Jingle All the Way

Today was Kylynn's Christmas play at school. The play was put on by all the 3rd graders. It was called "Jingle all the Way". It told a story about how Santa had lost his jingle because everyone had lost the Christmas spirit. They sang 4-5 songs during the play. My favorite was called "GPS mess".
 Each one the children had a speaking part. Kylynn was the reindeer Vixen. We went out and got her some antlers to wear and some brown sweat to make her look somewhat like a reindeer.
Kylynn was really sad because her Dad had to work and wasn't able to come to her play. So I recorded it all for Dad to see when he come home tonight.

Cute Kylynn as Vixen

The children trying to find Santa at the north pole

All the reindeer singing

Santa and Mrs Clause

Kylynn did a wonderful job and had her part all memorized and said it so everyone could understand it. Her lines were: "Keep ringing your bells, keep making that sound. And maybe Santa's jingle will come back around."
Everyone did a great job, It was well done.

5th Grade Christmas band concert

Jessica had her first band concert on December 5th. It was scheduled at the Junior High but due to some scheduling mess up it had to be done at the Middle School.

When the school year started Mr. Barton had sent home a note about band and the requirements. In his letter he talked about the concerts and requested that the front row flute player were pants. So I went out and got Jessica some nice black slacks to were. She was really upset with me because she was the only girl not in a dress. But at least no one could see up her dress like some of the other girls sitting on the front row.

Jessica had said the concert wouldn't be long, and she was right. The whole concert lasted 10 minutes, from start to finish. Of that 10 minutes there was about 5 minutes of music. The band played 5 or 6 short numbers including "Good King Wenceslas ", "Jingle Bells", and "Jolly Old St. Nicholas". The band did a great job.  Mr Barton is a wonderful teacher.

Jessica with the other flute players

Mr Barton and the 5th grade band

I was really proud of Jessica and how good she is getting on the flute. I really hope she continues to enjoy it.

Family Christmas Party 2013

We had such a fun Christmas Party on Sunday the 8th of December.  Cristy planned it this year. We each had to come up with "A Minute to Win It" game. It was so fun to watch everyone. We had some really good laughs.

Robin's game, trying to get a pop-pop to stick to the end of your nose

Wendy's game: pencil elevator

Vicki's game: Balance the Christmas bulbs

Jessie and Ky working well as a team

Cristy brought cup stacking. Aleeya wouldn't let anyone help her

Hunter didn't want to do any games afraid he would lose. Uncle Trent said he would play him blindfolded, glove on one hand the the other hand tied behind his back. It was very comical to watch.

After all the games we had dinner. It was very simple this year we had ham or Turkey sandwiches on rolls with salads. It was very yummy.

The last activity was the kids favorite. Cristy made each family a ginger bread house and we got to decorate it with all sorts of candy. My kids ate more candy than they put on the house. It was so much fun, but not something I had patients to do each year.

The Weekes Family

The Jacobsen Family

The Grant Family

The Klingler Family

The Erikson Family. If we would have judged them I think Mom and Dad would have one.

It was a great time had by all. It so much fun getting together as a family.

New Family Member

A couple of weeks ago our  neighbor Tom called to say that he had a gift for Aleeya and asked if he could bring it over. I was exercising so I told him to come over in about an hour.  We all knew what the gift was a little kitten.
We had another kitten that was ran over and killed. Tom had felt really bad for Aleeya because he knew how much she loved it. So when he noticed there was another litter of kittens in the hay stack and that one hung out in his garbage he was able to catch one for her.
Aleeya named the kitten Mickey. She loves it and wants to hold it all the time. She wakes up and gets the kitten out. It is so much fun watching her interact with Mickey. In fact all the kids love the kitten, they are always fighting over who gets to hold it.

