The Nelsons are selling......

Yes that's right we are finally taking a step in that direction. We do a lot of waffling back and forth between staying and moving (just ask our Realtors!) Anyway, we are at the moment getting ready to have the house on the market by next Thursday. Hopefully all will go smoothly but we will never know if we never try?! So if anyone out there is looking for a great house at a great price or has any advice as far as selling, let me know.

"We Need U"

Lilly had her second grade concert last Thursday called "A Z Does It"


Lilly tried out for a solo part and got to be the letter U.
She also had her own song called "we need U" that everyone sang about her.

Lilly with her teacher Mrs. Hollywood.


Lilly and Paris, two peas in a pod!

Easter Cookies

It took me a while to figure out how to get pictures off my phone, so this post it out of order. Sharon invited me over to do sugar cookies. After the craziness of the kids decorating they went outside to play and this is what Sharon and I accomplished. I had a great time talking and decorating cookies. They look too pretty to eat!

If I smile will I get out of Trouble?

I had to put up this picture because it is totally Foster. He has figured out that he can do whatever he wants as long as he smiles like this afterward. The sunglasses he is wearing are Ryan's, which he got by getting a chair over to the dresser. He got into lots of other things by the time I realized where those sunglasses were to begin with. But then he just pulls out one of his smiles and mom runs for the camera instead of after him. Who says three year olds aren't smart.

Strawberry Jam

So strawberries were less than a dollar a pound this week and that meant that I could try something new. I made jam, with the strawberries that didn't get eaten. You know one for the bowl, one for me. Anyways my mom said the hardest part about making jam is cutting the tops of the strawberries. I did find that it was easy but not that easy. So for anyone who's interested here's what I learned about making jam:
1. never double the batch. (I quadrupled it!)
2. sugary strawberry syrup boils over and froths and foams so you need a pot that is at least twice as big as your syrup!
3. You need some sort of thing to pull out the jars from the water bath. I tried using tongs, spoons and spatulas. I finally ended up turning off the water and letting it cool for a while, then put rubber gloves on and took them out. My mom has a special tool that is made for taking out jars and now I know why she has one!
4. Whatever flavor of your mashed syrup will be concentrated. (I accidentally added too much lemon juice. It tasted great when it was fresh and red but after boiling it to concentrate it became stronger, imagine that?!)

I guess there is always a learning curve to everything, even when you have a recipe or someone tells you how to do it. I only wish that they could come clean up my stove.

Posing with cabbage

I couldn't resist posting these. We have a simple sense of fun around here.

Easter Bunny

Here are the pictures from what the Easter Bunny left at our house. We left the Easter Bunny a letter and told him to come to our house early on Saturday morning so that we could keep Sunday special and that with church at 8AM, we would have had no time!

Staturday Projects

Well on a rainy Saturday we had projects to finish. Here are some of the highlights.

Ryan actually planting the plants that we bought over two weeks ago at home depot!

The backyard is clean. I had to document it!


Abigail likes worms, who knew?!

Foster is always wanting to help. Unfortunatly the shoes he picked to put on were not so helpful.

Easter Activity

So here are the pictures that Ryan took at the ward activity on a cold saturday morning. We all enjoyed getting out of the house!

Here is the link to all the pictures:

http://picasaweb.google.com/trimamma/DesertWillowEasterAcitvity?authkey=Gv1sRgCIKosfCbnMzO7gE&feat=directlink

Garden Lefttovers

So we finally cleared out the rest of our winter garden to plant the spring/summer one. The cabbage was very pretty but didn't taste very good. I need to get better at picking it when it is supposed to be picked instead of it becoming a freak of nature!

Bubbles

How simple a thing can make you so happy. Every once in a while you need to slow down and blow some bubbles.

Crazy Conference Weekend!

So here's a quick catch-up of what is going on over in nonsense land. I was asked and delighted to teach a yogurt class for a relief society activity. It turned out fantastic and I finally got the hang of making yogurt. The problem now is that I am up to my armpits in the stuff. It is filling every nook and cranny of our fridge and freezer. I think that I counted at least 7 different kinds and that does not include the yogurt cheese, yogurt dip and spreads, and frozen yogurt. So if any one wants some call me!

Right before the class in the rush to get everything out to the car and make sure I was ready to go, Abigail comes running in from the backyard screaming. Foster had thrown a rock shard and it cut her forehead. She was screaming so that I knew something was wrong and stopped what I was doing but then chreshendoed when she saw the blood dripping down her face onto the floor. Luckily we got the bleeding to stop and dad fixed it with some super glue and I left for my class slightly on time.

It is so funny that such a little cut could create that much commotion. Anyways, coming home after my class, Ryan and I chatted about the days events and were both relieved that the excitement had ended and were looking forward to conference. Little did we know it was just warming up. Foster got in our bed that night, like he usually does, and woke me up because he was moaning and groaning. I poked Ryan to let him know something was wrong just as Foster started to make heaving sounds. The rest of the night every half hour Ryan was up with Foster running to the toilet, poor guys. My job was to turn the light on when something happened since I didn't sleep after that. Ryan would immediately be asleep the next second after putting Foster back on the sleeping bag that was on the ground at his side of the bed. We hoped that it would just be something that he needed to work out of his system but it continued to come the other direction if you know what I mean. I should have counted how many diapers that I changed that day, but I didn't need to, the garbage smell proved it! The next night was the same story. Every half hour after 1 AM I would be up changing his poor raw bum, then we would go back to sleep until the next attack.

Well Saturday was spent at home with Lilly, Abigail, and Foster (we sent Andrew to the church with my family) watching conference. To give Foster a little relief we decided to let him wear under ware again and these are the ones he picked out, what can I say, he likes color. Sunday he was feeling better so we decided to venture to the church. Conference was great, I didn't want it to end. Everyone is healthy and no one caught what Foster brought home from preschool, I say with my fingers crossed!?