My Journal

 Providence Hill Academy started back up today. We were able to get everything ready last night so we were ready and off to school on time. The schedule was different for everyone. I did like my last schedule but I think I will like this one just as much. Maebryn started up at the big school and seemed very excited about it. It was cute because once everyone left she went straight ahead doing all of her homework. She also came right home and cleaned out her lunch from her backpack. I couldn't be more impressed with my little one. I also had parent teacher conference with the language arts teacher. It was a first for me for this but was good. It was fun to see how much she knows my children, their strengths and their weaknesses.  It was a full but good day. I still have a little bit of a cold but thinking that I might be at the tail end of it. 

 I didn't feel great today. I have had really bad allergies lately but am starting to think that maybe it is either leading into a cold or was a cold the whole time. (It would have been a long cold with strange symptoms but nevertheless I've wondered if it has led to something more.)  I debated for a little bit about cancelling everything but I haven't had a fever and really most of my symptoms were like allergies...sneezing, itching mouth and eyes and stuffed up nose. so we started everything choir and orchestra. They were nice small groups, which made it nice. I also worried about loosing my voice but I didn't. I am excited about our choir music and our advanced orchestra music and am trying to figure out how I can help beginner more. Beginner is tricky because the levels are so split but I feel like everyone is progressing so that is the main goal there. The boys have been doing well training their parakeets. It's been fun for them to have the land on their hands...

 Our church time was moved to 12:00 (noon). It actually worked out well, even though later church usually isn't my pick of time. I was able to get all of the kids sheets printed off for the week, we did "Come Follow Me" and I was able to get all things ready for church and was able to go pick up Frances. Church went well. Michael and I are primary teachers together, teaching such a sweet little class mostly of girls one of which is Roslyn. (1st picture is us doing Come Follow Me together in the morning.) This was Maebryn during primary, she was asked to stand putting her hands by her ears to help people remember a part of the song where it says, "whenever I hear". I thought this was cute because she stayed like this for the entire time we sang the song a few times through. I also don't remember her volunteering for anything so it was fun to see my sweet little one up there.

 Michael and I went and did sealings at the temple in the morning. We then went straight over to pick up Calvin from winter encampment. He had been there all week. He said he enjoyed it but that it was hard. Once home, I took the younger four to art class with Sister Taber. She showed us an English tradition of popping crackers, holding them in a circle and pulling on each others. Inside was a hat and a little toy. It was neat to see and be part of that little tradition. We then painted some trees and a beach landscape. To everyone's joy and pleasure, Austen was still here when we got home. He originally had planned on leaving today. We all had super fries for dinner that Michael had made and then played pickleball together. Austen had fixed up a number of holes in the duck enclosure so that was nice, he also brought in the groceries while we were gone, and had fun making pizza's for lunch with the kids. At night they showed him a little of the Tuttle Twins. It was a nice full ...

 It was fun having uncle Austen here. I started off the day by having a staff meeting for work. It is so nice having these on zoom because I am able to do other simple things like laminating while I am on the call. When I finished the call I had some yummy sheet pancake that Evan had made for breakfast.  Austen needed to go clean his car but I have been needing to clean our cars, so I said he should just do it here and we had everyone work in teams cleaning all of the cars. The gold van, our main vehicle was very messy as we hadn't cleaned it out since our trip to Tennessee in November. Once we got the cars all clean, Benson, Roslyn and Maebryn came with me to go clean Michael's office. Something else that I have been meaning to do for some time. They all chose to get Rosa's Cafe for their reward for cleaning the office. In the evening Austen went on a date and we played some pickleball outside on the patio. It was a nice day.

 Today was a very low key relaxing day. I ran to get some medicine for Robyn who just got out of the hospital. So I felt that made for a good start to the new year, being able to serve some. We then played in the yard, I did some laundry. Austen called saying that he would be flying in around 6 so I left about 5 to go pick him up. It was fun to have him surprise us for the New Year. The weather was beautiful and I was able to get a few things done around the house...we cleaned the walls well and I finished cleaning the laundry room that I have been working on. Felt nice to have so much clean. Yesterday I deep cleaned all of the bathrooms and put up new towels in mine and Michaels. (Picture is the kids going around finding spots to clean.)