Happy Birthday Kelly!

Today was Kelly's birthday and this morning she politely informed me she that she was "Princess for the day." Brandon and Michelle we're still here, so we had a waffle feast for breakfast. Kelly got a few presents and then we were off to church.

This afternoon I made dinner for Kelly and her friend from Palmyra came over to help us eat it.
Since it was Kelly's b-day she dictated the menu and I made it. We had roasted halibut with grapefruit fennel salsa and salad, bread, and mashed potatoes (the potatoes had a consistency similar to glue).

And then there was dessert. Kelly requested a Hazelnut crunch cake with Mascarpone and Chocolate. I was a little afraid of the recipe but I think I pulled it off all right. What do you think?

All of these recipes were courtesy of Giada de Laurentis and her cook books (Kelly loves them and I refer to them as "cooking with cleavage" because of the pictures that go along with each recipe).

Our Thanksgiving was great. Hope you guys all had a good time off too.

*Happy Birthday yesterday Lisa! Sorry we forgot to call.

We're back!

We drove home from Seattle on Friday so that we could see Kevin and Lisa. Really, I just wanted to see Lisa and do vinyl with her. We didn't get too much time to play, but atleast we did a little. Lisa let me know how the vinyl works in your Cricut! Hope it provides loads of fun.
We didn't have too many adventures in Seattle this time, Seth learned what it's like to bake bagels at 2:00am with his dad's help. While we were there Dale was able to go to church for the first time in a long time and he went back to the Deli. We've all made many plans for the deli and when we go back in 2.5 weeks hopefully we'll all be able to clean and attack the deli with vinyl!!! I'm also hoping to put their logo on the delivery truck. Something new to try!
The best story from this last week happened yesterday. Seth took Weston out to the stables to pick up his last paycheck (he quit working there just before we left for Seattle) and then went to the bank to deposit it. They drove the Rodeo and it has been having some issues with the battery. Seth pulled up to the window to make the deposit and turned the car off like they ask you to do at US Bank. He pulled up close enough to the window so that he wouldn't have to stretch too far to put the deposit in the little drawer thing. Well, when he was done, the Rodeo wouldn't start. So, he had to shimmy out of the door and non-chalantly push the car out of the drive through. While waiting for Dad to come and give him a jump he shared some of his feelings to no one in particular about his "love" for the Rodeo. When Weston came home, he couldn't wait to tell me that Dad said, "Freakin'. Car's. A. Piece. of. Crap." A couple of those words are inappropriate in our house (atleast for the kids...) I couldn't help but laughing. And I thought to myself, "that's all he said..." I just wonder what the tellers at the bank were thinking...

20 hours of driving later...

We made it home this evening about 6ish. The roads were kind to us, just a tad bit of snow in the middle of Wyoming. But other than that we flew on through. We are all VERY tired of the car but as always, it's good to be home.
Thanks grandma and grandpa for hosting us. We had a great time! We'll post pictures as soon as we find it under the piles of everything else,

A Few More Pictures

Our backyard covey of quail Smores in the rain

The "Fort"

After dinner!!!!

Great Grandpa Zirker

Dominos on the kitchen floor

Thanksgiving at the Ranch

Here is a picture of our Thanksgiving guests

About a week before Thanksgiving Kevin called and asked if it would be OK if they came home for the Holiday. Mom and I thought about it for a while (maybe a millisecond or two) and said we'd love to have them. They arrived Monday night and stayed until Saturday morning. We had fairly good weather Tuesday and Wednesday and then the fog and mist rolled in and stayed until about two hours ago. Thursday and Friday we all got a little cabin fever but we still had fun. Their family went to Coeur d'Alene on Tuesday to look around and then on Wednesday Kevin went back to visit with several companies he had contacted about employment. I'll let him tell it but just to say they were cordial but weren't hiring. While he was gone on Wednesday I took Braxton and Kanyon in the company pickup and we went to Lewiston to do some office work. We went to the scout office, crossed three bridges, got a candy bar at the gas station, rolled the windows up and down all the way home and just had a good time. Oh, and before we left we went down to the pond and fed the ducks. Grandpa came over for dinner on Thursday and Seth, Lacey and family came back from Seattle on Friday and we had a good visit that evening. Saturday we also lit the charcoal on the deck to make smores and just as we lit it, it started to rain. We put tin foil over the fire pit and roasted a couple of marshmallows and that was it. At least we tried.

