All Grown Up

 

1st Day of School

Mrs. Larsen

 

Yep she is all grown up.   All of her pants and skirts from the first of the school year are way to short.   She went in just learning how to read and now she can read and write.     It is exciting and sad all at the same time.  She went from my baby girl to my big girl in just 10 short months.    She loves to ice skate and most of her writing  and class assignments were based on this even her final poster for the graduation program.   We love Kaci and are proud of this accomplishment and milestone in her life. 

Quote to Live By

‎"You have to look ahead because where you go in life is not determined by how many gold buckles you're wearing. The important thing is how well you handle the letdowns and how you treat other people despite what happens to you." --Mickey Young

or as this Great Man would say...

"Ridin" for the Bigger Buckle"

My Beautiful Heartbreak

Hilary Weeks is one of my favorite LDS Musicians.  One of her latest songs and music videos is Beautiful Heartbreak.   It talks about how each of us have our own heartbreaks.   We all of trials and heartbreaks but if we find our way through them we wouldn't change them.   These are my beautiful heartbreaks.     Life has put a Mountain in the middle of our rode and so we are finding away around it.   Part of going around it will be sacrificing.   As we attended the temple wed night one of the talks was on sacrifice.    The Lord wants to know that we trust in him, have faith in him, and will obey him.   Often times to prove this we have to sacrifice  is not easy, it is not fun, and it accompanied by lots of tears.  The remainder of our Stake Conference our thoughts and feelings were strengthened as we learned more about sacrifice and obedience and the blessings that will come.    So I will cherish these photos and take this opportunity to teach my children that it is more important to obey and sacrifice because if we do we will be blessed ten fold.    This will all take place on the Lords time frame not ours.   With that being said,   I will shed a few tears but I will help my family find their way around this mountain.   We will search and find what Heavenly Father is wanting us to do and we will be stronger for it.  As we do this I will cherish the tender Mercies he will show us through this trial.   One of those tender mercy's happened yesterday as we drove out to check on the new babies.   We are already bottle feeding one because its mom didn't want her.     Although it was the sabbath we new the ox was in the mire and we had to save our new baby.    Dan, made a call to our friends the Carters and the boys and him went out with horses.   They roped the mom put her in the smaller pen and then they went back for the baby.   Jake was so excited to carry him back to his mom on M&M.  M& M was awesome he was calm and Jake was proud as punch until . . . the little calf was so nervous and pee and pooped all over Jake.   As I was snapping photos of the day to cherish and remember my eyes were filled with tears knowing this chapter was coming to an end.  Those tears turned to laughter as Jake was gagging and dry heaving from he unpleasant experience.     Another tender mercy and lesson to be taught.  

Runnaway Grandma

I mentioned we took the pony and the cart out on the desert with us.   The kids had a blast with him all weekend.   Saturday they convinced grandma she needed to go for a ride with ALL of them.   Jake was leading him most of the way.   The little hill to the main rode was a bit much for him so they all got out and walked up the hill.    The bottom picture was the last we saw them for quite awhile.  I got busy visiting with the Stallings when I heard my two youngest children screaming.   As a mom you get trained on how to interpret each different scream for each child and by both screams I knew there was a major problem.  Their scream got closer and I saw blue running with the cart Jake and Kaci were running behind him.  Susan Andrew and Maddison were on I knew this was not good so I was running for them.   Susan said  that Jake dropped the one rein and got off to get it.   When he got off Blue turned and ran Susan had Andrew on her lap and knew she needed to stop the pony so she convinced Andrew to sit on the seat and she got on her knees to reach for the rein.  She could reach the rein but was able to reach blues tail which she grabbed.  Not liking his tail grabbed blue kicked her.   She was finally able to reach the rein and pull him to a stop.   I felt so horrible.   Kaci was still hanging on the back when blue took off and Susan yelled at her to let go.   The outcome could have been so much worse but as it was Susan has a few bruises but everyone else was just scared.  Dan took Blue out and made him mind and then got everyone but grandma back on for a ride.   I don't blame her at all.  We will probably never get Grandma back on the pony cart but it will be a great story for generations.

April came and went

 

Seriously where did the month of April go?  

 We have been calving forever.  I guess when your herd is small it is a longer process because is so far between them.   We only have 3 more to go.    This will give us a total of 10.   We have lots of first time  moms this year and from the photo above you can see that one decided she didn't want to be a mom.   It happens with cows not just humans.   I really have a hard time with this concept but try as we might we couldn't convince her to change her awful ways.   She would be so mean to her baby and push her and kick her away.    After a week of trying the mom up so she couldn't hurt her baby and going to help the baby twice a day we gave in and just brought her home.   The kids love having a baby to bottle feed.  It is the one chore they fight over.  

