School's out for the summer :)

 The last week of school was busy for us. Monday, Colten had an awards ceremony where he received the Elite PE award. He was able to run the mile in under 6 mins and 50 seconds (he did it in 6 mins and 40 secs), run the shuttle run in under 9 seconds and hold a plank for at least 3 mins and 30 seconds. Super proud of him!!

The kids got their yearbooks on Tuesday and spent the afternoon looking at each other's books. I had gotten $10 tickets to go to Tuacahn that night. So, we left Zac and the littles home and took off for Tuacahn. When I arrived, I was like the parking lot looks empty. Pulled up my phone again to search for Tuacahn messages to find a message saying "Preview Canceled". I didn't see the messages before because gmail sorted them into the promotional folder, which I hardly ever look at. So, we went to the box office and rescheduled our tickets for later in July then headed to my parents house. We had already planned on staying the night since Ashlyn was graduating from high school the next morning. My parents had just gotten home from their camping trip with Paula and Kirk and were grateful that the kids could help Grandpa unload some of the heavier stuff.

Wednesday morning we were up and at it early since Ashlyn's graduation was at 8am! Washington County moved to all high schools holding their graduation at their own football fields instead of the Burns Arena. But due to heat, they wanted them early. The kids and I made a donut run to Albertsons (I forgot how cheap their donuts were) before heading to the ceremony. Luckily we were able to see Ashlyn before the actual ceremony and take a few pictures. She told us that she was 77 out of like 350 and that she totally approved us skipping out when she had walked lol. So we did lol.

Tuesday ended up being the last day of school for Aspen and Colten as Wednesday they were at graduation and Thursday didn't count on attendance. Colten had planned on going but Zac offered him $100 to sand a truck for him, so Colten took that opportunity instead. And he actually did pretty good for only working for 3.5 hours. Zac's friend, Randy, had actually called him the night before to talk about getting the truck done and offered him a ticket to see "Top Gun Maverick". He told him it was hard for him to sit through movies now but I piped up and said "I like movies" so Randy said "join us then". So on Thursday after Colten did so awesome on the truck, he text Randy to see if there was another ticket and he said yes, just not sitting by us. Colten didn't care lol. Aspen went with a few of her friends to see the cartoon "Bad Guys" but had to walk over to Dairy Queen because her movie got out about 30 mins before ours lol. Top Gun was such a good movie! I really want to go see it again.

End of School vs Beginning of School

Friday and Saturday were just spent chilling at the house for me. Aspen worked on Friday and Colten went to the pool with friends. In the evenings, we have been enjoying watching the basketball final games. I was happy that the Golden State Warriors secured a spot in just 5 games and get to rest while the East goes to 7 games. We have also enjoyed watching the USFL games. I hope they are able to keep the spring league going for years to come. Helps with the big lull between Super Bowl and the start of NFL season.

Today after church we are heading out to my parents to watch the Indy 500 with my dad. The kids leave for their dad's next Sunday so we'll try to spend as much time as we can with them, although Aspen got scheduled to work 38.5 hours next week lol.

Last full week of school :)

Doesn't mean we are done after the week, but it is the last full week of of school. But we are getting close to the end. 

Last Sunday was a lunar eclipse. Luckily it was happening during my awake hours :). Plus the scope I got Zac for his birthday made it so we could see it really well. His scope even lets you see the craters on the moon. It was definitely weird to see part of the moon and then have it disappear.

Monday, Colten came home from school saying that his stomach was hurting him. He wasn't sure if it was because he was hungry or a pain in his stomach. We found out a little bit later that it was indeed his stomach as he was throwing up. Poor boy. I happened to be on the phone with Zac and had to abruptly end the conversation with "I gotta go...Colten is throwing up in the toilet". He threw up one more time that night after trying to eat a piece of toast so I decided to keep him home from school the next day. It is so hard to keep your kid home when he isn't sick enough to sleep the day away and bored out of his mind. But he was doing much better and joined in on the combined young women/young men activity.

Aspen has been slaving away at her job...well as much as she can at 14 years old and still in school. She was busy this week finishing her Science projects, the class has been hardest for her this year. But she is squeaking by and keeping her grade up. Now if we could just get her to turn her assignments in on time in Science class, that would be great lol.

