Some more

I'd better hurry up!  It's the last day of August and I have only written once this month!

So...  I'm going to start out this post with our sad news.  Our cute little Mordecai has died.

 

He sure grew since this picture was taken.  I think I figured he'd be around for a long time like Scratchy was, and I've been not as good about taking pictures lately, so I don't have more recent ones.  I might have to steal some that Joshua took.  I know he was just a little ratty, but he sure grew on me.  He had a fun personality.  He was a lot more active than Scratchy was.  He was always pouncing around his cage and crawling all over Joshua.  He was just so cute and sweet.  We all miss him.  I'm so sad for Joshua.  Many tears have been shed.

 

So this is what happened.  You know how we've been going back and forth between Globe and Thatcher every weekend?  Well, this time I was driving as we pulled into Thatcher, and I wanted to hurry and get the shopping done so we wouldn't have to go back later.  I forgot we had a little ratty with us.  Joshua said, "What am I going to do with Mordecai while we're in Wal-Mart?  I can't bring him in."  I told him he'd just have to bring him in because he couldn't stay in the hot car.  Under normal circumstances we wouldn't bring him in, but in this case there wasn't much choice.  Then there was a discussion about it with Papa too, and somewhere in there Joshua understood that he could not bring Mordecai in, so he didn't.  He was gone before we got back out to the car.  I feel so, so bad.  We never wanted that to happen.  We love that little guy.  He is gone too soon.

 

I'm not sure what we'll do.  I'm certain that Joshua will want another rat some time, but I think right now might be a little too soon.  We'll see. 

 

This weekend worked out a little differently.  Jeremy had to work late on Friday, so we stayed in Globe on Friday night.  It was after lunch by the time we left on Saturday.  And then when Mordecai died Joshua wanted to bring him back to Globe to be buried near Scratchy.  So that's what we did.  There was much groaning an gnashing of teeth over the decision to leave Saturday night, but for Joshua we did.  We had a little funeral in the backyard at 11:30 PM or so, just Joshua, Jeremy, and me.  And then I went and sat with Joshua in his room for a while.  I felt like he needed that right then.  His brothers in there were all asleep, so we talked about some things that he probably wouldn't have mentioned at all if they had been awake.  I was really glad.  It was a good talk.  It was 1:00 when I got to bed, but sometimes it is very much worth it.  And then I was up at 6:00 to shower and get the two older boys and Jeremy through the shower before 9:00 church in Miami.  Phew!  I'm feeling it.

 

You're probably wondering why we rolled back into Globe so late.  Well, that's an interesting bit of story.  Well, maybe not so very interesting, but I'll tell you anyway.  We didn't hear anything all week from Home Depot about whether or not our laminate order was in, so we went over there and asked.  It turned out they did have the order and that it could be delivered Monday.  I didn't want to come back Monday, so we went back to the house and took the seats out of the van and then went and picked up the laminate ourselves.  And in the meantime we decided this whole thing was taking too long, so we decided to do the laminate ourselves.  We're hoping to get a good group of people together this coming weekend to put it in.  And it'll be a long weekend, so that might work to our advantage as well. :) Anyway, the lady in charge of flooring was busy getting our order together when we got there.  The laminate was already on a pallet and ready to go, but she had to get together the padding and the trim, and it turned out that the quarter round trim was all mixed up, so there were two sizes in one slot.  She had to take it all out and separate it, and then put back all the wrong size ones.  And there weren't enough pieces, but that's ok.  They were short by 3 or 4.  If we decide we need it later we can go get it.  The trim is not the important part.  Anyway, so between that and reworking the order to not include laminate installation (saving us nearly $2000 - yea!), we were there for 2 hours!  Thank goodness for good babysitters.  It was just Jeremy and me waiting at Home Depot for all that.

 

I'm glad we're doing it ourselves.  It was a lot of fun last time, and this time the older boys can help.  I think that will be a good experience for them, and I hope they enjoy it!

 

But we got all our stuff loaded in the van, and the kiddos helped Jeremy get it all into the house.  Jeremy got a nice flooring removal tool, and in a couple of hours the flooring was all out of the kitchen, dining room, living room, and entryway.  We still have a little bit of cleanup to do, but the majority of the sweeping up of green dust (because the padding under the carpet was green) is done, and the old flooring is waiting to go to the dump.  Timmy was a particularly good helper during the process.  He just decided he wanted to help, so he put on a glove and very carefully carried all the tack board out piece by piece.  He also helped break apart the weird tile stuff that was in the kitchen and dining room.  It was fun to watch him. :) By the time that was all done, with the exception of some cleanup, it was starting to get late.  But for Joshua's sake we went ahead and drove home anyway.

