10 April 2011 - Primary Activity

The weather has been more spring-like this week -- it only snowed three out of seven days.  On Saturday it was a nice 61 degree day which gave me a chance to spread two cubic yards of mulch in our flower beds and on our trees.  My lower back is still sore.

Saturday was also a primary activity for the girls.  I thought the presidency did a really cool idea.  Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of pictures because I spent most of the morning out doing bishoply stuff.

The activity was a drive-in movie.  The kids started off by getting together with their class and planning a skit.  Each class was assigned a story from the scriptures and their skit had to depict that story.  Once they had their parts and their lines, the went into the "studio" and they were filmed performing their skit.  From there, they went into the gym and got a cardboard box and made a car to drive to the drive in.

 

You can't see it in this picture, but there was white tape down both sides of the hallways and yellow tape down the middle, sometimes two stripes, some times one dashed stripe, so the hallways looked like a road.  Well, from my observation, the girls thought it was a road and the boys thought it was a race track.

Judging from the size of Jessica's car, this was likely her last primary activity (she turns 12 in August).

 

The kids drove their cars to the primary room movie theater, where their skits had been deftly (and rapidly) assembled into the premiere event.  They found shoe boxes with popcorn, juice boxes and M&Ms for them to clip onto the side of their cars using binding clips.  Although I didn't get to see the final product, I'm told it will be nominated for and Oscar next spring.

The girls still haven't tired of cupcake making.  Here are some of Joanne's fresh flowers and some marshmallow cupcakes.

 

Grass is turning green, and warmer weather is in the forecast.  Soon will be lawn mowing season.

3 Apr 2011 - General Conference

Welcome to April in southwestern Pennsylvania!

These photos were actually taken April 2nd, in between sessions of General Conference, which we enjoyed thoroughly by the way.  My favorite quote was from Cecil O. Samuelson:

"We should not have higher standards for others than we do for ourselves. Too often we may let the mistakes or failures of others, especially leaders or Church members, influence how we feel about ourselves or our testimonies. Other people’s difficulties are not an excuse for our own deficiencies."

 

I also appreciated Dieter F. Uchtdorf's counsel to Priesthood brethren on Saturday evening.  He challenged each of us to read Doctrine and Covenants 20, 84, 107 and 121.  Yesterday at church I asked how many of us had heeded that council....

On Sunday, when the sessions were all over, we had two families in the ward over for Sunday dinner.  One of the families is relatively new.  They moved to PA from Utah last summer.  The girls, not having lost interest in the cupcake cookbook, made these sugary monstrosities.

 

Despite the snow, there are definitely signs of spring and we're looking forward to a little warmer weather.

27 March 2011 - A Funeral and a Hockey Game

On Monday afternoon I received a call that a baby girl had been born to a couple in our ward.  The mother had been in a womens' hospital in Pittsburgh for three weeks because there were multiple concerns regarding the pregnancy, and the doctors had detected some developmental issues with the baby.  She was born about five weeks premature, and the birth defects were more numerous and more severe than expected.  I drove to the hospital and arrived as the doctor was explaining the prognosis to the baby's father and the outlook was grim.  With the help of a ventilator, the baby lived until Wednesday afternoon, but unfortunately passed away.  We planned a brief funeral, which was held at the church on Friday afternoon.  Many people in the ward helped out to make it a nice service, including Joanne, who sang a duet of Teach Me to Walk in the Light with our Relief Society president.

On Friday evening, after the funeral was over, a benefactor in our ward had arranged for our youth group to use a corporate suite for a Pittsburgh Penguins game.  Here are two of our young women and one of the young men from the ward, checking out the food selection (all of which was included).

Though the suite was cool enough by itself, there was also a hockey game going on, so we watched some of it.  The Penguins played the New Jersey Devils.  After regulation and overtime, the score was still 0-0, and the Penguins ended up winning 1-0 in a shoot out.

The building where the Penguins play is called Consol Energy Center.  It is a brand new arena that just opened this year and was designed specifically for hockey.  It was awesome and the kids all had a blast.

Here are three of our young men, enjoying the leather box seats.

