April 2024: Day to Day Life

In between all the busy April things (Spring break, surgeries, dance competitions and recitals, football practice and games, and soccer practice and games), we did lots of things that don't merit their own posts. 

We don't see Michael much during the day. When he has free time, he chooses to spend it in the garage, in the craft room, in the theater room, or in his own room. He doesn't just hang out in the main areas of the house, which means I have to get my hugs in whenever and wherever I see him, even if it's on the stairs in the dark. 

We also enjoyed living in our safe, quiet neighborhood, on our peaceful little cul-de-sac. 

Michael spent most of his free time in April in the garage, working on his hand projects. 

It's fun to watch him tell Papa all about the things he's doing. 

He finished his lathe, and I was amazed that it actually works! 

He turned this piece of wood. 

I think these pictures show that Brian and I try really hard to enjoy the little moments we get with Michael. 

For our spring yard project, we felt like it was time to add some retaining walls to our back hill. We felt like our trees and shed could really use the extra support. Here's the start of the walls. 

We decided to add a retainer around our peach tree as well to prevent erosion. 

Progress pictures. We have been talking about adding these stairs for years, and it is nice to finally have them! 

Here's Gabe's flag football team. He played on a third grade team with lots of kids from our neighborhood, which was fun. He really loved being on a team with Rixton. 

Michael got our swings up, and we enjoyed some warmer weather. 

Then this finally happened: Michael is officially taller than me! 

We enjoyed having warmer weather

by playing on the swings

and shooting some hoops with the help of family. 

We loved watching the world come alive again, especially all the blossoms. 

Gabe had his 8-year well child appointment (and, of course, read a ton while waiting for the doctor). 

Gabe and I dropped Rachel off at the ballet venue for her call time, and then we headed to Black Bear Diner for a dinner date. 

Later that night, Brian lamented about how so much of our world is built for people with two hands. 

We experienced lots of April showers, and I loved this particular shower where the rainbow seemed to end at the temple. This was a double rainbow, and very, very bright. I wasn't the only one who pulled over to try to capture its glory. 

Brian ran into Isaac Swap, a neighbor from Fox Hollow. I can't believe how much he's grown! 

Gabe went on a tour of the Lehi Bakery with the boys in Activity Days. I think I was more interested in they were. Here they are in the oven! It's so big! They load this with two carts that hold 13 ish full sheet pans. The tops of the carts fit into the groove on the ceiling, and the thing on the ceiling rotates the carts while baking to make sure the oven heats them all evenly. It's amazing! 

We also got to see the giant mixers

and the machine that cuts all the square donuts. 

We also got to go have lunch with Kleber while he was in town for work. (Kleber was the Saville's foreign exchange student, basically an honorary brother.)

We felt incredibly blessed--and busy--as we headed into May.
 

April 2024: More Dance Events

April brought us more dance events for Rachel. First up, a convention in Provo, where her team competed, but also took classes. Here they are performing their lyrical dance. 

And here they are using Rachel's phone to take off their make-up at the end of the night before I took them home. 

Rachel also had her ballet recital, and since she usually changes her costume before coming out of the dressing room on performance night, I made her pose with her costume prior to the recital. 

She had two performances for her ballet recital, right in the middle of the week, in Taylorsville. I watched both shows; Brian and the boys came to one of them, and so did Nana. 

Can you find Rachel in these dancers?

This performance was actually refreshing. We have not been impressed with her studio this year. While they have been great in the past, this year, Rachel didn't have as much enthusiasm and joy, and as we've watched her competition dances, it felt like in some ways, she's lost progress instead of gaining it. I asked her solo choreographer to make her dance challenging so that she would grow with it and improve throughout the year. I had her team director take over polishing it after it was choreographed, and throughout the year, I saw the dance get more simplified, which was frustrating because I knew that she could have done all the complicated moves. So watching her in her ballet group was incredibly reassuring that this whole year hadn't been a complete waste of our time and money. For the first time, we saw the improvement that we usually see at this point in the year. 

We tested Gabe and Rachel's height again, and she still has him, though it defies the laws of growth that she does because he's growing so quickly! 

Someone was kind enough to take a photo of our group. 

Michael and Gabe complain a lot about going to these events, but they are so enthusiastic when they greet her. I love watching how much they support and love her. They always make her feel so special. 

We love our tiny dancer. 

Here's some closeups from her dance. 

She did end up wearing her costume out after her last performance. 

Just a couple of days after her ballet showcase, Rachel had another competition. This one was at Hunter High in West Valley. It felt monumental to be back there because last year, she had a competition at Hunter High just three days after my heart ablation, and I was leaning up against the lockers because I didn't have enough energy to keep standing. It felt good to be back there without needing the support from the lockers! 

She did such a great job! It was the last time she performed this dance. 

Rachel's friend, Maelyn, was able to be there to watch her (as well as Maelyn's older sister). 

Rachel scored High Gold! By the time we left, it was dark and raining. 

The next day, Brian had to run boys to soccer and football games, so I went with Rachel on my own. Or did I? 

I knew Taryn and David were in the area to go to the Taylorsville Temple Open House, and I reached out and said, "Hey, I know it's a long shot, but Rachel has a competition today at Hunter High at [these times] if you can come." They came!!

Here's Evie, Rachel, Abby, Aaron, and Elijah.

Evie, Abby, Rachel, Aaron, Elijah, Taryn, and David. 

Her team got high gold for her jazz dance (007), High Gold and 1st place in her musical theater dance (Up is Down), and Platinum and 1st place in their Lyrical dance (Fix You.) It was a great way to end the competition season.