Our Trip to St. George - March 24, 2015

Tuesday - March 24th

We left to St. George on Saturday, March 19th.  It took us a while to get on the road, but when we finally got going, I texted my dad and told him we were on our way.  I also told him what time the GPS said we would get there, so he would have an idea of when to expect us.  The GPS said that we would get there at 2:00pm.  We stopped once or twice on the way.  The funny thing is, we ended up pulling up in front of my dad's house at exactly 2:00pm.  When we stopped, Roger pointed out how crazy it was that the GPS had been right on about what time we'd get there.  As, we got out of the truck, the first think my dad said was, wow, your GPS sure is accurate.  I thought it was funny.

We unloaded our stuff and relaxed for a couple hours before heading to my cousin's house for a BBQ.  It was a lot of fun to visit with my cousins.  My cousin, Cassie's boyfriend is my good friend, Jenny Springman's cousin.  It was fun to get to know him a little better.  We took a selfie of us with Cassie and Casey so we could send a picture to Jenny Springman.  While we were waiting to take the selfie, Roger took some selfies of me and him.  It was shortly after this, that my cousin, Kylie informed us that we are taking groupies, not selfies.  Mindi wanted us to take a big groupie.  Roger has long arms and his phone takes good pictures, so he took the groupies for us.  We took a lot of groupies.

 When it started to get dark, we watched a movie in the backyard.  We watched 'Big Hero 6'.  Alissa has been begging us to see that with her, so she was excited.  It was really fun.  They had yummy popcorn and candy to share.  We ended up not being able to stay for the whole movie.  Roger worked all night on Friday, then came home, helped load up the truck and drove us to St. George.  So, he was really tired.  He was having a hard time keeping his eyes open, and I had a headache, so we headed back to my dad's to sleep.

 We didn't do too much on Sunday.  We were really tired, so we all slept in.  Once we got moving, Roger took Parker and I on a bike ride (We only had 3 bikes, so we had to take turns).  After our bike ride, Roger took Brinley and Alissa on the same bike ride.  It was fun.  Roger thought it was funny taking the girls compared to when Parker and I went.  The girls, walked their bikes down the hills and went slower.  With Parker and I,  Parker went fast and kept yelling, "Woo hoo!"  I went slower than them, but they didn't have to wait for me for too long.  Roger thought it was a lot of fun and planned on taking Parker again as soon as they could.

On Sunday evening, we went and visited an old mission friend of Roger (The Harkers).  They were really nice.  We had a lot of fun visiting with them.  They have a really nice house.  The kids had a lot of fun playing.  Brinley didn't have as much fun, because she said she was tired and she felt bad that she didn't make a friend.  Alissa and Parker made friends.  They kept asking if we were going to go back.  The Harkers gave us a lot of good ideas of places to go while we were in St. George.  We ended up with a long list of ideas and things we wanted to do.  I already had a list of things to do, then we added their ideas on top of that.  It was hard to decide where to start.  After our visit, we went home to my dad's to go to bed.

On Monday morning, we slept in a little.  Not as long as we had on Sunday, but it was still nice.  My dad had a drawer of pictures, report cards, homework, family history stuff, and other things that my mom had saved.  He said all that stuff had been sitting in a container and he felt inspired recently to look through it.  He thought it looked like stuff that we would all enjoy having.  so, he put it in a drawer in his room, so when each of us come to visit, we could go through it and take the pictures and things that are ours.  I was so excited to go through that stuff.  I spent all morning looking through it.  I only got through half of it, but it was so fun to go through that stuff and be reminded of fun things from my childhood.  I'm glad that my dad found that.

While I was going through that stuff, the kids were watching TV and taking turns riding the bikes.  Roger went to the house next door with my dad to help him sheet rock.

