Great Scriptural Resource

Our Sunday School teacher pointed me to a fantastic resource for studying the scriptures:

http://scripturalindex.byu.edu

For any scripture in any of the standard works, it will give you a list of talks that reference that particular passage. In addition, there is a topical index for the Journal of Discourses as well as other search capabilities.

Overheard...

Jenna- outside yesterday (imagine singing) "Grow, grow, grow" sung to the plants outside.

Spencer- "I just couldn't suck anything in!" When referring to the fact that he couldn't remember his new bo staff form.

Jenna- "Chicka-de-de-de" to the chickadees and "Cheer, Cheer, Cheer" to the cardinals. She was trying to talk to them in their language since they don't understand English. Apparently she was trying to tell them "Please be quiet because I am trying to listen for my bus." We have our own little Dr. Doolittle I guess.

Organization at last!

I had some requests for photos of my new organization system- so here are some photos of my already full shelves. I love them already!

This is the one in the office and it has replaced 2 other bookshelves and more!

And yes, I am in need of a small step ladder to access those stamps and paper but since I don't have a lot of time to do that right now I can live with a little inconvenience.

And this is the one in the closet.
There is actually another column of shelves to the right
but I couldn't get it in the shot now that the doors are back on. :)

Promotion, Promotion, Promotion (almost)

We had a fun last Friday. Not as much fun as if Rick and Sherry would have been here but...

I tried to record some of the night to share with y'all.

Spencer went from a Purple Stripe to a Red Belt and Jenna went from a Green Stripe to a Blue Belt. And Nate went from a Green Stripe to a temporary Blue Belt- he won't be a full Blue Belt until he is given medical clearance to spar again. So Jenna is technically ahead of him- a fact that she is VERY pleased about.

Here is a shot of Nate doing the Required form for all adults. After he went it occurred to me that shooting video would be easier that trying to get a successful action photo.



Here I got Nate and Jenna doing their form. Sorry no sound on my camera.

Here is Spencer doing his Purple Stripe form.
The forms all have formal names but I don't remember what they are nor how to spell them.
I didn't get all of the form - I missed the first part because the camera gal (me) is still a novice.

Here are a few other photos:






Here they are
waiting their turn to be called up to receive their new belts.


































And here are the three of them wearing their new belts.
They are all very excited to go to class now and learn their new forms - Spencer gets to use weapons again and he is very excited about that.

Spring Cleaning

Well, even though it doesn't look like spring here, we have been doing a lot of cleaning around.

I have not had a good storage system for extra school supplies and all of my crafts and for the office. So we have attacked all three at one time.

Awhile back Callie asked for disaster photos of family rooms. I thought I would include a shot of some of the stuff we took out of a large closet.

The storage areas are strange in this house and the room we use as an office doesn't have a closet. Instead the closet is in the adjacent bathroom. Here is what the closet looked like empty.
I was feeling inspired by the IKEA shelves that Regan put into her closet. I bought the same size she has for my office and the larger one for this closet. The shelves only took about 30min for Nate to assemble. (He already had experience assembling the smaller shelves.)



AAK! While we measured that they would fit into the closet we didn't think about the smaller opening.

Sooo, 1 1/2 hours later...after the removal of 3 doors, a set of hinges and a piece of wood facing in the closet... Here is Nate doing his best Tim the Toolman Taylor with the shelves inside the closet.


Regan, these shelves may not come with us if we move either. But I LOVE them!

In case you are curious- I have already filled ALL of the shelves and am already enjoying the ability to access all of my stuff. We are almost done with the office cleaning so I will update you on that progress soon.

New website about Jesus Christ

I had heard about the new website that our church has put together that focuses on Jesus Christ, but I just visited the site recently. It is wonderful!

I would encourage everyone to visit it. They have wonderful articles, photos, testimonies and even videos! Whether for personal study, for family home evenings, or as a site to refer friends to - I'd recommend it for everyone.

Another first...

I forgot that this weekend will also hold a new first for my kids. They will be able to sustain a new prophet! They have only known Pres. Hinckley and yet they are very aware that Pres. Thomas S. Monson is now the prophet.


I love listening to conference and it is nice that we have the opportunity to watch it on our satellite on BYUTV or on the internet.

I was sent this conference activity packet from a friend. I tried to figure out using Google who had created it originally but I was not successful. It looks a lot like something that Regan could put together. I wasn't sure how to upload a PDF to my blog but here is a link to someone who did figure it out.

Some firsts!

Well we have been having some fun around here! And since it is the first of April I thought I would share a few of the firsts that we have enjoyed recently.

Nate and I enjoyed our first Roller Derby game! No, I am not pulling an April Fool's trick. It was a lot of fun! We were cheering on my sister-in-law's sister who is on the Atomic Bombshells.

Here is Jill and Lindsay with the Atomic Bombshell's mascot!

Another first was that for the half time intermission there was a polka band playing- so Nate danced his first polka dance!

(Note: other photos will be coming soon)

Another fun fact is that Nate and I actually managed to go on a date 2 weekends in a row! Our second date was an evening enjoying a MN Wild hockey game. In the state of MN (AKA the state of hockey) there is nothing so good as a fight on the ice and we got to witness a nice one and the Wild won, which of course was also a good thing.


This was Nate's first hockey game and both of us could use a refresher on the rules but it was a lot of fun.







I am the new owner of my own laptop! Yeah! Nate's old one is dying and since the monitor doesn't work anymore it really doesn't work well as a laptop- so that is one of my first for this post- my own computer. We got a good deal on the dell factory outlet on a refurbished machine. Nate isn't going to be too tempted by it since it is flamingo pink! I did have to load some games on it though so it can occasionally be used for gaming nights but that is a small burden to bear.

And what is the deal with it being April 1st and this is the view outside right now. A lot of snow.


It will be gone by the end of the week (a lot of it is already melting- so we need to be careful walking under the trees because when if falls it is really wet!) but I guess I should be used to snow at this time of year. There was often snow during General Conference weekend while we were living in Utah.

But this was the perfect time for Spencer to learn to use the snowblower. (It was his idea!) He did a great job although I had to help get started a few times at the end of the driveway- he didn't have enough weight and traction to get moving.

So here he is using the snowblower for the first and hopefully last time this month!

Yes, yes, I did realize that he is not wearing proper winter gear. No hat, no mittens etc. hey, at least he had boots on. I wasn't a great example I was out there helping him with no hat, no mittens and bare feet in my slip-on shoes. But it was about 30 degrees out there! We must be Minnesotans!

Other firsts that will be happening are Rick and Sherry will be here visiting us briefly next weekend. And Jenna is expected to pass up her dad in Karate- she should be on track to get her blue belt next week. She is really excited for both events!