The "Why" button is on!

Stringing fruit loops at pre-school. It was funny to watch. The kids would string them then eat them off the string. When I took Sean to school this morning Luke was wearing a string around his neck with one fruit loop on it.

The why button got turned on this week. Sean has been using "why" for a couple of months. His first why was "why can't I eat Cheetos in bed?" This week he started asking why about EVERYTHING! Why is the car in front of us? Why is the car behind us? Why is the car beside us? Why is the road bumpy? Why do we stop at red lights? Why do we go at green lights? Why is Thomas sad? Why is Thomas happy? Why, why, why? Reading books has taken a new turn. It takes a lot longer because every sentence makes him think of a question. I read an article about why toddlers ask why and it said that they are looking for conversation more than answers. That is good news because I don't know the answers to all these questions! He really makes me laugh! Why, you ask? Because he's funny. Why is he so funny? Because he ask so many questions? Why does he ask so many questions? Because he's three. Why is he three? Because he's had three birthdays. And so it goes.

Wedding plans

Other notes: I'm having fun helping Steph and AJ plan their wedding. I don't have a daughter to plan a wedding for and since her mom is in Costa Rica I get to fill in. (Yes I have Alika but I am sure her mom will be the one picking out wedding dresses with her.) We went to David's bridal and Steph got her wedding dress. I would post a picture of her dress but it's going to be a surprise. We have the photographer and we've settled on a date and location. I'm ordering the flower girl dresses today. I'm excited, it's going to be a beautiful wedding. Yesterday Don, Sean, David and AJ all got fitted for their tuxedos. We still need the cake, brides maid dresses, the time of the wedding and rehearsal dinner and someone to perform the ceremony.

The more stressful part is immigration. They've met with an immigration attorney and are going back on Tuesday to start the paper work trying to make sure they are in compliance of all the laws and rules. The filing fees are close to $2000 and that doesn't include the attorney's fees. People wonder why there are so many undocumented people in our country. Why? Maybe because it is cost prohibitive for people to do it the right way! Come on what housekeeper can afford those kind of filing fees and attorney fees on top of that. I'm told you can file yourself but just looking at the forms makes me say no way so they are hiring an attorney to do the work and guide them through all the hoops.

Another Addition to the Family

AJ and Steph are getting married! They've picked the location and on Tuesday they will finalize the date. It will be the middle of April at Eldridge Manor in Bountiful.

The babies keep coming

My niece Autumn and her husband welcomed baby number two on Friday, February 19. Liam Wallace Foley 9 pounds 3 ounces.

What a cutie he is!

Valentine's Day

Happy 12th Anniversary to me and Don. We went to lunch on Valentine's. It's been a fun 12 years. I love that man!

Steph and I went to the school and made graham cracker Valentine's houses. There was a whole lot of eating going on and not a whole lot of decorating. They had fun and were wired!

I had a couple of houses left so when we got home neighbor Ethan came over and they decorated the rest of the houses.

On Tuesday Alika and Steph and I went to see the play Hairspray at the new theater in Centerville. It was really fun! I love the fact that we can walk to the theater for a play.

 Jenny update: Not a lot going on that I know of. Jenny said the state has stopped their petition to stop reunification efforts. She said her attorney sent her an email telling her that. She was quite happy. I asked her about the fraud charges and she said it is all "just stupid." She said they are saying she got money for the girls after they were in foster care but that they didn't go into foster care until July. That's not how I remember it but OK. She's been working for a couple of weeks as a med tech at an assisted living center.

Andrew's Wedding

Andrew got married today. He looked so handsome and sooo young. I was standing next to his mom and we were both wondering where 20 years went. I know when we think of all that's happened in those 20 years it's been a long time but honestly I can't believe he's grown up and married. I admit I cried!

Little Aric tackling little Andrew. They've been friends for awhile.



