recap on last week

Beware: this post contains quite a few pictures. I can't remember how to do a collages on picasa, so you'll have to look at these pictures one by one. . .

This past week has been a busy, productive one. After 14 years, our trampoline mat finally wore out, so we had to buy a new one the next day since all the kids love it so much.

I have Cam's new room about done. I just need to get some curtains to go on the rod- with Freda's help. And that is to say- with Freda doing all the work. . . I love how his room turned out, and I especially loved that I didn't have to paint the room. It's nice that Cam has a lot more space now.

Last Saturday we had a garage sale here with the Skeens. It was a big success, with 10-30 people there straight from 7:30-9:30. We made $250 and the Skeens raked in $500. Sweet! I was so ready to get rid of the pile of "stuff" I'd been collecting for the past 6 weeks.

Salomon the dog came to hang out with us Sunday- Thursday. He kept us entertained with his funny ways. He's so like a toddler who just wants to be played with non-stop. When Emma came on Thursday, they made a great pair playing outside together for about an hour.

I feel such guilt when Sal looks at me with those sad eyes. He just wants to be played with! What also brings the guilt is when he goes outside and gets a ball and brings in inside and drops it at my feet. . .

Lydia loved playing with Sal through the window

She didn't love getting stuck under the table so much

Emma could tell Sal to do whatever she wanted to, and he usually did it. She even got him to try a piece of a leaf.

I don't think he fell for this bowl of sticks, leaves and mud however. . .

Sal LOVES to play catch with this ball. We all love to throw it because you use that little handle, then you don't have to touch the wet, slobbery ball!

Brad helping Jess fly. . .

And of course, Emma had to try too.

Friday night Mike and I drove to Bountiful with Tom and Freda to attend Jakes lacrosse game against Bountiful- the high school Derek Raymond plalys for. It was fun to meet up with Teresa and kids, and Brad and kids and watch the game and eat subway. We also all tried real hard not to freeze to death. It was fun for the cousins to play against each other, and funner for Jake in the end as Logan won by one point. Luckily, this morning watching Cam's two baseball games in Providence, the wind wasn't blowing, the sun was out, and it warmed up from 41 degrees when we started at 9:30, to 62 degrees when we finished at 1:45. We then, along with about 30 other family members, spent the next three hours at the Skeens listening to Andy tell about his mission to Mongolia. It was very interesting and educational. It's wonderful to see a returned missionary so in love with the country and people he served for two years. His parents went to pick him up and were able to tour around his mission for 10 days. Here's a pictures of a contortionist that they saw when then attended a production one night. Amazing! Her bum is resting on her head!

Yummy. . . for dinner we ate one of my favorite dishes- hawaiian haystacks.

Who is Cam texting???

This gym in the Skeens basement is da bomb!

All 7 siblings and Mom together! That doesn't happen very often. I think the last time it did was at Mom's 80th birthday celebration in '06.

Next post I promise pictures of Jessica's new room!

Redecoration, Easter, Spring break

So, lots has been happening the past few weeks. Cam thought it was time for him to have a bedroom and bathroom downstairs with Jake, so for the 3rd time in 4 years, Jessica has changed rooms (she and Cam switched). In the summer of '06 when Kylee went to Alaska, Jess moved out of her room into the big room at the bottom of the stairs as the priviledge of the oldest in the family. She enjoyed that room for 2 years until she graduated and it was Jakes turn to have it. He decided he didn't want to change rooms, so we made the big bedroom the game room and Jess got moved back into her original room. Two years later, and she's being moved again, this time upstairs into Cam's old room. It is the smallest bedroom in the house, but as she's hardly ever home, and when she is, she isn't in her room, she went along with the plan very willingly. And a bonus- she gets a bathroom all to herself! So, for the past 2-3 weeks, we've all worked hard to get the rooms changed, and redecorated in the process- including a new look for the bathroom upstairs. The messiest job was stripping the wallpaper and boarder off in Cam's room. Luckily it only went from the ceiling 1/4 way down the wall. But still. Hopefully I won't have to do that again anytime soon. . . Neither room is totally done, so I'm offering a sneak peak of Jessica's- with more to come of her's and Cam's (and sorry the picts aren't in the right order. . . ). We enjoyed a visit from the Bundy girls this weekend. We all love having them around, and especially loved Lindsey's decorating expertise with Jessica's room. She was a huge help and I so appreciate her! Below is Cam's old room being transformed.

I'm loving the change in here! Before it was gold and navy.

A peek into Jessica's new bedroom.

My friend Janae and I took our two boys to SLC for two days during spring break. We all had a great time! We stopped at the Soloman Center in Ogden on the way down for the boys to ride the flowrider. The boys went to the comic book store while Janae and I chilled at the SLC public library (very cool place) then we all ate out at the Pie Pizzarea near the Uof U. We saw a couple shows at the Clark Planetarium, and spent quite a bit of time at the Gateway mall. It was a fun get-away.

