Amina's Summer

This summer I went to Camp Invention. I had a lot of fun and made new friends. We planned our mission to mars, saved Sludge City, and took apart a radio and used the parts to build a Rube Goldberg machine that pops a water balloon. As we planned our mission to Mars, we designed a rocket, living quarters, and a communication device. Sludge City is a very stinky and polluted city. We had to re-make Sludge city and re-named it Slatter City. Also this summer, I had a soccer tournament. We lost two games and tied one. I knocked over two people on the last game and got a huge bruise on my leg because someone kicked me really hard. On Tuesday I went to Camp Kiesel and had a bunch of fun. This summer has been really fun so far!!!!!!!!!!!! -Amina

Ryan comes home tonight!

Love ya babe. I can't wait to see you. - Mel

Kansas City with MHS Students

I brought four of my students to Kansas City to compete in the National Skills USA Championships for Broadcast News. We flew from Salt Lake City on Monday and will be returning on Saturday. The weather is great and we are having lots of fun with little sleep. My students finished their competition this morning and won't find out the results until the never-ending awards ceremony which will be held on Friday.


The convention center entrance where we competed has huge coil sculptures by Jun Kaneko. I love his work! When I was teaching Ceramics, I would teach my students all about Jun. Later we went to the Crown Plaza today and there was an Alexander Calder stabile (stationary mobile) outside. There was an amazing sculpture hanging in the Hyatt Regency hotel where the dance was tonight. Tomorrow I am taking my students to an an art museum. All this art exposure is bringing back memories of the passion I once had for creating art. I want to make something! Now that I am teaching all video production classes, I think I am missing that connection to the art world that I once had.

Six days is a long time to be away from Moffett Manor. I miss the Crazies. I missed out on Amina's soccer game today. They tied 1-1. I missed out on taking Felicia and Amina to Camp Kiesel yesterday. I missed out on Sadie's Young Women's activity. I'm sure that I have missed out on a thousand hilarious Maisy moments. Most of all, I miss Melanie. It will be nice to come home. But don't get me wrong, I am having a blast. I love visiting other cities.

My students keep me laughing. This may not be as funny in writing, but today we walked into a candy store and the girl working there explained that everything was $7.50 per pound. So I asked her if they had cotton candy. Can you imagine how much cotton candy you could get for $7.50? Anyway, I asked and couldn't stop laughing. I was crying, squeaking, hurting in the gut, etc. Good times. -Ryan

Maddie

The girls got to hold and love on their new cousin for the first time today. We are all finally healthy enough to be around the tiny princess. She is adorable. Love you Maddie!

LUKE!

So, Maisy told me that she is going to marry Luke and if anyone else tries to marry him she will take him away. She tries to hide him when Brenda or Ron come to pick him up after he has been playing at our house. For the record- Standing in front of a baby or holding a blanket in front of him is not a successful way to hide him. Just so ya know.

Science Camp

I went to science camp for four days. The first day I went to science camp I went to the Ogden Nature Center. We went on a tour then we went to a fish farm, we went fishing and made rockets there. My Rocket went the highest. The next day we rowed boats, made rootbeer and Ice cream, made leaf t-shirts and dissected grasshoppers. The next day we saw two movies. My friend Elizabeth bought me popcorn. We also went to the kids museum. Finally, on the last day we hiked up to Handsome Cave, Middle Cave, and Tipanogas Cave. It was very tiring. But the cave was very cool. Then we went to Cabelas. - Felicia

SUMMER!!!

It is finally summer! I don't know about everyone else but I say it's about time. I love the heat. And, my flowers are finally blooming. It seemed like a long time that they just looked like tall green weeds out there. I waited most anxiously for the Daisies. They finally popped yesterday. Ryan got his garden in also, despite our pessimism's. We weren't sure it was going to happen with everything else that has been going down around here. Amina reminded him that "the prophet said to plant a garden", so he did. He is very happy about it.- Mel

Home Tag

Janna tagged me with this fun post idea. You have to take as-is pictures. You're next Krystal. Hee Hee

#1- Kitchen Sink- My only excuse is not having a dishwasher. Unfortunately, this is not the worst that it gets.


#2- Favorite Room- Ryan and I did this room together. I like it best when it is clean but, we live here.
#3- Messiest Room- This is the girls bathroom and I was sorting laundry. It looks really bad I know. They have an aversion to cleaning off the sink.


#4- What are your kids doing right now? We are all playing a friendly game of Farkle. Maisy did get mad and start her own game with dice on a rubbermaid container on the other side of the room.


#5- The inside and outside of my fridge- It is covered with clutter. I like to have everyones pictures out. If you look close you are probably up there.



#6- Is supposed to be a picture of my toilet but I forgot to take that one. Sorry

#7- My favorite shoes. Don't look to close, they are well used. They only cost me $3. Gotta love a great deal.



#8- This is my closet but if you go by possession, Ryan owns 4/5th's of it. He can't get rid of anything. On the other hand, if it doesn't fit me- I don't want to see it.


#9- Self portrait. I thought this would save me from the shame of showing an old face with no make-up..... instead you see my cowlick that looks like hair loss.


#10- Favorite vacation- Cancun. It was such a blast to watch the girls in the ocean fighting the waves and snorkeling (I was too chicken). The water was beautiful and the weather was gorgeous. We went with Krystal and Jake and it was such a blast. They are really good to us.
That's it. I am tagging Krystal cause she is the only one I know in blogland besides Janna. Love ya- Mel

Lagoon

We went to Lagoon Monday with our good friends The Sessions. It was perfect weather and everyone had a good time. The Dad's took the bigger kids to the bigger rides and the Mom's stayed with Maisy and Mazie for all of the fun little rides. Thankfully, Hayden stuck with us for most of the time and helped with the girls. We got back together for dinner and a few rides we could all go on (although Grandma Leslie and I opted out of most of them) including Rattlesnake rapids! This was the first time our Maisy was tall enough to go on it. She got drenched and after it was over told me we shouldn't have done that. I asked her if it was fun and she said, "Yes, but we still shouldn't have done that cause we got all wet. She and her "Best Friend Mazie" were so funny of all of the rides. The older kids shocked me with their courage. That Samurai ride was CRAZY. I couldn't even watch and they all came out jumping up and down and shouting about how great it was. We didn't get out of the park until ten o'clock and the Sessions had school the next day, but it was all worth it. I am just glad that Lagoon only happens once a year around here.- Mel

Felicia is a Star

We had so much fun watching Felicia dance at the Browning Center Saturday night. She and Lizzy both did a great job. It is hard to combine Hip Hop and Egyptian into one dance but they succeeded. They were adorable.