Sunday, May 25, 2008

The Zoo: a day of uneven odds

This past week was my last week of watching a couple of boys from the ward. I will still be watching 1 girl 3 days a week, but that will be it. I'm ready for a babysitting break. The little girl, Tierza, that I watch is really easy. She doesn't need a lot of attention and she takes a nap at the same time as Mitchell and Caleb so I don't mind having her here at all.

For our last day watching extra kids I decided to take all of the boys to the zoo. It was me and 4 boys under the age of 6. We had a nice lengthy talk in the car on the way to the zoo about how they needed to stay close to me and do what I ask. They did pretty well for the most part. A ride on the train after looking at all the animals was a great bribing tool. That was definitely the highlight of their day. It rained for awhile while we were there and so the train was closed. It broke their hearts when I told them that. So instead we went to play at the little playground they have there. After about 20 minutes the sky cleared and the train opened and they were very excited.

At the zoo Caleb developed a new cheese face. As much as I loved the last one I think that the new one is a little less intense. I hope that it's here to stay!


The animal highlight was the leapord. It was pacing back and forth in front of the window and Mitchell was laughing hysterically every time it would pass.

We were able to go to Wyoming this weekend to support Nicholas. He turned 16 today and was ordained a Priest. Congrats Nick! It was also Daniel's birthday. We had a good time celebrating their birthday and visiting family. Because of the increase in run off this spring the water pressure changed in Lyman and somehow contaminated their water. So while we were there we couldn't drink any of their water and even had to use bottled water to brush our teeth. The kids had the shortest baths that they have ever had in their life. It was pretty interesting. It was testament to food storage. Clint's parents had enough water stored that they didn't need to rely on the city for water like a lot of other residents did. Luckily the situation cleared this afternoon and they are able to use thier water again.

Monday, May 19, 2008

Kidathon

This past week I watched other people's children every day except for Wednesday (and Saturday). Monday was a whopper of a day with 7 kids including Mitchell and Caleb. The picture below shows a picture of them all at lunch time. I don't think that I have ever been so thankful for macaroni and cheese. Luckily all the kids got along really well. The only problem was that it was raining outside and so we were inside for most of the day. But the kids did great and I survived to tell about it. Mitchell and Caleb really enjoy having friends over so it's been nice for them to have kids to play with. They'll be sad when this week's over because I won't be watching as many kids anymore. I will only be watching 1 and she's a girl. At least I'll have fun; I get to do her hair once in awhile!

We bought a knight costume before we had kids for a murder mystery dinner. Mitchell found our costume box awhile ago and found the sword inside. Later he found the entire knight outfit and has been having a great time with it. Caleb, not wanting to be left out, puts this knight helmet on whenever he gets the chance. He can't resist cheesing for the camera so he wouldn't leave it on for the picture.
One of my really good friends that I grew up with just graduated with her teaching degree and is moving back to the area. We are way excited. Each time she comes Mitchell tells us afterwards that "only Jeni can tickle me....nobody else". He loves playing with her! Caleb also warmed up a bit and let us take a picture. Congrats, Jeni, on your new job! We're so excited to see you more often!
As always, we're enjoying the warmer weather. Last summer a friend from the ward gave us this mini roller coaster. It has been a big hit with the kids....even Caleb. Mitchell loves to help him ride it. I'm always afraid that he will fall but they have such a good time that I let them do it. (He's only fallen once so far!)

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Hanging in the Backyard

Caleb has been a lot of fun to watch lately. He is mimicking our actions and is making new discoveries everyday. This may be a little inappropriate but kids are so innocent that I think it is so cute. This picture of Caleb is him discovering something about his body. He is very interested.For the past two weekends we have had some pretty nice weather and luckily we've been able to take advantage of it. As I wrote before, we finished our sprinkler system last weekend but our fence is still gone. It is our neighbors fence and they are still trying to decide what they want to do. They have talked to us about putting up a vinyl fence (which would be awesome) but we're guessing that they're waiting for us to offer to pay for some of it........not gonna happen. We would much rather just put up some new posts and put the old fence back up. We're cheap skates and not afraid to admit it. So until they decide, we're living with some pretty big holes on that side of the yard where Clint and our neighbor dug out the cement blocks that were holding the posts up (until the wind snapped the posts in pieces). Mitchell is making the most of the holes. He likes to climb inside and take his trucks and shovels in with him. Caleb wants to be where his brother is. The picture you see was taken a few minutes before Caleb followed Mitchell in and subsequently got stuck, feet up, inside the hole. He wasn't hurt so I can say that it looked pretty funny and I wished that I would have gotten a picture, but I pulled him out quickly instead of letting him suffer. Yesterday we spent most of the day outdoors again. For our date on Friday night, Clint and I spent over an hour at Lowe's browsing the garden section. We picked out a few plants and got some wood chips to put in our backyard by the sandbox. We also got vegetable and herb seeds. So Saturday we spent the day planting and fixing up the backyard a little bit. We also bought some cement so that Clint could cement the swingset into the ground. I have been watching kids from the ward this past week and I spent a lot of time holding the swingset down while they went as high as they could in the swings. It was fun to put our hand and the kids' footprints int he cement. Mitchell was a little wary but after watching Caleb go right for it he decided to have a turn. As a little girl my family had put our hand prints in some cement by our basketball standard. As I grew up I loved comparing how big my hands had gotten compared to the tiny ones that I had imprinted. I hope that the boys have the some enjoyment.
After we were done working we spent a little time "relaxing" in the sunshine. That is what Clint was attempting, anyway.

Sunday, May 4, 2008

Sprinklers Status: Completed

We accomplished a major milestone for our family this past week. We finished our sprinkler system and it only took about a month to complete. I am so excited for all of the extra time that I'm going to have this summer that I spent the past few summers hauling hose around our yard. Hopefully our backyard lawn will finally fill in now that it will have some more consistent watering. I'm also really excited to watch the kids run through the sprinklers this summer. It will be a blast.
I think that Clint wishes that he could just rest now but we already have the next big project in our sights. We are going to take a wall down in our basement that creates a hallway that doesn't really need to be there. But removing it will include moving a major support beam unless we want to have a random pole in our room. It's going to be fun! (Says the one who won't be doing most of the hard labor!)
Sorry about the lack of pictures. I'll be better this week.