What May Looked Like

Pre-FSY activity for the stake youth.

Care Bear had a great time and is super 

excited for FSY (a regional youth conference) next month!

Skeleton passenger. Ha!

Care Bear and I took a super quick road trip to

Maryland and DC. I had reserved tickets for us

to attend the DC open house on a weekend

that I had a teacher workday marked on my calendar.

However, that was a completely false

teacher workday.

I'm not sure how I made that up.

Caroline didn't want to miss two days of school.

(Darn responsible kids).

So we drove up on Monday after school and

drove right back home on Tuesday.

It was a whirlwind.

We didn't even get to do any of the fun DC stuff!

I was so sad.

But we managed to have a good time anyway.

She's a great road-tripping buddy.

First stop: Frederick, Maryland,

home of my bestie Jayne and her husband, Tommy.

We got in kinda late, but they still took us

on a little walking tour of downtown Frederick,

It is such a great city!

I wish we would've had more time to explore!

Jayne has been living there for 5 or 6 years, but

Tommy is getting ready to retire this summer and they're 

moving back to Greensboro. Yay!

I'm so happy we were able to squeeze in a quick visit

before they moved.

There are cool old churches.

And beautiful old homes.

And fun boutiques.

The weather was perfect and I loved our little tour.

Cool rock-climbing art!

The next morning, Jayne came with us to the open house.

They did an extensive multi-year renovation project

on the temple, so they opened it to the public when it

was done and before it was dedicated.

I'm so glad she could make it!

She grew up in Baltimore and the DC temple has 

always been something familiar to her.

She never thought she'd have the chance to go inside.

It was great to be with Care Bear

in parts of the temple that she normally

can't enter, either.

So beautiful!

My favorite are the multi-story

stained glass panels on both ends of the temple.

The grounds are gorgeous, too.

After our tour, we grabbed a quick lunch

at Chipotle and headed home!

Too fast!

Stopped at Jon Henry's General Store in 

New Market, VA.

They have an art-o-mat! Fun!

The daisies are growing like crazy!

Sabrina officially taught Care Bear

foot locks now. Ha!

Date night at Spare Time!!!

Since we sometimes sell the items that we buy

with our tickets, we joke that playing Space Invaders

is our side hustle. :)

Cute baby ducks!

Poor Care Bear somehow managed to get COVID

while we were in DC. Even though we were in the car

together for MANY hours, I didn't get it.

It was terrible timing for her, because she missed her

end-of-year Chorus concert and her first quad-stake dance!

Booo!

On Mother's Day, she had to quarantine in her room.

We did a zoom call and played Jackbox together.

It was super fun.

B was cracking me up with his background images.

Whit made me this awesome bird card!

Drew got me a bird puzzle and a 

membership to the Piedmont Bird Club.

Fun!

He also found the perfect water cup for me:

Hit Happy

I always request strawberry shortcake with

fresh berries from a local farm for dessert.

So, so delicious.

And we finally busted out the expansion pack for Wingspan,

which Marianne and Patrick had given us back in Feb.

We love it!

On a free day,

I drove down to Crowders Mountain to 

do a hike and look for Rhododendron blooms.

Score!

So beautiful.

It's a good level of difficulty.

And I love the view from the top.

Pretty roadside flowers

Cute little goslings.

Our stake did a blood drive.

Whit had never donated blood.

She used to have a phobia of needles,

But she said she wanted to go.

I was SO impressed!

She did it!

My donation stopped halfway through and they had to 

discard it. Seriously?

They messed up on Andrew's first donation as well,

so you'll notice that both his elbows are bandaged!

Sheesh.

Whit was able to finish her donation just fine..

But then she almost passed out when she walked to the car.

Holy cow.

Poor girl.

But she said she'd do it again!

Amazing.

One of our highest-scoring games

of Wingspan ever! I won 153-126!!

Our coordinating council at church had a special 

opportunity this month. Elder Dale G. Renlund, Sister Reyna Aburto,

Sister Camille N. Johnson, Elder Matthew S. Holland, and

Elder Jose Texiera all came to Winston to visit and teach us!

It was SO great!

