Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary Dad and Mom, thanks for letting us spend some time with you this weekend. We love you!

Faith and the Brother of Jared

On Sunday morning Amber bolted the bedroom door so that she could work on her lesson before church. I was with the kids and was feeling a bit guilty for spending so much time over the past couple of weeks on school work. So we got together and made this corny little video.

For slower connections it may take a little while to load, but wait for it, it will be worth it! Also, enjoy the credits at the end of the film.

Waiting on a Story

I hear Dad has a story to tell. I am pretty excited to hear about it. Looks like someone got a photo of the event, anyway!

False Start

Well that little stinker has done it to us. Alayna has refused to use the toilet this week. Every time I tried to put her on the throne she gets her body all rigid like a board, and will not sit on the toilet. I guess we have a false start. And I do not know why each one of our children insist upon teasing us so, by first getting excited about using the bathroom, and then refusing to do so for a while. So it could be a few weeks, or a few months he for we are free of the diapers.

Disclaimer

Amber made me post this. She claims that my last few blog posts were a little error prone - laiden with confusing words that didn't quite fit. Lest anyone feel that I am losing my mental capacities, or fear that I had a pint too many while Amber was at her church meeting last night, I confess that I was too busy to type the blogs so I used some Speech Recognition Software that converts speech to text. I am not very good at it, and it is not perfect - hence I had quite a few words that were typed that were not really what I meant to say, it is just how the software translated my speech. I have to admit, it did pretty good, though.

I did happen to also use it on some of my homework last night, too...I hope I don't get penalized too badly for the errors the software made!

Disclaimer #2...This message was typed manually, thus any mistakes, unintelligible phrases, etc are the sole responsibility of the author and not that of any speech recognition software.

Potty Warrior

On Monday morning when we woke up to start our journey home to Provo, Amber discovered that Alayna had a dry diaper that morning. Amber was quick enough to ask Alayna is she would like to go and use the bathroom. Alayna agreed. I took Alayna into the bathroom and sure enough she went to the bathroom.

Alayna managed to to get through the whole trip keeping her diaper mostly dry. Every stop that we made, Amber would take Alayna into the bathroom and she would use the bathroom.

Today all of the kids have been in a bad mood. I think it is because of lack of sleep. Alayna is of no exception. In her bad mood today, she has refused to go to the bathroom, or rather has been unable to. Thus it remains to be seen, if yesterday's potty adventures will continue on into a habit of a regular potty program.

Fall fun in Spokane

Last Wednesday, we took the kids out of school early and headed off for Spokane. We arrived in Spokane at about midnight. I was very worried about how well Evee would handle the long trip. I have even searched high and low in our house for some ear plugs. I was afraid that that healthy long the little girl would have a lot to complain about during the 11 hour journey.

Evee and the rest of the children did awesome. We hardly heard a cry or complaints the whole trip. We also made a record of two stops along our way. One stop was that Dell MT. Ann and Verne had suggested a small cafe that serve the large portions of the very yummy food. We found ourselves at the small cafe that was once an old wooden schoolhouse. It was nostalgic and the food was terrific. There was no way we would have been able to eat all the food that was given to us. After our brief stop there, we continued on our way to Liberty Lake.

Ann and Verne both had commitments on Thursday. After getting rested up, amber and I dressed the kids up and got them days, and spent a couple of hours taking photos of them for some portraits that will go in our house. The pictures turned out well and we hope to have them hung here soon. (The pictures not the children).

On Friday, the kids road bikes and played while Ann and Amber did some shopping. That night, Verne and Ann had a dinner appointment with the stake president. Amber and I hooked up the karaoke microphone and had a jamming evening with the children.


Saturday was a beautiful day. We did a little Geo caching. We also spend some time up at Green Bluff at the Apple Festival. I believe that everyone else in the valley have the same idea as we did. For there were many people kicking up dust and waiting in lines. It was so bad, that we were stopped in long lines of traffic, just to get out of there when we were done. I was glad that I had asked amber to drive, as I fell right to sleep and didn't notice the traffic hassles on our return trip.

Shortly after our visit to the Apple Festival, we went to the nearby Liberty Lake County Park and set things up in for a barbecue picnic. While the adults worked on getting the food cooked, I played with the kids at the playground. Johnathan and Aylee had contests to see who could cross the monkey bars the fastest. Johnathan was very fast. He beat Aylee several times. However Aylee had more stamina. As they raised over and over again, Aylee started to be Johnathan more and more often. They wanted to continue the races, but I in my great wisdom told them they had better stop. I was a bit too late, however, for Aylee discovered she had popped in a blister that had formed while they were competing at the monkey bars. Aylee had never experienced a blister or a popped blister. This was a very big deal to her, and we heard her complaints for quite some time thereafter.

The night started to get cold, so we can grab the food from the picnic and ran home to have dinner at the house. Ann had cooked some delicious steaks and we enjoyed the need to and the barbecue vegetables in the warm house.

Just a Saturday had been a beautiful day, Sunday was the stormy day of the week. We woke up to rain and enjoyed that the rain for the rest of the day. Aliece and Alayna were both sick through the night. I was selected to remain home with the two girls plus Evee while everyone else went to church. Ashlee and Brett and Michelle arrived to Spokane during church. I took the three girls to the airport to pick up the new arrivals. Michelle's brother had already come to pick her up, so I grabbed Brett and Ashlee and took them to their home.

Brett and Ashlee's new home is awesome. It has a lot of potential for some fun winter projects this year. Their yard is huge and it opens up into a Park with a cool little playground. Aliece asked over and over again if she could go and play at the Park, however she did not realize it was a Park she thought it was their playground.

After church we all got together for a delicious dinner of ham and potatoes. We had an enjoyable time visiting together and saying our good byes. On Monday morning we headed back to Provo.

A few days with Elyvia

Last week we had the great opportunity to have Elyvia stay at our house with us while Ashlee and Brett went to Chicago to visit to Reed and Michelle. As luck would have it, we had sick kids the very first day of Elyvia came to visit. Despite the illnesses that ran rampant in our home during her stay, we all were very excited to have Evee with us.

