Rejoice!

Sunday night of last week when Mike was going on a walk with the dog he saw a bat swooping repeatedly in front of a neighbor's house, so he quickly ran back home and invited Rea and Sara to see it. They saw it swoop a few times before it flew away. It isn't too often that you get to see bats in Utah, so it was pretty fun.

On Wednesday the kids went over to the Brown's house to make Alison mother's day gifts. They made her bracelets, which she likes a lot. Some of them also got her other candies and things to give to her on Mothers Day.

Thursday Rea went back to the orthodontist. They told her that he mouth has successfully expanded enough, and so they are going to let it harden back up for a while, and then she is going to get braces. She is happy that expanding it worked, but it is annoying to still have to have machinery in her mouth.

Elsa is going to have a travel themed end of kindergarten party. They are all going to wear cars and have stations where they do travel related activities. Rea helped her make a car costume in preparation for it. She has been really excited for it (though it hasn't happened yet.)

In other news, we also still have a garden and a walnut tree, both of which seem healthy. Thanks Craig and Brother Waters! You guys are great!

Friday after school Gideon tried to make some crescent rolls. They weren't going very well, since he was having a hard time reading the recipe, but Mike helped him to get them finished, and the family (except for Mike (because of gluten)) really enjoyed them. He is getting to be a better cook.

On Friday evening Alison and the kids went to thanksgiving point to see a petting zoo that they had there. It was fun for them to be with their cousins (it was with the Rogers and Poulsons). While they were gone, Mike noticed a water running noise in the house, and after checking every faucet multiple times determined that there was a leak in the crawlspace before the shut-off valve, so he would have to shut off the water at the street in order to fix it. He had no car and no way to fix it that night, so he scheduled Saturday morning to fix it.

In terms of the fixing job, Timmy had the following to say: "Our pipe got broke and Timmy and Gideon and Grandpa and Mike went down there and fixed it. There were no racoons in the crawlspace, but I want to get some racoons in the crawlspace, because What's the point of having a crawlspace if there are no raccoons pooping in it?" He then continued to talk about how butterflies don't poop.

For D&D Timmy and the Plastow boys bought a new boat so that they could keep a herd of deer in it as food for their giant angler fish. They also got a troupe of 12 monkeys to crew it for them, so Timmy decided to print up a scale model of the new boat. The thing is gigantic, like it is going to take weeks to print all the pieces. He has been really enjoying it so far, however, I wonder if we will have it printed before they want to get a bigger ship in the game.

Saturday after fixing the pipes we had Nature Day with the Dalyias. The kids had fun playing in the gulley and Alison and Sister Dalyia had fun talking. Mike mostly tried to catch up on sleep, since he had lost sleep worrying about the leak. All in all it was well enjoyed by everyone.

Sunday was Mothers Day. We celebrated first by making Alison a breakfast. Elsa helped to make a Parfait, Sara helped cook eggs, Gideon helped make blueberry pancakes, and Mike cooked the bacon. We got Alison an entire pound of bacon this year for herself, and everyone else shared another pound. The kids gave her the present at that time. After that we went to church, and then in the evening we went over to the Brown's house to have a family dinner.

Timmy is super salty because the waters borrowed a cup of sugar from us on Mother's day. He says "Are they gonna give it back? Borrowing means that you give it back!" We have a 5 gallon bucket of sugar right now. Timmy responded to me writing this line by saying "Yes, but every cup counts!" and then he calculated that they borrowed 39 cents worth of sugar, "Which is a lot!"

Alison has also checked a bunch of books out of the library about gluten intolerance and how to deal with it, and is trying to weigh the scientific merits of various diets and techniques in dealing with it. We are first trying to get more live active cultures in our diet and mike is eating more yogurt, kefir, and fermented veggies (pickled peppers, onions, and garlic mostly, but we also made some fermented mustard that he has been adding to things). If this helps, perhaps he can correct his gut biome to be able to deal with gluten again.

Mike doesn't like pickles, but he is willing to put up with it if it means that he can eat gluten again. We will keep you posted.