My Fool's Rush In Moment

Kyle and I finally decided it was time to make our home look like home.  We decided to start by painting the walls.  Saturday we went out and picked out the colors to paint.  We would paint the formal dining room green and the breakfast room and kitchen orange.

Our dining room.  I am liking the green.

Now for the orange breakfast room.

Go ahead and laugh.  I am.  All we need to do is figure out where to hang the chicken and an antique statue of Jesus.  Can you hear the tune?  "Wise men say, only fools rush in"  I can.  It is what Kyle is singing right now.

Now I just have to go pick up the kids, so that I can go back and buy a different paint color to go on the walls. All I am seeing is orange.  I don't want to have orange nightmares.  I think we have taken being University of Tennessee fans to a whole new level.

First Day of School

Today is Savannah's and Zachary's first day of school.  I managed to get both to school on time.  Zachary barely... traffic was  awful.  It took 15 minutes to drive 1/2 mile.  We could have walked, but no sidewalks and no place to walk.  I dropped them both off extremely nervous.  I am hoping they each are having a great day.  


For me on the other hand, the day has been quiet.  I have cleaned out Kyle's closet and mine.  Quite a productive day.  I have some more cleaning to do then off to pick up the kids.  This is a big year for both.  Zachary's first year in middle school and Savannah's first in high school.  


I am already missing the lazy days of summer.

Exhausted... And Gearing up for Back to School

Savannah had Red Letter Days yesterday.  That is the fun where you get to go to the school and stand in line to prove your residency for that school.  Then go to the cafeteria and go to the seven stations to turn in the handful of forms I had to fill out prior to registration and pick up her schedule.  After all of that fun, we get the locker line.  This particular feature was made extra fun because the school is over crowded and there are not enough lockers.  The freshmen get to pick lockers the last day and there is a possibility there will be no locker for your child.  I'll just leave it at this... the my kid is not carrying 40lbs. of books all day, all school year, momma in me was out and in force with the kids who didn't want to notice the mile long line waiting for lockers. It was fun!  Savannah got a locker in the hall where she has two classes.  Success!  We got her books.  One which looked horrible and I will be taking a picture of it and sending that to the book people for documentation so that I am not paying for a beat up book at the end of the year.  We picked up her RHS hoodie order form ( gotta get that Raptor wear!) and out we went.

We got home and had dinner and then it was time for a Young Women sleepover at our house.  Thank you Kyle, Zachary, and Hannah for being good sports.  I know you are sleep deprived because of all of the laughing, screaming, running, etc.  Sorry. :) It has been a long day and it is only 1:00pm.  I am ready for bed already!  The young women were great though and we had a lot of fun. Just tired after 4 hours of sleep.

Summer Fun

This summer has been fun.  We have had the opportunity to get lost in service and the kids have learned quite a bit this summer, while having fun.  


It started out really busy with youth conference and then girls camp.  The week after, Kyle was checking in on scout camp.  Then Savannah had EFY in Bloomington IN.  She loved it.  She got to spend time with three girls from our ward and meet new people as well.


The rest of the summer we have been hanging around doing nothing to exciting.  Definitely enjoying the lazy pace of summer. 

Things we have been up to...


Painting grandma's closet.  The kids loved this!

Hannah was good at hiding while I was taking pictures, but she was helping out as well.

The kids have also been watering plants for grandpa.  It has been wonderful for them.  I am thankful that they had the opportunity to do this.  They learned that veggies don't just appear in the grocery store.  They started watering these plants in the spring and have had the opportunity to see vegetables grow and actually pick them off the vines.  This has been fun for the kids and a great lesson they never would have learned at home.  They were excited to do this for grandpa, for me at home, not so much.

Tomatoes!  Zachary's favorite.

How many tomatoes did you get?

Thanks grandma and grandpa for letting the kids do this.  You have helped them to have a great summer.  One that I don't think they will ever forget.

Other things going on:

-Hannah is working at JNW.  I think she has a couple weeks left.  

She just bought her all season sports pass and is grouped with her friends.  She is looking forward to getting back to school and seeing her friends.  She is ready to go to football games and have fun.  Hopefully there will be some studying in there somewhere. 

 She has decided to take her car this fall.  Yikes!?  There are some crazy drivers around there. :)  

She has a calling in the Nursery and loves it.  It is quite a change from the singles ward.

-Savannah has been working on her Personal Progress and she is coming along pretty well.

She is ready to see her friends at school and is looking forward to high school.  Early mornings?  School work?  Not so much.  

