MAY 2023

 SADIE'S SICK
Woke up to a sick Sadie.  She was throwing up a bunch and I was frantically trying to figure out how we were going to fit that into our big day!!  Poor little lady.  5-1-23

ERIKA PEDIATRIC OBGYN
We got a few more answers here and it was actually kind of a relief.  I wish they hadn't asked for her preferred pronouns cuz that stuff makes me crazy, but looks like things are mostly fine.  PHEW!  5-1-23

LAST CHANCE MEET- BRAD AND LUKE/SOUTH END MEET- NOAH
We had our last chance meet on Monday.  I got to help make the balloon arch for the Senior presentation, that was exciting and a fun to meet Kenzie's mom and visit with Brandon's again too.  We watched Luke and Brad both do 110 hurdles, Brad did the 100 M dash.  Then we rushed over to Farmington High for Noah's mile- he looked amazing in this one, although he said he didn't PR, I'm still shocked!  Then we raced back to Davis- literally raced!  We had grandpa Hatch and my mom with us, and we FLEW!!  Seriously!  We got there just in time for the Senior presentation, got to walk out on the field with Brad, he walked through the tunnel of players and then the balloon arch for a picture with mom and dad.  So fun!!  Kind of his moment!  They read off his favorite memory of the season- "jumping in Farmington pond every Thursday".  It was so cool!!  I wish we'd been able to relax a little more that day, but we were so worried about Erika babysitting the sicky in her disabled state.  It was a little crazy.  Then we watched Brad and Luke do their 300 hurdles and then stayed quite a while longer to watch Luke and Brad do the long jump!  This was LUke's first time doing the long jump and I think he did really awesome!  He also PRed on his 110 and 300 hurdles!  Very cool!  Brad made it into the finals with the long jump and PRed again on his 300 hurdles.  He keeps getting closer to his state qualifying time, but just barely not there yet.  We're so proud of these guys!  They are doing so much and working so hard!!  It's really fun to witness.  So cool!  5-1-23

BRAD'S FIRST ANNOINTING
We felt the need to give Sadie a blessing Monday night as she was still throwing up a little.  Nate got all ready to bless him and even I wondered if I should stop him so we could go get Brad to help, but I didn't want to interrupt and be that wife, so luckily Nate was prompted the same and actually stopped mid-sentence and went and got Brad.  So Brad got to anoint her head and Nate sealed it with a blessing.  So cool!!  Brad did great!  Makes this mom so happy!!  5-1-23

TEMPLE BAPTISMS
We went for another round at the Ogden Temple for Wednesday morning baptisms.  Woke up bright and early.  It was Bradley, Luke, Brandon and I again, only this time we brought some of Rishelle's names so that I could get baptized!!  This was so cool!  My first time having Luke baptize me!  Then another cool little milestone- Brad got to confirm all of us!!  Newly ordained Elder!  He did awesome!  It was so cool!!  I'm going to try to find new ways for him to practice using his Priesthood here, so he can get really comfortable with it!  So fun!  Such a great way to start my day!  Wendy's after again :).  5-3-23

BASEBALL PARK
We spontaneously decided to go to the park tonight.  Owen had just come over to play with Sadie, so we invited him and then Jack wanted Will there.  I called Heidi as we left and she met up with us as well.  So lots of fun!  Everyone was so good there, except for Sadie!  Nate was working the mid, so he brought Erika down on his way to work after Young Women's.  We had a good enough time.  I'll never forget Owen carrying my camp chair to the car for me- and then asking for the keys- HA!  He's adorable! 5-3-23

CHARITY MOVING HOME!
Charity is moving home for the summer before her plans to move down to Orem!  It's so exciting and even though Sadie was disappointed that Josh isn't moving in with us, we are all super excited to hopefully see more of Charity!  She invited Steve over to meet Josh and I think they were going to eat lunch, but Steve bailed.  But it was so fun to see Steve.  Nate put up our new light over the kitchen table while we all chatted.  Good times.  5-4-23

AWESOME FINDS
We went to the DI and then Good will for Noah's Grease costume and wasn't until we searched at Good Will that we had the blessing of finding the perfect leather jacket!  So cool!!  And then we found a quesadilla maker that was pretty thrilling!!  Kind of a cool little miracle.  5-4-23

JOSH'S BRAKES
Nate helped Josh change his brake pads.  Kinda cool that my dad taught him and now he's teaching Josh.  Very cool.  5-4-23

DATE NIGHT
We had to squeeze our date night in on Thursday, went to Monster Sushi and then grocery shopping for some stuff for Nate to test out his new griddle for Cinco De Mayo :).  Good times!  So grateful for Nate.  I seriously could not do this life on my own.  5-4-23

BYU INVITATIONAL
I got to spend the day down in Happy Valley with Bradley at the BYU Invitational.  This is a big one!  Every kids from Alaska were here!!  So cool!!  Brad was doing the long jump the 110 hurdles and the 300 hurdles.  He had some awesome jumps, didn't PR, so that was disappointing, but he did awesome nonetheless.  Then in his 110 hurdles the kid next to him hit his hurdle and he stumbled a little costing him his momentum.  Such a bummer.  He was very bummed about that but knew he still had his 300 hurdles for redemption.  He did AWESOME on his 300 hurdles.  He came in 3rd in his heat!  We were shocked when we realized he hadn't even PRed or qualified for State.  So sad!  He was a very good sport and didn't get too upset.  You could tell he was bummed though.  I have to say, I am so proud of Bradley.  He is a very cool kid.  I had this cool little moment while we were at that meet where I was talking with Heavenly Father and asking him if he could please just let Brad catch a break.  Please just let him have a win, ya know.  It's been a long season of him barely not making things and it's been okay because he's been so gracious about it all, but I just want him to have at least one little win.  And it was like Heavenly Father said, "I have bigger things planned for Braadley, just hold on, they're coming."  It was so cool!  I mean, I was a little bummed thinking he wasn't going to make it to state at this meet, but cool that Heavenly Father has a plan for Brad.  I'm excited to see what that is.  He's just awesome.  We had a nice time talking in the car, although I felt like I was mostly just annoying him- HA!  Good memories though.  I love this kid!!  5-5-23

SATURDAY
This Saturday was pretty chill.  Not a ton going on.  Just two soccer games since Noah had Grease dress rehearsal all day and Erika's foot is still on the mend.  It was fun to watch Molly's game- I was sitting by the woman I met at Stake Conference a week or so ago.  She was telling me all about homeschooling her kids.  I enjoyed hearing her story and what it has been like for her and naturally I consider doing it when I talk to people like this, but I just get stumped every time when I think about it.  I think it would take a massive prompting from The Spirit or words from our Prophet to switch.  I don't know.  Still cool to hear about though.  Her name is Lisa Stevens, in case I change my mind and need to contact her :).  We got to watch Brad's soccer game as well.  This was fun.  It's just fun to watch him doing something new and different.  I know he's not totally comfortable out there, but he really does a great job!  It almost takes me back to little Bradley days, like he's still testing out ways to kick and which ways work or not.  He looks so cute out there when I am thinking about this :).  Fun stuff.  After all the soccer games and saying goodbye to Nate, we did very little else.  I can't even remember what we did.  5-6-23

SUNDAY
My lesson was not my favorite.  Felt lame.  Luke said that "at least the time went by fast".  So there's that.  We didn't do our craft and our dessert bombed.  We did get to have Charity and Kelly here, as well as a couple of Kelly's friends when they dropped her off- if Ralph doesn't like her, I'm shocked!  We went on a walk to take some dessert to Michelle (aka: Richelle) and Lexi.  I want to get back into our conference talk studying on Sunday night!  Need to do that.  5-7-23

LONGEST DAY EVER
So Monday was THE LONGEST DAY EVER!!  We were all so anxious for Brad to get his call the next day!  Felt like eternity!  We didn't even have FHE because we were all sleeping away our anxiousness.  So crazy!  We did roast hotdogs for dinner and I think Molly counted that as FHE and that's why she didn't remind me.  But oh man- that was tough!!  5-8-23

BRAD'S MISSION CALL!!!
This was a cool day!  I am going to tell the whole long drawn out story just because it made me so happy!  So I took Brad to school around 8:50 because he had home release first.  Then at about 10:30 I got a text from him informing me that he got the text about his call being in his inbox!!!  He was so excited!  I was very excited too!  He was telling me how anxious he was to open it and I told him he just had a few more hours and then he was like, "Or you could check me out so I can go read it by myself quietly and then go back to school :)"  I was all for that!  HA!  I checked him out, picked him up, and he went down in the creek.  Originally he had wanted to go hike Adam's Canyon to go read it, but then he said he realized that was pretty involved and he probably didn't really have time to do that.  He's so adorable.  I love that he is taking this so seriously and making it a special thing.  So he read his call to himself down in the creek and then came back up to the house, just BEAMING!!  He had an even brighter glow than usual!  It was SO CUTE!!  He seemed very happy!  I was of course incredibly anxious to hear it and begged him to just tell me.  He wanted to keep it a secret til he read it to the family.  So I stopped begging.  But then I asked him if he could just tell me if it is outside the U.S. or not.  He said he couldn't tell me and then as soon as Kelly left the room, he whispered to me that it was outside!!  We were both super excited for that!  He had only said one thing about where he wanted to go and that was "Foreign" so I was a little relieved and thanked Heavenly Father.  So he and Kelly went and got lunch, took Noah to his ortho appointment for me (I was still in my pjs and trying to get the house all cleaned up for that night).  Then he went back to school.  The suspense was totally building up!!  It was so nuts!  Finally, he came home around 3:45, very excited and anxious to read it to us all, then Nate showed up with his mom and Subway sandwiches, and everyone else who hadn't been home showed up as well.  Everyone was here minus Charity who couldn't get off work til 5:00.  So Brad (about a half hour earlier than planned) requested that we just do it then!  So exciting!!  We hurried up with our guesses on the map.  Molly's original guess was China, but I had informed her that China doesn't have any missions, and gave her the option to change it.  I guess Ms. Smith had just been teaching them about Peru that day, talking about eating animals while she was there, and Molly had that fresh in her mind, so she chose Peru.   We all went down to the family room, Kelly said a little prayer, and Brad read us his mission call!!  It was so special!  The Spirit was so strong!  I LOVED IT!!!  Peru, Arequipa Mission- Spanish speaking!  I had not thought of Peru!!  Molly did, but I didn't!  HA!  We all got very excited and cheered, Molly was BEAMING at having guessed right!  Told Brad she would have to eat animals!  Everyone was hugging and wiping tears, and hugging some more!!  Such a neat experience!!!  For all of us!  I really was just so thrilled to have this experience here for all of these younger siblings and be able to witness the beauty of a mission call.  So Brad and Luke had to hurry off to their track dinner after that.  They were gone for about an hour and fifteen minutes.  I took Noah to his rehearsal.  When I got back the house was already starting to fill up, Brad was dressed up- it was so fun!  Each minute another like five or six kids came piling into the house for a good 15-20 minutes!  I couldn't believe how many teenagers we could fit in here!  Along with Grandma Ruthie, Grandma Hatch, Grandpa Hatch, Aunt Jen, Aunt Meg, Chris, Sierra, Matt, Jarom, Sam, Heidi, Porter, Alyssa... the house was full!  I'm realizing just how small our house is going to feel when our kids are grown with children of their own!  We gotta get on our remodel project soon!  So pretty much the entire track team had come over- as invited by Coach Agnello- and all of them were piled in the family room to hear where Brad was going!  This was so exciting!  You wouldn't think  you could get that many kids quiet, but they did!  Brandon said a prayer as well as helped Bradley pull up the email again.  We could hear Bradley so well!  When he read the Peru, Arequipa part, the room erupted!!  Everyone was so thrilled!   Even some teary-eyed girls. There were lots of hugs and pictures, I saw him showing some people where it was on the map.  So cute!!  I loved having this moment for him.  And it really was just a short moment.  Brad made the rounds, said thanks to everyone who came, shook the Bishop and Jay's hands, hugged his mom again and headed off for Pierce's call opening.   Just as fast as they all crammed in here, they were all gone!  Maybe faster!  But it was so neat!!  I loved it so much!!  Brad is such an awesome kid.  I'm so beyond proud of him and who he is.  This will be a really neat experience to watch him grow through this new challenge of serving a mission.  He is so good at challenges and so good at growing, I think it is going to be really cool!!  Now to prepare!!  There's so much to do!!  5-9-23

JACK'S FIRST BASEBALL GAME OF THE SEASON
After kicking everyone out of our house- and leaving some of them here- we all piled in the van and went up to Roy for Jack's first baseball game of the season.  This was a lot of fun.  Even Sierra and Matt and Josh came!  We had everyone but Luke and Noah.  Jack played awesome!  It was really fun to cheer for him and be there to support him.  After the game, Kelly and I headed up to Logan for me to take her home.  Nate brought everyone else home and headed off to the mid.  Up in Logan, I got pulled over, for the first time in a very long time!  I had turned right into the second lane instead of the close one.  Horrible me.  So I got pulled over.  The funny part was that at Jack's game I had said to Nate, "Remind me to get my driver's license out of the van before I go.  Oh, maybe it doesn't matter.  I'll probably be fine.  I'll have Kelly with me anyway so she can get me out if it :)."  Yes, I said all of that in one breath.  It was almost cool that everything happened as I had predicted.  I pulled over.  He told me why.  Then Kelly asked him if his name was Kelly, told him hers was too.  He asked how she knew, she told him she was a dispatcher and everyone told her she needed to meet him.  Then he got my info and went back to his car.  We talked and laughed, she could not figure out why he would pull me over for that, "they're not even trying to get a quota right now", and then sure enough, he came back, said it was just a warning and let me off the hook!  I give Kelly all the credit for that one.  I never get warnings!!  So kinda funny, also not.  I don't know.  Good times.  I really loved our drive home and talking with Kelly the whole way.  I'm so proud of that girl! She keeps going and that, alone, is a victory!!  5-9-23

