Random Rasmussen Writings

Circus

2012-02-16T04:50:00.003-07:00

While Scott was gone to Las Vegas, a circus came to town. It was just a small circus, it wasn't anything like Ringling Brothers but it was fun to see the tigers, bears, elephants and all the other acts. Eric liked the tigers the best, Lisa liked the ladies that did routines in the air on ropes because they wore pretty outfits, and David liked going up and down the stairs in the aisle ;)

Letting go...

2012-02-11T16:52:00.003-07:00

I think it is because David is my last baby that I am in no hurry to have him move on out of each baby phase.

He had been using sippy cups for a while, but he preferred a bottle - especially in the morning for breakfast. We were always running low on sippy cups (David has a bad habit of thowing real dishes, cups & utensils away. I've found a lot in the trash, but I'm sure I've missed seeing quite a few), so I let him go ahead and keep using a bottle sometimes. He would go to the drawer where we kept the bottles and if there was one in there, he wanted to use it. If the drawer was emtpy he was fine using a sippy cup. About a month ago I decided that this was ridiculous that a 2 year old was still using a bottle sometimes, so when I unloaded the dishwasher I just put all the bottles in the top cupboard and that was that. The next meal he looked in the drawer and saw it was empty and he's happily used a cup since.

Hand in hand with the bottle-thing is the temperature of his milk. With my first 2 kids I never warmed up their milk because I didn't want them to require warm milk so when we were out and about I could mix up some formula and they were good to go and we didn't have to find a microwave etc. It worked great. This kid thought he needed warm milk, especially in the morning. He actually wouldn't drink it unless it was warmed a little. I feel like such a push-over giving in to him. The same day the bottles went away, warm milk disappeared too. The first breakfast he had cold milk, he took a drink and said, "Brrrr" I told him, "Yea, isn't cold milk yummy?"

Finally is the paci. David loves the paci! I loved the paci because it would make him stop screaming. Lisa bit the tip off of hers a few weeks before she was 2. Scott cut the tip off of Eric's the day after his 2nd birthday. Here David is 4 months after turning 2 and he's still sucking away strong. (At least I weaned him to just having it when he sleeps and when he screams during sacrament meeting at church) I decided enough is enough and it is time for paci to go bye-bye. Scott was going out of town for a week, so I thought that would be the perfect opportunity so only one parent has to endure the screaming. So two weeks ago on Sunday night I cut the tip off of his paci. When it was bedtime I gave it to him like normal and said "Oh no, paci is broken!" He looked at it and thought it was pretty funny. I told him good night and turned off the light and there was silence for about an hour and a half. I couldn't believe it - it couldn't go so easy could it? Oh, no. He finally realized this was no game Mom was playing, this is for real. My paci is really broken and I need it to go to sleep! So the crying began and continued and continued for about 45 minutes until he was finally so tired he just fell asleep. The 2nd night he cried for about 15-20 minutes. And that was the end of that. No more paci and no more crying at bedtime. But that also means my cute baby isn't a baby anymore.

The last hurdle is potty-training. I don't even want to think about that right now...

The other day I was reading a magazine and found a quote that I loved relating to raising kids. "The days are long, but the years are short." Ain't that the truth!

Eskimos

2012-02-10T15:58:00.002-07:00

A couple weeks ago when it snowed, our kids and the neighbor kids played outside ALL DAY long until they were so cold in the evening they couldn't stand it anymore. They had so much fun making this sledding ramp.

Our cute Munchkins

2012-01-31T14:31:00.003-07:00

I thought the kids annual picture turned out pretty cute. They were all in good moods and excited to get their pictures taken which really helps.

I thought it was cute that the photographer wanted David to hook his thumb in his jean pocket for a relaxed look. He was concentrating so hard on keeping his thumb in there, that the other fingers are poking out - I love it!

I love those kids!!

The dessert

2012-01-26T13:57:00.004-07:00

I few weekends ago we went out to the desert. Eric has a hard time remembering if the correct word is desert or dessert, and it usually ends up as dessert.

Scott had gotten some new shooting gear for his upcoming training class, so he wanted to try it out.

We started by hiking up a hill.

About 10 minutes into it, David started whining and crying and wanted to go back to the truck and look at his books. There was a bitter cold wind, so I don't blame him.

So, David and I headed back while Scott and the other kids kept going. I had a feeling David wouldn't last long, so I was prepared and brought some magazines to keep me entertained while we waited.

When the others got back, we drove around a while. Later, we found a place where the wind was blocked. David found a rock that was just his size for a chair.

Lisa and Eric turn into little explorers out there and probably would have kept walking until we couldn't see them anymore.

Needless to say, on the way home they all crashed.

Must we really legislate everything?

2012-01-13T15:08:00.002-07:00

I guess when it comes to the Federal Government and the US Postal Service the answer is yes.

The other night I was at work and they sent around a memo for everyone to read reminding us of the Randolph-Sheppard Act (20 U.S.C. 107 et seq.) What is that you ask?

Under the provisions of the Randolph-Sheppard Act (20 U.S.C. 107 et seq.), people who are blind and licensed by a state licensing agency must be given priority for the operation of food vending services in Postal Service facilities. Because of this provision, the new vending supply guy has a seeing-eye dog so management was informing us all how to act around a service animal.

I fully support not discriminating against anyone, especially those with disabilities, but it just amazes me the extent that the government legislates little things in our lives.

Kid Talk

2012-01-12T15:52:00.007-07:00

I haven't posted a 'Kid Talk' post for a while, but Eric has been saying and doing some funny stuff so I have to write it down before I forget.

-When I was getting ready to take the Christmas tree down, he said I could hand him the feathers and he would put them on the floor for me. I asked him what feathers he was talking about and he pointed to the pine tree branches and said "these feathers"

-The other day I was vacuuming and was taking off the head to get in the corner and he was intently watching me. Then very thoughtfully he said, "Interesting..." Throughout the day he kept watching me do stuff and kept saying, "Interesting" Finally I asked him if he had just learned that word and he said "Yes, am I using it right?" He was, it just was a little odd to me that a 4 year old was talking to me like that.

-Eric is very aware of letters and their order and how they spell different words. Today he was looking at the box of Rice Chex and said "What does R-I-C-E spell because it has the same letters as my name." I told him it spelled rice. Then I teased him that we should just call him Rice instead of Eric since it had the same letters. He has always gotten really mad if we call him anything other than Eric (Scott used to call him Rick and Eric would go ballistic and almost start crying) and it was no different today, he insisted I can't call him Rice because I named him Eric when he was a baby.

-Lately Eric has been fascinated/infatuated with space and the solar system. He knows all the planets and little facts about lots of them. To his delight, this week in preschool they were studying the planets and they went to the Planetarium. That really kicked it up a notch with him. He's been running around the house and when I tell him to stop he says he can't because he's a comet. He even drew me this diagram today of the solar system and told me each of the planets names and some of them were gas planets and even though he drew Pluto it isn't really a planet and that all the pink lines on the outside are comets and the yellow lines are shooting stars.

-The other day the older kids were at a friends house playing while David was taking a nap. When he woke up they were still gone. David was searching EVERYWHERE for Eric and calling his name. The kids play hide and seek with Scott everyday when he gets home from work and David was checking all of Eric's typical hiding spots. I kept telling him that Eric wasn't home, but he wouldn't believe me. He found Eric's blanket and pillow pet in a pile in the living room and decided he was going to get in and pretend he was Eric until Eric got home. I dont' know what his drive was to find Eric because they have been fighting a lot lately, I thought he would be glad he wasn't here to bug him. On the other hand, Lisa totally caters to David and gets him anything he wants, but David wasn't in the least concerned about where she was. As Eric would say...Interesting.

Goals

2012-01-12T15:29:00.002-07:00

I used to be really good at setting and working toward goals whether it was educational, career or whatever. Then when I started being a stay-at-home mom I kind of stagnated. I didn't like that. I have always thought New Years Resolutions are lame because people make these grand resolutions and then a few weeks or months later they can't even remember what they were.

After realizing my "stagnation" problem I decided I needed some goals to work towards. I refused to call them "New Years Resolutions" because of the connotation I associated with that term. They have helped me focus on areas of my life I needed improvement on though.

Last year one of my big goals was to have 200 workout days in the year. Hand in hand with that was a goal to run a 5K, which gave me the motivation to work out. I met both goals and exceeded my workouts by reaching 244 workout days in 2011.

For 2012, I have expanded my goals. I usually have just had 2 or 3 (the "experts" always say that is best so you can focus on them.) This year I have 11 goals broken into 4 different categories. In my "Health" category I'm going to push myself to get 250 workout days and run a 10K. It's going to be a stretch, but I'm really going to try hard.

If I reach all 11 goals this year, it will be great. If I just work on each of my 11 goals, I will still be a better person for it.

Zoo

2012-01-12T14:57:00.007-07:00

For Christmas the kids got a Family Annual Pass to Hogle Zoo. The first time we went was a vacation day from school and it was CRAZY BUSY!! I decided to take the kids there again on their last day of Christmas break from school. This winter in UT has been very mild. We've had hardly any snow and the week after Christmas the temperatures were in the high 50's. It was a sunny 57 degrees and hardly anyone was there! We got to do all the things that were crowded last time like play on the animal sculptures.

We stayed for a couple of hours and each of the kids got to pick their top things to look at. It's nice just staying for a short time instead of staying there ALL DAY LONG so you get your moneys worth and then everyone is whinning and tired.

The kids all really wanted to play at the playground there, so that was our first stop. Nothing like going all the way to the zoo to play at a park, it's not like we don't have a park behind our house. Oh well, they had fun. The park toys were in shapes of animals.

What a proud lil guy

Taking a break

This one would slide all day...He LOVES it!

Turtle Lisa

Turtle Eric

They had these big Christmas cards you could pose in front of. David didn't want any part of it - he's photo averse.

When we were by the howler monkeys, two of them were swinging around and yelling. The kids thought it was the greatest. David kept copying them all day. He'll still be sitting there playing and start hollering like those monkeys were. Lisa and Eric of course encourage the behavior. It's pretty funny though.

December Happenings

2012-01-10T13:44:00.011-07:00

It seemed like I blinked and December had come and gone already. I guess I should blog about it before January is gone too.

Eric's preschool had a cute Christmas Program. It was held at night so the Dad's could come too. Scott had only seen the kids school programs on video, so it was fun to have him there to see it in person. Eric took the whole thing very seriously. They sang a bunch of songs they've learned throughout the year and then had some speaking presentations on art masterpieces and states and their capitals that they've learned. When it was Eric's art turn, he held up a picture and said he chose the still life "Apples and Oranges" by Cezanne. When they were doing the states, he said he chose Sacramento, California and California is where they make movies. At the end of the program each child recited a verse from the Christmas Story from Luke in the Bible.
The camera battery died right when it was his turn, so we had to do a make-up video taping of his part.

He was so confident and proud of himself for doing a good job. He still asks me if I want to hear his school part and he will recite it to me. At the end of the program he gave us a Christmas gift of his hand imprinted in clay and painted. He had been working on it at school for a few weeks and was supposed to keep it a secret. Secrets are really hard for him to keep, but he did great and didn't let it slip until we opened the gift.

Lisa's school also had a Christmas program, but they don't invite the parents - so no video. They have an assembly and each grade sings their songs for the rest of the school. Lisa learned one of my favorite christmas songs, "I want a hippopotomas for Christmas." She did a great job especially since it's a tricky song.

