29 September 2019

 Helen made these tasty and attractive kabobs for her health class this week.  Her group did a presentation on raw food.

She made a cake in between soccer games on Saturday.  She had a lot of fun decorating her cake with shades of green frosting.

Sofi's friend organized a murder mystery dinner party Saturday night.  Sofi's character was a famous celebrity detective who secretly was terrible at detecting.  She sent us a photo with a few of the guests from the evening.

 The temperature dropped 40 degrees over 3 days this week.  It was 45 degrees outside when we got home from church today.  Brandan built a fire in our ward stove and now our house is warm and cozy.

22 September 2019

Abe's team had two soccer games this week.  Another parent took this great photo of the team during the national anthem.

Gibson is also playing soccer this fall.  He's in the middle of the photo in an orange shirt.  He's learning how to referee, too.  He reffed his first two games as an assistant on Saturday.  

 Siskiyou Violins played a benefit concert for the Southern Oregon Historical Society.  The concert was scheduled for earlier this summer, but was canceled due to a thunderstorm.  This time it was a lovely evening, but the temperatures got chilly as the sun went down.  The violinists bravely played on, even when their fingers were too frozen to play a trill.  Helen is in the middle of the back row.

 Helen received her Young Woman medallion in church today after completing her Personal Progress.  

15 September 2019

We've crisscrossed Southern Oregon this week to watch Abe play soccer.  His first game was in Klamath Falls.  It was an ugly, sloppy game, but the drive out and back was beautiful.  It's always fun to watch Abe play, even when his team loses.  He plays cleanly and elegantly. 

His second game was in Eugene.  It was an exciting game to watch.  His team stayed ahead for most of the game, but the other team scored two quick goals at the end and won the game.

We took a break from soccer and went to the ward campout Friday night.  Becky, Helen and Gibson were some of the first people to arrive and we had plenty of space to set up our tent.  Gibson kindly posed for a photo.  Brandan came up after work.  We had perfect weather and enjoyed a fun evening with our ward.

Abe got his name in Sunday's newspaper for scoring a goal in his second soccer game of the week.

8 September 2019

School started this week!  Helen is a freshman this year.  She is super ready and excited for high school.

 

 Helen is going to walk to school this year with her friends.  Helen, Sophie and Clara start together at our house and pick up a few other friends along the way.

Abe and Gibson both got to start school a day later than Helen since neither of them are in the youngest grade at their respective schools.

Abe is a junior and has a challenging year ahead as he prepares for college admissions and testing.

Gibson is a 7th grader.  He's happy to be back at school and to see friends he hasn't seen all summer.  

For the first year in a very long time, Becky isn't driving any car pools for school.  All of the kids have pretty much the same school schedule.  Abe and Helen have early morning seminary and Abe has an early bird school class, but they all get home at the same time.  It feels like a new chapter in our family with three teenagers and no littles.

 Abe's seminary teacher is celebrating her 40th wedding anniversary by touring Portugal, Spain and Morocco with her husband.  Becky substituted for the first week of seminary.  The kids aren't very talkative at 6:25 am, but you can tell from the pictures they drew to explain the plan of salvation that they are thinking about the gospel and can explain what they've learned from the scriptures.  Teaching seminary is a treat-- it gives you a boost all day long.

Abe's soccer team had two games this week.  They won one and lost one, making their record 2-1 so far for the season.  This photo is from Saturday afternoon.  It's always fun to watch Abe play.  He plays midfield and does a great job controlling the field.

1 September 2019

Brandan didn't have to work on Wednesday so we drove to Redding to go to the water slides.  This was our kids' last week of summer vacation and it was a great way to spend the day together.

School has started in California so the water park was almost empty.  We never had to wait in line.  This is a photo of Gibson at the end of a water slide called "Raging Waters" which is actually the calmest ride in the park.

We got home from the water park in time for Brandan, Abe and Gibson to pick pears with the Young Men in our ward.  The pear harvest ended on Thursday.  As the pears ripen, they fall on the ground.  The fallen pears can't be harvested and canned because they are bruised and spoil quickly, but farmers feed them to their cows and pigs.

Abe made the varsity soccer team and was chosen to be one of the co-captains.  This is a photo of the varsity team.  Back Row: Coach Jason, Davis, Abe, Jake, Joe, Malakai, Camden, Spencer, Jayden, Ben and Coach Jen.  Front row: Carson, Colton, Diego, Clint, Tyson and Braden.  They won their first soccer game on Thursday, 4-1.

The Mays came to visit for Labor Day.  We went rafting together on the Rogue.  The weather was gorgeous and the river provided just enough excitement with the few rapids we went over.

 From the left are Becky, Ethan, Tim, Brandan, Kirse, Karina, Helen and Abe.  Sullivan is taking the photo and Gibson is behind Becky.  We had a fantastic visit and are looking forward to the next Hull/ May Labor Day adventure in 2020.

Helen finished her last value project for her Personal Progress Award.  She read several general conference talks about integrity and used quotes from the talks to create the outline of the Salt Lake Temple.  She hung her finished project in her bedroom.