March Madness

 March was a randomly busy month this year.  It included spring break, plus a quick trip to Houston for one of Jake's builder 20 meetings. Now I've been to Houston and I don't need to go back.  Not my favorite place.  Our hotel was kind of in a random location and I was stuck in like a 4 block area the whole time.  There wasn't even a place to run, which has never happened before.  So two thumbs down for Houston.  Although, it was still really nice to get away with Jake.  I'm never going to complain about that part.

While we were in Houston, Zack participated in a state 3D printing competition.  He worked with a partner and their test was to print something that would help solve a problem.  His partner works in retail and says he frequently watches ladies did through their wallets to try to find the right credit card.  So they decided to print a wallet that would make your cards easier to see.  They worked for a couple of days straight to get it printed, and then headed to the competition.  They ended up getting first place and they get to go to nationals in Atlanta in June!  He's really excited and I think loved competing in something that he's so good at.  I'm so grateful for the engineering program our high school has.  Zack's learned so many great skills.  So much so that he's currently working as an intern for an engineering company in Heber.  They need him full time through the summer and are going to let him work remotely at Utah State.  Yay!    

This post has a lot about Zack in it, because now I have to talk about his latest Jeep project.  I have a love/hate relationship with that thing.  I love that he's done so much work himself and thus learned a lot of great lessons.  I hate how much time everything takes that he does and I hate watching him kill himself to try to get things done.  And as smart as he is, he's still a high school boy who makes not great decisions sometimes.  One of those not great decisions is when he decided to paint his Jeep.  Yep, the whole thing.  It started out with Jake telling him he needed to fix the rust spots before they got a lot worse.  Jake was thinking he would lightly sand and then touch up all the spots.  He went back in to check on Zack and there were multiple spots sanded all the way down to the metal.  Guess we're painting the whole Jeep.  This involved hours of work over like 10 days.  Hours.  Lots of late nights.  Lots of weekends.  I know for sure that halfway through Zack was feeling like he'd bitten off more than he could chew.  We got to a couple of days before we were supposed to go to St George to do some jeeping, which Zack really wanted to do, and it didn't look like he was going to make it.  He ended up coming a day after us so that he could stay home and finish.  I was so nervous to see what it looked like.  I mean, a lot of things can go wrong when you paint a car.  But it actually looks pretty good!  Phew.  Were there any lessons learned with all of this?  I'm not sure.  Pretty sure there are more big projects in the future.  But I guess he did learn to paint a car, so I guess that's something.

I went to a Van Gogh thing in SLC with some friends.  It was pretty cool and fun to do something different.

His paintings surrounded you.

One day Jake found a pizza dough recipe and made an excellent margherita pizza.  It was delicious so I'm happy to turn all future pizza making over to him.

Zack asked a girl to prom.  She said no.  And didn't give the candy bars back.  No I didn't egg her house.  Yet.

Mud season means cleaning all the mud off the equipment.  Good times.

Zack in the middle of his eternal project.

The wallet they printed.

A smile!

Spring Break

 For spring break we headed to St George.  Our break this year was earlier than almost everyone in Utah.  Some people hated it, but we loved it.  Usually St George is insanely crowded over spring break.  Not a place you want to be.  This year it was the least crowded I've ever seen it.  So much better.

We've been to St George a lot, but this is the first time we went jeeping down there.  We had so much fun!  The jeeping is a lot different than Moab.  We got to experience our first time driving in sand dunes.  I was equal parts happy and terrified on the sand.  Jake made me drive for a good portion of one trail.  I went over some scary things!  I may or may not have shut my eyes a few times.  Zack loved having his Jeep and continues to be a great driver.  We were there with the Mackays again.  They're great Jeep friends.

Greg came with us on one of the trails.

Greg climbs all over the place.  

This picture does not do justice to how tight this was.  We had to put the mirrors in.  Also, I'm driving here.  With my eyes shut.

Sage and Volleyball

 This started out as a February post, but then I realized the only thing to document besides Moab was Sage playing volleyball.  Sage decided to pick up a new sport and chose volleyball.  My favorite sport, so I'm ok with it.  She's constantly hitting the volleyball inside.  Not annoying at all.  But it's fun to have someone to hit the volleyball with.  Outside that is.  We experienced our first sports tournament.  I know, we can't complain since it was our first one.  But it was all day, and it was long.  Sage had a lot of fun though, and we enjoyed watching her play.  

Moab Jeeping

 We took a last second trip to Moab over President's Day.  Our friends were going to be down there, so we decided to tag along.  Especially because our friend Kyle is an expert Jeeper and can get you through lots of crazy obstacles.  Zack's been wanting to take his Jeep out, so he was excited to go.  We ended up loading the Jeeps on the trailer and driving the new truck down.  So nice and comfy!

