Here’s what we have been up to the last two weeks. Noah had his last track meet. He ran the 4x200 meter relay. He enjoyed track this year and I am proud that he tried something new. Track is not the easiest thing to do, but he did it. Here he is handing off the baton during his race:
Women’s Conference was a very much needed break from the hectic chaos at home for a few days. However, I did have to solve a few things while I was gone, but nothing that a few texts and phone calls can’t handle right?! Being a mom is a 24 hour on call job.
May(hem) is in full swing with all the school activities, grades, homework, dance performances, band concerts, sports, etc. There have been a few nights Aaron and I have had to divide and conquer to see everything because they have been scheduled on the same night at the same time. It has been crazy. Sarah has been a peer tutor this semester and has loved it. Peer tutoring is when they pair up a typical student (Sarah) with a special ed student and they go to a regular ed class together. The peer tutor helps the special ed student stay on task and help them during the regular ed class with anything they would need. We were always so grateful for the peer tutors that helped Matthew. They were so helpful, caring and loving toward him. Anyway, Sarah wanted to be a peer tutor this semester and got the opportunity. She got paired up with Abbi for dance class. Sarah has loved being Abbi's peer tutor. She said that Abbi is really sweet. The high school dance company had a performance night and they invited the regular PE dance classes to join in performing, too. That meant Sarah and Abbi got to perform, too. Here’s Sarah before the performance:
Here’s a few pictures from their group dance:
They did great and I was so excited to see Abbi. Sarah has talked a lot about her so I was excited to see her. Sarah has loved being a peer tutor.
Sarah got to do some more dancing with her regular recreational dance performance group at a few care centers. This was one night Aaron and I had to divide and conquer. There was a parent meeting for Noah I went to and Aaron took Sarah to the care center. Here she is doing her captain’s dance:
Last week Aaron and I did a day date. We had originally had a weekend trip planned, but a bunch of things came up and it got cut down to only a day date instead. We made the most of our day date, though. It was Friday. We left the house in the morning right after all the kids had left for school. We drove down and went through the Taylorsville temple open house. I was surprised to find that the inside seemed a lot smaller than I thought it would have been judging by the outside. It was still a beautiful temple and we were happy to get the chance to tour it.
I LOVED all the tulips on the grounds of the temple:
After that we walked around the sports store Scheel’s for a bit. Aaron was looking for something, but it wasn’t there. Then we went over and played some Top Golf. I am so bad at golf!! Ugh!! Aaron is always up for playing Top Golf because he can totally destroy me at any game we play. Oh well at least it is fun!
Then we had lunch at a Mediterranean place in downtown Salt Lake. On the way home we took the Mrs. Cavanaugh’s chocolate factory tour. This is something I have wanted to do for a while so I was excited to get the chance to do it. It was interesting. We also got some fancy chocolate to take home afterward.
We had to take an intermission from our date because our kids needed to be driven around for a few hours to get to everything they needed to get to that evening. Then after the kids were done at their different activities we went to a late show at The Desert Star Playhouse. We saw the spoof Butch Cassidy and the Sunburnt Kid. We had a really fun day together.
Sarah has been really slow to recover from being sick with strep a few weeks ago. She is almost back to 100%, but not quite and is also trying to get over some pleurisy. She has been taking some naps in the afternoon because she is so tired. Sophie is always up for a snuggle. However, it was AFTER Sarah fell asleep that Sophie snuggled up to her--otherwise I don’t think Sarah would have loved Sophie’s rear to be so close to her face....Oh well.
We celebrated Cinco De Mayo with some brisket tacos Aaron made. He smoked a brisket and used that meat to make tacos with all the fixings--pico de Gallo, guacamole, cheese, sour cream, toasted tortillas, etc. It was really good!
Speaking of Aaron he got to attend his second Human Rights meeting with Chrysalis a week ago. Chrysalis reviews all their residents restrictions to make sure they are ethical and need a parent perspective in addition to the board made up of different specialties employed by Chrysalis (behaviorists, managers, social workers, etc.) They review each client’s case and make sure they have the least restrictive restrictions on them to make it ethical, but still safe if that makes sense. After this meeting Aaron comes home and is thankful Matthew’s issues aren’t more severe. There are some really sad cases.
Aaron also got to get two cavities filled this past week. The dentist is his nemesis that he HATES going to see. Aaron understands it is a necessary evil, but the dentist gives him major anxiety. He did get some laughing gas to help him get his cavities filled, but he was so nervous I don’t know if it did much for him--the poor guy! Luckily, he has until his next dentist visit to recover.
What adds to the craziness is we are awaiting his mission call. His papers are in and most likely he will be getting his mission call THIS TUESDAY!! AHHHH! I am so excited!! It still doesn’t seem real to me!
Josh got a chance to run the Ragnar Race in Zion National Park this past weekend. Ragnar is a relay race with a TON of other teams. Each team is made up of 8 people or 4 people who double the amount of running. Josh was in a team with 7 other people from his YSA ward. This race started Friday morning and ended Saturday afternoon with people running around the clock. Each team member had to run three different segments an easy 4 mile run, a moderate 4 mile run and a difficult 7.5 mile run. However, one of their team members ended up having a funeral in their family and couldn’t make it to the race. That meant Josh got to pick up one of the missing team member's running segments, too. Josh in total ended up running about 20 miles with one of the segments starting at 1 am. Their team really did run for 30 hours straight. Josh said he had an amazing time, but it will probably take him at least a week to recover--haha! Here’s their team before the race started:
Josh running one of the segments around Zion National Park:
The next day was Mother’s Day. The kids got up early and made me breakfast in bed. It was awesome! They also all wrote me some sweet notes. That is what I LOVE about Mother’s Day. I am thankful that I get to celebrate it with my kids and husband. I am thankful I have a great Mother who was a wonderful example, too.
