2020 Blue Jeans Week 21

Extra fun week.  We had some surprise visitors!  My oldest two came home for a week and surprised us!  Yeah!  So nice to have everyone home for a little bit!  It is good for my heart and soul!  Good week!  Take a look...

Quarantine read aloud--finished Harry Potter #2 this week.  Will watch the movie later this weekend and then start Harry Potter #3.  Can't beat those books.  So, so, so good!

These awesome signs showed up in our yard this week!   One for me for school board and one for Miss E being a senior.  So nice!  

A picture from Ben at work.  It was mental health awareness week at the hospital.  Poor guy, he hates wearing those masks, but that is life right now.  Important to keep him and others safe!

And this girl has a summer job which was a huge blessing in these times right now.  She wasn't sure what she was going to do since she is normally a lifeguard at the city pool, and no idea if or when that will open this summer, but another job just fell in her lap.  What a blessing!  She does reception at the hospital, and someone just brought in a ton of masks to give away. So many good people!

A treat for this week.  I follow Magnolia Bakery in NYC and they have been posting a few of their recipes lately.  These are their Key Lime Icebox bars.  Sooooo good!  Their banana pudding is one of our favorite recipes to make.  Follow them on Instagram and click on the recipes link for so many good things!  

Ahh!!!  Look who is home!  Makes my heart soooooo happy!  I knew they were coming, but Ben and the other kids didn't. So It was fun to see the scene as they rang the doorbell and Miss E answered and then screamed and Ben and Mr J were like, "Uh, what is going on?"  So awesome!  

Quarantine activity that we love--puzzles!  And we found some cool new puzzles on White Mountain Puzzles.  So much fun!  

Hope you have a good week!  Thanks for visiting!  Stay safe and wash your hands!

2020 Blue Jeans Week 20

Adjusting to reopening in our state and lives.  We have been blessed that were we live we have started into some phased re-openings.  In some ways I want to go out, but in others, I am happy to just stay home in my bubble.  Not sure what the "new normal" will look like, but we are grateful to be safe and sound and are remaining cautious as we reopen.  We are grateful for good leaders that do their best and have a hard balancing act to decide the best course of action.  So, we are good.  We had a good week.  Yummy food on Mother's day, and then a week full of rain.  Take a look at our week...

One of my Mother's day gifts was a humming bird feeder, and we go two to visit it right after we put it up.  That is exciting!  My Grum (my maternal grandfather) was a huge humming bird feeder man.  He had about 4 or 5 at his house and at his cabin in the mountains.  I have lots of fond memories of watching humming birds with him and of mixing up the sugar water to go into the feeders.  So, seeing this just makes me happy and remembering my Grum who I know was smiling down at my humming birds on my feeder!

My Mother's day cake--a lemon blueberry cake with whipped lemon frosting.  So, so, so good!  My kids did an awesome job making it!  It is from Mel's Kitchen Cafe

And lots, and lots, and lots of rain this week, but I was able to see this Baltimore oriole enjoying the orange we put out for it.  I think we have two pairs of orioles in our area right now.  They are so pretty and then to see them with our red cardinals is awesome too.  The colors of nature are amazing!  God definitely loves us!

So much rain, but I managed to get a picture of these pretty purple flowers blooming in my yard right now despite being almost surrounded by water in their beds because of so much rain!

And finally, it is the last day of school officially for this kid this week!  He was done with his online learning earlier this week, but Thursday was officially the last day of school--the school year that wasn't--so we got his traditional last day of school jump with  his mask on!  Here is to summer!

Went and donated blood this week, and masks were required.  My mom got our family these awesome BYU masks so we can be covered and protected in style :)

First project of the summer---making slime!  

And a picture from my college girls this week who spent some time in the mountains at a place we love to go as a family, and were able to go to our favorite little ice cream shop and get drive thru!  Sure love and miss these girls and am grateful they are safe and doing well!

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

2020 Blue Jeans Week 19

What a week!  We started out last Sunday with a crazy storm that did quite a bit of damage and killed our trampoline that has served us faithfully for 15 years.  Enjoyed some family zoom meetings.  Miss E is officially done with high school!  Graduation is still up in the air.  Had a big birthday this week and got some yard work done.  Take a look at our week...

Sundays we do "church" on a zoom call with Miss A and Miss O.  After we are done we always play a game with them.  We have figured out which board games you can play over zoom pretty well the last few weeks.  This week we played Wits and Wagers.

Sunday morning around 7:30 a crazy windy storm came through and we watched out the window with so much rain and wind that the sky was white and watched our apple tree fall down.  Then we looked over and saw our trampoline was gone, and we heard a huge crash as one of our outside tables had a glass cover that was torn off and smashed into tiny pieces every where.  Crazy!  They say it wasn't a tornado, but they clocked 75 mph winds!  And this picture taken later the same day, so it quickly cleared up and was nice.

