March 2012

We started off the month of March with the annual Cub Scout Blue and Gold dinner. At this event the boys get to decorate a cake for dessert. They really wanted it to be the boys creation, so I pinned (love me some Pinterest) a bunch of ideas and let Ben decide what to do. I baked the cake and frosted the initial layer. He did the rest.

Even took his own picture!
I got strep throat - AGAIN!! Kannon did some grocery shopping for me and brought home some fun green flowers for all of us. He wrote some special notes to everyone, too. Ben put his on his dresser. Sarah put her flower on my stove. Joshua turned his flower upside down and dip, dip, dipped it in the water. It didn't last too long. The rest of the flowers made it through the end of the month!

The wearing o' the green! We pull these out every year. When Ben was 4 we bought our St. Patrick's Day gear for a ward party/ talent show. It's awesome!

We had two of our favorite families over for dinner on the 16th for green food. The Edwards and the McCormick's came and we did potluck. Lots of green love. We ate kale chips, green quesadillas, lots of green veggies, some meat in green sauce (yum!), a green jello dessert and a bunch of minty chocolates! We also had a good time playing "What's Yours Like?" I've heard that game can get a bit racy, but I think it depends on the players. I've played it with 2 different groups and never had an issue.

On Sunday I sent the kids around the house on their Leprechaun treasure hunt (also pinspired!). Saturday had proven to be a really busy day and we didn't get around to it.

They found the treasure! Individual paper pots of m&m's!

Kannon's new hobby -the art of belt buckling! He really likes putting these together and spends a lot of his free time (which really isn't much) in the garage welding and buffing. He's sold a few and given some away. He traded one for some babysitting, too!

Kannon took all 3 kids to the Monster Jam. The original plan was to take Ben on their date for the month. But, he really wanted to take Joshua, too, and I told him that he had to take Sarah, also, if she wanted to go. She did. I dropped them off and spent a few hours doing some window shopping, then picked them up when it was over and we did some grocery shopping for the month. For Ben and Kannon's date, they built space derby ships.

I was asked to participate in a Chautauqua for our Relief Society Birthday party. I was Louisa Barnes Pratt. My mom made me this awesome dress for the 1840's. I had so much fun being someone else for the evening (we pretended all through dinner, too). I didn't want to take off my costume when I came home.

I really enjoyed comparing Louisa as a woman, wife, and mother to me as a woman, wife and mother. There were a lot of similarities. Doesn't matter that she lived so many years before me. We, as women are so similar through the ages. We struggle with the same issues. She had to take care of her family when her husband was called to serve a mission. I know women who have had to do that while their husbands are in the military, or just have to work long hours or far away. This depressed her for days, moved her to tears. But, she eventually came to herself and got down to business. She moved with her husband to the Pacific Islands to finish his mission. In her lifetime she built and left behind 7 homes. She had to choose between her religion and her husband when a time came that he wasn't willing to follow the Prophet. We each have similar trials. Anyway, I'm not a philosopher, but she wasn't "just" a pioneer - she was a woman.

Sarah and I made these S's. She and I got to go to Reno together and do a little shopping. We were looking for a present for her friend, Serenity. We went to the mall and got some hair stuff and we went to JoAnn and got these wooden S's. I made one for Sarah ( on the left) and she made one for Serenity (right). We had fun in Reno and we had fun making them.

Ben participated in his first dance! He's been doing swing since January and they had their first performance at the local "Dancing with the Stars." I thought they did a great job. Ben had so much fun. They danced to Rockin' Robin. Now he's learning the cha-cha.

These are some of the kids from his class at school. There are at least 3 more.

(Lane, Malcolm, Brayden, Bailey, Ben and Kale. Missing Storme, Paige, and Madison.)

Ben with his partner Storme D.

We spent the last weekend in Elko with the rest of the Polish's. We enjoyed General Conference.

Kate and Sarah

Grandma's Girls. She bought cute dresses for all of the granddaughters and took pictures with them. They were so cute - all in pink.

Lillie, Kate and Sarah (later joined by Grandma and 4 more cousins!)

Lots of outside time. It was a windy weekend, even snowed some on Sunday, but the kids were outside as much as possible. Kannon took me and Josh on a 4-wheelin' ride.

