From the Petersons

This was a nice short week for us. The kids didn't have school Monday, Joel took the day off and I had the day off! Ahhhh..... love it when the happens! We went to Riverdale and swam in the hot tubs. It was crazy how it felt like a summer night. Maizy didn't want to leave because she just kept saying "I can't believe what a warm night it is!". She didn't realize we were only warm because we were swimming in super warm water. But no matter the reason, it felt like summer and we LOVED it! Especially Miles. He is so calm and happy after swimming. It is great input for him. We also DCFS proofed our house. They were supposed to come Friday but she called and had a Dr. apt so she rescheduled for this next Friday. We put up raining on our downstairs (the kids are so super sad they can't jump off the stairs onto the big pillow now), and all sorts of little things like locking cabinet doors with cleaning supplies. We also lost our "Foster Child Jaron". He decided to go home before he leaves in a couple of months for his mission which I thought was a great idea. Leaving his girlfriend cold turkey sounded extremely painful to me. The kids will miss him a lot especially Tommy and Millie. They played with him all of the time and he thought things they said and did were as cute as I do so that was fun.
Last week when Joel and I went on a date for Valentines day, Millie was a little jealous and reminded Joel that he told her he was going to take them on a date. So...Friday he took them to McDonalds and they played on the playland there and got treats. They were in heaven having Daddy all to themselves! It was just me and the boys here at home. I was pinning my tatted doily (below) and noticed they were quiet. I went and looked up in the loft and T was curled up with a blanket and pillow pet and Miles was in his sleeping bag, both fast asleep. So it was a pretty quiet night for me!
 It was a good week to get lots of projects finished! Projects that have been almost done are all done now so it makes me feel like I have accomplished more than I really did. Including a 10 mile run on Saturday with my cute husband and my friends Darcy and Katie. Joel likes it when they come with us because he doesn't have to talk and he swears we run too fast for him to be able to talk. I think he may have been a little embarrassed when we were running around the dam and one of his biker friends passed us. Not only was Joel running, but he was with three girls!

Riverdale with my sweethearts! 

 An embroidery that I finished a few weeks ago. Finally bought a $1.00 hoop to put it in.

 An embroidery that I finished over a year ago! Finally painted the frame.

 Painted the bench Joel made me. These pillows aren't staying. They are just a collection of extra pillows from past beds that have accumulated there.

 This is a 60 year old tatted doily that Joel's Great Grandma Venice made. Grandma betty told me I could have it if I wanted to spray it and pin it out. Of course I jumped at the chance. Grandma said she washed it 30 years ago and it has been in her drawer ever since. I didn't realize it would take hours and hours to pin. It is 12 inches across and see every one of those loops? They each had to have a pin in it. I used three boxes of pins and then didn't want to keep buying more so I started taking them out of dried sections and moving them. I had over 500 pins in it at a time. Phew! Glad that project is done. I am now going to frame it so I never have to do that again!

This lovely little project only took 2.5 years but I love how it turned out! The colors make me so happy and Joel even likes it! It actually wasn't that time consuming I just worked on it and then put it away for a while. The fabric "Breakfast at Tiffany's" was discontinued before I even bought it but I had loved it when I had seen it a couple of years before so I found it on e-bay. Not a smart idea. By the time I finished it I had to scour the internet for the additional fabric I needed but still couldn't find any. It all worked out though (thanks to some old peach table cloths that the Relief Society president gave me to cut up to crochet rugs!) My favorite part is the shams (that include peach table cloth material :))and I sewed them up last minute with some extra pieces I had. The quilter called and told me when I bought the back fabric they had cut it not square so she had to cut it so the quilt ended up smaller than I needed it. I just called my smart Mother and she suggested a ruffle. It made it look so much better and now it is the perfect length. Just waiting for the bed skirt to be delivered.

Where did February go?

Time goes by so quickly......  Melanie commented about me not putting up my heart wreath.  I insisted that I would indeed put it up.  She just kept trying to get me to understand her point..... finally she just pointed out that Valentine's Day was already over.......   hahaha, well of course it is!  I am a little dingy sometimes.  And, not very good at keeping track of time!  :)

Almost all of our snow has melted!  The weather has still been kind of yucky, though.  It has been windy and overcast, almost feels and looks like..... November?  See, I do have a difficult time keeping track of the seasons!

Today was Alexia's tenth birthday.  Amanda invited us over for dinner.  It was a fun time.  Sadly, Josh wasn't there....he is on his way back from Washington DC.  Maybe he will report on that sometime in the near future.  :)

Love you all!  XOXO

Whoa! Am I first??

