Mesa Temple Open House

The Mesa Temple has been undergoing renovations for the past 3 years. So when they started giving out tickets to attend the open house (open to the public), I immediately reached out to Shelley. Shelley has been a great investigator. She even showed up to the church to be taught by the youth last month. Logan and an older young man ended up teaching her about the gospel (for practice purposes).

So I took Shelley and we walked around the beautiful temple. I had never been into the Mesa Temple before, so I couldn't tell what had changed or what had remained the same. But either way, it was beautiful. The celestial room, especially, with all of the sparkly chandeliers, was amazing. It was a neat experience.

I later went back with the kiddos, and with Rachelle and her family. William was supposed to meet up with us, but he had to work late. 

Ryan Elementary Festival

The kids always look forward to Ryan's Fall Festival. They always go all out on the inflatables and games. But most impressively, they go all out on the raffle baskets, which we never win. This year, I only donated $10. Then I probably spent another $10 on tickets. 

Since her 2 daughters now attend Ryan, we met Rachelle and her family at the school. Between the majority of our kids, we took over the entire swing set. Haha. The most eventually went missing, going out to do their own thing. I stayed with the girls who got their faces painted and jumped until they dropped.

Then at one point, as I was talking to Rachelle, I heard "Beeston". What?! They were announcing the basket winners, and we'd won one. I ran over there and found out that we'd won the fun activities basket, which Kendall had put some of her raffle tickets into. Yay!

 

In-House Convention

Alexis had an in-house convention weekend with lots of amazing dance teachers from all over the country. It was a great learning experience and she had so much fun!

Day 1, she had Hip Hop.

Day 2, she had Tap, followed by Ballet and Musical Theater.

Day 3, I came into the studio to Miss Betsy telling me that the ballet teacher had come to find her to tell her about this cute little dancer who couldn't quite reach her hand on the leaps and had just put her hands up saying, "Maybe next time..." She had been very impressed by Alexis' positivity. She sure is cute :-)

That day, Alexis started off with jazz, followed by Acting and Hip Hop. After over 3 hours of dance, I was ready to go home, but they wanted to show off some of the things they learned, so Alexis' group performed their Musical Theater piece.

Then they started passing out scholarships. At that point, I was ready to get up and leave, because they normally only hand these out to the big girls. But then the ballet instructor started telling a story about a little girl who couldn't quite leap high enough to reach her hand. I looked up, realizing that she was talking about Alexis. And then Alexis got a scholarship! She was the only girl in her age group to get a scholarship! I am so proud of how persistent Alexis is. 

After pictures, Alexis proudly announced (to me) that she'd gotten an award from the sweaty lady. Haha. I'm so glad she waited until no one else was around to tell me that.

Apex Run at Haley Elementary

I hate fundraisers. Like, I really, really, hate them. I hate asking for money from others and I hate giving these companies 50% of what they actually collect. BUT, all that aside, I got to volunteer to mark up the shirts this year, and that was awesome. I love that the kiddos that I knew kept coming back to me instead of other volunteers.

Alexis went first and did a really great job. She took a few walking laps, but she never completely stopped.

Taylor was going to run the non-color track, but after 10 minutes of bribing, I was finally able to convince him to run the color track, like 95% of the other kids. I kind of feel bad now, for practically forcing him to inhale corn starch, but I didn't want him to look back and regret not doing this, on his last year of elementary school.

I didn't get to watch Kendall run because she was running on a different track than Taylor, but at the same time as Taylor. She did great, though, and even ran more laps than was required of her. Taylor did, too, by the way.

I love that I now have the time to volunteer at school, see the kids, and be present in their academics.

Family Pictures 2021

Our family pictures came back, and I'm in love!!! Everybody looks so dang good!!! And this year, I didn't even wear heels, so William is actually taller than me. Haha.