First off, so good to hear from T&T in Texas. Congrats on the new job Thomas! Glad you're loving it and are able to help people get on the right track. How rewarding! I'll have to check out Tori's workout. I need SOMETHING!
This week ended a lot different than it looked at the beginning of the week. It looked pretty normal on Monday. We were gearing up for Alex's big beginning of college football season party (B.C.F.S.P.) on Saturday and things were proceeding pretty normally with some play dates, garden class, soccer practices and games and then mom surprised us with a visit Tuesday night and stayed all day Wednesday looking at houses (gasp! eek! thrills!) and while she was here we decided we really should plan a retirement party for Dad. We've been talking about it for a while, but hadn't set a date or finalized any plans. Since Joe and Lori were coming up for the B.C.F.S.P Mom thought that maybe she and Dad should just come up here and have a celebration. We made some phone calls, pulled a few strings, and arranged a helicopter ride for Dad. Hopefully someone will post pictures because I don't have any on my phone. So, Mom and Dad came up Friday night and Saturday morning they met us at the airport where our friend took him for a lovely ride. The pilot (our ministering brother) landed in the field by the church close to our house and Joe and Alex were there with all the kids holding a banner that said: "BE FREE GRANDPA". Grandpa ran through the banner and then we all headed back to the house for breakfast. We met up with Ruth and co. at the Farmer's Market where the kids fought with duct tape weapons that a guy was selling. Thomas, you would have been so impressed! This man had set up a fighting arena with a bunch of weapons that he had made and let the kids go at it. Some adults jumped into the mix too. We also watched while a man worked a top on a lathe. It was so cool! I think Joe wants a lathe for Christmas. After the market we went out to the farm by Ruth's house and picked raspberries for an hour or so. The kids were enamored by the goats, as was Lori. I told her I would buy one for her as a housewarming gift if she would moved to Idaho. I still stand by that. I'm not above bribing people.
Backing up a bit, on Wednesday Mom helped us spit shine the house for the movie crew that was coming over to film a promotional video in our kitchen. It looked so lovely for about 8 hours that day. I was in heaven. The crew was so cool! They found out that Ian was interested in film making and they let him hold the camera and shoot some of the office scene. He got to talk shop with them and had such a good time. They invited him to come over to their studio anytime and they would show him around. At the end of things they had him pack up some gear and haul it out to their truck which they assured him was what much of their job consisted of what hauling gear, setting it up, taking it down and hauling it out. It was definitely a highlight of the week for Ian.
Fast forward to Saturday...after raspberry picking and lunch and homemade ice cream, Mom and Dad headed home, the Nilssons and Joe and Lori's family hung around and played spike ball. So fun! At 5:00 we all did a quick clean up of the first party to get ready for the second party, the Nilssons took off and then our friends the Dennings and the Shurtliffs showed up for dinner and games before the football game started. Joe and Lori had to leave before the game started at 8:45 (horrible time for a football game to start). Most of the moms took the kids home while the dads stayed to watch the game and a few more showed up for just the game. BYU won which was a miracle and totally unexpected for those fans who've gotten used to them losing! I totally hit a wall and went to watch a show with Ian on my bed but fell asleep instead. Alex sent the boys to bed and fell asleep himself after the game ended around 1:00 a.m. No one was particularly interested in getting out of bed this morning. Thank goodness for 1:00 church!
Alex's sister came up from Brigham City this afternoon and so we've been having a Hart family dinner and gathering this evening. Alex and his brother are challenging everyone to corn hole games in preparation for the tournament they are playing in next weekend. Funny brothers.
Hopefully we will be able to get some good work done tomorrow on Labor Day. Hope you all enjoy whatever it is that you are doing for the holiday. Are gyms closed on Labor Day?
Happy September!
Sunday, September 2, 2018
Flake Fun
Sorry that it has been a couple of weeks since our last post. Things in Snowflake are going fairly well. Our garden is really ramping up and we'll probably start bottling tomatoes soon. We have gotten 7 zucchini's off our one plant in the last week so yes, we are turning into those people! Our neighbors know to lock their cars!
Our ward/stake is being realigned so there was a lot of weeping and wailing in church today. Some of the people in our ward have been in the same ward for 50 years! It will be interesting (and good) to see the changes. The realignment meeting will happen at 7:00PM on Saturday and the changes go into effect the following morning.
Hope that everyone has a great week!
Our ward/stake is being realigned so there was a lot of weeping and wailing in church today. Some of the people in our ward have been in the same ward for 50 years! It will be interesting (and good) to see the changes. The realignment meeting will happen at 7:00PM on Saturday and the changes go into effect the following morning.
