Memorial Day Garden

So we didn't do much for Memorial Day except plant a garden.  I know you're thinking that the end of May is way too late to start one but not if it's pumpkins that you don't want to be ready until the end of October.  Lucky for us Joe and J'Neal Robinson let us plant on her uncles empty lot.  So we planted a row of giant pumpkins, jack-0-lanterns, watermelons, cantalopes and cucumbers.  Then the outside row is forget me knots and HUGE sunflowers.  I read that if you plant some sort of flowers by your plants then you will attract the bees to help pollinate your garden and you"ll have better success.  So we are trying it.  I am embarrassed to say that this is our first family garden. We never planted one anywhere else.  We are grateful to the Robinson's for letting us try.  Most of these pictures where taken by Ben.  He has a great eye.

This is the lot with one and a half rows made.

 Lots of little weeds and hoeing rows trying to make them straight.  My dad has this cool thing that makes them for him.  So much easier and it takes him 30 seconds.  We were there forEVER.

One of Ben's shots.  No cropping or anything done to these pictures.

 I'm not sure what he's doing or looking at but it was cute.  You can see the Robinson's chicken coop in the background.

 All rows made and now time to plant.  Usually you plant melons in hills to keep them from getting water rot.  But, it Southern Utah it is never wet enough to need to worry about that, so the pumpkin patches around here just plant them in rows and let them go crazy.  So that's what we did.

 Sophie thinking she worked hard.  More like hardly working.

 Here is J'Neal letting the kids hold their chickens.

 David was in love with this little one and has been down to see it almost everyday.

 Self portrait.  Look at the future braces on that kid!

 

End of the planting.  Now to have the faith that something will row.

 

Grad Night!

Grad Night started at 10pm and went until 4am.  Joel and I were there for most of it.  Joel bailed out at 2:30.  I was in it for the long haul.  It went really well.  We had close to 200 kids and fun was had by all.  As the kids checked in they were given a grad night shirt and a lanyard that had a number on it.  The number coincided with at bag in the Coat room where when they won a prize they could take it and they lady in charge would put it in their bag until the night was through.  It worked really well.  No one had to hold onto prizes or make sure they didn't get taken by someone by mistake.

Speaking of prizes...they had a ton!  They had about 50 $15 itunes cards, all kind of restaurant gift cards, vise gift cards and even 4 $50 gas cards!  That was just to name a few.  There were 4 different places or games you could play to win instant prizes.  Then we had ping pong, surfboard races, Double Dutch ropes, Hula Hoops, Limbo, and a couple other things you could do to win a prize.  We also had things just for fun like Sumo Wrestling, an obstacle course, huge blow up slide, Lazer Tag, Wii games and Karaoke and a photo booth to pass the time.  Believe it or not the time flew by. 

 Shayne and Kilee Jones wrestled and everyone was watching to see who would win.  Kilee was the Student Body Pres. and has the same kind of dominant personality as Shayne so they kinda butted heads all year.  The topic of who would win in a fight came up more than once during school.  So the crown was pretty big to see them SUMO!  They were very kind to each other after.  I brought closer to everything, especially the school year.

I loved being there.  I felt like I should have been there anyway because I knew a lot of those kids and wanted to spend that last school moment with them.  I am a cool mom and I know it.  Cool in a, I know you and I know you can do better because you are an awesome kid, kind of way.  Not the, hey lets hang out and I'll let you do whatever you want and make sure you don't get into trouble, kind of way.  These kids are amazing and therefore I require  and expect a lot more of them.  They are the leaders and need to act like it and show respect to others.  Such incredible kids.  They all call me Mom except 2.  Nick Rabbitt and Alex Jones.  They call me Mrs. Beckstrand.    I'm really not use to that.  I'm used to Sister Beckstrand.  That's what all the neighborhood kids call me. But they both said that it is disrespectful to call me Penny.  I have had swimmers call me Shayne's Mom.  "Hi, Shayne's Mom."  But most the time it's just mom or mommy.  Anyway,  These kids adults are going to do some amazing things in their lives.  I'm excited to see what the future holds.

My first High School Graduate!

