Emma Jayne

Emma got her bottom braces on this morning. She chose light blue bands for top and bottom to match her Halloween costume that she doesn't have yet. (In her head, she's going to be Laura Ingalls Wilder and she'll be wearing a blue dress...not sure how that's all going to happen yet.)
Emma's class has regular visits from the school's "DARE" officer who talks about not doing drugs. We asked her what she learned this week and she said they talked about the dangers of "Tabasco." (I asked her if it was OK to use Chalula.) She said that they talked about another bad drug but she couldn't remember the right name for it, so she said, "I don't know the name of it, but it's weed."
She is so naive and innocent and we love it.

River Rock Triathlon

Lauren completed the River Rock youth triathlon yesterday! It was held about 3 miles from where we live, out in a new subdivision where no homes have been built yet, but lots are being sold. She swam 75 yards (in a man-made little lake), biked 1.5 miles and ran/walked 1 mile. The event wasn't timed, and each age group was divided up, so she was in the 8-9 year old category. She had a smile on her face the whole time, and finished in 33 minutes. The announcer guy interviewed her after she crossed the finish line and asked her how she liked the triathlon, she said, "it was so fun!"

Each participant received a "goodie bag" with a yellow swim cap (so the adult volunteers in the water can easily spot the swimmers), a T-shirt, Gatorade and other fun stuff. The water was only 2-4 feet deep, but 99% of the kids brought their own life jackets. There were 160 kid participants, but they only let 10 kids at a time cross the lake.

After Lauren reached the other side of the lake, I grabbed her hand and helped her get on her shoes and socks, her shirt and shorts and bike helmet for the bike ride.

After the bike ride, she walked her bike over to Dad who then put it back in the truck while she took off running for the last part of the race, which was the mile run. She loved the drink stations along the route. The volunteers told the kids to grab a drink and throw the cup on the ground when they were done. Lauren loved that part. She said she made sure to grab a drink at every drink station.

She walked for part of the mile, but ran across the finish line. She was so happy and we were so proud of her. You may notice from the pictures...it was a windy day, but still warm, about 80 degrees. I took some video of the event, but it's pretty raw. You may have to watch it a few times to see where Lauren is. I didn't have time or energy to combine the videos into something cool, so just take it for what it is.

Emma's School Picture

Emma had the bands on her braces changed the morning of her school picture. You may not be able to tell, but her bands match her shirt (blue). Funny kid.

Fun Day

We had fun today! We drove about 60 miles north to a town called Spencer. It has 2 working opal mines. We were able to get a few rocks with traces of opal in them as "free samples." After seeing some opals, we went to Stoddard Creek campground and had a picnic.

This is Spencer, Idaho. There's a gas station, a cafe and a couple of gift stores that sell opal rocks and jewelry. If we had worn close-toed shoes, we could have pounded on rocks and looked for opal traces in a big rock pile. We all had flip flops or sandals on, so no pounding today.

We had a very simple picnic today--ham sandwiches, Doritoes, green olives and diet Pepsi, plus candy corn and Hershey's miniatures in the truck. The video shows Lauren eating a green olive for a dollar. We couldn't convince Emma to eat one no matter how much we offered her. (Fear Factor--LeFevre style.)

Crazy Day!

So this morning I got ready to start my official 2nd day of work and Emma started throwing up. I kept her home and set her up with a movie and a bed on the couch. I went to Kennedy to try to help out for an hour or so, but when I called to check on Emma she had thrown up again. I went home right away and Emma kept throwing up. By the time I put her to bed she had a fever and complained about her knees and ankles hurting. If she's still sick tomorrow, I'll take her to the doctor. The school district has gotten me a little freaked out about the swine flu.

Lauren started a rock climbing class today sponsored by the city of Rexburg. They just let the kids climb around on the climbing wall and no one taught them anything. It seems like a huge waste of time and money, but Lauren loved it, so I guess I'll keep my mouth shut until the end of the class. (Then I'll give them my official "evaluation".)

I was in charge of a big enrichment activity tonight, but because Landon had class from 5:00 to 8:00 and Emma was sick, I bailed on my responsibilities. I hate doing that, but I had to.

The best thing that happened tonight was my friend Heidi brought me over a huge bag of produce from her garden! We got pear tomatoes, carrots, squash, zucchini, green onions, and radishes. I'm so excited to start eating it.

In case anyone is following our attempts to eat at home, we are detoxing from fast food. Landon and I are experiencing withdrawal symptoms and have been craving burgers, pizza, fries, Arbys, and everything else. We feel pretty pathetic and embarrassed about how addicted we are. Just the same, I'm looking forward to Saturday...Free Day.

New Job

I have a new job! I was hired to work at Kennedy (Landon's school) as an aide in one of the 4th grade classrooms. There are 32 kids in each of the two classes, so the principal is able to hire 2 classroom aides. I'll get to work with Mr. Bowman, Emma's 4th grade teacher and a friend of ours. (We gave our cat to him!) I'll be working 4.5 hours a day, 4 days a week...leaving after the girls go to school and home before they get back. The pay is a whopping $8.86 per hour, but a guaranteed 4 days a week so I'll probably average more than I do as a substitute.
Subbing was not really clicking for me this year, so I couldn't be happier. The principal hired me before even reviewing the other 20+ applicants, so it was kind of nice that both he and the other teachers wanted me to work with them.
We went to a 4th ward reunion/dinner tonight (that was the ward we were in when we lived in the dorm), so the Taco Soup I made in the crockpot today didn't get eaten. We canned it and ended up with 4 full quarts of Taco Soup for future use. Can I just mention how much I love our pressure cooker? It's been so much fun.

