Friday, May 21, 2010

catch up...

There have been a couple of things I just haven't found time to blog about, so I going to compile them all into this one.

Sarah Kay's 3rd Birthday-April 10th, 2010

We had such a wonderful time celebrating Sarah's 3rd birthday on Saturday, April 10th. Her cousin Raelee's 4th birthday was the week after, the 17th, so they had a very cute princess party together. Sarah is growing up way too fast and knows it too. She is too smart for all of us, but we love her so much. She doesn't let her daddy leave anywhere...or anyone for that matter (grandparents and cousins included)...without a "love and a kiss!" She is in love with candy, Dora, The Explorer, Barney, dolls, princesses, ponies, fingernail painting, make-up, and coloring. Just a funny story....She has been potty-trained for quite some time now, but when it's time for her to go there's no waiting around. We were driving from Orem to Odgen during our Utah trip and were in Salt Lake, when she said, "mom! I need to go poop!" I looked around for a good place to stop and there wasn't anything, so I told her to just hold it and "to squeeze her cheeks," and that we would be at Grandma Cook's house soon. So I looked in the rear view mirror to see her and she has here hands on her face and she is "squeezing her cheeks" on her face. It was so funny...and now anytime she really needs to go to the bathroom and can't right then we tell her that and she does it and it works. She made it all the way to Grandma Cook's house, which was another 20-30 miles at least.
So happy 3rd Birthday Sarah Kay! We love you!


















































































Brandon's church assignment (Dec 2009-April 2010)- Stake Handcart Trek Coordinator
*during this time, Brandon was in charge of building and coordinating the handcarts for the Frisco Stake Youth Pioneer Trek that took place March 18-20th
*they needed around 35 handcarts, so he was asked to build 10 (with the help of others of coarse) and then bring in 25 more from other stakes
*it was an amazing experience for him to learn how the pioneers made these things, cause he was asked to build them the same way, or very similar at least. So no screws or nails were used and helped cut and assemble all the pieces of wood necessary to make 10 handcarts.
*they ordered the wheels from an Amish man who makes them for a living in Missouri...they were absolutely amazing and Brandon was very grateful he wasn't asked to make those as well.
*he had a difficult time finding the handles that were the right circumference so he ended up turning them on his lath, which required him to build his own extension ...I think he really loved doing that.
*after several hours and several of his Saturdays of help from others they were ready to go in time.
I wish I had more photos, but this is all I have for now. We should have taken them along the way so we could have seen the process...that would have been cool.
He was grateful for the experience and even though he spent a lot of time away from the family, we were grateful too. I was able to attend the closing dinner with him and all the adults that were involved and it was really neat to see the video they made of those youth pulling those handcarts. What neat experience for everyone!