April little things

…which were filled with goodness (I’m still re-listening to conference every now and again…loved them so much!)…and a good April Fools prank:

More about those two things back HERE.

Gotta love Dave:

…and Lu too 🙂

Grace ran for Senior Class Secretary.

And won.

Woohoo!  We’re so excited for her!  She asked if I would come help her hang up her banner in the middle of the main hall before school, so I did.  But she was not about to document the fact that her mother was in the middle of that main hallway with her:

 haha.  (More about that back HERE.)

Lucy spent every Monday and Tuesday morning before school practicing her heart out for handbells:

Dave’s sister Julie and her family came to town.  And as I’ve mentioned before, this gets all of us living here together so much more than usual, which I love.  They stayed with us a few of the days:

We did yoga, met up for sporting events, got together with cousins, swam a bunch…

(all the details about that week back HERE)

Claire worked her tail off in track:

 As did Grace in tennis:

Got some old film pictures from Elle…this one’s dark, but made me miss that returned missionary of mine…and made me happy Elle likes film photography so much.

 The mesquite trees are always in full bloom in April…which quite honestly takes my breath away.

In Bo Jangles news, she got a haircut.

(Before and after pics. of that are back HERE.)

…and got herself her own whiz bang dog door (also in that last linked post):

It took her a few days to get it figured out, but then she got it like a pro and it is incredibly freeing, so grateful for that thing!

For some reason these pictures came up from Cambodia:

…so I took pics. to sent to our family group text because it made me melancholy and filled with gratitude for that trip.

Grace headed off on her prom “day date:”

Lots more about that “day date” back HERE.

 (all about that date back HERE)

 I made Claire take this pic of the sky en route home from something, somewhere.

Because how pretty is the gradient color of that sky!?

I love when I have a co-pilot I can order to capture so much beauty all around.

Cousin love:

 More love:

(Always birthdays to celebrate!)

More handbells.

When Dave’s parents returned home from their mission in Ghana we went out for frozen yogurt.  There was this random ad for “bike night” on the wall.  Something about those two words just really stuck with me…and somehow pushed me to organize one of those…in our neighborhood…to get to know all the new people in our newly divided ward.

So we did.  We asked our neighbors-across-the-lawn if they wanted to join in, invited a bunch of new families we wanted to get to know to ride on over on their bikes for Family Home Evening.  We served dessert and just talked and got to know people as our shadows lengthened across the grass.  I got this pic. after it was a little dark, but you can get the idea:

I loved getting to know all those good new people, and I think they did too.  The kids had fun running around to their heart’s content as well.

The plan was to do it again a few more times, but we just did one other gathering.  Which was also good, but that’s a “May little thing” we’ll get to soon!

Tennis season was in full swing:

One handbell concert came and went:

Someone practiced some photography with my camera…

We snuck away for an adult-lake-get-away one day with these folks we love:

Lucy’s piano teacher continues to write up her music for her like this, which melts my heart:

She is getting so good at playing “The Miracle”…her favorite church song.

Claire made up a “Claire & Bo Show” which is actually quite entertaining. 

I didn’t upload the right video…I’ll try to do it soon though.  Here’s a pic for now to help me remember:

For some reason I cannot help myself from capturing all that happiness.

More practicing:

Trying to get in some good hikes before it heats up too much:

Claire’s out-of-town soccer tournament.  I didn’t get to go, it was the weekend Dave and I “divided and conquered” trying to cover our bases with these kids, but the pictures I was sent made me laugh so hard.  Can you spot Claire in this one below?

Yeah, that girl who’s hair tie broke?  Haha.

Here’s a better one I think the next morning:

(more about that weekend back HERE)

Lu and I cleaned out our crafting cabinet while those two (Dave & Claire) were gone.  Found these puppies:

(They were supposed to be used as “coupons” that could be earned for good behavior.  The idea was to be able to exchange them in for cool prizes like “lunch with mom” or “five minutes extra to stay up.”  But we didn’t get very far with them, since they were brand spanking new.  Dang we kind of missed that boat…maybe they’ll still be good for Lucy….)

Loved soaking up some beauty desert sunsets:

ACT test studying for Grace:

(More details about that weekend back HERE….I was trying to keep up incrementally…)

Grace did some senior pictures I thought turned out so great:

We had all the youth in our new ward over for a fireside one night:

More mesquite trees:

…that left yellow carpets all over the place.  These pictures cannot do them justice, they were gorgeous and so vibrant.

…but not so great for the allergies.

Grace and I searched high and low for some perfect prom accessories:

We hiked some more:

See those tiny little people on that desert landscape up there?  Those are my friends.

Here we are close-up:

In April I started my quest to try to manage screen time…especially social media in our family.

I have learned a LOT since the beginning of this quest, things I will share in a post soon.  But this article was really good:

Claire got the time mixed up for a track meet one day. 

Her friend called her from the all-loaded-up bus heading to the track to figure out where she was.

She about died realizing she needed to be there so I raced her over to the school to drop her off as close as I could get to the bus.  This was her text after I left:

That was a funny day.

We went to a volleyball game to support these good friends:

And to miss our volleyball boy 🙁

Elle sent a couple pics of one of her final products from graphic design classes in Hawaii:

Cool stuff.

Claire and her friends are much too teenager-ish for Dave and my liking these days. 

They need to slow down!

Grace sweet-talked us into getting a few highlights for prom….since Elle did when she was that age. 

She sure looked different…and pretty beautiful too 🙂

We had the “most beautiful, wonderful, amazing thing in the world” talk with our last child.

…and it was a good one.  More on that back HERE.

Volleyball was in full swing:

Prom prep:

And the big night:

(Prom post is back HERE.)

We celebrated Earth Day:

We celebrated two new babies (a nephew and a niece):

We stole babies in church because the pictures we got made us baby hungry:)

Elle stood in a LONG line to get to go to a fireside with the Prophet of our church who was in Hawaii:

Max gave a talk in church up in Provo:

Thank goodness for his friends who take pictures…

I got a calling to teach Activity Days which I love…and since Lucy is one of those girls, she has helped us plan out all the activities.  Ha! 

My friend Sarah from England came for a visit:

Love that we get to catch up when she has layovers here (she works with British Airways).

Lunch date:

We were all pretty excited about Elle’s return home before she headed out to Jerusalem, but I think Bo may have been the one to show it the most.  Oh boy was she ever excited to see that girl!

We celebrated having that college girl home for a day and a half by heading to the lake.

…with Bo in tow:

(A little more about Elle’s visit on this “weekend” post back HERE.)

Lucy got a special letter that announced that she would be a Golden Scholar thanks to her hard work in school.  Most of our kids have received letters like this, but Dave had Lucy read it aloud to all of us since she was pleased as punch about that thing.

That picture doesn’t show it, but she was pretty delighted.

I got to hang with my college kids in Provo for a couple days to help Max move and to be at Elle’s Jerusalem orientation meeting with her.

…which meant I got to hang with the cousins too.

…and hike in this gorgeous spot:

…and borrow this cool car from my dad:

And do another hike in that beautiful place:

…with these folks I love so much:

…and visit my brother at his company that is taking off…along with a sleepover with my Utah sisters:

Yeah, it was a good side-trip.

The only pics I took at the Jerusalem orientation meeting were of the calendar of events:

Kind of fun to know a little more about what that girl is doing over there in that place I love so much, since she’s so many hours ahead and we don’t get to talk too much.

(All the rest of the details from that weekend up in Utah back HERE.)

Then I finally arrived home from my delayed flight in the nick of time before everyone arrived for Grace’s end-of-tennis-season banquet: