Clovers and Lakes

Saturday we woke up to the sound of thunder.  It was super loud and there wasn’t even any rain (at least not in our area-there was rain in other areas near us.)  Then our power went out for the morning.  Andy went out and mowed the lawn and changed the oil in the car while I got the kids ready.  The power came back on just before we left.  Luckily, there was still enough hot water in the hot water tank for both of us to shower.

We went to Andy’s cousin’s daughter’s baptism and a barbecue at her parent’s house afterwards.  It was a very nice service and it was great to visit with so many of his cousins.

Abby picked some clover blossoms for me (after she finally calmed down from her huge fits–no nap makes that girl MAD!)  It was cute when she was happy.  She brought me handfuls of clover blossoms.

While the grownups visited, the girls played (all girls other than Vincent).  They were out in the sun, but moved under the shade tree to eat their fudgesicles and orangesicles.  It was so hot, the shade looked like a lovely place to be.

Abby napped on the way home and continued to nap after we got home and I laid her in her bed.

We changed into clean clothes and started some laundry before going to a park to meet up with some friends for a Single Adult Branch Reunion.  Since Andy and I met there, it was a lot of fun to see friends we knew from when we were there.  There isn’t normally a reunion.  It’s just something one of our friends thought would be fun since it’s been more than ten years since we’ve been there.  15 or so people came with their families.

Friday night our regular game night friends, Nathan and Robie, were in Canada and Seattle, but our former game night friend Darren was in town with his wife Sarah, so they brought an uncle and two cousins to play games.  The cousins were able to play on the Wii with Elizabeth and Olivia while the rest of us played Risk.  I actually got second place.  It was sort of fun.

Anyway, you may wonder why I interrupted the reunion with that tidbit, but it’s because of this next picture.  Darren and Sarah brought grapes to share at the park and offered them to our kids.  That’s just about all it took for those grapes to disappear.

I was at the single’s branch for a pretty short amount of time (married on my 19th birthday after all!), but two of my cousins were there at the same time.  One married Doug who is tickling Vincent here.  Vincent got a kick out of Doug.

And if you want a flashback a few years check out this post.

While Andy and I visited with our friends, the kids played at the playground and ran around.  Vincent played in this “lake” at the base of a tree.  He went on a search for the perfect big stick to use.

Abby liked playing in the water too.

It’s always better when you play together!

Good thing it was bath night!  They were so dirty from having such a fun day!

Baseball

 

Tonight was Daddy Daughter Baseball night.  Andy’s boss arranges a night for this and another for Father Son Hockey.  It’s something the kids look forward to all year.

Since it’s a small business it was just Andy and his boss and their daughters this year.

 

The girls look to have had a good time!  Just looking at Abby’s face, you can tell how much she thinks she’s a big girl!

Andy with our girls.  His boss sent me the pictures.

Abby playing on the bleachers with her new hat.

 

Olivia with her treat.  She’s now missing three of her front teeth, so she keeps asking me to make soft dinners (that she doesn’t have to chew much.)

Thursday morning Elizabeth and Olivia let Vincent play Mario Kart with them.  We had pajama days as much as possible lately.  I’m always happy when they are getting along.

Vincent made this caterpillar with 18 legs while the girls were all gone at baseball.

I was picking out straps and measuring this toddler leash for a friend whose son outgrew it, but still needs it because of his developmental issues.

 

Vincent tried the toddler leash on for me.  I don’t think he liked it much…

It’s all fun and games around here (and no one got hurt)!

Girls and Knives

Elizabeth had a Stake Activity Day at a park all day Wednesday (girls ages 8-11) where they learned several new things and had a great time together.

I was able to go and hang out with Elizabeth, the girls from our ward, and some friends from a neighboring ward (total of 21 girls in our group) from 8:30am-3pm because my mother in law watched the other three kids for me.

First they were taught how to lead music and learned some camp songs.

The second station was a combo of roasting a biscuit on a stick and tying a fleece quilt to donate (not at the same time because that would be messy.)

Here’s Elizabeth putting her dough onto her roasting stick.

Next up was the games center.  I hadn’t ever seen this game before.  It’s called boardwalk and you have a partner you team up with, make your leg strong (90 degree angle) and then let someone walk over your board.  Once they get over your board, you move to the end they are walking towards so they can keep going.  The girls loved this, but only the four smallest girls had time to go.

