Taking Time Out For Fun And Chickens

I feel like I've been really overwhelmed with taking care of Josh, waiting on him, keeping on top of his pain meds, running Layton to ball practice and scouts and friends, doing housework, getting ready for Pack Meeting, caring for the new chickens, watering the lawn, etc. and yesterday I just wanted to go in my room and lay down for a while when Layton asks me if I can help him with a project. It wasn't for school or scouts or anything. He just wanted to create something. I could have easily said no. But I didn't. He wanted to make a chess board for an old set he's had that didn't have a board. So we went out to the barn and found an old board, measured it, cut it, sanded it, and brought it in the house. He sat at the table for a half an hour and measured out the squares with a ruler so that each square was exactly 2 inches. Then he chose which colors to paint it from my bins of paint. He painted all the green squares first. Then he asked me to help him with the black squares so that the edges would be really straight. Once it dried, he decided to wait till the next day to paint the edges so that he could have time to use it before he went to bed. He set it all up and invited his dad to play with him. I could hear them laughing from down the hall. It made me smile. Layton has such an awesome laugh. Vance beat him in every game they played. The board ended up looking like the picture below every time, with Layton down to 2 pieces trying to beat Vance. I ditched my plan to lay down in my room and sat at the table to watch them play.

These two chickens below are the only ones that survived the trip up from the valley. They are very sweet and follow us around when we go in to feed and water. The black one nearly died the first night and basically laid down in the dirt and wouldn't move. Josh decided to help her live. He picked her up and put her face in the water and forced her to drink. He hand fed her too. He held her in his lap and pet her. And she lived. Our 4 other chickens don't like their new coopmates so we kept them separated the first few nights but we've opened up the coop to all of them now and we'll see how it goes. The little ones hide behind the food barrels a lot. Hopefully the big ones will get bored with them and they can all be friends. Can't we all just get along?

Bad Choices Have Consequences...

Yesterday, Josh broke a lot of rules.

He took the Ranger out without asking.

He picked up a friend and let him drive it.

They drove it where they shouldn't have.

They drove it way too fast.

They tipped it over onto Josh's foot.

Josh drove it home and made up a lie about what happened.

Vance and I are not idiots so we got the truth out of him.

(He tried to convince us HE was driving, he was going slow, a cow scared him...)

We went to the ER in Show Low last night and got x-rays.

Too swollen to know if it's fractured or not so they sent his x-rays out to a radiologist.

They put him in a fiberglass splint and gave him crutches.

He is in a lot of pain and can't walk.

He's missing school he can't afford to miss.

He is grounded, he lost the priveledge of his phone and I-pod, he can't play Cops and Robbers with the neighborhood kids tomorrow night, and he's got a ton of make-up work to do.

He has also lost the trust he was trying to build up with his parents.

I'm gonna need a lot of hair dye cause this kid is turning me gray!

Sad Day To Be a Chicken

Vance and the boys came home from the valley yesterday with a box full of chickens. By the time they got to Payson, most were dead. By the time they got home, all but 4 were dead. By the time we went to bed, 2 were still alive and one looked like it was on it's way out. This morning, we were happy to find that it pulled through and looks like it will make it. So we ended up with only 2 chickens to add to our chicken family. So sad. I never thought it would happen but I've gotten really attached to my little egg-laying ladies. When I go out there to feed and water, they rush up to me and rub against my legs. They like it when I talk to them, too. I would be devastated if something happened to them! Good thing I hadn't met those other ones yet!

While the Kids are Away, the Moms Will Play!

This is Gail, Brenda, and I at the gas station before our ride. We also went with Jolyn and Vicki, who were on another quad. We rode for a couple hours and had a great time. We went out to Shone's Dam. I got very sunburned on my face and now I have racoon eyes. Ugh. We did this while everyone's kids were a school and mine were down in the valley.

