A Day in the Car

5:45 am - woke up

6:08 - went to the gym with Abi

7:16  - head home from the gym

7:50 - take Wes to Drivers Ed, he drove, I am a little stressed out in the passenger seat with a student driver

8:23 - home from Driver's Ed

9:31 -  back to pick up Wes from Driver's Ed

9:45 - take Wes to the Driving range at Cottonwood High School, I didn't let him drive

10:19 - home from Cottonwood High

10:50 - take Abi to Zupas

11:21 - home from Zupas

11:47 - go get Wes from Cottonwood High

12:03 - W drove as we went to get Abi from Zupas

12:17 - I drove as we took Abi and friends to Jordan Commons

12:44 - W drove home from Jordan Commons (pretending I can put my foot on a brake)

2:00 - take Natalie to her rehearsal at SLCC Grand Theater

2:25 - drop off Natalie

2:30 - I tried to go to Costco, but I'm stuck in traffic for 25 minutes because construction on 300 W in front of the downtown Costco made it take so long that we only had time to get gas

3:10 - drive back to get Natalie

3:20 - pick up Natalie, head to Jordan Commons to pick up Abi

3:50 - pick up Abi

4:08 - go by Wendy's for 8 Frostys, then arrive back at home where I am disappointed the kids didn't clean up anything while I was gone. Lily was the one with the most free time and I guess she just couldn't bring herself to do anything to help. 

5:25 - leave for Sophi's soccer practice and parent meeting (we were late) took SDP

6:39 - head home

7:04 - Corey left with Lily to a clarinet lesson (Thanks Corey for doing that one!)

And now I'm sitting here attempting to slightly decompress for a moment. During each 45-60 minute window that I was home, I'd beg and nag and plead with the kids to help me clean but they wouldn't do it. There were a few feeble attempts, but then they'd get distracted and start singing or playing or coloring. So the house is still a mess. 

Just clutter, crumbs and face cards everywhere. And where are the kids? I hear laughter from the backyard and I look out the window. 

They are playing some Raya the last water dragon game with the balls and blue poles from this Construction fort toy thingy that I keep trying to gather together so I can donate it to the DI, but they keep finding it. 

The big kids have been playing legos in the basement. There are face cards everywhere on the floor. I'm just going to throw them away. Natalie and Sophi have been doing this one "magic" trick for us over and over with the face cards and it was cute the first few times and now I will still do it but I admit I am not fully present when show me their magic skills. Tonight we had a good talk with Wes. Corey is a great father. Wes is a good kid. I want to do better. 

Peter driving a car on Corey's head, haha. I'm grateful for my family, for good friends (Nicole said a prayer with me tonight) and for Jesus Christ and his gospel in my life.

Rappelling, Spies, and a Waterfight

Next Monday Abi and Lily will be leaving and will be gone all week at a girls camp. They are going to Zion's National Park at the Ponderosa Campground. They are going to be doing some rappelling and stuff, which will be super cool and fun for them! Tonight they went up Big Cottonwood to practice and they said it was great. Abi said that she went on "the biggest one" and it was so fun.

The biggest one was a 60 foot cliff. Lily went on the biggest one too. 

Here is a group pictures of some of girls that are heading out next week. 

(They have such good leaders to sent me pictures!)

Lily going down again -

Tonight we also had Corey's birthday cake. The kids were all stuffed from lunch yesterday, and we had our leftovers for dinner, so I decided to save the cake for today. We tried waiting for Corey to come home from work, but even after he got home he was super busy and didn't get a chance to come for a picture and eventually the little kids were done being nice and trying to wait for him, so we sliced it up and served it out. Corey didn't want to eat cake anyway, so it was ok that we had bad manners and ate the birthday cake without the birthday boy present.

And Corey also gave us a good lesson at scriptures tonight. It was something he and Abi had been discussing earlier this week - he talked about our lives and what it is that influences us - is it nature or nurture? Some things are influence by both, but ultimately what we become depends on what WE CHOOSE.

I went on a bike ride tonight, it was a lovely sunset. God is an amazing artist. I bet it's fun to paint a sunset every day!

A few more pictures from Corey's birthday yesterday - I've been a little frustrated this week with the kids. They aren't contributing very well to help our stadium run smoothly. They're just playing the part of the crazy fans that go nuts and just want to party. When I came into my room for a moment of peace and quiet, they came knocking and telling me to take a picture of them. I told them to go away, but they kept knocking. So I gave in, opened it up, and here they are playing some 6 legs turned 4-legged race. 

Shortly after that, they moved on to a game of spies. When Corey's parents came by and we had a little visit outside. I came up to my room to grab my phone so I could take a few pictures. I had to crawl through a spy maze of laser lights to get to my phone. Then I army crawled my way back out. Kinda fun and funny, also a little annoying. 

Corey, I know it looks like the kids were throwing you a birthday party in here with ribbon streamers as decorations, but it was actually just an intense game of spies. These are laser beams. They used door handles, drawers, and our floor scale to wrap the ribbon around. They had to do it in here because ours was the only room clean enough to do it. They've already trashed the rest of the house. They were very thorough with their ribbons. Back outside for a few birthday pictures. We pulled out two lawn chairs and they sat in their car.

Their car could also be known as the birthday party van. 

Then somehow a waterfight started. I wasn't paying attention to what brought this about, but I bet it was that Corey got out the water guns. Daniel, Natalie, and Owen hunting down Corey ~

Eventually the hose came into play and everyone was soaked. 

The kids got soaked and they got Corey a little bit wet. I had Peter as my baby shield so I kept sitting in the chair and we didn't suffer too much from any friendly fire. 

Grateful for Corey

Last night Corey let us know that he wanted to take us all out to eat for his birthday today. He likes to do that on his birthday. The kids were very excited. Abi wouldn't have been able to go to dinner cause she had to babysit in the evening, so we all went out to lunch. Corey wanted to take them to the Original Pancake House.

We told the kids they were being tested to see if we could take them out to eat at a normal restaurant (aka not a buffet, like the Chuck a Rama feast of 2019). Here, at a normal restaurant, we sit.... and quietly visit.... and patiently wait for our food. The little kids started blowing bubbles in their chocolate milk and were close to not passing their test. 

When they took our order, we weren't really keeping track of who said what and we didn't notice that Sophi ordered two things, and each thing was huge and came with a side of pancakes and eggs, so it was an obscene meal, similar to the Black Bear Diner birthday feast of 2012.

Like enough to feed us for the whole day. Good news is I probably got out of making dinner (not that I do a great job at it anyway lately). Today was Ethan's p-day so he got to call, and Mel got to call again too, cause they get to call us on our birthdays!

I did a little facebook post and shared some of the scrapbook pictures I took on Mother's Day when I was looking through scrapbooks. It was fun to look at all these pictures again. Some of my favorite pictures are of Corey sleeping with our babies. Here with little Lily - 

And during one of the first few meetings with Lily when he was trying to discern her name. "You can't just pick a name like you would for a dog! She already has a name... It has to be revealed!"

If dad's taking a bath, everyone wants to take a bath - He's loving it, can't you tell?

Letting Abi beat up on his face. 

Family pictures December 2006

Corey picked up Joseph from the kindergarten bus stop once in the Darth Vader costume (just one of many of my illogical purchases)

Sledding with Hyrum at Joseph on the small Wyview hill by our student housing apartment.

Taking Melodie on a date to a BYU dance, she was thrilled and was the prettiest girl in the room.

Reading with kids - 

Spring 2005 reading the Bear Snores On - Corey played the bear part very well and little Hyrum was slightly terrified of this book if you can't tell by his concerned expression (they were almost at the part where the bear was going to wake up!) Sometimes Hyrum would hurry and shut the book when they got to the page before that moment, it was really funny. One of our fond memories of little Hyrum.

Taking the kids bowling at the Wilkinson Center.

I'm amazed with how much Corey did then with the kids when he was getting his MBA. He's pretty incredible. Teaching Ethan to ride a bike - using Mel's bike.

Showing Joseph how it is done. Ethan on the trike. 

Corey and Hyrum helping with the dishes.

Taking the kids swimming sometime during a Park City stay. 

Teaching the kids how to make rainbow crepes.

Joseph's turn - mixing the blue batter - 

Inspiring in Ethan a love of music. 

Corey is pretty amazing and I sure love him. See last years birthday post for some fun Corey stories (or this 2012 hilarious one that I mentioned yesterday, so funny). Those capture a bit of his awesomeness in action. I know how incredibly lucky I am to get to share my life with him. I’m so grateful for him and am stoked to be with him for my whole life and for ever and ever after that.

Drivers Education

Yesterday the kids were downstairs watching the Taming of the Shrew with Corey, and while they did that, I was upstairs blogging. I finished a few entries for last week and with that, now I am ALL caught upon the blog. I don't think I've been completely caught up since Nov 2017. I'm going to do my best to write notes and upload the pictures from each day so that I don't get overwhelmingly behind anymore, EVER EVER AGAIN, ha. I probably shouldn't say that. This past week was great though. I read my scriptures, I exercised every day, I got out in nature, I read to the kids and helped them with school work, we worked and cleaned...  it was just a really a good week. I didn't practice the violin as much as I would have liked, so I'll figure out how to fit that next week and will try to keep doing all the other things. After I was done blogging, I joined Corey and the kids downstairs watching the Scarlet Pimpernel (1982 version with Anthony Andrews, which I first watched in 6th grade in Mr. Cooks class on Valentines day before our valentine's dance and I've loved it ever since) so we did that for a little French History lesson ...and cause Wes needed to watch it as part of his attempt to finish English assignments and pass that class. It was fun cause the kids were all really into it, so even though it was getting late, we stayed up and finished it and it was good family bonding. I knew I was going to regret it though cause I had a super early morning today. 