We didn't know where our trampoline went.  Miss E went out on the street and walked up a hill about 1/4 mile from our house and found it all crumpled up.  So she got a wheel barrow and brought it home.  So sad!  The kids have loved that trampoline and it has lasted forever!  We have had it almost 15 years~  Replaced the jumping mat once, but it was a good trampoline!

Had a huge extended family zoom call this week.  It was fun to see grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings.  Technology is pretty amazing!  Sure love all these people and so glad everyone is safe and well!

A pic from Miss A and her friends as they made Japanese donuts this week.  Cooking/baking is their their quarantine outlet.  Yummy!

And today was this girl's official last day of high school.  We found her first day of kindergarten picture and got a shot with her first day of school and her last day.  So cute!

And just to document how weird and crazy her end of school has been, we took a mask picture.  

And then we had to do our traditional "Toyota" jump last day of school picture.  Pretty epic jump for her senior year last day!

Then the day after her last day of school this girl had her birthday!  It was kind of a bittersweet week as we were supposed to have her older sisters and extended family here today to help her celebrate and be here for her graduation which was supposed to be this weekend, but we did our best to celebrate this amazing girl!  Sure love her sooo much!!!  and So very proud of her!

She wanted to celebrate being done with her senior friends that she hasn't seen since mid-March, so she made a batch of her famous chocolate chip cookies and made these cute graduation mask tags and made sure everything was very clean and sanitized as she dropped these off on her friend's front porches to celebrate being done with school.  

Bad lighting in this picture, but as an end of school project for her physics class Miss E had to make a roller coaster with a pool noodle that a marble could go through.  She thought it was fun and Mr J wanted to do one too, so they took apart her school project and made a bigger and better marble roller coaster down the front stairs.  Pretty cool!

Saturday in prep for Mother's Day the kids and Ben got all the pots cleaned out, we bought plants for them, and those three got them planted for me as a Mother's Day present.  Love it!

Hope you all had a great week!  Hope you are all safe and well!  Thanks for visiting!!!

2020 Blue Jeans Week 18

It is amazing how you can adjust to crazy times.  In some ways I think we are doing good, and then sometimes it just hits you.  Man, this is just crazy!  Is this for real?  Are we really living this?  Yes, we are.  And we will get through it, and we will triumph.  We will have great stories to tell our grandkids, and I want to document what we did and how we stayed sane (most of the time) so here is a look at our week...

We started reading this end of March.  So good!  Ben read it out loud to us.  This is one way we have survived quarantine.  After we finished, we watched the movie, and then Ben started reading book 2 to us.  Love these!  Some of the best books ever!!!

I love crepes.  Fresh fruit (strawberries, blueberries and banana are my absolute favorite) with vanilla yogurt in crepes can't be beat.  I went to the store this week and got fresh fruit, so I have seriously made or had crepes for breakfast for one solid week....because I can.  And then the fresh fruit will run out for the next week and I have to wait until we get to the store, so I am just soaking up having crepes every day for breakfast this week and LOVING it!  I use this cinnamon vanilla crepe recipe here.

Documenting "school" this week.  This was one day for Miss E out in her hammock.

And "School" one day this week for Mr J at lunch out on the back porch

Ben was home one day this week and he and Miss E worked on some house projects.

One thing we are loving during this crazy time is John Krazinski's Some Good News.  Have you watched it?  We LOVE it!  So awesome!  We loved his Prom (since Miss E missed hers) and his graduation (since that is also something Miss E and Miss A missed) so check it out, if you haven't.  It is on youtube.

Documenting more menus that the kids have made.  Going 6 weeks strong of the kids planning menus and cooking dinner.  They make yummy stuff!

And this amazing girl had a birthday!  And we were a long ways away, but it was fun to video call her and see her open her gifts.  Especially the t-shirt quilt Miss E made for her. That was awesome!  Her sister Miss A took good care of her on her birthday and made these yummy oreo cheesecake bites for her birthday cake.  Crazy thing was Miss A's apartment was hit by lightning that day and her power was out most of the evening of Miss O's birthday, so that is why it is so dark.  Definitely a day to remember for sure!

Mr J decided he was running for a class officer for next year, so Miss E helped him film a campaign video the students can see before they vote remotely.  Pretty awesome stuff!

We love the show "Chopped" on the Food Network.  So on Saturday we decided we needed something different to do at home, so we held our own chopped competition.  Pretty epic stuff!  Ben faced off with Miss E in the first round.  Mr J and I were the judges.  Miss E won!

Then in round 2, Mr J and I faced off, and Ben and Miss E were the judges.  Mr J won.  In the dessert round it was Mr J and Miss E...

And this awesome dude was the Chopped Champ home quarantine edition!  Way to go Mr J!

Getting some yard work and garden work done.

My new recipe to try for May was homemade donuts.  Never made them before.  I used this recipe from Mel's Kitchen Cafe.  Yummy!  We did regular donuts, donut holes and then did some apple fritters.  So good!

Well, lots of pictures.  Hoping you are surviving, safe and healthy wherever you are!  Take care and wash your hands and see you next week!