April also brings General Conference. We tried to watch what we could and get a few projects done as well. At one point on Conference Sunday Brian looked like this...
Later that day we went to Grandma Joyce's house to give a cousins concert organized by Jordan for a school project. It was very fun to enjoy all the talented cousins perform.
We got to enjoy one more month with Frankie and Ahab before they headed up to greener pastures in Oakley. We loved having them here this winter.
Mark finished up closing in the chicken coop. There are still some finishing touches to do and he needs to add the nesting boxes when they are ready to lay eggs.
They still needed the warmth of lights through April. We have since removed the lights and Mark built some nice roosting bars for them.
Brian and Timmy spent many mornings doing origami. They were the quietest mornings we've ever had.
More time was spent with the horses and trying out my mom's new saddle.
I went to the parents and pastries reading morning before school. The kids love the donuts.
Cello practice
We spent an evening at Mark's parent's house while they were here for a week. It was so fun to be back there enjoying the Hsiao family company.
Cousins Ellie and Connor came to visit one day. The boys liked getting out the smaller kid toys that they never play with anymore.
Brian was baptized. More on that here
We had lots of fun playing with the chickens and watching them grow. They were little chicks just getting feathers at the beginning of April and they grew so much by the end of the month.
One day Mark came home pulling a big boat. He bought it from a friend because the motor didn't work. He sold it a few days later. The boys had fun playing in it for a few days though.
I watched the kids sing in a little leadership day performance at school.
Timmy spend an entire afternoon drawing a bald eagle. He colored the picture on the right and then drew the one of the left all by himself. I was amazed at his drawing skills! So cute.
We loved having the horses here so much that we decided to get a little one of our own. We brought home this little guy one evening and he quickly attached himself to Frankie. His name is Chip.
Then we decided the goats were just too pushy and crazy for us. They would smash their way through any gate when opened a tiny bit and they jumped up on us and so we started thinking we should try selling them. We had time on a Sunday evening to take a few pictures and then we posted the ad on KSL that night thinking it might be a week or so before they sold. At about 10:30 I got a call from a guy who did not speak English very well. From what I could gather he had to work all week and he wanted the goats now. So at about 11:30 we walked the goats out to the street and met these really nice Burmese refugees who wanted our goats. They said they wanted them as pets, but I have a feeling they may have had some other ideas as to what they were going to do with Eddie and Teddy. The goats really liked the men and hopped right up in the back of their SUV. And that was that. It was midnight by the time we watched Eddie and Teddy ride away in the back of a Jeep Cherokee. I was a little sad and the kids were really sad when we told them in the morning, but we are all fine now and loving that we don't have to deal with the crazies every time we walk into the field. Goodbye Eddie and Teddy.
One day for Family Home Evening we had a marshmallow war in the field.
Then Mark sliced his hand open helping a friend with his kid's pinewood derby. Luckily Mark's brother is a nurse and was willing to stitch him up.
I went to the children's theater with Timmy for a field trip.
I also built a sub-irrigated planter during April. There is a water reservoir at the bottom of this trough made from perforated drainage pipe. I put water in the pipe and it fills the reservoir and then waters the plants through capillary action. We'll see how I like this method of gardening. It's my little experiment.
Brian and Timmy finished up Saturday basketball at the end of April and they loved it.
And they started soccer, which they also love.
Luckily it was just warm enough the last Saturday in April to ride the horses before they left. I was able to lead Chip around while riding Frankie and three of us got to ride at once.
