Well...

My Mom will be here in 3 hours and the basement is...well...there's a bed down there. Other than that, it's a little like camping.

We still need to get a bunch of things so for now, the basement is a little bit bare - ok, a lot bare, but we're kind of moved down there, which means there's a place for my mom to sleep. I bet she'll like that a lot.

And I did finish the curtains. It wasn't horrible, except for the fact that the fabric is very slippery and would slide around a lot.

But, what do you think?

Here are the new curtains.

And our empty bedroom. There are a lot of plans, just not a lot done yet. It will be great when it's done.

What does Daisy think about all this crazy moving around?

She likes to survey her domain from the highest places she can find. This one happens to be our mattress while were were moving it. (And aren't her eyes cool? They look like demon eyes.)

And now I can relax. Until I have to go get my mom, that is. :)

Sewing Again!

You may or may not know that we are once again remodeling our basement. We already did it once. Took it from the serious 1980's with smelly boy carpet to at least the 2000's. Then we decided to move our bedroom down there. But, we had a problem. The people who lived here before us. You know, the ones who couldn't really do home improving, had built a wall downstairs making the big room into two smaller rooms. So the wall had to go!

Nothing has exactly worked right with the "easy" fix of taking down a wall, repainting and repairing the floor, but we're plodding along. I mean, my mom is only going to be here in, let me figure this out, like 114 hours and we do have to sleep, Brent has to work, Ryan has to have a birthday, we have to go to church and keep the Sabbath Day holy in there plus finish the basement. But I'm getting off topic.

A long time ago we bought fabric to make curtains for the downstairs window. There were some cheapo blinds in there before that we're that nice to start with but that Daisy pretty much demolished. Yep, I was going to make curtains. I was even going to make lined curtains to keep out the light and the cold. Yep, I was going to do that.

Then I chickened out completely.

So, now I bought curtains. The problem is, the window is long and narrow. Not the direction curtains usually run. Then I all of a sudden got this brilliant idea to buy some curtains and turn them on their side. I know, I'm a genius! But now I'm faced with modifying the curtains.

I hate sewing.

I can do this. I can do this. I'm just modifying them, right? I'm not making curtains.

I hate sewing.

Wish me luck!

Maybe...

I don't know what happened, but I don't know if this post made it on. I was trying to do some scheduling and I may have done it wrong. So, don't forget this one.

My Buddy and Me

Do you remember this commercial?

Sorry about the kid sister part. I couldn't figure out how to cut that out. Anyway, this song kept going through my head the whole week we were in Atlanta. As I said before, Brent and Eli were inseparable. As you can see...

Whether just sitting on the couch...

Barbequing some dinner...

Blowing some bubbles...

Or shooting some bad guys, or us...whichever...

You never found one without the other. Eli even suggested sleeping with us...in Em's full sized bed. So glad that he forgot about that one.

Brent and his buddy...where ever he goes, Eli goes...Brent's buddy...Brent's buddy...too bad we live a whole country away!

And so ends our wonderful trip to Atlanta!

Craftin'! Ye Haw!

I couldn't go there and not craft. I mean, seriously! I'm a crafter after all. And I really enjoy crafting with kids. So I found some stuff that I thought would be fun to do and sent them to Jenny to pick. She picked ... all of the above. Ok! Crafting here we come!

First off...vinyl! Have I mentioned that I have a cricut? And that I love my cricut? And that I love cutting vinyl with my cricut? Well, I do. So I saw these on, where else, pinterest and thought they would be perfect.

I, of course, made them mine and after some problems finding a background, came up with these.

I like how these turned out! If you would like one, let me know.

Then, Jen wanted some cool sayings for over their doors. This is my favorite...that and I forgot to take pictures of the other ones.

We made lip gloss with kool aide...

Which did not work! I'm 0 for 2 on making home made lip gloss. One of these days I know I can do it!

Here we are making these super awesome necklaces! What do you think?

Emmy's in the pink one, Meg's is the shell, mine is the star fish and Alyssa's is the lady bug

I really like the epoxy we used. It cures in the sun so you have time to place things just right. It is proving a little more annoying here in cloudy Washington but it's still working. Oh, and by the way, those necklaces are made from sprinkles and either stickers or beads. Kind of smart, huh?

And, here are a few pictures that are just fun...Enjoy!

Eli is flying!

Em showing some of her Beauty and the Beast moves.

Meg tried and tried and tried to get a dart stuck to the moving fan. Finally!

Meg and Alyssa

Happy craftin' y'all!

We Might as Well Go to the Other Mountain

How would you spell the Utahn 'mountain'? m't'n? I don't know, but you can say it in your heads the right way.

On Friday before we flew out, we went to Kennesaw Mountain. There was a big Civil War battle here. That's all I remember. Have I told you how bad I am at history? At least I know what the Civil War was...

It was a little walk to one of the memorials. Isn't it a beautiful place? So peaceful and nice. It's kind of weird to think of a battle being fought here. Right up until you see the grave stones along the path. Then you remember why you're there.

There were cannons to pose next to. (I asked if these were actual cannons from the Civil War to which everyone kind of chuckled at me. So, no then?)

There were squirrels to chase. When we first got there, there were squirrels all around. Then after a few times of Eli chasing after them, there wasn't a squirrel to be found. I guess they talked to each other.

There was a memorial to pose by.

Really and truly, Jenny was there with us. I even have some pictures to prove it, but ... they didn't turn out too well so I was nice to Jen and didn't put them in. You're welcome!