Last night we went to Darin Walker's reception. He got married about a month ago but they waited until all the family came home for Thanksgiving to have the open house. It was nice to see all the ward members and all five Walker boys and their families.

Erik and Jamie - we hope you enjoyed your trip to Florida. Tell us about it when you get a chance.

Those of you who might have forgotten your mother's birthday last Wednesday might give her a quick call.

Tomorrow we all head back to work. Hope you all had a nice holiday.

What's This?

I came up with a game where you take a picture of something close up and then people guess what it is. Here's a starter.

Tyler Z.

road trip, again...

We are in Seattle. We drove over yesterday and it was a fabulous trip. There were plenty of people traveling to the Apple Cup in Pullman, so Seth had something to look at. I started reading "Twilight." I had put it off but decided a car ride was the perfect time to read. I finished it last night and wasn't going to start the next one, but they included the first chapter of the second book in the first book and well...now I'm reading the second. Stephanie and I are going to see the movie later this week. I'm still not sure how I feel about the book.. While I read, the boys enjoyed a little Led Zeppelin. Seth is taking a history of rock and roll class this semester and Weston has been very intrigued by it. So they all rocked out, including Koper, while I read. Some listen to Little Einsteins, we rock to Zeppelin.
Hope everyone enjoys Thanksgiving! I'm trying to convince Seth that we need to go home on Friday so that we can see Lisa and Kevin, we'll see what happens. Apparently, the deli is in need of a baker this weekend and Seth has been nominated.
We saw Kelly's friend Monica at church today. She and her husband just moved into the Jones' ward. Small world.

Whew!!!!

My Week-

Wed- Work for Keith a little, run by Scout Shop get Radio Merit Badge Book, go to Radio Club Meeting
Thurs- Work all day with Kevin on new side job in the freezing drizzle, set up complete sound system for stake musical and run the sound for dress rehersal, come home and repair a broken mic
Fri- Work all day with Kev, hurry to stake center and run sound for musical (it was okay for my first time considering I had to control 8 wireless mics, 4 fixed mics, sound from a DVD player and music.)
Sat- Teach Radio Merit Badge all day at Kev's Stake Center, run home and load a dumpster with trash from the side job, run sound for the musical (much better this time) then tear down the entire sound system.
Sun- Bishopric Mtg, Welfare Mtg, Church, Tithing, a Disp Council, Stake Welfare Mtg, and a baptism.

I'M TIRED!!!

Brant

PS- Les and Aimee did a great job in the musical. Ty was my assistant and did a great job keeping the script in front of me.

Christmas Cactus

Has anyone ever seen a Christmas Cactus? This one is more of a Halloween/Thanksgiving Cactus. It kind of jumped the gun a little and bloomed a few weeks early.

We are busy getting ready for Thanksgiving. It was just going to be Mom and I and Grandpa until a few days ago when Kevin and Lisa called to say they would like to come up to Idaho for the holiday. Kevin has put out some job feelers in the Spokane/Coeur d'Alene area and wants to look around and maybe visit with some people. We are very excited to have them here. They drove to the Salt Lake area today and will be in Moscow Monday evening. Hope all goes well.

Life is busy at work for Mom and I and we are looking forward to having a few days off.

Lacey took all her photographic equipment and stuff out of the downstairs bathroom and they are going to try to sell it. It is amazing how fast that industry changed from film to digital. Everything else is obsolete unless you have a lab and a hobby and like to work with cut film. The bathroom has really changed. Mom put new curtains in the window and the tub is now usable again.

Everything in the hood is kind of slow. No painting, windows, doors, etc. Joe and Sandi did put up their Christmas deer with the moving head. Joey loves it.

We hope that where ever you are you have a Happy Thanksgiving with friends and family. Drive carefully and call if you get a minute.

We love you all.

Mom and Dad

Here's a little something my friend showed me the other day. There's more on my blog if you want to see them.