Oh and Colten got his hair cut :) And he is starting to win the who's taller battle :)

Thursday I had the pleasure of doing an oximeter test overnight. It wasn't too bad but with the windy night, it definitely wasn't a peaceful rest. The oximeter was a thing I put on my finger to measure my heart rate and oxygen levels while I sleep. I have been really tired the past couple of weeks so the doctor is trying to see if I have some sort of apena. The doctor's office called with the results from my blood work. They said that I didn't need to take my iron supplement anymore and everything else looked good.

Friday night Zac and I headed to St. George for a date night, which included stopping at Darcee's place for Jeramiah to pick out his bearded dragon he wanted. Then we all went to the Cedar Pet Supply to sell the rest of the baby dragons and show Jeramiah a few things that he will want to have. After the store, we headed over to Apollo Burger for dinner and finished up at Sweet Rolled Taco :) The kids ate dinner at home and headed over to Hollee's and the park, so they had a good time.

Saturday morning we spent a good part of it straightening up the garage so Zac could actually work in it. Then Zac and I took a nap while the kids played on their phones. Well, Colten finished up some stuff out in the garage and then went to play on his phone. After my nap, I took Annika and Channing over to Hollee's so she could do their make-up for their recital that night. She did an awesome job! And for a moment, I had to have Dr. Raven give me a check-up. And man, her check-ups hurt lol.

Zac and I went to the recital to see our girls, Tashlee, Annika and Channing, perform as well as Oaklee. Afterwards, we went to Dairy Queen for dinner and was joined by Hollee's family. When we got home, the kids continued watching Spider-Man until Channing fell asleep.

This morning Colten made waffles for everyone :) It has been a great weekend so far and planning on continue that today.

Can't forget about Rocket. While we are still struggling with the potty training, he is so cute. And he has been better at letting me take him on walks.

May is cruising :)

This week has been pretty low key but still hard to believe the month is half over. Colten is still having fun with spring football practice, he just wishes it was longer. He says at the hour mark they are just getting warmed up lol. He did get invited to an additional practice this week so Coach Matua could show the developmental coaches how they run plays.  He has also been busy finishing up the school year by doing the RISE end of year tests. He said he wanted to opt out of the tests but he scored a level 4 on all 3 subjects. I said that is an incredible feat and you should be proud of doing that. 

Aspen is busy finishing up the school year as well but she is taking UA+ tests and won't get the results until summer. She has also kept herself busy working. She told me the other day she got a raise :). I told her that yes, she could go make more going to a food place in Hurricane but that would require getting rides. She can walk to work now, so why ruin that? She has also stepped up to take care of Rocket in the early mornings. I just haven't been sleeping well so we moved the kennel into her room and she gets up when Rocket whines. Granted Rocket is not going all night without peeing but he is at least waiting until 5:30 (or later) to wake her up.

I spent Friday in St. George doing the UA+ testing with UTVA students. I feel bad for the students since they have to take all 4 tests in one day. But it was a fun day. Meghan was down and got the teachers Crumble cookies. Then Lori ordered Door Dash (Chick-fil-A) and the driver delivered the food to the back door of the convention center. I went and found it. Joette had already gone and got the replacement order so some of the kids got to enjoy some Chick-fil-A food :)

Saturday morning, Aspen and I spent the morning doing a little ministering and visit two of our sisters. Then we went to St. George to see if we could find a new dog bed since Rocket has been ripping his current one apart. We ran into Brandi who offered the kennel and bed that she had sitting in her garage so we decided to go with free :). Colten spent Friday night with Grandpa Higgins and his cousins at their Father/Son's campout. He had a lot of fun getting dirty with his cousins and spending some time with his Grandpa.

I had made some caramel popcorn (all on my own) on Thursday since I was planning on spending Friday night alone. Originally, Zac was going to take Colten to our ward campout but we had a change of plans on Friday. I still ate my share of popcorn on Friday. The kids each got a quart size bag of it and I gave a quart size bag to Shannon, who gave me the air popper to be able to do it. It's Sunday and I just have 3/4 a bag full. I am definitely not making caramel popcorn often lol.

