May 2017 part 2

While I was away in Florida Jared was busy at home trying to square away the purchase of a toyota matrix for Savanna to use so it would be ready to present to her on Savanna's 16th birthday. By the way Jared is doing well in his business and had a productive real estate month in May. He manages to make time for scouts, basketball, runs with the dog, and pickle ball--his new favorite exercise. He bought four pickle ball rackets and he has taught us all how to play it.
I came home from nationals to cold weather and a whirlwind of work fell upon me with clients, my calling, and kids activities. I'm glad we were pre-ready for Savanna's birthday on the 17th. Savanna spent every morning at 6 am for a week doing her roading to qualify for her license, and her birthday was one of those mornings, so we had to wait until dinner to present her with her gifts. I had bought her a rose gold emerald ring which she loved, but the highlight was the car. She was so happy to get that, and very anxious to get her license which we couldn't make happen until the 19th, but finally got it and she is an independent teen now who can legally drive. I had mixed feelings about it, I already don't see her much anymore I felt like I was launching her into the world already...aren't I supposed to have 2 more years? Well, Savanna is a social girl who loves being with her friends so I guess I have to let her go.
Savanna has been hired as a lifeguard at the Lindon pool again this summer so she spent her afternoons in May re-training for that. She was pretty busy in May with school, roading, concerts, and training! She loves music, choir and orchestra made school more tolerable for her this year. She did a great job at her end of the year choir concert, also fell on her birthday, accompanying a different choir on her violin, and doing a solo in a song for her choir. Grandma and Grandpa Barrett were able to come see, and aunt Wendy too, and they presented her with more gifts and lots of hugs after. Her friends and her went out to sushi and a movie the next night since it was less busy, she seemed happy on and around her birthday, which was nice since May was a tough month for her.

 

I got to watch Heidi's cutie kids again on the 18th, I just love these two babies and since I have no cute babies to show I love to put pictures of her kids on here to sweeten the post up a bit. My "kid" the dog Sky got left on the deck one too many times for extended time periods while I was in Florida, so he managed to chew through the bailing wire holding his pen in place and escaped into the neighborhood for who knows how long. But when I whistled for him he came running back! That's a good dog. He is learning to stay close to us on our runs and hikes and not jump on people too.
My parents were texting Savanna one evening and sent her funny selfie I had to share.
Fiora finished up horse riding lessons, she is trotting around pretty confidently out in the field now, and is taking an advanced riding class this summer
I got to babysit Knightly and Bourne while Kelsy was busy unpacking her stuff, they moved to an apartment this month while they build their house. Knight just turned 4 today and he is a clever and cute and kind little boy. Love them! While Jess was busily moving he took the time to edit La La Land for me so we could have it ready for my birthday party, which was very kind of him. I have the best siblings.
The kids finished up school with yearbooks and friend parties. Savanna seems to always have some friend thing to do, and Fiora had a party and hangs out a lot with her boyfriend (grr) Chris Stone, and Weston even had a end of year party with his school friends at the discovery space center. Another school year over.

Jared got up early with me on my 39th birthday May 26 and we went on a hike up dry creek canyon. It was a beautiful morning and the mountain still green. He made me a goat cheese omelet for breakfast and gave me a gift--a zip lining excursion at sundance! Can't wait until we have time to cash in on that. He was very kind all day and called twice to wish me a happy birthday. Weston gave me a card he drew of him giving me a hug. Fiora wished me a happy birthday, as did many friends and family, including my sweet mom who dropped of a dozen roses. Jared took me to Maria Bonitas for dinner and Savanna actually came, with her boyfriend Vincent in tow. I was happy to have some attention from her on my birthday. 

So I threw myself a party for my birthday the next day. I know that is kind of strange, and I went back and forth on whether to do that, and the morning of I almost cancelled the whole thing. My wish was to have all my siblings sans kids go to dinner with me, and to have a movie night with my favorite movie of the year La La Land. So I asked them to find babysitters, and took my daughter Fiora and her friend Eden all the way out to Eagle mountain to Grandma sit and watch Kaizlee so my parents could come. Amazingly all my siblings were able to find a sitter and have time to come join me at Pho Plus for dinner! It was so calm and nice to be with them all. And then Wendy Snow opened her home to us to watch the movie and Heidi Weight came and watched it with us, so much fun. 

