Spring Show

The theme for the Spring Figure Skating Show was Under the Big Top, a Circus Skating Spectacular.

It was a lot of fun but a lot of work too.

Victoria was in two programs, and got to wear this cute ringmaster outfit.

We had 20 minutes tops for three girls to switch and get their faces painted. We had three mom's with the girls lined up painting as fast as we could. It got the point across. 

Kirk painted all the backdrops. "They" looked spectacular!

Everyone is always so excited for what he paints.

It looked awesome and really took up the space well!

Our guest skater was Mayumi Namikoshi. She was amazing! She skated and hula hooped which she calls Ice Hooping, and then did a back flip on ICE!! 

I loved the circus theme with all the bright colors, the fast pace, the crazy music...

We had those hot pink dresses hanging in our laundry room for almost a week. 

There were quite a few comments when the boys walked in to see those.

Kirk also created this tent entrance where all the skaters went in and out through the big curtain. 

It's amazing what he can do with paint and cardboard!

Just the other day Victoria has started on her Axel which is the jump that all skaters work to achieve....and then comes doubles, triples and if you are Nathan Chen, quadruples!

She has some exciting goals to work toward this summer.

 It takes some people months to years to get their axel.

Either way, we are very proud of her and all her accomplishments whether or not she gets her axel or not. Parents are like that. Unconditional love. Hopefully we can still hug her after we have given an arm and a leg to support her figure skating!

Whittaker Job

Kaleb took a two week job working in Grace, Idaho with Whittaker. He's getting paid good money to be on a crew patching a 12 ft wooden pipeline of holes. They are walking through the inside in pure darkness other than where slivers of light cast through holes in the pipe. He is enjoying himself. He didn't want to stay in a motel and eat out every day so he found this little RV park in the middle of absolutely NO WHERE to camp. He is cooking his own food and camping every day.

He is loving it! I brought him a wind shield for the camp chef today because the wind just blows and blows up there. I didn't want to go home. I was thinking that I could just stay there and have some rest and quiet time. It is beautiful out there. Nothing is around but crops.

Kaleb's Home Sweet Home

Kaleb's essentials in life....hand sanitizer and apples!
Here is the Stave that they have been working on.

Kaleb and the guys kept joking around saying, "meet you at the Stave", like it was the place to be. Kaleb wanted to make it look like a post card. So of course Kirk had to make one....

 He also just signed on with Whittaker full time. The next job is down in St. George. They will be digging basins or something. Anyway, they have to have a Wildlife Management on site because of the number of desert tortoises down there, and every time they dig a hole the tortoises gravitate to the hole. Hmmm.....sounds like Alexander. Every time we would dig a hole for the sprinklers, he's got to come stick his nose in there to see what you are doing. We are going to miss Kaleb. We knew this was a possibility but now that it is actually happening, we are all having to adjust.
He's getting one step closer to working in Antarctica.

Brothers

These guys are awesome!

They took a bunch of scouts backpacking so they can earn their backpacking merit badge.

They are so different yet they get along great!

Jared has been known to flip Kaleb up over his shoulder and up side down to make him stop singing.

There is never a dull moment when these two are together.

They both have crazy hair but then you look at what Kaleb is wearing compared to Jared and it just makes me embrace their differences.

Up to our Eyeballs with Goats

Bottle feeding two baby goats every two hours the first week of life takes a lot of time. Not to mention that someone always needs to be home at the next feeding. The girls of the house have all taken their turn in keeping up with feedings. We are now at 4 hour feedings. Whew!

Only a country girl could be dressed for church and wear muck boots.

An arm full of pure happiness!

These little guys are so funny. Any time you pick them up they start to fall asleep. It is so easy to lose track of time holding and cuddling goats or watching them bounce around like crazy.

Daphne and Paisley

Moo taking a selfie.

He looks like he is smiling,

Goat Mama and her adopted babies.

Lizzy and three of her babies enjoying the beautiful sunshine.

I love how goats look they are smiling.

They are so sweet. Even the big ones.

My Bucket

This is what happens when you get sick and tired of people removing the 5 gallon bucket that you have designated as the house bucket...not the shop bucket, not the barn bucket, not your tool bucket, or the garbage bucket, or the wood bucket, or the weed bucket...no the house bucket!

So I bought this hot pink bucket.

Victoria named it the Sheriff Joe Arpaio bucket because it is pink. Remember that he dyed the underwear at the jail so inmates wouldn't steal them.

Good idea! Now there is no risk of someone walking off with my pink bucket.

Lizzy's Big Day

Look at this big Mama!

She is so ready to have her babies. Just looking at her made ME uncomfortable. She was constantly rubbing her sides and her bum on the fence. This picture makes me laugh a little.

 Animals just do what feels best and rubbing her behind was one of them! 

We knew for sure she was having quadruplets again!

Time to get prepared. We wanted to make sure we had a back up plan in case she needed help again.

Victoria put together a supplies bucket and this is Kaleb's interpretation of Lizzy.

I think it is very accurate.

After a very long day of checking on her hourly, she finally gave birth to 4 beautiful little nigerian dwarf goats. Lizzy is such a good mom too. She did her best at 2 am to clean them up. Victoria and I dried them off as they came out. It was quite cold! Daphne and Victoria carried the babies into the shop to a dry bed of leaves while Kaleb and I convinced Lizzy to walk across the pasture into the shop. Poor girl could barely get her legs to move. I think she was still contracting. 

She stayed right with her little ones all night while I slept on a foam pad right next to them. I was worried that Lizzy would eat something that she wasn't supposed to eat in the shop but she didn't. 

This is little miss Paisley. She was the first one out.

Mr. Apollo was the second one out. He was very adventurous from the beginning.

He kept coming over to me just hours old to curl up with me, and was the first to venture off. Lizzy had to keep going after him. She would constantly be talking to them to keep them all together. Every time he came to cuddle with me, I made him curl up with his mama. I didn't want him imprinting on a human. He is a sweet little boy though. 

This little guy was the third one out. He looks like a Holstein cow. Our friend saw him and claimed him when he can leave his mama. She has named him Moo. Not far from us calling him Cow, then Cal, because we felt bad calling him a Cow. He's the only one with brown eyes. The rest of them all have blue.

This is little Miss. Bonnie. She was the last one out and the smallest. She showed no interest to latching on to her mama to eat, so she and Apollo are being bottle fed. We couldn't get Moo to open his mouth for the bottle so we left him to latch on to his mama with Paisley. That has worked out quite well. Apollo drinks from his bottle and then sneaks some from his mom too.....the little piggy. Now when Bonnie is hungry, the rest run after Lizzy for breakfast and Bonnie stands at the gate and cries for her bottle.

It is amazing at just 5 hours old what these precious little babies are capable of doing.

They are SO SWEET!