End of Summer, Start of School

We are back to school routines now. Summer went by so quickly. The boys had a great backpacking trip with Neal. They went to Las Cruses Basin for three nights at the beginning of the month. They hiked about a mile into the basin and found a camping spot by a creak so they could fish. They had a great time together being in the outdoors and loved fishing. They caught lots of fish and ate them all. The pictures show that it was a beautiful place. I am glad they could go. I thought it was great that even Caleb was able to put on a pack and carry gear into the wilderness, well at least as wild as it could be for so close to city life. It was a fun way for them to end their summer break.

Caleb hiking, with his rain gear, they had 

a light rain while they hiked, but mostly had 

good weather. 

They were excited to catch so many fish

Hiking back to the car

Andrew had his 13th birthday on the 5th. He was happy to have a quiet day at home with the family. We ate his favorite food, fish, crab salad, and breaded shrimp for dinner. I guess he didn’t get enough fish on his camping trip. He wanted brownies for his dessert. That was a bit tricky since we still don’t have the oven functioning. On Saturday I got out the sun oven and was able to bake the brownies in that. We have done some other fun experiments with the sun oven. I have found that it works best on a clear sunny day. One day we had it out it was hazy and I guess that effected the sun rays because I couldn’t get the oven over 290 degrees. It still cooked things, just slower.  Well, now we have two teen agers in our home.

On the 7th the youth had a swim party at the Horton’s home, the young women president. They have a fun yard to play in with a pool and other activities. The kids had fun. We have had a lot of parties recently. Caleb went to a party at Miles’s home on the 8th. He loved being with a big group of boys his age and do some silly games and watch a silly movie. I had a RS dinner that night and enjoyed visiting with the women. On the 9th Ruth went out to eat lunch with her friend Delanney (a friend from work and school).  In the evening she went to a party at Zaida’s home. They had a group of girls together playing games and eating dinner together. The afternoon of the 9th Spencer went to the Horton’s home for a party for all the LDS kids entering the middle school in 6th grade this year. The organizers invited kids from the different wards that feed into this school so that the kids could meet each other and know who was LDS at their school. Spencer found out a girl he knew at the elementary school was LDS, they were surprised to see each other there. He enjoyed a play time with his friend Jonathan Merrill that week too. Our vacation and Jonathan’s family vacation were at different times and the boys hadn’t been able to play much together this summer. On the 17th Andrew had a party at the Hadley’s home for the “Goat Head Magnets” the biking group the boys have. They had fun together and planned times for more bike rides. Andrew really enjoys biking on the dirt trails around our home and up into the foothills. On the 18th Ruth went to a birthday party for Morgan. I think that was all the parties. They seemed to just keep happening.

Caleb enjoyed his last BCA class that was math art. They did some neat art work with geometric designs. He enjoyed being around his friends and creating things. The last week of summer was busy with doing the school registrations and picking up class schedules and ID’s. I also took Andrew and Spencer to the doctor for an annual physical, both are growing healthy.

On the 10th and 11th Spencer, Andrew and Neal joined the Boy Scouts on a special camping trip. They drove up to a small town in Colorado, just across the boarder, Antonito and got on a steam engine train for a ride. They were on the historic Cumbres and Toltec railroad. The boys had their back packs with them and after riding for awhile the train stopped in the wilderness and dropped the Boy Scouts off in the woods. There were about 14 boys and 4 men in the group. They made camp, went on some short exploring hikes and played for the afternoon and evening. The next morning they broke camp and hiked about five miles to the next train station picking up trash as they went. They were doing conservation service for the train company. When they got to the station they ate lunch there and were able to get on a train to ride back to Antonito. It was a great experience for the boys. I know my boys loved it. They had a lot of fun being on a train, watching the trains at the station and exploring the way it all worked. I am glad they were able to go.

A picture of the scout group

Andrew on the train, enjoying the view

Our garden has recovered from the hail we had. The butternut squash grew leaves again and is doing well. We cooked one yesterday and Andrew thought it was great. He loves squash. Even the swiss chard grew back. Many tomatoes had hail damage, but I just cut out the bruises. They have been delicious. We have had a lot of cucumbers too. I bottled tomatoes and cucumbers (pickles) last week. We are starting to eat our apples and pears. Many have hail damage and need to have bruises cut off, but they taste great. I have been cooking batches of apples and pureeing it into apple sauce. It tastes good. I don’t think we will get enough to bottle this year.

On the 5th we had a new bishop put in. Change is always good. Our old bishop will be Ruth’s seminary teacher. Ruth started seminary today at 6:00am. She is so good about getting herself up and ready.

Last week I did a hike with our wolf cub scout den. The boys needed to go on a mile hike. They met at my house and we hiked up to the bear statues in the open space. It is about one and half miles round trip. The boys had a great time. That night the boys scouts did a bike ride through the open space and we saw them go by on the other side of the arroyo.

