shirt underneath. She informed me again that she didn't want a shirt underneath, she wanted a dress with sleeves. *sigh* A little irked, we went to the fabric store and argued for an hour about fabric selections. Maxine kept picking blue, old lady floral prints and Juliet kept picking purple retro prints. Jack kept picking out camo. A fabric was finally agreed upon, thread was purchased and I ran from the store with my 3 kids.

That was 3 weeks ago. Yesterday, I decided to start Juliet's dress. I finished it this morning. I even sewed the best zipper I've ever done. (That's not saying much, I've only done 4 in my whole life because they scare me. But this one was GREAT!)

I have visions of corkscrew bows in the colors of the dots: dark pink, royal blue, light blue, green and orange. Maybe not all the colors but a couple of them. Maxine's dress will match except the skirt will be royal blue and Jack will have a tie or vest, depending on how much fabric is leftover. The ribbon by the hem was the hardest part because the hem curves and the ribbon is straight. But I'm satisfied with how it turned out. Yeah! One down.

Sleeping at the wheel....

Jack tends to fall asleep anywhere. If he's tired and there's enough space, he'll be asleep. We used to have 1 o'clock church and Jack would fall asleep in Primary around 75% of the time. His teachers would let him lay on the floor and doze off. We registered him for kindergarten last week and I requested morning for that reason. He doesn't have a nap every day but he will if he's tired. Last week we had some beautiful weather and the kids decided to play in the sprinklers. After all that playing and with a little dinner in him, Jack promptly dozed off, in his swimsuit.

Other than that, I've been busy. But I'd like to share these pics before going.

We made a fort over Spring Break and all 3 kids slept in it every night and spent most of their days in it.

And the kids like to play with my camera. These pics are as we're getting ready for church.

We teach them how to weld...

I know you're supposed to teach your kids how to walk, talk, feed themselves, etc. But at our house, we also teach them how to weld. (Okay, not really but just go with it.)

How it started: Merril was out in the garage, modifying something on his truck and there were little pieces of metal on the floor. Maxine picked them up and started to make a shape but said she needed to glue the metal together. Merril pointed her to the welder and gave her a few pointers and away she went. (Eye and skin protected is essential.)

Merril said she has a real knack for it. Most people have the problem of overthinking it. Kids don't have this problem.

Jack needed to learn too since Maxine was learning.

I was a little scared just taking the pictures because people aren't supposed to look directly at welding sparks because they burn the retina. I ended up getting the shot ready and then saying "GO" and clicking a couple of shots with my eyes closed.

Finished horse.

It's cute in a creepy sort of way. :)

A little story...

Do you ever have those days when everything drives you nuts???

Maybe you're having a bad hair day.

Do you feel so exhausted you can't stay awake another second??

Well, we hope not. But just in case, we wanted you to know that happiness still exists right around the corner.

Love is waiting for you. Go give someone a hug.

Been busy...

Don't you just hate that? I've been too busy but yesterday I had a day all to myself. There wasn't any PTA, Young Womens, or preschool to teach and I spent the whole day outside in the yard. Not that I don't like to do PTA or teach preschool or go to Young Womens, it was just a lot all at once. I made another grow box in the front yard and planted 2 blueberry plants and strawberries. I weeded my berry patch on the north side of the house and planted most of the garden. The garden has tomatoes, peas, carrots, onions, and banana peppers. My pic is a little overexposed but I still haven't put image editing software on my new computer.

My apricot tree is full of blossoms!! Seriously, I'm going to keep bees some day. I'll be the crazy bee lady.

This is one of my new new strawberry plants! I'm hoping the new grow box in the front yard will be the right amount of morning sun and afternoon shade. Here's keeping fingers crossed!

Hoover Dam...

We drove past Hoover Dam last weekend and stopped to take a gander at the new bridge! The kids wouldn't sit still for a picture and took off.


Here's the new bridge, view from the dam. It's hard to tell but it is massive! There's so much concrete and I was in awe.

We walked across Hoover Dam and Maxine kept trying to lean over the edge of the dam, despite signs everywhere saying, "Danger, Keep Off Wall."

Nobody died, although the wind was blowing really hard and Juliet was pushed by the wind a little bit. This is my favorite picture of the day.

When the wind blows...

There was a huge storm that blew through our part of town a few days ago and let's just say that I was afraid of losing some trees because of the wind. So now it's a calm beautiful day and I was driving and noticed something caught in the telephone pole wires. Right in the middle of the picture, can you see it?

Still can't tell what it is? How about now?

It's a tumbleweed. Now, generally speaking, tumbleweeds tend to roll along the ground. That must have been some ferocious wind.

Juggling abs...

So I've been learning to juggle this year. I used to juggle 3-8 times and then drop with a top count of 13. Now I juggle around 13 times without a drop and my top consecutive count is 33. I practice for 5-15 minutes a day, depending on my mood. So I've noticed that juggling is exercise. After 10 minutes, I'm sweating slightly, my abs are tight and my heart rate is elevated. What? Seriously? It's not super cardio but every little bit helps right? Merril and I have started joking that we could start a new areobic fitness craze called Juggling Abs by Jamie. "It's fun! It improves hand to eye coordination...and you can do it from the comfort of your own home! And you could have abs like these>>>(and then a stunt double with super awesome abs would provide the close-up shot because the days of showing off my abs are over.)

You heard about it here first.