Lots of time on the ds's. Ben on his and Will on Uncle Kreg's. Joshua loved watching him play games. He doesn't know how to play them so for now he's content to watch. I was just happy that there wasn't any beatings happening this weekend. I don't think Joshua hit anyone!

Out for frozen yogurt at the new "Spoon Me". I LOVE frozen yogurt!

Playing a bit of fruit ninja on the X-box Kinect. He made me play, too. Thank goodness nobody pulled out the camera then!

March was a pretty good month. Not too busy, but full of great memories!

February 2012

Ah, February, the month of LOVE! Here are some of the things we loved about February.

CARS!

We have quite the extensive collection of Disney's Cars. A whole basket full. The kids had dumped them out and were lining them up when someone (moi?) suggested that they line them up like a rainbow. This isn't exactly what I had in mind, but they had fun doing it.

Their was mass destruction afterward. (I was trying to figure out who took this picture. I'm on the couch and Kannon is walking. I think we didn't want to take this picture, but Ben was adamant. He used the timer!)

A Snow Day in the Mountains with Extended Family

My sister and her family came over from Sacramento and we came up from Fallon to meet at my other sisters' in Incline Village. We had some lunch and visited and then went over to Mt. Rose and did some sledding. We were there for an hour and a half. Enough time for most of us, not quite enough for Ben.

Joshua loved it, too! He was pulling Sarah in the sled.

His poor mittened hands! I wasn't able to find good mittens for him until after this trip. The ones he was wearing got so wet! He ended up wearing two pairs of mittens at once and still had frozen fingers.

Kannon and Sarah

Baking Brownies

I made 8 boxes of brownies for our Cub Scout Pinewood Derby. (I didn't love this about February, but everyone else did!) I cut out each brownie and put powdered sugar on them to look like checkered flags. It was SO time-consuming! And I hate how brownies don't come out of the pan. So I was eating the extra stuff that stuck to the knife or the pan or my fingers. Definitely NOT on the diet! And I didn't even get a picture of the finished product!

Marshmallows!

I had a bag of heart-shaped marshmallows for the month. I also had some mini marshmallows and a bag of regular marshmallows. A couple of times I gave Joshua a marshmallow or two for going potty. I was trying to get him excited about potty-training. That didn't happen. But, he did get excited about marshmallows. And even found his own way into the cupboard!

The Pinewood Derby!

This was Ben's first Pinewood Derby and Kannon was very careful to help him without taking over. It was a fun design and Ben did the painting himself. Kannon tried to figure out the best ways to make it go fast. They really enjoyed working on it together.

Ready to Race!

Ben got 3rd place in his age group. There were about 12-15 boys in that age group, so we felt like it went pretty well.

Ben - 3, Jack C. - 1, Sam R. - 2

DATES!

For my date with Ben, this month, we made slime. We used a Pinterest recipe, putting together, Elmer's glue, water and borax, with a little food coloring. It was "ew!" and "cool"!!

They liked how you could hold it by an end and it would slowly stretch out, longer and longer without breaking.

Dad took Sarah out to dinner. I told him it had to be special. I want him to start now, to teach her how she should be treated on a date. She was so excited to wear a special dress, get her hair fixed up pretty. They picked a restaurant and she made sure Daddy wore his fancy shoes.

Valentine's Day!

I got strep throat on the 13th. Ugh. So, I wasn't doing to good on this day. I did my best, though. I'm sure I made heart pancakes. I tried this heart thing in Sarah's hair; it looked pretty bad by the end of the day.

I also cut out some felt hearts to wear on her uniform buttons. You can kind of see them in this picture we took as we ran out of the house.

I did a few other fun things for the kids throughout the weeks leading up to Valentine's Day. Not as many as last year, but I blame that on being sick. We had a few visits to the Valentine's mailbox. I hope they felt loved anyway. They got to have a heart-shaped pizza from Papa Murphy's since I didn't feel like cooking! or eating. =(

Sorting.
I tried to engage Joshua a little more this month. We'd gotten into a rut. We'd take the kids to school, go straight to the gym and then he'd eat snacks and watch shows while I showered and browsed the computer or worked. Then, we did lunch, nap and then the kids would come home. So, I got busy and tried to do a few more things with him to help him have a more fulfilling day.

