Aaahhh, the Ocean

Our first time at the Oregon coast was amazing! We went our 1st weekend here. The kids were in heaven. On our way home that day Ben asked if we could go to the beach every weekend. We had to say no, but David and I were feeling the same way. We have been there twice and we have only been here a month. We love it! It is a little cold, but the kids don't seem to notice. We got smart the second time and took swim bottoms. We found out the hard way that the kids are going to run into the waves even if it is only 50 degrees outside.
This first time we went the weather was beautiful. It was around 60 to 65 degrees and completely sunny. We heard a park ranger telling someone that that was the sunniest day they had ever had at that beach (we heard this at the end of the day - kind of a bummer, we just assumed it was always that beautiful :). It was such a great way to break ourselves into our new environment.

It is about an hour and a half drive to this beach (Cannon Beach).

There are green hillsides all around the beaches here. The pictures don't do justice. It looks ten times greener in real life.

The kids were so excited to build a real sand castle. This was at the beginning of the day. I forgot my camera in the car after lunch so I didn't get the finished result. There were probably ten towers and they had a mote running around it and everything. I was pretty proud of their first castle. I can't wait to go again this weekend. Yay! I love the beach.... who knew?!

Science projects are not my thing :)

Benjamin has been asking and asking to make a volcano (he's been asking since we started homeschooling in December). We have these fun books that have all sorts of activities in them and this was one of them. So one day I finally read the directions and told Ben "okay, today we can do it. We have everything." You would have thought I told him he won a shopping spree at his favorite toy store. He was so excited. So we started getting everything out. The book called for newspaper and lots of glue to make the volcano out of. I had the newspaper, the vinegar, the paint, the baking soda, the empty water bottle, all of it.... but no glue. Seriously, we are talking about plain old Elmer's glue. I buy the stuff like crazy at the beginning of the school year when it is cheap, but for some reason I didn't have any (I think there is still a box in the garage somewhere - I haven't found my scriptures yet either, it is really weird). Anyway, his little heart was broken. I told him I would go to the store and get some glue, but we had to wait a little while. As with most 7 year old boys, he didn't want to wait. We had everything out and he was ready now. So I did what I thought most crafty mothers do (like I said before, this isn't really my forte), I tried to improvise. I got out the good old tin foil. There wasn't anything my mom couldn't do with tin foil, so I thought we would give it a try............ .....

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Viola. Here is the finished product. Not at all what we imagined ;) but the kids had a blast. David is planning on taking over the science project side of things. But if you know me at all, you would be pretty proud that we accomplished this much. I have to say, it was pretty exciting watching it explode (the second time that is, we didn't realize how fast it was going to come out the first time and David was still pretty much pouring in the vinegar by the time it was done - we figured it out though ;). Please notice the beautiful color of the grass. That is the actual color. These pictures have not been enhanced (as I am sure you could tell by our beautiful volcano). The grass up here is like nothing I have ever seen. In a word ... AWESOME!

The Joys of Moving

I don't usually blog with just writing, but I have a few things I don't want to forget, and I don't have pictures of them anyway :) so I am just going to write a little bit about our move.

Let me start off by saying that I had no idea how beautiful (and big) California is. The drive up to Portland was stunning. I have never seen such beautiful landscape, and it just kept getting better and better the farther North we came.

I am sure that anyone that has moved knows it never goes completely right. Our first day was great. The kids were fabulous (even Katie) for the entire trip. When we got to our hotel, David parked the moving truck (which had a car trailer/car hitched to the back of it) where the Hotel manager told him to park it. Everyone had warned us about getting stuck, but we didn't know where else to park. At night it looked pretty easy to get out of there, but in the morning we found out that wasn't the case. When we were looking at the situation and trying to figure it out, I suggested an idea that I thought would work. David listened but said it sounded a little difficult (which it was, but I knew he could do it). Then he told me he was going to do something else that should be pretty easy and should work. It didn't work :) To make a long story short, it took us an hour and a half to get the truck back to it's original spot, at which point David took my very first suggestion and we were on our way in about 10 mins. :). We laughed so hard. We were very careful from that moment on about where we parked the truck (David gave me permission to tell this story - I have very few moments to boast about when I was right :).

On our second day we stopped at a gas station to get gas. We were only about an hour into our trip, but we wanted to get some soda :). For most of the trip David would only stop at truck stops (it is so much easier to get back out on the freeway), but for some reason (later known as a blessing) he stopped at a little town. I gassed up my car, but when I went to start it it wouldn't start. I was on the phone with Julie, and I didn't notice, but David was standing next to the car and gave me a quizzical look. That is when I knew something was wrong. THE BATTERY WAS DEAD! How annoying. Luckily the Lord loves us and watches out for his children. As I said before we were lucky enough to be in a little town (tender mercy from the Lord), and the gas station was right across the street from a Burger King. I took the kids over there while David went down the street to an auto parts store and got a new battery. I am so grateful for all the Lord does for us.

