Picture sharing

We went to the beach again today. These are our new pictures.

Happy Birthday Makayla! She was so excited about being 7 years old. She doesn't have to take naps anymore (that's our family rule) and she gets to be baptized next year. She can't wait.

These are my cubbies. From left to right it goes: Will Allen, Alex Farley, Merrit and Tylor Pirk. Doesn't Tylor look so thrilled to be there? He can be a little on the whiny side sometimes. Our pack meeting for May was this passed Wednesday. The boys did an outdoor flag ceremony as part of a color gaurd. This was them as the color gaurd. Then we planted a tree. It was fun!

These are the cupcakes we made for Makayla to take in to her class for her birthday yesterday. We also did Chelsea's for her class too. Because she has a summer birthday she doesn't get to take cupcakes on her birthday, so I figured yesterday was as good as any other day and actually better for me since I was already making them for Makayla. Chelsea and Makayla both helped me put the marshmellows in the colored sprinkles and then on their cupcakes. They thought it was so fun and it really helped me get them put together quickly. I like doing things like this for and with my kids. I sure love them!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MAKAYLA

Happy birthday, sweetheart! Hope you have a great day and get a big cake.

House Update

Just thought you might be interested to know that yesterday we made an offer on the house we like and it was counter-offered (they wanted full price and wouldn't budge) and we accepted the counter-offer and now things are in the works. I talked to Eric's brother this morning and he said that he was hoping to have the inspection and appraisal done by the end of next week and he is also hoping that it all works out and that we can sign the papers the week we get back from Michigan. Wohoo! So, cross your fingers that the inspection is favorable. We know that it being an older house and only costing $57,500 it won't be perfect, but we are just hoping that it won't fall apart on us in 6 months or something. Hopefully it all works out.

Farthest run yet!

I am so proud of myself, I went a little over 4 miles today on my morning jog pushing Addie in a stroller. It was drizzling outside making it a bit cooler, and that really helped. I now only have 39 more miles to go before July 1st. Yahoo!

More Prayers

I feel like a sad, sad broken record. If you could keep my aunt in your thoughts and prayers I'd appreciate it. She is very sick and is not recovering well from her colon removal. The doctors say there is only a very slim chance she will survive. Please join Kurt and I in praying for her recovery.

Happy Memorial Day

We went to the lake today and let the kids swim. First swim of the season. We thought they would jump in and then jump right back out again because the water is still so cold. But they played for a good 45 minutes before we made them get out because we had other things we had to do today. They had lots of fun and actually stayed in the water a lot longer than we thought. We were impressed. Meg even got to come and went swimming with us. She had just as much fun as (maybe even more than) the kids did. The water is about 50 degrees right now, still too cold for me. I just sat and watched and took pictures. We will definately miss being so close to the lake. We haven't even really got to enjoy it to the fullest extent. We're going to try to go as often as we can before we move. We'll probably never live this close to a lake again. :(

Then we had a BBQ with some friends we've made through Chelsea's friend at school. All in all we had a very enjoyable Memorial Day. I hope all of you did too.

Some updates from the Hicks

Our friends, the Stamps, have said that we could live in their house in Flint. So we will stay there and try to help them sell it while looking for something more permanent for ourselves. And the house we were looking to buy and fix up was sold yesterday. We are a little disappointed, but we know that there are so many houses for sale that we shouldn't have a problem finding something different. There is actually another house we have our eyes on already. It was on the market in early April and before we could look at it was pending sale. Then today we saw it listed again. We checked with our realtor and she said she double checked and it is definately back on the market and that the sale must have fell threw for some reason. We want to see it and hopefully find out why the sale fell threw. It's 6 bedrooms, 2 baths on 4.3 acres in Flushing for $89,900. Can you believe that my kids could each have their own rooms? It would be so nice. Anyway, I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high, the market changes so fast that it might not be around too long.