As you can see from this picture our children were very best friends with Evee while she was here with us. The first few days she was here, Aylee was the only person to home Evee would play with. If Aylee was not close by Evee would be very unhappy. Amber was considering keeping Aylee from school, so that she could be at home with Evee. However, once school started, Evee warmed up to amber quite quickly.

For the week that she was here, Evee was one of the kids. She had a great time playing with toys and dressing up with the rest of our crazy lot.

We are very grateful that we were able to have the Evee in our home.

Addresses

Hello Everyone!

As you all know, Adee is getting married the middle of November. She wants to send invitations to you all, but needs your addresses. If Jen & Dave, Jake & Shan, Joe, and Nae will send me their current addresses, I'll get them to her. Thanks everyone!

WishTips.com

Hey everyone, you may notice that I sent an invitation to you earlier today to view my WishList at www.WishTips.com. No, it is not because my birthday is coming up, though, hey that is a good idea! But, actually, this is a website I have been working on for the past five weeks.

It all came about from Amber who requested the service. It should be a great way for us all to see what each other wants and then claim items so that other people don't give the same gifts that you do. By the way, the person will not be able to see who has claimed or purchased items on the list, so they still won't know what their getting and they can enjoy a surprise or two :-).

You will be able to create your own lists also and share them with whomever you want.

Anyway, try it out and let me know what is confusing and what doesn't work. REMEMBER, this website is not done. I have just completed the bare minimums to get it functional right now. But if it doesn't work, let me know and I'll get it fixed.

Enjoy, and happy gifting (by the way, don't forget my birthday is coming up)! ;-)

Last Day: Wisconsin

On the last day of our trip with Reed and Michelle, we spent the day traveling. We started off by heading up into Wisconsin to say that we had been there. Our first stop was the Kohler Kitchen and Bath Design Center, just north of Milwaukee. It was a multi-level center that had all sorts of bathtubs, showers, sinks, kitchens, bathrooms, etc. It was dang fun to walk around and see the imagination and creativity. Some of their bathrooms were as large as our first apartment!

The next stop on our trip was the Jelly Belly Factory. We got there just before closing, so we didn't get into a tour at all, but we were able to sample many of their jelly belly flavors, including their new Harry Potter line that includes, Boogers, Earwax, etc. I enjoyed the Earwax flavor, personally. To testify that we were there, we each bought a large bag of "Belly Flops" - the Jelly Bellies, that just didn't make it.

While we were in the area we grabbed our first and only geocache from Wisconsin - it was a mile long hike overall on a wet trail that helped us burn the jelly belly calories.


On our way back to Chicago, we stopped at the Naval Base where Reed works and saw the different buildings, and watched all the Navy personel salute "Lt. Dr. Verne Reed II". The Navy base has its own beach, so we stopped there and took this handsome picture of Amber and I on the shores of Lake Michigan.

Reed and Michelle were awesome hosts. We enjoyed every minute of our trip with them. Each day included selfless giving of their time and touring expertise. Top that off with some gourmet meals and it made a very memorable experience.

Heck, since we had to share our wedding night with Reed nine years ago, I thought it was fitting that we made this trip our nine-year anniversary outing so that we could share it with Reed once again!

Day 5 - Another Fun Filled Day in Chicago

Last Saturday on our Chicago trip, Reed had the full day with us along with Michelle. We started off the day by first sleeping in a bit. After we got the zzz's out of our system we loaded up and headed back into Chicago. Our first stop this time was Millenium Park where we did a geocache that led us to this incredible mirrored structure. We had a lot of fun snapping cool photos in the reflective spherical attraction.

Following the park we hit another geocache in the city center. It was of a building that had parts of other buildings embedded in the building. It was cool. We each snapped a picture of ourselves by different buildings that we enjoyed. This picture was of Michelle by a piece of the Salt Lake Temple.

Our final In-Town Chicago stop was Chinatown where we snapped some pictures and hunted for gifts for the kids and some art for Reed and Michelle.

We topped off the evening with some fun Karaoke where we all got involved and crazy :-).

What's Different About Me?

In this rymm, see what you can find.
123 clus I'll give.
Figyor it out in a snap.
See what you can find, behined.

1.ihrautc
2.by mom
3.behind what you see

My Kids Browser is in the Marketplace!

Many of your have already heard about this since it happened early last week, but I thought that I would blog this. Granite Distribution, the company that sells My Kids Browser to store owners notified me that they have sold 135 browsers and that need me to bring them some more! They were sold to several Ma & Pop stores. Deseret Book and Seagull Book have still not taken it. That will be my next goal :).

My hope is that the small book stores will be able to sell the My Kids Browser quickly so that they reorder. This 135 could be the only big sell that I get.... It hopefully, however, is just the first of many orders.

Anyway, I thought I would give you all the update!

Labor Day . . for sure!

Well, Mom and I decided to brave the domestic world and do some canning this past weekend. It was a perfect weekend with an extra day off and then I also took Tuesday off to finish up our work and spend a little more time with mom. Since I had never actually done a lot with Pressure Cooking, I thought it would be much easier than it was. I was quite optomistic and thought the process would go much faster and also give us some lax time. . . mom on the other hand was more realistic.

We canned the beef first and was able to also use Julie's stove down stairs so we could have 2 pressure cookers going at once. The pressure cookers usually take some watching over, however, we had some problems and ended up needing to watch them constantly. So we finally set up our stations and got some reading material and waited for the 2 hour process to complete. We got started Saturday afternoon and continued on through Monday. Then on Tuesday we did a bushel of peaches. It was a lot of fun and also a lot of work. It was fun to spend some time with mom and to learn the skill of canning.

We did take some time to watch a couple movies and do a little shopping. We also went up to Jake and Shan's on Friday and had dinner and visited. It was fun to have mom here and didn't want to let her go home, but I think she was ready to see Dad again.

Day 4 - Downtown Chicago

Reed had to work our first real day there at Chicago. Michelle was gracious enough to show us our first glimpse of the Windy City (wherein Michelle explained why it was really called the windy city - I never knew!)

We traveled on the L-train throughout the city and hit several downtown sites. She snapped our picture for us out on the Navy Pier - a tourist attraction that was built up for the world's fair.

We took a tour of the Franklin Lloyd Wright house which espoused some incredible architecture. It was a cool tour - one that Amber had been wanting to see.