My birthday was on Sunday the 18th, but we celebrated on Saturday since Scott had to be at church until 7:30 the night of the 18th for tithing settlement. So on Saturday, Grandma Saundra was nice enough to watch the kids so Scott and I could go out. We had such a fun time!! We went to dinner and then we went to downtown Salt Lake City. We walked through the Gateway Plaza and saw the coolest Christmas tree I think I've ever seen. Then we went and watched some of a scrimmage Utah Jazz basketball game. Then we went and looked at the lights on Temple Square and the Main Street Plaza. It has been a few years since I've been down there to see the lights, but there seems to be tons more lights and decorations especially in the Plaza. We also went to "our" bench by the Joseph Smith Building. That is where Scott gave me my engagement ring almost 12 years earlier. We didn't stay there too long though because it was FREEZING cold so we had to keep moving. Our final destination was the Grand America Hotel. I had heard these radio ads saying that the hotel had these holiday decorated windows and gingerbread houses decorated by the hotel chefs and it wasn't to be missed. ZCMI used to have decorated holiday windows so I thought the hotel must have taken up the tradition. So we started our trek down to the hotel via Main Street. Neither of us had been on Main Street in SLC since they've started re-doing everything. It is pretty nice. We even ran into the Occupy Salt Lake people by the Gallivan Center. All 3 of them. I guess it's too cold to sleep outside for most of them. When we got to the hotel, we were kind of disappointed at the misleading advertising. The "decorated windows" ended up being a story about a penguin that you went on a scavenger hunt for a star in each window. It was a game for kids. And there were not lots of gingerbread houses, there was one. But it was pretty impressive since it was about the size of a garden shed and was made out of 400 lbs of gingerbread. I ended up taking the kids there during their christmas break. They thought it was awesome and at the end of the scavenger hunt they give you a big yummy star-shaped sugar cookie.

On Sunday morning, Scott and the kids did surprise me by making muffins and putting a candle in mine and giving me flowers. It was wonderful.

On with the holiday rundown...

On Christmas Eve morning we went to my Uncle Doug and Aunt Julie's house for a Heer family breakfast. It was great to see my all my relatives, especially my grandparents there. It is amazing that my kids have seen their great-grandparents more by the time they are even in school than I saw mine in my whole life.

In the evening, Grandma Saundra and Katie came over for Christmas Eve dinner.

Scott and his mom

Scott and Katie

It was so much fun having them here.

After dinner we frosted sugar cookies for Santa that we had made earlier that day.

Eric wanted to point out that he put toenails on his gingerbread man.

Lisa is very precise and careful with her creations.

Then Dad read us the Christmas story from the Bible while we used our nativity puppets to act out what he was reading.

Then it was time for the Norwegian tradition of eating risgrot (rice pudding) You hide an almond in one bowl of the rice and then when everyone is done eating it you have to guess who had the almond. The person with the almond wins a marsipan pig. We substituted a chocolate santa. Eric didn't like the rice pudding at all and ended up spitting it out, but he was the winner of the chocolate this year.

After that, the kids got to open one present - new pajamas! Lisa wrote a letter to Santa by herself and we left him some cookies and the kids were off to bed.

I was glad that Christmas was on a Sunday this year, because I like going to church on Christmas. We told the kids since Christmas was really about the birth of Jesus we were going to go to church first in the morning (we have 9 o'clock church)to celebrate that and then when we got home from church we would do the fun santa stuff and open presents. The kids were totally okay with that and I didn't hear a single complaint.

After church I wanted to get a picture of the kids in their church clothes.

David was definately NOT in the Christmas Spirit, so I took his picture that way anyway.

I love watching the kids on Christmas. They were so excited about everything and squealing that they got exactly what they wanted.

I think it was all a little much for David. He was kind of whiny. He wouldn't open any presents, so I finally ripped off some wrapping paper of one of his so he could see there was something in there. He got a Batman computer that he likes to turn on and off so he can hear Batman talk to him.

Eric got a Optimus Prime Transformer LEGO set and

Lisa got a Barbie Jeep with a Ken and Barbie in it.

I got an entry-way table and lamps that goes with the couch I got a month early.

Scott got his projection home theater with a 7.1 surround sound system downstairs with the new Star Wars Saga Blu-rays to watch on it. All he wanted to do was watch Star Wars. It was a fun Christmas for everyone.

Christmas evening we went over to Grandma Saundra's for Christmas Dinner and to celebrate Christmas with the Rasmussen side of the family. It's so nice being with family for the holidays.

Wind Storm 2011

2011-12-04T21:53:00.006-07:00

On Thursday, Dec 1 around 2 a.m the wind started blowing and man it BLEW and it wouldn't stop! We thought our house was going to blow away. I haven't felt that kind of anxiety since the hurricane in Tampa. The winds gusted up to 102 mph! We looked out our front window and watched as big black garbage cans were air-born blowing down the street and as panels of vinyl fencing were like missiles blowing down the street. Our neighbors wooden shed blew off of its cement pad and blew into pieces. Their camping trailer started blowing down their driveway towards the street. All of the tramplines blew away and the playground equipment blew over. There are 4 houses on our street that the east side of their roofs don't have any shingles left on them. No ones fences in our neighborhood survived. Luckily our neighborhood doesn't have many big trees because most of them in the city were damaged or blown over. On the freeway any high profile vehicle was being blown over and the Highway Patrol told everyone to stay inside. The power went out around 9 am it was finally restored around 11 pm that night.

We escaped with relatively little damage considering the circumstances. We have a few pieces of fascia, soffit, and a downspout and mailbox that blew off and there are 2 small holes in the stucco where something (presumably a fence post) hit the house. I was out with a contractor today getting an estimate and he was completely amazed at the holes. He said even if you take a hammer and hit it as hard as you can it won't make a hole like that. He said whatever was flying through the air and hit the house was going really fast and hard and we should be glad we didn't have a window or anything there.

For some reason our yard seemed to be the dumping ground of a lot of the debris from the wind. However the wind patterns were blowing, it dropped a lot of junk in our yard. We probably had enough vinyl fence panels to build our own fence and enough shingles to re-roof a house. When we cleaned up on Friday and Saturday one truckload was completely full of just the fencing and the 2nd load was full of shingles and the other misc. junk that blew our way.

Yesterday at church, they cancelled the rest of the meetings after sacrament meeting so that everyone could go and help clean up the neighborhoods and the city because a new storm was forcasted to come in on Sunday night and they didn't want all the loose debris to become airborn and cause more damage. The Governor called up the National Guard to help. Scott said the line at the dump was over 5 miles long!!! The wind did blow last night, but not that bad and there was no additional damage.

Lisa thought the wind was bad because it was littering. Eric kept referring to it as the "mean wind" and he asked why Jesus made us get 'mean wind'.

When Lisa got home from school today she was telling me about the damage at her school. It was mainly to the portable classrooms and to some trees. Her teacher had them write a little story about wind. I thought hers was great: It is called :"The Litring Wind"

I love her detailed drawing of the fascia and mailbox missing. I also think it is funny that the "friend" she is referring to is a couple that lives down the street that are empty-nesters. All of the kids love them. Eric calls Bob his best friend all the time.

Most of all, we are glad that we were all safe because "stuff" is replaceble but people aren't.

Thanksgiving Festivities

2011-12-02T13:19:00.010-07:00

At the beginning of the week we had a guy come over and assemble our pool table that has been sitting upstairs in our front living room since we moved in. We now have a new usable room in our house! It was a relief to find out that the 3 pieces of slate that were still crated up from the move had made it unbroken. I sure was rusty that first game. We'll have to keep playing over the holidays to sharpen our skills.

On Tuesday, one of Lisa's little friends had a kid's book club where they brought their favorite book about Fall or Thanksgiving. She was so excited to go to a book club just like mom does. When she came home, I asked her how it was. Her response was,"All we did was talk about books" Imagine that!

On Thursday we went over to Grandma Saundra's for a delicious Thanksgiving meal. I made a pecan sweet potato casserole and a turkey centerpiece out of fruit that the kids called "Old Thankful" I thought it turned out pretty cute. As an added bonus, I learned my kids LOVE honeydew. It was fun spending the day eating, visiting with family, and looking at all the ads for Black Friday.

This Thanksgiving season I was thinking a lot about how grateful I am for so many things but for three things in particular. I am grateful to have such a good husband that I love and that handles my craziness. Along with that I am thankful for my in-laws. You hear all sorts of stories about the "in-laws" but I love my mother-in-law and my 3 sisters-in-law like they're my own. They are so accepting and loving of me and I really appreciate that. Lastly I'm very thankful for my health and that of my family. A few weeks before Thanksgiving we learned that our friends high school son was diagnosed with cancer. It just tore at my heart as I tried to put myself in their shoes. What a precious and fragile thing health is!!!

While we were sitting around visiting, David came up to me with his fingers in his mouth saying "YUMMM" I pulled his fingers out of his mouth and it looked like there was some kind of food on them. The food had all been put away so I didn't know where he had gotten any food from. Later when we were getting ready to have some pie, we found out what he had done. All the desserts were sitting up on the sideboard in the dining room, he reached his hands up there to see what was up there and got lucky by sticking his fingers right in the middle of Aunt Katie's pretty pumpkin pie.

On Friday Scott spent the day in the garage on a woodworking project. The kids and I started decorating the house for Christmas.

On Saturday we put up the Christmas Tree. I love to look at the christmas tree lights. It is officially the Christmas Season!!! We put the tree up in the newly available front living room in front of the window so you can see the lights from outside. From the moment we brought the tree upstairs from the storage room the kids were asking if it was time to put the decorations on. They probably asked over 100 times if it was time to decorate it while I was assembling it and putting the lights on.

On Sunday night we went back over to Grandma Saundra's for turkey sandwiches and to celebrate Scott's nephew Josh's birthday. My kids LOVE to go play with their cousins. That night Grandma helped the kids make their own cute Gingerbread Houses, while Scott and his sister were reviewing and sharing some family history.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

2011-11-09T14:05:00.002-07:00

This weekend was the first snowfall in the valley and the kids couldn't wait to get out and play in the snow.

This weekend I also got my Christmas present a little early...a new sectional for the upstairs family room! (We moved our old couch downstairs to the family room down there.)

Halloween Season

2011-11-04T13:35:00.007-06:00

Halloween festivities stretched out over a week at our house. Eric started it off by going on a fieldtrip to the pumpkin patch for Preschool. A lady in the neighborhood named Mrs. Bassett helped drive the kids. When I went to pick him up from school he said he rode with Mrs. Basket. Ha, Ha, made me smile :)

The last day of school before Halloween his preschool had a party and then a little program for the parents where they sang songs and said poems. It was really cute. He has such a fun teacher.

On Friday, Lisa's school had a costume parade. The boys and I loved sitting in the gym and watching all the kids go by in their costumes. There were some pretty creative ones.

On Saturday, one of Lisa's best friends had a Halloween party at his house. She had a great time decorating haunted houses and cookies, playing games and hanging out with her friends. She came home and told me one of the greatest parts was that his mom said they could eat as much candy as they wanted!!!

On Sunday we carved pumpkins. We ended up harvesting 32 of them from our garden - so there was quite a selection to pick from for everyone's masterpiece. The kids kept wanting to do more and more.

I think we ended up with some good ones.

Monday was the big day. We started by getting dressed up in the morning and going to Grandma Judy's school to watch her Halloween parade. Our kids even got to join in and walk around with Grandma. The rest of the morning we spent looking for couches at furniture stores. Normally it's not the kids favorite thing to do, but the salesmen kept giving them candy so they never complained or asked to go home. That night we left a bowl of candy on the front porch and the whole family went trick-or-treating together. It was a PERFECT night - we couldn't have asked for better weather.

Lisa was a witch, Eric was an M&M and David was a shark.

It was so cute to watch David's fin bounce around as he ran down the sidewalk. This was David's first year and he was just happy to be going with the big kids. He didn't bother going up to a majority of the doors. He was happy just waiting on the sidewalk. When he would go and get candy, he was amazed and kept taking it in and out of his pumpkin.

Before:

After: One tired little shark

David's 2 year old portrait

2011-11-04T12:11:00.004-06:00

I got David's 2 year old pictures back. There were so many cute poses it was really hard to pick one for the wall (I am biased, I know) I think he looks like a business man that was shrunk down into a kid sized body.

This kid is crazy. After almost every meal he pulls his bib up over his head like this and growls like a monster and then laughs and laughs. It cracks me up every time.

UEA 2011

2011-11-04T11:53:00.004-06:00

The last weekend of October is UEA and the kids get out of school for 2 days. On Thursday the kids got to go play at Grandma Saundra's which is always a treat!

