Disaster of the Day

So yesterday in my race to do laundry I must have left the huge plastic container of laundry detergent to close to the edge of the washing machine and my old friend gravity and Mr. Murphy came by for a visit while we were out. When we came back, the hallway right by the laundry room did smell suspiciously and overwhelmingly like laundry soap but as I had been doing laundry all day I thought nothing of it. A few minutes later when I did go in there to change out the laundry what to my wondering eyes did appear but a gallon of blue laundry soap upside down all over the rug, seeping through the rug and splashed up on the wall. Thankfully I had 2 things in my favor- Don was home yesterday and I had said my prayers. The rug promptly went into a large black trash bag-that much soap and it would have taken 10 washings to get it all out and plus the backing has been coming off that rug for a while now. It took almost all of the rags in the cabinet to get all the soap up. Don was holding onto my belt loop so I could straddle the mess and get to the cabinet with the rags and not fall on my butt. Did you know that laundry soap is extremely slippery? The good news in my laundry room floor is exceptionally clean and I get a new rug!

We Are All Dumber For Being Here

Please please please PLEASE!
DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY ON MALL COP!!!!!!

The boys went to a hockey game with Aunt Darbie last night so Don and I went to dinner and movie while we waited. I was not in the mood for hockey-should have gone anyway. Thank goodness the movie was very short-right at an 1 1/2 hour. There were some funny parts-drunk people are especially hilarious-but not funny enough to redeem the movie. This definitely qualifies as one of the STUPIDEST movies I have ever seen. I almost had Don talked into a new purse and shoes just for making me sit there with him.

I Hope That This is the Worst Thing I Ever Do To My Kids

OOPS!

I cut Connor's hair this morning and trimmed around the back by taking off the guard. I forgot to put it back on before I started on Caleb's hair.



Luckily it was in the back and at first he thought it was ok. That is until we went out in public. He kept his hand over it the whole time we were in the store and has decided that he will wear a hat forever. He did say "Oh good now I can wear a hat to church." Sorry buddy everywhere but church!

He thinks it's funny here until he goes out in public. Sorry Caleb!

Follow Up

So we get back from McDonald's and I am so excited to have a read-a-thon but my children decided that they would rather play with friends. Well poo on them-I will go have my own read-a-thon on MY bed with MY pillows and eat MY Oreo Cookies. SO THERE!

