Nothing but Pictures

I'm in over my head with life right now and I've got nothing left for blogging.  Nothing bad is happening; it's just a lot of different things pulling me in different directions and it's left me with  absolutely nothing extra.   I can't do creative.  I can't do stories.  This post is basically just a picture a day from the last week.       


February 23: One of our favorite youth activities of the year is ice skating and my kids love it.

A noble try for a diet friendly lunch from California Tortilla, but alas, it was way better looking than tasting.

February 24: Rain, rain, rain.

February 25:  Beautiful sunrise on the way home from dropping Emma off at seminary.

February 26:   Despite the fact that we've had these crazy good looking cupcakes sitting around our house for the last few days, I've stayed strong and haven't had a single bite.  And if you knew how much I like frosting, you'd know that that's actually a pretty big deal for me!

February 27:  Glen went to Colorado for the weekend to see Cami play in a lacrosse tournament at CU in Boulder.    His mom and dad also came, which was extra fun for Cami and Glen.

 Glen misses the mountains.

Cami scored two goals.  

February 28:  We had a wonderful New Beginnings program tonight.

I absolutely love these girls!

February 29:  It was  a beautiful spring-like day, which called for reading a book while hanging out of the sunroof (in a parking lot) and going for a quick walk around the block.  

Apparently it's also time for Adam to get his hair cut.  

Awesome to Lame

February 20: 

We had another youth family history night at our house on Saturday.    Together the youth found about 100 names to take to the temple and the whole experience lit a fire in Ellie.  Now that she knows how to do it, she's gone and found another 25 or so more names for a total of 31 in two days' time.   

Ellie has a family history buddy (another 10-year-old), who also found several names to take to the temple. 

Emma and Elena together found over 50 names. 

February 21:

On Sunday we had an extra six kids sitting in our row at church and although I didn't get anywhere near as much out of the talks as I normally do, it was absolutely delightful to look down the row and see the row of cuties!   We had the kids' cousins, McKenzie, Bridgette, Lauren, and Davin with us, and two other friends whose baby brother just had surgery.   

February 22:

When all else fails....post pictures of your food.   In this case it's chicken breasts "breaded" with a cashew, coconut, chia seed concoction.   It actually was pretty tasty with some spinach and a little dressing.     

This week is looking to be C-R-A-Z-Y to the extreme with a lot on my plate (and I'm not talking about food anymore), so don't be surprised if my blogposts this week are a little on the lame side....you know to match my lame sense of fashion and my lame personality.      

************************

Stuff

In case you haven't noticed, I have no idea what I'm doing with this blog.  I say I'm not going to blog at all, then I blog once a week, then I'm blogging every day, then I barely remember to take any pictures.    I do really like the challenge of capturing the daily happenings of our family, but, man, I really miss the days of being meaningful or funny. Until I get my mojo back (maybe when the kids are all graduated from  homeschool), I am certain that this blog will continue to evolve.  Into what I have no idea, but let's hope that it's something awesome.   

February 18:  

Here's a random sampling of what we found on the floor of our van today.  

A box of juice boxes, a water bottle, a pair of binoculars, a scripture case, a Hank Smith cd, some sprinkles, and an analytical essay!   It's almost as random as our day which included bot fighting, homework at Panera, and an awesome YW activity.  

February 19:  

What can I say?   I had a lot on my plate today and absolutely nothing turned out quite how I expected.  I ended up pretty grumpy and craving everything I can't eat on my diet.   

Adam, however,  rocked at the food thing and made awesome tinfoil dinners for his scout campout tonight.  

Blogpost #2001

Blog, schmog.  

Glen is back in town and suddenly I can't figure out how to blog again.    Or take pictures.  

But today's blogpost is my 2001st, so I'm putting up the only two {very boring} pictures I've taken in the last two days.   And I'm giving it the most boring title ever.   And I'm writing the most boring descriptions ever.   

 February 16:  Here's a random snow bridge that was formed with the weird snowstorm we got on Monday.  It snowed about 4-inches, then it sleeted which coated everything with a layer of ice, then eventually it warmed up and rained and made everything slushy.   Snow, sleet, slush.  

