5-week Progress

Who are these weirdos, anyway?

The Kinder-Graduate and More

This last week Megan had her last day of Kindergarten and her graduation (or promotion if you will). She is now a big first-grader! Wow, time flies... I'm sure I'll be saying the same thing when she gets married... tomorrow. ha ha.She just loved her teacher, Mrs. Memmott (whom I will be teaching with next year)Here she is with her good friend and carpool buddy, Carsen. And here's our family in the gym in front of the "Panthers" wall pads. Megan's teacher gave them all a big packet of homework that she said they could do "if they get bored this summer." Megan's already done a little of it. ha ha. She loves school. Saturday we had an end of the school year family day. We went swimming all day (meaning from 2-5) and then Aaron BBQ'd for us with his new grill I got him for graduation. He grilled steaks, pineapple, and corn on the cob. Delish!

After dinner I hurried off to a coupon party that my friends invited me to for coupon sense. I had heard of it a million times before but hadn't joined. I'm now a newbie member and I'll be posting my savings every time I go shopping. Aren't you excited? I didn't realize how cheap it was- I thought it cost like $60 to join, but no, the first month is a trial month and only costs $4. and then $14 per month after. Crazy, you say? Crazy-Awesome, I say. Especially when you save a few hundred a month and build up your food storage quicker than you can say Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis.

4-week progress

Click here for the 3-week progress. You will be amazed at how much all of this stuff has grown in a week. Here is a video of my garden in it's 4th week of existance. I'll do a tutorial on the pvc watering system for you guys if you want, just let me know. It was a lot of fun and it now takes about 1 minute to water my garden. awesome.



If you haven't read about the garden, please see
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part I
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part II
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part III

Graduation. yippee!!

On our way to the grajiation- The kids were very excited!! Here is our view from the 3rd tier in Grady Gammage Audutorium

We were so glad that my mom got to come from UT to be here! Thanks mom!!Here are Aaron's sisters and meHere is Karen (and val)And Val. I don't think we have ever looked more alike than in this picture.Aaron is the blurry hunk in the middle of the pictureMatthew was so excited for Aaron's graduation- he kept saying this and that about "my daddy's graduation" he just beamed when Aaron picked him up after the ceremony.Megan loooooves her daddy.Me and my bachelor husband... uhhhh...ok. I know that it sounds weird for me to be proud that my husband is a bachelor, but I am :o) A Bachelor of Applied Biological Sciences. Yay honey! Don't ask me what happened in this picture- I have no idea, but I thought it was funny, so I'm sharing :o)Aaron's parents- We are sure glad that his dad could come from Montana for the graduation. We miss him so much! They got Aaron a kindle 2 for graduation. Aaron is in p.d.a. heaven. (no, the other kind of pda- we have not made it a point to be lovey about town)Aaron's sisters are amazed at his vast knowledge.... (Val is holding the "diploma") What goof-offs.....Ahhhh there we go. Aaron's sisters Val and Karen are so proud of him for finishing school. The movie Tommy boy keeps popping into my head during this post. Aaron and the Harwards :o) Thank you Goodmans, for coming! You are family :o) right? since Aaron's cousins' cousin married Nick's Brother..... That counts! We are glad you could come :o) We had a great day with Family and friends and a great graduation party on Saturday- Thanks everyone for your well-wishes, love, and support!!

I CANT...STOP...EATING....

This is a serious problem..... I have these tomatoes ripening left and right and they are soooo good. I'm actually quite surprised I love them so much because I'm not really a tomato person. and definitely not a cherry tomato person. I hate the feeling of the tomato bursting in your mouth. yuck. I do not like tomatoes in salad, but I do like a good tomato sliced thick with salt and pepper. mmmmm. these are perfect for that (even though they are small) they are so yummy with a little s&p. yay for the first veggies yielded from my delectable garden.

Eight Things

Eight Things I'm looking forward to

Aaron's graduation on Friday and an crazy-awesome grad party on Saturday

Seeing my mom when she comes for the festivities

Seeing my Father in law when he comes, too

Girls camp in less than a month- woo hoo!

