Summertime

Today is Aug. 4th. Our 14th Anniversary. Yes. It's midnight and I'm home alone (okay, I guess I shouldn't say that. Alone with six kids...) Gary has had some long weekend call shifts lately, so he can have time off for all the family stuff this summer. I can't believe it's been 14 years. We have been very blessed and are very happy.
I don't think I've ever had a summer quite like this one. I think we've had 2 days on the calendar without something big scheduled. Can you say CRAZY? Yes. We are. We've been to three big family reunions (one of which was at our house), girls camps (pleural because the bishopric goes), scout camp, priesthood camp, backpacking trips, swim team practices and meets, 4-H contests, piano lessons (with no time to practice), County fair, Youth activities, rafting trips... Next week Nate and Bryan are going backpacking again in Utah, Gary is taking the priests backpacking for their "High adventure", We are going to Manti for Dawn's wedding, and then to Heber for family reunion #4, and are returning the day school starts. What ever happened to those slow, boring days in summer? They are no more.





















Today I spent the day at the church tying quilts. I was just released as the Enrichment Leader, and in June we set a goal to make 100 quilts for the Humanitarian project by September 1st. Today we finished 13, which brings us to 90 quilts done!!! Wahoo! (We set up the gym with fun stuff for the kids and then we just quilt all day. ) It's been a great experience.
I just got called to be the 1st Counselor in Young Women. It's the first time I've been in YW since I was one. I'm scared to death but excited too. We have a really good group of girls. We are going to have to have Bryan be our babysitter every Wednesday. Gary has bishopric meetings along with the youth stuff. It's a good thing we have great kids.


I've not had the time to sit down and figure out how to be a cool blogger. So, you get no music, no flowers, no videos, and all the pictures are stuck together like a big glob of kindergarten glue ... but hey it's something, right? Hopefully someday we'll be able to look back and see where all our time went!

Angie and Gary Bevan Spotlight

1. Name
2. Birthplace
3. Name Origin (meaning, or why your parents chose it)
4. Places you have lived
5. Places you have worked/What do you want to be when you grow up?
6. Hobbies & interests
7. Tell us what you have been up to since the last reunion, and any future plans you have between now and the next reunion

If you have children or siblings that may not have visited this site, pass the address along to them and encourage them to participate. I'll post spotlights as long as there are spotlights to post....I don't want to have to pull teeth to get them on here! Please send your info to daizymae@hotmail.com


Names:
Angie Ashby Bevan: I was named after my mom's missionary companion in Switzerland. Mom told me she wanted to name me Angelica (pronounced On gail eek a). Yikes. Thanks Dad.

Gary Don Bevan: His dad went to England on his mission and wanted to have a kid with the initials GB (Great Britian)... (Where would we be without those missions?!) Don is his Dad's middle name.

Angie was born in Salt Lake City and Gary was born in Rexburg, Idaho.

Places we've lived: Angie: Salt Lake, Tuba City, AZ, Duchesne, Provo, Tooele
Gary: Rexburg, Texas, Tooele, Louisianna, Brazil
Married: Rexburg, Murray, Salt Lake, Tooele, Rochester MN, Emmett ID

Places We've Worked:
Angie: Economy Cleaners (Dry cleaning), Ricks College Fine Art Dept. (HEAD usher...wahoo!), Various hospitals and clinics during my training, Home Health of Utah, Walmart, Rexburg Nursing Center, IHC Hospitals in the SLC valley (float nurse), and Mayo Clinic in Rochester (cardiac)... and currently...the bathroom, the laundry room the kitchen, the yard,... well, you get the idea.

Gary: Albertsons, Walmart, Tooele Army Depot, Tooele Transcript Bullitin, Ricks College Printing Office, LDS Hospital, Tooele Valley Medical Center, Mayo Clinic, and now St. Alphonsus Hospital and West Valley Medical in Boise and Caldwell.

