I looked out the window and what did I see?

No, not popcorn popping here but I love to see our winged "visitors" that come everyday to feed. Kelly, my neighbor and friend got me this cute bird feeder a couple of years ago for my birthday and I have loved it!!

We always have a ton of birds (all day long) and I find it so hard to get a good picture of them. This particular morning we had more than usual so I spent a lot of time trying to get a picture...

Darren was not that impressed, he worries about them pooping all over the deck, they can also be quite messy when they eat...but I love them and they make me happy :)

TWEET!

Eclipse

Last Sunday we had the privilege of witnessing a rare annular eclipse of the Sun. The best spot to watch this was Kanarraville in southern Utah. Instead of doing the long drive we went to Weber State University where they had some telescopes available to the public to watch this rare celestial wonder. They ran out of the special glasses but the telescope was more than enough for us. Daniel was able to take an awesome picture and he was lucky because he aimed at it just right since he was not looking directly at the camera or the Sun. From our position, I believe, the Sun was covered at an 88%. Pretty cool!

Crowd gathered to get a glimpse of the Eclipse

Darren and other kids climbing up and down the hill at the University's Planetarium

 Since we didn't have glasses, they gave us some paper to try to project the image unto it (one of the pieces had a tiny hole on it)

Dan's awesome photo!

"Hooked" on Fishing

On Monday, May 14, I accompanied the second graders to "Cold Springs Trout Farm" in North Ogden, I honestly didn't know what to expect because we are not the most "outdoorsy" people in this area. I've never gone fishing and Darren has had no experience doing any of this. Still, I was excited for Darren to be able to learn something new.
The kids tried fly fishing and they rotated through different activities all morning long. It was kind of a long day but I'm proud of Darren for doing a great job being patient and participating in the games (even volleyball!!). His has improved so much and even though there were things that normally would have triggered an outburst, Darren did a great job making right choices.
After struggling catching a fish and with the help from a good friend, Darren was able to catch his own fish and bring it home for dinner!
I wish you guys could have seen Daniel's expression when I told him I had a dead fish in a baggie in the fridge waiting to be grilled HAHA.
Darren was so excited to eat it that we couldn't throw it away and we ended up grilling it, skin, head and fins and enjoying it! (Uncle Robbie would have been so proud of us!).
Ah the things we do for the kid :)

Here's the link to the recipe we used to grill the trout Cooks.com, it's called "Grilled Trout with Lemon Butter". Easy and delicious! 

General Conference

Last week we enjoyed watching General Conference together. I gotta admit it's always a challenge finding ways for Darren to sit by us and try to listen to what the speakers are talking about. This time we talked to him about King Benjamin and how he addressed his people and built a tower so that everyone could see him. All the people gathered in tents with their families as they heard King Benjamin's counsel. We attempted to turn our family room into a tent, we weren't very successful, but Darren liked it and that's all that mattered to us. We know he's still young, but at least we're making an effort and we hope that Darren will come to enjoy General Conference as much as we do.
Here's some ideas I found around to help him. I don't remember all the websites I went to and I don't claim credit for any of the work sheets, some of them I printed and some of them I changed a bit to fit Darren's needs and likes. Coloring is something he doesn't find interesting so we always relay on math papers to kill some time. He's also not a big candy eater so we reward him with a few candy, coins and "coupons" that I come up with and these ones are his FAVORITES! (like skip jobs on Saturday, skip grocery shopping trip, earn 10 minutes extra before bedtime, etc).

Here's our attempt to building a tent, note that we're not campers AT ALL, bahaha.

Darren working on his General Conference packet.

(Hey! there's a giraffe back there!)

 Prizes (candy, coins, coupons) he earns when he listens to key words like: prayer, scriptures, Jesus Christ, Temple, etc.

 Some of the work sheets I found (If you made any of these, thank you!)

Darren placing each general authority on their seat as they spoke during each session.

Darren got to eat an M&M every time he spotted a general authority.

Darren working on a puzzle of the Salt Lake Temple...At this point we were almost out of stuff to do! (wherever Darren is, there will also be a giraffe haha)

 My boys working on the puzzle.

 Puzzle is finished!

Beautiful Salt Lake Temple.

 Darren coloring the ties of the First Presidency.

More work sheets.

 Daniel before General Conference.

Daniel 20 minutes into General Conference :)
Never listen to GC while lying down...duh!