So that's how she does it

Many of you may remember my earlier blog about Aliece and newspapers. Amber and I worried that we were such bad parents that Aliece would leave the house while both of us were home and deliver papers to the neighbors. Well, this morning, I caught her! Now that I have started school, I have been getting up at about 5AM to study before heading to work. Well, yesterday morning I was in our bedroom and I thought I heard the kids' door open, but it was pretty quite, so I just listened. I didn't hear anything else and I was going to dismiss it. However, a few seconds later I heard a door on the other end of the house open and shut. I got up and walking into the family room. I didn't see anyone, so I was going to go back to bed when I heard automatic garage door running. I started heading for the family room when I spotted that little rascal, coming in from the garage with a newspaper in her hand. Here it was, just after 6am. She handed me the newspaper, and without a word, headed back to bed and went back to sleep. I don't know how long or how often she has been doing this, but she has been going through the garage because all the doors have been locked. She opens the garage door and grabs the newspaper and closes the garage door up again.

Alayna's latest little tricks have been opening drawers and doors in the kitchen - DESPITE the child locks that we installed just one month ago. Alayna has worked intently on the doors with child locks and has discovered how to disengage the locks - thus allowing her free access to all of our kitchen supplies. To add to the nightmare, she has also learned how to open the refrigerator! 

They call me the "Lip Whore"

Well, I did it. Nicole and I have been dating for almost two months now. Everybody always hassles me about not kissing her yet. My old roommate met a girl a couple of weeks ago and within two days, they were kissing. Another friend went out with a girl for the first time on Thursday and that same day they were holding hands and then kissing by Saturday. Well, on Saturday, we went out to dinner and then got a movie and went to a friend’s house and watched it. They have a couple of big stuffed pillows so we were laying on one of those. So we were cuddling during the whole movie and then it got over. So we just laid there for a while cuddling. Then she started kissing my face because she was snuggled right up next to me. So I kind of froze and didn’t know what to do so I just kept laying there. So after an undisclosed amount of time, I got up the courage to move my face so that our lips were closer. So then we kissed a couple of times, but they were just pecks because there were other people in the room. So then I took her home. I was scared because I knew what was going to happen that night. I couldn’t just drop her off with a hug and then avoid eye contact and leave; I knew it was going to be “the night.” So I took her home and standing outside her apartment, we hugged and I knew it was going to happen so I thought that I would just be a man and initiate it so I did. I tried to initiate just a peck, but there was no way that she was going to let me go with just a peck. So we stood there kissing for a while. I was so nervous I was shaking and breathing really fast. Then I pulled away quickly, said good night and ran away. I don’t think that I did a very good job because I was so nervous. Hopefully next time I won’t be as uneasy. Maybe with some more practice, I will have some confidence and do a great job.

It's fun to have relatives

As many of you may know, I am spending most of this week in New Hampshire doing some training for some people at a company that Novell purchased a few months ago. I have never been to New Hampshire, so I was pretty excited about the trip. It has not been disappointing - it is definately green and beautiful here. Although we haven't seen the sun this week due to Hurricane Katrina, we have enjoyed the green rollowing hills. It is hard to tell how big any of the cities are around here because of all the trees. You just find placed nestled in trees and can't see much farther out.

Well, it has been good to be out here, but I have felt kind of lonely and missing home a bit. I was pretty excited that Ashlee and Brett invited me to come and visit them last night. It turns out that they only live about 50 miles from Lebanon. I went there last night and Ashlee had a delicious dinner of chicken and dumplings. While we visited she then whipped out her ice cream machine and made us a nice little ice cream dessert. It sure was good to see them. Little Elyvia is growing tall. No baby fat yet, though! It was funny to hear that she is still blowing out her diapers!

All in all, after being out here and feeling lonely, it was nice to visit them and be with family.

Back to School

Last Tuesday was my first day back in classes. It is kind of fun to see all the kids walking around campus with their back packs and books. But that is about where the fun ends. I started my classes at 8:00 am (which is a lot earlier than it sounds). I have my business stats class first. Then at 9:30 I have my business law class which is extremely boring and my teacher is from India. But I have friends in most of my classes so it makes it a lot more interesting and easier to study. But I go from 8:00 to 4:30 with a 1 hour break. It makes for a long day, but it is nice to only have classes on Tuesday and Thursday. What I am finding out though is that Wednesdays are a killer day because I have all the homework from all my classes due on Thursday.

