Valentine's Dinner for the Kids

So I saw a spot on Studio 5, I know, its not as good as Good things Utah, and some of you out there think that Darrin looks like Scott, but occasionally I do watch 5 minutes here or there. They showed this lady who would do a special meal for her children for valentine's day. Special dishes and everything. So I set the table with cloth napkins, nice plates, and our wine goblets, (notice that I only have 4 glasses that are 2 different types). Scott made pork tenderloin, carrots, broccoli, and rice. For dessert, we had chocolate dipped strawberries. The kids were very suprised and loved every minute of it! I definately think that we will be doing this again next year.

Free lunches and dinosaurs

I know, I know. This is Scott, and its been way too long since I've blogged last. Blame it on Facebook. We are all sure glad that the sickie season appears to be over. Lets see, now that football season is over, and all the football blogs that went with it, time to get back to whats been going on around here.

Hailey has been having a blast in preschool. She goes on fieldtrips every month. This month, its the post office. Last month, it was the dinosaur museum. That was quite the experience. If you've ever been there (especially with small children) you'll know what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the 'biggest dinosaur museum in the state? country? world?' Who knows, but its the one down there at Thanksgiving point. From what I've heard, it wasn't really that crowded when we went compared to normal, but I don't know. We weren't the only group adults herding around a seemingly endless supply of small children. Not sure if we were at a dinosaur museum or a wild children zoo. You know, the kind where the adults go and watch the children play (and fight). They've got places the children can play in the sand, and pretend they are digging up fossils. They've got a whole setup where you can pretend live dinosaurs are getting buried in the sand (and water). And if it sounds kind of messy, it was. They had aprons they could wear to limit the damage, and a washbasin, but of course never enough to go around.

The fossils were all pretty cool if you had a chance to look at them. Big full dinosaur skeletons, small little microorganisms trapped in amber. But being as kids are, they wanted to play. There were a few computer games around some of the exibits. Games that all the kids wanted to play. But if you want to actually see the exhibits, I suggest ditching the kids at home and go by yourself. Fun huh. Good thing we got to go for a discount since we were on fieldtrip, because the regular price is a little steep.

Now about the free lunches -- I had to go and see if I could score me a free lunch the other day at Denny's. The one that everyone else was apparently trying to get on Tuesday. Well, I drove by, and kept on driving. The line was out the door and around the corner. At least 200 people in line. Don't have that kind of time. So I went to my next option --- use one of my free combo meal coupons from Chik-Fil-A. Only I must have used up the last one I had in my wallet. Dangit, I'll have to raid my drawer at work for the few I have left. So option #3, actually pay for lunch . Had to try out that so called 'Angry whopper' at Burger King. Well, for one - it wasn't very angry, and two - since when does a combo meal cost over $8 at a fast food joint? More if you don't want the small drink and small fry!

Do I sound bitter?

Final Week!

Its all over! We have a champion. But we'll start with last weeks winners. Congrats Sherry! Its about time you win one! And on the season, Tammy wins it all! Wasn't even close. Jason moved up to 2nd, while Nick stayed in 3rd and Jim 4th.
Here are the results:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=pGlbc_um5DZF9YaPIgwhQKw

And now. I think I am considering retirement for this thing. Or just some much deserved R&R!

On to blog about bigger and better things ....

Bowl Week 1 Results

Yea! I finally won a week! Yippie! It was exactly what I asked Santa for Christmas.
Tough week for BYU fans! But there's always next year! Unless of course the economy tanks and all sports are cancelled. Talk about riots! Am I right people!
Here are the results:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=pGlbc_um5DZHLQwVDRJK4OA

The games for this week are the BCS games .. some pretty good matchups!
The Utes are in the Sugar bowl on Jan 2nd vs. Alabama
The Rose bowl on Jan 1st is USC vs Penn State. Go Joe Pa!
--And choose between some good basketball matchups
BYU hosting #6 Wake Forest on Jan 3rd
Utah hosting Gonzaga #7 Gonzaga on Dec 31st
or the Jazz at the Lakers on Jan 2nd

Christmas craziness

Maybe I am getting too old, but right now I am so ready for all the snow to end. We live next to a park and get the added benefit of having the wind blow all the snow from the park into our driveway. We also have the city when they plow, most of the time, turn the corner and leave it all right in front of our driveway. I feel like I am getting big blisters. I think that before the season is out, I am going to need to get a very nice massage.

This year I shopped more on line than I have ever before. There was a lot of killer deals out there and why shop all over the place if I can have them shipped to me for free? I am now just hoping that I receive them today, I'm worried that all the snow will prevent them from leaving me my packages. In the past, I have received nasty notes in my mail box saying that I need to clear the snow or not recieve my mail. Oh well, hopefully it will end soon. I guess if I don't receive the packages, we will just have to go with what we have and the kids should be happy with that.
We hope that everyone out there has a very Merry Christmas! Stay safe this week!

Week 15 Results

Its not over yet. Some good games this week. Unfortunately they didn't turn out so well in my opinion. Snow College lost their national championship. Weber State got knocked out of their quest for a title. And Utah State lost to BYU. Bummer! Then I go and take 2nd place to my co-worker (Ryan). Its sucks!
Anyways, here are the results:

http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=pGlbc_um5DZFjV9RJr-iRKQ

So still on the season, Tammy is 1st. Keep a look out for games in the bowl season. We're not done yet!

So how do you cope?

Raising kids and dealing with the problems that affect everyone else is oftentimes very difficult to deal with. Case in point: How do you react when you have a certain 5th grader that is already running behind because there is no sense of time? When its time to leave for school and he has to rush back into the house to get his jacket; but then gets distracted by whats on TV, all the while his dad is waits in the truck for 5 minutes to take him to school. In certain cases and for certain ages, timeouts seem to be somewhat effective. But when they're older and when there is no time for a timeout, what then? Yelling doesn't seem to get thru, it just causes friction and gets misinterpreted as a lack of love for the child.
I guess you might have heard that Elder Wirthlin passed away last night. I really admired that man. Do you remember his last conference talk? It was titled "Come what may, and love it" For reference, here it is: http://lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23-1-947-9,00.html
He mentions that when adversity strikes, we need to learn to laugh. Good advice. But difficult to put into practice; as I guess most good advice seems to be. Just yesterday, this same child on his way to school -- as he often does; stopped by his friends house to venture out to school together. But this friend was still off-track (even though he had already been off-track for 3 weeks). Long story short, the 2 of them spent the next half-hour watching TV at his house until his mom came downstairs and saw the two of them there. One of them (mine) should have been to school 30 minutes earlier. A moment like that, funny. That is, if you weren't there and after having some time to reflect on it. But in the moment, very frustrating.
So to all of you, especially those with older children and more complicated frustrating situations, how do you cope?