Vance took the boys and went down to the valley to tile my sister's shower for her. I planned to sleep in, do a little painting, watch some tv, you know - your basic slacking. Did it happen? Nope! My friend woke me up to go to a yard sale in the morning, then we went out riding quads for a few hours, then I came home and planted grass seed in my front yard, then we all met and went to dinner and a movie. We saw "The Lucky One". It was good. I woke up this morning with renewed hope for a slacker day and what did I do? Watered my lawn, did dishes, did laundry, went for a ride with JoJo on the ranger, talked to my neighbors for a while, cleaned my car, watered my lawn again, cleaned the chicken coop, and played the piano. I'm not sure I remember how to be a slacker! It's been a while. The only thing I slacked on was the painting I needed to do. Oh well! Vance will be home with the boys tomorrow and he's bringing up 16 young chickens to add to our coop. Holy toledo!

Guess What I've Been Up To Today...

Ha ha! When Vance gets home from work tonight, he's going to just die! I won't be here to enjoy the look on his face when he sees the mess I made in the kitchen today because I'll be at Layton's baseball game. I even considered cleaning it up but thought it would be so much nicer to leave it for Vance! Josh is supposed to bake something for the Young Men and Young Women's Dessert Auction tonight so I made mini cheesecake bites, brownies, pumpkin cookies, lemon bars, and medium sized cheese cakes. He's going to take an assortment platter.

This is the batter for the pumpkin cookies:

Here are the lemon bars before I cut them:

This shows some cupcakes I made earlier, the medium cheese cakes, and the brownies in the background:

My kitchen was filled with wonderful smells today!

And here is the mess Vance will come home to later: hee hee

It's not mean! It's funny!

Havasu Falls March 2012

In March, Vance and the boys hiked down into the Grand Canyon to Havasu and Mooney Falls. They went with the 14 and 15 year old scouts in our ward. Layton got to go because his dad went.
The picture below is the beginning of the hike on the switchbacks.

Josh and Layton and Loye Willis taking a break:

Loye Willis and Layton:

Josh, Layton, and Loye at the top of Havasu Falls:

Vance and Layton's tent:

Josh and Loye's tent:

Having breakfast, dehydrated scrambled eggs and bacon, mmm...yum!

The hike down to Mooney Falls was very sketchy but so worth it:

Granola bar anyone? No? Ok, i'll eat it all myself in one bite:

Loye, Layton, Josh, Nick, and Zane:

The water is FREEZING!!!

Hiking out:

Random pictures...

When we wake up in the morning of mid-April to find this:

We stay in our pajamas a little longer and make this:

I LOVE having a fire in the fireplace. We haven't used our central heating at all this winter, just the fireplace keeps us warm.

Vance looks a little suspect in this photo because I caught him breaking one of our biggest rules yesterday. We Do Not Feed the Dog At the Table! Its sick! And Vance is the weakest one when it comes to JoJo so I can always count on him to break the rules.

This is a current photo of our family room. We used to have a brown sectional in front of the door and we donated it and bought two couches. It works much better in the room. The walls were already painted this nice brown when we bought the house so I haven't really had to do much in here. We changed out the light fixture, which isn't visible in the photos, put up blinds, and we're planning to face the fireplace in travertine.

Have I mentioned how much I love my house?

Our Friday the 13th Project:

So I just realized all my pictures downloaded backwards so you get to see our progress from finish to start! We borrowed our neighbors dump trailer and got a load of fill dirt to fill in the hole in our backyard that used to be a pond. We will probably need more dirt. It didn't quite fill it. Vance's parents came over for a few hours and helped us move rocks and spread dirt.

Josh was thrilled to come home from school and realize we had some fun things in store for him: shoveling and raking!

Vance used the rototiller to help soften the dirt so it would spread easier.

We took rocks from an old garden area near the house and used them to outline the driveway. The ranger always comes in handy when we need to haul stuff.

This area was created by the previous owners of the house for flowers and vegetables. We are going to build a carport there so we needed to move the rocks out!

While it looks like Vance has been working hard, he just barely picked up the rake when I took this picture. I am actually the one who did all the raking and rock removal to prep the area for more dirt. We are going to plant grass here. I can't wait!

This project started at about 8 o'clock this morning and we are still not done and it's almost 6pm! We are expecting rain or snow this weekend so we're going to hold off on planting the grass. We've really killed ourselves today and I won't be surprised if we can't move tomorrow. I have blisters on my hands and my neck is out again and my arms feel like they're going to fall out of their sockets. But I WILL HAVE GRASS!