A Week of Celebrations

It was great celebrating this last week. We had mother's day, our 20th Anniversary, Jessica's birthday, and Jennifer's birthday!

The kids made me a nice mother's day breakfast. Brian gave me some pretty earrings, and I got cards from the kids. Melissa made me an apron in YW. Kevin gave a great talk in sacrament meeting- he looked like a missionary up there- it was a talk a mother could be very proud of. All the women of the ward were given gifts of chocolates (my favorite- Lindt). It was a very nice day.

Our anniversary was on May 12th. I didn't expect anything because it was a busy day and the kids all had Mutual and Brian had 11 year old scouts. On the way home from cello lessons, Rachel and I stopped at the grocery store to pick up some chocolate milk that she needed for YW. When we came back to the car there was a white rose on the windshield. I guessed that it was left there by Brian. Sure enough, when we got home he had a bouquet for me. I was also surprised when he brought out a gift- a beautiful hand blown glass vase. I also got a card!!!!! I expected the usual gift of flowers, nothing more, so this was a big nice surprise! He said that he wasn't going to scouts so that we could spend the evening together. This was another nice surprise. So I threw a table cloth on the table, the kids set it with our gold swirly plates (with my new vase of roses as a centerpiece of course), put steaks on the grill, and we all sat down together for a nice celebratory dinner. After the kids all left to the church, Brian and I went to Marie Calendars for pie (Marie Calendar is were we had our meal after our wedding). It was a nice evening.

Sunday May 17th Jessica turned sweet 16. We had a yummy waffle breakfast and she opened her gifts before heading off to church. She got a new bike (we had taken her to pick it out the day before), her own key to the van from Kevin, a promise to go to Baskin Robins after she gets her license and can drive them there from Rachel, earphones from Melissa, the book Little Dorrit, classical piano CD set, and piano music from Pride and Prejudice. A gift from Jennifer is on its way. I wonder what it is? During Sunday school hour, some of the Laurel class snuck into her bedroom and decorated it. She had a nice surprise when we got home. We had sweet and sour pork for dinner, and I made a chocolate cake with sea foam frosting (from scratch) that we ate when the kids got back from a fireside. Jessica is now anxious to get her drivers license. Now that winter percussion is over, and AP tests are taken, she finally has the time to do her drivers training. We will be scheduling her test soon!

We sent a box off to Jennifer for her birthday full of gifts, decorations, and stuff and hoped that it would get there in time for her big day on the 19th. We we happy to hear that it arrived a day early- but then were shocked when we called her on her birthday and hear from her that it hadn't arrived yet! Her roommate to the phone and told me that it had arrived, and they had hidden it from her. There would be a surprise for her the next day. So the next day she told us that she had come home from class, to find a note on her dorm door with clues for her to follow! She had to go searching for her gifts in the true Greenall family tradition. She had cheesecake (made from the box I sent) complete with candles and decorations. A heartfelt thank- you to Jessica W., Becca and Vanessa- Jennifer's fun roommates!

Now things have slowed down a little with all the celebrating done for a while. We are enjoying the nice weather that we are have been blessed with by working in the yard, and sitting in the sun. I love spring!!!!

Sunny Saturday

Jessica got some good driving practice and drove me and Rachel to the St. John's Parade (a Portland communtiy) yesterday. Jessica was excited to drive across her first bridge- The St. John's Bridge, and it is a very beautiful bridge! Melissa was marching with the Meadow Park Middle School 7th & 8th grade band playing the Sousaphone. We enjoyed the sunshine- quite a treat, and we have the red noses and famer tans to prove it.It was a fun parade, but nothing very exciting. It did have a lot cars of all shapes and sizes.

Kevin was off singing with the Westview Concert Choir at the State competion. They got 4th place.

Brian was in Fairview, Utah attending his Aunt Frances's funeral. This is his mom's sister. Brian was able to visit with his Knapp relatives that he hasn't seen since coming home from his mission. He had a good visit, and had a lot of pictures to share with us when he got home.

Frances Marion Knapp Thompson

Nov 7, 1931-May 4, 2009

This is a picture of Cheryl Newey (cousin), Gerald (Frances' husband), Kathy Kesler (cousin), and Richard Boyer.

This is Gerald and his four daughters: Kathy, Debra Peterson, Cheryl, and Lori Cleverly (I met her at our wedding).

Wax On. . . Wax Off

As I've been emailing back and forth with my brothers and mom about reunion T-shirts, and to "tie-dye or not to tie-dye", my mom called and told me about a new method of batik using Elmer's school glue! I looked it up on the Internet and sure enough it works. I did batik in my High School painting class and really loved it. I haven't ever done it again because I didn't have the equipment, and didn't want to mess with the mess. Well this is getting me excited again. I can do this. Easy. Glue on, paint or dye, and wash. That's it!

All this talk of batik made me realize that I never shared the fun I had in April learning to do Pysanky Eggs. A sister in our ward, Suzanne, decorates these type of eggs every year. So I requested she teach us for an enrichment activity and she did. It was so fun! Doing batik on eggs! I had thought I wrote about this, but realized I had just been chatting about it and posting pictures of my eggs on Facebook (that's the trouble with Facebook- no record of all the chats- but you can go there and look in my albums where I put all the pictures as I talked with friends of the process). Anyway I spent 3 hours on April 2nd doing 3 eggs. Then I went back during priesthood session of conference and took my daughters with me and we spent several more hours doing more. We all enjoyed doing it so much, that next year I will get our own supplies. So here are some pictures.

The long process of waxing, dying, drying, waxing, dying, drying. . .Me and Yuko show off a finished egg after heating the egg in the oven and wiping off the wax.

My three eggs:

Here Jessica, Rachel, and I show our finished eggs (Melissa walked home earlier). Poor Rachel broke two of hers after all that work!

Here they are after a coat of varnish and now on display.