Proof that my kids don't always drive me crazy

Last week I went on a fieldtrip with Henry's class to the Museum of Natural Curiosity at Thanksgiving Point. We had never been there before so I wanted to see if it was the worth $60 to take my whole family.

I don't go places with just Henry very often. It was fun to see him interact with his classmates and be a good listener for his teachers. It's nice to know he has it in him to be attentive.

Here are some things we saw.

This plain reminds me of Indian Jones.

When your 4-year-old wants to go over a series of net bridges 2 stories up, you follow. *Sidenote: It took all my upper-body strength to pull myself up to the platforms. I was so sore.

 I don't remember what this wheel thing did.

 We spent a lot of time in this room.

We had these star thingies when I was a kid except they were a little smaller. I had to make a crown just like I used to.

He did this like seven times.

And now for some funny things my kids say.

Henry: If I grew out my hair I could look like a girl.
Sarah: I know a way we could tell you were still a boy.
Henry: How?
Sarah: By how dirty you get!

Henry and Erica were playing a very dramatic game with their stuffed animals one morning. Henry went to preschool, Erica and I went to the fabric store. A kind employee asked Erica how she was doing and Erica replied solemnly, "Dumbo got shot."

Henry often hits Erica and lies about it. Erica will often lie about Henry hitting. It makes doling out sympathy and punishment very complicated as I can't trust either of them to tell the truth. One day Erica came to me and said, "Bickey (her name for Henry) hit me!" and I knew for a certainty he didn't. When she didn't get the response she wanted she tried "Bickey hit you" and when that didn't work she tried "Bickey hit Dad."

My kids love to ask about the calendar on the wall during dinner and ask me to tell them "what's on the 15th?" "What does it say on that day" and it drives me crazy. It's mostly boring stuff like who I am going to visit and doctor appointments. But one evening Henry got us all laughing when he first asked, "Where's the 'wunf'?' meaning the first and "Where's 'toof"?" meaning the second.

You should play "I Spy" with Erica. It goes something like this:

E: You wanna play I Spy?
Me: Sure.
E: I spy with  my little eye something that is green.
Me: The grass?
E: Nope.
Me: The trees?
E: Nope.
Me: Your eyes?
E: Nope.
Me: Your shorts?
E: Nope.
Me: Your popsicle?
E: Yup! You picked it! (her popsicle was yellow)
Me; Okay, my turn. I spy with my little eye something that is red.
E: Nope. My turn.

From "Eww" to "Ahh"

Last summer Justin bought 6 chairs at a garage sale. Three were painted bright yellow, three bright red with ugly fabric covering the seats. I painted them all white and recovered the seats with a pretty gray and white fabric.

Six months later, they looked like this. Well actually the seats looked pretty bad a week later. I grossly over estimated the power of Scotchguard. 

This is Erica's chair, by far the worst chair.

 Anyway, last week I admitted defeat and swallowed my style pride and bought the thickest vinyl money can buy (at Joann's anyway). I spent 3 hours recovering the seats and touching up the paint.

They make a nice airy "pfff" sound when you sit down.

It's only been 7 days but I haven't freaked out when the kids have spilled 83 times since then. I guess it was worth it.

Now the question is what color should my table be? (and by "my" I mean "the table I took from my parents' shed") I don't want to do the white/wood farmhouse look. Go white or go dark stain?

Homemade General Conference Goods and Spring Break

For my kids, conference means two things: cinnamon rolls and conference activity books.

This year I did not make conference activity books because they don't really do them. They like them for about 5 minutes but half-way through the first speaker of the first session, they're jumping over the furniture and asking for food and the books are never looked at again.

Saturday morning Sarah asked if I was going to make her a new conference book. "No," I said. "Go find the one I made you last year. You only colored like half a page."

She went off, to look for it but quite a while later she yelled, "Henry, I made you a conference book!"

These are my favorite pages. I think it's better than anything on pinterest.

Since I took Justin seriously when he jokingly said I should double the cinnamon roll recipe, I did this in my mixer. It was not fun to clean.

But they still turned out beautiful and delicious--even the pan that I forgot to sprinkle the cinnamon on before rolling up.

I had 24 gigantic rolls. I had to give some away and put some in the freezer. (FHE treat tonight?)

