Liberty's YW Medallion

A couple years ago, we decided that a rule in our home is--- that in order to have parent help financially with a driver license & driver's ed & a car & insurance & gas, etc- each child has to receive a YW Medallion or Eagle Scout. Driving and all that gets you ready is expensive!!!! (we're learning that the hard way! LOL) So we hope it's a nice incentive to get our kids motivated to accomplish some of these worthy goals!

Liberty finally got accepted into a Driver's Ed class for this Summer. [Driver's Ed in MT is insanely time consuming, expensive and hard to get in to] She's been working hard the last year to get all her YW goals done but time really got away from her. There was several warnings about time getting close where she would have to become responsible for the payment of her drivers ed class if her goals weren't done. The last couple weeks have been tons of work and we have had our share of "Teenage Cardio" going on around our home. {Liberty got a T-shirt recently that says- Eye Rolling is my Cardio. It's a family favorite to tease her about now!}
As of last Sunday. she had one final goal to finish up. Working hard as this weekend approached, it looked like she might actually make it. So, we made a couple phone calls to the Young Women's President and the Bishop to set up interviews. She didn't finish reading the Book of Mormon and recording her thoughts until late Saturday night. But hallelujah! she is done!!!! She met with the Bishop Sunday morning and got her certificate and medallion during Sacrament Meeting. She starts Drivers Ed tomorrow! ;)
We are super proud of Liberty for finishing up her YW Personal Progress Program. It is A LOT of work!!!! It shows she is capable of great things. Way to go, Sis!!!

As part of her program, she made and accomplished 6 experiences/goals for every value. Then she set a 10 hour goal for each value as well. Wowzers! That's a lot of time!

Here's a little brief look at the 10 hour Value Projects she did!

FAITH

She participated in our Youth Trail of Faith program to prepare for Trek. 

Every month before Trek, she read stories and scriptures and 

did some walking to prepare her for Trek experience. 

Then she survived Trek! Yeah!

DIVINE NATURE

She grew her hair really long. She did some research about Locks of Love. 

Then she had her hair cut and donated it!

INDIVIDUAL WORTH

She developed her musical talent. 

She joined the Band. She has done lots of practicing and several concerts!

KNOWLEDGE

She picked favorite recipes. She typed them up and made a recipe book. 

Then she made several of them for our family. Yum!

CHOICE & ACCOUNTABILITY

Liberty spent over 10 hours helping Mom & Dad make choices for 

our our new home would be organized. 

She helped drywall some of the basement and help with electrical wiring. 

She was a big help!

GOOD WORKS

Liberty spent almost her entire 8th grade year, going into school early. 

She learned a BelAVisEx program to help out younger students.

INTEGRITY

She helped design, cut out, pin, sew and cut a purple, Tardis blanket.

 It was a lot of work but she loves it!

 VIRTUE

She read the entire Book of Mormon. She kept a journal of her thoughts. 

Liberty and Mikal Fife had a little competition going on! They wanted to see who could be the 1st girl to earn her Medallion with the new Bishop. Mikal finished up her goals a couple weeks ago but then was out of town for several weeks. So it was super fun that they both received them today!! Awesome job girls!!!! Here they both are with their necklaces and Bishop Lynch:

CERTIFICATE 

will be here when the YW President signs it!!!

Symphony Under the Stars: Broadway

We attended the Symphony Under the Stars again tonight. We have loved it in the past. See 2015 & 2014.


This year, it seemed like the kids were more interested in friends and rolling down the hill than the music but we all had a great time. The theme was Broadway Music. The night was amazing!!!!

BROADWAY!

Allan R. Scott - Conductor

Doug LaBrecque - Vocalist 

Christiane Noll - Vocalist 

HELENA SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA

Michael Marsolek - Announcer

Overture to Gypsy
“There’s No Business Like Show Business” from Kiss Me Kate
“Begin the Beguine” from Jubilee
“I Could Have Danced All Night” from My Fair Lady
Highlights from Show Boat
Overture to West Side Story
“Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better” from Annie Get Your Gun
“Something’s Coming” from West Side Story
“You Can't Stop the Beat” from Hairspray
*** Intermission***
“Willkommen” from Cabaret
Overture and “All that Jazz” from Chicago
“Bring Him Home” from Les Misérables
“Defying Gravity” from Wicked
Highlights from Mamma Mia
Overture to American in Paris
“Phantom of the Opera” from Phantom of the Opera
“Music of the Night” from Phantom of the Opera
“Seventy-Six Trombones” from Music Man (with fireworks)

The younger kids brought their Pokemon cards to play with until it got too dark.

Then they "spy"-ed on their sister and her friends. LOL {See Glory in the tree??}

Fireworks were awesome! Fun night!

Kayaking with the Staleys

We had quite the Adventure today. (In honor of our Scout Auction coupon) The Staleys took our family on a Kayak Trip down the Missouri River today. It was a blast!!! They brought the kayaks, pizza, fruit and candy snacks. It was awesome!