We did sorting! This was fun for him. I didn't know he'd take to it so quickly. Although, I didn't let it go on as long as I had hoped because he soon turned to scattering. We have a bag full of dice and marbles. I liked the idea of using the muffin tin to sort.

The Great Outdoors

Joshua loves to be outside and has struggled with our colder winter weather. He goes out anyway and Any Way. At the beginning of the day when he's still in jammies. With, and without, shoes and/or socks. At the end of the day, when I want him to stay clean after his bath! With a coat or jacket or without. This one was just too adorable to pass up!

FHE

We had a fun Family Home Evening one night. Kannon was in charge. He had me pick up some white powdered donuts when I went to the store. Then he locked us up in a room while he prepared. We got to follow the iron rod ( a rope) around the house. There were obstacles, temptations and even the sound of water close by. The rod led us to the Tree of Life. And the "fruit" was truly delicious. (I was a good girl and didn't eat any - only spiritually this time.)

Just Dance

We had a code for a free game rental from Redbox and I used it to check out Just Dance 3 for the Wii. Kannon says it's not as fun as the one for the Xbox Kinect, but the kids and I had fun trying it out anyway. Ben got really good at some of the songs!

January 2012

New Year's Eve - Kannon made our dinner of nachos and we all enjoyed "clinking" our bottles of sparkling cider. My sweet visiting teacher gave us those little bottles and we stashed them away all month so that we could celebrate on New Years Eve together.

I hate the way I look in this picture, but I'm pretty sure it had been a long day for me. I know I was putting away Christmas stuff most of the day. On my way out to the garage (for probably the 10th time) I saw the fireworks that were going off at the County Fairgrounds. We could see them pretty good from our backyard and the kids grabbed blankets and watched for awhile from the trampoline.

We got the baths done while the ice cream maker went to work. We had a package of ice cream mix and we used up some expiring evaporated milk. This was super-yummy cherry ice cream. We ate it while watching something fun on Netflix.
We try to get out to my mom and dad's once a week. That usually is on Sunday evenings. It's a bit harder to do when we are on the afternoon church schedule. But, every time we are there, Joshua heads for the pirate costumes. He makes a great "argh" and is an expert at dueling!

I like to do something during the school breaks to beat the monotony of having nothing to do. And since we weren't traveling anywhere we decided to have a Winter Brunch Party. We made invites on a puzzle card so that the kids we invited would have something fun to do to (besides just coming to the party!)
I spent a lot of time trying to figure out fun food. Sometimes I think that time is so wasted. The kids never appreciate it that much. Most of them had already eaten! The powdered sugar on these donuts was so hard to work on. Can you spot the one-eyed snowman? I used frosting for the eyes, but it wouldn't stick! I cut up jellied orange slices for the nose and poked mini chocolate chips in for the mouth.

These bagels were cream cheese, olive halves and baby carrots, halved. We also had a pot of hot chocolate!

My festive mother came over and helped me out, too. Here she models our snowman pancakes - complete with chocolate chip face and buttons, bacon scarf and whip cream snow! They were fun and yummy!

We went outside (definitely not a snow-day!) and played a game of snowballs! I took our white socks and rolled them together to make snowballs. (We counted how many there were so that I would not end up with a lost sock or two!) Half the kids were on the trampoline, the other half on the ground. The kids on the ground threw the snowballs at the ones on the trampoline. If they got hit with a "snowball" they had to get off and join the throwers. When they were all out, we'd switch teams and start over.

I thought this game was fun and could have been played in a lot of ways.

Everyone had a piece of paper and pen. They took turns rolling the dice (the first player was the one who's birthday came next). Each number gave them a different part of the snowman to draw. So, one person might end up with a hat, but no head! Yet. They all got to play until they'd rolled their whole snowman. Some of them were so cute. Joshua even played!

They got to take these marshmallow snowmen home. I put three marshmallows on a stick and dipped them in melted white chocolate. I used a Hershey kiss for a hat and mini recess pieces (baking aisle) for the face and buttons.