After the tour, we met up with Reed in the city and had some pizza. Then we caught a show called the "Blue Man Group". See some trailers at this link. At the beginning of the show a girl came up to me and asked me if I would participate with them in one of the acts. I told them I would. They gave me some black shoes to wear and told me that near the end of the show they would come and get me.

Just as the show was beginning, they had Reed stand up in the audience and they announced that he had just mapped out the human genome. They asked everyone to applaud him. That was pretty funny - and the evening continued on just a funny. It was a pretty entertaining event. Near the end of the show, as promised, I was "selected" by one of the blue men where they put me in a jumpsuit and whisked me off stage. Once we were off stage, they showed a film of me getting my feet tied up and being hoisted up off the ground, painted blue, and slapped against a huge white canvas to create "art". Meanwhile, in the backstage they were changing my jumpsuit to be one that was already painted blue. They showed me a short clip of what the audience was seeing and then stuffed me in a small metal box that was rolled out onto the stage. On the cart was a large thing of jello. They told me that once the blue men started to shake the jello, I was supposed to poke my head out into the Jello through the hole in the cart. I did so, and once my head was in there, they ripped up the jello and there was my head. It was pretty dang fun.

Day 3 - Nauvoo, Carthage, Iowa, and Travel

On the third day of our trip, Amber and I did a lot of driving. Before we left Nauvoo, we ran over to the "Trail of Tears/Trail of Hope" road and read all of the quotes along the trail. This street is where the Saints lined up their wagons to cross the Mississippi river in compliance with the mobs that were driving them out of Nauvoo. It was a nice walk for us.


As we bid farewell to Nauvoo, we crossed the Mississippi ourselves to grab a geocache in Iowa. This one was located in a cemetery in Keokuk, Iowa. While we were driving back from the cache, we called Jen to get the information on her ultrasound - it was then that we first heard that she is expecting a girl. We were pretty excited.

Our next stop was Carthage. We stopped there and had the tour given to us. It is always a neat experience to go to Carthage where Joseph & Hyrum were martyred. This was my second time and Amber's first.

We spent the rest of the evening traveling the five or six hours to Chicago from Carthage. It was a beautiful drive. Chicago traffic is terrible and we were stuck in traffic quite a bit. We arrived about an hour early, but because of the traffic we needed that hour. The funny coincidence is once we called Reed to tell him we were near the airport (he was driving to pick us up) we all ended up on the jammed freeway within a few hundred feet of each other. We couldn't have timed it better.

Reed took us to his house at: N 41.98769 W 87.66344 (See it on Google Maps)

They live in a cool town house apartment and their decor is awesome. We enjoyed a several course meal and were treated like royalty!

Nauvoo, The Beautiful

On day 2 of our trip, Amber and I got up and readied ourselves for a full day of touring Historic Nauvoo. While Amber was dolling herself up, I ran to the only grocery store in the town and rummaged through it's five aisles to find some breakfast food suitable to our small hotel room.

When I returned, we sat on the bed and had some microwavable egg/sausage muffins and then headed out to do a session at the Nauvoo Temple. It was a beautiful edifice. I had visited Nauvoo with Jen just days before my first date with Amber nine years ago. When we had visited, the temple site was only an empty indentation in the ground with some historical markers in place. It was moving to be standing on that same spot and know that I was attending a temple session in the newly rebuilt structure. I had goosebumps the entire time!

After our temple session, we went to a newly opened mexican restaurant and ordered a taco salad. We were the first customers of the day and no one else was in the restaurant. As we visited with the only on-duty employee we discovered that she had lived in Kalispel, MT. Upon further discussion, we discovered that it was Sister Zeigler from Ann and Verne's Kalispel ward years back.

We took our food to "the Nauvoo Grove" area and sat on a bench amid the trees and crickets and consumed the large serving. We were lucky we shared the portion because we were both filled and had to throw the rest of it away.

We spent the rest of the day touring the visitors centers, buildings, and other sites. On one of our tours, we met up with a family from texas who were with more family from Australia. The Husband was the only one from the states as he married an Aussie from his mission many years ago. They were a very funny bunch and we hit it off with our Aussie friends.

We attended the "Rendevous in Old Nauvoo" production and enjoyed it. While we were waiting for it to begin, one of the missionaries came up to us to shake our hand. I told him that he looked familiar and asked him where he was from. He said that he was from the bustling metropolis of Malad, ID. Well, of course, I knew him right away. He was Elder Ward (I think his first name is something like Eldon or Elton or Weldon -- can't remember that far back). Anyway, he had some kids at Malad High with Jen and I. I even think Jen went out on a date with one of his sons. Anyway, he told me he enjoyed his association with my Dad during their Farm Bureau days and all that. It was fun to see a familiar face there.

After the musical production, Amber and I searched for some places that breached the 9PM barrier and remained open. After a few failed attempts, we were directed to "Dottie's Diner". We ordered our meal. Shortly thereafter the Aussie family. They sat by us and we had a great time visiting with them. They were here because their nephew from Australia met up with a girl from Kirtland, Ohio. Her family was a staunch anti-mormon family, but they hooked up anyway. The family flew up from Australia for the Kirtland wedding. We thought it would be funny if they asked the RLDS church if they could perform the wedding in the Kirtland temple, then when people asked, they could say they were married in the Kirtland Temple. Near the end of the evening we all said our goodbyes, only to find out that we were all lodging in the same hotel!

It was a fun and enjoyable day, to say the least. I sure love Nauvoo.

Meet me in St. Louis

As most of you know, Amber and I went out on a week long trip to Illinois last week. This is one part in a series of logs that I will log over the next few days of our great trip.

The purpose of our trip was to visit Reed and Michelle in their new resident city of Chicago. However, Amber had the awesome idea of us going a little early and flying into St. Louis and renting a car to go and visit Nauvoo for a few days. Amber has never been to Nauvoo and it sounded like a great idea.

We flew into St. Louis in the morning and tried to find a place to store our luggage so that we could tour the city before picking up our rental car that was reserved for later that afternoon. To our dismay, no place in the airport would store luggage due to 9/11 security risks. So, Amber and I toted our luggage around the city as we tried to get in a site or two.

