Moran Family Fun

This weekend was our Stake's annual Father and Son Campout. And since Jared has five daughters it only makes sense that he be in charge. Really, it does make some sense. He was probably the only guy not running after crazy little boys the whole time. Our friend John suggested to Jared that Manderscheid Castle would be a good place for the Father and Son Campout. There is room for everyone to set up their tents and they would be camping in/at a castle. In reality the castle is mostly in ruins but it was still a great place to camp. Besides the promise of camping in a castle Jared got people excited to come by promising an all you can eat pancake breakfast the next day. Emily and I spent a good chunk of Thursday evening mixing up pancake batter and pouring it into ziploc bags for Jared to take with him. By the time we were finished we had 20 gallon sized bags full of batter loaded in our cooler. Then Jared could just snip off a corner of a bag and start flipping pancakes. According ...

I think that spring might finally be here. After five days of warm, sunny weather I'm feeling confident that it will be staying warmer even if starts raining again. I've been watching my neighbors and waiting to see when flowers get planted in window boxes so I can follow their example. This weekend lots of boxes were filled with flowers so I went out and got our flowers today. Last year we did a mix of different plants flowers in lots of colors and that was pretty, but this year I decided to do all trailing geraniums in red and pink. I spent this afternoon planting flowers in our nine window boxes. It was a messy affair with two little ones helping me but they look so lovely now that we're finished. Hello spring! It's probably hard to see in this picture, but all the windows on the front of the house (even the upstairs bathroom window in the roof) have a window box that is now filled with flowers. Oh, and please ignore the large, ugly tree/bush that is taking over ou...

I've made a rookie mistake and now I've learned my lesson. When we moved into our lovely house the people before us left a lot of junk, I mean wonderful things behind. Like a lawnmower, weed eater, microwave, patio furniture, cordless phones, wireless modem, fans, and paint. Everything except the paint has actually been very useful to us and are things that we would have had to buy had they not been already here when we moved in. And recently I decided to use some of the paint to fix up Emily and Natalie's room. Their room was painted white but was looking pretty dingy and sad. So I got out the lovely pale green paint from the basement, some brushes (yes, they left those too), and got to work. I figured that there was enough paint left in the container to finish the entire room. After all, I was only going to do one coat and the paint looked as if it had been barely used. I got one wall finished, the second wall was done in no time, and then the third wall which took a litt...

The battle against the stumps in our yard rages on and Jared is winning. Since last month we've gotten three more stumps out of the ground thanks to Jared and his manly manliness. The one that in the beginning looked the smallest ended up being the biggest and most difficult. I've decided that stumps are kind of like icebergs in that the part you actually see above the ground doesn't really give you any idea of what's going on underground. This particular stump ended up having four big roots that branched out from the stump itself and made it really hard to get out. Jared's usual plan of attack is to first remove the sod from around the stump so we can then fill it in when he's done. Then he digs down about a foot, or until he starts hitting the roots, all around the stump. Next he gets the hatchet and starts cutting through the roots to loosen the stump. The last step is to use the pick ax to sort of lever the stump out of the ground. This has usually been a su...

Madison was inducted into the National Junior Honor Society this week. She got an application last month because she met the GPA requirement. She was told to fill it out but not to be disappointed if she was not selected because it was about more than just grades. We sat down and went over the application and I was wondering if she would make the cut. In addition to scholarship they were looking for character, citizenship, leadership, and service. In the end we had Jared help Madison fill out her application; he's really good at making simple things like mowing the lawn sound like a full blown service project. On Tuesday we got an email saying that she had been selected but not to let her know because they would be making an announcement at school and wanted it to be a surprise. So Wednesday she called from school so excited to tell me that she'd made it and that the induction ceremony was that evening. I was of course very surprised and happy for her. We all enjoyed seeing Ma...

I attended my first ever professional soccer match and it was a crazy experience. I don't really understand the whole Bundesliga system, but to me it seems like Division 1 and Division 2 in the NCAA or like the minor versus the major leagues. Anyway, the local team here has been playing in the minor leagues, but this year they have been doing well enough that they had the opportunity to move up if they won enough games. The deciding game just happened to be the one we went to so there was a lot of excitement surrounding the match. The city has a couple of big park and rides where we left our car and then crowded into a bus to ride to the stadium. I rode with our friends and Jared took our car and parked it in the church parking lot so that after the game we wouldn't have to wait for a bus, instead we would just walk back to the car. It was a little strange to be standing in line and then riding the bus with all these super fans who were decked out in red, white, and black as we...

Over Spring Break we took a last minute trip to Legoland, which is just three hours from home. It was awesome and we will probably be going again. I think our kids are the perfect ages to really enjoy the park. A friend from church told me about some deals Legoland was offering for April - kids enter the park free and if you stay overnight in the Legoland Holiday Village you get a second days admission for free. So we were able to get admission to the park for all seven of us for two days, an overnight stay, and breakfast for about $250. Not bad for an amusement park, especially considering that a weekend stay at Euro Disney would run us around $2000! The only real drawback was that our family is too large to fit in the Legoland cabins so we had to stay in a Knight's Tent instead. This was basically a big square tent on a wooden platform with beds inside. We had to bring our own bedding (sleeping bags), there was no electricity or heat, and we used the bath house for showering and ...