"Come fly with me" Prom 2017

The theme for Prom 2017 was 

"Come Fly with Me"

 which was totally fitting for our girlie and her date.

He's crazy about airplanes!

(notice the tie pin)

He's pretty crazy about fast cars too and has a deal

worked out with his neighbor

(a pilot)

to borrow his vette

in exchange for doing his neighbor's lawn care.

Our girlie was the beneficiary of all that mowing 

and loved the sweet ride!

Dig these Flynn Rider smolders - haha!

The group was at our house for part of the day date

 and we could hear them

laughing 

clear down in the basement.

=D

I LOVE the sound of teenagers laughing!!!

What terrific kids

and what a fun night.

=D

Tar Heels!!!!

March Madness ended well in this guys eyes!

Let's hear it for the North Carolina Tar Heels!!! 

Tar

Heels

Tar

Heels

Tar

Heels

!!!!!!!

A geyser in the basement...

After getting home very late the other night, 

I went downstairs and noticed the carpet near the bathroom seemed damp.

I called for the Mr., he felt the floor 

and immediately went to the utility room 

which was on the other side of the wall from the wet carpet. 

He reached up to move the water softener 

when suddenly 

we had a geyser spraying all over the place!

He tried several water shut off valves in the utility room 

with no luck 

so he took off running down the hall. 

I put my hands over the geyser 

to keep the water as contained as possible 

and pretty quickly he'd turned off the main water valve. 

The twigs came running with towels in hand. 

We squeegeed water that was pooled on the floor toward the floor drain, 

wiped down everything that was soaked, 

tore up carpet, 

isolated the water leak 

and wrapped it with towels, 

then set up a fan to dry things out. 

Our awesome plumber friend was able to come help

in just a few days.

Things are drying out 

and we're so grateful it wasn't worse !!!

Bison, a bunny, baptisms, a beauty, a beast, 7 brides, and an April blizzard...boy oh boy!

Because our girlie's school schedule is half High School classes 

and half College classes 

and their spring break weeks are in separate months, 

spring break didn't really happen for her. 

With a lot of planning and a little creativity, 

we got lucky and were able to party it up 

during her High School spring break 

between her college classes. 

I found the following evidence of the partying on her phone tonight. 

There was hiking on Antelope Island with friends...

and Bison.

There was an afternoon with Ashley at the movies

watching Beauty and the Beast

and playing with Waffles the bunny. 

There were several afternoons of doing odd jobs 

like raking all the leaves out of the garden,

stacking wood,

and having the family sort through their shoes

to make money for efy this summer. 

To top the week off we all went to Salt Lake 

for a live production of one of our family's favorite movies,

then baptisms at the Salt Lake Temple 

for our family members who've gone on before,

and yummy treats at Kneaders

just as a crazy April blizzard was beginning.

I'm thinking she did a pretty good job 

at improvising her spring break week!

<3

Because Zac said it made him so happy...

Zac came outside with me to play fetch with Rascal today. 

While Rascal was fetching, Zac was talking. 

I love when Zac does that. 

He's such a neat guy and I love to hear his thoughts about things.

He mentioned that when he was on his mission 

it made him so happy to get pictures of Rascal 

catching tennis balls

and catching snow. 

Zac said I should take some pictures of Rascal chasing the tennis ball 

and send them to Hunter. 

There you go, Elder Branch,

some happiness coming right at ya.  =D

I love these twigs! 

I love how they look out for and think of each other. 

We're not perfect

- far from it - 

we're working on being more thoughtful, 

more patient, 

more like the Christ we adore. 

I loved what Sister Jones said in General Conference this weekend.

"Understanding the doctrine of repentance 

is essential for becoming resistant to sin. 

Being sin resistant doesn't mean being sin-less 

but it does imply being continually repentant..."

How grateful we are for repentance and forgiveness, 

for family and missionaries, 

for cute tennis-ball-loving dogs 

and for our Jesus and his Prophets. 

We're also grateful for you. 

Happy General Conference Weekend!

<3

You can watch General Conference here...

The funny fix-it man aka how many bodies fit in that little room?