I got up at 5:45 to wake up Wes, but he didn't get up, so I tried again and 6:15 and he got ready and we left at 6:30 for his 7:00 appointment to get his driver's permit. We made this appointment two weeks ago, hoping it would give him time to take the test and pass it and then get to his 8:00 am driver's ed class on time. We had gathered the information he needed last week before he left for high adventure, so it was all ready and in a folder, ready to go. Last night I asked him where the folder was. It took him a few seconds but he found it. Ok, good, we're ready to go. We got up and left this morning, and then when we arrived at the DMV and were opening the car doors I said "You got the folder?" and then he clued in with a look of "uh oh" on his face and I was a bit dumbfounded. HE FORGOT THE FOLDER! He felt bad, but I was at a loss for words and how he could have possibly forgotten it. Like Wes... you knew where we were going, right? We're going to the DMV... and why we were going there... and you knew what you needed, and I reminded you last night... deep breath. SO, what do we do. It's a 25 minute drive back home, so now the whole point of doing this early is messed up. I told him to get in line and see if he could maybe take the test while I ran home to get the papers. I called Corey to ask him if he could meet me half way. I got like 3/4 of the way home before he was able to meet me, cause he was slower getting into the car, because Peter was awake and was tagging along, but it was helpful. We met at Waterford and I was able to turn right around and get back there by 7:30. So then we got in line, turned in his application and showed his birth certificate and stuff and he was taking the test by 7:40. This was the time we should have been done and headed to the car if he was going to arrive at his class on time, so that's not going to happen, but that's ok. He didn't pass the first written test. He took it again right away and we were both praying for him to pass, and he did. I gave him a small lecture on our way out - like forgetting stupid and simple stuff like this... that will get you an F in life! But if you remember the stupid and easy stuff, then you don't have to waste time scrambling back home and you can just get stuff done. Dad and I want you to succeed and will help you as best we can, like we did this morning, but let's just make things easier on all of us and let's remember things and show up prepared! 

After that I took him straight to Skyline. He got to class at 8:40. He missed the whole class last week though, so I'm assuming it's ok he was late cause he's catching up anyway. I had sent the teacher an email though as I sat at the DMV while he took his test. He replied that since there are two class sessions - from 8-10 and 10-12, Wesley could just come to the 10-12 class. He stayed after and worked during that class time, so he was able to catch up a little on the stuff from last week. And then he went on a drive from 12 - 1. He hadn't eaten breakfast this morning before we left, so he was tuckered out and hungry when I picked him up at 1:30. 

So it wasn't a great start to the day today with the DMV appointment, but tomorrow I should be able to get up and exercise before I take him to drivers ed. He has class through the 30th, so that is what my mornings this month will look like. 

Oh, and here's a funny picture from yesterday. After church Peter was ready for lunch, but I didn't want him to get his Sunday clothes dirty, so I stripped him down. (A funny story here where I stripped Lily down, Corey is hilarious!) And I pointed out to the kids how perfectly circle his belly button is. He was standing on the stool waiting for me to get him some more clothes, but he was standing like a perfect little David, so instead we posed him. Corey noticed what I was doing and gave P a usb cord as his sling...

I just realized that I posed him in the mirror image of David. 

Let's fix that...

There we go! haha, Peter is a masterpiece! Here are a few more masterpieces of nature from yeseterday after church. I'll limit my flower pic today to just one - look, it's so yellow!!

Ok, two... so pink!!

Ok, I mean three, I'll stop at three... but there could have been ten!)

So lovely. What else - our violin teacher is out of town today so we didn't have lessons, but did talk with our Mel and Hyrum. Ethan's p-day is tomorrow. 

We went on a bike ride tonight up at Snowbird. We went to explore a bit and see what Snowbird has (we're still newbies to mountain biking)

We parked and rode down and went around, most of it was too tricky for Sophi so we were pretty slow. Then before we had too far to backtrack, I stopped and biked back up to the car and was going to pick them up. But Corey texted that they were going to start heading down the canyon. Sophi was riding down with them but once I caught up to them with the car, Sophi came with me and Corey continued ahead with Abi and they rode all the way home from Snowbird. Impressive! I do think, though, Corey and children, that we need to learn how to had endurance to bike uphill too. We don't need to be able to go all 8+ miles up the canyon, but maybe a few... we shouldn't always be driving up and then coasting home, imho. I didn't get in my ride this morning so I was still itching for more so I biked up a little bit after taking Sophi home, I'll try to get a short ride in tomorrow morning. I'm liking biking more than walks or hiking at the moment, mostly cause it's faster to get back home after biking up.