Bethany is 19!

Nineteen years ago when Bethany was born my mom and dad drove to Powell in a snowstorm.  We had a repeat performance for her birthday yesterday.  We had a high of 37 and it snowed throughout the day.  The snow did make our evening less busy because several activities were cancelled due to weather.

Bethany has grown into a beautiful young lady.  She is a fun person to be around.  We were glad she came for dinner and cake.  We had chicken enchiladas and poppyseed muffins. Two of her favorite things.  I was just going to make a plain chocolate cake, but Julia thought we should do something Disney.  We decided to frost it blue and write with white frosting.  I tried to copy the Disney font.  I think it turned out pretty cute, but I ran out of room for the last word.  She still seemed happy with it.  We wrote: Happy Birthday, Bethany
You're Never too Old for a Disney Movie

It was a fun cake to make for her.  We all watched a Studio C together after Neil and Matthew got home from helping the Neiderhauser's move. (We are really going to miss Brother and Sister Neiderhauser).  We watched until David had to go to scouts. 

Happy Birthday, Bethany! We are glad you are part of our family and we hope you had a happy day!

A full Marathon

Parkside has a cool program to encourage the kids to get out and move.  Each week they can run laps around the school grounds at recess on Tuesday and Thursday. It takes 150 laps to equal 25 miles.  The kids who run that much qualify to finish the marathon together at the Middle School track.  They run the last mile at the track. David qualified and the younger children and I went to watch him finish his marathon.  As I watched him run the last mile of his marathon I realized that David hasn't gotten to be in the spotlight very often.  I loved cheering him on! He did a great job encouraging his friend who was running with him.  Only 5 kids in his class qualified for the marathon.  I was so proud of him!  I wished I had the camera there with me, but we had to settle for a picture after at home.  Each of the kids that ran got a medal and a tshirt.  It was a fun afternoon with beautiful weather. Good job, David!! I love you and I loved watching you run!

Look what Lydia can do

Lydia is quite the little lady.  She likes to try and do anything she sees others do.  The other day Matthew showed her some trick and she said "I'm not big enough to do that, but I'll try."  She loves to try things.  Her friend, Micah, has a little red trike.  I didn't know she could ride it, but she had to show me that she could.  We found our little bike and let her have a try at it.  She can do it, and is so proud of it.  She was excited to let Grandma and Grandpa see her ride her bike.

What happens at 2:00 in the afternoon when you stay up half the night

Tuesday afternoon this is how I found Joshua.  He was so tired he didn't even take the time to lay down.  Monday night he was up half the night crying that his ear hurt.  The only children's pain reliever I had had specific warnings against giving if you had a heart condition or were taking diuretics.  Joshua has both, so I didn't dare give it to him.  About 11:00 I made him a bed on the couch and turned on Tangled.  He was asleep when I woke up at 1:00 am to turn the movie off.  Tuesday morning he said his ear didn't hurt and he went on with life as normal.  He was tired by afternoon and couldn't stay awake.  I agreed with him, it was time for a nap.  I only got a short one after I tried to read to the children and just couldn't keep my eyes open.  I am glad he seems fine.  Neil went to the store on Tuesday and brought home some Joshua safe pain reliever just in case we need it.

LDS Prom April 26, 2014

Julia was thrilled on Friday to come out of Seminary and find a scroll in the car.  She was even more thrilled when she opened it at home and saw it was written in elvish.  She is an elf at heart and loves to read and write elvish.  She was excited that she could translate it without using any outside sources.  Ezra found the perfect way to ask her to the Prom.  I think it is so neat that he went out of the way to do something that would make it special to Julia.  She answered him with fortune cookies. In one of the cookies she put a fortune that said "The stars have decreed that Julia will go to Prom with you."  It was a fun idea.

 

 Prom was yesterday.  Neil needed to go as a Young Men's leader.  I was happy to go along and spend the evening with Neil.  It was a rainy night, that made it a challenge to keep the girls dresses dry and out of the mud.  Other than that, it was a beautiful night.  We had bought Julia's dress about a month ago.  We had to do a little altering, but we got it done in time for the dance.  We did her hair in the afternoon.  She looked beautiful. We put curlers in so she would have lovely curls.  I wanted to try a celtic knot in her hair.  It took several tries, but we finally got it. We didn't get many pictures.  We were running out of time before we had to meet the other youth at the church, and the rain made outside pictures impossible. Ezra picked up Julia and met us at the church to drive to Cody. 

 The stake paid for the dinner at the Holiday Inn restaurant.  They provided a delicious dinner of salad, garlic bread, chicken alfredo and brownies.  It was all delicious.  We had good company at our table.  The dance was at the Mural Chapel.  It has a smaller gym that was decorated beautifully.  It was a well done night by the Stake leaders.  I enjoyed looking at the beautiful, modest dresses that the girls had found.  The young men looked sharp.  I enjoyed visiting with friends and watching the youth enjoy the evening.  Most of all, I enjoyed spending the evening with Neil and even got a few dances in with him.  Julia and her friends thought it was great that we were there together on our anniversary. They wanted the DJ to play us a song and announce our anniversary.  He didn't get to it and that was alright.  It was a beautiful night.  I was so grateful that Julia was asked by since a fine young man.  I think I was almost as happy as she was.

Julia and Ezra at the dance

Some of the lovely young ladies from our ward

The race is on

Matthew has been getting taller and taller lately.  He is so tired of people commenting on how tall he has gotten.  He has long since passed me and all his older sisters. One of his favorite things to do is stand beside me and put his arm across my shoulder and look down at me.  I am just glad he likes to stand by me.  The race has been on for awhile between him and Neil.  The race is definitely getting closer.  I had them stand back to back and took a picture so they could decide for themselves who was taller.  What do you think? Has Matthew got him caught?

Mud

We have an abundance of undeveloped land around our house.  Unfortunately, when it rains or snow the land all turns into mud that is like quicksand.  A few weeks ago Dallin and Adam got stuck in the mud. They thought they saw MaryAnne's shoe that the mud sucked in last year.  The shoe wasn't really there, but they ventured in anyway.  Dallin got out on his own, but it took Adam's older brother, Ezra, to pull Adam out.  Dallin was the muddiest child I have ever seen when he got home.  You can't really tell from the pictures, but he was covered with mud.

Dallin's shoes and socks covered in about 5 pounds of mud

Today Joshua and Lydia went out to play in the snow.  They wandered off down the road and got into some mud.  The mud pulled Joshua's shoes off and he had to walk home barefoot because he didn't have any socks on.  Matthew had to go and rescue Lydia from the mud.  Matthew, thanks for being the hero and finding and saving Joshua and Lydia.