Family reunion in July at my brothers cabin in Oregon!

Summer!! Yay swimming pools, splash parks and kids home all day!

10-year anniversary in August (holy cow)

Eating all the veggies from my garden!

Eight Things I did yesterday (Monday)

Put my head down and fell asleep at the computer in the middle of the day (so sad)

Stressed out about getting things done (what's new?)

Watered my plants and decided to wait one more day to pick the beautiful red tomato out there

Put out the slip'n'slide for the boys and decided that outside a plumbers convention I would never see so many bum cracks in one place.

Bought a swimsuit and slid once or twice with the boys.

Put Aloe-Vera on Matthew's bright red back

Bought one of those packs with the badminton/volleyball net and supplies

Ate out with the family to celebrate Aaron's last day of school yippee!- I'm so proud of you honey!

Eight things I wish I could do

fly

Be the perfect, patient mother (yes, I know this is attainable- it just doesn't seem likely)

not be tired

be telekinetic

get in shape for crying out loud

get rid of all our electronics while Aaron's away at work and say we got robbed.

get the kids to shut the darn door. (and flush the dern toilet)

cure diabetes

Eight Shows I watch

Chuck

Dollhouse

Heroes

So you think you can dance

House

Celebrity Apprentice

Dancing with the stars

American Idol (which is rigged, but I still like to see them sing :o)

Tag Eight People

no thanks. If you want to do this, go ahead!

3-WEEK Progress

Below is a video of my garden after 3 weeks- I have since thinned the plants (this means that since I planted 2 or more seeds in each spot, I had to choose the biggest healthiest plant and eliminate/pull out the others) and they have grown a lot mot more- even after 2 more days.




If you haven't read about the garden, please see
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part I
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part II
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part III

Gardening with Mittleider part III

Before reading this post, please be sure to read:
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part I
GARDENING WITH MITTLEIDER part II

- by the way, Matthew has his own small shovel now :o)

I have the rest of the initial videos downloaded and so here is part III: (while some of these things seem simple to a lot of us, not everyone here has even picked up a shovel, so, there you go.)

So sorry about the tutu folks. Welcome to my life :o)

This one is really dark, SO sorry!

So basically just wrap the end of a dishtowel around the end of your hose and rubberband it in place. Lay the towel-hose at the end of the row between the peaks, turn the water on low and let it seep out to fill up the row 1" deep full of water. I water mine every morning so they are watered and ready to face the HEAT! 105 degrees today! I need to get my shade cloth! (we will talk about this soon)

Haircut

Ok, I feel really bad that i forgot to post the results of the haircut vote! I did go much shorter- thanks for the feedback ladies! Now with our car AC out and the temperature reaching 103 today (yes, that's what I said. 103. bleh.) I'm really glad to not have much hair. Hair is so overrated anyway. It's just to keep the sweat from dripping all over your face. Oh yeah, and to keep your brain from overheating. LOL I do love how little time it takes to dry and style. Sorry the pic doesn't show it very well. In all of the other pics I looked through i look awful. Not to say that this one is head and shoulders above the rest, but "it'll do pig." Plus in this one I have the little hair in front of the ear that likes to loop out sometimes when you wear glasses. annoying.

[Clever kid-related blog title here]

Hey friends. Just wanted to post a little about what the kids have been doing lately....

1. They have their very own box garden :o)The kids wanted to be in my garden all the time, so I made them their own and they love it!

I got a wooden pallet (the kind used for fork lifts) from the side of a dumpster (yes, me and the dumpsters, I know) and I pryed two boards off the top and nailed them to the sides and ta-da! A garden box! (with really good drainage, too)
Matthew planted corn and cantaloupe in his side and Megan planted watermelon and cinnamon basil. Matthews just came up and hopefully Megan's won't be too far behind! fun, fun!