On Friday we went with Grandma Judy and Grandad to Hogle Zoo. I think the last time I was there was when I was 12 years old.

The wooden carved rocking chairs were a big hit.

The first thing they all wanted to do was ride the train.

I didn't take pictures of any real animals, just the ones I brought with me from home.

David's favorite thing was the monkeys. He thought they were all Curious George.

Lisa was very interested in seeing the crocodiles.

Eric couldn't wait to see the giraffe's. We saw them all and by the end they were all tired of walking and fell fast asleep in the car on the way home.

Now whenever David is acting wild and crazy, Eric tells him, "You're a wild animal. We should have left you at the zoo!".

Dates

2011-11-04T11:11:00.005-06:00

A few weekends ago we took the kids on dates.

Scott and Lisa went to the BYU vs Idaho State football game. They got really good front row seats. When they sat down and Lisa was looking around, she asked if they could sit at the very, very top. After half time, Scott gave in and they climbed to the top and watched from up there for a while. When they got home I asked her how the game was. They only thing she wanted to tell me about was the cheerleaders. She said that there were some girls there that wore church skirts and shirts and had beeeuuuutiful hair. And there were some boys that would throw them up in the air and catch them. She went on and on about how wonderful they were. I guess football's not her thing.

The boys and I went shopping. I know it doesn't sound like a boy activity, but Eric just had a growth spurt and all his pants were floods so we went and got him some new pants. Then we went to a park in Bountiful that is a huge fire truck with slides and stuff. I was amazed and scared at how brave David was trying to go on some of the big kid toys.

Then we came home, David took a nap and Eric and I made cupcakes for my cousins mission homecoming the next day.

My kids LOVE to help cook. My awesome Aunt Vicki that lives in Cincinnati sent us a kids cookbook. For dinner that night we made a recipe from it called Crocodile Bites which is basically hamburger wrapped in filo dough.

Zig Zag

2011-11-04T11:02:00.005-06:00

In the middle of October I attended a seminar featuring the author and principles of a new book called "The Zig Zag Principle" which explains how to succesfully grow a small business. The author has started over 30 business, many of them becoming multi-million dollar ventures. It was very educational and motivational. My sister was a presenter at a few of the workshops during the day, so it interesting to see what she does for one of his companies.

Now if we can come up with a good business idea, I'm ready to start ziggin and zaggin!

Birthday Boys

2011-10-26T13:24:00.006-06:00

Scott and David have birthdays on Oct 6 and Oct 12 respectively, so we celebrated them together for 2 weekends.

The weekend of Scott's birthday we had presents at home for both of them. Scott loves to make pina colada's and other icy drinks but our blender is not good at crushing the ice. For his birthday he got a blender especially designed to make icy drinks and smoothies. Of course we had to try it out - it works good! He also got some ammunition (you can never have too much of that!)

David wasn't sure what to do with this "thing" wrapped in paper. The other kids were all too eager to show him how to rip off the wrapping paper and find the present inside.

Then we went to Grandma Saundra's for dinner and birthday cake with Scott's family.

David opened a cool car that moves and sings songs and he was perfectly happy playing with it inside the box it came in. Good intentioned parents, siblings and cousins kept trying to help him get the car out of the box so he could play with it and he would yell at all of them. He was perfectly happy leaving it in the box all night long.

The birthday boys blew out their candles together.

That sure was a good cupcake - it's good to be 2!

All the cousins agree - yum, yum!

The weekend after David's birthday we went to Grandma Judy and Grandad's house to celebrate.

David LOVED the candles (He loves any kind of light.)

The birthday boys blew out their candles.

"I ate it all - YUMMY!"

Grandma made a chocolate layer cake that consisted of 14 very thin layers of chocolate cake layered with a dark chocolate ganoche in between. It was good and very rich!

Both Scott and David were spoiled with gifts.

We're so lucky to have both of these guys in our lives. WE LOVE YOU SCOTT & DAVID!!

Lisa's Skirt

2011-10-17T16:35:00.002-06:00

I bought this fabric in July with the intention of sewing Lisa a skirt that week. Well, things kept coming up and what do you know - it's October and still no skirt.

Last week Lisa kept asking when I was going to make it, so I went down to the sewing room and knocked it out. They don't take very much time to make, I guess it's just a matter of priorities.

As a side note, it was the first project I have done in my new craft room in the basement - let me just say, I LOVE IT!!!

First Snow

2011-10-17T16:24:00.003-06:00

It's hard to believe but the snow is a comin'. The first snow fall this year was Oct 6. I guess it was Scott's birthday present from nature! Eric came to breakfast that morning in a tank-top and shorts - time to dig out the sweaters and boots!

Canning

2011-10-16T15:41:00.004-06:00

I have canned a lot of fruit and vegetables in my life, but never by myself. My mom was always doing the important stuff like measuring, cooking, timing etc and my brother and sisters and I just got the produce ready for her to do stuff to.

This year that all changed. Last year we only planted a few things in our garden to see if we could get them to grow. This year we had a much bigger garden that produced quite a bit. It seemed like we had tomatoes coming out of our ears there for a while. I was glad for the little cold snap we had so I didn't have to keep finding things to do with our tomatoes.

This year I canned lots of salsa, tomatoes and some chili sauce. If I have time I might do some applesauce. It's all pretty tasty, in fact there's already been a big dent made in our supply of salsa. A neighbor was asking how the canning was going and I told her I had to keep making more and more salsa because we kept eating it. She said they had a rule that no jars can be opened until after the first snowfall. I think that is a good rule of thumb!

Trees

2011-10-16T15:27:00.003-06:00

Every Fall we try and get a few more trees to plant in our yard. Most of them are around the perimeter. We are now up to 24 trees.

This year we planted a big Norwegian Spruce.

Two smaller Austrian Pines

And four Quaking Aspens

I love trees!

Pumpkins

2011-10-16T15:18:00.003-06:00

We planted 2 varieties of pumpkins in our garden this year. We had Jack 'O Lantern and Cinderella pumpkins. From the picture on the package I thought the Cinderella's were supposed to get really big, but instead they are a very deep orange color and kind of a squat shape.

We harvested the ones that were ripe and got 16! There are still about 8-10 that will be ready by Halloween.

The kids got a workout hauling them from the garden in the back up to the front of the house.

David was too little to carry the pumpkins so he just happily followed the kids back and forth dragging his rake behind him.

Mountain Cookout/Shooting and Conference Breakfast

2011-10-15T21:38:00.004-06:00

I've been slacking on updating our blog, so I'll try and catch up with what's been going on.

At the end of September we drove up the canyon above Pineview Resevoir toward Monte Cristo. The changing leaves were so pretty. We pulled off and drove down a dirt road for awhile. We found a nice place for a dutch oven cookout and a place to go shooting. The camera ran out of batteries so there aren't too many pictures.

Scott usually takes Lisa and Eric and I stay home with David. We decided David was probably old enough to handle it - we were wrong. Without a nap he was a whiney little boy a lot of the time. He also thought that every camp chair was his, and kept going from chair to chair trying to kick everyone out so he could sit there. What a little bully!

The kids didn't want to eat the chicken and potatoes we cooked in the dutch oven. They missed out because they were good!

The kids roasted hot dogs instead. Lisa was a good little roaster.

David kept dropping his food and his sippy cup in the dirt and then just picking them up and continueing to eat them. Once he was chewing some bread and it fell out of his mouth onto the ground. Since it was wet all the grass, dirt, rocks etc stuck to it. He went to pick it up but lost his balance and stepped on it, then picked it up and put it in his mouth. It was so gross!! He got so mad at me for taking it out of his mouth and not letting him eat it.

That day was the first day that I had been shooting in a LONG time. We were just shooting at cans and bottles that we found up there. I think I missed every time. I need more practice. Scott of course was dead on and hit almost everything he shot at.

The kids loved exploring and just playing around in the mountains.

The next morning was General Conference so we had Grandma Saundra come over for our traditional conference breakfast. This year Scott wanted to cook the whole breakfast outside on the griddle on the grill. (I can't believe we didn't take any pictures!) We had pancakes, sausage, hashbrowns, eggs, strawberries and orange juice to drink. It was really tasty!

Eric's Fieldtrip

2011-10-11T15:50:00.004-06:00

Eric's Preschool went on a field trip to the fire station. They had been learning about fire safety and this was the big finale. They got to dress up like fire fighters and get in the fire trucks and ambulances.

They even got fire hats and badges to take home.

Once a month the teacher has each mom come in for half an hour to help and have a mini parent-teacher conference on how your kid is doing at school. Last week was my turn to go in. I was really impressed! It is not your typical Pre-K curriculum. He really loves his preschool and his teacher.

Success!!

2011-10-11T14:25:00.002-06:00

If you read my blog at the beginning of the year, you will know that I made a goal to have 200 workouts this year. I tweeked it a little so that it was 200 workout days because I was working out twice a day for a couple months but I only counted the day once.

Well I had my 200th workout day on September 28th - I DID IT!!!

I am so happy that I accomplished my goal - and a whole calendar quarter ahead of schedule! Ironically I hurt my foot a few days later and only worked out once the whole week, but I'm healed and back at it again. I'm going to continue keeping track so I can see how many workouts I get for the year.

Thanks Amy Joy for your inspiration and idea!

Lisa's 6 year old portrait

2011-09-27T13:32:00.003-06:00

Since Lisa is in school now and gets her school pictures taken, I was just going to use those for her "yearly" photo for the wall. But a few weeks ago a studio called and offered free sitting and free photos so as a friend I worked with in Tampa always said, "If it's free, it's for me!" So we went and got her pictures taken anyway. I'm glad because I think she looks beautiful! I'm glad we did it them because the next week she fell at school and got MAJOR road rash on one side of her face (hopefully it doesn't scar-we've been putting all sorts of stuff on it so it won't)

Eric's 4 year old portraits

2011-09-27T13:27:00.005-06:00

I hold myself to the goal of getting my kids individual pictures taken once a year. I usually do it around their birthday so I remember, but I was a little slow this year. His birthday is in February and it's already September.

I think Eric's photos turned out very handsome. All the way to the studio he was practicing his smile for me :)

I know he's growing up, but when I look at these pictures (especially the one by the chair) he just looks like such a big kid and not my little boy anymore.

First Day of Pre-School

2011-09-12T15:00:00.004-06:00

Official First Day of Preschool Picture

Last week Eric started pre-school and he LOVED it! He was so disappointed that he didn't get to start school when Lisa did and had to wait until after Labor Day, but the wait was well worth it!

When I picked him up he said, "Do you want me to tell you everything we did?" I said, "Of course, tell me everything." So gave me a play by play of the morning. When he finished, he said "Do you want me to tell you everything again?"

His preschool is only 2 days a week so he started complaining that Lisa got to go to school everyday but he didn't. I hope his enthusiasm continues throughout the year and throughout his life!

He is going to a different pre-school than Lisa did and it focuses on different things which is perfect for him. My friend Wendy is the teacher and is really cute and sweet with the kids. On the front steps on the first day she wrote, "Welcome to Preschool" and then all the kids names.

He's friends with 6 of the 10 kids in his class so he loves the benefit of getting to play with friends while he's at school.

This has nothing to do with preschool, but the other day he came into the office with this frisbee ring around his head and said, "Look at me, I'm Saturn" He totally cracks me up sometimes with the things he says and suprises me with the things he knows.

The other day he was at Grandma's house and came up with a good one:

Eric: Jesus wants us to be hot.
Grandma: Why do you think that?
Eric: Because Jesus wants us to be a sunbeam, and the sun is hot :)

New Testament

2011-08-27T18:58:00.003-06:00

The kids and I have been reading from the New Testament Stories. We were kind of slacking there for a little bit, but in Primary they challenged us to read the scriptures everyday during the summer. For every day the kids read, they got 1 chocolate chip, when the whole primary filled a huge jar with chocolate chips the primary presidency would make them chocolate chip cookies. The primary filled their jar last sunday and they got their cookie and our family finished reading the New Testament this week.