KELLY'S VIRTUAL ENDOCRINOLOGIST APPOINTMENT
So this was a huge deal!  And that's why I was so bugged at myself for not making better plans ahead of time for kids to get to school.  I hadn't planned on the Forerunner being out of gas, but really, I could have planned better.  I was glad Kelly reminded me as I was taking Jack and Molly to school.  We were running late, so it was already like 9:05 when she said something.  I hurried and called Emily on my drive home, she so willingly accepted the offer to drive all the rest of my kids to school- late start!  I put Sadie in front of a show and went up to my room to get on the Zoom meeting for Kelly's appointment.  This has been a month in the making.  So I was very anxious to get some answers.  I would say it went fairly well.  Not thrilled about the supposed diagnosis, hopeful, but also not, but I also feel like we don't really know enough yet.  This doctor, whose name is escaping me now- she's the REI- mostly Endocrinologist- doctor.  She had looked at Kelly's labs and decided that she didn't have premature menopause, it looked more like POI- Premature Ovarian Insufficiency.  Not as promising as menopause because it means that she doesn't have anymore eggs, so freezing them for later would be out.  But as opposed to menopause, this disease can magically reverse and she could magically have eggs and spontaneous periods.  Kinda weird.  But gave me a little hope after all our hopes being dashed within the first few minutes.  She proceeded to tell us that they don't know much about this disease (we've heard that before- eyeroll) and that they are trying to do research on how genetic it is.  So she asked if we'd be interested in getting samples from all the female relatives to test.  Kinda cool- Kelly and I both liked that part.  She is going to prescripe an estrogen patch for Kelly, along with getting her some progesterone for when the lining of her uterus builds up from the estrogen.  She is supposed to get on some calcium and vitamin D supplements to try to fight the deterioration that will likely be caused by the lack of estrogen.  She is going to go in for an ultrasound to see just how bad her ovaries are, if there are any obstructions or problems with the follicles.  Hopefully see some eggs.  IF there are eggs, she could have them frozen.  If not, we can hope for some later.  I loved how this doctor talked to Kelly about her plans.  If all was well with her health, what does she want to have happen.  She said she's always wanted a big family and the doctor said, that's what she wanted to do for Kelly.  So that was nice.  She talked a little about informing family members and to begin thinking about who she would want to use as an egg donor if things don't go a different way.  She told Kelly that her body is probably healthy enough to carry a pregnancy, so she really could just do that.  I was happy for her there.  Who knows how it will all go.  Kelly was so tough.  I know it was hard news, it was for me as well, but she was really tough and continues to try to look at the positive.  I'm really amazed at all that this girl has to go through.  I hope she is equally blessed for it all.  She deserves so many blessings.  So I guess June 5th will give us some more answers, so we will baby step to June 5th.  5-10-23

REGION MEET
This was a big meet- took up a lot of space in Bradley's mind.  He was very anxious to get qualifying time on his 300 hurdles.  I got to go watch him do the 4X2, 110 hurdles, his 300 hurdles and tomorrow is his 4X4.  Unfortunately, I guess he hurt his shoulder in his practice and did something else to it on the 110's, so he was all taped up in his 300 run.  He did such a good job. I didn't notice any stuttering, looked really good!  He was even ahead of most of his heat the whole time. Unfortunately, this just wasn't his day.  He did not get his time he wanted.  I was so devastated for him.  He was super sad too.  He didn't come over to hug us this time either.  Just such a sad moment.  I think that his 4X4 team has a chance and we are all expecting them to make it to state, but this was a huge let down for Brad.  I'm glad he is good at bouncing back and will look back on Track with fond memories still, but this was not how I wanted his Senior Track season to end.  I'm so SO proud of him and all the hard work he put in.  He really did SO MUCH to get where he is and should be so proud of himself as well.  I hope he uses what he's learned throughout the rest of his adult life and is able to push and overcome many other challenges with so much strength then too.  Good job, Bradley!!  We love you!!  5-10-23

BRAD'S 4X4 
Day two of Region 1 track meet happened today and Brad got to run with his 4X4 team- they did incredible!!  I couldn't believe the gap we were going to have to close as I watched the first kid run, but sure enough, Brad was second and he completely zapped that gap!!  It was so awesome!  Handed off to Brandon and he did really great too.  I'm not sure who was last, but they were able to fight for second place and they not only made it to State coming in 2nd, but their time got them there as well!  They got a two second PR!!  He's hoping to take Victor in place of the first kid, but we'll see I guess.  So cool!!  Way to go Brad!!  5-11-23

MOLLY'S FIRST GRADE PROGRAM
We had a really fun time at Molly's show!!  I took lots of video and pictures.  It was so fun to watch Molly and hear all their hard work learning some really great songs!  I loved all the things that they sang about as well.  I need to get those songs on my Amazon music!  Great songs.  Molly knew every word and sang her little heart out.  It was so great!  I loved her name acrostic poem and self portrait- she really is an artist!  We went to artic circle, then the Creamery and finally Dairy Queen after to celebrate- the first two were closed for some reason.  But this was fun- Sadie loved it too.  5-12-23

MOLLY'S FOLLOW-UP
We went in for Molly's arm follow-up-- the brace is off! What a great relief!  She's a little tender still, but I told her that's how it will be for a little bit.  Hopefully that is true.  5-12-23

BRAD'S BOOK
It has been a challenge to find time to work on Brad's book this year!  I should have done more of it sooner.  It's been so much fun looking at his pictures and thinking about who he is and how far he's come.  He really is just such an amazing kid.  I'm so proud of him.  So proud of who he is and excited to see what else he does with his life.  I hope I can get his book done in time though :).  5-12-23

STAKE SENIOR DINNER-- I MEAN BRUNCH
I don't know why it was so frustrating to me that they did a brunch instead of dinner, but it was.  It was right during soccer!!  BUT doesn't change how excited I was for Brad to get to do this.  I love this little thing the stake does.  The food took extra long to get there, so we had the program part of the meeting first.  Pres. Perry spoke.  He did a little quiz thing of guessing familiar voices and then talked about hearing the Lord's voice through the scriptures, temple, and conference talks.  I loved it!  Great reminder!  Sweet and short as well.  I loved sitting by him and tricking him about the photo section of the program.  They do a little slide show of the kids baby pictures and current pictures.  Brad totally fell for it and so it was a surprise when his popped up on the screen :).  Funny boy.  We ate Cracker Barrel food, Brad didn't like Nate's cold pancakes :).  It was fun to talk about his mission and all the boys' calls around us.  Good stuff.  5-13-23

SOCCER
Erika played in her game for the first time this season.  Her food seemed to do mostly okay.  We will see how it holds up all week.  I was so grateful for Luke, he took her and watched her entire game- good kid- without complaints!  And it was a little early for him.  Her team won.  Molly scored in her game!  AND she blocked a bunch of the other teams' attempts.  We watched Noah's team too and he did awesome.  Brad skipped out on his game this time because he's gotta protect his body for state!  5-13-23

MOTHER'S DAY!!!
Today has been so great!!  It's not even time to eat Nate's homecooked dinner, and I already feel substantially spoiled!  Woke up to their cute song.  They each handed me a rose, so cute!  Then Nate gave me the eggs, bacon and sausage he made for breakfast- so yummy!  The kids all gave me gifts, youngest to oldest.  Sadie gave me a gift card to Dairy Queen and a stuffed pig :).  We named her "Mypig" so that we could both call her that :).  She's been adorable about the name and making sure she has Mypig when she's doing everything.  Molly gave me this (I was told) well thought out and shopped around for Spa Day set!  It's so cute, we get to make all the things for a spa day!  She really wanted to give me something different and something that would help me relax.  So cute!!  I can't remember if she had a gift card?  Then Jack gave me his coupon book he made at school along with a shrinky-dink necklace along with a puzzle I think everyone else picked out that looks pretty impossible :).  I'm pretty excited to see if we can do it.  Erika gave me a mini scrabble game along with a movie gift card!  We were both shocked the scrabble game has little tiles in it.  Noah gave me a package of chewy chips ahoy.  So good!  Along with a gift card- I need them all right in front of me, I'm forgetting where it was to.  Luke gave me a bag of cinnamon and sugar pretzels and a gift card to Buffalo Wild Wings.  We're gonna try to go on boneless wing night.  Brad gave me a note that said that he was writing his talk for five hours so he didn't have time to write me a card and then my gift of a volleyball net is coming!  Super excited for that!  Kelly wasn't here for the gift portion of the morning, but showed up after with a big poster of what she likes about me with cute drawings and stuff.  So fun!!  And she surprised me because she had told me she wasn't coming down today, but was able to get work off afterall.  Charity gave me a note that said my gift is coming as well.  They all gave me really thoughtful cards that made me tear up all morning!  I just love these kids!  I really can't be more grateful for the kids Heavenly Father put in my life.  I feel very lucky and very spoiled.  I am excited to go on dates and use the gift cards and use all my fun gifts.  Everyone was so thoughtful!  
Then at church, I got to hear a bunch of Mother's Day talks, which I love- talking about Christlike Poise and Mothers' poise.  Nate picked an awesome topic!  And the best part was hearing Bradley's talk!!  He did an amazing job!!  Even the part where he wasn't showering me with love and compliments was so great!!  I just loved it!!  It was hard to not be bawling the entire time!  He said so many sweet things.  Maybe I can get a copy of his talk and put it on here.  He's such a sweet boy, such a good friend to me.  I'm very very lucky to have Bradley.  Then I got to sit with my big girls all through Relief Society, giggling and being irreverent the entire time- that was fun :).  And then came home to making a sleeping mask with Molly as well as some lip balm!  So fun!  I'm just so happy I get to be a mom.  I don't think I deserve this family, but I sure love them!!  5-14-23

PASSPORT FOR BRADLEY
This was a huge satisfaction for me.  The past year I have been feeling like we needed to go get a passport started for Bradley.  I really wish we had followed through on that and just done it, but of course we had to now.  Thanks to Suzanne Wright, we scheduled an appointment and made it over to the Farmington offices and got his passport started.  This felt like a huge accomplishment.  I was glad Brad sacrificed his lunch to go do it.  Here we go!  5-15-23

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO US!!
22 years!!  Kinda crazy we've made it this far.  Kinda crazy NATE'S made it this far!!  I don't know how he does it!  He pours out so much love.  I don't think I ever imagined I would have this much love coming at me on a regular basis.  He is amazing.  I am so glad I made the choice I did to marry him and turn my life into something wonderful.  It is such a blessing!  5-15-23

BRADLEY SENIOR PHOTOSHOOT
Kelly came down and we went first to H&M for some new clothes, thenn over to the Farmington trail and then the brick wall in Kaysville.  I think we did a good job!  Got lots of pictures!  Brad was a good sport, had some fun.  I loved it!  It's always good to have Kelly's help and ideas too.  Fun times.  5-15-23

HOGLE ZOO WITH MOLLY
Sadie and I met up with Molly and her group at the zoo for a fun few hours!  We had so much fun!  I think we saw everything!  Molly seemed happy to have her sister and mom there and we got to enjoy the 1st grader Molly :).  It was a lot of fun.  I think the highlight was of course the polar bear!  So much fun!  He always puts on a good show.  5-16-23

ORCHESTRA CONCERT
We got to go watch Erika perform in her concert this week.  That was a lot of fun.  She does a great job!  I love hearing those cello notes and knowing they are hers.  It was a short and sweet two songs and then she went out with friend after to get ice cream at the creamery.  Pretty fun- she's growing up!  Great job, Erika!  5-16-23

COOL MIRACLE
Erika and I were hanging up a few State Track Kid posters on garages on Wednesday and we got up into Fruit Heights to this house that was a ways away, I don't think I even knew where I was.  We got the tape on the poster, got it all ready to hang up before hopping out of the car, and then as I shut my door I remembered that the car has been locking itself occasionally, even with the keys in the ignition, so I quickly asked Erika not to shut her door.  It was a quick little thought I acted on right away.  So she left hers open, we went and hung up the poster, got back to the car and sure enough, my door was locked!!  We would have been sort of stranded there, our phones were both in the car, the keys, the car was running!  Would have been a huge mess where I would have had to knock on someone's door probably!  SO INSANE!!  I was SO grateful we left Erika's door open.  What a huge blessing!!  Oddly enough, the next house, we both shut our doors, didn't think anything of it and they didn't lock, surprisingly and we did look like idiots racing to the car to beat the locks once we realized what we had done.  So funny.  But kind of a cool learning experience.  I was so grateful!!  5-17-23

OPEN GYM
She's back at it!  Erika went to open gym this morning and then soccer practice in the evening.  I think her foot is doing better.  Doesn't seem 100% yet, but definitely better!  5-18-23

BEES GAME WITH JACK
This was a really fun field trip!  One of my favorites for sure!  This time we actually got to ride the train and trax instead of a school bus.  It was so much fun!  Jack and Easton were in my group- Easton didn't really talk, but Jack and I had fun talking.  We watched the game pretty intently until we wanted some popcorn and snacks :).  Then Jack wanted a mini bat as well.  It was fun!  I think we killed the Las Vegas team!  Good times!  Our favorite part was watching the Jazz Bear down on the field warming up with the players, in the splits!  HA!  Funny bear.  Jack loved watching the player named Jack!  5-18-23

JACK'S WAX MUSEUM- BARNUM BROWN
I need to type up what Jack said about him, but he did an AWESOME job with this!  I was so proud of him for going all out!  We got him a cool fur coat that Jack actually loved wearing- HA, a hat and mustache.  I was pretty glad we got to go over and push all the fun little buttons and hear about all the kids' reports.  Sadie even liked it.  Jack did awesome!!  

