Various happenings from the last few months

Well ever since I started going back to school I haven't had much time for anything else. I am sure if you asked Molly she would tell you that I am not making that up. In fact the other day I was thinking that even though it had been pretty hard to keep up with school and everything else that at least I had been pretty good helping Molly out with the baby and the kids and other things around the house. But then Molly told me that I was wrong. It seems that I am just very oblivious. I feel pretty bad about that. I console myself in the fact that I was even more sleep deprived than Molly and that my brain probably just wasn't working right. Sorry Molly. I really would have done anything that you very specifically would have asked me to do. I think you know that. You were sweet to think that I was too busy to bother and just suffer in silence. But don't do it again.

Anyway, I have been so busy since January that I haven't done much posting on the blog. I have missed it really. It is nice to kind of review things that have happened and let myself take some time to ponder things. If I don't review in my mind the things that are going on around me they just fly by and I never learn anything from them. And if I write about them that helps the lessons to sink deeper into my brain. So for the next few months until school starts again, hopefully I will give myself a little time for this. Though I do have a lot of projects planned for the summer so I don't know how much time I will have. I have more projects planned than I have money for though so I guess my summer might not be as busy as it seems in my head.

Well, lets get started on the recap of the last few months. I guess I posted that we had a baby. Ethnie Rose Ellis. The final Ellis girl. She sure is a cutie and seems to be growing pretty fast. She has started smiling in the last week or so and that pretty much guarantees that we have to keep her now. Something about that smiling that just sucks her right into your heart. Here are a few pictures of her.



The fun thing about Ethnie is that she just seems so awake and alert all the time. She makes such grown up expressions that it is hard to remember that she is only two months old (yesterday). She really likes Seinfeld too. Or at least I assume that is why she insists on staying up late. She goes to bed about 11:00 every night and then sometimes she will sleep all night and get up between about 5:00 and 6:00. Then she has a hard time getting back to sleep before the kids get up so Molly doesn't get to go back to bed half the time. I am usually getting up just after she has finished eating at about 5:45 to get ready for work and Molly is half asleep in the rocking chair with that look on her face that lets me know she is very tired. She usually goes to sleep pretty well for me though. If Molly can't get her to sleep, I just take her and in 10 minutes or so she'll be snoozing. So I am not much good in the lactation department, but at least I can get her to sleep. We all have our strong points I guess.

Let's see, what else has happened? I took the four oldest to the zoo one day to give Molly a break. Here is a pic.
The kids love to go to the zoo, so we have a membership there and can go anytime. But it seems like lately even though they beg to go there, once we get there, they just want to go to the little park that there. Oh well, as long as they have fun right?

There was also Easter. We colored eggs. That is never as fun as it seems like it should be. For some reason the kids just end up fighting with each other about how many eggs they get to color or which ones are theirs or who is hogging which color. But I still insist on doing it every year. I must be crazy.
When it came time to get out the Easter baskets, I couldn't find them. So I used pots and mixing bowls. I don't know where those baskets ended up. I thought for sure one of the kids would complain, but no one even said a thing about it. This is the only picture that I took on Easter.

Then there was my birthday. I think Molly covered that one on her blog. It was nice. I got a pocket knife among other things. Here is Luke coveting it. Its so funny how the girls see it and have a look for a minute or two but then don't think about it again. But Luke just could not stop trying to get his hands on it. Boys and girls really are different creatures.

We had a pinewood derby in Elders quorum. Well, it was kind of like a pinewood derby anyway. We used a pinewood derby track but had no rules except that it had to fit on the track. I thought the best way to have a fast car would just be to make it heavy. It seemed like the heaviest cars always won. But I knew that if I made it too heavy that those little pinewood derby wheels would generate too much friction and it would slow it down. So I knew I would have to have wheels with bearings if it were going to weigh much. In the end I went to the DI and bought some used rollerblades and pulled the wheels off of those. They are kind of wide though so I tried cutting them in half. That didn't work very well, so I had to find something heavy and skinny that I could put between the wheels. I decided on a 3/4" steel pipe filled with BB's. I used a putty weld to attach the wheels to the pipe (using some threaded rod for the axles). Then I borrowed a steel paper weight from a co-worker (thanks Grover) and taped that to the top. A standard pinewood derby car is limited to 5 ounces. My car weighed almost 6 pounds. It was fast! But unfortunately not fast enough. Only two other people showed up to race. One had a standard regulation pinewood derby car and the other had a block of wood with a cordless dremel with a computer fan blade on the front that acted as a propellor. Well the propellor car was just a hair faster than mine. It won me by about half and inch each time. Good job Dusty. But next year I am sure I will win.


Leisel walked into the kitchen one day singing and wearing some fancy getup. I had to take a picture. She looked like a little french girl. Or at least how I imagine a little french girl might look.

Lila had a birthday, which was also covered on Molly's blog. I gave her a horn for her bike that she has been begging for for at least two years. Of course when she opened it she rolled her eyes and acted like I was being silly for getting that for her.

Molly covered Luke's birthday too. I guess most of you already saw the picture of his present. Those little battery powered ride on jeeps and tractors are just so much fun, how could I pass it up. The girls all got to enjoy the princess jeep (during the short bursts when it was working) so I figured it was only fair to let him have a chance too since the jeep died for the last time. I sure hope this tractor works better than that princess jeep did. I was always having to fix that thing.

Last weekend was the fathers and sons campout for church. It was a campout/service project and I didn't know that I would be much help for the service part with Luke in tow. So I decided to take Zoe along to help. She was a great helper. There was a little pond where we went so of course all the kids pretty much just hovered around that the whole time. Luke loved it. He would go get a handful of rocks (which was about three rocks in his small hands) from the parking lot and then go throw them in and go back for more rocks. Over and over and over. He also did a lot of "fishing" which consisted of waving a stick around in the water.






Well that about sums it up. Oh yeah, except the fence stuff I brought home on saturday. I am building a fence this year. There is now a big pile of cedar fence panels sitting in my garage where my car usually sits. So after I get the room in the basement finished, I will start on the fence. I am excited to get it built though. Seems like a lot of fun. Everytime I go in the garage and see that pile of lumber I just get excited. Hope it is as fun when I am doing it as I think it will be.