Spring Cleaning Part 2

I think I operate under the mistaken notion that if only I would organize things better I would....be ______________ (fill in the blank....more organized, cook better meals, be a better housekeeper, etc.)  I don't know if I am the only one that does that.  Even though I understand it doesn't always work, here I am reorganizing and redoing (and buying more totes) in an attempt to accomplish something lasting.  As I mentioned in a prior post, spring cleaning use to be a yearly event in January and February, although it has lasted throughout the year and often missed completely during the past 7 years.  This week, I touched up and repainted sections of our baseboards, washed wails, redid and cleaned my China hutch, and re did my PANTRY.  Yeah!  Here is the finished product.

I have an idea of how to manage my food storage better through using my pantry better as well.  Ask me next year how that is working.  I am open for ideas.  Does anyone have a computer program to mange their food supplies?

A New High

After bowling with Special Olympics, Jena joined us for one more game of bowling as Gary and I were bowling on another lane.  Her games for the morning were all three under her average, but I guess it was all for practice as she then bowl her new all time high score "128".    She was one happy bowler!  We have a tradition of posting the scores when new highs are done, so here she is with her score sheet posted on the honored spot--the refrigerator!

Our Week in Review

For the first time in over a year and only the second time in about 10 years, Gary went on a business trip.  He headed to San Jose for team meetings and team "building" time  (that means going out to eat at fun places and playing bocco ball for an afternoon.)  He left on Monday with a cold--never fun for a plane trip--and came home with a chest cough and feeling a bit "under the weather" as they say.  Hopefully he gets better by tomorrow.....we are having five families over to celebrate our "belated" Chinese New Year" for Family Night.
I had lined up the usual busyness for when he was gone and got a lot of spring cleaning done while he was gone.  I also stayed up late reading a book which I usually don't do much any more as my eyes really don't work that great past 10 or 11 at night.  However I got caught in the story "Lost Gate" by Orson Scott Card.  If you like the science fantasy type book, you would probably enjoy this book.  Warning..it is part of a trilogy and I don't think the other ones are published yet.

However, I missed him...more than I expected.  With all of the traveling Gary did early in our marriage, I usually did fine when he was gone.  I have just gotten use to having him around now.  I am the one coming and going and he is usually here, minding the fort.  Jena missed him as well and gave a daily count down to when he was getting back.  We were happy when he was back and life was back to our "normal".

Jena is busy with her play practice at the junior high.  She is loving it.  She is in the mission band of "Guys and Dolls".  I am in charge of the treats so I have hung out during parts of the practice.  It is so great to see her a part of the cast and interacting and feeling a part of that group.  The performance is on this coming Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.  We are excited.  Watch for pictures next week.

Jena's ski lesson was the past Thursday.  As we left the junior high it started to rain and by the time we got to Snowbasin it was pouring.  Jena said she still wanted to ski, although I wasn't even sure if her teacher would want to take her out.  Terrie was willing and off she went, skiing in the pouring rain for 2 hours.  I stayed inside most of the time, stepping out from time to time to wave at her.  She ended the lesson with big smiles and wet clear though.  Her hands took forever to get warm.  Apparently her gear is best for keeping you warm in the snow not dry in the rain.  She was very proud of her self.  She was the only one of the afternoon lessons that showed up to brave the rain.  I don't know if that is something to be "proud of"...it might mean she is a bit 'crasy" about skiing.

As soon as Gary was home, he headed off to go bowling with his sister, Valerie, and her husband bowling even with his cough. Jena joined him after play practice and they all had great time.  Then Jena bowled Saturday morning with Special Olympics.

I often have pictures to post of Jena but I took this one of Ben with one of our dogs, Mowgli,  Jena took the next picture of Ben working on his computer in our kitchen.

Other Hall news  Jessica is a proud owner of a new (to her) car.  She said that it is exciting to have a car with power windows and air conditioner that works.  Scott and Chantel are busy with the usual--school, work, the gym, and other life stuff.  Tosha has been working lots of hours serving at Cracker Barrell even though it hasn't been very busy.

And that's the wrap.  Have a great day.

A winter walk

When I drove car pool this morning, I realized that it was a very mild day outside so decided to take a walk outside for exercise instead of using the elliptical in the basement.  It was beautiful despite the gray skies.  It was about 40 degrees or so.  We have had a very dry winter so far with just a few snow falls.  It makes the pictures look more like late fall instead of winter in Utah.

Wet path but no snow

Left in the field for the winter

Can't see the mountains in the back because of low lying clouds (east)

Can't even see Antelope Island which is much close to the west.

Ducks enjoying the water.  In late December, this pond was coverred in ice, but the mild temps have melted it all.

Blue skys coming in from the west.

For those of you who miss snow, there is the only trace I saw on my walk.