2. They now have dish duty :o)
I probably waited a little longer to teach them this than I should've, but my kids are now dish-doing dudes! yay! they love it! 3. They had fun painting today :o)
This has got to be the most AWESOME-est Bakugan-holder ever! Matthew does a really good job painting- he loves to make sure every little spot is covered.

If you don't know what Bakugan is, it's the latest and greatest toy to get for boys right now. It's kind of a spin off of Pokemon but when you play, you roll the bakugan balls over cards and if they pop open (see below) on the same card as the opponent, you battle. Don't ask me more than that, that's all I know. The card has a metal plate in it and the balls have a magnet in a little spot in the bottom where if that spot touches the metal plate, it pops open to form a creature of some sort. They're fun to open.

Megan's teacher asked her to make a replica of her crocodile, Pippa, for her new preschool (Sunshine Sharing Preschool) and told her she'd pay her for it. Awesome-

She hasn't painted the white eyes or teeth yet, so they are still blue, but you get the idea. We'll post a pic when it's done. Megan is starting out young with her crafting business. ha ha. She said that she wants to make a catalog to "sell home-made toys, and blankets, and cushy pillows" And Matthew's job is to mail the catalogs and toys all over the world. She cracks me up.
Speaking of crafts and painting, I did another bow holder- this time for Megan. She saw me do the ones for her friends and wanted one so badly, so here it is. It doesn't even hold all of her bows... how sad. Oh well, it's cute anyway.

Kids say the darndest things...

The naked cowboy....
This morning when Aaron was leaving for work, Matthew stuck his head out the door and called to him "I love you daddy! Bye! Be careful to not fall down!"

FHE moment

Hey all- I just had to share a neat something that happened at FHE tonight. It was unusually quiet and nice tonight because Matthew fell asleep before we had FHE (he's been sick and I ran him ragged today with my errands I had to run all over town). Aaron gave a lesson about being clean. He had Megan close her eyes and told her to picture going to church. Walking to the doors and seeing unmowed grass with lots of clumps of weeds in it, then going inside and seeing walls with dirty hand prints and crayon scribbles all over, then past the cultural hall and seeing plates of old food stacked up and tables and chairs strewn every which way, and then into the chapel where there are programs stuffed behind hymn books and cheerios, broken crayons, and crumpled papers all over the floor. He had Megan open her eyes and tell her how that made her feel. She said "sad." (luckily we keep the church clean- this story made me feel a little sad, too) He explained how the spirit wants to dwell in clean places and then explained that to have the spirit in our home, we need to help mommy clean up. That if you see something, even a tiny thing, that is not in it's place, you should pick it up and put it away so that our house will stay nice and we can feel the spirit here. Megan said- "oh that's just like my dream! It was in this house and then the holy ghost walked in the door and mommy gave him a big hug!" I just started to cry- what a beautiful metaphor! I told Megan that that's the most important thing to me is that the spirit can be in our home and if I could see him when he did come I would give him the biggest hug ever. Megan saw my tears and said "I never make you THIS happy!" ha ha- I explained to her that the spirit was there and sometimes I cry when I know he's there. What a great FHE!

For Freeeeeeeeeee?

If you've seen Bedtime Stories, please read the title of this blog the way they do, if you haven't, either see it or skip ahead :o) Good Movie.

Get this: to show their appreciation to their customers, Goldsmith Co. Jewelers in Provo UT is offering all of you a free strand of freshwater pearls worth $100. NO PURCHASE REQUIRED

All you have to do is print off this coupon and take it in to GoldSmith Jewelers 120 N University Avenue in Provo and you'll walk out with your very own freshwater pearl necklace! A Perfect gift for you or your mother this Mother's Day! This coupon expires on May 9th, so get there soon! This coupon was originally posted a few hours ago on another very popular blog with provo-ins, so I'm guessing this is only honored as supplies last, and not until the 9th, so go as soon as possible and print one out for your husband to use, too! Tell your friends and family who might be close to Provo to print it out and go. (A lot of my family is in UT)