Just Sad

I have really been trying to find the positive to all of this that is going on and being in quarantine and everything. I am "enjoying" not going so many directions....but today we got the word that school is canceled for the REST OF THE SCHOOL YEAR!!! Matthew was a week away from performing his musical, Aladdin Jr. Now they won't get to do that, all that time, work and effort that got put into it, gone....Allison is devastated that she doesn't get to see her teachers anymore. She is SOOO very sad. There have been many tears, even when there was hope that they would go back in April. Matthew is an 8th grader so he won't get his 8th grade celebrations and all that comes along with completing middle school and surviving. I have been really holding it together but I think tonight I am just going to cry and then hopefully keep finding the positives of it tomorrow. I am happy for me, in a way that I get my kids home with me, and do things that we don't normally have time for but I am just sad that they will have to miss out on things that they should have been able to get. Extremely sad for those Seniors this year.

My Little Scout

Matthew and Allison's troops put on a pancake dinner and someone got these great shot of Allison. It is such a great smile!!

I just love this picture.

She also just earned her first rank so now she is officially SCOUT rank!

Thomas Family Restaurant

I mentioned to the kids that we would be staying home for the next two weeks, not going anywhere....and I said, which means mom and dad won't be able to go on their weekly date either. Together the kids decided that they could create a date for us.

Allison has been looking forward to this since Friday. She made these menus for us. She had the kids dress up for us. She even made the dinner (Alfredo..from scratch and steamed broccoli) for us. After Allison got the Alfredo, noodles and broccoli ready, I went to the Kingdom and picked up Chris for our date. We walked around the font door and we were greeted by an absolutely adorable hostess. She welcomed us to the Thomas Family Restaurant, asked how many people there were and then she told us to follow her. We followed this adorable girl to our seat and she gave us our menu and then said our waitress would be right with us.

Allison came and introduced herself to us as her waitress and then took our order and took care of us. She gave Michelle some things to give to us like our glasses of water and such. 

Allison who was the chef also, got our food ready and it was really good. After we were all done she said that we were the 100th customer and that meant that we got our dinner free. We may have left our waitress a $2 tip and she was SOOOO excited because she didn't expect that at all!!!

We asked about their hand-cut steaks but they had run out of them already. :)

Our hostess and waitress, who even dressed up for the job.

Matthew didn't really want to do it, and since he was having a bad attitude about it, he didn't have to. 

Later while the "employees" were eating, Matthew decided he didn't need to put his suit on, but if he just had a polo shirt on that would be dressed up. So when I said I was going to take a picture he ran upstairs, changed and ran down to be in the picture. We decided that he was the manager that Chris and I didn't see.

Menu.....I thought this was adorable that Allison made these and Chris was VERY impressed that she actually had a real dinner on there and it was good.

I think we are giving this restaurant 5 stars on Yelp:)

Next time, (if there is one) he might actually play a manager role and come out and ask us if everything was ok. Allison (and Michelle) just LOVED "playing restaurant" for us. I think she may already be preparing for next week's date.

Bob Books

I discovered Bob books when Allison was little. Since Michelle know all of her letters and sounds I decided to get them a try. She read all of these books in here which I believe there are 12 books that have about 12 pages each. 

She is coming along.

COVID-19 Break Day 1

Since we don't have school....for awhile, the kids wanted to camp out in their new tents. I found these 4 man tents on Clearance at Target so I got them for the kids and they bought them from me so that they could be THEIRS. 

They set them up and spent the night in them.

This situation is unfortunate with COVID-19 but I am looking on the bright side and SO excited to not have to go ANYWHERE for the next two weeks.  With that means CLEANING my house! It was so messy and unfortunately I don't have those pictures but I was happy to finally get this playroom cleaned that has been needing it for the last 5 months I am sure. 

And the preschool room also needed lots of attention.

And then there were Saturday chores to get done so that was nice to get those done as well.

I am looking forward to a clean house, time with family, getting things done and NOT HAVING TO GO ANYWHERE!!

Michelle's Playgroup Birthday "Party"

Instead of having a big party, I just bought some cupcakes and brought them to the next playgroup. I brought goldfish and waters as well. We sang Happy Birthday to her and she felt like she had a party, it was great.

Michelle's Birthday Present

Michelle got a new BIKE for her birthday. We finally decided to do presents on Sunday when we were finally all together. 

She is so excited about her bike!

She loves to go on bike rides around the block and gets to be really fast, I have to run to catch up to her.

Klondike Derby Campout

We are still trying to figure out this whole scouting stuff with being the only member of our church in the troop. I originally said absolutely no camping on Sunday but then I realized that really messing the troop up when it is cold they they don't allow kids to tent alone. So with this trip we spent Friday and Saturday night camping, got up early and took Allison and the scout master's daughter home early so they could make church that day. I walked into Sacrament meeting about 2 minutes before it started and when I am the chorister, it made the bishop a little panicked. We won't be doing that anymore. Allison can't wake up, get her stuff together and take down a tent in time to go to church. We tried, it just doesn't work.

Friday night camping was cold (low 30s), but VERY windy. I was not quite sure my tent would stay in one place. Also, where we stayed was really close to the airport....so Friday night there were a LOT of airplanes coming and going, most of the night. Saturday night wasn't as bad and the wind finally died down in the evening.

The funny thing about this, is that even though Matthew has been in scouts for longer, he has never been to a Klondike Derby. Normally his troop didn't go, but last year his troop was ACTUALLY going to go, they prepared everything and then it got rained out and never rescheduled. (Never fun to put up your tent in the rain). This year his troop didn't go either, but the girls did. It was the first year there have been girls at a Klondike Derby.    

I went with Allison's troop to be another leader, and to bring Allison and Julie home early. I always thought this event was super big and really hard. I thought they all started at a starting line, they had to rush through to do everything and whoever got everything done first won.

Apparently all of the troops went to a different station to do a certain scenario. They would have 30 minutes to get to their next station and get their scenario done. Depending on how well they did, would depend on how many "nuggets" they got. Whoever got the most nuggets at the end of the day won.

These girls' scoutmaster made sure they were really prepared.

Here are some of the situations they had to do, get their sled across the "water" without getting "wet"           

Put a tent together blindfolded, one person could see but they couldn't touch anything. They had to tell their patrol what to do. When she was pointing and saying "right there", and "pull the green string"... it was funny to watch.

One girl pushed the sled and the other girls pulled the sled...they were the "dogs".

Here is cute Allison as the lead "dog"

Allison's troop has two patrols in it. Hers is the younger (middle school patrol)

Moms watching on....I didn't like the cold...and ALL the wind. I wore my bright ninja mask almost all of the time.

Apparently they had more patrols than stations so they put both of our patrols together. (The high school patrol) is in orange.

The scoutmaster made this contraption for our washing station so we didn't have to do our washing on the ground. She originally said it was only for the adults....but the girls were so interested in it, she let them use it after us.

This scenario was that their horse (4 sandbags) died and they had to carry it from one area and then back. It took them a very long time to figure out how to do it but eventually got it done.

This one they had to make an A friend with just rope and sticks. Then they had to put someone on it and get them to a certain spot. Allison had a hard time being the one up there but they eventually figured out how to work together and got her to where she needed to be.

 She was SO grateful to get back on the ground.

 

 

At the end of the night, they announced that there was going to be a trophy...first one ever. They get to hold onto it for a year, get their Patrol name on it and then bring it back next year for the next winner.

The winner this year happened to be ALLISON'S PATROL!!!! 

Pretty impressive for sure!!

The Wednesday after this event, I ended up having a cold sore on both my top lip AND bottom lip....and I haven't even had a cold! I googled why I might have one, and it said excessive wind and cold could bring them on! Yep going camping with the cold and horrible wind, gave me two cold sores! Not fun, but oh well, I was glad I got to see how it all worked.

MICHELLE TURNS 5!!!!

It is so hard to believe this sweet little girl is now 5 years old!!!

She is so adorable, and so genuine. She tells me she loves me probably 10 times a day, maybe more. She is just the sweetest thing. 

We say that when you turn 5 your cuteness runs out....but having teenager and pre-teen as your siblings....we think her cuteness will stay around a little bit longer than 5 years old. 

My best friend here "Aunt" Sharon sent her balloons and a teddy bear for her birthday!

I thought about doing a birthday party for her, but she doesn't really have a lot of friends...she just has one...which is funny because that one friend is actually in the green in the back of this picture.

We have some friends who also have a pass to Jumpology (trampoline area) and so for her birthday Michelle went out to breakfast with Chris, then came home and I took her to meet her friends at Jumpology. 

 Michelle with a little buddy, Benny

 Tabitha Mitchell, Michelle, Benny Angel, & Jacob Eliason

After Jumpology, we took Jacob and his mom to Chick-fil-a for lunch and for Michelle and Jacob to play on the playground. 

After that we went home and Allison and I had to get ready for a campout that we were going on.

When Matthew got home from play practice, (Allison and I were already gone) but Chris took Michelle and Matthew to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. 

We didn't do any presents really since we weren't ever together as a family.