Yard Sale Blissdom

I forgot to show you my favorite find from last weeks yard sales - a sparkley new ruffled cake stand!

Best Birth Story Ever

Remember cute little Tristan who has been coming here the last several months? Well, on Tuesday morning, his brave Mommy gave birth to his sister IN THEIR DRIVEWAY! That's right, after a very accelerated labor, little sister decided to come out in their minivan with only Daddy there to catch her just as our BISHOP arrived to help!!

Here they are, coming to pick up Tristan after bring the sweet new baby home from the hospital. And yes, that is the minivan she was born in. Thank heavens for Relief Society Presidents, home teachers and steam cleaners!

Lispy Lisps and Empty Smiles

She did it - last week in fact. One night at bedtime Sophie I heard Sophie crying in her room. She told me that all of the kids and teachers at school were telling her to pull out out her tooth. It was hanging there in her mouth by a mere wisp of gum. She did not want all of the unwanted attention and she did not want to pull out her tooth.

So, I did what any concerned Mother would do - I pretended to see how loose her tooth was and then quick as a wink, I yanked it out. No pain and no blood - I was actually surprised she had not swallowed it at lunch that day. Sophie is left with the most adorable smile and a charming little lisp. I hope her front teeth take their time coming in!

Wacky People I Happen To Love

Yard Sale Therapy

These were my favorite finds from last week. Let me tell you one more time. I love yard sales.

1. Huge bin of legos for $8.00. The bin includes and entire lego Thomas the Train set with tracks and four trains and a mechanical magnetic lift tower thingy. The kids have been playing with these non-stop!


2. Twirly skirt for $1.00. I may have jumped up and down a little when I found this because every little girl needs a go-to bright red twirly skirt! When I was a girl, I had a yellow dress my Grandma Johnson made for me that I wore all of the time. It was my go to swirly dress and I loved it.

Card Class April

Card Class is next week on Wednesday April 29th and Thursday April 30th at 7:00pm. Classes are always free. All of the supplies are from Archivers and you will need adhesive, pop-dots and scotch tape. Please cut your paper before you arrive. You will also need to bring your own ribbon, three colors to match the baby boy card (you do not need more than 1/2 yard of each) and a bright red grosgrain for the berry card. If you would like to use ribbon I have on hand, the cost is $2.50. If you would like to attend, please email me and I will send you the supply list and dimensions for cutting. Thanks!

Chasing Ducks

It's that time of year again - ducks in the backyard. When Calvin was little, he would chase ducks all over the yard, often disappearing between the neighbors houses. It used to give me a heart attack as I would tear out of the house to give chase.

After Easter Craft

Thank you to Lori for this idea. The week after Easter, we made piles of egg-salad sandwiches. Somehow we forgot to make deviled eggs on Easter Day. Oops. As I peeled the eggs, I saved the shells in a muffin tin, separated by color. I set them outside to dry in the sun and promptly forgot about them.

The wind blew the muffin tin off the deck, but I made Max go pick up all of the shells from the grass because we needed those shells to craft! Glue + eggs shells = art!

In Memory of My Garden

Remember the nasty voles that moved from my neighbors yard into mine? Well, turns out they are still wrecking havoc in my neighbors yard and they have destroyed one of my garden beds. I finally managed to get outside to do some weeding (like 1/100th of what needs to be done) the other day and as I was pulling out the dead vegetation, I found this:


Those used to be lilies - lots and lots of lilies. These bulbs below used to be tulips and other stuff I can't really remember.


They have even eaten the bark off the flowering bushes! I want them all dead. Not deterred, scared away or moving into someone else's yard. I. want. them. dead.

I have some to terms with the rabbits. They nibble a good 50% of my bulbs as they come up, and I just plant more. The difference between the rabbits is this: the tulip the rabbit nibbles, could catch a break and come up next year. The tulip the vole gets to is gone - it eats the whole bulb.

So how do I accomplish my mission to kill the vile vole rodents? We already have rodent traps under the bay window in the front of the house and under the deck in the back. They are the kind where the little vermin go in, eat some poison, then go die somewhere else. We actually found a dead vole in the backyard on Thursday morning, but I was too busy cleaning up vomit on my carpet to properly celebrate.

The two poison stations are not cutting it so do any of you have any suggestions. And no, we cannot get a cat. I am very allergic.

Warm Weather Wednesday

Wednesday was GORGEOUS! Sunny and 67 - the perfect day to be outdoors! Kelly and I decided to take the kids on a 2.25 mile walk around Jensen Lake. The walk was marred only by the arrival of one billion gnats. They got in Evi's eyes and up Calvin's nose. Calvin thought the bugs must like to eat boogers. I think I swallowed about a dozen (bugs, not boogers).

No matter, the kids ran, ran, ran, threw rocks in the lakes, found the tree with the big tumor and were thoroughly exhausted by the time we reached the playground at the end of the trail. Success.

Views from my window - Wednesday

The first outdoor lunch of the season!

A Lemon Bar Haiku

smalls squares of sunshine
my lemon bars so fine. hey,
where did they all go?

haiku by Bryan, lemon bars by me.

Views from my window - Spring Cleaning

Our friend Ken came over with his rented power washer yesterday and washed all the grime off the summer toys which had been stored under the deck for the winter.


Since the kids were drawn to the power washer like a magnet, and not wanting any of them to lose some skin, I distracted them all with a movie indoors. Meet the Robinsons is pretty funny.


The toys are all put together and saw several hours of hard use today as the temperature soared to 67 today!! It was gorgeous.

Some Day, I'll look Back and Laugh

I'm not laughing now. I could have wallpapered a bathroom with the number of these Max has brought home this year. He always has some great story about how he has no idea he got a blue slip even though the slip spells out the crime. I would like to point out that I have no idea who the issuing teacher is on this particular blue slip . . . ?

Buck-Tooth No More

Easter Sunday

What did you do on Easter Sunday? Did it look a lot like this? Dad was home all day, we had dinner, games and an egg hunt with good friends - loved it.