We had a great time.  One advantage to having Zack's Jeep is that we didn't all have to fit in one car.  So much better.  We did three trails: Fins 'n Things, Top of the World, and Kokapele (I think).  Zack did a great job, and so did his Jeep.  None of us were sure if it would survive these trails.  There were many times Jake would look back, see Zack right there, and be amazed at his driving.  A proud dad moment for sure.  

Since this trip it seems like Zack's caught the Jeep bug even more.  He's been spending all of his spare time putting a new radio in so that he doesn't have to listen to whatever station he can get.  And also essentially repainting the Jeep.  Started out as just fixing some rust spots.  Turned in to much more than that.  But I've learned that this is how all Jeep projects are, so Zack is right on track.  

Here are a million pics:

Driving onto a narrow trailer when you can't see anything look terrifying.  

The first day we had a group of 9 Jeeps.  You can see some of them along the top.  Also, you can't tell in this pic but you're driving up a spine and it drops off on both sides.  Kate is terrified of edges.  She had her eyes shut and was almost crying.

This looks way less scary in a picture.  I frequently closed my eyes so I didn't have to watch my kids die.

It's not a Jeep trip if you don't look like this at some point.  

Moab is so beautiful

Jake and I asked Zack to take a pic of us.  Good thing you can't even tell that's us.

The view from Top of the World

Coolest pic of the whole trip.

Our friends rented a house.  Let's just say there wasn't much water left in the hot tub when they got out.

We did a Jeep trail before heading home on Monday.  If you know Jake, you know this is a miracle.  When it's time to go home he's always up and out first thing.  

Sage drove the last mile on a dirt road.  She was very excited.

January Happenings

 I know, we're already in March.  Maybe someday I'll catch up.

January was a pretty busy month.  I already covered going to Washington to hang with Mel, and our Beaver Creek trip.  The biggest highlight, other than those things, was when family came up to go tubing at Soldier Hollow.  Dad and Kathy made the tubing possible.  The Johnson's joined us for that.  Then we got together with most of the rest of the family after for yummy food.  Tubing was great fun and somewhat terrifying.  It's so fast I always feel like I'm going to die.  Especially when you turn around backwards.  And then if you hit a bump, watch out!  It was super sunny and warm, so we all took our coats off and enjoyed the sun.  It was great fun!

We started out the month with a youth program with all of the parents.  The first program like this I've ever been in charge of.  The youth did everything and they did a great job!

The boys in our ward that are Zack's age.  They've been together since elementary school and they're all graduating this year!

The office is slowly coming along.  Not nearly fast enough for Jake.  He's ready to move in!

It's hard to tell, but April got sprayed in the face with a ton of snow.  She was dripping wet!

Taking a break and enjoying the sun.

The kids did some karaoke.  As you can see, they were very into it.

Sage is taking a sewing class and loving it!  She made me this bag all by herself.  I use it every week at church!

Beaver Creek Skiing!

 We made it to Colorado to ski!  And I think it was our best ski trip yet.  We've skied at Beaver Creek before, and it's one of our favorites.  If you're looking for extreme skiing then you'd probably like other resorts better.  But this is a great resort for families, with a big variety of terrain.  Also, this year we skied at Beaver Creek every day, which was really nice.  In the past we've gone to another resort on one of the days, and somehow it just never worked great.  So it was nice to not have to deal with the stress of getting to, and figuring out, another resort.  We also stayed in a different hotel this year.  This hotel was right at the base of the resort, so we were by all of the restaurants and shops.  That was super nice.  We didn't drive our car once after we got there.

On our first day of skiing we put Sage in lessons.  She was so mad and insisted she didn't want lessons and would hate them.  The first thing she said at the end of the day..."Can I do lessons tomorrow?"  That girl.  But so glad she had a great experience.  We ended up putting her in lessons the next day, along with Kate.  Unfortunately, Kate didn't have such a great experience.  But we now call Sage the bullet when we ski because she goes so fast, so that was a definite win.

The first day we were there it snowed all day, so we got to ski in powder.  Jake and Zack made us go on blacks all day.  My legs were beyond exhausted by the end of the day, but for once I actually enjoyed skiing blacks.  The other two days were blue sky and amazing groomers.  Best of both worlds for sure.  I love a good groomer.  

Anyway, we skied our guts out, and enjoyed just getting away from everything.  Another win for the trip was that the roads were clear for our drive.  So amazing.  That drive is treacherous in the snow.  Definitely an epic ski trip!!

Why am I sitting in the back?  Because I can't even handle my kids fighting in the back seat.  So, so sick of it.

When you skied hard all day.

My favorite thing to do is the glow worm.  We were all so exhausted I had to beg everyone to do it.  But you ski down the bunny hill with glow sticks in the dark.  It looks like a glow worm coming down the hill.  So fun!

The candy cabin is a tradition.  Obviously it was a very sunny day.  Oh yeah, we watched a kid from ski school loading his pockets with candy.  I gave him the evil eye.

Warm cookies at the base every day at 3:00