Birthday Surprise/Field Trip/Football Game

So much has happened over the past few weeks that it's difficult to wrap my mind around it all. It's time to catch up on blogging again.

Back on September 23rd the girls and I decided we wanted to do something special for Grandma Vernie for her birthday that day. So Charlotte made a cute little watermelon shaped card before going to school and instructed me to buy Grandma a watermelon for her birthday because Grandma likes watermelons (her kitchen is decorated in them). We dropped Charlotte off at home and then drove to the store to buy some decorations. Then Alice and I headed over to Grandma's house to do the decorating before she got home. I thought she was at the Rec Center but I guess she was at the temple. We finished just in time because we got a phone call right as we got back home. Grandma Vernie loved it! Mission: accomplished!

On Friday September 24th Alice and I got to go to the MK Nature Center in Boise with her preschool for their first field trip of the year. I haven't visited this place in years so I couldn't remember most of it and I'm sure they have improved things over the years. I do remember that it had something to do with fish though and I was right.

This is where we sat to wait for everyone to show up and begin. We met at 9:30am.

There are hieroglyphs or pictures marked on the rock she's standing by on the trail we were walking.

They built a huge Eagle's nest for kids to climb in.

Along the path there are windows where you can view fish and other creatures. She's pointing at a crawdad.

Whooo is that? It's my little owl, Alice!

Inside their visitors center they had this beehive with live bees in it!

And lots of taxidermy mounts (real stuffed animals). Watch out for the mountain lion and bear!

Uh oh! Look what's behind us!

It was a fun trip that only lasted about an hour. Then Alice and I ate our packed lunches in the car. Actually, I ate my apple because I forgot to pack my salad dressing for my salad. I had to wait and eat that at home. However, we didn't go straight home. We went to WinCo to do some grocery shopping on the way home. 

Alice is sure loving preschool and our next field trip will be at the end of October to go to the Farmstead to pick a pumpkin. Funny enough, our family is going to the Farmstead tomorrow for a family activity. I have never been there so I don't know how it differs from Linder Farms where we usually go.

Well, that very same day that we had that first field trip was also a night where Garrett had another football game band performance. Curtis took Jack on a camping trip and Nikki was at work, so I took the girls with me to go watch their brother. I'm so glad I did because they had so much fun, especially Charlotte. We again got there in the middle of the 2nd quarter but I don't think they would have lasted an entire game. This time we sat by the band and could see Garrett down on the track performing with the band in the 1st half. The girls wanted to sit as high up as we could so we sat at the very top of the section we were in. Later on I bought the girls soda and popcorn and they loved it!

Skyview got brand new uniforms this year. They look so good! Garrett doesn't wear a hat because he's in the "pit crew" where they look down a lot so they don't want the hats falling off their heads.

And they got their band t-shirts.

Enjoying some popcorn.

And a swig of root beer!

It was so fun to watch how excited Charlotte would get. She even found one of her friends from school there and went to play with her in the side field by the bleachers. Our football team didn't do very well but we had fun anyway. Then the girls were happy to help Garrett wheel his drum back to the band room afterwards.

Skyview's last football game is tonight and I plan on taking them again as long as it doesn't rain. There are chances of rain throughout the day today. And it's about 20 degrees or so cooler than it was at the last game. We'll see how it goes!

Homecoming Weekend

Skyview had their homecoming game and dance last weekend. It started with the game Friday night, which was Garrett's first time performing with the marching band. I didn't go to the game until halfway through the 2nd quarter. Curtis didn't come with me because he was to help Sis. Joyce Cable (same one I get my plums from) with getting shingles put on her roof. They weren't actually nailing them down yet, which is what I thought they were doing. They were just getting all the new packages up on top of the roof, all ready to be put on this week. Curtis said it only took about 30 minutes but instead of coming to the game to watch Garrett perform he went over and helped Barry Cox strip some wire. He's an elderly man in our ward who recycles copper to help bring in some money. Of course I didn't find this out until after the game but he totally could have done all 3 things since he said he finished the roof project around 6:30 and Garrett didn't perform until 8:00. Sometimes I feel like he doesn't think the things his kids do are important enough to make it priority. It's frustrating sometimes. He'll be missing this Friday's game as well to go on a stake campout with Jack and the Deacons. I don't know if he'll come to the competition on Saturday. We'll see I guess.

