April's a wrap

Can you believe it is May already?? I can't. Although I must say I am very excited for the winding down of school.   I look forward to the break and upcoming summer.  Tanner, Garry and I decided to get serious about his Raccoon puzzle he got for Christmas.  We set it up on January 1st, but then it got moved into our bedroom and was forgotten about.  Finally, Garry got sick of it and started helping us and we moved it back out to the family room.  We actually started making good progress, but it's still hard and tedious.

Cynjyn got duct tape for Christmas and one Saturday out of sheer boredom, she pulled it out and started making some bracelets.  Cute huh!

We finally finished the puzzle.  Garry and I put the last two unfinished sections together one night after Taz's volleyball game.  Tanner had gone to bed after working on it all evening while we were at volleyball.  So, we made him come downstairs and put the LAST piece in since it was his puzzle.

The next day, I got puzzle glue and he glued it.  Garry and I got a frame and it is now framed in his bedroom.

General Conference Sunday found Tanner down stairs at 8:30 am.  Anyone that knows Tanner knows how shocking that is.  He is rarely up before noon on a day that he has a chance to sleep in.  So, I made him stand under the clock and got a picture to document the occurance, that's how rare it is!

As per tradition, we emptied all our coin bowls and the kids and Garry rolled coins during conference sessions.  We made about $80.00 to add to our every growing pot!

Garry and his bug bites.  His body just doesn't take them well.  He had three on his hand and this is a picture of it two days after it happened.  Swollen and itching and painful. 

Taz has had games weekly for volleyball.  We go to almost everyone.  I missed one and Garry missed one.  This happened to be the night Garry was gone.  Taz and I stopped at PeiWei after his away game and enjoyed dinner.  I love this one on one time with Taz and hearing his enthusiasm for life and volleyball.  And boy is he HUNGRY after the games. 

Cynjyn spent one Saturday with her friend Olivia.  They went to the new Children's Discovery Museum and then back to Olivia's where they made rice krispie/candy sushi.  It was yummy!

Taz has been having a lot of social gatherings with his friends.  They got to Paige and Courtney's houses and sometimes come here.  He is quite social and has a core group of friends that like to hang out together.

Sister Turner gave Taz a Chinese Bible.  Last summer, they had an investigator at church from China and he said he would read the bible if it was in his native language.  So Sister Turner tracked it down and gave it to Taz to give to him.  He has since been sent back to China and Taz has lost contact with him, but the bible is really cool.

I got a second calling a few weeks ago.  I am the assistant camp director and so I will be going to Girls Camp this summer for the 4th time in a row.  We had a parent meeting a few Tuesday's ago.  We were to dress like we were going to camp and got extra kudo's if we incorporated a bandana.  This is Cynjyn and I getting ready to go to the meeting.  Cynjyn is actually excited I am going with her.  So I guess that's a good thing.

Garry had to go out of town for two days and Tanner was out of town too, so I got to take Taz to seminary.  The sunrise was beautiful.

O.K.  Sometimes Cynjyn really looks like my cousin Petra.  She has the same smile and dimples.  So one morning, I was trying to get her to have her Petra face to show Tanner.  I tried to get a picture of it, but she doesn't know when she's making the face.  This is NOT the face.  But one day I will capture it and then I'll have to put a side by side picture of her and Petra!

My hair is getting long.  I straightened it that day.  I don't know if I like it long.  It gets really bad ends and really puffy and shaggy looking.  But this was a good hair day.

Tanner participated in a restaurant management competition for his culinary class.  They finished first place and got to go to National's in Baltimore April 17-22.  They showed their competiion live and so Garry, Cynjyn and I watched it.  Grandma, Grandpa, Krissy, Brian and Ky also watched it from their homes.  He, Katie Barker and Madison Jenkins totally rocked their presentation.  The judges grilled them after it was over.  One of the judges asked what they would do if people found it difficult to pronounce the name of their restaurant:  Saucier.  Tanner piped in and said "we don't care what they call us as long as they come and eat!"  Everyone in the room burst out laughing and the judges loved the answer.  Afterwards when they were walking out and shaking the judges hands, one judge told him that he got a cold star for his answer!  The showed the awards show that Saturday night.  Tanner's team didn't place in the top 5 and win awards, but they did get 9th place out of 39 teams.  He had so much fun.  We were so proud of him!

Taz had a problem with his braces over the weekend, so we went to see Barbara Zach in our ward who works for an orthodontist.  She has been so helpful and kind to fix Taz up on weekends when we cant get tot the ortho.  Anyway, she had the cutest little kitten that her family had rescued when it was just a couple of days old. 

It was so cute and curious.  Taz fell in love with it and it played on/with him for quite awhild.

Then it curled up on his laugh and went to sleep.

Taz didn't want to leave and it really was cute to see it curled up on him.

We got a new bishop two weeks ago.  Garry stayed on as 1st couselor and Dave Tanner became the new bishop.  The Holland's are moving to Boston.  David will teach at Harvard.  Cynjyn and Taz are distraught!  Bethany is Cynjyn's best friend.  They get along so well!.  She has been coming over a lot on the weekends and after school.

Grady and Sean come too.  They usually walk over to Dairy Queen for a treat.  They have fun toether and C and B are the only girls their age in the same school grade and Beehives.  I am so sad they are leaving.

Our ward had a daddy daughter night at a local climbing center.  It was from 6-11pm.  Garry and Cynjyn went and they had a blase.  Cynjyn climbed and ballaed all night.  Her arms were sooo sore the next morning.  She had to go to dance class too that next day and it was killing her, but she loved every minute of it!

This is my relaxed, lazy Tanner.  I often find him in precarious positions playing on his phone and chillaxing.  It's so him.

Garry has been taking Friday's off lately.  We have been running errands.  This last Friday, we went to Home Depot.  He LOVES it there.  I on the other hand never knew it would take 20 minutes to pick out a screw!

Half Price shakes are back at Sonic.  We had a ward Luah last Friday and afterwards, we all went to Sonic.  Alexa was with us, we got 6 shakes for $13.00!!  Woohoo.

The next day we went to Olive Garden for lunch to celebrate Garry's birthday.  They were having an awesome special where you bought an entree and got to take one home for later for $12.95.  So we all got that special and had food for dinner too.

Taz has been reading To Kill a Mockingbird for school.  He was having trouble answering the questions in the study guide, so I started reading it to to help him because it had been awhile since I'd read it.  I ended up reading the last of it to him.  We had a good time bonding over it.  We finished it last Saturday. This was his face after we read the last page.  I pretty sure he was happy with the ending and not just happy to be done with it:)

And that my friends, is April.