27 May 2018

Becky celebrated her birthday on Monday.  It was a lovely day with sweet phone calls, texts, cards and surprises.

We tried a new recipe for dessert: four layers of vanilla gluten free cake filled with lemon-white chocolate-mascarpone filling and fresh berries.  We might rename the recipe "Becky's Birthday Cake" because it's her new favorite cake recipe. 

Brandan made this gorgeous cutting board for Becky.  It's an inch and a half of solid walnut.

Becky substituted a few days for Abe's early morning seminary class.  Brandan came to help on a couple of mornings when he didn't have meetings before work.  Team teaching was more fun.  Even if the kids weren't talking, we could talk to each other.  Becky wore her glasses all week due to severe seasonal allergies which added to the early morning, not quite awake look.

Gibson and Brandan helped a family move their belongings into a storage unit on Saturday.

About half the workers who showed up to help were shorter than 5 feet.  They worked hard all morning. 

 Saturday afternoon we planted our vegetable garden.  We bought all of our starts this year at school plant sales so instead of choosing the perfect specimens, we chose the best of what was available.  We have 3 cherry tomato plants, one mystery tomato and 1 volunteer.  We also got 2 varieties of cucumbers.  They aren't labeled, but we can tell they are different by looking at the leaves.  We bought a mini pumpkin plant that was planted by a kindergarten class.  There were more rocks in the seedling pot than dirt.  Gibson is posing next to a cantaloupe plant.  It will be fun to watch them grow.

Brandan pulled some weeds on Saturday and got out the microscope so Helen and Gib could look at sticky weed under the microscope.  It's no mystery why the weed sticks to itself and your clothes.  The surface of the plant looks like velcro under a microscope.

 Gibson built a lean to from branches Brandan trimmed from our maple tree.  It's now easier to walk under the tree.

20 May 2018

The highlight of our week was skyping Sofi on Mothers Day!  She is happy and healthy and we were delighted to visit with her.

We love this photo of Sofi studying.  Sofi went on exchanges with Sister Wu last week and Sister Wu sent us this photo.

Brandan had the idea to take a ward photo.  After church on Mothers Day turned out it to be a great day for it.  It was a beautiful, sunny day and everyone was in a good mood.  If you're trying to find our family, Brandan is in the seated row with a red tie.  Gibson is standing behind the seated row, about 3 people to the left of Brandan.  Helen and Abe are standing next to each other in the right middle mass of people.  Becky is taking the photo.  Sofi is in Taiwan.  

Here's a behind the scenes photo of the ward photo.  Abe and Ashton helped Becky set up chairs before church got out.  They also helped her find where the edges of the photo would be so everyone would fit in the photo.  With the planning done, the actual photo took about 10 minutes to set up and take.  

Helen made a chocolate cake for Mothers Day.  It tasted it delicious as it looked.

A parent helped a group of kids in Helen and Gibson's class build planter boxes and chairs for a fundraiser.  Gibson is in the middle of the photo, screwing the back on one of the chairs. 

We bought the chair Gibson built, plus another one to match.  Now we need to decide how to finish the chairs before we put them on our front porch.

Gibson made a wooden wand on his lathe.  He decided to give the wand to their teacher's aide as a going away present.  He also made a pouch to put the wand in.

Here's a photo of Gib giving the wand to Miss Halli at her going away party on Friday.

Miss Halli has been with their class for two years.  She loves theater and Harry Potter and has shared her talents generously with the class.

Gibson got to go on his first campout on Friday.  Here's a photo of him getting dropped off at the church with all his gear.

 He had to take a break from the campout and come back to civilization for piano syllabus.  Abe, Helen and Gibson all had successful evaluations.  These certificates represent months of hard work memorizing music and learning theory.  Abe passed level 7, Helen passed level 6 and Gibson passed level 3. 

Becky drove Gib back to his campout and Abe decided to stay for the rest of the afternoon.  Brandan was already at the campout.  Here's a photo of the ever popular BB range.

 This is a photo of Gib shooting a BB gun.  Gib loved the campout.  The 11 year old scouts were in charge of planning meals and Gib thought the food was delicious.  He also liked sleeping in his hammock and playing ultimate frisbee. 

Abe went to the stake dance on Saturday night.  Here he is with Camden, looking handsome.

Our ward had a combined sacrament meeting today with the two other wards who share our building. The meeting had a combined musical number with people from all three wards.  A group of singers sang "Amazing Grace" accompanied by the organ and a string quartet.  The arrangement was challenging and took a lot of work to put together.  It sounded beautiful.  This photo is from a rehearsal on Saturday night.  It was taken before the organist and about half the singers got to the church.  Helen played her violin.

13 May 2018

Happy Mother's Day!  

We're including this beautiful photo of Sofi in Taiwan with our Mother's Day photos.

Helen submitted one of the wildflower photos she took to the newspaper and it was selected for publication.

Tuesday was Abe's school's honors night.

Abe received two awards, the BIS LEADS award and an award for having a 4.0 GPA.  The BIS LEADS award is given to students who demonstrate Leadership, Enthusiasm, Academics, Determination and Success.

We're proud of all of Abe's friends.  They're a high achieving bunch.  From the left are Malakai, Camden, Jake, Ashton, Jay, Abe and Spencer.

 The freshman English teacher received the Golden Apple award from our local BYU chapter.  Each year, local seminary students nominate their favorite teachers for this award.  With several high schools in the valley, there is a lot of competition.  In the photo are Elizabeth, Jayden, Ashton, Abe, Jake, Mason, Mr. Bertrand, Rachel, Katrina, Eliza, Spencer, Camden and Logan.  All the youth in the photo except Elizabeth are in our ward.

Becky's service learning class spent Wednesday morning helping at a community garden.  The garden raises vegetables for local food banks.  We helped get several rows ready to plant and planted a row of squash.

Helen and Gibson's class held their passion project exhibition on Friday.  Gibson tried to train Lily to walk through a maze.  He doesn't know if she is trained or not, but he learned that she will follow a line of red pepper pieces anywhere.

Lily spent the day at school for Gibson's presentation.  He took he out of her tank for recess and let her wander around outside.  The kids liked feeding her dandelions.

 Helen and Clara did their project together.  They made a business proposal to open a snack shop at school.  They have permission from their principal and hope to open the snack shop before the end of school.

Abe played in his spring piano recital on Saturday night.  He played "Reverie" by Tchaikovsky, a dreamy, impressionistic piece.  Here he is with his piano teacher, Michele.

6 May 2018

Abe played in his last golf tournament of the season on Wednesday.

Brandan and Gibson went for a bike ride with the 11 year old scouts on Saturday.  They rode about 5 miles along the greenway.  Gibson brought a bike pump in his backpack just in case and helped another boy with a flat tire.

 Abe and Helen put their hammocks up in the backyard.  It took spring a long time to get here and we appreciated the warm weather this week very much.