The kids love listening to the stories of Jesus. I hope this helps them build their testimony of Christ and the Gospel.

They've decided they want to read the Old Testament Stories book next.

Lisa's first day of 1st Grade

2011-08-27T18:47:00.002-06:00

Lisa loves school and was excited to be starting 1st Grade on Aug 22. Her english teacher is Mrs. Gardner and her spanish teacher is Senorita Avila. She was most excited to have school lunch (afterwards she said it was gross and requested home lunch the rest of the week) and 2 recesses and to see all of her friends again.

After school when I asked her how it was she gave me two thumbs way up. I hope she has a great year!

(If you noticed, yes she is wearing a different skirt in the first and second picture. She wore the blue one and got pictures taken and then a few minutes before leaving for the bus in the morning she went to the bathroom and realized the zipper was sticky and she couldn't undo it by herself which required a change in outfits to the gray one that she could do herself)

Road trip to Idaho

2011-08-27T18:11:00.005-06:00

I know it's exotic, but Scott had never been to Idaho before and I hadn't seen my grandparents for a while so we took a day trip to Rexburg with a detour through Idaho Falls and Ammon where my dad showed us places where he grew up and told us about his ancestors and how they ended up in Idaho as Germans from Russia. It was a very interesting family history trip. I have a VERY bad memory, so I documented the trip in writing and with pictures and video so I will be able to tell my kids about their ancestors.

Everyone is all smiles at the gas station at the beginning of the trip. Lisa and Eric brought the DVD player that kept them in a trance most of the time.

David was a good little traveler and even without a nap (he doesn't like to sleep in the car) he traveled like a champ.

This is the Ammon school where Garth went to Elementary school.

This is the house he grew up in on Avocet Street in Ammon. He helped his dad build on to the house to almost double it's original size.

We saw the Idaho waterfalls and this is the Idaho Falls temple that they are currently re-doing the landscaping on.

Before we left out of IF we stopped at Reed's Dairy. I had heard about this place, but had never been there. It's a working dairy with cows and everything. They have yummy ice cream!

Then we went on up to Rexburg to my grandparents house. My cousin Matt from Denmark lives with them during the school year so that he can go to high school in America, so we got to visit with him as well. They had a weeny roast all set up for us. The kids LOVED it! Their backyard is next to an elementary school so the kids had a blast playing on the playground all afternoon. Great Grandma even got the kids pinwheels to play with.

Relaxing in Great Grandma and Grandpa Heer's backyard blowing on the pinwheel.

David hanging out with Grandad.

Lisa roasting her hot dog.

Great Grandpa was telling us stories of his ancestors and showed us this picture of his mom Caroline Bartholoma and some of her siblings at their farm in Aberdeen, ID.

On the way back home we drove by BYU-Idaho (Ricks's College) and by the new Rexburg temple that we had never seen before. It is across the street from wheat fields on 2 sides. That tells you how rural it is. It is a really pretty temple.

The County Fair

2011-08-27T17:42:00.005-06:00

It's Fall which means it's time for the county fair! Seeing that the fairgrounds are at the other end of our neighborhood, we can't not go.

On Wednesday night our family went with Grandma Judy and Grandad. We got to the pony ride a few minutes after they closed, then we got to the petting zoo as they were putting the animals away for the night, but we did get to see a baby zebra. We got to see the rabbits and the chickens though - pee eeww, they were stinky!

Then Gma and Gdad let each of the kids pick 2 carnival rides to go on. They decided to ride the boats together. Eric went on the roller coaster which he called a train.

Lisa chose the airplane ride.

David enjoyed it all from the comfort of the stroller.

Then on Friday during the day the kids and I went with Jennifer, Beck, Macie and Jonas. We watched the Yo-yo Champion of the World, a pie eating contest, we watched dog diving, and the kids got to play in a toy area where a clown made them balloon animals. This time the kids got to ride the ponies! (I took pictures of them on my new phone without thinking that I don't know how to get them off the phone and on the computer, so I only have a few I took with my camera.)

Eric the cowboy

David on the pony

Jonas and Lisa on the pony

Eric on the pony

The votes are in...Farmingon is a great place to live!

2011-08-16T13:47:00.003-06:00

Money magazine just came out with their list of the Top Places to Live in 2011. Our city of Farmington, UT was ranked #12.

We love living in this rural community. It feels like we live out in the country with all the horse property and farms, but we are only 15-20 minutes from Salt Lake. Hopefully there won't be a big influx of people now that will spoil our nice little city.

Change of plans

2011-08-16T11:16:00.004-06:00

On Saturday we planned on hiking up City Creek Canyon. As we tried to get up there, there was TONS of traffic and the road ended up being closed for the Tour of Utah professional bike race.

Since the trailhead is almost in downtown Salt Lake City, we decided to walk around downtown for a little while.

Lisa went to her first wedding reception on Friday and thought the bride in her wedding dress was the most beautiful thing. She couldn't believe how many brides there were around the SLC temple.

Lisa practicing for her photos when she's married.

She loved these flowers and the fountain that looks like a shell.

The flowers were really pretty everywhere.

This was a cool tree. It seems like there's some significance to it, but we don't know what it is.

Of all the dozens of times I've been to Temple Square, I NEVER remember seeing this on the ground. I thought it was cool.

A couple cool shots of the temple.

Hill Aerospace Museum

2011-08-16T10:24:00.004-06:00

Hill Air Force Base is just a short drive north of us, yet I had never been there before last weekend. We went and visited the Hill Aerospace Museum there. It is 30 acres of aerospace "stuff." The Museum exhibits more than 90 military aircraft, missiles, and aerospace vehicles on the grounds and inside the hangars.

We took tons of pictures so I will just put a selection on here.

Lisa trying out a helicopter pilot's seat

Eric checking out the helicopter pilot's seat

Eric in a B-1 Bomber's air intake. It was neat to see the plane that Scott's Dad spent some of his career working on.

Those are big landing gear wheels!

At the end of the museum there was a kids hands-on learning center. The kids were relieved that there was something "fun" to do while they waited for their dad and grandad to look at everything!

Lisa built and launched her own rocket!

They had flight simulators and Eric wouldn't get out of this one or take his flight suit off. Maybe we have a future pilot in our family.

David had seen enough and wasn't interested in getting his picture taken in a bomber jacket.

Lisa tried out being a NASA astronaut - too bad that job doesn't exist anymore.

Rasmussen Family reunion

2011-08-16T10:04:00.004-06:00

The last weekend in July all of Scott's family, except one niece who had to work, went up to a condo at the Park City Mountain Resort for a family reunion. There were 17 of us. It was fun!

There was lots of swimming.

The cousins played games and loved being together.

The kids watched movies.

There was LOTS of food and visiting!

It was so fun to be all together as a family. Thanks Grandma for organizing the reunion.

Pioneer Day Weekend

2011-07-26T11:52:00.007-06:00

In Utah we celebrate July 24th when the Mormon pioneers came into the Salt Lake valley. This year it was on a Sunday, so the celebrations stretched from Friday until Monday.

On Friday night we went over to Scott's mom's house for dinner and visiting and to watch the Bountiful City Fireworks Show. There is a great view from her front yard. His sister Heather and her kids are visiting from Cincinnatti and the kids had a great time playing together.

David LOVES lights of any kind. When the fireworks started he got very excited to see the pretty lights in the sky. He kept pointing to them and making a shocked/surprised noise.

Eric sat on Aunt Katie's lap most of the time and seemed to have some comment about every single firework. She made the comment that it was too bad there wasn't a music soundtrack to go along to the show. Why do you need music when you have Eric the Commentator giving you a blow-by-blow of the show???

Everyone always loves going to Grandma's house!

On Saturday morning it was our family's turn to help clean our church building. Lisa and Eric were good little helpers. David cried and held onto my leg the whole time. I think he thought he was going to be left in the nursery!!

That night Lisa and I went on a date with her cousin Emily and Aunt Heather to see the play "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers" Some of our friends down the street had 5 members of their family in the show and gave us tickets. Lisa was excited to see her little friend Maclayne up on the big stage. They did a great job!

Sunday night there was a big family dinner at the Rasmussen's. All the little cousins were there having so much fun playing together!

On Monday the fun continued. I started the day by sleeping in :) I actually got 8 hours of sleep! I can't remember the last time I got so much sleep - it felt wonderful! That morning we headed up Big Cottonwood Canyon for another family hiking adventure. This time we went to Donut Falls. Last year we tried to find the trailhead, but didn't know the right turnoff to follow so we never made it there. This year we were successful though!

The kids LOVED the hike! Eric could hear a raging river and kept trying to find where it was. All of the kids were so excited when they finally found the water. They wanted to climb up to the donut through the water, but we made an executive decision that where the path stopped was far enough for us.

Of course throwing rocks is a favorite past time. At the very end of the clip you can hear Eric asking for food. I introduced them to trail mix as hiking food and now they start asking for it as soon as we get out of the car!

Of course a favorite part was having a picnic lunch up in the mountains.

David got a ride on the way up in the backpack, but he walked on the way down.

Lisa and Eric are a couple of billy goats. At first Eric wasn't too happy because I told him we didn't bring the stroller for him to ride in. But on the way back down he was happy and said he doesn't need a stroller, he can hike and his feet and legs don't even hurt. Success!

That night we had a yummy BBQ dinner. We got some new patio chairs this weekend so we needed to break them in. To eat we had ribs, fries, corn on the cob, watermelon and the big hit, Scott's icy drinks.

Scott made yummy strawberry daquari's, pina colada's and a new flavor we tried called sweet and sour which was like a frozen lemonade.

This is David's reaction to the lemonade one - it was sour!

The kids had a ball picking the ingredients to go in, watching Scott mix it and then off course drinking the final result. Lisa was so impressed with his abilities she told him he should get a job mixing drinks and selling them at a shop. Scott and I just laughed that she wanted her dad to be a bartender.

Kid Talk

2011-07-26T11:36:00.003-06:00

It's been a while since I've posted some of the funny things my kids have been saying. I was cleaning off my dresser and found an old envelope I had written a bunch of their sayings on so I wouldn't forget. So here we go...

Eric: Mom, I love buggerflies - they're sooo coot.

Eric: What's your letter name? (AKA how do you spell your name?)

While Lisa was doing her homework from school, Eric would busily get his paper and crayons and say, "I have to do my homework" and then he would draw until Lisa was done and then they could play.

Eric: I'm hungry.
Mom: For what?
Eric: I'm hungry for TV

I was talking to Lisa about her goals for school and Eric piped up with "I have a goal - it's out in the backyard right now for soccer."

The other day we were eating sandwiches for lunch and Eric was looking at all the crumbs on his plate and he said, "Look at all the bread dust"

Kids are cute and funny and they make me chuckle almost everyday with the funny observations and comments they make.

PIE

2011-07-20T15:53:00.003-06:00

I love pie! But I hardly ever make it. Whenever I do make a pie, it is usually a crustless apple pie that we love.

There is someone who loves pie way more than me (especially cherry) - my Dad! So yesterday for his birthday I made him a cherry pie.

I thought it turned out looking pretty good!

Arizona: Part 2

2011-07-20T15:46:00.005-06:00

We closed on our second investment property in Phoenix, AZ this week. It is a 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bathroom, cute 2-story. We're crossing our fingers that we'll get some good tenants for this one too. If it weren't so hot down there right now, I might go down there - maybe in the winter.

Family Hike

2011-07-20T08:43:00.004-06:00

I've been wanting to go hiking with our whole family for a while, but the kids seemed too young. This past weekend we decided we would give it a try. My parents gave us a book called, "60 Hikes within 60 Miles" that details the difficulty, distance, scenery etc for each of the hikes. We picked an easy one that started up at the Alta Ski Resort in Little Cottonwood Canyon and went to Cecret Lake.

