Vermont Trip Episode #4: The Final Chapter

After 3 weeks in Vermont, it's hard to believe that my time went so quickly! I felt like one of the crew! Adrianne and Grandma Debbie both commented how much the boys missed me...believe me, I've missed them too! My baby hunger is getting worse...keep the prayers in to The Man so that we can fulfill that hunger!

Anyway, my time Vermont was coming to a close. I realized that we had not done some of the art projects that I had brought with me. For the 4th of July we made this cute sign.
I did not remember to take a picture until it was raining a few days later...sad!
On the 4th of July we also lit some fire works. These were the growing and smoking kind. It was just right for the small boys. Too much noise would have been a problem.


Back to art projects...
We made targets using a piece of string and a pencil. The teacher in me could not resist teaching the boys about the parts of a circle as well as the word concentric. Parley remembered it really well for a while...I wonder if he still does! It means two or more circles with the same center but a different length radius. I was proud of my moment with boys! The whole point of making the targets was to be able to shoot marsh mellows at them, but we never got to that part! I was a little to gun shy to do that! (yes, pun intended)




By the way, Mike and I think lot like...the engineer and the math teacher! We had a great time making punny jokes which usually only we thought were funny! Good times!

Many may not know this, but my mother-in-law, Gramma Amy, to the boys, has been doing art with the boys on Thursdays. We got together and planned a few art lessons that where math related. It was great! The targets were a good way to talk about the parts of a circle and was mainly Amy's idea. The next few pictures are of the stepping stone mosaics that we made. This was mainly my idea and it let us talk about many different shapes and why those shapes have those names. For those of you who know about shapes, I taught them that right now they call a stretched out circle an oval, but when they get to high school, it will be called and elipse. I doubt they remember that, but it was fun for me to talk about anyway!

Mixing and poring the cement!

Jacob's stepping stone!

Parley's monkey! He's next to a tree...can't you tell?


Oliver's tree is next to a stream. Parley helped me make this one.

I couldn't leave out Lizzy!! She gets a sun flower with the shortest version of her name...I ran out of room! I did this one all by myself and would not let the boys help when they wanted to-and believe me, they wanted to!! This is my cute stepping stone for the cutest little Burklund!

Sadly, my trip to Vermont came to an end. We drove to the Boston Temple on my way to the train. I had been to the New England area TWICE and still had NOT gotten a picture of the Boston Temple! Ammon and I have a file pictures we want to have printed and put on a wall in our home. We have most of the temples around us, but oddly enough, not the Mesa Temple! Anyway, there is a train station about a mile from the temple, so it worked out to stop off at the temple!





I know what you're thinking, why is Shari posting this picture? Shortly after Lizzy was born Mike was heading to work and ran into a deer. The front was damaged in such a way that the drivers side door would only open about 3 inches: not enough for anyone to get through, in case you're wondering. So for the remainder of the trip, it felt like a clown car where everyone gets in the same door! All the rest of the doors worked, so that wasn't actually the case, but who ever was driving did need to climb into the car from the passenger side! Adrianne laughed about that one for a while!

After the temple they dropped me off at the train station which left late (the conductor told me) about 2 minutes after I got there. Yeah for late trains! I then switched to the Silver Line Bus to get to the airport. At the airport, we boarded the flight on time, but sat for an hour before take-off. There was one thing after another with this flight! First, there was too much weight in the back of the plane due to cargo underneath. Since it was faster to move people instead of cargo, they asked people from the front of the plane to move to seats in the front of the plane. I was already towards the front...no moving. Then someone a few rows ahead of me had some sort of medical some thing happen (we never found out what) and a flight attendant asked over the PA if there was a doctor on the plane. There was. He came forward, spent about 10 minutes with the person and went back to his seat. I have no idea what happened! Then when we finally got cleared to leave the gate, the tower was having a problem with its radio and we sat for more time until we know it was safe for us to proceed to the runway. Then we had to wait in line to use the runway. We finally took off an hour late. We made good time though-we were only half an hour late getting in to San Jose! Then, the baggage contraption was already turning when I got to the baggage claim area. I was one of the first people off the flight and our bags were already on their way! It was great!

The detailed oriented people reading may have noticed that I said San Jose. That's right! I flew from Boston to San Jose non-stop! My mom picked me up at the airport and we spent the next few days doing girly things. But more on that later in a post about California!

I miss playing Legos with Oliver or reading him a booky. I miss holding little Lizzy. I miss Jacob's thoughts on life. I miss Parley's never ending energy. I miss having Adrianne (and Mike) to talk to and learn from. When I have my own kids I'm sure I will be calling ALL the time for advice! Oh yeah, and I miss the nice weather! Man! AZ is HOT!