School Days!

It is official... I am old! Sydney started kindergarten this year. School actually started on August 25th (26th for Kindergarten), but I have been horrible about blogging lately. Sorry! Anyway, school is going great. Syd loves her class, her teacher, recess and the bus ride home. She doesn't even notice that she is learning. Usually when I ask her what she learned in school, she says nothing, we just played. But, her reading is getting so much better. Yes, she is learning to read! When we read bedtime stories I will point out 3 and 4 letter words and she can sound them out. It is crazy!

I do have one cute story. I know, I share way too many of those! But, here it is: Syd came home from school last week and said they had learned about shapes. I figured she meant triangles, circles and squares; which she already knew. She surprised me by telling me about a hexagon, a rhombus and a parallelogram. She giggles every time she says those 'huge' words. It is so exciting to see her excited about learning!

I hope all of your school kids have teachers as wonderful as Mrs. Francis. She is awesome! Syd loved her the first time she met her.

P.S. The shirt Syd is wearing in the pictures below she calls her "mommy shirt". She thinks she looks like a mom in this shirt. Funny girl!

Jack Johnson in Concert!

Brian got tickets to go see Jack Johnson last Monday in SLC. We drove down Monday afternoon and got to the USANA Amphitheater at about 4:30. I thought that was pretty early-- the doors didn't even open until 5-- but I was wrong! There was already a line when we got there and when the doors opened I was glad we got our pick of seats. The concert didn't start until 7, so we had two hours of waiting, but it was fun (and interesting) to watch the strange array of people that attended the concert. There were two opening bands, one I liked, one I didn't. Jack didn't even play until almost 9pm. So, that gave people 4 hours to get really truly drunk. It was quite a sight! Then, when Jack did start performing, out came the drugs. I have no idea what people in the pit were smoking, but it definitely wasn't a cigarette. So sad! But, even with all the crazies, it was an amazing concert. We had a few songs that we really wanted to hear and we lucked out and got to hear all of our favorites. The concert lasted until 11pm. It was great! But, we made the mistake of doing the trip up and back in one day. Yeah, we'll never make that mistake again. We didn't get home until 3am. Next time we will get a hotel. It wasn't worth saving money, we were both so tired that we had to switch off driving. But, overall we had a great time! Hooray for Jack Johnson!

'Who Let The Dogs Out?'

Preface: We are dog sitting this summer for my parents while they put their yard in. Our dog's name is Toby and he is a Border Collie.

The Story: On Saturday morning at 5am we awoke to the sound of someone banging (I literally mean banging) on our front door. We jumped out of bed and Brian ran to answer the door. An Idaho Falls police officer was at our door. He said there had been complaints about our dog barking and bothering the neighbors. Brian said, "We haven't heard our dog bark at all tonight." The officer said it was Toby and it had to stop. Brian was furious. I think he was about to kick poor Toby out! I looked out the back window to see if Toby was barking and he was curled up sound asleep. I knew it wasn't Toby! I know his bark and he is not a yappy, barking dog. He is a really good dog. Anyway, Brian went outside to make sure Toby was quiet and he saw another dog in our yard. A stray dog had squeezed in through the fence, eaten all of Toby's food and then proceeded to bark up a storm all night. Coincidently, this stray mut was also black and white, just like our border collie. But, how do we apologize to the neighbors? "Hey, sorry about the barking, but it wasn't our dog it was another black and white dog that just happened to be in our fenced-in back yard." Yeah, right. That sounds unbelievable even to me-- even if it is the truth. Luckily, Brian scared that darn dog so bad that it has not been back. But, Brian did look at pellet guns at Wal-Mart on Saturday afternoon!

Hand in Glove FHE

Once again my wonderful friend Diantha comes to my rescue. Thanks for emailing me the FHE lessons. I am posting it so all can use it because eventually all of us and our children will experience the death of a family member or friend. Here it is. Hope it helps your family. My mom told Sydney the basics of this lesson the day of my great uncle's funeral and she has already "taught" Brian and I about it multiple times. I am impressed with how quickly she grasped the concept and put complete faith in it. Oh, if only we were all "as little children".