When they were done with that, we ate some lunch, then went out adventuring.  On our way out to adventure, we walked with my dad over to a house nearby that was the colors he wanted to paint his neighbor's house.  He had us come over and compare the colors to his paint samples so we could help him figure out if he had the right colors.  It was hard to tell, but we thought we figured it out.  Dad went back home to call the painters and get that figured out.  Roger really wanted to take Parker biking on that trail again.  He wanted to go farther than they went when I was with them.  So, they got ready and went on their bike ride.  The girls and I decided to just go out and walk around.  I was thinking it would be fun to walk over to Quail Lake.  We took a nice slow walk and spent time looking at everything.  This is the house at the entry into Harrisburg.

 This is the house near the entry to the KOA.

 We waited in this area for a little bit because we wanted to get some pictures of Parker and Roger as they left on their bike ride.  It took them a long time to come, because Roger was teaching Parker things he needs to know about mountain biking.

 Parker and Roger went by and the girls and I went on our way.  We were having fun, up until we turned on to this small dirt toad that led to the lake.  That's when Brinley decided that she was too tired to go on.  she wanted to quit our adventure and go back to Grandpa's.  we really hadn't gone very far, so that was frustrating.  Brinley was funny though.  She just stopped, put her head down, and just stood there.  We eventually convinced her to go a little farther.  she didn't like it though.  so, we turned around and headed back.  

 I took 2 more pictures of the house by the KOA.  I wanted to walk up to it, but Brinley said she was too tired.  So, we didn't stop.  We just headed back to my dad's.

 These are the pictures that Roger took on their bike ride.

 When we got back to my dad's, the girls and I fixed ourselves some food and watched 'The Phantom of the Opera' on Netflix.  Parker, Roger, and my dad eventually joined us.  While we were gone, my dad came up with another way to get the paint color he wanted.  He needed to go to a store in Washington to see a sample of what it would look like.  We were planning to go swimming at the Washington Rec Center, so we figured we could stop and get it on the way.  We turned off the show and we all got ready to go.

We like swimming here.  Our favorite thing is the lazy river.  I think it is a funny lazy river, because it moves really fast.  Here are the pictures I took of our swimming fun.  My cousins, Kesha and Mindi acme and met us at the pool.  It was fun to visit with them for a little bit.  It was hard for them to have too much fun, because they both have little ones.  It is stressful to go swimming when your kids are little.  I was glad that they came though.  I don't get to see them enough.

 Parker was funny.  He got in the pool and let the water go up to his waist, then he turned around and got right back out.  He decided the water was too cold and he had no interest in swimming anymore.  He sat in a chair on the side of the pool watching us play and playing games on my phone.

 Roger and my dad swam with us for a while, but then they got bored and decided to get out also.  My dad needed to go to another store, so the boys got dressed and left to run some errands while the girls and I stayed and swam.

 Not too long after they left us, the life guards made everybody get out of the pool while they checked thing.  That's when my cousins decided to leave.  We called Roger to see when they would be coming back.  He said they would still be a while, so Alissa and Brinley got back in ans swam for a while.  I decided to stay out, dry off, and take some pictures of Alissa and Brinley's swimming fun.  They pretty much spent all of their time in the lazy river.  I din't know what game they were playing, but they had a lot of fun.

On Sunday night, Roger had gotten a text from the Search and Rescue about a missing man at Willard Bay.  Roger was bummed that he couldn't be there to help.  While we were swimming, he got another text.  This text said that the man is still missing and they really need people to come help find him.  They were calling off the search for the rest of the night and planning to meet at 6:00am the following morning to resume the search.  Roger felt bad about not being there the first time and with this second text saying that they really needed people, roger really felt the need to be there.  So, we talked to the kids about it on our way back from swimming and we decided that we would end our trip early so Roger could be there to help with the search at Willard Bay.  The kids weren't fond of leaving early, but they knew Roger needed to help and I told them we would go to the jump zone and get some ice cream.

We went back to my dad's, ate some pizza and continued watching 'The Phantom of the Opera'.  We relaxed for about a half an hour, then we got busy packing up our things and loading them out to the truck.  We ended up leaving my dad's house around 9:00pm.  The kids all fell asleep right away.  They all slept the whole way home.  We made really good time, because there was no traffic and we didn't have to stop once.  We ended up getting home around 1:45am.  We were happy to be home and climb into our own beds.  