Unless someone is composing right now and about to post...I am first this week! Wahoo! :) Wow--who didn't love the gorgeous day today? Makes me anxious for Spring. Just a really really lovely day. We've had a nice Sabbath. Church was great, we had a nice Sunday dinner, my house is clean, my husband just left for work and I'm working on my scrapbook. We did have one sad thing...Daph's boyfriend left for two years. She was SO SO sad. (She doesn't know her sweet sister and a couple of their mutual friends are planning to whisk her away as a surprise to go to his farewell in a few weeks).
We had an unusual week with Aunt Karen's funeral. It was pretty nice, I guess. Bunny and Cynthia asked me to find and read a poem ("because I'm a librarian" they said....?). The one I found is so lovely and I got a bit choked up thinking about Dad and just how brief this life has started to seem lately. Instead of boring you with the details of my life: work, driving, work some more, drive some more, I will leave this poem with you. Love you all!
Looking for the Sunrise
--Albert Simson Reitz
I'm not looking for the sunset,
As the swift years come and go;
I am looking for the sunrise,
And the golden morning glow,
Where the light of heaven's glory
Will break forth upon my sight,
In the land that knows no sunset,
Nor the darkness of the night.

I'm not going down the pathway
Toward the setting of the sun,
Where the shadows ever deepen
When the day at last is done;
I am walking up the hillside
Where the sunshine lights the way,
To the glory of the sunrise
Of God's never-ending day.

I'm not going down, but upward,
And the path is never dim,
For the day grows ever brighter
As I journey on with Him.
So my eyes are on the hilltops,
Waiting for the sun to rise,
Waiting for his invitation
To the home beyond the skies.

And darn! Just noticed Jen beat me! :)

Busy Week

Tyler made a yummy dinner today and it’s almost ready, so I’m going to keep this short.   We had a busy week this past week, and I thought we were all getting better and that this last bout of sickness was well on its way out, but Levi is running a fever again tonight! L  Ugh!!  Hopefully it doesn’t go through the whole family again!  We can’t seem to stay well!

Tyler left Thursday after school for the state wrestling tournament and got home late lastnight.  One of our guys placed fourth, so that was good!  A few months ago I signed up to have a Paparazzi booth at an expo in Kingman (about 45 min. away), so I had that all day yesterday.  Tyler was supposed to be home to watch the kids, but since they had to postpone sectionals a couple weeks ago that moved state to this weekend.  Anyway,  I tried all week to find someone to come stay with the kids, but could not find anyone!  So- yesterday was Taylor’s first time babysitting the kids for more than a couple hours!  He did great!  I was worried that Ryder would give him trouble, but he said Ryder was the best out of them all!  

We had a Blue & Gold cub scout activity on Thursday night and both Taylor and Jon received their Arrow of Light awards.  Taylor earned his a long time ago, but we never got a ceremony put together for him and Jon earned his back in October of last year.  It was a neat ceremony and it's good to finally have it done :) 

We are excited for the Gilbert Temple Dedication next week!  I’ve never attended a dedication before.  I think it is so cool that they can broadcast things like this so more people can experience it.  We wanted to go to the Open House, but we’ve been sick this past month and weren’t able to make it. 

Well, that’s about it for us.  We hope everyone else is well and that you all have a great week!

The last couple of months in Clarkston

This is Tommy's "cute" face. Maizy taught it to him. It is pretty dang funny when he asks for something and says "PLEASE!" and pulls up his shoulder and bats his eyes! It makes me laugh super hard every time!

Happy Birthday Joel! We were getting ready for bed and had just finished our family prayers and I had just said "okay, put it in for the family cheer" and Joel appeared in our bedroom doorway (where we do our prayers and cheer). He was over an hour and a half early. I screamed and the children attacked him. All of them ran for him. It was a pretty happy birthday surprise. Maizy had made him "cookie in a cupcake" but had hid them because she wanted to see him get them and she thought she was going to be in bed when he got home. SO they all immediately retrieved all of their treats and birthday craft that they had made hm.

This is what I was looking out at as I tried to do a nine mile run on my treadmill. I only made it three miles. I got off, changed into some winter running gear and asked Joel if he wanted to go with me because I couldn't do one more second on the treadmill. He quickly got dressed and we headed out into the horrible blowing snow. Fortunately it let up a little while we were running and ended up being a pretty good run. EXCEPT, after about seven miles my heel started hurting really bad (it had been hurting a little for a few weeks). In fact it hurt so bad that we were about a half a mile from home when I hit nine miles and I stopped and walked the rest of the way home. I went to the Dr. on Thursday and he said planters fasciitis. Bummer! Well, he gave me a cortisone shot in my heel. I have never had a shot that caused such excruciating pain! The worst part was that he would pull it back a little and move it to a different spot and shoot more fire into it, pull out a little and push it into a different spot and more fire. It lasted what felt like forever! The best part is that Tommy was with me and jumped off his chair and got in the Dr.'s face and said "You hurt my mom! Don't give her any more shots!" Good to have the little fire cracker looking out for me! and as a side note, the receptionist, after talking to her a bit, we figured out that she is Ralph Call's sister! We talked about Mom's accident and she asked me about Carolyn's accident too.  How crazy. Joel pointed out that I have a  random connection to a lot of Dr.s here in the valley. My OBGYN's Mom used to hang out with Dad in high school, eye Dr. is from Lewisville, my Chiropractor is my cousin, and now the podiatrist's wife is Ralph Call's sister.

This picture is one of my favorites! Every one of them have their cheeks puffed out as they blow out all 38 candles on Daddy's cake.

Sick...AGAIN!

We’ve been sick again this week L  We can’t seem to stay well! I was talking to Faylene and we decided it might be a good idea to set off a Lysol bomb in the house!  If only something like that existed!  Anyway- so that’s what we’ve been doing this week- along with helping Jon put a last-minute Science Fair Project together, making homemade laundry soap (I’ll be posting about this on our own blog soon), and Ryder turned eleven months old yesterday!  One more month until he’s ONE!  This past year went by in a flash!!  No picture of the cute little guy though because I couldn’t bring myself to take a picture of his sad little face!  So sad that he’s sick! 

Josh and kids came to visit us this afternoon for a couple hours.  Levi and Ryder took a little bit to warm up to everyone, but it was fun to have some visitors!  We went on a little drive across the London Bridge and then down to the Lake.  The kids had fun putting their feet in the water J  and it was good to get some fresh air!

Tyler left Friday after school for wrestling sectionals, but I’ll let him write about that.  

-Well we had wrestling sectionals a week late after a skin disease broke out in Phoenix.  So we went to Yuma Friday after school and stayed the night in a crazy hotel. It was nice but there were soldiers from all over the world there for desert training. We talked to a guy from Belgium.  As for the wrestling we had our two best wrestlers cruise into the semis where one lost by 1 point in the last seconds of the match and the other just got handled and lost by like 11.  The first one, our 126, recovered and took third. The other, our 170, lost by 2 and didn’t qualify for state- a heartbreaker. He was one of our team captains, a senior and returning state qualifier.  After consoling him I had to take a walk to collect myself as I had tears in my own eyes.  Our 160 who had a lot of potential but only a .500 record placed third. I told him that morning “you are going to surprise a lot of people today” and he did.  Our 195 pounder lost by 1 and took fourth but still qualified. Unfortunately for the second year in a row our heavyweight came up just a little short.  So of the 5 we had in qualifying position 3 qualified.  I was pleased and we will leave this Thursday after school to Prescott Valley for State on Friday and Saturday.   

Well, that’s it for us.  Hope everyone has a good week!

Kay, Mom and Mel--Sunday's not over yet!
For as little as I was home the last two weeks you'd think I'd have something interesting to report. But nope. I had a book fair last week at my library. We went with Usborne this time because they set up, run, and take down...all by themselves. A really nice change from the Scholastic fair but not nearly as exciting! They also are generous with their commission and have great non-fiction. I have been doing some weeding and have removed science books from the 60s and biographies (several of them!) from the 50s. Anyway, the Usborne rep couldn't be at my library for an hour during the sale so I was running it. I had just made change to a mom who only had a 100--so all I had left was a 100 bill and three ones. I ran to check out some books for a mom--making sure I could see the fair the whole time--and forgot, just that one time, to take my cash box (which was on a table around the corner) with me. And yep. You guessed it. When I decided to double check my total against my records a few minutes later, I only had three ones.

[A few of my weeded biographies. I may keep the Theodore Roosevelt one in my office forever more. But Seriously, show my a child (well, besides me 35 years ago) who would want to pick up a single one of those books! :) I now have now added all of the new presidents as well as a new Dolly Madison, Amelia Bloomer, Davy Crockett, John Chapman, and John Coltrane--really, what more could you need! ;) Yes, I am aware I am buying books I want to read myself...One of the perks of being a librarian!]

