This week was an interesting one, ha ha. In spite of the FRIGID cold (Sunday with wind chill factored in, it was 14 degrees), much was still accomplished. I am always motivated by DOING stuff, so this was a good week as far as that goes.
One morning, as Amber and I headed out to run errands, and as I got ready to shovel some freshly fallen snow, we noticed some very unusual "footprints" on the sidewalk by our front porch.
Not dog footprints. Not cat footprints. But something larger for sure. Amber sent a picture to her friend, Lindsay, who studies environmental science and animals as part of her career path. Lindsay said, Yep. That's a raccoon! Well, we know there have been raccoons in the neighborhood in recent years, but to know that one walked all the way across our driveway and right next to our front door . . . it makes me a little jumpy, ha ha. Raccoons might seem cute, but they can be vicious!! I wouldn't want to run into one in the dark.
Monday: I shopped for baby quilt fabrics, cleaned my bedroom closet from weekend sawdust and labors, organized my clothes in the new cubbies, and even got motivated enough to paint some door trims upstairs with a fresh coat of white paint.
Here are the empty cubbies - ready to fill up! :)
I also baked some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and made chicken soup. And later that evening, Scott and I got permission to take the Sacrament over to an older widow in our ward that I minister to. She is still recovering from a recent surgery and when I found out no one had brought her the Sacrament during the whole month of February, I knew she would appreciate us bringing it. Scott made sure it was okay with the Bishop to take care of that on a week day, instead of on a Sunday. Jane was extremely appreciative, and was also very grateful for the soup and cookies that I brought as well.
I also spoke on the phone with Grandma Lillian for a bit. I wanted to check on her after Uncle Tim passed away recently and unexpectedly. He took a turn for the worse over Valentine's weekend, and the Dr. said there wasn't much hope for recovery. They made Tim as comfortable as possible, and he passed away peacefully in his sleep on February 15th. I was in awe of the fact that out of all the weeks I could have visited in Ukiah, I happened to be out there when we could take a picture of him through his ICU hospital room before they moved him to a different room a day or two later. Those pictures were the last pictures we have of him. He was a fun and spunky guy, full of life and definitely full of sarcasm, ha ha.
(Sorry for the handwriting on the photo - I think I wrote on this when I was a teenager or thereabouts)
Tuesday: More tinkering around the house . . .
Wednesday: Amber took the girls up to Rigby to surprise Weston's mom for her birthday. All the children were there, including kids and grandkids from Utah! They coordinated the surprise with Weston's dad, so everyone was there to shout SURPRISE when Mike and Kathy got home from work together.
While they were having pizza with all the cousins in Rigby, Scott and I decided to try our own little adventure in the kitchen. We pulled out an OLD can of dehydrated egg powder mix to see how it tasted. The plan was to make breakfast nachos if it all turned out good enough. If it didn't, well, then, we would resort to regular store-bought eggs and make the same dinner with that instead.
We bought this egg mix with several other food storage cans about 25-26 years ago.
We decided to start by making just a little bit to sample. This is what it turned out like. And it actually tasted GOOD!! Shocking!!
So we mixed up a bunch more and poured it into the pan. It looked more like crepe batter than eggs, but trust me, it turned out to be tasty!
Breakfast Nachos - hash browns, "eggs", avocado, tomato, cilantro, cheese, etc. Yumm!!
Don't be afraid to try new things. Be brave. We certainly were not disappointed!
Thursday: I got another letter from my older cousin, Valerie, in California. She doesn't do email or anything with technology - not sure exactly why, but we've been writing back and forth since before Christmas. I liked the cute thing she wrote on the outside of the envelope . . .
And since we're in the joking mood . . . Hank Smith had some cute thoughts on his Instagram page that same day. I shared these two with our kids.
Friday: Amber gave the girls an opportunity to finger paint using chocolate pudding and gummy worms. What a genius idea!! So cute!! Abby was very creative and enthusiastic as she painted homes and other features for her worms. Gwen was more reserved, and even a little disturbed at how it felt. She was even more disturbed when she licked her pudding-laden finger. With her occasional gag reflex, we thought she was really going to throw up! But she didn't, thankfully.
Saturday: Even though the week was a little quieter overall, and nothing really exciting happened, we made up for it on the weekend!!
Scott did a lot more work on our bedroom closet, for starters.
He pulled down some lower shelves, and moved his clothing rod up higher.
Hung his clothes back up.
Then proceeded to build a big long shelf underneath all of our clothes.
Gwen and Abby were happy to test out the new shelf. See if you can find Gwen. :)
And voila! This is the (almost) finished product!
All that's left (we think) is to get rid of the skinny little shelf above Scott's clothes, and just use the big shelf that wraps around above everything. The space feels so roomy now. When I sit down to put on my shoes, I just marvel at how spacious it feels in there. He is such a good worker guy! I'm so lucky to be married to him!!
While he was working on the closet, I worked on organizing our pantry (again). I got a few new containers to simplify the look of things, grouped everything in smarter ways, and moved some things down to the cold storage room downstairs instead of it just hogging up precious space upstairs.
Before:
After:
Before:
After: (you may not be able to fully appreciate what was done by looking at these 2 photos, but trust me. We did a lot!!
And within moments of finishing up both the closet and the pantry, we headed out on a double date with our friends, Scott and Jen Anderson.
First stop: Axe Throwing
Above: Scott and Scott
Below: Jen and Me
This is the coolest video ever - of Scott throwing his axe into the target in slow-motion.
Check it out! (12 seconds)
He took a slow-mo video of me, too, but it only caught the very end . . . (10 seconds)
Click here:
The look on my face as it hit the bullseye is just priceless! Especially when this was one of my first few throws!
We took turns chucking those axes for about 30-40 minutes, before we decided we had had enough. We drove over to a nearby restaurant, called Yessi Puerto Vallarta, a tasty Mexican place close to our house. I ordered the seafood chimichanga again and enjoyed every single bite! Scott ordered a fajita sandwich and enjoyed it, even though it definitely had some chipotle kick to it!
After dinner, we headed over to the Anderson's house to check out some of their recent home improvements, and then sat down to play dominoes for a while. It was really fun to hang out with them, and to just PLAY at the end of a hard working day.
Sunday: What a busy day that turned out to be! A dizzying blur of sorts. But in a good sort of way.
I got up early to shower and get ready.
Worked on a little bit of family history and ate breakfast
Meeting from 10-11 a.m. at the church
Networked after the meeting, via texts, emails, and phone calls
Squeezed in some lunch
Went to church from 1-2 p.m.
Came home, cleaned up the kitchen, baked some cookies
Took cookies to a couple families & made some important visits with some new move-ins
Squeezed in some dinner
Meeting again from 6-7 p.m. at the church
Hurried home to watch my favorite show: Relative Race at 7 p.m.
Finally slowed down the pace after that, and then got ready for bed.
No time, really, for working on my blog yesterday. But that's okay I guess. I really don't like to have it still hanging over my head on Monday as I start a new week, but I didn't really have any other option this time. :)
Coming Up This Week:
Doctor & Dentist appointments
Baby clothes extravaganza
Election training for next week's election
And a fun YW activity at my house tomorrow night - making cinnamon rolls!!
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