Daily Danny

This is our farewell conversation today as I dropped him off for school. D: Bye Mom. I love you. Me: I love you too. D: Oh yeah, Mom can you do me a favor today? M: Sure luv whaddaya need? D: Well, can you please dust behind the organ while I'm at school because I stuck my finger behind it and it got a lot of dust on it. Yeah. . . I'll get right on that.

Home Teaching Mishaps

So the ol' Home teachers came by last night and what a night it was. This is a father son duo whom we consider very good friends of ours. We enjoy our visits and were glad to have them over. Let's just say we were in rare form. So, Brady was sitting on the organ bench and totally ripped a big long one with absolutely no remorse. In fact he thought it was hilarious. I wasn't in the room yet and I hear it was an accident, but COME ON!! Hold it in or something. Geez! I guess Brent, the dad, just went on without skipping a beat. Devon, the son (age 18) did okay until he made eye contact with Natty and then they busted up too. Wow, we're really putting our best foot forward. So a little while later the subject of girls camp came up and I mentioned something about Deer Creek Reservoir. Brady leans over to me and loudly whispers, "Ha, ha Deer CRACK. Hahahaha." Well I'm about as mature as a 12 year old boy so this hits me funny. I giggle and tell him to shush and then I see that Devon has heard the whole thing and I just lose it. Yep, I lead by example. Too bad it's in the wrong direction. Ahh, good times! PS - If Angie B's son ever wants to call and tell me jokes he can swear all he wants and I can guarantee that I'll laugh.

Three totally unrelated statements

I'm still awake (sigh) . . . But guess what? Der and I went to see Avatar in 3D tonight. Seriously the best movie I have ever seen. THE BEST!! We have to go back and see it again SOON! Oh, and I found a HUGE pot today at DI that will be perfect for cooking salsa. I'm glad too because we only have two bottles left and we are totally snobbish when it comes to salsa now that we have Demaree's awesome recipe!! Incidentally, a lady wanted to fight me for a bench at DI today. I didn't have it in me so I let her have it. She kept giving me the old "stink eye" and it kept cracking me up. It was highly entertaining. Now I'm off to count sheep, recite the alphabet backwards, count my blessings, and other miscellaneous BS that will hopefully help my slumber! Yeah, I know that this ended up being more than three statements. . .

What Gives?

I CAN'T SLEEP! It doesn't matter how tired I feel, I just can't wind down. Come on friends, let's hear all your great beddy-bye tips. Heaven knows I NEED HELP! Seriously, I'm one grumpy lady. On a totally different subject . . . I got a fancy grain mill yesterday! I can't wait to use it. I bought some oat groats too, and tomorrow I'm getting some hard white wheat. It feels like Christmas, except for the "I can't sleep" part. Did you know that you can mill rice and also popcorn kernels? Does anyone else wish they had chickens? I do. Maybe even a milk cow. (This too could be a result of insomnia, but I digress . . . )

Happy Belated Valentine's Day

Friday marked the boys last day off track. We celebrated by having a :public transportation day." It was free ride day on UTA and Derek took the day off for the fun!! We started out by riding the bus from Magna to the Trax hub in WVC. Travel Time 37 minutes. Then we boarded Trax and headed into town to the end of the line. Travel time 45 minutes. Next we boarded the FrontRunner high speed commuter train and headed to Ogden Union Station. Travel time about 45 minutes. From there we walked to the Railroad Museum and had a great time learning about the railroads. We had lunch on the train ride home. We sat in a booth with a table and pulled out our picnic. It was great. The kids thought it was so exciting. I told Der of all the times I rode the old Magna 37 out to the mall, or out to the Granger pool. My cousin and I would ride the bus to the mall all the time to get candy Zots from the Keyhole or go to the dollar movie. We weren't even 12 yet! Boy how times have changed. I don't even let my twelve year old walk around the block alone.

On the way to the pool . . .

. . . we passed the Frito Lay manufacturing plant. I told the boys what it was and Brady said, "Wow i wonder if there are any Cheetos..." Danny said, "Wow I wonder if there are any potato chips..." Then Danny notices the smoke coming out of the smokestack and he says, "Oh I bet that smoke smells so good. I just want to eat it." Brady replies, "Danny you can't eat smoke, you would die." Danny thinks on this and says, "yes you can if it tastes like potato chips." Brady is quiet for a minute and then says, "true."

I should Get A Special Award

I took the boys swimming today. Yes, I did. Don't believe me? Just ask Danny. He said this was the bestest day he ever had. It's not that I mind swimming. Au Contraire!! I just don't like to be seen doing it. Gulp!!

A Special Treat

"The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society" This has been such a delightful book. I just joined a book club and this is one of their past reads. If you enjoy history and wonderful writing you will love this book too!! I don't want to say much about it. Just trust me!! You wont be disappointed!!!

Therapeutic Rambling . . . feel free to skip this post!

