Mothers and Daughters...

The boys went to Father's and Sons, I mean the Commemoration of the Aaronic Priesthood, and so the girls took off for dinner out.  We went to Prospector's Place, an Italian eatery.  It was kind of raining but we decided to run down to DQ for some ice cream instead of drive.  For the record, I wanted to drive but Maxine told me to quit being a chicken and walk in the drizzle.  I tracked it with my phone and it was .5 mile.  We ate ice cream and were silly.

By the time we were ready to leave.  It was raining, not sprinkling.  We debated what to do but ended up just running and laughing all the way back to the car.  It was a good run but we were pretty wet by the time we got back to the Tahoe.  #gigglygirls

We're jammin...

Our strawberry plants and throwing some good strawberries!  We picked these the other day.  My kids and all the neighbor kids love to search for strawberries.  It's also time to get some strawberry freezer jam made up!

We make it with apple juice so there's less sugar.  (There's still sugar in there, just less.)  Mikayla and Mark were my awesome helpers.

We got plenty finished so Jack can have his favorite jam on peanut butter sandwiches.

As a kid, I remember my Grandma Gordon always had raspberry freezer jam in her fridge.  :)

Bubbies' basket...

This little guy has been nicknamed Bubbies by Jack.  His nickname, like Mikayla's nickname of Bo, evolved from calling him baby.  He now mostly refers to himself as Bubbies and we have little success getting him to say Mark.  It's understandable, we hardly call him Mark.  It has a few  permutations including Bubber and Bubboo.  Anyway, the older kids made him this bed out of an old laundry basket.  He calls is "Bubbies basket."

He took 2 naps in that thing and insisted on being put to bed at night in it (we moved him when we went to bed).  I don't know how his legs didn't fall asleep from being all smashed in the bottom.  

I told him to pretend he's asleep.  He kept smiling.  

Birthday surprise for Daddy...

The day before Merril's birthday, Maxine and the kids wanted to plan a special surprise.  I was not privy to their plans except that I was to get Daddy out of the house for 2 hours so they could prepare.  So Merril and I went birthday shopping.  Merril's preparing to run the IRONMAN (I know, right??!!) and needed a new bicycle helmet.  So we bought that and a few other things and headed back to the house for the surprise!

We were greeted by a completely cleaned house and the restaurant staff of Jamie's Cafe, complete with matching uniforms.  

They ushered us downstairs, where there was a candlelit table waiting for us.  

They immediately brought garlic bread and followed with salad.

We were served spaghetti after the salad course and loved our little dinner.  Mikayla and Mark were starving so they ended up eating downstairs with us.  They were all adorable as they brought down drinks and took our order.  It was delicious and they did a great job!

The next day I planned a big BBQ birthday bash at a park and invited all Merril's friends and their families.  We had it at Nisson park and it was a nice night.  I totally didn't take a single picture.  C'est la vie.  Happy 38th birthday Merril!  I love you more than I ever thought I could.  You are so generous to me and everyone around you.  Loves-J

Jack's end of year program...

Jack is nearing the end of 4th grade and it's time for his program centered on Utah history.  They sang songs about Utah and pioneers.

Jack was picked to be one of the students in the square dancing portion.  He did great!

I brought the wrong camera and didn't get a very good shot but you get the idea.

Boys Trip Back East...

Merril bought a Jeep for a guy in Japan and it had to be picked up back East and driven here (this is the reason the garage shelves started this weekend).  Merril took Jack and Ryan R. and they headed off on an adventure!  They picked up the Jeep in Philadelphia.

 They decided to drive around to some cool spot and went up to New York City.  I tried to convince Jack that it was going to be cold but he didn't believe me.  This is the top of the World Trade Center Tower.

He kept stealing Merril's hat because he was cold.

Breezed past Washington D.C. and the Washington Monument and met up with Dan Moore, who lives there.

The Besens were the big reason that Jack went with Merril.  They were our neighbors for a while and Jack and their son, James, were good friends.  Sharon is about the nicest person you will ever meet and Ted is great!  Their son, Lance, has grown up a ton!

Merril's garage birthday surprise...

I love Merril.  I love Merril's garage....but it seriously lacked organization.  Piles of items littered the floor and drove me bonkers.  Enough is enough.  I set out to hatch a scheme to build shelves for Merril's birthday.  He left town for a few days and so I set to work.  I started in an unimportant corner of the garage to get started.

Things went along pretty well so I moved to a different corner by the garage door.

I learned pretty quick that I'm kind of a weakling.  Theses shelves would go a lot faster if I didn't have to pilot drill all the holes.  But the work moved along and soon I had some good sections!

Then came the fun part!  Fill up all the shelf space and getting stuff off the floor!!

Yippee!

After Merril got home, I was able to ask his opinion about how he wanted the rest of the garage.  And then I set to work.  I didn't want him to finish it because that didn't seem like much of a present.  So I did them all myself.

It's going well but it's still going to take a while to finish it all up.  As I go, I get more ideas of how to store things.  It's a work in progress but coming along nicely!

Update:  I don't feel like I took pictures of anything else this month because I was working on this project A LOT!  It took almost the whole month to construct all the garage shelves.  I'm pretty proud that I didn't lose any fingers.  I got some sore muscles and a few bruises, including this goose egg, which I received trying to take apart a section I'd messed up and the board twisted around and whacked me in the forearm.    

In the end, I'm really please with how they turned out.

Boys Trip Back East...

Merril bought a Jeep for a guy in Japan and it had to be picked up back East and driven here (this is the reason the garage shelves started this weekend).  Merril took Jack and Ryan R. and they headed off on an adventure!  They picked up the Jeep in Philadelphia.

 They decided to drive around to some cool spot and went up to New York City.  I tried to convince Jack that it was going to be cold but he didn't believe me.  This is the top of the World Trade Center Tower.

He kept stealing Merril's hat because he was cold.

Breezed past Washington D.C. and the Washington Monument and met up with Dan Moore, who lives there.

The Besens were the big reason that Jack went with Merril.  They were our neighbors for a while and Jack and their son, James, were good friends.  Sharon is about the nicest person you will ever meet and Ted is great!  Their son, Lance, has grown up a ton!

Mikayla Moo...

 A little about Mikayla:  She looks good in hats.  So cute.

She's started writing her name well.  She draws cute stick figures with the legs coming right out of the head, one of my favorite stages.  

She hums her own made-up tunes, especially when she's daydreaming or studying something.  She likes to make up dances and sing.

She's a great climber!  We'll go to the park or to hike and I get comments like, "Are you worried about her climbing like that??"  And the truth is, I'm not.  She's good at finding a way out of a sticky situation and if she needs help, just asks for it.  Mostly, she can downclimb anything she climbs up to.

She's independent but still likes to have Mom around.

The older kids have nicknamed her Bobo, or Bo for short.  It evolved from calling her baby which turned to Bobo which turned to Bo.  Love that girl!

Jack's basketball camp...

Jack really likes basketball but we haven't really signed him up to play for city leagues or anything.  The high school was offering a basketball skills class and he wanted to do it.  They still played some games, of which I didn't get a single good picture.  Even this one is sub par.

He hustles pretty well and can make good foul line shots and he improved on things like dribbling and lay ups.  Good job Jack!