Shavonne's wedding and I like sushi-- a lot

We started this summer off by being out of school on May 30th! It is the first time we have not had any school in June at all. And we go back to school the last week of August--so it will be our longest summer ever. Lance is working from home and he says it is definitely more noisy with all the boys home. He locks himself (literally) in his office upstairs, but it is by the room where the boys play. Luckily Kuna has started a Boys and Girls Club and it only cost $10 per child for the whole summer so Thayne, Bruce, and Hunter can go there and play for hours (anytime between 11 and 6). It is only for grades 1-6 so Dallin and Luke get to hang out together. They have a blast and see friends from school. They will get to do that a few times a week.

In June, I flew down to my parents on June 2nd to help my mom with some wedding preparations for Shavonne and Joshua's wedding on the 6th. We got to go shopping for shirts and ties for the boys, make cake balls, mini cheese balls, and lots of cream cheese mints. Then I made corsages, bouiterres and Shavonne's bouquet. Their reception was very cool looking with fun colors of gerber daisies and the yellow and orange Shavonne loves. Lance and the boys all came on the Friday before. We got to stay at my sister Elisabeth's new house with Douglas and Shauna's family. Elisabeth hadn't even moved in yet--so it was just us and sleeping bags and a few air mattresses. The hot water heater was broken--so we got cold showers. She has gotten it fixed since she moved in, but it took a few days for that to happen too, so she got cold showers too. I figured it was easier to deal with the cold showers than to worry about fitting showers in at Mom and Dad's house with a bride getting ready and the other guest to their house. Lance forgot the camera, which is the only thing he forgot. Pretty good with five kids to bring.

We had a good time visiting everyone. The boys really just enjoyed seeing cousins. They all danced together at the wedding which was really cute. They loved going swimming together too. We missed seeing Joseph and Sasha and their girls, who still had school. We know it's hard to live far away from family at these times. They are lucky enough to live by her family though.

My brother, Douglas, is a chef at King's Seafood and he and Shauna took, me, Lance, Aunt Nancy, and Uncle Dana to eat at the restaurant in Las Vegas for lunch. I really miss eating fresh seafood. I used to order fish a lot when I went out to eat on a date in Mississippi, but not so much in Idaho! I tried sushi, I had had the sushi rolls with krab or tuna in them before and liked them (at my cousin's wedding reception) but never the "raw" sushi. Some of what I tried was raw, so sushi rolls are cooked. I like the ALL! The eel was my favorite, the tuna was really good too. One was spicy--very good stuff. Doug warned me to be careful because lots of restaurants will sell sushi, but it is not a good quality. I figured that would be the case. Lance got talapia (sp?). I liked it a lot! He liked it too and he didn't think he like fish. But since we live so far away from good fresh seafood, I doubt he'll be ordering any more fish for a while!

It's so good to visit family. We also got to go to Vegas in March for part of spring break. So the boys are feeling a bit more caught up with their cousins.

Pinewood Derby Cars and a recipe.

Bruce and his Pinewood Derby car. He went into the races hoping to have the faster car there, but he realized that every year is different. His car was fast again. The races were oh-so-close for so many of the boys. The best part of the derby was that at the end every boy got a really cool t-shirt with a design for the best car on the front and a racing hat from Napa Auto Parts.

Make a Smilebox recipe

Thayne's Pinewood Derby Car and another recipe. This is from my friend Heidi Mumford. She gave it to me years ago in Colorado and it is one of my favorites still, but ironically it is not one Thayne likes. He has a thing against spaghetti sauce! So I leave a few pieces of breaded chicken naked for him.

Make a Smilebox recipe

Pizza Dough

This is our favorite pizza dough recipe. I got it in college from Eileen ? (I think it is Mumford now) at Continental Apartments at USU. Anytime I'm feeling like just ordering pizza, I remind myself that this only takes 30 minutes to make a pizza and the cost is SO LOW. I've been working on a new recipe book as my Young Women value project (the 10 hours are LONG past! It'll be more like 100!). I'm going to share lots on my blog! So enjoy--you can print these out or email me and I'll send it to you as a picture.