Lisa is quite the walker and could have gone on forever probably. Eric on the other hand HATES walking and complains about having to walk to the end of the street to the bus stop. He did really good though. I think he was distracted from the walking by throwing rocks in the stream and picking up sticks etc. David was in heaven and walked for over an hour. He could have probably gone farther, but he was slowing us down with his short little legs. He liked the hiking backpack though, so it was fine.

The temperature was nice and cool and the landscape was really pretty.

It was surprising how much snow was still up there in the middle of July! Eric REALLY wanted to build a snowman, but the snow was crusty and icy and not good snowman snow.

About a mile from the lake Eric hit a wall and the whining began: my legs hurt, my brain hurts, I'm tired, I want to go home etc. So we decided to turn around and head back before the rest of the kids joined in the meltdown mode.

Now that we know they can do it, I we can't wait to go again!

Recent Happenings

2011-07-12T22:30:00.011-06:00

On the 4th of July we went to Pineview Resevoir for a picnic and to play at the beach. That night we made homemade strawberry ice cream using the strawberries from our patch on the side of the house.

It was really busy, but we found a little piece of beach just big enough for our family between a bunch of trees so we had privacy.

The kids had a lot of fun. David wasn't quite sure about the sand, but he sure looked cute.

We started swimming lessons again this summer. This time Eric is also taking lessons. He didn't really even like water before this summer, so he's doing great.

Lisa is practicing her strokes and learning to dive.

We got some goggles and the kids wear them more outside of the water than inside of the water.

When we were folding laundry the other day, Lisa put her swimming suit bottoms on David. We thought he looked funny, but he liked it and wore them around the rest of the afternoon.

Lisa is really enjoying her Summer Girls Group. Last week they made these cute gumball machines. This week they made a jewelry box and made some cards using embelishments.

A bunch of my college roomates/girlfriends all came to town the same weekend from across the country (literally from CA to MA and places in between.) We got together on Friday night for dinner and visiting.

Then on Saturday morning we went hiking up Millcreek Canyon to Dog Lake.

It was so nice to be together again and catch up with what everyone is doing. These women are AMAZING and I am blessed to have them as friends!

Mid-year Workout Tally

2011-07-07T13:18:00.002-06:00

As I've mentioned earlier, I made a goal to have 200 workouts this year. With the mid-point of the year just passing us, I remain ahead of goal. As of June 30, I had 137 workouts completed!! I think I will actually accomplish this goal - Yeah!! It has gotten to the point that if I miss a workout, I feel like something is missing all day - who would have ever thought I would say that!

The Basement...is FINISHED!!!!!

2011-07-05T13:57:00.004-06:00

Last Thursday we had the carpet installed in the basement! The project is finally finished and we love it!! I'll post pictures over time as we get the different rooms put together.

The kids are in heaven and keep running in big circles down there. We moved their toy room down there and now they disappear for long periods of time. They are happy to see some of their toys that have been in storage during the construction. They were all so excited they wanted to sleep down there, so they had a sleepover on Friday night.

Our regular vacuum broke, so we replaced it with a central vacuum unit.

We crossed our fingers after we installed it that everything would work - and were happily surprised that it did. I knew it would pick up a lot of dirt, but was surprised at just how much it would pick up. I vacuumed with a regular vacuum on Thursday, and we vacuumed with the new vacuum on Saturday. This is how much dirt was sitting in our carpets - GROSS!

Suddenly everyone wanted to vacuum. The kids were quickly cleaning up their rooms so they could have a turn to vacuum. It feels so much cleaner in here.

Girls Group #1

2011-07-05T13:54:00.002-06:00

Lisa's Girls Group was at our house this week. Since it was right before the 4th of July, we decided that we would design and draw our own 4th of July t-shirts with fabric markers. Then we decorated star cookies. A lot of girls were out of town, but the ones that came had a fun time.

Arizona

2011-07-01T14:37:00.004-06:00

Earlier this spring, I was doing a lot of research on investment real estate. We decided that the Phoenix, AZ market was a prime real estate investment market. The last week of April, I went down to Phoenix for an afternoon and looked at a ton of foreclosed houses within our investment parameters. We made a bunch of offers on different properties, and ended up getting a contract on a nice 3 bedroom, 2 bath rambler house with tile through-out on a quiet cul-de-sac with a nice big back yard. Yesterday we closed on it. Now we just need to find some renters.

(for some reason this is the only picture I can get to load, nice view of the garage!)

Old McDonald's...I mean Grandma and Grandad's Farm

2011-06-16T09:42:00.003-06:00

Grandma and Grandad's house is turning into a farm. Their baby ducks are getting bigger and the kids like to play with them while the ducks still let them and before they start living in the pond.

Last week they got 2 baby pigs.

This week they got a steer. Grandma named him Whitey, but Eric calls him Hamburger.

Summer Fun

2011-06-16T09:07:00.003-06:00

It's been a couple of weeks since school's been out and luckily I haven't heard too many complaints yet of the kids being bored. We have an activity for everyday that if the kids get their chores done we get to do the activity. Their favorite is Wednesdays when we take a picnic and go to a different park each week.

The kids love playing in the splash pool and running through the sprinklers with their friends and then relaxing in the hammock.

Every week during the summer Lisa is going to a "Girls Skills Group" where the girls her age in the neighborhood get together at someone's house for an activity to learn a "skill." Last week they made different shapes out of bread dough and cooked them. This week they're making a father's day gift and learning to wrap a present. I'm not very creative, so I need to put my thinking cap on to come up with ideas for when it's our turn to be in charge. Suggestions are appreciated.

Last Friday we took the training wheels off of Lisa's bike and she took off! She's been doing fantastic. She gets me nervous though because she starts doing Evil Kanevil speedy stuff and I cringe waiting for her to crash. Luckily she hasn't had any major crashes.

Bowling

2011-06-16T08:58:00.004-06:00

After school let out for the summer we went bowling with Saundra and Shannon and some of her kids. Our kids LOVE bowling. The bowling alley we went to had these cool metal ramps that help the kids bowl. They put the ball at the top and roll it down the ramp and down the lane.

Lisa's turn

Eric's turn

David was happy just hanging out with Grandma. At the end Scott helped him roll a ball down the lane. He loved it. It was a good thing it was at the end or else no one would have been able to bowl without David helping them.

Basement continued...

2011-06-16T08:45:00.004-06:00

A few weeks ago the plumber came and finished the bathroom.

He put on the sink faucet and toilet.

And put the tub/shower fixtures on.

This week the painter came back and did touch-ups. The carpenter is supposed to put on the door handles/hardware etc this week. It seems that the flood potential in the area has gone down and our basement is still dry so I think we'll try and get the carpet installed next week. Then it will be time to hang out and enjoy it down there - finally!

Yesterday I found a steal on a weight set for the gym downstairs. The trick is how to get it down there. I can't wait for the gym to be operational.

Week of "Lasts"

2011-06-03T12:24:00.006-06:00

On Tuesday was Eric's last soccer game. With all the wet weather this spring, we had a lot of make-up games. Most of the season it was a struggle to get him to play, but then the last few games he did really well and was excited about playing and scoring goals.

This team picture perfectly captured the personalities of everyone on the team.

Today was Lisa's last day of Kindergarten. I can't believe how fast this school year has gone by. I have seen a lot of growth, maturing, and learning in both English and Spanish in her over this past year. She loves school; both the learning and socializing. We sure are proud of what a good girl she is.

This is Bob her bus driver. He drives the morning kindergarteners home. He is a nice guy.

This is Senora Perez, Lisa's kindergarten teacher. She was really great, especially considering how many kids she had in her classroom. She is transfering to a different school to start a new Spanish Immersion Program, Lisa will miss not being able to visit her next year.

Chef David

2011-06-02T10:50:00.001-06:00

David's first cooking experience.

Memorial Day Weekend

2011-06-02T09:35:00.009-06:00

Even with the rainy weather we managed to squeeze some fun in between the storms.

On Friday night, Grandma and Grandad Heer came home from their mission to Norway. The kids painted them a sign and signed it with their handprints. (Eric fell asleep on the way to the airport so he was still a little grumpy from waking up for this picture)

Lisa and Eric were big helpers with all the luggage.

On Saturday we went down to IFA and the kids helped pick out 4 baby ducks for Grandma and Grandad's pond. When Dad was asking David about it, not surprising he said the ducks said "woof"

We had wanted to go camping this weekend, but the weather forcast put a damper on our plans. Sunday evening we decided to at least have a cookout in the backyard. We roasted hot dogs and made smores.

Lisa was pretty good at roasting her marshmellows so Scott interviewed her about it:

Eric always tells the same joke, "What's brown and sticky?" The answer changes almost everytime he tells it, but when he started eating his smore he was getting pretty gooey so I asked him what was brown and sticky. This time the answer I gave was "Eric!"

Everytime I would get a graham cracker out to help someone make a smore, a "graham cracker snatcher" would come grab it off the table and put it in their mouth or on their plate. He was not very sneaky so it was easy to find the culprit - DAVID! After a while he had a bulging mouth full and a plate full.

Just when we were finishing up, it started to sprinkle - perfect timing.

On Monday we got all the bikes back in working order and took a family bike ride on the new paved trail they just finished by our house. The boys chilled out in the bike trailer behind my bike and Lisa rode like a wild woman showing her stuff to me and Dad.

During the rain we got some inside work done, relaxed and watched some movies. What a weekend!

Karate Kid

2011-05-21T20:50:00.003-06:00

Lisa went to a birthday party at a karate studio today. They learned some karate moves and played some karate games. Afterwards, she informed me "this was the coolest birthday party EVER!"

5K Challenge

2011-05-21T20:36:00.003-06:00

There was a Community 5K Challenge today in Centerville that I ran in. The Challenge part was to train for 6 weeks to either walk or run a 5K.

The last 5K race I ran was 4 years ago with some friends in Tampa and it was a lot of fun, but then life happened and I eventually stopped running. At the beginning of this year I made a goal to run a 5K again so I started training and for the last few months I've been running between 3.5 to 4 miles a day. So today was my official 5K race day. I surprised myself by running it 2 minutes faster than I usually do, so that made me happy. Scott and the kids were there cheering me on which I appreciated their support. Lisa ran the last straight-a-way section with me. I am proud of myself for actually achieving a New Year's goal instead of just writing it down in January and forgetting about it. My next goal is to train to run a 10K that they have in July at midnight. I hope I can do it.

The Garden

2011-05-21T20:14:00.003-06:00

Around these parts it's been RAINY!!! You'd think we live in Seattle or something. Last Saturday it was dry and sunny so we started prepping the garden. We weeded, spread some mulch and our very kind new neighbor helped us out with his rototiller.

On Tuesday we planted and with the weather we've been having around here, we crossed our fingers that it wouldn't freeze and that the plants wouldn't wash away with all the rain. A few days later we had a HUGE thunderstorm that ended with TONS of hail. The next morning the little plants seemed to have survived.

We planted lots of roma tomatoes (last year they were delicious and plentiful), cherry tomatoes, pear tomatoes, green bell peppers, red bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, zucchini, butternut squash, cucumbers, watermelon, jack-o-lantern pumpkins, cinderella pumpkins, carrots, green beans, and corn. (It think that was all)

A couple days later Eric went out there to see if there was any food out there yet. Lisa and Eric love to eat food straight out of the garden.

David made sure we were all doing it right from his stroller. I actually had him out so he could help, but he kept running away to the front yard by the street - so he finally had to be captured and constrained in his stroller.

Basement continued....

2011-05-21T19:43:00.003-06:00

Let there be light! The electricians came and did their thing amd hung all the lights, put on all the switches and covers and now we can actually see at night down there. I think it turned out great.

The main areas all have canned lights.

This is the bathroom vanity light.

The walkway to the bedrooms have these sconces.

And the bedrooms have regular flushmount lights.

Then the glass people came and installed the wall mirror in the bathroom.

On Monday the plumber is coming to put on the fixtures and toilet. Then the painter is coming back to do touch-up paint.....So close to done!!!

