Happy Birthday to Allison!

We kidnapped Allison, our newest Laurel, last night for her birthday. She just turned 16, so now she is in my class at church. Chelsie blindfolded her, and we took her to IHOP for dinner. We had a great time...here is a picture of our table, minus me, of course (Allison is the second one from the far end on the right):

Jace's Bike Rodeo

Jace had his annual bike rodeo at school yesterday. He had so much fun! The preparation was less than exciting for us (read: the parents), though. To pass inspection at the rodeo, your bike has to have reflectors, a bell or horn, and a headlight (why elementary school children would be riding at night, I have no idea, but anyway...). So, I remembered that his headlight was really crappy last year and it broke like the week after the rodeo, so I picked him up one at Wal Mart...no big deal, right? Well, I forgot that his really cool combination compass/bell broke a few months ago, too. Jace reminded me of this the night before. Matt, the best dad in the whole wide world, went to get one after his stake meeting that night. He went to Wal Mart, Dick's and finally Academy (he was too late to get to Target). Finally, the only one he could find was a Disney Princess bell. Yeah. So, at 10:30 PM, I'm in there sanding this pink bell so the paint will stick to it and hunting for something to cover up the pink heart that unfortunately was important to the construction of the bell. The next morning, after the bell was painted, complete with a spider on top (the bottom was purple, but the top was black...it's almost Halloween, right?!), Jace said, "Is that ALL you could find?" After I explained to him that I could scrape all the paint off, pull the cover off the heart and put the Disney Princess sticker back on the top if he wanted me to, he was fine with it. Anyway, here are the pictures Matt took (I was at a play with Brett and his preschool...the dividing of the parents begins!).

Jace just before his turn:
Inspection time:
Look how straight he's riding!
Jace in action, riding through the cones:

Amarillo Trip!

So we got to go to Amarillo this past weekend for my friend Leslie's wedding and since Chuck and his family live there, we got to stay with them and visit, too! We had such a good time! The boys had a blast hangin' with their cousins, and Matt and I had a great time watching Psych with Chuck and Heather and going to the wedding. Here are some pictures of our mini-vacation:

OK, Cyn! You made the blog! This is me and my best friend, Cynthia. We haven't seen each other since Dan's wedding which was about 2 years ago? I think?
OK, so my camera is not working so well, but this is my friend Lindsay, me and Cyn again...so much fun to see everyone at the wedding! Leslie, you should get married again soon...j/k! Oh, and I got no pictures of Leslie because my camera was in the trunk until AFTER the wedding...oh well,
This one deserves explanation. As the bride and groom were headed out the door, we all had sparklers for their send-off! It was a cool idea, but a lot of people were gone before the send-off happened, so there were loads of sparklers left. The pink sand was in vases with the unlit sparklers stuck in there for us to grab on our way out. Leslie's mom didn't want to keep the sand so Paul, Cyn's husband, took it out and poured it into these pots at the front of the country club. Then he had the brilliant idea of taking the left over sparklers, sticking them in the pot, and lighting them from the bottom. Man, did they burn hot and fast! It kind of reminded me of a certain chemistry lab. It's amazing that we didn't burn the place down! Here is the aftermath:
The pinkish/redish glow in the middle was the smoldering afterward, not the pink sand:
Here's Paul distinguishing the leftovers:
And then here are the kids playing at Chuck's house:

Reilly and Brett coloring:
Me and Chuck with "our" birthday cookie. Matt ordered the cookie before we left San Antonio as an afterthought, not remembering that Chuck's birthday was the following week and that we should celebrate it, too! Sorry, Chuck! The cookie was still good, though, even without your stinkin' name on it!!!

And for Chuck's birthday, I got him so smart alecky signs for his classroom at Tascosa High School where he teaches Spanish:

And, my personal favorite, Chuck with the only Sandie allowed in his room, the Rebel blowing the Sandie away. For those of you confused, Chuck (and the rest of us) went to Amarillo High School and our mascot was the Golden Sandstorm, or a Sandie (basically a small tornado), and now he teaches at the rival high school in Amarillo, Tascosa...
And the kids watching a movie. The girls were so good to Brett:

New Grass for Dad!