It's been a nice peaceful weekend, just anxious for school to be done. Colten is counting down the days of him having to wake up at 6:30am for school.

Still working on getting pictures uploaded so I need to add the pictures.

Washington County Fair, Boy's birthday and May is here :)

 So, back in November, Washington county announced that they had Walker Hayes coming to the fair. I had followed Walker on instagram before COVID but he got really big when his daughter choreographed a dance for his song "Fancy Like" and it took off. It sky rocketed him on the charts and pretty much every song since has had a dance and he does well. So, I contacted the family asking if they wanted to go. We got those that did and I was ready to buy tickets on the Monday they opened. Well, I got a thought to check the day before and they were on sale. In my panicked state, I was like, we gotta get tickets now. Well I ended up buying less than what I needed, then bought two more and still needed one more but couldn't buy just one cause it left one on the end of the row. Well Aspen was going to see if she had a friend that wanted to go and when that didn't work out, I called Hollee and she did.  Well the fair and concert finally came on April 22nd. Hollee, Christa, Aspen and I went to grab dinner before the concert at Cross Country Diner. Then we met everyone else at the fair. We ended up having floor seats off to the side, second row. Darcee tried to get the body guards to hook her up and get her a picture but they didn't go for it. But we were in heaven because during the second song, some people started to go up towards the stage so we did too. We were off to the side but man was it close. Aspen enjoyed being that close, same as Kayleeya. We even got Grandma Chris to come stand with us, for as long as her body allowed her too. All in all, it was a great concert. Annika and Channing were there with their mom as well, just had seats further away.

The next day, we went to the fair because Annika and Oaklee had cheer/dance performances with Dance Fuzion. Then we walked around and the kids rode some rides. I had found a Baby Yoda smiley/frowny thing that I wanted. And the kids got to ride a few rides and a few fun houses. We joined Oaklee and Raven for some rides and then all of us went to Dairy Queen for dinner. It was a good time :)

Then it was time for the boy's birthday. Colten had said something the night before about having a way to announce his birthday at school so we did the best we could on short notice. We got some Happy Birthday ribbon and wrapped it around his hat. Then I got some balloons for both boys, and we sent the Happy Birthday one to school with Colten, it didn't make it home.  I took the girls shopping for a present after school and Tashlee dropped off her presents before her dance. I made beef stroganoff for dinner, at Colten's request. Then Holly made the boys their dessert. Colten got lemon cake and Zac got homemade velvet oreos (which he raved about for days). Then we gave the gifts. Zac wanted cash towards his gun purchased so the kids gave him $10 each. Annika and Channing each had $10 to spend on Colten and used it very wisely. I think he has enough candy to last him until Halloween, of course it is not. Aspen also got Colten lots of comfort food, Cheetos and caramel m&m's to name a couple.

That Friday night, Zac got a call from Kim who offered to take us to dinner for our birthdays. We had a good time catching up and eating good food at Lupita's.

Colten spent the next Saturday at the swimming pool with friends. He apparently forgot that sunscreen existed until the very end of the day and got burnt. We did the aloe vera gel and cooling cloth thing for a couple of days to help ease the discomfort. Aspen worked 5 days straight in May to get this weekend off.

On Thursday, I had made an appointment for the kids to go do baptisms for the dead at Cedar City Temple. I had invited my dad to go with us and he gladly accepted. Colten forgot his recommend but we learned that temple recommends are now online so the people at the temple can look to see if people have an active temple recommend. It is so fun to see my dad perform these baptisms with both of my kids. Afterwards, we stopped by Culver's for a little ice cream.

Friday, Aspen and I, again, got to go to the temple with the young women and priests. The priests performed the baptisms while the Bishop and Brother Ballard did the confirmations. We enjoyed a little pizza in the wind afterwards.

Saturday we spent a little time at the splash pad with Hollee's family, then we all came home and took a long nap. Then I took Annika and Channing over to Oaklee and Raven's for a little bit before Zac took us for some ice cream. It's been a good weekend. Now to see if I can get my laptop to read the hard drive so I can upload pictures to the blog. Wish me luck!