$4775.00

A few random thoughts

So I realize it's been a while since I posted anything...not that it really matters because my posts usually don't really create much of a stir amongst the fam (perhaps something to do with not having kids or any interesting pictures to post), but I'm going to ramble for a few moments about what's new with us. Of course, that's really the problem because nothing really is new. Trav's job is possibly up this month; one of my best friends is moving to Seattle; we had cottage cheese pancakes for dinner (think a cross between traditional pancakes and french toast); and today we made a list of all the places we would like to live in the world. Here are a few we agreed upon:

• Amman, Jordan
• Charlottesville, VA
  
• Italy
• Peru
• Seattle, WA (well, I really like Seattle and Trav might tolerate it for a year or 2)
  
• NYC, NY
• Couer d'Alene
  
• Spain
• Chicago, IL (this also gets an "eh" from T-rav)
• Dubai, UAE
  
• Denver, CO (this is our back up plan if nothing works out)
  

I would also be willing to go to almost anywhere in Asia (Japan, China and Korea pay ESL teachers amazingly well!), but Trav gives all three of them a hearty "blech!" So I guess now we just have to find jobs. Any suggestions? Places where you'd like to visit us?

So what are everyone's plans for Thasnkgiving? Buddy and Michelle are coming up from Vegas, and we're having dinner together with Brad and Caroline. Happily, I'm in charge of making dinner. I think I'm going to make my 9 pie- pie crust recipe this week in preparation. Delish!

Trent's Birthday

Trent turned 8 on wednesday. Rett and Erik wrestled while Trent opened gifts.

The kids had decorated the family room with black crepe paper. Thank you grandma and grandpa for the cub scout uniform, belt, hat, book, etc...Trent was so excited to put it all on as he had just returned from his first den meeting that night. We'll get some better pictures posted after he gets all dressed up for pack meeting this week.

Trent also loved the 50 states quarter collection book, book of world records and the maps. Thank you grandma and grandpa! You always get it right! We could hardly get Trent to turn his light off at bedtime and the map is hung next to his bed. Now he is looking forward to his baptism day.

Thanks Dad

I'm not sure how much money I've saved over the years by fixing my own car and changing my own oil, but yesterday I saved another $200. All of that time spent holding the flashlight must have paid off in the end.

Finishing Touch

It is amazing what you can do with vinyl. Find the unsafe condition

Which one is Weston? Is golfing OK on Sunday?

These last few days have been really nice. Yesterday was almost spring-like. I mowed the lawn, vacuumed up the last few leaves, painted (primed) that last 4' patch of fascia and soffit, hauled a load to the recycling center, hauled the old front door to the dump, put up the new address sign and changed the oil in the both cars. I was a little sad when I drove away from the dump and left the old door laying there. Lacey did the vinyl numbers and then we added the "Lund Lane" just for effect. It turned out very nice.

Seth came over last night and changed his oil and then cleaned out the inside of his car. It's a little more challenging in the dark.

Do you like my "reverse" ladder trick. You climb up the "inside" of the ladder. It works great until you get high enough that you can't reach the house any more. I just have one more time to put the finish coat on the fascia and soffit and I'll be done for the year. I do have the new glass storm door to install. We'll see if I get around to it before winter.

That's it for now - time for a nap.

Catchin' Up

We've had a busy week with work, school and vinyl. At the end of this week we get to go back to Seattle for Thanksgiving Break. The goal is to leave this coming Saturday and come home the following Saturday. I really hope we stick to the schedule this time. Seth's dad was recently (last Saturday-Wednesday) in the hospital again. He had a blood clot in his lung and a couple in his legs. He also developed pleurisy, something to do with the lungs. Dale was in a lot of pain and his patience has run thin with doctors and nurses. He and Teeny were beyond relieved to go home one more time. I think I mentioned this before, but the doctors originally told him he would be down for six weeks, then they bumped it to twelve. At least he got a shower while he was in the hospital, it had been a month because their shower at home is upstairs. Seth will be working at the Deli when we go to Seattle to try and give Tommy a break. Tommy dropped out of school to run the Deli. So hopefully we can be of service while we're there.

I've had vinyl coming out of my ears this past week, I did an enrichment for Teeny and then a mini-enrichment for our ward. It was a lot of work but it was fun. Most of the girls have never done crafts before and these were easy ones. I'm also working with Pat Woodbury to kind of update the look at Now and Then. So this next week I'll be vinyling a bunch of her antiques. They are also doing a radio ad on Friday and they will be giving me a shout-out, so we'll see how that goes. Someday I'll finish my website... Hope all is well with everyone

The vinyl projects we did yesterday. The glass block actually turned out differently with the black extended to where the font is and the "O Holy Night" was pulled out of the vinyl leaving the glass to shine through. If I get around to doing the cute ones I want to do, I'll post a better picture.

