Mission Papers

So we are now getting ready for our second boy to go on a mission.  Jeremy had his missionary interview with the our Stake President - President Call this evening.  I wasn't there to take a photo of him getting the car to drive over to his appointment, but I was there to take photos of his well needed rest afterwards.  :)

I took lots of pictures because I knew that he would like to remember what his room looked like when he is gone from it for two years - and also because he won't recognize it when he gets back - it's gonna be changed shortly after he leaves, but I don't think he knows that yet!

"Burying himself in the scriptures"

 

 

A face only a mother could love

 

Still studying......

 

That is a scary look, but I am just going to take it as an extra large "EYE HUG" for his ever loving mama

The view from Jeremy's bed - door to ceiling.  I know he'll want to remember that view....

 

 

Jeremy's very own "title of liberty"

 

How the boy felt about the whole interview- he is ready to go

 

Two boys and their technology - that boy is going to miss his cell phone and text messaging for sure!

Tyler's EXTRA LARGE foot

Love it for now, Jeremy, love it for now. 

 

And just to let you know - Yo Mama is so proud of you!

S'mores, anyone?

So we had a impromptu dessert party after our BBQ dinner the other night.  Mike BBQ'd  for the first time this season and it was yummy!  But afterwards it got real sweet with a backyard s'mores party!  Tyler took some time to start a fire in our little metal fire pit and when the coals got nice and red-hot - we pulled out the marshmallows, chocolate and Graham crackers.  The marshmallows were a little sticky as this whole S'mores idea was really Peggy's suggestion from last October when I bought the supplies - but they still did the job.  Poor Briggy was the only one that didn't get in on any of the BBQ or S'mores action because he was over at Isacc's house.  Mykalyn pulled out her camera and got some shots. 

 

Mike really doesn't like to waste any time with the cooking of mallows, melting of chocolate and crackers - so he decided to put all three items together and get it done QUICK! I think things got a little well done, but I think he really enjoyed the speed. :)

It was spontaneous fun for Peggy and the whole family (minus Briggy who got a whole candy bar to himself later!)

Star Wars!

So it's Spring Break and the only one of us that is off on a vacation is Mykalyn who is snowboarding with her friend, Megan Fisk and her mama.  The rest of us are here in our wonderful house with not a lot to do during the day without school taking up hours and hours - so we needed some fun to have here. 
Thus....
the Star Wars Marathon idea!

We had a Star Wars party and watched Star Wars episodes 3, 4, 5 and about 1/2 of #6.  FUN!  I love those movies and hadn't watched them forever!
We started with awesome Jabba the Hutt (homemade) pizza and it took off (un-healthily) from there. 

Thanks for the sign covering up Jeremy's inappropriate house-wear!

 

Our fun "Star Wars" food. 

 Kid loves his "Yoda Soda!"

 

How was your Spring Break?



April Fool's Day 2013

April Fools day is a bit of a fun one around our house only because I have a traditional dinner that is fully for a fool.  I totally make a regular dinner to go along with it, but sometimes "dessert has to come first." 
We had spaghetti & meatballs, potatoes with gravy and peas & carrots:

 

We usually have something that resembles chicken nuggets, but I couldn't find any candy that fit the bill, and I realized that I could have created them out of pound cake, frosting and graham cracker crumbs, but by then it was too late.  There's always next year!