New pictures

Okay, okay I'm back. I have been reading the blog (not as often as I would like) but I haven't had any comments to make. I don't really have anything great to say now either but we have some real good news. We knew we needed new swings because the other two were getting so old and ugly (we really need to do something with the bench swing as well and may do it sooner than later, depending upon the cost) so we went out yesterday and purchased three new swings, and the good news for you three with young babies, we purchased a baby swing. That's why we purchased three instead of two. Now we can have two normal swings or one normal swing and one baby swing on at any given time. I took pictures to post them so that I could get you all more excited to come. I'm sure that will heighten your desire to be here even more. See you in a couple of weeks.

schedule on June 7

For those of you who don't know the schedule of events. Here they are as I know about them. Kari and Eric get here on Monday, June 2. Jana comes in on Tuesday, June 3. Hillary and kids come Thursday night, June 5, and Charlie on Friday night, June 6. I've been informed that sometime there will be a grandchildren picture taken, but I didn't hear when. Saturday is a busy day, and here is the schedule for that day.

Jim has a senior breakfast and graduation rehearsal from 8 to 10 am. His court of honor will be at the church at 11 am. That should go about an hour, they tell me. I think, as long as we're already there, it would be a good idea to practice the song after the court of honor in the chapel. That will give us a chance to see how it sounds in the room we will be singing it in and not just in our living room (which is a lot smaller). Then we plan to take the whole family out to a restaurant for lunch. Jim is still deciding which one. Jim has to be at Eastern Michigan at 5 pm and the rest of us need to be there at 6 pm. We don't have tickets for the grandchildren, except those who can sit on laps, so I'll find a baby sitter for them. Jim has his all night party at 10 pm.

Sacrament meeting starts at 9 am on Sunday, June 8. We'll sing and then Dad will take Jana and Addie to the airport, so she can get home and wash her clothes and go to girl's camp the next day. I imagine that the Hicks will leave Sunday afternoon, but I don't know that for sure. Kari and Eric leave the next day on Monday, June 9. Then they can go home and pack up to move. June 9th is also the day of Dad's final.

It will be fun and hectic all at once. I'm looking forward to it. This coming week we'll be busy with the last choir concert,senior honors night, prom, and Jim's last week of school. It turns out that senior honors night is the same night as book club. Now I'm torn between going to support Jim, or going with my daughters to book club.

If I've gotten anything wrong, please let me know.

TOES!

Yesterday Noah hit another milestone-well, to us anyway-he found his feet. His are some pictures of the momentous occasion.

Some More Pictures

So I asked my friend Melissa go look at that house I told you all about (her husband is going to medical school at A.T. Still) and she went yesterday and took lots of pictures. Click here to check them out. I know the basement looks gruesome, but we think it just needs to be cleaned up. Also we would paint the outside and take out those huge bushes in the front and put in some nice flowers. Also we talked about putting a nice white railing on the porch to kind of enclose it. Melissa said she really liked it and that if she only had one baby that she would buy it. So we are going to make an offer as soon as we get some things cleared up with the loan and hopefully get the inspection done pretty quick so that we can move right in when we get to Missouri. So keep your fingers crossed that it all works out.

Les and Kristi's baby is here

Charlie's brother, Les and his wife, Kristi, welcomed their newest edition into the world today. This is their first girl. They named her Audrey Ruth. I don't know if either of those are family names or not. I think she looks just like their oldest son, Bradyn. Just thought I'd share the happy news. We are excited for them.

Nice People

Yesterday I had the Relief Society Pres. send out an e mail to the sisters of the ward asking if I could borrow a pack 'n play while my grandchildren are here. I got 6 offers back! People are so nice.

We are moving too.

We've decided to move at the end of June. That's about all we know for sure right now. We've been praying for several months for guidance and direction on this matter and we feel that we are suppose to move back to Michigan. We don't really know why. Charlie felt prompted to turn in his letter of resignation about a week ago. Even though he doesn't yet have a job, or has even had an interview, he feels very strongly that we are suppose to be in Michigan no matter what. With knowing that, we decided that it makes no sense for us to stay here until he has a job. We will just have to keep paying rent and he will have to go back to Michigan every time an interview comes up. That could get really expensive. So our plan right now is to see if we can stay at some friends of ours. They moved to North Caroline just after spring break and haven't sold their house yet in Michigan. We are going to see if they will let us stay there until we find something more permenant.

We have a house in mind that we'd like to try to buy. It is in the Flint ward. Yes, we are returning there, but we won't be living in the city. It is a foreclosure and needs major work. We would basically gut the whole inside and start over. It sounds like a lot of work, but it will actually be easier to do it that way than to try to save what is there now. It's a four bedroom, 2 bath house on 2.79 acres and is listed at $18,900. We think we could probably get it cheaper though. We want to smack a reconstruction loan on top of our mortgage and use that to fix it up. We are working with a realtor from the Howell ward and she is very knowledgable with the housing market and loans, etc... She is really helping us out and we appreciate it.