Roger didn't get a ton of sleep, since he had to wake up at 5:00am, get ready, and head to the Search and Rescue building to help with the search.

He said that they walked the beaches of Willard bay for a few hours.  They didn't find much.  They are sure the guy is dead.  They found his boat on Sunday morning.  It was running and he was no where to be found.  After hours of searching the beach, they sent the guys walking the beach home for a while.  They asked them to come back at 5:00pm to search the beach again.  They were thinking that maybe his body would have floated up and reached the shore by then.

So, Roger went back at 5:00pm.  He didn't get home until around 9:00pm.  He enjoyed this search a lot more because he got to ride a 4-wheeler.  It's illegal to ride 4-wheelers at Willard Bay, but they got to because they are part of the search and rescue looking for this man.  He thought it was kind of fun that the rules didn't apply to them.  They weren't able to find the guy.

Roger said that the man's family was around and it was really sad.

He said he has more stories to share, but he is exhausted from lack of sleep, so he will tell us later.  They are planning to have them come back and search the beach on Friday night and Saturday morning.  Hopefully they will find him soon.

Before Roger left to go searching at 5:00pm, we took the kids to get some ice cream.  We got vanilla and I let each of them pick out their favorite ice cream topping.  Then we stopped at Redbox and got the movie 'Big Hero 6'.  We all enjoyed our ice cream and the movie.  roger had to leave before the movie ended, but t was nice to get to spend a little time with him before he left.

I really liked that movie.  The girls had been telling me about it.  They watched it with their friends.  We all really loved it.

Brinley Fell Asleep Behind the Couch - March 19, 2015

Thursday - March 19th

Brinley got mad at me today.  Lately, when she's angry, she goes and sits behind the couch to pout.  This time, she fell asleep.  I thought it was funny, so I pulled out the camera and took some pictures. 

 Parker was sitting in the living room playing the PS3, so I took some pictures of him also.

St. Patrick's Day - March 17, 2015

Tuesday - March 17th

We decided to celebrate St. Patrick's Day different this year.  We usually don't do anything, except wear green so we won't get pinched.  This year, we decided that we wanted to do more.  So, Brinley and I looked online for some ideas on how to celebrate and we chose our favorites.

Here are our new St. Patrick's Day traditions:

-The day before, we decorate rocks to look like gold, then leave them on the table.

-The Leprechaun visits us while we sleep.  He brings candy and something green for us to wear.  He sticks them in our shoes and hides them.  He also hides the gold that we made.  In the morning, the kids get to find their shoes and the gold.

-We eat a green breakfast - This year we had Green Rice Krispie Treats and Green Milk.

-I make a St. Patrick's Day cake - The rule on St.Patrick's Day is that you don't have to wait for a certain time to eat the cake.  Whenever you feel like eating cake, you eat cake.

Yesterday, Brinley and her friend Teirnynn, went out and collected some rocks for us to decorate.  Brinley and Parker painted some gold, but we really liked the way the glitter looked, so we did most of them that way.  We painted the glue on then dipped it in the glitter.

 Parker was watching TV with Roger, but after I took this picture, he came and joined in on the decorating.

 The kids were so excited in the morning.  I love the mornings when they have something to look forward to because it is so easy to get them out of bed.

 Here they are wearing their new shirts and holding their St. Patrick's Day candy.  It was a fun morning.

 Brinley loved her green milk.  I put froot loops on their straws.  I was supposed to put more on so it would represent a rainbow, but it was hard just to get those ones on.  The kids still thought it was cool.

 Here's Parker posing with the St. Patrick's Day cake.

 I had a lot of cake mix, so I experimented and tried these whoopie pies.  I colored the cake mix green.  They weren't that yummy.  I probably won't do that again.

 Roger got the tires rotated on the car and after that, the car was rubbing against the back tire.  Roger, came out to pull it away from the tire so it would stop rubbing.  I was outside taking pictures of the kids, so I decided to take a picture of roger also.  He never poses normal for a picture.  I like that about him.  I think it's funny.

 After school, the kids had fun riding bikes and blowing bubbles.  I pulled out our big bubble wands and mixed up some green bubble solution.  The neighbor kids, of course, came over and joined in the fun.

 When we were done playing with the bubbles, the kids turned on the faucet outside, to wash their hands.  We didn't have the hose hooked up to it yet and this was the first time we used it this year.  while they were washing their hands, the neighbor came out yelling for them to turn it off.  They quickly shut it off.  He told them to leave it off because it was flooding their kitchen.  The kids came in all scared and told Roger that the neighbor wanted to talk to him.  They were scared and feeling really bad, like they had done something wrong.  None of us could figure out how his kitchen would be getting flooded from that.  Anyway, I told the kids not to worry, because they didn't do anything bad.  

Roger went to the neighbor's and was surprised to see that their kitchen floor was covered in water.  Then, Roger thought he better come and make sure it's not leaking on our side.  He came back in to tell us what was going on, then he looked on the floor under the computer desk and realized that it was covered in water.  We quickly unplugged the computer and everything that we had plugged in that corner and moved it to safety.  That could have been really bad.  We had a ton of wires and things plugged into a long extension cord on the floor in that corner.  So, we quickly cleaned it all up, then Roger had to leave to work.  Before he left, he called the town home managers and let them know that our kitchen was flooding also.  The neighbor's kitchen was much worse than ours. Eventually someone came to fix things.  They cut into the wall on the neighbor's side to fix it.

Here is a picture of it before I took the time to dry it up and clean it better.  I ended up moving the computer to another wall in the kitchen.  Everybody likes it where I moved it, so we will keep it here until we move.  

We had a really fun day and we love our new St. Patrick's Day traditions.

Roger and Parker Went Shooting - March 15, 2015

Sunday - March 15th

Roger and Parker went shooting with some of Roger's friends from work.  They had a lot of fun.  Roger was funny with all the pictures he took.

 Brinley had fun playing with the cloud dough.  She used the dishes and pretended to make food for her dolls and stuffed animals that she had all set up to the little table.

 Two days ago for Parker's homeschooling, we decided to experiment and see what happens when you soak an egg in vinegar for 2 days.  Here is the end result.  It was really cool.  It felt like a big bouncy ball.  After we all had a chance to look at it, Parker popped it.

 Alissa had her hair in french braids.  The curl held really well this time.

We Got a Car - March 9, 2015

Monday - March 9th
Brinley was feeling a little better today, but not enough to go to school.  she gets up and plays for about 10-20 minutes, then she is too tired again and she falls back asleep.  I'm going to keep her home from school again tomorrow.
Alissa stayed up late tonight to finish her history display board.  She is supposed to go to Logan and spend the day at USU at the history fair tomorrow.  It sounds like it will be a really long, boring day.  They are expected to be there in the morning when the judges come, then they can leave for lunch and come back around 2:00pm for an awards ceremony.  I'm worried about how things will go tomorrow.  I was thinking I would leave Parker and Brinley home, since Roger will be home sleeping.  The more I think about it, the more I realize that it is a bad idea to leave them home.  But, I also think it will be really hard on them to come with me.  They will be bored and Brinley is still sick, so that will be extra uncomfortable for her.  I wish I didn't have to go.  I can't leave them here, because we are almost out of food and they won't really have a good way to feed themselves.  but they will be so bored with us in Logan.  Hopefully tomorrow will go well.

Roger's friend, Dan, sold us a car about a week ago.  I can't remember the exact day that we got it.  But, it is a cheap, old car.  It gives us something to drive around town, so we can save money.  The truck uses up a lot of gas when we drive it around town.  It gets much better gas mileage on the freeway.  So, we think we will be able to save money by having this car.  Hopefully it really will save us money.  I realized today that I hadn't taken pictures of it, so I went out and got some.  Here is our new little car.  I think it is a 1996 Toyota something - I can't remember.  I spent a long time cleaning the inside so it would look like new.  I think I did a pretty good job.  I should have taken a before and after picture from the day I spent cleaning it.

 After school, the girls had their friends, Malaiyha and Teirnynn over.  They are playing Minecraft and Malaiyha has her phone set up to record their game.  The kids love to watch you tube videos of people playing games and hearing them talk while they play, so they decided to start making their own you tube videos.  Malaiyha has an account and that's where they post the videos they make.

Roger had a busy day.  He likes to be busy.  when he woke up, he took Parker with him to the storage unit and to Logan to get the bikes and the bike rack fixed and ready to go.  After they got home from that, roger had about 20 minutes to sit before he had to go to a meeting for Search and Rescue.  They passed off their hiking with 20lb back packs on.  Roger loved it.  I'm really glad he gets to do this.  It's perfect for him.  They also each got multiple kinds of maps of Box Elder county and they spent time learning about how to work this tool that they gave him.  I can't remember what the tool is called or what it does.  I was too tired when Roger told me about it.  Nothing he said stuck in my brain.

Parker had a little time to play with friends after Roger left to the Search and Rescue meeting tonight.  Yesterday, Roger bought 2 new PS3 remote controls.  Now we have 4 remotes.  The kids are loving it.  Now when their friends come over, all of them can play at the same time.  It made things really fun for the kids and their friends today.

Playing at The Corrine Park - March 8, 2015

Sunday - March 8th

My poor little Brinley is sick.  It is not fun.  She has a fever.  She has had one since Friday night.  she has been sleeping a lot.  She started to feel better today.  This sickness is making Brinley have crazy dreams.  She keeps waking up all scared and convinced that she is seeing ghosts.  We watched some scary ghost shows during the week.  I'm sure that was the cause of the crazy ghost dreams, but the sickness helped to make it so much worse.  Last night, she woke up saying that her blanket came off her bed and flew around the room in circles really fast, then it came back on her and pressed into her chest.  When she first told the story, she said that she got up and ran around the room.  When I asked more questions for her to clarify what she was saying, it changed to her blanket flying around the room.  She begged me to come upstairs and look at her blanket.  When I went up, it looked normal.  Nothing was out of place.  Her stuffed animals were still sitting on the blanket in the same place they had been when she went to bed.  She was so confused.  She woke up quite a few times after that.  It was a long night.  Tonight, Parker convinced Brinley to sleep downstairs in the living room with him.  I'm pretty sure he was scared from Brinley's ghost story from last night.  So, they were both downstairs sleeping and I was in the kitchen playing the computer, when I heard Brinley in the living room talking (she talks in her sleep).  I just ignored it at first, but then she got louder.  She was yelling to her friend, saying, "Layla come back!"  I walked in the living room and Brinley was on the luv sac, up on her knees, looking and yelling for Layla.  I asked her what she was doing and she said, "Where's Layla? Will you tell Layla to come here?"  I told her that Layla wasn't here and she was dreaming.  She looked really confused, then laid back down with a look like she was going to cry.  Then she started to wake up.  She looked at me and told me that she had a scary dream.  She said, "It ran through the door and into the kitchen."  I told her that I thought she was having a good dream because she had been talking in her sleep about Layla.  Then she started to remember that part of the dream and that it wasn't scary.  

Roger came down stair right after that and said that he had a crazy dream.  He dreamed that we were going up a canyon.  There were 2 options.  You could walk or ride a crazy roller coaster.  He chose to ride the roller coaster.  He said it was long and crazy, but so fun.  He felt like he was flying.  At one point they flew way up high then came racing back down into some water.  But they hit the water really softly and it felt amazing.