Our first stop was at the St. Louis arch. It was pretty cool. You can ride up there for a fee, but with our time restraints and luggage, that was pretty much a non-option. We got a couple of shots of the arch under the overcast sky.

After visiting the arch, we found an outdoor restraunt and shared a lunch together and enjoyed the scenery. We then headed back on the Metro (the light rail system) to the airport where we picked up our car and headed off for Nauvoo.

On our way to Nauvoo we stopped in Missouri at a small town to catch the Mine Car geocache to say that we got one in Missouri.
We arrived in the sleepy town of Nauvoo around 10:30 PM.

It's a baby!

Well family. . . . Dave and I were able to go and get the ultrasound done on our baby yesterday. It was so amazing! There really is a baby in there! Sometimes it's hard for me to believe it even though I can feel it and have heard the heart beat (and of course I'm growing :). He said everything is looking good and the baby is measuring right on the due date of January 16th! Here are a couple pics that I thought were so cute!

If you haven't heard and can't tell by the pictures. . . .it's a girl! She was pretty active and not shy at all! We can already tell she's got a bit of Andersen in her with these great poses. It was fun to see her moving and sucking. We've already become proud parents and sharing our fun pics!

Anatomically Correct

Aliece drew this picture yesterday of a Mommy. As you can probably see, she was fairly anatomically detailed in her depiction - as she puts it, she even included the parts of the body that make the baby grow big.

Bench Warmer

Wednesday night Jake and Shantell came over to our house to watch our kids for us at 9pm so that Amber and I could go to an interview with the 2nd Counselor in our stake presidency. Amber and I didn't want to get our hopes up, but we figured something was up!

We attended the interview and there we were told that I was being released from the bishopric, and (even better news) the new bishopric had already been called.

The counselor told us to keep it quiet, but that the release would take place this Sunday.

The secret was successfull as no one suspected anything. We had to reschedule the sacrament meeting talks and after-church interviews/visits. The Stake Presidency showed up on the stand just before the meeting and after the sacrament, they took over and released us and sustained the new bishopric.

On Wednesday night I was very excited for the release, but as the week has gone on, I have fallen a bit nostalgic and reminiscent. I nearly cried all the way through this morning's interviews and the first part of the sacrament meeting. There have been a lot of great experiences, and I have loved getting to know the ward members so well. I will miss the calling, but I do say, it will be a great change to be able to sit with Amber and the familiy and be a "bench warmer" during church again.

Oh, the smell

Tonight I was putting some things away in the kitchen and every so often I would catch a reminiscent smell. I couldn't put my finger on it, but it kept bringing back good feelings and vague memories.

It wasn't until after a few minutes of working in the kitchen that I realized what it reminded me of...Grandpa Willard. Now, I enjoyed the memories a little longer until the detective in me decided that I needed to figure out what the smell was.

I paid attention to my wanderings as I continued cleaning the kitchen. Then, when I was putting some stuff in the pantry, the smell hit me. I looked around...There was a bunch of fruit that Amber had put in the Pantry to ripen.

It all made sense...Grandpa's treasured boxes of fruit and produce salvaged from local grocery store garbage bins.

Back to School

Well this week has been the "Back to School" week for the Andersens. On Monday, Aylee started the third grade. Yesterday, Wednesday, Johnathan started first grade. It is Johnathan's first time as a full-day student, which he really seemed to enjoy.

The kids are getting back into the school routine with early mornings and homework. I just hope that I can get back into the routine -- after Friday, Jake and I will have started school once again by attending a 4 hour "orientation" in Murray.

Here comes the bus, Here comes the bus, Here comes the bus!!!

A Poopy Problem

Over the past few months, Alayna has been big into taking off her clothes and diaper at night while she is supposed to be sleeping. We have then been finding her stark naken on her wet or worse, poop smothered bedroom.

To alleviate this problem I went to the hardware store and bought a nice big role of duct tape that is stored with the diaper supplies and dedicated to the use of securing her diaper from being removed while unattended.

This has worked up until today. As Amber went to get Alayna up in preparations for church today, she found the brown stinky mess all over the bedsheets. Smears of brown covered the face and mouth of the little culprit. (Thank goodness for Sunday Morning bishopric meetings!)

So, how did she remove her diaper this time?? The answer is, she didn't. Instead of removing the clothless wonder, she kept it on her body, but had been sticking her hands in the back of the diaper to pull up the messy treasures.

Any advice (handcuffs, straight jackets, etc) on the matter would be appreciated!!

Camping up Midway

Well, I was going to post some pictures with this, but blogger is experiencing some problems tonight with pictures.

On Friday afternoon, Amber and I loaded up the truck with gear and children and we headed up to Midway, Utah (about 30 miles from Provo - up the Provo Canyon) for a fun filled camping trip. We camped at the Wasatch Mountain State Park at a cool little campsite. That night they had a special thing with park rangers about Owls. We got to learn about great horned owls. Johnathan and Aylee played some costumed parts as a kestrel and fox respectively in a play designed to teach about the feathered night goer. As the sun went down, we enjoyed a small campfire with some smores that the kids cooked up.

We slept fairly well, all things excepted. We woke up around 8am and had a great breakfast of coffee cake that Amber had made the previous day.

We cleaned up camp and went to a nearby park for playing and a little baseball. After that we spent the rest of the day doing some local geocaches and seeing some cool parts of Midway and Heber.

We also stopped at the spots where Amber believes her great-grandparents lived there in Midway. They were still pretty cool places...we took some pictures of them and hope to share them sometime.

We got home around 4:30pm just in time for the Saturday evening process of getting kids fed, bathed and ready for the hustle and bustle of Sunday morning!

Happy Independence Day

I have a friend from Bangalore, India that reads our family blog every once in a while. He just Instant Messaged me to tell me that not only is today a special day for Amber and I as we celebrate our anniversary, but it is also Independence Day for India. It was August 15, 1947 that India obtained political independence from Britain, France and Portugal.

So, along with my celebrations for this day, I tip my hat to my Indian friends on this their 59th Independence Day Celebration. Happy Independence Day!

Amber has made it nine years!

I just wanted to wish Amber a happy anniversary with me! Yes folks, today marks nine years since we tied the knot in the beautiful Idaho Falls Temple.

Amber and I celebrated our Anniversary yesterday in fact, because of some meetings Amber has tonight. We went out to dinner and then went for a movie. It was nice to spend the time together.

It has been a fun nine years, I'll say that. I can't believe how much has changed, and yet how much hasn't. The experiences we have shared over these few years have been magnificent. The other day, I was looking at some pictures of Aylee's birth - how Amber and I just looked like two kids. That is wierd. We don't feel old, but we don't remember being so young when we got married - it was kind of funny.

So, if we are considered "old" now, I look forward to growing "really old" with Amber in the many years to come!

Family Bike Ride

On Saturday afternoon, after Johnathan got his new bike, I worked on getting some training wheels on Johnathan's old bike so that Aliece could start her biking experiences with the rest of the family. I installed the training wheels and Aliece hopped on the bike and took off like a natural.

For dinner, Amber wanted to have a picnic and she wanted us to all ride our bikes to a part on the Provo Parkway trail along the Provo river for a picnic dinner. She put together a smashing spread of sandwiches, drinks, vegetables, and fruit. She loaded the kids up with their own backpacks and off we went.

I was really worried about Aliece making the 1+ mile trip, but she hung in there with the coaxing of her Mom. She did have a couple of scary experiences. On our way there, one of her training wheels went off the trail and that caused her bike to veer off the trail. Down she went off the steep slope of the shoulderless shore, through trees, weeds, rocks and nearly into the river. I had hopped off my bike and ran after her. Luckily she stopped before entering the now shallow river. She had some scrapes and bruises, but she was ready to hop back on and continue the journey. We are grateful she didn't get stabbed by one of the many large branches that she barely missed in her speedy careening down the hillside.


We stopped on the trail for our picnic dinner and then headed back home for the Saturday night bath routine.

On the way home, Amber was with Aliece. Aliece had the same experience as before, but this time crashed headlong into a chain link fence. That phased the girl a bit and she walked her bike for about five minutes before hopping back on to ride the rest of the way home. We all arrived home just as a small rainstorm crossed our paths. The kids thought it was cool to finish our ride in the rain.

Johnathan's New Bike

For the past few weeks, Amber and I have noticed that Johnathan has been having a hard time keeping up with Aylee on bike rides. I took a look at his Bike on Saturday and determined that despite the adjustments we have made to the old bike, it is just getting too small for that guy. So, I grabbed Johnathan, had him give me all of his money, and we went to the store and found him a new bike.

He was pretty darn excited to have a new bike, and now he keeps up with Aylee just fine!

Daddy - Daughter Campout

After Alayna's birthday party festivities, I took Aylee and Aliece to a Daddy-Daughter campout for our ward last friday night. Our camp took place at one of the favorite sites our ward likes to go to, Blackhawk Campground off the Nebo Loop and past Payson Lakes.

When we got there it started to rain, so I made a makeshift shelter with all of my non-boy-scouting skills. It only rained for about 15 minutes, however, and then let up. It was beautiful the rest of the stay.

We had a fireside that night, and when the Bishop asked who would like to offer a prayer, Aliece raised her hand and said loudly, "I will!". So, at that, Bishop said, "And Aliece Andersen will offer our prayer". After the song, Aliece offered a nice little prayer. The bishop replied that it was probably the nicest prayer he has heard at a fireside.

For part of the fireside, the Bishop asked for two primary girls, two young women, and two men to talk about women that have made a difference in their lives. Aylee raised her hand and spoke about Amber and how she has always reminded and encouraged Aylee to read her scriptures and that has helped her in her life. Just before bed, the three of us sat in a circle in our tent and talked about their Mom and their grandmas. We had a great time.

The next morning, the Dad's made breakfast that was furnished by the ward. Eggs, pancakes, ham, etc. The girls had a great time playing with their friends and hanging out.


We had to take off early to get home in time for Amber to run to a stake meeting. However, on our way home, we stopped off at a nearby geocache and grabbed it. It was a fun walk in the woods. Aylee spotted it first and they both had fun trading some items in the cache.

Alayna's Birthday

Alayna's birthday was a success last weekend. She had a great time going around with her brothers and sisters prompting her in saying "How old is Alayna??? Two!!". Alayna got it down and would say it to us all.


The kids had a great time helping her open presents and play with them of course. She enjoyed the delicious Ice Cream pie that Amber made for her. After her party at Noon, Alayna went down for a nap and her brother and sister watched the movie she got for her birthday -- you gotto love being two!

Aylee's Baptism

I am trying to get caught up on my blogs, and as of yet, I have not blogged about Aylee's baptism on August 5. Aylee had a lot of people there to support her in this important decision. She has worked really hard to prepare for her baptism and this day was one that she will remember.

Afterward we had a picnic at our house. It was fun to have everyone together and to visit.


On the next Sunday, Mom and Dad came to our house and watched the kids so that Amber could go to her brother, Jake's, Patriarchal blessing in Logan. So, Mom and Dad took the kids to church for us so I could still go to my meetings. The kids really enjoyed spending part of Sunday with Mom and Dad.

Ensign Article - Must Read

I don't know how many of you have read this month's Ensign or not, but there is an excellent article on Financial Freedom on any Budget. You can see the article: Financial Freedom on Any Budget.

Amber just called me a few minutes ago after reading the article and looking it over. She asked me where our cousin Jan lives now-a-days. I told her that I thought he was teaching college down in California somewhere. She said, "Well, then that is it, I knew it was him". I asked her what she was talking about. She said that the article in the Ensign was written by a Jan D. Andersen who was a professor at California State University, Sacramento.

I did a little research and sure enough, found his webpage at the college: Jan D. Andersen's Faculty Page

I have read part of the article and thought it was pretty interesting, but I never look at the Authors. I guess this is proof positive that Amber not only reads the Ensign, but she Feasts upon it's every printed word!

Happy Birthday Alayna

We want to just wish Alayna a very happy birthday today - two years old!! We're still trying to get her to say "two", it should be a fun day.

We're just going to have a small party at lunch time with some presents and cake. She still is at that stage where she doesn't really understand that it is all for her. (So we can keep it cheap!) :-)

The Suffering Surfer

Tonight, Amber and I took Aylee and Johnathan to an Orem Owlz baseball game. Jen and Dave were kind enough to watch Aliece and Alayna.

