May Misc

Weston and Savannah had their back-to-school night in May, so we got to see some of the things they've been working on.

I got to have lunch with my sister-in-law Carrie who was running a nearby race the next morning.  Alex and I got our temple visit in for May.  I made it back that afternoon for a bridal shower for one of my friend's daughters.  Savannah and I had a girls night while the boys were gone camping (or to Scotland). We had BLT's, sweet potato fries, rootbeer, and ice cream.  We watched Tuck Everlasting and Overboard. (The boys need to leave more often.)  

Weston and Owen went on a camp-out to a nearby beach and enjoyed sliding down the dunes.

The youth did a talent show for one of their activities this month. Owen sang a solo that he did for school choir recently.  "Knee Deep" (Zac Brown Band) was Owen's spring final at school.  He was chosen to sing it for the spring concert as well and did a great job.  A few of his friends joined in the song for choreography.  I don't have a copy of that yet - still waiting for them to send me the video.  Owen sang it for the youth talent show too, but he didn't have his friends to join in.  Owen's friend RJ participated in the talent show as well, singing two songs, along with playing the guitar.  He wrote one of the songs - very talented!  All of the youth did well and were very brave to get up there and perform in front of everyone. 

Savannah made sock puppets in her recent Activity Days.  She's been enjoying that, especially since one of her school friends has been going with her as well.  In young women's, I made several lemon and lavender hand soaps to give to the moms.  The girls made the paper lavender flowers and filled out a Mother's Day survey.  

I taught one of the YW lessons this month, on preparing for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.  I started out talking about planning a party and how that could be compared to preparing for the 2nd Coming.  First, you'd need a reason to celebrate, maybe a guest of honor, and then you might need to clean and decorate, gather supplies, and send out invitations. We talked about what would make a successful party (lots of friends there, good food, and lots of fun) and the things that could go wrong (people don't come, not enough food, rained out, people get hurt or sick, guests are bored or don't interact well).  The level of preparation determines whether you'll have a successful party and be prepared for possible things that could happen.  Thinking about the Second Coming and the Millennium, that's the "party".  The guest of honor is Jesus Christ.  We are the guests and we need to invite as many others as possible to attend.  The supplies, cleaning, and decorating are the things we need to do to prepare: read our scriptures, fill our testimony "oil in our lamps", prayer, and keeping the commandments.  Birthday parties usually have gifts, so I made some little gift boxes with bows.  The girls had to sit and look at those during the lesson, wondering what was inside.  Towards the end, I gave them each a box and let them open it.  However, there was nothing in the boxes.  I asked them what the empty boxes could represent.  They were empty because they are the guests bringing the gifts, so it's their responsibility to symbolically fill those boxes and bring gifts to the Savior.  What they give is up to them - maybe they are going to be more kind, more diligent, or stop bad habits or behaviors.  I found a quote that I loved:  "What we are is God's gift to us. What we become is our gift to God."  If we become more like the Savior, that is our gift to Him. Maybe when the girls see those empty boxes, they will be reminded of what they need to work on.  The girls were a little disappointed with the empty boxes, but I did have cupcakes tucked away that I surprised them with at the very end.  So they did walk out with a sweet treat!

The last couple of pictures are from Memorial Day.  Owen and some friends met at the beach to play volleyball, so Weston, Savannah, and I hung out at the beach as well.  It was pretty chilly though.  Savannah had friends over to play during the morning.  We made cookies, talked to Nathan, hung out at the beach, and went to a BBQ in the evening.  I was still "single-mom-ing" it, as Alex was still in Scotland with Jared.  (Weston is carrying around a metal detector at the beach.) 

                       

Track 2023

Jared finished his track season, going out with a bang!  He had been working this season to break 5 minutes on the mile and finally got a 4:56 at the last race.  He started out with a 5:15 for the season, then a 5:09, 5:06, 5:03, and 5:01.  He had a few other races in there, but these were the PR's.  Prior to the last race, which was league finals, he found out that only the top 32 runners would compete in the race.  He was in spot 36... so he didn't think he'd get the chance to break 5 minutes.  Even with a 5:01, he hadn't quite qualified (the top guys in the event had 4:08 to 4:10 PR's).  Not everyone who qualifies signs up to run the race though, so we prayed he'd get a spot.  A couple days before the meet, he found out he made it in.  I was so happy he got the chance to run, and then it was up to him to break 5 minutes.  I watched closely the times on each lap.  He ran the first one really fast (almost too fast I thought), the second one was right on pace, and the third lap was at 3:45.  I knew he'd do it at that point, because I knew he'd have the adrenaline and kick on that last lap to carry him through.  He took spot 19 out of 30, so he proved that he deserved to be there.  I was really proud of Jared for his hard work and grateful for the little tender mercy in allowing him to accomplish his goal.  

Jared also ran the 300m hurdles again this season.  He kept about the same time with each race, with a PR of 48.4 seconds.  I made a video about his season.  I couldn't resist the music for the last race, because it did feel like an epic finish to his season.  

Jared won the "Most Reliable" award at the track banquet.  He has received an award for every season of cross country and track so far highlighting his great character as an athlete.  He has great character on and off the track!

