April Showers bring…my tulips, yard work, and a hairy surprise!

April Showers bring…my tulips, yard work, and a hairy surprise!

We got quite a bit of rain this week, which was a welcome change to snow. The tornado sirens went off one night, one touched down 15 minutes north of us. Poor Alayna started freaking out because she was worried the F5 from the movie “Twister” was coming, flying cows and all! I had to reassure her that an F5 was not coming to carry us away.

Tulips

My tulips bloomed this week and are absolutely gorgeous! I love it because it is a sure sign that spring is here! Marisa cut some yesterday and made a beautiful floral arrangement for our kitchen table.

Yard Work

The weather was gorgeous this week too. We played tennis, went on family bike rides, and started working on our yard and garden. We trimmed and weeded all the plants and roses in the front yard and cleaned out the window wells. Tyler and Alayna ended up on a rescue mission to save a frog stuck in the window well.

Yesterday we spent 5 hours working on the garden. Massive weeds overtook our garden through the winter. So, we had to clean out every box by turning over the dirt and pulling all the weeds. It was a HUGE project!! But we had some great workers out there. It is amazing how much work you can get out of Tyler when he is trying to earn a new book series! We planted an entire box of onions (red and yellow) and started a box of broccoli. Our raspberries are flourishing! We even have some lettuce and cilantro growing from last year’s crop-so weird!

(Before Picture)

(After picture)

Hairy Surprise

One time yesterday when Bob turned over the dirt in a garden box, there was a huge woven ball of grass. Upon closer inspection, he realized that it was moving and pulsing. We all raced over and agreed it looked like something out of the movie “Alien”. We came to the conclusion that it must be a 13 striped ground squirrel which has pestered us for many summers. Bob told Tyler to go get the cooler so we could throw the nest in and capture that pain-in-the-butt ground squirrel once and for all. As Bob shoveled the nest up, I let out a blood-curdling scream. I am shocked neighbors didn’t call 911! All of the sudden, all these small things came flying out which TOTALLY looked like rats. We soon after realized they were baby bunnies (5 of them). We got them all in a box and put it next to the shed. There is a bunny that keeps running under there so we can’t get her out of our yard, so we hoped she was the mom and would still take care of them even though we wrecked her home. When we checked on the box this morning, all the babies were wrapped up tightly in a new nest. Good job, mommy bunny! One baby died though because he got hit the first time Bob hit it with the shovel. It was bleeding and by morning he was dead. The kids were devastated and now Bob’s new name is “Bob-the-bunny-killer”.

Miscellaneous stuff

Marisa was at a tennis meet Friday night for many hours and Saturday for 4 hours. She came home sore and exhausted (but loves it). So last night, when she was trying to climb up the stairs, she totally looked like Frankenstein. She couldn’t bend her legs at all and had to grasp the railing and the wall. I should have gone down to help, but I was too busy laughing!

Kayla went with 2 friends to do their service hours raking from the ward auction. In 2 hours they filled 14 huge yard bags of leaves. Then she came home and had to spend hours doing homework and then babysat last night. She is starting to get a schedule like Marisa. She has her 1^st tennis meet tomorrow. She had another challenge match this week and won all 4 games!

Tyler has discovered a new book series. He is hooked and said it is the best series ever. It’s called “The 39 clues”. I haven’t read it yet, but I am going to have to since he is so excited. I just thought I would share in case any of you are looking for something great to read. Maybe we should start a book recommendation/review section?

Kayla is becoming a wonderful cook! She often makes yummy desserts and dinner. This week though, she almost caught our kitchen on fire! She was making stir-fry. She put vegetable oil in the skillet on high and then went to do something else. I turned around and it was a skillet full of fire!! I wanted to take a pic for you but I thought it might be more important to put the fire out.

Modeling poses

I asked Alayna to do some poses for me, maybe like a model does. This is what I got:

S’Mores

I forgot to post last week that we made “S’mores in  Jar” for Easter.  They turned out so cute!  We haven't eaten one yet.  We will let you know how it turns out.

Top 10 reasons BYU grads make great soldiers By Sara Israelsen-Hartley

Corey sent this to me and I thought it was hilarious, so I am sharing.

As Gen. David Petraeus began his remarks at BYU Thursday night, the commanding general of U.S. Central Command shared his sense of humor by reading the following list, which was received by waves of laughter and applause.

General Petraeus' Top 10 reasons BYU grads make good soldiers:

10 — They have already been on many a mission.

9 — Army chow is no problem for folks accustomed to eating green Jell-o and shredded carrots.

8 — It's not a problem if they don't know what rank someone is, they just refer to them as Brother or Sister so-and-so.

7 — They never go AWOL. They just call it being less active.

6 — They will seize any objective swiftly if you tell them refreshments will be served.

5 — They know how to make things happen. In fact if you ever need a base built quickly in a barren wasteland, stride out to where you want them to start, plant your walking stick down and say in a loud voice, "This is the place."

4 — They have innovative ideas for handling insurgents — like assigning them home teachers.

3 — They always have a years' supply of provisions on hand.

2 — They are the world's most reliable designated drivers.