Anyway, my in laws were there at the game before I got there to watch Garrett and so I sat with them on the far right side of the bleachers. They were subbing for someone at the temple the next day so they left right after the performance. I tried to zoom in for some pics with my phone camera but they turned out a bit blurry. I think I will bring my nice camera to the next game and the competition. I wanted to get a close up picture with him after the performance but that's when everyone went and changed out of their uniforms. So next time I'll get there early and sit on the side by the band, which is on the opposite end of where I was sitting. I did move over there after half time but this being my first time ever going into Skyview's stadium I had no idea where the band was going to be.

I at least got this close shot after the game was over and I was helping him bring his music stuff inside.

The next day on Saturday I started out the day with helping the Relief Society with their turn to clean the church. Then Curtis and I left around 11:45 to go pick up Grandma and Tamara to go to the temple to do a proxy family sealing session at the Meridian Temple. It was a good session and we got a lot of names done so I'm glad we were able to go. Since Dad and Laverne work at this temple Dad was the one who set it up. They work the early shift on Saturday mornings and so we did a 1-3pm sealing session. It was very windy when we came out of the temple. Mom and Dad had already eaten lunch in between sessions but the rest of us were ready for a late lunch. And Mom had to hurry and get back because someone was coming over. The rest of us ended up eating at Chick-fil-A. I ordered chicken soup and mac and cheese. Well, that day was homecoming day for Nikki so we had to rush home to get pictures before they left on their date. Although, they were waiting for Angie and her date to show up so we played a couple rounds of Golf while waiting. Then I got some pictures and they were off to go to Texas Roadhouse to eat dinner.

Nikki wanted to make her own dress and had her Grandma Butterfield (Gaya) help her. She picked out the style and the fabric. I have to say it's so nice to have a daughter who prefers dressing modestly. All of the dresses at the homecoming game when the junior and senior courts were presented were very immodest. Even a girl from our ward who's dad is in the bishopric was one of them. She at least had long sleeves but the dress was very short still. And one nice feature on Nikki's dress is that it has pockets, which she loves!

As soon as they put the sunglasses on I had to get a picture of this pose.

All grown up and looking so nice.

Later that evening we decided to go over to Grandma's to watch the BSU game. We got there late though because we had to feed kids and then bathe the girls. Unfortunately BSU lost this game and it was at home but life goes on.  Nikki's group ended up going back to our house to play video games because they were not having much fun at the dance and it was too crowded. The gym is not available to use right now so they were crowded into the cafeteria. But they enjoyed playing games like Mario Kart at our house so it wasn't a total loss.

September Fun!

With the smoky air, harvest season, and weather changing we have been feeling the effects with some coughs and sniffly noses the past couple weeks. There were a few days where Charlotte and Jack stayed home from school. Then on the Friday before Labor Day Garrett came home from school early not feeling well, which resulted in him missing his first halftime performance for marching band. Fortunately, everyone is doing well now except I still have the sniffles a little bit. I've been staying on top of it with Sudafed but I think I need to take a break from it so I don't over use it. I'm feeling mostly good though. I think part of my sniffles probably came from overdoing it with yard work the same week that I helped that elderly lady with weeds. I had mowed our lawn on Thursday. Then I had gone back on that Friday after I saw her outside pulling her garbage bin up but by the time I got back around she was gone. I don't think she was planning on working that day, just pulling in the dumpster from having garbage day the day before. I did try to ring her doorbell but she didn't answer. I saw her car was gone so she must have gone on an errand. I noticed when pulling in and out of her dirt/gravel driveway that there were some big dips. I decided that instead of pulling weeds today I went back for some tools and decided to smooth out those dips as much as I could. I got a couple of honks (not sure who they were but hopefully they were "good honks") while doing this and a thumbs up. Then I saw my parents walking the path nearby and they came over to chat for a bit. 