Hobbies and interests:
Angie: I love to quilt. This is the first time in 13 years that I haven't had a new baby or been pregnant at this time. So...I haven't done a lot of quilting, but I have big plans. I love to read,work in the garden, backpack and camp, and spend time with my family.

Gary: woodworking, farming, yard work, poetry, biking, hiking, and any kind of work!


I think the last reunion we were able to attend was ATOKA. We have a little "farm" which Gary and the kids raise cows, pigs, and chickens.

School is out!!

It's so easy to fill my day with stuff other than writing in this blog. I want do better at keeping up with writing so that I have some record of what our lives are like, but life keeps getting in the way!
Today was the last day of school. We had 3 piano recitals, 4 end of year picnic parties, field days, and awards assemblies... Done! Today is the day the kids come home and dump their backpacks full of the years odds and ends all over the house. All treasures, of course.
Now come the questions... "Mom, can we invite..." "Mom, can we have a sleepover?" "Mom, what can we eat?" "Mom, can I get out the games?" ... I just keep waiting for that day when I hear, "Mom, I'll do the dishes, why don't you go have a nap?" or "Mom, lets have a healthy snack. Don't we have any carrots?" or "Gee mom, this laundry is stacked 16 baskets high, do you want me to do it for you?" Okay. IN MY DREAMS!!! I guess I better not hold my breath!

We've had another crazy month. Last weekend the bishopric and their wives went to a really beautiful cabin up on Cascade Lake. We left all the kids overnight with a babysitter and just had a ball. It was really fun to get to know everyone a little better.

Monday (Kid's Day) we spent here in Emmett with just our family. It was kind of nice to just spend a holiday with our own family. We slept in and took the kids to McDonald's play land for breakfast. Then we let them all pick something at the dollar store (definitely a highlight of the day). Then we picked a family in our ward and helped them get some yard work done. (It's kind of nice having 2 older boys that can really work!) Then Gary took all the kids to pick up this years piglets... We even had a runt thrown in for free. They are pretty cute at this stage! Then he took the kids fishing while Abbie had a nap and I tried to create some order. Then we all went swimming at the hot springs (a pool that I reserved) with a couple of families we invited. It was a nice day. We even had a flag ceremony! I love that tradition!

Abbie broke her leg last week. She was riding down the slide at the park on Bryan's lap. I think her foot got caught between the slide and him. I took her to the ER that night and they sent me home. She wouldn't even x-ray it. So I took her back in the next night and insisted on an x-ray. They did her foot and sent me home again. Finally, four days later I took her in to a surgeon that Gary works with in Caldwell and he x-rayed her leg. She has a fracture in her growth plate (by her ankle). He put a cast on her and now she's walking all over the place (just not really fast). Boo Boo.

What does it mean when your two year old starts calling you SISTER BEVAN on a regular basis? Or... what if you overhear your kindergartner bragging to his friend... "Well, my mom weighs more than your mom!" What about this one... Your 6 year old asks you, "Mom, do parent's still love their kids even when they get mad at them?" Parenthood is quite the experience!

New calling

Last Sunday Gary was released as a High Counselor (after only six months) and sustained as a 1st counselor in our new bishopric. I have to say, we weren't really surprised. It's going to be a good change. They are all good men and excited to get going. Gary will now be able to go to the youth activities... and keep an eye on Nate (and Bryan and Bekah in the next few years). It's going to be busy but... what else is new? Does life ever slow down? Will there EVER be a day when we just sit and relax? I hope not. It seems like we get much more done when we are stressed than any other time.

I'm getting anxious for school to let out. Yesterday I helped at the school and I can't believe how crazy those kids were! I don't know if it was just me being there, or that they know that there are only 27 days left! (We aren't counting or anything.) Every year I look forward to summer and then after a couple of weeks I wonder what I was thinking. (6 to 12 kids here 7 days a weeks all summer long?) We have so many fun things planned. I've decided that we are really spoiled to live 5 minutes from a river and 10 minutes from a reservoir. Gary bought a used river raft this winter (I think it holds 8). He's so excited to go test it out on the whitewater! We also have 4 family reunions planned.

