I'm alive!!!

It's official, I lived through this week! 
  Work - done!    I'll miss all of my friends.  But yep, I'm excited to be finished torturing my body for awhile.  Besides, I'm too busy to work!

  Eagle Project - done!  Thanks to all of those who were able to help Galen out.  His project was successfull and I couldn't be more proud of the way he handled things. Now for the paperwork . . .

  Graduation - done!  Yes, Corwin graduated!  It's a miracle!  We are soooo proud of the work that he has done and the effort he put in.  Many thanks to all of those people over the years that have help, inspired, prodded and otherwise helped Corwin out along his road in school.  Now, if we can keep up his momentum!  I love seeing him start to understand his own potential that we have all seen all along.  

  Packing - started!  Yep, I've overdone and have been not feeling well through this weekend, so the packing is at a crawls pace.  But that is why I gave myself an additional week before the big move. 

  The big day is June 15th.  We are out of here!  If I have anything of yours, borrowed or otherwise you better come get it!  If anybody wants anything of mine, come get it!  That way I can fit the rest of our junk in one truck.

  We are very grateful and feel very blessed to have so many friends and family that want to keep in touch with us.  I'll try and do my best to keep pictures coming on here and try and add a few

stories along the way.  Hopefully you can fill in the blanks.

Love always! 

Our house full of Goofballs

(I always say, it's never boring around here!)

Help Galen with his Eagle project, PLEASE!

  Well, I've never sent out a plead of help this way before, and hopefully never again!  But I'm getting short on time and if you read this blog, you know why!

  My son Galen, surprised me the other day and said that he wanted to finish his eagle project before we move in a month!  I replied that he was probably just trying to give me an anyerism or something.  He said that he had made a promise and would do his very best to fullfill it to the best of his ability.  Silly, selfish me.

Galen(the one  on th right), has planned, organized and researched his project on his own.  I am just so proud of him (and a little surprised) that he has taken on this challenge.  He has planned to paint the interior of Leo Montoya's boxing gym in the Rose Park area of Salt Lake.  Leo has a non-proft youth group that he teaches to box and some good old-fashioned respect and manners.  He is 85 or so and still gets out on the floor with them weekly.  His gym hasn't been painted for 25 years and is obviously well used.  He says that you don't need anything to teach kids how to be good boxers and young men. 

 

Galen has a short list of things he needs donated in time for his project next week.  He says he'll just pay for it all, but I thought we could do a little better than that.

  His list is as follows:

  >paintbrushes

  >Semi Glass white Kilz paint (15 gallons)

  >high gloss, black paint (2 gallons)

  >Drop cloths

  > 2 inch, painters tape

  > painting rollers

  > paint rolling pans

  > mud trowel

  > drywall sanding screens

The wants are a little different, but equally important:

  >Neon open sign

  > window squeegee

  > Paper towels

  > bottled water

And the most important element:

  > Vinyl work ( call him for details)

If there are any money donations they will go directly to the cost of any of these items, and best case, the extra will go to some boxing equipment.

If you have any questions about this or Leo Montoya, look him up, he's well known.  He has a non-profit number for tax purposes if you need to write it off.  Please drop me an email, or call me or whatever! 

Thank you, my friends.

--Melanie

(801)589-3090

--Galen

(801)719-9667

Melissa is a city in Texas!

Well, since we got back from our trip to Texas, people have been asking where we are moving to.  My kids have told them, Melissa, Texas.  "No, not who you're living by!" they've said.  Well I'm here to tell you that Melissa is a place! 

  We are thrilled to share pictures of our new home that is processing through the terribly slow mortgage and USDA system!  We found a low interest, no down loan through the USDA, since Melissa is considered rural.  Our home looks like a big brick cube now, hopefully we can plant lots of trees to get it to blend a little better.  Our back neighbor is a giant field, our house is brand new, there is a creek down the street for frog catching and lots of new and exciting neighbors.  We have a new church in the city and the schools are great! 
We are really looking forward to the move. 
  Then, reality of a move in a month, broken car, laundry, work and raising kids hits me like a ton of bricks.  Things will work out I'm sure, and boy we'll have a blast doing it!
  Oh, by the way armadillo's look much stranger on the side of the road than skunks!

Yep! To Dallas we go!

    Well, it's official, we are moving to the great state of Texas! 
Hopefully this blog will help keep our friends and family in touch and apart of our adventures.  We are excited and nervous.  We are in the almost frantic search for a house to buy, if you know of any in the northern Dallas area. 
     There are quite a few differences even in housing in Texas from here.  There aren't any basements, the water-table is too high.  I wonder where everyone puts all of their junk!  It seems like most of the houses are in a community with HOA fees and community pools.  Fireplaces are in almost every house, I guess they are used in the winter?    We are looking for a larger yard since you can grow stuff in the garden most of the year, YEAH!  We are also looking for a one story, since we are scared about utilities from cooling the house from 106 degrees in the summer! 
   So far, we've looked into the schools and they look great!  The ratings on them are very good and we are encouraged.  My sister-in-law works for a school so they are probably great!  The main difference is that we noticed that the schools are separated into Elementary which is K-4th, Intermediate 5th-6th, Middle School 7th-8th, then High school 9th-12th.  That'll be strange!  Hopefully everything will transistion well.
  Doctors, Orthodontists, Dentists, Eye Doctors, Pharmacy's, Specialists and the list goes on.  I'd love some advice from you guys that've moved some distance, I'm a newbie!

Until next time, Bye!
Melanie

I added pictures!

I added pictures of our sealing day in the Bountiful Temple.  Check them out!

Still designing. . .

Well, I am still in the design stage of this blog.  I'm learning the slow way as usual.  If anyone who reads this is fabulous, PLEASE make sugestions!

Just a test, on our new idea!

This is the first blog, a test.  Will it work?  Will it be read?
Does this do anythig?