We decided to have monthly dates with our kids, this year. I'll do Sarah one month, while Kannon does Ben. We'll switch the next month. So, for January, Sarah and I made a cake together. She picked it out and helped me get some ingredients at the store. Then we put it together. It was a lemon meringue cake. It was super rich, but really good, too. We shared it with my parents and then gave them the leftovers!

Ben and Kannon worked on Ben's Pinewood Derby car. I'll post about that in February.

Ben also did try-outs for the local Swing Kidz team. There were so many interested kids, this year, that they made another kids team. Ben made the team as an alternate. He has practices every week and seems to enjoy it. He is a bit tired on those days, though. He goes from school straight to his 2-hour practice. It makes for a long day.

I found Ben and Sarah playing chess one evening. What? Don't your 8- and 5-year-old's play chess? For some reason it's their game of choice around here. Except when Joshua wants to play, too. Then there is some extra excitement. Anyway, I guess a few pieces were missing, so they substituted! Ben had some Lego guys and Sarah had a few dolls and animals from her stash of toys.

I also had a super nice visit to Utah this month. My mom wanted to make the trip back to see her brother, my Uncle Tom, who wasn't doing too great. We were able to work things out so that I could go, too. My parents drove their van and took me and the kids on a Friday (before the Monday holiday of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day). We dropped the kids off in Winnemucca with Kannon's sister. We went the rest of the way to my sister's house in Salt Lake City. Kannon went to Winnemucca after work and stayed the night. They went up to Elko for the rest of the weekend. Kannon had to be back at work on Monday, so he left the kids in Elko where we picked them up on our way back through on Monday. They had a lot of fun with their cousins, aunts, uncles, grandma and grandpa. I had a GREAT weekend with my parents, Janet and Levi. We visited my Aunt Nancy and her kids and saw Uncle Tom. We played some great games and ate good food and I felt renewed.

Also, this month, Ben and I read some Chronicles of Narnia and Kannon and I attended a super-fun high school basketball game.

My birthday

So here I am....36.
I struggled a little at 35 because for some reason I had it in my head that that was middle age. That we all die at 70 or something. Anyway, that leaves me thinking that I'm over the hill now, at 36. Oh, well. What can ya do about it?!
Here's a little about the day I was born. I found this information at http://www.kakophone.com/ where you can input a date and find some crazy info.

It was a Monday (I always liked the poem "Monday's child is fair of face.....")
Number one song on this day 1976:
US - Saturday Night by Bay City Rollers
UK - Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen
Diane Keaton shares my birthday.
Eggs cost 84 cents/doz.

Info about the year from http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/
In 1976:
The movie Rocky won the Oscar for Best Picture.
A gallon of gas cost 59 cents.
The United States celebrates 200th birthday of independence from British Rule.
The $2.00 bill Issued
Apple Computer Company is formed by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak
United States Presidential Election 1976 Jimmy Carter (Democratic) Defeats Gerald Ford (Republican)
Colin Farrel and Reese Witherspoon both born
Popular musicians: Queen, ABBA, Diana Ross, Barry Manilow, The Four Seasons
Popular Films: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, All the President's Men, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Rocky (that's the only one I've actually seen from their list)

So, yeah. Things have changed over the years. Funny thing, though, I still feel 21. Like that's where my brained stop maturing. That makes it hard to grasp the thought that I graduated from high school almost 18 years ago! Or that I've been married for 10 years. It really is true that time flies when you get older. The days, weeks and years just speed by and we're left with the memories. Although, the older I get the less I can remember. No wonder I get on my 8-year-old to write in his journal. It's just too easy to forget the little experiences. I started a new thing this year - one I found on my favorite go-to place, Pinterest. I have a 3x5 box with notecards in it. At the top of the notecard I write the day (January 5). On the first line I wrote 2012 - (and will add something done today). Every year I will write down the year and something done on that day, or a memory, or whatever! I think it will be a fun way to keep track of some of those little things that get lost in life. Find the original here: (would somebody PLEASE teach me how to make the link invisible so you would only see the "here" to link to!)

http://www.designsponge.com/2010/12/diy-project-vintage-postcard-calendar-journal.html