Our Week (01/09 - 01/29)

 We haven't taken many pictures lately. Here is Heidi in her debate. She participated remotely because she was isolating from COVID:

The girls' new volleyball season:

Heidi is becoming a chef!

Hiking:

(Can you spot the 3 deer in the background?)

(I love the bright colors! It's even prettier in spring.)

(Emma found a walking stick.)

Liz was looking very middle school-ish, so I snapped a pic without her consent:

Heidi got nominated by her classmates as student of the week:

Heidi's Talk About Goals

Heidi was asked to give a short talk about goals for "Emblem Night."

Last fall, when my mom was dropping me off at school one morning, I noticed how dirty the playground looked. There was trash everywhere! It made me sad that people weren't taking care of our school and the earth. I made a goal to do something about it. I talked to the kids in my class, and we decided to clean up together. My classmates Rose, Brayden, Maddie, Jillian, Bethany, Tyce, and Will all came to school on a Saturday morning with their families, and together we picked up all the garbage on both playgrounds, the fields, and the parking lot. It looked beautiful when we were all done! 

 

One lesson that I learned from this experience is that when we have goals, it is a good idea to have help. Maybe I could have picked up all the trash by myself, but it would have been hard and taken a really long time. With the help of my friends and their families, the work went very quickly, and we had a lot of fun together!

 

The Youth Guidebook says, "Your growth is up to you, but you aren't meant to do it alone. Your Heavenly Father wants to help you, and you can ask your parents, your leaders, and friends for help. ... Heavenly Father wants His children to love and support each other." So when you make goals, you can ask for help from your family, your church leaders, and your friends. I am excited to be in Young Women's now so that I can help the members of my class accomplish their goals, and they can help me accomplish mine. I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

 

 

Love, Share, and Invite - For our ward history

The Young Women president asked Liz to write a paragraph about "Love, Share, Invite" for our ward history. Here is what she turned in:

I have had a wonderful time in young womens so far! One of the things that made it so wonderful is that I could have my friends from school there! At the beginning of 2020, I went to young womens once a week and I would have lots of fun! I thought that my friends would really enjoy it, so I started inviting them. Every week I would pick up three of my friends and bring them to young womens, and they would have so much fun! My dad started telling me that it was really nice that I was inviting my friends, and it made me feel good inside. At one activity, one friend asked me about the Book of Mormon and I told her a bit about it, and she seemed really interested. We had a nice conversation about it and near the end of our conversation she told me that her favorite person in the B.O.M. was Nephi. I have really enjoyed having my friends at youth activities with me, and I'm glad I've been able to have such a great experience as a young woman so far.

 

Our Week (02/02 - 02/08)

Emma's first week in Sunbeams:

 

At the Texas Stars hockey game:

(Poor kid only lasted the 1st period.)

Vegan ice cream!

Birthday party at Kung Fu Tai Chi place:

Getting her ears pierced!

King Cake for Epiphany:

Heidi's science fair project:

Sing 2 on the last day of winter break:

Our Week (12/26 - 01/01)

One of our family Christmas gifts was a trip to San Antonio. We stayed in the Drury Plaza Hotel, a historic hotel in Downtown that's 24 stories tall. We stayed on the 18th floor, and our room overlooked the Riverwalk, San Fernando Cathedral, and Main Plaza. We also went swimming in the rooftop pool one night. Since it's one of the tallest buildings in the city, you get a great 360-degree view of the Downtown area.

Other stuff we did: Went for a walk at Eisenhower Park, had takeout from Torchy's, checked out dinosaurs and a body exhibit at the Witte, had a picnic at Brackenridge Park, saw the Riverwalk lights (and heard the OU marching band perform), saw lots of sea life and other animals at the aquarium, played monster laser tag, and had lunch at Buc-ee's.

This is the view of the city from the roof of the hotel (we snapped a photo with the mural, on display in the basement):

The fancy lobby:

The hotel was formerly the Alamo National Bank, built in 1929; the lobby has 50-foot ceilings, travertine flooring, and stained glass windows. The whole building is trimmed with granite and marble, terra cotta embellishments, molded plaster, and decorative bronze. Pretty snazzy!

From the San Fernando Terrace:

Torchy's Tacos:

The Witte:

The kids loved digging for dinosaur bones:

Whataburger at the park. Four of the kids didn't want their pickles, so Heidi took them all:

Riverwalk lights. The OU marching band took over two of the riverboats and played some songs while they sailed by. They were in town for the Alamo Bowl:

Bathroom break at the Buckhorn Saloon and Museum:

Alamo Plaza:

Emma's "baseball card." (Scott let her hold the room key, and she became very possessive of it. We swapped her out for this one.)

The sign says, "Do not feed your children to the alligators!"

Laser tag at Monster Mini Golf and Laser Tag:

(Scott won handily.)

Buc-ee's!

Emma is a big fan of straws these days: