Jared's never-ending imagination

For some strange reason, I let Jared make his own version of a spider web on the stairs. And the second picture is his version of a gun which he made all out of paper towel tubes and tape. It's amazing the things that boy thinks up!

Lip Sync!

Every year, our ward YW sponsor a Lip Sync and bake sale for their camp fundraiser. It's always a fun evening. This year, the lip syncs were all done to Disney songs. Nicole's group (the Laurels) did a princess song and Jacob's group ( the Teachers) did "Who's afraid of the big, bad wolf?" Well, from the looks of him, we'd all better be afraid of the big bad wolf! :)

Gerbil Babies!

Here are three of the gerbil babies...
as you can see, they are growing a lot!
They are 3 1/2 weeks old now, and their mother is weaning them.
Nicole puts some cheerios in their cage,
and they LOVE them.
It's so cute to see the babies holding a cheerio,
which in relation to their size, looks like they are holding a doughnut.
I'll try to get a picture of that and post it.

What else do you get when the transmission goes out on your washer?

You furiously clean the laundry room so that the "new" washer
will look nice in there.
Crazy? I know. That's just me.

What happens when the transmission goes out on your washer?

I didn't even know washers HAD transmissions, for starters!

You get a new washer--but if you're like me, and you're too cheap to pay a thousand bucks for a fancy one, you go to Affordable Used Furniture and Appliance, and you get a used one for a fraction of the cost.
I admit I LIKE the fancy ones...probably because they are PRETTY!...but as long
as it's going to clean my laundry, I'm happy.
And I am.

How are the baby gerbils doing?

Five of them (there were originally 6) have made it! Here's a shot of mom sitting on top of them and feeding them, which is about all she does all day. You can see on the left side the one which has white markings like its mother--the others are fully black. We think we have determined that 3 are boys and two are girls. (Emphasis on the word THINK. Cause we aren't completely confident!) We'll have to be separating them in about a month...if we can still tell who's female and who's male! It seems to only get harder. :)

And, I repeat: Gerbil, anyone??

A foot of new snow and fresh air to breathe!

The inversion with all its yucky air is gone (although I'm sure it's not the last inversion we'll see this winter!) In its place is a foot of new snow. Here's a shot of the tree that shades my deck in the summer.

Rollin' On In

Went out to get the mail this morning, looked north, and saw the clouds literally rolling up over the mountain there above Centerville. We've seen this happen before, but it never loses the cool factor. It's always fun to watch!

The Birds and the Gerbils

Okay, this is an incredibly long story made short. Nicole got a momma gerbil and her 4 mostly-grown babies for her birthday. The bottom picture is of Nicole holding one of the "teenagers." When Nicole came home from school today, she went to check on her gerbils, and lo and behold!! MOM HAD GIVEN BIRTH AGAIN. Yeah, we were shocked.
As it turns out, gerbils mate again immediately after giving birth, and then have another litter about 6 weeks later, which is how old the "teenagers" are.
I'm telling you, you learn something new every single day. :)

And don't worry: the buck stops here. There was no daddy around here to mate with this time. Whew!!

Gerbil, anyone?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO NICOLE!! (or, the cake her friends made)

Nicole's cute friends made her a Cinderella cake and brought it over to surprise her.