Braces

Yes, it is hard to believe he is old enough to already have these on. Back in my day, you didn't see the orthodontist until all of your permanent teeth were in and were a mangled mess. Then you would get your braces on and wait for years until your teeth became untangled. That is old school. Now they prefer to do it in phases.

In Taylor's case, where his teeth are going to be mangled to the max, he will wear braces for about a year to make room for the rest of his permanent teeth to come in. Then the braces come off for a year or two and are replaced by a retainer. When everything is in he will get braces again to finish the straightening. This will reduce the amount of time he will need them, especially when he gets older and wants them off.

He was so excited to get them and he loves showing them off! Well what ten year old wouldn't right?

Finished!

And a month early at that!






And now I will officially announce that I am retiring from cross-stitching for the rest of my life. I'm done.

How good can syrup be?

While I was up at girl's camp I overheard one of the leaders excitedly saying that one of the other leaders brought up her syrup. Syrup? Syrup is good but how good can it be to drag it up to camp? I found out. We had it on french toast and on crepes. I was practically licking it off my plate. I have since made it at home just to see if it really was that good or if it was the sleep deprivation that was messing with my taste buds. It really was as good as I remember. You know how eating muffins is just a sneaky way to eat cake for breakfast? This so-called syrup is really like caramel sauce. But you can't have caramel sauce for breakfast without feeling guilty, so we call it syrup.

So if you are looking at making something special on a Sunday morning, give this a try. I promise you won't regret it.

Buttermilk Syrup

1 cube butter
1 1/2 c. sugar
1 c. Buttermilk
dash of salt

Combine and boil for 1 minute. Watch carefully so it doesn't boil over. Remove from heat.

Whisk in
1 t. vanilla flavoring
1 t. maple flavoring
1 t. baking soda

When you add the baking soda, the amount of syrup triples so watch it carefully.

Great Quiet Activity

Now that Scott has to sit on the stand during sacrament, it is up to me to try and keep 4 boys relatively quiet and still for 65 minutes. That is impossible. I find myself hauling out Owen and Chase between 35-40 minutes after the meeting starts. That is my limit.

The other day I was thinking that maybe I need to update my diaper bag with new toys that will hopefully keep them occupied and quiet a little bit longer. I then remembered years ago seeing a kid using flannel board Gospel figures on the back of the pew that was right in front of him. They stick to the fabric that covers the pew and there is a fair amount of surface area for a lot of figures. Genius I tell ya.

So I start looking around on the internet for these figures. I found some for $15 a story. No way am I paying that amount. I will figure out how to do them myself. After a few more minutes looking I found 2 blogs that tell you how to make them and they have the figures that you can download too. Isn't the internet wonderful?

So I went to Walmart, spent about $10 and now I have enough stuff to make 6 stories. Genius I tell ya. I took some to church today and Chase was quite entertained hanging them up. I got a whole 8 more minutes out of him! Plus as an extra bonus I can use them for FHE.

Here are the 3 that I have done so far.





And here are the links to make them. Have fun!

http://chocolateonmycranium.blogspot.com/2007/11/flannel-board-stories.html

http://alittleofthis---alittleofthat.blogspot.com/2010/01/felt-figure-fun.html

July

Can I just say Wow! July was crazy! I don't think I could have fit anything more in if I tried.

Week 1: Camping at Ponderosa Pines with the family for Chasey's birthday. Little sleep, lots o' dirt. Really what more could you ask for except for someone falling into the creek.



Wait! That happened too, except it was Scott instead of one of the youngsters. Those rocks can be pretty slippery!



Week 2: Girl's Camp
Yep, I had the ummm great opportunity to attend girl's camp this year. Honestly I was not looking forward to it. Camping...bad...giggly girls...bad...no sleep...bad bad. But I survived with earplugs and a plethora of sleeping agents available to me. Our Ward has a tradition of doing a gangster walk after testimony meeting. Say what? So they invited me to do my "gangster walk" down their catwalk lined with all the YW by chanting my name relentlessly until I did. I am proud to announce that I have been labeled the whitest girl at camp. Thank you very much.

Week 3: Camping with the Larsens
The following weekend we took off down to Fremont to do a little camping and Razoring with my parents. I have labeled it the dirtiest, but fun camping trip ever! See pictures in previous post!

Week 4: Camping with the Kimballs
And just to make sure that I get my camping fix for the month, we went camping again with Scott's side of the family. Have I told you how much I adore camping? Thanks to Aunt Linda, queen of all things cub scouts, the boys were entertained by

making bracelets and boondoggles



using marshmallow shooters and making rockets



performing skits that included props



building an enormous sand city with the cousins



and just hanging out with the family.



I found a slightly less dirty spot, stitched away and watched the entertainment. All of this within a 24 hour period.

Week 5: Hiking to Stewart Falls.
Scott and I loaded up the boys on Saturday morning, took them up to Sundance and hiked up to Stewart Falls. The weather was still cool, the waterfall pretty and the hike was just the right distance for little kids.



Welcome August. I predict it will be just as busy with slightly less camping....I hope.