Mother's Day 2026

I feel like this Mother's Day, some of the celebrating was spread out over a few days.

A few days before Mother's Day, Jet brought home a card he made at school. 

Friday, Jeremy brought me Mother's Day flowers with a card. I love my husband.

Sunday, Jeremy made me breakfast.

Jr. Jr. drew a picture for me.

See. She's holding 5 eggs. I have 5 children. 

 

I got to teach a short Relief Society lesson then we had muffins and yogurt and fruit and socializing for the women.

When Jeremy was going to take most of the kids home (Lucky stayed with me for choir), Jet seatbelted a Mother's Day card in so it would be protected. 

Lucky gave me a card, a candy rose, and two pictures taken by high school photography students. Awww. I love them.

Jeremy gave me a present- a portable selfie stick tripod. I used it when I FaceTimed my mom for Mother's Day- hands free use of my phone. Although I picked it up and pointed it at different family members plenty. Tee Hee.

Later, I found Timothy, the banana slug, using the wrapping paper for a home. Have I mentioned I love my family?

I got to rest and spend some time looking at Jeremy's latest book.

I didn't have to make dinner. Jeremy fixed it for us. It was a hit with the family.

Jet entertained me using his Spidey powers.

I told everyone for Mother's Day, I wanted them to play D&D. They hadn't in a while and I knew Jr. was waiting very patiently to play again. The others couldn't play video games because it was the last day of Screen Free Week so they didn't have a good excuse not to. Bwah ha ha ha.

Jr. made chocolate chip cookies.

On Monday, I found out I missed a present from Jet in his backpack. He decorated a keychain for me.

Awwww. 

I enjoyed my Mother's Day(s) this year. 

I love my family. 

Valentine Days

Sadly, we don't have access to some of our pictures from around Valentine's Day so this post is missing some pictures. Oh well. Here it finally is:

 

O.K. Finally getting to it. Valentine's 2026.

I already told you that Jeremy made chocolate covered strawberries for me. Chuckle. He made them early enough that they got eaten up before Valentine's Day even came. 

The week of Valentine's Day, there was a kindergarten Valentine dance at the elementary school, just like when Lucky was in kindergarten and Jet was a baby. 

Jet and I dressed up and went and danced and had refreshments and danced some more and were excited when Daddy came to join us. He had a fair convention that day but made it back for the end of the dance. 

I think Jet has similar moves to Lucky at that age.

 

The day before Valentine's Day was when the elementary schoolers had their Valentine parties and Valentine exchanges. Lucky's class invited them to decorate boxes to hold their Valentines. Since Lucky is preparing for the school play, Alice in Wonderland Jr., many things are Wonderland themed right now. Lucky brought a Mad Hatter's hat as his Valentine box. I supplied the materials (empty oatmeal box, fabric, another cardboard box, cardstock) and Jeremy helped Lucky make it into a hat. 

 

This year, like last year on actual Valentine's Day, Jeremy and Nichole were at Life, The Universe, and Everything symposium. 

Let me stop right here and share something funny that happened during prep for LTUE. Jeremy printed off a list of classes/panels so he and Nichole could see what they both wanted to take and what they had that overlapped.

 

Mom: Nichole, Dad wants you to look through Life, the Universe, and Everything to see what things you want to do. 

Jet: Nichole, Dad wants you to look through the telescope at the university holes.

 

Thank you. Back to Valentine celebrations.

While Jeremy and Nichole were at LTUE, Jr. wanted an excuse to eat ice cream so he rationalized this.

It was Single Awareness Day. Single people eat ice cream when they don't have a date. Yes! Great excuse. And my husband wasn't with me for Valentine's Day so I should eat ice cream, too.

Reminder that I fully support the Daddy-Daughter date at LTUE (my husband did make me chocolate covered strawberries. I love chocolate covered strawberries).

We also had heart-shaped pizza for dinner or broken heart pizza as it is cut.  

I did get a nice hug from Jeremy that night. He didn't completely forget me. Heh Heh Heh.

