After Christmas 2024

After Christmas we were all still sick. Most of December we were sick. Blah.

We did celebrate Stan Lee's birthday on December 28 with shawarma. 

We had latkes and challah during Hanukkah.

I finished the adult reading program last minute on New Year's Eve. I earned a water bottle that says, "I read more in 2024."

I finished a year of "A Season of Family Meal Plans" by Jordan Page. I love those books.

We took apart our Christmas tree.

I got some morning walks in among the lights at City Center Park before the New Year.

We had New Year's Nachos.

 

Be an Angel Day 2022

August 22 is Be an Angel Day. Jr. and I went to a music store to get more rosin for his cello. One of the employees was an angel and got us each a cold water bottle because it was a hot day.

We had our traditional alfredo sauce on angel hair pasta.

It was also Pecan Torte Day. We didn't have that but we had Butter Pecan Crunch ice cream.

STEM Boy

He did it! He did it! He did it! Jr. completed all 3 summers of UVU Prep and has learned lots of STEM skills.

He's even found interesting ways to use his skills.

 

Jr.: Alphabet Cow lives!

Mom: This is why Jr.'s doing UVU Prep.

Nichole: So he can bring decapitated children's toys to life.

We've had this toy since Nichole was a toddler. It's been stepped on, dropped, thrown, had heavy objects put on it, you know how it is with some children's toys. It's supposed to be "Alphabet Pal" but it sounds like "Alphabet Cow" so that's what we've been calling it for years.

Well, such is life, Alphabet Cow finally bit the dust. The head cracked and came off completely. Jr. decided to use his skills and tools he had and "bring it back to life." He managed to get it to play music through his headphones since originally the speaker was in the head and he managed to get the lights working. That's my STEM boy.

Jeremy and I were able to go to Jr.'s closing celebration for UVU Prep. We all went as a family the first year and last year they just had a drive-thru to pick up shirts since it was all online.

Jr. had a good experience with this program for three years both in person and online. He was happy to be back in person this year. Can't you tell by his smile how happy he was?

Like the first year the closing celebration was crowded but Jr. was able to show us some of the projects he worked on. He also got a UVU water bottle which he's been waiting three summers for. It's interesting the things he gets excited for. We all have things like that, though.

I'm so glad he enjoyed his time at UVU Prep and I'm looking forward to seeing what kinds of things come from what he's learned in the future. Bringing more decapitated children's toys to life? We'll see.

When we got home that night, I quickly let everyone have a gummi worm since it was National Gummi Worm Day on July 15.

It was also World Youth Skills Day and I already commented on Jr.'s STEM skills.

Kokanee Salmon

The National Days Calendar our friends gave us earlier in the year has a whole bunch listed for September 26, 2020. There's National Pancake Day, National Singles Day, Public Lands Day, Hunting and Fishing Day, Family Health and Fitness Day USA to name a few.

So for celebrating Jr. made us chocolate chip pancakes before we all set out for a drive with our water bottles and little packets of singles flavoring. Originally we thought about heading to a public land but we thought that it might be too crowded since it was free entrance that day. Like his brother before him, Jr. Jr. recently got a national parks pass so we can go to public lands as a family anytime for free for a year. We decided instead to go to Jordanelle Reservoir to the Rock Cliff Recreation area where we hoped it would be less crowded. We didn't go to the fish trap at Strawberry Reservoir to see kokanee salmon this year (and they're not doing salmon viewing events this year) so we thought we'd try this place which I recently read was a good place to see them.

 

There were boardwalks to walk around on to get our exercise in (health and fitness) and there were indeed some salmon in the river where we could see them from the bridge we stopped at (hunting and fishing). There were also trout swimming along to snatch up the eggs deposited by the spawning salmon for a nice meal. We learned about this because while we were there on that uncrowded bridge, along came a couple of volunteers from DNR to check on things in the recreation area since there had been flooding in the Spring and because it was kokanee spawning time. They were very friendly and very happy to tell us things about the salmon and about the area. It was very informative and they were great to answer our questions. 

Nichole was great to get pictures of the salmon.

At one point, Jr. fell down so I offered to give him a piggy back ride. He's not as small as he used to be. I thought it would be funny to give him a piggy back ride since he's taller than me now. I can still lift him.

"Will you marry me?"

If you look really closely in the background of these pictures, there is a great blue heron sitting in a tree. Nichole took pictures of the heron while I took pictures of Lucky.

We had a good time. Love that family bonding.

Ice Bottle

Jr. Jr. left his water bottle in the freezer for a few hours (overnight) and when he took it out, it looked like this.