Girl's Night Out

Last night our ward had a girl's night out salon/spa because this weekend was the father/son campout. We did our nails and had facials, had snacks... girl stuff. Josi was so excited to go. As soon as Ben got home she was in the garage telling him what we were doing and that it was just for girls, no boys! At the end we had a Project Runway style fashion show. We broke into 5 teams and each team got 2 bags of items that we had to create 2 outfits with.

Josi was one of the models. She fits better into a garbage sack than any of the adults did. Here is in the middle of the design process. This was a face she was pulling all night long. She had gotten laughs the first few times, and like any 4 year old, she kept hamming it up. Our bag consisted of garbage sacks, tissue paper, double sided tape, toilet paper, clothes pins, ribbon, yarn, hawaiian leis, and safety pins.

Part of our team was a lady that I met while we owned our video store. I hadn't seen her since we sold the store, but she was there last night. I was really good to see her again. She and I worked on this dress together.

There is Josi 5th from the left or 6th from the right. Our other model is to her left. I had little to do with her outfit. This was the judging of the designs.

Here is our finished product. Josi was a great model. She got a chocolate bar for it. Our design won! That is a garbage bag and tissue paper on her head, held on with a rubber band. Her dress is a garbage sack held together with clothes pins. Her belt and sleeves are tissue paper. She has a toilet paper train that you can see in the top picture. She was ready for a day at the Kentucky Derby or a night at a grand gala. Such a cutie. I was told I was in charge of Halloween costumes by a lady in our ward. It was really fun. Josi had a ball.

I DID IT!

Okay, I got up at 5:30 this morning to beat the heat. I weed-wacked it a little, mostly around the edges. I am so glad I got a weed wacker that doubles as an edger. It doesn't look as green anymore because it had gotten so long that it was all thatchy underneath. It took me two hours to do it, but I got it all cut and I even got it to the lowest cutting height. And it was even kind of fun, mostly the challenge of it. It looks much neater now, hopefully it greens back up now. I decided I hate bermuda grass. The runners it sends out to spread are so thick, it jams up the mower. Compare to the top photo below. Tomorrow I will prune the tree, if I can move:)

Sprinklers

Finally, since I got married, I have actually really been able to use the knowlege I went to college for. I have used it a little here and there, for house plants and pruning and what-not, but nothing this extensive. Since early March I have been working a little here and there on putting in a sprinkler system for our back yard. Just digging the trench for it. 2 weeks ago I was able to go and buy all of the pipe and fittings and a trenching spade to get the job done right. This week on Tuesday, Wednesday and today I worked from about 8 or 9 in the morning each day until 3 in the afternoon and about 6pm on Tuesday to get it done. I still have a little more digging to do to get the wiring hooked up to the timer (on the opposite side of the house as the water; DUMB!!) and I have a little more piping to get together for the garden sprinklers, which will be above ground, and then of course I have to bury it all in the backyard.

Here are a few pictures of what I totally completed today. The really white pipe is what I put in and the black/green box with 3 new valves. When I put the T in off of the main line I accidentally stepped on the existing sprinkler line and broke it right at the joint to the valve. It turned out to be a good thing though. I had to put a filter on the new line for the drip irrigation and it wouldn't have fit in the new box, so I just rerouted the existing line to the new box and hooked the new drip line and filter up to the old valve in the old box, where it fit. Yeah! you can kind of see the white pipe going left to right.I wanted to get a box the same tan color as the other one, but I could't find one anywhere that was the right size, I even looked online. I will just have to get one of those cool fake rocks that you can put over them to hide it or paint it someday.



Here is after I buried the part that was in the front yard. In the shadow you can see the pipe in the open trench.

Now you can't even tell I had that part all dug up, can you?! I wanted to get that all back to normal so we didn't get in any trouble by the HOA for having the visible yard torn up for too long. They are pretty picky.

And this is what I look like after a day of playing in the dirt. Josi took it for me. My face, arms and legs from the knee down are sunburnt; my lips, forearms, and shins are chapped and I am sore from my shoulders to the bottoms of my feet, but I love doing it.

