Parentheticals

 Last Monday we brought dinner to Grandma Sheila because she had foot surgery. We made chicken noodle soup with chicken bone broth. It ended up really good, so we are going to remember the recipe: Add 10 chicken wings (bone in with skin) to a slow cooker and enough water to cover them slow cook until the meat is done. Pull out the wings and remove meat from them. Set aside meat in refrigerator. throw back the skin, fat and bones back into the water add five celery, an onion cut in half, two carrots, lots of garlic and then slow cook overnight. The next day toss out everything but the broth. Re-add the meat and then add carrots, celery, egg noodles and salt to taste. Cook as long as it takes egg noodles to be done. Serves multiple people. The first half of the week Mike was working on his final project for his Masters degree. He submitted it Wednesday and it has since been graded and he passed the class and earned his master's degree. Last Thursday we cleaned the church. We did...

 Let's see, what happened this week?  Tuesday we did science for school and we learned about weathering and erosion. We made mountains out of play dough and weathered them with water and ice and wind. Rea also did an extra presentation on how ice splits stone apart, putting two grey cushions next to each other and putting a balloon in the crack and blowing it up to simulate water expanding as it freezes. It was great. All of the kids did wonderful science presentations. Wednesday the girls planned an Old Fashioned Party for them and the Plastows. They dressed up in old fashioned clothes, featuring fake mustaches. They played Pin the Tail on the Donkey and lasso the cow swing. At the end, they had root beer floats. They are getting to be very good party planners. Thursday we went to the farm at Thanksgiving Point. Grandma Julie invited us there, and the kids had a lot of fun. The pony ride is the best part of the farm, but it was so crowded that we had to wait for an hour to ge...

This last week we went to southern Utah in order to attend the nature group fall camp out. The leader has a relative who has 800 acers and a cabin on the Utah-Arizona border, and they let us camp there for free every October during fall break. It's a lot of fun, although we always end up getting a hotel instead of camping because Mike needs to work at night. That was a good thing this year, because they had an unbelievable cold snap down there! At one point, they were predicting lows of 25 for those nights! I think it was a little warmer, but most of the families ended up finding somewhere indoors to sleep. Some of the teenage boys tented the first night and woke up to frost on their sleeping bags - they slept in their cars for the other nights. We were glad to be in a hotel. We drove down Wednesday afternoon and checked into the hotel. Thursday morning we went to Coral Pink Sand Dunes, which is one of our favorite places down there. The dunes are pretty, playing in the sand is fun...

We had lots of warm weather this week. The kids have been loving being outside for long periods. Inside, though, they have been argumentative and grumpy. It got so bad that when they finally started playing nicely together on Thursday, we canceled everything we had planned and just let them play as a reward. But we eventually decided that everyone needs more sleep in order for things to go well, so we're overhauling our bedtime routine. We're going to try to put each child to bed separately, so bedtime will take at least four times as long as it does now. If it means that everyone gets enough sleep to be reasonable during the day, it will be worth it. The kids thought this was an excellent week because we saw the Dalyais every day except Sunday. Monday they came to our house for a Carnival party; Tuesday we all went to nature group; Wednesday we have the Dalyais' nature group and Thursday is ballet taught by one of the older Dalyai girls; Friday Faith Dalyai had a birthda...

It still feels like we're just getting back into the swing of things, even though we have been home for weeks now. We're restarting all the kids' social activities: nature groups (three a week!), ballet class from a friend's older sister, library trips, etc. And of course getting the basics of school happening. January is always an exciting time in our homeschool. Every year, we retell the Montessori Five Great Lessons: The Story of the Coming of the Universe, The Story of the Coming of Life, The Story of the Coming of Humans, The Story of Communication in Signs, and The Story of Numbers. The goal is to put all learning into context and make it exciting! We did the first Great Lesson this week, which covers the Big Bang up to the Earth being covered with water. The big hit of this one is always the volcano, which did not explode in a very satisfactory way this year. Alison wants to remember to use a disposable water bottle for the reaction chamber next year. Rea mad...

Monday we had family night because we were driving last Sunday. As the treat we made another tray of fudge (we really need to stop that) On Tuesday we had park group during the day, and excepting Rea, the kids all got cold and whiny. It ended when Gideon wet himself and we got fined and kicked out of the park (that last part was a joke) Mike is feeling constantly exhausted recently because baby Elizabeth is having such a hard time sleeping through the night. We probably haven't ever had such a hard time getting a kid to sleep. On Wednesday Rea and Sara went to Activity Days. It was Sara's first activity days activity. They wrote down things about themselves on pieces of paper and then ate cupcakes. It was fun. On Thursday we had a party to celebrate Carnival. It was Timmy's choice for a theme, so we had an Amazon Rainforest themed party. The cake had amazon themed animals for toppers, and we had some kids from Timmy's class over as party guests. During the day...

Last Sunday we had a game day at Caitlin and Sal's house. We played a game that Jay brought (which we enjoyed, but whose name we can't seem to recall), as well as multiple games of Resistance. It ended very late in the evening, but it was very fun. Since Sunday night it was really cold, we decided on Monday that we would pick the grapes that are at the park near our house. When we went over to pick the grapes on Monday, then we discovered that the grapevines were all dried out. It looked as if the previous owners of the grapevines decided that they were done taking care of the grape vines. Sad. On Tuesday Allison and the kids went to the natural history museum because Timmy wanted to go really really really really bad. Rea did some research into the Native tribes of this area and now wants to learn beading as her next handicraft. Timmy liked looking at dinosaur bones and digging in the play quarry. We managed to leave on time to get to nature group, which was extra fun beca...

