Shannon Messenger fans

When your daughter’s favorite author (Shannon Messenger) comes to Phoenix, you drive the four hours necessary on a school night with some of her friends.

 They were all reading ferociously on the way home until they fell asleep.

Just a bunch of suckers!

I, gratefully, inherited my mother's metal sucker molds.  A few times a year, we get them out and make homemade suckers.  It's always really fun.  This fall, my kids decided to turn it into a family business.  I priced out all the ingredients, calculate how much it would cost to make each sucker (.13) and then asked them how much they wanted to sell them for (.50).  Honestly, they were a little nervous about selling at school, but the first day was a huge hit and they quickly warmed up to the idea.  I spent each afternoon making several new flavors.  I just love the colors!  Aren't they pretty?

The kids were given a certain number of suckers each day and they had to return with the suckers or the correct amount of money.  This way, we knew if anyone was eating/giving away suckers.  I did have to charge a certain child once or twice or suckers they'd eaten themselves.  After a week, the school office was starting to ask questions and we figured we'd better stop.  We sat down and counted out the money.  The kids had made around $75.00.  That's around 300 suckers!!

Some of the flavors included grape, watermelon, cherry, apple, lime, orange, raspberry, blueberry, strawberry, and lemon.

 It was decided that all the money collected went into a common pot.  The kids brainstormed what they wanted to do with the money.  Everyone came to a weekly family meeting with ideas which they pitched to each other.   Ultimately, they voted on going to Dave and Buster's.  It is a local arcade/restaurant.  We waited several weeks so we could go on a 1/2 price Wednesday.  The kids had so much fun! 

They spent a little money on lunch and (with a little help from mom) still had plenty of money to play games with.  We spent several hours there eating, playing, and shopping with their earned tickets.  Here are the kids with their loot.

Emma and Aiden both won their big items from the giant claw machine!

It was a fun project for the kids to do together.  As a mom, I am always on the lookout for ways to do that.  Good times!

Sydney Sue, I love you!

Sydney turned 12 this year.  What?!  This girl is still one of my top four favorite kids ever!  She wasn't all that excited to go to Young Women's and even asked if she could still be in the Primary program.  That all changed after she came to Young Women's for a week or two.  Then she was happy to cut all ties to primary.  We even got to go on a baptismal trip just a week after her birthday.  Love our new temple and love these girls!!

Twelve is the last year that we do birthday parties.  Sydney decided to have a game night with a whole bunch of friends.   It was pretty crazy.  Something about this age makes girls think they need to scream and be louder and more dramatic than everyone else.  I seriously wondered if the neighbors were going to come knocking asking us to keep it down.

However loud they are, I am so grateful for these friends of hers.  She has been lucky in the friend department.  Many of these kids have been here since they were toddlers.  They are a good group of kids.  I hope they all remain friends for a long time.

They had tied themselves in a not and had to untie without letting go.

Conner Nielsen was the only boy who ended up coming.  Sydney and Conner have been friends since they were two.  It wasn't a big deal for either one of them to have him there.  But, it was a big deal to a lot of the other girls.  They spent the night teasing and commenting about it.  I found it a bit annoying and inconsiderate.  I finally told Sydney she needed to tell her friends to stop.  But, it made me grateful that my girls aren't silly about boys.  They've both never gone through the "boys have cooties" stage.  They have friends that are boys and are comfortable around them.  It's no big deal.  I think part of that is because we don't allow teasing at home and part of that is because they're just awesome girls.  Hopefully, things stay this way because I think it will make teen years a lot more fun.
 

Sydney requested that she got her own birthday cake because she wanted to reenact this scene from her first birthday. (But, with clothes on, of course.)

Here is that chubby baby eleven years later.

This girl loves to play.  She is so fun and is so easy to parent.  I've always said that Sydney makes me look good as a mother.  I am so grateful for her kindness, her patience, her forgiveness, and her desire to do what is right.  Love her!!

Aiden's New Room

This wonderful boy turned nine this year.  So, as is tradition, he we I got to redecorate his room.  He chose navy blue and orange as his colors.  To be honest, Aiden was more excited to see all the boxes that his new furniture came in.  This boy loves to play with boxes.  He builds forts with them, makes arcade games, colors on them with markers, creates tunnels etc.  I ended up gathering a few boxes from neighbors to give him as birthday gifts.