Hand in glove
Brief Description/Purpose: The familiar body/spirit glove object lesson, adapted for Primary children.
Objects Used/Preparation: a glove
Lesson:
Each of us are made up of two parts: a body and a spirit. You can see a body and feel it and it can move and talk and do all those wonderful things. You can't see a spirit, but it is also there. Can you see radio waves coming into your radio? Can you see music waves coming out of a piano? Instruct the children to blow into their hands--can they see the air? No, but we know all those things are there. This glove represents your body and my hand is your spirit. (Put the glove on the hand) Your body has to have a spirit inside, or it wouldn't be alive and able to move around. When it is time to die then the spirit leaves the body and goes back to be with God, who created our spirits. (Take off the glove) The body is not alive anymore, but the person that we know and love still exists but as a spirit. We can't see spirits, but we know they are there. The body stays right here on earth until it is time for the resurrection. What is that? It is when your spirit is joined again to your body. (Put the glove on again) After a person is resurrected, the spirit and body will always stay together and never be separated again! It is sad when people we love die, because it means that we won't see them for a long time. When Jesus was resurrected, he made it possible for us to be resurrected too. We know we will see our friends and family because Jesus
was resurrected.

Source: http://www.geocities.com/
Here is a link to a hand puppet to make
http://library.lds.org/nxt/gateway.dll/Magazines/Friend/2006.htm/
friend%20september%202006.htm/sunday%20box%20%20you%20are%20
eternal.htm?fn=document-frameset.htm$f=templates$3.0

I'm Speechless!

Today the girls and I attended my great uncle's funeral. It was a celebration of his life because he is in a better place, out of pain and with his wife. Of course, it is sad for the children and family still here, but as members of the Church, we can see the joy and hope in this funeral. At the luncheon after the funeral, Sydney was with my grandma. (My dad's mother.) Out of my hearing, Sydney made this comment to my grandmother: "Grandma, it's about time we had a funeral for you. Maybe in the next couple weeks." What do you say to that? Luckily, my grandmother is a wonderful lady that thought Sydney's comment was funny. I thought I was going to die! (No pun intended.) To continue my mortification, grandma proceeded to tell everyone at the luncheon about her 'cute great-granddaughter's comment'. My mom had an incite about Sydney's comment. She said that Sydney is starting to figure out that getting old means dying and she knows that grandma is getting old. My mom also told me that it is time to have a family home evening about physical death and where our spirits go. She said she's seen an FHE using a hand in a glove to show the difference between the outer body and the spirit. Anyone have an FHE lesson like that? If so, please let me know. I'd love to get a copy from you.

Our Climber

Yesterday I was emptying the dishwasher. I turned my back for less than 30 seconds and when I turned around Payton was "helping" me empty the dishwasher.

What a great story...

This evening I was feeding Payton her dinner and noticed that my table cloth had red crayon scribbled on it. Trying not to be angry I asked Sydney what happened. This was my answer: "Well, I was coloring and then my crayon did something bad." Yeah, right. It was the Crazy Crayon. I can just see Sydney struggling to keep the red crayon from drawing on the table cloth. I explained that crayons do not do bad things on their own. Anyway, it was a great story! I have been laughing about the version in my head all evening!

The Look

This particular post is dedicated to our wonderful friends the Wallings. Recently, I read Diantha's post about Madison cutting Garrett's hair-- an experience we have not yet had. I told Sydney about the incident. She got a horrified look on her face and said, "Oh, no!" Thinking I had a good teaching opportunity I said, "Sydney, what are scissors for?" Sydney just looked at me like I was stupid and rolled her eyes at me. Then she said, "Mom,(imagine drawing out the word into two syllables)I know!" "Ok, but just tell me," I replied. Then I got THE LOOK. You know the one, it says, "I am humoring you because I think you are crazy and I am tired of this subject." So, in an equally humiliating voice Syd replies,"For paper, Mom." Yeah, she's five. I can't wait for 16. If THE LOOK is already this impressive, what will it be like in 11 years? Scary!!

Bear Lake

We had so much fun at the cabin. The girls were really good-- except Payton didn't sleep. The weather was great. On Thursday night Brian and Trevor surprised us and rode up with Adam. Sydney was so excited to see Daddy. It just wasn't a vacation without him. We got home Sunday afternoon and I was actually ready to be home. There's no bed like your own!

Dam Marathon Recap

So, the 5k was over a month ago and I am finally posting the pictures.

P.S. I don't know where my captions are! Sorry.