Old Testament, New Testament, Another Testament

Did anyone else see the Church's banner ad on the Yahoo mail webpage?

New Calling

I got called as the committee chair for the Perfecting the Saints committee in Elder's Quorum today. I got a few ideas from the Pres. but not much. Anybody have any experience with this calling or ideas for how to proceed?

A Slooow Week in Moscow

Sorry, no pictures tonight. We just got back from Richards - it was ice cream cakes for all. We celebrated Matt, Grandpa, and Koper's birthdays. We also had dinner at Seth and Lacey's last night to celebrate Koper's birthday.

It has rained for two weeks and I checked the weather and it looks like rain all this week. Kind of cold and dreary. It has been foggy today too.

Mom has a new idea for Christmas. She is thinking of instead of drawing names and buying a gift that we all do projects of service in our wards or neighborhoods. She's also thinking of having us do a missionary contact with someone and even something to do with the temple. I think I like the presents better. Anyway, she will send out an e-mail soon to get your input. So, for now, I don't think we are going to draw names. Any thoughts or comments?

Things are getting a little busy at work. We start a $40,000 replacement project at Milton-Freewater to install a new sound system. They start tomorrow. We are finishing up an addition of 4000 square feet on the Colfax building. They put the new wood floor down last week. This week they install the new WonDoors, and next week they put new carpet in the whole building. There have been lots of change orders and problems but it is finally coming together. Thursday night I have to give a presentation at Round Table on tracking eagle scout progress. I have been hoping for such an opportunity and it fell into my lap. I have to give a 40 minute presentation. Several weeks ago my boss recommended me to the Director of Temporal Affairs for the North America Northwest Area to be on a 12 man committed to study energy conservation in the meetinghouses. The 12 of us are from the North America Northwest Area and the North America Central Area. I have a conference call on Wednesday to line things up and then a two day session in Salt Lake on December 9th and 10th. They say this is a one year appointment so we'll see what happens. I'll probably drive down and maybe stay with Travis and Kelly one night and then up in Salt Lake for a couple of nights and then head home.

We're having a ward crisis on controlling your children in sacrament, Sunday school, and relief society. Any thoughts or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. We have a growing number of parents that just let their kids run during these meetings and distract the speakers, teachers, and others that are trying to listen.

Just remember, the church is still true.

I am enjoying the Backlund blog.

Halloweenie

It's not Halloween unless you break out the power tools!

Trent now lives in an inner city neighborhood of Denver.

Somehow Jaime talked the kids into going to the movies instead of trick or treating. We spent our evening with Troy and Gabriella.

School Certificates

Raya had to be like the boys and get her picture taken as well. Congrats on your perfect attendance Raya!

Lisa said that Kanyon wouldn't hold still for the picture. We're just lucky to have his whole torso in the frame.

Way to go, Super Reader! Any of you alls with grade school kids heard about the "Magic Treehouse" series. Braxton loves them.

Not much new this week. We had stake conference today. It was a broadcast to stakes in Montana, Wyoming and Colorado. I enjoyed Elder Hales' talk and Elder Eyring's, at least the parts that I heard. Too bad they don't publish these talks.

Take care fam!

Seth and Lacey, how's your dad doing?

K-K-Katie, Beautiful Katie...

Anyone else remember marching around their fourth grade classroom to old WWII era songs such as K-K-Katie and Into the air Junior Birdman (yes Dad I can still make the googles and you can't!)

I'm discovering that there are a TON of blogs out there. With the new Backlund blog, I've found out that the other families all have blogs as well. (Cousin Katie is married to a guy named Tyler and they like to four wheel.) Some are locked and some are open. I can see how housewives could easily make this an all incompassing and addictive hobby. I try to visit a few now and then, but could never keep up with all of them. I did find one site that showed how to change your signature and other cool little tricks. Too much work for me!

Brant

Making Bob Weisel Proud

I went to register to vote today, and before I knew it I was standing in line to vote. They have an early vote option (just an absentee ballot, filled out on scene) and I stood in line for a good half an hour to cast my vote. On our ballot is a bond initiative to build a new Sheriff's Department and jail, so I did my best to vote for a new workplace.

