Parent Teacher Conferences

Last week was Parent Teacher conferences at the elementary school. Both Jared and Kamryn got excellent reports from their teacher.

Conferences also mean Book Fair time. We let the kids each pick out a book for doing such a great job at school. They always to buy something with their own money - this year they decided to get posters.

Kamryn with her cute puppy poster.

Jared with his BYU poster

How did that happen, you ask? Very good question. He told me he was going to get the BYU poster and I teased him about that. Then when it was time to buy he said he wanted the Utes poster. I was working at the book fair at the time and I think he thought i was serious about my teasing. I told him he could get whatever poster he wanted and he chose BYU. He says he wanted that one because the animal is COOLER.

So, of course, I had to take a picture of him with it and I emailed it to Justin :)

I finally did it

I got all the equipment and supplies to make my own bread last summer. When school started I went to my friends to learn how to make bread from her, she's an expert. And then i never did it on my own - too busy getting a missionary ready to go, and then the holidays.

In January I put it on my list of things to do and every week it was still on there.

Finally yesterday a friend of mine asked me what I had planned for the day and I told her I was going to make bread. Did I just say that? Since I said it I figured I'd better really do it.

Here is the end result.

Not too bad for my first time on my own.

It smelled so good that Brooke waited around a few minutes and was a little late to work so she could have some before she left. We all enjoyed a warm slice of bread for a snack and then more for dinner.

PS I got this recipe from my friend Jill. She got it from the Deals to Meals blog.

Pinterest

Some people are afraid to get involved with Pinterest. It can be time consuming at the beginning while you're figuring it out and looking at all these new cool pictures and ideas. But after awhile the newness wears off and you can just check in for a few minutes a day and find another new cool idea, pin it to your board and you're good.

I got the idea pictured above from Pinterest and it came from this cute blog. I have a friend who is having a hard time and I thought "I'm going to make my own version of this and take it over to her."

Sunshine in a Bucket

This is how my version turned out and I love it. I just walked around Walmart and the Dollar Store looking for yellow "sunshine" It was super easy, didn't take very much time and would make anybody happy.

My Ute Kids

Justin gave these cute kids Utah shirts for Christmas (he couldn't stand seeing them in their blue AspenGrove/BYU shirts). He gave them long sleeve shirt and they wanted short sleeve shirts and its taken this long to get them exchanged.

I think this one will make Justin smile.

President's Day

I got these first 2 pictures from my sister's blog. She is very lucky to have this great exercise group in her ward. Amy is a personal trainer and holds these classes at their church on MWF and they are quite the challenge. I was able to go on Monday and participate in the 25 station interval training.

This is Amy with her daughter

After working out and getting something to eat

we took the kids sledding at a park near Susan's house

It took longer to get ready than we were there, I think.

I would have liked to take more pictures but my camera battery wasn't charged.

guess the kids had a fun time

this is how they looked on the ride home

Princess Party

Kamryn was invited to her cousin Yoel's 1st birthday party

It was a princess party for all the girl cousins

Kamryn had so much fun getting all dressed up for the party

All of the princesses

Kamryn getting her face painted

opening presents at the party

Rachel, Katie and Kamryn

3 beautiful princesses

my princess

Avignon, France

Justin arrived in Geneva Switzerland on Valentine's day

The mission president and his wife picked them up at the airport

and brought them to the mission home for lunch

Elder Justin Adams

in Geneva Switzerland

at the Mission Home/Office

Elder Adams with President and Sister Murdock

Finding out who his trainer/companion is

Elder Justin Adams with his trainer companion, Elder Wolfart

Having breakfast at the mission home

then training with the president and assistants.

Then at least a 4 hr train ride to his new area -

Avignon, France

Its pronounced like Avinhon (from wikipedia)

or as Brooke said it "avinyone"

Airport Call

Monday morning we were able to talk to Justin while he was waiting for the first of 3 flights he would take to get to his mission. Brooke, Jared and Kamryn all stayed home from school so they could talk to Justin (Taylor couldn't afford to miss school and figures he'll talk to Justin on Mother's Day :). Paul had to be at work but was conferenced in on the call. It was so great to hear his voice - sounds the same. We had him give of us some of the talk he gave the day before in his branch sacrament meeting - in French of course. His French sounds great to us. We were able to talk to him for about an hour before he had to get on his first flight to Chicago.

In Chicago he barely had any time at all before boarding his next flight to London. Luckily we'd sent him a pay as you go cell phone so he was able to text me when he was taking the shuttle from one terminal to the next. Their layover wasn't very long and they didn't even have time to get something to eat. Luckily they were flying on British Airways to London, which is a pretty swanky airlines. Justin said the plane was REALLY nice and the info online said they'd be getting a 3 course meal.

Hard Time

I'm having a really hard time keeping up with all the things that need to be posted on - this blog, Justin's mission photo blog, his mission letter website, facebook, my written journal, email and written letters to Justin. Don't misunderstand - I want and like to do all those things, just trying to keep up with all of them is sometimes a challenge. I can't even remember what I've been meaning to post on here.

Volunteering

Every Thursday I volunteer in jared and Kamryn's 1st grade class. I give spelling tests to 4 kids - each child in the class has their own spelling list each week. And then I do whatever the teacher asks me to do.

Last week I put up this bulletin board - which is in the main hall.

This is Kamryn's comic retell of "The Mitten"

This is Jared's comic retell of "The Mitten"

Jazz Game

Last week Paul called from work to say he had 3 tickets to go to the Jazz game that night and would we like to go. Brooke volunteered to stay home with Jared and Kamryn. So Taylor and I got to go. The best part was we got to see the game from the Layton Suite. We had a great dinner and got to choose our desserts from the dessert cart :) Oh yeah, and watch the game, which the Jazz won.

Between

I never remember to take the BEFORE picture on a big project.

So here is the BETWEEN picture.

This is the back half of our storage room. Its normally FILLED with lots of STUFF. I've decided that I want it finished so it can be my office/sewing/craft room. Its really a domino effect of decisions. Where all my office stuff is now is in the back half of our family room in the basement. It used to be a big open room where we had a ping pong table. With the addition of 2 more kids when we had the twins we needed more bedrooms and lost the ping pong room. Well, we'd like it back - especially for the teens to have a place to hang out. This was really prompted after Taylor and his friends spent about 8 hours playing ping pong at the cabin.

So, we've moved all the stuff from the storage room into Justin's room. I did most of the work in one day! The only stuff left in there is Paul's :) So, I'm giving us a year to get this project finished - that's the goal anyway. We've at least got to get the room cleaned out before Justin gets back.

Jared and Kamryn photos

While we were at the cabin

Susan and Kierra braided Kamryn's hair in lots of braids

this is the results

it turned out really cute

and we think it made her look really grown up

jared in his super cool angry bird jammies

the pjs I got him for Christmas didn't fit so I was able to exchange for these

I scored big points when I brought these home

Jared had to go to the dentist last week

to have 2 teeth pulled and a cavity filled

he was very brave

didn't cry at all

and didn't ask for me to come back

he had to have the teeth pulled

because the 2 adult teeth were fully grown in

behind the baby teeth

Welcome to 2012

We were very lucky to get the cabin for new years weekend. That is our favorite place to be for New Years Eve. We were up there with my parents and one of my sisters and her family and one of my brothers and his family. Paul and I were sad that Taylor and Brooke chose to not come and go to parties with their friends instead (but we understood). So it was just Jared and Kamryn up with us.

We were there from Friday to Monday (I even kept Jared and Kamryn out of school on Monday) and it was such a great weekend. We went to church up there and the best surprise was that they only had sacrament meeting since it was a New Years Day - what a great idea.

We enjoyed playing games, watching movies, eating lots of good food and just relaxing. Its such a wonderful place and we're so grateful to our parents for such a great getaway place.

There is not much snow but there's enough to go sledding.

Most of Monday was spent outside in the sun and snow.

what a fun train

susan is a great mom to sled with her kids

(luckily, I had the job to take pictures)

Even my dad took several runs down

the sledding road

Kamryn loved being outside in the sun

(jared chose to stay inside on Monday

and play video games with his cousin Jake)

katie

(who can resist this cute face)

Kierra and Kamryn

Kierra is such a great friend, cousin, big sister to Kamryn

while we were at the cabin someone asked Kamryn who her best friend is

and she said Kierra

What a great ride

they went down all the runs

over and over

this is mostly to prove that I was really there