Thinking Green

I have been doing my part to save our planet...

Our household water usage for March 2008: 8000 gallons

Our household water usage for March 2009: 4000 gallons

I'm sure this has nothing to do with the fact that we are down one member of our household....or the fact that I shower at the gym most of the time...I am just doing my part to conserve. ;)

Don't Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

Dozer decided to fall asleep in my bedroom the other day

(he knows he isn't allowed in there, so he snuck in.)

I knew he was in there before I saw him.

How did I know he was in there?

The room smelled like dog farts....

There, I said it.

All I have to say is...Seriously???The girls before church this morning:

(I couldn't make my post solely about dog farts now could I?)

***Oh...Only 200 days left until Justin comes home!!!

Benefits of a Blizzard

This is a pic I took on Thurs. (the day it took me an hour to get home from the gym.)

I have to admit...I actually enjoyed the snow the next day.

I enjoyed it even more when I realized that I didn't have to shovel the huge drift that had formed on my driveway because some wonderful members of my Ward did it for me (not sure who all of them were cause I only caught a quick glimpse as they drove away, but I am so grateful for their act of service.)

The girls and I headed out Fri. morning with every intention of making a snow sculpture...once out there I couldn't resist turning a large mound of snow into an even larger mound and having the girls slide down it.

It was Sydnee's idea to get the sled...

Sydnee could have stayed out there all day, and she basically did...I had to force her to come in for dinner when it was getting dark.

wipe out:Charlee went down on the sled a few times...every time she got to the top and I put her on the sled, she would look down and say, "I don't want to go anymore." Being the nice mom that I am...she went anyway. She liked it, but the first look down scared her every time. :) After a while she tired of it and just wanted to play with her beach toys in the snow. As for today...I went shopping with Cherelle and spent...well...let's just say I had fun. :)

After shopping, the wonderful young women that babysat for me, joined the girls and me for a movie: Monsters vs. Aliens. (It was a decent movie.) It was nice to have the extra hands at the theater.

So this has turned out to be a pretty happy weekend...except for this stupid, ugly cake that I made for a school carnival cake-walk that was postponed (unbeknownst to me.)

Last Day of Swimming

This is my third post of the day. wow

I must say that I have had tons of pics in my posts lately, but I do it mostly for Justin's benefit. so....here are a ton more:
Sydnee and Charlee have been going to swimming lessons at a pool that belongs to a friend...A couple of girls from our ward have been teaching them. The girls absolutely LOVE going. They count down the days to swimming lessons. They were very sad that Wed. was their last day.

I think the highlight was the slide they got to go down at the end of class. They wore life-jackets so that they could go down by themselves, without anyone catching them.

Syd...making a splash:

Charlee looks a little scared, but she loved it and went down it as much as she could.

She really caught some air at the end of the slide.

Here Sydnee is swimming all by herself...these lessons are the first time she has been able to do that. I think she could have a while ago, but she would get scared after she went under...she felt like she wouldn't be able to get back up on her own (she still doesn't like to go very long without something to grab onto.)

Syd doing a front float:

Log Home

Justin has been asking me to put pics up of my parents' house that they are almost done building...I could just direct him to my sister's blog but then I wouldn't get to have the pics in my blog book (my 2008 one should be done by 2012 at the rate I am going.) So I stole her pics (with her permission of course) and I am posting about it too...just not in near the detail that she did, so if you are interested in the details of what we did over Spring Break...click here. :)

This is some of my parent's food storage...moving this was Vicki and My's first project: This is a huge table that my Dad created...I think it is the coolest table ever!This is the master bedroom...you can kinda see the great view of the mountains out the window.Another view of the master:

While we were there, my mom was getting the last bit of the tiling done...I helped her grout a small part of the laundry room floor, and it was harder on me than I thought it would be...My Mom is one tough, hard-working lady.

The above and below pics are of the same room.This is what is known as the "Russia" room...I guess it has been named that because it will hold lots of the Russian souvenirs that my parents brought home from their trip. It also has a neat world map that has pins in it, showing which child in our fam has been where...Vicki has the most by far...hopefully I can catch up a little bit throughout my life.

There are so many things I love about this house...I take pride in knowing that a lot of my parents' hard work has gone into it...plus, along with other friends and family, I have gotten to work on it a little as well. It has a great cozy-cabin feel to it, and I look forward to spending a lot more time there....enjoying, not working. ;)

Here are some fun pics of my girls and my nephew Trey on the long drive home...oh and Dozer:

They were having fun dancing.