sewing, skiing and schooling

Maddy and I were matching so we had to take a selfie.

Mindy's good friend Iliana moved to Seattle right after Christmas.Mindy was sad to see her go, but her grandparents live close to us so we will see her again.

We had a nice Christmas break and it was hard to start up schooling again in January. Here are Mackensey and Marianne doing homework on the couch in the living room. I offered to Mindy that if she wanted to look into taking another class at the jr high (she takes band right now) we could. She is so social I thought she would enjoy taking an academic class with her friends. Her response "Not unless I can take my couch with me!" I guess she likes the ease and comfort of doing her schoolwork at home...

Makayla got a sewing machine for Christmas. Here we have two desks set up in the basement with Mindy and Makayla's sewing machines side by side. When Barry saw the set up he had to laugh. When he was growing up his sister's had their sewing machines set up side by side in the basement. Makayla did an excellent job sewing this skirt. I think it turned out pretty cute. Stay tuned, her three sisters are all working on sewing projects at the moment.

 Ben was learning about inherited traits in his science schoolwork. I was explaining to him that was why he looked like his daddy. He said, "I don't think I look like daddy." I said, "Yes you do, you have blue eyes and freckles like daddy." Ben: "But my hair isn't like his he has a line down the side." He was talking about Barry's part. We explained to him that a part isn't something inherited. The science lesson segued into nature vs. nurture. :-)

We've had lots of snow to play with in the month of January.

Trying on ski boots. 

Makayla teaches Marianne how to ski. 

 

I have been giving Marianne ski lessons while the older kids are in their lessons. This week was Marianne's third ski lesson and it was time for her to graduate from the tow rope to the ski lift. We used the practice seat above and then went for it. They slowed it down for her to get on and off. The way off was not very graceful. I ended up grabbing her coat and basically dragging her off the lift. She had fun skiing on Animal Trail for her first time down the bunny hill. She fell down a lot and asked, "Why is skiing so hard?' I told her that it was a lot easier to learn as a kid than as an adult.

Skiing with Mackensey, Makayla, Ben and Mari.

This is Animal Trail. A side trail off the bunny hill. It is not very steep and very beautiful. 

It has been my routine to update my blog on Sunday evenings. Lately my Sunday evenings have been taken up in family history indexing. The website was down tonight, so I took the opportunity to update my blog ( I also posted a video of Marianne skiing on Facebook if you want to see that). I'll have to see how I can keep up with both my blog and indexing in the future.

Have a great week!

Decorating the Perfect Tree and Pictures with Santa

Stockings are hung on the banister with care.

Going through the lights. All of the strings had half of their lights not working.  We made do, but I think we'll have to throw them all away after Christmas and start over with new lights next year.

The store where Maddy works puts up and decorates 15 trees every year. She has the training and took over the lights on our tree this year.

There is a little more motivation to our Christmas decorating this year. We have volunteered to host the Chewelah Camber of Commerce Christmas party. Barry is the chamber vice-president, and the people who come to the chamber party are people like the mayor, Maddy's boss and other business owners and is basically a who's who of Chewelah. 

This week Makayla (front) and Mackensey (back row) had three choir concerts. Christmas is a busy time for their elementary school choir.

Marianne had to be talked into sitting on Santa's lap. She was very brave (and pretty darn cute if you ask me).

Speaking of cute...

Have a great week! We'll let you know how the party goes.

P.S. This is my 100th blog post. That is something to celebrate! Thanks for reading so we can keep in touch.

The Perfect Tree

Driving around the property to find this year's Christmas tree.

Marianne is a cute backseat driver.

Yes, Mackensey is wearing boots, coat, hat and....shorts.

Yes, the family cat was brought on the excursion.

That's it! That's the one!

I used my new telephoto lens so that I didn't have to walk as far in the snow.

Loading up the pick up.

After setting up our tree we celebrated Mindy's 13th birthday. We now have two teenagers in our family.

Our family has been battling the stomach flu off and on for two weeks now. Here Ben is resting with the cat for company.

Family picture time. 

I realized I haven't posted for a while. Here's a catch-up picture of the kids on Halloween.

Have a great week!

Father's Day Flowers

For Mother's Day the year after we moved into our house Barry bought me two rose bushes from Costco. They never grew, and the following spring I called Costco to see if they would exchange them. They said that they did not get rose bushes that year, but I could return my dead rose bushes for a refund. So I dug them up and did. This year I heard on the radio that Home Depot had rose bushes on sale for Mother's Day. We didn't have a trip planned to Spokane at the time, and we missed out on the sale. In June Barry came home from a trip to Spokane with two rose bushes! Home Depot still had good prices and he bought me two of my favorite color roses. He planted them on a Saturday, which happened to be the day before Father's Day, so I call them my Father's Day rose bushes. They have just thrived and here is a picture of Marianne sitting behind one of them.

I was at the high school with Ben and Makayla when the Medistar helicopter landed at the hospital. Ben asked if we could walk over and watch it take off. I told him that we could go look at it, but we may not see if take off, depending on how long it would be there. We walked the one block to the hospital and I took their picture in front of the helicopter. A few minutes later we were able to watch the medics load up the patient and take off while we were standing just 50 yards away. It was SO cool to watch a helicopter take off while being so close.

Makayla likes to help take the meat off the bones of the turkey.

Barry took me to see the Spokane Symphony play at the Chewelah Peak learning center. Maddy got to get in free by helping set up and take down with the band. She was tickled to see that one of the pieces they played was the same music that they had played in band last spring (Sound of Music medley).

Maddy celebrated her 16th birthday. What a beautiful teenager. She was excited to get her driver's license on her birthday and drove herself to seminary and school the next day. When she came home she walked in the door and said, "Ummm, Mom?!?" I said, "What did you do?!?" Her response, "Oh, no, it's not that. The car is fine. I just had a problem in one of my classes." Whew!

Marianne poses for me. Silly girl!

And they're off! Cross country has begun! Here is Mindy's first race. She beat her time by 2 minutes!

Mackensey smiles as she runs down the hill. She did well on her first race

This picture of Maddy's race was taken at the beginning. By the end she was hot and tired. It was 86 degrees for her race!

Sisters sit in the shade during Maddy's race.

The Monkeys climb trees while they wait.

Barry, Kensey and I watching the BYU game at our friends house.

Barry took his Dad to the BYU game on Sept 11th to celebrate Gerald's birthday. Barry was in Utah for business.

Mackensey won a tablet for getting third place for our school district's summer math marathon using Khan Academy. She worked really hard all summer (the other kids did it to, but weren't as committed.). Here was the picture that was on the front page of our newspaper. She is nice and lets me borrow her tablet every Sunday to use when I teach gospel doctrine. As payment I helped her make a cover from a pinterest tutorial.

 

Have a great week!

Future Missionaries

Last Sunday we went to church with the Jensen family to watch Victoria speak in church. She will be leaving for her mission soon, and she did a good job on her talk. It will be fun to hear about the experiences she will have over the next 18 months. Here is a picture of the Jensens and the Thomasons. 

Becca took our family picture. 

We stayed after church for lunch with the Jensens and to play with cousins. Mindy and Marianne fell asleep on the way home. When Marianne woke up she started crying. I asked her what was wrong and she said, "I miss Sam!"

driving home

Since Maddy drove and Barry sat in the passenger seat, I got to sit in the middle row with Mackensey and Makayla. 

Have a great week!