On Thursday we invited a couple in our ward over for dinner, Peter and Louise. Neal and I both have assignments to minister to them. We thought a dinner would be a good way to get to know them. They are younger and were fun to talk to. Lou is from Australia and they both served missions in New Zealand (that is where they met). So we enjoyed hearing stories about those countries. They enjoyed seeing our busy family life. When they arrived, a little early,  we had out instruments, Spencer was on the sax, Andrew on the trombone and Neal on the trumpet. It was a busy, noisy place, different from their quiet apartment life.

Last Monday school started! Ruth had a great week of school and is excited about her classes. She got the electives she wanted, creative writing, anthropology, and French. She is also in honors English and Geometry, AP world history and 10th grade science. It will be a busy year for her. Today she started seminary, so it will be a long day for her. She is still working and is going to try to work three shifts a week. We will see how that works with her school load.

Andrew started 8th grade at the middle school. He is excited to be in symphonic and jazz bands with his friends. He has been very confident getting back into school. Spencer is in 6th grade at the middle school. He has been a little overwhelmed with the classes and moving around to different rooms and teachers. I think he will get use to it soon though. He likes walking to school with Andrew. The first day of school was hard, he was overwhelmed and his back pack zipper broke. We got him a new pack this week end and this morning he was all smiles as he had a new back pack and was ready to face another week of it.

Caleb is in 3rd grade this year. A few days before school started I had a phone call from the school about his gifted class. To give a little back ground, gifted education is under special education in New Mexico. Caleb qualifies for part time gifted services in math and language arts. He is in what is called “B level” giftedness. He was very close to getting the “C level” full time gifted services. At his school there is a class that is C level, all day, with a gifted teacher, Mrs. Moses. This year Caleb was invited to be in Mrs. Moses class for half of the day. He is with her for 4 hours a day (this includes lunch time) to receive math and language arts instruction with her. I had to go into the school and make some minor changes on his IEP to say he was receiving the maximum amount of gifted services that he can have with B level. I was excited about this change because I have heard great things about Mrs. Moses. His other teacher is Mrs. Hedges. Spencer had her and she was wonderful with him. Caleb is excited to be in her class too. She is an amazing teacher as well and has National Board certification, which takes a lot to earn. Caleb is with her for the end of the day for science and social studies. He is also with her class in the morning for “specials” (when they go to PE, computers, library and music classes.) Caleb loved his first week of classes. He loves going into Mrs. Moses class room and tells everyone that he has the two best teachers ever! Caleb has wanted to ride his bike to school for a long time now. We decided to let him do that this year. We bought him a bike lock and had him practice with it and today was his first day doing it. I hope it goes well. It was different to me to send him off and realize that I don’t need to drive or walk anyone to school this year.

I am enjoying a quiet morning. I have been going on walks still and doing lots at home to keep up with this busy family.

Summer is Ending

It is August already! We have one week left of summer vacation. I can’t believe how quickly it has gone. We are getting ready for next week of school schedule pick-ups and meet the teacher night and back to school activities. It will be a busy week and then schools starts on August 13^th. The summer break has been good but busy.

Ruth enjoyed her multi-stake youth conference. There were about 600 youth that attended. They kept the kids busy from 7:00am to 10:00pm for a couple of days. Since Ruth was local she came home for the night. It was a busy time with classes, activities, dances and a service project. She enjoyed it all. I am glad that she could participate. 

The boys have had some fun play time with friends. Andrew likes to bike ride with his group. Caleb likes playing with Charlie. Spencer and Andrew played with their friend Nathan one afternoon too. Spencer had lots of fun going to a birthday party for the Duran twins. They went to a Lego store and Gravity Park to play. He loved it all. This last week Ruth had her friend Brianna come over for an afternoon. The girls had fun visiting together. They also rode their bikes together to the library to get some books. It is good to have friends.

We have enjoyed the Bear Canyon Academy classes. Spencer did a service class and went to the Road Runner Food Bank two different times in July. I went with his group one of the times, they needed another driver. I enjoyed being there helping. I hadn’t gone in before. When I went in we were sorting through a big delivery donation from a farmer of onions and green peppers. All three boys went to a swimming party class at the Johnson’s home. For four days they got to go swim in their pool for an hour and a half in the afternoon. They enjoyed the water play with other kids that week. I went with them one day and sat and talked to Sister Johnson and enjoyed that. I did a sewing class. I had the kids make a pillow case and a tote bag. They turned out good and the kids had fun making things. This last week I did a science class. We did some simple experiments and just had some fun together. I am glad I am done with classes though. It takes time to prepare and to teach them. This next week Caleb has a class to go to about math art. I guess we will see what that might be. 

