Mariner's Game(s)

Our family loves to go to Mariner's Games.  We don't go that often and wish we could go more!
We have some fun memories from Mariner's games.

When I was in middle school the Mariners were doing really badly!  They would give a set of 2 tickets if you got good grades.  I got 3 sets of them.  I think we went 2 times.  (I can't really remember)  I know my mom wasn't too happy with me because I fell asleep during the game... Our last set of tickets we didn't go and we couldn't even give them away!

Ray & I got to go last year, someone from work gave us some amazing tickets.  You could see everything without being on the monitor.  Even I was glued to the game. (I like to people watch sometimes more than the game..)

This is the pictures from last time we went as a family.  It was sunny that day & Keagan was tired! (And I didn't get upset with him that he fell asleep.:)  We got to see one of our favorites.. Ken Griffey Jr. I think this was the last year he played. Melissa even had on her pink Mariner's jacket.

Melissa has been raised to love the Mariners and baseball.  She makes her dad proud and really does love it!!  Ray & Melissa are comparing stats and players quite often.  I like baseball.  But I guess I am a fair-weathered fan.  I would also like it if it were only once a week or so.. not every day from March to September or October is you're lucky!

We took Melissa on a special mommy & daddy date when she was little and left Keagan with a babysitter.  I love how you can see her sitting on the edge in her flowered jacket watching the game, even when she was little.

 When Aunt Laura and Uncle John came we went to a Mariner's game with her.  She almost looks like a boy dressed in her Mariner's gear!

We even took her to a game when she was very little, 5 months I think.  This game was in the kingdome.  My sister, Cindy, was nice enough to leave early with me because it scared me to death and I had nightmares about it for the next few days.  Ray & I got cheap tickets in the 300 level and happened to get the first row.  Melissa was at a stage where she moved around a lot.  I could just see her wiggling free and falling down, the long long way down to the field.  It really freaked me out!!  My mom, Cindy, and Adam had good seats.  Cindy didn't really care too much about baseball, so she gave Ray her seat and came home early with me.

For Father's Day this year (2013) Melissa had just gotten her first paycheck and wanted to get Ray something special.  She found Mariner tickets for a pretty good deal and it was LDS night.  We would get free t-shirts with our tickets!  She bought them and was prob. more excited than Ray to give them to him.  She said that she would buy them for all of us and call it a Mother's day/Father's Day gift.  And then Keagan paid for our parking!  What a nice gift!  We had such a wonderful time.  We sat in the 300 level & they lost, but it didn't matter!  Luckily at Safeco field, there really isn't a bad seat and it isn't scary sitting way up high like it was in the kingdome! It was fun to see all the LDS people there and a few we knew.

 Before the game started.. The Stringfellows were sitting a few rows in front of us.

Kimmie, Melissa, & Katie with their free LDS Mariner shirts.

 One of Melissa's favorite (current) players is Felix.

Troubles sleeping

Luckily, I fall asleep pretty easily.  But most nights (mornings) I wake up between 2 and 4 a.m. to have to go to the bathroom.  A few times a week  I have trouble going back to sleep.  When this happens, I'm usually awake for a couple of hours.  I lay there tossing and turning, squeezing my eyes shut tight and trying to go back to sleep.  I think of all the things I need to do the next day and whatever problems I am having.  Sometimes I keep my ipod handy and write myself notes or emails, so hopefully I can get to sleep faster.

 I usually give myself an hour to try to get to sleep myself because most nights I can, but when I can't, I find my headphones & ipod and listen to a story, General Conference talks or Stories from General Conference.  There are lots of good choices!

As I was pondering this the other night in one of my sleepless states, I had this thought.. I think sometimes we laugh as we say things like,  reading scriptures & General Conference talks puts us to sleep.. but then I thought, maybe it is a good thing that they put me to sleep, because when I listen to those things they bring me peace and put my mind to rest.. no wonder they can help put me to sleep!  I like the idea that reading/listening to scriptures & General conference calms me down and helps me relax.. even enough to fall asleep when I am having troubles falling asleep.  Another blessing of reading/listening!  :)  (For the record, I usually hear at least one conference talk all the way through and then the 2nd one, I can't stay awake)

Here is a link to one of my favorite things to listen to. Mormon channel (I have the app. on my ipod)  Also another one of my favorite things to listen to is another app on my ipod -podcasts -Stories from General Conference, History of the Hymns, and Conversations.  Stories from General Conference you can get on the Mormon Channel, too. It is one of my favorites!!

