December

Even though we are only a few days into December we have already done a lot. Last weekend we went to see the decorated trees at the Eccles center and then went for ice cream. I was given 12 free tickets to the Nutcracker by Ballet West, so after ice cream we took the whole family to their first live performance. Since I had so many tickets, I even gave some to our favorite neighbors, the Minucci's. Hayden was pretty squiggly and Andrew fell asleep sometime before intermission, but all things considered I think we all had a good time.
I am usually done with my holiday shopping by now, but this year has been a tough time all around, so I am not even close to done this year. I was having a really hard time deciding what to get the kids this year, since they have almost everything, but my parents helped out with this problem. They are getting us a Wii for Christmas. (Shh! Nobody say anything until Christmas!) But, now I can go get all sorts of new games and accessories!
It is also tradition in our house to make some sort of homemade gifts for the holidays and this year is no different. One of the things I did this year was make holiday cards that I passed out at Thanksgiving so people could send them during December. We also have been working on a cool little wood project, but I am not going to give too much more of those details away.
The kids are working hard for all of their holiday programs. They will perform a small operetta with the school and their holiday music recitals. We are also really looking forward to all the church dinners and programs going this month. There are three dinners just in the next week. We are also really looking forward to going to the live Nativity procession that a local church performs next weekend.
We are all counting down the days. We have a little thing that hangs with little pieces of the Nativity to hang up each day to count down to Christmas Day and the kids have been fighting over the order they put them up in, because they all want to do baby Jesus. What do you do when you have four kids and only 1 baby Jesus?
It has been a good year and I am thankful for my beautiful family and all of our many blessings!

November

Like everything else in our life November came and went very quickly.

Some of the teachers at the school wanted to have a Veteran's Day program this year. The weekend before plans were still finalized. I mentioned I might know someone who could speak and the next thing you know, I was in charge of the whole thing. So, of course, I fell back on the trusty boy scouts. I had my wolves each say a little thing and I used Ethan's webelo's for my color guard. Although, some people noticed we did not correctly fold the flag (give my poor 9 years old a break!) overall, I think it turned out really well.

The other big even at the school was the the second and third grade Thanksgiving program. They made a stew and all sorts of crafts. They performed a little play and fed the audience. They were really lucky because dad took the day off the work to come and ALL the grandparents came to watch too. Hayden brought home his lines the night before and that was when we found out he had the biggest part, and he did a stellar job. Yeah, my man!

During November most of the family has been battling illness. I been sick all month with a terrible cough. Everyone else has gone in and out sick times. I have been told it isn't the dreaded H1N1, just some other flu, but it has been really annoying. In fact because I was sick we didn't go over to my dad's for Thanksgiving. Nor, did I get to see my grandma, whom they just moved into an assisted living center over the long weekend. The Liddell's didn't seem to mind our illness too much, so we were able to go over to their house for dinner.

I made my turkey the next day and I was so proud of myself because it was really juicy. Hayden even said my turkey was better than grandma's! Maybe someday soon I'll feel more qualified to host dinner at my house!

Halloween!

I'm only a month late, but hey, I finally had a day to sit down and pull stuff off my camera. (Okay, I really had to pull school stuff off the home camera and happened to find these, but whatever works!) As you can see pumpkin carving at our house is a big event. It is always scary to put carving tools into the hands of young children. I have to admit, if it hadn't been for the kids teacher letting them carve pumpkins at school, I probably would not have allowed it. However, they came home from school whining, "but we got to carve the pumpkin at school!" UGH! And between school and scout field trips, we end up with quite a few pumpkins by the time the season is all said and done!

I have included the obligatory costume shot. Can you tell by their faces they were all mad at me because I wouldn't buy them new costumes this year? We have so much costume stuff. I told them they had to deal with what we already had. Oh, well! You still get the same amount of candy no matter what your costume looks like, and we still have a giant bowl of candy left! Even though I siphoned off a big bag for dad's work, put some in the freezer for later and sent at least 1 piece in their lunch boxes every day for weeks!

School Links

One of the reasons that I have been lacking in keeping up my own blog is because I am teaching computers this year. Strange -- a computer teacher that doesn't have time to be on the computer. I have been working on blogs - just not my own. I have taught my 7th and 8th graders how to blog and I maintain the blogs they write -- all 11 of them. I have included links of the two classes that they blog that relate to my own children, so check out the links on the side for Ethan's class (4th) and the twins class (2nd/3rd).

Writing a Book

I have written two books in the last nine years. Neither of them are published. Truly, I would not chalk that up to my writing (yet). Mostly, it is because I am afraid of the publishing process and therefore have not adequately tried to present my work to publishers. My second book, which I finished last April, I have only sent to two publishers. My first book, I only sent out queries to six publishers. I have heard stories of people sending out 50 to 200 queries before getting a bite. I have noticed that writing and promoting my material is usually only something I do in the springtime. I can't think of any particular reason why that is; it just is.
Anyway, last May I sent my book off to Granite publishing, and a few weeks ago, I had a strange experience. The man whom Granite paid to read through my manuscript called me. He said he didn't think Granite would publish it, but he did think my manuscript was compelling and was a great message for others. He told me that "readers" are not supposed to contact potential writers and that I should not tell the company he called. So, I have been trying to understand just what was his purpose for calling -- and I don't understand. During the call he said he would send me a letter with some advice for re-writes, which I received yesterday along with complimentary copies of two of his published books.
The letter was three full pages of typewritten (actually on a typewriter) material. In it, he tells me the "reader" only does a cursory review for the company. So, it was probably on his negative review remarks that Granite has chosen not to publish my book. However, he wrote to me he was "captivated and impressed" with what I wrote. He went on to say that my, "struggle...is quite typical of what so many young people face today. You are doing a good job and and I am impressed with your spirit and sincerity."
Since, no one has obviously ever read my book, let me tell you - it is about me losing my faith in the church and how I regained my testimony.
The interesting part about some of his advice for rewrites is that they go exactly to the point of why I wrote the book. For example, he tells me to discuss the "incident and the boy you dated before his mission," only once and then leave it alone. However, most of the point of the book is how people treated me because of "that incident" and how "his mission" effected my life and how not waiting for him effected my testimony. In the letter he admonished me not to give my opinion on when I think boys ought to go on missions because, "it is not my right to counsel general authorities." Wow! I never stopped to think about a general authority sitting down to read my book. However, if they did, I wouldn't view what I wrote as trying to counsel them or change any church policies. However, I would honestly say, that I am trying to counsel mothers regarding their expectations and pressures they put on their son's regarding missions. He proves my point when he quotes a general authority that says 50% of young men who go on misisons leave the church after they get home. (He said the G.A. said it's all the young women's fault. -- I have searched and searched for any type of quote on the church site and can't find one...if you can find it, please let me know!) If 50% of our missionaries leave the church after they get home, there is obviously a problem.
He also talked about a psychologist who says, and mission presidents that would teach that we should not rehash the past. That we should just repent and go forward. Does that mean then I shouldn't write the book at all since it is just a rehash of the past? Looking at my past has helped me to learn about myself, to understand why I think and believe the things I do. I believe I have learned valuable lessons and want to share them with others -- that is why I wrote the book. A year ago I was in a a salon getting my nails done and was listening to the young women doing my nails. She was talking about "her" young man on a mission, how his mom didn't like her, how another boy asked her out on a date and she didn't know what to do. It was like looking at myself umpteen number of years ago. I knew exactly what to tell her. Stay strong and wait.
My reviewer goes on to say, "We came to this earth to prepare for Celestial glory. We are not supposed to be preparing for anything else." A huge premise of my book is that it was this exact same sentiment that turned me away from the church when I was young. I was told my education and "my" mission and my plans for my life didn't matter -- only marrying the man I knew I should marry was important. As an adult, I understand the sentiment to be 100% true, but I couldn't look past the limitations I felt it put on me then. (Side note and adjacent to my point: if missions are not a requirement for Celestial glory, then why is the pressure to go so intense?)
So, with all that said, I come back to why did the man call me and send me his letter? Was it to encourage me as a writer? Or was it to counsel me as a member of the church? Although he seems to like my book and my overall message in the end -- some of his advice seems to contradict the idea that I should even try to move forward in publishing it. I don't know. It doesn't matter too much because now I won't get back to it until next Spring. LOL!

Too Much To Do...

I have so much I really want to write about. All the field trips and fun things the kids have been doing in school and our fun experience with H1N1, however, my time is a little short because of all those cool things my kids have been doing. We did just take some family photos though, and I did want to get those up to share! I am only going to paste a few here. There will be more on my facebook account!

Religion

Discussing religion is always a touchy subject. It is something people have intensely strong feelings about. I usually try not to touch that subject, but my life is surrounded, daily, by the quandaries of religion. I am a card carrying, garment wearing, temple worthy LDS person, who teaches at a Lutheran school. I have sent my kids to the same school for five years now. I love the school for it's small class size and personal attention. I do like the fact that my kids are taught the lessons from the bible and that they are are able to pray before meals and at the end of the day. I like the fact that for the most part I don't have to worry about who my kids are playing with at school and what kinds of bad things they might learn. My kids can actually sing Christmas songs about Christ or Santa. They are not bullied with political correctness (which I believe has far overstepped its purpose.)
Because I work at a religious institution, they have the right to hire based on religious preferences. I had tried to get hired at my kids school for many years, and often believed I was not chosen because of my religion. The people they hired instead have all come and gone. I believe that after watching me for many years, they were confident in my commitment to the school and in upstanding living. I believe that is why they finally decided that I was an allowable choice to join the staff. I am of the opinion that my religious beliefs are my business. If someone asks, I will tell; but I do not go around publicizing my beliefs.
Now with all that said, here is my point. About a month ago in my class a young boy started to make fun of LDS people by making references to the South Park clip (which other than the dumb, dumb, dumb music - I didn't not think it was really all that bad.) So I said to the student, "you might want to be careful because you never know when an LDS person could be standing near you." He looked shocked. "Are you LDS?" he asked. At that point I told him yes. My students were unaware what religion I was up until that point. I have always felt that most Christian religions should teach tolerance of others and their beliefs.
The other day when I was trying to find a quote about missionaries (see post below) I ran across an interesting article called, "Theocracy in America" by Stephanie Mencimer. I read it. It is a typical attempt at Mormon bashing. The most shocking part about it was she states she went to the very Lutheran school I teach at. She talks about part of the reason for attending the school was to get away from the Mormons in the public schools. I was absolutely disgusted to think that someone who calls themselves a Christian would publish such a defamatory article about another religion. Especially someone who went to the school where I teach and so strongly support. I wonder how she would feel to know that a card carrying, garment wearing, temple worthy LDS person not only teaches at her school, but also sends all four of her kids there. The faculty have often commended me for how wonderful my children behave and how they set good moral examples for the others. I have viewed my time at the Lutheran school as an opportunity to be an ambassador to others, so that others can see that the negative stereotypes they have of the LDS people are not always true.
Anyway, I was thinking that Stephanie should not have written her article and that she should be more tolerant of others -- that she should be more politically correct. Then it hit me -- I was wrong. Stephanie has every right to speak her opinion and not be tolerant of LDS people, so long as she does not infringe upon my human rights. I came to this conclusion because I started to think about the Islamic religion that teaches they must kill all who do not believe in Allah. If I continued to believe that everyone must be tolerant of others religions, then I must believe I must tolerant of the belief that it is okay to kill someone just because they don't believe what you do, and I can't support that. If we are too politically correct and worry too much about what others think or say about us, we will live in fear and someday, someone will come and take our rights away because we didn't stand up for what we thought was wrong. Just like how millions of Jews were allowed to be killed by Hitler. As Elie Weisal said, "there must never be a time we fail to protest." As Camus said, "Not to take a stand, is a stand." I want to be able to take a stand. I want the right to to stand up and say "This is Wrong!" So, therefore, I guess I have to allow Stephanie that same right -- which is tolerance. So, now where am I? Back at the beginning? Oh WHY can't we all just get along??

Jammin' in July

Even though it is still July I can hardly remember what happened at the beginning of the month. On the fourth of July Brady performed in the Clearfield parade and the weather was pretty decent. We wanted to go to after parade festivities at the park but there weren't any.

