All Aboard!

Toady we went to the Heber Valley Railroad to visit with Thomas the train. He was here just for the weekend and we were lucky enough to get tickets to ride him. The ride to Heber City was gorgeous right through Provo Canyon (thank goodness Chris was driving because the roads were winding). When we arrived in town, we saw Thomas chugging down the tracks with other riders and this is when Casey started to get excited. It was a nice little affair. They had different activities for the children (tatoos, magician, playing with thomas train sets, bubbles and food). The highlight of the day was the train ride which lasted for about 20 minutes. We sat outside on an open train car but on the way back we decided to head inside to one of the passenger cars. It was a nice relaxing day. I think Casey and I enjoyed it more than Chris and Emily. Emily was a good sport and didnt complain but I knew she felt out of place with all the little kids. We did get her a train whistle so I think that made it a little better for her LOL.

Our first attempt at gardening

Since we dont own our house and cant have a real garden, we decided to grow some crops in planters in our backyard. We all went to Lowe's last weekend and purchased some grape tomato plants and a strawberry plant. We had gotten some planters a while back when they were on sale so we were ready to do some planting. I have never had any luck with growing anything. Maybe it was the weather down south or maybe it was that I dont have a "green thumb".
The kids have been taking turns watering the "crop" and tonight we actually tried some of our strawberries. Emily and I tasted these beauties and they were F.I.N.E. Actually, Emily wants us to go get two more strawberry plants because she thinks one plant wont fulfill her appetite for those scrumptious berries! I just hope they continue to grow and that they dont shrivel up and die like everything else I try to grow LOL!

My best Mother's day!

I had a fantastic Mother's day this year. I got to sleep in late and was woken up with presents and cards. I recieved a willow tree angel, a memory card for my camera and a book that Emily made at school. After reading the Sunday newspaper and eating my cinnamon rolls that hubby made, we piled into the car for an adventure. We decided to go up into American Fork Canyon. I had seen some photos on a neighbor friend's blog and decided to find out where that was. She told me that it was quite close to home so I thought it might be a nice trip to take. It only took us about 20 to 30 minutes to get there and it was so beautiful. We drove along the road not quite knowing where we wanted to go but the scenery was just gorgeous. We tried to go to the summit but the road was closed so we turned around and headed for the reservoir. There were alot of people fishing and walking around the lake. We decided to hike up a little path and see the lake from a different view. Well that was the wrong thing to do. The kids totally freaked out when we were walking the path because they would lose their footing whenever we went down a hill. I took these photos of Emily and Casey trying to get down from the path. I was laughing to kill myself ( I couldnt help it) Our little family went on a 50 yard hike..that was all we could handle. LOL! We did manage to find a nice paved path to walk on and it even had a walking bridge that went over the stream. We were doing fine until Chris and I saw the "Please stay on path because this is a rattlesnake area" sign. We decided it was time to turn around and go home.
I got lots of photos of the trip and downloaded them to Walmart. Our new Walmart photo center is awesome. Well back to the rest of the story. We got to go to dinner for Mother's day. We went to Tepanyaki which is very much like Shogun for you Alabama folks (it wasnt as good as Sho gun!) Casey did great this time. He only flinched a little when they started the fire on the grill. It was yummy and the people brought me a free piece of cheesecake for mother's day. I finished the day off by painting and planting out in the garage while the kids scootered. I was a relaxful, wonderful day that I will always remember. Thanks to my three loves, Chris, Emily and Casey. I love you guys lots!

School project time!

Emily has a school project due later this month and she has been working on it diligently. She had to read a book about quilts and then do a book summary. Next she had to visit a quilt shop or quilt show. Finally she had to design a quilt on paper and then make a real quilt. She has finished everything except the sewing of the "real" quilt. We went to Joanns a couple of weeks ago and she picked out some cat fabric. She decided she should make a quilt for the cats.
A couple of summers ago, EMily took a sewing class in Alabama and made a quilt. At the same time we purchased a new Janome machine which is the one she learned on. She loved sewing for a while and then, like everything else she tries, it fell to the wayside.
She started sewing Sunday and hopefully she will finish before the project is done. All those sewing skills she learned are coming back slowly.