We started telling people at church on Sunday that we'd be leaving. We feel like they need to have some time to find people to take over our callings before we leave. I'm sad to be moving again. Although I don't really feel like I have many good friends in this ward, I do have a few that I will miss very much. This ward was very kind to us and the people here are very good. I want to come back a visit as often as we can. I hope to stay in touch with them too.

So, we don't know what is in store for us. We are just trying to do what we feel the Lord wants us to do. This is new territory for me. I usually have some idea of what the Lord wants. Now, I don't really know. It's kind of interesting operating in the dark and having everyone look at you like you are insane. I feel a little insane, but I'd much rather be insane than to go against the will of God. He will provide for us in some way. It just might not be the way I am expecting. Sometimes I wish I could see from His perspective.

A Trip To the Zoo and Moving

We went to the zoo today because Eric got to go home from work early and it was a beautiful day today. Here are some pictures of Noah's first day at the zoo. We had a great time.

Also, I got an email from Dad this morning and in it he asked me about what we were doing about housing and I realized that I should probably share with everyone. One of Eric's older brothers has offered to help us buy a house. We are going to co-sign on the loan. He is paying the down payment and we are paying the mortgage and the taxes and all the utilities. He will be paying for any repairs or improvements on the home and we will be taking care of it. We found a house and once we are approved on the loan-either tomorrow or the next day-we will make an offer. We are pretty excited...but I am a little nervous because we are moving the week after we get back from Michigan and I just want things to move a little faster so that we can get other things done. So that is what we are working on right now. We are only looking at a 2 bedroom home, but if you come to visit, we will make room for you...and it will be our place you are staying. Awesome!

Everything else is going well for us. I just started WIC and I tell you, that was an inspired government program-we used our vouchers for this month and saved $96. Holy moly! Noah is big and healthy and doing great at sitting up assisted and holding his head up. He is so much fun to have around (when he's happy), he laughs and smiles at pretty much everybody. We are just trying to wrap everything up here in Utah before we leave and seeing as many people as we can. We are going to miss Utah-Eric especially-but are really excited to start a new adventure in a new place. We can't wait to see you guys in less than 2 weeks and are excited to live much closer than we do now. YIPEE!

Dad?

It occurred to me that Dad has been missing from our blog for quite some time. Dad? Where oh where have you gone? Have your classes swallowed you whole?

Baby Food Debacle

I want to start making Harvey's baby food as prices for the little jars are ridiculous for 2 oz. of food. I tried once before just pureeing green beans in my food processor. That ended in tears and vomiting since he couldn't handle how chunky it was. So I bought a basic food mill and tried that today. It was such a pain! I don't know if I just bought a cheap one or if this is how it always works. It went down like this:

First, I processed some steamed sweet potatoes. They were super mushy and it worked like a dream: fast, easy, good consistency. Inspired, I cleaned the mill and pushed on to peas. Here is where the headache began. These were cooked canned peas so they were well on the mushy side but they just scooted along in front of the blades. I ended up having to puree them in my food processor and then put them through the food mill. This was frustrating but I was happy with the consistency. I wanted to add carrots to the peas because Harv is at the point where we're trying to introduce combined foods. So I wash up all of this rigmarole and start over with carrots. I steamed them in the microwave until they practically fell apart as I picked them up. Yet, they also just scooted along in front of the blades. After putting them through the food processor and back through the food mill they were still too chunky for Harvey and my several hours of work ended in tears and vomit. Any advice from those who have used this method before? My food mill seems like it is of decent quality, certainly not top of the line though. It was a frustrating and disappointing couple of hours.

getting creative

Check out my new project, I'm pleased with how it turned out! I was given these five leftover pieces of wood and decided Addie's room was in need of some decoration. And, just for fun, a picture of Addie thoroughly enjoying her spaghetti!

Kurt, Harvey, and I are all up north for a family tragedy, again. My cousin committed suicide over the weekend. Please keep my family in your prayers.

Mother's Day Wish

Happy Mother's Day to all who are mothers and all who have mothers. I hope you had a wonderful day. I sure did! My kids are great. I'm so thankful they love me so much, despite my faults. I love them dearly. Charlie is also a wonderful husband who helped feel like a very special mom today. I love him dearly too.

Some share time

So the kids and I made some homemade clay, shaped it and then baked and painted it. We did it last week. I thought I'd share their creations with you. The link below is the recipe I used, if you're interested.

http://familycrafts.about.com/cs/claytyperecipes/l/blovclay1.htm

I got my hair cut today too. I really like it. I thought I'd share that too.

Mother's Day Wall

For Mother's Day this year, instead of just buying Mom flowers like the past few years, I decided to ask her if there was anything she needed done. She told me that she's wanted to get a nice paving stone wall put around the patio flower bed, and that for my gift I could help Dad put it in sometime. Well, Harvey's daycare was closed today, so I had planned on just taking the day off to watch him. Then I got the idea that I could come up and work on the wall while Mom watched him. So that's what I did. I only got one side of it done today, but it looks great. And now that it's started, it shouldn't take too much more work to get it done. Here are some pictures of the progress.


Bottom row of bricks laid, and dirt filled behind. This row took the longest because I had to make sure the bricks were lined up and leveled correctly.


Second row of bricks laid, with dirt filled behind. The bricks have a little lip that sticks down in the back to help position them correctly on the row below, and to keep them from falling forward. So this row was quicker, because I just had to place the brick where the lip made it set right.


Third row laid, not filled. The top row needs to be filled by hand to make sure the flowers don't just get buried, so Mom and Dad are going to do that. This row was the quickest because I was getting the hang of it, and I didn't have to put fill dirt in. You can see that the ground slopes a bit, because the brick near the house in the bottom row is completely under the grass line, while the brick farthest from the house is completely exposed.


View of all three rows from the other direction. The wall is going to look great when it's finished. Plus, most, if not all, of the big pile of dirt on the patio will be used to fill behind the brick, so Mom and Dad will have their patio back!


Lastly, here's a cute picture of Mom holding Harvey, watching me work.

Pictures

These are the pictures I took over Easter weekend and Kurt's birthday. Enjoy!

to the Bahamas and beyond

Jason and I got back yesterday from a whirlwind week in Florida and a two-night, one day cruise to the Bahamas. We had a lot of fun, ate a TON of food, and are now very glad to be back with Addie. Here are a few pictures to share some of our experiences with you.

This is me on our tour of the Everglades. It was pretty, but there were hardly any birds or other sign of wildlife. I was quite disappointed and sad about it. The tour guide said we went at the worst possible time, the middle of the afternoon, but I thought we would see more. It was also sad to see how little of the Everglades there are left. The tour guide did say that the water level is nearly back up to what it should be, 3.5 to 4 feet, which is positive.
We DID see an alligator though! Now THAT was cool! He swam right up to the boat.
This is Jason and I after we went snorkeling in the Bahamas. The fish were BEAUTIFUL, but the reef itself was rather brown. It wasn't as colorful as you see in many pictures of the Great Barrier Reef near Australia, but the fish were amazing. We are developing our underwater pictures today and hope to get some great ones. Look how blue the water is!
After snorkeling we rented this moped for a couple hours and drove around Nassau (the capital city of the Bahamas). It was so much fun! We stopped at some of the sandy white beaches and almost got killed because they didn't tell us that you're supposed to drive on the left side of the road. It was gorgeous and we had a blast.
The buildings there are so colorful (they are in South Florida, too) . This is one of the police stations in Nassau. On a pretty beach. We didn't swim, though, because we're not really into hard, crusty sand on our bodies. Snorkeling was enough swimming for us.

Here is a picture I'm quite proud of, doesn't it look like something you'd see on a computer screensaver? I took this from the back of the moped.

This is the tiny cruise ship we were on. It was so small, but charming. We had a great time eating and relaxing and singing kareoke. We would DEFINITELY like to take a cruise on one of the big liners now.

These two pictures were taken outside of the Lego store at Disney. The statues are made completely out of legos, isn't that cool?!?!

We ate at a Wolfgang Puck restaurant in Disney and ordered sushi. Wolfgang Puck is a world-renowned chef. This was the best sushi either of us had ever had (and so colorful, too!). Mmmm...

The buckets from Fantasia were pouring out flowers!On the slide in the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground.

Mary Poppins' actual horse!We tried to get a picture with Mickey, but the line was already closed, so instead we attempted to get him in the background. If you look closely, you'll see him there.

All in all, this was one fabulous vacation!