 

So yesterday we got some happy news!  My baby sister Kelly, whom I lovingly refer to as Kell-o, is engaged to Rick Eastham!  We haven't met him yet, but we're hoping this weekend might be the big day for that (meeting him). :) We're excited!  When she called I picked up my phone and saw that it was Kelly and got all happy about it, and then Jeremy said, "She's engaged."  He was right!  Here's a cute picture of the happy couple, stolen shamelessly from Facebook.  Aren't they cute?  And isn't her ring gorgeous?  Right now that plan is for a December wedding.  It might be a very busy month!  I guess we'll see.  We're so happy for her. :) Well, and I guess we're happy for him too because he's getting a terrific gal, but we don't know him yet, so... ;) Also, Kelly Eastham has a good ring to it, no?  It sounds very British. *wink, wink*

 

 

And now for some other, more random pictures from August.

 

We've been sleeping on cots in Thatcher.  Timmy got out of his bed and into mine one morning.  Yes, he is hugging Iron Man.  We bought that guy a month or two ago, and it has been some money well spent!  Timmy had started playing with Jill's Barbies, an it was kind of disturbing, so we decided he needed he own manly dolls to play with.  This is what he picked.  About a week later I went back and bought Jeremy a Hulk one, and it has been so great!  Jeremy has liked The Hulk since he was little.  Anyway, so now Timmy brings Papa his Hulk and they play together and have a great time.  I love it!  Timmy likes to make Iron Man say, "I'm going to poop on my pants!" And then he makes tooty noises and repeats. Typical boy stuff.  They all go through it, and they all grow out of it, but at some point they all think that bodily functions are hilarious.

 

 

Here are most of the boys walking to church. :) We go across the street from our house and cut through EAC.  This is right by our house on EAC campus.

 

 

Looks like Papa got tired on the way home from church.

 

I love this picture!  It turned out better than I thought. :)

 

Michael's selfie

 

Bubby was sad one day, and he was also diaperless.  That's not uncommon.  I try to keep a onesie on him, but that only helps his diaper stay on most of the time, and then I run out of onesies.  This particular day, Benji went to his rescue.  He comforted him and then got him a diaper and some other clothes, right down to the shoes, and then he lent him a hat from his collection.  Bubby was pleased, but it wasn't long before he had stripped off everything from the waist down again.

 

 

Benji's selfie

 

Here's the new HVAC unit being hoisted onto the Thatcher house.  The crane parked behind our back fence to do it.  I had a great time watching. :)

 

The old swamp cooler going bye-bye. :)

 

One great thing about our house in Thatcher is this long bench thing on the fireplace.  There's a bit on both sides.  And another great thing about Thatcher in general is that they have Cocoa Roos!  I know it's silly, but I love those generic brand Cocoa Puffs, and they are no longer available anywhere in Globe.  There are some store brand ones, but they're no good.  Anyway, so there has been much eating of Cocoa Roos at the Thatcher house.  This particular morning Jeremy and I went to the Temple, and then when we came home Timmy was up and completely dressed and ready for breakfast.  I thought he looked cute sitting there eating. :)

 

Bubby found Timmy's underwear laying around (Thank heavens it was clean!), so he put it on backwards all by himself.  And then he found Papa's glove and some soap from the bathroom.  He was a happy boy.

 

Here's our backyard.  There are two doves perched on the back gate.  They looked like were kissing at one point.  We always liked that there were so many doves in Thatcher.  It's fun to be around them again.

 

Benji and Michael got clever with their notebooks.  Benji's arrow shot Michael's book.  I don't think they know it, but these guys are going to miss each other when they go to school!

 

Timmy had me print him Mario and a Hulk mask, and then he put them together.  He thinks it's super funny.  He also drew that M in crayon right on the wall.  His art is all over our house, and I mean that quite literally.  I cannot keep up with it! 

Timmy has been talking a lot about Halloween and being a pirate, so one evening Jeremy made him a paper pirate hat and found some "treasure." It's a little chest full of old scout belt loops and fake coins.  He was so happy!

 

This day we walked down to the EAC Activities Center to see our friend Andra's scribble art exhibit.  It was pretty awesome!  He made it all with tiny strokes with a Sharpie!  On our way we rolled down the hill in front of the auditorium.  I was glad we weren't on our way to church because we couldn't do this in those clothes. ;) It was quite fun.  Here are the 4 older boys.

 

Papa, Jill, and Bubby

 

Timmy and Michael

 

Bubby!  I put him in overalls to try to keep his diaper on.  It usually works. :)

 

We like to stop by the bell tower and hear the bells chime the hour.

 

Bill Reed was one of my Institute teachers and is dear to my hear.  His name is on a brick with his sweet wife Claudia for donating to help build the clock tower.  President Eyring's name is on a plaque on the tower because he dedicated it.

 

This was my favorite picture that Andra did.  Unlike the other pictures, she only used one size of Sharpie on this.  It's all just a bunch of tiny marks.  It's so neat!  I wish I had photographed all of the pictures, but Jill and I were stuck in the bathroom (that was the weekend we were so sick) for too long, and then everyone was ready to go.  You should go see the exhibit if you can, though.  She has a bunch of signs talking about how she did this and that too.

 

Jill with the dancer

 

Bubby and me

 

We love playing with these blocks together!  Jill made apples one day, and I thought they looked like little roses.

 

Timmy colored Cookie Monster and had me cut him out, and then he took a picture of him.