The last 2 days of the trip were great. Nothing really bad happened. On the last day when we were coming over the mountain pass just before the Oregon border it started to snow (this was April 29th). My kids were so excited. We stopped at the first truck stop we came to and they got out to watch it fall. It wasn't heavy, just enough to swirl around in the air. It was the 1st time Katie had ever seen snow. She loved it. We started to drive again. As we crossed the border into Oregon it really started to snow. The girls said that Oregon was welcoming us with snow. They were so happy. Around that time the windows started to fog. I turned on my defrost, but I didn't know if I was supposed to do warm air or cold. I have not used the defrost in years. It was so crazy. I called David to ask him what to do. He didn't know either. Well, I did the wrong thing. I turned it cold first. Then it got really bad so I called my parents to ask them. It is warm air by the way :). I hiked up the heat and then it started to get better. The kids and I were roasting, it was horrible. After a few minutes I gradually started to turn it down. It all worked out in the end. At least now I know how to defrost my windshield :) Sheesh. That is really something everyone should know - I am sure most people do, just not me and Dave :). It really was a fun trip. Our longest drive was about 8 hours so it worked out pretty great.

We love it here! It is beautiful. I have never seen so much green. After I got over the shock of living in an older home again, and being incredibly homesick for a week and a half, I am really finding out how much I love it here. The kids are so excited everyday to wake up and discover something new.
Yesterday Emma came running in telling me to come see the spider spinning the aphid in its web. I found my shoes and went out to see. There has been this spider in the same spot for a few days and the kids have see it eat a couple of bugs. I came out and watched and then said "cool." I turned to go back inside when Joelle says "I threw it in there." That caught me off guard. I said "what?" She said "I threw the aphid in the spider's web." She said it so matter of fact like. I asked her "why?" She said "the aphid was eating my rose bush so I picked it up and threw it in the spiders web." With a smile she turned and ran off. What happened to my sweet Joelle? She is just feeding aphids to spiders and has no remorse over it? She is one funny little girl. Don't mess with Joelle's rose bush :).

We went to the ocean our 2nd weekend we were here. It was the most beautiful beach I have seen (I will post those pictures soon). We spent 6 hours there. The kids thought it was the best thing ever. We saw starfish, anemones and seagulls. We found sea shells and what Ben called "little shrimp". It was quite the adventure. On the way home when we were all tired and dirty and wet, Ben calls out "Can we do this every weekend?!" We just laughed and told him "no," "But we will do it as often as we can". I have wanted to go back every day since. We need to work it in soon. I miss the ocean!

So that is our trip and a few funny things that have happened since. I have so many pictures that I need to post I will try soon. Home school takes up most of my time, but so far we love it. My hand is cramping now :), so I am going to call it a night. I love it here!

Who Doesn't Love Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve is the Best. Everyone is so happy. The excitement is still there but Christmas Day is close enough that you can really enjoy the anticipation. Christmas eve is really my favorite night of the year. This year was even better because we had David's Mom and Dad staying with us. It was so much fun to have help on Christmas morning. We got to see everyone open everything because we has so much help opening packaging so the kids didn't get bored waiting to open their stuff. I wish we could have grandparents with us every Christmas morning.

We have kept my family tradition of a chandelier present. We all get one small gift and hang it on the chandelier. We open it as soon as Christmas eve dinner is done. It is a fun little gift.

Nana's flight was supposed to come in the day before Christmas eve, but it got cancelled and she had to come the next day. Her flight got in just in time for Christmas Eve dinner. She was surprisingly happy even though she had just traveled an entire day. We love them so much. They are the best house guests you could ever have.

Our latest tradition is for David to play Christmas Carols on his guitar while we all sing along. It is the best time of the night for me.

Sugar Cookies.... yummmm!

We were lucky this year to have Nana and Papa coming to stay with us for Christmas. Papa got in a few days before Nana and we did a bunch of fun things with him. He and David made sugar cookies with the kids. That is always a favorite. We enjoyed Papa's good cooking the whole time he was with us. He taught me some very dilicious and simple dinners. He remineded me how great potatos are. He helped us fix our garage and our water softner and all sorts of things while he was here. Poor man, I didn't really feel like he got much of a vacation :). The kids were in Heaven with Nana and Papa.

Katie had so much fun with the cookies she got all tuckered out and fell asleep standing up. I really don't know how anyone could do that :).

Temple Lights

One of our favorite things to do before Christmas is go see the temple lights at the Mesa Temple. For the last few years we take hot chocolate for when we are done. The kids really like it.
This year we let the kids touch the temple ( I know they talked about it a while ago in conference, but this is the first time we got around to it). This was a very special experience. I love the temple. Even the spirit outside is something wonderful.

Our friend Kim came and stayed with us for a few days in December. She and I took the 3 older kids and saw the Joseph Smith movie in the visitor's center. It was AMAZING. I cried and cried. If you have the chance, I strongly suggest seeing it with your older children. It is so touching and so well done. I loved it.

Home School Christmas Party

We went to a friends house for a home school Christmas party (gift exchange) back and Dec. 11. It was great. The kids had so much fun. There were a bunch of leaves all over so a group of the kids decided to make a huge pile and have everyone jump in all at once. The cool thing is, that they invited everyone to jump, not just the one's who built the pile. Very generous I thought. :)

Ready, Set, Go!

How fun to be a kid.