This is looking at the area in front of the fence where we pulled weeds plus the road that I worked on to level out.

But even though I'm sniffling some I love the change of seasons!! Fall/Autumn is my favorite! My neighbor friend Ashlie grew a big garden this year and she shared a bunch of little pumpkins (which I think are called gourds) So one day I told Charlotte that we should paint some of these little pumpkins as a family activity. I was meaning another day when Curtis wasn't so busy preparing for a presentation for work but they wanted to paint one right away! So all 3 of the girls painted a pumpkin. I forgot to get a picture with Nikki and her finished pumpkin so I will do that later.

They used water color paints.

I have also been having fun starting to try new hairstyles with Alice's hair now that it's getting longer.

It's a little crooked because I was working over the back of the chair.

Now I'm only babysitting the twins since the older sister is back in school in person. Last year she did homeschool. The girls had fun with the rabbit the other day and wanted pictures.

We also had a fun ward BBQ on Sept 11th at our neighborhood park. The weather was perfect and everyone had a good time eating, visiting and playing games or on the playground. They had these picture booths set up so I got my little girls to get pictures, which were the only pictures I got that night.

My cute little mermaids!

Jack just told me that this was actually for throwing a football through but oh well. We got pictures!

I have been having a hard time finding pants Charlotte's size that she'll actually wear that aren't leggings. I recently found a couple pair I was hoping she would like. One of them was purple, her favorite color. Unfortunately they just didn't fit right and didn't come up high enough. The other pair was a pair of boot cut jeans. She doesn't like jeans because they feel weird to her and she wants to be able to move. I was finally able to convince her that if she wore these jeans she would look like a cow girl because that's what they wear. So she decided to dress like a cowgirl that day going to school and of course Alice wanted to do the same.

This week was also busy with making plum jelly. I wasn't sure I was going to do it this year but when Sis. Joyce Cable called me to ask if I wanted any plums this year from her tree I started to think about how I could make it work. I didn't have any canning lids and hadn't seen any in the stores so I just wasn't going to can anything this year. After her phone call I decided to look on Amazon and saw that they do have some for sale online. I found some and ordered. There were 128 in a box so I bought regular and wide mouth so I will have plenty of lids for awhile! On Wednesday Curtis and I went over and picked a bunch of plums. The next day I washed, pitted, and cooked them down and made them into a plum juice, all ready for making jelly. I still had a few boxes of sure jell leftover from last year so I went ahead and cooked up one batch that night. I wanted to test one batch first to see if the lids would be good, and they all sealed! So Friday morning I cooked up a couple more batches after taking Alice to preschool. Then I had to go to the store to get more sure jell. I was worried they wouldn't have any but they did. I bought a 6 pack so I would have plenty.

The washing and pitting station.

Then cooking them so they are nice and soft.

Once they are soft I put them through the processor on the Kitchen Aide mixer. It separates the juice from the skins and then we throw away the skins.

It made A LOT of juice!

Charlotte wanted plum popsicles so I made some, no sugar added because I knew she already liked it the way it was since she had tasted some of the frozen juice I dumped into the kitchen sink recently since it had been in the freezer for a year.

All done!

I made 30 jars this year but I also have two batches worth measured and put in the freezer for making more later. We plan on giving some away as gifts. And all of them sealed! I was worried about that because I had heard that lids you buy from Amazon were not good to use. Fortunately I found a good set.