 

He drew Om Nom and his candy from the game Cut the Rope.  In that game, you have to strategically cut the ropes so that the candy swings down and feeds the monster.  It's a cute little game.

 

Timmy helped peel up the dining room floor.  That green padding smelled awful!

 

What to do with a little boy who steals my phone in church and plays with the camera... (!) He took his picture and then exclaimed, "Bubby!  Bubby!" 

These mustaches were part of singing time at church yesterday. 

Timmy begged me to take his picture with a mustache, and then Papa joined in. 

Jill needed a picture too.



Update

So we've decided to stay in Globe until December.  I don't know if I mentioned that or not.  It was a hard decision for us.  We've spent some weekends in Thatcher, and it's been so nice.  It's as therapeutic as camping, and with so few electronics in the house there, the kiddos have had to be more creative.  They've whined every time about going, and then they've had a great time every time.  It's been especially hard for Joshua.  His computer crashed big time and has gone to that great computer heaven.  His hard drive was no good anymore.  That was quite disappointing for him.  He put a lot of work in on that computer, trying to build video games and whatnot.  I don't think he was able to salvage any of his work.  I hope he learned a good lesson, but about what I'm not sure.  Anyway, so now he has to share the other computer with his brothers, and he doesn't like that.  That means taking turns, and he's not always patient enough for that.  So by the time the weekend comes and he has to get ready to go to Thatcher he's not happy about it because, as he sees it, he'll be missing out on time to work.  Oh well.  I know he doesn't see it, but there's time.

So anyway, we had actually planned to only move absolute essentials until the carpet was in.  Jeremy would commute to work, and Hyrum would go to the college across the street, and Benji, Michael, and Jill would go to the public school.  (Joshua wants to continue homeschool.  I'm ok with that.)  Oh, and we're putting Timmy into Dan Hinton school in Pima because they can help him.  More about that later. 

Well, getting the flooring in has been a bigger mess than we planned on.  First, the bank we were trying to pay with kept declining the charge even though the money was in there.  We called them and finagled and after several attempts were finally able to pay.  Then the flooring company waited like a week to call, but they called Jeremy's cell phone, and he doesn't take that to work.  We specifically told Home Depot to have people call MY phone for that very reason.  Then we called them back.  And called and called and called.  About 50% of the time it rang on forever without even an answering machine.  Finally we were able to leave messages, and then a miracle occurred and we were able to talk to an actual person.  They said that the laminate has to be done first, and it has to sit in the house for 72 hours to acclimate before it can be installed.  I knew about that, but I figured they'd figure it out.  They said that we had to go pick it up ourselves and let it acclimate.  We decided we'd get that done this last weekend.  Also, we have been getting mail at that mailbox in Thatcher, and one recent piece of mail was a notice for a package we had to go in and sign for.  That meant that we needed to be in Thatcher before the post office closed, which meant that Jeremy needed to take time off work.  He took off half a day Friday, which turned out to be a good thing because our front window in the Globe house has been cracked for months, and pieces were starting to fall out.  Jeremy was able to replace it, but not without plenty of trouble.  It doesn't look like the window frame was made for the glass to be replaced at all. :P Well, he made it work in the end.  Anyway, so we hurried over to Thatcher to pick up that package before the post office closed, and guess what it was.  It was brownies!  What in the world?!  Our mortgage company sent us brownies for being their customers. This must be a thing in Thatcher because the company that replaced our swamp cooler and furnace with an HVAC system gave us a little water jug with cookies in it.  Anyway, Jeremy was quite frustrated that he'd missed half a day of work to hurry to Thatcher for brownies.  They were individually wrapped gourmet ones, but I guess the mortgage company sent them that way to make sure we got them in a timely manner.  Crazy.

Sorry for this wild train of thought post.  Just trying to get everything in.

Anyway, so Jeremy took two of the seats out of the van and headed over to Home Depot to get the laminate, but they told him that they didn't have enough of it.  They said they did when they sold it to us, but the flooring company took too long to get moving, so part of it was sold.  So we have to wait for the next shipment, and we have no idea when that will be.  At least they told us that when it comes they'll bring it to us.  Still, so frustrating!  That was the second thing we wanted to be sure to get done that trip, and it also turned out silly. 

Another reason why we've been in Thatcher every weekend has been to go to the Temple.  Jeremy and I have twice gone to the early session on Saturday (6:00), and it's been such a blessing!  We were planning to do it again, but just in time for the weekend we had some sort of bug going around our family.  It's diarrhea, and Jeremy, Jill, and I were hit hardest.  We're still not quite over it.  We didn't think we could make it through a session at the Temple, and that was quite disappointing.  I guess we should have tried to do Initiatory or something.  But really, it was probably just best that we didn't go.  I was very thankful that that bug waited for the weekend to be the worst, though, because then we had 3 working bathrooms.  That was such a blessing!