Union Ward Roadshow 2013

So last November I received a new calling at church.  It's title is "Young Women's Activity Specialist" which was a weird calling title because basically I was in charge of creating our wards Roadshow.  I haven't heard of a Roadshow being done for YEARS!  In fact, the last one that I was involved in was when I was 12.  I was Alice from Alice in Wonderland and I still can sing a bit of the song and do part of the dance number we did.  I won't show that to you. 
Anyway, so it hasn't been done for years.  I was a little overwhelmed with this task to say the least.  We spent Thanksgiving at Mike's mom and dad's house and it was very much on my mind.    I decided to put it out of my mind until after Christmas, but we had a roadshow meeting that put me into another Roadshow focus (or overwhelming feeling).  I had very many hours laying in bed thinking about it until I finally fell asleep.  I did come up with some great ideas in those many hours. 
We celebrated in the New Year and actually stayed up after 1am, but at 5am I woke up "bright eyed and bushy tailed" and wrote the entire roadshow in a few hours.  It was really inspiration.  I defiantly didn't do it without some help from on high. 
My challenge was utilize as many youth as possible.  Knowing that we have 40+ youth - that made it tricky, but I knew that not everyone would want to be on the stage.  We needed stage crew, sound and lighting people, someone to run the spotlight, people to help with scenery and I wanted a couple of extra directors - all this besides the actors/actresses.  Our youth stepped up.  I sent around an interest sign up sheet to see what the youth would be interested in doing.  Bishop made my job a little easier by letting them know that they would all be participating in one way or another, so they should choose what they really wanted to do. 
We ended up having 25 actors/actresses, a couple of co-directors, lights & sound people and stage hands..  It was great having so many involved, but that also meant that getting (at least) 25 schedules to coordinate for practices was a challenge.  That made me nervous about the outcome of the final performance.  But in the end, it all came together.  The youth did a fantastic job. 
I would LOVE to upload the video for your viewing pleasure, but it is over 100mb and Blogger only does 100mb, but I will attach some pics!

Jeremy and Nathan - Besties, but in different plays.

Our AWESOME backdrop!

 

Fairies & Tinkerbell!

On Stage with Peach Pod Products.

 

Brigam helps out with the making of the tutus!

Spencer doing the Harlem Shake.

 

Our Dancing Deacons

 Our shopping princesses.

 

This book comes in handy!

 

 Our dancing deacons wiping around their ties.

 

 

King Stefan and his daughter, Nelly.

 Our princesses.

 

Annanana, Random Boy from the Kingdom, One of the guards, Mrs. Hautersteinmeyerson, and the trusty side kick, Roger.

My Chandelier hanger, My HERO!

All in all, it was a great experience! 
Maybe we'll do it again - in a couple of years!

 

 

Our time at Fishhook - Camping

We had a great time camping this year at Fishhook. Usually Pam's whole family goes with us, but this year she had a surgery and after only a week of recovery, didn't feel up to going.   I was super bummed, but I remember how much I hurt after my surgery.  Yuck!  So Jeremy brought his friend, Max, and we had 2 of Pam's kids come anyhow, Devin and Rachel.  There were 8 of us all together.
We drove up on Wed afternoon and put up the tents while Mike was still at work.  I was way impressed with myself.  With just a little help from Briggy, we put up my tent faster than those three boys put up theirs.  Silly boys!  It's because they can't read directions you know.
We only forgot a few things and were happy that dad was still coming up later so he could help us out.  We did forget forks for our tin foil dinners, but Max, being the super outgoing guy that he is, wrangled us up some forks from another camping group.  Max was awesome.
Grama Anderson came up on Friday and hung out with us all day.  We had a Boat Club boat on both Thursday and Friday so we had a great time on the water.  Thursday was a little windy, but still most of the people got in the water (not me, someone needs to man the camera!)  Friday was perfect.  There was tubing and wakeboarding.  Here is some video for your viewing pleasure!

4th of July

So we spent the 4th relaxing and visiting friends.  At 2 we went to see Jared Peterson who just returned from his mission.  He was having a little backyard get together.  It was good to talk with him and his dad, Jay.  After sitting with the big people for a while, Brigam was bored and asked if he could swing on the swing set.  Of course!  So he and another girl started swinging along on the Costco, wooden swingset.  Pretty soon we hear a loud crack and as I look over, I see Brigam who looks like he is pinned under this metal beam that was hold the swings up.  The whole thing broke and the kids both fell to the ground.  I think the beam did hit him in the head, but with the way it landed and was still attached to another piece of support, it probably hit pretty softly considaring the size of the whole thing.  Shortly after that we high-tailed it out of there since Brigam had "brought the roof down", we assumed our work there was done.

After a good, 4th of July nap, we headed down to Pam's where we BBQ'd with their family and the Jensens.  Mike spent "the best $5.00 he ever spent" on dry ice and proceeded to make dry ice bombs.  Their poor dog, Zack, thought the world was about to end and was DYING to get in the house.  That was funny.  Here's some video of our epic night:

After that, we just stayed at Pam's as she moved into a new house and the previous owners said you could see all the fireworks from their house.  You could see them if you were in the middle of their street, looking though the neighbor's side yard, and cocking your head to the side.  But we did see them.  We couldn't hear them too well.  I told her next time we are going down to the river!  :)