Well, the kids had a great time at the game. I got a fun video clip of them, but it was pretty big (33 MB). If you dare to download it, you can at:
Take Me Out To The Ball Game

Anyway, near the end of the game, the kids were reading the program featuring the Orem Owls. Aylee was scouring the bio's of the famed baseball players. She came upon one biography and as she read it out loud, it caught our attention as it didn't sound quite right.

Aylee read, "...and he enjoys Suffering."

Amber and I turned to her and Amber re-read the sentence to Aylee, "not Suffering, but Surfing."

Johnathan, in his quick sense of humor, added, "He is 'surfing' for his sins!"

Amber and I got a great chuckle out of his cool wit.

Anyway, the Orem Owlz won the game just after 9:30pm with a score of four to zero.

Andersen Ranch & Farm : HOME

Andersen Ranch & Farm : HOME

A Dreamy Water Fight

On Tuesday night, Verne, Ann, and Jake were staying the night at our house before flying out to Chicago the next day to visit Reed and Michelle.

Jake chose to sleep downstairs in the family room on the couch. Well, of course Jake is up all hours of the night anyway, but he had a visit from Johnathan around 1:30 AM.

Jake said that Johnathan came walking into the kitchen and started opening the back door to go outside. Jake stopped the midnight prowler and asked him where he was going. Johnathan looked at Jake and said softly, "Oh, I'm sorry. I was getting the 'Super Soaker'. I didn't ask though."

With that, Johnathan turned around and trotted back off to bed.

That is the same type of thing Johnathan has done when we wake up to noises in the kitchen and catch him getting food. However, we had no idea that he has ever tried to get out of the house. Luckily Jake was there to catch him. I don't know if he has ever left the house in his sleep or not.

I can't believe what a sound sleeper that kid is. After that experience, we are going to not only deadbolt our doors but lock them with the higher chain lock also.

A new car for the Andersens!

Hello family,

Great news!!! We found (and purchased) a new car! As you can see from the pics attached, this is a Buick LeSabre. It is a '92 with 140k miles. The lady that owned it before us took great care of this vehicle. From the outside, it looks almost brand new. The car runs beautifully and the engine was overhauled about a year ago.

When we were looking at the car, we had trouble getting the arm rest to open. The lady tried but she couldn't open it either. She said that the lever that opens it was broken when she purchased the car over 10 years ago.

When Shantell and I drove the car home, I stuck a seatbelt into the latch and was able to pry it open. We found 2 pairs of sunglasses: a his and hers. So, not only is the car new in these pics, but so are the glasses that we are wearing. We love them!

I found a poem on the Internet that I think wraps up our experience for the past couple of weeks. Enjoy...

On the side of a busy road
this car has died again
I thought Corollas were good
but I think we have a lemon.

So we searched the classifieds
every day without waver
Now Shan's a happy girl
Cause we brought home a Buick LeSabre.

Political Correctness

I guess even the children are being taught how to be politically correct - even in preschool.

Today, Aliece's cousin, Ciri (sp) came over to visit. We were eating lunch at the time. Aliece asked Ciri. "Do you know Dave?"

Ciri responded with a "no."

Aliece answered, "He is Jen's Partner"

Man, Hillary Rodham-Clinton sure would be proud of Aliece!

Andersen Ranch & Farm : HOME

Happy Birthday A's! I can't believe your 8 years old today! You're catchin up to me!

Sounds like you have a fun day planned! I may have to see you another day this week to personally wish you a Happy Birthday with your busy schedule :) But I'll be sure to get my spankins' in! :)

I love you! Have a Happy Birthday!
Love Jen

Happy Birthday Aylee

We just wanted to wish Aylee a very happy birthday today!! She has her day planned out, including Toast for breakfast, fishing with Dad before lunch, mac n' cheese for lunch, party after lunch, Activity Days before dinner, baby chicken (S.O.S.) for dinner and miniature golf with the family before bed - this girl is a planner!

Video Game Author

When we had that lightning storm in June, it burnt up the kid's computer. They haven't had a computer or video games to play with all summer long. It has been great, but it doesn't stop Johnathan from dreaming. He is compensating for the lack of computer games by inventing some of his own. Johnathan has been making up future video games lately during his Journal time. He draws pictures of them and writes about them. He has created a new character call Nuigi. Nuigi is supposed to be Mario and Luigi's dad.

This is the message that he wrote on this journal entry. This is super mario surfing and super nuegi and super luigi.

The scare I had last night

Last night Jen and I spent a quiet evening watching TV. During commercials one or both of us would run and get something else done that we needed to do (for me it was typically getting more food to snack on until the next commercial). After one of these breaks Jen came back in and sat down, a few minuets later I started talking to her about something, probably to do with the show; she didn't seem to be responding like I expected her to so I turned to see what was up. I got quite a fright but didn't make any reaction thinking it was just in my mind and had something to do with the reflection of the TV. I had to take another look but still I couldn't figure out what had happened to my poor wife who had been responding a bit like Frankenstein's Monster... and now to see her face. Finally I got up the courage to ask her what was wrong, and after repeating herself a few times with muffled words through tight lips she explained that it was to help her look more beautiful??



Here are a few pictures of what I saw, look closely, you might not be able to see it well. The second picture is with the flash but I must say it was a little more creepy with just the green glow of the TV.



I just want to tell Jen, I love you just the way you are honey!!!

I did it!

hay,gises whatch ya up to? Have you read grandma's [mom's] blog and what she said about me finnishing something?Well,now is the time that I shall tell you... I FINESHED
THE BOOK OF MORMON!!!
I'll right to you gies soner or later!
Bye!
Senesseraly, Aylee Ann
ps.I FELT RELLY GOOD insid.
And for my testimony I would like to say that I know the skripshors are trew.

Object Lesson

Tonight we ran to the library and the got ice cream cones with the kids on the way back. While we were in the car we listened to some more of the Harry Potter books on CD.

When we got home, Aylee was folding clothes and I was making dinner. I didn't have much to say, so I thought I would use an object lesson to teach Aylee a principle. I wanted to talk to her about Lord Voldemort - about him having knowledge and great power, but abusing it all.