February 17:   Yes, we're still doing the Whole30 diet and we're definitely getting better at it as the month goes on.    Tonight we made a shepherd's pie.    It was ground turkey and some sautéed vegetables covered in this dairy-free sauce made with broth instead of water, and then topped with mashed sweet potatoes and coconut milk.   It actually turned out very tasty!

Then I clipped my fingernails, washed socks, and sent Spence on a wild goose chase.  

Happy 2001st blogpost to me! 

*******************************

A Valentine President's Weekend

February 13: 

 Valentine's Day being on a weekend this year made it perfect for taking a romantic Saturday night to celebrate.   A dinner and movie.   Or a nighttime walk on the town.   Or a show downtown.   

Alas, we did none of those things! 

  First off, Glen was out of town on a business trip, which made anything resembling romantic downright impossible.  However, even if he had been home,  we would have had no time to wist ourselves away on any outings, yet alone a romantic one.  Even the evening got sucked up, because it was our ward's turn to host the Valentine's stake youth dance.   So we ran all day and I ended the night with these lovely ladies as chaperons/food preparers!  All night long we kept about 300-youth fed and happy by cooking up frozen snack foods, decorating cookies, and refilling the water and food trays,  etc.  By the end I was completely exhausted and had a newfound appreciation for waitresses, nurses, and others that spend hours on their feet helping others.   

It was all worth it, though,  for these sweethearts and the rest of the 295 or so teenagers there that night. 

February 14: 

We got to celebrate a modified version of  Valentine's Day (on Valentine's Day) by Glen coming home from a week long trip to India!  He brought us these Viennese chocolates which sent us all into peals of laughter.     

February 15: 

We woke up on President's Day to a few inches of snow and a surprise visit from the cousins!  We were all very much still in our pajamas, but loved the spontaneous chance to talk and play together !  

 

We also had to laugh at their "Wiener chocolate" gift to go with our Viennese chocolate!  

 We had an absolutely lovely (and by lovely, I mean lazy) day "snowed in" together and all in all it was a good Valentine President's weekend!   

I Spy...

February 12: 

I spy four lies and a truth...

My sister, Kristina,  is pregnant. 

My brother, Nate, is buying a house. 

My mom is retiring. 

 I love dieting. 

My tire is flat.  

*************************

Puppy Love

February 11:   

If you were to randomly take a look at my phone and scroll through the camera roll, you'd almost certainly come across a spate of pictures that looks about like this:  

It's a certain little 10-year-old in the house that really, really loves our sweet pug/beagle mix, Rocky!

 He barks too much, gets into the trash, chews holes in our socks, and tries to steal the people food, but he's also gentle, snuggly, and very patient with our bustling houseful.   We've had him for more than six years now and the kids still love him as much today as the day we got him.   The kids love when it's their turn for him to sleep in their bed he gets to sleep in and at this point  I only have to bug them occasionally about taking care of his daily needs.  

I am totally not a pet person, but he's definitely grown on me over the years and I am to the point where I would even consider getting another dog someday in the future.   The kids have stuck true to their word that I would never clean up his messes, although I do have to remind of them of that promise sometimes.    I still mostly keep my distance from him, but I don't mind a good Rocky snuggle if we're sitting down to watch a movie or something.  

Here are some interesting facts about Rocky:  

1.  He had just been dropped off  at the pound, when a friend called to tell us about him

2. We adopted him when he was about 1 year old and we were his third owners.

3. His original name was Oliver

4. Spence and Cami chose the name, Rocky

5. He's about seven years old, which in dog years makes him the oldest member of our household. 

6.  I think his crazy loud door greetings are a strong deterrent from friends coming in our house all the way when they drop by unexpectedly. 

If you live close by and ever want to come by and get your fill of puppy love without actually owning one yourself, give me a call!   We love to share! 

****************************

LATE ADDITION (added Friday morning 2/12/16): 

These are the cute little Valentines that Ellie helped me design this morning.   They fit so well with the blogpost, I figured this was as good a place as any to add it in.  :) 

A Golden Oldie

February 10: 

What does it say about me that when someone sends me a text saying that they just went to Westminster Abbey and the Tower of Big Ben...

that this song released before I was even born instantly starts running through my head?
   

