A Wonderful Weekend

General Conference Weekend

General Conference weekend was absolutely wonderful.  The boys loved the Conference Center board.  On Saturday morning I made Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls.  The boys loved them, and I enjoyed more then my fair share as well.
After breakfast we set everything up for Conference.  For Saturday morning we had "special word" treats.  So everything the speaker said: Scripture, Temple, Family, or Prophet, the boys got to have one of the pre-assigned treat.

President Monson made some very special announcements during the Saturday morning session.  His first announcement was that two new temples would be built one in Arizona and the other in PERU!!!!

 The boys started dancing and singing, "That's where Grandma Emma and Grandpa Walter live."

(For the record my parents live in Urubamba- which is a small town by Cusco, but this new temple in Arequipa will be a whole lot closer to them.)  I'm so excited for my family and all the people of Peru.  

Then with the second announcement that young men can go on their mission at the age of 18. And young women can go on their mission at the age of 19.  The boys soon realized that this meant that they could go on their mission one year sooner.  And I am excited to see what the young women will say about this at church next Sunday.  And Weston and I were reminded several times throughout conference about the important role that parents have in preparing their children for missions.  

The boys loved setting the board up and switching the speaker and topics.  They would go back and forth from the board to the treat table.  

Saturday Conference was wonderful!!!

Here's a cute picture of Walter drawing a picture for President Monson.

In between the two sessions of Saturday Conference we went on a family bike ride which seemed like the prefect thing to do after listening to President Uchtdorf's talk  

http://281fourthstreet.blogspot.com/2012/10/not-race-printable.html

Sunday morning we started again.   I was a little worried that they might not be as interested in the Conference Board the second day,but I was wrong.  The boys picked up right where they left off.  

For our treats on Sunday we did "Apostle" treats.  Each of the remaining apostles who had not spoken yet were assigned a treat.  When they spoke the boys could enjoy the treat.

They were pretty excited when President Monson spoke since he was the KitKat bars.
Another fun moment was when Walter F. Gonzalez spoke.  Walter got a real kick out of it.  He thought that it was so cool that they shared the same first name.  He even started saying, "I wonder if Grandpa Walter is listening to Walter."  It's cute to see the little things that amuse him.

Towards the end of the Sunday Afternoon session, Hunter turned to me and said, " Thanks for making Our Conference Center."  These boys sure know how to make their mom smile.  

Overall the Conference Center board was a huge success.  It helps keep the boys focused.   They loved it.

You may be wondering where Quincy was during all of this, well he was mostly napping.  On both Saturday and Sunday he went down for a nap at the beginning of each session and he slept for about 1.5 hours each time, so he was awake for the last speaker of each session.  He was an angel and allowed his mother to sit and listen and just enjoy the speakers.

The End of September

Soccer season came to an end in September.  Walter had his last game on Saturday. He really enjoyed soccer, and he loved having his dad as his coach.  He scored at least one goal every game.  We did have to remind him every game that this was soccer not football, so there was no tackling.  Here are a couple pictures from some previous games.  I was going to take more of his last game, but it started raining, so I just focused on keeping Quincy and me warm.

And then here is the one photo that I took at his last game.  

He loved soccer, and he had such a good coach.  Walter also had a really good team.  All the boys tried their best, and it was fun for Walter to have some of the boys from his primary class on his soccer team.  

Rise and Shout

Weston and I got season tickets to the BYU football games.  Last Saturday it was BYU vs. Hawaii.  And it was a true blue victory.  

 
(Do you like my caught in the headlights look?  So often in pictures I have my eyes closed, so I was focusing on keeping my eyes open.  But after looking at this picture I think I should focus not looking like a deer caught in the headlights.)



On your tickets it told you if you were suppose to wear white or blue.  So each section had a color and that way we you looked out at the crowd you would a pattern of blue and white.  I tried to get a photo of it, but it didn't turn out as well.

And here is the team setting up for the extra point.

 Hopefully BYU will have another victory this weekend.

One Year Older and Wiser Too

On Sunday we went over to Weston's parents house to help celebrate Sharman's 62nd birthday.  The kids had a blast playing with their cousins. And hopefully Sharman felt loved and is looking forward to many more to come.

The Great Outdoors

Weston also had the opportunity to hike Four Peaks in Provo with one of his friends (He is standing on peak two (above) and you can see peaks 3 and 4 off to the right in the background).  It took them from six in the morning until two thirty in the afternoon.  (8.5 hours) But it was well worth it.  He came back home a little scraped up, but already looking forward to his next adventure.

