Lots of Bugs!

Due to the sheer number of bugs around our place over the past week or
so, I set up our Bug Zapper last night. In Provo, I would have to clean
out the zapper once or twice a summer. After having it on all night, we
got up this morning to find it completely full of dead bugs. That
thing works over time. We'll run it again tonight. I am interested to
see if we have fewer bugs each night of operation, or if it makes a
difference at all. Yuck!

Swat Team

The month of September seems to be a pretty bad month for flies and
other bugs. I remember the when we moved into our house last year during
the last half of August and into September we had so many bugs in the
house. Amber and I just figured that we would have to get used to having
bugs in the house all the time.

We were pleasantly surprised, however, when most of the summer passed
without hardly any bugs in the house. As September rolled around,
however, the bugs have come by the droves and we seem to be plagued by
them just as we were last year.

Jace and Amber have taken on the daunting challenge of killing flies in
the house. John named them the SWAT team. They're pretty good at
catching the flies both on the wall and in midair. You just need to make
sure that there are no flies on your arms or your face when one of the
two of them are nearby with a flyswatter!

Spud Day Parade

This morning was the parade for spud days. Alayna had the opportunity to be in the parade. Some of the kids from her school were selected to ride in a school bus and throw out candy to all those who were watching the parade. Alayna was very excited to be able to do this.

The rest of us found a great place to hang out for the parade. We chose a place that was fairly close to the beginning of the parade so that we would have a greater chance of receiving candy. They ended up being quite a chilly day, so many of us wish that we had jackets on to keep us warm.

Our kids got so much candy from the parade. By the time that we got home and emptied their bags, we had over two ice cream buckets full of candy.

We were excited when we saw the school bus with Alayna inside. She looked very cute standing by her window and throwing out candy to the onlookers.

Jace turns four!

Today, Jace turned four years old. His birthday happened to coincide with spud day today. So along with the spud day celebrations, we spent plenty of time during birthday activities with Jace.

Jen and her girls, Janae, and my parents spent the night last night instead throughout the day to celebrate Jace's birthday.

Jace received a lot of fun presents. He even had a couple of Skype sessions with grandma and grandpa Reed as well as with Reed and Michelle and their family.

We are excited to see that Jace is now four years old. He is growing up to be a fun and handsome boy.

Amber's First 5k - The Shelley Spud Run

The kids were not the only ones to participate in a running sport for spud days. Over the past few months, Amber and a few of her neighbor friends have been getting up around six in the morning to go running together. They decided that it would be fun to train for the annual "spud run".

They have had a great time preparing themselves for the race. They met up this morning at 6:30 AM to run their race.

I had a great time hopping from station to station throughout the race. After Amber's first mile, she was looking strong. I wish I could have grabbed a picture of her at that point. At the second mile point, she was really sweating but she had confidence in her face. I knew that it would be a good race for her. At mile three, you could tell that she was giving it all she had. That last 10th of a mile was hard but she pushed through it and into the race at about 31 minutes -- making her pace a 10 minute mile.

Amber has really gotten into running this year. It has been a great experience for her. I think next year she's going to be ready to take on a 10K race. It has been fun to see her fight so much enjoyment running with some of her good friends here in Shelley.

Editor's Note: I actually slept in this morning and my subconcious convinced me that Amber's race didn't begin until 7:35 AM. I woke up accordingly and went downstairs. My Dad was down there wondering if I was going to the race. I told him that I was. He wanted to come along, so we hopped in the truck. On the way over (about 7:45) Amber called my cell phone. I was surprised that she would call during her race but wondered if they were starting late. I answered and Amber asked if I slept in. It then hit me that I was on the wrong time schedule...the race didn't start at 7:35, Amber was expecting to FINISH at 7:35. The good husband that I am missed the race entirely. I at least got there in time to snap the picture!

The Tator Trot

Given that this weekend was Shelley's annual spud Day celebration, the community posted a race for the younger children in the area. This year, we had four children participate in the "Tater Trot".

All of our kids were in the younger half of their age division this year. Despite the age difference between their groups, they all did a terrific job in their races. I think we have a family who likes to run. It was fun to see the kids don their race number tags and hit the pavement running.

It was especially fun to watch Jace do his run. Aylee ran next to him to help him along. Jace insisted on riding his imaginary horse most of the way. He even held his hand out and pretend to carry some reigns as he trotted in his lane.