Field Trip

Weston got to go on a 3-day field trip to Catalina Island with his class.  They left at 4:30am on Wednesday and returned on Friday around 7:00pm, so they had a 2-night stay there, with lots of activities during the day.  Some of the activities were rock climbing, snorkeling (saw an octopus), and touch tanks in the aquariums to explore the sea life.  He had a great time, and he apparently took the 3-day no shower challenge... which I think is pretty gross!  

Youth Activities

We've had some great youth activities recently.  We did an Easter egg night where we hid filled eggs outside of a few homes with young children (they got "egged").  After that we came back to the church and decorated sugar cookies.  

Another night we made pioneer skirts since we have a youth pioneer trek coming up this summer.  Alex and I are serving as a Ma and Pa again, so I made a skirt for me.  We just finished up our trainings as well, since we are in charge of all the Mas and Pas.  We did 5 trek presentations earlier this year and then 3 in-person trainings for Mas and Pas.  We may still do one final zoom training for those who missed their training.  

We had our fun girls night - this one involved different dare challenges, such as blowing up a balloon until it pops, doing ballet, or sorting skittles with tongs while they are being jiggled around on the plate. 

We had another Bishopric dinner for the youth, which is just a Sunday evening get together to hang out, eat breakfast food, and have a short spiritual message at a member of the Bishopric's home.  Cameron and his wife made lots of bacon and waffles for all the youth.  

A couple of other activities was indoor volleyball, which was a hoot, and a bonfire at the beach night with games, roasted marshmallows, and cinnamon rolls.  

The young women won the spring family history challenge for the 3rd time!  This one was an indexing challenge, so we did an indexing activity in March.

Spring flag football

Owen finished his spring flag football season.  They didn't win any games... but Owen always played hard.  He mostly played wide receiver or running back, but he did play a little bit of quarterback.  He has a great arm, but he was needed more to catch the ball than to throw it.  He and Chase (#3) worked well together and were valuable for their team.  Chase is the QB in the video while Owen is receiving it, and Owen is QB part of the time.  Owen scored 5 of the 8 touchdowns for the season.

Prom

 Jared went to a church sponsored prom recently and had a great time.  Jared and a few of the guys got together and made the corsages the night before.  He went with a girl named Grace from our church congregation (and we're good family friends too so we knew that Jared snagged a great date).  They went with our good friend Nathan and his date, so we took several pictures of them before the dance.  I loved the beautiful modest dresses the girls wore.  That was the great thing about the church prom - much more likely for modest dresses and not the current trend that seems to be looking more like lingerie these days.  The girls looked so pretty and the guys looked pretty good too.  They went to a dinner before the dance.  Jared's only complaint was they only played ONE slow song the entire night!   

Easter 2023

We had a wonderful Easter.  The Easter bunny showed up on Friday afternoon.  Jared was working early on Saturday morning so it was nice to get my photos of them with their baskets while everyone was here.  Alex, Owen, Weston, Savannah, and I went to a church Easter breakfast and egg hunt on Saturday morning.  We didn't have time to color eggs and make the sugar cookies until Monday evening, but I didn't want to miss out on it.  We basically had Easter weekend from Friday-Monday.  Savannah went to her ice skating party on Saturday afternoon and Alex and I went to the temple.

As I mentioned previously, Easter was pretty busy.  Savannah, Owen, and I got up early to practice with the choir.  We sang "Oh Divine Redeemer" and "He is Risen" in Sacrament meeting.  Savannah also sang Easter songs with the Primary kids.  The meeting was great.  Right after church, I headed home to start on the rolls and potato casseroles.  I pretty much spent the whole afternoon baking.  We squeezed family photos in there.  I finished recording some accompaniment for my Easter Devotional for after dinner.  We had our Easter meal with 3 large families, 1 couple with a newborn, 2 missionaries, and their friend.  So we had 22 (plus baby) at our dinner.  However, three of us combined efforts (made a little extra of our assignment) and delivered a meal to another family in our church.  So we needed enough for 25 people.  Our friends hosted the dinner, so they did all the cute decorations and tableware.

We had a great meal, played some games, did my Easter devotional, and had a testimony meeting by the fire that evening.  The whole day filled me to the brim!  

One of the talks during the recent General Conference inspired me to put extra effort into our Easter worship.  I knew I wanted to do something similar to our Christmas devotional with singing songs and reading the Christmas story.  So I made one for Easter, with Easter songs and reading passages about Jesus' last week as well as after He was risen.  I started with the triumphal entry into Jerusalem and then read a passage about Jesus washing the disciples' feet and admonishing to love one another. Then we read a passage about the sacrament and one about prayer.  The next was Gethsemane and the Crucifixion, followed by Jesus' resurrection.  Then we finished up with two more passages and songs - the first when Jesus appeared to His "other sheep" on the American Continent and the last when He appeared to Joseph Smith in our day. We did 9 passages and songs.  I ended up playing and recording the songs on the piano so they'd be in order and ready to go.  The recordings weren't great, but it worked okay.  Here are some of the passages: