Hooray!

The last few weeks have been great! We have invested more time and effort to make our place seem like home. The other night we spent the day in the yard. Todd dutifully built me a bunny hutch. The boys built a fire pit with some bricks mom and dad Barney brought us from their house. They did an amazing job and did it with almost no direction. The next day we roasted marshmallows and sang camp songs. It was fun!

Ok so I have a funny story, one that seems typical of small towns. But yet you may not really think it would happen. So I was across the street talking to my 80-something year-old neighbor named Reba. We were just visiting when we heard sirens in the distance. I didn't think a thing of it. In fact I didn't even really notice it. In Riverton we lived pretty close to the fire department so I heard them several times a day. I just tuned it out.  So anyway she stops in the middle of our conversation and listens...... and waits...... and listens some more. The ambulance comes down our street and she jumps up and hobbles to the middle of the street and says "Hurry you can go faster then me to see where it is going". Ha ha then I see three cars following in pursuit trying to find out where it was going.  One of the trucks drove by and Reba sighed with releif oh good it's Sally she has a police scanner she will know. She always knows. Then jokes to me about how nosy they all are. So then I hope in my van and follow the chase so I can let Reba know what happened (now remember I am a dumb person to send because I don't know whose house is whose anyway). So I come back to report the street coordinates and Reba had already pulled several cars over to find out the dirt. Haha The next day I go to visit with my other neighbor and sure enough they are making and freezing creamed corn in their kitchen listening to their own police scanner. Haha I guess that's entertainment in a small town.  Are you all itching to know what happened. I will keep you in suspense.

Mom and Dad Barney came up on Friday. We had such a great time with them. We ate, went to the library, and the park. It was so good seeing them. It made it feel more like home. Today after school I took Thomas and Sam to the Dinosaur Quarry. It was actually really cool. They showed us a 10 by 30 yard area that they have found 10-12,000 dinosaur bones. The interesting thing is that non of them were connected. They were just a bunch of random bones. They are still digging.

Oh and the most important news of all Todd passed his test! He did a fantastic job! We are all so proud of him. Thomas also started his first day of school. He came home and told me one of the kids names was Draw. Today he came home and said that he found out it wasn't Draw it was Ryder. Cute kid.

I will post pics tomorrow    

Horse and Buggy Days

This week underwent a turmoil of events, and a lot of deviation from the plan we had made for the weekend.  As of Wednesday night, we were anticipating my parents coming to visit the next day and attending the local rodeo (they call it a "showdeo") in Elmo.  We were so excited and getting ready to have a great time, when Thursday morning Sam woke up and began throwing up like a sick dog.  About an hour after I got to work in Price I got a phone call from Heather.  This is the event that changed everything.  While Heather was making overzealous dinner preparations for my family, she tripped down the staircase outside while wearing my shoes and dancing to "Gettin' Jiggy With It".  She landed on a metal grate at the bottom of the stairs which gashed her knee pretty good.  Thomas was recruited to get help, and what a diligent little helper he was.  He made the rounds to all the neighbors houses knocking on their doors and not getting a single answer.  On his way home he saw our next-door neighbor's nurse and asked her to help.  In the meantime Sam was trying to help Heather by bringing her a tampon for her knee and a bowl in case she needed to throw up.  Sweet Sam!  I got home and saw Heather with a wrapped up knee sitting on the ground and all the kids inside.  Apparently, Lucy had woken up and Thomas got her out of the crib and put her on our bed while he played with her.  I was pretty surprised when I found out about that.  We loaded up everyone in the van and went to Castle Valley Hospital to the ER.  She got 6 stitches in her knee, and no pain meds.  Despite all this, she could not be persuaded to stay home from the Horse and Buggy Days rodeo that night.  Thomas and Sam each participated in a handful of events including: mutton busting, money-goat chase, stickhorse racing, boot race, duck chase, greased pig chase, etc.  Sam actually got a dollar off the goat (it had fallen to the ground), and Thomas rode a sheep like a real cowboy.  He also won two events that night.  Friday was the Castle Dale pageant.  The boys sang a couple of primary songs for the prelude music, and then we left about 30 minutes into the show because all the kids were whining so bad.  On Saturday, at the park here in Elmo, there was a big party.  A fire truck was spraying water all over, knocking people down, and also spraying foam onto the grass for the kids to play in.  The kids got to make 2-liter bottle rockets and launch them.  At the dinner that night, a raffle was held, and we pretty much won the grand prize!  Heather bought about $20 worth of tickets and we ended up winning a $500 gift card to Sutherland's!  We still can't believe our luck.  So it was a crazy week, and a lot of fun.

Written by Todd

Life

I figured blogging would be a great way to journal and to let everyone know what is going on in our whirl wind life. If there is anything I have learned over the past several years it is that we are not in  control of our life. Which in some ways makes me glad because our Heavenly Father knows the best path for us anyway. Anyone who knows me in fact anyone who knows certain people in my family (you know who you are) we are planners! We like to plan 1-30 years ahead. Well for me I have had to learn that what I had planned is not our path. I have learned (and still am trying to learn)  that our life is going to be full of adventure! And that every turn is going to be a new surprise. Ha it is actually getting kind of fun! We have no idea where we will be in a year from now but for now we are here in Elmo. Population 388, beautiful sky's, no pollution, freshest of air (except for the occasional smell of manure), slow paced, friendly people where everyone waves to everyone, where your principle, postmaster, bus driver, teacher, and hair stylist live in your town and where your post office, library, church, fire department, and town hall are with in short walking distance. Oh and where people swear in church and now one bats an eye. We love it here. Yes our house smells old but boy it has character.  And yes we have a giant float and a bunch of junk in our back yard but ahhh never mind who am I kidding I hate the junk. We are happy here! The following quote describes my feelings perfectly.

“......... I wanted to live deliberately, I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, To put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die discover that I had not lived.”

                                                                                                                    -Henry David Thoreau

Written by Heather