STITCHES AGAIN!

 Jared and I finally got all our things done for the night, picked up dinner, ate it and sat down to watch a show together - its about 8:30pm....10-15 minutes into the show we get a text from Tyson "I think Tyler needs stitches" my response "are you being serious?" then comes the picture....yep, he needs stitches. So we just text back, "yep he sure does. On our way!" Tyler and Zac were riding a moped and turned the light off so it would work better and then ran into a trash can and they flew over the top of the bike and Tyler landed on his knee and then Zac landed on top of him! Adam offered to stitch him up, but since we have met our deductible, we just snatched him and ran him to the ER. They took xrays to make sure nothing was broken, numbed him up really good, cleaned out his wound (the dr had to ask what the stringy stuff was he was pulling from his knee and Tyler just said, grass! ha ha) and then gave him 8 stitches. They would have done more, but on the knee they wanted to do less so he would still have mobility. Tyler took it like a champ. Only cried on the way to the hospital because he did NOT want to get shots! The last 2 stitches he could feel and it hurt really bad!! The doctor was suprised after the first one he felt, but told him either way he is going to feel it next so let's skip the numbing shot and just do the last stitch. He was very brave, but you could tell it hurt so bad because his poor body was shaking. Tyson did NOT want to come to the hospital so he stayed at the Halls. We texted Emma on our way over there and asked if she could pick up Eli if he needed a ride and her and Hunter were more than willing to do whatever we needed. We hadn't had time to tell Eli yet and when he came home and Emma saw him she checked on him to see how he was doing and he had no idea so we got a sweet little text from him saying, "I don't want you to worry about me, you need to worry about Tyler. But next time can someone tell me these things. I am his brother too and I need to know. Is he going to be ok?" These kids of ours really rally around each other. Despite not wanting to go to the hospital all night with Tyler, Tyson has taken really good care of him and let's him rest his leg on him while they play video games, he takes the last shower so he can wipe down the shower doors so Tyler doesn't have to the bend, etc. In the end the story is funny how it happened, these idiot boys living their best lives and it's just another round of stitches for Tyler man. 

FATHER'S DAY!

 Father's Day this year...looked a little different, but we really liked it. I had just gotten home from Girls Camp the day before and a week earlier I couldn't decide what to get our dad's so we decided to just have both our parents over for dinner like we did on Mother's day. Jared smoked tritip and we had baked potatoes, salad, rolls, lemonade and even had Hunter over. We are really loving having our parents over together for holidays to celebrate with everyone and leave no one out! So grateful for Jared and the amazing Father he is to our kids. He is attentative to them, helps them, supports them, prayers for them and loves them. I couldn't have asked for a better dad for them! We are blessed! 

STAKE GIRLS CAMP!

After being in this ward for only 7 weeks and in that time having only gone to church twice (due to attending other wards for mission farewells and homecomings and some baseball tournaments) I got called to be Camp Director. I thought they were crazy, they didn't even know me! So I started to going to some mutuals, to young women's on Sundays and I could not break through with these girls. They could have cared less about me. So I quit trying so hard and just did my thing. Then the Stake said they didn't want camp directors and they were doing it all themselves and each ward was only allowed to bring up 4 leaders and it was to be the YW presidency and if one them couldn't go you could replace them. So I was off the hook! I was so relieved. Jared had cancer, I wasn't friends with these girls, I was only friends with a couple of the leaders....I was glad! Then a month before camp, Maxi called me because they didn't have any other leaders that could go and they needed me. I spent that afternoon trying to figure out how to get out of it without feeling guilty. I couldn't come up with a good excuse. I knew deep down I needed to go. So I agreed as long as Emily was my cabin mom. The Wednesday before we left for camp we had a mutual to practice our tik tok dances that would be our camp roll call. There was one girl who would not participate, she wasn't having any part of it. I spent the night trying to convince her also while trying to practice the dances. In the end, somehow I said "let's have a wrestling match then" since she was a high school wrestler. She didn't think I was serious. She doesn't know me. We wrestled. She kicked my trash. My boys were very let down by me and thought for sure I let her win - I did not. But that wrestling match was a game changer. She was now pumped to go to camp! Another YCL was not excited to go to camp because she says she cant be that friendly and bubbly the whole time, I told her to come find me and we will throw back some caffeine, complain together and then put a smile back on our face...that helped her. Slowly I was breaking these girls down. But I still did NOT have a good attitude about going. The morning came and I had to go. Jared drove me to the church and came to open  my door and help me out but I sat in the car for another minute....knowing as soon as I got out of the car I had to put on a smile and be the happy leader everyone needed. And sure enough, as soon as I got out of the car, someone drove past me and the girl flashed me a heart sign with her hands....and so it begins. I could write so much about camp, but I am to lazy to do that. Long story short....It was the best experience for everyone. We had some pukers, some mental breakdowns, my hands went crazy and Jared had to order and send up some steroids for me, girls forgot sleeping bags...BUT Our ward girls came together like I have never seen them do before. The girls and I became besties, we bonded, we laughed, I cried with them, we danced and danced some more together, we made friendship bracelets (yes, Jared and Emma had a hard time with me wearing 4 friendship bracelets cause they knew how much that wasn't me, but I need to wear them for a month so the girls can see), the leaders didn't think our girls would bare their testimonies, I knew they would and sure enough all but 4 of them did and they all went 2 or 3 times! We ended up having a last minute mutual the next week to keep these friendships strong, then even the laurels planned their own activity and invited me and Maxi. Emily and I had the little girl cabin, it was rough, but the girls were cute and Emily and I laughed ALOT together! We came home as a very tight knit ward and now my friendships with these girls is so strong! We hug every Sunday, etc. Again, so grateful for the opportunity to serve at camp, get to know these girls and have them get to knw me and now I am YW secretary. This ward is changing and it's all for the better! 

PRIEST CAMP!

 Eli still hasn't had friends really in our ward. They will talk to him at mutual and occasionally in class, but mostly he is by himself and on his phone. It's hard being the new person coming into a ward that's a tight knit group already. I wasn't going to force Eli to go to Priest camp by himself, especially since Jared wasn't going to be able to go. Plus, they kept changing the date of the camp to accomodate every boy. So I got tired of waiting and Eli got presented an opportunity to go to his first PBR with Seth. It ended up being the day the boys headed to camp. So Eli was out for sure. Long story short, the Bishop really wanted Eli there, but we couldn't find any flights there. He finally found one and offered to split the cost with us since it was $451, but we weren't even sure he would make it on time because of baseball. Then he ends up letting us know he got his brother to fly Eli to Colorado and it would only cost us $150. So Monday morning Eli and Seth head off to the west side to attend the PBR. I meet them out there towards in the end to watch. Eli loved it. They take your height, weight, time  your speed, everything and upload it to their site so you can get recruited by colleges. We don't really expect anything to come from it, but he really wanted to do it, you had to get invited and it was a great experience for him! When it was over we raced home, got him showered, made a plate of dinner and raced off to the church so Eli could meet the pilot and Bo Smith and they headed off to Falcon Field to head to Durango, Colorado. In the morning the boys got up and went river rafting, they went zipling, camped and traveled in an RV, tried to get me to let him bring home a puppy, stopped and did baptisms at the Snowflake Temple & the Montecello Temple (and he may have borrowed church clothes from his leader since he had to unpack his for church and forgot to repack them - oops!), but the best part about the whole trip, the part I was trying to explain to him before he left...since he really did NOT want to go....was that this would help him become better friends with everyone. I knew if these boys just took a chance to get to know him it would all be great. When I got home from camp and finally saw Eli for the first time; he didn't bother to tell me about all the cool things he did, no he told me, "mom you were right! I did become closer with all the priests and now we are all friends!" The very next Sunday the Priests were looking for Eli and talking to him like they were all long time buddies! So grateful for a Bishop who exhausted every effort to get him there!! It was everything he needed! 

TWINS TURN 15!

 I think I say this every year....how are my babies 15?! They didn't really ask for anything this year - especially Tyler. He never really does. They just wanted shoes...so Shoes they got! Mikey showed up and brought them a gift, Nash gave them a gift and then we all went out to Cheesecake Factory (per their request) for dinner, then came home and had an ice cream cake, opened presents and then watched a movie. It was a Sunday birthday so it was pretty uneventful. The day before I was going to have a little party for them, but they ended up having a basketball tournament for the summer ALA freshman team so we couldn't. We love these 2 more than we can say! They complete our family for sure. So grateful we get to be their parents!