Back to Arizona! Memorial Day.

Home again to the White Mountains! We made it back Sunday evening in enough time for me to run over to the Ranch house to see Jon and Kristi's new place. it is crazy right now with the move and all but they have their own place now and see a lot of potential in it. I think I would love living on the Ranch it is so pretty and green.

Monday morning Dad put up the flag for Memorial Day. Jon and his family came over for breakfast. Melissa and Jaden hardly stopped they just blew past the french toast for the fun outside. Jaden came running in yelling he had found a humongous torny hoad - or Horny Toad. We went out to investigate and found that it was a large one - easily caught I let the kids take turns holding him, and Elise and Ian took turns taking pictures (they both love cameras!). As you can see I am slightly worried about the poor lizard in J's hands. After a few minutes we let the big fellow go.

We had to go too - we went over to the Pinedale cemetery to work at the headstone. Dad, Aunt Louise and I had run into town to get some flowers earlier and with the help of the kids and Jon and Kristi we made short work of adding to mom's and Jeanie's graves and hopefully making them look a little nicer. It was a good way to start out Memorial Day - a drive back to Tucson took up most of the rest of it.

Graduation Weekend!

Ben's graduation! The first graduation ceremony we went to was for the department. It was very nice and small. You can see the happy family so excited that Ben is all finished, no one is as excited as Kori, she has worked so hard so Ben could do this.


One really nice part of having a small ceremony was that Ben told them that his grandparents were coming and that both were graduates of the 'U' so in the middle of everything else they took a few minutes to honor Grandma and Grandpa for their combined 119 years of alumni. Grandma graduated in 1948 (a year before Dad was born) with a B.S. in Business while attending what seemed like an all-girls school as all the boys were off at war. Grandpa returned with the rest of the male population and enrolled making the school go the opposite direction. Grandpa graduated in 1951 with the same degree. Grandma later went back and got an additional degree in elementary education.


After the pictures were done we headed back to Ben's birthday bash. We had pizza then ice cream and crazy cake which was crazy good! Kenzie and Carson helped blow out the candles (3 and 3 in this case makes 33 not 6)!

Saturday morning we went to the College of Medicine graduation ceremony. It was larger and longer - but still very nice.

After the ceremony we had a fun BBQ back at Ben and Kori's. Rachel and I ate with the kids on a blanket (which Kori later used to take a quick nap), Kenzie and Carson both practiced casting their new fishing poles.

According to Wikipedia Marzipan is a confection consisting primarily of sugar and almond meal, however I didn't know that. Marzipan is my nic-name. Rachel has been calling me that for a long time. Sarah calls me Marciona (or Marce for short), and Rachel just took it and transformed it to Marzipan. So basically Rachel is calling me sugar, and this weekend I got to try out some Gourmandise Bakery items with Marzipan. Only the almond bar thing dipped in chocolate and the small pear tart had Marzipan, the bread pudding and the peach puff both just looked good. We took box of treats back to the house, cut them up in 8 pieces each and everyone had a sample!

Rachel wanted an Ikea shelf but when she got to the sale the black ones were all gone - so she got a white one for Ben and Kori to put in the kids' room. The family all helped to put it together - all but Dad and I who were content to take pictures of the laborers. Aunt Louise helped by holding Chloe, who just watched and listened.

Rachel has been taking an ice skating class! She has learned a lot and showed me her moves! I even picked up on a few but will have to put in a lot more time to get them down.

We ended our fun day by playing one of Rachel's many clue games. This one is Harry Potter Clue complete with passage ways that rotate, house points and dark marks. Rachel, however, randomly guessed her first turn and won. The second round lasted much longer but Rachel still won.

Sunday morning Rachel drove me to the hotel that Grandpa, Grandma, Dad and Aunt Louise were staying at. I said goodbye to her, got in the truck with the others and we headed south to Sunny Arizona. It was a long drive but we survived and made it back without any problems (or water in the fuel).

Going to Utah

Wednesday May 20, started out early in Tucson, Grandma, Grandpa and I loaded up and headed to the Mountain. We stopped in Pinedale to transfer our stuff to the truck and set off again this time with Aunt Louise at the wheel. We drove to Springerville where we picked up Dad and headed north to Utah. We hadn't even picked up Dad when the smart little computer in the truck read "water in fuel" when Dad started driving it did it again. He gave me the manual to read, we stopped and he tried to drain the water. Then when reading it didn't seem to help, we started calling the boys. Tim and Jon are always good to call when you need something looked up on the computer but neither was at home with access to a computer. We got Daniel who probably knows more about cars than I ever will and he called his father-in-law, Jeff who does this for a living and is amazingly good with helping us all out. We stopped again, this time at the little LDS chapel in Granada where we met the Missionaries who were super helpful but didn't have the right tool. We kept pressing on, making it to our hotel in Green River. The next morning we stopped at Napa where they didn't sell the tool we needed but one of the workers not only had the tool but came out and drained the water himself. The light came back on when we got back on the road, but went off soon and didn't come on again for the rest of our trip.

Once in the Valley where was our first stop? Cabela's of course. We can't go through Lehi without stopping! We let dad shop, while Grandma and Grandpa enjoyed the nice Utah air on the large benches outside the store. Aunt Louise made sandwiches for everyone and Ben brought Carson down to meet us. Dad took Carson on an extended tour of the store- I think his favorite part was the humongous aquariums, and the fishing pole that Grandpa Paul bought him!

