Pure delight

Late this afternoon I received a knock on my door. When I opened the door I was delightfully surprised to see a sister from my ward standing there with a beautiful bouquet of flowers. The first thing I thought was: "oh, no, who has passed away now". You see, we had one wonderful person pass away last Sunday and another one pass away this morning. So, death and funerals have been on my mind a lot lately.

However, she was just bringing them by to let me know that she thinks I'm awesome. Wow, I was so happy I practically started bawling right then and there. You see, today has been a "bad" day for me. I just wish I could heal everyone's pain and suffering. Since most of the time I can't I just get down and discouraged. Today the discouragement hit a high point, but thankfully there are wonderful people who help me to realize that sometimes I'm the one that needs the most help. Thank you 'B' for your wonderful friendship and caring attitude for your RS Pres. She really needed some happiness today and you knew just what she needed to make herself 'normal' again.

Life is hectic

It's hard for me to sit back and "smell the roses" these days. Every day goes by so completly fast. Peter wakes up at 6:30 then it's a rush to get ourselves fed and Dad out the door. Play time is next, followed by Peters three hour nap (10-1 everyday). While he's napping I exercise for an hour. I then write my journal, read my scriptures, and a quickly clean up the house. In the afternoon we play with Aunt Amy or go visiting. This week our afternoons have been full with: a doctor appointment for Mom, visiting with Aunt Alli, babysitting Peter's friend Stasha, going VTing, going VTing, going VTing, and playing with Aunt Amy. Seriously who has time to get bored with this much to do. I'm just so thankful that Peter is content to come with me wherever I go.

Today's activity

Today we had an activity over at the Thorneberry Atrium (the Senior Community in our ward boundaries). I was so happy that so many sisters came out to our 'Celebrate Women get-together. The ladies shared funny stories from their past and we ate cookies and had punch. It was simply delightful. Even Peter enjoyed himself.

Yesterdays lesson

Yesterday was a fantastic day in Relief Society. I'd been planning to do a lesson on Visiting Teaching for all the sisters to hear since January. Well, yesterday we finally taught it. Thankfully I didn't have to do much of the teaching. My wonderful VTing coordinator, Amy Blackham, and the Assistant VTing coordinator, Hillary Hardle really helped me pull off a good lesson.

Here are the pictures we took to show the sisters what VTing looks like. It was a blast and I hope our VTing numbers for the month of May skyrocket.



FYI - we have 83 companionship's that go and visit 200+ sisters in our ward. Now you can see why I have both a coordinitor and an assistant to help me out. Whew, all three of us stay sooo busy staying on top of it all.

Master Brandon

On Saturday Brandon officially became "Master Brandon". We are both so grateful that he is finally finished with his Masters Degree. It feels so good to have his school "career" behind us now. We are hoping for a promotion at UVU to go through which will help us to save up for a house. Ye-haw!

After the graduation ceremony we met at our ward building and had a luncheon for our family members that came to the ceremony. It was a blast getting together, eating good food, and chatting for a few hours. I hope that someday Peter will follow in his father's footsteps.

$2

While wandering the aisles at Walmart this week I discovered this darling cake pan. I was elated to discover that it was on sale for $2. I couldn't pass that price up for anything. So, I whipped up a yummy white cake with chocolate frosting last night. Bran, Amy, Peter and I devoured every bite. I think this cake pan will start an annual April Thomas Family Tradition. Wahoo!

20 minutes

I managed to find a spare 20 minutes this afternoon. So, I enjoyed a nice foot massage. Oh, how I love this simple invention.

World Famous Deviled Egg Recipe

This is Brandon's recipe that we use every year.

1) Take a dozen and a half of hard boiled eggs.
2) Take the shells off the eggs , cut the eggs in half, then scoop the egg yolks into a bowl.
3) Take 6 large Tablespoons of Miracle Whip and mix it with the egg yolks.
4) Add some yellow mustard.
5) Add salt & pepper.
6) Have your spouse taste it.
7) Add more Miracle Whip.
8) Add more salt
9) Dump mixture into a Ziploc bag
10) Cut a small hole in the corner of the bag
11) Squirt mixture into the remaining egg halves.



There you go. There's not much to it, but these taste so good. Yum.

Easter

We had a wonderful Easter weekend. As a child my parents would always celebrate Easter on Saturday so we wouldn't be hyper for church. So, that's what we did too this year. The Easter bunny gave Peter a tiny bit of candy along with laminated pictures of Jesus, President Monson, and the Mt. Timp temple.


On Sunday we went over to the Thomas side for the traditional Easter Egg Hunt. The older cousins were so awesome to let Peter, and his cousin Morgan, find all the eggs that were in plain sight. He loved finding all the eggs and then putting them into his sand pail that Gma T. gave to him. Bran, I, and Peter each had such a wonderful time. It was so much fun to have Peter walking around this year on his own.

Choices and Peter the Helper

Life is full of choices. Every morning we wake up and decide whether we should get out of bed or roll over and go back to sleep. Well today, I decided to roll over and go back to sleep. We also get to decide what clothes to wear. Yesterday, I didn't do so well in that department and I felt weird all day long. Today I had the choice of doing the dishes or posting to the blog. Obviously, I chose to post to the blog. I love choices.

Today was great because I was able to stay home while Laurie Ann went to get her routine blood work done about which she has been so worked up. I lounged around all morning. After she returned home, I showered and got ready for work. About 11:00 AM we got a phone call from one of my co-workers. She expressed her concern because nobody had heard from me. They had all assumed I hadn't shown up as an April Fool's Joke. To tell you the truth, it was my plan to leave a note on my desk that said, "I quit!" But I forgot. I think that ruined the joke.

Peter excels at one thing, making messes. He can make a mess faster than I can stand up from a sitting position. (I don't stand up very fast, so I guess this isn't a good metaphor. Instead I should say that he can make a mess faster than a frog can eat a fly. That isn't a good metaphor either. However, the metaphor isn't important. The point is, he's fast.) I have watched him move from room to room and leave a disaster in his wake. If there were little people living here and he was a giant, I think all of the little people would be dead. (My metaphors aren't very good today.)

Anyway, today he had one of those clean-up moments. Usually when we ask him to cleanup, he just makes more messes or runs away and laughs. But the following video proves that there is hope. I call this video, "Peter, Peter, Clean Up-inator"



That is all I have for now. I will bore you no longer.