"Hi, I'm Barnum Brown, I was born in 1863.  And died in 1973.  I was famous for being the first paleontologist to find the T-Rex remains.  When I was younger I really liked studying science and I really liked laying in the grass.  I faced many trials in my life but the hardest trial I faced was losing my wife."  5-19-23

PICNIC ON THE PLAYGROUND
We got to meet up with the kids on the school playground with Wendy's and Little Caesar's for picnic on the playground!  So much fun!!  It's a little different these days with just the two kids there!  But we had fun.  Sadie and Molly went and played on the playground for quite a while and I got to visit with Sis. Williams from our ward.  I didn't know her very well.  Erika made a guest appearance for a few seconds, we loved that!  It was nice!  Glad we get to do those things.  Next year I'm offering to pick up pizzas for everyone!  5-19-23

STATE CHAMPIONSHIP AT BYU- BRADLEY 4X4
This was it!!  The moment we'd all waited for!!  Brad left early with Victor.  We headed down after Noah's soccer game.  We waited for quite a while, they had been on schedule until the 4X4s, but the excitement was building up!  It was awesome that Nate made it down.  We waited some more.  Grandma Hatch showed up.  We waited some more :).  Then Brad and his team were finally up!  Last section of the last division, last heat... the very last race of the meet!  They ran an amazing race!!  Especially Brad!  I was so proud of him!!  They got a 1 second PR, got 7th place overall.  Very impressive!!  I was so proud of him!!  So glad he got to have this moment, and just so proud of him!!  We went over to Brick oven afterwards, that was awesome.  I loved his team's comments when they saw him sitting there with his family, eating already.  "Whoa, Brad, you have a family?" HAHA!  Then, "I KNEW you were 35!"  HAHA!!!  Funny kids.  His smile was adorable.  Good times!!  I really don't know what to say about this amazing track career he's had so far.  I hope he gets to come back and do a decathlon like he wants, or gets to do something else with it, after the mission.  He really excelled and made a name for himself!  Good job, Brad!!  So proud of ya!!  5-20-23

SEMINARY GRADUATION- BRADLEY
We had a great time at Bradley's seminary graduation.  Great speakers, great name reading :).  Just kidding.  I actually really loved the talks, and I loved that Brad just looked so amazing up there, getting his diploma.  He's such a handsome kid!  I really couldn't be more proud of him and all that he is doing right now.  So much is happening!  But he's doing it all with such poise.  Very cool.  We got pictures and cupcakes after.  Good stuff!  5-21-23

ANNOUNCEMENTS
We created Brad's announcements Sunday and got them off Monday- not a moment too soon.  They looked great!!  I was happy Brad let us use the one with him laughing on the announcement.  Grandma Hatch loved the hurdling pics too :).  5-22-23

LUNCH WITH MOM
My mom, Sadie and I met up at Penny Ann's Cafe for some lunch.  It was nice to spend some time together.  5-22-23

MEMORY MOVIE WITH MOLLY
Ms. Smith has been amazing with Molly this year- it was super fun of her to have us all over to watch the class memory movie.  I loved seeing Molly in her element and thinking about how much fun she's had this year!  It's been a really good year!!  5-22-23

DINNER AT KENZIE'S
This ended up being a really fun night!  We went over to Brad's friend Kenzie's house for dinner and fun.  It was fun to meet all his friends' families and talk a little.  I mostly talked with Brandon's mom about mission stuff, but it was so fun!  Very relaxing time!  Kenzie's parents are very nice!  It was fun being there.  5-22-23

FIELD DAY
I think this was my least favorite Field Day ever.  I mean, I hated it.  I usually love field day!  I don't know what's happened, but it was awful!!  Mostly I think it was the stupid station I was at- I had to do kickball with Kindergarten and first graders!  Not ideal.  Even with the fifth graders, they were just mad the whole time.  So that sucked.  Didn't help that we had a HUGE meltdown with Molly that morning over her shoes and she ended up wearing socks and then we had to go get her some shoes at the store... crazy!  But awful.  It was just an awful time!!  Made me sad.  I miss the old field days!!  5-23-23

CHOIR CONCERT
We got to go to Noah's choir concert Tuesday- luckily Jack's game was rained out we didn't have to choose between the two- He did awesome!  It was o fun to watch him!  I loved the song choices and loved seeing Noah own this performance!!  Fun stuff!  5-23-23

BRADLEY'S GRADUATION DAY!
This was huge!!  They didn't have graduation until 5:00, so we just got to bum around a little before, but then at about 2:00, we went over to the school with his friends and got a bunch of pictures on the football field, track and in front of the yellow D.  It was a lot of fun to have them together- probably the last time I get to be with all of them together.  Then I got to drive them up to Weber and drop them off.  They all looked so great in their caps and gowns.  They looked all grown up but were still cute, nervous kids.  I loved watching them.  I was able to go in and get us a seat, on row 21 for Grandma Ruthie.  It was an awesome graduation.  Great speeches, most of them were short and sweet.  I loved watching Brad.  It was fun waiting for his name.  We were all poised with our cameras, waiting to capture the moment.  He looked great on the jumbo tron.  Such a cute kid!!  Charity, Kelly, Nate, Me, Grandma Ruthie, Grandma Hatch, Simon and Grandpa Hatch were all there to support him!!  So great!  We went over to Red Lobster to celebrate after.  So much fun!!  I just love this kid!  I'm so excited for what he has ahead and to see what he does with his life.  He got to go to the all night party at Boondocks that night.  I didn't see him again til 1:00 the next day and even then, it was just to tell me he was going to keep sleeping :).  5-24-23

GAILEY PARK FIELD TRIP- JACK
This was Jack's last field trip.  Sadie and Erika and I met up with his grade over at Gailey Park.  It ws pretty fun to watch him pushing Sadie on the swing, he did that for a while.  He passed on the pizza and then as I was getting ready to leave because I needed to go pick up Nate from work (had to have the Prius to get the tires replaced), some girls started picking on Jack.  They were very rude and he was pretty hurt.  He was crying a little and so we sat down to talk for a minute.  I suggested that maybe he could just come home with me and he liked that idea.  I felt bad just taking him away, but I couldn't bear the thought of just ditching him there in that mood.  So I checked him out with Mrs. Moncur.  I hope his sixth grade year is more comfortable for him.  5-25-23

JACK BASEBALL
Jack has had a really good baseball season despite it being clear up in Roy.  I think he's had a good time.  His team and the parents are awesome!  I have loved working with Roy people.  Even the kids- one of them yelled out- JUST LIKE PRACTICE JACK-KNOCK IT OUT THERE!!  SO awesome!  I just love it.  He has scored a bunch of times, but being that it is team pitch he hasn't really been able to get a piece of the ball at practice.  He's got a good eye though!  5-25-23

LAST DAY OF SCHOOL
We had an awesome last day!!  Molly got to walk to the ponds- we took her a jacket, Erika and I- and then Nate had to cater lunch for the junior High so we all helped with the mad dash of that!  It was crazy how much he crammed into those last two hours!!  Amazing!!  I went over and got pictures of the kids with their teachers at their little flag ceremony and singing the national anthem- so cool!  It was a great year for both Molly and Jack!  I was very proud of them!!  We came home and got distracted and completely missed the end of year water party at Clemenses.  The kids were so mad.  But we did manage to have our Projector movie.  Super Mario Bros.  Only watched the first half outside because of some rain.  If only we'd waited a bit longer, it stopped by the time we got everyone inside.  Kinda funny.  But we had a good time!  Here's to another year!  5-26-23

ALUMNI GAME- KELLY
We got to go over to Davis for a fun Alumni Lacrosse Game!  Kelly did amazing!!  If we'd been keeping stats, her seven assists and two points would have put her at the top!!  Over their beloved Maci.  Not sure what makes Maci so special, but for some reason she is.  I was so proud of how well Kelly did!  She's still got it- even having not really played for two years!  Those other girls are on teams now!!  And the alumni team would have killed it had Kenzie not been such a horrible goalie.  I mean we won, but we would have won by a lot more if Morgan hadn't started playing on the field and turned over the goal.  Still good though!!  Fun stuff!!  Go Kelly!!!  She was pretty sore for days after- she earned that!  5-26-23

JACK SELLING SNACKS
Jack and Liam  have been selling snacks at Jami's Race Cats track meets- it's been really cool!  He's made a lot of money!!  Kinda cool!  He wants to go sell at the park during soccer games and stuff.  Fun stuff.  5-27-23

SUNDAY
Charity got surprised with giving the prayer in Sacrament meeting today and then she was set apart as a primary worker after church.  So excited for her!  She's very excited to teach the nine year olds.  This Sunday was a rough one for me.  I felt SO SICK!!  I came home and slept for like five hours.  5-28-23

MEMORIAL DAY
We had a great time at the ward breakfast.  Brad lead the flag ceremony.  We ate cold eggs, bacon, sausage and pancakes.  Kinda funny that they always want to do warm food at those breakfasts, but whatever.  I got to sit and talk with Bishop, Jay and then Emily and Charity.  Fun times.  We bummed around a bit after that, then ran some errands for Nate, picking up meat for another job.  Then we headed down to visit Nana's grave with Grandpa, Steve and Heidi and kids.  It was a nice time.  I love giving Nana a minute.  I love her so much!  Still!!  Then we drove down to Lynn and Ali's for barbecue.  This was a lot of fun too!  Talked mostly with Heather, Rachel, Nancy, Liz, Adam, Brad and Luke sat by me- I loved that!  Then on the way home I got to talk with Becky.  Fun stuff.  It was a great time!!  5-29-23

FIRST WEEK OF SUMMER
It's been a fun first week so far.  We've all had fun listening to Sadie and Owen play together.  All of the times Owen has said the words, "my mom said I could", "my mom let's me do that", and my personal favorite, "I'm gonna go ask my mom if I can go ______________ with you." (when he hasn't been invited- HA!  Sadie has tried out the new pool along with Molly and Jack, destroyed the game room with the styrofoam from the bean bag chairs, ridden on the wiggle cars way past the Clarks a few times, and taken a few naps completely on her own.  Not to mention watching Super Mario Bros a million times and renting it for $25 after we already purchased it for $30.  I think she is getting thoroughly worn out.  Funny girl.  Molly has spent a lot of time watching tv, playing her new Boddle account, activity days, snacking, and playing with the water.  Jack has been extra helpful and in a really good mood.  He has been whistling the theme to Jurassic Park for about three months straight and has not let up for summer ;).  He likes the switch and computer as well.  But has spent a lot of time outside too and finishing up his baseball season.  Erika has spent a little time at Station Park, running, babysitting, movies, cross country, and texting friends.  Noah has worked, worked, ran, worked, went to Lagoon and played with friends.  Luke has spent most of his time with friends, but we love having him around and having him to laugh at reels with.  He has spent some time on the switch, playing basketball, and eating ramen.  Brad has been extra busy lately.  He's gone fishing with the kids a few times, mowed the lawn, cleaned out his car, lots of very late nights with friends, orbeez gun fights, water fight, I can hear him practicing spanish occasionally, and having fun with Sadie.  It's been a full week!!  Kelly has been around a little and we catch glimpses of Charity along with Josh, but not a lot of time with them.  It's been a fun time!  5-31-23

APRIL 2023

 APRIL FOOLS

I made spaghetti pancakes for breakfast- just pancakes in the shape of noodles, it looked really cool with the ferrero rocher as meatballs!  I was pretty pleased with that.  Everyone did a prank or two.  There was yarn all over bedrooms.  Lots of tricks and fun things to remember it was April Fools.  4-1-23

SPRING BREAK
We had a pretty fun little Stay-cation-y Spring break this year.  Monday we went to Grannie Annie's bright and early for some scones.  Everyone was so well-behaved, I think this is the first time we've had such a pleasant time there.  Helped that there was almost nobody there.  We went swimming at the rec center that night.  That was a lot of fun too.  Everyone seemed to be having a great time!  I was thankful that Nate took care of Sadie most of the time- she liked jumping in to his arms.  I spent a lot of time in the lazy river with Molly and then the hot tub with Erika.  Fun stuff.  We missed Luke, Charity and Kelly.  4-3-23
Tuesday we played a lot of games and spent time at home and then in the evening we took the older kids- Bradley, Luke, Noah and Erika out on our "big kid date".  We went to dinner at Sushi Monster and then to Boondocks for some bowling.  This ended up being a major highlight for me.  I loved having this time with these kids together.  We had a lot of fun trying new sushi we hadn't tried before- the Vegas Roll!  We all loved bowling, I think Brad won.  So much fun!  We decided we were more fun than the family next to us who we never saw say two words to each other- it was a little strange.  But so fun with the big kids!  I'm so glad they will do these things with us.  We were bummed that the weather was crummy so Charity and Kelly weren't able to come down, but we had a great time. 4-4-23
Wednesday we babysat Porter and Alyssa and since we had been dumped on with snow over the night, we ended up bagging our plans and had a snow day!!  Brad had so much ambition that day- he was the ring leader.  He and Jack started a snowman, we all kind of contributed, but it ended up taking a couple ladders and so many hands to get the head on top and all of the accessories.  It was about 10 feet tall!  It was SO AMAZING!!  People driving by were stopping to take pictures of it!  So cool!  Then Brad ran over to the field with a bunch of the kids and then eventually his friends and made a giant igloo!  Took them all day!  So fun though!  I was so happy we finally got to play in the snow- we've had so much this year!!  Actually more than Utah has seen in over 40 years!  Pretty cool!  Fun memories.  4-5-23
Thursday was our "little kid date".  We took the little three to McDonalds's and then to Classic Fun Center for some fun.  This was a fun date as well.  Funny how different it is to take these three out verses the older three at their ages-ish.  We got to hear all about the girl who things God put her in the wrong body and identifies as a boy while we were eating- super lame- I'm shocked because we were in Kaysville of all places, but the kids never get to eat at McDonald's so they were thrilled either way :).  Classic was a lot of fun.  They did the bounce houses for quite a while and then we moved on to the arcade- that was pretty cute.  Fun to see what they chose to do with their tokens/cards.  They all picked out prizes and we were done, but it was so much fun spending that time with them.  We need to do this more often.  4-6-23
Friday was our Mario Movie day!  Kelly came down!  We went and picked up Uncle Steve and we all went to see Mario Movie together.  Popcorn, treats from home, it was the perfect event!  Everyone loved the movie!  I was so glad!  Then we went over to Costa Vida for lunch.  I loved it!  Such a fun day!  Afterwards Charity and Josh showed up and we had our game night.  That was a lot of fun.  We all stayed up way too late, but so fun!  4-7-23

EASTER SATURDAY
After the first talk of conference being about making Easter more about Christ's Resurrection, we decided to do our Easter bunny stuff on Saturday.  I think it went pretty well and it was fun to have two days to call Easter.  Saturday morning we got up bright and early to look for baskets!  This was a lot of fun.  Everyone was really cute as they found theirs.  I love how excited everyone gets even though it's usually just something simple.  We tried to go a little out this year, just for fun.  Sadie was loving it all, kind of like it was her first Easter again.  Very excited by all the eggs in the backyard- that was cute.  So after baskets, we gathered eggs in the back.  The kids got spoiled rotten by the Easter bunny in candy form, holy moly!  There was plenty for sure!  I see cavities in our near future.  After the eggs we colored our hard boiled eggs.  I know I say this every year, but I just love our system for doing eggs.  Its so satisfying!  Always goes so well.  Everyone seemed to have fun.  Kelly had to leave before she finished, but she got into it and made her friends on her eggs :).  Bradley did as he always does and made very bright bold colors.  I loved his space looking one.  Luke takes this very seriously as well.  He had fun and made some cool eggs.  Noah was quiet during this, but I think he was entertained.  I don't think this is his favorite thing, but he humors me.  Erika got into it, made some really fun eggs.  Same with Jack!  He was very artistic.  Molly looked like a mini Kelly drawing details on all of hers.  She had some very creative ones with a sunrise and sunset... lots of cute creativity.  It was fun to see her get so into it.  I don't think she finished either.  And Sadie did her eggs with some help this year.  I think she had a lot of fun.  She doesn't have the longest attention span, but she managed to trade away all her cracked ones :).  I think this was success this year.  I loved it!  After we cleaned up the egg mess, way later than finishing cuz we were waiting for stragglers to finish theirs- I started on Porter's cake!  Heidi wanted a shark cake that she had toppers for so I just did a really simple cake.  I wish I'd paid more attention to the toppers, I may have done it differently.  But I was SO happy with how smooth it turned out!  Even with three layers!  That doesn't usually happen.  My research paid off.  Everyone kind of parted ways at this point in the evening, there were parties and dates, but Erika, Jack, Molly, Sadie and I went over to Heidi's to celebrate Porter's birthday.  Grandpa Hatch and Jo were there, we had a lot of fun playing pin the fin on the shark and eating cake and ice cream.  Fun night!  4-8-23