She has freshmen orientation tomorrow and red letter days on Thursday, where she will get her schedule and locker assignment.

She is also studying for her drivers permit.  I don't know how I feel about that one yet.

She is wanting to take dance lessons this fall.  Lyrical and hip hop.

Zachary is working on his Faith in God for primary.  He is working on memorizing his Articles of Faith. Only seven more to go.

He is getting nervous about middle school and not anywhere near ready for summer to end. Me either! 

School starts next week.  He just had Saber Day at school where he got his locker assignment.  I think he likes having a locker.  He is a pro at opening his locker now.

Zachary is also taking golf lessons and loving it.  

A Harry Potter Moment

Mom and Dad have been re-doing their bedroom and so they moved everything out and began the renovation.  The work is complete now and we were at their house watering plants and so we got to take a peek at the finished work (before the furniture is added).  In their bedroom, is a closet that is under the staircase in the hall.  Zachary thought it looked like Harry Potter's room under the stairs.  He wanted me to capture his Harry Potter moment with a picture.  In truth, he wanted to come back and take a picture with his Harry Potter glasses, but mom and dad are ready to move back into their room and clothes will shortly be occupying the closet.  Even though I didn't have my camera, we made do with my fogged over iphone ( I had been outside in the heat and humidity)  So here is Zachary's Harry Potter Moment...

I think Zachary has found him a place to sleep when he visits grandma and grandpa.  I think a cot will fit in there no problem.

Glamping... AKA Glamour Camping

Yep that is what some would call our style of girls camp.

Here are the girls in our ward.  This years theme was Survivor.  Each ward picked an island or a location that survivor the TV show has taken place.  Our ward was Bora Bora.  As you can see in the picture, going with the survivor theme, each camper was given a buff to wear.  I particularly love Savannah's face in this picture.  I think she has seen too many pictures of Uncle John?


I was not a cabin mom this year.  I was called to serve on the Stake Camp Committee as a certification specialist.  Before you all laugh, knowing the camper that I am (not) I think it all turned out okay.  The girls survived and we had them make breakfast burritos over a fire that they were all able to eat.  Ha!


Our cabin moms this year were great.  We get teased for glamour camping because we stay in cabins and we decorate them for the girls.  The girls love it, so that is what we do.  Our ward cabins were decorated like the huts you see on the water in Bora Bora.  There was straw hanging from the roof of the cabin down to the tops of the screens on the side of the cabin.  (both side of the entire cabin are giant screens, no walls until you get close to the floor.  Great for air circulation) One of the cabin moms made paper-mache masks that the girls painted in tribal fashion.  They were really cool.  I'll have to see if I can hunt down a picture of them.  They hung these on the side of the cabin under the straw.  One of the cabin moms also made a giant totem pole thing with tribal masks and wholes where you could put your face and pose for a picture. It was really cool.  Again, I am hating that I don't have pictures.  Inside, the back wall was covered with a white sheet with on open window over looking the beach and ocean painted on it.  Lantern lights were hung.  It looked great.  They also had bags with goodies for the girls.  They got a ward t- shirt with Bora Bora on it, fun things for the girls.  The girls loved it.


The temperatures cooled to the upper 80's for the week, which was a blessing!  


The girls got to climb the wall, repel, ride the flying squirrel, zip line, swim, test survivor skills in survivor games.  The winners of these games got to go through the food line first each day.  There were classes and crafts.

We even had our own survivor camp song, written by our camp music specialist.  She took Hawaiian words that translate to "Survivor! Press Forward!  Love God and all Men!" She had the girls play a ukulele and a didgeridoo to give it a tribal sound. The girls loved it.

I was horrible about getting pictures.  I was either too busy to walk everywhere to get them or I never had my camera with me when I had time for pictures.  I did manage to get a picture of Savannah with her friend from Italy that visits her grandparents in our ward each summer.

It was fun being at girls camp with both of my girls.  Hannah was able to go as a YCL cabin mom.  She enjoyed the perks of being a leader.  (Sonic Happy Hour)  


Well, that is all for girls camp.  It ended on July 3.  Just in time to start celebrating our nations birthday all weekend.  Sleep, three nights of fireworks, grilling out and homemade ice cream.  Can't beat that.

Youth Conference

It has been a busy summer so far.  Now I have time to play catch up.


