In which Brooklin only appears in the title and pictures

The weather has been really nice outside this year, so it wasn’t too bad when AJ started soccer a few weeks ago. He’s on a 2nd grade team with his cousin, Andrew, this year, so it’s been challenging for him to keep up with the bigger kids. He really enjoys being part of a team and going to practices. I can’t say that I’m certain that he actually likes soccer, though. He absolutely refuses to take his ball out of the house except for practices and games. Grr…


Our Primary activity was on the 18th of March making fleece blankets for the Church’s humanitarian efforts. We focused our stories on the earthquake in Haiti and how many people are still without homes, but the Church told us they can’t guarantee that’s where the blankets will actually go. We know at least they will warm someone in need. The activity was a ridiculous amount of work and worth every bit. The kids really seemed to understand the service project and were excited about helping others.

Natalie was asked to participate as a Little Sister in the Miss Moses Lake pageant this year. She got to practice all week for a dance that she performed on stage with the other girls. And she got to dress up and escort one of the contestants on stage where she received her own Princess crown and got to walk and wave to the crowd while they read her bio. Her Big Sister, Meghan Houston, gave her a gift set of nail polishes and flower nail stickers and a plush duck, which she is thrilled with. She insists on wearing her crown all the time, and I can’t say I’m surprised. Meghan was voted Miss Congeniality.



Some other fun things we’ve done…I took the kids to see the new Alice in Wonderland. It was a bit weird, but the kids thought Johnny Depp was hilarious as the mad hatter. Joe and I saw our stake’s production of Hello Dolly! on a double date with some friends. The best part of that was getting to spend an evening together without the kids. AJ sold cookie dough for a school fundraiser. For future reference, it’s a ripoff. We found out afterwards that only a very small portion of what they sell goes to the school. And it’s $14 a bucket. And they messed up on AJ’s orders as well as a whole bunch of others. They are very good cookies though.

Joe is ever busy wheedling as much money out of me for his car as possible and spending it on projects that weren’t supposed to need fixing. And apparently loving every minute of it. Some progress though; the car has actually made it out of the garage under its own power. In fact, Joe is driving it home teaching right now. Maybe that’s why he’s not home yet. ;)

While Joe’s been in the garage, I’ve been working on becoming a semi-professional scrapbooker/photographer. Look what I did with the following picture. I don’t know what happened, but something on my camera (the shutter) does this periodically.


I turned it into:

Not bad, huh?