Well, today I'm babysitting a few extra kids, I'm making and taking treats to Bryan's class party, taking kids to piano, then we have two birthday parties the kids are going to, and some guys are here working on adding some lines to our sprinkling system... Hopefully Gary and I will get a date in. I guess I'd better start folding my 8 loads of laundry before I have to go. It's sure nice that I don't have to WORK! Ha Ha!

Conference Weekend and Spring Break

I love general conference. Not only do we get to hear a prophet's voice, but we get to sleep in, sit around all day watching TV (GUILT FREE), spend time with our family, and eat yummy food all day long. It should be a declared holiday. (Of course, then the stores would have to start lining their isles with conference gear biannually. Imagine loungewear with "2008 Solemn Assembly" logos, sweatshirts bearing the faces of the Mormon Tabernacle Chior or the new Young Women Presidency, and the FOOD! Oh the possibilities.) Okay, maybe it's a good thing it's not a real holiday... this way, they can't ruin it. I especially enjoyed Elder Ballard's talk on motherhood and Women. I feel truly blessed to be a mom and a wife and a Woman! I believe that women have the better end of the deal. We spent a lot of the weekend with Rod and Amy and their kids. (You may wonder how we got anything out of the talks with 10 kids running around!) We are so glad that they are close and we can spend time together.

Okay, I'm having a hard time with the pictures for my blog. How do you get them to go where you want them to? I wish there was a rotate button on this site. I'm still learning. It takes me forever to do anything.

Gary's sister Mellissa drove up to Emmett with her kids to spend a few days with us over Easter. I love her. We always have so much fun together. His youngest sister Danie came too. What a cutie. My next door neighbor and I hold an Easter Egg hunt for all our friends and their kids every year. They have 5 acres and we have 7. We hide eggs EVERYWHERE and then we split our properties up into zones. (Age groups). Everyone brings some eggs for each of the kids they bring and then we provide a lot of extra. Then we have yummy food and treats in the house for all the parents and older kids. It's so fun. I'm sure we had over 75 people this year. It's become something everyone looks forward to. I think next year we are going to have a NIGHT hunt (the night before) for the older kids...with flashlights and a bonfire. This is definitely one of the percs of living in the country.

Last week I took the kids down to Utah for spring break and saw Grandmas and Grandpas, Aunts and Uncles, and cousins. We spent time with the Bevans and the Ashbys. We went to Thanksgiving Point in Provo area and went to the dinosaur museum there. We watched the 3D IMAX movie and the kids loved it. (Well, Abbie refused to put her glasses back on after the first 30 seconds and Eric insisted that he wasn't scared, though I don't think he took his hands off his ears the whole time. I got to go shopping with Mom, Erin, Liz, Amy, Bekah, and Dawn for ... A WEDDING DRESS! It was so fun! Dawn is getting married! We are so happy! Ray Smith. August. Happy Day. The other fun thing I got to do was go sewing machine shopping. Very exciting. I ended up buying a new Janome. Then I got a Janome serger for free. Now I have no excuses. I'm going to have to start producing articles of interest. Hee Hee. On Sunday I went to Gary's youngest brother's missionary farewell. He is the last of 8 boys to go on a mission. He is going to Edmunton, Canada. He's going to do great. I tried to weasle the secrets of success out of Deanne (my mother in law)... I've got a long way to go. I have the greatest mothers in the whole world. How blessed we are.

Cool Tongues

I just walked into the living room to find Eric and his friend Devony standing there, perfectly still, mouths wide open, tongues hanging out, staring up at the ceiling fan (which was going full blast). When asked what they were doing, they produced cinnamon candy wrappers and stated, "We're cooling off our tongues!"

A week in the life...

I thought I'd just run through some of the activities of this week to give an idea of what goes on in the Bevan home ( and out of the Bevan home...)!

Sunday: We drove to Nampa to see Rodney and Amy's baby Grant blessed. We had dinner with them and Dawn and Ray and Denise Bryan and her kids. It's so nice to have family close.

Monday: I volunteered with Bekah's class at school for a couple of hours. After school we got Bekah to Achievement Days. She loves going and has a pretty big group of friends her age in her primary class. We had planned to go on a bike ride for our Family Home Evening that night. By the time Gary came home and dinner was finished and all 7 bikes and a trailer pumped up and loaded into the horse trailer, it was almost dark. We went to the "Island" , our own little Emmett sports complex and made it all the way around once!!! ( A whole 1 1/2 miles.) Bryan and Nate made it around twice and had been waiting in the dark for 20 minutes by the time we loaded back up. It was pitch black and the kids were freezing, BUT... we had fun and only had two falls, one chain come off , and one flat! Amazing. A side note: Last week Bryan stayed home from school sick one day and decided that if no one else was going to do it he would fix all the bikes. We have a puncture vine problem and every tire it always flat, so no one can ever ride. Anyway, Bryan filled all the tires with green goop and then TAUGHT Jacob AND Bekah to ride with out their training wheels ( in one afternoon)... Yes, Gary and I are delinquent parents.

Tuesday: Gary gets up around 5 AM and leaves for work by 5:30. I don't get up till 6:00. I've been running a little each morning with my friend next door before Nate leaves for school at 7:00. By 8:00 the other kids are out the door. Jacob, Eric and Abbie get to stay home with me. I usually try to get most of my chores done in the morning (well, that's the idea... Is it EVER done?) Tuesday is my day to cook. I've been doing this dinner group with 3-4 families. I cook for them one day and then I can expect dinner to come to my door on Wed., Thur., and sometimes Friday. It is awesome! I kept my friend's two kids while she volunteered at the school all morning. After school I fried the 50 burritos I had made, took Bekah and Bryan to piano lessons, picked up Nate at the Jr High from his study group, dropped all the dinners off, and picked the kids up from piano. Gary came home in the middle of dinner to eat and run off again to high council meetings. Then...the night routine: dishes, homework, baths, homework, piano practicing, homework... sleep?

Wednesday: After all the morning chaos, It's my day to drive to preschool. (Carpools are great.) After unloading all the preschoolers, I drive to a friends house to pick up her kids. She is moving and cleaning out her house to sell. I keep her 9 month old and 3 year old until the kids come home from school. (The baby didn't like me...he cried for 3 solid hours. His mom NEVER leaves him with anyone, (including the Dad) and he hates formula...) Whew! Wednesday is scouts for Nate and more high council meetings for Gary. Homework, chores, and piano...

Thursday: Dentist for Jacob, scouts for Bryan, 4-H for Bekah and me (she has to do a cooking demonstration which I have to take pictures of and help with), and I am in charge of the nursery for our "sister ward" enrichment. My friend and I tackle the job together. 18 kids showed up for us to tend for 2 1/2 hours!!!!

Friday: Bryan has Japanese play at school that he is in (they are sending it to their pen pals), Bekah has 4-H again, Nate has piano lessons, and an orthodontist appointment, I have my book club, and of course everyone wants to have sleepovers!!! Gary even helped Rebekah make stamps for her scrapbooking demonstration!

Saturday: Nate and I got up at 6:30 and left for Boise for an all day adventure for National History Day. He and his friend have prepared a model for competition with the regional schools. We also took one of his other friends and stayed there all day so he could be interviewed and judged. He won 1st place in the Jr. Group Displays!!! He is now going to the state competition in Boise. Rebekah did well in her 4-H demo. (Thank goodness for my friend next door...We do a lot of tag teaming.) When I got home Gary had the house in perfect order. He even changed the sheets for us. What a guy. Gary and I didn't get much of a date this week. I wonder why.