Swimming Pool Drained!

Our new house has lot's of "exciting" things for us to do! One of the high on the list of things that had to be done this winter was draining the swimming pool! I figured we would do like all of our friends and hire someone to drain the pool and acid wash the pool. But, I figured wrong. . .My dear husband is a handy, handy man. He found on the internet the kind of pump we would need to drain the pool, drained the pool and did a light acid wash on the pool and fixed the broken light. Our only problem was the unprecedented rain that dropped several inches during "our" project :)

 

While Jake worked the boys delighted in playing in the pool! There is quite a slope and it is hard to walk on, so the boys being monkeys just climbed!

 

When it was time to refill the pool, the boys took some painters plastic and slid down the slope and froze -- fortunately, they could go from pool to spa!!

 

They had a blast and the pool is clean and full!

 

Our Orchard

When we moved into our new house, one of the first things I wanted to do was plant citrus and fruit trees in our pasture. We moved in August so timing for weather being kind to our fruit trees wasn't ideal. In January, Jake suggested we go to the citrus nursery so we can at least identify what kind of trees we wanted. We went on a Monday, and the lady at the nursery assured us that it was the "PERFECT" time to plant trees. . .Owen, Jake's younger brother was coming for the weekend, and we needed help with planing. . .so, we ended up with sixteen trees. It was a project to get all of the tree holes dug, this was right after the flood, and the new dishwasher and such. . .but we got it done.

 

The following week we had an unprecedented freeze. A really unprecedented freeze. We covered our trees as best we could, but it was windy, really windy on Tuesday night and all day Wednesday. On Thursday morning, we were scheduled to get irrigation water at 4:30 in the morning. Jake is good about irrigation and early mornings (he doesn't like to get up early) but 4:00 he got up to a frosty calm morning. . .Some of or sheets were not covered, and the hose was frozen, but somehow we had water when we weren't supposed to, Jake had to go "hunting for our water" but we had water in the front part of our pasture -- I got up to go to the gym at 4:30 and was confused. I called Jake who was trying to keep pool pipes from freezing and some pipes that aren't well insulated from freezing.

 

We were able to weather a realitively bad freeze with super young trees, hopefully all making it (think water coming at the coldest times of the night) and an early morning irrigation turn that alerted Jake to getting things going. . .Some of our friends and neighbors weren't quite as blessed, fortunately, for them it wasn't terrible, pipes froze, but didn't break and a tree or two died. . .but we are so very grateful for the tender mercy of the missed water turn by someone in the neighborhood and the new water when we needed it. I am still hopeful that our young grapefruit tree will make it, but the others look like they will be fine!

Valentines Day

 

I LOVE Valentines day. . .No, it's not because Jake is a hopeless romantic, and really, I'm not either. . .I think it is because I have an excuse to decorate in red and pink, and we get to MAKE things. . .This year, we made valentine's for all three boys. . .I almost got tired of making them. . . but then. . .well, I love Valentine's! This year, Spencer insisted on Bubbles. We did them for Preschool, he wouldn't change his mind. . . Jacob too, gum. I did get to change the look of the valentine, and I knew sooner than the night before that we would be doing them. Ryan, though. He was my hero! He let me decide his Valentine's, and when he came home from school, he said he had pretty much the best Valentine. . .We did candy heart I-pods. The idea came from Familyfun.com, but it was fun to improve on a good idea! Happy Valentine's day!

Washington DC

It seems fitting that the first picture in my montage of pictures is Ryan and his snowman! Being an Arizona kid, he doesn't get much snow in his life, and being in Washington, there were a couple of inches, he and my kind, sweet, patient mom went out and built a snowman with him. I watched from the balcony or launched major snowballs at Ryan while they did it. . .as a mom of boys, I have learned to strategically place myself when I do things like that ;)

Ryan and I took the opportunity over MLK day to go to Washington DC to visit my parents who are serving in the Washington DC temple until there Visas come in to go and serve in Spain. . .We LOVED it!!! Ryan is never the child who gets to decide what he wants to do for entire days. . .he got to here, and with almost everything free to see, who cared what we did?!
On Saturday, he decided he wanted to see the National Zoo. They have a few pandas on loan from China, so we got to see some!