I painted over the blue stripes on his walls, which really ended up snowballing into a total repaint, but newly painted walls and trim are so wonderful.  So, I didn't really mind.

I was really excited about this motorcycle artwork.  It's made from scraps of paper, which have been put together so it's 3 dimensional.  I think it's interesting to look at.

 
 I also re-stained his dresser.  I bought this off craigslist years ago and still love it. Restaining it really made it beautiful.

 We added these board and hooks along the wall for him to hang stuff. 

 Aiden's room has two very deep windowsills.  He's always tempted to sit on or jump off them so I felt like I needed to give them a purpose instead of leaving them blank.  The one on the right is now a window seat and the one on the left has been turned into a shelf.  He's also really enjoyed the magnetic chalkboard hung between the windows.  I got the coolest old frame at the thrift store, painted it blue and inserted a piece of sheet metal with painted with chalkboard paint.  I love it when a project comes together like that.

Notice the DogMan books.  That and the Bad Guys series have rekindled a love of reading- YAY!

I love the orange metal chair!

Did you notice the awesome floating desk?  As always, I had a vision and Brent had to figure it out.  There may or may not have been some choice words expressed while building this.  The walls are never square, the cuts aren't exactly straight, and the boards aren't always true.  But,  I am so happy with the way it turned out.  It's cute and functional for Aiden.  He has actually gone upstairs several times to do his homework here.  

See the hinges? The top opens up for storage.

It was a fun project for me to do and I feel like Aiden won't outgrow it.  I am happy with the way it all turned out.  Sure love this boy and his new room!

Our Temple is Here!

One of the reasons for our busy summer was the Tucson Temple Cultural Celebration.  I wholeheartedly volunteered to be a ward captain because I knew it would be an awesome experience.  Basically, I was in charge of 10 youth and all their costumes, hydration, rides, etc.  The weekend of the dedication was spent outside on the baseball field for two days rehearsing.  It was pretty hot and miserable.  

Emma sitting in the stands listening to instructions.

Our stake did a rodeo dance.  Each stake also had their own color of t shirt.

Our stake did a rodeo line dance and a missionary hip hop dance.  Emma was one of the singers that was pre-recorded for the missionary song.  It was fun to hear her voice over the load speaker.  

The captains spent the hours running around with costumes, spraying kids with water, filling water bottles, fanning people with anything we could fine, watching for signs of heatstroke and keeping up moral.

 Me and two other leaders from our ward.  They were awesome!

  

 Finally, the performance day came.  They got to listen to President Uchtdorf speak and they performed under a beautiful sky. 

The next day, we attended the temple dedication.  Brent sang in the choir in the celestial room and the family got to watch in a nearby sealing room.  It was wonderful to sit there with three of my kids (Taylor isn't old enough yet).  I had some great experiences teaching them about the temple and bearing my testimony about the work that is done there. 


I am so grateful and excited for this temple.  Since the open house, I have felt a sense of ownership for this building.  It is beautiful.  I am so excited to be able to go more often.  I can get there in 45 minutes, attend a session, stop for lunch with friends and still get back before school is out.  I know the work done here is eternal.  I know that when I attend the temple, my family and I are blessed.

Summer Wrap Up

Our summer was short and busy.  Here is a quick rundown of what we did.

We spent July 4th weekend camping in New Mexico with Grandma and cousins. 

 

Emma brought her guitar and played it a bit.  I was so impressed with how good she is.  It was nice to hear her and see all those lessons paying off.  Brent taught her a few songs.

Shara caught a frog and let everyone hold it.



 Brent spent his time enjoying the hammocks. 

Sydney finished up rehearsals for Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat.  It was such a fun production and she really enjoyed doing it.  This girl is learning to love the theater, and she's pretty talented if I do say so myself.

Aiden went back to the hospital for his appendectomy.  Luckily, it was a 24-hour stay with no complications.

We brought all the nurses and staff cookie the next week. 

Emma and I attended girls camp.  This year I went as a stake leader.  It was very different than when I was a ward leader.  I had a ton of fun with the other stake leaders playing games....and pranks.

This is the priesthood cabin.

I spent several afternoons helping with the repelling.

But, I found that I missed my ward girls.  They are pretty awesome and fun.  Emma had brought a nonmember friend with her this year so that was fun too.

