Jenny Graduates from UVU & Laura and Hannah are here!

Jenny and Trevor at Jenny's graduation
(more and better pictures to come)

Hannah and I having a snuggle

Home Projects

I've been working on getting a few home projects done around here:

Rich got me this mirror for Mother's Day - I did pick it out. :) I love it! Another Gothic arch mirror and I love that this one looks exactly like a Kirtland Temple window! It was a project hanging it over the stairs - thankfully, just one trip to Home Depot and Brian's skills at finding the studs and balancing on a ladder to hang it.

we moved the video cabinet by the TV, this is definitely our "old school" family room with the big screen and green carpet - but it still works

ç

reorganized and got rid of some videos

found this cool lamp that matches the room at Hobby Lobby

I've struggled for some time what to call this little room. It was an exercise room when we first added it on. Then it was the Americana room, but that never really stuck. I decided to just decorate it in black and white to go with the West Wing and it is officially called West Wing II. Jenny and Trevor used it to store all their stuff for the past year but now it's back to being a guest space. Jenny let me keep the curtains she had hanging there so it's a little more private when used as a guest room.






it's all good

My Nephew Ryan Graduates from BYU

Jenny and Heather Lilley

When we served as Mission President in Daejeon, Todd, Jenny and Michael attended TCIS ~ Taejon Christian International School. Jenny became fast friends with Heather Lilley who is from England and attended TCIS. They have kept in touch through email and letters and facebook over the past 7 years and Heather came this week on her first trip to the States to spend a week with Jenny. What a great friendship!

On Tuesday morning I joined them for a short hike at Bridal Veil Falls. It's so delightful to listen to Heather talk in her British accent!

at the bottom of the falls

after the hike to mid-falls

Bridal Veil Falls

Myla Jae and Sophie Lynn

Thursday Jenny and I went to Mary's to get out hair done. I got these cute pictures of Myla and Sophie. Blonde hair and cute grandkiddies ~ what a great day!

Myla being my buddy (pre-hair done for me)

Sophie had a fever and wasn't feeling great, but she still had a great smile for me

Seesters in NY

My three daughters are together in New York right now. Mary and Jenny went back to meet Hannah, and visit the Buchanan family for a bit. (Alan always uses that term, "a bit," it sounds so British - which is where he served his mission. I've found myself using it lately) It makes me so happy that my girls are such good friends and enjoy each other so much.

it's all good!

One Last Day of Skiing

I didn't ski once in March; but it was for good cause: a precious and perfect new granddaughter and my missionary son. Family always trumps skiing, just barely. We've been getting a lot of snow lately and so even though Sundance has closed for the season, Kathy and I decided to go to Solitude for one last ski. It was a beautiful, sunshiney day and the snow wasn't too icy. It's over an hour drive to get there, but even that was beautiful. I'm thankful to get one more ski in and then it's 8 more months before I can go again. :(

the Solitude trails go through the trees, which is lovely

the blue sky is equally gorgeous in big cottonwood canyon

I had hoped to capture the snow that was falling from the trees in this photo, but sadly it doesn't show up, but it was exquisite!

1:38 min/3.48 miles


it's all good!

Words with Friends

Words with Friends is an online scrabble game that I am now officially addicted to. Rich and I were playing each other last night while we were at dinner and during some TV shows we were watching. I love this game! I like to think of it as being "alzheimer prevention" since I'm using my brain to find words. And I like the feeling of being connected with the person I am playing with. Even though you're not actually speaking to each other,(although you can send messages through the game) it's like you're connected through the game. Sometimes you're shooting words back and forth as fast as you can, and sometimes it's days between words because you get busy, or are in different time zones. But it's always a nice connection. I don't win very often, but I still enjoy the game and knowing that someone I love is getting a thrill from beating me.

My online name is jprife - invite me to a game - you'll probably win!

it's all good!

Ideas from Laura

Every time I visit Laura I get some ideas of things I want to do at my house. One time I read a book she had and reorganized all my scrapbooking stuff.

This time I got three great ideas:

1. I copied her and got this poster.



Here's this history according to Wikipedia:

Keep Calm and Carry On was a poster produced by the British Government in 1939 during the beginning of the Second World War, intended to raise the morale of the British public under the threat of impending invasion. It was little known and never used. The poster was rediscovered in 2000 and has been re-issued by a number of private sector companies, and used as the decorative theme for a range of other products. There are only two known surviving examples of the poster outside of government archives.

I love this sentiment. "Keep Calm" reminds me of "Be still" and is always good advice. And "Carry On" is as Laura put it, just keep enduring and do it well.

Of course, hanging this post meant that I had to change my walls around a bit. But that's always a good thing.



2. Laura reminded my of how her friend, Gabby Blair, of DesignMom fame arranges her books in rainbow order. So I took all the books off my shelf, which had been arranged sort of by genre, and put them in the spectrum. I love it!

The rainbow starts on the left and goes across the top shelf and down across the next shelf to the left. I love how the heights kind of make a rainbow shape! There's a section of brown and black on the third shelf on the right and then all the white books are on the bottom left. The third shelf on the right is my journals tied in ribbons by year. The bottom right is magazines and miscellaneous.

3. Andrew's clothes are under his bed in wheeled boxes that roll easily. I had some things under my bed that were not as well organized as I would like. So I bought a couple of the wheeled underbed boxes and got organized.

Thanks, Laura!

it's all good!

August James to the Temple

Our nephew, Augie, went to the temple today as he prepares to go on his mission to Brazil. We were happy to be able to go with him and take him to lunch afterward. My parents also came; my Mom said she felt like she should be there for Nanna, since she knows she was there in spirit.

at Los Hermanos after

Augie and Sam, his roommate who was his escort

The Jung Family

When we were on our mission in Korea we got close to the Jung family. President Jung was one of our excellent stake presidents, the closest one outside of Daejeon. He came into the mission office often when he taught an institute class nearby. We love their family! They currently have three missionaries from their family. Two are in Seoul (Michael's mission) and one is in Canada, Toronto. They came for General Conference with their two youngest daughters and we were so happy that they were able to squeeze in a visit at our home.

Last Day in Tuckahoe

me and my four silly Buchanan grandkiddies

the less silly version

Laura has FOUR kids!

me and Hannah ~ one for her book so she'll know that I came when she was born

we were shooting for Laura and me, but Abby and Andrew couldn't not be in the picture, photo taken by Connor

Conference Weekend

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that we could watch Conference at Laura's home. Last time I was here for conference (3 1/2 years ago for Andrew's birth) we could only stream online. We had a great time watching all four sessions of Conference. Laura is such a great Mom and had activities and treats planned for all the sessions. I enjoyed hearing all the talks and taking notes and I'm looking forward to reading them, some I plan to read right away and not wait for the May Ensign. I'm a visual learner so l really like reading the talks.

Andrew colored these pictures of President Monson and his tie and thought he should tape them to his bare chest. He's a silly guy!

Park Between Sessions

We decided to go to the park between sessions to get a little energy out of the kids. It was Hannah's first park outing.

Sisters

April Fool's Day

Laura had a snack all prepared for the children after school. It looked like grilled cheese sandwiches and grapes. But the sandwiches were actually cake with orange frosting. They looked amazing real. What a fun Mom!