Luella's Kitty Cat

Our sweet neighbor Luella leaves each winter for Arizona. She has tamed this wild cat, but hasn't dared take it back and forth with her. It adopts us each winter. As soon as there is too much snow to catch mice it starts crying at our doorstep. We feed and snuggle it each day. My kids love her. 

Oakley and the Museum

For Oakley's humanities class she had to attend a museum. She suckered Ali into going with her. They found out from someone that the Artitorium could count as a museum and since it is a kids place they brought along the little cousins. Memory and Ember thought it was so cool to have a date with the big girls! They played and played and Oakley and Ali laughed and laughed at those two cute little girls. Oakley was suppose to have a picture to turn into her professor to show that she had gone and this was the best one they got of Ember. Hahahaha! Too funny! They also learned on their outing that Memory can speak "Cat!" They got to listen to it all the way into town. Hahaha! Hilarious! Cousins, big and little are seriously the best!  

Snow Date

On Saturday March 2nd I got to finally go with Ryan to try out his new tracks/4-wheeler.  He's taken the boys out, but this was my first time. We ran to Ozone and weren't there long, but it was so fun! This machine is incredible. It could go anywhere. We rode all over checking everything out. We saw close to 100 elk, a deer and a coyote. It was a gorgeous day. Chilly, but gorgeous. I did learn that when Ryan says he's just going to wear his sweatshirt, coat, jeans and muck boots that I DEFINITELY need to bring my snow pants. :) I do love the days I get to put on my muck boots and tag along with him though. Those are for sure my favorite days!

SNAP Activity

This year the youth from our ward had the opportunity to help with the SNAP (Special Needs Adult Primary) Valentines Dance. Rhett was asked to take pictures at the photo booth. I got to help with this years ago when I was serving in YW's and was so excited that my kids got to participate this year,  and was even more excited when they needed an extra driver! Wahoo!! It was such a fun activity with these sweet people with such incredibly special spirits. 💓

Skiing

The kids were out of school on February 18th and this year the snow just keeps coming and coming so we decided to go with cousins skiing. They had a blast!

Violet, Memory, Laiklie, Rhett and Sage

Drama Club 2019

Drama Club 2019 was another successful year! This is Laiklie's last year of drama club and I have committed to helping one more year then I will be finished as well. We did Lion King Jr. for the show this time and we had a great turn out. The kids worked SO HARD and did an amazing job! We had some great little voices and the costumes and animals were amazing! Laiklie got to be Sarabi, Simba's mom and Mufasa's wife. She is the tallest kid in the entire elementary so she towered over Mufasa. Hahaha! No big deal! Most of the girls towered over the boys in the play. It's just the age for that. Laiklie did great on her lines and loved spending Wednesdays with her friends at drama club. 

The week of the play is probably my most stressful week every year. I don't sleep, I am constantly going over all the little details and the songs are never ending running through my head. Being a co-director of 75 kids and trying to put on 4 successful shows is CRAZY to say the least. I am the backstage lady that makes sure sets and kids are where they are suppose to be. I run the lights and the curtains and crowd control. It is always high stress.....but it always turns out amazing. Such a great feeling to be a part of something that affects so many little lives in such a positive way. I'm so blessed!

Boise Dance Competition 2019

On February 15th the girls and I headed to Boise for the annual dance competition. Oakley decided since it was her car she got to drive. (Can you see me rolling my eyes?!?!) I told her since it was a clear sunny day she could drive to Pocatello where we were going to stop for lunch. When we got to Pocatello though she insisted on still driving. I, of course, gave in. She is actually a really good driver for the most part. About an hour of so outside of Pocatello we hit a TERRIBLE snow storm. It was blowing snow like crazy. We passed several cars off the rode and a semi on its side. The road was covered in slush that was constantly jerking us around. Oakley wanted to continue to drive so I said a little prayer and let her. She did amazing through the storm....she did scare me to death one time passing a semi when the slush about jerked her off the road and she jerked back. AHHHH!!! But she really did a great job. 

 We stopped in Jerome to use the bathroom and I asked her if the car needed gas. She said no, that it didn't. To tell you the truth I'm not sure if she even checked the gauge. She had gassed up that morning so I think she assumed we were fine. About 20 minutes outside of Mountain Home I heard a "Ding" and asked her what it was. IT WAS HER GAS GAUGE SAYING WE HAD ONLY 20 MILES OF GAS LEFT! What?!?! We were seriously in the middle of no where. We were too far past Mountain Home and still 40ish miles from Boise. Oakley was FREAKING OUT! I did get a pretty hilarious video of her freak out! Hahaha. She said, "I think we need to pray." I kind of giggled and she said, "No Mom, I'm Serious, I think we need to pray!" HAHAHA! Heavenly Father was watching over us that day and all of the sudden in the middle of no where when we were down to 12 miles left in the tank there was this little gas station. A definite tender mercy of the Lord. Once we got to the gas station she was ready to let me drive. About running out of gas scared her far more than the snow storm. :) Poor girl! 

 

 When we pulled into the hotel parking lot I asked Laiklie if she remembered to bring up her leatherish pants that she had tried on that morning and needed for her long duet with Ellie? We started digging through the bags, and NOPE, they were still on her bedroom floor at home. So we ran to Walmart as quick as we could and found a pair of leggings for her and Ellie that we made work for that night. We've learned with this kind of thing we just have to improvise. The girls danced well.  It was a great first competition of the new year. Oakley lost her tap part way through her freestyle and was suppose to be on stage to do her acapella  just after. I ran to the car looking for another pair of clogging shoes while her and Kasandra tried putting the tap back on the pair she was wearing. They successfully got it back on just in time for her turn on stage, only to have it fly off part way through the acapella. So sad! She didn't even finish the acapella, just kind of walked off the stage. Such a bummer! She got a 4th overall on her freestyle even with losing a tap so that was great! Such a fun weekend to be together. I love being the mom of these girls.