Parker wanted to have a sleep over really bad on Friday.  The problem was, he went outside and invited 3 friends to sleep over.  He invited Tayson, Porter, and Simon.  I never agreed to it, but they were all convinced that it was happening.  I really considered it, but the longer they were here, the more I realized that I would not be able to handle all these boys here all night.  So, I sent them home.  I'm really glad that I did, because shortly after they left, I realized how sick Brinley was.  She hadn't acted sick at all all day.  Alissa and Brinley both got invited to go over to Malaiyha and Teirnynn's house for cake and ice cream to celebrate Malaiyha's birthday.  Brinley came home early from that, because she said she felt tired.  I'm glad she came home, because that's when I noticed she was sick.

Yesterday, Alissa went with the Young Women to Salt Lake to the Family History Library.  She learned  a lot of fun stuff and was so excited to come home and tell us all about it.  She was also tired, since they had to wake up so early to go.  When Roger realized Alissa was home, he took Alissa and Parker with him to go for a little outing.  Parker and Roger were bored, because they hadn't done anything that day.  They went to get some pizza.  I stayed home with Brinley because she was sick.

I did some research yesterday.  I love learning the history of places we've been.  I love to have good stories about where we are.  We were watching an episode of 'Ghost in my House' and in the show, the house was haunted by some ghosts of people who had passed away in a train wreck near their house, so it occurred to me to search if there were any accidents on the train tracks that run through Tremonton.  I discovered that there were two major ones in Box Elder County.  One in 1910 ish, obliterated a small town called Jackson.  45 people lived there.  Of these 45, 9 people survived.  Everything and everybody was blown to pieces.  It was hard to tell what was what.  One train had explosives in the last two cars.  another train was coming up behind it.  The train with the explosives, was supposed to pull off onto a side track in Jackson, while the other train passed.  It pulled off the track, but a portion of it was still on the main track.  The train that was supposed to pass it, ended up smashing into the back of it and everything exploded.

The other big train accident happened in 1944 around promontory point.  The train was full of men coming home from serving in WWII on New Year's Eve.  A train up ahead of them had some problems.  Their train was alerted to it and had to slow down.  The train behind them, did not get the message and ended up slamming into the back of them.  40 something people died in that accident.  

Anyway, those stories were really sad, but it was really interesting trying to find out things that have happened around here. 

Today Brinley started to feel a little better.  When Roger woke up, he took us all to go outside and get some fresh air.  We decided to go to the Corrine Park.  We love that Park because it has a fun merry-go-round and teeter-totters.  Those are two things that they don't usually have on playgrounds anymore.  I thought it would be especially nice for Brinley to get out and get some fresh air.  The fresh air was nice, but Brinley didn't really have energy to do much. 

We got a nice new Frisbee and a Boomerang to play with.  The Boomerang was frustrating.  I couldn't figure out the right way to throw it so it would come back to me.  And, of course, Roger had it figured out in no time.

 Brinley played on the playground for a little bit.  It wasn't very long though.  She was feeling really tired.  Parker and Alissa played on the teeter-totter for a little bit before Alissa ran over to the field to play Frisbee with Roger. Then, Parker played on the merry-go-round.

 Brinley, pretty much, spent the rest of the time sitting here and watching everybody play.  I feel bad that she is still feeling sick.  I really hope she gets feeling better soon.

Brinley was looking really tired and I could tell she was ready to go home and sleep, so, we gathered out things and headed home.  We came home and ate a yummy dinner of chicken, potatoes, gravy, and corn.
We all had a really nice day together, besides the fact that Brinley is sick.

Alissa is excited for school tomorrow, because it is the start of the new trimester and she finally had a class with her friend, Erin.  They have P.E. together.  She is going to have a hard time waking up though, since the time changed today.  Daylight savings time in the spring is a hard one to adjust to.

Goofy Children - March 5, 2015

Thursday - March 5th

Brinley and Parker were being really funny tonight.  I don't remember what game they were playing, but they kept telling me to come and see them.  They kept falling in these funny positions, then they'd yell for me to come and take their picture.

