Grandma and Grandpa O

We had the opportunity to go to my parents house in Perry, UT a couple of times this summer for various reasons. First, in June we went up so that I could take the Praxis test in Logan in order to get my Utah teaching license. I passed the test with flying colors and we also got to spend the week hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa. We spent most of the time at the house just relaxing in the yard or playing in the house but we did make it out for a round of mini golf. Both Haylie and Zander used some pretty interesting tactics to get the ball in the hole. Mostly they just kind of pushed the ball along until it got close to the hole then they would tap it in or in Zander's case pick it up and put it in the hole. They loved any hole that involved the ball going through a tunnel to get to another part of the hole and had to try it over and over.

Dave and I celebrated our 11th anniversary on June 30 so we decided to head through the canyon again to celebrate. We decided on going up to Perry again because there would be free babysitting for a date and then we could stay and celebrate Independence Day in Perry. We got to watch fireworks on Saturday night then on Monday morning we went down to the parade. Perry was having its 100th birthday so there were all sorts of things to do in the park after the parade, including face painting.

Last, we went up last weekend for the annual Oberholtzer Family Reunion. This year is was combined with a Demar and Virginia Hillyard Family reunion at Willard Bay. It was fun to see some of my cousins that I haven't seen in years. We were all meeting at the beach of the bay and as I was looking around and total strangers and wondering if they were my cousins. The reunion also included my younger brother Ryan blessing his new baby girl Xanthe. It is always great to get together with my family. We always have lots of laughs and make lots of great memories. It is just too bad that we don't live closer to Dave's family so that the kids can make more memories with them.

Mother/daughter campout

Dave and Zander when with other members of the ward for the annual Father/son campout. Haylie was feeling a little left out so we decide to have a little "campout" of our own. Haylie LOVES pretend play so she was super excited about it. We decided to really rough it and go out to dinner, then we stopped at Wal-mart to get all the supplies we would need--s'more makings and orange and yellow glow sticks to make our fire glow. We came home and cut some fun foam in the shape of flames and then used our glow sticks to "light"our fire. Then we made our s'mores by heating them in the microwave and them ate them around the fire. We watched a movie and then got ready for bed and climbed into the tent Haylie made under her bed. You can see she has a slide bed in the background. She hung blankets around it to make the tent. It was a fun night, even if we both ended up in my bed by the end of the night!

Late Easter

I am getting ready to start another edition of my blog book and I am realizing that I have kind of slacked over the past several months. so in an effort to document our lives the next few posts might seem a little outdated but need to be here for posterity sake.
We had a pretty low key Easter this year. We got to color Easter eggs on Saturday which is getting more and more fun as the kids get older. On Sunday morning we let them hunt for eggs and for their Easter baskets. Not too much excitement but it is fun to see my kids enjoying the traditions that I enjoyed as a child.

A man obsessed

Zander has a serious obsession with sprinklers. It is almost scary how excited he gets about them. Today he sat on the curb for probably 45 minutes watching the sprinklers across the street run. He loves to see them run but he even has to stop at every sprinkler head he sees in the ground whether it is running or not. We have spent quite a bit of time this summer at Grandma and Grandpa Oberholtzer's house and they have huge yard. Zander spends most of the time we are there walking around the yard and checking the sprinkler heads when they are not on and the rest of the time watching as each of the zones run, all the while asking Grandma and Grandpa which one is going to come on next. My parents were also taking care of the yard and house of their next door neighbors so Zander kept asking about Bob's (the next door neighbor) sprinklers too. It is a very strange obsession that is certainly unexplainable. I have to be careful not to mention sprinklers that I see when we are in the car. If Zander doesn't see them before we pass there is real trouble. What a quirky little guy! Speaking of obsessions, Dave's recent obsession has been our house plans! That is the kind of obsession I encourage so that we can get moving on it. We have secured a lot and will be taking the paper work to the bank this week. If everything goes smoothly we will be breaking ground by the first part of August! Yippee!!! I can't wait use a dishwasher again!!

Zander's 3rd Birthday

Zander turned three on the 10th of April. It fell on Sunday this year and I have been so busy with teaching that we decided not to have a friend party. Instead we took a trip over the mountain and took the kids to a place called Jump On It. It has a bunch of trampolines lined up together with all of the springs covered. The kids jumped all over the place and exhausted themselves. We also ran some much needed errands and went out to eat at Dickey's BBQ. It was funny because we ordered the large family platter because we wanted some leftovers but we weren't prepared for the quantity of each item that we got. I am sure people around us were gawking at the amount of food. It was a fun day spending the day with each other and having a little change of pace. The only down side was that it took us an extra hour on the trip home since we had to crawl through the canyon in the middle of the snow storm.

