Sutter's Mill

My family came to visit us Memorial day weekend. We went to Sutter's Mill since Jeremy and I had never been there. We had a good time. It was a nice drive and the kids liked playing outside. The museum had some cool artifacts from the gold hunting days, like little Chinese shoes that looked like they should have gone on a doll but people actually wore. The kids' favorite part was playing outside where they had some picnic tables, some big boulders perfect for climbing, and some teepees. They also had fun with their uncle Brad, KC was up in Yuba city with some friends.

JD has been really cheesy about smiling lately. It's kind of cute.

The funniest part of the whole trip was when Brad decided he was going to jump off the boulder and fell flat on his butt. Then he got up and decided to to it second time and landed on his feet. Luckily Jeremy was up there to make sure that the kids did not decide to follow suit. I still laugh looking at these pictures. Brad was a really good sport about it.

My mom has a thing for lizards and squirrels. We can't go anywhere outside without her getting a picture of at least one of them. This little guy was sitting on the mill. We also walked down to the river so Dad could take pictures and we could show the kids where the mill really used to be. As you can see, the river is very full and fast this year. The bridge there is the tallest in California. I thought the picture my dad took was nice. I also think the old stagecoach is cool.

Busy Times

I handed in my finals for my World Literature and Algebra classes yesterday. I don’t think I have ever been so glad for a set of classes to end. The World Literature class was supposed to be one that I would enjoy, but nothing that I handed in was ever good enough for the instructor. If he didn’t agree with my interpretation of the reading assignment, I lost points. If I forgot to add an apostrophe to a word, I lost points. Usually I can figure out what a teacher wants and do it. With this guy it was impossible.

We just got back from Utah on the 27th and celebrated our 10th anniversary on the 30th. We had a nice visit with family and friends. There were some stressful spots, like when the car broke down on the way to Manti, but overall it was a good trip. I even came home with a Cricut Expression.  I can’t wait to start making cards with my Wild Card cartridge. The small Cricut I have didn’t cut big enough to use all the templates.

This week was really crazy. It all started on Monday when the dryer decided not to heat up anymore. Jeremy spent the next few days reading about it and looking at it before he gave up for a couple days. Wednesday was nice. Jeremy and I were able to get a babysitter and go out to dinner. Then we went shopping and bought inexpensive anniversary gifts. It was nice to get out for a little bit without the kids. While we were out, my dad called and said my cousin Tyler was in a rock climbing accident at Scout Camp and had to be life-flighted to Primary Children’s Hospital for emergency brain surgery. Thankfully the surgery went well and appears to be recovering well. Hopefully he will recover fully without any lasting damage.

Thursday night I tried to update my phone again after Apple replaced the first one when it broke while trying to update. I ended up having the same problem all over again. In the mean time, I woke up at 1:30 am Friday morning to find out that our basset hound, Sweetie, was ill. Jeremy stayed up all night watching her. She seemed to improve and he went to bed after I went to work at 3:30 am.

Friday Jeremy took my phone in and they were able to restore it.  I tried to update a third time and had the same problem yet again.  I finally called Apple and they got the phone working, but I lost all the phone numbers that were stored on it. We discovered Friday afternoon that Sweetie was not better after all.  Jeremy had to leave work early so that we could take her to the emergency vet. She had intestinal bleeding for some unknown reason. She’d lost so much blood that it was too difficult and too expensive to even try to save her. After only having her for a few short months, we had to put her down. Then we had to tell the girls. They stayed up waiting for us.

Yesterday had its good points and bad. We were invited to a BBQ , fireworks, and a water fight with some friends in the ward. Jeremy went with the kids while I took my finals. I went afterward. Then I hit a car that was driving by when I was trying to move my car to a different spot. I just didn’t see them. It was just one more really frustrating, stupid thing to add to the ever growing list of crap that seemed to be going on.  I had a nice time visiting with friends and they were nice enough not to make fun of me too much. If you’ve ever met the Andrus family, you know that took a lot of self control on Jared’s part. I really appreciated it. I went with a couple of the ladies to go see Eclipse. I enjoyed it and it was nice to go out after having such a hard weekend.

Now the dryer is working, Lucky is without his friend, the car is a little messed up, and I’m ready to start the last set of classes before I get my Associate’s degree. I hope I can get a reprieve from trials for a while. I know that there are people out there with worse trials than I, but I feel like I’ve about reached my limit.

I’m going to post some pics of the Utah trip and the other assorted events I’ve missed over the last few months, I just have to finish going through all of them first.

Another Bodega Bay Page

I'm really having a good time with this tutorial. If you can get the image big enough, there's some text around the picture.

Digital Scrapbooking

I've been wanting to try my hand at digital scrapbooking for a while now. I've been hesitant for a couple of reasons. One is that I already have a TON of paper items, so it doesn't really seem reasonable to spend money on a different kind of scrapbooking. Also, I just really like playing with the paper, adhesive, ribbons, and my Cricut.

Jeni makes digital pages and posts them on her blog, which I think are really cute. I decided to try the website she has linked to hers, FreeDigitalScrapbooking.com. It has lots of cool free stuff, so that takes care of my excuse about spending money. And I think having pages on my blog would be cool, especially if I ever steal my friend Holly's idea about making a book out of blog posts from Blurb.com. I had actually planned on doing it for Mother's Day or something, but I'm still too far behind on my posts. Maybe I'll do something for Christmas this year.