Lisa's 6th Birthday

2011-05-04T15:27:00.006-06:00

I can't believe it, but on Monday Lisa turned 6 years old! She knew EXACTLY what she wanted too. She drew me a picture of instructions so I wouldn't forget. It included balloons, invitations, strawberry pancakes for breakfast, macaroni and cheese for lunch, tacos for dinner, a star birthday cake, presents, and people at her party.

For dinner we were going to surprise her and go to Chucky Cheese's, but unfortunately on Sunday night Scott came down with a stomach bug and was under the weather on Monday so we revised the plan and made homemade personal pizza's for dinner (she likes to make hers into a smiley face.)

Afterwards we played "Pin the Tail on the Donkey" The kids LOVE that game. David wasn't into getting blind folded, he just liked spinning around in circles.

Lisa was pretty specific about the decorations she wanted on her star cake. She always is wanting the multi-colored licorice and was convinced that the blue ones would look great around the edges. I thought a star is a basic shape and should be easy to make - WRONG! It took some work and some dusty geometry skills to make a one round cake into a pentagon and the other round cake into triangles that all fit together to make a uniform looking star.

Eric REALLY likes to blow out birthday candles and was poised to help Lisa. We had to threaten him with no cake if he blew out her candles. She did it all by herself in one breath.

She got spoiled with too many presents, but she's a good kid. She got a new shirt/shorts outfit, a necklace with an "L" on it, sparkly flip-flops that she has rarely taken off since she got them, and a Barbie. I think the Barbie won the "Favorite Present" prize - when I went to check on her that night I saw this...

Lisa is a sweet, friendly, smart girl and we are so glad that she is part of our family.

Basement continued...

2011-05-04T11:04:00.004-06:00

After a brief hiatus due to lighting ordering issues and contractor scheduling issues we are back at it.

The cabinet shop came and installed the cabinets in our laundry room. I LOVE THEM!!! I think they did a good job on matching the existing cabinet stain. I love all the extra storage. I like the clothes bar to hang things on. Now all the "junk" ie cleaning supplies, laundry supplies etc that was on the countertop is in the cupboards. I got small laundry baskets for sorting the laundry that fit on the countertop instead of having big piles of sorted laundry on the floor. And now the floor is clear so we can actually walk on it, and you know what I found under all the clothes on the floor - we have tile under there :)

Before:

After:

The cabinets were also installed for the bathroom vanity. In this picture they look kind of dark, but they are a natural maple. I still need to get handles for the laundry and bathroom cupboards and drawers.

Yesterday the cultured marble was installed in the shower. That shower has been kind of a pain since before the framing, but I think it turned out really nice.

They also installed the cultured marble sink/counter on the bathroom vanity in the picture above. They forgot one piece of the backsplash and the wall mirror, so they will be coming back to put those on.

The electricians are coming tomorrow to finish all the electical work and install all the lights - Let there be light!

Sewing Project: Lisa's skirt

2011-05-04T10:30:00.002-06:00

For my quilting/sewing class for April we made skirts. There are 5 different fabrics that are sewn together and then gathered and a 6th fabric is sewn on for the top and bottom. They are super easy to make and I think they are cute. The good news is Lisa actually likes it and wants to wear it all the time.

We were also supposed to make ties for the boys. I have the same fabric that is the top and bottom of Lisa's skirt for their ties, but we are still needing to schedule the tie class for those that did skirts during our regular monthly meeting.

My quilt is still needing the binding. Maybe I can get to it in the next few weeks.

Easter

2011-04-27T14:29:00.006-06:00

We forgot to decorate eggs this year, but the Easter Bunny left us plenty of plastic ones hidden around the house. Eric woke Lisa up around 6:15 a.m. The night before I told them they couldn't touch anything until everyone was out there so they carefully scoped out their easter baskets and looked for eggs without touching anything. Eric decided the Easter Bunny was just as good as Santa Clause because he brought him some good stuff in his basket.

David didn't care about his easter basket much. He was just interested in drinking his bottle. About half-way through his bottle he was walking around and found some eggs that were hidden.

It was funny to watch him. It must be instinct, because he knew to bring the egg and put it in the basket. Aunt Patrice (an egg farmer) would be so proud!

When everyone was dressed for church I attempted to take some photos. Eric was not happy about it and David kept trying to escape. Finally Eric got in a better mood but David kept trying to walk away, so Eric was holding him by the collar of his shirt to make him stay. I think we got one that was ok.

Haircuts

2011-04-27T14:12:00.005-06:00

4 out of the 5 people in our family needed a haircut badly this weekend, so I finally got them all rounded up to get the job done. Eric needed it the worst and he HATES to get his hair cut so he went first. I don't know where he got his hair, but it has to be kept short or it sticks up all crazy.

Lisa keeps changing her mind from wanting long hair like Aunt Heather to wanting really short hair like her teacher. She finally decided she would cut it for easter. We compromised with a bob. When her hair is shorter, there are so much less tangles so it makes it easier on her and me every morning.

Before...

After...

After watching the 2 older kids, David couldn't wait for his turn. He kept trying to climb up on the kitchen chair by himself. He did amazingly well. He liked wearing the cape and he sat there very still the whole time while I cut his hair.

April Showers

2011-04-18T12:55:00.005-06:00

April showers (whether they be rain or snow) better bring May flowers because we have had a TON of moisture this spring! There are several families in our neighborhood who have had their basements flooded this spring with all of the water that we've had. So far (crossing our fingers) we've stayed dry. We bought our carpet for the basement on Saturday, but I think we will wait to have it installed until it dries up a little bit.

On our anniversary last month, Scott made a slideshow on the computer with family pictures and has the song "I don't want to live with out you" by Foreigner as the soundtrack. The kids especially LOVE to watch it. Anytime they hear that song, they start yelling "Slideshow!" and start running to the office.

Random picture of the kids in the back of the truck watching a movie while Scott and I cut down a broken limb off a tree at the apartments.

The fam on the way to church yesterday.

Last night after Family Home Evening we decorated popcorn balls. The kids got a popcorn ball decorating kit for Christmas last year that I forgot we had. They each made an interesting creation - they are both snowman faces in case you couldn't tell.

Spring Soccer

2011-04-13T14:48:00.003-06:00

Spring soccer started for Eric last night. He was so excited! All day he kept saying, "I'm so excited, I'm so excited, I can't wait, I can't wait" (He's in red in the middle)

His friend Hank from our neighborhood is on his team and Hank's dad is the coach.

Watching this age of kids play soccer is pretty entertaining. At one end of the field there was a hill that some spectator kids were rolling down. A couple of players thought that looked pretty fun, so they ran off the field and started rolling down the hill in the middle of the game. There were a couple of times that Eric was right in the middle of the action but instead of going after the ball he was standing there daydreaming or something - he was oblivious to what was going on around him. He was pretty proud of himself though for scoring a goal (too bad it was the other teams goal)

Basement continued...

2011-04-07T10:39:00.003-06:00

Yeah - the basement is painted! We have 3-tone paint with the ceiling and trim white and the walls are a tan color. I think it turned out nice.

I also think the window sills turned out nice. It took the carpenter a long time to make them with the crown underneath, but I think he did a good job.

The bathroom vanity and cabinets are being installed on Saturday.

This week we picked out all the light fixtures and last night we went and looked at carpet. It's close to being finished!

Is it Spring?

2011-04-03T14:06:00.003-06:00

On Friday and Saturday we had such beautiful spring weather with lots of sun and temperatures in the 70's.

This morning we woke up to this...

When I get Spring Fever it is always so disappointing when it snows. I feel bad for my poor tulips that are trying to come up and then get covered with snow.

On a side note, David always keeps me smiling :) We have a set of plastic food for the kids toy kitchen. David always find this chicken leg and chews on it. Even if we hide it at the bottom of the toy box, he still finds it and walks around chewing on it. We all think it's pretty funny.

Goal update

2011-04-01T10:39:00.002-06:00

I was reading on my friend's blog that she was determined not to have heart disease since it took her mother at an early age, so she made a goal every year of how many workouts she was going to have during the year. I thought that would be a good motivating goal, so in January I challenged myself to have 200 workouts during the year.

My criteria for a "workout" was more than just a walk around the neighborhood with the kids. For it to count as a workout it has to be a minimum of 30 minutes (preferably 45-60 minutes) doing something that makes me sweat and keeps my heart rate in the target zone.

I've been tracking it through the year and now that we're through the first quarter, I am ahead of schedule with 72 workouts under my belt - Yeah!

My little fairy

2011-03-29T13:35:00.003-06:00

The other day the older kids were playing a game where they were in space and had to wear gravity packs, so they both put backpacks on. They decided David needed one too and outfitted him accordingly. Surprisingly he didn't mind. They put his paci in his backpack for safe-keeping. He looked like a cute little fairy to me, and walked around all afternoon with it on. I think he forgot it was there because when I took it off, he looked surpised to see that that thing had been hooked onto him.

He also has taken on the chore of putting the ironing board away. When he sees me putting it away he runs over and holds onto it "helping" me carry it to the closet.

New Furniture

2011-03-29T13:19:00.002-06:00

A family on our street was giving away their entertainment center because it was too big for their family room. It is an armoire style which is what I was looking for because I don't like looking at a TV and all the components, wires etc if I'm not watching it. It also keeps the kids out of it.

It is solid wood instead of particle board like a lot of them that I've looked at. It was originally a natural stained wood, but the lady sanded it and painted it black.

On Saturday we gladly took it off their hands. There were a couple of knicks and scrapes so I repainted it. I think it turned out really nice and it fits in nicely in our family room and looks a lot better than the TV stand we used to use.

Random stuff

2011-03-21T10:15:00.004-06:00

Nothing too significant has been going on that seems to be blog worthy, but I guess there are a bunch of little things to write about.

On March 10th Scott and I had our 11th wedding anniversary. Grandma watched the kids that weekend so we could go out and celebrate. It was nice to be together without kids for a change.

Our anniversary always lands right around March Madness. On our honeymoon we went to the NCAA championships in Las Vegas. It's a fun thing to remember this time of year. This year we're having fun watching BYU play. I have a bracket contest at work. The prize is a day off. I doubt I win.

Some ladies in our neighborhood started getting together for quilting classes once a month. I have only tied quilts before, so this is different and fun. My first quilt is almost done. I'll post pictures when it's finished. For Easter we're not really doing a quilting project, but we're making matching skirts and ties for our kids. Hopefully mine turn out at least wear-able.

I have been doing a lot of research on real estate investing lately. It is interesting and exciting and I've learned a lot.

I started running again. It is nice to go out in the early mornings when it is nice and cool and quiet.

Lisa learned to tie her shoes last week. Now she offers to tie anything that has laces.

She also picked up David's bowl and started feeding him one day. They both love it. Sometimes he won't eat if I try to feed him, but he gobbles it up if Lisa holds his spoon. She waits for me to set down his bowl to do something and then takes the spoon so she can feed him. She is a great big sister!

On Monday she was playing outside with the neighbor girl. Lisa walked in front of the girl right when she went to throw a frisbee and got hit pretty good right between the eyes. It got pretty swollen and bruised pretty bad. Now it is green and has leaked down to her eyes. It looks pretty gross but she said it doesn't hurt unless it's touched.

David is getting in more and more things. He also learned how to go up and down the stairs by himself. He says "woof" when he sees a dog. A neighbor walks her dog to the bus stop and both the boys love her dog. David says 'woof' all morning. Yesterday he saw the lady at church and kept saying, 'woof, woof' It was pretty funny.

And a final picture, we think we have pretty cute kids.

The Basement continued...still

2011-03-21T10:00:00.003-06:00

Well the basement is still a work in progress although last week we did have some progress.

The doors were hung and the casings were put up.
(The single door on the left is the kitchen pantry. The double doors are what replace the little door we had before that led to upstairs)

The closet shelves were made.

The baseboard was put up.

The window sills and crown are supposed to be finished in the next couple days and then prepping and painting will begin. yeah!! I talked to the cabinet shop on Friday and they should be done at the end of this week. This last portion of the project has become logistically intense.

The kids (and the parents) are anxious to have a downstairs play room again. By the time it is done, it will be summer and then they'll just want to play outside anyway. Oh well, there's always next winter!