Once we finally finished I rode back to Ben's house with him. Dad and Aunt Louise took Grandma and Grandpa to our bed and breakfast, where Grandpa stayed to rest. Everyone else came over to Ben and Kori's to visit.

Kenzie broke her arm on Tuesday on a field trip with her class (she feel off the monkey bars). She, however, despite breaking her left (writing) hand has been doing really well with her right hand - you can see how well she wrote her name. Carson is no less of wizard but his talent comes in the shape of puzzles. He does them so well for a three-year-old!

Rachel and I aren't any better. We both go for the kids toys - Rachel bought a walkie-talkie watch to use at work with the girl in the next cubicle! We both sat and helped Kenzie color one of her many get well gifts (this one a princess poster - no surprise there).

For dinner we went to Red Lobster! I got the grilled salmon! Yumm! Ben and Rachel both got non-sea food items!

After dinner Rachel and I went to the B&B where dad rented us a room. When I heard he did this I was very confused - but he explained that he just wanted us to have a fun time while we were together, so it was very nice of him. ( I think he still just wants me to get excited about B&Bs enough to move home and help open one! not likely!) But that is okay - we had an amazing time - walked through the wooded area, enjoyed the water falls and ponds in the garden, really enjoyed the comfy bed and the gigantic bubble jet bath tub!

Summer Job!

That's right after all of these years I have joined the girl scouts. My new summer job is working at the girl scouts day camp and I am so excited! I loved teaching science camp for the Science center so I think this will be great fun for the summer.

California Weekend!

A while back I randomly bumped into Saundra Lamb while both of our wards (though 100 miles apart) were doing the same temple grounds service project. She told me she was going home for Mother's Day weekend if I wanted a ride. I couldn't think of a better way to spend Mother's Day and was very excited!
After I got off work on Friday I drove to her place in Scottsdale, where Saundra, her roommate Kelly and I set off for California. It was a fun ride, we had a few "U" turns around midnight, but that just added to the fun. We got to the Lamb's around 2 a.m. and I took Scott's truck to his and Beth's house. Needless to say I was tired, but that didn't stop me from doing one of my favorite things in California - watching Saturday morning cartoons with the boys. William always gets up early so I knew that sleeping on the couch I wouldn't be able to sleep-in. I can't feel to bad for myself because I woke up just enough to see Scott leave for work before 6, this is the busy season so he has been working crazy hours. Sarah would have, but she took the day off because I was coming!
I did a lot of my favorite things that Saturday - We had homemade waffles for breakfast. I took pictures of the boys, we went shopping and we just hung out. Dad sent us money to have a nice dinner - we got some Panda Express and Beth and Sarah made lettuce wraps! Yummm!
Sarah has been working long hours but had promised Thomas a sand rail cake - Friday night she made the cakes, Saturday night she carved them and frosted them. She put the cars on and set it up on Scott's gigantic gun safe. Beth, Sarah and I were all upstairs talking when we heard something fall... when we went down stairs we found that the top of the cake (which sadly I had not taken pictures of yet) had fallen over. Beth and I sent the exhausted Sarah to bed and did our best to repair it. We didn't put the cars back on - but in the morning Thomas beat us to it, by climbing on the TV he added the cars. After we tried to fix that up - Sam took the cars and made them all pop wheelies. The cake by this time was in a sorry state - but had survived and the boys loved it.

Sunday was Mother's Day - but Scott and Sarah both had to work so they couldn't help us celebrate. Sarah had stayed up to make a cookie flower bouquet for Beth and in the morning I had the boys put together one flower each to add it to the rest - I also had them sign a card. We made a big deal out of keeping it a secret and they thought it was the funnest thing to try and hide it behind them, and close the doors before Beth could see. We also had Beth's favorite breakfast - french toast. The boys ate left-over waffles instead. After getting ready for church we took some pictures and gave Beth her flowers and card.



After church we went to the Lamb's where we had a nice chicken dinner. Lamb Chops called it a day, so Sarah and Scott were able to come! I can't forget the cake and ice cream - I will say that adults were served a different cake! We almost had catastrophe number four when Thomas blew out his candles - he leaned over the nearest one to get the far one and almost caught on fire - we could have just added it to Thomas' many accomplishments of life. So many and so young.

We played outside for awhile...

We bought a Frisbee yesterday and I told William I would play with him. We tossed it back and forth with all the Lamb boys. We had a lot of fun until Dozer got out - then like magic all the boys were in the back of Brandon's truck in a few seconds. Thomas wanted to play too - but the big boys never threw it to him.

Thomas got a bike for his birthday from Keith and Mickey. So when we got back to Beth and Scott's we got the bikes out. Sam got a new bike too (a very late birthday gift). Beth and Scott set to work - William needed a new seat - Chopper ate the last one, Sam needed the training wheels off. We then enjoyed the nice evening - watching the boys on their bikes, William and I threw the Frisbee (I tell you he is addicted!)...

Beth got chopper out to enjoy the family time too...

That night Ryan got his first taste of solid foods...

Monday morning William and I played Frisbee before he went to school. Ryan had a doctors appointment so I watched Thomas and Sam. We went to the park and watched the movie Bolt(very cute).

Then we met Mickey, Saundra and Kelly for a Mexican lunch! Then us Arizonians headed back east. I got back to Tucson around midnight - and went straight to bed! I think I could use a few days off to recover from my vacation!