Valentine's, the super bowl and Jim's birthday

 

We did a spur of the moment thing for Valentine's day.  We both had to work, but then we made sugar cookies and ate at Waffle Love.  It was yummy and fun.  Ada found some coupons and Jer turned 9 waffles into 17... They were running a promotion that for every two waffles you get a coupon for a free waffle later... It was unexpected and fun. So now we'll have another family date night sometime.

Seth and I made this valentine's box for his class valentine's exchange.  They didn't really do a party because they had a field trip to watch the play The Cat and the Hat at the Scera.  I asked Seth how it was and he said, "It was good." It was fun making the box with him.  

We made our yearly cousin valentines.  One year we made them and I was going through a funk and didn't get them out... so we saved them to send the next year and then and I were both in a funk and we both forgot.  This year we made it though.

Grandma and Grandpa asked if we'd like to watch the superbowl with them.  We said sure.  We're not big sports watchers, but if it's with Grandpa then yes!  McKay's family was going to come too, but they all had the flu.  The kids facetimed Grandpa to talk smack during the game.  

Seth, Ellie and Walter built this epic fort.  Ellie had a baby doll in there and kept telling people not to wake it up.

Six legged Centaur... courtesy of Millie, Ellie and Seth.

It was Jim's birthday.  He turned 77.  He joked that he loved turning 7 so 77 was just as good.  Jer, Ada and I made him a model rail car of Porco Rosso's wrecked plane being shipped to Italy.  Jer did most of it, and it looks amazing.  I got him a Japanese Book of Mormon. 

Fast blog update

There were horrific fires in California. Including three towns of homes being burned down.  It's so sad, but I'm grateful that the temple is still standing.

Our beautiful new Lindon temple got it's windows.  They're so pretty!

My wonderful Great Uncle Duck (Doug) turned 80.  He's such a good man and I loved seeing all his kids and grandkids there.

Jer and Jim went to the Hanzel and Gretel opera in Salt Lake.

Sam was so tired.  Ada and him went to a youth fireside... Ada showed him the whale she'd made and it knocked him out.

Cutie patooties

Progress on my egg painting.

Patient cat with daycare kids.

We got to go to the Payson temple to do baptisms for the dead.  It was so cool because we got there and Sam exclaims, "I can do the baptizing now!" And so we arranged for him to baptize Evelyn and I... then Jer baptized Ada.

Tiredness is contagious.

We got to drive up to Ogden to celebrate Aubrey's graduation with McKay and fam.  Look at these great people.

New favorite cousin picture.

Seth gave a talk.  He's been giving a lot of talks lately.  I'm always grateful that he says yes.  I love watching him in Primary.  This last Sunday he was asked to sing a solo in sacrament meeting.  He said, "No, but I'll sing in a group."  So we invited his Primary class to sing with him.  The 4 that said yes sang the first verse of Joseph Smith's First Prayer.  His wonderful clear voice... 

Evelyn gave her first talk in Sacrament Meeting on Sunday too. When she was asked, she burst into tears.  By Saturday she was okay with the idea and Jer and I took turns walking her through writing her talk.  Then on Sunday she asked me to sit by her on the stand.  I did, she shook until she started her talk... then she wasn't nervous anymore.  She gave testimony of straightforward doctrine and then told me that she'd like to give a talk again.  She had started an outline in one computer file and then started a second with her actual talk.  To differentiate the two files, she wrote ACTUAL TALK across the top of the one.  She forgot to delete that part before printing it and joked with me for a good few minutes about having to have the ACTUAL TALK.  

I took pictures of Christian for his baptism.  It was so cold, so we set up our photo backdrop and did them really quick.  He's on the spectrum so taking pictures is not easy.  He let me take some if I let him take pictures of the dinosaurs after. 

He kept saying how much he liked Seth's lego dinosaurs, so I got him a lego triceratops.  

Crazy cats.... Vinn was hugging Syl's tail.

Jer had an ER visit over the weekend.  We were headed to an endowment session and he got dinner stuck in his throat.  Last time we had to go to the ER for this was about 13 years ago.... then about 15 years before that he had to...   So maybe we'll prebook a visit in another 15 years.  He's going in on Wednesday to get his throat stretched.  

I played the piano at Christian's baptism.  In true Ecuadorian fashion, I wasn't asked ahead of time.  I showed up and they said, "Hey you're on the program... and will you play Gethsemane for Isaiah to sing a special musical number too?"

Sam drove in the snow for the first time.  It just so happened to be with Robyn.  That helped Sam feel more secure knowing that she had his back.

I met baby Annie for the first time.  I was going to babysit from 5-9... ended up being from 12-8 and included two baths... one from a child throwing up all over and the other from a child peeing all over.  Whelp... that's the way it goes.  It was nice to meet Annie.

I did the taxes for the daycare.... now gotta do our personal ones.

Our Stake put together a temple activity over the weekend.  It was really neat.

Seth in the temple mirrors.

Making rice krispies temples.

Ada made the Provo temple and included an angel Moroni on top.

Evelyn got to go to the space center for Rose's birthday party.  They had fun.

For Primary, I gathered different Book of Mormons in different languages.  We talked about the different languages and how all of them was the same message of Jesus Christ.  Dale Yancey brought his Māori copy that his grandfather used as a missionary in New Zealand... I told him that it's possible that he had met my Great Grandpa and Great Great Grandparents who were members of the church there at the same time.  It was a neat lesson.

Again cuddling with the tail of her sister.

 

Sam gets ordained

Sam was ready to get ordained as a Priest.  There are 16 or so YM Sam's age in our ward... very unusual... but that means that there were a lot of schedules to work around.  We decided to wait until the middle of the month for Sam's ordination.  That worked out well so that Robertson grandparents could be there too since they'd been out of town.  Then I was talking to McKay and we figured out that Isaiah was also getting ordained.  One at 2:00 and one at 2:15... So we moved ours to later in the day so that our Wilcox grandparents could make it to both.  I love seeing Sam grow.  He goes in uncertain, gets his feet under him, comes out spectacular and then grows again.

He was able to have:

Grandpa Roger Wilcox, Grandpa Jim Robertson, Dad Jeremy Robertson, Bishop Kyle Bilboa, Counselor Dale Yancey