The women had a fireside on Friday night.

So did the youth.

Then on Saturday, Andrew had trainings all day.

I organized a get-together with all of the stake presidents'

wives that day. We met at Ginger Scott's beautiful home.

We helped her organize lunches for some of the general

authorities for tomorrow. And then we worked on plastic 

bag mats. I love these ladies and look forward to getting

to know them better as our husbands serve!

Me, Carrie Smith, Deann Carlson, Betsy Smith,

Sister Holderness, Ginger Scott and Lisa Page.

Elisha Jenkins was the only one who couldn't make it.

Rainbow!

Saw a couple deer on one morning walk.

Since W turned 18, she also got to vote for the first time!

Hooray!

Senior pics up in the hall at PGSA.

Whit had her last chorus concert of her high school career.

And Andrew had to be in California on a work trip.

Seriously???? Such bad timing!

Whit has LOVED being in the little PGSA

chorus. She will miss it!

The three seniors:

Jordan, Whit, and Josh

They will be missed!

Dubs got to introduce one of the songs.

A couple of their songs.

W's senior solo

All the seniors also got to sing solos.

Whit chose "Misty" and absolutely killed it!

(I can't figure out how to insert html like I used to...

So click on that link if you'd like to watch it.)

Mason, Abigail, and Skyler all came out to support her.

So did her voice teacher, Clarice.

They will REALLY miss each other, too.

Mr. McCleary-Small was a fantastic teacher.

Group hug!

Cute little chipmunk on my walk.

I decided it was time to re-paint my front handrail.

It didn't go so well....

It does look better!

However, I didn't tape around it well enough.

And painted the deck.

And got splatter on the bricks.

Boo.

Lyra

It's not every day that I see a Great Blue Heron

on top of a building!

That's a big ol' bird!

Eastern Towhee

I thought this drink looked so fun!

Powerade with frozen raspberries.

Avery's Corporate HR Leadership Team that Drew met with in Cali.

The seniors can buy a brick at PGSA that they

get to paint. Loved this guinea pig brick that W did.

Because of the trees all around us, 

we don't get to see much lightning around here.

But one night, there was an awesome

electrical storm with lots of lightning

and it wasn't raining.

The girls and I had fun sitting out on the driveway

and watching the lightning.

SENIOR PROM!

Whit went with her group of friends.

We took group photos down at

Adams Farm lake beforehand.

So pretty!

Love the flowers in her hair!

And the earrings she found at the

Charleston Market.

Whit, Aila, Mason, Skyler, and Abigail

Plus Joya, who was running a little late. :)

Love this group of friends that helped

Whit survive high school.

Such great kids!

So happy that our hummers came back!

Love watching those cuties!

One of my 3.5 tennis teams won our division and got

to play in the local playoff to go to states.

It was a two-round play-off, which seemed super lame.

There are two night leagues, so they also took the second

place team from the day league and we had to win

two matches to make it to states.

We won our first match!

Hooray!

But then we had to play that second place

team and came up just short.

Boo!

Sandy, Stephanie, Debbie, Brenda, Me

Serena, Elisabeth, Teresa, and her daughter

I got this pic from Destiny.

She and B are both in Snowflake to watch Carson's graduation.

So happy they could be there to support him!

They also streamed graduation,

so we got to watch it online.

Care Bear and I usually get pedicures together

for our birthdays. We went to Lexington and

Yoanh and Yuong treated us! So good! 

Care Bear's birthday!

Starbucks in the morning.

Panda Express with friends for her party.

Vegan cupcakes so that KK could enjoy with us.

Grateful for Caroline and her good friends.

Drew and I drove out to Kernersville to 

watch a meteor shower. We didn't see many,

but were happy seeing a couple.

We were fooled by fireflies a couple of times. Ha!

Middle School Promotion!

Care Bear did awesome in 8th grade and won lots of awards.

With her friend, Jasmine.

So proud of her!

Great job, Care Bear!

You survived middle school!

PGSA senior awards ceremony

She also won several awards.

Super proud of the hard worker that she is.

She'll do great in college!

These are the days!

In just the blink of an eye, we'll be down to

ONE KID at home.