It is fun to see the kids enjoy running. I hope it is something they carry with them throughout their lives.

A 37th Birthday

This Thursday I celebrated my 37th birthday. It was probably one of the more complicated birthdays that I have ever had simply due to logistics. I got up at 4:00 AM to catch my 6 AM flight from San Diego to Idaho Falls. I had been spending the week in San Diego participating in a training for service-now.com.

When I reached the airport, it was announced that our plane had broken down and that they hoped to have it flying again in four hours. We were instructed to call the airline and try to make alternate reservations. After waiting in line for many minutes I was able to get on the phone and get a new itinerary that would get me home around four or 5:00 PM in Idaho Falls. I was not too excited about spending my birthday in an airport, but at least it was going to get me home in time to celebrate my birthday as if I had been at work.

Luckily, they were able to fix the planes sooner than expected and I was able to change my flight plans again and get home only two hours later than I was originally supposed to. I was really grateful and relieved that are worked out that way.

Amber, Jace, and Avary picked me up at the airport and we went to the Olive Garden for lunch. It was so good to be home and see Amber and the kids again.

Work ended up being quite busy that day and so we celebrated my birthday from about six to 8 PM. After that Amber laid on the couch next to me and fell asleep while I worked on my laptop for several hours and made phone calls to help some sales guys on the West Coast.

By about 11:00 PM I finished up my birthday by waking Amber up and helping her up to bed. I was so grateful to be home and in my own bed that was still a very nice birthday!

Thanks to everyone who called or otherwise expressed your heartfelt birthday wishes. It is always good to hear from everyone.

15 miler

On labor day, Amber and I took Aylee and John on a 15 mile bike ride.  Shantell and Janae came along as well.  Dave was good enough to be our support vehicle driver and Jen watched our kids for us while we rode.

We rode from the top of Mink Creek down to Jen & Dave's place.  It was a fun ride.  Aylee and John did a great job with the ride -- especially since they really haven't ridden much all summer.

A fair time

On Thursday last week I wanted to get to the fair before it ended.  We were originally headed to Provo for the weekend, so Thursday was going to be my last chance.

I got all of my work done early and Jace and I dressed up in our best cowboy gear and headed off to the Eastern Idaho State Fair together.  He wanted to wear his vest and chaps.  He looked really cute.

Mom and Dad met us at the fair and we hung out with them for most of the our time there.  We had a great time together.

Jace got a lot of attention with his outfit.  People really thought he was the bomb. Some even gave him extra fair swag because they thought he looked so great.

We had a great time together.

Another day at the fair

This past weekend we were supposed to go to Provo to visit old friends.  However, several of the kids were still sporting Pink Eye  They were all on medicine, but we didn't want to make people feel uncomfortable with us staying with them, so we decided to stay home.

Since we were going to be home, we decided to go to the fair with the whole family.  I had gone to the fair the previous day with Jace, but we decided to go again.

We had a great time there looking at the animals, interacting with them, as well as checking out all of the fun entertainment and food.

Alayna spent some of her hard earned money to get her face painted.  She was really excited about it, and it looked great.

One of the big activities for the kids was the science exhibit.  There were lots of puzzles and experiments to play with.  The kids loved that section.

While we were there we ran in into Jake & Shantell and their family, Jen & Dave and their family, as well as Janae.  It was a lot of fun.  We were there for a good four or five hours.

Amber made a big purchase at the fair as well.  She has been wanting vinyl decals for the back of the suburban for a long time.  We found a place at the fair that let you design your own decals.  We let each of the kids choose their own icon for the banner.  It was a fun process and it looks great.

First Triathlon

On Saturday, September 10, there was a Kid's triathlon at the golf course in Shelley. John has really enjoyed long distance running, and he did well on the swim test at Scout camp this summer, so Amber talked to him and asked if he wanted to be in it. He was pretty excited, so we signed him up the next morning.

He didn't get to train for it at all since he had about 12 hours advance notice, but he did a really good job.

The triathlon consisted of: 100 meter swim, 3 mile bike ride, and 1.5 mile run.



His chain came off twice on his bike right at the beginning which put him back a ways, but he persevered and stuck with the race, doing a very good job.