EASTER SUNDAY
We had a really nice peaceful Easter Sunday this year.  I actually really loved that we didn't have to cram so much stuff in before church like we usually do.  We were able to have Nate home and ate Creamed Eggs on Toast for breakfast.  Then kind of a mad dash to get dressed and to church.  But we made it :).  I sang with the Choir and we sang a really beautiful song by Sally DeFord called Because He Lives.  I loved it!  This was Janeel's last song with us.  I still feel like we failed her.  We only had the one hour for church, so we got to come home and spend the rest of the evening together.  We were able to focus on the Savior's Resurrection, we went around the room and talked about what the Resurrection means to us.  I wish I'd gotten the egg thing together, but we watched Don't Miss This which was awesome and had a good time together.  Charity and Kelly and their friends Kora, Josh and now I can't remember the other girl's name all came down for a nice dinner.  We had pot roast and potatoes.  It was actually a really nice day so we sat out front to eat.  So nice!  I loved it!  Nate and I stayed up all hours of the night talking with Charity and Josh :).  That was fun too. 4-9-23

ABC DINNER
This has become a really fun way to do dinner over the years.  I love that the kids still like it.  We were supposed to do it as part of Spring Break but we missed it for some reason, so we did it Monday.  The teams were: Luke and Molly on Appetizer.  They had M and did mozzarella sticks.  Brad, Noah and Sadie had the main dish and the letter E so they did Egg sandwiches (after I vetoed their 80 minute cook time Enchiladas).  Jack and I had the side and the letter R so we did a Raspberry yogurt salad, super yummy!  Nate and Erika had dessert and the letter M and they did Mango sorbet-ish type stuff.  It was a very delicious dinner!  Everyone was pretty happy with it I think :).  Fun times.  4-10-23

MOLLY'S BROKEN WRIST
Bea was letting Molly have turns on her scooter and on one of Molly's turns she came back and didn't stop right when Bea asked her to, so she shoved her off of it.  Poor Molly fell on her hand and came in the house crying.  She seemed pretty hurt and it wasn't the dramatic crying that she sometimes does, so I was a little worried, but didn't want to jump to conclusions.  We got some ice on it, gave her some motrin and sent her to bed.  I had hoped a little sleep would make it feel better, but sure enough, the first thing she said when she woke up was that her arm hurt.  Rats.  I decided to monitor it all morning and watched her getting dressed.  She was able to do so many things with her wrist and seemed mostly fine, but as soon as she tried to pull up her skirt and couldn't and started to cry, I knew.  I knew it needed to be x-rayed :).  I wasn't going to stop worrying about it until we did.  We went right over to the instacare as soon as we dropped off Jack at school.  It was pretty funny because by the time the doctor was looking at it and having her move it in certain ways, ways she seemed perfectly comfortable moving it, I was pretty sure it was totally fine.  Feeling really dumb that I had brought her in there, but then!  The doc came in just as surprised as me and announced that she actually did have a buckle fracture in her radius.  Shocker!  Poor tough little Molly!  So they got her suited up with a brace, told us she could play soccer, and sent us on our way :).  HAHA!  Here's to hoping she heals enough for soccer.  4-10-23

BASEBALL DRAFT FOR JACK
We missed the Kaysville Rec deadline for baseball so I went searching for a nearby city to go through.  Roy was the closest.  I was hesitant, but he wanted to play baseball so bad I gave in.  He's really excited :).  He had his draft on Tuesday and according to Nate did really well and connected with the ball quite a few times.  I'm excited to see him play- it's going to be so fun :).  4-11-23

MINISTERS
Our ministers Greg Richardson and Bryan Radik came by Tuesday evening and we had fun talking to them about what we like to eat and then the creek/possible flooding.  We have really awesome ministers.  But we found out in a text a little later that Greg has lymphoma.  He was telling us so that we would know why he's not doing as much, but makes us want to do something for him.  Hopefully prayer helps for now.  4-11-23

KJH TRACK MEET
This was much anticipated!  Noah and Erika were so excited!  Noah signed up for the 110 hurdles and the 1600.  He did great on his hurdles.  Then knocked the mile out of the park!  I think he got his PR time, so he was wishing for a better time, but did so awesome!  Erika signed up to run the 100 hurdles, 1600, and 800.  She did amazing in her hurdles!  We were so impressed!  She'd been put in a faster heat and got 2nd place!  7th overall- scoring points for the team!  So awesome!  Then she ran the mile and we could tell things weren't quite right.  She started out just fine, but slowed down quite a bit before the end.  She did great, just not what she had expected.  Then a little later she ran the 800 and there was definitely something wrong.  She came through the finish line and her foot was just in excruciating pain!  They of course didn't have any ice and she was trying to play it cool for sure, but was in a lot of pain.  Come to find out she had hurt it during the mile!  So she ran most of a mile and 800 M with a very hurt foot- tough girl!!  All because the coaches told the kids they are not allowed to talk about pain to them.  I had to set the record straight with Erika and that she should listen to her body, but ugh.  We're hoping it can heal over the weekend for her track meet Monday, as long as she stays off it.  Fingers crossed.  But it was a fun track meet overall!  4-12-23

WEDNESDAY
We had four kids at three track meets with adventure days and activity days in between it all for two other kids!!  Such a juggling act!!  I went up to Syracuse High to watch Erika and Noah while Nate went to Davis to watch Lukey and he took Jack to Adventure days.  Then Nate went down to Woods Cross to watch Brad and then because they were so behind schedule, I was able to get down to Woods Cross for Brad's second race while Nate took Molly to activity days!  Kinda nuts, but we pulled it off!  Everyone had cheerers at all their events and everyone was where they needed to be!  Crazy fun!  4-12-23

LUNCH WITH MOM
My mom and I went to lunch this week.  We went to this new place by Cabellas called Aubergine's?  It was really yummy!  It had a total health food vibe so I want to take Nate and Kelly there.  I got the coconut curry- super good!  It would have been better if Sadie had eaten her food and hadn't spilled her drink and if the toilet was flushing in the bathroom, but other than that- a nice little break from the day. 4-13-23

PHOENIX INVITE
Brad did so well at this meet!  We were so proud of him!  I was sure his pulled hamstring would keep him from running his 4X4, but nope!  He pulled out an amazing run!  Still trying to qualify for state, but they're close!!  4-14-23

DATE NIGHT
For our date night we watched Brad run at Farmington High.  He had a few races so we were able to watch a couple, sneak off for some Sushi Monster, and then back for his last race.  He did so good and it was so fun to watch him!  We saw Brandon's parents also and got to talk to them for a little while, that was fun.  It was a really nice night though, just hanging out together.  4-14-23

NO SOCCER THIS WEEK
Since the older kids don't start til next week and with Molly having a broken wrist we opted out of her first game this season and didn't have any games this week.  We will see if she's able to play her next one, she's pretty anxious to play, but we'll see.  The doctor at the instacare said it was fine, but Uncle Brent said, "Absolutely not!" so we'll see :).  4-15-23

BABYSITTING PORTER AND ALYSSA
Heidi was going on a hot date really late so we got to have Alyssa and Porter sleep over!  It went really well!  I loved that Porter and Jack conspired and had him get all his stuff in Jack's room instead of where I had planned for him to sleep next to Alyssa, but they were right- that was better.  They slept all night as far as I know :).  All was well until Heidi left her phone at the guy's house and didn't have her alarm to wake up.  Luckily Kelly was fine with staying here with them til Heidi could get here.  Kelly was planning on going to a different ward up in Logan and then that idea got scratched, so she came and joined us for Sunday School.  It's always fun to have her around, but I felt bad she missed the sacrament.  She's always so helpful and sacrificing.  4-15-23--4-16-23

SUNDAY
We did cool water color looking canvases with quotes on them for our craft- I'm excited to hang them up in the hallway.  Then we were going to have brownie chex mix, but my Walmart order never came so we had something I can't remember right now for dessert.  My brain is not recalling things very well.  It was a nice Sunday though.  Charity and Josh took Jack, Molly and Sadie off to the park for some fun while I took a nap :).  Then we had spaghetti for dinner and played out on the front lawn.  It was really nice.  4-16-23

ERIKA SPRAINED FOOT
So Erika's pain had just gotten too unbearable and even though I didn't think she could break any bones running, I had to take her in.  To get a boot if nothing else, but I really did want the x-ray.  Fortunately they couldn't see any broken bones (although they always add the caveat that there could still be broken bones that they just can see because of the many angles you would need to see all the bones in the foot, so we should take her back in in a few weeks for another x-ray to know for sure if there were any fractures- not sure we'll do that, but good to know), so they put her in a boot (I was going to request one if they didn't offer it, luckily they did) and told her to use crutches as well.  Hopefully she will be able to heal now!  She had to miss her track meet that day, but did so good at keeping a positive attitude.  Here's to healing before her track meet on the 26th!  4-17-23

RANDY ANDERSON VIEWING/FUNERAL
I was so sad to hear about Andrea's dad this week.  I know how much she loved him and how close they were, it was hard to imagine what she must be feeling like.  She's been really tough though and keeps saying how she's glad he's not in pain.  She's right.  I guess he hasn't really been himself for a while. That would be so hard though.  I was able to go to the viewing and funeral Monday.  Thanks to Nate taking Sadie home it was actually really nice to be able to talk with Andrea for a minute and then sit and hear the whole funeral.  He was a really cool dad.  You could tell that family was a priority to him.  I was wondering what my kids would say about me at my funeral and it made me want to be a little more intentional about how I parent and the way I treat my kids.  I get rushed I think and less in the moment.  I need to work on that.  But it was so good to see Andrea.  And I got to see Eric too!  That was cool!  He was really nice to talk to as well, just for a few minutes.  I was surprised there weren't more people from the 54th ward there! 4-17-23

TRACK MEET
Noah did an awesome job at his track meet on Monday!  He did great on the hurdles and then got a PR on his mile!  5:48!!  Good job Noah!  4-17-23

FHE
Noah taught our lesson, we watched the Good Samaritan video- the one set in today's world.  Very cool.  We had a nice discussion about it all and then played King Pig.  I was holding a sleeping Sadie so I just watched, but it was really fun.  We used signs that go with things you can do to be close to Heavenly Father and the Savior.  Jack's treat was ice cream!  4-17-23

ORTHODONTIST SPRINGS
Noah and Erika both committed the awful crime of not wearing their elastics enough and were fitted with springs on Tuesday.  This was not a happy thing for them.  Both of them have been in a lot of pain and can't eat anything solid.  Erika was especially bugged by how she looks.  So this is fun.  Hopefully it's not too long that they have to wear them!  4-18-23

ROMANIAN LADY AND HER DAUGHTER
I was taking Jack to the store to get a gift for Will and this cute little Romanian lady and her daughter stopped us in the parking lot.  She was saying that they needed coats because it was so cold outside, and it really was, but they did have jackets on.  I wasn't sure how to help her with no cash, so I offered to go in and buy her something and she was so happy, she wanted to come with us, so she followed us in and then we wandered through the clothing for quite a while looking for coats.  Since it's April there weren't any coats, but she did find some leggings and her daughter found some shoes she wanted.  It took a minute but I was so grateful for an opportunity to use what we had just learned in family night the night before.  I wanted to help her with more but she didn't seem to want anything else, like food or anything.  She started telling me, in her broken English, that she wanted a place to stay because they are living in their car, and asked for $50, but I just can't hand out that kind of cash for some reason.  I tried to buy her more stuff and she didn't want anything else, but I did get $20 cash back to give her after we checked out.  She was so cute, kept hugging and kissing me and telling me that my Jesus loves me.  She was really sweet.  We said goodbye to them and went and bought Jack's gift for Will and then headed back out to the car.  By then I had realized that it would be really easy to go home and get some blankets and coats for them and bring them back, so I drove around the parking lot to find them to offer that to them and when we found them they were headed back into the store with a man, and they had turned toward the McDonald's so I was really happy that they were getting some more help.  We just came home.  I might put some extra blankets and coats in the car though, just to have for these occasions (assuming it's going to stay winter forever).  It was nice to help her but I still wonder if I should have done more.  4-18-23

LUKE'S LAST BIG MEET
Luke ran his 110 hurdles and 300 hurdles at Syracuse High on Wednesday in what was probably his last big meet of the year.  He did so good!  Broke 21 on his 110, a PR and got 50. something on his 300!!  Also a PR.  So proud of him!!  This was a beautiful day, but so cold, we felt bad we didn't dress the littles warmer to sit and watch, but we were lucky enough to see both races!  4-19-23

DATE NIGHT
We went on our date Thursday instead of Friday this week because of Brad's track meet Friday, but we ended up havin got squeeze it in after Jack's baseball practice up in Roy.  It was okay though, worked out just fine.  And it was super nice of Christie to do the Young Women Dodgeball so I didn't have to.  We went to Sushi Monster and it was delicious!  4-21-23

BRAD AT THE WOODS CROSS INVITE
It was pouring rain ALL afternoon but the track meet went on!  Nate, Erika on her crutches and I were able to head down to Woods Cross to see Brad run the 300 hurdles.  We got there with about 15 minutes to spare, which was funny.  It was really cold as we stood there with our umbrellas.  He did such a great job!!  Especially since it was freezing cold raining the entire time and then as he came around the turn a kid tripped and fell, falling right in his path, so he had to step around him after his hurdle.  It was pretty remarkable (unfortunately, after the race I learned that that moment was not caught on video because of a pole!  UGH!!).  His form had been looking perfect up to that point, his steps were right on, but then after that little trip up he studdered a little before the last few hurdles.  Still looked amazing and we are so proud of him!  I just felt bad for him that that had happened right then.  He didn't quite PR, but like he said, it was wet, cold, and there is room for improvement.  I was really proud of him!!  Oh and he got 2nd place overall :).  Shows how hard he is on himself.  Great run though!!  So proud!!  4-21-23