In other news, Emmy thinks she has found a new apartment for school next year (cue Sunrise, Sunset and Slipping Through My Fingers. :( ) Ken keeps telling me I have to let them grow up. I don't know why!  Daphne's boyfriend decided to move back in with his parents until his mission in two months. So I guess the consolation is I may be losing one daughter but I'm getting another daughter back! And really, the Emmy situation is MUCH better this time. She will be living next to campus (In Old Farm, that name will be familiar to some of you! ;) ). She's moving with good friends into a good ward and will be able to start having some of those great times I told her can happen when you live on your own during college--she sure didn't get those before. When I told her that "I told her so" about the last situation she was seriously stunned. She didn't remember that I warned her!!! Very selective memory! :) Well, I think that might be about it. The kids are getting excited about their play, Jungle Book coming up the first part of next month. 

Oh! And remember crazy Aunt Karen? She died this last week. By the time they found out she had cancer it was in every organ and all through her body. They don't even know where it started. Very sad. She had actually, tragically, started to put her life back together after her stint in jail apparently scared her straight. :( 

I think that's about it! Love you all!

Love you all!

                                                                                                                 

The boring radfords

Well, this week, 2 VERY fun things happened!
Dan and I went on our first date since...I actually think it might have been last Valentines Day??? Hmm, that can't be right, but it just might be. We put the kids to bed and went to get or annual Valentines dinner ofThai food, in Rexburg, and then went to walmart and broulims! :) It was actually a lot of fun. We then went and said hi to our long lost friends that live in Rexburg still, and stayed at their house for a couple hours. It was a great night! Thanks for watching the kiddos Granny Faylene.
The other exciting news is that we started sleep training Sylvie June bug. We put her to bed without being swaddled and without her binky! I was also feeding her in the middle of the night and knew that she didn't actually need it but was now relying on it. So I also cut that out of her routine! It only took her one night and now she is sleeping 13 hours straight! High five!
Not much else happened this week---we are super boring.
My vball team is finally doing better now that we have a good setter.
Dan lost 2 more clients
Stori is adjusting well to granny's house
Sylvie is a rockstar eater/sleeper and turned 6 months on Valentines Day---post on my blog about that soon...
and we are all a big happy family!

P.S. We are all just wondering if it's summer yet??? We had some 50+ degree weather this week that melted most of the snow, and now the wind is blowing the rest of the snow away. I am anxious for some warm weather and tons of family to hang out with!

Stori loves her toy that daddy got her on their date. El Chupacabra

I think she might have curly hair

my heck i love her

Sylvie LOVES stori's punzel. It replaced her binky and helps her sleep 13 hours straight

Dan's dream came true! Stori woke up from her nap and asked to watch Star Wars.

at Original Thai. "I think I'm going to order R2 & D2..." good one SDR

orange is her new favorite color.

hahaha

LOVE HER!

Another holiday down!

I am so relieved to have Valentine's Day over and gone!  I love my job, but those long days  ( over 17 hours on Thurs. and over 11 on Friday  :(  )  are NOT fun!  I didn't even get a day off ......so, even more boring of a week to report on.   Soooo, that is about it?   I am looking forward to some fun trips coming up...... that might give me something to report.

Love you all my dear family!XOXOXO

yes, its me

Yes, I do have time to write on the blog today. :)  We are enjoying our weekend in the sunshine in Vegas.  We enjoyed our Christmas at home and the kids seem to enjoy their gifts.  I think Amanda and I enjoy their gifts on long trips.  Never seen them so quiet as when they are all on their electronic devices.  We came down to Vegas on Thursday and are enjoying a little break from school and winter.  When we get home tomorrow I will be home for 2 days then head to DC for a workshop for Industrial Hygiene.  I am the president elect for the society, so I get all expenses paid trip.  I just found out that they also pay for my parking, taxi and food in the airport.  I'm way excited because I have tours scheduled for the mint, library of Congress and the Capitol.  Amanda is still really enjoying teaching at BYU-I, and we are excited that Grace will be heading our way in fall.  Here are a few pics that catch us up a little.  We do enjoy reading the blog and feel a little guilty that we don't contribute, but not that guilty. :)

 This is what happens when the snow melts really fast.  This is Harwood elementary

 The kids loved putting on shorts and playing at the playground

 sporting their new flip flops in anticipation of summer coming sometime in Idaho

 Church in Las Vegas

 my hot wife and son

"the boys"

our kitchen floor

 

 living room and family room

 office

 the kids got a ride back from the farm from uncle Ken

Another of Amanda's great bday cakes for my adorable 6 year old

Hi!

I guess there's a very good reason for writing on Sundays... It's the only day I have time! I have just a second and I told Mom I'd write today (Hi Mom!) but I have a RS meeting in 9 minutes! So I gotta go! I WILL write on Sunday (promise, Mom!) :)
Love you all!