I have been dating Nicole, the girl from Star Valley. Things are going well. We are holding hands a cuddling a lot, but I still havent kissed her. Maybe in the next week or two.

Left behind - As you can tell, there was one Andersen child old enough to want to go to school, but that was unable to. Donned in her pink backback and pigtails, Aliece was depressed that her older siblings were boarding the bus without her. Two more years, Aliece! Two more years.
 

Johnathan on his first day of Kindergarden. Can you tell this guy is excited to start school?? We could hardly contain him this morning, he was hyper and running around the place yelling that he was going to school. As soon as we told him he could head to the bus - Off he ran! 

Come as you are

Amber was giving one of the kids a bath last night. I am not sure of the circumstances, maybe it was that she changed Alayna's diaper and it was sitting on the floor. Well, anyway, before Amber could say anything, Aliece took the diaper to the outside garbage can to help her mom out. Aliece is so helpful - the only problem was, she was ready to get in the bath and so she had taken the diaper to the outside garbage wearing nothing but her brithday suit and her bright smile.

Aylee started her first day of second grade on Monday. She is pretty excited for school to start up again.
 

Me and the kids on the Hayden's Semi-Truck while we were hauling hay this weekend. - Thanks to Jen for the picture. 

Entertaining Statements of the Day

We have been pretty tired after our quick trip up to Idaho and back this weekend. It was definately a fun and worthwhile trip, but it has taken its toll on us.

Although part of the day has been a little trying, the kids helped to lighten the load a bit by making some very funny remarks. I thought I would share them with you tonight before I go to bed, so that I would not be leaving them amoung the volumes of funny quotes that are left unrecorded - to be forgotten.

This morning it was Aliece's turn to choose a Sunday movie for the kids to see while Amber got things ready for church. She asked Aliece, what movie did she want to see. Aliece stopped and pondered for a moment, and then said in a rather casual tone, "Oh, I don't know, something amazing, I guess".

Then Johnathan was working on an art project after church. Amber was sitting on the couch reading her scriptures. Johnathan interrupted her and said, "Mom, it would be WONDERFUL if you could help me with this!" - How could a mom say no!

Finally, we were sitting at the dinner table tonight. I had planned on giving the kids a father's blessing since school starts tomorrow for Aylee. In order to help them look forward to this event, we repeatedly mentioned throughout the day that I would be giving them a blessing. In our final attempt to help them understand what we would be doing and the importance of it, I asked Johnathan across the dinner table, what he thought might go on when I gave him a blessing. Just before this conversation, Johnathan had been walking around telling Aylee that he was going to have a blessing today. Well, when I posed the question to him, his face lit up and he said in a quiet reverent, yet excited, voice, "You are going to give me the Aaronic Priesthood!" That kind of threw me off pitch a bit. I guess Amber and Johnathan have been reading the scriptures in the D&C and talking about the Priesthood. Johnathan had somehow connected the upcoming blessing with receiving the Priesthood. I was relieved that he remained excited (and was the first in line) to receive his father's blessing, even though it did not include his receiving the priesthood at this time.

Alyee and Johnathan wanted an Air-Hockey game. Of course they knew that I would not buy them one to put in the small confines of this house, so they improvised and made one out of legos. I was pretty impressed by their improvizations. It was a pretty cool setup - and they were able to play hockey to their heart's content. Please note their competitive faces. :-)
 

A Free Spirit

We all love Aliece, but we know that she is somewhat of a "free spirit". She just likes to go where she wants to, do what she wants to, without any concern for rules or laws that have been set in stone for ages by her parents.

Amber was having a pre-school meeting with other moms at our house. All of the moms had their kids playing in our back yard, so the mothers met at the picnic table in the yard to make sure the kids would be fine during their meeting. Well, their meeting started and the kids played joyously in the yard near them. I guess Aliece kept the kids well stocked with snacks...during the meeting Aliece went into the house, opened the pantry and got out peanuts, fruit snacks and in the freezer she got out popsicles. After emptying our pantry and freezer, she then proceeded to hand them out to all of the kids outside. Amber was aware of this until it was too late and only a couple of packages of fruit snacks were found in the bottom of the retail-sized box.