Dinner Menu

It's not a secret that our family struggles with regular homecooked meals. We eat out a lot because we're lazy and we think of it as a fun family activity. Well, we've come up with a new plan to see if we can reduce our "eating out" expense. We made a month-long menu with a "theme" for every night of the week. Our themes include Mexican, beef, Italian, poor people food, casserole, breakfast, soup, chicken, pork, and Idaho night. Saturdays are leftovers/eat out night. We came up with simple, cheap food for each night of the week. We're going to shop once a week for the food we need that week and see how it all works out. Maybe if it's successful, we'll try to incorporate healthy eating in the future. Baby steps.
We started this today, even though the menu shows meals listed since September 3rd. We created a complete month's worth of meals so we can just use the same menu for October.

*If you want a readable copy of the menu, email me and I'll send you one!

Our School Routine

No fun pictures, but I felt like I needed to make a current blog post.
Now that school has been in session for a few weeks, we're into our new routines. It's been busy and every day is a little different. When I sub, it can get complicated because the girls each go to school at different times. Emma's school starts at 9:00am and Lauren's school starts at 8:15am, so of course they get out at different times too. Sometimes Landon has to take Emma with him at 7:30am and she'll catch the middle school bus at his school, if I have to sub for an elementary school job that starts early (because I won't be at home when she has to leave in the morning). Other times, Landon has to leave school right when the kids leave so he can hurry home and be there when Lauren gets home and take her back to his school to work until I am done with a later sub job. It's not ideal, but we figure we can all work together so that I have a job that allows me to be at home when the girls aren't in school. Somehow over the years we've always been able to figure out creative ways to make ends meet so Mom's home when the girls are.
I subbed 3 of the 4 days this week. Tuesday I subbed for the computer teacher at the Middle School. It was pretty awful. 7th graders are complete asses! One kid unplugged several monitors on his way out of the room and I didn't figure it out for 2 hours. I thought there was something wrong with those computers so I had to move kids all over the room so everyone had access to one. Another kid was acting out so bad that I finally asked him if he forgot to take his medication that day (probably not a legal question for a real teacher to ask). I'd take a room full of 1st graders over 7th graders any day. Wednesday was also pretty bad. I had a classroom of 4th graders at Burton (Lauren's school) and I ended up sending one to the principal's office. Thursday I had the same class of 4th graders, but came armed with candy for the good kids. All of a sudden I had a classroom of good kids. I'll never attempt a sub job without a bagful of candy again.
Lauren gets home around 2:40pm everyday, never has homework and just plays outside with the neighbor kids everyday after school. Emma gets home around 4:00pm every day and always has plenty of homework. We make the kids get in bed by 7:30pm every night, so there's not a lot of time for extra events during the week.
Landon has a class in Idaho Falls every Monday, 7:00-10:00pm, and in Rexburg every Thursday, 5:00-8:00pm. Thankfully, next semester he begins his internship and will be all done with regular classes. He's really looking forward to that.

Ugly Toad Story

Today I taught Relief Society because it was my turn. The lesson was on not being so hard on ourselves and trying not to be discouraged or depressed about life. I started the lesson by reading a story Kristen wrote about the two of us when she was 13 and I was 21, about to leave for my mission. I've held onto this story for all these years because it is so funny, so cute and it still makes me feel good when I read it. The ladies LOVED IT! Everyone laughed out loud and I was able to get the lesson started off with everyone's full attention.
I also passed around a picture of myself at age 14 to remind the ladies of how insecure and crappy we all felt about ourselves at that age, and to ask if we are any more positive about our self-esteems now, than when we were 12-14. (I'm still pretty hard on myself, as are most women--no surprise.)
Anyway, it turned out to be a good lesson (there were serious parts of the lesson too, it wasn't just me being a comedian) and I wanted to share the story and the hideous picture of myself. Everyone got a good laugh and I enjoyed revisiting the "girl mullet" of my youth.

Erin, age 14, 1985

Punch/Candy Sale

Yesterday the girls invited over 2 friends who happen to be sisters and they held a candy and fruit punch sale. Being a holiday weekend, it was kind of dead in the Meadows neighborhood, but they stayed with it for about 3 hours. They earned about $5.00 (I had $5.00 invested with punch and candy from the dollar store, but who's counting?). They split it 4 ways and walked away with $1.25 each, 2 bottles of juice and several suckers. Poor Emma couldn't eat the suckers because of her braces, but that's life.
As a side note, yesterday we also went to Idaho Falls for a little shopping and dinner at Cafe Rio. Landon and I renamed Emma and Lauren "crybaby" and "grumpy," respectively. Somedays I wish they were a little more fun and a little less obnoxious when we go to Idaho Falls.

Son of a ...

So today I rolled a stop sign and got pulled over by a Rexburg police officer. I deserved a ticket, but I was lucky and just got a warning. This cop followed me all the way to the Dollar Store, then took off. (I hit every light, because I went just under the speed limit.) 20 minutes later, I stopped at Taco Bell to take Landon some lunch at school and guess who ended up right behind me? Yep, the same cop.
I've been driving 22 years and I haven't gotten a ticket, but obviously I've just been really lucky.