So that was all kind of disappointing.  We still haven't heard from anybody about flooring.  I don't know if we just need to call them every day to make sure our shipment isn't sold before it can make it to our house or what.  I'm wishing we'd just done the laminate ourselves.  It was so fun putting it into the Globe house, and it would be neat having the older boys able to help this time.  But it's also a big deal tearing apart the floor in those areas (entryway, living room, dining room, and kitchen).  Jeremy is wishing we could have invested that money instead.  We'll be so glad to have the laminate, and I know I, for one, will be thankful to have all the flooring done before we move in!  I know Jeremy will be glad for it too, though, especially the laminate.  We can't very well drive toy cars through block tunnels on carpet, you know. ;)

Just a side note - Timmy has been constantly asking me to print coloring pages for him lately.  I've printed lots of them.  It's better than a coloring book because he wants all sorts of different things from Mario to Cookie Monster.  Anyway, he had a mishap with the scissors.  He was in one of his moods where he starts picking on people, and I didn't get the scissors away from him.  He went up to Jill and grabbed a little handful of hair and snipped it off chin length.  Argh!  I can't bear to cut the rest that short, so we just try to ignore it I guess.  So he hasn't been allowed to use the scissors for a few weeks.  I finally let him again yesterday, but I have to watch his mood closely so I can take them away if I need to.  In the meantime I spent a lot of time copying AND cutting everything out.  He's had a lot of fun with the things that he's made, though.  He's learned to trace a Mario that's already cut out and cut out a new one to make shadow Mario.  Yesterday I printed him a Mario (that's his favorite right now) and then a Cookie Monster and lots of cookies, and he and I have been playing with them together.  He's always Mario and I'm always Cookie Monster.

And speaking of Mario, with the prospect of Timmy going to school, he decided he needed a Mario backpack.  Any old backpack just wouldn't do.  I waited until I was ordering things on Amazon to try to get the free shipping, and I ordered him a little Mario backpack.  He LOVES that thing!  It has some little Velcro spots on front and some coins and shrooms that he can stick on.  He played with it all day the first few days.  On the second day he said, "I love my Mario backpack."  That is the second time he's ever said he loves anything or anyone.  The first time was a few weeks ago.  He was snuggling my hair as usual one evening and suddenly said, "I love your hair."  He's sung Skidamarink many times, but it's not quite the same because he's always quoting things he sees on TV, whether they're recent or not.  The Super Simple Songs channel on YouTube has a cute version of that song, and that's where he learned it and a few others.  Anyway, it's thrilling when he picks up new things like that!  He's definitely still making progress. :)

So, we've made lots of trips to Thatcher lately.  Some of them have been me going on a weekday.  For instance, on Monday afternoon I took Timmy to Dan Hinton for an evaluation.  A few weeks ago I went on a Wednesday morning and was just there long enough for the gas to get turned on before going home.  We spent the following weekend there in Thatcher.  We didn't have any cooler at all that weekend.  Yes, it was HOT!  Coincidentally, we didn't have a fridge either.  It was kind of an interesting weekend, and our ice melted, so we had warm milk on our cereal one morning.  Ewww!  We ordered a fridge that weekend, though, and we ordered carpet at the same time.  (Yeah, this is kind of our of order.  Sorry!)  Jeremy looked at the swamp cooler and decided he couldn't fix it.  There just wasn't time.  We decided we'd better just get the HVAC installed, even though it's not cheap.  We'll still need ductwork done later.  There are only 2 vents downstairs total, and the upstairs ducts are not the greatest.  They need replaced.  But that'll be another $1000 or so.  Yikes!  Another day.  Anyway, so the following Friday morning I took the four younger kiddos with me and headed to Thatcher.  The AC guys were already hard at work, and they were there all day.  It was a hot day!  We tried to stay out of their way by going shopping and then staying in the master bedroom upstairs.  But man, it was hot!  When the AC guys finished, though, the house was getting a lot cooler, despite the need for new ducts.  The best place by far in the whole house is in the middle of the stairs when the cooler is on.  A big vent there blows straight down.  I like to come home and just sit there after a shopping trip or whatever.  Ha ha! :) And that same day Home Depot delivered our new fridge, complete with water dispenser and ice maker.  HOORAY!  The water dispenser doesn't cool the water, but we have ice!  My favorite thing is to fill my water bottle with ice and then add whatever water will fit in there.  It always melts faster than I expect, but it's so wonderful!  I miss it when we're not in Thatcher.  And also that day a guy came and measured for flooring.  He had a nifty tablet that was strapped to his arm like a shield.  He went around and measured everywhere we wanted flooring, and when he was done he had a nifty floor plan on his tablet all drawn out.  He showed me to make sure what flooring we wanted where.  Then they gave us an estimate, and then came the mess of trying to pay.  It all took way longer than we expected!  And it still is!  At least the AC only took a day, and the gas was hooked up to that unit on another day. 