Aleeya and Mickey

And The Winner Is:

For the last event of the Madison centennial celebration, they held a history fair. The theme was "A tapestry of American History".  I really didn't want to participate but Jessica's teacher sent it home as an assignment. If you could relate your topic to Idaho or Madison county you would get extra points. Jessica really wanted to pick something that involved Madison county. It took us awhile but we finally came up with a topic that would include all three; Dam Failures in the 20th century.
We did a lot of research and found out there were 4 dams that had failed between 1960-1980. I thought it would be fun to make the information into a book with pictures of each of those dams and the damage caused. She worked on it for about a week or so, reading stories about the dams breaking, mostly the Teton Dam. She learned a lot. Then on Monday I found a web sight that had a series of pictures of the Teton Dam breaking. I knew we had to find a way to include them. So on Tuesday we added a tri-fold posted to her project.
The fair was on Thursday night, with the judging taking place right after school. In the rules for the project it said that they didn't want a prepared speech on your presentation, that the project should stand on its own. So we didn't prepare much for the judging other than taking about why she chose the topic. When the first judge came to talk to her I got really nervous because of all the questions he was asking. Then 3 more judges came by with similar questions. She did really well for not preparing for it.
They announced the winners after the fair opened to the public. They went through the Adults, senior, and then elementary winners. Delwyn turned to me and asked what happened to the middle school division. Then they announced the 3rd and 2nd place winners and they weren't Jessica. I started to feel really bad that she didn't win anything. Then they announced that the winner of 1st place in the middle school division and winner of the I-pad was Jessica Klingler. I was so surprised and happy for her.
The highlight of the night for me was Jessica telling Ky that she could have her other tablet when we got home.
I found out from her teacher that the reason she won was that the judges were impressed that she had tied in America, Idaho and Madison county history into her project.
Way to go Jessica, we our proud of you.

Spud Days Fun Run

Since my friend Anna Dickey was unable to run the Pioneer day fun run with me. We decided to find another one that we could do together. We decided on the Spud Days run in Shelley. This gave me motivation to continue to workout and train for another 1 1/2 months.
During this time I discovered that I also loved to ride my bike. So I would alternate running and then biking each day. I found that it was easier to go biking, especially after the kids returned to school. I would pull Aleeya behind me in the cart, and she loved it. Each day she would ask to go on as bike ride. I tried running with her in the cart or in a stroller but I just couldn't go very far, and I hated it. So this past few weeks I haven't ran very much. But I was determined to try and beat my previous time when I did the 5K.
I headed to Shelley at 5:45 am. I was supposed to meet Anna at 6:30 at the elementary school. I had printed of directions to the school to follow, since I don't know my way around Shelley at all. It turned out that my directions were not very helpful or I'm just no good at following them. I got lost a couple of times and wondered if in would make it before the run started. Finally I found it and got checked in.

Anna and I at the start with all the other runner behind us.

Andrea from work came over to the school to see us off at the start of the race.  Anna kept telling me that I would be leaving her behind, but I figured she could stay with me for the first little while but turns out she was right, I left her right after the race started. So one again I had to run by myself. It felt great to run and I was even passing people most of the way.  I wanted to stop a few times and walk but I wouldn't let myself. Finally when we were about 3/4 of a mile from the end some lady came running up to me and said  " were just about there". I ran with her for as little bit, then she would walk, I would catch up and then she would run again. Finally when I figured we had to be getting close she starting to walk and as I ran up to her I told her " no, we can do this" and so she kept running. She was able to finish just before me a couple of runners. But as I came across the finish line she came up to me and thanked me and gave me a quick hug. It was nice to help someone finish strong. I remembered at the Pioneer day run just when I wanted to quit I ran by someone that told me " you go girl", it meant a lot to me and helped me finish. It was nice to return the favor.
I had set as goal  to finish this run faster than my previous time of 36:47. I was hoping for 35 minutes, but I want that fast. But I did do it faster than before in 35:33. And I was the 90th person to cross the finish line. I'm not sure if all those were running the 5K or one of the other races, but I was very proud of myself for doing better.

Anna and I at the finish line.

Anna also met her goal of finishing in under an hour. I encouraged her to do it in 45 minutes and she almost did she finished with a time of 48:03. Not bad for someone that has struggled with the altitude her whole training time. I was glad she ran with me, it was a lot of fun. We will have to do it again.

Madison County Centennial Concert

Madison county celebrated 100 years this year. To celebrate they planned a big concert the last day of the fair. I was so excited when I saw who they had got to come. I ran across the concert information in a mail insert, I saw that Sawyer Brown was coming and I got on line to buy tickets. I didn't care how much they cost,I just knew I wanted to be there. I told Cristy about it so bought 4 tickets. I was so excited for the concert I began to count dawn the days in my mind. I talked to Erin a couple weeks ago to arrange babysitting for the kids. Now all I had to do was wait for August 17 to arrive.
The gates were opening at 4:30 so we planned to go around 4 so that we could have good seats. Turns out that wouldn't have been necessary because not that many people were there.
The concert had 3 different bands. The first was a local band from the college names West Memphis, they were a funk band. I wasn't that impressed with them, I could hardly understand what they were singing.
The next group was "Starship featuring Mickey Thomas". This is who Delwyn was glad to see. I wasn't even sure what songs they even sung. Delwyn told me a couple that I might know. It turned out that I new 4 or 5 of the songs. It was really loud and I had a hard time understanding the words to the songs, especially the songs I didn't know.