  
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Big Aric standing up as Big Andrew's best man. I'm not sure what the tennis shoe thing was all about. All the grooms men wore red tennis shoes. The brides maids wore red shoes and the bride and groom wore yellow.

Sean and Don tasting the food.

What a good looking kid I have.

 Sean thought this was Andrew's birthday party and wanted to know when he was going to put some candles in that cake and blow them out. He was confused when they shoved cake in each other's faces.

First dance as husband and wife. They were really cute.



A nice day to ski

We went up to Wolf Mountain for a couple of hours of skiing before the rest of our busy Saturday.

This was the first time Alika was out this season.

Sean was pretty distracted by Alika and I being there. Last time it was just him and Don and he did much better. He wanted to go ride the lifts with Alika. Don kept trying to explain to him that he didn't know how to ski well enough to go down the big mountain. Sean pitched a mega fit. Good grief. He wanted ALKILAAAAA to come down off the mountain and ski with him. He told me I wasn't his friend and he wanted to go home. Sean had his skiis off and was walking in his boots and told me "this makes my legs feel weak." Where did he learn the word weak? Last week when I asked him what he wanted for a night time snack he said "I don't have any suggestions."

Alika off the mountain walking across the lot with Don. I like this picture.

Look how happy Sean is in the back of the car, because his ALKILAAAAA came off the mountain.

"I broke the house"

Sean came running into the bathroom this morning looking very scared and said "I broke my house." He was holding a key in his hand. I said "did you break the key?" and took it out of his hand and he repeated, "I broke my house." I looked at the key and it was black. Holy crap. I looked at Sean's hands and they were black. I asked him if he was hurt and he just kept talking about the house. I called Don in and we washed the soot off his hands, there were no burns. He told Don again that he "broke the house." Don said "show me." Sean took his hand and this is what he showed him.

Thank goodness the outlet is the only thing damaged. Yes, there is a child's safety plug in the bottom of the outlet. There was a Spiderman nightlight in the top outlet. Apparently Sean connected the key to the prongs of the nightlight and an arc of flame went across the top of the outlet. The key had a plastic top to it which helped protect Sean's hand. It tripped the circuit breakers. Glad my biscuit didn't get hurt. We had a long talk about electricity and safety and why we don't put things into outlets. I think he gets it!

Wise Guys

We went to the Wise Guys comedy club to see Ben Bailey, the host of Discovery Channel's show Cash Cab. Art and Char were with us too but Char was taking the picture so they aren't in it. I laughed until I cried. There were three or four warm up comedians, all but one were really funny. The one was just a dud. Ben Bailey was hysterical! Very different then what I expected, not that I really spent much time thinking about it.  There were only about 40 of us in the audience which was pretty lame. He's has a national television show , he's got a movie coming out and he can't fill a comedy club. I think it's a reflection of lack of advertising on the part of Wise Guys. I could tell it really insulted Ben because he kept making cracks about how small the audience was.The only reason we knew about it is because Char saw an ad in City Weekly and then told me she was going.  Oh well for Ben Bailey, those of us who were there had a great time. I was joking with Don before we left that I wouldn't be able to stay awake because if I'm not teaching I'm in bed by 9 and the show didn't start until 10 but I wasn't even tired. I will never watch his show the same way again.

Farmington Bay Bald Eagles

For the last several years hundreds of Bald Eagles have been wintering at Farmington Bay. We decided to take the short drive, check it out and snap a few pictures.

OK, so I didn't really take this incredibly cool picture. There were all sorts of people with mega fancy cameras out there taking pictures. How was I to compete with my little digital camera. I had to snag one of the fancy pictures taken with the high priced cameras off a Farmington Bay website. 

Here are my not so cool pictures. It was fun to get that close to that many Bald Eagles.  They were eating fish and chasing away the Seagulls.

When we first got into the bird sanctuary we saw six eagles in this tree. There was a sign that said "Eagle Rest Area". It is nice that the eagles can read.

Sean and Steph in the cat tails. I let Sean bring one into the car which he then broke and now I have puff stuff all over my car. Silly me!