They also taught the girls how to tie square knots in some rope and talked about binding families together.

Then we had lunch (and spudnuts for dessert because Elizabeth’s leader brought some.  Yum! -If you don’t know what spudnuts are, they are basically doughnuts made with potato flour.)

After lunch was the Safari Expedition.  We had a nature walk and then they shot targets with marshmallow guns.

The next station was talking about Heros and Friends and how you can find real friends and recognize heros in your life.

The final station was the much anticipated obstacle course.  It was all set to church centered activities. One was the iron rod balance beam.  This one is the “lengthen your stride” walk.  They had to step on each of the three corners of the triangle.  The jug of water is the burden they each had to carry through the obstacle.

 

This was a teamwork part of the obstacle course.  They had to hold hands with their team (four teams in the square with five or six girls) to make it across without stepping in the grass (lava).  The tiles had been rained on throughout the day and were breaking pretty quickly.  The idea was that a whole tile could have two feet total (you could share with one other person) and a broken one could only have one foot.  It took communication and effort to get through it.  If they were stuck, they were supposed to ask for help (prayer) helping them know they weren’t alone.  Then one of the ladies in charge would put a tile in their path where they needed it.  All they had to do was ask.

 

After we picked up the other three kids, we came home, rested, had some dinner, and then got ready for Andy’s Teacher Quorum to come over for mutual (I guess that means they were Venture Scouts instead of Teachers for the night…)

Andy prepared some metal at work a few days this week (it didn’t take too long) for the scouts to grind into knives. (His coworker sent me this picture).

 

While waiting for their turn, the boys practiced throwing knives into some stumps by our tree.  In this picture, the knife is between the house and the fence on the right.  You can sort of see it…

One of the knives in the stump.

 

The boys using the grinders to make their metal into sharp knives to throw.  I was doing my best to get pictures with the most sparks flying.  They weren’t hot and didn’t catch anything or anyone on fire.  Don’t worry.  (I did get the fire extinguisher out just in case and we had a pitcher of water.)

The four scouts who came and the Young Men’s Counselor over the Teacher’s Quorum.  They had a good time (and no one got hurt.)

Andy worked on this piece of metal he found that was used on a railroad track at some point.  He was making the edges smoother.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I convinced the tallest boy to stand on a stool and trim the tree that hangs over our driveway and roof from our neighbor’s tree.  He’s working at getting in shape at basketball camp, so I was just helping his strength training. =)

 

The other scouts used their new knives (and some of Andy’s) to hack away at our yucky trees that grow through the fence at the back of our driveway.  We filled up our yard garbage can with branches which was great because it gets picked up Thursday morning.

 

 

Elizabeth and Olivia helped the boys bust up the branches into small enough pieces to throw away.  Vincent and Abby went to bed early. They actually went right to sleep.  They must have been really tired.

Pioneer Trek

Andy and I went on a four day 22 mile trek with seven teenagers this past week.  Andy’s sister, her husband, and their three kids came to our house to take care of our kids for the time we were gone.  It was so great to know that our kids would be well taken care of and we didn’t have to worry about them or arranging several people to watch them.  We left our cell phones in the car and didn’t even have watches.

Andy came home and made an approximate map of where we went using Google Earth.  Luckily, he used to work out on the church-owned farm that this trek is located at, so he kind of knows his way around the fields at least.  This map doesn’t show how many steep hills there were, but it does do distance.  He labeled the map.  Click on it for it to be larger.

Here’s Andy and I before we were tired, and dirty and before we met our pioneer “kids”.  We had to be there at 7am.

We waited to be organized into families and then had some time to pick up our pretend baby, bags with journals, and watch some weaving and blacksmith work.  Then we loaded up our hand-cart and I asked someone to take our family picture.  I took my oldest digital camera on the trip because I didn’t want to wreck (or carry) my newer (heavier) camera.

The first day we started at 11am or so and our company (there were three of them) were first to leave the base. It was slow-going to get to know our new kids (we never had even met five of the seven), and for them to all open up a little, but they all got along pretty well, and became pals by the time it was all over.

