Caitlyn turns 12

Caitlyn had her 12th birthday! We had her birthday party on her actual birthday. Grandpa Terry and Jackie came to celebrate with us, along with Marian. As usual, we prepared her birthday feast for lunch as Terry and Jackie has a 2 hour commute and like to get home early which means, I got up at 4:30 in the morning to start the brisket in the oven.

I prepared most of the cake the day before. I made a chocolate crepe cake. It just needed some finishing touches. Caitlyn and grandpa always shares a birthday meal since Terry's birthday is approximately a week before Caitlyn's.

After lunch, we rolled over to the living room to watch the video Christian made of Caitlyn's 2nd year. We are still working on catching up with all the kids videos so Christian makes two every year. Last year he did her first year video over and her 10th year. This year he is doing her 2nd year and her 11th year. We actually didn't get her 11th year done on time. He's hoping to get it done before Mother's Day now.

Afterwards, she opened presents. Emily got one gigantic present this year. Caitlyn got a bunch of little ones as she isn't really in need of anything specific.

Grandma Cheri sent her a card along with some money. Grandpa Caldwell also gave her some money.

Grandpa got a couple of presents as well.

After presents, we cut the cake. The crepes were not so tender. I don't think that I will be using that recipe again. It was a difficult batter to work with and didn't turn out that good. I think I will try it again some time making a variation of the previous recipes we've tried. The crepes were much better. The chocolate hazelnut topping was excellent though.

All our guests left shortly after. Caitlyn and Emily spent the rest of the afternoon playing with her gifts. We were tired and by dinner time, no one was even hungry since we all had a huge lunch. We had smoothies for dinner, watched a movie with some popcorn and called it a day.

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The next day was Sunday. Caitlyn "graduated" from primary. She had to go up in sacrament meeting to get her Faith in God award and recite her favorite Article of Faith. She chose number 6. Luckily Sunday was also her friend's birthday, so they got to do everything together. It is much less frightening for them to go up there when they were able to go together. They had even gotten baptized together when they were 8.

At home, Caitlyn worked on her friend's birthday gift. Later that evening, they stopped by to bring Caitlyn a gift. We had made some cupcakes to celebrate Lynette's birthday.

Update for April

Spring break was fairly uneventful. We went to Joshua Tree in the middle of the week so that there would be less people there. Christian worked most of the week, I worked on the eaves some more and finally finished it this month. I still have a lot more to work on my the eaves are at least done.

My Trooper had some major problems. The transmission gave out on us. We knew that there was some slipping in the transmission. We were hoping it would make it until summer so that we would have some time to rebuild the transmission, but it was not meant to be. We ended up having to take it in to a transmission place to get it fixed. Supposedly it would take only 4-5 days. If we did it ourselves, I thin that we were looking at nearly a month of work and we just could not be without the vehicle for that long.
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At the end of the week, we went to Shen Yun. Christian's dad got tickets for our family for Christmas. We had to take the truck. We have not fixed the problems we were having with the fuel pump yet, but it seems to be running okay again. We figure that it is a loose connection in there. Luckily, it is still running of us or we would not have any vehicle at this point.

Shen Yun was a very beautiful and interesting show. The girls were pretty excited to attend. The dancers and music was great. We learned some interesting things about the Falun Gong as well.

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My dad had had a cold for a while that he couldn't quite shake. It turned into Bronchitis at some point and ended up in the hospital because of his high fever and difficulty breathing. He got pneumonia as well. He was spending most of his time sleeping. He was barely eating. He had to have supplemental oxygen and was getting a barrage of antibiotics. We figured that his time was coming to an end pretty soon and was thinking that we needed to prepare for the worst. 

After about a week and a half though, he seemed to recover somewhat. They were able to take him off the oxygen and move him to a nursing facility. We drove over to take my mom to the new facility. He was still sleeping a lot but was eating a little more. He slept through our visit. We were not sure if it was all the medicine or the sickness that made him sleep so much. He was still on some antibiotics at this time.

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Marian came over the next day after church for Easter. Last year's Easter Egg Hunt was supposed to be the kids' last as they are older now. But the kids kept pestering Marian for one more. They also missed the Deans' annual Easter Egg Hunt since we had to go visit with my dad.

Compared to last year, this year's Easter Egg Hunt was fairly straightforward. Although, she did have some peculiar and strict rules (such as, no opening any of the Easter Eggs until we are done).

Caitlyn was really on fire. She got a lot of eggs. It was probably the first year that she actually got more than her sister. I'm not sure why Marian made us participate as well.

In the end, the whole Easter Egg Hunt turned out to be a big gag. The candy in the eggs were very old and disgusting. She threw in some old screws and staples in them to boot. The kids were sad to have to throw away what used to be perfectly good candy...especially the Godiva chocolates. What a shame! We just don't know why Marian couldn't leave Christian and I out of her sham of an Easter Egg Hunt.

Aside from being saddened to throw away all that candy, the kids still had fun doing the hunt, so they were not completely deterred my Marian's efforts to stop the Easter Egg tradition.

But Marian didn't forget about them completely. She brought them an Easter treats still...

What made it a little sad was that it was a hollow Belgian chocolate egg...but since they got a little melted in the heat, they had collapsed on itself. What they got was a barely recognizable lump of chocolate. The kids aren't too picky though and happily ate them anyway. At least they were not moldy or rusty!

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Marian had missed Emily's birthday this year because she had to work, so after the Easter Egg hunt, Emily got some belated birthday gifts as well.

She actually got a whole pile of presents. She mostly got new clothes so she was pretty excited.

We ended the day with a nice Easter dinner with Marian before she had to take off.

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We got word back from the transmission place that our TCM was not communicating with our transmission, so we had to order another one of those. We had to settle for a used one as a new one would cost a small fortune.

However, while there was a small delay for them to get the part in, they apparently didn't bother to even get working on the transmission. So, 5 days turned into nearly 3 weeks since they didn't even have the parts for the rebuild after 2 weeks. We were none too pleased since we didn't rebuild it ourselves because we feared that it would take 3 or 4 weeks to do.

Meanwhile, Christian had to take the kids to school every morning and then come back from work to pick them up again. It was quite disruptive. On the third week he got pretty busy and I had to walk over to pick them up. The kids headed back and I met them most of the way back. The first couple of days was not too bad but it started to get hotter and hotter as the week progressed, so we were pretty relieved when I finally got my car back.

After all the money we ended up spending on it and the time, it appears to be working like a champ. It just better stay that way for a number of years to make the expense worth while. It will most likely be the last major work that we are willing to put into the vehicle as parts are getting increasingly difficult and expensive to procure. I couldn't even get parts from my old contacts at Isuzu. After we recover from this latest hit to our bank account and after Christian gets a new job, we will have to start saving up for a new car. It will be a sad day as I love my old Trooper!

Joshua Tree

At the beginning of the month (during the kids' Spring Break), we talked ourselves into going to Joshua Tree once again. We have not had very good experiences here lately, but out of desperation, we gave it another try.

We got up extra early to get a spot out on the Wonderland of Rocks area. Our climbs were open and there were no other climbers on the Wonderland North area. We climbed up The Chief (5.5). It is somewhat short so we all took a couple of laps on it to get back into practice.

Christian led the climb and the rest of us top roped it. After getting a feel for the climb and warming up, Emily was going to attempt to lead the climb but as she started up, she inadvertently put her hand down on a furry caterpillar. It is spring and there were a bunch of western tent caterpillars crawling all along the rocks we were on.  Apparently, they carry some kind of toxin on their spines because Emily started whining and crying about her hand. We did not think too much of it as we have not had any experience with stinging caterpillars. As she was upset and cradling her hand, we told her not to go up. Christian went back up to clean his anchor. I followed to clean his gear. The kids took a nap at the bottom of the climb while they waited.

By the time we got back down, Emily was calmer but her hand still hurt. We moved the gear to the next climb (Speedbump 5.6). This was a fairly easy 85' slab climb. The only difficulty was getting over one difficult spot near the beginning, dubbed the "speed bump."

While I took my turn on this climb, a swarm of bees flew by me. Luckily, I had passed the speed bump and was going up the easier slab at the time. I had to throw myself down onto the rock face to get out of the way of the swarming bees. It was a little scary.

We had our lunch at the base before we moved on to a much more difficult 90' slab climb named Fender Bender (5.9-). This had some pretty difficult spots but everyone managed to make it up pretty well.

After the kids did their climb, they took off to do some exploring. Christian and I actually took a brief nap in the shade while they were away. I took my turn going up Fender Bender and was finishing up when they got back. Christian went up Ninny's Revenge (5.9) which had this crazy overhanging start. Of course, the kids didn't take any pictures, so we don't have any of that. It was pretty neat though.

Then Christian went up Reggie Zigzags (5.4). A 60' pitch that goes up this chimney that is about 6 or 8 feet above the ground then zigzags up some cracks.

Nobody was up for any of those climbs so we called it a day. We packed up and hiked back to our car. We were pretty happy with how our day turned out overall (minus the insect incidences). We only ran into one hiker that came around. He was friendly but quiet and left us in peace. We got in some good climbing.