Here's some of the kayak fun from Wolf Cree to Craig. There were faster parts and slow parts, deep parts and way shallow parts. What a fun experience!! I soooo want to go get us some Tandem Kayaks for our family. Dang cool friends! They make me want to break the 10th commandment!! LOL.:

And all the kids got out of the boat at some point. I didn't catch one of Justice but he was the 1st brave one to try it. It was perfect weather to get a little wet once in a while. It was a little trickier to get back in however. LOL

We pulled over and the girls did a little rock climbing.

We got to see lots of birds along the way. Here's Glory & Dad standing in a huge flock of geese.

And they chased quite a few pelicans as well.

Here's tons of swallow nests along the rocks. How cool!

Ons of Justice's favorite things was to do a little crawdad fishing. He first threw a dead one on my lap. Oh man! My pant leg reeked like poop for the  rest of the trip. Gag! Then the boys went on to catching live ones. Pretty awesome!

Thanks to the Staleys!!! We had such a good time! You're awesome!

Bread Makers

The kids were trying to come up with something to cook for their Power Boards. They decided on BREAD. Mom had to run errands today so they did it on their own. Oh my heavens! Look how awesome it turned out! They rock this bread thing!!!!

Check out the size of this slice of bread with our home-made jam. Yum!

Liberty 1st Day of her 1st Job

Oh my! My oldest got her 1st job. She's starting as a buser at the Montana City Grill. We're way proud of her but a little nervous. Now someone else gets to control her time. Plus she'll have a cash flow somewhere other than doing extra jobs around the house. Ahhh! Life will never be the same! ;) Good luck Sis! You'll do awesome!

Sunday Twins

Glory & Rebecca have matching dresses & matching scripture bags & are the same age &  are in the same class. They worked it out to wear all the same things and do their hair the same. Such cute girls!

Garden Boxes

On our list of house projects to complete over the next couple of years---- a garden is kind of down on the list. We have a fort and the basement and the lawn, and a hot tub and a air conditioning and a Cruise and etc, etc. Does it ever end????
But as we examined our timeline, we realized that if we wait like we had planned- Liberty will be moved out before we get to it. So.... we decided to make-sift something for this year so she can participate in our Family Gardening Experiences.

Brett bought us some treated wood. He went out of town so the kids and mom got out the power tools and made some boxes. We set them up on the east side of our house and bought a little dirt. (When I say little---- we bought quite a few bags but it didn't even make a dent in what we need for these boxes. Oops! It looks a little pathetic actually!)

The kids and mom did some shopping and everyone picked some plants to grow for this year.

They sat in our garage for quite a while until we decided to set them out in the boxes to get some sunlight. Unfortunately that day it started to HAIL!!! Can you see the hail pebbles on the deck. Crazy! We ran out and rescued as many as we could. So much for our grand plan on sunshine! LOL

When Brett got back in town, he decided we should move the boxes to the place they will eventually be permanent. (We really want to have a fenced garden with fruit trees, a pathway, a bench and a little red barn to keep our lawn mower & go-karts in-- but that's wayyyyy down the road so we thought it'd be easy to just put the boxes on the other side this year. At first it was a bit buggy that Brett wanted to move them but in the long run-- it'll be awesome! Plus the strawberry patch can get good and established. Way to go- thinking ahead, love! So we moved them all over & Brett added another layer to each box:

We all helped dig and level all the boxes so that they are a bit tiered but not slanted down the hill. Way to go us!!!!

We ended up having a dump truck bring in 5 yards of dirt and spread them in our boxes. It was more than we wanted to spend but holy moly did it save us time & our backs for getting that much dirt in there! Then the kids and I worked hard to get all our plants in the ground. I came in looking like a strawberry from the garden. LOL Whew! Gardening is hard work!

The kids took turns 2 or 3 times a day going out and watering our little garden with the hose hooked up to the well. It is way late in the season but it'll be fun to watch it grow anyways!

Then Brett got really ambitious and put in a drip system. We tried all kinds of different sprinkling heads so we know what we like. Wowzers! It is awesome! If it ever needs to be watered more- Brett taught the kids to manually turn it on. We are Garden Rock Stars! That is... if they ever grow any bigger! ;)

We have enjoyed a few strawberries. How fun is that!!!

Youth Float Trip

Our Ward Youth Leaders took the kids on a Float Trip in Glacier today. They had an amazing time!

Here's the bus ride to the river:

Here's the whole group:

Justice's Boat with Josh, Bryson, Caleb, Walt Tubbs, Bishop Lynch, Josiah, Justice & Colton

Liberty's Boat with Marcus Strange, Aimee, McKenzie, her boyfriend, 

Nick Seedall, Samantha, Anna Strange, Liberty & Stacey Rae Lynch

Mr. Nuetered

Brett's co-worker brought by a special gift for him today.

Zinn's Ranch

We went up to the Zinn's Ranch again for the firework show. It's so awesome! (except super chilly!) We love it. It is so nice of them to do it and invite others up.