General Conference Prep 2
I finally finished "Our Conference Center" board.  From the moment I saw this on Jennifer Lund's blog, I knew I wanted to make it.  It is just such an awesome idea.  (like so many ideas that Jennifer shares on her blog)  It took me a little longer then I thought it would, but I'm so excited, and more importantly the boys are super excited to use it this coming weekend.

I can't help but smile when I see how excited the boys are.  At the end of FHE on Monday I explained to the boys how the board works, and then on Tuesday morning I found the boys playing with it.  I asked them what they were doing and they told me they were practicing for General Conference.

Jennifer has written a blog post on how to make the board if you are interested.  Right before I started working on mine, I saw on pinterest that Tiff Keetch had also made one.  Both Jennifer and Tiff have printable files.  So I printed and used parts of Jennifer's files and parts of Tiff's files.  
Here are the links:
Jennifer's Conference Center
Tiff's Conference Center  

Just one more day until General Conference I'm so excited!!!

And since no blog post is complete without a picture of Quincy, here's a cute one:

OK maybe two, he is just so cute.

A Busy, Fun Week

This last week was full of fun, memorable activities.
BYU Race Day

We signed Hunter up in the BYU Race.  He was so excited.  We met up with two cousins and took a quick picture before lining up for his race.  

(Can you find Hunter?)

They separated the kids by grade and gender.  

It was a mile long race.  Hunter loved it.  We told him, just to have fun and to try to run the whole time.  Well that is exactly what he did.  As I watched him, he was smiling and looking around him, and even at the finish line he jumped across it, and he ran the whole way.  We are so proud of him.  

When Hunter finished the BYU staff presented him with a card that had his time and what place he finished in this race.  We were surprised to see that his time was 8:53 (mile) and he finished 12 place for his race.  And he had so much fun and now he wants to continue to participate in races.

Bee Sting
On Tuesday during Weston's morning run, he got strung by a bee.  And we are pretty sure that he must have had a mild allergy reaction.  He was stung on the back of his calf and by the next day his knee down to his foot had swollen up.

He even measured his calf and the one on the left is 2.5 inches bigger then the one on the right.  It has finally gone all the way down, but for the second half the week his foot was so swollen that every time I looked at it I could help but feel bad for him.

High School Football and a Yummy Recipe to Share

So I have "pinned" a bunch of recipe ideas, and I have tried a few of them.  Some have turned out and some have not.  But this one was delicious.  Weston and the boys loved it.  This was actually the second time I made it.  Both times I also served it with steamed zucchini and squash (Which we grew in our garden.)
Crock Pot Chicken Teriyaki-  from Scattered Thoughts of a Crafty Mom
So easy- just throw everything into the crock pot, and so delicious.

 Weston serves with the youth in our ward and one of the young men plays on the sophomore football team, so one evening we decided to go see him play.  He was number 26, unfortunately we were only able to stay for the first half of the game, and he did not go in until the second half.

Dance Festival and Wendy's Birthday

On Friday night we went to Hunter's school for their Dance Festival.  It also happened to be Wendy's birthday, so we invited her to come with us.  The school had a dinner at 5:30 and then each grade presented a dance.  We told Wendy that for her birthday we were taking her out for dinner and a show.
Walter was able to provide us with a pre-show dance

Quincy sure thought the dancing was fun.  

Hunter waiting for the dance portion of the evening to start.  

Quincy and the birthday girl

Waiting for the dancing to start.

Then after the dance we went back to our house to sing and have some cake.  It may have not been how my sister thought she was going to spend her birthday, but I know that the boys were so happy that she was able to spend the evening with us.  Happy Birthday Wendy!!!

Soccer

Saturday was Hunter's last soccer game.  It was a fun season and we noticed that he paid more attention to where the ball was this time.  He still may not be the most aggressive player, but he sure has fun out on the field.

Quincy 1st Baby Food

 Quincy is six months old!  So this past weekend we gave him is first taste of baby cereal.  And it was a success.  He was a bit unsure at the beginning.  I can't believe that he is getting so old.  He loves to roll all over the place, and he can get into the crawl position, but he still has not figured out how to crawl.  It is only a matter of time.

General Conference Prep

General Conference is just 9 days away.  We are so excited.  As we reviewed the talks from the last conference we added a small visual to each picture.  This has been a wonderful activity not only for the boys, but it has helped me remember as well.  The paper chain on the side is our countdown chain.  This idea was provided in the September Issue of The Friend.  We have had so much fun reviewing and doing small activities.  Our favorite activity which we did earlier this summer, was the boat race that we did with President Monson's talk: The Race of Life.
President Monson spoke about how when he was a little boy, he would make small boat out of pieces of wood and then raced them on the Provo River.  He then compared our life to these small boats that are on the race of life:

"Our Heavenly Father did not launch us on our eternal voyage without providing the means whereby we could receive from Him guidance to ensure our safe return. I speak of prayer. I speak too of the whisperings from that still, small voice; and I do not overlook the holy scriptures, which contain the word of the Lord and the words of the prophets—provided to us to help us successfully cross the finish line."
-President Monson, Ensign Nov 2012

So we made small boats out of empty whip cream containers and raced them down the BYU stream.

