Celebrating Austin's and Wade's Birthday

Today we are celebrating these two boy's birthdays! They are both a Mom's dream come true for a son. They are both kind, thoughtful, hard working, and such good dads and husbands. I am so proud of them and so grateful to have them for my sons. Austin is turning 37, so he got 10 candles, Wade is 35 and he got 8 candles. I added the two numbers in their age together to come up with how many candles to use. Wasn't that a great idea? If I had to light 35 or 37 candles, the first one might be melted and totally gone by the time I got the last one lit! I made Grandma Palmer's chocolate cake with fudge frosting, one of our family's favorite cakes!

I couldn't come up with any good gift ideas, and neither could Delwyn, so cash it is! At least they can buy something they want. I told them this is not grocery money, this is fun money. Haha.

 Austin got this electric guitar for his birthday, and so he brought it over to show us and to play for us. I loved it! Music means a lot me, and I'm so glad my family is musical. It means so much to me that Austin, Wade, and Landon all live here and we can share our lives together.

Happy Birthday Austin and Wade!!

Easter

Blake loved the holidays and the traditions we have. The Easter before he passed away he told me that Savannah's family didn't have any Easter traditions--they don't color eggs or hunt eggs, they just get a little candy and he thought that was sad. Traditions help build memories and make holidays more meaningful is how I feel about them.

Melissa always has matching outfits for their family for Easter, and I love it! She made skirts for the older girls, Emma has a jumper, and Austin even has a matching bow tie! So cute!

The kids are lined up and ready for the egg hunt! Megan took Dagny and Lincoln to California for a quick trip to visit her mom. We missed them, but know they are having fun there.

Calista is off to find some eggs! 

Go Millie!

Quick Maddie! Get that golden egg behind you! The golden eggs have a dollar in them and each one of the kids get one golden egg and 9 regular eggs.

Millie found her 10 eggs pretty quickly.

Calista gathered a few eggs, and the decided the slide was more fun. This girl loves to be outside on the slide, swinging, digging in the dirt, and jumping on the trampoline.

Time to see what's inside those eggs! Tootsie rolls are one of Claire's favorites, hopefully she got some!

These girls certainly have my heart! They were so excited to hunt for eggs and I love this tradition we have.

Wade and Kimberlea had to wake Everlee up to come over for the egg hunt. She was still a little drowsy and couldn't quite figure out what was going on. Kimberlea helped her get some eggs, but Everlee didn't care very much for picking them up. She was more interested in just watching the other kids run around. 

I had bubble guns for the older grandkids, but didn't give them out on Easter. We were a little slow getting started, and by the time dinner was over, it was almost dark and was pretty chilly. I gave Calista hers one day the next week. She loved it and shot out bubbles for a whole hour! 

Of course she went on the slide and took her gun with her.

 

Lincoln ran right outside to shoot bubbles.

The kids love the trampoline and bubbles just make it even more fun.

That's a lot of bubbles!

Austin's girls finally got their bubble guns a few weeks after Easter. The weather has been too windy and chilly on Sundays to go outside.

Lots of bubbles for Millie.

Easter traditions are fun, but I am also grateful for the real reason we celebrate Easter. I'm thankful for the resurrection and the opportunity we have to live with God and our families forever. l'm grateful for the hope, peace and love that the Savior gives us.

 

The Bees are Here!

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Delwyn has been interested in getting a backyard beehive for quite some time. His boss, Leo, has bees, and Delwyn has talked to him quite a bit. He has  also done a lot of research and watched a lot of videos. He decided he wanted to do it and here we are! He ordered the hive and started building the frames and foundation in February.

There are 10 of these frames in each box. The bees build honeycomb on these frames and the queens lay their eggs here and they also store honey. When the box is full, it will have about 200 pounds of honey.

The bottom two boxes is where the queen lays her eggs, the top two boxes will have honey.

He even made a stand for it, so it wouldn't be sitting directly on the ground.

And of course, a bee suit! He's all ready and just waiting for the bees to get here. He ordered them from a place in Littleton and they come from Mississippi. They are Russian bees.

