Water Tower

I had 'Mommy cereal' before church today. It is 'Pumpkin Flax Granola' that Cassie gets at Costco. Dad introduced Cassie to it. Her kids call it 'Mommy cereal' and that makes me laugh. We had early church today. I went with John to Gospel Doctrine. Cassie was asked to substitute Trevor's class, so I was going to help her. Turns out that the primary got a substitute because they didn't know about Cassie. Cassie couldn't be in there during sharing time because she teaches Sunday school. So, Cassie and I were able to go to Relief Society. It was quite the show. The teacher was really good. She was doing some weird game with two of the women and their husbands. They were trying to get papers smashed between themselves. I didn't really get what was happening, but oh well. Anyways, the lesson was on marriage. The comments were super weird. One lady said, "When we were married 17 years I decided I was done with my husband. Just done. So, I decided to look around. And guess what? Everyone is just like him! There is nothing better out there, so if you get frustrated in your marriage; just realize there is nothing better so you might as well stay where you are at." Then later she said, "I hope I don't offend anyone, but I decided to have an affair." What? At this point she paused then added, "An affair with my husband." Weirdo.

Cassie made a delicious roast for dinner. I worked on my blog for awhile. I wanted Saturday's post to be finished before my kids came home from church. Cassie thought it was funny to see John and I at the counter with both of our computers.

John & Stephanie

 Stephanie & Collin

 Stephanie hiding Collin's binki

Mike sent me a picture of his train. He made a water tower to fill drinks. He sent a video of the taco train. I showed the video to Mallory, Trevor and Brandon. They watched it about twenty times!

Mike's new water tower

Taco truck

Maysen sent me the first chapter of the story she is working on. That was fun to read! I'm so glad she is planning on spending this summer writing. John and Cassie taught me a game called Bohnanza. It was a bean collecting game. We were pretty close the entire game, but John won on the last turn. We then stayed up talking until almost 3:00 in the morning. John is going to be so tired at work tomorrow! Cassie has to get up to get Mallory to school too. I can just get up when I want. Suckers!

Lotts, Lagoon and Storymakers

We left early this morning. I dropped Stockton off at school. He is going on a field trip to Lagoon today. I dropped Maysen off at Sam's house. She is going to the LDS Storymakers conference. I took Jorja and Preston to the dentist. No cavities. Eric, the dentist, and I went to high school together. He was Mike's best friend growing up. We were talking about high school and he asked if I knew that Heather Elkington died. Hahaha! I don't keep in contact with many people from high school, but I do keep in contact with Heather. I started laughing at Eric and told him she was still alive and kicking. He was relieved. I had fun texting Heather today and telling her that I will miss her! She wrote back, "Someone will be so disappointed!" I love Heather.

Stockton posted this picture on Instagram. It made me laugh.

Stockton didn't have the best time at Lagoon. He was hanging out with his friend Acea. Little did Stockton realize that Acea has a girlfriend who was there. Acea also met up with some friends from his old school. A couple. Stockton ended up being the fifth wheel. Not very fun at Lagoon.

Janet and Tracy from Georgia came and had dinner with us today. Well, we knew them in Georgia, but they live in California now. We had a great time. I love being around people where it seems like no time has passed since we last saw each other. Tracy told Jorja there was no way he would recognize her now. Preston looks exactly like Stockton did when we lived in Georgia. Stockton they would have recognized, he is just a lot bigger now. Tracy and Janet are in town for Josh Doan's wedding. I can't believe Josh is getting married! I remember him in primary!

Janet & Stephanie

 Tracy, Janet, Mike, Stephanie

 One with Tracy's eye's open

Tracy would fit in so well here. He loves riding bikes. It seems like everyone around us rides bikes. Tracy is still recovering from a horrible bike accident he had a year ago. Makes me not want to ride a bike.

Stockton and Jorja went to a multi-stake Young Men/Young Women movie night. They plugged the address into Stockton's phone. I told them that was not the right place. They were in a hurry and didn't want to listen to me. They said they would be fine. I went back into the house and told Tracy and Janet that they were going to an activity, but there was no way they were heading to the right place . . . at least they'll have an adventure together. Jorja called us about fifteen minutes later. Mike directed them on the phone where they were supposed to be. The one problem with having so many LDS churches nearby.

Later tonight I was reading the kids some weird things posted on Facebooks and their replies. For some reason I couldn't stop laughing. I was crying. I don't know why I thought it was so funny. Two of my favorites were: The sun has fallen out of orbit and is about to collide with the earth. Your only hope to survive is to take cover in a bomb shelter. There are two shelters left with one space in each; A) Shelter full of Call of Duty players B) Shelter full of Halo players Which shelter do you choose to save your life?

One person had a super long answer; I laughed so hard! This was the answer: ....this is literally the most stupid premise I have ever heard for an apocalypse scenario. First of all, "The sun has fallen out of orbit"? Are we talking about some sort of pre-Galileo cosmic death here? The Earth orbits the Sun, not the other way around. Second of all, I would like to shake the hand of the man that can invent a bomb shelter that can withstand the FREAKING SUN crashing into the Earth.

Third of all. I'm assuming these Call of Duty and/or Halo players are as annoying, vulgar, foul mouthed twelve-year-olds, so I would definitely prefer to stand out in the open with arms outstretched waiting for the Sun to destroy me rather than live out the rest of my days with people like that.

Hahaha! I thought it was so funny. That and the post that said, "I couldn't possibly be happier right now. For the first time in my life, a girl told me that she loves me." The first comment said, "Aren't moms great?" Jorja, Preston and I then spent the next several minutes jumping on beanbags and laughing our heads off. Mike came down towards the end, but he was too tired and didn't last long. Preston decided he wanted to sleep on the beanbag tonight.

Anyways, Maysen got back super late today. It was so nice of Sam to take her! It sounded like she enjoyed her day at the Storymakers conference. She even accidently had to pitch a book to someone. Great experience. She will get to sleep for a few hours before she is back at it again tomorrow. Starting her summer off right!

NaNoWriMo

Maysen participated in the NaNoWriMo challenge.  That stands for National Novel Writing Month.  The goal was to write a 50,000 word novel in one month.  Maysen spent a lot of time working on this.  She titled her story Courtesy of Number 124.  She hasn't finished her story completely, but she reached her 50,000 word mark!  Awesome!

Maysen

We took the kids to the Festival of Trees today.  I absolutely love this festival.  I went while they were in school and was able to look around more.  I also made up a scavenger hunt while I was there.  This evening we met up with their cousins and split up into teams.  Stockton was all business.  I don't think he even looked at a tree.  He didn't even notice the upside down tree!  I think Jorja had the most fun.  She felt so grown up being on her own with Jacob and Weston.  Mike was on a team with Preston.  Preston loved it!  He told me many times, "Thank you for making this game for us."  Super sweet.  I love this time of year!

Little Peacock Tree

 Little Mario Tree

Reflections

Maysen was invited to a reflections award ceremony tonight. I didn't think much about it, but let her choose between that and going to Young Women. Tonight they were doing Zumba. Maysen was more than happy to go the the ceremony. Good thing she did. Apparently her story got past district, got past region, and she is now moving on to the state level. There were only 2 of them from our district that moved on to state for writing. Nice work Maysen!