GAME NIGHT
We had a game night last night, so much fun!!  It was really only Erika, Molly and I since Nate was making cheesecake for PROM, Brad was hot tubbing, Luke was off on his day date to Clark Planetarium, Noah was at his friend's house, Jack was feeling nauseous on the couch downstairs, and Sadie was sleeping!  PHEW!  But we had SO MUCH FUN!!  We played my game choice first (we drew names to decide who got to pick the game) I picked Bananagrams!  Then Molly picked the new Princess Bingo game (not sure what it's called) we played that a million times.  It was really fun to finally play it with the tokens- Sadie and I hadn't gotten to that point yet.  Super fun though.  Then we learned how and played about three games of Sushi Go that Erika got in her Easter basket!  SO much fun!!!  I really like that game.  It's like a different game every time you play it.  You almost can't use the same strategy twice.  We watched a movie after- called Ohana something- after trying a different movie and witnessing a guy to guy kiss (gross by the way- why is that still PG?), this one was okay.  Had a weird reference to "mormon missionaries" and the acting was sub par, but the kids seemed to like the treasure hunting aspect.  It's supposedly inspired by Goonies, thankfully there wasn't as much vulgar language.  Good times though.  Late late night, I think we went to bed at midnight!  So much for my new bedtime.  4-21-23

SOCCER
We had some fun soccer games this week.  Erika decided to go cheer on her team in her crutches, pretty cool team mate.  They finally pulled out a win- stressed Erika out while they were losing ;).  Molly's game was at the same time so we sent Erika with Kate.  Molly did great as well!  And then we hurried over to Angel Street to watch Brad play his very first soccer game!  He looked like a pro!  Nobody would ever know it was his first time playing on a rec team.  Noah's game was later and his was also a really great game!  Noah looked awesome as usual.  It's fun that this season is finally underway.  We're enjoying our elongated winter/actual spring, but missing out on sports wasn't fun!  4-22-23

PROM 2023 BRAD AND LUKE
Prom was a success this year!!  Everything seemed to go very smoothly.  Nate did the food for Luke's group, they ate at Noriega's.  He also did the cheesecake desserts for Luke's group and Brad's group!  So much fun for Nate :).  He loves being asked to cook.  No seriously!  With the Forerunner out of commission, and Brad needing the van for his group- I got to drive Nate to work :).  It was a mad dash getting food delivered, Noah ready for his soccer game, and then rushing Nate to work barely on time and then hurrying back to get everyone to Noah's game.  Kind of crazy, but we made it!  The boys seemed really happy with their dates and how the evening went for both groups.  I wish I'd gotten a picture of them together, but it sounded like a really fun night!  Couldn't be prouder of these boys and the way they are handling their lives.  They're just so awesome.  4-22-23

KELLY'S POSITIVITY
Kelly posted her story and some feelings about the past two years.  I need to share it on here too.  She's so incredible and such a positive influence and example to everyone around her.  So proud of her and the way she is overcoming the challenges in her life.  4-24-23

KELLY WITH JASON SMITH
We finally got Kelly back into Jason's office.  It was a really good visit.  We talked a lot about how far Kelly has come, how much she's improved.  It was a really positive experience.  The aids were all happy to see her and wanted to hear about what was going on in her life.  It was really neat.  I love it when Kelly gets the love and attention she shows others.  It seems only fair.  4-25-23

STEM NIGHT AT COLUMBIA
While Kelly and I were at her appointment with Jason, Nate took everyone else to STEM night at the Elementary school.  Sounded like it was a big hit.  I'm bummed I didn't get to go in Jack and Molly's classrooms and oooh and aaah over their work.  I like that part.  But they all had fun.  4-25-23

TEMPLE BAPTISMS
We made an appointment a long time ago to go to the temple on Wednesday, during our late start.  It ended up being the same day as Noah's track meet so he didn't really feel like getting up at 4:45 am.  So we missed him and Erika is still in her boot and crutches so we talked her out of going.  But Bradley, Luke and Brandon all came!  It was a great time!  This was Luke's first time baptizing!!  My one regret is that I didn't have family names so I didn't get to be baptized.  But I did get to watch them as a witness and it was so neat!  Watching those boys trade places in the font and baptizing each other- very cool!  The Spirit was so strong!  I loved it so much I made plans for us to come back the next week!  4-26-23

ERIKA OBGYN
We finally took Erika to the OBGYN on Wednesday.  This was a long awaited appointment.  Unfortunately, not any real solid answers.  They gave us a little glimmer of hope and then told us to go see someone else.  Big surprise.  That is 2 for 2 with this OBGYN Peterson-Rodriguez or something.  Anyway.  Kind of annoying.  We'll get to the bottom of it soon though!  4-26-23

MOLLY LUNCH WITH THE MAYOR
This was a very exciting thing for Molly!  She was chosen to have lunch with the Mayor on Wednesday!  Molly was actually really excited and not nervous at all, which I thought was really cool.  I didn't want to change that by pressuring her to wear anything particular, or making her change, so she ended up in a very mismatched outfit that day :).  She was so happy though, it was fun to see her so excited for this thing that she wasn't really even sure what it would be.  She went and said it was really awesome.  She wished that it was something they did every day and that they could go be with the mayor on their own, without everyone else :).  I love that.  She seemed to love it.  She failed to mention the roundabout or ask when they were going to start working on it.  I can't imagine why she didn't want to talk about that :).  I'm so proud of Molly though!  Her little picture she brought home says it all on the back- Miss Smith wrote out this paragraph about Molly and all that she contributes to her class and what a cool girl she is.  I should go get a picture of it.  She really has been such a great student this year and done so much good in her class!  I'm so proud of her!!  It's pretty cool that we're still pumping out Maynes kdis that get this privilege :).  I think most of our kids have gotten to do this.  4-26-23

NOAH'S TRACK MEET
Noah did so awesome at his track meet!  Cut off a whole like 30 seconds off his mile time!  SO IMPRESSIVE!!  He decided he didn't want to do the hurdles and took off his watch for the mile- seemed to help!  5:28 Mile!!  Go Noah!!  4-26-23

BRING YOUR KIDS TO WORK DAYS
Brad, Noah and Jack went on Monday.  They went bright and early with Nate in the morning and then I picked them up at lunch time.  We grabbed some Wendy's and got them back to school.  They had a lot of fun though!  Especially working out :).  Erika and Molly went on Thursday and went early as well and then I picked them up at lunch.  They got to eat at Nate's work though.  It was a fun time for them.  Molly's favorite part was drawing on the thing- whatever that was :).  I love the pics of Erika on the bike in her boot, working out!  Fun stuff.  I'm glad they get to go to Nate's work and see what he does.  They even got some busier traffic on Thursday.  It's pretty cool for them.  We'll see if anyone ends up doing this when they get older :).  4-27-23

LUNCH WITH PAPPY
Sadie and I got to meet up with Grandpa at Olive Garden again.  Our second monthly lunch.  We had a great time.  It was cute that Molly was anxious for him to get there, since we got there first, and then so sad when he left while we were in the bathroom.  I think I need to explain things better to her.  But she was a good girl and we had a great time!  4-27-23

TEMPLE ENDOWMENTS
Nate and I got to go to the temple for our date night.  We stopped at Five Guys for some overdressed dinner- have I mentioned how much I love hamburgers right now?  I don't know what it is, I could eat them every day!!  This was nice.  We went up to the Bountiful temple.  I loved it.  Such a nice time together.  4-28-23

DAVIS INVITE/SOCCER GAMES/BASEBALL PRACTICE
Saturday was packed!  So much happening!  We got to watch Brad do his 110 hurdles in the morning.  Rushed Jack and Nate off for baseball practice.  Then we watched most of Molly's soccer game and then rushed off to see Brad do his 300 hurdles.  That was the maddest dash ever!!  I totally thought we were going to miss it, but we made it!  He did awesome!  PR!!  We got to go home for a lot of the afternoon, then Noah's game at 3:30, then rushed off again for Brad's 4X2 and then dinner, Brad's medley, then his 4X4 which the littles came to with me and all got to see him with his medal on the podium!  His 4X4 team has been great this year and will go to State together.  Such a fun thing!!  For all of us!!  Such a full day, but we made it!!  I forgot to throw in that I took 60 baked potatoes to the cafeteria for the big dinner.  Kinda crazy day!!  We had a great time though!  4-29-23

STAKE CONFERENCE
We had an awesome stake conference.  We had to sit on the hard chairs which is always... hard.   But I think we did okay.  This was a special one because Brad was sustained to get ordained as an Elder!!  So awesome!  The people behind me stopped me after to tell me how beautiful my family is and that Brad just has this amazing glow about him.  So sweet.  4-30-23

BRAD'S ORDINATION TO ELDER
We invited Grandma and Simon and Grandpa Hatch (Grandma Ruthie was invited also, but she was not able to be there), we met in the old YW rooms of the Stake center (brought back memories).  Travis was our high councilor and he conducted the little meeting.  Bishop, Jay and Bro. Worthen (Elder's Quorum Pres) were there as well.  It was pretty special.  Brad was ordained and given a beautiful blessing by Nate.  I loved it!  This is so cool!  Just one more step in the right direction!  Good job Bradley!!  We love you!!  Nothing afterwards, but Grandpa came by and relished in the moment with us.  4-30-23

DINNER AT MY MOM'S
We went to my Mom's on Sunday for a little dinner.  That was nice.  She had arranged it with Charity, so I think we were all just extras to Charity and Josh's fancy dinner.  We had a great time!  I'll never forget the stink that came out of our car as we were leaving though.  I'm glad it wasn't a fart from Brad or Noah, although I wish I'd found the source before the next morning's carpooling.  Nate's shaker bottle lid had cracked open just the slightest bit!  SO RANK!!  Holy moly!!  Good times.  4-30-23

MARCH 2023

 DENTIST

I had to get an old cavity re-filled with Dr. Dave this week.  Kinda sucked and I wish I had a way to describe the sensation when he numbed it, but my heart raced so hard!!  It was so weird!  I don't love that.  Things went pretty well though.  I think I'll live.  And now I can chew on that side!  3-1-23

TALENT SHOW
The youth all had a talent show for their activity this month.  Sounded like it was a lot of fun.  Erika and Nate displayed art.  I don't know what the boys did :).  But it was a fun evening.  3-1-23

LUNCH WITH JULIE CLEMENS
Julie and I finally got together for lunch!  It was so nice!  We went to Robintinos and were able to visit pretty well even with Sadie there.  She did really well, actually.  Til my phone died of course.  I just love Julie!  I love that we are in the same stage of life with adult kids/missionary stuff/younger kids- a lot of the same issues.  It's just nice to have someone to talk to.  Julie and I see a lot of things the same and are able to kind of join forces with the issues we face as moms.  I love her strength and her example.  I wish I had advice for her YW problems- we are lucky to have such great yw in our ward and not have the problems poor Julie has to deal with!  We need to get together more often.  3-2-23

YOUNG WOMEN BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT
Our cute yw made it into Regionals!  I mean, we really didn't get to play very many teams this season because everyone else was forfeiting, but we had so much fun and did so well when we did, we made it in to the tournament.  I was really nervous for our girls, going into it, since we hadn't had much experience playing other teams, but within the first few minutes of our first game, I knew we had a chance.  We played awesome in the first game and won!!  We were lucky to have both Erika and Kate along with Cameron.  The other girls are great and such awesome cheerleaders and have so much heart, but we relied heavily on Erika and Kate for points and coaching during the games :).  They did so good!  We go on to game 2 tomorrow!!  3-2-23

BRAD AND NOAH TOURNAMENT
After our YW game, we all loaded up to go watch the boys play their tournament game 1.  They did REALLY well!!  It was a lot of fun to cheer them on and enjoy that victory with them.  There was some drama with the other team's coach, but overall, it was a good game.  We kinda killed them.  I was proud of my boys!!  Luke had to miss because he was out on his day date for MORP.  3-2-23

GAME 2- YW
Friday evening finally came and we got to have our second game of the tournament.  We were a little nervous because we were not able to have Cameron or any of the older girls, they were all out on their dates for MORP.  But we had high hopes.  I wish I could do this game justice, just writing about it, but I know I can't.  Our girls did so well though!!  Cute Erika and Kate racked up the points at the beginning.  We were winning by a lot for a really long time.  Kate had to leave about 20 minutes in to the game, so the other team started creeping up on us.  It was harder for Erika to score without another really strong player.  Elise and Lexie totally stepped up to the plate though and scored a few points each.  Cute Allie scored.  There was so much heart in this game you wouldn't believe it!!  Poor Erika was getting so beat up and pretty worn out.  She took only a tiny little break to get a drink and then she was back in.  We were so proud of her!!  I think she felt really good about her performance too.  There was a point where the other team had caught up and we were trying to stay alive and Erika had the ball and was just dribbling over on the side to draw the other team over and just as she was about to go score, Stori's dad's foot inched onto the court and the ref stopped the game.  I was so mad!!  He didn't need to stop the whole game in my opinion.  So anyway, we had to throw the ball in and it was stolen, which was a total bummer.  Then there were a few other missed shots that hurt pretty bad, but I was so proud of our girls!!  They seriously played SO HARD!!  If they'd had another couple minutes we could have pulled ahead for sure.  But really, it was a great game!  I was really proud of them.  And after the game, the ref, even, came up to Erika and told her what a great game she played and that she did so well!  I thought that was awesome!  He was really trying to favor her in the end there, giving her several foul shots.  It really just wasn't meant to be that we win.  I was grateful for the chance to try, but it just wasn't our night to win.  And we were okay with that.  Christie and I were happy we didn't have to give up another date night next week :) haha!!  They did awesome though!  We were so proud of them!  3-3-23

BRAD, LUKE AND NOAH'S GAME 2
After the girls' game we headed over to the Creekview building for their game 2.  They did a great job as well.  Played SO HARD!!  I was so proud of them!!  But they lost also.  The parents on the other team may have killed someone if they hadn't won, so we're all glad we didn't have to find out who it was that took the brunt of their frustrations.  There were plenty of complaints even while they were winning.  3-3-23

STAKE WOMEN'S CONFERENCE
This meeting was a challenge for me.  I think I did okay, I wish these didn't have to be so hard for me, but I think I did okay.  I liked all the reminder to go to the temple and scheduled some temple trips for us coming up.  That was good.  3-4-23

DEEP CLEANING- KITCHEN
When I got home from the stake women's meeting, Nate and the kids were already started on the kitchen!  I was so glad!  This is something our house really needs, so I'm glad it's become a priority to everyone.  We didn't have as much time for the kitchen as I would have liked, but it went well.  3-4-23

MORP
Saturday was MORP!  Bradley and Luke were both going.  The theme was Dynamic Duos so Brad needed a greek God costume which we were able to borrow from the Maughans and Luke's date wanted them to do Peter Pan and Wendy and we were able to whip up a Peter Pan costume for Luke the week prior.  I thought they both looked great!  Their pictures turned out so cute- this was such a fun theme idea.  I wish they had more of those.  But they both seemed to have a lot of fun.  Brad's last girls choice dance!  3-4-23

CAST OFF DAY!!
Sadie and I had really been counting down the days to her getting her cast off.  We were very excited for her to be able to wear pants, boots, walk easier, run, jump, swim!, take baths!!  We were just so anxious!!  So we went on Monday and she was so brave getting it off- even giggled quite a bit because the loud saw was tickling her :).  She did so well and then didn't want to have anything to do with standing or walking on it.  She's struggled to get back into full mobility.  I'm not sure what to do with her.  She still wants me to carry her most places and is needed constant help with going to the bathroom, getting dressed still... so kind of anti-climactic, but I am hopeful that we will get there.  They did say her leg would be kind of tender for a good week or so, so I'll try to be patient.  She's such a good girl, and she's been so tough through it all, I really shouldn't complain.  3-6-23

ACT
Tuesday was free ACT day for Luke and Noah.  So Bradley and Erika got the day off!  We were trying to make the most of it, Erika went to breakfast with Kate.  We played a few games, went to Costa Vida for lunch (we picked up Noah on the way, so he got to go with us as well), and laid around a lot :).  Brad took full advantage of being able  to sleep in and such.  I actually really loved the day.  It's always nice to get a different dynamic going with different people together.  3-7-23

SKITS
Molly was a little nervous to do skits at her activity days this week, but totally braved it and surprised me when she said she did it!!  I was so proud of her!  She did something hard!!  Something she didn't think she could do.  And did well!!  Super cool!!  3-8-23

NOAH FESTIVALS
Noah had his choir festival on Tuesday and then his orchestra one on Wednesday!  Big week for him!  3-8-23

CHARITY'S 21ST BIRTHDAY
We had such a great time celebrating Charity this year!  (Minus the weird "computer gliche" when Texas Roadhouse called us in and weren't actually ready for us)  We drove up with everyone including Aunt Jen and Grandma Ruthie and then met up with Grandpa Hatch, Kelly, and Charity and company (Josh, Kora, and Lindee).  We had fun chatting in the car, laughing at Charity and her funny stories.  Nate and my dad visited in the front seat, talking about the UFO stuff.  It was just nice.  We let Charity open some of her presents out there while we waited.  Next year we will pick a day that ISN'T a FFA convention (or whatever it was).  But we did eventually get seated and the food was good, the company was better and everyone seemed to be having a good time.  The hangry kids got their food and all was well.  Charity got to be the center of attention as she sat on the saddle being sung to.  Fun stuff.  She told us the cute story about how she and Josh held hands for the first time and how their hands were like a millimeter apart for about a half hour of their movie and then she finally went to make the move and he pulled his hand away to fold his arms.  Then later they ended up playing around with their hands and interlocking fingers.  It was cute because I said, "Maybe he wanted to make the first move?" and he goes, "Or maybe I was just totally freaked out!"  So adorable.  Cute kid.  I really like Josh.  Charity seems very happy with him and the way that he treats her.  It's super cute.  We said our goodbyes in the parking lot and drove home.  Sure was great to see my girls.  3-9-23

TEMPLE DATE
Nate and I got to go to the temple finally!!  It was so great!  We had to go to Ogden because I made the appointment kind of last minute.  But we were able to go do an endowment session with all the new changes.  It was really nice.  I kinda liked the new changes and the extra attention it drew.  I love the focus on Christ.  We went to Union Grill for dinner afterwards, my cobb salad was delicious!  3-10-23

DAY OF REST?
Sunday didn't feel very restful this week.  Not sure why, but I felt like I was running around just as much as any other day.  I love the things we did and it was a good day, just not super restful.  I feel like I need more rest in my life right now and I am not getting it or the recharge that Sunday used to be.  Between choir, Preparation for Life firesides, interviews, presidency meetings, the family meeting, etc... just hard to relax.  I think I'm going to revamp our Sundays.  We'll see how that goes.  3-12-23

FAMILY MEETING
We made it to the family meeting this week.  A little late, but we made it.  We got to pick up Becky on the way.  There was a lot going on this week, but everyone seemed pretty attentive.  I liked talking to Nancy for a few seconds.  That's about all I got before it felt like it was time to go.  I wish we had more time to visit.  But it was a good evening.  Grandma gave everyone some treasures to take home :).  3-12-23

CLOSET
I spent a good two hours cleaning out and organizing my side of the closet.  I needed to make room for all the new craft stuff and things from grandma :).  It feels so much better in there!  I'm going to work on some of my drawers tomorrow.  3-13-23

FIRST TRACK MEET OF THE SEASON!
Davis canceled our meet on Wednesday and had it today instead.  It was just a dual meet, against Farmington, kind of chill track meet, so that was kind of nice.  Brad did the 110 hurdles, the 4X200 relay, the long jump and the 4X400.  He did really great in all of his events.  I don't know times, but he got 18.3 on the long jump, possibly the best distance.  Luke did the 110 hurdles, the 4X200 and the 4X400.  He did great as well.  It was a lot of fun to watch him and cheer him on!!  Jack, Molly and Sadie loved cheering as well and then when Erika and Noah got there, they helped too :).  It was a nice time.  Crazy that we're finally here!  3-13-23

COOL LITTLE MIRACLES
I have been better at noticing the miracles that occur in my life on a daily basis and I wanted to document some from the other day.  I was bummed that there weren't any protein bars in the pantry (I've started doing the intermittent fasting with Nate) and I was going to have to get more creative and then just seconds later, Sadie came over to the pantry and pointed up to the left (where I forget to look) and said she wanted one of those- it was the protein bars!  A whole box of them!  Kinda put a smile on my face.  And then the other one I wanted to remember was that I remembered the track meet at kind of the last  minute and needed to grab elementary kids before I could even go up there, but I was able to go grab the kids and get up to the high school JUST IN TIME for the hurdles!!  They're always first thing so I miss them sometimes, but even with the whining and dragging little people over there, we made it!!  I got to watch Brad and Luke both run.  Kinda cool.  Made me happy.  3-13-23

PIE DAY!
The night before Brent's birthday, it occurred to me it was pie day, so I quickly looked up a "breakfast pie" recipe (we didn't have much to make an egg quiche which is what most of the "breakfast pies" were, but) I decided we could make a coffee cake in a pie pan and call that pie :).  I found a really simple one using white cake mix, so that was awesome.  I was so pleased with the reaction from Molly and Sadie about pie day!  Haha!  If you wake one of them up saying, "Good morning! It's ______ day!" With a happy tone, they get so excited!!  It's really fun :).  And fun all morning!  Not just for a minute.  So we had our breakfast pie for breakfast and then for dinner I made some chicken pot pies for dinner and a delicious Oreo pie for dessert.  I realized that I just need the slightest little motivation, like a silly "something" day and I am on top of things.  I had a really productive day, got lots done and cleaned the house and I think it was because we had something silly to look forward to.  Kinda funny.  I did feel horribly ill all night long thanks to all the wheat and sugar I ate, but I was glad for something to motivate me :).  The kids loved it too.  3-14-23

LUNCH WITH DAD
My dad took me out for lunch on Thursday.  We brought Sadie with us, she did so good!  We went to Olive Garden this time, it was really yummy.  I loved this.  We had fun talking and laughing.  It was a really nice visit compared to how things have felt lately.  I think we are going to make it a regular thing- third Thursdays :).  3-16-23

LAST DAY OF THE TERM
We had an awesome last day of the term.  This term stood out for some reason at our house.  We don't usually talk much about the end of the term, but I think everyone had things they were catching up on and wanted certain grades changed before, so this was a big day! It was early out for the Elementary kids even though it was a Thursday, and when everyone got home, we were all just very relieved to have the whole evening to just play and have fun.  We were all anxious for the day off the next day.  I spent a little time working on my hoodies for Leprechaun's day!  That was fun for me and things went SO SMOOTHLY it was a miracle!  I think I only messed up on one little thing, that never happens!!  Nice day!  We watched Shazam with the little kids for our movie night.  3-16-23

LEPRECHAUN'S DAY
This is my favorite holiday!!  It was a great day!  We even had school off so I was able to go all out :).  I loved surprising the kids with their personalized green hoodies first thing in the morning.  I wanted to do hoodies this year and somewhere along the way came up with the idea of putting something they said when they were little on them :).  It was a lot of fun going through my blog looking for funny things for each of them.  Charity's says, "sorry dis" for when she was walking around the Christmas tree excusing herself for bumping presents.  Kelly's says "uh oh doop doop" HA!  Bradley's I found from when he was about 3.  He came into our room to ask Nate if he had to work that day, Nate said, "no, why?" and he said, "I was just asking you that so you would wake up" HAHA!!  Funny kid.  It reminded me of how much he lived for time with Nate.  That was in Eagle Mountain right after Nate got home from OK, so I'm sure he was just anxious to have time with him.  Super cute!  Luke's says, "thank you my highness" HAHAHA!  Noah's says, "I ate my ice cream can I have a treat now?" funny kid.  Erika's was of course, "it bin in da dote" from her whole monkey poop/giraffe poop comment.  Hahaha!  Jack's says, "What you say?" for his constant asking that when he was little.  Makes ya wonder if he had some hearing loss or something.  Molly's says, "I knew it I knew it I knew it" for when she used to say that while we played Apples to Apples.  Funny girl.  And Sadie's hoodie still isn't here, but when it comes I think I'm going to put, "it's fine" on it.  She got a little green shirt with a rainbow on it.  I was so happy to make these even though I know they may never wear them in public :).  But they liked them in the moment.  Then we finally got the kids all up and were able to start our Pot of Gold Scavenger Hunt!!  This ended up being a lot of fun, I just wish I hadn't made so many tasks.  It was funny to see their faces change when they realized I wasn't making them do a bunch of housework for the tasks :).  I'll have to post the paper I wrote up.  It was fun.  Lots of time together.  The boys had to skip out and do track which was a bummer.  But we went to lunch with Becky in the middle and were able to get the whole thing done and found the pot of gold before Nate and I needed to leave for our Brian Regan show.  This was another highlight!  We had so much fun!!  Grabbed Zupas on the way downtown.  We weren't sure about the start time because the tickets said one thing, my calendar said another, and then the schedule on Eccles theater site said another!  So we got there as soon as we could and hung out waiting for an hour.  We got lots of things planned and talked about- that was actually really nice. Brian was hilarious.  Along with the guy before him- Kermit Upeo? not sure how to spell his last name.  But we had so much fun!  My abs hurt in the morning.  I loved it!!  Merry Christmas to Nate :).  3-17-23

TRACK MEET- SALT LAKE CLASSIC
We had a track meet down in Draper this Saturday.  We had planned on taking everyone down there, but with how many events the boys were doing and since Nate had a bunch of things he needed to get done on his last half a day off, he opted to stay home with all the littles and I went to the meet.  They canceled two of our meets so this was only our second and I've been really anxious for Track this season, so I was super excited to go.  Brad's long jump was first thing- I stood there for a good hour to watch him jump :).  The parents around me were all new to the track game, so I was able to help them out and give them the link to the meet.  Felt good.  I got to watch all three of Brad's jumps, he did AWESOME!  18.8 on his first one!  Then I raced up to the stands to catch Luke's hurdles!  It was pretty crazy how close those two events were to each other.  Luke did awesome!  Even caught himself after snagging the last hurdle.  Then not long after that, Luke surprisingly ran the 4X100 and did awesome!  his team didn't win, but he did awesome!  Then I got a text from Becky asking if I was there, telling me that Alicia was there!  I was so excited to go down to the end of the track and watch the pole vault with Becky and Alicia.  I loved meeting her cute kids and being able to hear about her year.  It was so nice to be there.  I got to go watch Brad's 4X200 which he won!  So fun!  Then I found Kelly and Cam, we went and watched Brad's 300 Hurdles, which he won!  He really did so awesome!  I took Kelly and Brad over to meet Alicia, then Kelly left, Brad left, I stayed to watch Henry do pole vault and visit some more and then it was time to go.  I picked up Kelly and we stopped at Wendy's house on the way home.  That was actually really cool.  I loved seeing Wendy!  We've been having fun on Marco Polo lately and hearing about her mom has been awesome.  It's just really fun to rekindle that relationship.  Kelly was cute with Carter.  We hurried home, stopped at Mo betta's and waited for Charity, Josh and Kora to show up!  3-18-23

CHARITY AND KELLY
We had a fun little game night Saturday night with the girls and their friends here.  It was pretty late so the younger kids were off a little, but it was still really fun.  They spent the night and went to church with us the next day.  So fun!  The whole ward wants to know about Charity's boy and why he had his arm around her all through Sacrament meeting :).  3-18-23--3-19-23

A NEW KIND OF SUNDAY
After our FHE Monday, changing how we want to run things for Sunday, we came up with some new ideas- traditions- that we want to do each week.  Puffy Pancake for breakfast, church music playing (I was going to make a new playlist, forgot to do that), a craft (painting the russian dolls to look like us), relaxation, dessert (apple crisp), go on a walk.  We did most of it and it was great!  I really loved it.  I think the kids did too.  It was fun that we had Kelly, Charity, Josh, Kora sleep over the night before and were able to enjoy their company for most of the day.  They left around 2:00. 3-18-23

