Monday, October 28

Jon and Andrew spent a lot of time working on his eagle project again. They also polished off a few other requirements. I spent a lot of time with Andrew as well working on the rest of his paperwork for his eagle rank  application. He also finished all of his requirements for Duty to God for Deacon today!!! He has been working hard on that for many, many Sundays over the past year... almost two years. Yippee! That means he has also earned the On My Honor award, which is a really awesome religious award in the BSA.

Andrew’s eagle project is this week and we (especially Jon) are really excited to get that done and behind us!


Yay for a fantastic Halloween week!

Tuesday, October 29

Wednesday, October 30

Thursday, October 31 - Happy Halloween!

Friday, November 1

Saturday, November 2

Sunday, November 3

Andrew winding up the cord to be used in his eagle project.

I got double temple time on Temple Tuesday! I loved initiatory in the morning, and then picked up Natalie at 11:20 to do baptisms for the dead. In support of my kids attending the temple I told her that “I offer a free temple shuttle service... anytime!” Originally I thought I’d just drop her off, but going with her was so amazing! There were hardly any people there at that time, which was nice. We got to be witnesses together for the first time! I printed a family name she found and 4 I found, so I knew the names. Brother Johnson from our ward was helping in the baptistry and stood behind us as we were witnesses - super nice man! We saw Ben Sandholtz get baptized, and then he helped confirm Natalie later. In and out it only took 42 minutes! I loved whisper-chatting with her while we waited at each place. It was just such a lovely time together! Then I dropped her off back at BYU.

I had a haircut with Melanie, which always feels amazing. I had her cut off 2 inches because my hair has gotten so long that it has felt cumbersome. Yay!

After volunteering in Tyler’s class Wednesday morning, I walked over to Lindsey’s house with Jon and Weston to help them load their moving truck. Jared took one look at me and said, “Why don’t you go see if Lindsey needs some help inside” ha ha! I am pretty wimpy, but after helping pack a box, carried a lot of boxes and gear out to the truck... enough so that my poor little biceps and forearms were sore that night and the next few days! I am so sad that this cute family is moving, but I’m so happy that they found the perfect house for them, which is also close to Jared’s work. They are so awesome!

After that, I ran to the high school to pay for Amy’s 3 upcoming AP exams, ordered a personal pizza from Little Caesar’s via their app for Andrew’s Halloween costume (I wanted the little box). I managed to eat one piece of that deep-dish pizza, but it was too greasy and intense for me, so I gave the rest to Jon and Weston.

I bought (too much) Halloween candy, made soup for the party, and finished costume preparations for the party that night.

Since the boys couldn’t wear masks to school I painted their faces in the morning. Tyler loved his, but once Mark saw himself in the mirror he was unhappy with it and wanted me to remove it. We were already late for school, so Jon and I convinced him to keep it on. Sure enough, at school he got a lot of positive reactions, so quickly changed his feelings about it.

I had such a great time taking Natalie out to lunch on Friday! She needed to interview me for a class, I needed to give her her ballot so she could vote, and she needed to give me her blue heels for Amy and return her Halloween cowgirl garb. It was the perfect excuse! She was in heaven eating Café Rio, and we had such a blast talking! I love this girl!

Amy competed in her very first solo competition* in the Young Artists Competition -- a chance to perform with the Utah Valley Symphony. She was very nervous, and I was too! We really didn’t know what to expect, but it was a good experience. She played a 3-minute segment of her concerto for only one judge in this round - the concertmaster.

*Amy and Natalie competed in one competition a long time ago, but they played a duet.

Fast offering collections was more like trick-or-treating for Andrew! He came home with every pocket bursting full of candy!!! He was one happy camper!

We had family scripture study in the morning to finish New Testament reading we didn’t finish last week, and then at night we read the material for this week. Phew!

After all the errands during the day, I made sure Adam was primed to take care of the boys at home. I drove Amy to Jayne Galloway’s house to rehearse for a violin competition this Saturday.

We drove straight from there to Rosalie’s house in Centerville for a 2-hour lesson. That was super valuable! Rosalie is such an amazing teacher with so much valuable experience, knowledge and expertise! Then we drove the hour home. Phew! That was a tiring afternoon-evening! Amy is so awesome!

Jon took Adam and Andrew to Springdell to do some prep for Andrew’s eagle project and to also take care of some Springdell business. (Jon is on the board of directors there.)

Jon saved the day for our neighbor who is in Italy and England with his family for the semester. Temperatures dropped below freezing, and they weren’t sure if their water got shut off. Rob had asked their next-door neighbors to have the guys who take care of their yard to also shut off his. But no one could tell if it was done. Kim asked if Jon would look. The cap was off, and everything was covered in mud, so you couldn’t reach the turn-off valve without vacuuming out the mud, which Jon did.

Then he was able to see clearly (and with his favorite new shop lamp) that it was still on, so he shut it off. What a man!

I picked up Andrew from school so we could squeeze in a temple trip for him before Ultimate Frisbee practice. (This would be his only solid chance this week due to a Frisbee tournament.) He changed super fast (like Superman), left his change of clothes in the car, and I dropped him off at the temple about 3:25.

Practiced was changed to an indoor strategy discussion at the McGills’ house at 4:00. I was amazed that Andrew called me right at 4:00! He changed in the car and was at his “practice” by 4:05 - before another teammate... and Andrew went to the temple in-between school and the meeting! It was so cool and felt so good!

Tyler went to “Learn to Code” club after school and that night was picked up for Webelos den meeting where they shopped for dinner ingredients, made the dinner at Brother Hadley’s house, made this fire with Alex Garrett, enjoyed the food they made and discussed nutrition goals. I love Tyler’s den leaders!

After dinner with the kids, I dropped off a gift to one of our Mia Maids with a co-advisor, Miken Johnson.

Amy had her self-defense class at BYU and Jon worked at Garafa.

I sewed a double-layer fabric tooth appliqué on Amy’s t-shirt for her tooth fairy costume. It took me a few versions of the background grey layer to make it work. Then I added silver glitter-glue, which gave it a nice finishing touch! I sewed on 4 toothbrushes to her tutu, and added ribbons and curly sparkly pipe cleaners to her wand.

I also sewed a pizza for Andrew and finished the paper pizzas for his spear. Pizza, pizza! After school I took photos of all the kids in costume.

Mark: blue Halo dude

Tyler: green Halo dude

Adam: Gorilla

Andrew: Little Caesar’s Pizza mascot

Amy: The Tooth Fairy

(It was freezing when we took these pictures!)

Jon was Superman and I was Wonder Woman!

Tyler insisted that I make bracelets and even brought me the aluminum foil while I was helping Mark with his costume.

Knowing that Amy was going to be the tooth fairy, Makenzie dressed up for the ward party as a little girl who just lost her tooth. So cute!

Andrew didn’t last long in his costume. Adam, Andrew and Amy all helped at carnival-style booths for the Primary kids. Andrew and Arri manned the ring toss.

The Jensen family went all out for this fishing booth! I have never seen one that awesome! There were even lights behind the water scene making it look like the water was moving.

Every prize included a real stuffed animal along with tons of candy and trinkets. I was blown away!

I was dying over how cute Beck looked in his knight costume! His real costume was sent with his parents to their new house where they were unpacking. Paula found this one in her costume bin and hemmed it to fit him. It was so shiny and adorable!

I think Hayden and Beck are going to miss Amy. This has been such a fun connection!

I watched both the boys in Rock Canyon’s Halloween parade. Mark was behind that enormous football player so it was hard to catch him until he was on the other side of him. It’s so fun to watch their faces light up when they see me!

Jon got nailed with a racquetball int he neck that morning! You can see the whitish spot in the middle of the red.

I ran errands in the morning, then took care of dinner prep and kids’ needs.

We had our traditional Halloween dinner of yummy mummies and sweet-potato-mashed potatoes and egg nog. I got to debut my grandparents’ green cups that I remember so fondly from family gatherings growing up. I thought they went well with our Halloween colors. The kids loved them!

Jon and I watched Tyler and Mark trick-or-treat in our side of the upper-U and then talked with our neighbors, the Kolbs, while the boys finished the block. Then Jon took drove them to a few, select houses. They picked me up for a trip to the Kemps’ for homemade root beer and (new this year) hot chocolate. We finished the outside portion of our evening by visiting the Middletons’ amazing jack o’ lantern display. These dragons were Mark’s favorites. Laura did an amazing set of pumpkins with a cheetah and topi from Elder Bednar’s talk. Their jack o’ lanterns are always very impressive. Jon, the boys and I watched Hotel Transylvania 2, which we really enjoyed!

Amy went to Savannah Rencher’s house for a friend party, Andrew went trick-or-treating with his buddies, and Adam trick-or-treated with these friends and then partied at our house afterward. These kids were laughing so hard in the basement playing Slap Jack.

We hardly had any trick-or-treaters at our house! I think cold was the number one reason, but we also have a lot of dark houses on our street (people leaving their lights off) so I think people have learned that it isn’t the best neighborhood for candy volume.

It took quite a while to get all the face paint off of Tyler and Mark. I threw them in a bath for good measure. Jon, Adam and I watched a bit of soccer to top off the evening.

It was a good Halloween!

We took our family picture right before dinner so I wouldn’t stress about losing good lighting. Here is our “no masks” picture. (Adam blacked out his eyes so you couldn’t see his white face through the mask.)

masks and posing

Natalie was nice enough to send me a photo of her with Megan - cute cowgirls!

Rather than mailing in our ballots, I decided to drive to the Provo rec center so Natalie could officially vote for the first time... and feel like it! That was super cool!

There is way too much candy in our house right now! Tyler isn’t even eating any of it, keeping with his year-without-candy-for-$100 deal. I’m amazed at his self-discipline, though he’s been opening packages and keeping the candy in a jar.

Sorting candy is so fun!

Adam was in and out of the temple so quickly! We’ve found the temple’s soft spots and are loving that!

Andrew had an Ultimate Frisbee tournament that I wasn’t able to go to because I needed to take Adam to and from his cello group class. (Adam has been having an absolute blast at these! He has such a good time with his fellow cellists, which makes me very happy!)

Jon tried to go to Andrew’s last Frisbee match, but the games ended before he got there. (They played shorter games than normal and took out the breaks.) Such a bummer! Andrew had a good time, though.

The other reason I couldn’t go to Andrew’s games was that I needed to take Amy to Jayne’s for another rehearsal. (Jayne squeezed us in, which was super helpful!) While Amy can drive herself there, she likes having me there. I love hearing her play! I also take on the job of taking video for her.

We waited a long time for the results, but were thrilled to see that Amy was a semi-finalist! We returned less than an hour later to play her entire concerto (5 minutes) for 3 judges including the conductor.

She was very disappointed that she was out of tune in a few places because she never has been in those places. Overall, her performance was phenomenal! Unfortunately, she did not make it as a finalist. The preparations she did for this (which were pretty last minute) were so significant and the results were amazing!

I forced her to cancel all her teaching lessons for this week, which gave her the time she needed to practice and get extra lessons. It also made her consider her priorities and she may need to make some adjustments to her teaching load so she can focus more on progressing herself.

Fast and testimony meeting was really great! I went to primary for the second hour so I could accompany Mark while he played Come, Follow Me with the Primary in a practice for their upcoming program.

Andrew missed the two Book of Mormon episodes we watched last week, so the boys watched those to catch him up. Then Amy and I joined them for this week’s new release. I love these videos! They are so well done and get us thinking and talking. I love hearing the boys exclaim how awesome Nephi is!

Andrew also got some extra manhood training from Jon.