A few days later it was the twins seventh birthday and we didn't do too much. They were going to a Science camp out at the fairgrounds all week. so their morning was already booked. Later that day they had a friend over to play. We more than made it up to them later, though. We went to pick dad up at the Gateway and had giant Ben and Jerry's sundae's and we went to make new Build-a-Bear's. since Harry Potter was coming out, they both chose to make the Hedwig owl. Then we went to Seven Peaks in Orem for the day. After we finally convinced Hailey to go down some slides it was a lot of fun. Brady and I even got our blood pumping on the half pipe slide. SCARY! Sorry no pictures.


A friend of mine recently moved into a new house this summer. When Brady helped them move he knew he was in trouble -- after I saw the house I instantly starting looking for a new home. I spent quite a few days actually going and touring homes, but unless I go significantly over my price range, I just haven't found anything that offers everything I want -- and I refuse to sell my home first with the idea that someday I'll find it, 'cuz who knows when someday could be.

Ethan was back for two weeks in July as well. He came home specifically to do scout camp and a CSI camp he had signed up for with a friend. Since he is studying Utah history this year, we also took all the kids up to the Golden Spike. Oh, and have I ever mentioned that all of my kids want to be astronauts…

I was seriously stressed out about Scout camp, but it went really well. Now that I have done it once it will be no big deal. At the camp store they were really "pushing" pocket knives. I told the boys they couldn't buy one unless their mom's were there and agreed. Many of the mothers did let their boys get them. I didn't. A week later at least three mom's said their boys had cut themselves. One even needed stitches! OW!

Brady also performed in the Bountiful handcart days parade. They always have a fun carnival at the end. Recently someone posted about some rude people they encountered at a parade -- well check out the goose egg Andrew got because some very large kid bowled him over to get a piece of candy. It is a week later and he still has a scar.

We were also given a large bunch of Apricots from another friend and we spent the last weekend canning jam, nectar, the apricots themselves and making fruit leather. I was overwhelmed and I only had a few buckets. She has three trees full of ripe apricots -- I can't imagine.
I also spent a huge amount of time preparing to go back to work next week. (I am still very unprepared!) I guess in my attempt to prove how unqualified I am, when I moved all the computers around in my room, I brought down the whole school network for 2 days! Yeah me!

The Rest of June...

It wouldn't be one of my blogs if there wasn't something related to Scouts! One of my brilliant ideas this year was to march in a parade with the pack, so we did the South Ogden Days parade and had a great time. (Maybe even started a new tradition!) The boys had a great time! See all those yellow neckerchiefs? Those are all my wolves!

We went to family camp at the girl scout camp Cloud Rim, up above Deer Valley. Even though it was the end of June there was still snow on the ground and it was freezing cold. We still had a great time though! We went on fun hikes and saw a beaver lodge and moose tracks. There were crafts and dance lessons provided. Brady was able to rock climb and after two days we finally convinced Hailey to take a canoe out on the water!

The kids love the fact that Dad works at The Gateway, because every time they go down to visit him in the summer they get to play in the water.

We have done a few other fun things this summer that I didn't get pictures of too.

We had to take Andrew down to Primary's for some check ups. Once you have had the privilege of an extended stay down there you get free tickets to the zoo -- for life! So after we visited the Dr., we borrowed the admissions pass and headed for the zoo for the day. My family can never seem to spend more than a few hours there. We took the passes back and the headed out for a tour of the new temple in West Jordan. It was a very educational experience for the kids. They asked a lot of questions. However, Andrew slept through the whole thing and Brady had to carry him. I think Brady is still trying to recover. We finished off the night by taking the kids to Tempanyaki. Can't get much better than dinner and a show!

We also had both the Liddell and the Kunz family reunions on the same Saturday this month. It was a day full of trying to shove as many unfamiliar names and family history stories as one could remember into our brains. Both of the reunions had Brady play his pipes for entertainment. At the Kunz reunion the twins even sung a duet for everyone and they did a stellar job. Andrew didn't want to be left out either. He is such a ham. He went on stage and sung a duet of Twinkle Little Star with mom!

Brady also had his big Salt Lake competition this month. I have banned family attendance to that one. Payson is free a month later, so I don't want to pay $40 for us all to get in, just to sit around all day doing nothing but trying to keep kids entertained all day. Not only is Payson free, but it has huge playground for the kids! Besides, this year at Salt Lake there was a huge rain storm most of the day! Brady's band didn't even have any competition to speak of, so of course they took first.

