The Bike Ride

Last month, I told Zane I would get him a bigger bike if he could learn to ride without training wheels. He wanted a Spiderman bike. We took the training wheels off but after 5 minutes he wanted them back on.

Monday, Zane announced that he was ready to try again. With training wheels off, we went to the fitness trail to try riding on a smooth, flat surface. Morgan was bored as she zipped around us. Finally, I let her ride on ahead while Zane kept practicing. After an hour we were all hot, tired, and thirsty. Zane was frustrated. "I can't do it! Never mind about the Spiderman bike," he said as we climbed into the car. But I wasn't giving up.

Yesterday, Zane sadly told me he wanted to ride but just couldn't do it. When the day cooled off, I convinced him to try again. He was struggling with starting off and was leaning on me when I was beside him. I asked Morgan to show him how she starts. (She was thrilled to be the expert.) Zane watched carefully, tried a few times, then took off riding his bike.



Best day EVER!

Chair Re-cover

Chasing tornados is not the only thing we've been doing... I finally recovered my rocking chair cushions. I found this fabric at Hobby Lobby a while ago and fell in love with it. I've been waiting to find foam but decided I didn't want to wait any more.

I added a little black piping to the front of the seat cushion. It's kinda hard to see in the picture but I like the way it looks.

Zane had to test it for me. Yep. It still works. And it looks so nice with the black leather couch. Now for the pillows.

Tornado Warning

(The pictures are completely backwards from the order they were taken but my computer is having issues these days and it was too much work to try and fix them.)

We had been at the park earlier and watched the black clouds roll by just north of us. The angry sky grumbled the entire time we were there. When everyone started leaving, I decided to follow.

I was giving Zane a bath, getting things ready for Sunday, not really thinking about the weather. I had checked earlier and the report was for scattered thunderstorms all evening, which is to be expected. No mention of a tornado so I was not too worried.

Scott had gone out to give the dog water and quickly came back in and yelled for me to come look at these clouds. I turned on the radio. Yep. Tornado Warning was in affect until 8pm. The man said "get into your basements now and if you are in a mobile home, leave immediately."

Scott grabbed the keys, I pulled Zane out of the tub, and we jumped in the car. Scott was a little annoyed that I made him stop so I could take pictures. The clouds are just so fascinating to me.

We first went to the feedlot, south of town. Scott parked the car and we looked up. The storm was almost directly over us. We left. I called some friends in town who have a basement and we headed there. It was more fun to watch the clouds and the hail with friends anyway.

When the threat had passed, we returned home to find some large dents in the pickup and no power in our house. We brushed our teeth by candle light using a water bottle. Then we read scriptures with a flashlight and crawled into bed. (Almost felt like camping.)

The storm passing over town.

One of the larger hail stones. Glad they weren't all this big!

There is awesome power in these clouds! So incredible! Not like anything we have experienced before. The hail came down with so much force!
We are ready to move back to Oregon.

Tornado Watch

Yesterday we had a tornado watch... so we watched for the tornado. (I felt like a tourist standing in front of my house.) One of Scott's co-workers lives about 5 miles down the highway from us. They spotted a small twister on the ground near his house. Fortunately for us, the storm went more north than east and most of the bad stuff missed us. We had some pretty wild thunderstorms all night. Is this summer?

Here are some pictures I took from in front of our house:

These were all taken just a few minutes apart.

Then we drove around the corner and got this last picture. We kept driving south until this scary looking cloud was gone. Last week we had golf ball size hail that did a lot of damage all over town. Wow! This has been a very EXCITING summer.

{ Happy Father's Day }

With the storms yesterday, we turned off all electronic devices. We had thunderstorms from sun up to sun down, and beyond!

My two favorite DADS...

my own dad

and dad to my children

Father's Day wouldn't be complete without an ugly tie. :)

Scott wanted lots of presents so we counted the ways we love him. He got nuts for his NUTTY sense of humor, chapstick for his soft KISSES, and a Mr. Goodbar for being a GOOD guy.

I cooked him a nice dinner with strawberry crepes for dessert.

We love our DADS! Happy Father's Day!

i LOVE you more today than yesterday

It's hard to believe we have been married for 11 years!
(Click HERE to read about how we met.)

Scott surprised me with flowers. Under that tough cowboy exterior is a sweet, romantic. After our first date, he had roses delivered to me at work. My boss smiled and nodded. He seemed to know before I did that a wedding was on the horizon.

We enjoyed a nice dinner at the Buffalo Point while our children played with wonderful friends. Then we bought ice cream cones and drove around while we talked - something we did when we were dating. Our town isn't very big so we ended up strolling through Walmart and picking up a few necessities. Yep. We are old.

Through it all, our love continues to grow!

A Simple Act of Kindness

Next week is our wedding anniversary. This date not only brings memories of the day Scott and I were married for eternity, it also brings memories of preparing to move here. It was last year at this time that Scott had accepted a job offer in, what seemed to be, a far off land. We celebrated our anniversary and then he left to start the new job, in a new state, 10 hours from home.

I was left with the overwhelming task of caring for the children AND the dog while getting our house ready to be sold and everything packed. Fortunately, I had Brittany there to help. Unfortunately, she was working full time and trying to spend time with her friends before they all went separate directions. While I was thankful our home had sold so quickly, I felt the burden of getting everything done in one month.

The stress of trying to move was compounded with feelings of not wanting to leave our community that we had known for 4 years. (The longest we had ever lived in one spot.) We liked our house. We liked our ward. We liked our friends. We did not like Scott's job though and this was the best job offer he had gotten.

I needed help but I didn't know how to ask for help. As I sorted through stuff, trying to decide what to pack and what to get rid of, I didn't even know what anyone could do to help me. School had just ended for the summer and families were busy making preparations for vacations. I didn't want to bother them. And again, I didn't know what to ask them to do.

I am SO thankful for those dear friends who saw me struggling, and even though they didn't want us to leave, stepped up and offered to help. A simple thing like letting my children spend the afternoon playing at their house was a HUGE help. It gave me time to pack things without the kids unpacking. And the neighbors who brought us dinner so I didn't have to worry about what to feed my family was a HUGE help. That was the best food I have ever eaten! And when the neighbor boy showed up on his riding mower he probably thought I was strange as I cried and thanked him.

To them it was no big deal. It took little effort on their part. Many expressed a desire to do more to help. To me it was HUGE! As we gathered one last time as friends to say good bye, there were no words to express the gratitude that I felt for those dear people that had become our family. I promised myself that I would do better to see the needs of others. A simple act of kindness can be HUGE to the person who receives it.

"The Lord's way to help those in temporal need requires people who out of love have consecrated themselves and what they have to God and to His work."
President Henry B. Eyring