I personally am not a big fan of snow.  I like it fine on the grass just not on the roads and walks.  However I do understand the whole water cycle facts and know we definately NEED snow not just for the skiiers but to drink and water our yards in the summer.  So start snowing...well, not right now.  We are going to our annual Hong Kong Reunion-Chinese New Year Dinner in Salt Lake with many of our old friends tonight and as I mentioned I don't like snow on the roads.

Walnut Grove Pinewood Derby

After months of anticipating, weeks of building and practicing, we had our Pinewood Derby for our scouts yesterday.  (which is why I am too tired to doing anything on my list today and am catching my blog up to date instead).  All of that anticipating, building, etc....was done by Gary.  After the practice beta test with the High Priests in October, Gary has been looking forward to making this a great event for our 28 Cub Scouts.  My goal is always to have no Cubs cry during the event.

After some nervous moments and a bit of a delay for Technical Difficulties (poor Gary),  everything slid into place and we were able to run a fast moving pinewood derby.  All cars ran down all four of the tracks in a collection of 4 different heats.  The times were all done by the computer----no fights about stop watches (so nice).  The computer kept track of the times and the calculated the winners at the end.  We had decided to not give awards to the individual finishers but to the den with the fastest total times.  We did announce the top car in each den, but then had the dens come up as they were announced as third, second and first.    It was fast and fun and even with the delay, we got done just after 8:00 which is great for 28 boys with four races each.

Here is some of the sights but no sounds from The Walnut Grove Pinewood Derby 2012:  (I was busy manning the starting button so didn't take many pictures.)

The Pit area

Put the cars on the track.  each boy did their own.

The famous "Bacon" cheer for awards given during a break

Gary with his other Webelo leader and their cars

The Webelos

And for dessert, I took the idea from my Plano Ward (I believe my friends, Robynn and Julie did them):  Our own tire donuts.  The boys loved them.

Thanks to Debbie, the Primary President, who helped me decorate 144 donuts for this event.

Did I mention that we are exhausted today!  But in that good way!

(We are curious if the dads were disappointed to not really know where their son's car ended up overall,  We will see if we get any feedback in the next few weeks.)

And the results are in

Jena got a bronze in double competition and a gold for singles in her recent Special Olympics Bowling tournament.  She scored one of her highest scores of 112 during the singles competition.  This past Monday during a practice game with her dad and Uncle Allan, she scored a 119 which is her highest score to date.  She was pretty excited about that.

Her gold in singles

Back to school after a holiday

Jena, Scott, and Chantel all headed back ot school after the holidays.  Scott and Chantel are starting their last semester at Weber State (although Scott may need to go into the summer for his internship).  They are excited to finish this part of their studies.  Jena went back for the last two weeks of her semester and had a geography project her first day back.  She had to do some type of art related to Mexico or Central and South America.  After Internet research, she (and I) decided to do a mosaic.  Here is her final design.  Thank heavens for the Internet to get good clear directions on what to buy and how to do it and for Michaels for having the raw materials we were looking to buy.  She painted, designed, glued, gouted, and finished it with mostly just directions from me.  She was very happy with it.

This is a picture of the hair bow Jena made in Young Women's the first week of the month.

Everyone loved Jena's.  I guess she was the only young women who thought to put two different colors together for one of the flowers.  The leaders were thrilled with how well she did and how creative she was.

Of course, this is the only time you will see it in her hair as she does not like headbands.

It is cute, anyway!

Jena's new semester started this week although she has missed two days with a bad cold.  She has mainly the same classes but is now taking a cooking class instead of dance.  Two more weeks until her class's production of "Guys and Dolls".  She is so excited.

Merry Christmas 2011

A good Christmas holiday season and day.  We never got everyone in the same place at the same time but we enjoyed time with our kids and extended family over the holiday time. 

We played games with my Dad and Karla a few days before Christmas and went out to dinner at Beto Po's or something like that and actually ate at the kitchen table.  Yes, actually right in the kitchen itself.....they had a large table set just to the side in the kitchen where you could watch pasta being prepared while you ate (It was Italian food.)  When theyofferred the "kitchen table" we said yes, it sounded fun.  We didn't realize at the time that we were part of the tour as guests came to the restaurant.  They were all led through the kitchen on the way to the tables and the "kitchen table" was pointed out.  We would wave and one person asked if our meal was cheaper since we were eating in the kitchen.  (The answer is no).  It was fun and good food.  I would recommend the food and the table for a fun time.  (If I actually knew the right name of the place, that is.  : )  ).

We spent Christmas Eve with the Hall extended family at Grandma's house.  This is a yearly tradition since a couple of years after we were married.  Here is a couple of shots of our kids.  Jessica, Jena, Ben, and Chantel were able to spend part or all of the party with us.

Jena...the pose

Jessica was able to attend for a bit before heading home and work--graveyard shift.

