Trevor's magic trick

This is how Trevor plans to pay for college. (Sorry the video's so poor--it was taken with a camera phone.)

Near Death Experience

Today I had my first near death experience--unless you count the one when I was 8 and fell two stories and landed on a concrete floor. I usually don't count that one because although I remember falling, I then only remember waking up in my bed a couple of days later. I don't remember thinking I was going to die. Today I thought I was going to die.

Chris, Branden, and I were heading down to San Diego for the baby blessing of my sister's baby. We were driving our more fuel efficient Honda Accord and we were in the carpool lane on I-5 south near the 10 freeway. There was a pickup truck in the lane next to us that was just a little bit ahead of us. It had several things in the back of the truck bed, including a mattress and box springs that were not tied down, just being held in place by other things in the truck bed. I remember looking at the truck and seeing the mattress kind of bouncing around when all of the sudden the mattress and box spring came flying out of the truck right towards us. It seemed like they were coming in slow motion, although I know they were coming extremely fast. I was watching them, wondering if they were both going to hit us or if one of them might veer a little to the left of us. There was nothing we could do to avoid the mattresses, they were too close to us. I braced myself for the impact and was imaging which way we were going to spin when they hit us and hoping that the car behind us could see what was happening and slow down so that it did not hit us when we spun out. (I was also thinking that we had left Kelsie and Trevor home, and that my kitchen was a complete mess and in case we didn't make it, other people would see my disgusting kitchen.)

One of the items (I don't know if it was the mattress or the box springs) hit the front of the car straight on, then flew under the car where we drove over it. The other one seemed to have hit the left front of the car and then flew over the top of us. Amazingly, we did not spin at all, and continued to drive straight in our lane. I don't know what happened to the mattresses after they hit us. I immediately grabbed a paper and pen and started writing down the truck's license plate number. We were able to drive up to the truck, signaled for him to roll down his window while we yelled at him, "Your mattress just hit us!" We were able to get him to pull over and we pulled over as well to assess the damage to our car. Miraculously, there was absolutely no damage at all to our car.

We finished our drive to San Diego, although we were running a little late by this time. We realized we probably were going to be late for church and miss the blessing, but we figured we'd give it our best shot. We walked into the church and heard music from the opening song, "The Spirit of God." We slid into a pew just in time to sing the last words of the last verse "Amen and Amen," after which there was the opening prayer, a few items of business, and then the baby blessing.

I know we were being watched over to make it through that experience without a scratch on either ourselves or the car. That kind of incident usually causes serious damage to both people and cars, but amazingly we were fine. I don't think I really like near death experiences.

Mexican Bath Day

(posted by Kelsie)
Today at work, I was approached by a little boy, of Hispanic descent, who informed me that today was Mexican Bath Day. I said, "oh, well, what is mexican bath day?" His response was, "My dad says that Mexican Bath Day is when all the Mexicans go to the park and take baths." I burst out laughing and he said, "But you're not Mexican." And I, still laughing, said, "No, I am not," lol. So, that was my conversation with this boy about Mexican Bath Day on our way to the park. I guess I'll just have to stick to showers:)

Family Reunion

We just enjoyed a family reunion at Trinity Lake.  Trinity Lake is located in northern California northwest of Redding where there are currently hundreds of fires burning.  Another fire was almost added to the number, but luckily Trevor knew how to use a fire extinguisher and put out a fire in a neighboring cabin.  Despite the smoke, we had a great time on the lake and had fun spending time with family.  I didn't take many pictures, but did manage to get a few to help remember the occasion.

Twenty Years!

Yesterday, June 25th, we celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary.  (Yes, I got married when I was 15--jk).  Actually, we didn't actually celebrate it yet since we had absolutely no time yesterday, although we tried to throw in a super quick lunch at Red's.  Chris got to the restaurant and ordered for me since I only had a 15 minute window.  When I got there I noticed it was Free Dessert Day (my favorite day at Red's) so we asked the waitress to bring our free dessert before we were done with our meal since we didn't have much time to wait for it after the meal.  Well, she brought it before we even got our lunch.  So for lunch I had one of those huge martini glass ice cream sundaes--a dream come true for me.  Chris only had a bite or two and so I had to eat the rest myself.  That was a great lunch, it's not everyday I get to eat a huge sundae for lunch.

Anyway, twenty years!  Chris and I met at a dance on September 11, 1987 at BYU at the apartment complex I had just moved into and Chris had just moved out of.  We were both dating other people but we went to the dance because they were having free pizza and any college student will eat free pizza.  As my journal says, "I met a cute boy.  He is just rad!"  (OK, it was the '80's.) We started dating, got rid of the other people we were dating, became engaged in March and  were married in June on an extremely windy day at the Jordan River Temple.

Chris always says we don't have anything in common...(music, motorcycles, camping)... but after twenty years at least we have twenty years and three kids in common.  We are both very different, but somehow I think we compliment each other.  We've both grown and changed a lot over the past twenty years--hopefully  for the better and I can't wait to see what the next 20 years bring.  I love you, Chris.  Happy anniversary.

Here Kitty Kitty

We were walking into church on Sunday and a little kitten came out of the bushes and sat right in front of the door.  We were waiting to see more little kittens come out of the bushes, but he/she (never checked) was the only one.   It was very friendly and came up to each of us and wanted us to pet it.  We felt sorry for it since it has been real hot all week (100+) and figured the kitty was pretty hungry and thirsty (especially since it was trying to eat Kelsie's fingers and tried to eat the dried up gum on the concrete.)  Chris went in the church and brought out some water for it and then went to try and find some food for the kitty.  The kitty was obviously used to people and didn't look too orphaned so we looked for "Lost Kitten" signs in the neighborhood, but didn't find any.  Chris put the kitty in with the YW (we have YW/YM first and sacrament meeting last) because the kitty would not move away from the church doors and Chris was afraid someone was going to open the door  and hit the kitten.  It was as if the kitty knew that if it came to the church someone would help it. :]  After YW, for some reason,  the Sunday School teacher didn't want the poor kitty in their class, so I went to take it back outside.  On my way out, our wonderful, compassionate primary president saw the kitten and actually volunteered to take care of it until it's true owners are found.  (Thanks, Julianna!) I'm pretty sure that it has real owners, it's a persian kitty, and although it was dirty it looked fairly healthy.  The funniest part was when she carried it into sacrament meeting and all of the kids in the chapel started yelling, "Look, a kitty!  A kitty!"  Hopefully, the owners will call her soon and she will not see this as a sign that she needs to move out of our ward into a house that lets her have pets.

A Day of Firsts

Yesterday was one of those days when each of the kids have something "big" happening.  Kelsie started her first job.  Her first real job where she actually gets a paycheck.  She has a part-time job working as a camp counselor for the summer for a Lutheran church in town.  She liked that the kids call her "Miss Kelsie," but does not like the fact that she needs to wear a polo shirt.  She, apparently, does not "do" polo shirts. The good news was the polo shirts have not come in yet so she didn't have to wear one.  As soon as they're in, I'll post a picture of her in her shirt.

Trevor had his first high school basketball game.  He had a lot of fun and played a great game, scoring 10 points.  He had a four hour basketball camp in the morning and then went to his game in the un-air-conditioned gym when it was 108 outside.  Needless to say, he was hot, tired and hungry when he came home.  I have never seen him eat so much in a three hour period.  It was actually rather scary.

And Branden got braces.