 

The next day, I made a fancy dinner to celebrate since Jeremy and Nichole were home that day.

A great way to celebrate love with food is by using recipes from Whisk Me Away by Michelle Wright. We had some fun during and after dinner based on the Regency Era. 

For dinner, we had Green Bean Almondine with Rice Pilaf (both from the cookbook). We also had ham but I didn't use the honey glaze from the book. We rounded it out with modern day rolls and ice water to drink.

After the kids set the table in our normal use what dishes are in the cupboard (or dish drainer), mismatched or not, manner, I showed them a picture from the book of how a proper dinner table should be set. Ha Ha.

While we ate, I read to them what the book said about Regency dinner party etiquette, which made some of them do the exact opposite because that's what kids do.

After dinner a few of us decided to play a Regency game from the book. "Forfeit."

We used Lucky's "hat" to hold the forfeits and we had a blast playing together. We had the youngest of us and the oldest of us playing so it was a good game for all ages.

I love family time. And I love that we can have the whole family be involved in a holiday that doesn't have to be just for significant others. 

I do enjoy time with just my husband but we do get to do special things together other times, not just Valentine's Day and anniversaries (and did I mention that my husband made chocolate covered strawberries for me?). 

I would never try to go out for Valentine's Day to a restaurant or something like that anyway. Too crowded. We did stop by the grocery store to get some milk after I picked Jeremy and Nichole up from LTUE on Valentine's Day, though.  

I hope my children know they can always celebrate with us. There are so many reasons to celebrate. 

 

Update: We have access to our pictures again. I put some on another blog post on April 11, 2026. 

So You Want to Know About August, Huh?

Let's see. August. Well, I learned from Sarah M. Eden (one of my favorite authors) a little bit about Lammas Day which was on August 1. It's a celebration of harvest so it's common to bake bread on that day. So that's what I did. I baked wheat bread that day.

August 4 was American Family Day. We played together. For a couple days before that, we played the game my brother made up that we played with my brothers in Oregon.

 

\August 5 was Work Like a Dog Day. Jr. and I did yard work.

Later that evening, I took three of the kids with me to the Provo Library to an interactive movie event: The Princess Bride. They had instructions for us on paper for things to do at certain parts of the movie (yelling, "Stop! Stop!" during the kissing scenes, and rhyming with Fezzik) as well as items to do them with (balloons for swords, pieces of chocolate for the miracle pill, bubble wrap to pop in the Fire Swamp). It wasn't just interactive with the movie but with people around us, too. We had little bottles of water that we traded with a neighbor several times during the iocane powder scene until we finally took a drink. It was a lot of fun.

August 6 was Night Out Day. While I left the kids with root beer and ice cream to celebrate Root Beer Float Day, Jeremy and I took a drive up to Kyhv Peak Overlook to watch the sunset and eat Winco salads (it's our date food). I'd never been up there for sunset before. Jr. Jr. and I went up there for sunrise last year before October General Conference. It was nice to be up there with Jeremy for the sunset.

That day was also Wiggle Your Toes Day. I may or may not have played "This Little Piggy" with Jet but I didn't get any pictures if I did. I know I wiggled my toes, though. 

 

August 8 was Sneak Some Zucchini Onto Your Neighbor's Porch Night. Nobody celebrated at our house. Sigh.

That evening, Jeremy, Nichole, Lucky, and I went to the annual Utah County Birders potluck. We spent time beforehand looking for birds but barely saw any. Oh well. Still pretty scenery near Timpanogos Cave National Monument. 

Our Vacation, Thy Creations, and Our Relations- Part 4

After all that Go Go Go, it was nice to take a couple of chill days.

 

Church, resting, family time.

My brothers came down and taught us a new game that my oldest brother created.

I introduced my parents and my brothers to The Fablehaven Cookbook. We made Ogre Stew and Olloch the Glutton's Caramel Biscuit Bars, our two standards.

My boys did help with yardwork.

I love family.

I'll share more of our wonderful vacation later.