This and That and Eternal Friends

At Alex and McKay's school, there is an awesome Japanese drum line.  He is in band, and his band teacher (awesome Ms. Ugaki) gave him one of the headbands that they wear.  So whenever Todd helps him play his djembe drum, McKay wears his headband.  It's wonderful!! McKay has so much fun!

Alex and McKay have had a wonderful time in Junior High the last three years!  They have learned a ton and made a lot of friends.  On Friday, their special needs class had a party to highlight all of the things the kids had accomplished.  They talked about Alex helping to dissect a sheep's brain, and some other stuff they did in science class, and they highlighted Alex and McKay since they will be moving on to high school.  (AAARGH!)  The teacher and aids were in tears as they told how much our sweet boys have contributed to the class and how wonderful it is to have them around!  We were very proud parents.

Yesterday we went to Logan for a friend's wedding.  We first stopped at Maddox Drive-In in Brigham City for lunch, then enjoyed the lovely drive through Sardine Canyon.  Once in Logan, we went to see the temple, moseyed through the cemetery to see Todd's grandparents' and great-grandparents' graves, along with several other relatives' graves, and drove past the house where Todd's Dad's grandparents lived in downtown Logan.  (Todd's Dad grew up next door, but his house is no longer there.)  It was a very nice day.

And we saw 8 temples between our house and Logan.  Amazing!


Finally, we went to the wedding reception for Linsey.  Her parents, Brent and Leslie, (see the picture below) were friends of ours in Boston.  Their son, Jake, is about 4 years older than our kids and has cerebral palsy.  These are the friends that we lived with in Hungary 13 years ago when we took Alex and McKay to the Peto Institute.  Brent and Leslie have been wonderful to us and we just love them.  They were so instrumental in helping us work through all of the CP-related issues when our kids were little.  It was wonderful to see them.  And wonderful to visit with Jake, who is truly inspirational.  Despite his physical challenges, he just finished his first year of college at Utah State and starts a full-time church service mission tomorrow working with computers in Logan.  He is so excited to be a missionary!  His speech is much easier to understand than it used to be and we loved talking to him. His candor and wit in explaining to us some things about his life had us laughing.  And he had me crying -- which led him to declare: "Oh!  You're just as bad as my mom!"

It was a wonderful day.  I am so thankful that Heavenly Father has placed so many sweet friends in our path to help us along in our not-so-normal life.

Finally, it's time to make our summer reading lists!!!  Last year Todd and Abby and I enjoyed writing down our summer reading goals, so we're doing it again this year.  We'll help the boys make some goals, too.  I don't need a list to motivate me, but it was fun to keep track and compare notes on what we were all reading.  Of course, last summer Abby and I each had about 20 books on our lists, and Todd had 3.  We keep teasing him.  Well, I think Abby has made her list and now I need to make mine.....

Happy Mother's Day

Dad surprised Mom for mother's day and took her up to Salt Lake on Friday afternoon.  They stayed overnight and came back on Saturday morning.  It sounds like they had lots of fun.

Here are some irrelevant pictures:

Godiva Chocolate Cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory.  Yum.

In Harry Potter Land.  I took this picture all by myself.

It's a pillow...it's a pet...it's a pillow pet!

Countdown until Christmas: 225 days

Countdown until school is out: 18 days

Countdown until we go to Hawaii: 23 days

Countdown until Friday: 4 days

Spring Fun

Since I last blogged, our family has had some fun outings and some fun at home. First of all, our little dog Molly had a birthday! So we had a party. She turned three. It was fun.

We had a wonderful time at the Thanksgiving Point Gardens for the tulip festival. It was beautiful. We were very excited to see the beginnings of a permanent exhibit of Angela Johnson's sculptures of the life of Christ. Eventually there will be 15 life-sized sculptures, but right now most are still small and 3 are big. It is already stunningly beautiful. (I was so amazed that I forgot to take any pictures of them, but I'll include some of the kids on this beautiful day.) I predict that eventually when the exhibit is finished, people will come from all over the world to see it.

Abby and I went to see The Secret Garden at the Hale Center Theater. It was amazing. The lead male was an friend of ours, we met him in Nauvoo, and it was so fun to see him and his wife. They are such nice people. So here's Abby with Dallin and Rachel.

Alex and McKay had a great time at the 9th Grade World Fair. Their helper had been working with them on the information to present Bangladesh since January. They had lots of visual things and she programmed their iPad so that they could tell everyone all about Bangladesh. Todd made a lovely yogurt drink, Mango Lassi, to serve. It was really fun.