School again

The kids will start school again this week. Adam will be in 10th grade at American Fork High
School, Emily in 7th grade at American Fork Junior High and Molly in 5th grade and Matthew in 3rd grade both at Forbes Elementary where I also work as a secretary.

My cousin Paula mentioned on her Facebook page that signing up her two high school daughters for school this year consisted of paying over $1200 for public education fees. And she still had to pay for her twin boys at their junior high. YIKES! Luckily I have to come up with only $500 for my two secondary school students' fees. $200 for Emily and $300 for Adam. Sometimes it would be nice to have a credit card in our possession.

In-laws visit

Jon's dad Clay Sherman and his wife Stephanie visited us here in Utah this weekend. We didn't do anything spectacular just sat around talking and listening to the kids and their friends be silly.
Emily and Adam played a duet on their electric and acoustic guitars and Emily played a song on the piano which in and of itself is a miracle. We ate good food-flank steak, shrimp on the barbie, watermelon, strawberries, cucumber salad and other stuff I can't remember. For dessert-key lime pie. Fun weekend.

Dog Days of Summer

It's that time of year when it is too hot to go outside except early in the morning or late in the evening. All outdoor activities have to be curtailed unless it involves a swimming pool or a lake to sit in. In Utah we have what is called a swamp cooler that cools our house. Air-conditioning sucks all the hot air out of the house while evaporative cooling (swamp cooler) pushes water- cooled air through the house. If the temperatures are below 95 and it is dry outside then the swamp cools nicely. However on days like today it is not so wonderful. Today is 100 degrees and about 50% humidity which is high in Utah. It's like living in a cooled down sauna. Makes one very, very sleeepyyyy....and laaazzzyy.

Beginning of summer: part deux

Our family from the east end of the country came to visit us at different times for the first few weeks of June. Grandpa George was here to be a part of Matthew's baptism and then Jonathan's brother, Ben, and his wife, Leah, and boys, Duncan and Donovan came to spend a week with us. Ben's family and our family went to Bear Lake in the northern Utah/southern Idaho region. It rained 1.7 inches every day for two days in a row! And it was cold!! We decided to do some other non-beachy things like investigate a local stalactite cave in the region called Minnetonka Cave. My children have been there several times and are sick of it but they had a good time anyway. On the last day the sky cleared for awhile and we went to the beach for a couple hours. On the way home we hit the Great Salt Lake on Antelope Island. The stink was terrible and the bugs horrible! I can say I've been to the Great Salt Lake and now I never have to go again. But you really do float in the water because of the high salinity.

Beginning of summer

To start our summer off, Matthew our youngest was baptized as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I think the whole thing was lost on him. Some of our kids when they were baptized got the idea and importance of it and some didn't and he was a didn't. However, as they grow up and mature a little they come to realize the idea and importance of it.

Neutered

Every spring the sheep have their lambs. The sheep live about 1 mile from us in a field next to the Alpine Highway or 100 East to the locals. Every fall and winter we watch them wander around the field eating whatever sheep eat, growing fleece and and getting fatter with the impending lambs.

Between the end of February and mid-March we start looking for the lambs. We drive that way a few times a week on the way to the kids' piano lessons which gives us a great reason to look for the lambs. We drove by a few weeks ago and there were the sheep laying all over the field or standing awkwardly on their little black legs, fat and round and lazy, waiting for the lambing time to begin.

About a week ago we drove past again and notice several little black lambs standing near their mothers, nursing or gamboling on their scrawny, wobbly legs with their long tails still intact. When I told my dad about it he commented that they wouldn't have their tails for much longer. Still a farmer at heart. We noticed at the time that some of the sheep were still pregnant. A few days later they had all given birth.

We were approaching the field on Saturday when the children asked to pull next to the field to look at the lambs. We watched them for a few minutes then drove on. Molly had a question: "Wouldn't it be funny if people could be fixed like dogs?" Where did this come from??!!

I asked her what she meant knowing full well what she was talking about. She said, "Well, like you can spay the girl dogs and neuter the boy dogs so they can't have more babies like Pepper (our dog)."

I told her, "Well, they do, honey. It's called tubal ligation for girls and a vasectomy for boys."

She said, "Really?"

How did a pleasant look at the lambs turn into sex education? Oh, yeah.

Yesterday my son came into the office right after the bell rang. He was crying loudly with his hand pressed to his cheek. I asked him what had happened and he said that someone had slapped him. I asked him who had done this and he told me a name which I had to help him identify by picture on my computer. It was one of the Rabbits. I called the Rabbit into the office and asked him why he had slapped my child. He told me, " It was a joke. It was just a joke!" I said, "Well, he doesn't look like he thinks it's a joke. He's crying and you hurt him. I'm calling your dad." Then he got this look in his eye of "oh no" and left the office. I called the dad who is in law enforcement and calmly let him know what had happened. I said, "I didn't yell at him but I did speak to him sternly." Dad said, "Well, you could have. You should have!" He then said he'd take care of it. So I have to wonder what happened last night.

My son cried for about 20 minutes. At one point he said that it had gone from stinging to hurting. He must have really smacked my kid hard. That just makes me mad. We aren't a physical family; not a lot of roughhousing. My point is that parents need to keep in mind what happens at home will almost always come to school.

And that's all I have to say about that.