So we spent the better part of today throwing sod in Grandpa's yard. It looks so much better with no weeds and dirt over there! Hope you like it, Dad! Here are some pictures for you (if you click on them, the differences are easier to see):

Before (yucky, weedy, dirt patched eye sore):
Before grass, after top soil:
Yay! New grass!

Testimony Gloves

Since Matt was working Monday, I had youth on Tuesday, and Jace was sick Wednesday and Thursday, we finally had family home evening on Friday night! The boys made testimony gloves and we learned the important parts of a testimony and we talked about the importance of having your own testimony and finding out for yourself if things are true. Here is a picture of them with their gloves, even though the gloves are hard to see:

These are the 5 things we talked about:

1. I know that God is our Heavenly Father and He loves us.

2. I know that His Son, Jesus Christ, is our Savior and Redeemer.

3. I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God. He restored the gospel of Jesus Christ to the earth and translated the Book of Mormon by the power of God.

4. I know that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the Lord’s Church on the earth today.

5. I know that this Church is led by a living prophet who receives revelation.

If you want to make one or use it for a lesson, you can find instructions here.

Heart Attack!

I feel so loved! I got heart attacked twice in one week! The first one was for someone's family home evening, I'm guessing, and they brought me a heart cookie (I love cookies!) and hearts on the door. The 2nd one was much more elaborate, thanks to Allison Burwell and Becky Mendez.

On Tuesday, we were having class activites with our youth at church and my group, the Laurels (16 & 17-year-old girls), were at my house. Allison and Sister Mendez came over and decorated the sidewalk with chalk, Matt's truck with butterflies and stars, and our front door with loads of hearts, then left a treat, rang the door bell and ran. Well, apparently we don't have enough bushes to hide behind and they got caught. But we were getting ready to have milk shakes, so they got to come in and join us. The boys thought it was so great the next morning, especially when they got to enjoy a rice krispie treat!!! Thanks to all who made me smile! Here are some pictures of the 2nd one:


OK, so the last picture deserves an explanation and is definitely blog-worthy. So, a couple months ago during the summer, the boys and Matt were really into watching Survivor Man on Discovery Channel. It's this show where a guy supposedly goes out in the wild and survives without very many supplies and he does things like eat scorpions and other bugs, plants and sometimes animals to live for a few days. Well, I guess Jace decided it would be a great idea to play Survivor Man and get Brett to eat a spider, so he told him that it would make him run faster. I was not outside at the time, and Brett comes running in saying, "Look how fast I can run after eating that spider!" I, of course, had to question him about that and after the story came out, I questioned Jace about the fact that he told Brett to eat a spider. Jace confessed right away and we had to have a little talk about not eating bugs or spiders or anything else we find outside. Matt wasn't home until late that night, so he didn't get to see the boys until the next morning. First thing when the boys woke up, Matt asked Jace if he would like to have spiders for breakfast, and Brett immediately responded, "No! Mom says we don't eat bugs!" So, at least he was listening! I told the girls in my class about it a couple Sundays ago and they thought it was great, so that's where the message in chalk comes in...funny stuff!

Just call this house "Wild Kingdom"

A few weeks ago, you may have read about our possum in the attic. Well, last Sunday night, we were sitting in the living room shortly after the boys were in bed and we heard the cat going nuts. Matt went to investigate and discovered 3 racoons (a mom and 2 babies) in the garage. We had left the door up, unfortunately, and they came in to scavenge for some cat food. Matt was able to scare 2 of them out (the mom and 1 baby) but the other baby was too afraid to go out! He was stuck under my car for a little while and then scooted over in the corner of the garage behind some shelves and rolled up in a ball. He would not come out! So out came the trusty old trap again...we set it and dumped some cat food in there...and waited. A few minutes later, he smelled the food and started getting curious. Pretty soon, he walked right into the trap and Matt was able to carry him off down the hill to the lake. We hope he found his mom! Here are some pics of our 2nd critter: