JANUARY 2019

JANUARY - A new year!!  It was actually pretty nice waking up at home instead of loading up to drive home like we have done so many times in the past.  Kinsley was ready to party today and wanted to know what we were going to do keep the celebrations going.  Jed had received a gift card to Big Al's so we took the kids bowling. Dallin was very crazy.  I keep thinking he won't be so bad when we go out in public, but so far he keeps proving me wrong.  We went upstairs to the arcades afterward for a bit. 

Tresa, Jeff, Ryan, and Cheyenne went to India to celebrate Ryan's graduation from school so we have been stopping to check in on Tyler.  He has been doing pretty good and likes watching the kids act so crazy. 

We went out on the trampoline with Tyler and Kyler to burn some energy.  Kinsley's hair took on an energy all it's own!  I was glad I had my camera to practice with.  I thought these pictures turned out pretty cool of her hair. 

We stayed outside for quite awhile.  Our kids bounced and bounced until their legs were about to give out.  It takes a lot of muscle to bounce those older boys.  By the looks of it though, everyone thought it was worth the effort.

We got our traditional Chinese food and fortune cookies for the year.  I can't remember which fortune belongs to who now though. :)  I do remember mine said that I would enjoy good health and financial independence.  The picture of Ava and Grandpa was taken while we were in Rigby, but Ava was happy to note that she is taller than Grandpa. 

Every year before Christmas I think to myself - "Is it really worth it to get out all these decorations?" - and then we get everything out and it seemed like it was actually a good idea.  Then the new year comes and I think that it was in fact not a good idea at all as I'm putting it all away.  I finally had Jed hang the light fixture I've had for 10 months for the dining room.  There were words said by Jed that I can't repeat about how stupid the whole process was.  For some reason it was really funny to me today.  I'm not sure how everything we own is a "piece of crap." haha 

There have been lots of changes this year.  I like to think I'm good with changes, but I'm realizing that they cause me a lot more stress than I like to admit.  I definitely tend to hold onto what I'm comfortable with and my first instinct is to question the change as something bad.  I really want to work on that because so much time is wasted on complaining about the change instead of accepting it and diving in.  One big change was that YW & YM's schedules are changed on Sunday.  Well the whole Sunday schedule in general changed in that RS, Elder's quorum, YW, and YM meet only two times a month.  The other two Sundays are only Sunday School.  Church is only 2 hrs long.  YW activities are still supposed to be every week though.  Also anyone turning 12 during the year starts coming to YW in January rather than their birthday.  So I think we gained 13 girls to Beehives overnight!!  Our YW is pretty large with right around 50 girls so it is pretty crazy.  I wasn't super excited to lose Ava to Mia Maids as I was still planning on another 9 months with her in Beehives. 

Another big change is that I committed to watch a little boy named Johnny during the week.  I felt somewhat prompted to do so as a way to fellowship and get to know the Weigand family, plus it was a way to make some money too.  He is a pretty cute little boy with red hair.  He is an only child so the first few weeks were rough as he constantly wanted to be held and screamed if he wasn't.  Babies are so much work!  Dallin thought it was pretty cool having him around though.  Actually all the kids think he is super cute.  Kinsley loves cuddling with him when she gets home from school.  Johnny's parents are super nice people and provide all the equipment, food, and anything Johnny needs.  We agreed to $100 a day which will be nice extra money.  I'm going to watch him Mon-Fri unless the kids are out of school from about 9-5pm.

We spent a lot of time snuggling on the couches this month.  This picture below of Kasen makes me laugh so hard.  He looks so creepy.  I've looked at it so many times and it never ceases to crack me up.

Enjoying some hot bubble baths this month as well.

SCHOOL - It didn't take long for the kids to jump right back into busy busy school days.  Ava has continued being a part of the Kindness club at Eagle middle.  They are constantly doing projects of kindness around the school.  There first big project this month was for the lunch ladies.

Ava had a book report due and made the cutest project for it.  Her book was "The Benefits of Being and Octopus" and this is what she came up with.  I thought it was so adorable.

Kasen has been working hard on reading more.  He has tried reading books to Dallin, but unless it is reading the stats on the basektball cards it is hard to get Dallin to be interested. 

At school both Kasen and Kinsley were honored by their teachers for exceptional behavior and academic skills in the classroom so they were invited to attend the "Breakfast of Champions".  I like how this school does this.  Only the kids honored are invited with their parents.  It isn't a big assembly during the middle of the day.  They serve a treat of donuts, juice, or coffee.  Then the principal reads off the kids receiving the awards by grade.  They go up and get their certificate and run down the line of all the teachers from the school giving a high five.  It's super cute.  And it's all done before school even starts which is nice because Jed can come.  We were really proud of them - well almost everyone.  Dallin was a little disappointed nobody game him an award.

SPORTS - Kasen's basketball season got busy in January.  He is playing with his same team as last year.  He works hard and hustles.  He is really good at playing defense.  I thought it was cute that he wanted to wear his arm sleeve he got at Christmas to his games. :)  Dallin continues to be pretty obsessed with basketball cards, players, and so on.  One day at Tresa's house she found Ryan's old Michael Jordan toy from when he was a kid.  Dallin LOVED it and it's the first thing he searches for when we go over there now.

Ava also has been busy with her volleyball club season.  We decided to try a more competitive club this year.  We will see how it goes.  Taking Dallin and Kinsley to these long tournaments seems so less smart.  It looks as though everytime Ava has a tournament so does Kasen so it will be an interesting next few months.  The little kids just get so tired of sitting for that long.  The basketball games aren't too bad, but the volleyball games you never know what kind of seating will be available.  This tournament was a rough one.  It took me about 30 minutes just to get Dallin to go inside.  He was not having it and kept running away and hiding.

Ava did good and always gives a good effort.  She likes playing middle the best and got to do that during some of these games.  Dallin had a few loud meltdowns before falling asleep on the hard gym floor.  He fell asleep the exact same way later when we got home.  A constant conundrum I feel faced with is how hard do you go with sports.  If you don't go and do all the club stuff it seems like you can't stay competitive and on the flip side you are practicing 2-3x a week with tournaments all day long on the weekends.  It feels too intense and like it overtakes your life, but what else do you do?  I haven't figured out the answer yet.

MLK HOLIDAY - We were invited to go stay at a mountain lodge with some families from our ward over the MLK weekend.  The place belonged to a friend of one of the families who invited us.  There were the Crawfords, Hales, and another family I can't remember their name. (oops) Anyway, it was fun - we mostly just hung out and played games and talked.  The place we stayed was huge and so there was a lot of room for the kids to roam and play.  There was also an awesome movie room that felt like a castle room or something. It was quite out of our comfort zone to go "vacation" with other families.  We are less social than we think we are! 

SAMANATHA'S FAREWELL - The last Sunday of the month we headed to the Arctic tundra of Idaho to say goodbye to Samantha.  She is headed to Chicago for her mission and we were very excited and proud of her.  She did a great job on her talk and it was fun for the whole family to be there to support (minus a few.)  While there Jed also gave his dad a blessing as he'd been having a lot of panic attacks and anxiety about being sick.  I was wrestling kids in the car so I didn't hear any of it, but Jed said it was a very spiritual moment.  It seems like so long ago that I left on my mission.  What an adventure - I hope it will be as life-changing for Samantha as it was for me.