When the mom's were leaving, Amber was helping them gather their things and their children. After they left, Amber saw Aliece playing with a metal flag lawn decoration. She knew that it wasn't ours and was tried to figure out where she had seen that ornament before. After a few minutes of pondering, Amber realized that it was from a neighbor's house that was clear around the block on on the other side of the street. Sometime while Amber was helping the moms gather their things, Aliece had left the back yard, walked around the block, crossed the street and snatched the lawn ornament and returned.

Amber was exhausted and exasperated. She was venting to one of the neighbor ladies a few doors down about Aliece's adventures. Her fried told her that was funny, but Aliece has been "Delivering" their newspaper to them every morning. Both Amber and I are usually home in the morning getting dressed and ready for the day, but I guess Aliece makes it a daily routine to leave the house, walk a few doors down, pick up the neighbor's newspaper, ring their doorbell, and hand their paper to them. Then she returns home without us knowing any better.

The Little Snot

Johnathan is going through a stage right now that we all hope ends soon - it is the stage of "I'm the older brother and I can beat up on my little sister if I want to".

Yesterday Amber was reading Aliece a story in her bedroom in preparation for naptime. While she was reading she heard Alayna screaming like she was really mad. It didn't sound good, so Amber got up and left Aliece to go and check on Alayna. She found Johnathan grabbing Alayna by the ankles and dragging her on the kitchen floor - face down. Alayna was screaming and trying to stop with her hands as her nose kept scraping the floor. Needless to say Johnathan got a severe beating by his mother.

The beating really helped because we it was Back to School night and we had visited the classrooms for Aylee and Johnathan. Amber had to go and write some checks for the many "donations" asked for by the school, so I took the kids out on the playground. I was visiting with a member from our ward in the play area and I saw Johnathan carrying Alayna by her armpits. Alayna did not want to be relocated and was screaming in protest. I yelled at Johnathan and told her to put her down. Well, he did just as I said - he let go and Alayna and let her fall to the ground.

I think I'll go and purchase a whip.

Alayna after eating her ice cream pie on her very first birthday today! Alayna got a lot of good presents today - thought she didn't enjoy opening them as much as her brother and sisters enjoyed helping her. We had a little party tonight for here where Amber made some delicious Florentine shells for dinner and then a yummy ice cream pie. Jen, Dave, Jake A., and the Kosmickis attended. We all had a great time.
 

Busy Sunday - one more visitor to the geocaches

Today has been a very busy Sunday. I was home from 4:30pm - 7:30pm and then back after 9pm.

Jake and Shantell, and Jake Reed and his girlfriend, Paige, came over for dinner and dessert.

I had another person write today saying they visited some of the arbon caches on Saturday...

Big Onion Cache:

You did a great job on placing these caches, so many of them made it more worthwhile to make the drive through Arbon valley. I also have rounded up cattle on the Onion a few times as a teenager since I grew up to the East of Arbon in Downey. Thanks for the fun tour of Arbon. T- horse L-duck keychain.

Ripley Road:

Part of our family grew up just over the mountain and I have never really been to Arbon Valley, I knew a few people from Arbon when I did rodeo in highschool, we enjoyed the drive. Thanks.

Rocky Ridge:

Kudos to you for setting your caches in such a way that we got a wonderful tour of Arbon Valley. You did a wonderful job, Thank you.

Arbon Church:

This was a cute little church, we haven't seen one this small for a long time. Coming from Utah the churches are much bigger. Thanks for bringing us to your quaint valley

Cemetary:

We came in through Malad from Cache Valley on our way to visit family. We particularly liked the old windmills and the rustic, western look of the cemetery. Thanks for placing so many fun caches. We enjoyed the drive and exited Arbon Valley via Hawkins.

The Arbon Caches have been visited!

Just wanted to let you all know that the seven geocaches that I left in Arbon last week have all been visited by a guy that goes by ScatStomper.

By the way FTF stands for "First to Find" - it is what people put in their logs if they are the first to find a cache.