One weekend when we had decided we were for sure moving right away (or at least partially until the flooring was done), we asked Thatcher 2nd Ward to transfer our records over.  Now that we're not moving yet, I'm still glad we did that.  We've been spending every weekend there, if for nothing else than going to the Temple, and that's reason enough!  But we've also done some little projects here and there.  Our records were finally read in this last Sunday.  And that made the weekend nice because then everyone was suddenly all interested in us. ;) I found out that the reason Sister Dodge thought I looked familiar is that I look like Lynnette, and Lynnette rented from her.  She is such a nice lady!  She is someone I could sit and talk with forever!  And there were a few other people we don't know who welcomed us and struck up a conversation.  They've just been so nice!  And Timmy goes to Primary happily!  Do you know what a miracle that is?! 

Here's a story for ya.  At first, we were having church at the Institute because some work was done over the summer at the chapel next door where the ward usually meets.  The nice ladies who work in Primary were finally able to get him to go the last 2 Sundays at the Institute.  And then work was all done and we were able to go to the chapel for church, and that made for some complications.  Timmy wasn't ready for the change, and Jill was being clingy that day too.  I had to drag both of them in.  Timmy was being noisy, so I tried to take him to the back and stand with him, and Jill hung onto my leg and wouldn't go sit with her class.  And then I finally decided I needed to take Timmy out, but Jill didn't want me to leave her.  I got grouchy and she ended up sad under a table.  I felt bad for grouching, so I went back, and I bent down to talk to her, and my skirt was too tight. (It's a pencil skirt, so it's not too tight unless I want to do things like get in the van or bend down.)  Anyway, I ended up falling over on top of Timmy.  At least it was in the back of the room, but man!  Embarrassing!  Then some nice ladies came to my rescue.  Two of them comforted Jill and took her to her class, and she made a friend that day, so now she's happy to go to Primary!  Another lady has a husband who works with autistic kids at a school in Safford, and he was happy to come and help Timmy.  They also had a few sensory toys in the closet that were just the ticket.  I was able to leave both of them there, and they were fine.  By that time, though, I was so embarrassed and overwhelmed that I came out of the room sniffling, and then a member of the bishopric came and talked to me, looking for Jeremy, and he asked me if I was ok, and that made it worse.  I ended up bawling there in the hall, trying to assure him that I just needed a minute to sit down, before beating a hasty retreat to the (thankfully) empty mothers' room.  Man!  But it all worked out, and now people know that I need help (a good thing but kind of embarrassing in a way), so this last Sunday (the second week in the chapel) went a lot more smoothly.  Phew!  I was even able to go to Sunday School!

Also this last Sunday I finally got to talk to Sister Whetten.  I remembered her from last time we lived in that ward, but I don't know if I'd ever introduced myself last time.  She is the mother of a guy about my Mama's age who was always in choir and band with his son.  And she's the mother of some other people that Mama knew when she was attending EAC.  In fact, Mama lived next door to Sister Whetten and worked with her daughter in the cafeteria, and another daughter lived up north near Mama's family for a long time and is well loved there.  It's a pretty small world.  Anyway, when I introduced myself this time, it was cool to finally meet the daughter from those stories Mama has told.  And Sister Whetten was so happy to meet me.  She kept telling me she was so happy that we were in the ward.  We stood there and had a good visit.  It was so nice.  I remembered that I loved her before, but I'm remembering now all the reasons why.  Just such a sweet nice lady.  I had hoped that she would still be around when we moved back, and she is. :) One thing I loved that she said during the Relief Society Lesson was, "Getting old has its compensations.  You can hug people and they don't think you're flirtin'."

So about Dan Hinton School - we decided to look into it in the first place because Kimberly suggested it, and I'm so glad she did!  There is such a happy feeling there.  Both Jeremy and I feel that that is going to be a very good place for Timmy.  It sounds like it'll only be two days a week for two hours each time, and that will be just great!  He's been talking about going to his school for weeks, and we finally did go in for an evaluation on Monday.  We took in the diagnosis, so that took a step out of the process of getting him enrolled.  The evaluation took about 2 hours.  We're going to have to go back in for another part when I go down on the 2nd for Jill and Bubby's dentist appointments.  And Timmy wouldn't cooperate at all with the hearing test.  He's never done one before.  They tried lots of things to get him to say if he heard a beep or not, but he wouldn't do it.  And they tried to do the little machine that can tell if he heard it or not, but he would have none of that. He did not want that things stuck into his ear.  So we'll have to go to an audiologist who can do it easier, and, luckily, there happens to be one here in Globe!  But he has to have the hearing test done before he can be enrolled.  But really it went well. Everyone is so nice and helpful.  And it sounds like the teacher who might be Timmy's is our Primary President.  She is such a nice lady.  I'm just really happy about the whole thing.

And when we thought we were moving right away I got all the paperwork ready to enroll the kiddos in school there (the 3 I mentioned before).  Oh, and we had Hyrum enrolled in all sorts of great classes at EAC.  *Sniffle*  Anyway, it was a lot of work, but I got it all done, and then we decided we'd better wait.  So now we'll just have one paper to bring in when we move, and the boys will still need to be tested.  I'm glad that we have some of that legwork done anyway.  That will save some trouble later. 