In other happenings Matthew’s house manager let him pick out his own new glasses after he got his updated eye prescription. He absolutely LOVES them. To be honest they probably wouldn’t have been the ones I chose, but Matthew is happy with them so I guess that is all that’s important.
He even got ’The Human GPS’ inscribed on the arm:
Matthew got to compete in the Special Olympics Track and Field this past week. Aaron and I weren’t able to attend because we were already dividing and conquering with all the other kids’ events. We will make sure we go to the State competition for him, though. He got a silver medal in both his races and a gold medal in shot put. He made sure he wore all his medals to church so he could show them off. Wahoo, Matthew!!
Here’s the during:
They didn’t take any after shots, but I think Daniel regretted doing it for a few minutes. Oh well, it is only hair and will grow back soon. However, I did notice a small patch of white hair on the back of Daniel’s head. He says that means he is now a super hero. I just said that just means you are starting to get old--haha!
Aaron really loved helping to coach him when he was in junior high on a recreation league. Aaron really misses that so he really wanted to watch him play.
It was a good game. His team won despite Daniel outrunning or passing one of his teammates and getting her out as he rounded third base. Fun times. The team teased him about it the rest of the night.
Their team was one of the last to get there so they got the worst camp site. It was right next to the portapotties.
The running map:
As it got dark he got to run with his head lamp on so he could see the trail:
His team after they finished the race. Josh is the one wearing the white hat:
It rained most of the time they were there. He still said they had a lot of fun. They all just camped in a tent and when they weren’t running they were either sleeping in the tent, playing ping pong in the resort clubhouse, sitting in the hot tub, playing games or chatting. He came home super exhausted, stinky, dehydrated and sunburned, but happy he did it.
Josh pulled in to our driveway from coming back from the Ragnar race as we were pulling out to go and see the Northern Lights at 10 pm Saturday night. I have wanted to see the Northern Lights for a long time so I was excited to see if we could see them. Josh decided he wanted to come with us despite being exhausted. We just drove about two miles away from our house to a darker road and waited to see if anything would happen. It was barely visible to our naked eye, but the camera really picked up the lights. They were so beautiful! Here’s some picture overload of what the camera saw over the course of 20 minutes:
This makes me want to go to Alaska or Canada to really see them at some point. Aaron bragged about he got to see them a lot while he was on his mission in Canada. I was jealous! Maybe we can go to Canada to see them someday, too.
Matthew’s house manager helped him make me this cute sign:
In Josh’s YSA ward they handed out flowers to all the women. Even though I am not a part of that ward Josh still grabbed me a flower for Mother’s Day, too. Here’s all the YSA guys handing out the flowers down the hall as they ladies walked by:
After church Josh just came home and crashed. He was still exhausted from Ragnar. As always Sophie is up for snuggles and wiggled her way in while Josh slept:
Later on that afternoon we went and had dinner with my extended family at my brother Bryan’s house. It was fun to visit with everyone and enjoy Mother’s Day. The guys all got assigned the food so the women didn’t have to do anything for dinner. It was great!! It was such a nice day we got to eat outside, too. I loved it!
Daniel and two other friends decided to shave their heads one night. Here’s the before:
Daniel had to get his blood drawn the other evening. He absolutely HATES getting it done. He copes by putting on his headphones and turning up the music as loud as it will go while he gets it done.
The liver doctor wanted Daniel to do a trial month off his Ursodiol to see what his liver enzymes would look like after not taking it. Awesomely enough his liver enzymes were all NORMAL except his bilirubin which will always be high due to the Gilbert’s Syndrome. That was such good news!! That means he doesn’t need to take it for now. YAY!!
Daniel has a friend whose family put together a recreation softball team and asked Daniel to join because they needed more players. Daniel has missed playing baseball so he was excited to join. They had their first game this past week. Aaron and I went to watch him play. He got to play second base and third base.
Noah had his end of season track banquet/party two days ago. For one of the activities they got to play Wiffle ball in the gym. That was until they got the Wiffle ball stuck in the light. Noah texted me these pictures to show me what happened--haha:
Nice. I don’t think the coach was super happy, but what can you do?!
Right after the banquet was Noah’s end of year band concert. It was fun to hear how much the intermediate band (8th grade) band had progressed since the beginning of the year. Noah got to play the marimba and the snare drum for the concert:
For the finale all three bands got together to play a Harry Potter song:
After the band concert we went and had some pie with the Einzinger’s at their house. It was fun to visit and catch up because it has been a few months since we have gotten together. The pie was really good too! I LOVE key lime pie!!
Josh loves to cook/bake. Two days ago he made us all some Creme Brûlée. It turned out yummy!!
Sarah had her dance dress rehearsal yesterday. It was fun to see her dance. I can’t wait for the recital in two weeks.
I can’t believe school is almost out for the summer!! This year went by really fast! I have a feeling summer will go by just as fast....
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