In July Neal and Ruth went on a back packing trip with some others from our ward. They went to Wheeler Peak and climbed to the summit on their second day. They enjoyed two nights out and had a great trip. Ruth enjoyed going with some friends from the ward. 

While they were camping I tried to have fun with the boys. One afternoon we went to the Hinkle Family Fun center. I had a bunch of coupons from the last school year and we decided to use them. The boys did Laser Tag. Then all of us played a game of miniature golf. Then Andrew and Spencer did the Go Karts. They had fun driving some cars. Caleb played some games in the arcade while they were doing that. With all that the only thing I had to pay for was for me to play mini-golf. Pretty good deal. We had a fun afternoon.

This week Neal took the boys on a back packing trip to Las Cruses Basin. They were going to fish and camp for three nights. I expect them home any time now. I have missed them. It has been quiet at home with just me and Ruth here. I have been able to do things with Ruth though. We worked on her dress that we started making last May. We were able to get it done yesterday. She is excited to wear it to church. It turned out cute. We went shopping and got her some new clothes for school. She even let me cut her hair! It looks cute shorter. We also went out to eat and watched the movie “Pride and Prejudice” together, the long version. We had a good time together. 

I got a new phone and took a selfie

I enjoyed going to a baby shower for three ladies in our ward who are expecting. It was fun to visit with the other women and just go do something without the kids. 

Doug’s family went to Utah for a vacation and stopped over at our house on their way there and their way home. We enjoyed our visits with them. They got here in the late afternoon and we had dinner and an evening together and then they would leave the next morning to continue their journey. Last Monday they were here on their way home and we had a random hail storm. The boys had been outside playing in the water, I had turned the fountain on for them. They decided to eat their dinner outside but then it started to rain. It was interesting how quickly it came up and how long it lasted. It just kept coming down. We had hail piling up and the water was running down the street like a small river. It was sad really because the hail caused damage to our yard, especially our garden. I was looking over our apples and pears this morning and seeing so many with hail damage and actually thinking that it was good we didn’t have a good crop this year because I don’t know how it will be when they ripen in another month. The hail damaged and knocked out the peaches. We only had a dozen or so, since it was a small tree, and we ate them up the next day. They tasted good. The butternut squash plant that was taking over the garden got damaged really bad. I was looking at it this morning and amazingly enough there are little new leaves all over the vine, so maybe the squash isn’t going to be a total loss. This week on a few different days I have worked out in the yard getting all the leaves and pine needles swept up that were knocked out of trees. We have had a lot of rain this last week too. It is helping a lot to have us recover from the drought. I noticed that the open space looked green. The cucumbers weren’t too hard hit and I picked a lot this week. I made 11 quarts of dill pickles. 

during the storm

there was a river going through the open space

the garden, taken the morning after the storm

these pictures were taken a couple of days later

the pickles I made

The green open space

Doug and Caleb being silly

Last week we had the missionaries come over for dinner. A couple of weeks ago the missionaries needed to borrow some bikes for a few days. Neal offered one of his because one of the missionaries is 6 foot 8 and needed a bigger bike. He was thankful Neal had one that worked for him. We enjoyed having them in our home. 

I have enjoyed going to the temple. It had been a few weeks since I had gone, with vacation and the busy schedule we have had I hadn’t been for over a month. Neal and I went together last week for our ward temple night and I went again this last Wednesday while Ruth was at work. I am thankful for temples and the peace that it bring into my life. 

Andrew has worked hard on scouts this summer. He had the leadership role of troop historian and worked hard on making a history book of the camp-outs they had gone on for the last six months. He did a nice job. He was able to finish some merit badges and this last week he had a board of review and has earned his Star rank. There will be a court of honor later this month. He is already starting to work on his Life rank requirements. 

Last Saturday Neal and I took the boys around to some pawn shops looking for a saxophone. Spencer has wanted to learn how to play one for over a year. He will be in band this year at the middle school so we decided we should get a sax before school starts while there are plenty to choose from. We looked at a lot of them and picked out the best of them and bought it. He is so excited about it. He has worked hard at learning how to get some sounds out of it. I am glad that we found a good one at the pawn shop where we got it for less than a new one. Now we can look forward to more music being played in our home. 

This summer Neal has worked with two interns on some projects. It took some time to help them with projects and mentor them but it was a good experience. This last week the interns finished up by giving a presentation on what they had done this summer. In the evening we went to dinner at a nice restaurant with the interns in this group (there were about 17 of them) and some of the employees that came to the dinner. It was to go out together and to meet and visit with some of the people Neal has worked with. 

I am thankful for my busy family. It has been a good month.

The boys just got home right as I am finishing this. I am thankful they are home safe.