We rotated positions so no one was stuck in the front the whole time and someone was always holding our baby.  We noticed the kids in the back weren’t pushing as hard as the kids in the front, so we moved the guys from the front to the back to give them a bit of a break and one said to the other, “even though we’re back here, it seems like we’re pushing just as hard,” so from then on we didn’t rotate them around much. Eventually they each gravitated to a favorite position, so we didn’t have them rotate anymore.

Most of the first day was spent discussing the baby’s name.  I wanted to name her Rebecca.  Other names tossed around were Penelope, Sheniqua, Leather (that one came up late in the day), Ariel, and several others.  We finally voted (not like actual babies…) and her name was Penelope Ariel Ransom.  The kids called us Pa and Ma Ransom.

Andy’s fancy mustache.  (It was shaved off as soon as we got home because although it looks cool, not everyone enjoys it.)  Andy says: Bishop Johnson told me I should keep the mustache because it looks nice.  I said, “everyone tells me that, except the person I make out with.”  NaDell says, “I never said it doesn’t look nice, I just don’t like it.”

Second day of our trek.  It was very windy!  It rained throughout the day and the entire night.  It rained so much that most of us had wet sleeping bags.

Gold Company.  Can you believe this is just a third of the people who went on the Trek?

We found a few interesting things growing out in the desert.  I ran out of batteries and had to hang back a little to change them and take a picture of this blooming cactus, but it was worth the running to catch up.

The second day was brutal.  We walked nearly 9 miles, crossed a few small streams, and climbed a hill so steep they had to use a big, strong rope to get the carts up.  (I’m happy to say that I held the baby and she was the first one up the steep hill from our family.  My training paid off!)

This was one of the streams.  We had to use a big rope to get across this too.  The man in the middle was the Trail-master and he was awesome!

We used to be cub-scout leaders, and many boys who were once our cub-scouts went on the Trek.  A few of them were in our company, and would come up to visit the boy in our family who was with us.

The third day was hard because we didn’t have much breakfast.  They gave everyone a bag with four ounces of flour to show them what it was like when the pioneers had to ration their food and give everyone four ounces of flour per day.  The kids struggled with that but eventually there was a stop further on and they served us some breakfast.  It was a good learning experience that put them into the pioneer shoes a little bit, but we knew what was going to happen and it was really hard to not tell them! We traveled about 8 miles on the third day.  It was slow because of the hand-carts.  It just takes a long time to push/pull them.

That evening, the sun came out, and it warmed up enough that we set up our tents and got our sleeping bags dried off before bed.

Andy and I did the dishes while the kids went to the hoedown.

The final day was only a mile and then we arrived in Zion where we were handed watermelon and had a feast.

Although this was a hard thing to do, I only had one tiny sore on the back of my ankle and a few mosquito bites.  I wasn’t terribly sore or tired.  Andy says: I was pretty wiped by the end of the second day.

More than anything, I have a better testimony of what the pioneers went through with our tiny piece of trekking and I have faith in our future missionaries and youth!  They are amazing!

The night before trek we went to a family birthday party.

When we got home and cleaned up we had a jujitsu barbecue to go to and a wedding reception for Andy’s cousin.

Abby and Vincent playing in some dirt at the barbecue.

 Andy’s cousin and her husband at their reception.  Yea!

 

Her little brother came and was in charge of the music.  He was born the day before Elizabeth so we always have to see how they compare to each other.

Then we came home, I gave the kids baths, put them to bed, and went grocery shopping.  Laundry is waiting until Monday.

Splash Park

 

 

Monday we ran a few errands and then met up with my sister, Janessa at a splash park after she visited Grandma Zora nearby.  We won’t see them again for a long time since they’ll go back to Colorado while we are gone on the trek.

Abby sat on the bench watching the fun for a bit, played in the water, and then came to hang out by me and eat pretzels.

Vincent played the longest time with this one water spout.

Elizabeth liked shooting people with this one.

My cute nephew Jacob found someone’s basketball.

When my kids got bored with the water, they spread out on this piece of concrete.

Vincent and Olivia needed a drink.  Apparently they didn’t want to share very well…

Janessa’s friend took a picture of the two of us after our kids were all loaded up in our cars.  Do we look like sisters?

It was fun to visit with you, Janessa!  Enjoy your trip!

 

Happy Father’s Day/Anniversary/Birthday!

