Makin' crayons.

Summer is coming which means more and more time to do nothing. Yeah, that is pretty much what happens at our house-absolutely nothing. I have found a lot of blogs to change that tough, there are tons of tutorials out there in the blogosphere and I plan to take advantage of them this summer. Our first project.....Crayon Making...... we used this tutorial and it was so much fun. The kids loved being destructive and peeling off wrappers and braking the crayons in half.

Snow??

What a beautiful day it was yesterday. I looked at the thermometer outside and it registered 86 degrees, ahh perfect for a trip up to the canyon. I grabbed the camera, everyone put their sandals on and headed out the door. "How 'bout silver lake?" I suggested to Cache. "There is probablly a little snow in shaded spots, but I bet we could walk around the board walk". Up the canyon we headed, and Up we headed some more, and up, up, up, up. "I forgot how high up Silver Lake is" I thought aloud. As we pulled into the parking lot of Brighton ski resort we looked to the sides of the road, there is about 6 feet of snow on both sides. DUH-I guess it is only May and the snow at the top of the canyon has just barely started to melt. Oh, well how often do you get to play in the snow and walk on a frozen lake in flip flops and shorts? Although there was a TON of snow it was still 75 degrees and beautiful. I love this weather.

It's the birthday boy!

Today is Cache's birthday, he is 31. So far this birthday has been better than last year, he moped around and had a quarter life crisis for an entire week. "I'm 30!wah-hah" "Is that a gray hair?" "look at all the hair I'm loosing". I haven't had the depressing 30th year yet, but come on, can it be that bad?

I picked up his birthday present last night, it has been at my brother-in-laws house for two weeks. I am really excited, because he has wanted a foosball table for years and I caved in and bought him one this year. I can't wait to see his face as he walks in the door and sees it(he is at Fathers and sons with Finley). We might have to have a few playoff games before we leave for an early mothers day celebration in Heber. Poor guy has to share his birthday with me, but he is a good sport about it.

Dear Cache,

Thanks so much for being you! I am grateful to have a husband that helps with dishes, cleaning, ironing,cooking, and diapering. Thanks so much for the patience you show me when you have to help with these things because I didn't do them,I know you would much rather be playing your guitar. Thanks for being frugal (yes, I am grateful for this) and level headed, if it were up to me we would be living beyond our means in a big giant house and paying off maxed out credit cards and driving cars that aren't paid off. And wow am I grateful that you work so hard to provide for our family so we can have food and shelter and clothing and cute shoes. Because of you our lives have much less stress. I love you tons, even more than the day we were married. I hope the next 31 years are exciting, joyful and full of fun.
Love you and S.M.I.L.E!
Carrie

Cache was feeling unappreciated yesterday, so I want him to know how appreciated he is here at home and how much we love him.

Grandpa's passing

I am awfully tired of staring at the Paula Abdul video on my last post, I have been working on some other things to document, but my mind and my creative capabilities (the few I have) are in the outhouse right now. Although, I can't let much more time pass without me documenting Cache's grandpas death.

Grant was a wonderful man, the first time I met him I seriously laughed so hard my sides ached. I loved the way he could throw a cuss word into any sentence and it came out sounding so funny. Cache and I were able to visit Grant during the last week he was on this earth. He was in a nursing home trying to recover from a fall he had and had dislocated his hip, he was in and out of coherency, one of the times he was alert he pulled Peanut close and asked if she would like some ice cream, she of course responded with a "yes" Grandpa immediately started yelling to everyone to get her some ice cream and bring some for him too. When we finally found some to give him, Grandma was taking her dear sweet time feeding it to him and he tried to grab it saying "give me the damn Ice Cream" who knew a 93 year old man would be so demanding about ice cream. We loved being able to see him and enjoy his personality, it is too bad that it is after someone is gone that you wish you could've spent more time with them.

The funeral was yesterday in Logan, it rained the entire time we were in the funeral home, but when it was time to travel to the Smithfield cemetery, the clouds cleared and let the sun shine. It was a good thing too, because I didn't bring coats for me or for my kids.

We love and we will miss you Grandpa! We hope your reunion with your parents, son, grandkids and great grandkids was wonderful.
Grandma and her children

Grandma's last goodbye

I am not that old. Am I?

Okay people I am only 28.5 years old, but last night at Young Womens I felt SOOOOO old. I had the beehives in my car and we were driving to our activity for the night. My radio is set to RadioDisney, and it rarely changes (I confess I like it as much as my kids do). The new song by Paula Abdul came on and the girls asked who was singing it. I replied (surprised that I actually knew the answer) "Paula Abdul" one of the girls was totally flabbergasted (i love that word) and said she didn't know that Paula Abdul was even a singer. um!!!!!Hello!!!! she was my 5th grade rock star. She had never heard of "Opposites Attract" or "Cold Hearted Snake" I knew every word and every dance step. She was my first album I ever owned (actually I think I had a tape of "TIFFANY" when I was 6). So to all of you who don't know that Paula is a singer and not just an American Idol host here is my favorite song (I can still sing it word for word)
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Our First House

A fellow blogger did a post of their first apartment she and her husband lived in when they were first married. I thought this would be fun, but then I got looking through my pictures and I don't have any pictures of our first apt. or even our second apt. They were both basement apartments and they were our little heaven on earth. Things seemed so simple, even though they really weren't at the time. Both of us were working and going to school. And at the time I thought it was really cool that I made more money than my husband! I was working at Primary Children's Hospital and Cache was working at Finova. Our first Elder's quorum president told us we were "living large", we laughed at that remark and wondered what he was talking about. As I look back, I now understand.

So since I don't have any of our first apartment pictures I will post our first house pictures. It was downtown SLC, right across the street from Cache's parents home. It was a dump when we bought it, in fact it was condemned and the city wouldn't let us live in it until we fixed it up. Someone went in before us and tried to remodel it, but only made it worse. He cut through the heat ducts to the upstairs to put in a pass through window from the kitchen to the dining room. I guess he didn't care if it was warm upstairs. He wired all the electrical cables on the outside of the walls and stapled them down. This was only a few things that made our home a wreck when we moved in. Take a look: (you can click on the pictures to enlarge)

It was a HUGE project and wouldn't have gotten done without the help we received from family and friends. I spent hours and hours painting the ceilings, plus other stuff, but this is what I remember most. Cache got a hernia, we had to hire someone to do the front porch area, but the rest was pretty much done with our own labor.

Have you ever........

tried Geocaching? It is so fun! If you have a hand held GPS device, you can do it. If you don't have one, you can come with us. Here is how it works; There are little treasure boxes hidden all over the world that contain little gizmos that you can trade. You would be surprised that you have probablly been walking past one of these on your daily jogs through the park. First, you have to log into the Geocaching website then enter your address or zipcode and select how many miles you are willing to travel. Second, find a "cache" that you are interested in and enter the coordinates into your GPS. Third, go find it by following the directions on your device. Don't forget to take little treasures to leave in the container and don't forget to sign the log inside too. Usually the treasures aren't that neat, but the kids like to choose something to keep. sometimes there is money, sometimes there are toys, pins, jewelry. It is a good way to get out and explore the valley. We have found a few parks and hiking trails that we wouldn't have found if we weren't looking for treasure. For the intense "geocacher" there are travelling "bugs" (that's what they call them, but they aren't real bugs) that you can find sometimes in the container, If you find it.....sign it out and put it into another "cache" and log it on the website. These bugs travel all over the world. Anyway warm weather is almost here, so I thought I would share one of our hobbies so you can can enjoy it too.