The Basement Continued...

2011-03-07T19:06:00.004-07:00

The basement project is coming right along. Today the tile in the kitchen and the bathroom was finished.

It is dim down there since the lights aren't installed yet so the tile looks darker in these pictures than it really is.

On Wednesday the doors and trim are being delivered and the carpenter will start installing them on Thursday. On Monday the painting begins.

Last week we ordered the bathroom vanity and scheduled the guy to measure for the cultured marble.

It's so close to being done!

As a side project, our laundry room is short on storage and looks like the junk yard of the house, so while we were ordering the downstairs vanity from the cabinet shop, we also ordered some upper cabinets to go all the way around the laundry room to match the existing cabinets on the bottom. I can't wait for them to be installed in 2 weeks and then I'll be able to see the laundry room floor and countertop!

Happy 4th Birthday Eric!

2011-02-25T09:14:00.008-07:00

Our little guy turned 4 on the 16th, and we had a family party for him on Sunday. He was so excited to celebrate with his cousins, aunts and Grandma.

He is still infatuated with Thomas the train, so once again in the Rasmussen tradition he got a train cake with 4 cars since he is 4 years old.

About 3 months ago we were at a Chevron gas station and they were selling a Fire Truck. Ever since then Eric has wanted one. For his birthday he kept asking for a firefighter. I was trying to find out if he wanted some kind of action figure or something and he would always say he wanted the firefighter from the gas station. A couple of weeks ago we went to the toy store to look for fire trucks. He found some that he thought were pretty neat, but when we saw them all he said he still wanted the one from the gas station, so that's what he got. Funny kid. Grandma hooked him up with a fire station that had a fire fighter and now that's all he will play with.

Some things about Eric.

-He is a fun, loveable little kid that loves to give hugs.

-He's pretty smart for his age and even helps Lisa do her homework.

-He LOVES doing puzzles and is really good at doing them.

-He's a deep sleeper and he snores. He is an early bird, but likes to be alone in the mornings. If you try to talk to him before he has adjusted to being awake, he is VERY GRUMPY!

-He is clumsy, mainly because he doesn't pay attention. He's our only kid to have stitches and he's had them twice. The day of this picture he fell off the kitchen chair and hit the tile floor mouth first. Luckily he didn't lose any teeth.

-He loves trains, cars, helicopters, fire trucks and army guys. He lines them up all over the house.

-His favorite foods are PB&J sandwiches, noodles and oatmeal, but isn't a big fan of ice cream because it's too cold. He rarely eats much dinner, but more than makes up for it at his favorite meal - breakfast!

-He likes to do anything Lisa is doing.

-He tries really hard to be a good brother.

WE LOVE YOU ERIC!

The Basement continued...

2011-02-24T12:06:00.007-07:00

We have walls!!

The sheetrock was delivered with a big crane-like truck.

They removed the basement window to get the sheetrock in.

Both boys (and me) loved watching it through the window.

It was amazing to watch the drywallers work. Two guys hung the whole basement in about 10 hours! Then another guy came and put on the corners. Then a crew of three came and taped and mudded. Then sanding and more mudding and more sanding. Then 2 guys textured the walls and ceilings and more sanding again. We did pretty good at keeping the sheetrock dust contained downstairs, but this is definately the dirtiest part of the project. They did an awesome job.

Next week the finish carpentry should get put in (i.e hang the doors, trim, baseboards, closets, window sills etc.) Then paint and flooring and we're done!

Awesome finds

2011-02-11T12:35:00.003-07:00

I don't know about you but every house we have lived in I have struggled to keep my spices organized. Last week when I was cooking something that used a spice I don't use frequently, I got fed up with digging through every bottle in the cupboard to find what I wanted. So my search began. I wanted some spice organizer thing, but I don't like "stuff" on my countertops so even though I found some cool looking spice racks for the counter I continued my search. Then, I found IT! It's the Spice Stack. It has labels you can put on the drawers so you know what's in there and then each drawer pulls out and down to give you access. I LOVE IT!!

My second find is also liberating but in a different way. When we moved to UT we stayed with Scott's mom for 7 months while we looked for a house, so most of our stuff was in a storage unit. I had a mental inventory of all of our stuff and as we unpacked I checked everything off my list except for the mattress pad and "pee protector" for Lisa's bed. I looked EVERYWHERE for them and couldn't find them anywhere. I bought new ones but occassionally still go sifting through stuff because it bugs me that they just vanished. Fast forward to last weekend when we were rearranging the boxes in the basement to get ready for the sheetrock to get hung. In our old house we had a countertop microwave, but this house has an over-the-range microwave so our old one was in a box marked "microwave" and I never opened it because that was all that was in there...I thought. I was going to sell it on the internet so I opened the box to take a picture and low and behold what did I find? I had used the bedding as padding around the microwave. I'm glad to find it so we can use it, but also because now it's one less thing to drive me nuts.

100 days of Kindergarten

2011-02-08T14:55:00.003-07:00

Yesterday was Lisa's 100th day of going to Kindergarten. I went and volunteered in her class for the celebration. She seemed more excited to have me come than to be doing the fun activities her teacher had planned.

Why can't they be like this all the time?

2011-02-08T14:48:00.002-07:00

On Saturday Scott went to the Jazz game with some guys from the neighborhood. I got a kids movie out of the Red Box, we all made personal pizza's and watched a movie.

I went to get David something and I came back to this picture. They are on each others case so often, it was nice to see them like this for a change.

The Basement continued...

2011-02-08T14:39:00.005-07:00

After the electricians finished, Scott went to work running all the speaker wire, conduit etc for his home theater. It should be nice.

On Friday the insulators came and put in the insulation. While they were here, we had them put some extra in the attic.

The drywaller's should be here this week to start hanging the sheetrock. That will be a huge milestone on the project.

And the loser is...

2011-02-08T14:28:00.002-07:00

Last week David was walking and fell onto the corner of the window sill. The window sill won. He cut open the side of his eye. This picture is the next morning. It turned into a big black eye. It looked pretty gross.

One small step for man....

2011-02-08T14:26:00.001-07:00

David finally took his first steps a couple weeks ago. He gets better and better at it every day.

Love

2011-01-26T12:59:00.003-07:00

A couple of days ago, a girl that I went to high school with found her 20 month old son had died some time during the night from what they think was SIDS. As I was reading his obituary today, my heart hurt for their family. They were blessed with the knowledge that they will see their baby again, but in the mean time I can't imagine how empty their hearts must feel.

This just reminds me how fragile life is and makes me want to hug my kids tight and tell them I love them. We need to take every oppurtunity to tell those we love that we love them.

The Kids

2011-01-17T19:25:00.002-07:00

I just went and picked up the kids annual photo together. I think it turned out pretty cute.

Lisa's FHE

2011-01-17T19:19:00.003-07:00

This week for Family Home Evening, Lisa wanted to be in charge of everything. When she was done preparing she handed everyone a "program" so we would know what order we were going in. She gave a nice lesson on being polite and we played a game she made up using the alphabet.

The Basement continued....

2011-01-17T18:53:00.005-07:00

There's been a lot of progress on the basement this week....

Last weekend Scott got out the sledgehammer and the saws-all and demolished a couple of walls at the bottom of the stairs to make a bigger doorway so we can put french doors at the bottom of the stairs.

Before:

After:

We also changed the plans so instead of having an unfinished storage space under the stairs, we are finishing that space and all the components for the home theater will be back there. Because of the change we needed a door going into the cold storage room, so Scott framed one in.

Last week we had the electricians here. They pulled all the wires and put in all the boxes for the outlets, switches and lights in the basement. I'm getting so excited for it to be finished.

While they were here we had them put in some lights in the garage. There used to be 2 bare light bulbs, now there are 4 eight foot lights. Now there is some LIGHT! It is so bright in there that at night it lights up the front lawn through the windows.

Today Scott ordered all the wiring for his surround sound so he will install that this coming weekend when it arrives.

Next is insulation.....

Orthodontist anyone?

2011-01-17T18:51:00.003-07:00

Now that David finally has some teeth, it looks like some visits to an orthodontist might be in his future.

Why did we move from Florida?!?!?!?

2011-01-11T00:15:00.003-07:00

Now that it's been over a couple of weeks that the temperatures have not even made it above freezing here in UT, I keep thinking to myself, Why, oh, why did we leave those most pleasant Tampa winters? Single digit temperatures are not my friend! I feel like my fingers are on the brink of frostbite everytime I am outside more than 5 minutes. I really don't know how those people in places like Minnesota and Chicago can handle living there. I miss those occasional Tampa winter nights where they measure the number of hours it will be below freezing instead of here where I am counting the days until it will be above freezing. What I'd give today to be looking out our back window at this again....

David's 1 year portrait

2011-01-08T20:24:00.002-07:00

I picked up David's 1 year portraits the other day. I think they capture his cute, fun personality.

Christmas 2010 & New Years

2011-01-02T22:37:00.013-07:00

We celebrated Christmas with Scott's family on Dec 18 since his mom was going to OH for Christmas break. The kids were so excited to play with their cousins, we hardly ever saw them. Saundra made so much yummy food she could have fed the whole neighborhood! There were lots of gifts exchanged.

Can you say "Grandma is Eric's hero?"

Earplugs required when she goes at it.

"Katie, how does this work?"

On Christmas Eve we went down to my Uncle Doug's house and had brunch with his family and my sisters family. Good company (except for my whiny baby) and once again, yummy food (do you see a recurrent food theme here?)

That night Scott's sister came over for a nice Christmas Eve dinner.

The kids LOVE to play with Katie.

We read the Christmas Story from the Bible and had our Nativity puppets act out the story as Scott read. Then the kids got to open their one Christmas Eve present - PJ's. (I thought I got a picture, but I guess not) The kids left graham crackers for santa and tangerines for the reindeer with a note and they were off to bed. They were so excited they could hardly stay in bed.

On the other hand, I found David trying to escape all the fun we were having.

Christmas morning the kids slept in until 8 am which is unusual but always nice. We opened our stockings and then had cinnamon rolls and sugar cereal for breakfast. Katie came over when we were getting ready for breakfast. It was fun to have her come for Christmas morning.

After breakfast the kids were ready to open some presents. Santa spoiled us this year.

David likes his new mobility to walk in the middle of a room now instead of having to hold onto couches and walls.

Lisa and Eric LOVE their Pillow Pets.

Scott bought me a new computer. Can I say THANK YOU enough???? Our old computer was seriously almost 7 years old!

I got Scott a Sony Blu-ray player. We spent the afternoon watching movies/napping and eating while the kids played with all their new toys.

That night we went over to Scott's sister Shannon's house to hang out. Once again the kids disappeared with their cousins until Eric had an accident and we had to cut our visit short. It's nice to have family close and it was fun to hang out for a while.

The whole Christmas weekend was SOOO enjoyable. It seems like we had been living in a whirlwind for the last 2 months and it was just nice to be with the family and relax and do NOTHING for a while.

For New Year's Eve we went to Shannon's house. There were lots of people, food, games, and fun. By the end I was getting tired, but the kids were still running at full steam. Shannon took some cute pictures of my kids and put them on her blog, so I borrowed them.

After she took this picture, Lexi said, "This is my Lisa"

Eric was being very "academic" as he helped put together puzzles.

My favorite Christmas decoration in the whole neighborhood

2010-12-26T18:56:00.002-07:00

For those of you who don't recognize this iconic image, our neighbors have the leg lamp from the movie "A Christmas Story."

It's awesome!

Visit with Santa

2010-12-22T13:55:00.004-07:00

The whole family went down to see Santa. On the way in, the kids were wondering where Santa's reindeer were, they soon forgot their concern when they saw Jolly Ole Saint Nick himself.

When I've asked Eric what he wants Santa to bring him he always says just a candy cane. He was pretty happy when he got one and it wasn't even Christmas morning yet! He told Santa he wanted a Thomas the Train. (surprise, surprise) Lisa wanted a Barbie.