On Family. . . Kramer seems to be making very slow progress. He is still living at my folks as they have much fewer stairs than we do. Dad is loving his JetBlue job. Mom is loving her job at the Jones Center. Der has been working ten hour days to cover for his taking Thursdays off to be home with the boys. Yeah ten hours doesn't sound that bad right? Except he leaves the house at 4AM!! How he keeps a smile on his face I'll never know! Natalie was up until 4am this morning finishing her book project. I was grumpy about it so Der stayed up with her to help. He's patient and wonderful. He lasted until about 1:30am and then he had to crash. Let's see if she has a smile on her face later. I'm guessing ...no. The boys are in hog heaven. The rocket came home yesterday. It's about 10 feet long, four feet wide and four feet high. It is constructed of three HUGE refrigerator boxes and various other odds and ends. It has actual computer keyboards and mouses donated by a neighbor, and has a plunger joystick taped to the floor (yes it's a new plunger!) It has battery powered lighting, 2 liter bottle booster engines, escape hatch in the nose, and all other cool features dreamed up by Bones and manufactured by Grandpa, Grandma, Bones, and Der. Pictures will be coming soon. On work . . . Yesterday was my second to last Thursday. I didn't expect to be so sad about this. My friend Heather (the hygienist) won't be there next Thursday so Dr. T bought us all lunch yesterday and that was a fun treat. On church . . . does anybody else ever get into a funk in this department? Yes I know the church is true, but it's not always enjoyable. 'Nuf said. On me . . . I'm tired (and I went to bed early!) I ran a little on the basketball court Monday. It made my knee hurt pretty bad, but did you hear that I RAN!! I think I might be brave enough to go back to the gym when the boys head back to school in a week. Maybe I can download Carrie's new play list that Sam made her for my work-out tunes!!! Off-Track . . . I love it! The boys and I went into town to the Museum of Natural History Monday morning. We had a ball. It was so fun. They have a live bugs exhibit going on and that WAS NOT fun. Huge Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches, giant tarantula's, wolf spiders, black widow, centipede, and plenty of other creepy crawlers!! They each got a cool pocket telescope/microscope from the gift shop. After this we headed over to the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers Museum so I could show then the two-headed lamb. Very cool. They loved the restored steam fire engine on display in the carriage house. Also the box toilet was a highlight. We then drove up to the trail head for Ensign peak so they could look out over the city with their new toys. It was a great morning. Wednesday I took the boys to see "The Tooth Fairy". One word...GAY! The boys loved it so I am glad for them. The popcorn was excellent! I can't wait for next week. Anybody know of any good tours around here besides Sweet's Candies? I'm thinking about maybe the Golden Spike Museum. Or maybe Hill Air Force Base. That's a great ride when the boys have a dvd to watch!!

Another Daily Danny

Whispered tonight during New Beginnings "Hey Mom. I wanna do stuff you need and you give me money."

Daily Danny

(first thing this morning) Good morning Danny (I say with a sleepy voice) GOOD MORNING GORGEOUS!!! (he says with much enthusiasm) Everybody needs a Danny!

No! Not Foot Juice!

We had a great weekend.

On Saturday we rewarded the girls for their good grades. We had a family date and it was so cool! We started out at Sweet Tomatoes - YUM! You should see Danny put away the mushrooms! It's not natural! The kids all looked so nice in their "date" clothes. The boys (including Der) were in button down shirts and slacks, and the girls were in slacks and dresses. It was so fun. The kids enjoyed their dinner except for the part when a man behind us had his shoes off under the table and was grossing Brady out!

After dinner we headed downtown. We parked next to Capitol Theatre and picked up our tickets. We had an hour to kill so we walked down to the Gallivan Center and looked around. You should see the city through the eyes of 6 and 9 year olds! It was so fun. They ooohed and aaahed about the tall buildings, TRAX, the ice rink, Channel 2, and the many cool sculptures on the sidewalks.

As curtain call neared we headed back to Capitol Theatre and watched the production Circle Cycle.

"With hula hoops, volleyballs, balloons, and ping pong balls, you just can't help but feel like a kid again. CIRCLE CYCLE literally revolves around anything round! Life is not only full of circles but cycles . . . endless cycles of life. Beginnings becoming endings, endings becoming beginnings. Imagine looking at the world through a child's eyes."

It was very cool. After the show we asked the kids if they liked it and Brady pipes up and says, "It was really cool except c'mon? Bare feet? Gross!" This kid hates feet!! The dancers all were bare foot. Several years ago at swimming lessons a child's foot grazed his cheek and he nearly started to cry because they got foot juice on him!

After the show we headed back down south for some delicious Cold Stone Ice Cream (Merry Christmas to us from Gavin and Kimberly!) The kids (the boys) couldn't believe we were actually in a real ice cream parlor and they loved creating the perfect bowl of ice cream.

It was a wonderful night.

Sunday we got to spend the afternoon and evening with the Angie and Boyd and their family. Our kids haven't seen each other since Logan's baptism over two years ago. They were all so excited to be together. They had a ball and so did we! Love you guys!