Birthday Mania

Birthday Month has come and gone. Three birthdays between the 6th and 16th...thank you very much.

Lyndsey's was the first. It was September 6th. She was turning eight!! Of course she was lucky enough to have it land on Baptism Saturday. I noticed this would happen about a year ago. The wheels turned in my head and I though how cool and convenient it would be to have a kidlet birthday party/ extended family party for all three kids/ baptism celebration all in ONE DAY! Yea!!! Months of planning...First the perfect dress for my last baby and of course a cute photo of her in it.

Then we made the perfect invite (two kinds of course- one for the baptism and one for the kidlet party). Then I had to arrange all the food: Pizza, salad, veggie tray, fruit, bread sticks, appetizer, drinks, cake etc... for an army of 40 people. Then Lyndsey decided it would be fun to have a tea party complete with a craft for twelve little girls. They would make tea party bonnets (supervised by 6 adults). The straw hats turned out to not be easy to find and when I did, I bought out two stores worth. I had to also find the perfect flowers, netting and ribbon. The logistics of the party were mind boggling: be at a niece's wedding the night before, get everyone up and in church clothes and to the church at 9:30 AM on the morning of. Then someone thought it would be nice to have "a display table" with a book to sign for visitors. Please, this was supposed to be simple. It feels like a wedding.

After three loooonnng baptisms with over a hundred people in attendance, we finished and moved onto the party part. We had invited the little party girls to the baptism and had to transport them to the party.

Once we got there we had kids running all over the house; we were trying to bake 6 pizzas and get the food ready and I was trying to round up little girls to make there craft. We had a bit of dilemma with a father asking if his younger daughter could come to the party too (what??? why do men create such social blunders. What could I say? Of course I graciously said sure) now I wouldn't have enough hats. It was stressful but worked out in the end when a girl who was at the baptism didn't show up to the party (whew!)

Several adults wrangled hot glue guns, flowers and bows onto hats and we settled down for a tea party with china and lemonade. The girls looked adorable and finally we were able to feed the crowd who was patiently waiting for the cooking pizzas to be done and the craft to be finished.

There was lots of food and more people kept showing up (I will save you from the details). Now it was present time. Relatives brought presents for all three kids. We had our presents for Lynz and her friends of course brought gifts. Then there were more baptism gifts and cards. Wrapping paper, tissue paper, plates, cups and napkins of paper. A new hamster for Lynz running loose in his ball. Kids and people in my house and yard. FINALLY, the joy was over. It took the whole rest of the weekend to recover and then... and a few days later...It was Sarah's birthday.

Our New Dog (Mutt) for the day

Our neighbor Gwen's daughter found a dog hanging around one day. They already have a dog and we had been thinking about getting one, so we asked if we could keep it while trying to find it's owner. We posted ads on KSL and signs around the area. We held this dog and played with it and really thought it was cute until night came. We had recently fenced our yard and it is summer, so we left the dog in the back yard. In the morning it was gone. It had dug under the fence to visit our other neighbor's yorkie. We put the dog back in our yard and placed a rock over the hole it dug. Within minutes, it had dug another hole and gotten out. Our neighbor was getting annoyed. We borrowed a leash for the night. Mark didn't want the dog in the house. All was quiet until just as we were falling asleep the crying began. First the dog yelped, then he whined and then the yowling started. Nothing would shut the dog up. This went on for a couple of hours. I turned to Mark in bed. "What should we do? Should we let him in?" Mark replied, "No way, let him go...perminently." I was upset he would suggest such a thing. Another half our of crying went on. We both couldn't sleep and I quietly slipped out of bed and let the doggie in. I put him in the mudroom where he couldn't hurt anything and slept in quiet the rest of the night. In the morning we let the dog out and he was once again on a long leash. He wasn't liking that, but what could we do. The little escape artist wouldn't stay in the yard. The crying began once more. Meanwhile of course no one had called to clain the mutt. I think someone had dropped him off far away in hopes he wouldn't come back. Gwen showed up on my doorstep and asked what she could do to help. She said her 15 year old daughter was crying in her room because of the dumb dog's crying and they hadn't slept all night. I was pulling my hair out by then and really regretted asking for the dog. I didn't say one word to Gwen, but silently handed her the dog and shut the door. Goodbye doggie!

The first day of school came too quickly for Sarah and Lyndsey. Sarah started the
5th grade in Mrs. Ketcher's class and Lyndsey started 2nd grade in Mrs. Jarman's class. It was a sigh of relief to have the house back to myself.

Oh yea, Westley is still here...For one more month...Someone help me!!! JK...Wes and I enjoyed the house quite together due to the fact of
1. Westley no longer had anyone to tease.
2. Westley slept in until noon most days.
3. I snuck out to shop ALONE before Wes woke up
4. We made lunch together and quitely read the paper
5. I hadn't given him any chores to do yet that day
6. He was off mowing lawns
7. I was off to work.
We celebrated the end of the summer together by going to a movie right before School started,(eighth grade)!
"Please come see Mama Mia with me...I'll pay...and bring treats...and increase your allowance..." (WE) sort of enjoyed the movie.

24th of July Camping at Albion Basin

Albion Basin's flowers are incredible especially if you check them out in July/August. Apparently everyone else in the nearby region decided to as well. That being said, we attempted camping over the 24th of July holiday. Two days turned to one after a sleepless night of partiers in a cabin above our campsite. We were in the campground in Alta's Skiing basin in Little Cottonwood Canyon. So much for getting back to nature. Although it took one day to pack and one day to unpack, we trimmed our stay to one night. I swear I will never tent camp again. It is too much work and the kids really do hate it! The hike was fun though. The other great part was Emily, my sister, and her family coming up for dinner. We looked forward to their coming all day. We left on the 24th of July and went to my Mom's instead to help her out after she broke her leg.

