May Happenings

I finally got some pics edited to blog about! This first one I took May 6th and it's kind of hard to tell what's going on in it. Christian had gotten a hold of a spool of white thread and thought he would make a giant art sculpture-type-thing with it. He wound the thread around a bunch of bar stools and things on the counter, and then managed to hang a glue stick from it. Sounds like someone is turning out to be creative like his sister :)

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Later that day, my sister brought over their puppy, Tiff, for her first haircut. (Remember this little fluffball from Christmas?) She was really pretty good for it!

On May 8th, the sickness curse struck our family yet again and Christian was running a fever. By the next day, Faith was sick, too! Here the kids are, in the middle of the day, down for a nap with their "barf bowls". Tony & I were both suffering from some nasty allergies that week, so we were a pretty pittiful bunch of souls!

By Mother's Day the kids were both feeling better, so we visited the grandparents and brought gifts of homemade fudge. (I'll have to get the recipe posted soon--it's incredible!) I didn't manage to remember to take pictures besides this one, Buddy sure loves his grandmas!

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I had a wonderful Mother's day and got the cutest gifts from my kids (pictures coming in the next post). I love being a mom and feel very privileged to be able to stay home with them every day. Thank you Tony for working so hard to make it possible!

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On May 12th I went out to dinner with the fabulous ladies that I was in the 6th Ward Primary presidency with. It was so much fun chatting and laughing with those gals, I can't wait to do it again!

I should mention that I have a new calling--nursery coordinator! I'm so glad to still be in the primary, and I really look forward to doing some fun things with the tiny ones. I'm especially excited to do music time with them!

On the 13th, Faith told me that she noticed a bird coming out from behind our satelite dish. We got on a ladder and found this nest with four little chicks! They'd been there for awhile because they were already all feathered out. On Memorial Day we checked on them and they were already gone :(

Early May 14th I left for a PTA conference being held on the BYU campus. Faith made me this letter to remind me how much they each would miss me :D

I ended up having a lot of fun with our PTA board ladies, even though some of the seminars were less than thrilling. The first day I went to a class about getting people involved in their child's education and one about the School Land Trust program. We then met up and went to lunch at the Brick Oven, which has great salad and pasta bars. My last class was about an online membership program. We went to dinner at PF Changs. I'd never been there before and I loved it! After that, we stayed up too late playing Phase 10 and being silly.

The next day I had a really neat class about increasing membership and then one about PTA awards. After that, there was a general meeting where we got to hear from motivational speaker Chad Hymas, and that was an absolute treat! We skipped out on the presentations and instead spent a long lunch at T.G.I.Friday's. The last class was called "Music and the Brain" and was taught by Michael Hamblin. What great information! Did you know that most children under 14 are kinesthetic/tactile learners (they learn best through movement and exploring the environment)? We did a fun clapping game to "The Lady With the Aligator Purse" and soothing (& tiring!) movements to "Kumbayah" as part of the seminar.

The conference certainly did its job--motivated me to do a good job in my positions in membership and grants next year. I hope everyone reading this who has kids in school will become a PTA member!! It really is a great organization which does a lot for the children with a small amount of money.

I got home Friday night and on Saturday the kids spent a lot of time playing our new Wii game "Wii Ski & Snowboard". It's hilarious to watch Christian play this and try to avoid crashing into everything!

Faith's team won their soccer game that day. The regular season is over, but they have one makeup game on the 30th.

When my mom came over to watch the kids while I was at PTA conference, she brought an awesome gift. These two containers of tiny caterpillars and a butterfly pavillion!

Here's how big they were on the 17th,

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. . . . . . . . . . and the 19th,

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and the 22nd. In this one they are getting ready to make their chrysalises. I will post more on them in a week or so ;)

Speaking of new pets, Faith got this Beta fish and named him Grape Juice.

When I was editing this picture of his fish bowl, I noticed a pair of sneaky little eyes on the lower left. Come on, Dusty, say it with me "Fish are friends, not food!" (~name that movie~)

You can see him better here, he's getting sooooooo big!

And finally, Christian doing his favorite activity again--cooking. This happens to be lemon poppyseed muffins.

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We've had a great month of May at our house!