2022 Blue Jeans Week 8

What a crazy week!  Waking up one day to a totally different world than you have ever known.  Prayers for Ukraine! It is just so sad!  On our home front, Ben and I had half the week with no kids home.  Mr J was at state band for half the week, so we had an "empty nest" experiment.  Our highlight of the week was attending Mr J's state band concert which was flat out amazing!!!  So good!  It brought us to tears!  Music is so powerful!  Take a look at our week...

Walking down the stairs this has been my living room view all weekend and into Monday.  A few games we played on the cedar chest, Mr J's legos he was working on over the weekend and a few books everywhere that we are all reading.  Real life snapshot right here.

Mr J heading to state band.  So proud of his hard work and excited for this experience for him!

Went to lunch with one of my dearest friends and we got some really yummy pie!  Good pie and great friends--you cannot beat that combo!

Date night this week was a movie in---we watched Respect which was about the life of Aretha Franklin, and it was interesting and also such a sad, hard life!

Highlight of the week was getting to attend Mr J's state band concert.  Amazing!!!!  So, so so good!

Mr J's high school band teacher that accompanied him to the state band this week plus my mom to hear his concert.  We were so proud of him!  It was amazing!

Hope you are safe and healthy where you are!  Prayers for so many things right now!  Have a good week!

2022 Blue Jeans Week 7

Hello!  Hope you had a good week!  We had another crazy winter storm and school was cancelled for a day last week.  We stayed home safe and warm!  We enjoyed the Olympics and are sad they are over.  Such inspiring stories!  Enjoyed our Valentine's dinner at my mom's.  It was a good week.  Take a look...

For Valentine's day we always make heart shaped sugar cookies and decorate them.  A yummy and favorite tradition!

Ben got these exercise hula hoops super cheap and he needs them for a project coming up, but he and Jesse had fun building with them one day this week.

Had our traditional Valentine's day dinner at my mom's this week.  This has been a tradition in our family that my great grandma started when my grandma was a little girl.  There is a box in the middle that has strings coming out of it to each place setting.  When you are done eating you pull the string and a little wrapped present comes out of the box.  A fun tradition we all love!

Happy Valentine's to my favorite!  Mr J gave us these cute mugs for Valentine's day. 

Church youth activity this week was making pizzas.  Yum!

Had rain turn to ice and then to about 4 inches of snow one day this week.  School was cancelled so we stayed home and were safe and warm!

Mr J and I made some mini pizzas for lunch on the day school was cancelled.

Tried my hand at a new bread recipe.  It used my sour dough starter.  A homemade loaf of bread is always so cool especially when it looks like it is supposed to!  

Date this week was playing some new games.  Our library has a good selection of  board games and so we went to the library and checked out some new ones and played them for our date this week. This is Hanabi, and we really liked it!

The college kids had an Olympic watching party together with lots of yummy food.  Fun to see them together!

Thanks for visiting!  Hope you are safe and healthy and happy where you are!  Have a great week! 

2022 Blue Jeans Week 6

We warmed up pretty quickly after our winter storm.  We had a good week. Enjoying the Olympics and we had a fun family day in the city as Ben took a day off this week when Mr J had school off.  Take a look at our week...

Our leaning snowman who is quickly disappearing...

A cake I made this week for a birthday of one of Ben's employees.  It was a chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting.

Had lunch with my dear friend this week.  We have a lot of of fun together!

Church youth activity this week.  The kids facing the board had to describe how to draw something  to the kids behind them.  It was fun!

Mr J had a day off school because of parent teacher conferences, and Ben took the day off too so we went to the city and served in the temple in the morning.  I love to see the temple with my family!

After the temple we went ice skating.  It made us really appreciate what the Olympic skaters do!

Tried a new place for lunch that had yummy breakfast food.  Mine was the best--cinnamon roll pancakes!

Thanks for visiting!  Hope you are well and safe and healthy!  Have a great week!

2022 Blue Jeans Week 5

We had a crazy weather week last week with school being cancelled for two days.  We got ice and snow and below zero temps with wind chills.  We stayed home and stayed warm!  Take a look at our week...

Our Sunday game was Dominion which we haven't played in a while, so we had to review the rules and then we remembered how much we liked it!

Cold days are starting, so we have the fire going.  I was going through the books on our bookshelves and found this classic from 1906.  I had read it to my girls, but Ben and Mr J had not heard it, so I read it to them one evening--took less than an hour.  It you haven't read it, it is a children's short novel that is so good and so timeless in its message.  Highly recommend!

Another game night as everything was cancelled because of the weather.  We played Azul: Stained Glass of Sintra.  There are 3 versions of Azul, and we have played 2 of them and like them both.  

Our snow that cancelled everything for two days.  It was icy underneath which is very bad to drive in, and it was so windy and cold!  It was nice not to have to go out in this!

While staying in and warm by the fire we got out the crayons, markers and colored pencils and enjoyed an afternoon coloring.  Haven't done that in a long time.  There are some fun free coloring pages online.

Date night this week was getting BBQ take out.  It was so good! And then we watched the Olympics!  We love the Olympics!

Saturday the snow was melting fast, but it was great snowman snow, so Mr J and I got a snowman made before it all disappeared.

Thanks for visiting! Hope you are healthy and safe and happy!  Have a great week!

My 2021 Reading list

 I have had the goal for years to read as many books as I will have candles on my birthday cake that year.  Some years I go way over, some years I am right on, and some I don't even get close.  Last year was one of those years.  Within that reading goal, I also have the goal to have at least 10 of my books be non-fiction, and I met that goal this year.  I love to read and this next year I home to be much closer to my goal or maybe even surpass it has I have in the past.  Here is a look at what I read in 2021in no particular order, just in the order I read them throughout the year.  

1.  The Jane Austen Society by Natalie Jenner

2.  Ashes on the Moore by Sarah Eden

3.  All Creatures Great and Small by James Harriot (non-fiction)

4.  All thing Bright and Beautiful by James Harriot (non-fiction)

5.  Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt (non-fiction)

6.  Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers

7.  The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

8.  The Mourning Dove by Larry Barkdoll

9.  Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer (non-fiction)

10.  The Book of Mormon (non-fiction)

11.  Tropical Secrets by Margarita Engle

12.  Before and After by Judy Christie and Lisa Wingate (non-fiction)

13.  A Tangled Inheritance by Chalon Linton

14.  Dragon Hoops by Gene Luen Yang

15.  When Stars are Scattered by Victoria Jamieson

16.  The Callendar Papers by Cynthia Voight

17.  The Book of Longings by Sue Monk Kidd

18.  The Day the World Came to Town, 9/11 in Gander, Newfoundland by Jim DeFede (non-fiction)

19.  The Woman They could Not Silence by Kate Moore (Non-Fiction)

20.  The Crown of Rosemund by Michele Ashman Bell

21.  Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man by Emmanuel Acho (non-fiction)

22.  On the Wings of Heros by Richard Peck

23.  No Cure for Being Human by Kate Bowler (Non-fiction)

24.  Inquisitor's Tale by Adam Gidwitz

What were my favorites?  I loved James Herriot's books.  I need to read the other two.  When Starts are Scattered is a graphic novel and a true story about a boy in a refugee camp.  So powerful! I wouldn't not recommend any of them.  They were all good.  Angela's Ashes was probably my least favorite.  It was hard to read at times.  What did you enjoy reading this last year?