Father’s Day celebrations started on Saturday when my siblings were all together with my parents for some fun at a park.
I think my dad is so great and always so willing to go on walks with his grandkids, read with them, or do anything they’re interested in.

My kids have a wonderful dad too!  (I mean, I picked him, so I think he’s fantastic!)  He is a lot of fun, reads to them, teaches them, shares interests with them (video games, board games, maps, history, etc), and helps them so much.  They all love him!

And they all like to be silly too!

Andy and I celebrated our twelfth anniversary of our wedding when we went to Portland.  Here’s a flashback to us on our wedding day.

I love this picture! Every year just gets better and better.

Sunday at church we listened to wonderful talks and lessons (that is NOT sarcastic.  They were really good!)  Some nice ladies in the ward made cinnamon rolls for the men.  Since Andy doesn’t care for cinnamon, I get to eat his.  It’s the best!  I ate my roll for lunch and it was delicious!

After lunch I read a lot of facebook birthday greetings, took a lovely nap for a few hours, and then woke up to talk to a good friend on the phone for an hour.  It was worth every minute!  We went to dinner at Andy’s parent’s house and visited with family there.  Then we had red velvet cake and ice cream for my birthday.  It was yummy!

And it’s all these pictures that make me even more determined to lose that tummy!  Still, better than where I was 40 pounds ago!  (If you are looking for someone to really admire in the weight loss department, I’m not your girl.  Check out my friend’s blog where she talks about her 140 pound-and counting-weight loss! She’s amazing!)

I’m 31 now and plan on getting a year older (and hopefully wiser) every year.  Age is a good thing.  Plus, I have a ten year old little girl.  I NEED to age along with her.

Cleaning house and getting ready for company to come and take care of our kids while we go on the pioneer trek (and a birthday party, wedding reception, picnic…)  My mom posted a picture of me in the skirt and apron she made for me on her blog.  I’m sure my blog will see plenty of trek outfits in a week.

Multitasking…

 

Pictures below if you want to skip the rambling…

I ended up with THREE days  this week with nothing on the calendar squares.  It was fantastic.  Now, I wish I could say that I just sat around a read a book the whole day (and took care of the kids), but I couldn’t do that ALL day.  I did a little, but also had a lot of prep work to do for things that were coming up the end of the week and this next week, so I was still busy, even without things scheduled to do.

Monday night after working around the house all day, we had FHE, Andy took Vincent to get his bedtime star chart ice cream cone, and I went on a walk with my girls (and one neighbor).  Abby wanted to walk too, but didn’t last long and just a little ways away, Olivia had to use the bathroom, so I tied the house key to her helmet strap and the three bigger girls hurried home on their bike and scooters.  I texted my neighbor so she could look out for them and they were already home before Abby and I were even halfway there.  I love this time of year when neighbors are outside more and we can chat.  We live in a nice, friendly area.

Tuesday afternoon I went to Olivia’s ballet parent participation class for the whole hour.  I stood at the barre with her and did all of the stretches and ballet positions and everything (not as well as her, but this was really my first lesson).  We did some moves across the room and she tried to teach her uncoordinated mom how to do some dance steps and I’m afraid she failed… My calves were sore for a few days after that!  Ballet is hard work.

Wednesday I ticked plenty of things off of my to do list.  I hardly remember what they all were because I made a new list midweek and threw away the old one that was all crossed off.  Wednesday evening while Andy was at mutual, the kids and I, along with a different neighbor girl and her mom went on a walk.  I like Wednesday walks.

Thursday’s list was very long!  I was/am trying to get everything ready for the weekend of fun: crafting, reunion, birthday/anniversary/father’s day, and not to be made small at all, trek prep.  I completed almost everything and felt very good about that. I do my best to make manageable lists.  We also had a friend come over in the afternoon so she wouldn’t have to go on errands with her mom.

Friday I met my friend at the park (the one whose daughter I babysat while she went shopping) so that she could watch my kids while I went grocery shopping.  It was great to go alone and go pick up all the food and supplies I needed without distractions.

Some cute girls of mine with their friend at the park.

Friday night I went to a Ransom Made Design craft night.  We made these fun wood signs that say, “I pledge allegiance to the flag…”   Mine is going to hang outside my side door year-round because it’s never a bad time to be patriotic.

