Christmas Card & Letter!

First, we would like to wish a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all friends and loved ones. We hope this year has been as good to all of you as it has been to us. Also, we apologize for not sending a “real” card this year but we hope this will suffice for the moment.
I guess we’ll start with the biggest news first. Trina and I are expecting our first baby and it’s a girl!! Her “do date” is March 29 so in three months you should all be receiving an announcement. It is starting to get closer and closer and we are getting really excited to welcome her to the world and to our family. Both mom and the baby are doing great, and growing, and we feel blessed in that regard.
Our year has been good, a little less eventful than the last. No break-ins or blown up car engines this year which we are very thankful for. We tried to buy a house this summer; I think we must have looked at fifty or more over a month’s time. We even submitted several bids but were always out bid in the end. After all the looking, and being out bid, we decided to sign another lease at our current place. We enjoy our current ward and some of our best friends live in the apartment directly below ours so we feel maybe this was what was supposed to happen.
Trina still nannies during the day for two little boys. I think she still likes it and I don’t hear too many complaints from her. It’s getting more difficult now that she is pregnant because the younger of the two still doesn’t walk and I guess he’s a real solid little guy. Trina did get a few weeks off this fall while the father of the family was between jobs, which was nice.
Trina still does some photography when the opportunity arises. I think she did two weddings this summer and there is always the occasional family portrait, graduation, or missionary picture. And of course, there are always lots of nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters, etc who need photos. Her website has been down for a few months, something about the person who was hosting it moved or is not hosting anymore, I’m not sure of the details. So any work that comes her way now is purely by word of mouth.
I’m still working for the same company doing estimating for the framing division. This year has been a little scary as residential construction in Las Vegas has slowed to a snail’s pace. The company has had to let a lot of people go this year and closed our divisions in Reno and Kingman. My department has stayed busy bidding anything and everything that can be framed out of wood. We have been able to pick up some apartments and a few commercial buildings to supplement the few houses that are still being built. It still looks a little bleak but we pay our tithing and live the best we can and try not to worry too much about it.
I have also been taking classes in the evenings at the community college. This spring I will transfer to UNLV and will enter their construction management program. The degree still seems a long way off but it will be good to be into the program finally. School is school and I guess there is no easy way to get around it.
We feel very blessed and love and enjoy having you in our lives. We hope you are all able to enjoy the Holiday season and spend it with the people you love. Merry Christmas!

Let It Snow ... Let It Snow... Let It Snow...!

What a day we had yesterday here in Las Vegas, I have never seen so much snow fall at one time in my hole life of living hear in Nevada. IT WAS BEAUTIFUL!!!! about 11:45 in the morning it started to snow, I was no my way to pick up Spencer ( one of the kid's I nanny) from Pre School and I don't think it stopped snowing till after Ben and I went to bed at 11:00 PM. I took some photos of the the snow with my phone while I was at work so sorry they are not that good but they work.

I had to drive pretty slow no my way home, but it was worth it. To see the white snow cover everything in Las Vegas was quite a site, I laughing to myself saying this in not Las Vegas maybe UT or WY but not hear. Ben & I had tithing settlement at 7:20 PM so we got to go out into the weather and enjoy the snow while it lasted. We had trees in our Apartment complex braking because of all the weight from the snow that had fallen on then, the poor things they were not meant to have so much snow on them.

When we got to the church Ben had to spin a few donuts in the parking lot and when we left, we decide to take a drive and look at the Christmas lights that look so out of place most of the time hear (because it never look like winter hear) they looked so pretty with all the new white snow it made them stand out and really shine! I loved it!

I had at about 4 inches of snow on my car before I went home from work. This is Erik the family that I work for helping me get all the snow off my car.
The sad thing is snow does not last long here by this morning it was melting and has been all day.

It's Almost Turkey Pinata Time!!!!!

Hey Everyone I just wanted to show you my beautiful Turkey pinata that i made. The last three weeks I had off from work so I was trying to get some thing done around the house and my to do list, but my sister in law summer was making a turkey pinata to take to Mexico with them for Thanksgiving and it looked like a lot of fun so I had to make one. I think he is so cute I call him turkey lurkey I forgot to put a thing on him so we can hang him up so were going to put a nooses on him I think its quite funny but that's just me. I think all the kids are going to love him!

Extra! Extra!

Make a Smilebox greeting

Time to place your bets!

Hey Every one i hope your all doing fine Ben and I have been doing a lot lately, Ben is do working on that house (Yes! I'm so happy) I think Ben is too. This last weekend Heather help me and Connie can fruit the we got for free from friend is Alamo. It was fun but i knew i would run out of steam before we would get it done so having Heather there really help a lot we would have never got it all done with out her. Ben tried to go camping this weekend and got his truck stuck in a wash so he had to dig himself out by had witch took him 3 hour and not knowing how close to his Buddy's camp he went back and stayed the night with josh. Poor guy it looks like he got in a fight all of his hands and arms are scratched makes me feel bad when i look at then.

 

Well We are going to find out what were having Nov 4Th so we are taking bets on if its going to be a boy or girl.  

I made it to 13 Week's

Hey everyone sorry I have not been posting much, today it my 13Th week mark and online it says that it is about the size of a medium shrimp and weighs nearly an ounce. Connie, Robin and I have started walking at 7:00 am every morning at sunset park and we up to two miles a day. Then we let shay plan on the new kids play ground that they finally fixed and put in that soft rubber stuff on the ground, She love to swing! I'm doing alright not liking the fact that I'm getting bigger and its just going to keep going but oh well that's what happens when you want a kid. Ben has been working on a building project that is taking all of his extra time, so I'm home by myself a lot witch I have not been liking very much but hopefully he'll be done soon. My brother Cody and Luci are engaged and are getting married Nov 29Th the last Saturday of the month. Well Braden is crying so got to go.

Peanut Photos

I'm so sorry for not writing this month but it has been a really busy one for me. Now for the big news, I'M PREGNANt!!! I know what some of you are thinking, "you're prego and you didn't even tell us". Well maybe not my side of the family, they've known for awhile already. Yes, I'm 9 weeks and 2 days, the pictures say 4 days but when they measured the baby it came out to be 2 days less then the predicted date.

The Wyoming Trip

I've been meaning to try my hand at this "blogging" business for awhile now. I guess its not just for computer geeks and lonely "Star Trek" conventioneers anymore. Look out everybody Ben is entering cyberspace, wish me luck.

It seems like most of August has been spent in our Toyota Corolla driving to and from some family function. We started the month by driving 15 hrs straight from LV to the metropolis of Powell for my Grandma Hopkin's B-day and, unfortunately, my Grandpa Wharton's funeral. He passed away from complications of a stroke and just plain old-age. He lived a good life and was 86 at the time he passed away. We loved him and continue to, he will be missed.

The trip wasn't all doom and gloom though, we did get to see lots of cousins and aunts and uncles. I think Trina felt a little lost amidst all the Hopkins (that's how I felt with just her immediate family for the first year) but she did well and was very cute, as usual.


After most of the family had gone home we were able to spend a few days doing what we wanted and I, of course, wanted to get uo in the mountains. We decided to head for the Big Horn Mtns to the east of Powell. I've always liked these mountains, they're not as well known as some of the other ranges but I think they are some of the prettiest. We invited Mom and the Grandmas to head up with us for lunch the first day. Thankfully, they drove their own car, that much old ladiness in a confined space might have had me looking to join Grandpa Wharton. Just kidding, it was fun to have them along and I'm sure it was the first time in a few years that Grandma Wharton had been out somewhere.

Trina and I had rented a room at a lodge on the mtn so after lunch and after the old folks went back to town and we went and checked in. Being true Whartons, after check-in we promptly took a good two hour "nap". After nap time I was getting the itch to chase the wily trout so I looked at a map I had borrowed and came up with a plan.

The largest river on this mtn is the Tongue. It has two forks, a north, and a south. I found on the map where the two forks converged and thought it looked like a good place to try my luck. It was a little off the highway (only 2 miles on a dirt road and another mile by foot) so I thought we could avoid the crowds. First, let me say that it takes a real man to drive a Toyota Corolla on a pot-holed mountain road. Anyone can drive a 4x4 with two feet of ground clearance but only the boldest (craziest) do it with a vehicle with six inches of clearance.