He was in the same bracket with one of his best friends, Emily Rickabaugh...they both finished about the same time.

It was a very positive experience...we're really glad that he decided to do the race.

Four Wheeler

While I was at scout camp this week with John I have asked Amber to
check out a four wheeler off of craigslist. On Monday, Amber and her dad
visited the people that were selling the four wheeler. They took it for
a spin and liked it enough to buy it.

When I got back from scout camp, Amber and I took the cargo trailer over
and picked up the four wheeler. It is just over 10 years old but is in
pretty good condition for its age. It does have a few quirks, but it
seems to run pretty well.

It came with an electric winch as well as a good snow blade.

When we were picking up the four wheeler I told the guy that I had
purchased a snow thrower last winter and found out that my property was
just too big for it. If he was interested he could stop by our house and
check it out. Last night, he swung by our house and looked at it. He
liked it and bought it from us. It turned to be a pretty nice arrangement!

Where there's Smoke, there's Fire

Today, I had to get the oil changed on the pickup so I took my laptop to Big-O and did my work while they serviced the truck. While I was gone, Amber was home with all of the kids except for Aylee who is at Girl's Camp.

While Amber was taking a shower, she thought she smelled smoke, but kept on taking her shower. She could tell that the smoke was outside and a ways away, so she didn't think anything of it. When she got out of the shower and downstairs to check on the kids, she found John, Aliece, and Alayna all out sitting in the driveway out by the road with their 72 hour kit backpacks. They smelled the smoke and had grabbed their emergency gear and waited outside all prepared. Aliece even had her blanket and favorite stuffed animal with her just so nothing happened to them.

We both had a good laugh about it and were proud of their efforts. The only downside: while they had their precious belongings and were safe, they had let Avary and Jace stay in the house -- Avary in her bed and Jace playing with his toys. At least the stuffed animals will be safe :-)

Cowboy Jace

Ever since we moved to Idaho, Jace has had this thing about Cowboys. He often insists that we call him "Cowboy Jace" instead of just Jace. Amber was telling a friend today that Jace doesn't no how to run normally, he trots all of the time on his imaginary horse any time he wants to get somewhere fast.

Well, I just got home from Scouts tonight and was trying to find Amber. Jace has been having a hard time falling asleep lately with the sun being up so late in the evening, so I guessed that she might be in his room helping him fall asleep. Sure enough, as I peeked through the crack in the doorway, I saw Amber sitting next to Jace on his bed in the dark bedroom. Amber had Jace's head on her lap and she was lightly brushing his face and tracing the features of his face with nothing other than his silver toy six-shooter pistol.

Woah Tex...this kid has it bad!

Indiana Jones

Amber heard the Indiana Jones theme song coming from our closet. She walked in there to find Jace humming the song, flipping his rope whip, all while dangling down in our laundry chute.

He loves to play Indiana Jones!

Dad Singing Eggbert the Easter Egg

We had a great time this past Saturday with the family at our house for the Easter party.  It was especially fun to see Joe.  The kids loved having Lucy there as well.

I managed to catch a recording of Dad singing "Eggbert the Easter Egg" for all of the gang.  You can listen to it here:

http://www.callfamilyhistory.com/manual-uploads/joann/DadSingingEggbertTheEasterEgg.mp3

Potty training tool

As many of you know our son Jace has been having a hard time learning how to go poop in the toilet. He's getting old enough that All of his cousins that are his age are potty trained. He is lagging behind. I have tried lately to get him to sit on the toilet for an extended period of time by setting up a table with my iPad on it showing a movie of one of his favorite cartoons. We'll have to see if this works!

Arbor

The last couple of weeks I have been working on an Arbor for a wisteria vine on the side of my house. I thought I would send a couple of pictures so you could see the progress.

I planted that wisteria vine last year becuase I had visions of an arbor at the spot so the vine is well established by now and should start climbing the arbor posts.

Stool Sample

Tonight, Amber found some plans on how to make a long bench. She decided that the bench, if shortened would make a good stool. When I got done working at 5pm, I found her chopping up some spare wood scraps. By 7:30, she had her first prototype finished. It is sturdy and looks pretty good. We're going to paint it and then mass produce them to go throughout the house!

True Colors

Last night, one of tonight's appointments fell through so I decided to go on a date with Amber instead. As we were going out the door, Alayna grabbed onto me and pleaded that I would stay home with her instead. I was touched by her sincere desire to have some quality time with her dad. However, I was immovable on the matter. When she realized that I was indeed leaving, her true intentions came out with her question...

"Well, Dad, can you just leave your iPhone here then?"

So much for wanting Dad to stay home for some quality 1:1 time :)

Jace's new eating habit

Jace was having a hard time eating his lunch today. He then offered amber a solution that would help him eat. Surprisingly it did the trick!

2010-2011 Weight Competition Results

I just wanted to take a moment and thank everyone that participated in the 2010-2011 Holiday Version of Leading Losers. It looks like over half of us were able to shed our holiday pounds...so congratulations. Everyone else was close to being back at their pre-holiday weight!

Those that lost weight or broke even:
John, Jen, Amber, & Jake

It was a fun go around, and I appreciate everyone's well wishes for me taking the entire pot of $168.00 (that's a few visits to chuck-a-rama!). As you can see by my picture, I still have more to lose, so we'll have to circle our wagons and plan our next weight challenge sometime!!

Aliece hits the news....

I was reading the Shelly Pioneer (a weekly newspaper for the Shelley area) and found that Aliece was mentioned in the paper. She recently won a story telling competition for her classroom. She then competed in the school and did very well.

I have scanned in the newspaper article about the occasion.

We were really proud of Aliece for going out of her comfort zone and doing such an amazing performance.

Splits

I don't know where Jace got the idea, but today at lunch he thought it would be fun to do the splits on top of the kitchen table. He did a pretty good job!

Flooring has arrived

We just got our hardwood flooring in yesterday. I had to take the trailer to the lumber store to pick it up. It weighed about 1.5 tons. It really maxed out my trailer's towing capacity. I was kind of worried, but we took it slow and made it home without any incident. When we got home, we had some neighbor kids come over and Haul the wood into the house. It is now sitting in boxes in the kitchen area so that it can adjust to the climate in our house. Within about a week or two the floor will be installed. It will be so nice to have a real floor again! The kids keep tripping into the subfloor and getting close snagged on pieces of wood. Before the floor gets in, we will need to replace our exterior doors. After the floor is complete, we just do some repair work on the cabinets and build an island. It will be nice when this project is done!

A sticky situation

This week we were at the high school switching buses like always when I walked passed John's stop and saw him on a pole. I told him to get away thinking that he would get his tongue stuck, but it was too late. He had already frozen his tongue there. Fortunately, one of his good friends was there and got a guard. While they ran to get water, I kept pushing his head forward so that he wouldn't cause any more damage. Luckily, he only hurt the bottom of his tongue! Well, Alayna is begging me to get off, so see you! Love A's

Remodel Project

Here are some pictures of the remodel of my breezeway. It is still a work in process but I finished putting the primer on the ceiling today. Next week I hope to put the paint on the ceiling.

Before:After:

Mommy Did It

This morning, mom turned the on monitor on the computer for Avary. For the Next while, Avary sat there watching small Sesame Street clips. When I walked in a little later, I noticed she was pressing the monitor button. I told her that wouldn't work, then she said: "Mommy did it." Who knows what she will pick up next!

Love you! A's

My kind of shoes

There was a picture I saw on Google Reader that showed the coolest high heels ever. They were black and totally covered with star wars stuff. Now those are shoes I wouldn't mind wearing!

Love you all!
A's

P.S. To those who didn't know, I am getting braces this month.

Suggested Resolutions

While sitting around the dinner table tonight, our conversation moved toward new year's resolutions. Everyone started suggesting resolutions for each other. Suggestions for Avary and Jace were to be potty trained. Alayna & Aliece, were suggested that they should learn to tie their shoes. John Jr was told that he should work on keeping his room clean. Aylee was challenged to show confidence when she talks to other people.

The kids caught on to this along the way and were firing these suggestions off right and left. Then they directed their attention to their parents. Alayna told Amber that her resolution should be to prepare dinner at the right time (tonight's dinner ended up taking place after 7pm).

Then John looked at me and said, "I know Dad's resolution!" The table went quiet momentarily as I cringed waiting to hear the verdict. Here it came, "Dad, you should just keep up the good work."

I looked at Amber a little haughtily and smiled proud.