This funny fix-it man got down on the laundry room floor the other day

so I was super helpful and ran for my little camera. 

That brought out the fix-it man's animations. 

Back to the reason he got down on the floor in the first place though.

You see, the washer died with a full load of water still inside.

Zac came and helped. 

Then Rascal wanted to see what was so interesting. 

It was like a game of "how many bodies fit in that little room?"

After we got the water drained, 

the fix-it man found the problem and fixed the washer lickety split! 

He's the bomb!!

Thank you Heaven! We love tender mercies!

A gift to everyone she meets - a real peach, and squeeky...

Writer, Clara Kramer, said 

"There are people who are simply gifts to everyone they meet."

Don't you love that! It's so true! 

One of those exact gifts, one of those people, is my friend Vickie. 

Whenever I describe her to people 

I tell them if she ever had to have open heart surgery 

I'm certain they'd find 3 hearts in her! 

She is full of love and goodness, 

kindness and empathy, 

patience beyond measure and generosity to a fault. 

I know because I've been the recipient of her kindness, 

her listening ear, 

her understanding hearts (do you see what I did there) 

and her generosity.

This week she was terribly sick with a stomach flu. 

I didn't even know until the next day 

when I found out she was feeling better 

but one of her 7 foster children needed picked up from school 

because they were sick. 

I didn't have a car to go get her 

so I just ran over to Vickie's house and watched the little ones 

while she drove to the school to pick up her girl. 

It was nothing. 

In fact it was a blessing because I got to hold her 6 month old baby 

while she was gone and that was heaven. ;)

The next day, lo and behold, Vickie thinks she needs to thank me. 

She never needs to thank me. 

She's such a joy and blessing in my life that she is gift enough. 

She gave us this fancy dancy little gizmo vacuum.

I tried and tried to refuse but Vickie is also very determined. ;)

She has one just like it and is crazy about it! 

Calls it a fantastic marvel and says it's the best feeling 

when it's vacuuming 

because it's like getting two chores done at once! 

We decided the gizmo is a girl 

and because she makes everything squeeky clean 

we shall call her Squeeky. 

Rascal was freaked out by her in the beginning 

but now he just leaves whatever room she's in. 

Zac thought she needed googly eyes. 

She's a peach I tell ya...

but nothing compared to the peach that is our Vickie!

<3

San Fran with honors...

Zac needed to take an honors class for one of his scholarships. 

The honors class that was highly recommended to him 

came complete with a field trip to San Francisco!

The class was called "The Beat Goes On" 

and the field trip was over spring break. 

Zac was awesome to send pictures each day!

Here are some of my favorites. =D

The Class Description says "From On the Road to the Summer of Love to Woodstock with several stops in between, this class explores the events, trends and personalities that illuminate this explosive time in America. Central to the class is a “field trip” to San Francisco where the students explore many of its neighborhoods that are on the forefront during these decades of change—places like North Beach, Berkeley and Haight-Ashbury. The class will also examine what of this revolution in thought and action has endured, as well as what has not, into Twenty-first Century America."

I believe one of the objectives of honors classes is 

to acquaint students with diversity of thoughts and actions. 

Some of the class experiences were a little too diverse 

for Zac's liking but he's an optimistic guy 

and found lots of things to love. 

This picture's for you, Hunter. <3

Zac found Alcatraz's audio tour quite interesting.

This is one of the two professors (taking a 360 photo) who led the field trip. Thanks men!

A memorable experience for sure.

Fryday...

At work this week, Debbie told us about their young womens french fry activity. 

The leaders got fries from several places, 

 the girls put on blindfolds

and they had a taste test to see which fries they liked best 

and guess where the fries were from.

When I told the fam about Debbie's activity they wanted to have a go at it!

Can you tell where these fries are from just by looking at them???

The choices are...

Burger Bar

5 Guys

Red Robin

In & Out

Craft Burger

It's pretty hard to go wrong

when you're making something with potatoes - yum!

The twigs think we should do this again

 but

with chocolate.

Let's do it!  

;)

(Left to right - the fries are from Craft Burger, Burger Bar, 5 Guys, In & Out, Red Robin)