Starship

Hobbie, and Jim from Sawyer Brown watching the Starship show

The high light of the night was when Sawyer Brown took the stage. I have always been a fan of there music, and have seen them already 5 times in concert. I was a little nervous that Mark Miller would have slowed down, since he is getting older, but no need to worry he still had tons of energy. He did his crazy dance moves that kept everyone entertained for the whole show. I thought I would know all of there songs but turns out they released an album in 2011, that I didn't know about called " Travelin Band" they sang 2 songs from it that were great. My favorite was Travelin Band that told the story of the group from the beginning when that were on star search to the present, it was a fun song and brought back memories of seeing the in concert in there younger days.

Sawyer Brown

Mark Miller doing his crazy dancing

What a great group

The night ended with a firework show, but we didn't stay to watch. I saw a few of them while walking back to the car and the drive home and they were beautiful. They had it going with music, but the music was from the early days of the county and it drove me nuts, so I changed the station.
Over all it was a wonderful date night with Delwyn, I think he even enjoyed Sawyer Brown, he said that they were entertaining at least. Thanks for going with me, I love you.

Pioneer Day Fun Run

Today I was able to do the 5K run with my Mom and sisters in St. Anthony's Pioneer celebration.  We met at Cristy's house at 6:30 and walked to the Stake Center as a warm up and to check-in.

  We all lined up at the start and took off, once the race began. Robin, Cristy, and I all ran. While Mom, Vicki, and Kenna walked. As we left the start Cristy started distancing herself from Robin and myself. Robin and I stayed together for the first 2 miles and then I was unable to keep up with her any longer. But I didn't quit, and kept putting one foot in front of the other.  Finally I could see Cristy's house and knew I was almost to the end. It was nice to have people cheering me on this time,  thanks Dad, Tom, Justine, Quincy, and Jessie Sabin.

Finally I could see the finish line and I was sure I would make it. As I entered the Stake Center parking lot I willed my legs to go a little faster. And I was the 93 rd person to finish the 5 K run in 36 minutes 47 seconds.  We all did great. Cristy finished 59th and Robin finished 89th. Mom, Vicki, and Kenna were the, 4,5,and 6th finishers in the 5K walk.

It was a lot of work, but fun. Hope to do it again sometime.

I did it!!!

On June 27, I was able to participate in my first 5K. My ward planned it for a Relief Society activity towards the first of the year. I Decided about 2 1/2 mouths ago that I would like to participate. I found an abb "couch to 5K" and I started working out most days on the treadmill. When I first started I thought I would die just running for 5 minutes straight. But by the time the 5 K day arrived I was running for 25 minutes straight.
The night of the run came and as I pulled into the church parking lot the car thermometer read 88'. It was going to be a hot run. Not very many sisters showed up, and I was the only one that had planned on running.  I felt bad about leaving everyone behind, and I didn't want them to think I was better then them. I had made a goal that I was going to do this for me and no one else. I wasn't able to run as far as I had in my practice runs, due to the heat, but I did my best and I finished it. I finished a 5K. I was so proud of myself for not quiting anywhere a long the way.
 I was sad when I got to the finish line because no one was there to celebrate my accomplishment.
I will continue to train and run another 5K in July with my sister's, and this time I hope to run it all. Wish me luck!

South Dakota Vacation

View of Mt Rushmore from the Iron Mountain Road

For vacation this year Delwyn thought it would be fun to take the kids to Mt. Rushmore, I had never been there so thought it was a great idea. We left early in the morning on June 10, and drove across Wyoming and arrived in Custer, South Dakota around 5 pm. The kids handled the drive over fairly well, because they were so excited to go.
After getting checked into the hotel and eating dinner, it was off to the hotel pool. The pool was suppost to be heated, so as I went to step in I go a shock to feel ice cold water. I backed out and spent my time in the hot tub. Delwyn and the kids did venture in and seemed to have a great time.