Now I am in my jammies for the rest of the day and, yes, it is not even 4 yet! I think I deserve it :)

Interview with my child Josi, age 4

I didn't get tagged and I usually don't do them even when I do, but I really wanted to hear Josi's answers. So, here they are:
1. What is something mom always says to you? Do the truth
2. What makes mom happy? If you give you a hug and give you a kiss
3. What makes mom sad? It makes you be naughty
4. How does your mom make you laugh? If you said a funny word
5. What was your mom like as a child? You were a baby
6. How old is your mom? I don't know (with a duh/confussed look on her face)
7. How tall is your mom? Big
8. What is her favorite thing to do? Clean up my (Josi's) room
9. What does your mom do when you're not around? If your hiding, somewhere else... When...I...I don't know.
10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? If your big
11. What is your mom really good at? at playing games
12. What is your mom not good at? At baseball if you falled
13. What does your mom do for a job? to make your bed
14. What is your mom's favorite food? chicken and the corn
15. What makes you proud of your mom? if we love each other
16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? A sweetheart (?)
17. What do you and your mom do together? We make our beds together
18. How are you and your mom the same? girls
19. How are you and your mom different? It's a really hard one
20. How do you know your mom loves you? If you tell me I did a good job to clean your room
21. What does your mom like most about your dad? doing his work
22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go? maybe if you're a sweetheart to go to the zoo

By the way, I'm not tagging anybody:)
*Can you tell she had to clean her room today?

SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!

Okay, Naners, if you are reading this before mom comes to see you, then you really should stop. Or you can read on and spoil the sorta surprise. Everyone else can read on, if you choose to. I recently took on the project of making crib bedding for my little sister, Janae, who is due to have her first child in April. A little boy they will name Collan. They are doing his room in earth tones and a jungle theme. I finally finished today and tried it out on Hyrum's crib. He doesn't sleep in it anymore, but we really don't have anywhere to put it until we put some shelves in the garage, so we have just left it up in his room.
The first two pictures were really dark and I lightened them, so the colors seem a little off now.

This is more like the real colors, depending on the light. Sometimes the polka dots are brown and sometimes they look more green.

Here is a close-up of the cute little jungle animals.


At times they were a real pain in the bootie to make, but that was just because of the serger I was using for the first time. Mostly it was fun. I am afraid the colors won't be right, but it was the best I could find and it was just so cute. I hope she likes them!

Early Christmas

Christmas came a little early for me this year. Ben decided that he wanted to buy the car I have wanted since I was in highschool for me. He went and bought it on Monday and was going to surprise me on Christmas day. Then he got a little nervous about what my reaction would be, so he tried to feel it out a little and got the opposite reaction he was hoping for. I was trying to be the responsible adult by saying I would rather just pay off the car we have, rather than start all over with another one. Of course, that is easy to say when I think that the possibility of getting the car of my dreams is years in the future. So, then he showed me the keys and said, I guess I will take these back then. I quickly started to back-peddle on my earlier declarations of not wanting to get a new car, especially when I learned it was a Toyota 4Runner.

I LOVE IT!!

So, last night we went to pick it up and traded-in our Lancer. What a sweet husband I have! Now I don't feel so bad going over our budget for his gift :)

Halloween

For Halloween Josi was Tinkerbell and Hyrum was Mr. T. This is just before we left for our ward Halloween Hulla-boo-lo. They had a chili dinner, mini carnival for the kids and then a costume parade with trick-or-treating. In the costume contest Hyrum won the "Most Clever Costume". Everybody loved his costume. Grown men were awed.

Afterward we took them around our block to do a little real trick or treating. I couldn't find the other trick-or-treating basket we had for Hyrum which was a jack-o-lantern so he had to use that yellow basket which looks more like an Easter basket.
Here is my last minute costume choice. It was definately one of a kind.

Chicago O'hare Airport

The trip home from Toronto we had a 4 hour layover in Chicago. To pass a little time Ben and I walked to another Terminal to see the light tunnel. It was pretty cool. These pictures don't do it justice.

On the way there, we passed a dinosaur and this neat Lego display. The Statue of Liberty is actually made of legos. She is holding a windmill instead of a torch though. The display was basically an add for the wind power energy company.