So for now we're still dong homeschool.  This is supposed to be our first week back, and it's been really busy and has gone kind of rough, but we'll figure it out.  I got some Saxon math books for Benji and Michael, and I set up things for Jill.  I planned out a schedule for each of them to get halfway through the coursework for their school year so they'll be ready to go in in January.  If I can just keep them focused they're able to do the work themselves.  Well, at least Benji and Michael are.  And Kindergarten is easy to teach.  There isn't much that she really NEEDS to know other than reading and some math.  I have some good resources for those, so we're working on it.

Hyrum has been going to Seminary in Miami this year.  He went to Globe last year because Aaron was teaching it, but now Aaron has moved, the Seminary building was sold (Sad!  That's the building that Jeremy went to Seminary in.  It's an old house made over, right next to the high school.), and now Globe Seminary is at the Stake Center.  That's even further away from us than before.  Hyrum decided that since it wasn't Aaron and it's so far he'd just rather go to Miami.  I'm so glad.  That means I get to sleep in because they start later, and it takes about 3 minutes to drive there.  It's at Sister Mawson's house (the wife of our old bishop), and there are only about 6 students.  So it's small and family-like.  He likes it so far. 

And Hyrum has also started college again.  We decided that he'd probably have a better experience taking English 101 in Thatcher, so he's not doing that this semester.  He's taking the next math up, which is one or two classes below College Algebra.  Moving on up there.  And he's taking his Papa's classes.  Jeremy is teaching two classes there this semester: Microeconomics and Finance.  It sounds like so far he's doing pretty good.  He has always been kind of a hasty fella, so he didn't do as well on his first two tests as he could.  He didn't understand the directions, so he did the wrong problems.  That sort of thing.  But he had a rough start last semester too.  I figure it'll all get better like it did last semester.  And so far he has a perfect score in both of Jeremy's classes.  Jeremy's mom is also taking his Finance class.  I'm so glad that someone in the family is finally taking them.  It works out funny, though, because Jeremy had to pay for Hyrum to take his classes.  He does get paid to teach the classes, but it's not nearly what we paid for it.  Ha ha!

And we got some books for Hyrum to work through to fill in different things on his transcripts.  They are pretty neat.  They are basically a bunch of textbooks in two great big books.  There's English in a bunch of parts, world history, American history, geography, physics, biology, chemistry, and who knows what all else.  I've had a chance to sit down with them myself and I quite like them.  I'll have to sit down with them some more.  The best part for me is that I can talk to Jeremy about what I read, and we can discuss it.  If you ask me, that's how learning happens best - through following interests and discussing it.

As for Joshua, I found some things for him to do for school as well.  He prefers to work online, so I would love to put him back in one of those free online schools like we had him in before if I knew it would work.  But it didn't work for him.  There was too much extra stuff that he was just stressed out, and when he gets stressed out he can't do anything at all.  He just shuts down.  So I've hodgepodged together a curriculum for him.  He's about 8th grade level.  I just need to convince him to do the work.  It'll work out, though.  We'll get him through it.  :) And next fall he can start some college classes too.

Well, I think that's about enough for now.  I've been meaning to write for a long time.  I often think of things I want to say, and then I wish I could just transplant them instantly from my brain to the blog because I just don't seem to find the time. 

Oh, one more thing before I go: I have been working away at family history lately.  I am making a book of Badger family history for my kiddos.  It'll have family group sheets and then stories about ancestors.  It's been a lot of work, and a lot of the work is filling in missing data for the family group sheets and linking families on findagrave.com.  That last bit has been so rewarding and exciting, but it's also been frustrating.  My computer has a super slow processor, so all the ads on findagrave make it take forever to load each page.  It is sometimes just agonizing, but it gets done.  I'd try to replace the processor, but I already tried to replace the video card, and every card I could possibly buy is physically too big.  Nothing fits into that tiny little shell.  I'm just not sure about trying to replace anything else.  FamilySearch also takes a long time to load, and it has no ads.  I've used FamilySearch and Ancestry a lot.  What a blessing that the church worked out that deal with Ancestry so we have free access!  It is such a treasure trove.  But like I say, anything on the internet takes absolutely forever to load.  Anyway, it's getting done.  I have also been looking down descendancy lists on FamilySearch and finding Temple work that needs done.  As I suspected, most of the work for what's on FamilySearch has been done, but I've found more than I thought.  Most of the work is sealings, but there's other work to do as well.  It's exciting!  It's all on the Badger side so far.  I figure Mama is working on the Peterson side.  I need to get my boys working on the Burks and McDermotts.  If I can find things to do, surely they can too, and what a blessing it would be to them! 

Also, I can't tell you what a happy thing it is to be across the street from the glorious old EAC.  It brings back many, many memories, and I'm sure my kiddos must surely be tired of hearing them, but it's a happy place for me.  I've heard the band practicing at the stadium across the street.  We've walked to church nearly every time, down that avenue of evergreen trees.  Last week we walked down to the Activities Center to see an art exhibit that Andra Jensen, an old friend, had there.  That was really cool!  It was all done with tiny little strokes of different sized Sharpies.  She had 10 or 15 different pictures, all bigger than 8x10.  I was quite proud. :) And this weekend there should be a football game that we may be able to see from Benji and Michael's window.  Not that we'd sit and watch the whole thing, but I'd watch the band at least. :) Oh, and this last weekend I brought my laptop and The Book Thief on DVD, so Jeremy was finally able to watch it.  Man, it made me cry!  Such a good movie.  I've got to read the book.

