Hello! We have Kelly's parents and sister, Holly, visiting, so I'm not taking much time to type right now, but here are pictures from the weekend. Rus' new bonsai plant we got him for his birthday, Xander with his binoculars, Rus' blowfish picture from his birthday on Saturday, Holly with Isaac, Laurelin, and Gwen; Rus, Kelly and Xander on his baptism day, the kid cousins at Xander's baptism

Sorry about the order of the pictures. Something isn't working right. I tried!

About two weeks ago, I sold 20 baby Bristlenose Catfish for $40.00, and put the male and female back together. I now have another batch of ½ inch babies beginning to leave the nest—I suspect the warmer summer temperatures helped the eggs to hatch sooner.

Xander had his Knight and Dragon themed birthday party more than a week ago in the park near our house. They challenged to dragon to rescue the princesses, had boffer sword fights…Xander was heartily pleased.

On Monday we had a brief but fun reunion with a number of good friends we hadn’t seen in far too long They came from faraway exotic places like Orem, Spanish Fork, Huntsville, and even Poland! The first meeting was at the zoo, and then the rest joined in at Applebee’s for Xander’s birthday dinner.

At his track meet the next day, Xander beat his prior records at the long jump and shot put, bringing his long jump up tp 5'11", and his shot put to 8'.

Yesterday, after a Maxed Out Puppetry performance at the Freedom Festival in Provo, we had a fun time at Grandma and Grandpa Wilson’s house: First, a barbecue, and then a kid-friendly Daylight Firework Festival.

Kid quotes of the week:

Gwen: (referring to imaginary foes in an elaborate game she was playing with the other kids) I know how to defeat these little stinkers! Just get their bums out of their heads!

???

Gwen: Please!

Isaac: Say ‘pretty please with a cherry on top.’

Gwen: I don’t WANT a cherry on top!

Rus: Ma che sono questi? (“What are these things?” referring to some large, red, presumably decorative spheres outside Target. He was talking to Kelly, and did not make any sort of gesture.)

Xander: You mean those red spheres?

Xander understood the Italian, without even realizing that I had been speaking it!

Laurelin: There are three kinds of bad guys. Sort of bad, really, bad, and evil.

Gwen: Or Medieval!

Laurelin: Girls are very special. They are the gateway to life.

Xander: Well, boys are the key!

(Not bad for two kids who don’t even know how everything works yet.)

We were in the car, listening to a silly song called “I Never Go to Work.”

Gwen, to Rus: Babbo, I wish we lived in that song so you never had to go to work.

flyer for Viktoriya benefit show

Here is the flyer for the benefit show for Viktoriya. There will also be workshops and a show featuring Sherri, formerly of the Bellydance Superstars also to benefit Viktoriya the weekend after this show. The blog wouldn't let me upload the flyer though, I'll see if I can get Rus to try to fiddle with it and convince it that it really does want to upload it...

Why is the heater on in JUNE?!?!?!?

Happy Midsummer! Why do we still need the heater on?!?!?
Our newest nephew, Caeden Micheal Cataldo, was born this week! He actually just narrowly missed being born on Kelly’s birthday, being born at 1:55 am June 19. He measured in at 7 lbs, 6 oz and 19 ½ inches long, and is officially very cute : ) Kerry and Mike let me be there for the labor and birth, which was very special.
While we were down in Orem/Provo for the birth, we, along with Rus’ parents, stuck a candle in some yummy coconut ice cream and sang happy birthday to me.
Poor Rus was so exhausted after the long night that two of his coworkers had to bring him home from work on Friday, afraid that he might pass out if he stayed. When the kids and I arrived home that day, we put a movie on for them and he and I took a nap on the floor. But it was totally worth it of course!

Last week we got to see Laura and Cody and Mariah and their new baby Liam for a short visit anyway. Cute babies seem to run in this family. We got to hug and cuddle Liam too, which was great, it's too bad we didn't know they were here the whole week before that, we would've come down to see them more!

After that we were able to have a quick visit with Sarah and Juma too. We met up at the zoo, along with Shelley, Melissa and company and some of Sarah's inlaws. Rus was even able to meet us there after work. After the zoo we went back to our house for a thoroughly unhealthy but quick and kid friendly meal of hotdogs and watermelon. We sat and visited while the kids played and wondered how grownups could be so boring. (I used to wonder that myself when I was a kid).

So all in all it's been a great month for nephews!

Picture roll call:

Xander playing puppet with his cousin Oscar at the zoo,

Cousins at the zoo

MaryMegan (aka Auntie Moo) and Caeden

Caeden

Kelly holding Caeden

"Fireball of Stickiness"

Gwen cracks me up everytime:
Gwen was biting her arm in the car,
Rus: Gwen, don’t bite you arm!
Gwen: But it’s fun for me!
Rus: You used to do that when you were a baby, now you’re a big girl, so don’t do it anymore.
Gwen: Let’s have a contest-I’ll bite my skin, you bite your fur!

Gwen after eating pancakes with honey for breakfast, held her hands up above her head, and in a very dramatic, very loud voice declared, “My hands...are...a fireball of stickyness!!!” I replied, “Why don’t you wash them?” She, adopting an odd, wide, face-stretching, mad scientist (still very loud) sort of voice said “I don’t want to do ANYTHING to take care of them!!”

Xander brought me a rose from our backyard and said “Mamma, if you multiply that by a BILLION, that’s still not a QUARTER of what you are” Sweet boy, he makes me smile.

Isaac has been very helpful keeping the younger kids happy and busy, inventing games and fun stuff to do during summer vacation.
Yesterday we went to the Scottish Festival and Highland Games that is held at Thanksgiving Point every year. We saw some of Molly’s Revenge ( a Celtic music group), the kids and Rus did the “beat the giant” “boffer” fighting at the SCA tent, (Rus and the “giant” tied once, and Rus won the next two times) Rus got to see how many pull ups he could do while wearing 20 lbs of chain mail, and Jon and Chastity and kids caught up with us for the Wicked Tinkers (a bagpipes and drums and digeridoo type of experience). Rus was sick last year, so he didn’t get a chance to dance much, but this year it was lovely to dance around together. There is something about dancing barefoot in slightly muddy ground to live bagpipes and drums that makes one feel more alive. In fact I was reminded of Marjorie Hinckley’s (former president of the church Gordon Hinckley’s wife) quote about wanting to exit this life with peanut butter stains from making sandwiches for a sick neighbor’s children, etc (It’s a great quote, wish I could remember it verbatim right now.) After we had finished dancing two nicely coiffed, done up women walked by, and I was reminded that after dancing outside and getting sweaty and slightly rained on, and the wind whipping my hair all over I probably was a bit scary looking. But then I realized that I really didn’t care, I would rather “exit this world” so to speak sweaty and mussed and grass stained from dancing and being alive than with my hair perfect from staying on the sidelines. What’s the point of being alive if you aren’t going to live?

Maxed Out Puppetry had a couple of performances at the Princess Festival down in Lindon. We performed Ape in Boots, Hardware Store, and a new sketch called “Seanderella,” set in the ocean.
And, for the record, Kelly looked good even after having danced crazily in the muddy grass.

Kids' Documentary

Xander, Isaac, and Gwen and I decided to make a 2-minute documentary. The kids improvised a narration for it in the style of BBC's "Walking with Dinosaurs." Here's the result:

Ballet (with VIDEO), birthday, and carnivorous plants

This version has the video of the dance recital in it.

Quotations of the week:

Gwen-“Fweeping booty when it was not her birthday the evil queen gave her a bad gift that she would pick her finger in the finning wheel and DIE!”

Kelly: Did you guys eat some breakfast yet?
Isaac: No, we were too busy traveling through time.

We had fun with Kerry and Mike on Memorial Day, making English Muffin Pizzas and just hanging out.

Gwen and Laurelin had their Ballet recital yesterday. Grandma and Grandpa Wilson, Kerry, and Mike were in attendance. The girls did great...Laurelin had expressed some worries about stage fright, but she beamed the whole time and was right on with the music. Gwen, who never lets that stuff get to her anyway, hammed it up a little, but not unduly. She even knew to keep going when her antennae headband fell off, and didn't miss a beat. Video will be available in some form for those who request it. The girls with their ballet teacher, and the girls in costume:

Laurelin had her friend party on Friday afternoon in a park near our house, and on Saturday after the recital, Mom and Laurelin had a joint birthday party in the park in Orem. In between, we did some much needed yard work (thanks to Utah Mom and dad, who brought up some equipment) so yesterday was pretty full, but we all had fun.

Harvesting radishes and salad greens from the garden:

The Time Machine:

Laurelin's Friend Birthday Party:

A short video clip of our own Venus Flytrap, Mars, catching a fly: