January 20th

So we decided that we eat a lot of yogurt at our house, but it either has high fat or lots of artificial sweetners. So we decided to invest in a yogurt maker. Today was our first try. It only takes milk and a couple of tablespoons of plain yogurt to get started (actually if you use skim milk then you need to add non-fat powder milk) that's cheap in my book. The only draw back is it does take about 15 minutes to prepare the milk and then it cooks in the little machine for 10 hours. You can add any flavor you want to each individual cup and honey if you want a sweeter taste. We'll see how it goes. I'm sure it will take a little bit of trial and error until I am satisfied since I am not a big yogurt eater (I do love the yogurt parfaits at McDonalds though).

January 19th

Every Wednesday I try to go to the temple. Since Mauren has a week off between jobs I invited her to join me (It has been a long time since we were able to go together). I had stopped at the hospital to see Velma Hughes (a sister I visit teach) and almost didn't leave in time to make it, but since I am a quick dresser I did fine. It was great to spend some time with Mauren.

Mauren said she hoped my eyes weren't closed since it was too hard to see in the small window of the camera to be certain, but either I was on the way to closing them or opening them or there was lots of sun in my eyes.

Tuesday, Jan. 18th

It was another basketball night. Last night we played Brenham. Chase's team was in Brenham and lost by 25 points. MiCayla was at home. They took it into overtime but in the end we lost by 12 points. We had 3 of our strong players fouled out in the 4th qtr. or the very beginning of overtime. That left MiCayla to play point, something she rarely does, and she was already struggling. The coach made her feel like the game was all up to her (she really seems to like to put her down) so MiCayla felt like it was all her fault that they lost, but it wasn't. There was so much going on on the floor and the refs not calling most of it. MiCayla went in for a layup and got slapped hard across the face and no foul called. Then the coach gets mad at her when she doesn't want to charge in again.

Such is life and the experiences that go with having a new coach that doesn't understand the tenderness of these impressionable girl's hearts. I told her this is in the past, it doesn't do any good to be angry because it just let's Satan in the door. She just needs to calm down, and reflect what she could learn from it.

It is sometimes difficult being the parent because you want the best for your child, but at the same time you want to understand that life is not always easy and that they need to learn from these hard times. I find I have spent a lot more time praying for them this basketball season than anytime before.

Monday, Jan. 17th

Someone told me that on a 365 day blog that you can include memories if you don't have a picture for that day. Since there wasn't much to take pictures of (I guess I could have taken a picture of my clean bathrooms).

Tom, myself and Ogles went on a Mediterranean cruise last May/June. Barcelona was where we flew into and got on a our cruise ship to see the rest. We were able to spend a full day walking around Barcelona and seeing some sites. There was so much more I wish we could have seen (like what is that big rocket looking thing in the middle of the picture?), but we are grateful for what we did get to see.

Memory: Barcelona, Spain

Sunday, Jan. 16th

Sundays are always hard days to come up with a picture. It's not like I'm going to take a picture of going to church. So here it is: rain. That's right--it has rained most of the day, so I took a picture of the wet driveway--exciting just like my life is on a Sunday, but I prefer it that way.This is the other fun and exciting thing going for today. MiCayla is reading "Kite Runner" for school. Me on the other hand, I went to church, to choir and then sat down with the kids and watched the final episode of Hannah Montana forever. How will we ever survive with out Hannah Montana? Hope everyone had a great day!

Saturday, Jan. 15th

Today was a nice easy Saturday. Nothing pressing to get done. Tyson and Chelsea brought the girls out to see grandpa and grandma. They are always telling their parents that they need to come see us even though we had seen them on Wednesday night for about 10 minutes. They are sweet little girls with lots of energy. Kaitlyn (the one in the pink) has been sick with RSV. Usually she is smiling lots, but since she isn't feeling so great we didn't get a smile in this picture.

Friday, January 14th

Today Tyson started putting the shingles on the roof of the barn. Isn't that just so exciting? It is to my husband.

The pool cleaner is always spraying the back windows and since it is a salt pool it leaves the windows a mess. So since my husband wanted to see the barn more clearly so he decided to clean the windows (I had just cleaned them less than a month ago, but I appreciate his excitement to do it again). He didn't realize it was so hard to get the salt off the windows. I feel so much more appreciated now.


It's Friday and of course that means basketball. Chase was playing in Waller, so we only got to see about 30 minutes of his game. They won. MiCayla was at home playing Waller. She had a great game and we won by 5. It is always more peaceful around home when they win and play good.

January 13, 2011

I really do not enjoy the cold! My husband and I had this discussion tonight about the cold. We both grew up in Idaho and thought we didn't mind the cold, but after living in the Texas for almost 30 years, we have decided that we prefer the heat over the cold. I just can't seem to get warm for more than short periods of time. Then with the cold comes itchy, dry skin. No fun!

Since it was so cold outside (cold is relative to some of you --in the 30's) again today I asked my husband to take the picture of HIS barn expansion project so I didn't have to go out in it.

He is so excited and loving how it is coming out that he didn't mind so much walking out to take the pictures for me.

Back view.
Front view. The walls on the wings were added today.

Wednesday, Jan. 12th

Tonight for young women's we did Faith Factor (aka Fear Factor). The girls seemed to have a good time. They were divided into 3 teams. She would ask a question, the team with the right answer first got 10 points and the other 2 teams had to participate in some of following activities in picture and the winning team would get 5 points.

This portion is digging in the dirt (ground up Oreos) to find the green gummy worm.This activity they were doing charades--trying to guess the name--King Benjamin.
This round they were eating baby food--pears and peas. They said the pears were ok (which was 5 points) but the peas (10 point value) were bad. Sarah (in the brown) managed to eat both jars and was awarded 15 points for her efforts.
This one they were licking whipping cream off the plate. Whoever got the most in 30 second won.
Here one more days progress on the barn. My husband is so excited for it--he is like a little kid at Christmas.

Tuesday, Jan. 11th

Of course, being Tuesday, we had basketball tonight. Chase's team won by 2 and MiCayla's team won by like 39. Since Chase was playing at home we attended his game. We attend MiCayla's on Friday since she'll be at home. It works out really well for us that we attend the home games because we were able to buy season tickets to save a little money. When we go to another school we have to pay.

So today when I got in my car I thought it was starting to have this funny smell. I went and worked out and then I went to buy groceries. I get into the back of my car to get out my reusable bags and I notice something in the cooler bags I keep in the car. There was a large package of ground beef (fortunately inside another plastic bag that the store provides for such things so they don't leak) that I had bought last Wednesday at Sams. I wanted to cry. Apparently when we unloaded the car last Wednesday, it got left inside. I guess it hadn't stunk until now because it has been soooo cold outside, but there went $13 down the drain. I guess I learned the hard way to make sure I double check everything.

This is the lastest update of our barn expansion. It is certainly a lot larger than I thought it would be.