BRAD'S LAST GAME
My heart sank a little as we were watching Brad's games Monday night that they were his last two games, possibly ever on an organized team.  Makes me a little sad.  I know these kids are all growing up and I am trying really hard to prepare myself for it all, but it's so hard.  I hope that Brad finds other teams to play on though.  He's mentioned playing with the Elders, etc.  But for now, he is going to take it easy on his ankles and knees so that he can have a decent track season.  I'm so proud of him and all that he has done with his basketball skills and life.  He was such a fun player to watch.  He was usually the star of the team, but you hardly knew it because he was so good at NOT being a ball hog.  I almost didn't like it sometimes because I wanted to watch HIM score :).  SO MANY assists, so many proud moms and happy teammates who got a chance because of him.  I just really love that Brad is himself out on the court.  He doesn't turn into a different person.  He still treats others with respect and makes his family proud.  I have loved this Roy team he was on this year.  Something about this team and the refs and the way it is put together made it really entertaining and a nice little treat to watch.  Unfortunately, this last two games didn't quite feel like that.  The first game was to determine who would go on to play against the other championship team and we won that one- pretty close game, but we won and then had to play back to back games for the championship.  Kind of a rip off if you ask me, but it was a Roy team that we played, so maybe there was something to that.  The refs were horrible these games.  I'm not sure what it was.  So many missed calls and so many upset parents, it got really heated and then with 16 seconds left, we were five points down, the ref called the game.  She was sick of the complaining from everyone, including Mike Flood who got kicked out.  It was sad.  Kind of a weird way to end the season and Brad's last game.  But I can't say he didn't do a great job.  He played a good game, played hard.  No regrets whatsoever.  I was really just so proud of him.  He seemed happy afterwards and agreed with me that it was kind of sad it was his last game possibly ever.  We have had a few moments lately where we are both realizing he is moving on.  Kinda crazy.  I'm sad and happy for him.  He's going to do big things!!  So many big things!!  I really get excited when I think about all that that kid can do and will do in his life ahead.  I'm really just so proud of him.  3-19-23

NOAH CCR
We had an awesome CCR appointment with Noah.  Very informative and helpful.  I think this will be really useful for him.  I want to remember there's a webiste for help with finding out the career best suited for you.  I think a lot of my kids could use that.  Noah is too cool.  I'm excited to see what he ends up doing with his schooling.  3-20-23

KELLY OBGYN
Well, we finally made it to the blessed OBGYN appointment and as usual, it was very underwhelming.  It's so frustrating to get our hopes up and think we've reached the end of the wild goose chase and then they wow us with yet another referral.  Who knew there was more to this.  We did learn a lot about Kelly's hormone levels and where she's at there, and got some information there.  No answers or solutions yet of course, but it was nice to know how her hormones were three months ago and why she was referred to OBGYN.  Her hormone levels are similar to those of a post menopausal woman.  She is experiencing Premenopause.  Kinda weird.  She tested negative for all the diseases that reflect that of course, but good to know.  Unfortunately, this OBGYN doc couldn't do a thing about it, so she ran some more blood tests to confirm the previous one (and can I add THREE!), which is always so exciting.  She did get to endure a pelvic exam which showed no problems there.  Awesome.  But as usual, she was referred to an REI doctor.  Probably will take a few more months to get in with them which sucks, but whatever.  Kelly is tough.  I guess we could find out just how tough she is.  I love that girl.  I wish I could take away her pain and trials.  I really wish I could just give her my easy life and let her relax for a while, but she's Kelly.  She has to be tried at the level Kelly can be tried at.  I know she's hurting and stressed, but she is handling it like a champ. I hope she can be blessed with the strength to keep pushing on.  She's so awesome.  I'm so proud of her!  Here's to another three months of waiting for a stupid doctor appointment.  Hopefully there's answers at the end.  3-22-23

ERIKA OPEN GYM
Open gym started and even though Erika knows she's going to be running several miles after school for track, she still had the guts to get up at 5:00 and go tto open gym Thursday.  She's planning on going every week!  I'm so proud of her and her hard work!  It's not easy for her to get up early and she gets so worn out with all the track stuff, so I am beyond impressed with this girl!!  So cool.  3-23-23

LUNCH WITH MARIANNE
We had another nice lunch this week.  We went to Blaze pizza.  I'm loving this and enjoy talking with her so much.  I hope she is benefiting too.  3-23-23

SNOW
We've been getting SO MUCH SNOW lately!!  Like it looks like Christmas outside!  It's been so beautiful!  But also so frustrating for our Track season!  Poor Brad and Luke's meets keep getting canceled because of the weather.  We missed another one Friday because of the snow and they've already moved Wednesday's to Tuesday based on the reports.  Kinda nuts!!  This is supposed to be Brad's big season!  His last season!  So we've been annoyed.  But hopefully it will clear up enough for the district meet Tuesday.  He has had some awesome runs though!  I've been so proud of him!  3-24-23

DATE NIGHT
We got our date night this week, on Friday, but we got it.  We went to Blue Fin and then to the store for ingredients for Nate's Salmon Dip to put inside the bunny belly for the family party.  Then we went to see the movie Shazam II.  Pretty entertaining.  Not one I want my kids to see, unfortunately, since there were some really fun parts, but pretty entertaining.  I just enjoyed being with Nate.  3-24-23

DIPPIN DOTS
This is just kind of funny.  As we were leaving on our date, I looked down at the ground and the snow falling looked a lot like dippin dots :).  It was basically hail.  So I quickly sent Erika (who was babysitting) a text saying, "Looks like dippin dots outside!"  Thinking she would want to show the kids and have something fun to look at.  Well, when we got home, someone said something about the snow looking like dippin dots and I thought they had gone out when I texted, but then Erika informed us that she had thought I was texting her that there were dippin dots outside in the freezer to eat.  SO they went out and got the dippin dots in the freezer and ate those rather than going out and looking at the snow. HA!  Kinda funny.  And pretty rare that we have dippin dots in our freezer, so kind of funny that way too!  3-24-23

DEEP CLEAN
I'm so proud of us!  We've been so good at our deep cleaning!  One hour on both bathrooms today!  Everyone works together, we all get the space cleaned up and organized, and we all get to enjoy the clean space for a few hours :) HA!  Just kidding.  They look great though!  I was really glad we still did it.  3-25-23

EASTER PARTY
We had a fun Maynes Family Easter Party.  Everyone was there!  Well, not everyone but SO MANY PEOPLE!!  It was super crowded.  I really think for these parties where we have games and stuff, we really need to have it at a church.  But it was still really fun!  Different but fun!  There were salads for lunch (the meat didn't go very far), Then a new way to get easter eggs- the kids would try to get the older people to say the Easter words on the paper hanging up and then they could steal an egg from them.  Kinda cool.  It took a minute to teach Molly and Sadie how to do it, but they were all in after that.  They ended up with quite the haul by the end!  Lots of eggs full of candy!  I think they liked it.  I smiled when we got home and I realized Molly had purposely brought her gloves in her easter basket (borrowed from the storage room cuz she couldn't find hers) to wear because I think she thought they were going to be hunting for them in the snow :).  How cute is that!  She's a planner sometimes!  Makes me smile.  Then we did a little cake walk thing for the bunny shaped treats everyone made.  We had brought some cookies that Molly slaved over and iced to look really cute and some rolls in the shape of two bunnies with Nate's salmon dip in the tummy.  They were awesome until we put them next to everyone else's treats.  Oh well.  Ya can't win 'em all.  There was some mix up at the end and apparently people like sweets rather than rolls and salmon dip, so we ended up with one of ours.  Totally fine with me.  We said goodbye to Nate nad then packed up to leave as well.  Everyone was so hungry because nobody likes salads, we stopped for some Little Caesar's on the way home.  I just love my kids.  They are the best!  Becky did a great job on this party.  3-25-23

SATURDAY FUN
We struggled coming up with an idea this week for fun, but then the church gym was calling everyone's name.  We went over to the church, played some lightning, some chair soccer and then got kicked out because someone had the church reserved.  Bummer.  But it was fun while it lasted.  We came home, got baths and then watched High School Musical.  It was a nice evening.  I liked it.  3-25-23

SUNDAY
This was our second Sunday with our new plans.  Puffy pancake, clay pen craft, sticky popcorn for dessert!  No walk since it is freezing.  I thought it went really well.  3-26-23

BRAD'S PHYSICAL
We finally went in for Brad's mission physical!  This was exciting.  Dr. Woods even took it very seriously, had fun telling some stories about his own mission call to Portugal (the ONLY place he didn't want to go).  They said he needed one shot and then forgot to give it to him, but he went back to get the TB test read the next day and then a few days later to get his other one.  We're getting closer!  3-27-23

LUNCH WITH HEIDI
WE met up with Heidi, Alyssa and Porter for lunch at McD's.  That was fun.  I grabbed a salad for Heidi and I at Chick-fil-a, the kids ate and played.  It was a nice break from the day.  There was a bunch of chaos and confusion from the High school because the door to the locker room was locked, Brad wasn't able to get in and get his spikes out of his gym locker.  I was really irritated that the school wasn't doing anything to fix it.  Called a few times, made a fool of myself.  Did nothing.  Pretty frustrating, but we all made it up to Syracuse for the Track Meet and Brad did awesome!  Victor said it was because of his lucky spikes Brad was wearing :).  Luke did a great job too!!  3-28-23

DATE NIGHT WITH DAN AND ADELE
We finally made it up to Bue Fin with Dan and Adele!  This was a lot of fun.  It's always nice to spend time with them.  We went to see Dungeons and Dragons after.  3-29-23

GENERAL CONFERENCE WEEKEND
We had a great weekend!  Very edified in word and spirit.  And we ate lots of treats ;).  This conference was great!  There were so many good talks.  I really loved it.  I liked using the pictures of the Apostles for the girls to learn a little more about them and the BINGO cards.  I had some prizes for the last session since the girls were getting a little restless near the end there.  I loved watching the kids get into it this year- most of them stayed away most of the time!  Very impressive.  Brad found a cool new method of taking notes- that was cool.  It was just a really great time!  4-1-23--4-2-23

FEBRUARY 2023

 HEIDI'S HOUSE
Sadie and I finally made it over to Heidi's to play with Alyssa and Porter- this was a fun visit!  It's fun to see our kids playing together and having fun.  Sadie and Porter have come a long way :).  2-2-23

ERIKA'S KJH SEASON
Her season is winding down.  Kind of sad, but also good.  She was getting pretty worn out with all the practices, early mornings, and stress of the new thing.  She did SO WELL!!  I was so proud of her all season!!  We loved the home game when Mrs. Burns came to show support to Erika and Kate and Grandma and Grandpa Hatch made it to a few as well.  She has had a lot of fun, a lot of growth.  It's really exciting to think about the future when she will be able to play longer and even more exciting games!  Fun stuff!!  2-2-23

BRAD AND LUKE'S TEAM
Thursday nights have been Brad and Luke's games.  They have had a rough season, losing most of the games.  They are both playing great, just not a lot of reliable players on their team.  Kind of a bummer.  But it's fun to watch them play together one last year and fun to sit and visit with my friend Krista :).  2-2-23

LUKE'S 17th BIRTHDAY!
I had fun making Luke's sign the morning of :).  We had crepes for breakfast.  He had to go to school which is always a bummer.  Then we spent the evening getting ready for his super short party.  Grandpa Hatch and Heidi and her kids came.  We hurried through cake and ice cream, presents, and singing to Luke.  Then raced off to the Olympic Oval to watch Brad do his triple jump!  Kind of a crazy evening!  It was fun to have Charity and Kelly meet up with us there and since they were WAY behind, we were able to sit and visit for a couple hours!!  So fun!!  I actually really loved that part of the day.  I felt bad Luke had to share his birthday, but I also knew that we were going to be throwing him a surprise party the next week, so I knew he would be happy about that when it came.  He was so sweet about all of his gifts- drone, squishmallow hamburger, comfy... lots of fun stuff- and so grateful.  It's crazy that he's 17, but it looks good on him!!  So proud of him!!  2-3-23

LEATHERBY'S FOR GRANDPA RUSS
We all went down to Leatherby's to celebrate Grandpa Russ.  This was nice!  I got to sit and visit with Liz the whole time.  And watch my boys be adorable.  Fun times.  Happy Birthday, Russ!!  We miss you!!  2-4-23

BRAD PATRIARCHAL BLESSING
I know I've said this before, but this is definitely one of the coolest thing I've been able to be part of as a mom so far.  It strengthens my testimony so much!  Especially of the Priesthood!!  Brad was a little nervous I could tell, and he'd been fasting so his tummy was grumbling the whole time, but he seemed like such a grown up there.  And it didn't help that Patriarch Huls was calling him a man the whole time :).  He really is!!  And what a cool blessing he received!!  I was in awe at this kid after that.  I really don't think I can treat my kids the same after hearing their blessings.  They are just so special!!  So neat!!!  I hope he wrote about it in his journal :).  I loved it!  (that morning I realized that I had received my blessing just one day later, 29 years ago on 2-6-1994- pretty cool!) 2-5-23

JACK'S DATE
We finally got to take Jack out for his dinner with Mom and Dad!  This was a great time and he was so awesome to talk to.  He is such a cool kid!  I'm so proud of him and all that he is learning and thinking about.  Such a good boy!!  2-6-23

BRAD'S FUN GAME AGAINST TONGA
Brad's team was totally nervous to play this team because they had a giant kid and had won all the games up til then (just like us, but Brad's team was still pretty nervous).  They had spent a lot of time hyping themselves up!  It ended up being one of the most fun games I have ever seen!!!  SO MUCH FUN!!  I mean, Brad made like 13 points within the first few minutes of the game!  We were ahead by at least that much the entire game!  The only time they really gained on us was when they took Tyler and Brad out at the same time, but they fixed that pretty quickly.  65-32 was the final score!  HA!!  Brad scored almost 30 of those!!  He made 12 out of 13 shots, four three point shots, had SO MANY assists!!  It was INSANE!!!  SO FUN!!  I seriously loved it!  I would have paid money to see that game :).  So fun.  2-6-23

NOAH'S PERMIT
We were able to get Noah over to the DLD and he passed his first test and earned his driving permit!!  Wahoo!  We stopped at the church to practice for his first time, in the van, and then we've gone several other times in the week in the Prius.  He's loving it!!  Such a crazy thing to have him driving already, but I think he's ready!!  He's even tall enough now!  So cool!  2-7-23

MOLLY ACTIVITY DAYS
Molly had such a fun activity.  They did the cool icing for the sugar cookies.  I was excited for her to do the activity cuz I knew she would love it and then when she brought her cookies home I was shocked!!  Her cookies looked AMAZING!!!  Even Lindsey texted me after to tell me that Molly's were the most amazing by far!!  Kinda cute!!  And I was happy to hear she's not too shy there :).  Fun stuff.  2-8-23

YW BASKETBALL
Our YW season has been really fun as well.  And is also winding down.  Unless we make it to regions.  Which would be pretty funny considering how young and small our team is.  Nobody in the stake showed up all season so we played ourselves mostly.  We only lost by one point though when we finally played a big team, so that says a lot.  It's been so much fun!!  Erika and Kate are basically our stars :).  They've been helping the younger girls so much, which has been so fun.  Good times!!  2-9-23

TEETH CLEANING
Unfortunately, I found out I need some cavities refilled.  Such a bummer.  I've been doing so good!  2-10-23

DATE NIGHT
We went to Texas Roadhouse and then came home to watch a movie with the kids :).  Such a nice time walking through the mall and talking while we waited.  I just love this man I married.  2-10-23