Random picture but I like to be chronological. This is a neighbor girl who came over to play with Sarah but Sarah couldn't play until she finished cleaning her room. So while she waited, Erica kept her busy by bringing her books to read to her.

The following Wednesday we went to St. George for spring break. This trip was pretty similar to the trip we took in January 2015 since my kids had to do their favorite things again but we tried some new stuff too.

We stopped at Red Cliffs on our way down. Justin took me on this hike on the way home from our honeymoon and I hated it because I had to scale cliffs and repel with a old rope and I was wearing flip flops. I'm pretty sure I didn't talk to him for the rest of the drive home. He's been trying for 10 years to get me to go again. I finally agreed to put the demons to rest but told him I was a grown up and could decide for myself when I wanted to stop and go back.

 I forgot that there were lots of cool things to see before the death-defying part.

 Dusty bums.

 See how green this is? I miss leaves.

 And then the pools begin.

 I taught Erica to throw rocks in the water to keep her from wanting to run into the water.

Sarah jumped right in because she doubted Justin when he said it can get deep suddenly. He was right; she had to be rescued.

Then we got to my parents' condo in Hurricane, cleaned up, the kids ran around exploring the house and yard then we got fried chicken for dinner.

Thursday was our best weather day so we planned more outside stuff.  This is Pioneer Park in St. George.

 Also known as where my kids run up things and give me heart attacks.

 There were times I just couldn't watch them or had to go another way.

 Then we went to the Children's Museum.

Henry wants to be a farmer when he grows up so he likes this room.

 Designated Dad Bench. There's one in every room and it's what we looked for first.

 It was pretty crowded so I took a long time to get this shot. She's so cute.

 Grocery store room. They go crazy for these little carts and play food. Hey kids, we have a toy cart and play food at home.

 We do not have a sweet checkout lane though.

 The Government Room. President Henry anyone?

 I took a picture of this book so I could maybe find it at the library for my kids someday. I'll make them read it for a sweet prize.

 Do you know which kid of mine this is? Picasa can't tell.

 The Fairy Tale room. Henry means "ruler of the household" and Erica means "eternal ruler" so looks like they found their proper chairs.

 I'm surprised she let me put this on her.

 There's a lot more I didn't take pictures of but it's a cute place.

Outside at the city park we ate a picnic lunch and then the kids changed into their swimming suits for the splashpad.

 Erica liked doing her own splashing but FREAKED out if, heaven forbid, someone ran past and splashed her.

Then we went to Nielsen's to get frozen custard ice cream cones then drove back to Hurricane. That night we ate dinner at Rigatti's in Washington. Best pizza I've had in a long time.

Friday was an iffy sort of weather day and the pool we wanted to go to didn't open until 2 so we went to Toquerville Falls. You drive on the craziest, bumpiest, washed out, bolder strewn road for a few miles and then you get to this. Such a random place for a waterfall.

Thanks for ruining a perfectly good picture, Henry.

 Hey look, there's me. I was there!

 More rock throwing. Erica has no fear and would have walked right into the stream and gotten carried by the current down the falls and lost forever so after a little while, I made her go hang out in the car with me and eat string cheese.

Then we went back for lunch, rested, then went swimming at Washington's city pool. The kids had a blast and Erica is hilarious in the water. She has no fear. Then we went to Black Bear Diner in St. George because that was the one place Henry and Sarah wanted to eat. We each ordered tons of food and ate so much. What is it about swimming that makes you so hungry?

Saturday. Now these red rocks and red sand are at Snow Canyon State Park. I had never been there in my whole life. These are the sand dunes.

 Someone was getting their wedding pictures done. I think it's a very cool idea.

 You can run all you want here, kids. It's nice and soft.

 My photography skills don't do this justice. These bushes were blue, I tell ya!

In 1894 or something, pioneer youths wrote their names in axle grease on this wall. Now it's a historical site. There's a lesson to all you graffiti punks out there. Give it time and we'll think your defacing of nature is of historical significance and go out of our way to see it.

 Justin called this rib roast rock.

 They kept trying to climb up this cave but it was so sandy and slippery.

 Erica thinks she has to push her head out and say cheese when I take her picture. I like it.

We took the long way home by driving on through the park then onto Veyo, Utah and Veyo Pies. If you like pie, you'll like this place.

One of our kids always freaks out when we reach about Nephi, but not this year. This year Erica lasted until Santaquin before she lost it.