What She Missed- August 9

Monday, August 9-

Jeremy, Nichole, and Jr. got home around 1:45 in the morning. Later on that morning (at a reasonable hour), Lucky came out and saw Jeremy on the couch. "Daddy!" He gave him a big hug. So precious.

Nichole was home for less than 12 hours (and part of that was other places in the neighborhood packing coolers and trailers) before they whisked her away to Girl's Camp which started the next day. I thought we'd have her for the day but she is a Youth Camp Leader this year, even though it's her first year getting to go to Girl's Camp, so we found out last minute she had to go up and stay overnight for preparations. Sigh. Poor girl only got so much sleep and we had to do laundry after her trip and all the collecting and packing things since she'd been gone for about a week.

Good thing I was starting to feel better because I was running around helping out and continuing on even after Nichole was gone. 

I did some dishes and Jet decided to be a big helper.

I did rest a bit and told everyone dinner was whatever they could find in the fridge but I found some bacon in the fridge that needed to be used so I ended up making carbonara which a few of us ate. The kids also found some trip food and things we didn't ended up eating while Jeremy and the oldest were gone (being sick throws everything out the window), so we snacked as well. And I ended up talking to a friend on the phone for a lot longer than I originally intended which was also relaxing.

 

We did Family Home Evening without Nichole. Jeremy gave us a lesson about cleaning sin out of our life like cleaning trip stuff out of the van so we helped clean trip stuff out of the van (nice object lesson, Jeremy). Then we played video games (Lucky's idea) and had root beer floats with red vine straws (Jr. Jr.'s idea).

What They Missed- August 17

Monday, August 17-
The day they came back.
I sewed two more masks before putting the sewing stuff away. Lucky and Jr. Jr. were having fun with them.

Lucky: My precious.

The boys were saying, "If you want your precious, you have to wear a mask." They are silly.
When they found out Dad and the other kids were coming home that night, they said they won't be able to get in. I told them Dad has keys. They started brainstorming how to make some sort of magnet that would get his keys away from him. They tried to get Jet in on it, too, asking him to distract Mom so they could do these things. They interpreted his looks as his willingness to help out.
I love the creativity in this family.

Jet had fun cleaning Mommy's face since she cleans his so often.

There were more things due at the library so we took back library items and recycled glass. I remembered to put the glass in the van this time. In the van, the boys had paper and clipboards to work on their plan for when Dad got home. They also challenged each other to draw different things.

We drove up to Bridal Veil Falls again. Jr. Jr. didn't want to get out (it was too hot at 97 degrees). Lucky did want  to get out. We parked in a spot where we could see the falls well from the van and both boys ended up getting out. They threw rocks while Jet slept.

Both boys put masks on without me asking them to even though there were no people near our van at all. I think they'll be able to handle getting into the habit of face masks for school.
I tried to take pictures of the boys with the falls in the background. Lucky explained that it was "too sunny."

When we got home, the boys "locked" me in my room with Jet as a distraction so they could "carry out their plan."

Later Jr. Jr. fed Jet so I could do dishes.

Lucky helped make pizza.

The boys took out the garbage and fed the birds.

For my Family Home Evening lesson, I used The Friend magazine for August 2020. We sang "The Wise Man and the Foolish Man." We read Helaman 5:12 and talked about building our foundation on Jesus Christ and not something else. If you follow him you'll be okay even with the storms of life.
Jr. Jr. built a structure out of cards that was easy to knock down.

Lucky built a structure out of blocks that was... easy to knock down. He kept redoing it until it was hard to knock down. The cards were always going to be easy to knock down. Anyway, they got the idea and had a lot of fun.

Jr. Jr.'s treat was marshmallows dipped in chocolate. We had to hold off on the activity because we ran out of time.

Jeremy, Nichole, and Jr. came home. Yippee! I love them so much and was happy to see them. Jet was a little hesitant at first but quickly warmed up to them.

They were exhausted. But they're home!

Catch of the Day

Getting ready for church.
I told the kids to put the books away. "You don't have books in Sacrament Meeting." Nichole put her book under her chair and said, "I left it in the car."

Helpful Oreos

The kids and I sat down with a plate of Oreo cookies this evening.  March 6 is the birthday of the Oreo Cookie after all.  For each Oreo we ate, we told one thing that we were going to do this coming week to help our home and family.
Here's what we'll do:
Jr. will be nice to Mom and Dad and help clean up the kitchen.
Jr. Jr. will clean up everything he takes out of his room and eat everything that Mom gives him.
Nichole will clean up after herself and clean up the living room.
I will read my scriptures and say my prayers and I will listen to my children.
Jeremy came home later and added to the list.
He will not yell and he will give a compliment each day to someone he loves.

It's kind of a fun way of goal setting- rewarding ourselves for setting realistic goals in the first place (I did have to point out what realistic goals are when one of the children said he would clean up every room in our home- not realistic).  I figure after the week is up (or during the week), we'll sit down with another plate of Oreos and report on how we did (or are doing).