The two young women who came with us were busy taking pictures of Mario Lemieux, widely considered the best player to ever play for the Penguins, and now the team's owner.  You can't really tell which one he is due to the angle I took in this picture, but he is the black-haired guy in the suite next to ours, in front of the flat screen TV with his head turned.

Here are five of our young men who took a break from eating free pizza to watch a little of the game.

20 March 2011 - Spring?

We're cautiously beginning to get excited for spring.  The weather's been warmer, but the forecast warns that we might still have some winter before we're officially done.  

I came home the other day and the girls were making paper mache' Easter eggs.  Easter is still a month away, but what do I know?  I guess they're optimistic.

 

 

Here are some of the finished products.

We had the missionaries over for dinner the other night and the girls had made butterfly cupcakes for us.  This one is mine.

13 March 2011 - While Mommy's in Utah

Mommy went to Utah this week, so we got to have some daddy/daughter time. We made some peanut butter cookies.On Saturday, the weather got really nice for a few hours. By about 4 pm, the sun had come out, it was about 57 degrees, and Madeline and I decided to take the motorcycle for a ride.
Madeline's school class has been learning about robots, so we decided to try to build one. We went to Radio Shack and got some parts. This is us testing some voltages and currents to make a line following robot. We're not done yet, but we're working on it.
Despite all the fun, the girls are all excited to have mommy coming back home soon.

6 March 2011 - Brandon's Visit

Jessica's school choir finally got to have a concert. The Christmas one was canceled due to weather, but this week we got to see her for the first time this year. The lighting was bad for a photo, this was the best I could do.This week our nephew Brandon came to visit us and to check out Washington & Jefferson College. He's already been accepted and received a scholarship offer, but he had the opportunity to interview for additional scholarship money. This picture is actually at Carnegie Mellon University, not W&J. We forgot to take one at W&J, but when we drove through the city before heading to the airport on the way home, we got this one.
The weather was beginning to get a little more spring-like, until Sunday when we woke up and found several inches of snow had fallen. I took this picture right after church.
Why I love our little town. I'm so excited, I just can't wait!

27 February 2011 - Madeline's Birthday

On Monday, I was working quietly in my office at the college. A storm was brewing outside. By about 4 o'clock, large snowflakes were falling at a rapid pace. I gathered my things to head home before the roads got too bad. Right before I shut down my computer, I got an email from the Young Men's president in my ward. He works for Google (center in the picture below) and they were having a ski day the next day at Seven Springs, about 50 miles east of my house. He invited me (on right), and our Gospel Doctrine teacher (on left) to go with him. It wasn't Utah skiing, but it was excellent nonetheless.
Many of the slopes were ungroomed, so we found lots of powder to fall down in.
For several years we've had a very comfy Poang chair in our basement. It was always the first chair occupied when we went down to watch a movie or play Wii. The pad finally wore out, so we went to IKEA to get a new pad for it, and ended up with one new pad and three new chairs -- two little ones and another big one. Now I don't have to fight for a comfy chair anymore.
Lest we lose track of the most important event of this week, Madeline turned 7 on Thursday. She got more presents than she needed, but thank you to everyone anyway. This is a crystal set she got from Grandma.
She also got Toothless. A stuffed animal never fails when it's for Madeline. This was from the girls.
Mommy made Ho-Ho cake. Super yummy.
Here's Madeline opening her card and gift from Grammie. When she saw the money in the card she grinned mightily and and said: "Oh! Grammie is soooo loving!". It gave us a good laugh.
On Saturday, she got to have a friend party. Joanne had a really good idea for a craft. She had each of the kids decorate a place mat and then laminated them for the kids to take home. (Joanne's a laminating fool.) The party's theme was Disney, mostly Mickey Mouse. I guess our Christmas trip left an impression.
We played pin the tail on the Mickey donkey. I don't think Mickey would have appreciated being turned into a donkey -- kind of reminds me of Pinocchio.
I have no idea how many of these Mickey Mouse cakes Joanne has made in the past couple of months.

Madeline was very excited about all her presents. She passed some time on Saturday by working with her crystal set.

Happy Birthday to Madeline!