The bees come in this box called a nuc. The people in front of us had a mesh bag to put their box in. Smart idea!! The bees are cold, so they huddle together to stay warm, but they can get out of the box. As we started to drive home, we could hear them moving around and making scratching noises since they were starting to warm up. I was a little unnerved. Originally Delwyn was going to be working, and I was going to pick them up myself. I was VERY glad when his work got pushed back a day, and we went together to get them.

By the time we got home a handful of bees were flying around in the car. One landed on the passenger window right next to me and I gave a little scream. One landed on Delwyn's arm, good thing he had his winter coat on! Of course I jumped out of the car the minute we were on the driveway. I actually wanted to jump out when we were on Liggett Road and walk the rest the of the way home!

The nuc has 5 frames with about 5,000 bees total. Delwyn took them out and put them in their new home.

Lowering them down into the hive.

The bees are so packed into that frame! I'm a little freaked out that we are going to have so many bees in our backyard.

Done! Now they just have to settle down in their new home. This bird bath will give them water to drink and Delwyn has to feed them sugar water for a few months until there are enough flowers for the bees to get nectar. In a new new hive, they have to build up honeycomb, so that takes some time too.

There's a lot of bees on him! Thank goodness for that bee suit! He did get stung twice on the ankle. I guess some high top boots better be his next purchase.

It was chilly day, the sun was beating on the door and it was really warm, so the bees swarmed to it. By evening, they had found their way into the hive and the door was clear. Whew! I was a little worried there for a bit. Delwyn's new hobby is up and running, now we just to have to wait for them to make honey. We probably won't get much this year, we'll see!

Painting Easter Eggs with Claire, Millie, and Maddie

In December Melissa asked Austin what he wanted for Christmas. He said he didn't want any more stuff, he'd rather have an experience. Melissa asked me if I would watch the kids the second Friday of each month so they could have a date night. She wrote a bunch of ideas on popsicle sticks and put them in a jar. Austin picks a stick and that's what they do! Tonight they were going to shoot at the range, but it was closed, so they went swimming instead.

Delwyn suggested I should color eggs with the girls and I thought that was a great idea.

Claire's first egg was a smiley face. Cute!

Millie loves to draw and she was excited to make designs and Easter pictures on her eggs.

Maddie loved all the different colors.

Then Claire got really creative and made this fancy three colored egg. It took a lot of patience to hold the egg in 3 different colors.

Millie loved the way Claire's egg turned out and she wanted to do something similar. Great job!

A pretty purple egg!

The girls show off their colorful collection of eggs! 

The egg kit came with some stickers to make robots after the eggs were colored.

Maddie was very interested in making robots. It was really hard to make the arms stay on.

A close up just because it was so cute!

 After the egg coloring, the girls wanted to watch a movie. They made a cozy spot on the floor and snuggled up together. Such cute sisters!!

We had a fun night! We ate chicken nuggets and fries, ice cream, and then a snack of cereal later. These girls love their cereal, and not just for breakfast! These date nights are just as much fun for me as they are for Austin and Melissa.

Trip to Roosevelt

I have wanted to learn to make quilt tops for a long time. My Mom makes beautiful quilts and I want to be just like her! I'm not talking about hand quilting, that takes WAY too much time and patience. I want to learn how to piece the tops and then have them machine quilted. I started one several years ago, and one of my goals for 2022 is to get it finished. I have 22 blocks made and I still need a lot more, but I want to learn to do the sashing, so I planned a trip and made it happen! Britta's not sure how their summer will work out, they might not be able to come to the Collins reunion or to Colorado for a weekend, so they decided to come too. And they brought Ryan! Of course I was super happy to see them all!!

I wanted to stop by the cemetery and see my Dad's grave. When I come to the reunion, there isn't enough time to come to Lapoint. I sure miss him.

It is peaceful here, but there aren't any trees like there are at the Castle Rock cemetery.