My Hubby, Mark

Mark is my best friend and soulmate. He was feeling bad that I didn't put anything up about him, so here it goes. Mark loves to play and watch basketball. Man can he jump. Westley told me in confidence that his dad was 'getting old and could hardly dunk anymore,' but I know otherwise. The truth is he can still outplay if not outlast his almost 14 year old son. I think there is some rivalry going on between them. The time of teenageness is coming to Wes. He use to look up to us, but now thinks he knows everything.

Mark also loooooves music. He is a killer guitarist and finally has a small home studio. I "let" him have a bigger room in the basement to house his growing collection of guitars. He wishes he has more time to play, compose, record and learn new music, but he is very unselfish.

Mark is a jack of all trades. He refinished our basement, built me a storage room, built me a fence for our yard, put in tile, remodeled the other two floors top to bottom and keeps the yard work up. He is a hard worker and good supporter of our family.

To keep me happy he goes on hikes with me so I don't disappear one day, listens to me talk, complain, dream and gossip for hours. Sometimes he helps me do my jobs when I need it. He helps out with the kids and occasionally cleans the house (especially if family or friends are coming over). He lets me do whatever I want, even if it isn't the best choice. He lets me learn from my mistakes. The best part is he loves me despite all of my shortcomings. I am glad he honors his priesthood and is a righteous man.

Saturday's Date

Mark and I went to the Sandy Ampetheater on Saturday to see Richard Marx. He is like one of my fav-o-rite artist from the eighties. I have seen him four times. Anyway, we first went to Outback Steakhouse for dinner and when we came out and got into the car...click...no start the engine. Our battery passed on to the other side. We asked someone for a jump. Nada. They offered a ride down the street to the concert. We barely made it just in time. Yes, the concert was awesome! I was really to the stage and standing and singing and jumping around. Richard Marx waved at me!!

Well, after the concert we called a tow truck to get our car at Outback. We thought that we had some time, so we hung around the back by Marx driver hoping to catch a glimpse of the man. He was busy with the people his manager had given backstage passes to, and we decided we better leave.

We started walking down 13th East to Outback. We thought it wasn't very far, but did the math and figured we were about two miles away. By now it was 11 'O Clock at night and very dark. We got a call the tow truck was there and waiting for us, so we started running in our sandles! Mark was struggling with his footware, so I gave him all my crap and started booking it. I finally got to my car and eventually Mark did too. We both have blisters to prove it. Hey it was all good. We had just got back from the Grand Canyon and was glad that we didn't break down there! It must of been all those prayer we said... "Please help us not to fight and be safe..."

Our Grand Vacation

Our trip was great. We hiked to the bottom of Bryce and back up the first day. The kids whined...alot. The hoodoos we saw were so cool, but the change in elevation made the 3 miles feel like ten. That night we stayed in Cannonville, a tiny town. We had to call the manager to come and let us into our room. He arrived on an ATV in about a half-hour. You've got to love Utah. The next day we went on a wonderful 6-mile roundtrip hike to Calf Creek Falls. It had a cool clear gurgling stream all along the way. We even saw a petraglyph. We were rewarded at the end of the hike with a 128-ft. waterfall! We were having someone take our picture in front of the falls and a big black raven had the nerve to steal Lyndsey's unwrapped granola bar and take off with it. We all laughed, but Lyndsey was sad. I made her feel better by telling her about my lost yogurt parfait in a stream when I hopped over it, and it was unsecured in my fanny pack, on a previous hike.

We drove through the beautiful Escalante Staircase Monument. The landscape would change from red cliffs to light colored slickrock swells. The next few minutes were driving through a forest of pine trees. After stopping at the Petrified Forest and Anasazi State Park we drove to Kanab that night. Kanab is the cutest little town with red cliffs. It is famous for the western movies made there. We stayed in historic Parry's Lodge. It is a beautiful colonial home with "boarding house" style rooms where all the stars stayed in the fifties when they made all those movies. It was so fun. The have an old barn where they show a free western movie every night. The movies where made in Kanab and the stars all stayed at the lodge. We stayed there two nights (in Sammy Davis Jr. Room) and didn't even use the ITEX voucher for the second night I had prepaid for ahead of time. We couldn't face back- tracking all that way just to stay there on the way home. The kids wanted more time to swim in the nice pool that John Wayne had built there at the lodge.

We drove to the Grand Canyon the following day. We took a wrong turn (how dare they not mark the right way with a BIG sign?) We almost went to Flagstaff. Everyone (even ME) was exhausted from the heat and all the hiking. We took a little hike (5 miles of mostly flat ground) around the rim of the canyon. It is really an amazing, huge hole in the ground. It is hard to fathom. I really want to backpack overnight someday there and go rim to rim. I don't think I will have any takers in my family though. After the hike we went to the lodge which is perched on the cliff of the canyon and sat in the rustic chairs and took it all in. Everyone was sick of hiking, so I went on a paved half mile hike to Angel's landing which went off on a little ledge overlooking into the canyon. The height really takes your breath away and makes you feel dizzy.

Yesterday morning we were ready to leave. I woke early to go running and ended up running up a trail to Squaw Peak. It was 1 1/2 miles to the top of a cliff overlooking Kanab and the whole surrounding area of beautiful landscape. You could see for miles. I was really trying not the run off the cliff when the sun came peaking up over the top of the ridge. There was a bench up on the top of the mountain. I stood on top of it and yelled "wheewwww." Know one could hear me, but it was fun to do.

I really enjoyed this trip, even if I dragged the rest of the family along. Sometimes you have to do what you want to do, when you don't get to do it very often. Mark called it my "dream vacation" It was in a way, but in my dreams I would have hiked longer, faster, and more often...hee, hee.