Go Team USA!!

It was a pretty normal week for us so there’s not much to report.  We are excited for the Olympics and enjoy watching all of the events as a family.  Tyler was supposed to go to Wrestling Sectionals this weekend, but one or more of the teams (not ours!!) that were supposed to go had some kind of a skin disease going around so they had to postpone it.  Taylor had a test in band playing the trumpet and got 100%!  He was pretty proud and we were pretty proud of him too!

I’ve been trying to get all the pictures and happenings from summer finally posted on our family blog, and it’s been fun to look back and remember what a fun time it was J  Looking forward to visiting Idaho again in a few months!

Lewisville Radfords

We are almost completely settled into Mom's house! The only thing left to sort and put away is food.... No place to put all the cereal and dry ingredients. It's kind of fun to have a full fridge at mom's house for once though! :)
Despite what Mom says, Dan actually loves living here! He thinks Mom is one of his favorite people and has told me that many times! (and says she's the best cook he knows.... he must have forgoton about me when he said that ;) ).
Last Friday Dan and I had to return some things to our old apartment and when we turned on the road to go there Stori got soooo excited and said, "WE'RE GOING TO STORI'S HOUSE!" I had to remind her that another family get's to live there now but she just cried when Dan ran the things up to the apartment. She was fine once we were out of sight, but it still broke my heart a little. We took her over to the Craze to let her play for about 2 hours and she loved it. She made a good little friend that took her around the big tunnels and jump in the bouncy house with. She also informed me that her name is now Elsa. She told the girl that that was her name after the girl couldn't understand Stori telling her that her name is"Astoria Rose Radford." I'd rather be Anna, but whatever.

I will never stop loving the picture on the bottom right! Hahahhahaha Oh Dan! 

One of my favorite things about living at Mom's house is doing dishes with a window to look out of! Especially looking out at Mom's perfect back yard. Sounds silly, but it's fun. I also love a lot of things about living here, but that was something fun I noticed this last week.

I guess I should put on here for the record that Dan got into the U of I for Law School. I know you guys already know, but it's fun to write again! :)

Well, that's about all for today. I have an extremely boring life compared to all of your adventures! :)
Love you all!

P.S. Stori absolutely LOVES "Sunday  Church Day." on Saturday we were singing the "Saturday is a special day...." song and after we sang the line about shining our shoes, Stori improvised and said... "And we clean up our guns, so we don't have to work until Monday." hahaha that girl is a hoot. I made sure to make fun of SDR and then we had a good laugh. Being a mom so rocks!

Goodbye to the last traces of Christmas

Well, I finally put away the rest of the nativities and took down the Christmas cards!  :)  I have actually enjoyed the little glimpses of  that long ago holiday hidden away in my hutch.  Time to move on.

This next week at the Caramel Tree is going to be busy.  We already filled an order for thirty Valentine baskets on Friday.  Also, a five hundred dollar order for a shop in Salmon to resell.  Keeps us hopping!

It has been nice having the Radfords at my house...  almost like having my own chef.  :)  I have a sneaking feeling that Dan isn't enjoying it quite so much.....  one more female to boss him around.  I'm really looking forward to this summer when even more of my family will be here.

Love to all!  Hope everyone has a happy and healthy week!   XOXOXO

Oregon Snow

            It finally snowed in Oregon! The snow started off on Tuesday around lunch time. then it was mostly melted by Wednesday. On Thursday we got a call at 6:30 in the morning saying school was cancelled because of a big winter storm that was suppose to happen. It turns out it didn't start snowing until around 4 in the afternoon, but we had a fun day of making cookies and watching movies. This was Thursday:

 On Thursday it did end up snowing, and it didn't stop snowing for almost 3 days! We had another snow day on Friday. We went over to the Nelsons house where we tied a bunch of sleds up to a four wheeler and Kabota and drove around the farm in them. It was so much fun even though none of us could feel our fingers and toes for awhile afterwards. It snowed all day the whole time we were there. On Saturday, it stopped snowing and we started getting freezing rain. We went over to the Nelsons for another day of sledding. My dad also made the call to cancel church because some of the members were snowed into their houses and the roads were too dangerous to drive on. This morning the snow has started melting and the temperature keeps going up. We are hoping for at least one more snow day tomorrow, but it might be gone by then. Either way we still had lots of fun enjoying our foot of snow for our 4-day weekend.

                                                                                                        Wednesday:

Thursday Afternoon/Night:                                                                                            

Friday/Saturday:                                                                                     

Sunday:

Love, The Durst Family