Week In Review

Last weekend was a busy one. Friday was Cody's 16 birthday. I wanted to surpirse him by bringing lunch to him that day for him and a couple friends but they had semester exams and were out of school by 9:40-why even bother going? So I found that out earlier the week before and called one of his friends to help make arrangements with all his other friends for a surprise birthday breakfast. I made a breakfast casserole, grits, bacon, sausage and about 40 pancakes. The kids all got there right after school and Don had gone to pick up Cody and drive him around Overton for a few minutes until all were assembled and then they came back. Seriously he did not have a clue what was happening and so he came in the door and headed toward his bedroom yakking away to his dad the whole time before we yelled surprise and he figured out what was happening. Megan did a good job keeping it a secret. The kids all had breakfast and then to my dismay the party continued. They hung around until 2:00 when we finally kicked them out. His friends that came were Megan Potter, Shelby Bennett, Jessany Mortensen, Sterling Waite, Daniel Gourdin, Emma Hardy, Allison Hardy, Jordan Hardy, Grant Mecham, Pamela Mecham and a foreign exchange student whose name I did not catch. They played Scattergories and then watched a couple episodes of Supernatural-again to my dismay. We left for St. George to go to dinner right after we picked up Caleb and Cayden from school. The plan was to go to Texas Roadhouse but it was particularly busy and we did not want to wait. We went to Ruby Tuesday instead. After dinner and a short perusal through Barnes and Noble-ok 30 minutes and few purchases later we went home to wait for the arrival of Grandma Penny, Granddaddy Larry, and Mawmaw. While we waited Cody opened his presents from us. He got some new white church shirts, a new Ihome, and a electric keyboard. They arrived around 10 and we helped them get settled in. Saturday morning we had another big breakfast and then Don, Larry and Cayden went for a ride in the Rhino while the rest of us risked our lives on the freeway as we let Cody drive to Mesquite to go to Walmart. He did much better than I thought he would although if I was a smoker I would have gone through a pack in the 30 minutes we were driving. He is getting much better at driving and has gotten a few in hours in in the last few weeks. We came home from Mesquite much poorer and very hungry so we made dinner. We had hamburgers, chips, Suzanna's yummy fruit salad and homemade salsa. Cody made a lemon ice box pie for dessert. We settled in for an uneventful evening watching 7 Brides for 7 Brothers and then my parents watched National Treasure while I laid on my bed watching hour after hour of Bones. My neck was giving me trouble again-shocker! Sunday morning dawned bright and clear-seriously with the weather hovering around 70 all week. We made biscuits and gravy and Connor went for his interview. We also got started on some of prep for the after church meal. I made Frog Eye Salad and the angel food cakes for the dessert. Then we got ready for church. Connor was called up on the stand to be sustained to the office of a deacon and recited the 4th Article of Faith. After Sacrament we went to the Bishop's office for the ordainings. Don ordained Cody to the office of a Priest with Granddaddy Larry, Grandpa Don, Bishop Barlow, Bill McConnell-2nd Cousenlor, William Stratton-1st counselor in the Young Men's Presidency, Greg Chappell-2nd Counselor in the YM Presidency. Then Cody got to stand in the circle as Don ordained Connor. The Deacons quorum presidency was also in attendance-Sean McConnell, Devin Mortensen, Mitchell Eide and Jeremy Waite. As soon as the Amen was said for Connor's ordination Cayden jumped up out of his seat and said " My Turn". He was quite adament that he get a blessing too but we told him it wasn't his turn. In hindsight we should have just let Don give him a short blessing too but oh well. Don's parents and Darbie were there with us too. After we were done in the Bishop's office we went home to get ready for dinner. We had a baked potatoe bar (the potatoes were the size of footballs and took almost 2 hours to bake) with Chili and Broccoli Cheese soup plus all the other fixings for potatoes as well as Frog Eye Salad, green salad, and my mom made rolls. For dessert we had Snow Tunnell cake without the tunnel-Cody's traditional birthday cake request. Chris and the girls came over for dinner although we missed Dena and Ashley who were in Arizona. Dave and Amy did not come either. I love having yummy food to eat but it takes so long to prepare and then almost as long to clean up. My parents decided to stay overnight again and go home Monday since it was Martin Luther King Day. I think that they probably were wishing that they had gone home Sunday night but Larry had a bunch of conference calls early Monday morning so they ended up not being able to leave until 2. Cody had friends come over again around 11 for a contination of the Supernatual marathon and so there was a bunch of screaming girls and very loud sound effects all afternoon. It was really rather obnoxious but hey we decided that it was better that they were all here so that we knew what they were doing as opposed to being somewhere else getting into all sorts of trouble. The kids went back to school onTuesday and had a short week because there was Teacher Development day on Friday. I made baked potatoe soup with all the left over baked potatoes from Sunday on Tuesday as well as homemade rolls and monkey bread-a new family favorite. One of my goals for the new year is to use my food storage at least once a week if not more so the bread was part of that. I went to the temple Wednesday morning and Don has had a show in Vegas all week. Thursday I made a quiche and whole wheat banana chocolate chip muffins-again the food storage and I even ground up my flour again with my handy dandy wheat grinder. I ground up a whole #10 can just so that I don't have to do it as often. That was after I ground up part of another can and realized that it had weevil carcasses in it. Now I could have gotten away with it with noone the wiser but there is just something psychologiallyand morally wrong with eating weevils even if they are all dryed out and ground up in the flour. I threw out the rest of the can and the flour. I guess if we were starving I could gag it down and of course I would not tell anyone but now is not one of those times. Thank goodness! The kids are home today and it is rainy and wet and muddy. Lovely-couldn't it have rained yesterday when they were in school? If Caleb gets all his missing assignments done I told them we could go to McDonald's and then have a read-a-thon this afternoon. Connor and Caleb are going to the hockey game with Aunt Darbie tonight so Don and I will take them in later to meet her. Bad thing is that Don is already in there at the show and says that he wants to come home and then go back in tonight. I don't like that but whatever! He just knows that I don't like to drive at night and besides we would have 2 cars in there also. Happy Friday!