 The month started with a fun wedding weekend.   Paul Sperry and Ari Richards got married.   I helped decorate and Dan and Meggan sang while Jeron accompanied them on the guitar.   It was Dan's first wedding gig and he was a nervous wreck.   On our way to the temple he was telling me he couldn't do it when I had the brilliant idea for him to have Meggan sing with.  He loved it called her and she rode home from the temple with us.   They did an amazing job.  The day was beautiful, Paul and Ari were so adorable and looked to happy it was an honor to spend the day with them. 

We had a great Easter and Spring Break.    For Easter we went out to Young Living Farm and enjoyed their Easter festivities  then Dan and the boys went out to the church ranch and doctored calves,   Kaci and I went to Spanish Fork to my cousins little boys Baptism.   It was so fun to see my family.   Easter Sunday was a different day than our usual.   We usually go to Grandma Nelson and have dinner and an Easter Egg hunt but this year she didn't have it.   Dan had signed up to have the Missionaries over for dinner so we took them to his moms house for dinner and the kids did an Easter Egg hunt for the Missionaries.   They filled the eggs and even put scriptures in some of them.   Then they hid the eggs.   They also hunted the eggs.   I am pretty sure the missionaries were thinking they were to old for an egg hunt at first but then I think they enjoyed it.  

Spring Break went by fast.  Kaci was sick most of her spring break the boys went out on the desert with Byron and Susan a day early then Dan, Kaci,and I joined them.   We loaded the trailer with everything.   The boys convinced Dan to take the pony cart out there.   I am not a fan of this family tradition.  I do not enjoy the desert at all much to my families dismay.    This year Dan was awesome and took just ME on a horse ride that was the highlight of my trip.   Then I learned an addicting game of cash cow on the ipad I drained poor Andrews battery twice and Madison's once.   

The rest of the month was filled with Campaigning.   My father-in-law has decided to run for County Commissioner.    Dan has been big into politics the last 2 years and so he has helped his dad a lot.   This year when he attended the coccus meeting he was elected as a delegate along with my dear friend Tina.     They both looked so official all dressed up with name badges and all the night of the coccus meetings.   I wish I would have had my camera.   Dan  really enjoyed this experience and looks forward to more events like this.   He has been a huge support to his dad throughout this campaign setting up meetings with other delegates and talking to people himself.    I helped him set up a facebook page and also did his flyer for him.   

March Goes Out like a Lamb!

 My brother was a little camera shy silly Goose.   Him and McKenzie surprised us and came to watch the boys Saturday morning.  

 There is nothing better than hangin with the cousins.

We spent the last weekend in March in sunny St George.     It was a 5th and under/Junior High Rodeo.    We love being in St George with our family.     We invited Andrew to ride down with us so he could hang with his favorite cousin Kolten.   They played and played Andrew cried when we had to leave.   Our kids are blessed to have such great relationships with their cousins.  We usually stay with Shannon and Lance when we go down but when we take our horses we stay with Jeff and Kathryn.   They are gracious and accommodate us and our four legged animals.   It is not because Shannon wont but she can't because of where she lives.  Because it was conference weekend we decided to stay until Sunday and spend time with our family.  It was also a great opportunity to go see where Coy and Teresa Fackerell lived and eat breakfast with them.    We had Sunday dinner  with Dan's family before driving home.   It was so fun to be with everyone.   The boys had some success as well which is the icing on the cake.     Zeak won his first check in ribbon roping and earned points.   He also earned points in the chute dogging and break away.   Jake made some awesome pole runs and won 2nd the first day and 2st the second day.     It was a great weekend full of the things we love, our family, our friends, and rodeo.

Lucky

Our St Patrick's day party was on Sunday the 18th this year.   We had Hayden's baby blessing before so we were not quite as prepared on the green attire as we have been in the past.  I was pretty impressed with Zeak's creativity when he saw his competition.  Taylei was decked to the hilt in green.  The competitive nature in Zeak doesn't come out as often as Dan would like but tonight it did and Grandpa Sperry gave Zeak a gold dollar for being so creative in his green and Taylei a gold dollar for being the most prepared.   I'm pretty sure this is the same trend that we have seen in them since they were babies.    Since everyone had to participate Dan sang a song this scored him more gold coins than anyone.  Grandpa and Grandma Sperry LOVE to listen to him sing.   I had a weak attempt at an Irish poem.   I don't recall what Jake and Kaci ended up doing but be rest assured they got more than their share of gold coins.  Grandpa Sperry then decided to have another competition that has been a Sperry tradition for a really long time.   Zeak was pretty pumped and knew he could win and he started strong but then fell apart.  You had to hold the jar of cheese balls and see how many you could get in your mouth.   It was a one at a time concentrated effort.   Paul must have had the most practice as a child because he was undefeated in every round much to his older sister Tina's dismay.    Grandma is always so generous and has a fun treat and treasure for all the kids.   Aysen loved his bug net and seemed to think Kaci was the perfect catch.   What a fun  Irish tradition to celebrate with an Amazing Family.  We Love You  Sperry's.