Enjoying the cold pool

The next morning it was up early to drive to Mt Rushmore. It was amazing to see and learn about its construction. We were able to take the almost mile walk up closer to the monument. The kids seemed to do well. We had brought the stroller for Aleeya, but she didn't want to sit in it much, most of the time we ended up carrying it or pushing it empty.

The Kids in front of Mt Rushmore

We went also to see the monument Crazy Horse that is still under construction. It is not even close to be finished but they seemed to be making progress. The monument is huge, so huge in face that Mt Rushmore would be able to fit in just the head of Crazy Horse.

Crazy Horse

We were also able to take a couple of scenic drives through Custer State Park. The Needles Highway was awesome.

Amazing tunnels on the Needles Highway

Needles Highway scenery

We also decided to drive into Rapid City for dinner, while there we took the kids to "Dinosaur Park" to play. They loved climbing on each and every dinosaur and have a picture taken.

Dinosaur park

We loved to climb on the dinosaurs

On Wednesday we had hoped to go on the 1880 train early in the morning but it was full, so couldn't go until afternoon. We spent the morning taking more scenic drives through Custer State park. The Wildlife loop wasn't very exciting for us, since we can see bison all the time in Yellowstone. But for some people they stopped and looked forever. The Bison like to stand in the road and not move, and no one seemed to want to try and get by them. At one time we were stopped for 15 minutes just waiting for the cars in front of us to go around the bison. The Iron Mountain Road was great. We went through 2 tunnels that as you came out you could see Mount Rushmore, it was cool.

Cool bridges on the Iron Mountain road

Herd of Bison that didn't want to get out of the road.

Finally it was time for the Train ride. Aleeya had been waiting for this the hole trip.   The train ride was 2 hours through the Black Hills from Hill City to Keystone. We saw lot of forest and the rocky mountains up close. We were able to see Mt Harney, which is the tallest mountain between the Swiss Alps and The Rocky Mountains. The kids seemed to enjoy it. On the ride into Keystone we ended up sitting in an open window car, it was a little cold, so for the return trip we moved into a car with windows.

The family at The 1880 Train

The kids loved this train especially Aleeya

 After the train ride we headed back to Custer so the kid's could go to the Flintstones bedrock city amusement park. They had been wanting to go since they first saw it across the street from our hotel. They had a great time, Delwyn even joined in the fun by swinging on the swing set.

Betty, Jessica, Wilma, and Kylynn

The kids in Barney's car

The family swinging

  We left early Thursday morning to come home. We decided to take a different route on the way home and go to Devils Tower, WY. We arrived just after 8:30 am and hardly anyone was there. We made our way around the tower, the kids complaining about having to walk. Then about half way around they decided it was OK and started to climb on all the rocks and wanting there picture taken. I have more pictures than I know what to do with.

Family at Devils Tower

Devils Tower

We ended up getting home at 10:11 pm. It was a really long day and the kids were much more grumpy and they thought they needed to stop every hour. I was never so glad to see the Welcome to Idaho sign and know we only had about another 1 1/2 hours to go. Over all it was a great trip. Thanks for the Memories everyone.

Softball tournament

Jessica was able to participate in the 8U softball tournament on June 4 and 6th at the community fields. For there first game they only had 6 players and got killed. They were so discouraged, after the first inning when they couldn't get anyone out. I felt so bad for them.
There next game wasn't until Thursday night since they were in the consolation bracket. I was suppost  to   work but was able to trade so I could be there for her. Jessica was hit in the arm her first time up, and could hardly move it, but she continued to play. The game was close the hole game and ended up going into an international tie break for the last inning. I was happy for them but after sitting for already 2 hours I wasn't sure I wanted them to have to play a second game today. They ended up winning and were so happy.
The  next game was for the consolation bracket championship. They had to play a team for Rigby, and they didn't do so well, but they continued to encourage each other. Jessica had wanted to pitch all season so they let her try, she threw mostly ball with a couple of stikes, but no one seemed to care, they just kept encouraging her it was awesome to witness. I was sure glad I was able to trade shifts at work to be there. They did loose the game but no one seemed to upset. They even gave them a medal. Way to go girls.

Jessica's hurt elbow, glad it was the left arm.

Jessica up to bat

Jessica trying to pitch

The team of 7 great girls, they played hard.