A Little (?) Update

Maybe it'll be little.  I guess we'll see. :)

I had a second ultrasound yesterday.  It was supposed to be the big one where we find out if we're having a boy or a girl, but the little one did not cooperate.  This is our first one who did this to us!  I couldn't believe it.  I even drank orange juice to make sure he/she could move around good, and he/she did, but with his/her legs firmly crossed.  We don't get another shot until early October!  Still, the baby is healthy, and I'm thankful!  He/she is growing right on schedule.  I was honestly kind of mad, though.  I wanted to know what color yarn to buy and which clothes to start stocking up on.  Well, October is sooner than December.  I'll have time.  Jeremy is convinced this is a girl.  I guess we'll see.

This pregnancy has been progressing, but it's been kind of hard.  I knew it would be, but it's different knowing it's going to be hard than experiencing it.  A couple of months ago I was already pulling muscles in my hips.  It makes me nervous for the rest of the pregnancy.  I don't always know what I did wrong that pulled the muscle, but I can sure feel it!  It's usually on my right hip I think.  Anyway, today I was just in bed and I rolled a tad to the right and somehow that pulled my muscle pretty far.  It hurt!  I've also been having LOTS of headaches.  Normal for me is usually 1-2 headaches per month, but during the last month or two I've been having them most days of the week.  It really stinks.  I forgot to ask the doctor about it yesterday.  I always forget, and that's silly.  I used to have to take a list of questions, but then I have to remember to look at it.  I guess Dr. Joe makes me feel so positive and upbeat I forget anything is ever cockeyed.  I guess I didn't have one yesterday.

I took Jill with me yesterday, partly because Jeremy couldn't go.  We both thought she'd enjoy it, and she kind of did.  I think she had a hard time making anything out on the screen.  I didn't explain beforehand that the pictures would be a bit blurry.  I know that she was glad she went and she did enjoy some things, but she wished we would go be outside by the pond or playing in the elevator.  Ha ha!  When the doctor came in she was suddenly all shy and hid under the table until he listened to the heartbeat.  Then he asked her if she wanted a cookie, and then she pestered him to get her one until we could get out of that room. :) They were little sugar cookies.  There were strawberry shaped ones and flower shaped ones.  She picked a flower.

I had really hoped that yesterday we would know boy or girl so that Jill and I could go do a little shopping.  I wanted to buy a pluggie and an outfit in the appropriate colors.  I was so bummed!  I thought it would be fun to have Jill there to help me pick.  Well, when we didn't know I decided we needed to do something fun to celebrate our little outing.  I hadn't been to Krispy Kreme in a long time, so I suggested we go there.  It was fun to take her in and have her pick a donut and watch the donut machine, but I think we both wished we hadn't gotten donuts by the end.  It was too much sugar and not as yummy as I expected.  Oh, well. :)

Yesterday after I got home Jeremy and I went to sign papers for the new house.  I think there are one or two that somebody forgot, but for the most part the house is ours now.  Exciting!

We have been thinking about school for the next year, and it seems like it would be a wise thing to get Benji and Michael into school, and possibly Jill.  I know that they might be a bit behind, so we've been trying to work on that.  We are considering just putting Jill in kindergarten.  She just turned 6 last month, so she wouldn't be terribly far behind.  Joshua doesn't want to go back, and Hyrum is registered for college, so I don't think he's going back either.  That's ok.  Timmy is 4 and knows most if not all of his letters, so I'm hoping this year we can start some simple reading with him.  I'm going to miss those kiddos while they're at school, but I will feel a little bit freed up, and they are looking forward to going.

And since we're thinking about putting them in school (and since Hyrum is going to go to EAC in Thatcher), we'd better get moved over there pretty soon!  I was thinking about maybe August 1 or August 8, but I don't know how in the world we can.  I've been so tired and overwhelmed.  Jeremy's always at work, and this week we have the Burk family campout.  I just don't know how it's going to get done.  I feel like it's all on me. :P I know we don't have to be 100% moved all at once, though.  Maybe I should just pack the most important things next week and move them on Saturday - if Saturday is even free.  I guess we'll see.  That may be the best thing to do.  I also need to get utilities set up, and we're having the swamp cooler switched out for an HVAC unit.  We wanted to get just an AC unit, but the people said that this is the only way for some reason.  Just the way everything's set up, I guess.  They said they can have it all done in like 3 days, but we need to get over there to talk things over with them, even though they've already given us a quote.  I'm thankful that Jeremy is insisting on getting this done before we move.  He doesn't want to send his pregnant wife over there with just a swamp cooler.  Nice boy. :)

And now for some recent pictures - from June and July

Here is the turtle Jill found in our yard.  I think that I talked about that in the last post.  She named him Fwed.

