You have to be brave and tough to get through spring in Utah!
Percussion Recital
As part of preparing to perform in the annual Day of Percussion that is held every spring, Clark was able to perform his piece Nocturnal Opus 70 by Benjamin Britten in a Waterford percussion recital. It was a long piece originally composed for the guitar, that took many months to prepare and was very challenging to perform. He did a great job! He also received good marks on his performance at the Day of Percussion Festival.
Backyard Wildlife
“I looked out the window and what did I see?”
Fourteen deer looking back at me!
Elliot’s 17th Birthday
This year Elliot turned 17 years old. He has now graduated in my book to a “fairly experienced driver” and he did get through his first winter of driving in the snow unscathed, so I am able to quit worrying about him (for the most part 🙂 )
Gifts for Elliot always seem to have a BYU theme and this birthday was no exception! He is still the biggest fan in the family and he hasn’t even gone to school there yet!
Clark’s Eagle Scout Project
Over the past several months, Clark has been working on his Eagle project. He decided to collect used and new books as well as money to purchase books; all to be donated through the Big Brothers Big Sisters organization to three different elementary schools. Our ward was super generous and he was able to collect several boxes of books and several hundred dollars to purchase books.
He had fun shopping for and buying the books. If you can’t afford to buy for yourself, the next best thing is being able to buy for someone else! During our spring break from school we were able deliver all the books to the elementary schools throughout the Salt Lake valley. The schools and the kids were so appreciative – he even got some thank you cards from some of the children!
Loading up all the books!
BYU Kids
All the Provo students are doing well. They are studying hard and working hard to earn and save money. Our married kids, Loren and Anne, are doing well and often have their siblings over for meals and movies. It’s crazy having half of our family down there – but so fun for them to all be there at the same time.
Michelene’s Birthday Weekend
And so I’m older. But I guess that’s good, because that means I am still here – right?! Aside from being sick in bed with bronchitis the whole week before my birthday, for the most part, I enjoy really good health. I feel lucky that at this point everything still seems to be “working” for me. My birthday weekend we decided to have “get-a-way” by staying here and sending the boys down to Provo to play with their sibs. I didn’t feel great, but we enjoyed watching movies, eating yummy food, reading and resting.
We also worked on finishing up some family history work and getting some names ready for temple work. It was nice to spend the weekend together on our own, but it also made me a bit sad to realize that we are getting closer and closer to living in this house all by ourselves. I was kind of glad to have the boys come home :). We celebrated my birthday on President’s Day and the Provo kids came up for another round of dinner and presents. It’s always fun to have everyone here for a few hours.
Elliot Racquetball
Having played racquetball for two seasons now, Elliot is really improving and enjoyed winning several matches. For some reason Waterford has about half the kids that play private school racquetball in their region. We have two teams, so often our kids end up playing each other which is a little lame. It’s nice that Clark and Elliot can play each other and that they can take turns wearing their (very competitive but in slightly less better shape) father down. I even tried playing a bit after not playing in over 25 years and I’m as bad as I ever was with only a few community ed lessons shortly after we were married – I will leave it to them!
International Bananagrams!
One weekend when the kids were playing Bananagrams, I suggested that they each play in their “other” language. So Tess spelled her words out in Polish, Clark used French and Elliot used Spanish. It took them a bit longer than in English, but it was fun and a good brain exercise! I am so proud of my foreign speaking children!
Bananagrams is an short easier version of scrabble without the board.
Clark’s 14th Birthday
This year Clark turned 14 years old. He seems so tall and old – he is taller than I am and has almost caught up with Elliot. We decided to celebrate a couple of days after his birthday so that all the sibs could come up from Provo for a family party. The grandparents came over as well and we had a yummy chicken divan dinner complete with Grandma’s homemade cheesecake. Of the gifts he received, my favorites were the black dress shirt and keyboard tie that we gave him. He will look awesome for his next jazz band concert!
Along with turning 14 Clark had the opportunity to be ordained a teacher in the Aaronic Priesthood at church and now he gets to be Alan’s home teaching partner. Sadly though, his campouts with the scouts are coming to a close. They were so glad that he would still be going on the Klondike because he is a master at building fires and tying knots. Their troop won the fire building contest and took 2nd overall (even after getting no sleep because they had 7 boys in their 4 man tent and were sleeping on a slope!)
I think Clark has had grilled cheese and fries for every birthday since he was two years old! Of course he got to choose a Sunday Birthday dinner for when the whole family was here to celebrate.
