Piggies in Puyallup

Don't even think of BACON !

Aren't they adorable?

We went to the Puyallup Fair last night. Aside from all the nummy food, there are PIGGY'S all over. This litter was born on the 15th of September. There are 13 in all, although I couldn't get them all in the picture. I love the little piglets. Anyway, I just thought that I would show off my favorite picture.

An Organized Closet!

My closet is now organized by color.

I spent this past weekend cleaning our closet. This is a task that has needed to be done for , I don't know, a billion years. Anyway, once I removed all the clothes that I no longer can wear, I decided to follow the advice of a good friend ( Thanks Bobbie!) to arrange all my clothes by color. I must say that I think it looks really nice. Although in the picture it does look like something black is hanging by my red coat, it is really a dark purple. Anyway, I know that it is an anal thing to do, but I think I like it that way. Now, the hard thing is going to be able to keep it looking like that.

Crazy Dog

Dave and Mercy

One of our most favorite things to do on a Saturday morning is lounge in bed. By the time the morning has progressed, usually Sasha and Jayson have crawled into our big bed and we just hang out. Well, this morning we had extra company. Mercy, our Golden Retriever, decided that Dave was a perfect spot for her to lay down on. Usually she will just lay next to one of us.....Not this morning. She decided that Dave was her most favorite place. She just jumped up and sprawled all out. It was super cute. She stayed that way for a good 30 minutes. Maybe she was cold...maybe she wanted to be like the kids....or maybe she just thought that Dave looked comfortable laying there so she wanted to too. Anyway... I just wanted you to see how cute this was.

Dental Work

Yesterday I had the misfortune of getting the first part of a crown put on in the back of the bottom of my mouth. Pres. Stevens in my dentist. As he was working, he was having a hard time getting all of the torture devices (I mean dental equipment) in my mouth. Apparently I have a small mouth. Who knew? I have always had a hard time opening my mouth to floss properly, and when Pres. Stevens got out his caliper to measure my mouth opening, he was surprised at how small it was. So, even though a LOT of noise comes out of my mouth, there truly is not any room for all the other stuff when one goes to the dentist. My jaw is so sore because of me trying to keep my mouth open further than it should. It feels like someone sucker punched me super hard. Owwww!

Two Peas in a Pod

L to R: Dave Mathison and Mike Pope.

Tonight was a memorial celebration for Cory Jenkins who was killed in Afghanistan two weeks ago. Cory was a Scoutmaster from the Steilacoom Ward. Dave and he worked together for several years. Bro. Mike Pope and Dave have also worked together several years as Scoutmasters too. Mike and Dave have been such good friends over the years. They both discovered tonight that not only did they wear the obvious Boy Scout Uniform top, but that they wore almost the same pants and the same color and type of shoes. For years now, we have always called these to men brothers....now we can call them twins.

Seminary For Sasha

Sasha will be using these a lot now !

Yesterday was the first day of Seminary for Sasha. For those of you who are not of our faith, Seminary is a 4 year scripture study course that is either early morning at 0600 or as a class in High school if one is lucky enough to live in either Utah or Southern Idaho. Since Sasha lives in neither of these places, then she gets to go to Seminary at 0600. The class is at our Church building which is only a block from her High School. This is a fabulous program as it teaches our teenagers the Gospel in more detail than they could get if they only were taught at Sunday School. I went to Seminary back in the olden days and loved every minute of it. I hope that Sasha will put her heart into it and really learn what God wants her too. So far, she is up and ready to go every morning...So far, so good. I wish that all teenagers could start their days by reading the scriptures. It would really make for a better world.

First Day of New Schools

Jayson on his first day of 6th grade

Sasha's first day of High School in 9th grade

Wow! I can hardly believe that both of my babies are starting new schools today. Sasha starts HIGH SCHOOL and Jayson starts Middle School. Sasha, of course, didn't sleep much. She couldn't get to sleep until 0130 and then she woke up at 0430. She is such her mother's child. Jayson slept better but was still awake before his alarm went off. Both the kids are very excited about starting new school years. This will be Sasha's first time back to a regular brick and mortar school as we have home schooled her for the past three years. She is ready and so am I. Now all I have to do is worry until the kids walk through the door again this afternoon. It is hard to be a parent. Only 179 more school days to go!!!

Mercy May

Isn't this the most adorable picture ever?

Mercy has decided that Raggedy Anne is her favorite new toy. She carries her around all the time and rests on her. I just love how tender she is over this dolly. Mercy truly is a "people". She just happens to live in a dog body. I wish my life would be as carefree and simple as my dog's life is.

Summer Ends...Boooooo

The Evil ,Horrible, and icky Dryer

Today I have done something that I haven't had to do since the end of April. Can you guess what it might be????? Are you done guessing? As a few of you may know, it is against my personal religion ( well not really...but it sounds good) to use the dryer. I hate, hate, hate running that expensive, energy guzzling, time wasting dryer. I long every day of the cold wet winters for the nice breezy days of summer. Since school is starting on Wednesday, and I have been under the weather for the past week, my laundry pile is quite large. I had hoped that this weekend would be nice and warm so that I could hang out all my laundry....but it has basically poured off and on this whole weekend. So, that drastically altered my plans. So, I had no choice but to resort to the icky ol' dryer. At least it works. I know that I should be grateful for a dryer. The pioneers would have loved having clean, warm, and dry clothes, instead of their dirty, wet, and freezing clothing. I will be grateful for a dryer....I just won't be happy using it in the summer.

A Perfect Grade

My perfect report card!

I don't know if you can see it clearly or not, but for the summer quarter, I earned a perfect 4.0 on my anthropology course.You can click on the picture and it will get much bigger. Look at the arrow on the right side. Granted, it was only a 100 level class but for an old gal, I did pretty good. This was my first attempt at an online course and I realized that I LOVE IT! I had a great teacher who gave a lot of feedback and I met some amazing classmates, well not really met, but met through the internet. I wish that I could take ALL my classes online. That would be awesome. Anyway, I just had to brag a bit and show you my grades.

Nancy's Birthday

Happy Birthday Nancy

Today is my great friend, Nancy Hoeppner's, birthday. She is 47 today. By the way, her shirt says PETA...People Eating Tasty Animals . Isn't she beautiful??

Tater Tot Casserole

Two batches of my famous tater tot casserole

Tonight was my mom's 65th birthday and we had a whole bunch of company for dinner. She had requested my famous tater tot casserole, so being the dutiful daughter that I am, of course, I was only too happy to fulfill her request. I have lost my new awesome camera, so I had to resort to my cell camera. Hopefully I will find it soon. Dinner was delicious and super filling. With all the cheese and everything it was also low calorie...NOT. Anyway....it was a nice dinner.