On Sunday night, after church and dinner, we went down to DC and saw the mall all lit up, I particulaly loved the Lincoln monument and the Jefferson Monument... So amazing! Thank goodness for a TomTom in the car, we could get pretty much anywhere we wanted. . .only once did we wonder if the tomtom was on drugs ;)

On Monday, we went and saw the Smithsonian American History museum and Ryan and my dad went to the Natural History Museum. My mom and I went and saw the First Lady section with all of the beautiful inaugural gowns and learned about the life in the white house. We came to a display America at War and called my dad and Ryan over from the Natural History museum. . .Ryan thought it was so interesting to learn about the different wars. . . he spent probably an hour in the area just reading different things. . . so VERY interesting! Theres was a lot more to see in the America History museum. . .but alas, we ran out of time!

That afternoon, we went and saw the Washington monument. Amazing! I can't believe how tall those monuments are. . .so awe inspiring too!

This was our first sight when we got off the subway! On Friday we were so excited to be in DC and see these amazing sites that we only see on tv!

 

 

We went and toured the Capital and also saw the air and space museum. Ryan got a little irritated that some things weren't what he thought they should be and was surprised to learn that this model of the man on the moon was one of the I think 12 ships that were identical to the Apollo orbiter -- he just thought it was fake. The thing he remembers about the space museum? He tells everyone that the astronauts where diapers and it takes three hours to put on their space suits!

 

Grandpa and Ryan at the National Zoo. . .

 

Thanks mom and dad for letting us come visit! I loved getting to go into the Washington DC temple, I wish I had had more time there. . .but it was so fun to see everything there and I can't wait to go back!

Normal Days

Somedays are just "normal" nothing exciting happens, life is just as we know it. Somedays are exciting, there is something that we have anticiapated happening or something we love goes on.
And then there are THOSE days.

The normal days I get a little bored of. I mean, cleaning, errands, mundane is so overrated.

The last almost three weeks I have found are so non-normal. Exciting, some of the days and some of THOSE days? You bet! The THOSE days were a little more than I wanted to endure. I will post os some of the exciting enthralling days soon, but today, lets just, hopeully get over the those days.

We lost our dog the first day she came to live in our new house, that would be New Years day. She ran away. It took LOTS of WORK to get her home. We got her home, but we acquired a new dog before she came home. Sunny got "rescued" one more time on her own. We thought we had the problem solved, a dog tag and an electric fence. Roxie, our new dog, and Sunny are great playmates. This past Friday, we took Sunny to the park with us, Roxie stayed at home as she is a much younger dog and harder to get to mind. We played a long time. Ryan chaied Sunny up and one of the other boys brought Roxie out and unchained Sunny. When it was time to feed Sunny and Roxie the boys went out and found no dogs. We looked and couldn't find them. We just hoped and prayed that we would find them. . . Saturday, the call came they had been picked up by a policeman and taken to the pound. Now, Roxie is a younger dog, and we weren't sure if we were going to keep her. . .So, we didn't spay her and take care of her. . .So, we went to spring the two dogs. Almost three HOURS laterwe left less one dog. . .You see Roxie couldn't leave without having to pay two HUNDRED and fifty dollars for her not being spayed. . .or their vets could spay her for free. . .she will hopefully come home on Monday.

In the midst of the dog craziness, I came home after being gone about forty-five minutes to find about an inch of water on the main floor of my house in my FRONT room -- the connection to the toilet in my boys bathroom had failed and we had a flood of epic proportions. LOVELY. The carpet is still pulled up awaiting Jake's assistance in relaying the carpet We just hope and pray that we didn't miss the water and are so grateful I was ONLY gone forty five minutes :).

I used almost all of my towels in the flood and my washing machine decided to have a pump go out. I have been without a washing machine all week. I ordered the wrong pump online. We had company twice. We got new trees, sixteen holes needed to be dug.

My renters called and said the dishwasher in that house was under recall and they had had problems with it leaking. A new dishwasher will be delivered and installed on Tuesday.

Yep, the past several weeks has been tough. Here is to the normal mundane days. I look forward to them. I am grateful for them. But even more, I am grateful that each of my challenges has made me more grateful for so many things, as my pile of laundry is being whittled away and my new trees are now in the ground with the promise of many delicious fruits. I have to remember that the normal days are blessings that I need to remember to be grateful for. The dry ground in my house and no floods when I come home from errands. . . Challenges come, and they truly try me at times, but I think I need to be grateful for each day.

it's DONE!!!

Do you remember this? I started it October 2. . .

 

Well, on a VERY LONG flight to and from Washington DC, it moved to this. . .

 

to hung and COMPLETE!!!

 

I think I am in LOVE. . .

more

I am visiting my parents, and I found old pictures. . .so, I thought I would post some on my blog to show my kids. . .