Sunday the 28th we went to my parents to have sunday dinner to celebrate Kynsie's and Knightly's birthdays. And I had to pick up Fiora and Eden who had spent the night in eagle mountain and hardly gotten any sleep, silly girls. Jared and Savanna managed to fall asleep during all the ruckus, they looked so cute. We stopped by my grandpa Rappleye's grave for an EFHE tribute that evening.
My mom organized a mother/sisters breakfast the morning of memorial day, it was her belated mother's day gift to us and she treated. Was really nice to have more adult time sans kids! I love my nieces and nephews but the calm adult time is a treat.
The same morning we dropped Savanna off at EFY (she wouldn't let us check her in and didn't even say goodbye or anything that stinker) and then made our way to Gunnison to visit Grandpa Neil and Bonnie for our Memorial Day. They treat us with good food and lots of funny stories about animals and politics, lol. We hit memorial day traffic coming home and were on the road for 2 hours, bleh. Now to get into some kind of summer grove while the kids are out of school.

BUSY MAY!

May Part 1

This post includes first half of May and Weston's Nationals trip to Florida.

Cute Titus and I hung out a couple days first week of May while Heidi tried to get her house put together. Sure hard to get anything done with two babies in the house!
Weston went camping with the scouts at Goblin Valley and Jared went with him, they did some cool hikes in the red rocks there.
My chickens are still alive and producing 5-6 eggs a day. One egg was missing its yoke and looked like a quail egg. Jared got a sprinkler guy to fix up our system and it works much nicer now and water doesn't hit the coop.
The gate on our fence rotted out and fell over, that and a couple other house issues--roof leak, plumping leak in kitchen--need to be addressed this summer. Our house is getting the 20 year itch.
Wes and Fiora had a choir concert and did great. Weston got to accompany his choir singing "I lava you" on his guitar.
Our nephew Seth Snow and his wife Katherine held a gender reveal party for their first baby, they are expecting a girl! Which is amazing because my sister Holly, and sisters in law Kali and Kelsy are also expecting girls. Kali twin girls! Yay for girl power.
My Aunt Betty Ann came to town for my cousin Sara Rappleye's wedding and we enjoyed the reception and the next day Betty ann came over for dinner. Its always fun to have her around.
Jared took Sky on a beautiful hike up above our home, Its so nice to live so close to the beautiful mountains.

Weston qualified for Nationals and made the bulletin board of honor at AAG, I thought that was cool so I took a picture. Deagan, Emmit, and Weston all qualified so their moms and I took them to Kissimmee Florida for 6 days to compete. We rented a car and a house together to help with costs. The weather was beautiful and it was a nice break from my regular duties.

We made it in time for Opening Ceremonies on Wednesday, huge arena with 2 training areas and a competition area, and over 800 athletes, JO and JE levels 8,9,and 10. 

Thursday the boys had a short training session in the afternoon then we took them to Disney Springs to tour the shops and get souvenirs. Weston had a head cold and wasn't feeling well, but said he liked this excursion anyway. We saw lots of cool lego sculptures.

Friday the boys competed in the preliminaries. Weston did pretty well considering he didn't feel that good, got 3rd place on floor, and easily made it in the top 84 that moved on to finals. He looked so awesome in his nationals uniform. 

The house we rented had a little pool in the backyard the boys got to enjoy that evening. We made them some dinner and relaxed. 

Saturday there was no training or competition so we took the boys to Cocoa beach about an hour away. They had a blast playing in the not too cold water and sand. We met the coaches for dinner at Applebees after that.

Sunday they competed in the final competition. It was Weston's first time competing twice in one week, and on a Sunday, he wasn't quite on his game and didn't do as well in this round. But still placed 15th in the nation on floor and 49th overall. His score card shows the combined scores of both meets (floor scores cut off the 1) and his place is in red. Order is floor, pommel, rings, vault, pbar, high bar. I was just thrilled for Weston to have the experience and that he made finals, I bought some professional photos there and made posters of them for my wall when we got home.  Savanna asked me "why is there a wall of Weston?" lol

Monday we had some time to kill after checking out of the house and before going to the airport so we stopped at Gator Land. My idea so I was worried it wouldn't be worth it, but it was really cool, hundreds of gators and a natural aviary, totally worth the price I thought. And that was the end of our fun Florida trip!