Parker's Volcano - March 4, 2015

Wednesday - March 4th

Parker helped me fluff up the luv sac this morning, then he wanted me to take pictures of him as he jumped on it.  I thought it would be fun to get some fun in the air pictures of him.  A lot of the pictures turned out really blurry, but we there were a few good ones.

 Parker loves to do science projects for his homeschooling.  Today, we decided to get creative with play dough and rocks.  We planned to make a really cool volcano.  It didn't look as cool as we wanted, but it still worked and Parker had a ton of fun making it erupt.  He experimented with different drops of food coloring to see what colors the eruptions would be.  He loves the reaction the vinegar and baking soda make.  He played with the volcano for a long time.  He tried really hard not to ruin it before his sisters came home, so he could show them what he had been working on.  After his sisters came home and he showed them, then he tried a few different things and basically destroyed it.  His friend, Simon came over and helped in the destroying process.  It was a big mess and not fun for me to clean up, but Parker had fun, so it was worth it.

 The kids really love playing with the cloud dough that I made, so when I saw an idea on Pinterest for clean mud, I had to try it.  They thought the clean mud was really fun.  It held it's shape

really well.  The kids had a lot of fun playing with it.  

This is Brinley and her friend, Tiernynn.

Brinley's Temper Tantrum - March 3, 2015

Tuesday - March 3rd

Brinley was really fussy tonight.  It was rough.

I exercised really hard this morning.  I didn't get a lot of sleep last night and I was tired today.  Because I exercised this morning, I didn't get to take my morning nap.  And, since, I exercised so long and hard, I was extra tired tonight.

After Roger left to work, the kids, their friends, and I all had popcorn and sat in the living room watching a scary show called 'The Haunted'.  It was creepy, but we had fun.  After their friend left, I started to get really tired.  By 7:45pm, I couldn't keep my eyes open anymore.  I laid down on the couch and fell asleep.  At 9:30pm, Brinley woke me up.  She was crying and demanding that I get up and make her some food.  I told her what she could eat that was easy for her to get herself, but she said that she wanted me to make her food.  She sat down and threw a fit about it for a while, then got up and went in the kitchen to fix herself some food.  When she tried to grab something out of the fridge, a container fell out and spilled all over the floor.  That made her cry even more.  I finally managed to wake up enough and I told the kids to come up to bed.  Brinley was so tired and throwing such a big fit, I knew sleep was the only thing that would calm her down.  When we got upstairs, Parker and Brinley started fighting over who got to sleep on the top bunk and who got to choose what show they watched (The person on the top gets to chose the show - they don't like the top and that was the only way to get someone to sleep up there without throwing a fit).  Brinley was getting really out of control with her temper tantrum.  She was crying and screaming and being absolutely ridiculous.  I gave them some time to try and work it out, but their fighting just got worse and Brinley was being really rude.  I sent Parker downstairs to watch a show and give Brinley time to cool off.  She sat in her room crying and screaming and knocking things over for about 10 minutes.  She finally calmed down around 10:10pm.  She came in my room to talk and to apologize.  Parker came up also and we all sat in my room talking for a while.  Brinley fell asleep on my bed while we were talking.  We said a prayer, then I tucked Parker and Brinley into their beds.  Parker was really talkative tonight, so I stood by his bed and we talked for a while.  We had a good talk. 

While all of the major tantrums were going on, Alissa was downstairs trying to get her homework done.  Alissa is going to try out for a play at the Old Barn tomorrow.  She's been bust practicing.  She has to come prepared to sing a song.  Earlier today, while she was in the kitchen practicing, Parker's friend, Porter, asked if Alissa was the one singing.  I told him it was and he said that he thinks she sounds really good.  Alissa was very flattered by that compliment.  That gave her a big boost of self-confidence.  She needed that.  I'm excited for her.  I hope the auditions go well for her tomorrow.

Roger's been busy lately with work and training for the Search and Rescue.  He is loving the things he gets to do and learn in the Search and Rescue.  I'm glad that he gets to do this.