We made it safely down the dirt road(didn't bottom out once) and found our trail head. We loaded up and were on our way. The trail was large, it was at one time a road but was all over grown now. The hike went well, it wasn't too steep and the weather was good. I was thinking to myself as we walked "it would be cool to see a moose or elk today" and about that time we came around a corner that opened into a clearing. At the edge of the clearing I quickly noticed a large dark colored animal feeding. For a split second I thought "cool a moose" then immediately realized it was too short for a moose. About the time I realized it was no moose it raised its head and there was no mistaking it anymore. About 25 or 30 yds in front of us was a black bear.

Trina was about two steps ahead of me when I realized what it was so I immediately grabbed her by the arm and told her "there's a bear". Luckily for us, as soon as the bear realized what we were he turned straight around and was gone in a flash. In my mind it seems longer but the entire encounter probably lasted 5 or 6 seconds. By the way, a bear makes a lot of noise running through the woods.

Trina say she was worried as soon as we got out of the car because of all the dead and rotting wood on the ground. She said a silent prayer for safety while we were walking. It might have been the prayer that kept us safe but I like to think that that old bear saw my 185 lbs of mean muscle on the other side of the clearing and ran for his own preservation. Ok, it was the prayer.

After our encounter with the bear and discovering that the two rivers converged at the bottom of a canyon we decided to call an end to this adventure and try our luck closer to the highway. I had some decent luck, nothing too big but lots of bites and a few fish.



Cut-throat, kinda skinny



Nice brookie.

This moose (not bear) was hiding in the willows about 10-15 feet from where I was fishing.

Saturday Craft Night!

Saturday night ends up being a girls night because all our husbands go play basketball for 2 hour or more. We are always trying to think of what we can do besides site around talking and eating food witch is fun but not all the time.(Got to keep my size under control) So Connie and I made glycerin soap and we have found a new way to make decorative soap by using acrylic stamps that you can put into the molds and they don't melt witch we were worried about. In September for our enrichment night I'll be helping them make soap so were trying to come up this different ideas. What Do you think?

Becoming Self Reliant

My Sister Connie and I have been trying hard to become self reliant, we want to learn how things are made and what does it take to do it. Lately we have been studying up on soap making I know its pretty easy to just go to the store and buy our soap, but if there comes a time that we can't just go to the store and get it I wanted to know how to make it myself. So I started looking up books online through the library to see what kind of books they had and if any that I liked. I have made soap before buy just going to Joans and buying the bricks of glycerin and meelting it down and adding what ever I wanted to it, and it is nice and easy to do. But I guess i want to know what other tipes of soap there are and how to do it. The book I have been looking at is about Milk Based Soap and it calls for Lye. I know the stuff your grate grandma used to clean everything that could take your skin off if you weren't careful. Well there are two ways to get lye now days that is buy it already made or make it your self, but you wont find it in stores I guess about 3 years ago they had some kind of scare and they pulled it out of all the stores. (You can buy it online) I found some websites that teach you how to make lye from ash and rain water if your interested in reading about it I have post the artical and put the web link at the end. Hope everyone is doing well

www.wikihow.com/Make-Lye

How to Make Lye

Lye, also known as NaOH, sodium hydroxide, or caustic soda, is used in making soap, and also in biodiesel fuel production. You could easily buy lye from a chemical supply house or online, but you may find great satisfaction in doing it all yourself, not to mention the money you will save.

Steps

1)Start a rain barrel to catch soft water. This is a key step. Depending upon how much lye you want to leach, make sure that you have 2 or 3 gallons of soft water before you proceed.

2)Find a local brewer's supply house and pick up a wooden barrel and a cork about 3" long. You can use a cask-sized or waist-high barrel.

3)Take the barrel home and drill a hole in it approx. 2" above the bottom. Make sure that the cork will fit snugly into the hole.

4)Find a place that the barrel will be undisturbed. Lye is caustic. Take the necessary precautions. Put some bricks down and place the barrel on top of them. The brick base must be stable. It raises the barrel up so that you can easily drain off the lye into a container when it is ready. Give yourself room to work.