On the day of Zander's birthday we had cake and he got to open his presents. He got a motorcycle that he can ride and push with his feet, a kung zhu pet to go with Haylie's zhu zhu pet, a block set, a bubble blowing car and some money.

He insisted that he wanted a train cake that had chocolate frosting and was a triangle shape. I tried to talk him into a rectangle or circle cake but he is a very stubborn little boy and I knew if wasn't like he had envisioned it there would be trouble. Thus we have the triangle train cake. It wasn't minty as you might think and it is kind of strange looking, but it sure made the birthday boy happy.

He was very excited to have a card that played the chicken dance when you opened it. He even chose to bring it for sharing day at the day care.

Zander has always had a great sense of humor, even from the time he was a baby. He likes trains and blocks and playing whatever game Haylie makes up. He seems to be asserting his power by refusing to eat anything we call dinner and refusing to even think about going potty in the toilet. He likes to play trapeze with Dad and Super Mario Brothers on the Wii with Mom (he is Luigi). Lately when he is asked what he wants to eat or what he ate at daycare he responds with a made up word. His favorite made up word is ba blister. Don't ask me what it means. We have been so blessed to have this funny little boy in our lives. He keeps us on our toes with his insistance on things being exactly what he has in mind, but we sure do love him!

Thoughts on teaching

The last 3 months have gone by in a blur. I have felt like I am barely keeping my head above water in most areas of my life and that is not a feeling I like. Teaching 4th grade has been a learning experience for me. It has made me realize that I enjoy older elementary kids. It has been very hard to come into a classroom and take over for someone else. I was given no information whatsoever and was basically told to be the teacher. The kids really have taken advantage of my lack of information and it has really been an uphill battle to manage the classroom. That has always been my biggest challenge as a teacher so it has really been tough for me.

Haylie and Zander have done really well at day care. There are mornings when the don't want to get up and go but they always have fun while they are there. I am glad that Dave drops them off most mornings because every time I have to I shed a few tears. I feel sad sometimes to think of all the time I am missing with them. I can't wait for the summer when things can slow down a bit and I can be there for them. I have become keenly aware of how much I love them and how quickly they will grow up. Being away from them everyday has given me a totally different perspective.

Next year Haylie will be going to kindergarten and Zander will be going to preschool for part of the day so I have decided that I will job share a teaching position in second grade. I will teach in the afternoons from 11:15 until 2:45. I am excited to have the time at home to keep up the house and spend some one on one time with Zander. The person that I will be teaching with already has an established classroom and just wants to start teaching part time. It should be a pretty easy transition to just pick up with what she has done in the past. Zander will be at preschool for part of the time I am gone and the other couple of hours we haven't decided where he will go. I think it will be nice because I have a feeling that once Haylie is gone all day Zander would get bored hanging out with me all day. I am exciting for the prospect of having something think about and a reason to get up and get ready each day without having it consume my whole life. Only about 25 days left for this school year. Can't wait.

A job

This is kind of an ongoing saga that goes back to this fall and this post. I got an call last Tuesday from the principal as Castle Heights which is the elementary school just up the street from us. They had one of their 4th grade teachers get transferred to be a prinicpal at another school and so they were in need of a teacher until the end of the year. She got my number from the principal at the Jr. High where I coach and was hoping I would think about "applying for" the position. Now if you read my other post you might think that this is a continuation of my little test and so did I at first. I mean, really, what do I know about 4th grade except having passed it when I was 9? So she asked me to think about it and let her know the next day. I figured I would just call her and say thanks but no thanks.
That afternoon I got a call from Paige who is in our ward, teaches 1st grade at the same school, and has a daughter in the class that doesn't have a teacher. She pleaded with me to seriously consider it and told me her daughter had been praying for a good teacher. So I decided to look into it a little bit more. As I got to figuring what I would making after paying for child care, I realized it is almost the exact amount of money Dave and I are short for the down payment on our building loan. Wow!! I suddenly felt like this opportunity was given to me for a reason. So I found some options for child care that sounded good and decided that I would do it. I went in for an "interview" (like there were so many candidates) and now I start on Thursday. It will be a big change but I feel like we can get through for less than 4 months. I am continually amazed at the knowledge that our Heavenly Father knows us and knows our needs. I am so glad that I have an education and have kept up my certification. This will be the second time that I have been able to use it when our family needs it and both times the job has fallen in my lap. I am a little anxious about the changes for Haylie and Zander but I have to keep telling myself that it will be for a very short time.