Grandma Hall opening gifts

Then Scott and Chantel were able tojoin us for Christmas Eve at our house.  We started a new tradition of giving Christmas story books instead of pjs to married children.  Here Scott and Chantel are reading their book called "One Boy Stirring" a version of "Twas the Night Before Christmas".  It is a cute story with darling pictures.

Christmas Morning---Sunday is a great day for Christmas.  Since we don't have any early risers (Jessica was always the one to wake the others up early), we went to Church first at 9:00 and then came home and got our pjs on again (except for Jena and Gary) and opened presents.  Very sweet.

Beautiful Girl.

Ben getting ready to take some pictures of his own.

The newest addition to Gary's t-shirt collection.  Jessica searches the world
to find great t-shirts which always attract attention when he wear them.





Scott and Chantel--they arrived just when we finished opening presents so we got to watch them opening gifts.

We had a very good Christmas.

Jessica painted this nativity for my Christmas gift.

The reason for the season!

Cute camel

Voice Male 2011

December Catch up continues....

Jessica was the one that introduced us to the group Voice Male who is a singing group of six men who have been singing together over 16 years.  They make all of their own music with just their voices including drums, bag pipes, and anything else plus they have good voices and they are funny.  We are hooked and try to see them each December when they perform a Christmas program in the area.  Sometimes they perform in the summer as well and we try to go to those as well.

Here is Jena and our neighbor Abby with John, one of the group numbers.   







We attended the Salt Lake performance which was downtown just southwest of Temple Square.  You can see the temple in the right of this picture.  The orange reflection is from inside the building.

You can see the "odd" statue in the background of this picture of the Hall "women" who went to the concert.  It was a great evening and perfect for the days before Christmas.

Three Phone Calls

Now I know that I promised I was catching up with December and the holidays first, but I haven't taken time for that yet, but did want to write about today and my three phone calls.....

As a preface, I wanted to say that last week was a difficult week with many appointments for Ben and generally a hard week with him and his illness.  Things had calmed down by the weekend,( and we both had a nice day Saturday, Gary bowling with Jena and me attending a Broadway production of "South Pacific" and dinner with Gary's mom and sisters) but Saturday night Gary and I sat and watched a bowl game and then a "ondemand" TV show we like...five hours of just watching TV and doing NOTHING.  We were exhausted.

I promised myself that this week would be better and it has been.  And it became a great week with three phone calls.................

the first was one that I finally made to my sister Valerie.  It has been over a month since we have actually spoken on the phone together and I have been wanting to talk to her, just for fun.  In addition, she has become a grandmother for the first time since we last spoke so we had lots to talk about.  We had an hour chat until she had to run her daughter to piano lessons.

the next came from a neighbor, Michelle.  It was short but great too as we finalizated some long delayed plans to go to the temple together tomorrow.  It is great to have nearby friends to go to the temple with.  We don't do things together nearly enough.

Not long after I hung up from that phone call, I got a call from my dear friend, Eileen, calling me from Hong Kong on her vonage line.  Oh the wonders of our new age.  We spoke for an hour about my upcoming trip to Hong Kong and our dear friends who will gather with us.  It was as if we had just seen each other last week in Church although it has been since last July that we visited last.

Isn't it an amazing gift to have connections with family and friends, near and far?  I have been blessed by a great family and amazing friends where ever we have lived and they all are such a blessing in my life.  Thanks to Valerie, Michelle, and Eileen and to everyone who makes an impact in my life.

I think I will be making more phone calls this year.  :)

Parties and more parties

Lost my camera to computer cable so I am now playing catch up for the month of December is there will be a few posts dated today.  Using my pictures as my reminders, I will try to catch-up with everything.

We held our annual (almost) Adult Christmas Party.  We had around 30 people and had great fun with Chrsitmas Family Feud, a Christmas Getting to Know You game, and the ever popular White Elephant Exchange (and yes, the lizard continues its reign as the visiting guest after 22 years or so.)

The next day we held our Giberson Christmas dinner.  We played some of the same games after having a great dinner together.  The only sad thing was that my dad and his wife weren't able to make it at the last minute because my dad had to make a quick trip to the ER.  After a few hours he was home again and recoving and is doing fine, but they missed the fun.  We recruited Gary's sister and her husband to help us eat food and having fun.  It was a fun evening but next year we are planning on Grandpa and Nana Giberson to be there.

Gary, Judy, Megan Ipsong, Danielle, Siera, Jenna, David (Dodsons),
Niles and Rachel Giberson,
Jena, Ben, and Valerie and Allan Burk
(Gary's mom took the picture)

The other adventure was when people came to get their shoes, Sierra's shoes which were actually slippers were missing.  We found them out in the backyard with chew marks.  Needless to say, they wre "history".  Fortunately, Ben was able to find the exact pair on line so we ordered new ones and sent them to hers.  Silly dogs.