John will be getting a $20.00 bill under his pillow tonight. :-)

A 3 year old dissappointment

Apparently, according to Aliece & Alayna, Jace is disappointed in me as a Dad since I got mad at him tonight when I caught him out of bed way past bed time.

Luckily for me, Alayna tried to cheer the three year old up and Aliece tried to explain to him how why grown ups do the things they do.

Someone needs a psychiatrist in this house!

Newest Computer User

Due to increased computer activity by our youngest boy, Amber was driven to create Jace his first ever computer account on the kids' PC at our house.

Lately Jace has really gotten into the activities on PBS. He can pretty much navigate himself around the computer alone.

Maybe we'll have to buy the kid a laptop for Christmas. :)

A Broken Nose

The other day we had a guy over to our house to do some maintenance work
on our fireplace. I was sitting in the room with the service man to
watch how he was doing everything. While we were there, Jace came up to
me excitedly and said, with a proud look on his face, "Dad, look at this!"

I looked down at him and he was sticking his finger in his nose and
then putting it into his mouth. Then he got a perplexed look on his
face. He then tried it again. The finger went into the nose, but came
out clean and then went into his mouth.

He stuck his finger into his nose one last time, and it came out clean.
He stuck it into his mouth and then said in a frustrated tone, "Dad,
it's broken!"

I guess he'll have to wait until his nostrils fill up with more of those
juicy little snacks.

No Electricity

A month ago, Aliece brought home this essay that she wrote at school. I thought it was really cute, so I thought I would post it to the blog. In case it is hard to read on the scanned image that I am including, I will also type her essay here:

Title: What I would do if there was no electricity
By: Aliece

What I would do if there was no electricity. I would go outside and play. I would even light a lamp with fire and have my family stay behind me. I could even walk and look behind me to see if my whole family was there. I would feel brave and we would even have our emergency backpacks. It would keep us safe and happy.

I would feel like a Hero. I might would be in the newspaper. It would be great. But we love electricity!

The End.

P.S. But we wouldn't marry electricity. And it is fun to have electricity.

By Aliece.

Dave can fix anything!

I went downstairs and hear Jace getting upset in the room with our computer. I asked him why is was mad and it was because he was trying to watch a disney video on the internet but it was choppy due to slow internet speeds.

I worked with it a bit to try to speed things up, but to no avail.

Aliece, who was standing behind me offering encouraging advice, said, "Maybe we should call Dave."

I replied, "Oh, you think Dave can fix this?".

She responded so absolutely, "Oh yes, Dave can fix ANYTHING!"

So, Dave, when you get a minute, can you come over to our house and give us faster internet speeds??

The kind gesture of a simple card

After my business trip from Denver, I came home last night to find a nice little card on my pillow from Alayna. Amber explained to me that Alayna had made these cards for everyone as a special invitation or message. She explained that Alayna had put these on everyone's pillow.

I guess last night when Jace went to bed he found the card from Alayna. Amber said that he was so proud of that card. He kept pretending to read it over and over again, saying Alayna's name randomly in his "reading". He kept the card next to him all night and kept picking it up and setting it down over and over again before sleep overcame him.

This morning I found Jace toting around his little card from Alayna. I grabbed a photo of him eating his breakfast with the card right next to him. (Yeah, he is trying to smile in this picture - don't you love it when little kids realize that their is a smile pose and it takes them a year or so to get it down?)

Thanks for your thoughtful act, Alayna, it really made a huge difference to Jace!

Naughty List

I am working here in my home office and I overheard John Jr sing, to the tune of a Polar Express song, "And Santa falls off his sleigh..."

Then I heard Alayna chastising him, " Johnny, that is not nice. What if you end up on Santa's 'Naughty List!'"

I guess that should straighten him out. :-)

First Play on our Home Theater Stage

As part of our basement remodel, Amber and I decided to make a stage where the TV goes so that our home theater room would be both a movie theater room along with a drama room. The kids love to make movies and plays, so we thought this would go over well.

Yesterday, after church, the kids made up a play about the Biblical story of Esther. They came up with it quickly and did a fun presentation. It was humorous to see Jace in his various costumes getting into the play. Avary even hopped off Amber's lap to make a few appearances in the production.