First "real" day of Summer Break

We weren't even planning on doing anything.. but it was suppose to be sunny and the rest of the week rainy so we decided to skip chores (they can be done on a rainy day!) and go to one of our favorite beaches.  We love going to Owen beach in Tacoma.  It is the beach by Pt. Defiance.  It is so beautiful & peaceful.  We let the kids rent kayaks.  They had a great time.  They said they saw a lot of jellyfish. The ferry going by is the going to Vashon Island.

The only "downer" of the trip was seeing a woman who had taken her shirt off, going around the beach in her bra... REALLY?!!  It wasn't even that hot.. 75ish.  I guess hot for WA!

I hope we can go back a few more times this summer!

A trip to General Conference

Ray's Aunt Darlene from PA is serving a mission In Salt Lake City.  She works in the Joseph Smith Building.  She offered to pay for our gas to come see her for General Conference, so we jumped at the opportunity! We have never been to conference before and have always wanted to go.  We got 5 tickets for us all to go to Sunday afternoon session.  The kids weren't sad at all that it meant missing an extra day of school. (When we left it was still spring break).

We left Thursday and drove and stayed with our good friends The Reddings who live in Meridian Idaho.  They are so good to us to come let us stay with them when we travel.  We love them and are glad they are our lifelong friends! Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of them this time.. next time.  It was fun as always to visit with them.  We even got to celebrate 2 birthdays with them.. Kims and Mackenzies!

Friday we went to stay with our good friends The Herbert family. (We sure are blessed to have lots of good friends!)  We have known them for many years.  Ray & Cathy grew up in the same stake together, so they share a lot of fun stories about youth activities growing up.  Ray met Shaun soon after he came home from his mission.  I met Shaun soon after I met Ray. We were all in the same ward at Ricks college.  Shaun was a witness at our wedding at the WA DC temple.  Cathy was there, too. And we were at their sealing several months later.  Below is a picture of their family now.

Cathy, Seth, Jessica, Aaron, Shaun, & Sarah Herbert

A funny thing happened while we were there, when we came out to our car the 1st morning, someone had egged it!

We had never been to conference before.  Even though it made for crazy traffic, it was fun to see the crowds of people coming and going to the conference center.

 We watched the morning sessions with the Herberts and Sat. afternoon at Aunt Darlene's apartment.  She is across the street from the conference center.  It is really fun to be in walking distance! It was a little tricky finding a parking spot...

 I love that they are snuggled up together to watch conference!

 Waiting seemed to be the name of the game... This is outside Darlene's apartment.

 We wandered around Temple square area for a couple of hours.  We went in the Church History Museum. It was pretty cool.  We didn't get to see all of it because it was closing soon.  Here is a replica of the podium at the conference center.

 It was suppose to rain all weekend.  Someone told us that in Salt Lake it was raining. Near the conference center, it didn't rain at all.  It was a little gray at times, but mostly sunny.

 The statue of the restored priesthood.

 The trees are just starting to blossom.  Aunt Darlene told us that the workers have been busy planting flowers for conference.  It was beautiful!

 Here is Aunt Darlene.  Behind her is the Joseph Smith building where she serves.  Her office is the 3rd row up, over on the right.

We went into Deseret Book.  It was crazy!  There was someone singing in there and Michael McLean was there!  We heard that we just missed Marie Osmond.  It was a little too busy for us, the kids didn't like it much in there, being that busy.  They were showing me they are not amused faces.  (They have these faces down good!)

 I told them that they had these faces down good & that maybe that would next year's Christmas card picture, this is what followed.  :)

 This is the lobby outside Aunt Darlene's office (cubicle).  The work area was locked.

 The temple is soo beautiful!

 Sunday afternoon session of General Conference!  I didn't take my camera because I thought I read somewhere that they weren't allowed, so luckily I had my ipod to take some pictures.

 It was an amazing experience!  I love how quiet it got when the prophet walked in and we all stood!  I love our prophet President Monson!  We had really good seats.  We were in the middle section, Terrace 6.  We got there early enough to sit in the 3rd row.  The only problem was that we right in the middle so I didn't know which big screen to look at.  Darlene brought her binoculars.  It was fun to watch the apostles walk in and greet each other.  You can tell how much they love each other!

We were so tired of driving!  9 hours to Boise, 5 hours to Salt Lake City and then back again.  Poor Ray wasn't feeling well most of the trip, so he didn't drive much.  Thank goodness for a 3rd driver.  Melissa drove quite a bit.  When I got my ipod out, up above is some of what I got.