Canada Day 2- Casa Loma

Sunday was our last day and we had the entire day to do whatever we wanted. Our flight didn't leave until 2:30. Ben's boss, Kenneth, and his wife invited us to go with them to Casa Loma (house on the hill). It is a 98 room mansion that they call a castle. Sir Henry Pellat built it and eventually when bankrupt, before it was even finished. He began the project of building it in 1911. It took 3 years and $3.5 million. The Kiwanis Club owns it now.

This fountain is right out front.

This is the swimming pool in the basement. It didn't get finished. In the basement there was also a space that was supposed to be a bowling alley. It just has a cafe in it now for the tourists.

My favorite room was the conservatory. It was Canadian Thanksgiving and they were setting up for a brunch so we couldn't go inside.

This is Sir Pellat's room.

When the house was built he had top of the line everything, including this shower that sprayed from every direction when most homes barely had running water.

This room belonged to Lady Pellat. She was in a wheelchair so she spent most of her time in her room. Looking at these pictures, Josi said she wanted this room. I have to agree with her. I wouldn't mind have a bedroom like this.The closet was amazing too.

This room is called the Round Room. It is perfectly round and all of the doors and windows were specially made to fit with the curve of the walls. Look at the detail on the ceilings too! This was intended to be a sitting room for when royalty was visiting.

Ben's favorite part were the secret passages.

There was one on each side of this fireplace. One went up to his room on the second floor and the other went down to the wine cellar in the basement.

There was also a passage that went from the basement to under the stables/garage/potting shed. It felt like it was a mile long. You couldn't really see the other building from the main house, so it was far even if it wasn't a mile.

You could go up into the towers of the castle. To get there you climbed 4 sets of stairs, two of which were these spiral stairs. It was tough for me going up and even worse coming down.

And this is a view from the tower.There was only a tiny window to look through. The other tower was closed for repairs, but normally you could go out on top of it.

This is the back patio and a view of the grounds from it. I love the fountain.

The grounds were so beautiful, probably my favorite part of the whole thing. This is a little of the formal part of them.

You'll need to click on the photos to see them better. The one on the left has a a cool gazebo in it.

And this is a path to the informal part of the grounds.



This is a really neat sculpture that was on the grounds.

When we got closer I discovered just why is was so neat. And then I read the plaque.

Toronto Day 2- Royal Ontario Museum

After the CN Tower we walked two miles to the Royal Ontario Museum, the largest museum in Canada. It was really cool. I enjoyed it more than Ben. After our two mile hike to get here our feet were pretty tired so Ben just cruised around each floor and then found a comfy place to sit while I took my time with each exhibit. This was probably my favorite part of the day.

In this "little" 5 floor building with over 100,000 sq. ft. of stuff we visited many countries.

The first floor was dedicated to the Asian countries of China, Japan and Korea. Another entire floor was just the Dinosaur bones and a section full of real animals that were stuffed, one floor was dedicated to the European countries, the 4th floor had all of the South American countries, Africa and everything else. The 5th floor was not yet finished. They actually are in the middle of renovating the whole thing. It is an old building that they have built around to expand the museum. It is actually pretty neat to see. I should have taken a picture of it.

China

A chinese throne. Must have been a pretty big guy, this king.

These statues where all carved from wood. There were at least this many more in other places in this exhibit.

Korea

I thought these boxes were really pretty and the butterflies in the back are cool too. I think they were light stands.

Maybe my Dad can translate for us:)

Japan

Samari armour

Canada

These is some cool Candian Inuit clothes. The one on the left with the decorations is all done in tiny seed beads.

Dinosaurs

Lots of cool Dino bones. The huge one is a sauropod dinosaur called barosaurus. I couldn't get the whole thing in the picture. His tail went on for several more feet. And that T-rex on the left is just a juvenile. To his right is a stegosaurus.

Europe

some cool armour

There were many room set up like this.

This is the train of Marie Antoinette's dress.

EGYPT, Africa

a real mummy!

Greek/Roman

By the time we got to this exhibit we were so ready to be done walking and we still had to walk the two miles back to the hotel. So we really rushed through it.

This is a really old toilet seat. I thought it was funny.