random list . . .

Suzanne tagged me: Name 7 things about myself that people might not know...Hmm

One: I was born in Las Vegas. There were no family connections to that city before my birth and no connections since then. My dad was working a management retail position there for a short period of time.
Two: Winslow had a truck that would drive around the streets spraying fog out the back to control the mosquito population in and around town. We followed behind it on our bikes each time we saw it coming down our street. Fortunately, none of my siblings, my neighborhood friends or myself have been diagnosed with cancer from this ridiculous activity.
Three: I am a list maker. But I don't always follow my list each day. Often I forget about it. Sometimes at the end of the day, I add all the things I actually did do, and then cross them off. Somehow, it makes me feel better.
Four: I was the pianist for my church youth activity night when I was a young teenager. I could only play 3 hymns and to this day when I hear them, they remind me of that period of time when we sang the same set of songs every three weeks for a year.
Five: Since Suzanne and Lezlee confessed their first kiss . . . There was a Christmas dance at our Junior High School and there was lots of mistletoe being passed around. Well you know there are mistletoe rules that have to be followed and I think I had my first, second, third and maybe fourth kiss that night. What I would like to know now is - where were the chaperones??? And why were they not stopping this very inappropriate 7th grade behavior??
Anyway, there was a long dry spell for me after that night.
Six: I have never broken a bone that required medical attention. However, I am sure that several bones in my toes have been broken or cracked as I have stubbed them on furniture around the house over the years.
Seven: I don't like to wear shoes around the house. Thus the problem listed as #6.

All right now . . . Lauri? Cindi? Curtis? Debie? Anyone else want to play?

i looked out the window and what did i see?

I was sitting at our computer this morning and out the window I am seeing this vine - practically growing before my eyes. I know good and well this was not visible out the window when I was working here at the desk this morning. How can this be? We have a garden out there, but it is a good 20 feet away from our view out the window at the desk.

Brady planted 3 pumpkin seeds near the end of July. For a while, they were healthy and cute little plants growing in the designated garden area. They have since taken over the garden, the yard and I'm afraid if we don't keep an eye on it, it might overtake our entire house! I don't know if this picture does it justice. It has become a monster . . . 25 feet wide and probably over 30 feet long. It's beautiful and healthy. Brady is fighting a battle with some aphids on the underside of the leaves, but he appears to be winning the war. He's hoping to have some enormous pumpkins in time for Halloween.

time capsule

He had a fun activity at the church the other day. Ten years ago, our ward buried a time capsule. An information plaque has been on the wall of the bishop's office all these years and the time had come to dig it up and open it.
Word spread far and wide, old friends gathered and the plaque was taken down from the wall with the digging directions and measurements listed on the back. Here's what has happened in the past 10 years - the stake boundaries were realigned and the Madison ward itself was dissolved. Luckily the new ward boundaries kept many of us together, but moved us to another building to meet. (Strike one - no more Madison ward!)
The instructions said,"from the SW door, move to the nearest tree on the south lawn. (The tree had been removed several years ago -- strike two!)
From the tree, measure 10 1/2 feet to the east. The measurement should line up with the expansion line of the sidewalk to the south. (The sidewalks had been torn out and replaced since then -- strike three!)
However, many people had somewhat vague memories of where this capsule had been buried and the digging commenced. Dave was the brave one to dig into the beautifully manicured lawn and as some time went by, many started wondering how large the hole would actually be before finding the capsule.

This picture looks like Dave was digging to the center of the earth:

Success! The capsule came up, it was still sealed tight. (I read about a time capsule that wasn't so successful a couple years ago.)
Our former bishop joined in and opened all the treasures inside. There were letters to and from many ward members, the primary classes had taken pictures and put in notes, there were letters from ward members who had long since moved and some that had passed on. We had to laugh at Roxanne's letter. She was 8 when she wrote this: I'm only posting this because of the embarrassment that will be caused over the "I love Pokemon" comment.

My letter to Dave began "I can't believe I'm married to a 48 year old man!"

Dave had written a letter predicting some events he had hoped for for our family. Among his predictions was the wish that he would own a tractor. (So shall it be written . . . so shall it be done!)

It was a fun evening catching up with old friends. We are thinking we might want to make a time capsule of our own.

happy birthday brady!