'Tis the Season

2010-12-14T09:03:00.004-07:00

Christmastime is my favorite time of year. I especially love the lights and music that put me in the Spirit of Christmas.

We put up our Christmas decorations the first weekend in December. We have a fake tree, so I had to assemble it and put the lights on before the kids could decorate it. They were so excited, I was hurrying as fast as I could. I told them they needed to clean their rooms before we could decorate. (I knew that chore would buy me some time :) They both kept coming out of their rooms and seeing how high the branches were each time. Eric kept coming over and kneeling by me and saying, "Mom, this is going to be great!"

While I was putting the lights on the tree, Scott made sugar cookie dough with the kids. While the dough was in the fridge, the kids got to put the decorations on the tree. They love to look at and remember all the decorations that we have. It is such an exciting time for little kids!

Having David mobile this Christmas, we made our tree bare on the bottom few branches in order to discourage him from messing with the tree and decorations. To my surprise, he hasn't even touched it...yet.

After we decorated the tree it was time to cut out the cookie shapes. Then everyone's favorite part - frosting and eating them!

Then my favorite part - sitting with all of the lights off except for the tree lights and listening to Christmas music.

There was lots of laughing and playing around that day. I've tucked that memory away and I know that when my kids get older I will look back on days like that when we were all together and having fun and I will smile.

Every couple of days Lisa will ask Eric if he knows why we have Christmas. If he says he doesn't know or if he ignores her question, Lisa explains to him that we have Christmas so that we can remember when baby Jesus was born. Even though she is young and Santa is such a big part of Christmas for kids, I am glad she knows and thinks about the real reason we celebrate Christmas.

Apartment Remodel

2010-12-10T11:49:00.008-07:00

My parents have 21 rental units that I have been managing for them while they are on their mission. At the begining of November one of the units became vacant. It was built in the 70's and had never been updated (think harvest gold appliances and yellow honeycomb patterned linoleum floors era) So we decided to pretty much rip out everything and update it all. It was a big time consuming project that took a little over 3 weeks to complete. This is what we did:

THE KITCHEN:

The existing cabinets were that dark brown 70's wood and many of them were falling apart. The countertops, appliances and linoleum were harvest gold. We ripped everything out down to the concrete floor and back to the sheetrock. It got a fresh coat of paint, new maple cabinets, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances including adding an over-the-range microwave, dishwasher, and disposal. A new sink and faucet, new 2" blinds, a new light fixture and a new ceramic tile floor.

DINING AREA:

In this room we textured and painted the walls and got a new light fixture. It had the same lovely yellow honeycomb linoleum as the kitchen so we replaced it with ceramic tile.

Scott learned how and practiced laying tile in the kitchen and dining room. He did an awesome job! Now he can lay it in our basement.

LIVING ROOM:

There was wood paneling on one of the walls, the paint was literally peeling off the wall, there was brown shag carpet, the blinds were broken and wouldn't open anymore and were missing about half the slats. It was soooo dark in the whole apartment it was like a cave in there.

We removed the paneling, textured and painted the walls, put up new vertical blinds, new light fixtures and new carpet. Throughout the whole apartment we also painted the old brown wood doors white.

BEDROOMS:

The bedrooms required the least amount of work. We textured and painted the walls and replaced the brown shag carpet. All of the window seals were originally tiled, but they were all chipped and broken. So we replaced them with a new PVC-type window sill. We also got new 2" blinds. The original light fixtures had already been replaced with ceiling fan lights that were still in good condition so we left them.

LAUNDRY AREA:

The laundry area was carpeted and had the same cabinets as the kitchen. This hallway/laundry area was definately the darkest place in the apartment. We textured and painted the walls, replaced the carpet with ceramic tile, replaced the cabinets with ones that matched the kitchen and replaced the light fixture with a nice bright flourescent light.

BATHROOM:

The existing shower surround was tiled and the grout was full of old mold and mildew - use your imagination, it was gross! We cut out the old sheetrock with the tile attached and put up new sheetrock. While we had everything ripped out we replaced the plumbing in the shower. Then we put in a marble surround. We replaced the old sink and vanity with a new sink, faucet, vanity and light fixture. The old toilet was broken so we replaced that as well. The old baseboards had a lot of moisture damage so we replaced them with vinyl baseboards. We finished that room off with new ceramic tile as well.

I think it all turned out pretty nice. My brother-in-law and one of my parents neighbors that helps do apt maintenance helped us do some of the stuff we didn't know how to do. We learned some new skills and that's always good, especially when we can apply them to our own basement in a few months. I like doing work like this when you can see a finished product, but I am SOOO glad it is done!!!

What happened to November?

2010-12-09T09:53:00.006-07:00

It seems like it was just Halloween - and according to our blog it was! We've been so busy in November the blog got pushed to the back burner. Now for a little update:

Most of November was consumed by doing a complete apartment remodel (I'll go into that in a seperate post later)

Nov 9 we had our first snowfall of the season. On her way to school Lisa was so excited to come home and play in the snow. She was so disappointed that 2 days in a row the snow melted before she came home from Kindergarten. I assured her there would be plenty of snow for her to play in later this winter.

Lisa finished her first term of school and we had SEP (student/educator/parent) conferences. She received an award for being an outstanding student. Her teacher had nothing but good things to say about her. During our conference, Lisa and Mrs Perez demonstrated to me some of the Spanish that she has learned this year. She is getting quite a vocabulary! We are so proud of her.

On Nov 23, we experienced "Blizzard 2010." The National Weather Service issued a blizzard warning which hardly ever happens here. Everything shut down around the valley. Businesses sent their employees home and closed early (except for the post office of course - I called in and stayed home from work that night!) and they told everyone to stay off the roads. There was a lot of hype for not a lot of results. We only got a couple inches of snow, but it was really windy and cold. The biggest result was here was an arctic blast that kept everything freezing cold in the single digits for over a week. On Thanksgiving it was -2 degrees. The cold weather kept us indoors for most of the holiday weekend. The "blizzard" didn't bring much snow, but the next week we got unexpectedly dumped on for over 24 hours. The kids love to shovel the snow! Actually, Lisa shovels it and Eric rakes it.

We had a very nice and laid back Thanksgiving Day. We went to Scott's mom's house with one of his sisters. The kids were in heaven playing with Aunt Katie all day! Saundra went all out and made a delicious meal. It was the first meal that David ate nothing but real food with his newly acquired 4 teeth. Scott made two different BBQ sauces from his BBQ University book. I made a sweet potato casserole. I normally don't like sweet potatoes at all, but if you add enough butter, sugar and pecans anything is good right? ;) I also made an apple pie.

The Basement Continued....

2010-12-09T09:13:00.005-07:00

Slowly but surely we're making progress on our basement. At the end of October we had the plumber come and rough-in the plumbing for the bathroom and the kitchen in the basement.

We also had him put in a water softener.

Then I splurged and spoiled myself by getting a circulating pump that always circulates hot water through the house so when you turn on a faucet you immediately have hot water instead of waiting forever for the hot water to reach the other end of the house. It's nice!

Next is the electrician. I just had one come today to give me an estimate. Hopefully we can get that done in the next couple of weeks.

Halloween Weekend

2010-11-03T21:49:00.003-06:00

Halloween lasted all weekend around here.

The costumes this year were: Lisa as Tweety Bird, Eric as Batman, and David as the devil. Lately Eric has been running around just in his underwear, this is unusual for him because he usually insists on being fully clothed. Anyway, when I tell him to go get his pants on he will tell me he does have pants on - they are the same pants that Wonder Woman wears. (Thanks Super Friends on YouTube!) He wanted to be Wonder Woman for Halloween but I nixed that idea so he settled on Batman again.

On Friday night, our ward had a dinner and a trunk-or-treat activity. I am still on the activities committee, so we had to go and there was a really good turn out. It was a good thing the kids went trick or treating then because it was a beautiful night.

On Saturday night, because Halloween was on Sunday and we live in UT - Saturday was the night to trick or treat. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain and freezing cold for most of the night. Grandma Saundra came over and hung out with us. We played some BINGO and had a good time. During a brief hiatus in the rainstorm, Scott took Lisa and Eric out to trick or treat. After a few houses, Eric had enough and came home. But Lisa and Scott went out again. As I understand it, there was one house that was too spooky for Lisa to even ring the doorbell, she made Dad do it.

David wasn't too fond of his costume. He kept rubbing his head on the carpet like a bull. I finally figured out he was trying to get his hat off. After I took it off, he started rolling around. I figured he wanted the rest of his costume off too. When he was back in his regular clothes, he turned back into a baby instead of a bull. It was funny to watch though.

On Sunday night, we went over to Uncle Doug's house with Jennifer's family for dinner and some family time. The kids had unlimited amounts of candy while watching a Halloween show. In the car on the way home, Eric kept saying his tummy hurt because he ate too much candy and that he didn't want any more candy. I felt bad for the poor guy. It reminded me of the time Jesse fed Lisa as many cookies as she wanted because he thought I didn't let her have enough sweets. Then all the way from Gainesville to Tampa I had to hear her say how much her tummy hurt.

"The Hill"

2010-11-03T21:08:00.004-06:00

Every morning after we walk Lisa to the bus stop, the boys and I continue on a morning walk. Where we live, the city has dozens of trails that wind around the city and neighborhoods and inter-connect to each other. I love it because there's plenty of places to walk without getting bored of the same path everyday.

Eric's favorite walk to go on is on a skywalk that goes over the freeway and train tracks (train fanatic) and then on a trail that goes behind Lagoon (an amusement park) where you can see some of their animals. There is a big herd of buffalo, three reindeer and some horses. He swears there's a goat there, but I've never seen it.

There are tons of trees which makes it a good place to go on rainy days because you don't get very wet. It has been beautiful to watch the changing colors of the leaves this Fall. There are also a few bridges that go over a creek along the trail. There is also a tunnel where he loves to hear his voice echo.

My least favorite part of this particular trail is at the end. After walking for 3 miles there is a fairly steep hill that lasts for 1/4 mile. The hill takes you up to Farmington Pond that is at the start of Farmington Canyon. I consider turning around almost every morning we go there, but with Eric's pestering that he wants to see the ducks, I continue to make the trek up.

Let me tell you, this picture does NOT do this hill justice!! Pretty much everytime we pass someone on that hill they say, "I can't believe you're pushing 2 kids and a stroller up here - I can barely get myself up it" Needless to say, it kicks my tail everyday.

At least at the top there is a pretty pond to look at as I catch my breath.

Eric loves to look at the ducks and geese. One day he kept trying and trying to touch a goose and of course they would flap their wings hitting him and run away. Finally he looked at me and said matter-of-factly, "Mom, I don't think they want me to touch them." Nothing gets by that boy!

Fall Harvest and Pumpkin carving

2010-10-27T15:47:00.005-06:00

We got a decent amount of produce out of our garden this year. Our tomatoes by far outperformed everything else.

Most of the corn was destroyed by a few really bad windstorms. The onions didn't get very big either.

The pumpkins did very well. And we picked quite a few for carving.

We even got to use the corn stalks for decorations.

This week we carved our jack o lanterns. The kids were so excited!

We each picked our pumpkin out of the garden and picked our design.

I think this picture is cute because David kept wanting to get in on the action.

Final products: Mine is the "intricately" designed "R" for Rasmussen, Lisa's (with LOTS of help from Dad is the scary face, and Eric's is the happy face. After helping Lisa with hers, Scott didn't have time to finish the skeleton on his. I'll have to post pix of it on Halloween night.

I forgot to get tealight candles from the store this week, so we did a trial lighting with some scented candles that I had. I'll get better pictures on Halloween.

The Desert

2010-10-27T15:34:00.005-06:00

On Saturday Scott took Lisa and Eric out to the desert (or as Eric calls it "the dessert") They had a great time hanging out with Dad.

They went hiking around.

The brush was so tall Eric kept almost getting lost.

Eric said they climbed a volcano-I can see how he thought that. Can you find the kids in the brush?

After they did all that hiking, of course they needed a snack.

Lisa shot a .22 for the first time.

Of course Dad got some shooting in too.