They are awesome birds. They've been coming here for years but this is the first time I read about it and went out. It is only about 10 minutes from our house, just off the frontage road.

Sean with the Eagles in the background. Other bird watchers were glad when I took my noisy three year old and left. They were doing some seriously quiet bird watching and we were doing some seriously not so quiet bird watching.

Don hits the slopes with Sean

The big kids are all too big and too busy to ski with their dad so Don decided it was time to teach Sean to ski. They went to Wolf Creek. They did the pre-bunny run which has a moving side walk that takes you to the top of the hill as opposed to a lift. You just stand on it, ride up, then ski down. Sean thought that was all sorts of cool and then would ski down between Don's legs. The last run he held on to Don's ski pole and skied beside him. Cost for this event, $6 for Sean's ski rental. Since you don't buy a lift pass it doesn't cost anything. Pretty fun. Maybe I could ski down that hill, Nah.. Too old to start now. I will go next time to video tape Sean skiing. David was so cute when he was 4 and skied. He had no fear and would just go barreling down the mountain. Hm, maybe that's how he broke his clavicle last month. He still has no fear. Funny how the ski resorts making skiing so cheap for kids. They want to get them hooked while they are young. The state of Utah even subsidizes this addiction.

Nothing very exciting

The windstorm earlier in the week knocked a big branch down off the neighbors tree. It landed across our yard and on the shed of the yard behind us. There was a little irony. The neighbors who tree fell went to great personal expense and effort earlier in the fall to have the trees cut down on a foreclosed house next door to them to keep those trees off of their house then their tree falls. Fortunately,  no one or thing was hurt. I thought they were going to get hurt pulling the tree down. They were all pulling on a rope tied to the limb while the neighbor stood under the limb with a chain saw. Not wise.

Don had gas heat put in the garage. Now his man cave is complete. He can do his manly garage things in comfort and warmth.

We went up to the lake today. Don wanted to go to Morgan and find a cafe. For a minute I thought we were in Lovington Illinois. Lots of boarded up businesses. Finally we found a place called "Deb's spicy pies." We even met Deb.

It was cold and windy so we didn't make it down to the lake to walk across the ice. Sean looked so grown up to me as he hiked in the snow.

It was a very pretty day on the lake. There were people ice fishing and cross lake skiing with their dogs.

Chef Tim AKA my little brother

Happy Birthday Dad

Today would have been my dad's 83 birthday. He died 10 years ago just a month before his 73rd birthday.

Here are some pictures of my dad in no particular order.

Well, I guess this random order is particular. This is my dad with the cutest of his six children. That would of course be me!

Dad and Tim sometime after I had left for college.

Dad as a little boy in Maryland.

No wonder my brothers were all so skinny. They got the skinny gene from my dad. He never did get heavy.

Before Tim was born. I am the baby in mom's lap. Sitting on the step outside the Durham ward. We used to love to play games in the front of the church.

The whole family. Sometime in the 60's.

At the Warehime's in Lynchburg Virginia is the 70's.

Mom and Dad's engagement picture. That's where we all got our good looks.

Charles and Daisy with Mom and Dad. This was the day Daisy left to go back to Brazil.

Mom, Dad and Tim. This was when Tim was the only kid left at home. It was the 80's when light blue suits were cool.

Don and my wedding.

Dad helping Alex carve a pumpkin.

Dad and Mom at Christmas in N.C.

Dad and Shari at Easter.

Dad and Matthew (or maybe James, I'm not sure) doing some work.

Dad, Mom and some relative. I think Paul.

Dad and Matthew.

We had a birthday cake tonight to celebrate Dad's birthday. Sean tasted the frosting in advance, put on the candles and blew them out for dad. Happy Birthday Dad, I miss you. I always think of you when I eat chocolate cake, use duck tape, go to Radio Shack, use any of your tools with your name etched in them, and lots of other times.................