It was Brady's birthday yesterday and it's getting kind of hard to have a party around here.

Roxanne: "I have to work at 2:45."

Dave: "I've got a certification exam until 1:30."

Brady: "I might go camping all weekend."

Rachel: "I already have a lunch date I set up a long time ago."

Me: I just want to make a cake and not have it go stale before we can blow out the candles.

So, Brady didn't end up going camping and we decided on a 1:30 pm lunch time family party. At 1:15, as a beautiful hot lunch was coming out of the oven, presents ready to open, birthday candles are ready to light, I got 2 texts from the girls, "Sorry mom, I'm going to be running late". We finally got all 6 of us together and fit in a little party from 1:51 until 2:37.

My birthday is tomorrow and we've got the same problem. I wanted to go out to dinner with everyone:
"I don't get out of class until 4:45."

"I have to be in Scottsdale by 7:00."

etc

etc

I know one of these days, our family will be spread out all over the country and we won't have everyone home for birthdays anymore, so I suppose I am just grateful we can all be together, rushed or not.

Anyway, Brady is a year older and wiser. What do you get a boy who is about to go on a mission? I'll tell you what . . . . ties!

Although missionary supplies are not the most exciting gifts, they are needed and everyone was generous with him. The gift he was most excited about though was from Melanie. It was a space pen. The ink cartridge is pressurized at 50 psi and will write upside down, on oil surfaces and even underwater. The girls were baffled at when a person would need to write underwater. Brady assured them it didn't matter - he was just glad to be able to write underwater should the need arise.

I am posting a picture of our delicious lunch. Not only was is very yummy and made our whole house smell divine and is one of our family's favorite sandwiches, but it makes a pretty presentation on the table too. This is important today, because true to my past, I made very unattractive birthday cupcakes for Brady. The idea in my head was good, but not so on the execution.

So - Happy Birthday, favorite son! We'll miss you around here on your next birthday.

attic

We were working in the attic yesterday. It really makes no sense that we were working in the attic. It is August/September in Arizona . . . the hottest days of the year. Yet that is when we chose to insulate.

We've got a great walk-in attic room - space for lots of junk, which unfortunately we have a lot of. The bad part of working up there is that the roof slopes down dramatically, so even though there is a sense of having room to walk around, I find myself cracking my skull on the overhead beams if I walk a little too far to the right.

Yesterday, we took up all the floorboards so we could spray in some insullation between the first and second floor. The process entailed prying up nails and planks of wood, scooping out handfuls of 60 year old nasty, deteriorated insullation, sweeping, vacuuming, cleaning etc.

As the floorboards were being removed, we were walking around on the trusses. This process requires some balance and attention, because if you step between the studs, you could go right through the sheetrock to the living room below. Dave and I didn't worry about actually going through to the living room, because we certainly wouldn't fit between the studs. Melanie, however, would have crashed right through onto the couch below.We really didn't want to do any sheetrock repair in our living room so I prayed that we would be sure footed through this process. We were carrying around planks, buckets of tools, the shop vac, big hefty bags of the old insullation. We were prying wood, ducking around each others movements, all while balancing on the trusses. Eventually as the evening went on and we became more and more exhausted and nearing death because of the heat, and after many near misses with shoes and tools and buckets I realized it was inevitable. We had many close calls through the evening. I had to change my prayers to "Please don't let it be me that that puts my shoe through the sheetrock." I was looking down focusing on where I was putting my feet and smacking my head on the overhead slope more often than normal.

We had a company come and spray in some insulation this morning and Dave is like a little boy at Christmas, so excited and proud of the new and improved attic.

Sadly, this is only phase one of many phases of this project. We have to put down a new floor, insulate the ceiling of the attic, sheetrock, insulate a very wierd and hardly accessible space over one of the back bedrooms, insulate and seal around the walls of the loft upstairs, then tape and paint all the sheetrock. Oh, and Dave decided that since we have everything out of the attic and we're in the construction mode already, we might as well add those dormers on the roof that we've always wanted. So yeah, that too. I'm predicting by December, we should be finished and be able to put all our storage stuff away. (Just in time to pull a lot of it back out again to trim our Christmas tree!)