On June 24-26 we had a multi-stake youth conference at Western Kentucky University.  Kyle is the stake YM president and was in charge of a lot of it and on the planning committee with all of the other stakes to put it together.  Needless to say, he was busy all year and especially coming up to youth conference getting all of the details done.  Anyway, the day finally arrived for  us to drive to Western for the conference.  We said good bye to Zachary, Brinkley and Hannah, leaving Hannah in charge of her brother at home, and off we went.  Kyle had to be there early so he left at 5:30 am. I was meeting up with our ward youth to load up my car with youth and their belongings.  I got my car full of girls and we were off.  On our trip we laughed and talked and the girls made up a rap.  I wish I could find what they wrote.  It was pretty funny.  When we got to Western, "the Hill Toppers" was written on several things and one girl asked what was a Hill Topper and why would they call themselves that?  We found that out very quickly.


We got checked in to the dorms and headed for the Opening Assembly.  This is where we found out all about the Hill Toppers.  The hall that every Assembly was held was at the top of the huge (did I mention it was huge?) hill.  Then to get in the building we climbed hundreds of stairs.  I kid you not!  And I now have the calf muscles to prove it.  We were almost always going up hill no matter where we were headed.  All of the classes were at various places up this hill.  The only down hill time was going to the dorms after classes or heading to the dining hall.  That may sound okay, but it wasn't very fun to walk up hill after eating dinner to get to anything else. I know, enough about the hills... moving on.


The theme for Youth Conference was Be Strong from Joshua 1:9.  The youth theme for this year.  The kids spent the first day (Thursday) taking various classes by local leaders as well as from Brother Dietlein of the YM General Board and Elder Cornish, a member of the Sixth Quorum of the Seventy from the North America Southeast Area.  They had some really great experiences in the classes they took.  One of the favorites was by Brother Halverson, our local CES Coordinator.  He talked about the Atonement and made it real for the kids.  I don't think they will ever forget that class.  Elder Cornish talked about everything having a worth as well as a cost and to not just chose what you want now and give up what you want most.  It was a good class as well.  He also just let the kids ask him questions that were on their minds and I think he gave the kids a lot to think about. 

It stormed on Thursday afternoon, so the outside games were cancelled, so everyone got cleaned up, went to dinner, then walked up that huge hill to the auditorium for a Concert.  The thing about that hill is that is was a beast to climb, but it was always well worth it once we got to the top.  The concert was by Jason Deere, Dan Truman, and the guys from a group called Due West.  They sang songs from the CD A Nashville Tribute to Joseph Smith.  They also sang songs from a new CD coming out for missionaries.  They talked about their missions or conversions and shared their testimonies.  Then just for fun, Due West sang their new country hit for us.  It was a great moment for the kids to feel the spirit through music and to just be entertained.  Even the people that weren't  country music fans thought it was great. 


 After the concert came a dance.


It was very weird for me to watch the dance.  There were kids dancing, but a lot of girls in one group and boys in another.  The girls wanting to be asked to dance and the boys to scared to ask. Girls choice had more people dancing as well as the line dancing.  It was a packed gym with around 800 kids.  Great to see so many youth together.


Friday morning we had another assembly by Shane Hadley CES Coordinator for southern Kentucky and Madison stake in TN.  After that, more classes, lunch and then a service project.  The original service project fell through, so at the last minute, we did a canned food drive for the Bowling Green KY area.  The kids did a scavenger hunt around campus asking locals about charities in the area, another group was in a building contest to see who could build the best thing with the canned foods, they had kids writing about what they thought poverty meant and they also had a group of kids writing uplifting letters to go with the canned goods to the local shelters.

They passed out the Mormon Helping Hands shirts for the kids to wear.  I didn't have my camera or much free time, but I did manage to get a couple of shots from my phone of the kids during the service project.



Afterwards each stake went their separate ways for testimony meetings.  In ours there were kids who had talked about questioning the truthfulness of the church and thinking it would be easier to leave the church but after the youth conference and what Brad Wilcox had taught them, they knew the church was true and no longer wished to not be Mormon just for a day so life could be easy.  After a great testimony meeting we headed home.  We began our journey by stopping at Sonic.  It was happy hour.  I can't pass up happy hour.  We weren't the only ones there either.  Most cars from our ward stopped as well as from other stakes.  At the beginning of YC, brother Halverson told the kids to remember what they felt at YC and to fly home and I think they did.


Hannah did a great job holding down the fort while we were gone.  She let Zachary borrow her Kindle and he read all of the Percy Jackson books, while we were gone.


Coming soon... Girls Camp.