The Burrs In Our Saddles

Today Meriden's friend Brynlie came to play. Meriden goes to Bryn's house every Friday while I go to work, but today we had her come to our house. Can you tell how excited she was? She really enjoys her "Bess Fend." They fight like sisters--it's kind of endearing.

So I mentioned we finished the basement. This morning I took some photos so everyone can see what we did. It isn't really that exciting anymore--just the basement. But when we were finishing it, it was really exciting and a HUGE deal. Before we started, this was the door that led to the unfinished basement. So picture a blank brown wall with this door. We took out the door and knocked out a bigger section of wall for the entryway into the new basement. We had to get a different carpet, so there is a small tile transition from the old to the new carpets. Colby tiled it while I was at rehearsal one Wednesday evening. He was so sick of me not accomplishing anything during the day by then that he was ready to get it done--himself. The bathroom. Madison's room. Keep in mind we let them choose their wall color and new bedding sets. I really like the bedding sets (I still have to decorate) but the walls are a bit crazy. Mackenzie's room. Mom's area is (still) not put ...

Madison chose, when she turned 8, to get baptized and become a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We, as her parents and family are really proud of her choice. That's one of the beautiful things, I think about the Church, is that kids are old enough to make the choice for themselves. I hope she didn't feel pressure from us. Colby taught her the discussions (the went through Preach My Gospel ) and she chose to be baptized. I took her to her Bishop's interview on Sunday, January 25th. While we were in the interview, Madison told the Bishop that her Grandfather was going to baptize her. News to me, but we'd figure it out. So she called Granddad in Hawaii that afternoon to ask him to baptize her. At first I was a little upset about it because that's something dads usually do, but what a great opportunity for her and for her granddad. So Colby got to confirm her a member of the Church and give her the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was a rea...

Since the holidays aren't busy enough, we thought that we'd finish the basement. Since the girls and I returned from Hawaii, we (The Father and I at first, then mostly The Father) really buckled down. We were having company coming the first week of February for Madison's baptism and were determined to get it done before anyone came. Madison and Kenzer were going to have new rooms in the basement and we'd have a guest room upstairs for visitors along with Meriden's "new" room. We had to move all our crap (yes, we have a lot of it) out of the storage part of the basement (about 700 square feet) and into our living area while construction was happening. We could barely walk from the stairs to the computer to the storage "room" (aka half of the basement). Let alone the girls' toys that already took up most of the room. Anyway, we put up a plastic sheet so the drywall dust didn't get in the living area all over literally half of our house...

Since I'm done with Hawaii (not really, I'd go back if you twisted my arm a little bit), I figured I should probably update with the rest of our lives. A lot has gone on the last couple of months, so hold on to your seats, folks. Madison turned 8 on January 22nd. I can't believe my baby is 8. It makes me feel really old although I'm not. The only things she asked for were Mario Kart and Littlest Pet Shops. So she got 'em both. I went to Wal-Mart (I know, I hate it too) and got the last Mario Kart on the shelves. Literally--they had (I was told) 20 at about 6pm and by 10, I had the last one. Could it be true? I don't know, but I do know I got the last one. And that's all that matters. ;-) She requested a Banana Cream Pie, not cake. I spent way too long making a pie that was the most unpleasant looking pie I've ever seen. I had no idea (I'm not sure why I couldn't figure it out) that bananas would turn brown if I put them on top and int...

Today was the day we went back to the Mainland. We got to Honolulu just fine, got all our bag (it was like 77 lbs--I had to take a bunch of stuff out and distribute amongst backpacks) checked, our car seats checked and we were ready to go. Grammy cried, the girls cried, and we got on the plane after being lei-ed with an Airhead lei. M3 had hers gone within minutes of being on the plane. We got to Phoenix at about 12:30 am and we were exhausted. Our bag came, but the car seats never made it. We didn't leave the airport after filling out paperwork and such until almost 2 am. We drove to my sil's house and slept for a couple of hours until we had to leave by 7:30 to get our 9 something flight. We were all even more exhausted than before. Argh. After we got into SLC, we went to the closest Wal-Mart to get another car seat for M3. M1 & M2 had their booster seats still in the car, so luckily I just had to get 1 more. What a pain in my rear. We went to my mom's hous...

Since the PCC doesn't open until 11:00 am, we went to the beach in the morning. It was a lot of fun because it was the first day Granddad went with us. And Uncle P was there! Grammy rented a couple of boogie boards so M1 and Granddad paddled out to the reef. We dug a lot, built sand castles, made sand turtles, and buried each other. A great time was had by all. After we were done at the beach, we went back to the apartments, showered, ate lunch and headed back to the PCC. Our Tour Guide (aka P) gave us the tour and some of the additional information that only the VIP's get. I wish we could have done more at the different "islands" but we were being prodded like cattle to get through as fast as we could (it felt like). We did visit Tahiti where M1 got to help mix coconut bread. We went and saw Iosepa (a boat that had it's maiden voyage while P & J were going to school at BYU-H), Hawai'i where the girls learned to hula, we were reprimanded on our p...

I'm finally sitting down to blog without guilt. Today I taught my first Gospel Doctrine lesson (my new calling, yay for me--I hope you can all hear the dripping sarcasm) and it's done. We had our Symphony concert last night and I shouldn't be practicing any tricky spots. I could probably be cleaning up the house, but I really don't feel like it. The Father can deal with it if he doesn't like it ;-). My Amish Friendship bread is baked (would anyone like a starter? I have 3 up for dibs!) just 1 day late. Not bad for my schedule this past week. M3 is potty trained. Yes, you read that right. Potty trained. She still wears a diaper/pull-up at night because I don't want to change wet sheets if that's what's going to happen and I don't want to find out whether it will or not. She has woken up dry for the last few nights, but I'm still not braving it. Back to Hawaii. On Wednesday we went to swim with the dolphins. We went to Sea Life Park ...