Father & Sons

This past weekend Connor, Logan and I went camping for Father's and Sons. Our friends Jason and Anne were spending their last night before Jason's deployment at a hotel without kids, so I took their 4 yr old son Garrett with us and Amber watched their 6 yr old daughter Ellen. It promised to be a scorcher with temps predicted in the 100s, but it really didn't feel that bad. We were in the shade most of the time and didn't really notice the heat. We got their at about 5 and pitched the 2 man dome tent inherited from Amber's father. I have a newer tent, but it is a large one for the whole family and I didn't want it to pack it around. We won't be using this tent anymore though. two of the poles are broken and the tent ended up leaning at a weird angle. It was fine for 1 man and three boys, though I did have to line everyone up outside to come in one at a time to put on jammies and assign them a spot. We were one of the few that actually cooked a dinner instead of stopping for Subway, so we had a nice meal of barbecued hot dogs, bratwurst and the traditional Smores to finish it off. I think the boys preferred burning the marshmellows to eating the Smores! I did get a good tip for future camping ... glow sticks! One of the fathers brought some and gave them all to the kids to play with. It let you know where the kids were in the dark and they had a blast. In the morning we had breakfast cooked up by the bishopric and packed up and left. We had a good time and of course the kids got really dirty!!

My trip to Chicago

This past week I was able to go to Chicago for some leadership training. The training started Monday at noon. So I had to fly in on Sunday. Since I was leaving Sundy, we started celebrating Mother's day Saturday. Sunday there were a few windy storms in Chicago, so my flight from Salt Lake was delayed. With fuel costing so much, instead of circling till the plane can land, they are now delaying the plane from leaving the airport. So it was very late when I arrived in Chicago. The train throughout the week was very informative. After the training, some of the nights I went walking around the city. I have included a few pictures.

These first four pictures were taken at millenium park.

Well, I was having problems getting the pictures on my last post, so I will try again with this one. As most of you have probably heard, we had our ultrasound this last week. Unfortunately, Baby was being shy, so we still don't know the gender. Hopefully at my next appointment, it will have moved to a different position. Today we went and registered at Target. We didn't really know what type of things we really needed or wanted, so we probably ended up with a lot of random stuff on there. It was also difficult not knowing the gender. There are only so many yellow and green things. It was fun nonetheless. Well, Clarke is done with the semester and has the rest of May to relax until summer term starts. It's been nice having time to spend with each other. Hopefully our next big news will be the gender of our baby.

Hopefully, I am doing this right. I once had to blog to get more hours for the required amount for my laptop at school and I hated it but should be better with just family. Right! Since I am feeling over whelmed right now and going to be gone a week I thought maybe I should put something on it. Today at school was crazy. Everything that could go wrong with my computers did. So much for having an organized lesson today with my 6 graders. Well, I actually need to go do more things on my list. love, shauna

Clarke & Bethany Farrer

I have included some pictures of my growing baby (or belly rather). We find out Wednesday, May 14th what the gender is (if the baby cooperates). We are excited to finally be pregnant after 1 1/2 years of trying. We just made our first big purchase of baby things (crib, cradle, child's rocking chair, and changing table set) at a yard sale. It will take some rearranging of our little apartment to accommodate baby, but we welcome the rearrangement (of things and life). We still have not decided if I will work after baby is born (most likely yes, but part-time). Clarke is about 2 years away from his degree in Recreation, Parks, and Tourism and continues to work at FedEx. This summer he is taking a Spanish class (he's never taken a language class, even in high school, but he has to have had two to graduate from A&M), or rather 2 beginning classes. We will be flying to Utah for Clarke's sister's wedding June 6th then be back in Dallas June 14th for her reception. We went camping a few weeks ago at Lake Bryan (20 minutes from our house), which was fun even being pregnant. Our lives are busy, but we are enjoying it. Happy Mother's Day to all the women in the family!

Clarke & Bethany

Jeff, Lisa, Macay, and Kyla

Even though up untill a month ago I was against Blogging, I think this is a good idea.

Few weeks ago, We went up to Bear Word. It is located just south of Rexburg. The weekend we went they were having a deal on the bear feeding tour. On the tour, you ride on the back of a truck that puts you about 14 feet above the ground. At certain spots, the truck stops and you are given food to throw to the bears. We handed the food to the girls before we got to the bears, but they thought it was for them and started eating it. I decided I needed to hang on to it untill it was time to feed the bears. Below are some pictures I took of the bears. I also have video, but I took it with my phone and can figure out how to play it on the computer.

We have also started yard saling again. Iusually work Saturdays, but I have gotten a few off the last couple of weeks. Here the newspaper puts toegether a map of all of the yard sales. It makes it alot easier to find all of them.

welcome to the blog

With the family becoming so spread out, I felt it would be nice to have a family blog, so here it is. This is my first experience making a blog, so please help me with it. I know some of you participate in other blogs, or have your own blogs; if so, you can post links to those blogs that have information about family members. I know we are all busy, but it would help keep the blog going if we all post something to it a month, even if it is only posting a few pictures. Eric, of course, is exempt from this.

To start things off I with share the story of my transmission. It is a tale of woe and frustration. I got my transmission rebuilt in Dallas in January when I was home over break. At the end of March I was on my way to Springfield, Illinois for a date, which is a story for another time even though many of you are probably more interested in that story, when my transmission started acting up. I made it to Springfield, and when I went to leave, my car would not go in reverse. Luckily, I was able to put my car in neutral, push it out, and then put it in drive. I somehow made it home and took it to an auto shop a few days later. Because the transmission was under warranty, I had to have the auto shop here take out my transmission and ship it to Dallas, where the shop where I had my transmission rebuilt rebuilt it again and sent it back. It is now May, and I still don't have my car back. Right now my transmission is in transit from Dallas. It took over two weeks for my transmission to get to Dallas because the shipping company accidentally shipped it to Chicago, then St. Louis, anywhere but Dallas. I hope to get my car back by my birthday, but it does not seem likely. Speaking of my birthday, it is this Wednesday, May 7, and I am expecting phone calls from all of you. I do not teach Wed. so call any time.

Love,

Scott