Shayne Graduated on May 22nd!  It was amazing.  She wore her hot pink heels!  It didn't match her cute new dress but they looked amazing with her BLACK cap and gown

See Madi's cap and gown?  Maroon.  Shayne's?  Black.  Apparently the Jostens company that they rent them from thought she was a boy.  She, of course, loved it and took it proudly without saying a word to anyone.  It was funny.  I told Joel something like that would happen when you name a girl a boy's name but he didn't listen.  Oh well.  It's a good thing she loves the attention.

Here she is sitting on the stage with the rest of the Executive Council.  What a good group of kids! 

Here are the other 200 graduates.

Here is Brad sleeping through it all.  That really isn't anything new because he did fall asleep in his own graduation just 3 days earlier.

As part of the Exec Council they got to graduate first and then shake everyone else's hands after they graduated as they went back to their seats.  This is Shayne and Buck, Nikki, Kyson, Enrique and Conner.  She hugged about 17 more as they went through.

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  Oh yeah...I almost forgot.  Right before Mr. Mees, our 2nd favorite principal next to Burke Staheli, stood up to talk the fire alarm went off.  We are blaming the Desert Hills High School kids.  It's something they would do.  Mr. Mees handled it like a pro and told everyone that they were talking to the fire department and to remain seated until they have turned off the alarm.  Then it was over and time to thank everyone for coming.  James & Jace were there and so were Michael and Jen and Pat.  Along with all of her older friends and co-workers whom we consider family as well.

My favorite part was about 5 minutes later when these 3 made their way over to Shayne.  Most kids would have stayed with their families but these 4 are family.  I just wish this guy wasn't in the way! 

This is Alex Jones, aka Tyler, aka Football is my religion Alex.  We heard of him way back in their Sophomore year when they would all talk about religion every single day at lunch.  Alex was always there, listening.  A year later he was baptized.  Now it's been another year and he is preparing for his mission!  I love this kid!  He is a great example to his friends. 

Here is Mitchell, Conner, Zack, Brescia, Shayne and Josh.  Another group of amazing kids!  Well, except Josh.  Just kidding buddy!

       

Here we are minus the 2 little boys.  They were there half the time until Kyle, who is awesome, took them and Evan to their city baseball games.  After everything was over we went back to our place to BBQ with the fam.  Jandy made Shayne this, -what's another word for amazing? - cake.  Shayne LOVED it!  It even has a quote from Mark Spitz on it.

This is Brad again.  Trying to bust his buttons and almost succeeding!  I laughed so hard I cried.  I am so thankful that my family could be there to support us.

What an AMAZING day!  I am so proud of the wonderful woman that Shayne has become.

My LAST Kindergarten Graduation!

My 5th and final time!!!  David has had Mrs. Shelley this year and she is AMAZING!  We have loved every second of Kindergarten.

David and Taiven lined up outside, super excited!

  They had a student teacher all year long named Mrs. Neumann and she was so good with the kids. 




So the program was great.  All of the classes lined up outside and then one by one they came dancing down the isle into the gym/lunchroom which was PACKED!  They sang a ton of songs and then went back to their classes to hand out awards and graduation certificates.
 



 My 5th Kindergarten graduation was just about the same as the first one, with three exceptions.
 Buck, Kyson and Zack.

I absolutely LOVE these three guys.  They came to the entire thing and cheered super loud when David got his "diploma".  There were a lot of grandparents there but David was the only one with his own cheer section.  He was so excited.  It was a lot of fun.  It's like he has 3 older brothers than Josh. 

This is Destiny.  They are BFF's.

I am so proud of all of my kids.  Even the ones who don't belong to me.  They have been a great influence to me and my family and I will be forever grateful.

Eclipse!

So on May  20th there was an Eclipse!  If you didn't see it then you totally missed out!  I bought a couple pair of special glasses so we didn't burn our eyeballs out.  We had heard about the Ring Of Fire and have now see one in real life.  I was amazed at how cool it was.  We went over to Jandy's because we were dog sitting and because they don't have any big trees by their place because of the neighboring sod farm.  So nothing to get in the way. 

Here is our little pin hole eclipse.  This is what you do if you don't have cool glasses.  It was fun to watch the phases.  Here it was on it's way and here is our pin hole picture of the ring.

Here is a professionals picture of the real thing.  It was amazing!  It's supposed to happen again in 2018!  Woo Hoo!