Of course I then couldn't help myself from asking them if they'd also seen the "rosy red cheeks of the little children." 

Weirdly, they thought my question a little strange. 

***************************

The Legend of the Qingaio

  

February 9:  

Have you ever heard of the legend of Qingaio bird?  

No?   

Well, let me tell you a little about it.  

This elusive bird lives only deep in the Tian Shan Mountains of Kyrgyzstan.    It looks very similar to the American roadrunner, except for its brightly colored plumage, excessively large size,  and razor sharp talons.   The legend says that when the Qingaio is captured, the captor will be visited by an invisible llama bearing 12 bags of gold and a set of steak knives as a reward.   

Sounds crazy, no? 

Well, my sister swears she saw one on her walk the other day, perhaps on its legendary round-the-world migratory route from the North side of the Tian Shan mountains to the South side.  

My mom says it was just a roadrunner.   

But then my brother sent us this photograph that he captured while traveling in Europe last year and we knew without a doubt that the legend is true. 

An actual picture of the Qingaio bird

  

Please let me know if you see it, because I could really use some new steak knives! 

********************************

NOTE:   I am merely sharing the story of the Legend of the Qingaio and will not be held responsible for any injuries that may occur while trying to capture this beautiful, but elusive bird.  Additionally, it has been made known to me that the invisible llama has the right to make changes and/or substitutions to the prizes at any time.  Also, this story may or may not have been entirely contrived from the contents of a recent group text message amongst my siblings.

I'm Sorry.

February 8:  

While we were cleaning up from dinner tonight, Spencer, Adam, Emma, and I were having an animated conversation about a variety of topics from the Super Bowl to religion to politics.    

We were working and chattering along when in the middle of the conversation, we were surprised when suddenly my phone spoke loudly from my pocket saying, "I'm sorry." 

I looked down to see why my phone was randomly apologizing to me and realized that I had accidentally summoned Siri while I was doing dishes and she was madly trying to interpret our conversation.    

Here's the screenshot:  

1.) I swear our conversation was way more coherent than that. 

2.) But since that was all my phone could hear from the confines of the pocket of my fleece vest, I can totally understand  the confusion.   

******************************

Dark and Hairy

February 7:  It's a rare day that I spend more than 5 minutes on my hair care routine, I go to a salon once or twice a year at most, and I've kept my hair long most of my life.   

In other words,  I am extremely low maintenance in the hair department, which is why I've been dyeing my hair lighter and lighter over the last few years.    My hair is almost exclusively gray now (thank you, Spencer) and lighter hair means that my roots won't show as much.   

Today, I decided to dye my hair before church and came across a box of my old darker color dye.   I waffled for a bit, but in a fit of nostalgia for my old more youthful brunette complexion I decided to go for the change.   

And I'm rather loving the result!    

And in other hair news....Glen is growing a beard.    

He's got a small part in a play in March and was asked to grow a beard.   He feels a little out of his element growing it and gets a little defensive if anyone says anything even remotely resembling judgmental about it, but I'm coming around on it and rather like it.  

After church we rushed over to a friend's house and went to cheer on Glen's hometown Denver Broncos!    It was a great night with fun friends and delicious food (which I totally cheated and ate freely)!    

...and the Broncos won, so there's always that excitement too! 

*************************

Where's the Beef?

February 6:  

 Where's the beef?    

In Switzerland or Iceland?  

 In Italy or France?  

 No, silly!   Those are just the kids' (and my) geography projects for this week.  

The beef was right there on the counter and it caused a great deal of confusion at our house. 

Emma didn't know how to cook it and Ellie didn't even know what it was. 

  

Apparently my dislike of beef has made it a rare menu item in our dinners, but what do you do when you're avoiding grains and dairy (amongst other things) for an entire month?     

You search for ways to mix up the things you can eat in hopes that pure novelty will make it taste better.   

<Sigh>

It didn't work.  

*******************************