November Pack Meeting

This month the boys got to show off what they have been working on. The Bear Den sang some songs (really badly) and then performed magic tricks.

In a modified version of "I'm Getting Not'in For Christmas" Ethan sang "I put a frog in Courtney's bed." It was a cute song. They got a little derailed when trying to sing "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" but nobody complained about a shortened song.

Ethan singing:
His magic trick:
Here is their version of Rudolph (with a re-start at the beginning):

Thanksgiving Holiday

Grandma and Grandpa Pack, David and Andrew came to our house for Thanksgiving!! And we had a TON of fun.

The kids were out of school on Wednesday, so we spent a few hours that morning making pies and getting beds all ready. Then we played. We went to the library, bought some last minute things and played outside. It was relaxing and fun.

Grandma and Grandpa Pack arrived after noon and we played with them. We went to the park, shot baskets, rode scooters and kicked around a soccer ball. After dinner we visited while waiting for David and Andrew to arrive. Actually, we went to bed while Grandma and Grandpa waited up for them.

Thursday was Thanksgiving and Bryan's birthday!!! We had a wonderful dinner (Grandma made the rolls for us) and then we played games and watched a lot of football.

Dancing with Grandpa:Bryan with his traditional peach pie for his birthday:
Friday, we all went for a hike at a place about 2 miles from our house. There were Indian hieroglyphs. It turned into a rock scramble when we decided to try and get down by the river, but it was fun. We even saw a hawk. Pretty cool!

The scramble down:
The hieroglyphs: On the trail back to the vans:
Saturday, we decided to go up the Red Mountain. We have never done a hike up this before but we know people who have so we decided to try it. We went up to the base of the mountain and found a TON of trails going up, but none of them were the right trail. After scrambling up the side of the mountain for a while we decided that, for safety reasons, we had better get down.

We ended up hiking to the Ivins Cemetery and back. While on our way back to the vans, we noticed a man and his son starting up the Red Mountain. We watched and noticed, for the first time, a trail. We spent the next 30 minutes or so watching their progress up the side of the Red Mountain. It looked steep but now we know where to begin.

Then Grandpa took us all out for ice cream at the Ice Box.

The Red Mountain:
View of Ivins from the top point we got to:
Ethan and Courtney (Ethan was really nervous that someone was going to fall so he didn't enjoy being up there scrambling over rocks):
Andrew's perch:
A lot of time was spent watching football (and BYU basketball). Bryan got a new game table for his birthday so games were set up on that most of the time...or a puzzle was on it. We ate way too much food and had a great time together.

David and Andrew went home Saturday night and Grandma and Grandpa went home Monday morning. It was fun having everyone come to our house for Thanksgiving.

Mountainman Rendezvous

The fourth grade classes had a mountainman rendezvous. They had to earn beaver pelts (pieces of paper with a beaver on them) which they traded for food, games and prizes. I was asked to help at one of the games so I was there to see Ethan have fun.

He got to pan for gold, eat a lot of scones (he spent most of his beaver pelts on food), shoot a marshmallow gun and throw bean bags (that was the game I helped with). I think it was a fun activity for them and they learned a lot about Utah history through it all.

Rollerblading

Ethan hasn't ever liked rollerblading because he fell the first time and it scared him. Courtney, on the other hand, is really good at it and doesn't have fear. The other day some other kids in the neighborhood were outside on their rollerblades so Ethan and Courtney decided to go out there with them. It was hilarious!!

One boy, Carter, is really good at rollerblading and thought it may be easier for the others if they used their scooters as a crutch. It worked great and Ethan figured out what he was doing. For the next 3 or 4 days, that's all the neighborhood kids did...rollerbladed. It was great to have them outside enjoying the great weather and having fun.

That's really a smile, I promise, the sun was in her eyes.
The kids using their scooters to give them balance:
Ethan getting used to his blades:
He had so much fun!

The Splint

Ethan has been living with pain in his heels for about 9 months or so. I took him to a podiatrist who told us it was Severs Disease (not really a disease but a dis-at-ease). The growth plates in his heels have become inflamed and they hurt really badly. The doctor told us to buy some heel cups and have him discontinue all physical activities. The doctor wasn't impressive and didn't spend any time with us. I wasn't very happy but Ethan loved him because Ethan was playing soccer at the time and wasn't enjoying it too much. So the doctor had just given him an excuse to stop playing when the season ended.

The cups didn't work at all and actually made the pain a lot worse. We tried to get him to stretch but he wouldn't listen to us and things weren't getting any better. After watching him limp all over on Wednesday, I called a different podiatrist who got us right in.

I took Ethan in on Friday and the doctor spent a ton of time with us. The new doctor confirmed that Ethan does have Severs Disease but said that he should be able to become pain free and still play in activities and do what he would like to.

The doctor showed Ethan some stretches to do, gave us a new insert into his shoes, and then gave us a night-time stretching splint for Ethan to wear while he sleeps. The doctor told us that the pain should be quite a bit less in 2 weeks and that he should be feeling great in a month.

Ethan has been stretching and he has been wearing the splint at night (which hasn't bothered him at all) and his pain has gone down considerably!! Bryan always asks him to rate his pain on a scale of 1-10 and it was always a 7 or 8. This morning it was a 1, so I think things are looking up...which is good because basketball season starts next month.

Still Got It!!

Bryan was commenting on how fast I type and so I decided to take an online typing test. Right before we were married, I entered a typing contest and won a free hotel stay. I typed 93 wpm at the time. (I have played the piano for YEARS and I was a typesetter at a newspaper for a couple years, so I have had a lot of hand-eye coordination practice in my life.)

I still type at 88 wpm. Not bad for only typing emails and blogs entries. I've still got it! ;)

It Still Works

My sewing machine went weird on me yesterday and I couldn't figure out how to fix it. (The bobbin has black thread in it but white thread keeps coming up and getting tangled somehow so I think there's something weird going on.) I only had a couple more seams to sew on a Christmas present and I had a bee in my bonnet about getting it finished, so I decided to try sewing on my Grandma Andersen's old sewing machine.

Most people look at this in my house:
and they don't realize that this is inside:
It's a 1934 Singer sewing machine and it works great! (Yes, I looked up the age by using the serial number.) Instead of a foot pedal it has a lever that you push with your knee to get it to go forward. It only goes forward and backward and I'm not sure it even has a zigzag stitch. It's REALLY slow so it took about 10 times the time it should have, but it worked great and all the stitches were even.

Now, if I can't figure out how to get my other machine to stop being a pill, I'll have to sew Christmas pjs on this machine. It won't be bad but it will take a long time!! ;)