Saturday morning we went to Walla Walla to see my parents, all of my siblings, and all of my parents grandkids (except the one who lives in Ohio with his mom).  We had a big family picture and did some individual family pictures as well.  I liked this one of my family the best.

We had a real photographer come and take pictures.  Everyone wore red, white, and blue.

My dad is not too big or too old to play on the toys with his grandkids and they LOVE him so much for it.  I love watching them all play together.

 

Several years ago while I was at a church meeting or something Andy took our girls to a McDonald’s to eat dinner and play and they ran into my dad who was there with my brother and his son.  My dad got right in the playplace even at McDonald’s to play with the kids.  I have an awesome dad!

Olivia and Vincent (not his head pictured) loved this spinning toy at the playground.

My dad and I took about 14 of the 16 grandkids on a half hour hike near the park.  Abby was a little bit slow, but she walked the whole way.

 

My dad with a bunch of grandkids by the cherry trees at the end of the path.  Some guy who was running saw about six of the kids ahead of me at the beginning and asked me if they were all mine.  Seriously?!

The wildflowers were pretty, so I took a picture of my three cute girls.

Abby’s cousin brought her a wheat stalk to play with.  She carried it around for probably a good twenty minutes.

And finally we crossed back over the bridge (my dad with all of his granddaughters-currently) to go back to the group and have blueberry pie with ice cream.

The only downside was that the rice crispy treats I brought were gone when we got back and some kids were sad they didn’t get any.

Two of my brothers played kickball with the bigger kids.

The fun was winding down, but we went back to my parent’s house so Andy could help my mom with her wireless setup and the kids played with my brother’s kids and picked a LOT of strawberries.

 

 

I think they managed to fill all three gallon buckets at least halfway. They are great strawberry pickers.

 

 

Olivia and Vincent worked together on this bucketful.

Elizabeth picked, washed, and ate (almost single-handedly) this bucket of strawberries.  Luckily, she didn’t get sick.

We ended up staying for dinner and then had some ice cream cones.  The kids thought it was funny to make the cones into phones.

Wheelbarrow races….kind of. Uncle Brant was a little too heavy for Elizabeth.

Plenty of wrestling.

Abby LOVED this old key on a keychain that my mom had in with the toys.  She pretended to lock and unlock the back door over and over for probably an hour altogether.

She only really locked it once (by opening the door and locking it).

A team effort to make Derek giggle like crazy.

Birthday/Anniversary/Father’s Day to come.  Must blog before trek so when I get back I can blog about trek. =)

Summertime

 

 

Saturday I told the girls that they would have a book report due each week this summer.  We went to the library between the ballet rehearsal and ballet recital and they picked up just a few books to read…

They are acting pretty excited about book reports so far.  One a week isn’t too hard and it will keep them thinking.

This morning the girls made sure their dolls had breakfast.

Elizabeth made a summer schedule of their activities for each day.

 

I think we may need to add some handwriting and spelling lessons in to their days too… Sewing, free choice, history, and PE are all included in their schedule.  I interrupted their day today for them to help me clean our house.  Really, I cleaned the bathroom a lot and they played with Vincent and Abby after taking the laundry to the laundry room where I could sort it.

Then I made lunch, dinner (times 2), and boiled some more eggs and did all the dishes, changed a bed, put Abby down for a nap, finished my book, and took a little nap myself.

Despite some minor squabbles, the kids are doing pretty well for a first day all really home with nothing on the calendar.  Did you hear that?  Nothing on the calendar. I turned off my alarms on my phone too.  It was lovely to have a day without going anywhere (well until later when I take a dinner to someone in my ward and go on a walk.)

Vincent will get to go get ice cream with Andy finally because he finished his star bedtime chart.

Time to finish the laundry and unload the dishwasher.  Adios!

Field Day and Ballet Recital

Thursday morning I ended up going over to Elizabeth’s field day even though I wasn’t planning on it.  A friend of mine posted a picture of her daughter and I wanted to be there for the four person relay Elizabeth was a part of and didn’t know what time it would start.  I got there in time for this tug of war.

