South Pacific

I wasn't able to take any pictures the night I went.  Something about copyright laws, etc.  Lucky for me my sister-in-law did not get the same message :)  She took a lot of pictures.  My nephew and niece were also in the play and I had another niece in the orchestra so she is not pictured.  The kids did a great job and I really enjoyed the show.

I'm back!

I am kind of amazed that it has been a year since I have posted!  A year ago this month my mom had a heart attack and I spent two weeks in Las Vegas with her as she went through a quadruple bypass and an episode of flash pulmonary edema.  On the plus side I also got to spend a week with my sister.  It has been many many years since that has happened and it was good for all of us, I mean other than the heart attack.

I came home and put Mark and Rebekah into public school after 8 years of homeschooling.  I went to work for the first time since Justin was born over 20 years ago (at this point 21 years ago) on the same day they started school.  Justin had moved to Temple before I got home and John took Alex to BYU-I in early September.  Not only that, John retired from the military and started a new job a couple of months later (in October).

The Ferguson household had been pretty much dumped upside down and scrambled!!!

I have been wanting to post but where the heck to start after all this time?! This week :)

Monday was Alex's 19th birthday! He will be heading back to BYU-I in early September with his cousin Vickie.  Notice I made 2 pineapple upside down cakes, 'Cake of the God's" or so I've been told.  There were no leftovers. None.

August 1st brought the end of Justin's 2 month stay with us as he headed back up to Temple College (about 40 minutes away).  He got his Associates degree at the end of last semester but has some science classes he needs to take so that he can apply for nursing school.

Long story short on the new kitty. She was a stray someone brought in to have fixed. I have been wanting a calico and I decided to adopt her and her litter of kittens she will soon be having.  You can see her shaved tummy, I really had to make a quick decision.  She came with the name Mia, but Mark wants to name her Cocoa Fo Sho.  I like Mia but he has said it so many times I think Cocoa is going to stick.

My niece had a baby this week and Alex and Rebekah just finished with the play "South Pacific" today.

Hopefully you will see more of us as I continue to get used to balancing everything out.  I guess I am a slow learner :)

Scholarship

This is the same scholarship that Justin won a couple of years ago (which I thought I posted about but when I went to look for the link it wasn't there).  Anyway, Alex won this last year and this year.  They give you just about 2 seconds to take a picture and last year I forgot my camera and used my cell phone which made it worse.  This year they made a book that contained the following information which they usually show on screens as they are presenting the award.  I thought it would be fun to scan it and post it here with this years picture.  We are really proud of Alex!!!

Here is the picture from this year.  It doesn't really tell you anything, but Alex looks handsome don't you think? 

Seminary Graduation

We sure are proud of Alex for finishing Seminary.  This is our other graduating student from our Branch.  Both of these kids are incredibly smart!!

Priest Laurel Prom - Alex

Alex had a busy spring, much like Justin did when it was his senior year.  Thankfully, Alex got is Eagle last year and we didn't have to worry about it this summer like we did just before Justin's 18th birthday.  Alex took this cute girl to prom in April.  She is from Round Rock and so once again I didn't get many pictures.  I think it is fun that he styled his hair almost like his character in "Barefoot in the Park".  Alex and his date triple dated with his cousins Jordan (and her date) and KC (and his date).  They made a full day of it which included Olive Garden.

Barefoot in the Park

Alex performed in "Barefoot in the Park" for the last two weekends.  The play was a success and he did great!!  It was a little shocking in that I'd never seen the play or the movie so I was a little unprepared to watch my son and all the closeness of a newly married couple.  He was the youngest member of the cast.  I'm not sure how old his 'wife' was but the other four were into their sixties or so.  Rebekah took plenty of pictures of the most embarrassing parts for her, but I was able to sneak in a couple of others.  I have about 44 and that is after deleting several.  Here are a couple :)

Barefoot in the Park

Speaking of plays.  Alex just landed one of the lead roles in "Barefoot in the Park".  He will be playing Paul.  Way to go Alex!!!!

Speaking of college.  Alex has also been accepted to BYU-Idaho and will be roommates with his cousin James.

We are very proud of him!!

A Few Good Men

Justin, Alex and their cousin KC were in "A Few Good Men" last December.  Yes, the same month that we had Alex's Eagle Court of Honor, Seminary Auction and Christmas :)  The pictures loaded in backwards from what I wanted so the above picture was taken after the play and I took it because I still am amazed at how tall Justin is.  He towered over everyone.

This was also taken after the play.  KC, Alex and Justin. 

 At the end of the play.  Justin and Alex are the ones that restrain this General from killing one of the lawyers.  That particular picture was very blurry.

Both Justin and Alex had multiple parts.   

Alex’s Eagle

December was crazy busy.  One of the reasons was because we had Alex’s Eagle Court of Honor.  Phew, two down one to go

 

He built a cat house for an animal shelter.  The picture in the middle shows where there was nothing before and the pictures surrounding it show the finished project.

 

 

 

His mentor, our Branch President, who is a veterinarian.

 

I thought this was a good picture of Grandma and Grandpa.  They are so proud of their grandchildren!  Grandpa did all the electrical work for the cat house.

Random

I took the kids out the day before Thanksgiving to take pictures.  Next thing I know they are all grabbing pets to have their pictures taken also.  They turned out to be some of my favorites!

Amy is an Anatolian.  They are used to guard livestock.  We got rid of the livestock but got stuck with her because Mark bawled and bawled the day I tried to sell her.  Yeah, I gave in.  She refuses to come into the house which I am VERY grateful for because if you’ve ever seen our lawn when the weather warms up it looks like it snowed.  Seriously!

Teyla is a Cocker Spaniel.  She is dumb as a brick.  She drives everyone crazy, but is still very loved.

I told our vet that while we loved our other pets if anything ever happened to this dog the entire family would be devastated!!  He said, “so she’s in the will”?  Absolutely.  We have had Sydney for nine years this February and she has been the best dog.  She is half Blue Healer and half what looked like Australian Shepherd.



Justin, “put on your serious face Mark”.  A little too serious, but I love this picture.  We don’t have many good pictures of Sydney because she is afraid of the camera.  So this will be nice to have.

Halloween 2011

Alex and Mark getting into ‘character’.  Alex is a serial killer and Mark is a Zombie.

Mark’s face make-up turned out so cool!  It was even more awesome when his face started falling off toward the end of the party

I think Alex forgot what ‘character’ he was supposed to be.

This is Rebekah and her cousin as newborn vampires.  Yes, think ‘Twilight’.

Justin got home from work sometime after the party started.  Very proud of his Angry Bird in a Santa hat!!!

Mark’s pumpkin was a combination picture.  On one side he freehanded the Batman symbol and on the other he freehanded ‘Minecraft’.  It is a game.

Rebekah painstakingly traced this from a book we had and yours truly got the job of cutting it out.  First, we grew these pumpkins and the flesh was about two inches thick with a hard outer crust.  Second, it is kinda cool that you cannot tell that I lobbed off one of his horns and that his lower jaw was barely hanging on!!!

Camelot

Alex's Eagle Project

Alex has been ready to do his Eagle Project since before Justin finished his. He had to wait until Justin and Stephen finished theirs since we live in a Branch and man power is pretty limited. Long story short, this past Friday and Saturday they started work on a cat house for a local animal rescue.


Friday they prepped the site by removing the tree and setting up the foundation. Saturday it was in the 40's and raining, but they persevered and set up the flooring and built the frame for two sides.



You'll notice Alex's hair was wet and various other clothing in the last two pictures. The mud was unreal.

I am proud to say that nobody really complained. They just made fun of the fact that they worked in the rain and mud all day. He still has a ways to go before the cat house is finished, but they made a good start.

Happy 16th Birthday Alex!!

Alex turned 16 yesterday. It will be a while before he is a driver but we are working on it. He will be taking a couple of classes at Temple College this fall, which starts in a couple of weeks or so. He spent some time with his cousin James this summer in South Carolina.

This is how Alex likes his hair but I chopped it all off the day before his birthday!!! I don't have a very good picture of it yet.

Alex & his pet Delaware, Stacy

We ordered some Delaware chickens about 8 months ago. At the time it sounded like a great idea, not so much today. I picked them (10 pullets) up and while Justin was looking around for chicken supplies (he had been warned days, weeks and months in advance) the chicks were in the living room. I was not paying attention because I was making dinner. I kept hearing Alex say, "but we are not having chicken". I thought he was talking to his cousin Stephen, thinking that maybe Stephen really liked chicken and Alex didn't want to share. Or something. As it turns out Alex had been holding one of the chicks and introduced me to her as 'Stacy'. Then it hit me, he didn't want Stacy to know we were actually having chicken! (Yes, and this is a good day for me ;)

It didn't stop him from feeding Stacy a noodle from our chicken helper. I told him it probably wasn't a good idea, but it didn't stop him.

She ate that whole noodle!! We were all impressed. I'll let you know if she survives it.

Alex's Haircut

Over the holidays I got very lazy about cutting hair. It is not my favorite thing to do and since John was off I put it off as long as I could. All the boys had long hair, well longer than I like. These are before and after pictures. Somehow I lost Mark's, so it will be of Alex and Justin only. Alex's was by far the worst, but after only 2 hours they all looked spiffy.

AFTER :)

Over the holidays I got very lazy about cutting hair. It is not my favorite thing to do and since John was off I put it off as long as I could. All the boys had long hair, well longer than I like. These are before and after pictures. Somehow I lost Mark's, so it will be of Alex and Justin only. Alex's was by far the worst, but after only 2 hours they all looked spiffy.