Caydenisms

On Wednesday night Cayden was getting ready for bed and Don went in to say help him with his prayers. Cayden had been looking for his baby doll a few minutes before bed and we could not find it. Before his prayer started he told dad that they needed to pray for baby. Don told him to go ahead but Cayden always says "Help me" so Don helped him start his prayer then gave him the chance to continue. But then he said again "help me" so Don continued with the prayer with Cayden repeating after him. After a second or two Cayden looks up and whispers "Dad, we need to pray for baby". So Don helped him pray for baby. Then Cayden went to bed. Don came in to tell me what had happened and Cody overheard him and said that he thought he knew where the doll was and so we found it. Don took it to Cayden and Cayden said "I knew it! I knew we would find baby." So Don had a quick little talk with him about how he prayed to Heavenly Father and Heavenly Father heard him. I don't think that Heavenly Father was overly concerned with the location of baby but he was concerned with the heart and prayer of a little boy and a little boy's mom and dad.

Last night Cayden found a long thin dowel in my office. He asked me what it was and I said that I did not know. He said "I think it is a whoopin stick". I said "a what?" and he said "A whoopin stick. You know like you beat our butts with." For the record-I don't beat my kids butts with sticks but it was amusing none the less. I told him to go and tell his dad all about it. Kids can be quite entertaining when they are not making you insane!

We Are A Happy Family

I just had to post this before I forgot. Tonight during scripture study we were talking about prayer. We were talking about how praying is like calling Heavenly Father and that he answers our call through the scriptures and through the Holy Ghost. Cayden asked how Heavenly Father talks to us. Then I said that he talks to us through the scriptures. I was sitting on the couch with my scriptures open on my lap and Cayden was kind of sitting at my feet. He raised up on his knees and turned and laid his head down and put his ear to the scriptures to hear Heavenly Father. It was so sweet. It was one of those times that you just want to last forever. Of course I had to rain on his parade by saying that we have to READ the scriptures and that is how Heavenly Father talks to us-through the words. He is so innocent some times and believes literally what you say. I wish it were that easy -to just put your head down on the scriptures and listen.

In other news-The Little Red Hen Visited My Kitchen
Last Thursday I made homemade bread. I got out my new handy dandy wheat grinder and ground up my own wheat and then I made the bread with the flour that I had ground. In case you were wondering my children were true to the story by not helping me. Although Cody did make cupcakes during the time that I was making the bread so I guess he was helping a little bit. I took a loaf to scouts and then we had the rest for dinner. It was quite tasty with my homemade peach jam.

Connor is loved by so many people. He went to tutoring on Monday and came home with 2 presents and a birthday cake. His math tutor gave him a cute frog decoration for his new desk that he got from Grandma Adams' house. He also got some peanuts and peanut butter crackers. Then he went next door to Grandma Millie's. She is snowbird elderly lady who come here during the winter. She lives in Idaho during the summer. Connor's math tutor helps take care of her and Connor goes over to visit and help her a few times a week. He has helped her put up and take down a few strands of Christmas lights, pulled weeds around her steps, planted some bulbs for the spring and just visits with her. She gave him a nice card with a little bit of money and then she told Meals on Wheels lady that it was his birthday earlier last week and so the Meals on Wheels lady made him a homemade birthday cake. It was the perfect FHE treat for last night. I am glad that there are so many people that love and appreciate him for who he is.

Speaking of FHE-last night we had the quietest FHE in history. Don has had a lot of back and neck pain the last few days and so he finally took a pain pill about 5:00. About 5:15 he was dead to the world and so the kids were pretty good about being quiet. We had FHE in my bedroom because Don was crashed on the chair and so we tiptoed around him and tried to be quiet as possible. Not that I think that he would have noticed if a dumptruck drove through here but it had quite the effect on the kids. Of course it did not hurt that the lesson was on service and selfishness. (none of that mattered this morning or tonight though-in one ear and out the other)

Caleb had a missionary experience last week. He came home from school and asked if he could invite a friend to church with us and I said yes. He also wondered if he could bring him to scouts with him and I told him go ahead and to ask. He got turned down but I am glad that he had the courage to even try!

I guess since I have mentioned almost every one in this house I better say something about Cody. He has driven for and hour and 15 minutes since yesterday and all of that in the dark. He has to have 40 hours of daylight driving and 10 hours of night driving to get his license. At this rate it will take 100 days of 30 minutes a day to get this done. We just don't drive that much so I told him that he needs to take every opportunity to drive so he can get his hours in. He did ask to take on the freeway and drive to Mesquite this weekend but I am not quite that comfortable yet with all of this so we will wait a bit to venture out on the freeway. Pray for me-oh and for him!