I started out the conversation by saying, "Aylee, do you want to be like Lord Voldemort when you grow up." The expected answer came quickly..."No!".

I continued, "why not? He was very powerful and very smart."

Aylee replied matter of factly, "I am already all of that." There was a bit of stunned silence on my part. Then I heard Aylee continue. I expected her to say, "notwithstanding, I still wouldn't want to be like him because he used it for wicked purposes." But, no, her response was different, she concluded just as resolute as before, "...And I don't need any more of it!"

That was the end of my object lesson!

Come over for an Evening of Entertainment

Amber and I are very grateful to the Provo clan that has helped us over the past months with moving into our house. With my recent back surgery corresponding with our move, we required a lot of extra helping hands.

On our moving day, Jake, Shan, Jen, and Dave helped us move some larger items (including a bed and appliances) into our house.

Well, you know that after the initial move, there are little (or big) things that need moved here and there. These items have always seemed to "come up" during visits from the Provo family. One time, Amber and I invited Jen, Dave, Jake, and Shan over for a bbq one monday evening. Just after the food, however, I asked if they would help me get the kids swing reassembled from the move, which they did graciously. At another time we had Dave and Jen over, we needed a big thing moved in our yard and Dave was gracious enough to help. These things just always seemed to coincide (sometimes on purpose, sometimes not)

Ok, so Amber and I decided to get a second refrigerator - one of those side-by-side things that has been all the rave since the mid-1980s.

We ordered one from the RC Willey Outlet store just before Amber went off to Girls Camp last week. The delivery of the fridge was scheduled for Thursday morning - around 11am.

Mom was down here taking care of the kids while Amber was at Young Women's Camp. I thought it would be fun to have games and dessert at our house one evening so that everyone could be with Mom and we could visit. I made the invitations for Thursday night at 8pm.

Well, Thursday came along and the fridge did not arrive by 11am. I let it go a couple of hours later and still there was no refrigerator. I finally called the store and they said that for some reason the delivery information was never scheduled. They felt badly and said that they would have a truck drop it off after it made all of it's scheduled deliveries for the day.

Well, knowing my luck, the truck did not arrive at the house until 7:45pm. The delivery guys had to measure the hole for the refrigerator and sign things, so it wasn't until 8:00pm that they started to remove the refrigerator from the truck. It was also at that time that Jake, Jen and Dave were arriving. Jen saw the big delivery truck and turned to Dave saying, something like "Oh, not again!". She thought for sure that the reason I invited them all over was to help me install my new appliance.

Of course, my intentions were pure - I wanted them over for an evening and games and treats. I still thought the install of the refrigerator would be able to happen without their assistance. However, as it turned out, the hole for the refrigerator was just a few milimeters too narrow and we had to widen the gap a bit with a hammer and board. The installers wouldn't hook up the water line because it didn't have the right shut off valve at the end of the hose. So, I was stranded with a refrigerator stuck halfway into my kitchen that needed water connected and brute force to snugly wedge the white giant into the opening that was barely adequate for a device that size.

Familial responsibilities and stewardships fell into place and Jake and Dave assisted with the rest of the installation. After about 30 minutes, we were able to start our evening of relaxation and entertainment.

As President Monson would put it, "Despite the unexpected events that enveloped the evening, unforseen rewards were reaped as family ties were strengthened, brotherly bonds were built, and heart-melting memories were made."

Jake to the Rescue

A couple of weeks ago, Amber and I decided to look for a refrigerator. We went to a number of places, but found the best deal at the RC Willey outlet in Provo. The problem with purchasing something there is that once you see a good thing you have to act on it right away.

I had remembered Jake telling me that if I ever was to purchase something there at the outlet, to have him come with me because he can get free shipping and a discount with some package he purchased earlier in the year.

Well, Amber and I were on a date, so it was evening. I figured it was a long shot, but I called Jake up on his cell phone and told him that we found something. He and Shan were out on an excercise outing at the Provo Recreation Center. Jake was kind enough to drop everything and run over to the outlet to help negotiate and purchase our refrigerator with the free shipping deal.

Now, skeptics will say he only did that so that he could get out of exercising...but I know Jake better. :-) Thanks Jake for your help (and to Shan for letting him run off like that)!

A Special Request

Aylee is at that stage in life where she is territorial of her bedroom and places signs on her door such as, "Knock before Entering", and "Trespassing will result in your severed had being hung from my door jam!" (Well, OK, she didn't really have the second sign on the door, I just threw it in to make this post a little longer since it is meant to be a pretty short post).

Anyway, Aylee has been staying up very late these past few weeks. It is not all uncommon for her to go to sleep around 11:00 pm. Last night, Amber and I went to bed just before midnight and Aylee was still awake in her room. Well this morning, I got up before everyone else and headed downstairs to drive to work. As I passed her door, I noticed a new sign hanging there. It was a simple request, though one that baffles me - could it be a plea of assistance in a self-driven reformation process? Her request, "Please wake me up early tomorrow, like 4:45." Needless to say, her request was denied.

Swimming at Seven Peaks

While Amber was at Young Women's camp, I took Aylee and Johnathan on a date night to Seven Peaks last Tuesday. They were "high flyer readers" last year in school and won these passes to Seven Peaks, so I was the only one that had to buy a swim pass.

Grandma made us some yummy sandwiches, drinks, and snuck in a roll of Neccos for a treat. We headed off into the sunny afternoon for some water fun. The kids were amazing in their swimming abilities - the progress they had made from the last time we were there last years was phenominal.

I had a head cold and was not feeling particularly well, so I had them start out in one of the pools that had small slides. They played in that pool for about 30 minutes while I stretched out on the side of the pool, dandled my white legs in the water and slept. After my little nap I was feeling 100 times better. We then took off and found some tubes and floated the lazy river. I thought they would stick in the tube, make one round on the river and then beg me to get out. However, they loved the lazy river. They didn't want to ride the tubes at all. They spent their time swimming by themselves in the slow current. They tried catching each other and swimming under the waterfalls. We had a great time.

Our next stop was the wave pool where they were fearless. We went to the deepest end of the pool during the wildest part of the waves and they thought that was the greatest thing.