Hope that everyone has a great week!
Sunday, August 26, 2018
T&T in Texas
We haven't been on here for a while! So sorry! Life has been super weird, crazy, eventful, and stressful to the max! For starters, I took over as the head trainer at the gym I've been working at in the sales department and I'm sooooooooo much happier now! I get to train people all day (literally) so I'm very tired from all the early mornings and late nights, but it's great to see people begin to change their lives and experience the results they work hard for! I've had one lady lose 17 lbs in just a couple weeks, and she is so so excited she can fit in the clothes she wants to again. So it's been very rewarding so far.
Tori is traveling a lot for her job and she's loving it. It takes a lot out of her, but she also enjoys the places she gets to see when she's not working. She recently found a great workout program called Beachbody On Demand, and she is now a coach who is building a team through social media and her own website, so it's been a really fun side hustle for her as well. And the programs are actually really fun and intense that you can do at home.
I'm still working on my business and will probably be traveling back to Utah every few months to work with different schools. Thank you for all the prayers and support with this venture, it's been really stressful and tiring, but very fun and rewarding as well!
We are looking for a new apartment that has a little more space and a few more amenities. We've narrowed it down to three options, and we are really really interested in one, but we have to wait a couple weeks to see the apartment we're interested in, so if anyone wants to make a trip down here in the next month or so, we'll have a much bigger and nicer place to stay for ya! :)
Well, we love you and hope all is well! It's still in the 100s here during the day, so enjoy the more chill weather for us up there!
T&T Out!
Tori is traveling a lot for her job and she's loving it. It takes a lot out of her, but she also enjoys the places she gets to see when she's not working. She recently found a great workout program called Beachbody On Demand, and she is now a coach who is building a team through social media and her own website, so it's been a really fun side hustle for her as well. And the programs are actually really fun and intense that you can do at home.
I'm still working on my business and will probably be traveling back to Utah every few months to work with different schools. Thank you for all the prayers and support with this venture, it's been really stressful and tiring, but very fun and rewarding as well!
We are looking for a new apartment that has a little more space and a few more amenities. We've narrowed it down to three options, and we are really really interested in one, but we have to wait a couple weeks to see the apartment we're interested in, so if anyone wants to make a trip down here in the next month or so, we'll have a much bigger and nicer place to stay for ya! :)
Well, we love you and hope all is well! It's still in the 100s here during the day, so enjoy the more chill weather for us up there!
T&T Out!
Manning Moments
It has been a great week! We are continuing to get to know Chet and his big personality in a little body. He could win any grunting or growling competition! He wakes Nick up with his grunts in the night which is saying something for someone with one ear! I usually can't wake Nick up.
It has been interesting to try and figure out how to keep everyone alive including myself while Nick is at work. Lots trickier than it sounds. But Wesley is a very responsible two year old and he is very good with Chet so that is very nice. Wesley keeps amazing us with his brilliance. He was singing on pitch while I was playing Mary had a little lamb and Twinkle Twinkle. But I suppose every parent loves to dote on their kids!
It was delightful to have the Harts here for a couple hours. Always fascinating conversation and good times!
We have had lots of yummy food from the garden including cantaloupe and watermelon. I love this time of year!
That's all for this week.
It has been interesting to try and figure out how to keep everyone alive including myself while Nick is at work. Lots trickier than it sounds. But Wesley is a very responsible two year old and he is very good with Chet so that is very nice. Wesley keeps amazing us with his brilliance. He was singing on pitch while I was playing Mary had a little lamb and Twinkle Twinkle. But I suppose every parent loves to dote on their kids!
It was delightful to have the Harts here for a couple hours. Always fascinating conversation and good times!
We have had lots of yummy food from the garden including cantaloupe and watermelon. I love this time of year!
That's all for this week.
Hart Happening
It is starting to feel like fall! The weather is predicted to take a pretty dramatic dip tomorrow and we'll see if it'll climb back up so we can get some kind of a harvest. Our cherry tomatoes have been abundant along with our carrots, beans, potatoes, and broccoli, but we have yet to eat a ripe watermelon, and we are just barely getting cucumbers, with the barest hints of the larger tomatoes' intentions to turn red. The pumpkin sends his regards and has expanded his takeover to the neighbor's yard.
I was amazed when we went to Lauren's that her garden is about spent. They are on the tail end of harvest there while I feel like we are just barely getting started! It was so fun to spend some time with the Mannings at the beginning of the week and meet baby Chet. They are such a lovely family! We dropped Ian off to visit an Education Week friend and he arrived at the end of our visit to the Manning and made Chet's acquaintance and finished off the Thai food we had for dinner. We dashed off to the Hale Center Theater that night to see Newsies, which was spectacular! The boys had a wonderful time. Joe and Lori let us crash that night at their house which crash didn't happen until about midnight because all the cousins were having such a good time playing and the adults were chatting it up. Sorry guys! The Sandy Bellistons live in a really ideal location. It is close to so many things! Alex and Ian woke up early the next morning and drove to Salt Lake to meet the other youth from our ward who had come down to meet the General Young Women's presidency and do baptisms for the dead in the Salt Lake Temple. They really enjoyed the time there and then had fun riding some electric scooters to Joe's work and getting a tour of his studio. Meanwhile, I enjoyed myself immensely visiting with Lori while we walked to the park and took the kids swimming at her grandma's pool. I was inspired my my conversation with her and Ian and I are going to go off of sugar for the next week and hopefully make some better choices in our eating habits.
On the way home, we stopped by mom and dad's house. We caught a glimpse of dad as he rushed off to a meeting, Mom fed us a delicious dinner, and we were able to visit with a friend of ours who was staying with the parents until his apartment came available. It was really nice to see them. Never long enough to visit, but always good to touch base!
We were home long enough for a garden class, cousin time with the Nilssons, some soccer practices, a playdate that included swimming at one of the local pools and playing at the splash pad, time for Alex to make some important progress on a couple of big deals he is working, and a Great Brain planning session. The Friday morning we headed up to a friend's cabin and spent a couple days up in Island park boating and enjoying a hilarious play at the theater up there. Peter fell off a bench and sliced his head open on the fire pit surround, so he is sporting a nice head wound. Our friends are such generous and wonderful hosts and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. The husband is a pilot (the same one who took us for a ride in his helicopter) and was talking to me about the maneuvering speed. I need some more clarification from dad about this idea because there is also the concept of supermaneuverability and I think that both of these have some really great gospel parallels. It's a theory in progress and I will think on it some more and get back to you.
The boys were beat and slept most of the way home and even when we got home we mostly just laid around recovering. Alex and I went to the adult session of Stake Conference which is always excellent, and which were all able to enjoy this morning.
That's it for the Harts. Hope all is well with the rest of you.
I was amazed when we went to Lauren's that her garden is about spent. They are on the tail end of harvest there while I feel like we are just barely getting started! It was so fun to spend some time with the Mannings at the beginning of the week and meet baby Chet. They are such a lovely family! We dropped Ian off to visit an Education Week friend and he arrived at the end of our visit to the Manning and made Chet's acquaintance and finished off the Thai food we had for dinner. We dashed off to the Hale Center Theater that night to see Newsies, which was spectacular! The boys had a wonderful time. Joe and Lori let us crash that night at their house which crash didn't happen until about midnight because all the cousins were having such a good time playing and the adults were chatting it up. Sorry guys! The Sandy Bellistons live in a really ideal location. It is close to so many things! Alex and Ian woke up early the next morning and drove to Salt Lake to meet the other youth from our ward who had come down to meet the General Young Women's presidency and do baptisms for the dead in the Salt Lake Temple. They really enjoyed the time there and then had fun riding some electric scooters to Joe's work and getting a tour of his studio. Meanwhile, I enjoyed myself immensely visiting with Lori while we walked to the park and took the kids swimming at her grandma's pool. I was inspired my my conversation with her and Ian and I are going to go off of sugar for the next week and hopefully make some better choices in our eating habits.
On the way home, we stopped by mom and dad's house. We caught a glimpse of dad as he rushed off to a meeting, Mom fed us a delicious dinner, and we were able to visit with a friend of ours who was staying with the parents until his apartment came available. It was really nice to see them. Never long enough to visit, but always good to touch base!
We were home long enough for a garden class, cousin time with the Nilssons, some soccer practices, a playdate that included swimming at one of the local pools and playing at the splash pad, time for Alex to make some important progress on a couple of big deals he is working, and a Great Brain planning session. The Friday morning we headed up to a friend's cabin and spent a couple days up in Island park boating and enjoying a hilarious play at the theater up there. Peter fell off a bench and sliced his head open on the fire pit surround, so he is sporting a nice head wound. Our friends are such generous and wonderful hosts and we enjoyed ourselves immensely. The husband is a pilot (the same one who took us for a ride in his helicopter) and was talking to me about the maneuvering speed. I need some more clarification from dad about this idea because there is also the concept of supermaneuverability and I think that both of these have some really great gospel parallels. It's a theory in progress and I will think on it some more and get back to you.
The boys were beat and slept most of the way home and even when we got home we mostly just laid around recovering. Alex and I went to the adult session of Stake Conference which is always excellent, and which were all able to enjoy this morning.
That's it for the Harts. Hope all is well with the rest of you.
Sunday, August 19, 2018
Hart Happenings
I blinked and another week flew by! It was surreal to be in church again this afternoon without it seeming like there had been a week in between this and last Sunday!
We went on a glorious bike ride this morning. It is the only time I feel safe taking the boys around on these busy streets, they are pretty deserted on a Sunday morning. Alex and I were repented of all the whining we did about 1:00 church. It has been wonderful. I'm not sure why we dreaded it so much.
While the rest of the crew slept in this morning I listened to Rob Eaton's devotional from Education Week about the Zone of Spiritual Totality. It is sooooo excellent. I would highly recommend it to everyone.
This week was full of fun! We spent Monday afternoon at the water park in Rexburg with some friends, Wednesday morning we went and picked raspberries for a couple of hours, Wednesday afternoon we celebrated Emer's birthday with the Nilssons, Friday we babysit our favorite 3-year-old, Ireland, and Saturday we attended a Spikeball (Alex's new favorite game) party hosted by some friends of ours, and took in a movie (Christopher Robin - excellent). Full of fun. I feel like everyone is cramming in the most fun possible before school starts!
Jack is loving the fact that soccer has started again and Peter is anxious to get his team assembled and practicing. He asks Alex (his coach this year) every day what the plan is and who is on the team and where they are going to practice, and he counts down the days until practice time. Good times.
Alex stays busy with work and all his sports he plays - racquetball, frisbee, Spikeball, and most recently, soccer. He started playing with the husband of a friend of mine and has been enjoying that.
All is well up here in Idaho. And I hope it is the same for all of you in your various locales.
P.S. Ruth, I love the idea for the cookbook.
We went on a glorious bike ride this morning. It is the only time I feel safe taking the boys around on these busy streets, they are pretty deserted on a Sunday morning. Alex and I were repented of all the whining we did about 1:00 church. It has been wonderful. I'm not sure why we dreaded it so much.
While the rest of the crew slept in this morning I listened to Rob Eaton's devotional from Education Week about the Zone of Spiritual Totality. It is sooooo excellent. I would highly recommend it to everyone.
This week was full of fun! We spent Monday afternoon at the water park in Rexburg with some friends, Wednesday morning we went and picked raspberries for a couple of hours, Wednesday afternoon we celebrated Emer's birthday with the Nilssons, Friday we babysit our favorite 3-year-old, Ireland, and Saturday we attended a Spikeball (Alex's new favorite game) party hosted by some friends of ours, and took in a movie (Christopher Robin - excellent). Full of fun. I feel like everyone is cramming in the most fun possible before school starts!
Jack is loving the fact that soccer has started again and Peter is anxious to get his team assembled and practicing. He asks Alex (his coach this year) every day what the plan is and who is on the team and where they are going to practice, and he counts down the days until practice time. Good times.
Alex stays busy with work and all his sports he plays - racquetball, frisbee, Spikeball, and most recently, soccer. He started playing with the husband of a friend of mine and has been enjoying that.
All is well up here in Idaho. And I hope it is the same for all of you in your various locales.
P.S. Ruth, I love the idea for the cookbook.
Flake Fun
We are up in a small little town called Greer, AZ to celebrate Dad Flake's 60th birthday. All of the kids came up which has been a lot of fun. It is nice to be away from everything and just spend quality time playing games, enjoying nature and roasting marshmallows. Since we were gone last weekend as well, I felt like I was playing catch up all week trying to make sure that we had food on the table and clean clothes! I'm guessing that this coming week will feel the same but I don't know that we are planning any other big trips next weekend so perhaps we'll get back to normal!
Fun story of the week. Yesterday Scott and I took one of the four wheelers out to explore a little. We just drove up the road, walked down a little path and then started back to the cabin. It was barely sprinkling on the way up but about 1/4 of the way down it started raining a little harder, and then a little harder...by the time we got back we were both drenched. I don't know how Scott could see to get us home but somehow he did!
Hope that you all have a good week!
Fun story of the week. Yesterday Scott and I took one of the four wheelers out to explore a little. We just drove up the road, walked down a little path and then started back to the cabin. It was barely sprinkling on the way up but about 1/4 of the way down it started raining a little harder, and then a little harder...by the time we got back we were both drenched. I don't know how Scott could see to get us home but somehow he did!
Hope that you all have a good week!
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