If you have 10 minutes to kill, you can view it here:

Craft fun for thanksgiving

One of the many activities for our Andersen family Thanksgiving get together included a craft activity for the kids. Janae rounded up the kids for this activity. They had fun painting clear plastic cups brown and then cutting out their hand shapes to make turkey feathers.

The women folk have busy busy on other crafts as well as the guys have gotten their fill of football and James Bond.

Double take

While I was working this morning Amber hung up our Christmas stockings on the mantle. As I walked into the room I did a double take as I saw the number of stockings. I thought Amber had gone crazy hanging a gazillion stockings for fun.

As I counted the hoard of multiple-colored socks I realized that there was just enough for each one of us.

Man, when did my little family get to be so big?

Just so that I wont forget it

The other day, my watch died on me. I thought it would be fun to take it apart, so I did. After I was done, I took a piece of paper and wrote my locker combination on it and stuck it in my watch, so that I could see it. Now I am pretty sure I won't forget it(not that I have yet)!

Love ya!
A's

The Monster

Yesterday I realized that I have procrastinated the day of my repentance. We had nearly a three foot drift in our driveway, and I still didn't have a good snow removal solution for the house. I bundled up at lunch time and headed out to some stores to seek out the perfect, low-cost, snowblower.

As soon as I reached the first store, I found out that finding a snow blower was going to be as easy as grabbing a $100 ipad on a black-friday sale. People were lined up at the snow blower isle, each clamoring for the blower of their choice among a very limited stock. I found one that I liked, but wanted to check out Sam's club first to see if they had a better deal. I ran over to Sams to find a snow blower that was a beast. It was huge and dwarfed any of the others that I had been looking at. The price was good, but it was still 200 dollars more than the unit I liked best at the Home Depot.

I ran back to the Home Depot to grab smaller and cheaper unit, only to find that they were all sold out. There was a much smaller and cheaper one left, and I was just about decided to buy it. The wheels on the thing were pretty small though, and I started to think about the drifts in my yard. I decided to go with the Sam's Club behemoth version instead.

I spent the extra money. It took four guys to get the box into my Suburban. As I drove home, I was sick. I wondered if I really needed a blower that was that big.

However, after I got it assembled and started blowing snow last night, I realized that this thing was probably the smallest I should ever go on a blower for our place. It took me 90 minutes to do our driveway and barn area. When I was hitting the biggest drifts I was grateful for the size of the blower. I realized that if I had let it go one more day, even this snow blower would have had a hard time getting us out of the house.

Oh, Duuuuh

Today was our high council assignment day in which the assigned High Councilor from the stake made a visit to our ward and gave an assigned talk. Somewhere during his talk he was telling a story from the book of mormon of a very wicked man who hated the Nephites and caused a lot of contention between them and the Lamanites. During his talk, he forgot the name of that particular Book of Mormon villan.

In his exasperation, he said, "well, I can't quite remember the name, but it sounds like the city of Zarahemla". At that point, Johnathan, who was sitting next to Amber, exhaled in almost of sound of resigned disgust, wispered, "Zarahemna!"

Amber and I did our best not to start laughing right there in the middle of the talk. Good job on your Book of Mormon reading, Johnny!

Welcome to The Netherlands

This week I am in the Netherlands for work. I flew out on Friday and got Amsterdam on Saturday afternoon. They are 9 hours ahead of us in California so adjusting to the schedule was very difficult the first day. After one day in Amsterdam it was off to Tilburg which is a city of about 250,000 about 1.5 hours from Amsterdam.
We finished things up on Tuesday night and then drove back to Amsterdam last night. This morning I flew to London and am enjoying my first day in London before heading off to Paris tomorrow. Looking forward to seeing Paris before heading back to Amsterdam to fly back to California.

The two that made it all happen!

I just wanted to take a minute and wish Mom and Dad a very Happy Anniversary today! I have always loved this picture from one of our camping trips to Twin Lakes. I carried it with me in my scriptures throughout my mission to Brazil. I would always look at it to feel a touch of home.

Hope you both have a very nice day today. You deserve it. Thanks for being the parents and grand parents you are. We all love you and appreciate all the attention and love you give to us.

Beehive 2nd Counceler

Hey guys! I want to do more blogging, so I figured this is the perfect chance! On Sunday afternoon, One of the bishopbric members interviewed me and asked if I would be the Beehive 2nd counceler! Of course I said Yes.