Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Kansas City Missouri temple- October 24th, 2010




This post takes place at night... usually we take pictures on the way to church. However, with the late Saturday night going to the ER with Samuel and then lots of other sick kids, we chose to go to the temple site on Monday night instead. So it was a little dark with the changing seasons... even though this was before 7 pm we still had to work hard to get a good picture. Enjoy! Look at how far we've come! If you look at the construction photos on the actual temple site (linked on an earlier post but I can do it again here) in September they posted pictures of the basement, including the baptismal font beginnings. Here is the link. Another cool thing is that the October Ensign (Church magazine for those who don't know :) ) is all about temples. Here is a link to that.

Monday, October 25, 2010

Sick kids- October 2010


Our adventure this week is another trip to the ER. I say another because every time I tell someone we have 7 (6 living) boys, they ask how many times someone has broken an arm, etc, and gone to the ER. We've now been to the ER a total of 4 times. Twice for Nathanael (as a baby he got dehydrated exactly one week before Samuel was born, and then again for the cut on his cheek 2 years ago October...) once for Benjamin with the big bike accident April 2009... when I was pregnant with Liberty and couldn't go with him to Xrays... and now Samuel with pneumonia.

At least it was early stages... we were able to come home and treat him with breathing treatments, an inhaler, steroids, an antibiotic, and fever meds. You'd never know he was sick other than his voice.

It also helped that the hospital was only a few minutes away. We live minutes from the North Kansas City hospital.

Most of the family has bronchitis, but when Samuel was crying trying to breathe we ran... it came on suddenly. We are in the process of keeping everyone else breathing too. We are preemptively bringing Liberty into the doctor when Samuel has his followup.

Benjamin was the first to get sick a week and a half ago, it went through Emilie, then Michael, then Emilie again (we brought her to Urgent Care where she got antibiotics and breathing treatments), and then Samuel. Timothy and Christopher both aren't feeling well, then Liberty got sick and now Nathanael, but everyone still seems to be doing ok and not needing anything urgent in their care. I am still glad I am in the process of finding a pediatrician so we have someone to ask or talk to about these things.

Having had 9 children gives a lot of experience knowing when to get a child in to be seen... and even more when it comes to emergencies.

Sunday, October 24, 2010

Kansas City Missouri temple- how it will look...





We have this set as our computer background and can't wait to have it on our wall, and then a picture of the real thing :)

Kansas City Missouri temple- July 18th, 2010






I didn't realize I had pictures from the first time we saw the temple site- On July 18th Tom and I were driving around, exploring, while waiting for news on the house and other things and we drove by the temple site, visited the Independence visitors center, and walked around some areas near our future home. It was very hot. We took pictures, though. So much has changed.

Kansas City Missouri temple- October 9th, 2010



Never mind, we didn't miss a week. These are pictures Tom took Saturday morning when he was at the temple site for the Stake Center groundbreaking right next to the temple site. Isn't it amazing? It's so exciting, we're getting a new stake center too. Right now we go to Liberty for anything stake related, and Stake Conference is actually broadcast to several different buildings because of distance and parking problems. This will be so wonderful for the whole area.

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Cow Appreciation Day 2010























Kids have been planning for this year's "Cow Appreciation Day" at Chick Fil A ever since last year's... where you get a free meal if you dress like a cow. Here is the link to last year's...

Here is the official stuff from Chick Fil A- LINK

So, we were in Illinois during July, and Tom was in Missouri. We looked, and there were no restaurants near us. Period. There were some little ones in towns a few hours away that were part of corporate office buildings that didn't participate in these events.

We could have gone 3 hours away to Chicago... but I thought about it and said, if I'm going to go that far away, why not make it farther and just go to Kansas City and we can see Tom, do Cow Appreciation day, and spend some time together? So I booked 2 hotel rooms (no, we couldn't stay with Tom in his extended stay hotel room...) and we met Tom in Kansas City, decked everyone out in spots, and went to Chick Fil A in Liberty, MO. It was great! We went swimming at the hotel, had the hotel breakfast in the morning, and went to see Toy Story 3 before I drove back with the kids and Tom stayed in Kansas City. It was good for everyone.

Kansas City Zoo


















We are trying to explore our new city. It's a bit of a novelty to the kids, the last big city we lived close to was Cincinnati, and how old were they when we left? Amarillo isn't a big city, it's a little city pretending to be a small town... we still liked it there. When we were in Coolville, we lived equidistant from Columbus, Ohio and Charleston, West Virginia... and close to a town called Parkersburg, West Virginia, and another one called Athens, Ohio. Which is where Nathanael was born, incidentally. Provo wasn't big but it was close to Salt Lake City. Indiana wasn't big but it was close to Pittsburgh. Not that we ever went to Pittsburgh if we could help it. We only lived there 9 months anyway. We went to Washington DC more often than we went to Pittsburgh.

ANYway. So 2 weeks ago the kids and I went to the zoo. The kids were great! Even though the zoo is large with a lot of walking (when we get a family pass we'll get the train add on...) there wasn't ONE complaint until we were almost back to the van. And that was just one kiddo.

So, just sharing pictures. I think my favorite part was the elephants and the zoo keeper telling us all the names, ages, and personalities of the 7 different elephants. The kids liked Nikita, the polar bear, but there were too many school groups when we got there to get a good look at him. They liked the otters and many of the other animals. Very different than the Amarillo Zoo.

Not impressed with the reptiles... we see more of a snake at home. Or at the pet store. The kids were very unimpressed. It was cool to see alligators. They were just as impressed with an awesome spiderweb as they were with the animals. We didn't get to see everything, so we are definitely planning to return soon.

Friday, October 22, 2010

Kansas City Missouri temple- October 17th, 2010










We missed a week! We drove by when Tom's mom was here for Benjamin's ordination, but didn't take pictures and thought we'd go again Monday or so to take some. I even had the camera with me. However, here are some pictures from just this past Sunday after Stake Conference. There is also going to be a Stake Center next to the temple. That's what this last picture is.

We were very impressed with the job site rules. They are:
  1. Each individual must wear a contractor identification badge issued by JE Dunn. The badge must be worn on clothing and must be visible at all times.
  2. All contractors are required to maintain a clean site- trash and recyclables should be placed in designated receptacles.
  3. Profanity, unacceptable language, or lewd contact will not be tolerated.
  4. Tobacco use on property is prohibited.
  5. Hard hats must be worn at all time on this project.
  6. Contractor parking is only allowed in areas designated by JE Dunn and LDS Temple.
  7. Golden Rule policy is required when interacting with neighbors of the project site.
Especially 2, 3, and 4.