On another Saturday of the month, we meat at the house of the twins teacher next year to go on a hike. We went on a four mile hike up in the foothills between St. James and 2nd Street. Brady had to carry Andrew for about half of it, but it was really a lot of fun. Then just as it started to rain we made it back to her house for food. We had a great time roasting hot dogs and marshmallows in the fire pit -- even while it was raining!

We also joined the athletic club for the summer. I have been going almost everyday. I have been doing well taking exercises classes. My favorite discovery has been yoga. It relaxes me and works me out at the same time! Of course the kids just love to go swimming all the time! They haven't even asked to put up the back yard pool's yet 'cuz we just go to the club! Yeah! We haven't even been to the little water park by our house all summer!

It has been an amazing summer so far since we have pretty much only had one week without rain! I hope that this means that the season will last a little longer on the other side. There is so much of summer left to live and so little time and good weather!

Always Doin' Somethin'

Knowing how our summer is planned I will probably have something cool to post every weekend. I sat down and figured out our summer schedule and there were only three free weekends all summer. Too much to do and too little time! This last weekend we started off the morning in Eagle Mountain for a parade Brady was marching in. It was one of the longest parade routes ever and there were almost 130 entries - not bad for the middle of nowhere. The loot the kids collected wasn't too bad either, but they were still sad because the group next to us got everything - like 6 t-shirts, and hat, frisbee and everthing, and we mostly got candy! After that we headed to the Girl Scout Cookie Party. (What would my life be like without Scouts???) It was a huge free carnival for the kids with prizes and bounce house things - the works. After that we headed off to the Kennecott Copper Mine. It was the first time any of had been there. I figured since Ethan would be studying mining with Utah history this year we would make the trip. It was surprisingly pretty cool. If the weather had been better we might have stayed longer, but it was windy and cold and we were hungry. So we went to the Old Spagetti Factory. It is great because it had a special gluten free menu for Hailey. Poor Andrew just couldn't keep up. He fell alseep at the table just before the ice cream arrived! The next day was the air show at the base. We have been looking forward to this for a long time, since the last one we were able to attend was in 2006. I checked a few different weather reports that said it would rain all day. I asked the kids if they cared if it was raining and they said no, so we bundled up and off we went. It was raining the entire time we were there. The good part was compared to the time we were there before this time was actually better. I'll take the rain over the heat anyday. There weren't too many people either. The longest line we stood in was to get into the cockpit of the c-5. They still were able to do everything they wanted to do -- collect all the free stuff and visit the NASA booth. They also had a great time stomping in all the puddles. We had to leave a little early, and as we were leaving it stopped raining and was clear the rest of the day. That was frustrating. If weather people are paid so dang much to predict weather, why can't they be even somewhat accurate? Ethan and I went to the park by our house in the afternoon to watch the Thunderbirds do their thing in the afternoon. All in all it was a pretty busy weekend!

More Monday Pictures

Memorial Day Weekend -- Monday

On the way home we stopped in Heber to play at the railroad for Thomas the Train Day. They got to ride on the little maintenance car and see a magic show and pet ponies and play games and get balloon animals and all kinds of fun...for free! The bottom two pictures were taken a few years ago when we went before, just for a comparison shot! It's funny to see that both times Hailey seems to be standing apart from the boys...hum...

More Sunday Pictures

Memorial Day Trip -- Sunday

Sunday we went to a place called Red Canyon Lodge. It was a lot of fun. If you are ever looking for a fun place to go with kids, this would be the place. They had a small kids fishing pond. Ethan and Hayden both caught fish there. Hailey and Andrew tried, but never quite made it. Then the boys went on a paddle boat out on the lake. We tried to get Hailey set up for horse back riding, but they were too full. We went to pet and feed the horses anyway. Then we fished some more on the lake and Ethan caught a relatively big one right from the dock. Then we went to a few scenic overlooks of Flaming Gorge and then went on a tour of the damn. The kids favorite part of the tour were the marmots that were collecting all the fish food at the bottom of the damn. The kids also completed packets here to earn a pretty cool patch for their scout jackets.

More Saturday Pictures