* Kole and I found out we get to go on the Trek! It’s really a youth trek, not a whole stake trek, so I had to bug a few people (namely the Bishop and stake young women's president) to get to go but as you all probably know “the squeaky wheel gets the oil.” I’ve never been on the Trek before so I am way excited- though I am not sure it is completely sane to be excited about hiking miles through the Wyoming desert in the hot July sun, dressed in pioneer attire and pulling a hand cart, not to mention no hope of a shower or real bathroom for four days, - but I’m still beaming with anticipation. Plus I get to help the youth of our stake get spiritually prepared to go. I love that I have this assignment. I have no idea what I am doing but I am sure it will be a lot of fun mixed with a lot of hard work. Somehow Kole gets to go but he doesn’t have to do any work beforehand. Hmmmm. How convenient. Anyways, I am happy that this trek is mostly for the young men and young women. I love the youth of the Church. They are so fun and funny and insightful and it will make the Trek extra fun to go through this experience with them. Now I just have to get in shape so I don’t end up with an unhappy fate like many of the original pioneers.
* Kole and I finally graduated from institute! http://institute.lds.org/ We still intend to be perpetual students (I’ll just say, the more I learn, the more I realize how little I know.) but it was nice to make everything official and get a diploma along with the 2 additional certificates for extra classes taken. Guess it was about time since we've been going for over 8 years! It’s a solemn feeling to add up years and think about what else was going on in your life that many years ago and what has happened all during those years. It is practically a miracle we didn’t get sidetracked with all the craziness of life- marriage, kids, work, school, callings, etc. We went all year round and even with babies in tow at times. I love Institute and all the time and “sacrifice” has been totally worth it. I hope we always live close enough to an Institute so we never have to give up this incredible learning experience.
*We all got the stomach flu. Ugh! Even if you don't live around here you should be afraid... I know so many people who have already passed it along to their family and friends in other cities and states. Kole, Eve and Jack seemed to get the mild version... it only lasted about 24-48 hours with a little lingering nausea. Jack complained that it felt like something biting his tummy from the inside. Cute the way he describes feeling sick. Mostly the kids would just throw up and then go back to playing and then throw up again a little later and then play some more. But from what I've experienced and what my friends have said, it tends to be a little worse for adults. I am positive I have never been so sick in my entire life!!! My mom concurs. The first day I couldn't eat anything or keep any food in me so my blood sugar level got too low and I kept passing out. I thought I was going to have to go to the hospital and get hooked up to IVs. It was so terrible. Even after the worst of it, I lived off crackers and Gatorade and didn't get out of my pajamas or leave the house for 4 days. I will spare you all the gory details but let's just say that I now know more than ever that Kole really really loves me.
* My church calling kept me super busy during the month of April. It's like having a part time job on top of my full time job as a wife and mom. Whew! Good thing I love it. Firstly, we decided it was time to do primary teacher reviews. Since one of the counselors in the presidency just had a baby, our president asked me to go along to all the interviews. We wanted to really get to know our teachers and how they were doing with their callings so we put together a rigorous questionnaire and then had a sit down “interview” at each of the teachers in their homes to go over the questions. It was a good thing- we have amazing teachers and we learned so much- but obviously it meant a lot of time away from home and family pretty much every Fri, Sat and Sun. 18 interviews at 45 minutes each = You do the math. I’d rather not find out just how many hours it took. Fortunately, we have a year break until we need to do these again.
But on top of that busyness I taught Sharing Time all month long. That basically means I lived in a state of continual stress thinking about what to do for my lessons all month long and then every Saturday night my sweet husband and children had to live with me ignoring them so I could prepare my lesson. Thankfully the Spirit is the real teacher and the Lord is good to ensure everything turns out fine despite my potential to completely mess things up… probably shouldn’t agonize so much over everything. Oh, also and I was in charge of putting together the Stake baptism program. Ahhh, this month is much more relaxing.
* Kole started a workout program... P90X to be exact. Have you seen the infomercials? I get tired just watching them. I think I’m not even in good enough shape to get in shape with P90X. But Kole is motivated… He has a “Biggest Loser” contest going on between him and some friends. I guess they are doing the contest for something like 100 days. I’m actually really impressed with the results so far. He lost about 15 lbs last month! So not fair. The only time I could lose that much in a month is if I have a baby pop out of me. Anyways, I promised Kill Joy that I wouldn’t post any embarrassing pictures- even though they are just sitting on my computer practically begging to be released to the public. Guess you’ll just have to be surprised when you see him next.
* Misty, the dog from the underworld, was sent off to obedience school for 3 months. I’m hoping they work on her digging instincts.
* We buzzed Jack’s head a little too short a couple weeks ago. Now he looks even more like his daddy. When he saw himself in the mirror he cried. But it’s growing and he seems to be less traumatized from the whole experience. We were supposed to have family pictures a few days ago but they got pushed back until the weather gets better. Good thing.
* Mother’s Day was really quite peaceful and uneventful. We went to church and then I came home and took and nap and watched the Blindside and basically vegged. Normally we would have done some big family thing with both of our moms but that didn’t happen this year… Both of our moms ended up going out of town- Kole’s mom took a vacation to Oregon with her mom and sister. My grandma ended up getting really sick over the weekend and had to go to the hospital so my mom flew out to California to be with her. Not exactly the circumstances that make for a great Mother’s Day but I guess we will have to celebrate when they get home. Maybe I’ll even take some pictures.
* Easter was in there somewhere… still hardly any pics. I told Kole to go take pictures of the kids hunting eggs. This was the best one. Need I say more.
* We had a few freak snowstorms. Ahhh, spring in Utah... I'm going to be really bitter if it snows in summer this year.
* I guess I did get some more pictures of Jack falling asleep in random places. Cute kid. I probably should just start an album of him sleeping.
