We Got off the Sofa!

Ed and I took a long break from exercising in December. We're finally back at it. We've been walking on the surface streets, as there is so much snow in Lambert Park. The first day we did 3 miles and were VERY sore the next day!

We've been alternating with pickleball and realized it wasn't as easy as we thought figuring out how to put the net together! Pickleball also left us sore! But it a good way!

I got a new watch for Christmas. It lets you choose from about 100 workout activities, none of which is pickleball! You'd think there would have been room for that between paragliding and pilates!

3-D Printer!

Look what Ed made with our new 3D printer! This Jenny-O RV was missing a front tire, so Ed printed a new one out! It turned out perfect!

I'm so excited with the possibilities of things we can do with the new printer! I'm also happy to have Ed to learn how to use it and teach me after he has the kinks worked out!We live in exciting times!

Snowy View

I spent most of the day yesterday holed up in my study! This was the view from my desk!

Ed spent a few hours out breaking in his newer and bigger snow blower! It made his job much easier than before!

The bird feeder (on the left) continues to attract birds. I'm feeling guilty because it is almost empty and I don't want to go out and fill it!
When the birds stop hanging out I'll go fill it, as I'll miss them too much!

Calvin's swimming Birthday Party

My great-nephew, Calvin, turned three this week, and his parents hosted a swimming party for him!

Lacy and Eli take Calvin to the Goldfish Swim School in South Jordan for swimming lessons, and they rented the whole pool for the birthday party! Calvin and his little sister, June, both loved the water!

Clementine loves the water, too, and gets a false sense of security with her water wings!

Mabel is more secure on a boat or on land. (That is Clementine swimming away on the left!)

We enjoyed staying dry and visiting with grandma Barbara and Aunt Abby and Uncle Andy!

We also enjoyed the great pizza party afterwards! Thanks, Eli and Lacy for hosting such a fun event!

Basement and Back Yard

I finished organizing the basement and labeling the boxes! It is very satisfying knowing where to find things now!

I even finished putting clothes on 30-40 naked Barbie and Ken dolls! Mabel enjoyed playing with them with or without clothes!

Ed even put in some extra lights in the room so I can read the labels when I'm looking for something!

We watched Up with the girls Thursday night. They started out in very precarious seats, but came to Grandma and Grandpa for cuddles with the pack of mean dogs showed up!

Friday morning we blew up some balloons in honor of the movie. Happily, our house wasn't carried away to Paradise Falls!

Sadly, I got roped into playing Mario Cart during pajama party time. I am not only terrible at it, but I get motion sick and am miserable when I play!

I was glad when Brittany and John arrived Friday and joined us for game night! Brittany took my turn at the wheel in Mario Cart after we played a few board games!

Friday morning I took the kids sledding in the back yard! It was just their speed, and not to fast for me to keep up with them!

The snow was too deep for them to walk in, so I had to tow them uphill with a rope attached to the sled! It was a good workout for me! I was glad when Clementine got too cold and wanted to go inside!

Poor Ed got stuck snowplowing for the third time this week!

We went inside and warmed up and relaxed by the fire! Having fun is a lot of work!

Cleaning up with Kids

It turns out you can clean the storage room with kids' help! I spent this week going through boxes in the basement, and the kids enjoyed playing with toys as I discovered them! Our jungle stuffed animals were a big hit after the girls recovered from the terror of Ed chasing them with a crocodile. He had a hard time explaining to them it wasn't real!

I enjoyed discovering matching outfits I had saved from when the girls were little. These were dresses for Amanda and Crystal 28 years ago!

Mabel and Clementine both fit in the Tinkerbell costume, but neither one of them has seen Peter Pan!

I tried to get Clementine to pose with her ladybug pillow showing, and with her face looking over her shoulder! We could get the back or the face, but not both at the same time!

Ed and I haven't been working out much, but the kids really enjoyed using our trampolines! We also let them play with trolls and beanie babies!

The Jenny-O houses were a real hit. Mabel is old enough not to choke on the tiny dolls. Clementine doesn't seem to want to put them in her mouth, but we kept an eye on her!

We pulled Mona out of the puppet box to give a reprise of The Lion Sleeps Tonight!

We've had pajama parties every night, followed by bedtime stories! Grandpa is especially good about putting expression into the reading! He's also good about going downstairs a half hour later and telling the girls to get back in bed! Just like old times!

Mary Poppins weekend

We enjoyed our new 2 hour church schedule! And it was fun having Mabel and Clementine with us to comemorate the day. (Last week had been stake conference). Both of the girls were very good going to their classes by themselves after Sacrament meeting.

After church Mabel helped Grandpa make pancakes.

Grandpa built two little houses out of boxes we had in the garage. He even put doorknobs on the doors! They both wanted to own both houses, so sharing was occasionally precarious!

We had another pajama party Sunday night, this time playing Lucky Duck, which was pretty fun, as well!

We watched half of Mary Poppins to prepare the kids for our big day on Monday. They had never seen the show before. Ed and I had all the lines memorized, despite not having seen it for 30 years!

Monday morning we took the kids to their first show at a real movie theater. We even gave them the full popcorn experience!

We saw Mary Poppins Returns, and loved it! It was wonderful and paid such homage to the original!

Mabel and Clementine were glued to the screen! They loved it as much as we did!

And to top off a great date, we took them to Costco for pizza after the movie!

We had our third pajama party before bedtime. I played Lucky Duck with Clementine.

And Mabel got to play Mario Cart with Grandpa. I think they'll never want to go home now!

A Week of Grandkids

Brittany and John are going on a vacation/staycation this week, and dropped off the grandgirls for a week with grandma and grandpa! The adventure began with dinner on Saturday!

 Saturday night we had a pajama party and played games. Our Frog Soccer worked great, despite being 30 years old!












We had to buy a new copy of Go Fishing, which was just as much fun as we remembered!

Hi-Ho Cherry-O was much more less painful than I remembered. Either that or my expectations were lower enough to make it fun!

The fun continued right up till story time! They love a good night story. We love putting them to bed!

Just in Case

I bet you can't guess what is in this case! It took me 6 months to finally finish it, but I think it turned out great!

It's John's musical saw! It is very cool to have a son-in-law that can play a saw! It is much harder than it looks! We found it is somewhat dangerous transporting it to gigs, so I made a nice plastic-lined case for it. It also has a nice pocket to protect the bow from losing a few hairs along the way!

I got so carried away that I even added a little loop so it is easier to hang on the wall!