Eli the poser

At one point, we stopped to read a marker and we were looking out into the forest. Jenny said that there could still be bullets from the Civil War in those trees. That kind of stuff is cool to me. That makes history something other than just dates in a book.

We were glad we went. It was a perfect end to a perfect week! It was sad to leave but we had a great time while we were there. Thanks guys!

What Y'all Doing Up There?

Man, my Southern accent is coming along nice. Now I just have to merge it with my Utahn and I'll be in business!

The older kids were in school and Steve had to work so we got to spend a lot of time with Jen and Eli. It was quite fun. And Eli developed quite the love for his Uncle Brent. They're BFF's now. Even though at first Eli would call him Jim. He'd say, "Hey Jim." And Brent would say, "What's my name?" To which Eli would say, "Uncle Brent." Then he would call him Jim again. It was funny.

Anyway, I digress.

The last time we were in Georgia, there was a lot of sickness going around so we didn't get to do that much. I've been hearing about Stone Mountain for a long time and really wanted to see what all the hubbub was about. Luckily this time we only had a little bit of sickness so we were able to go.

Stone Mountain is this huge granite mountain that just sort of appears on the Georgia skyline. I read about it but all I remember is there was something about a lava bubble...or something like that. Anyway, there's this big old granite rock and someone, apparently the same guy who did Mt Rushmore started it, carved some guys in the front of the granite mountain. I don't remember who they are, some southern people, but I'm sure I'll remember soon.

Since it's not summer yet, there wasn't a lot open at Stone Mountain. But that also meant that there weren't a lot of people there, which is just fine with me.

First things first, we took a gondola ride to the top of the mountain to have a look around.

What don't you see in these pictures? Yep, that's right, mountains. Not a mountain in sight. You could see the sky scrapers in Atlanta, but some reason I didn't get a picture of them. You could also see the back of your head, or maybe Florida, from there.

It was nice up on top of the mountain. Jenny said that it was probably the nicest it's been. Normally it's really cold or really hot. It was pleasant up there. Windy, but pleasant. I was glad we got a good day.

We took a couple of scrunch pictures. Yep, I'm that good...I can get 4 people in a scrunch picture.

And we took some other pictures too.

Eli and his BFF Jim, I mean Uncle Brent

It was hard to get a picture of Brent without Eli. Too cute!

Notice how I am nowhere near the edge. I'm so brave.

Oops, another scrunch picture. Got to love the wind!

I mean, seriously, that is so cute!

Then we waited for the gondola to take us back down and Brent took this great picture of Eli.

Not too sure what was going on with the gum... boys!

Then we walked around the shops a little. Most of them were closed and there wasn't anywhere to eat open, which was surprising but there was a glass studio there so that was fun to watch. Especially since we know how hard it is to do now.

And the carving on the mountain of the three Southern guys that I still can't remember who they are. Let me look it up. Ahh...the internet didn't fail me. The three men are Confederate President Jefferson Davis, General Robert E. Lee and Lt. General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. Kind of funny to have a guy named Stonewall on a stone wall. Hee hee.

 I added this picture for two reasons. 1) You can see the gondola tower at the top of the mountain on the left. And 2) You can see the big lawn that people sit on to watch the laser show that is only on the weekends this time of year. Too bad. Maybe next time we'll plan it a little bit better because I do think that would be fun to see. Jen says the lasers make it look like the carving runs off the mountain. Now that's something to see.

So there you have it, Stone Mountain. Well, what little was open that day. Normally there is a ropes course and lots of shops and other stuff to do. But we had a great day anyway and only got caught in a little bit of traffic on the way home.

Howdy All Y'All

Just practicing my southern accent since we're back among the Northerners and it's slowly slipping away.

Atlanta. Well, technically Kennesaw, Georgia. What fun we had there. And why did we head all the way out there? To see Alyssa get baptized and to spend some time with the rest of those folks.

Today's theme is...the Baptism.

We got in late Friday night so when the alarm went off at 7:00 am (Atlanta time) the next morning, that being 4:00 am our time, it was somewhat hard to drag ourselves out of bed. But we did and made it to the church just in time for pictures. Brent was so excited.

Notice the cloudy sky. Yep, we brought our weather with us, which was just fine with us. I don't know how anyone else felt.

The baptism was great. There's such a special Spirit you feel at a baptism. Alyssa asked me and her Grandma Blythe to speak. Mine was ok, Blythe's was amazing. I was glad she went after me. The water in the font was so warm that you couldn't see through the glass to watch her be baptized, but I bet that was nice for them.

Then it was on to birthday fun since Alyssa got to be baptized on her actual birthday. We opened presents, went to lunch and had some pretty yummy cake.

We decided to eat at Bahama Breeze. I don't think any of us had ever been there before, but we really liked it. I had fish tacos. They weren't as good as Rubio's. Rubio's has ruined me for fish tacos. Sigh!

We had some of those great shooter desserts - the little ones that come in a shooter glass. Perfect size dessert if you ask me. I had a key lime pie one. It was awesome.

They even put a candle in Lyssa's.

The wait for our table wasn't that long, but I guess Steve got hungry.

Then home for some great cake that Blythe made. Angel food with ice cream in the middle. Yum! I love angel food cake.

Alyssa attempted to get her ears pierced but it was just a little much that day. But she'll do it the next time. (I totally understand her trepidation. When I got my ears pierced, they got the machine stuck closed on one of my ears and it took them about an hour to talk me into doing the other one. I don't remember how old I was but I remember it being traumatic!)

What a fun day! And that was just the first one!