Elizabeth was on the team with her green shirt class, but used a backwards pulling technique.  I like that her teacher is there cheering them all on.  (They still lost…)

Wednesday Elizabeth’s class made these fun tie dye tshirts.  Each of them brought in a white shirt or three dollars to pay for the shirt the teacher provided.  Her teacher’s last name is Batdorf, so they all had a bat symbol on their shirts.  It was  a HOT day.

Sack races!

The fourth and fifth grades had a combined field day that was all day long.  Before lunch another parent lined Elizabeth’s class up to take a class picture, so I jumped right in next to him and took one too.

Vincent, Abby, and I went home for lunch and then came back (and I really should have sunscreened myself…)

Elizabeth running the 100 yard dash with the other fourth grade girls who signed up for their classrooms.

Elizabeth with her relay team.  Earlier in the week they had an all girl race and the four fastest girls were put on the relay team for each class.

It was fun to watch these girls huddle together to encourage each other and plan their handoffs.

Elizabeth’s relay team video here.  They got third place out of four, but in their defense it was at the end of a very long, hot day and after most of them ran in other events.  I suppose the girls on the other teams had the same excuses though…

Vincent liked watching the fifth graders play this game.

Another tug of war against a different class.  Look at these techniques.

And they still lost… They gave out awards Friday on their last day of school.  Elizabeth and Olivia have really enjoyed school.  I told them on Saturday that they were each assigned to turn in one book report a week all summer.  They need to keep reading and writing to continue to do well and reading is good for them.

Friday afternoon Andy and Vincent left for the father son campout.  The girls came grocery shopping with me and I let them each pick a nail polish.  We ate our dinner, watched a movie, painted nails, and ate some popcorn.

Then Abby went to bed and Elizabeth and Olivia watched another movie and slept on the hide-a-bed.

Saturday morning we went to the park for Olivia’s ballet dress rehearsal.

Here she is in her ballet outfit with the added skirt and headpiece.  I love that we don’t have to pay some exorbitant amount of money for a costume we’d wear once.  This is way nicer.

Olivia with the little boy we’ve driven to ballet many weeks this year.  He goes to the same school, so it just made sense.  Some weeks Elizabeth would play with his sister during ballet too.  There were four boys in Olivia’s class.

Saturday night’s performance looked like this:

Yeah, we didn’t get the nicest seats, but everyone was pretty happy.  Elizabeth read her book, Olivia and the boy from her class watched the performances, and I had my freshly painted feet up (can you see where my feet are sunburned from Thursday’s field day? They are and it hurts!)

Abby ate her apple.

Vincent made his flip flops dance to the music.

 

 

Olivia had a nicer headpiece for the evening performance.  She lost her second front tooth this week.

Olivia’s class performance.  She’s on the right side in the front.

 

Olivia loves ballet!

 

Olivia’s ballet video here.  Next week is parent participation week.  I guess she’ll have to teach me something about being cute.

Playing

After school the kids wanted to play in the sprinkler because they were so hot (just wait until it’s really hot in the summer!)  Elizabeth helped Abby go down the slide.

Abby found a ripe strawberry in the garden, even after I picked what I thought were all of the ripe ones.  Olivia saw that and decided to go look for another strawberry too.

Vincent running through the sprinkler, or rather just close enough to get a tiny bit wet. =)

Vincent decided he was tired right after dinner, changed into pajamas, and put himself to bed (6:30pm).  I was folding laundry with Abby’s help when Andy took the girls with him to mutual for Senior Honor’s Night.   Abby tried on Elizabeth’s jean shorts while I put the other clothes away.

Thursday morning I tried on some of the trek clothes I’ve been gathering.  Do I look like a pioneer?

Abby likes to cross her legs while she sits by the fireplace to read books.

Elizabeth had field day this morning.  She was able to be part of her class girl’s relay team because she was the fastest girl in her class last week and they had the top four girls in each class do a relay race.  She was assigned to do the last leg of the race which is apparently longer than anyone else’s.  I don’t know how they did because I wasn’t there, but I’m sure she did great.

Olivia has her ballet recital coming up this weekend and told me that at her final class next week it’s parent day and they told her they were going to give her a trophy because she can do the splits so well.  I haven’t heard of them giving trophies, but I guess we’ll see.

School’s almost out for our girls and then we have a little break before any plans, although there’s plenty to do before the plans (ie: trek, reunions).