Post-Conference Blues

Hi everyone,
Well, conference is over now. It was great. I really enjoyed exactly who I thought I'd really enjoy-- Elder Holland, Elder Scott, Elder Eyring, President Hinckley. Plus lots of others. I loved the "Good, Better, Best" talk, I really liked Sister whats-her-name's (RS Gen pres) talk (it was almost the same talk she gave in the RS broadcast, but worth hearing again!), and several others that I will look forward to reading in next month's Ensign.
I always feel a little let-down when conference is over. Another six months!
This was the first general conference that our boys really let us watch/listen in relative peace. It was so nice!! They played really well together upstairs, outside, in the playroom, occasionally came into the living room and listened/watched with us. Very few interruptions, I hardly had to yell at them to be quiet at all! They must be growing up. Not long ago and trying to listen/watch was just an exercise in frustration.
This afternoon we went over to a ward family's house (the dad is our home teacher) for lunch and then to watch the afternoon session. That was nice too. We had a great dessert, two kinds of pumpkin pie and a spice cake I brought. Uh-oh, the calorie-season is upon us!!
Let's see. What else happened this week. I've been busy. We tied a baby quilt for mutual on Wednesday, so I went with Mosey on Monday to pick out some fabric. While we were there he spotted some care-bear material that wasn't overtly feminine (purple, yellow and pink carebears on a green background), that he *had* to have. So I bought it for him and tied a quilt for him too. Got those bound on Friday, and he hasn't been without the blanket since. He may turn into Linus, as Ben commented this afternoon.
I made a really good dessert for mutual, too, and it was really easy. I wanted to make an ice cream cake, so I looked on allrecipes.com and found this one that was rated high and really easy (two prerequisites for any recipe I make). Layer the bottom of a pan with ice cream sandwiches, then spread a layer of hot fudge sauce, then a layer of cool whip, then another layer of ice cream sandwiches, then I did a layer of caramel sauce, and a thicker layer of cool whip, and then topped it with crushed oreos. I got lots of compliments and no one guessed it was just ice cream sandwiches until I told them. Not low-calorie though! I will try it next time with the reduced fat ice cream sandwiches and fat-free sugar-free cool whip, and maybe top with strawberries instead of oreos.
The boys had an early release day on Friday so after picking them up we went down to the Austin zoo. Aunt Pat got us a membership a few months ago but we didn't get the chance to go until Friday. It was really cool! This is not a typical zoo, it is more of a refuge for animals that have been rescued from various situations. It is quite small, but we spent 2.5 hours there and didn't look at the whole thing, so it is plenty big enough. The great thing is that you can get WAY up close to the animals. The enclosures are right there where you can walk right up to them (except the dangerous animals where there is a fence around the enclosure). We saw prairie dogs which are soooo cute up close, all sorts of monkeys (these were also really fascinating to watch up close), a whole bunch of parrots and mackaws, giant tortoises, leopards, bears, tigers, lions, and more. The zoo is located in the middle of nowhere sort of, amidst the rolling hills of Austin's hill-country, so the terrain is really beautiful. It was pretty awe-inspiring to get up close (6 feet) to a grizzly bear, and probably the same distance away from a couple of bengal tigers. I took some pictures and video which I will put on my blog. We stopped half-way through to rest for a while and observed a whole bunch of ants trying to cart off some goldfish crackers someone had left on the picnic table. Then the boys had fun imitating the tigers and showing me their fiercest tiger yowls and pounces. Mosey got a little carried away and actually started biting me (not too hard though). Anyway, it was fun and we'll definitely be back. I think I'll plan outings like that for all of the boys' early release days.
On Thursday the boys and I went to the Spicewood Elementary fun-run. The boys ran a couple of laps around the park next to the school and then we ate hot dogs and chips and popsicles in the cafeteria. There was a guy in there all set up with a sound system, playing the guitar and singing some oldies rock and roll songs. I was thinking it was pretty cool that the school hired someone to entertain during the dinner, and then the boys told me that was Mr. Steinburg, their music teacher! Wow, I never had a music teacher as cool as him when I was in elementary school! No wonder Brigham comes bounding into the car when I come pick them up on music days shouting at the top of his lungs, "I LOVE MUSIC! I LOVE MUSIC!" (He really does this).
Ok, one more story from the week, and then I'll close. I am convinced that I really must be the angel of death to toads. You remember all of my past attempts to raise tadpoles have ended in mass death of said tadpoles? Well, some of them actually did make it to toad stage, but none of them left my house alive, sadly. So on Wednesday I was in the backyard with Mosey, trying to catch a butterfly with Joseph's butterfly net. I couldn't get the butterfly, but did catch a little toad. We put it in Joseph's bug cage thingy (this little case with a handle, and mesh sides), with the plan that Mosey could look at it and show it to Brigham and Joseph when they got home from school, and then we'd let it go. So we did that, and Mosey carried it around with him most of the day. I wanted to let it go before we took Brigham and Joseph to TKD, but Mosey wanted to take it along, so I let him. Well, at TKD, Mr. Toad got man-handled a bit too much in his cage, both by Mosey and another little boy waiting there for his big brother. Mr. Toad ended up on his back on the bottom of his cage, after being tumbled about in the cage several times. I hoped he was just stunned and playing dead, but when we got back home and took him out, no, he was indeed dead. So we buried him in the side yard, yet another toad we've sent to an early grave. :-( Maybe I will have really learned my lesson this time to LEAVE TOADS ALONE!!
Ok, on that sad note I will close this letter.


Cutie Mosey at the zoo.


Ducky Joseph.



Brigham studying some ants moving goldfish crackers.



This is Mosey "being a tiger." Well at least that's what he said he was doing! Not quite sure I see the resemblance myself...

Now Joseph has to show me how *he* can be a tiger.

Don't leave out Brigham! I think he actually had the most realistic tiger imitation of the three of them.

All three boys "being bears." If you look in the upper left corner, sort of above Mosey's head, you can actually see the *real* bear in the background.

Another bear. We could get closer to this one. I think this is a brown bear. It is a lot bigger than it looks in this picture.

One of the Bengal tigers (they have two tiger enclosures). This one was pacing around his enclosure and came right up to the fence to take a look at us! We were literally only 5 or 6 feet away! These are enormous creatures.

The other tiger enclosure. This tiger made eye contact with me and we had a staring contest for a few minutes. I won.

One of the many monkeys we saw there. I think this was a "Patas monkey."
He was reaching through the bars to pick some cedar foilage as a snack.

The King of the Jungle himself. Isn't he gorgeous?

A leopard lazing in the sun. He/she lay there looking at us for a minute or so until Joseph threw a dandelion at him (Joseph thought the leopard would like to eat the dandelion, don't ask me why, but it hit the fence and didn't go through), then he stood up, looked at us really disgustedly (yes, cats CAN get disgusted looks on their faces), and stalked away.