Shortcut

Spontaneity doesn't agree with me. I'm just not a very spontaneous person and it's driven Brook crazy for 17 years now. So last night I thought I'd try. Just down the street from our house is a stop sign that leads out of our neighborhood. You can turn left or right. Right takes us on a road through a neighborhood and left takes us through a FIELD to an adjoining neighborhood. I was driving Zach to basketball practice last night, on my way to pick up some other players who live right through that field. As I reached the stop sign, I glanced left and saw that the snow was melting and that there were many bare spots and tire tracks in the field. "Zach," I said, "let's go four-wheeling" and before I thought twice about it we were in four-wheel-drive and driving through the field. It was fun! We were doing great! "I'm such a cool mom," I whispered under my breath. Just about that time we reached the top of a little hill. "Mom, it gets deeper here," Zach warned, but I didn't care. I was cruisin'! Sadly, just beyond the crest of that hill the sun doesn't shine as much, and the wind doesn't blow the snow away so effectively and I quicikly found myself stuck in a very deep snow drift. And I mean stuck solid. In a panic I called a friend and told her to bring the basketball players to the field with shovels. They arrived and spent the next hour trying to dig us out. Cars traveling up the street saw a black suburban stuck in a huge snowbank with a blond lady ordering four young men around. Cars honked. Moms brought their kids outside to watch. And thankfully men in shirts and ties, arriving home from work, stopped to help. When Brook came up the block he was greeted by the sight of cars pulled off to the side to watch. When I waved at him, he pretended that he didn't know me and just kept driving before he thought better of it and came to help. My new best friends, Steve and Todd, finally helped Brook pull me out and I had to stalk their houses down today to deliver pies and thank-you cards. Lessons I learned from my experience: shortcuts take longer in the long run.... Spontaneity isn't something I'm good with...... People are generally willing to help strangers in need..... and every once in a while a good laugh is needed.

A St. George Weekend

It's always nice to have friends like the Karras's who invite us to do things! They invited us to go to St. George with them over President's Day weekend and we had a lot of fun. It's so nice to get away from the snow once in a while. And while it wasn't exactly hot there, we'll take wearing a hoody and tennis shoes over a parka and snowboots any day of the week. Caitlyn and Zach decided they want to LIVE there year round. It was nice to relax and just hang out with our friends. We went bouldering one morning on some beautiful red rocks somewhere in town (can't remember the name). We also went to the St. George Parade of Homes (insanely beautiful homes), hung out at the park, watched a little baseball, etc. The Karras's even ran in a 5-mile race in Hurricane Saturday morning (the WHOLE family except Carson, who's only 5). I think that Kristin won it in her age group and the kids, Kadee, Cooper and Cameron all placed in theirs. They're a family who loves to challenge themselves. Go Team Karras! Thanks for the getaway :)

Wait, She's 15?!?

Happy Birthday Caitlyn!!
I'm having a hard time believing she's fifteen years old already. Where in the world has the time gone? It doesn't feel like that long ago when Brook and I were busy in our lives, getting ready for our first baby. I was student teaching at Ogden High and Brook was going to school and working at the bank. We thought we had three more months to finish up things and prepare for her. Caitlyn, however, had different things in mind. She decided to visit us early (13 weeks early) and bless our lives in ways that we had no idea about. We are so lucky to Caitlyn! It has been so much fun to watch her grow from a bald baby with huge blue eyes into a beautiful young woman with a heart of gold. She is a great daughter and sister and we just treasure her in our family.

It was fun to celebrate her birthday with her yesterday. She started the day by breakfasting with friends at the local IHOP before school and she finished the day by celebrating with a family birthday dinner and cake. She felt the need to keep reminding us that next year she can DRIVE and DATE at this time. Geez Caitlyn, let us catch our breath first. :)

Happy Birthday Sweetie!

FIFTEEN things we love about Caitlyn:
1. Her laugh
2. Her sense of humor
3. The way she asks daily if Mom needs any help
4. Her relationships with her siblings
5. Her shining example
6. Her blue eyes
7. Her artistic abilities
8. Her determination
9. Her taste in books
10. Her smile
11. Her talent in writing
12. Her dependability
13. Her efforts not to be critical of others
14. The way she puts up with us
15. The way she loves her friends

Family Book Idea

Thank goodness for my friends who got me motivated to start this thing. When Jeni Rhees sent me a link to her new blog, I fell in love with the idea instantly and thought, "I can do this." I decided to use our blog as our family journal and record our lives. It has been so much fun and I've loved doing it. I'm not a scrapbooker, so this has been my offering to our family history. My sister directed me to a website, http://www.blurb.com/, which publishes books, and I published our family blog into hardback bookform. It was an experiement at first, but we just got our book for 2008 and I love it. I'll probably change some things next year, but overall, it's good. I wish I had a book called 1970-something from my childhood! Wouldn't that be fun? The idea is to get a copy for each of the kids and keep it for them until they get older. This year's book is an 8 x 10 hardback book with 85 pages and cost about $40. I'm sure that the 2009 book will be bigger as I got a late start on this last book, but the pricing isn't crazy for more pages. I just thought I'd share the idea in case anyone is interested.

Draper Temple

Today we had the privilege of taking a tour of the new LDS temple in Draper. It's just a few minutes from our home if we go up the mountain, over Suncrest. The kids were out of school and Brook met us during his lunchbreak. It was a great experience. Brook and I each remember going to the Logan temple when we were children and taking a tour through it. It left an impression on each of us. I hope touring this temple leaves the same impression on my children. I hope that they will come to understand what a sacred and special place modern day temples are.

The volunteers in the district have the tours down to a science. We met at a local church building, watched a video about temples and why they are so special to us, and then borded a bus which took us to the temple.

The Draper temple is truly beautiful on the inside! There is great craftsmanship in that building. The colors are calming and gorgeous. There are also some great painted murals which reflect the geography around us and the beautiful places to be seen here in the Wasatch mountains. Many of the rooms have extrememly high ceilings which make the rooms look very majestic. My favorite room was probably the bride's dressing room. It's a lovely, perfect setting for a young bride to prepare for her wedding. Actually, I loved it all. I loved seeing it, and I loved being there with my family. I'm grateful for each of them and that families can be forever.