Garage cleanup? Garage Disaster!

    What a great Conference weekend we had! Great messages/guidance from our Prophet, apostles and other church leaders and also a great time to declutter the garage and make room for a couple new motorbikes. Greg really went to town cleaning up the garage and found just enough room in the garage for the Groms. Then......just two days later, he had a bit of an accident!

 

 

    I requested Greg do a little touch up painting of the basement walls that have had patch work on them for more years then I care to count. He grudgingly agreed and searched through all our many cans of paint and found the right one and thought he'd better do a bit of mixing before painting. He decided to make his own mixing device using a rope and a drill. All was going well until he decided to increase the speed on the drill and all HELL broke loose in the garage! Yellow paint EVERYWHERE! There will never be a day in the future where we won't have some yellow splatter in the garage and on the car to remind us of this SPECIAL EVENT!

These photos don't really do it justice but thank goodness those bikes weren't in the garage. And thankfully the Harley had a cover over it.

The car was my first order of business while Greg started the garage clean up. Thankfully it was water based paint!

 

Greg did have to help me reach the top of the car where I couldn't reach.

Thank goodness for Andy who came and diffused the stress a bit.

  Small tangent:  We got a preview of these cute girls and their Easter photo shoot mid week.

 

    Thankfully Greg didn't let the paint disaster stop him from the painting projects and he's currently painting all the house doors and has finished painting all the patched walls.

Just had to document these guys literally watching paint dry.

    So that's how we spent our Spring break and General Conference weekend. Now on to the last 7 weeks of school and only 16 sleeps until the Aussie's arrive. (Fingers crossed.)

Babies and Honda's

    We've had some fun times this week. Cute grand-babies to snuggle and the boys, Carter and Isaac, bought some fun new transportation that will save them a lot of money on fuel.

Cute baby Harley.

Grandpa entertaining the girls.

Uncle Carter with cute Harley.

This is Isaac's new ride, a 2019 Honda Grom that gets 125 miles to the gallon. 

Nice biker gear.

    And while the boys are riding motorbikes all summer I might as well help out and keep the Camaro in use but first I needed Carter to clean it up for me. What a good boy!

He's happy to do whatever I ask right now because I'm fronting a small loan for him to buy his new ride.

Meet Carter's cool new bike! This is a 2020 Honda Grom and also gets 125 miles to the gallon.

Let the fun begin! The summer of 2022 is going to be 'lit'!

    So there you have it, another week down.

     And I must say, our Australians may not have gotten here by the end of March, but they did get the miracle they needed and we can't wait to see them in just a few short weeks. God always has something better for us and He came through with flying colors once again!

Why!?

    These aren't the photos I had in mind for this weeks post. These adorable people were supposed to be in photographs I took with my own phone and at my house! But, sadly, life doesn't always go as we planned and we're are praying most earnestly that by next weeks post I will have photos of them that I take with my own phone. Here's to everything coming together before March is done!

But seriously, how beautiful are these girls!?

Bring the Atkinson's to America!

    All I want for 2022 is this!

Fire and fun

    Have I mentioned how much I love our neighborhood?! Nearly every Sunday is a small, sometimes larger, gathering of great neighbors, rain or shine. Our neighbors captured these great shots of the burn barrel.

Just another Sunday night.

    And before the burn barrel fun I caught this fun moment with Kayli and Beau. Toddlers are fun! (Especially the ones that just come to visit.)

Train show

    We went to see some model trains on Saturday and, once again, I failed to get photos. I did manage to get a group shot, only to find out today that somehow Brock wasn't in frame, but I promise he was with us. We had fun and if Kayli would have joined us I would have had all my kids with me, a rare treat. We did see Kayli earlier that morning when she came to Charlie's last basketball game, so I did get to see all my kids and that's always nice. 

    The model trains were cool and the detail involved in the setup is always impressive. My boys are now wondering if this is a hobby they can get into but I think the $ might be a bit of a hinderance. As for the rest of the week, it's been fairly uneventful so no other photos were taken.

 We also had Isaac's girlfriend, Morgan, join us.

    Another nice week and now we get to 'spring-ahead' tomorrow/Sunday so we're going to enjoy this last night before we 'lose' our hour! (I love daylight savings! And I'm not being sarcastic.)

A break from reality

    That week long water conference, that happens every two years, for Greg, was this week and it was great, at least for me. I love a break from my reality every now and again. It was so nice, sunny, warm and full of little adventures. Nearly every morning there were at least two hot air balloons in the sky, a favorite thing for me to see. 

 

 

    And thankfully they have a Fiiz in St. George so I didn't have to skip my Wednesday treat.

My favorite breakfast of the week.

    We also went on a little adventure to Gunlock where we explored the dried up falls and reservoir. 

 

 

 

 

    Greg may not love the classes he has to attend but he doesn't mind the break from his regular work and he does get some free stuff, including some fun prizes, shirts, hats and lots and lots of pens. We also enjoyed a few great meals paid for by others and even participated in a 'casino' night. It's been a great week! And we found out we can parent remotely, the kids did just fine without us and with cameras and phones they really didn't need us here. Now back to reality!

Proof

    We had a nice week and another couple gatherings with Greg's buddies. I still don't have all the photos that were taken but I did get a couple while they sat around at our house. It's always fun when these guys get together and reminisce. 

Buddies for life

 

    Greg may be allergic to cats but they're not allergic to him.

Cuddling with the neighbor's cat on their sun porch.

    And occasionally I find selfies of Charlie on my phone.

 

 

Charlie and Kat.

    Recently Charlie's had a substitute teacher at school and he's fascinated by her hairdos everyday and refers to her hair as 'hair-origami' so now the pressure is on for me to 'impress' him with a different hair style every day. This 👇 was the most recent one. Next week is going to be a big disappointment because I'll be away in St. George and her hair is going to be far from fancy while I'm gone but I'm sure looking forward to a week down south where it might be a few degrees warmer then it is here.

 

    Greg is currently on a 'camp out' with the priest quorum. Charlie's basketball game was cancelled and she's planning on having a sleep over with her nieces and the rest of us are going to hang out and take it easy. And did I mention Greg and I are going to St. George next week?! I'm pretty excited about it!