We enjoyed a nice Easter dinner at the Weyerts along with most of the rest of Mike's family. As always, Freda prepared a feast that we all very much enjoyed. It was fun to see and visit with everyone- and as an added bonus, we all talked to Kylee and Brody on Skype. It was awesome!

Cam looking like there's no way he can decide what to eat- there's so many options!

Jessica W. made these adorable bunny cupcakes. So creative!

Sadly, tomorrow it's back to the ole school/work routine. The boys are pretty bummed. They've enjoyed a week of staying up late, hanging out with friends, and sleeping in a fort in the game room. Reality is a hard pill to swallow! Wish us luck :)

On Friday after driving Mom to the airport in
SLC to fly back to AZ after her week in Utah, I stopped at the new Walmart in Providence to get a few things. I was totally amazed at all the people lined up to eat lunch at the nearby Rumbi Grill that had just opened that day. Who would do that? Is the food good enough to warrant an hour wait in the cold? I don't get it.

Recently I came across a book of mine I hadn't looked through for awhile. It's called "Deep Thoughts" by Jack Handy. Here are some of my favorite. They are soooo random.

*When I found the skull in the woods, the first thing I did was call the police. But then I got curious about it. I picked it up, and started wondering who this person was, and why he had deer horns.

*If you're a cowboy, and you're dragging a guy behind your horse, I bet it would make you mad if you looked back and the guy was reading a magazine.

*If you go to a costume party at your boss's house, wouldn't you think a good costume would be to dress up like the boss's wife? Trust me, it's not.

*Most of the time it was probably real bad being stuck down in a dungeon. But some days, when there was a bad storm outside, you'd look out your little window and think, "Boy, I'm glad I'm not out in that."

*If you were an ancient barbarian, I bet a real embarrassing thing would be if you were sacking Rome and your cape got caught on something and you couldn't get it unhooked, and you had to ask another barbarian to unhook it for you.

*Instead of putting a quarter under a kid's pillow, how about a pine cone? That way, he learns that "wishing" isn't going to save our national forests.

*Somebody told me how frightening it was how much topsoil we are losing each year, but I told that story around the campfire and nobody got scared.

*I wish I had a dollar for every time I spent a dollar, because then, yahoo!, I'd have all my money back.

Anyway- that's it for today. Sometimes they seem funnier than other times. I guess it's just my mood. Hope you enjoyed them!

Pranks

This picture doesn't really go with this post, but this is the one picture I took on Sunday that I couldn't figure out how to find on my new computer when I did my last post. So here it is! Four of my nieces, two great-nieces, Jessica, and Jake with his dorky smile in the background.

I haven't downloaded the program I used to have that let me rearrange my photos once I've put them on the post, and I also can't figure out how to copy and paste my explanation of this post, so it's inbetween the pictures. I could do it on my old computer- and I'm sure anyone else in the house knows how and could tell me, but they're not around right now, and I want to post this and get to bed, so sorry- it's not perfect!

I've had such a fun day today. I've been thinking up different April Fools jokes I could do on the kids and Mike for awhile. It was shocking to wake up to Mother Nature's April fools joke on us however with 4-5 inches of new snow. It's always hard to take in the spring when all the winter snow has melted. Hopefully it will melt quickly. Last night I planted about 25 ping pong balls in the cupboard the boys get in every morning to get their paper route supplies. . . and they all came tumbling out as soon as Jake opened the door. Good one! I sewed together Cam's hat he wears on his route, as well as his snow pants. I put food in the toe of the boys boots. Jake had a great idea that I went along with (and felt bad about it all day!) involving his friend Corey. It was Jakes turn to drive to school, but I went to pick Corey up in the Pilot with Jake hiding behind the back seat. I told him that Jake was running late, so I was saving him a few minutes by coming to get him and taking him to our house. On the 2 block drive over, I told Corey that I thought he was a bad influence on Jake, that I could see negative changes in Jake that I attributed to Corey, so I didn't want them hanging out as much. Sad! It was hard to do w/o laughing, and even harder to keep up when I saw the look on his face. I can't believe I did it! After 15 seconds of awkward silence, Jake busted out of the back laughing his head off. Corey was very relieved, and hopefully he will still like coming over to our house! I went to the high school later this morning to move Jake's car in a different parking spot, and fill the front seats with about 50 balloons. Lastly, I shoveled all the snow on the driveway onto the side where Jake would have to drive to park his car in the garage. Seems like most of my pranks were targeted at Jake, and that's because he's the one who tries to fake me out most often with little stories, so I figured he deserved it. He was a good sport about everything. I'm already thinking about what I can do next year :)