Saturday, February 21, 2015

Valentine's 2015

It's crazy that Valentine's day has already come and gone! We had a few fun family festivities.  How's that for alliteration?!

One afternoon I went in for a little bit and helped the 2nd graders made chocolate dipped pretzels.  They are doing an economics unit learning about buying, selling, consumers, producers, etc.  The 2nd graders helped make the pretzels, and then sold right before Valentine's day at the school. It's kind of funny though, because unlike the "real" world in candy/snack production where ingredients need to be purchased first, all of the chocolate, pretzels and sprinkles were donated.  When Lee wanted to sell lemonade once when he was a kid, his mom had him buy the ingredients from her first.  (As far as I remember the story correctly!)
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Both girls were able to come and help while I was there.
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That same afternoon we replaced our old washer and dryer with some newer "used" ones.  I am not sure how old this dryer is, but it must be from the 70s...or even the 60s!  It served us well the past couple of years.  Though recently I had to turn it on two or three times to get it to dry the clothes completely.
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Here are the "new" additions:
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And actually that same morning, I happened to be the very first customer inside Target that morning.  It was a first for me!
Feb 3 2015

One day Lee and I received a Valentine from Elden.  His teacher sent it to us...so cute!
Feb 4 2015

I mentioned in the last blog post that the kids are all reading the same book together at school and are bringing home a jungle animal with a journal.  They record their adventures with the animal and draw a picture.  Shanna and Haley's animal was a sloth.  I didn't take any pictures when Haley brought it home, but did with Shanna.  I am sure you are so glad I did. You're welcome.
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It was kind of gross having the sloth on my counter, ha ha.
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One of Haley's self portraits.
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When I visited the personal finance teacher at the high school to talk about implementing Dave Ramsey's high school curriculum, I snapped a picture in the hallway...obviously.  Our kids' future high school!
Feb 5 2015

I happened to stop in at the school one afternoon, maybe after making copies?  Elden was making a Clifford craft out of hearts with his "reading" buddy. I love how his teacher will often invite me to come in and see what is happening in his classroom.  She is so great!
Feb 6 2015

Lee set up a fun date a couple weeks ago complete with a game of darts, a yummy chocolate silk pie, salted caramel rootbeer (my contribution) and Death Comes to Pemberly.  The rootbeer I bought at World Market.  It tastes like rootbeer with soy sauce. 
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And more randomness, one Saturday morning Shanna came down from the playroom dressed like this, and posed on the floor like this.  She almost scared me.  And I couldn't tell at first which kid it was!
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Shanna made a big group Valentine to share with her primary class.  She came up with the idea all on her own.  I had Haley get in on the picture just for fun.
Feb 8 2015

The week of Valentine's, we made boxes for our family members to leave notes in.  Shanna and Haley LOVED it and left lots of notes.  I had the boys join in too of course. It was fun writing notes to everyone.
Feb 10 2015 (2)

Figuring out features on my camera.
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Feb 10 2015

Lee gave me a fun Valentine!  I loved it!!!  I thought it was cute/funny when he said he did not use Pinterest at all to create it.
Feb 12 2015 (2)

Every year when the kids came home from school with their Valentine "loot" Elden was a little sad that he wasn't in on the fun.  Well, he had a pretty fun first year exchanging Valentine's at school!
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The goodies from school.....
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Thursday morning was the last day of school for the week, and the same day for Valentine parties.  Also Shanna, Haley and I had our teeth cleanings that morning too.  (I had a cavity, boo hoo.)  I found these cute pea coats for them at Old Navy the night before, and the cute blue shirts too.  I admit, I bribed them to wear the jeans to school.  They hate wearing jeans, but they look so cute with the boots and all! (Just need to straighten the legs on the jeans so they're not bunched...next time I guess!)
Feb 12 2015

On Friday the 13th some boots came in the mail for me.  They didn't fit.  They were so cute too!  I have been looking for boots and bought a couple of pairs already, only to return them.  I have never bought (and kept) a pair of boots before.  Maybe sometime soon I'll get some! I keep looking!
Feb 13 2015

Now on to the actual Valentine's Day. That morning Lee and I attended the first session at the temple, then headed back to Lois'.  I went to a baptism with Lois as our friend's son was baptized. After the baptism we went out again for our Valentine lunch date.  We ate at Not Your Average Joe's.  It was so yummy!  We ordered a specialty pizza.  It came with corn, so Lee asked the corn to be left off.  Well, it had corn on it anyway.  I mentioned it to my server, but told him it was still good.  At the end he let us pick out a dessert for free because of the corn mishap!  We picked a key lime pie slice with raspberry sauce.  It was sooo good! Oh, and the artisan bread and oil dipping sauce they put out on your table when you first arrive was amazing.  Lee and I were actually not really hungry by the time the pizza came out!
Feb 14 2015 (16)

We made a run to Aldi, then headed back so Lois and Jeff could head out on their date.