Make a Smilebox recipe

To my husband: Why I Love You More 15 years Later

Lance and I have been married for 15 years now. It amazes me that as time goes by I don't feel older. I love Lance and like him even more than when we got married 15 years ago. On June 17th, 1994 we had so many adventures to look forward to together: finishing at USU, a real job, children, buying a house, church callings. We were ready to move on in life and do everything together. Our plans for the future were well grounded in the gospel of Jesus Christ and our hopes were realistic; so, our 15 years together has looked a lot like our original hopes. Our hopes and dreams didn't have places or names assigned to them in 1994. Over the 15 years we added names to our hopes and plans. Lance got more schooling than we had hoped for, we saw more of the the great USA too. Happily we have ended up in a community our family can call home. Our boys fill our house with love and they help make it a home.

Fifteen years ago I loved Lance for lots of different reasons and why I love him more now:

To my husband and love, Lance,

• You were so cute!
• You still are--I love your blue eyes, profile, and how your hair has a smattering of gray in the temples--mmmm, very sexy.

• You had a plan for your professional life and you were working hard to reach your goals.
• I love that you think ahead, plan, study, and worse case scenario with your career--and then work like crazy. You are very good at your work. I think you are a favorite engineer for many the cities in the valley because you are honest and very thorough in your work.

• You had a job and you were working while in school. You grew up working and farming. I love that you already knew how to work and that you liked to work. I know you didn't necessarily like THE work, but you liked to work.
• I love that as my husband will do whatever you can to provide for our family. Thankfully, right now it is still work you love to do. And you are seeing success with your own company.
  
• I've love that you are extremely self-motivated. I don't worry that you are working from home. You stick to your work schedule and can rarely be tempted away (but it is worth it when we do tempt you away, huh?)
  
• I LOVE that you are a nerd--the best person in our marriage to take care of our money! Life has been so much more peaceful since you got us on the "Dave Ramsey Plan" and we got out of debt.
  
• I love working on goals with you. We make a good team. You keep me on track and realistic.
  

• When we were dating, I was always impressed that you were so kind to other people. You were always first to help shovel a sidewalk or offer your seat to a woman on the bus.
• You still do that stuff, even for me. I can always have the last of the ice cream or even the last potato chips--if I wanted them, but I usually let you have the potato chips because I know you love them.
  

• You're just smart--book smart, gospel smart, common sense smart
• You're even smarter now--and more experienced in life!
  

• Having a family was important to you. You came from a great family too. I just loved them then.
• I love your family even more.
  
• You're a really good dad. I don't even know how to quickly write about this--you just are
• You placed the Lord first in your life and you knew the gospel well.
• You still strive to do all that you are asked to do and we work as parents to teach our children the gospel. You teach by example.
• You attended the temple and could take me there
• We still go to the temple together and you've always remained worthy of that privilege
  

I am sure I can go on and on. But time is a factor now, and I have eternity to tell you these things. I know I need to be better at telling you. I hope you don't mind if I write it--that is so much easier for me. I love you.
Melissa

Third Grade Wax Museum

The third grade at Indian Creek Elementary has a wax museum every year. Each student gets a person to read a biography about. Then they create a poster with life facts on it and put together a script and costume to wear for the museum. Bruce was Wilbur Wright. He had so much fun preparing for it and the best part was that his best buddy, Tucker was Orville Wright. They got to stand next to each other for the museum and they looked pretty authentic, for third graders!



Thayne spent a lot of time getting together ideas for his costume for Paul Revere. He looked so good in his tri-corner hat and gold vest. His script, which he wrote, was practiced a lot at home, but I think he gets nervous for the camera! He's so cute though, I just want to hug him when I see this and his eyes moving around to remember everything.

Each class had their own time in the gym and different classes came around to visit the museum along with that classes parents. Thayne didn't have much time to just stand around--there was always someone new to come along and push his button!

This was a great project--I hope they keep it for my younger children!

Almost Old Enough

Dallin at twelve, almost 13, has been funny about upcoming growing older changes. He has teased me that he is growing armpit hair, but it is PINK! He's a bit happy that he's starting to get "guns" and he gets mad if I take the razor to his fuzzy face when I cut his hair. I mean, not every twelve 1/2 year old can grow a goatee!

Okay, okay, it is just pretend. Dallin really wanted to try on the fake goatee just to see what his Grandma and Grandpa would say when they got here for their visit in May. It does match his hair color very well and he is tall enough to pull it off. (He's over an inch taller than me now and his feet are huge!) He no longer wears glasses, but he thought he looked like Danny Goekey, from American Idol, with them on.

During spirit week at school, Dallin was pretty stoked to participate in crazy hair day. The only colors of hairspray we had were white and black--so a skunky do made perfect sense to us!