As the summer wrapped up, I sent the kids off to school. This is the last year they will all be going to the same school (Emma will be in high school next year!) 

These kids are super cool!

Aiden cashed in his flight that he had won from the airplane contest.  The pilot let him fly-which had me in a bit of a panic.  But, he did great.  It was really cool!

Then, a few weeks into school, we drove up to Utah for Tanner's wedding.  Can't believe this little boy went from this (at my wedding):

To this:

The best part of the wedding was getting to hang out with these guys.  Having the baby of the family get married made me a little sentimental about my siblings.  I sure love them!

New York and Emma

A few years ago, Brent and I decided to start a family tradition.  When each child turns 13, they get to go on a trip with mom and dad. There are several reasons we think this is a good idea.  We hope to have some good, bonding memories before the busy and emotional teen years set it.  Spending one on one time with our kids reminds us how much we love them.  With only one child, we aren't getting pecked to death every minute and we can actually have a whole conversation. These trips will also allow us to be able to spend some time with them before they're too cool to hang out with us. We are hoping to send the message to them that we love them, we are fun, we think they're fun, and we are on their side in life. Plus, Brent and I have the added bonus of being able to travel every few years (a built-in parenting perk).

So, we included Emma in as much planning as possible.  We let her pick her destination (New York City) and we gave her a small list of things we were requiring her to do while there (The Statue of Liberty and 9/11 museum were on that list).  Then, we let her do the research and plan the itinerary.  It was so much fun!  And a very needed break from our previous nightmarish month.

We also tried to make it a learning experience.  Much to Emma's dismay, we required her to write a one-page report on every place we visited.  That made me feel a little better about the extravagance.

Taking a picture of how high up our hotel room was.

One of our first stops was Coney Island.  We, of course, had hot dogs for lunch (this is where hot dogs were invented), walked the beach, and spent a few hours at the amusement park.  Brent and I learned that we are getting too old for roller coasters.  Emma learned that she is NOT getting too old for them.  This may have been her favorite thing we did the whole trip.

 

We also saw all the necessary New York sites.  Because of her reports, Emma was able to tell us a bit about each place.

On Liberty Island looking at New York City.

Standing on the Empire State Building looking at the Chrysler Building.

One the boat to Liberty Island

One the Chrysler Building.  It was almost midnight and we had been going for over 14 hours.

Showing off the NYC library.

At the 9/11 museum. This place was kind of emotional for me.

Another highlight of the trip was the Broadway plays.  They were so amazing!  We had only planned on seeing one (Aladdin).  Grandma Robertson surprised Emma with some spending money for the trip and she decided to use it to buy a ticket to School of Rock (We didn't have to think twice about joining her).  Then, we ended up getting some great same-day tickets for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  They were all so fun!

This was probably our favorite play.  It was so full of energy and talented musicians.

In line for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

The Oompa Loompas were so fun!

The sign above us says Aladdin

Emma was very excited when she found out about a big ice cream fundraiser happening while we were there.  All you can eat ice cream for 8 hours.  It only took us about 1 1/2 hours to be sick.

We took a speed boat tour on the Hudson.  Also a highlight for Emma

And I made sure we stopped often and got sweets.

In China town: This ice cream was flattened, frozen and rolled up. 

A famous bakery in Grand Central Station

We stopped at a park in China town and Emma tried her hand at ribbon dancing.

Emma went to her first professional baseball game. New York Mets vs. San Diego Padres.  Brent taught her all about the game. 

Emma also chose to hit up a small yarn shop to see if she could add to her crocheting addiction.

 We rented bikes and rode across the Brooklyn Bridge.  We also rode along the harbor and did some site seeing.

We spent many hours riding the subway.  I am so grateful for Brent when we are traveling.  He does all the research on how to get us from place to place.  We didn't even get lost once.

Doesn't she look like she belongs in New York?

Just resting my eyes at the end of a long night.

We promised Brent that we would stop at B & H Photo.  It's the only brick and mortar store for huge electronic/photo company.  He was pretty much in hog heaven looking around there.  Emma started playing with this toy. 

After a bit, people were crowded around watching her draw.  She is kind of amazing like that.  

We had the best time with Emma.  It was so fun to experience things with her.  I think the trip was a success!