We had a family Valentine's party when Lois and Jeff got back.  Lee and I made dinner for everyone. The weather was crazy that evening!  Super cold, windy and snowing.  Lee was brave and took all the kids sledding at the complex's park after dinner.
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After sledding the kids exchanged Valentines.
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(One more sledding picture!)
Feb 14 2015

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Lee purchased a new phone from Republic Wireless and Valentine's day was his first day using it.  The kids were so excited about it.
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The kids made cute Valentine bags with Lois while Lee and I were out that day.  Thanks Lois! 
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And we decorated sugar cookies.
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I made chocolate cheesecake for everyone too.  Luckily some of the kids didn't want some so that left more for us adults!
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We had a fun family celebration.  That night we found out that our church was canceled so we decided not to drive home like originally planned.  When we woke up the next morning it sounded horrible outside.  Lois told us a little later that their church services had been canceled too. We had a fun time being "weathered" in that night and next morning.  The kids had fun playing with each other. Lee received permission to administer the sacrament to us, so we had our own little sacrament meeting, combined with family scripture reading.  Almost all of the kids shared their testimonies too.  Sorry Lois, I am just realizing that we did not clean up your playroom!  Sorry about the big mess!!!
Feb 15 2015

The roads were great coming home that afternoon.  We opened our Valentine note boxes and read the notes from our family members.  Lee also left Valentines on the porch for the kids.  He rang the doorbell, then ran out back.  My dad would do the same when I was growing up.  I though it was fun that he gave us kids a Valentine every year.
Feb 15 2015 (2)

A little history: after I finished my training at the Missionary Training Center, I flew to Los Angeles. My first day in the mission field was Valentine's Day.  My Aunt Jenni, my brother Sam and sister Lena were at the airport to see me off.  I am sure others were there too...can't remember! 

Then my next Valentine's day on my mission (and if my memory serves me well, which it doesn't!), my companion and I were kind of complaining about Valentine's day to one of my favorite district leaders.  We weren't sad that it was Valentine's Day (I love Valentine's Day!), or that we were "single". I mean really, I didn't go on a mission to moan and groan about being single, ha ha.  Mainly it was because we didn't have any fun candy or packages for that fun upcoming "holiday". (Like I said, if I remember right.  Sorry for all of you out there who did send me a package on Valentine's day!) Anyway, Elder Davis was so sweet and gave us some candy on that day.  Or somewhere around that day.  I thought it was such a kind gesture, and I felt like he really did care about us and helping us on our mission...even with a bit of candy.  I'll have to ask my companion Kelly, if that is what really happened! 

Another thing that happened that Valentine's day on my mission, is Sister Clark and I (Kelly) decided that we would be so kind, and such sweet sister missionaries if we did a "heart attack" on a single sister's door.  I totally used to remember her name for YEARS, but right now it escapes me!  We cut out a bunch of hearts and probably close to sunset, or maybe even after dark, we went to her house and taped up hearts on her front screen door.  Oh what a great, sweet surprise she would have! 

Well, the lady heard some noises on her front porch and when we were close to being done all the sudden she starts banging on the door (or window next to the door) like CRAZY.  And yelling at us to go away.  We were totally freaked out!  She thought we were robbers or something!  Poor lady! She said something about it not being a good neighborhood to be in and that she had a gun or was going to call the cops or something. It seems like we sheepishly took off the hearts, said sorry through the door/window and left.  Yeah, so much for being kind, wonderful, thoughtful sisters. 

Sister Clark and I were pretty shook up. (And now I totally freak out when people so much as knock on my front door when it's dark out! Not because of this scenario but because of Lee's scare with death in Memphis.) Soon thereafter we were done proselyting for the evening, and true to LA traffic had a little time in the car before we arrived home at our apartment behind the LA Temple on Santa Monica Boulevard.  During our drive, we both started busting up laughing at the whole craziness of the night.  Oh, we laughed and laughed and laughed. 

Hope you all had a great Valentine's Day!  And that no one scared the daylights out of you!

1 comment:

Lois said...

That was such a fun day! Thanks for coming!! Fun seeing everything else that led up to that day!