Hyrum liked this waterfall at the Temple.

In June we took a little trip to St. Johns to see my parents, and we met them in Snowflake on the way.  My dad, Jeremy, and I took Hyrum and Joshua to the Snowflake Temple to do baptisms.  It was so wonderful!  There were just boy names, so I didn't participate this time, but it was such a privilege to watch!  There is nothing like being in the Temple as a family, especially watching the boys' reactions as they perform the sacred work there.  It's just so beautiful. :) And while we were in the Temple my mama took the rest of the kiddos on a little tour of Snowflake, telling them all about their Peterson ancestors who lived there.  It sounds like it was a pretty neat tour.  I'm so thankful that she did that!  They are rightly proud of their heritage. :)

This picture actually goes before the old one.  Here are the boys just after we all came out - all wet and squinting in the sun, but happy. :)

 

 

This was Jill's birthday cake.  We haven't had a working oven for like 3 months, so I baked the square cake pieces in the oven.  It kind of worked, I guess.  And then I made rice crispy treats for the towers and stuff.  Jeremy made the archway, the drawbridge, and the dealies on top, and Michael, Jill and I made the towers.  (That short one on the right was Jill's.)  Benji made the flags on the towers, and then Michael made a few more to go in the middle.  It looked pretty great, and it was a lot of fun to do together.  My only regret is that I forgot the sprinkles, and Timmy would have been just the guy to do those.  He would have loved that!  Oh, well.  It was Grandma's turn for Sunday dinner, so we took the cake over there.  It got hot in the car, and the towers started kind of melting and flopping over.  It was a big mess before we got there.  I'm glad we took pictures first.  Ha ha! 

 

 

Here's Jill opening her presents. :)

 

 

Jill dressed up for the Fourth of July - red white and blue! :) She wanted to wear just the blue tutu on the bottom, but that was not allowed, for obvious reasons.  Ha ha!

 

Just a cute picture of Papa and Bubby :)

 

Aaron's lab rats (the ones he keeps to feed his snakes) had babies, so he let Joshua have one.  It's a boy named Mordecai!  He's so little and cute!  He seems more active than Scratchy was.  You can already tell his personality is a little different.  And right now he lives in a small rectangular fish tank.  It works pretty good since he's so small. :)

Cute little fella!

Bubby has stolen my phone a lot and taken lots of strange pictures.  This one was at the store.

 

Brookie got baptized last Saturday. :) Jeremy was in St. George for the wedding of a good friend, but the rest of us were able to go to the baptism.  I was really stressed about going without Jeremy's help.  Timmy and Bubby sometimes go nutso at the same moment, and I didn't know what I could possibly do if that happened.  I brought my phone and my Galaxy tablet, and they stayed happy and entertained for most of the time, though.  It worked good.  It's such a blessing to be able to go to these!  I'm so proud of my nephews and nieces!  They're pretty great people. :)

 

And I like this picture of Aaron and Brookie. :) I should have demanded a picture of Brookie and Michael since Brookie is Michael's favorite cousin, but I guess I didn't think of it in time.  I'm more of a go-with-the-flow kind of photographer.  I like to just take opportunities as they arise instead of demanding.  Guess I'd better get more bossy. ;)

 

Here's Brookie all baptized.  I did actually ask her to hold still for this one. ;)

 

Bubby had a great time playing on the stage during dinner - until he jumped off!  He got right back up and tried to climb up and do it again, and that's when he was not allowed to go on the stage anymore. ;)

 

Michael and Bubby

 

Jill and Bubby (can you tell I was chasing Bubby? ;) )

 

And then I went home and madly cleaned the children's rooms because it was our turn for Sunday dinner.  Here is Timmy giving me a hug break. :) And then in my worry about the lesson I had to give in Relief Society I forgot to put the roast in the crockpot in the morning, so at 6:00 PM it still wasn't done for some reason.  (Did I mention this was a doozy of a weekend for me?  It was!  All day Friday I worked on my lesson and neglected my children. And when I actually gave the lesson I started bawling uncontrollably in the middle and almost didn't recover.  So embarrassing!  I've cried in a lesson, but not that hard!  So lesson prep on Friday.  Baptism on my own on Saturday, including a super bloody Timmy nose.  Lesson and Sunday dinner on Sunday.  And Jeremy wasn't home until 2:30 AM on Sunday, so he was dead tired, and I was pretty tired myself.)  Maybe I didn't put in enough water in the crockpot.   And I'd spent a whole lot of time trying to get the kitchen clean, so the potatoes weren't started, and really, why start the potatoes if there's no roast to eat with them?  We ended up just eating a simple dinner on our own and then going to Grandma's for dessert.  That was her suggestion.  I was bummed because I'd worked so hard!  Oh, well.  It was nice to have it clean for ourselves.

 

Here's Jill outside at the doctor's office with her cookie.  I paused here to let her eat her cookie and look at the ducks on the pond while I called Jeremy.  She's such a cute girly. :)