Post Halloween Candy Cramps

Diary of a Wimpy Kid- "Greg Heffley"

"Our little angel"

"Cavegirl"

"Little Witch"

Is it bad that I could not find a single shot with all of us together in our costumes? Halloween here was great. The weather was perfect and we actually trick-or-treated in our costumes without heavy coats covering them. We had the ward trunk-or-treat on Friday. It was the usual dinner of chili and same games throughout the church. The kids had fun seeing the decorated cars and there was even a small haunted house. Afterwards, we ran home and Les took the kids around the neighborhood, while I manned our house. We didn't miss too many of the neighbors and it was fun to see them out with their kids.

Today, we were missing several key ward players at church. No 1st Counselor, no Ward Clerk, no Finance Clerk. Guess who got to handle a late quarterly report, a completely updated ward roster for the stake directory, tithing, temple reccomend interviews, setting aparts, checks and a couple of food orders??? A lowly 2nd Counslelor and his Bishop. I'm done dealing with church stuff.

Enjoy the candy- if you need any more, our bag is still overflowing.

Brant

Backlund Cousins Blog

I forgot to mention this. I started a blog for the Backlund cousins it's backlundcousins.blogspot.com. It will be a secure one because some of the cousins have asked for it to be. I'm hoping to get it all set up later tonight. Will you email your email addresses that you want to use for your log-in???

Fun Times

We had a fun Halloween at the Ward Party on Thursday and then we went Trick-or-Treating to the fam and some friends on Friday. We took home "Most Creative" on Thursday for our family costumes. I think there were others who were more creative, our ward is pretty creative.
Yesterday, Mom and I took the boys to Home Depot while Seth worked. Mom and Dad found out about their Kid Activities on the first Saturday of each month so we took Weston to that. He got to build a leaf press. He's not too interested in pressing leaves but he loves to screw and unscrew the wingnuts.

We will also be playing "store" later this week. I'm in the middle of organizing "Creekside City" for some of my friends here. My friends and their kids are going to have a store at each person's apartment and we'll take a day or two to "go shopping." I am going to create "Creekside City Cash" and the kids have to earn it so they can go shopping. We're all pretty excited about it, so hopefully it turns out well... Saturday is Koper's Birthday, he is getting a map of Slovenija for his cake.

Braxton and Kanyon's Lego Store

Hasn't every kid played store at one time or another. The "Cool Swimmy" cost $1.45. We didn't have any change in Monopoly money so I paid $1.00 for it. I like these guys, they round down.

Vote

Don't forget to Vote on Tuesday.

Slow Week

Yup, That's Us

This was a good Halloween week. Mom finished up her parent-teacher conferences. They are always interesting. Teaching would be a great job if it weren't for the kids and parents.

Our ward Halloween party was Thursday night. We had been invited to join the other three married student wards on Halloween but the bishop (me) didn't want to combine so we respectfully declined and moved our party to Thursday night all by ourselves. We had our usual door decorating, down the hall trick-or-treating, costume contest, and dinner. It was just as much fun as last year. I wasn't sure if the new families (about 15 of them) would get into the spirit of the evening but they were great. We had about 30 of the 40 families in the ward at the party. We also had an inactive part member family and one non-member lady there. We had lots of fun and creative costumes. As you can see from the picture, mom and I were chefs. Everyone got a kick out of my tire gauge, wooden spoon and rubber scraper in my sleeve pockets.

Because the party was on Thursday we got to stay home and greet trick-or-treaters in the neighborhood. It has a little rainy but we had quite a few. Mom and I noticed how polite they were. They all thanked us and many of them said, "Have a happy Halloween". Tiff, Matt and their crew came by and stayed for a few minutes. Seth, Lacey and family were our last ones and they stayed and visited too.

Nothing to report on the house this week. I finished caulking and repainting the trim around the new front door. Most of the neighbors have said they like the new door.

I spent Saturday in the rain blowing and then picking up the leaves in the yard. I took 6 garbage cans full to the recycling center. It was almost enjoyable (as much as leaves can be). Mom, Lacey, and the boys went to Home Depot in Lewiston while I worked in the yard.

It looks like rain all this week. It's nice since it has been dry most of the late summer and fall.

Have a good week.

My new blog

So Caroline Clark (as in B-rad's wife) and I decided to start a new blog all about cooking. Since Caroline's a great photographer, we're going to put lots of amazing pictures up and lots of good recipes...so you should all go look at it. Please. We need viewers!

Two Little Chefs