Here are the notes that he recorded on the geocaching website:

Watch for Cavities (Bull Canyon Cave)
FTF!! This was #1 of 7 for the day. Never been in this part of Arbon Valley. Took tube of toothpaste and left spool of dental floss and two packets of Wet Ones wipes. Thanks, ScatStomper

Ripley's Believe it or Not (Ripley Road)
FTF!! This was #2 of 7 for the day. TNLN. Thanks, ScatStomper

Rocky Ridge Freight Road (Rocky Ridge)
FTF!! This was #3 of 7 for the day. TNLN. Thanks, ScatStomper

You've got mail - end of the lane (I made this one a puzzle where they had to research prices of postage stamps in different years to find out the real coordinates.)
FTF!! This was #4 of 7 for the day. I liked researching the 'net for USPS first class postage stamp history. Good idea! Thanks, ScatStomper


Arbon Church
I can't claim FTF on this one. The log sheet showed that some of the Andersen clan had signed it. This was #5 of 7 for the day. Good little puzzle. I hate to see the old church house being replaced with a new one, but I guess that's progress. Thanks, ScatStomper


Resting Place - Arbon Cemetary
FTF!! This was #6 of 7 for the day. My mother had sisters buried in this cemetery. Thanks for the memories, ScatStomper

Arbon Valley Roundup - Above Frank and Loretta's old place where we used to take the cows up to the onion
FTF!! This was #7 of 7 for the day. Quite a view of the valley. The wind was stirring up a duststorm. I took nothing, and left a Sponge Bob T shirt. Thanks, ScatStomper

ScatStomper then wrote me an email:

I thought I should give you a little insight into who I am, since I logged 7 of your caches today.
When I was seven years old my folks moved to Arbon from Pocatello to my grandpa's farm. Grandpa was James R. Bailey and my mom, Merle, was his youngest daughter. She passed away in 2000. She told me about the post office being in their home. I went to school in an old school house a few miles from the farm for the 2nd and 3rd grades. My brother and I would ride together on one bicycle during the fall and spring, and on one horse during the winter.
That schoolhouse closed, so for the 4th grade I went to school in the schoolhouse by the Arbon church. My most vivid memory of the 4th grade was when a girl blew off her two fingers and thumb when she stuck a compass point down into a blasting cap. This was right in the classroom. My brother was in the seat in front of her and little brass pieces went into his back.
Today at the cemetery, I saw the grave of Elmo Jack Andersen. He was one week older than I. We played together the summer of '42 before my folks moved to Malad. I remember Willard and Mamie and Jack's sister, who we played with, but I can't remember her name
I live in Malad and my name is Darrell Christensen or ScatStomper!!!
I really enjoyed going down memory lane (gravelled roads) today. Thanks much.

Also I got another email today from a guy that saw my geocaches on the internet:

Hi there Arbonboy, are you really in Arbon? I haven't been to Arbon for years; looks like these caches will get me there. I am really looking forward to visiting all the locations. I really wanted to tell you that I appreciate the bits of history surrounding the cache location. Each of them sounds truly intriguing and will definitely warrant a visit from Explorer's 3.

This has been a lot of fun! It is neat to think that those caches have helped people relive some memories or learn more about the Valley.

Guess who's walking!

Well, it has happened, Alayna is now claiming to be the sixth bipedal hominid in our family. Yesterday she was walking to get places. Amber and I watched her for a little while last night - I think the record was 17 steps in a row before falling. It is fun to see her teetering a little here and there as she wends her way to her destinations.

On Thursday, Amber and I went on a date. We spent a couple of hours hiking in Provo Canyon and nearby to do some geocaching. Our last cache was on a small hill overlooking all of Utah Valley. We had a hard time finding a good road to get to the hill with all of the new home construction. So, we didn't get there until after the sun had went down. So, we had a fun hike in the waning ambiant light from the sun that had already disappeared behind the western hills. It was a beautiful sight atop the mountain - all the valley was lit up in street lamps and house lights. It was a fun end to our date. We came home and shared some orange julius to top it all off! 

Janae's Very First Geocache - On Wednesday, Janae and I went hiking on the mountains near Novell to do a little geocaching during my lunch hour. We did a little hill climbing and got some weeds in our socks. It was a two part cache where you had to find a small film canister with a second set of coordinates to go to. I used my experienced eyes to find the film canister. Janae then beat me in finding the second part of the cache which was this ammo can that she is holding. Our experience wasn't memorable just because we were geocaching, but because Janae nearly stepped on a Rattlesnake! She showed me the snake. It was the first rattle snake that I have seen (know Dad killed some before, but I never was close by). Anyway, I tried to take a picture of it, but it rattled fiercely at me and then slithered into a hole in the rock.