Jordan River Temple Open House

About a month or so ago, I requested tickets for the Jordan River Temple Open House. Fifteen was the max I could get, so that was enough for all of us living at home, including the Dog Walker's family, Drama Queen, and Teach's family.

We all met at the house about 6:30 for a quick dinner before we loaded the big van (they asked us to carpool) and drove the couple of miles to see the temple. Our first stop was the parking lot and then a quick walk in the pouring rain to the meeting house just up the street. From there we boarded a shuttle bus that took us around the corner to another meeting house adjacent to the temple.

We watched a 10-minute movie and then we crowded into the canvas tunnel that kept us dry while we waited our turn to enter the sacred walls. They covered our shoes with paper booties and then we began our walking tour of the temple. It started in the baptistry and wound around until we saw pretty much everything.

I so miss my dear friend, Astrid! She and I spent many happy hours together in this temple and I know she was looking forward to the opening as much as I was. As we exited the temple, we grabbed a moment to take a pic of our group. Such a beautiful experience!

We enjoyed the bus ride back to the church and then we walked to the parking lot in the still drizzling rain. Back at the house we had banana splits and laughed at the Dog Walker when he put Play Doh flavored ice cream in his. It was a beautiful evening and a wonderful reminder that Families are Forever. My only wish was that we could have had all of the kids with us. Then if would have been perfect.

Finally Finished!

I'm not sure I've ever looked at Spring Break quite this way before, but I'm glad it is finally finished! Because we worked so long on the basement yesterday, my sweetie went easy on the kids this morning and he got up early and did all the pruning. So when they got up, all they really had to do was drag all the branches around to the (now) huge pile we have for Monday's dumpster.

Taco and Burrito came over to help us again, so Burrito took some pics for me of the branches. Since we had Twizlet, she and I got to stay inside and clean up the kitchen. Why is it when you start a big project somewhere that everywhere else seems to get trashed?

My sweetie also finished up the half bath project. It looks so good!

I have been embroidering hats for the baseball teams and working on that ever present pile of laundry. The kids got to play with the Geotrax and we went out for a hamburger for dinner with their free kids' meal coupons from Reflections.

We also got schedules for the ballgames and they start on Monday. We won't have much time for big projects again until June...

Work Party #4

We seem to start these parties a bit later every day...

The sleepover kept the kids up late and this time we didn't really get going until about noon. My sweetie had chosen the basement to tackle today and honestly, it could have been much easier, but we really needed to do some major sorting and tossing to make things easier to maintain.

Of course the little kids didn't want to let anything go and the big kids were willing to let pretty much everything go, but in the end we came up with a nice compromise. We now have 8 totes with sorted toys. My sweetie hauled the two large metal shelves to the garage so he could use them for his projects out there. I cleaned everything up in the Food Store and most of the utility room. My sweetie ran the group that sealed all the new tile in the utility room and he did heavy cleaning in the bathroom.

We cleaned up the storage room, the projector room, and the reading nook. We left the apartment to Dog Walker and Cat Lover. This project filled the big van with stuff to go to the DI tomorrow and a good sized pile of trash to put in the big dumpster on Monday. As I'm sitting here pondering; I don't think we even opened the door to the furnace room. (I hope it was clean...)

It also took most of the day.

We finally got around to dinner about 8:30 and then we debated on what to do for our play party. My sweetie gave the kids 5 options and they chose to go to Sonic for 1/2 price shakes. It's late now and I'm sorry I don't have pics of all of our hard work. Sometimes it is so difficult to take a minute out for pics. Let's just say we are reclaiming our house... one work party at a time...

Another Work Party

It seems our work parties are starting a bit later. We didn't get rolling today until after 11:00, but we headed for the yard this time. Sport tilled the sandpile and we got rid of any weeds and trash that had accumulated through the winter.

Crafty was in charge of the patio and the sideyard and by the time she was finished, Dog Walker had pulled all the patio furniture out of the basement and had it set up.

Waiting while we uncover the pool.

My job was to run to the IFA with Twizlet and buy garden seeds. That didn't take too long and soon they were busy planting peas, beets, and lettuce. Curly spread new grass seed and fertilizer and everyone else gathered leaves. It was a quick and relatively easy day.

Which was a good thing since we had so much fun planned for the evening! Li'l Sis was bringing the cousins for a swim party, movie, and sleepover. Our amazing friends again offered their pool for our use and we swam until almost 8:30. Some Greatest Showman, popcorn and leftover Easter candy finally put the kids out for the count about 1:00 AM.

Rocking out to The Greatest Showman!

Can't wait to see what my sweetie has in mind for tomorrow...