Last week we failed to click the post button, so even though we wrote a post, it was never published. Two sundays ago we had a game night with the Fords. We played The Scarlet Pimpernel, and Nefarious. Both games were fun, and the kids had a fun time as well. That Tuesday Mike went to the Board Game Design Guild meeting, and talked about games mostly. Also on Tuesday we also went to nature group at 2:00 for the first time this year. We picked some feral plums, apples, pears, and we also saw a fox. It was fun. Timmy found bones - they looked like fox bones. Rea read a historical fiction book called "Naya nuki: Shoshoni girl who ran" for her history and geography lesson. She then made a sheet cake, frosted it, and decorated it as a nap of Naya nuki's journey. Wednesday afternoon she told us the story and then we ate the cake. Homeschool book reports are the best. For our Thursday date night, Alison and Mike played "the Perfect Moment" - it is fun...

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...

Rea scheduled a party this week with some local kids. The Beuses ere going to come but they couldn't because they got sick, however the Dalyias were able to make it. Rea made a lemon cake for the party, which turned out pretty good. They also put on a play: Cinderella. Everyone got a part, and they had a fun time putting on the play. Sara was particularly silly - she was Cinderella, but she played that she was scared of the fairy godmother. Mike finished his game of Twilight Imperium at work on Friday. He won despite two of the other three players teaming up against him. It is good that they were not able to stop him because this upcoming week Mike's office building is changing to an office in Draper (right next to 1800Contacts actually). Friday we made tempura for our date night. It ended up pretty good. Mike determined that with the oil at a really high temperature the tempura ended up more crispy than is usual (which was good.) This weekend Mike tried to fix the fridge...

Gideon became a meerkat this week. He can crawl around, stand up on his two legs (without any support), and then squat back down to crawling all by himself. He seems to be closer to walking than he was before, and his balance is getting much better. This week Sara, Rea, and Timmy all drew all over their faces. It took quite a lot of scrubbing to get it all off. Perhaps this will be a learning experience for them. They also carved some pumpkins. We are not sure what they were supposed to look like, but they are pretty scary. On Thursday Rea invited some friends over for a Halloween party. It was supposed to be a costume party, but no-one showed up in costumes since they all cam straight from school. They cut corn tortillas in the shape of pumpkins and coated them with orange oil, and toasted them into chips. Rea was very excited about this recipe. Other than that they mostly played outside. It was Alison's type of party. Alison and Mike have been dreaming of making an onsen ...

On Tuesday, we had an arctic themed Carnival party at the park with three families from our ward. Alison filled water ballons with water and food coloring and froze them and then hid the blocks of ice for the kids to find. They had a blast smashing them and melting them with salt. Carnival has been very fun and will probably become a tradition. Tuesday evening we had a Book of Mormon party (because we finished reading it). Mostly that meant having a dessert, and acting our favorite parts of the Book of Mormon as a family. It was pretty fun. We are now starting on the New Testiment. Wednesday was Sara's date night. She wanted to go to the DI and buy a new bowl (she had broken hers Tuesday night), and then to come back home and play Barbies. Yay. Friday Alison and Mike went to a play and ate sushi as well. The play was funny, the sushi was good, and the company was excellent. It was a well needed date. On Saturday we had a Mexican fiesta, which Sara had picked for her Carniva...

After having read a post from last year we decided to interview the kids about this week. M: Tell me about the 12th day of Christmas. S: We played. R: And had a crown cake and opened presents. S: that's all we did, and didn't eat breakfast or lunch or dinner, but be ate dinner but didn't eat breakfast or lunch or dinner but that's what we ate. <singing> "do do do do" and I'm a fairy that waved her dangily wand. R: The thing that any fairy can do is change her self into a princess S: Well, I'm a princess fairy - see her wand? M: How about the Tabletop Simulator R: All I know is it is tabletop simulator and that daddy can move things around in it. S: I know chess! M What about that Princess/Jedi Party? S: I was a princess and I was a princess and there were so many princesses - even a ton of the little kids that - Rea, tell the rest. R: It was fun and we played and had a lot of treats. I wished I could stay there. S: Yes. M: Thi...

Last Saturday we went to my work party. It was super hot, but they provided us with free tiger blood snow cones, so we were ok. The girls liked the swimming pools and the pony rides, and the parents liked watching the kids have fun. They gave us some fireworks at the party which will come up later. Now, this week all that we did (says Alison) was go swimming and try to keep the house clean. My Kickstarter campaign started on Monday and I have been managing it fairly actively. I have 15 backers and have $240 pledged (of a $40 goal) at this point in time. If no new pledges were made from here until the time that the campaign ended I would be happy since I am already going to have to make more than 90 counters (which will take some time.) I am glad that the campaign has been quite successful. On Friday I had the day off and so we hiked with the Poulsons up in Albion Basin (up Catherine's pass.) We made it to the little stream and then turned back (because the kids were done)...

On Monday and Tuesday we helped Andy and Amanda paint the front of their house and clean out their gutters. We were pretty tired from the trip so far, so that was a nice break. On Wednesday we went to the airport to go home, but the plane had been delayed. We missed our connecting flight in Denver by about half an hour and so we had to wait for 12 hours in Denver to get home. We went to the children's museum amid a tornado warning and flash floods. They made us stay in an inner room with nothing fun in it since the tornado could break the windows and turn the entire museum into a museum of death by flying glass as it were (the joys of tornadoes). When we got home (at 1:30 am) we went to sleep. I missed some work on Thursday for some strange reason. Not really, Alison's car was broken and we had to get Timmy to a doctor's appointment. Not only is Timmy healthy, but we got the car fixed as well. On Friday Alison took the kids to her mom's house. Her sister Katie was...