We decided to head back out to Trashcan rock to have our dinner as they have picnic tables in front of the rocks. Christian and Emily decided to do some climbing while I heated up our dinner. Emily decided to lead Karpkwitz (5.6) since she did not get to lead The Chief. It is a short but somewhat difficult climb up some crack systems. She even set up an anchor up on top but she was not very confident about her pieces. Christian climbed up and checked her pieces. She did pretty good for the most part except for a couple of pieces that he thought would not really have held too well.

March Update

I have been terrible about keeping up with my journal entries this year. I try to eventually get to it, but  because so much time has passed in between, I am unable to remember all the things that are going on...especially if I don't have pictures to remind me.

It has been a dark month for us. Christian found out that his boss and friend of some 25+ years is dying. He has cancer. It is terminal. He got diagnosed with it some time last year, I think. He had some operations and chemo-therapy and seemed to come out ahead, but in his latest check up, they found that it was still there and spreading.

To add to that, Christian will have to find a new job. Everything is going to be changing because of it.

We were supposed to go on vacation to the Tetons with Christian's sister's family again in June. That's not going to happened anymore. We can no longer afford it or if Christian has a new job by then, we won't be able to get so much time off in the beginning. His sister actually had altered their plans to accommodate our schedule and now we won't even be joining them.

We went down to San Diego to see her family and explain our situation to all of the family there.

The main purpose of our visit, however, was to be there to see our nephew open his mission letter to see where he will be going. Christian's sister was working so we all ended up at the hospital, where she works, to open the letter.

Austin got called to a mission in Paraguay. His big brother, Mason, will be returning from his mission in Uruguay shortly before Austin leaves. I think that they will only have a few weeks together before it will be Austin's turn to ship out.

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Caitlyn finally completed her Alfred's Basic Piano Prep Course, Level B. She is officially ahead of her sister now. Neither of the girls practice very much. It's always like pulling teeth to have them practice and so, we haven't pushed very much. Both girls pretty much stopped practicing regularly when they got to Jr. High and were issued Chromebooks. They pretend to have too much homework to practice and end up wasting their lives away playing games and watching video and just searching out stupid tidbits. 

I have still been able to push Caitlyn a little more than Emily, which is why she managed to pass up her sister. Emily isn't too happy about it and has put a little bit more effort into completing her piano lessons because of it. 

Dad gave Caitlyn a little Soprano recorder as a prize. She was pretty excited about that, because it fits her hands a bit better than a regular recorder.

Emily's Birthday

Emily turned fourteen this past weekend. We measured her at 5'5"...a whole 3 inches taller than I am with no signs of slowing down still.

Unfortunately, I had been sick all week. My worst day yet was the day before her party. I was mostly able to muster through it all.

Marian could not make it to the party this year. She got stuck at work and was unable to join us. Christian's dad and Jackie was able to make it though, so that was nice. Luckily, Emily requested a super easy meal of carne asada burritos. We had a salad and lots of chips and homemade salsa to go with it. She also requested The World's Best Cake. Not that that is our opinion exactly, but the actual name of the cake. I don't know if it is the world's best, but it is pretty good. It is a cake with a meringue topping that sandwiches a bunch of bananas and cream in between and topped with a bit of toasted coconut.

This year, Emily just got one big present from all of us. She got a new mattress for her bed as her old one was used when we got it and was worse for the wear. We had Christian's dad help chip in for it as it is a pretty big ticket item for us.

Emily was pretty excited as now she has a new bed to go with all the new bedding she got for Christmas.

Her actual birthday was on Sunday. I saved a few trinkets for her to have something to open on her actual birthday. Caitlyn gave her a necklace and a drawing pen. I was still pretty wiped out, so I slept in. Christian made dinner and we had leftover cake for her dessert.

February in Review

We didn't do too much this past month. With Christian's truck still needing repairs and our horrific experience in Joshua Tree, we didn't even go do anything over the President's Day weekend. Mostly Christian worked on Emily's birthday videos since her birthday is coming up really soon. There was also rain in the forecast to most of the areas nearby that we might have wanted to go to.

We took a break and went for a walk in the Box Spring Mtns here in our backyard on Monday. We did a little climbing. Mostly we took videos of the kids.

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While the weather has not been very good for our outdoor adventures, it has been nice and chilly to work for our adventures in charcuterie. We have all kinds of sausages and coppas in various stages. Some are cold smoked and other's are fermented. It has been pretty crazy when we stop to think about what we are doing but no one here is complaining as everything has been really tasty. We have all kinds of shelf stable meats that we can take with us now on our adventures...now the problem is being able to get out there.

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Caitlyn's school made a half assed and late attempt to reward their honor roll students for the 1st trimester. Caitlyn got a 4.0.

