Events of the day

This morning Emily got her new glasses. She put them on and everything was clear! Her vision is now 20/200. It was 20/60 with her old glasses. Later the kids and I elicited help from the neighbor with bikes. Karen has a little bike with training wheels that she can sort of ride. Eric's training wheels were all bent and broken, so they were removed. Eric now rides without training wheels and is happy for the freedom. Emily and Caitlyn have their bikes all fixed so that they can ride too. The neighbor also removed our metal pole where the mailbox used to be. Emily had her dance dress rehearsal. Benjamin can now say "momma", "no", "yes", cacker" (cracker), and tries to imitate many other words.

I have the pictures from the play to share:






Here's Caitlyn's flower crown that she picked the flowers for and I made. Then it went bad an hour later. The flowers were on their way to death in the garden anyway.

The Play was Saturday. Eric had a solo part. He came out by himself, saluted, and then was stuck in a box. He was sooo cute. I'm sure he was picked for the part out out of the cuteness factor. Caitllyn said her "mama"s well and Eric saluted well. Those two just followed around with the other kids in their group without any other speaking parts. Emily's group was huge and she was probably picked to help fill the ranks. She was the smallest kid of the bunch, but given the biggest clothes. It was wrong of them. She spent the show holding her vest on. She did have one line and said it well- for Emily anyway. Aaron claims to have pictures- not sure when he'll get them uploaded though.

Illness has attacked our family. I can't complain since no one got sick all winter. No barfings at all. In fact- not even a cold. This is some sort of cross between cold and flu. Emily started it out. She was feverish, then developed a cough. Next was Ben who first had a runny nose, then cough, and fever. Last night it was Aaron and Eric. Eric was really weird last night. He cried and cried. I went in to find out what was the matter and he was incoherent. I had him get out of bed. He got down and then started to climb in to Ben's crib. I stopped him and sent him to the bathroom. He did his business, then started crying because I wouldn't let him out of the bathroom. So, I sent him to the couch with blanket and pillow. He slept the rest of the night. I bet he felt better having his head elevated. Ben is still coughing. Emily is hard to tell. So far Karen, Caitlyn, and I are still well. Hopefully we will stay in such a state. Caitlyn has viola lessons tomorrow and she already missed last week.

One day I cleaned the whole front room. I got the corners and behind furniture too! I vacuumed, but that didn't do much. Dh approved the purchase of a vacuum, so now I have a new toy! I filled up the collection container just from the living room. The vacuum sucked dirt out of my carpet. Then I went around and vacuumed clear areas. i filled up the container again. Now my carpet is fluffy! I need to get everything else cleared up and vacuum all. I love my new vacuum. It isn't the greatest, but it is way better than the old one ever was.

Star Trek is IN!

My kids were ahead of the trend last year. Eric dressed as Captain Kurk when the other kids had no idea who he was. He was talking phasers, klingons, "Beam me up", and Spock. Now with the new prequel Star Trek movie others are learning about classic Trek. We were wandering about Albertson's yesterday (instead of just going to the bakery for french bread) and ran across Kellogs' family sized boxes of cereal with Star Treak "Beam me up" badges.They were $2.50 for the family sized box, so I bought 4 boxes.The boxes were opened this morning. Caitlyn got the Romulan badge, Emily and Eric Star Fleet Administrative badges, and Karen got the science officer badge. Now there's hope we might find a t-shirt at walmart or something. Too bad the kids aren't going to see the movie. There's a bedroom scene in the preview. Why ruin a movie with that garbage? Maybe when it comes out on dvd we can skip that part (and any other inappropriate part).

Tonight the 3 kids are in the play Pinocchio. I'll blog more later.

Good news!

Aaron kept his job!!! Apparently the cuts were based on job performance. I'm glad Aaron is a good worker and good at what he does. I went right out and spent money.I took the kids out to McDonald's for dinner. Of course, I'm frugal and our total for 5 kids, 1 adult was $20. Then I found out about a sale on t-shirts at disney.com 3 t-shirts for $12! Emily and Caitlyn have about 3 short sleeved shirts between them, so they each picked out 3 t-shirts. Then they each got a nightgown that was also on sale. Now I'm finished spending. Until Saturday when the kids have eye appointments and will likely need new glasses.

In other news, Eric lost his second tooth today, but his new tooth is already partially grown in. The kids spent their Easter gift money at walmart. The girls pooled their money together for a giant ball and a set of bracelets. Eric bought a ninja set. He just wanted daggers and is thrilled to have pictures of worm-like dragons on the daggers. He says his dagger is called Sting and quotes "The Hobbit" often. A few weeks ago we finished reading "The Goose Girl". I grabbed a couple books and asked the kids which book to read next. Emily went and found "LOTR: The Fellowship of the Rings". The kids begged, pleaded, then voted. We've started the book and will be reading the trilogy for the next year probably. My kids are obsessed!

Found!

A couple years ago a dinner plate dissappeared. It has bothered me ever since. How can you lose a dinner plate? A theaory I had was that my dad (who was visiting at the time of the disappearance) had broken the plate and not bothered to tell me about it, but that didn't sound like him. He's broken dishes before when I wasn't around and told me about it afterwards. The other theory was that somehow it was thrown in the trash and no one noticed it. I think a dinner plate would be pretty noticeable in the trash though.

For the first time in years we actually got down our special dishes for Easter. For the past several years we have been at the in laws for every feast and just used regular dishes for our "after holiday" feast. I asked Aaron to put the dishes away for me, since they are heavy and go in the cabinet above the fridge. While putting away, he found the missing dinner plate!!! That's great since one was broken recently and we were down to 6 dinner plates. Now we have 7.

In other news, tomorrow is downsizing day at Stampin' Up. No one knows who will be cut and who will stay. The employees have been wrapping up their business, making medical claims, clearing out their desks, their email accounts, and finding company owned items at home. Aaron has collected his company equipment to turn in tomorrow if necessary. He is one of two database administrators. They really need both, but conceiviably they could go down to one. Aaron is favored because he also works on servers, has been the virtual machine guy, and can do all kinds of other computer stuff too. The other guy is strictly a dba. The other guy, however has about 14 years seniority over Aaron. We will all have to wait and see. I don't want him to lose his job!!!

Easter

We had a good Easter. Saturday morning the kids found most of the eggs the bunny left. The bunny counted 76 eggs, but only 74 have been found so far. Benjamin is an obsessed child. He loves candy and will feast on it if his basket is left down from the fridge.






Sunday morning we watched Aaron on Music and the Spoken word. It was a great Easter program. Sacrament meeting was a bit dissapointing. The organist, who picks the hymns forgot it was Easter, so the hymns sung only once anually, were skipped this year. Since it was fast and testimony meeting, you wouldn't really even know it was Easter. I'm a bit bummed out by that since I think Easter should be at least as important as Christmas. Well, I made a big deal in my home anyway.

Hot Cross Buns

They were good, but if I want them next year, I think I will just buy them from the store. I spent the day washing all the pots, pans, and mixing bowls from last night's feast. Then Aaron made Paskha (Russian Easter Cheese). He used a whole bunch of pots, pans, mixing bowls, and etc kitchen stuff, which I had to wash. (Come on, a man can't wash!) Add that to a pot, a couple bowls, and kneading bread and I'm all tuckered out.