macbeth

In February, Ben and Sam performed in their high school's MacBeth.

The same week, Ben's honors art class held an exhibit at the school.
 Proud of you, guys.

sixteen

In April we celebrated Sam's sixteenth birthday.  I brought home this dinosaur friend to appease Grant who was greatly disappointed that Sam wasn't going to Chuck E. Cheese to celebrate.  Sam pardoned the dinosaur.  Everyone agreed he was too cute to smash,  so we just shook the candy out of him.


We all had dinner at Pizza Pie Cafe.

And earlier Sam and I had lunch at Kneaders.

And we couldn't properly celebrate Sam without movies.  We made several trips North in honor of his big day. One Saturday in April Sam and I enjoyed a trip to the Megaplex at Valley Fair Mall to see Oblivion and have lunch at Zuppas.  This picture was from a beautiful Tuesday.  It was wonderful to see Salt Lake City blossoming with tulips and daffodils, and the trees dressed in my favorite baby lime green leaves.  Sam and Ben went to see Upstream Color at the Tower theater.  Grandma Martha and I entertained the little ones at a McDonald's in downtown SLC.  I was sure I had taken Sam and Ben there many years ago.





Sam blesses our lives with ideas...like this one. A day that would have been lost if it weren't for his persistence, and creativity, and passion for a special day, and persuasiveness.  Sam you are great company. I hope you love being sixteen.

june

Its been a busy week, moving preparations, papers, tests.   Last week  I had a paper to write on "Research a pathology an how it relates to massage therapy.   Wasn't sure where to start so I googled "what's your favorite pathology/" " I got a med-student survey.  Hematological pathologies turned up number one, but not as interesting to a massage therapy student as neurological pathologies, which turned up number two.

Neurological pathologies seemed like a good choice to me. I don't remember why I ever became interested in massage therapy.  About twenty years ago when I was in college it just occurred to me that it might be some way that I could be helpful to people.  My hands have a slight tremor, which kind of drives me crazy at times. Massaging other people seemed to sooth my hands as well. So before too long I had a small core of volunteer clientele, including some athletes.  I looked around for a massage therapy school, but at that time the only campus was in Salt Lake City and I didn't think I had time to travel back and forth.  Enough about that for now.

So I wrote a short paper on Parkinson's disease.  It was interesting to learn that Parkinson's disease patients muscles, because of the constant tremor, experience the same intensity of muscle contractions as many athletes, so of course massage therapy can be beneficial, both in soothing the central nervous system and in lengthening and relaxing the muscles.  It would also be interesting to research whether or not massage can affect the dopamine production at all.

So aside from school, the younger kids are adjusting to summer camp at the daycare center. Even Sophie goes now. She is very social with the other babies. The teacher said she tries to take their toys away.  I'm not surprised.  William adjusted too and is shy in the morning but acting like the big man on campus in the evenings.  The girls keep busy with their friends swimming and playing dance games on the x-box.  They are asking me about playing soccer in the fall.

Here's a night the kids made dinner for us.  Sam made some amazing bread sticks and bbroccoli soup. Bethany and Ben helped with that too.

Sam spent the week on the stake Pioneer Trek in Wyoming.  I was grateful to see him get off the bus with a huge smile on his face.  It turns out he loved pulling a handcart. The youth leaders were calling him "the Clydesdale."

And here's a picture of  Sunday evening two weeks ago . Ben and William and bowls of ice cream.

second week of may

Wednesday May 13, Sam and Ben went hiking with their young men's group.

Thursday May 12, Art Show at the elementary school.

Then to Kyle's baseball game.

Friday May 13, Sam Ben went to Lagoon with the Science Academy.

easter 2011

Sam was born in a snow storm, under comet Hale Bop.  Every once in a while Easter falls on his birthday.  The last time was 1859.