It was well into the third quarter at this point. The principal didn't even bother attending and then they marked her for being truant while she was at the assembly.

Nightmare in Joshua Tree

At the beginning of the month, we headed back out to Joshua Tree to attempt to get in some climbing as we have not been able to work on it as much as we would have liked to this last year.

We started off on an easy climb on Trashcan Rock to warm up (B2).

Christian went up and set up the anchor. Emily lead next. Caitlyn followed and cleaned and I just top roped the climb. 

It was very crowded and noisy. We couldn't hear each other speak on the climb. It was pretty irritating. Of course, by the time we got off and decided to head elsewhere, most of the noisier people moved off.

Our next climb was a short hike in from the Boy Scout Camp parking lot. There were several possible climbs out there. Unfortunately, when we got out there, we found that all three routes were being hogged by one party. They had their gear and ropes up on all of them but they were climbing none of them. While we were trying to what was going on, two other groups came by wanting to climb the same route as well. At that point, one of the people in the first party trotted over to pretend that he was going to start climbing. Of course, when we confronted him with his bad behavior, he tried to not take any responsibility for his actions saying that the rope wasn't even his but his friends'...like that made any difference.

We left in a huff while the other parties that also wanted to climb. but couldn't because these people were hogging up the routes, couldn't even figure out why we were even upset. We left and tried to decide what to do next. There was virtually no parking anywhere. We got the last spot in our parking lot. We did not think the other parking lots in the park would be a whole lot better since it was so crowded everywhere. Meanwhile, we kept looking back at the people hogging up our climb and after another 30 minutes or so, still no one was climbing the friggin routes!!!

We ended up just wandering around and scrambling on the rocks. We were not very happy. We did find a couple of nice little practice boulders and climbs but not much.  The sun was starting to go down and we decided to head home early. There was a group of nasty giggling girls hiking up to the top of one of the rock formations we had just left. They were super loud and obnoxious. When they got to the top, they pulled their pants down and mooned their own camera and just thought it was the funniest or cutest thing. It was seriously time to leave.

We stopped by the McDonalds in town to let the kids get a quick snack to hold them over until we got home for dinner. However, when we got back into the car to leave, it would not start. We were pretty low on gas but should still have had plenty to get to the gas station which was our next destination. We thought that maybe the meter was not working well or something. We dumped our white gas into the tank to see if it just needed a little more to get it started, but nothing happened. We emptied our water container and Christian and I walked to the nearest gas station to get some gas. We brought back more than two liters of gas but it still would not start. We seriously started to panic at this point. 

Christian decided to leave his i-Pod at home as he usually brings it but never uses it. I usually bring my cell phone but had left it plugged in to the charger under my desk and forgot it. We had no numbers memorized but found Marian's home phone number in Christian's glove compartment as we sometimes use it for discounts on gas. Unfortunately, we had no phone. We walked up and down a couple of nearby shopping centers but there are no longer pay phones anywhere anymore. It was dark at this point and we were stranded. We had even checked at a rent-a-car place in one of the shopping centers but they had just closed. It was a nightmare.

We ended up at an auto parts shop to get a wrench. We were going to attempt to disconnect the battery to see if it was just some freak computer problem that we would reset by disconnecting the power. No dice.

Finally, I forced the kids to come with me to ask a stranger to borrow their cell phone. I found a nice family inside the McDonalds that leant me their phone. As luck would have it, Marian was home when I called! Christian gave her directions and she headed out to come rescue us. Meanwhile, I talked with the guy that happens to work at a parts store and knew a bit about cars. He suggested that we try to trigger the fuel reset which sometimes pops in accidents and such. He told us where to look and we profusely thanked him to check it out and wait for Marian who would have been over two hours out still.

We could not quite see the fuel reset. At this point, the family that leant us the phone was getting ready to head out to take the kids to the circus that was in town. They stopped by to check on us on their way out. The fuel reset did not work but he told Christian to turn on the car and listed at the tank. He told us that our fuel pump was not engaging. He banged on the bottom of the tank a few times and told Christian to try it again. The car actually started!!! It was unbelievable. We tried to call Marian to see if she had already left but could not get a hold of her. Unfortunately, we did not get her cell phone number from her earlier so there was no way to contact her. We had to wait until she got to us.

We drove the car out to the gas station and filled up. We also got food for everybody back at the McDonalds that we were waiting for Marian at. We were too afraid to shut the car off though and just left it running the entire time. Marian finally arrived shortly after the McDonalds closed for the night. I rode back to our house with her and we followed Christian and the kids in the truck to make sure that it made it back.

It was a pretty stressful night and situation. We made it back safe and sound, thanks to a kind stranger and Marian, plus we found out what was wrong with the truck.