5)Cover the bottom of the barrel with some palm-sized clean rocks (e.g. river rock). Cover the rocks with approximately 6" of straw (this can be hay or grass). This will filter the ashes and help your lye drain cleanly.
Gather branches and/or logs of oak, ash, or fruitwoods. Remember that the best lye is made from hardwoods. Avoid pine, fir, and other evergreens.

6)Burn it outside in a pile, or better yet, use it in your fireplace or woodstove.
Scoop the ashes out and put them in the prepped barrel. (Make sure that the ash is completely cold, or you'll set your barrel and anything around it on fire.) You can fill the barrel with ash but it is not necessary you can make smaller amounts with less ash.

7)Put a pan under the hole and remove the cork. Pour the soft water in until you see it start to drain into the pan, then put the cork back in tight. The water level should be about 6" from the top. After a day, the first ash should settle and you can add more ash.

8)Let it sit for at least 3 days. You can add ash all week and drain it regularly on a specific day of the week.
Check to see if your lye is ready. For what purpose are you leaching this lye? Body soap or heavy cleaning? Lye concentration gets stronger with each leaching. For average soap making, you can use these measures: Drop a fist-sized potato or a raw egg into the barrel. If it floats enough for a quarter-size piece to rise above the water, it is ready. If it doesn't, you need to add more ashes or drain all the water and re-leach it (pour it back into the cask and let it set one more cycle).

9)Make sure that you have a wooden crock or glass container to catch your lye when it's ready. Put it under the tap, gently pull the cork, and fill your containers. Leave enough head room that they will be safe and easy to pour. Make sure that you have tight fitting lids.

10)Store your lye in a cool dark place until use. (The sooner the better.)


Tips
Do not start this project until you have collected 2-3 gallons of rain water and have purchased or scavenged all of your supplies.
Make sure that your lye barrel has a stable foundation and is in a secure place where it cannot be knocked over by, for example, roving children.
If you run a dehumidifier its collected water is an alternative to rainwater.
To dispose of old leached ashes, dig a hole away from everything and pour the muck into it. Don't cover it until the ashes dry thoroughly.


Warnings
Lye is a base, also known as an alkali. Both acids and bases are caustic; they "burn" anything that they touch. Please use common sense and follow the tips provided.

Wear rubber gloves and eye protection when draining off or handling your lye, it can burn your skin and blind you!

For all backyard chemists, chemical-resistant gloves (the yellow kitchen ones will do), safety glasses and arm and body covering are mandatory.

Educate yourself on poison treatment before you begin making soap or biodiesel. visit www.poison.org [1] for appropriate actions to take if lyewater or lye crystals spill on you, are accidentally swallowed, or get in your eye.
In the instance that lye should come in contact with your skin, brush off any solids and do not run it under water. Neutralize the burn with vinegar. Water will only make it hurt worse. The strong base can cause severe burns, and you may not feel the effects right away due to nerve damage. So always (see next dot)

In any emergency, call 911 or your local poison control center's emergency number.

Another Website that has instructions is www.ehow.com How to Make Lye

Gosselin Sextuplets & Twins

Gosselin Sextuplets & Twins

I don't know about you guys but I love this show it is so much fun to watch. I know its just everyday life but she has six 3 year old's and two 7 year old's. If that doesn't make you crazy I don't know what would, I love that they say were not perfect and there just trying to do the best they can with what they have. I always think to my self that someone should convert them. (Just a random thought I had)
My mom had 8 kids but she only have one set of twins Connie and Cody man, and I thought my mom was super women and she is, but this is on a hole different playing filed.

Swimming Is our new Workout!

It's Summer now and boy is it hot! The past two days have been up to 111 with excessive heat warnings, but Connie and I have found a fun way to workout in the mornings. We have been getting up and going swimming every morning around 7am at my pool. By then it is about 95 degrees outside, we take turns playing with Shay while the other one is swimming lap's. We get about 8 laps in each before I have to go get ready for work. It has been quite fun and a good way to wake me up in the morning. It always takes me a while to get going in the morning. :)
It helps that our pool is heated so its not freezing cold when you get in.

Our 3 Day Weekend!