Unexpected Day of Service

Yesterday morning I did something unexpected and out of my comfort zone but it was worth it. I started the morning as usual getting kids off to school and it was a day for preschool for Alice. I drop off Alice last for school and on the way over I noticed a little old lady bending over pulling out tall weeds by the busy road of Midland on a big property right by the greenbelt. I had the impression or thought that I should go help her. I kept thinking about it on my way to the preschool. Lately I have been listening to less music so that I might have a better chance of listening to promptings of the spirit. I decided that this must be a prompting and that I should go ahead and do it. Since they were tall weeds I went home to change out of my gym clothes, deciding that I would skip the Rec Center today, and got in my work clothes. I also grabbed some gloves and a shovel. I was getting more nervous about it as I got closer and thinking that if she's not there any more then I'll forget about it. Once again I saw her still out there but I chickened out and kept driving. I told myself to stop being a chicken and turned into Melissa's neighborhood to circle back and just do it. I circled around and pulled over on the side of the busy road, got out and introduced myself.

I learned that her name is Delores and asked if she needed some help. She told me she was mostly trying to get goat heads out so people wouldn't step on them and track them around to grow elsewhere but she was also pulling out the bigger weeds. She said I didn't need to help her but I said that I wanted to and that I was raised to do as the Savior would do. So I grabbed my shovel and gloves and we got to work digging and pulling. Together we probably cleared about 8-10 feet but there's still a lot to do. I came to find out that she's 89 years old and widowed, which made me even more glad that I stopped. She's the same age as my grandma! She has also lived in this area for a long time but for different reasons her kids are not able to help with things like this. After working for almost 2 hours hours she had asked if I was raised on a farm. I said no, I was just raised to work hard. My grandpa and my dad were hard workers. Well, my dad still is a hard worker. We finally called it quits for digging and dragged the tarp full of the bigger weeds over to the dirt driveway. She said she was going to put them in the garbage bin later but I said I have the time and can help right now, so we walked up to the house to grab the dumpster and pulled it back out to the road. We filled the bin up chopping the weeds to make them fit. It was a big pile but we were able to get them all in! She said she was very thankful that I stopped to help and wanted to pay me. I said no you don't need to pay me, I just wanted to help. She insisted on getting my name and address and phone written down so I did. I had told her that I was planning on going to the Rec Center to exercise this morning but this was much more rewarding. I was truly happy that I listened to the prompting and helped her. I told her that if I saw her out here working again on Friday when I take Alice to preschool I'll stop and help again. She said she needed a day to rest in between working like this and I'm seeing today that I do too!

However, I think one reason I really needed rest is because I didn't stop working after I left her place. For days I keep driving home and seeing all kinds of garbage on the road in our cul-de-sac and it has been driving me crazy. And today it was added to by a bunch of white rocks smashed up in the road. I didn't realize what they were until I got the blower out to blow the garbage into a pile. I didn't see it when it was happening but I'm sure some of the boys in the neighborhood were the ones responsible for smashing these big beautiful white rocks to pieces. I don't even know where the rocks came from. So I was outside for the next couple hours blowing and sweeping off the entire cul-de-sac. I know some parents saw me out there so I'm hoping that they'll will do better with having their kids clean up their messes.

I was so exhausted, stinky and sweaty by the time I finished but I didn't have time to shower before picking up Charlotte from school. I had a hard time keeping my eyes open as I waited in line at the school so I went right to my bed after we got back and rested for awhile. 

When Curtis got home later and we started to cook dinner together he could tell I was tired and wondered if I was getting sick. I said no, I'm this tired for a reason (other than sickness) so I proceeded to tell him the story. He loved hearing it and had me repeat it to the 4 younger kids (Nikki was at work) while we were eating dinner. I think the kids were impressed to hear it also. I just hope that they see what I did and follow my example. That service can be a reward in itself. We don't always need to get paid in money but the most important part was to follow through on a prompting of the spirit that I received. It's my hope that I will be better at following through on promptings I may have from here on out.