The boys loved it.  And they now can tell you about President Monson's Race of Life talk and the four things that Heavenly Father gives us to help us "sail/race" though life. 

So because of this and other similar activities the boys are excited for General Conference, which makes me smile.  And I'm still working on more General Conference Prep.  

To Learn more about General Conference watch this short video below.  

When Life Gives You Grapes

Weston's parents have a grape vine growing on one of their fences.  And from what I understand years ago they would use the grapes to make either juice or jelly.  But it had been several years since the last time they picked them and so for many years the grapes had been left on the vine.  (I should add at this point that these are concord grapes, so you can't just pick them and eat them.)  Last year when we first moved to Provo, Weston and I decided to use the grapes to make grape juice.  And that is exactly what we did.  The actual process took a long time, but wasn't all that hard.  So this year when Mac asked us if we wanted the grapes we said, "YES".  But this year I had different plans, I wanted to make grape jelly.  I love PB&J sandwiches and the best ones have grape jelly.

So once again the boys and I went and picked and picked.  One of the great things about grapes, is that you don't have to be picking too long before your bucket is full.

And Quincy just enjoyed being outside. And eating his car seat (Not his best picture-but still cute)

Weston joined us after work

And within a couple of hours, we had a whole box full.

We picked all the grapes on Friday night and then went to the store to buy some jars and sure-gel.
On Saturday at nine in the morning we started juicing, and we were done with the whole process at nine o'clock at night.  It took us twelve hours.  But it was well worth it, we ended up with

36 half-pint jars of grape jelly (which we hope to use as neighbor gifts this Christmas)

11 pint jars of grape jelly (which are for us)
16 quarts of grape juice

We have found that one of the best ways to enjoy grape juice is to mix a quart of grape juice with a 2 liter bottle of 7-up.  It is so delicious.
So next time you come and visit ask us for a glass, you won't regret it.

For Grandma and Grandpa

My parents recently moved to Peru, and the thought occurred to me that I should start blogging again, even though I call my parents every week.  This way I could share pictures and also journal about our lives.  A ton has happened since the last blog post, but I'm not going to go back, I'm just going to write about what is happening in our lives right now.
Hunter (6) recently started first grade.  He is in the Spanish Immersion Program this year.  So in the morning he goes to one classroom where everything is taught in English.  Then right before lunch he goes to a different classroom where everything is taught in Spanish.  He really enjoys going to school and likes learning a different language.  Everyday when he comes home he tells us about all the different words he is learning in Spanish.  I have to stop myself from correcting his accent.  His Spanish teacher is from Argentina so he is learning to say words with an Argentina accent.  (which Weston loves).  Just this week he brought home some math homework (all math is done in Spanish), and they are working on least and greater or in Spanish menor y mayor.  Well I was saying mayor the way I say it, and he corrected me and said it with an Argentina accent.  "That the way Sra. Z says it." he told me.  I can already tell that it's going to be a great year.

Walter (4) is at home with me.  He loves soccer and enjoys that Weston is his coach.  (I will take pictures of him this week at soccer and post them next time)  We still do school at home and he enjoys it, but he also misses Hunter.  Just last night I heard him talking to Hunter at night time.  He was telling Hunter not to go to school, but to stay home with him.  (I will also try to get pictures of the day to day activities that we do during school time.)  Walter also starts Talking Time (Speech Therapy) again this week.  He is really excited, because at least for a little while, he feels like he is going to big boy school.  
Quincy (5 months) is growing and growing.  He can sit up by himself really well now, and he wants to crawl, but has yet to figure out that he has to move his arms and legs at the same time.

Our newest past time as a family is going on family bike rides.  Weston and I recently got new bikes and then we also got a bike trailer.  Which only fits on my bike.  (I tease Weston that he purposely got a bike that the trailer couldn't be attached to)  But so far it has been so much fun.  Walter and Quincy love it and I hope to be able to start going on small errands with them on my bike.

Well that's a small update on our family right now.  More to come next week.  And I am going to try to take more pictures of small events that occur in our lives.  Sometimes I forget about taking pictures or I only take pictures of the big events.  I did find this list online that I hope will help me take more pictures of the small day to day activities:  Fall Photo Checklist