Following the wave pool we went on the big tube rides. I had two tubes, a double and a single. Aylee would take the single tube and Johnathan and I would ride the double. We went on a fair amount of those rides. I was worried that once we started the tube rides that would be all the kids wanted to do, but no, they surprised me again.

The kids were looking for adventure right and left. Our next destination was the activity pool where the Lilly Pads were located. This particular pool was deeper than the kids were tall. There were two ropes above the pool and then six floating pads that you had to try to step onto and cross to traverse the pool. There was a sign that said kids were not allowed to attempt the activity if they could not reach the rope. Johnathan and Aylee were the smallest kids there in line. They really wanted to try it out so I stood behind them. When it got to be their turn, I would hang on the rope when the guard wasn't looking and have the kids then grab the rope that I had lowered for them with my 200 pound frame.

Aylee made it across the pool over all six lilly pads twice. Johnathan gave it a valiant effort. He made it over four of the six pads before his little arms and legs gave into fatigue (it was hard for him to try to reach out to each floating lilly pad). He finally fell in. He doesn't yet know how to swim, but he has been giving it a valiant try lately. I jumped in with him and let him hit the bottom. I then grabbed him and told him he had to swim to the side. I gave him a push and off he went swimming to the wall. (Granted, he was a bit scared).

We then continued practicing our swimming there in the deeper pool and then repeated some of our earlier activities. We had a great time together - it was a memorable evening in the sun and water.

Grandma Camp

As most of you know, Amber went off to Young women's Camp last week. Mom came down to take care of the kids for us while Amber was gone. The kids were really excited to have Grandma come visit, but I don't think they could have anticipated the great fun that was in store for them.

Grandma's visit included picnics, visits to McDonalds, cool workbooks, stickerbooks, coin books, beadwork, movies, and more! They had their own little "Camp" with Grandma here. It was fun to see them all so involved, but I am sure it wore Mom out by the end!

We had our home teachers over yesterday and they asked the kids if they missed their mom while she was off to Girl's Camp. They all said, No. They had such a great time with Grandma, that they really didn't have much of a chance to think about their mom's absence.

Thanks Grandma for the fun activities and time you spent with our kids!

Happy Birthday Johnathan

Johnathan is Six years old Today!

Ladies and Gentlemen!

I have been off to scout camp this week with the Deacons. In my absense, Aylee has been quite productive. Amber told me that each day that I was gone, Aylee would go and invite kids from a specific street to come to our house at a certain time of the day for a magic show. There she would charge them about 25 cents for the production. Each day she would target a different street, and each day she would make about three dollars.

It appears she really was enjoying the profits that she was able to reap from the magical acts. On the last day before I arrived, unbeknownst to Amber, Aylee raised her show prices from 25 cents to $1.00. She had a good number show up too. When Amber got ear of the price hike, however, she made Aylee walk to every child's house and return 75 cents to them.

When Aylee was originally caught in her price gouging, she nervously asked Amber if she had to tell Dad what she had done. Amber told her no and Aylee breathed a sigh of relief. I have a feeling, however, that it was not Aylee's nerves that Amber was trying to calm, rather she probably knew that I would tell Aylee to try $1.50 tomorrow :-).

Duct tape, anyone?

Alayna is now at the lovable age where clothing and diapers are only a nuisance - an item to be removed and discarded. Last night after several attempts dress Alayna and re-issue her diaper, Amber asked me to get out the big guns - Duct Tape. Remorsefully, we were out of the gray fastening wonder, but I compromised with some wide clear packing tape. As far as I know, the pajamas came right off again, but her diaper stayed on through the night. Anyone got a little extrac duct tape to spare?

To and Fro

The time has come once again to say goodbye to my beloved town and head back to the cramped town of Rexburg. However, I will be returning every weekend to continue working at Heinz. My boss, John, requested that I stay on with them for the summer semester and then in the Fall return and work on a project they will be doing. He siad it will be about as large as the one we just did. He was in hopes that I would stay since I am the only one that has worked on a project this large. SO I petitioned to switch tracks and it was granted. I will still graduate in about the same amount of time it will just take 2 months longer than planned. However I will be making more money than I had planned on making during my last year of school so that will be a major plus.
Looks like my goodbye will only have to be for 2 months then I will bbe permitted to return to the promise land :)! (Well close to it, it will make it so Arbon is only about 40-45 minutes away.) :)

Struck by Lightning?

As many of you know, this past weekend I had youth conference, so Amber took the kids out to Arbon for the weekend. Well, on Friday night I arrived home to a spectacular electrical storm. I watched it for a bit and then threw on a movie.

The movie got over around 10:30 and I decided that I had wasted enough time and that I was going to head to bed. I thought I might take a look at the lightning for a moment before I headed there.

I opened the front door to look outside and enjoy the noisy splendor. As I stepped out onto the front porch, a huge burst of light and a loud crack of sound caused me to jump and the house to shake. Nearly that same moment I heard a sharp POP in the house.

I wondered if we had just been struck by lightning. I ran around checking things and turning them off. Everything that I checked seemed to work ok. I sniffed for smoke and didn't detect any, so I went to bed.

In the morning I got up to go to the second day of youth conference but the Garage door wouldn't open. The unit was receiving no power at all. I unplugged it and plugged it back in and the unit started to work. I counted myself lucky and headed out the door.

When I got home Saturday night, Amber was there with the kids. We were visiting and she asked me why it was so hot in the house. I checked the settings on the thermostat to find that it was indeed warm, but the thermostat thought the air conditioner was on. I went out to the furnice room to find that we had no power to our blower. I unplugged things and reset breakers all to no avail. I then decided I wasn't so lucky with the previous storm.

On Monday, I was heading to work and decided to throw on a movie for Aliece. I went to put a DVD in the player but to my dismay there was no power to my DVD player that happened to be on my $2.00 surge protector/power strip (Note to self, $2.00 power strips do not have real surge protectors inside them).

As of yet, we still need to buy another DVD player (maybe a father's day gift?), but my Air Conditioning friend was able to come over and fix our blower. The unit was fried (scrambled eggs as he put it), but he was able to fix it for $400.00 (and that was the discounted rate).

I called the insurance company, but our deductable is $500.00. So, all of this has come out of pocket.

As I look back on that fateful evening, I should have set the movie aside and sat on the porch all night enjoying the multi-hundred dollar light show.