REC BASKETBALL ERIKA
Erika had some rough back to back games this week.  She wasn't too happy after and learned some hard lessons, but I was so proud of her and how hard she pushed herself!  Even with a VERY jammed finger!!  The other coach had even purposely expoited her injury.  2-11-23

LUKE'S SURPRISE PARTY!
We had so much fun planning this party and getting things all ready for it.  Brad helped so much!  We decided to go to Uncle Mark's breakroom!  It was so nice of Mark and Nancy to sacrifice their Saturday night to let us use the breakroom.  They have everything there and Luke has been talking about it since the last time we went there, so we were sure he would love it :).  Brad took him to the store and then his friends all came and waited and waited while Brad took a minute to bring Luke back- haha!  But they came, everyone jumped out to surprise Luke, he was SHOCKED!!  Even went a little white- it was so cute!!  We drove everyone out to Sandy and had pulled pork sandwiches and waffle bar for dessert with lots of yummy treats and snacks in between.  It was so much fun!!  He has some fun friends.  He looked happy and that made me happy :).  Happy birthday Luke!!  2-11-23

STEVE'S 35th BIRTHDAY
We went up to Grandpa's for Steve's birthday on Superbowl Sunday this year.  I forgot it was the superbowl.  It was a very chaotic night, with the kids screaming and the echo and such, but I was glad I got to talk with Steve quite a bit and spoiled him with a really yummy, Reese's cake.  He loved it :).  I was happy about that.  I have the best little brother on the planet.  I hope he knows how much I love him.  2-12-23

LUNCH DATE WITH BRAD
My mom came to watch Sadie, so Brad and I were able to go on a date!  We went to Chick-fil-a and Pretzel bites after.  It was such a great time talking with him.  It's been a while since we were able to do something like that.  I love my Brad.  He's such a good kid!!  I can't even imagine my life without him right now.  Such a good kid.  2-13-23

VALENTINE BOXES
Molly's box was a fun idea I had, a hot air balloon.  She and I pulled this off quite nicely!  She really loved it and her eyes grew so big when we got the balloon filled with helium :).  It was so cute!  She worked really hard tying all the ribbons on the basket and then I got the thought that maybe she couldn't take that with the latex balloon.  Luckily Ms. Smith didn't mind.  When she got out of the car on Tuesday someone goes, "WHOA!!" and I think she suddenly became embarrassed about how big it was and kind of tried to hold it down and close to her after that.  I hope it was okay.  She seemed happy with it at school when we stopped to say hi, and then again at home when she was showing off the goods.  Such a cute girl.  Jack's box was an idea he came up with after browsing Pinterest a little.  He didn't want to buy anything for it and didn't seem to want any help.  But he pulled off a very cool little basketball court!  So fun!!  He is such a good boy, so good at creating things too!  2-13-23

VALENTINE'S DAY
We had an awesome Valentine's day this year!!  I made pink waffles for breakfast and threw in lots of pink and red in their lunches.  We got the kids off with their boxes and cards (actually Fun Dip :) ), then Sadie and I went and did some last minute shopping of our own.  Then we created a game for Jack's class party and enjoyed a visit from Richelle Pearce- we played Jumanji and Richelle (or Michelle as Sadie calls her) gave us her leftover eggs before she leaves for Hawaii.  That was so fun of her.  Then we headed out for Jack's party!  We did Fish Bowl, which ended up being a bit of a struggle for his class.  Not sure why.  They weren't listening to the instructions.  But anyway.  We came home, Dad gave everyone their chocolate caramel hearts and then Nate and I headed out for our date!  Friday I will be at Simplot so we moved our date to Heart day!  We decided to risk going out to eat- went to Blue Fin.  They told us the wait would be an hour and a half and we only waited for about 15 minutes!  Kinda nice!!  The food was amazing as always!  Good conversation- I am so thankful for Nate.  So glad that he's mine!  I just love having him in my life.  We are my favorite team.  We came home, gave each other our gifts- I gave him a Jazz shirt, hat, almonds, werthers, and a basketball standard for the door.  He gave me a cute penguin warmie, heart stuffed animals that magnet together- SO CUTE! and a really sweet Willow Tree figure of a wife and husband with the wife standing behind the husband arm around him.  I love it!!  We said goodbye to Nate- he was working the mid, watched the rest of the kids' movie and then went to bed!  Good times!  2-14-23

FAMILY FUN
Charity wanted us to meet her new boyfriend Josh, so we quickly planned a very special family dinner/basketball game :).  We were so excited, cleaned up the house, waited :), Kelly, Charity, her friend Kora and Josh all came and we ate chicken tacos/salad.  It was a really nice dinner!  I loved it!  Josh was really nice, really polite!  It was fun to see them both so happy and flirting.  We got all ready to leave and then realized the van key was in the Prius that Brad and Luke took to their game, early.  We frantically looked for the other key, couldn't find it, thought about asking Krista for a ride, and then realized we still have the kids' car, so we searched for that key :).  Luckily, Brad answered his phone and told me where it was.  This was chaotic, but then Nate (in Charity's car with all the friends) and I all went to the wrong place!  Their games were usually at Farmington Gym, but this one was at centennial.  Kinda lame!  So we missed the first half of the game.  Kind of a bummer!!  BUT the last half of the game was so much fun!  Almost made up for it!  We loved having Charity there to help cheere for their last game.  We even had Sierra and Matt there as well along with a lot of Brad's friends!  So much fun!!!  After the game, Brad, Luke and their friends took SADIE and some girls to McD's :).  Charity, Kelly and their friends went to visit Lindee home from her mission.  The rest of us came home to get NOah and Erika from Youth Activities.  It was a very full evening for sure!!  Everyone ended up back here and we all got to stay up and talk, asking questions and having so much fun till midnight!!  So crazy.  I'm really feeling it this next day!  not my favorite.  But lots of fun!!  I love my family!!  2-15-23

TRAIN RIDE 
Sadie and I got to go to Owen's birthday party on Thursday.  It was a train party so we rode the train up to Ogden and had some treats, games and train whistles on the way there, then got back on and rode home.  It was a lot of fun.  I could tell that Sadie got a little over-stimulated by the end.  She was such an angel to begin with.  We had picked up Lacy to bring her along and she and Lacy were having so much fun together on the elevator and on the train in the beginning, but slowly lost it's thrill.  Sadie has a shorter attention span.  But we had a lot of fun playing BINGO and talking about the train.  She did really well.  2-16-23

SIMPLOT
Brad decided to try Simplot this year!  Erika and I were thrilled to go and be his cheering section!  Thursday, we all rode up together, just after lunch.  We got to the Arena in time for Brad to warm up and get ready for his hurdles.  This is the biggest indoor track meet in the nation!  Pretty amazing!  He did so great on his hurdles!  He had the 4X200 on Friday and did really well on that one too!  I was very impressed when he passed the other team after being pretty far behind from the first two runners.  His ankle was hurting quite a bit after the 200 so he opted out of the other relay he was supposed to be in and chose to save his ankle for his Triple Jump.  Unfortunately, the Triple Jump did not go as well as he had hoped.  The track there was quite the challenge and made it really difficult.  But we were so proud of him!! Thursday night we all had dinner at Costa Vida, watched some movies, did some shopping and had some fun navigating Pocatello.  Friday night we let Brad go hang out with his teammates at the pool and rooms while Erika and I went to Red Robin for dinner and then to see the new Antman Quantumania movie.  We had a lot of fun, loved the movie.  Then headed back to our room for another movie and our delicious dessert.  On Saturday, we had fun getting lunch at Jimmy Johns in between events.  Then my Aunt Bambi showed up for Brad's Triple Jump on Friday afternoon so I got to visit with her and meet her new husband, Kell.  That was pretty cool of her to come up for that.  On Saturday we got up and out of our hotel pretty quick, didn't bother going to the Arena for the Finals and just headed home.  First we stopped at my Great Grandparents' house, Grandma and Grandpa Mottishaw's grave, and to stop and visit Bambi for a few more minutes.  It was nice.  I loved this trip- it was long enough to relax and short enough to not feel like a burden.  Fun times.  I was really proud of Brad for competing and putting himself out there and for doing so well in so many events.  Cool kid.  Thanks goes to Nate for being the single parent for the few days.  He's a rockstar and way better at my job than I am.  2-16-23--2-18-23

PRESIDENT'S DAY
This was kind of a lazy day for us.  Didn't do much.  But we did get to go to Brad's basketball game in the evening.  Kinda nice.  2-20-23

NOAH CHERRY HILL
Noah applied for Cherry Hill, went to his interview and got another job there, all by himself.  So proud of this kid!  He is headed to great things with his ability to take initiative.  Good job Noah!  2-21-23

PIPE AND DRAPE ASSEMBLY
This annoyed me more than it should have probably, but I went to put up the pipes and drapes again as usual and they had recruited a bunch of other people to help, so there were too many cooks in the kitchen and I had way more on my mind that I needed to focus on than this dumb little assignment, so I was irritated.  We got done way before the job was supposed to be over, but I just left anyway.  Kind of annoyed.  I should have been happy I was done early, but I was left feeling like I didn't do enough for some reason.  Whatever.  It's done.  2-21-23

CHOIR CONCERT- NOAH
We got to go watch Noah perform in his choir concert!  That was awesome.  I really love that Mr. Simon is the choir director.  He does a great job!  I loved all the technical songs and that they sang them so well.  Took me back to 7th grade choir with Mr. Farley- he was awesome.  Noah did great!  I loved hearing him sing!  2-21-23

ERIKA BASKETBALL TEAM BANQUET
We got to go enjoy Nate's pulled pork in the presence of Erika's team and parents on Wednesday!  This was a really cool banquet that felt like the coach had put on.  She did a great job.  I loved hearing her passion for basketball, photography and making photo videos :).  I could totally relate.  She made the cutest video of all the girls.  I loved seeing Erika in her element and loved that she's had that team this year!  I think it was so great for her.  She got to bring home a picture of her and some fun treats and a sweet note from one of the captains.  She's really going to miss the varsity girls next year, but I think she's pretty excited for next year overall.  2-22-23

MOLLY ACTIVITY DAYS
Molly is loving her activity days so far.  They did a getting to know you thing and now a writing thing.  She has some great leaders and all the girls are so fun.  2-22-23

DATE NIGHT THURSDAY
With YM/YW basketball over with, we were able to move our date night to Thursday this week so that we could do Jack's play on Friday.  We went out for sushi- it was delicious. 2-23-23

FAMILY HISTORY CENTER
I am working on Brad's graduation book and needed to scan a whole bunch of pictures, so I went to the Family History Center.  I had a little trouble getting started, but this cute service missionary was very helpful and stood and talked my ear off for a good half hour after ;).  He has some version of Autism and was explaining his life and that he was an only child and that he wishes he had siblings so that he could have a support system.  I loved the thought that my kids have such a large support system, having so many siblings.  He was telling me he is going to write a book.  I was going to look for it when it comes out but now I can't remember his name.  I think it was James Tanner.  I might be wrong.  But anyway.  I got all of my pictures scanned and work on the book continues ;).  Thanks to Nate, Sadie was well entertained while we were there.  2-24-23

ORCHESTRA CONCERT- NOAH AND ERIKA
We heard about this concert at the last minute, but we were able to squeeze it in before the play and LOVED it!  I just love hearing the bass cleft and knowing that's my kids!!  It's a fun part to play if you ask me.  They all did great!  We were happy to have the grandmas and Jen with us.  It was kind of a chaotic evening, but we made it work!  2-24-23

SHREK JR- JACK
We finally got to go see the fruits of all of Jack's labor!!  He's worked so hard on this play, it was fun to finally see it.  Friday night was our family night to see it, we had Nate, me, Charity, Kelly, Brad, Luke, Erika, Molly, Sadie, Grandma Hatch, Grandma Ruthie, Aunt Jen, and Charity's friend Josh also to cheer him on Friday night.  He did awesome!  I love seeing him on stage- he just shines!  It's been a fun outlet for him and I think he really enjoys it.  He was Young Shrek, got to be in the very first scene! and did awesome at it!  Then he was also Jack and the Beanstalk.  He was cute to yell out his "name" during the one song.  He really wanted a speaking part this year, maybe next year though!  Then Saturday night, we had Grandpa Hatch and Jo, Steve, Noah and I.  He did great both nights.  I think he loved the candy bouquet I made him :).  Can't wait til next year!  2-24-23--2-25-23

DEEP CLEANING
We've started our spring cleaning while it's still really cold outside :).  We did the living room first.  It went pretty well.  I'm hoping to get a room a week done.  We'll see how it goes.  Everyone was really helpful for the most part.  2-25-23

KELLY
I got a phone call from Kelly, Monday morning, telling me she had been let go from her 911 Dispatching job.  This was so sad.  I felt so bad for her.  She has worked SO HARD for this and was mostly loving it so much.  It was so hard to imagine that CRPS could be getting in the way of yet another thing she loved and wanted to do so badly.  She has since decided that it may have been for the best and realizing that she would have let the stress of that job eat her up, she realizes she might be better off.  It's been hard to watch, but I'm so proud of her and the way that she is enduring life.  She really has been through so much, it's painful to watch, but she bounces back and is able to look on the bright side so well.  I just really couldn't be more proud of her.  I hope she is getting the emotional exercise she needs for this life.  (she of course got turned down by the guy she was liking, kneed in the ribs, possibly breaking one or two, and then got tonsilitis all in the same week!  This girl is a brick wall!)  BRICK WALL!!!  2-27-23

ERIKA DR. WOODS
We were able to get Erika in to see Dr. Woods this week.  This appointment ended up being more than we'd planned.  She got to have a mini pelvic exam- ugh- and found out she has an imperforate hymen.  So she will most likely be needing a procedure done in a few months to take care of that.  I'm really hopeful that it will help with her pain.  Not sure if it will, but at least we know that's the cause of her monthly pain she's been dealing with the past few months.  We'll see how this goes.  2-27-23

SADIE
Sadie was playing with something she was calling a map and said, "Let's see what the map has to say about that." HA!  Funny girl.  2-27-23

HEAVY
Life got really heavy this week with all the different challenges our kids have been facing.  It was really hard not to feel the weight of it all as parents.  So Nate decided we needed to go out.  We went out on Tuesday night this week :).  We went to Sushi Monster and were able to talk through a lot of the things ahead and make some plans and kind of team up.  It was nice.  It's crazy to think that things are only going to get more and more challenging as time goes by.  Hopefully we can also get better at it.  We'll see.  2-28-23