Parentheticals

In celebration of completing a 5 year project we got a bonus day of paid leave at work. Since Alison and the kids' nature group was planning a camping trip on this last Wednesday, that day seemed like the obvious choice. On the day that the trip was scheduled to begin (Tuesday) it was raining, so all of the other people that were supposed to come wimped out except for one family. We got our tarps and hammocks set up before the rain was really going, and we also got a fire going despite the rain. It was colder than usual, however it was still pretty good weather. It didn't snow at least :) The rain continued all night, and well into the next day. Mike was able to get a fire going on day two as well by tearing apart a dried out pine tree that he found in the camp site. Mike, Rea, and Sara went out and picked a bunch of berries (raspberries, currants, and serviceberries). We plan on making a pie, though that hasn't happened yet.  The kids were a bit grumpy about the rain, but ...

On Monday we celebrated Memorial day with Mike's family, having a picnic at the park and playing with the cousins. The kids all had a fun time together while the adults talked. The kids then all wandered too far away, so we had to break up the conversation to discover where they all had gone off to. Grandpa Mike helped them catch a little garter snake, and they all loved holding it. After that, we worked some more on the fort, and also prepared to swap all of the winter clothes with summer clothes. The girls needed new clothing, but aunt Amy had supplied enough boy clothes for Timmy and Gideon that we didn't need to buy them anything. The day was blessedly free of rain - We like rain normally, but picnics in the rain is another thing altogether. Overall this week was pretty rain free, so we got more time outside, however the kids still fought a lot, so perhaps we have to break the habit from them. Tuesday Alison and the kids went to Wheeler farm. The kids met up with some...

On Tuesday of last week we had Nature group, which was cancelled due to rain. It was raining all week, which made it hard to work on the tree house. Wednesday was Rea's date night. It was raining so we read the hobbit, had a fire, and then we ate currant pie (we still have some frozen currants that we just found in the freezer.) On Thursday we bought and wrapped presents for Alison's birthday. The kids wrapped all of their presents by themselves. Friday was Alison's birthday. Mike worked from home, and Grandma Sheila and Grandpa Mike came over and dropped off a care package. It included easy to make food for when the baby is born, which was a very nice thought. After Mike quit working we had Alison's birthday party, brownies, and then we went to bed. On Saturday first thing in the morning we had a dance party, and then after that since it was the first time in a week that it wasn't raining we worked on the tree house and Grandma Sheila came over to visit us....

Good grief! Apparently we are terrible at remembering to make blog posts. We will now try to remember the last two weeks... We gave up trying to hunt morels. They just don't seem to be out there this year. We made more shoes for Gideon two weeks ago as well - that is a huge process. Alison's mom came over two weeks ago, and they all went to gardner village and had a fairy party. Also, we gathered ingredients for, and began construction on a "tree house"for the kids. It also rained a ton this last week, so construction has been slow. We read and finished "the last unicorn". The kids really enjoyed it. We ordered another bunch of parts from Haba in order to enter their kids game design contest. Timmy and Dad designed a game that we are considering entering into the contest. It is currently about stealing a magic lamp from a cave full of monsters. On this last Friday we went to see Matilda, which was pretty fun, but was also one of those Dahl st...

Gideon has been sleeping at night better, but not taking good naps. Alison needs to figure out a different time to exercise if he's going to only sleep for 20 minutes at a time during the day. Timmy got a robot car from the DI and is very happy about it. He has not been very obedient this week, although usually when we stand up to implement consequences he suddenly obeys, while wailing. But still sometimes not, and then he goes to bed and screams. Sara has been incredibly helpful and obedient this week. Apparently there's a balance, because she's just leaving a year of a not-very-helpful phase, and now Timmy's starting. But now we have two very helpful kids to run errands and clean up, which is amazing. Rea is growing up. She really enjoys being with friends and is figuring out social things. She is very responsible. She also has amazing biking skills. It rained a ridiculous amount this week. In about 10 years in Utah, we've never seen rain like this. It...

This week Alison has felt pretty good most of the week. We even got the entire house cleaned on Saturday for the first time in a long time. It was nice to have the house clean (even if it doesn't last very long.) Our gardens are starting to grow wonderfully. We stole some lettuce, strawberries, raspberries, chives, and other various plants from Sheila and Scott (they had some extra that had volunteered from last year). The raspberries died, and so did most of the lettuce, but the strawberries, mint, and chives transplanted like champs. We got a weed whacker last week, and tried it out this week (a little bit). It worked well. I still need to whack most of the weeds in the front yard. The funny thing is that the more weeds that I look at the more edible plants that I am finding in the yard. As of yet we have lambs-quarters, mallow, henpeck, alfalfa, blue mustard, shepherds purse, nettle, and I am sure that we will find other varieties edible as we look more. We have also found...

This past week in Utah it rained a lot. I tried to look up how much it was, but apparently that is difficult to find on the internet. Anyway, it was a lot. Today it even hailed a bit. On Thursday we watched Music Man at the Pioneer theater. They did  a good job of it. The program commented how surprising it was that the play was thematically relevant after 100 years, and that was in fact true (with the exception of the shapoopie song, which wasn't even relevant the day that it was written.) They sang well, danced well, and enunciated well. They even watched their phraseology. On Friday we had a mushroom hunt, which was not very successful (but was fun anyway). Saturday we made a brie and went to the DI to discover a vacuum sealer on sale for $10. We bought it since I have been thinking of vacuum sealing cheeses and $10 is super cheap. We haven't used it yet, but we will soon. Saturday we also went to Grandma's house and picked up some things that the grands were g...