At the beginning of Covid when everyone was sheltering at home, Glenda told me she took Mom up Deep Creek to see the ranch and her childhood home.  Since then, I have really been wanting to see it too, so that was another reason for my trip. I don't know when I was up here last, probably when I was a very young child and I really can't remember anything about it. Glenda and Mom were able to go inside, we were not and I was very disappointed. Lyle owns the property, and his grandson Caleb is taking care of it and running the ranch. There used to be a key hidden up there, but he has stopped doing that and doesn't want people to go inside. Mom wasn't sure when Grandpa Taylor bought this property, it was before she was born at least, and so it has been in the family for a very long time.

Most of the windows had the blinds down so we couldn't see inside, but we were able to see in two windows. One room had a very old washing machine, and one was a bedroom with a bed and a pretty dresser with rivets. It would have been so fun to go inside! Mom told us that Myrna would make a line down the middle of the bed and tell Mom she had to stay on her own side. Typical childhood sisters! She also told us that one of her chores to was go to a little stream and get water each morning. We have so many conveniences that we take for granted!

The cellar has had some improvements done since Mom was child. She said it was dark and scary down there and she didn't like going in to get food that was stored here.

This was a wood shed. Now it is filled with hoses and an old box springs for a bed.

Kind of hard to see in the picture, but there used to be a tree house here! How fun! Some of the steps are still nailed to the trunk and you can see the floor.

This is part of the yard. Huge, flat, grassy, beautiful! It would be any kid's dream to have such a big place to run and play. Mom told us they moved to Lapoint when she started school and then they would come back here for the summers.

I wish I would have taken some pictures of the scenery on the drive up here. A variety of landscapes, some big rock formations, red clay, lots of greenery--trees, bushes of different kinds, with mountains in the background. Some beautiful land for sure.

Mom made chicken and baked potatoes for dinner and then the kids and I played some games. Britta brought a card game called Zeus on the Loose, a math game that Kade won. Then we played Rook, still teaching Kade how to play. He did great and he and Britta won.

Keeping the tradition of Sunday pictures when everyone is dressed up.

Some of my favorite people! I was so glad they came. It was fun to spend time with them and Grandma was excited to show her grandkids off at church.

I have the best Mom in the whole universe! She is kind, hard working, gives her all to her family, never says an unkind word about anyone, is an amazing quilter, baby blanket maker, and has a strong testimony. I want to be just like her.

Of course Gandma wanted some pictures with her grandkids.

Britta and Ryan took a lot of pictures together on Sundays the last couple of years they were home, and I like to keep it up whenever I can. You can never have too many pictures!

My family is my best blessing! When I was a little girl, I just wanted to have a lot of kids and be a stay at home Mom. My dream came true!

I swear Ryan is taller every time I see him! He really enjoys weight lifting and has some big muscles.

• After church we changed clothes and I loved Britta's top, so I wanted another picture.

I spent most of Monday sewing and working on my quilt. It was so fun to be able to sew all day! I cut the sashing strips and learned how to sew them on.

Quilting requires a lot of ironing, and Mom helped me out a lot with this part.

I'm almost halfway done! The strips are sewed on in one long piece, but I made a mistake and had to unpick part of it. I really like the way it looks and is coming together!

Monday night we took Mom out to dinner at Mi Casa. Mom and I had enchiladas and Delwyn had a chimichanga. It was really good! And just the right amount of food that we could eat it all, but not feel stuffed. There aren't many places to eat in Roosevelt, this

Being the engineer that he is, Delwyn is working on making his beehive a smart beehive. He is wiring it up so he can see how heavy it is and how much honey is inside, the humidity in the hive, and other things. All this information will be on his phone.

If you zoom in, you can see the display reads "Grandpa's Beehive." Pretty fancy!

These are the sensors that he is wiring up. They will go underneath the bottom layer of the beehive and be placed on part of the stand. He made quite a bit of progress on it.

We were planning to go home on Tuesday, but there was a big snow storm in Vail, predicting 6 to 12 inches of snow, and so we stayed another night. More than once we have been stuck because the road was closed and had to spend the night in a hotel. Since we had the option to just stay another night, we did, which meant I got another day to sew all day long and I was not disappointed in the least! 

 It was a great trip and I had a great time. I want to do this more often. Maybe come once in the spring, the Collins reunion, and once in the fall. I enjoy spending time with Mom and I don't get to do that very often.