Hi everyone I hope your weekend was as good as ours was. Thursday night Ben and I went on a date, it was nice to spend time with him since he has been in school these past four weeks. We went to a new shopping center on Las Vegas Blvd not too far from our house called Town Center. We stopped at Borders for awhile then walked around to see everything. It is an outdoor shopping center and there is a kid's playground and water park. There was also a lawn where they show free movies every weekend. We decided to go to the Apple store because Ben had never been inside one, it was quite fun but it made me miss my Mac laptop :( (what can you do)

We ate at this restaurant in the middle of the shopping center that was called Brio Tuscan Grill. The pasta was Amazing!! and not to expensive. They also baked some awesome flat bread. We loved it. Ben and I have been trying to come up with our own recipes because we love pasta so much. We especially like the Bertolli frozen dinners for two. We want to try to make them on our own. I laughed at myself while we were eating our dinner at Brio because we were trying to figure out what they used to make our pasta. I was thinking if only we had something that could tell us what they used to make it, like a machine. Then I thought, "oh my I'm plankton from Sponge Bob Square Pants", he is always trying to steal the crabby patty and use his machine to see what is used to make it. I know you're thinking I'm crazy but Spencer, the kid I watch, loves that show. After dinner we went home to pack and finish the cookies that I had started making that morning before work. I don't know if I'll every make them again because it takes almost 4 hours to make them. Crazy!

I took this Photo in front of Brio Grill. I love fountains and I really like this one, maybe we'll have it in our yard some day :)

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Tonya had a Baby girl!

Tonya my sister had her 5Th girl yesterday, June 30Th at 2:50 am Utah time and her name is Amelia Okeson she is 8 lbs 4 oz and 20 inches long. Mom and Dad Bowman got to be their and Kirt and his Family stayed at the hospital till 1:30 am in the morning waiting with mom and dad. Congratulations Tonay & Hyrum were so happy for you.
Lets see what number of grandchild would this be I think this is number 23. Let me know if this right.

Sewing Group

Our Ward started a sewing group that's meets every first Tuesday for every month at 7 pm and we can bring anything we want to work on or start working on. This is the quilt i was talking about that i started like 4 yrs ago and my goal is to get it done by the end of this summer. I also have all these crafts that i want to get done for stockings and gifts for Christmas.

On thursday I got off early from work so Connie, Shay, and I decided to go swimming in our nice pool at our apartment complex. It was such a nice day to be out swimming. It was over 100 degrees that's Vegas for ya, but the pool always makes it so much better. Connie forgot to bring shay's swimmers so she had to wear a diaper so she had a very big butty it was so cute! I just had to take a photo with my phone.

Trying to Find a Cute Swimming suit!

Hi everyone its another day. I have been looking for a new swimming suit now that my other one is falling apart. I don't want to pay 100 bucks for a swimming suit, I think that's crazy. So I found this swimming suit online at http://www.spiegel.com/ on sale for 49.00 which is still a little high for me. I might get it if it lasts me longer than the one I currently have. Anyways I just wanted to know what you guys think of it. It comes in other colors, black, dark peacock, olive green, red pepper, and double espresso.

first posting

Hi everyone. I hope this gets better with time after I find my way around the web site. I hope this helps everyone to get to know us a little better. I don't right letters, and all that, because I'm a really bad speller. I do pretty good with spellcheck so we should be OK. I'll say sorry right now if there are any misspelled words so hopefully you'll forgive me!

Ben and I are doing well, We had our First Anniversary last month, May 5Th. We're trying really hard to save up some more money so that we can, hopefully, buy a house in 3 or 4 months. Our lease is up the end of October so well see what happens. Summer and I have been helping Heather fix up her kitchen and it is looking a lot better. We stripped the old wall paper off and we got the walls painted a pretty yellow. Ben is in summer school right now so I have had a lot of time to myself. I've been trying to get this quilt finished that i started about four years ago. We'll see if I can get it done before the summer is over. I shot my last wedding on Saturday it was long and very hot. I don't know why people want to get married in Las Vegas in June, July, or Aug, they are the hottest months we have out of the year. (Ben likes it that people get married in Vegas, he wishes Trina did weddings more often. The pay is amazing)