Anyway, the other roadblock to digital scrapbooking was I had NO IDEA what to do. However, my Photoshop Elements software came with a how to CD, complete with a template (shown above), papers, and embellishments. I still don't think this has quite the same feeling as real paper and adhesive, but it makes for a cute post I think. So I know I said yesterday that I was going to scrapbook Christmas day of last year, but I want to do some digital pages and I haven't found free paper for it yet. If anyone knows of some websites where I can get free stuff, feel free to comment.

These pictures are from April Conference weekend when Mom, Dad, and KC came to visit. Mom, Dad, and I went with the kids to Bodega Bay. It was a really long car ride, but the kids had fun on the hike we took and they liked collecting shells. We also saw some deer, which was neat. There were a lot of really cool looking old farms on the ride town. I love this picture of Becca that my mom took, she looks so happy.

Catching up – Christmas Eve

Since we are 7 months away from Christmas, I thought it would be a good idea to post pictures from last Christmas. I am definitely looking forward to finishing the Associates degree program. I think when I start the Bachelor’s in September that I am going to take a week off between classes. I need time for myself and my hobbies. The kids would probably enjoy some time to play with me too. =)

This is proof that I can and do cook. I made Christmas Eve dinner over at Grandma Musser’s house. We had chicken fried steak. I even managed to make a decent gravy.

Here are the kids in front of the tree. You see the 49ers sweater JD is wearing? He LOVES that thing. He wears it, even when it’s hot. He plays in it, sleeps in it. It is starting to get too small. We need to find him another.

Making cookies for Santa. The kids have fun doing this every year. Thanks Aunti Jeni and Nana!

I love this pic of Grace. She attacked the pinata for Christmas Eve. See JD there in the background looking kind of bummed? He had his turn but he wasn’t sure what to do. He figured it out after his turn was over and wasn’t too happy when he saw everyone else having fun.

The pinata fell apart before everyone had a turn, so they had to do a quick repair job. At least the tape was red like the boot.

It didn’t last much longer after that.

We had a nice talent show and Nativity. Sariah played Jolly Old St Nicholas and Becca sang some songs. JD didn’t really feel like being a shepherd though. He got tired.

Last but not least, the kids and I opened up our Christmas Eve pajamas. Next time I’ll post pics from Christmas day and work my way through everything else that I’ve missed over the last several months. It’s been a busy year.

The End is Near

I am 18 weeks away from getting an Associates Degree. I’m very excited. Part of the reason I am so excited is the Bachelor’s program has a break every five weeks, which means I might be able to get back to blogging. In the mean time, I thought I might try out posting from Windows Live and see if I like it any better than through the Blogger editor. So far so good since this format is similar to Word. I haven’t taken a whole lot of time to see what Blogger can do.

Anyway, I’m sure everyone would like to see some pictures. This is of Sariah in April 2005

Isn’t she cute? This is of Sariah when we were at Disneyland in March.

It just blows me away how she went from a sweet chubby cheeked little girl to a girl that in a few short years will be a young woman. I showed her the photo from 2005 and she embarrassed. Too funny.

This one is Becca from 2005, the same trip to Santa Cruz as the one of Sariah.

  

This is Becca at Disneyland in March

My girls are growing up!

What's up?

I've been remiss in posting to the blog. I was telling Jeremy yesterday that this might turn into an every nine weeks blog; since each set of classes is nine weeks. I finished my Research Writing class and my Economics class yesterday. Tomorrow I begin Ethics and Business Information Systems. I've enjoyed school. I wish I had done as well in High School as I am doing now. I didn't do poorly in High School but it feels like now I am more focused and understanding comes more easily. I guess that happens with getting older.

Yesterday we had a party with the kids we teach in Sunday School. I had fun after the initial freaking out internally when the first two kids showed up late and the others slowly trickled in. I shouldn't have been surprised kids were late, I mean, we do run on Mormon Standard Time. We played Guitar Hero and Super Mario Bros. Wii. and the teenagers were nice enough to let Sariah, Becca, and JD play. They had a ton of patience with my kids. They are a really great group. I bought way too much food. I thought they would eat more. That's OK, more chips and dip and chocolate covered peanuts for me.

I am really excited for this week since not only do I start a new set of classes, but I also get to go to the Bon Jovi concert with Jeremy on Tuesday. Because of the concert on Tuesday, I am taking the day off Wednesday so I can sleep in.

Becca has a lying problem. Any idea how to get her to stop? She got herself in trouble at school on Friday and then continued to get herself in trouble this weekend. She has me at my wits end.

JD was upset today because the girls were playing Guitar Hero. I told him "I hate to break it to you buddy but you are too small for that game." JD says "I like to break it to you Mommy, I am a big boy." Can't really argue with that one, can I?

Sariah went ice skating with a friend from school Saturday. It worked out for me since I was happy to have one less kid while trying to write my final papers. She had fun, I'm glad she's made a good friend.

17 days to Disneyland! March is going to be a good month.