The Electric Ukulele

OK, so funny thing happened.... Travis' science teacher this year is really big on having all of his students enter the science fair because of the opportunity to move on to district and state and nationals and get scholarships. (I hate science fair projects by the way, we always opt for something really easy) Anywho, Travis and his friend Daniel decide they are going to invent an "Electric Ukulele". So they spend their whole 3 months of prep time bidding on ukulele's. They finally won one and when it got here from California, it was smashed in because they did a poor packaging job. So, this puts us to within 2 weeks of the actual science fair. They had already ordered their pezioelectric pickup and had it so Sean made an emergency run to the music store in Spanish Fork and bought a ukulele. Travis and Daniel then spent a very short amount of time using electric tape to tape their pickup to their ukulele. They plugged it into the amp and wa-laa, it works. Not like an electrict guitar mind you, because it has nylon strings, but it did amplify the sound.

They then proceeded to spend the next 1 1/2 weeks every night after school watching some Hawaiian guy on U-Tube teach them how to play "Somewhere Over the Rainbow". We made their cute little display (which took about 10 times longer than the actual project) with palm trees and surfboards and a sunshine.

Travis came home saying how wonderfully he had performed for the judges and how impressed they were with him and Sean and I are looking at each other thinking "yeah, right!" but we were glad they had fun.

So, we go down for the open house for the science fair and we were going to just cut out before the awards assembly, but did decide to stay. First they handed out the participation prizes (candy bars) to everyone that participated but didn't place in the finals. They didn't call Travis' name, so we thought they had just forgotten him.

Next, they announce the third and 2nd place prizes, still no mention of Travis Nielsen. So Sean and I are sitting there giving each other puzzled looks wondering if they forgot him or if he really did win. So, they say "First place in the Engineering with a Prototype category, Travis Nielsen and Daniel Allred for their Electric Ukulele." Sean and I start laughing, all the girls start cheering, I start wondering if they are going to throw things at them because they had to listen to that annoying song for two days.....

Who would have thought that a kid of mine would win the science fair? Surely not me!

New Beginnings

I am sharing my New Beginnings invitation. It looks kind of blurry on here, but I thought it turned out quite cute. I am really short on time because I am so busy with work, so I thought instead of making 45 individual invitations. I'd do one digitally and let Wal-Mart make 45 of them. So, here they are. The picture on the left is from the new insert for the new value that has been added. I listed all the values with the new value at the bottom in bolder print because the new value "Virtue" is our theme for New Beginnings this year. I know we are kind of late for New Beginnings, but we just had a new presidency put in, so we are kind of behind schedule.

My Husband, the dork

I know I've mentioned this before, but it seems like Sean is the hardest one of my boys to get to cooperate for family pictures. We did a photo shoot with my family at Thanksgiving in Leamington, and we only ended up with one good picture of the two of us together and he had on that bright yellow Steelers jacket, so B&W photo's work right?!

I just wanted to wish my sweetheart a Happy Valentine's day even though he is a dork and even though he got me a frying pan for Valentine's Day! I love you Sean!

Happy Birthday Sis

Well, we are to the last of the birthday's for a while. There has been a rush of them lately. I wanted to take a minute and tell my little sister happy birthday! She is the best little sister and I feel like we are getting closer as we get older. We had our moments as teenagers.........

Luckily we had Dad to sit us down and talk things out and help us realize that we really did love each other. I know I used old pictures on my layouts for my brothers, but this is my new favorite picture with my sister that was just taken last Thanksgiving (thanks Andrea for suggesting we take this shot!) Hope you had a great day Heidi! I was thinking of you.

I'm teaching an online Photoshop scrapbooking class and the word art on this page was done by one of my students. She did a great job!

Happy Birthday Brett

Well, I'm a day late, but I have had a crappy head cold all week and am feeling a little bit better today. Yesterday was my brother Brett's birthday. I tried to call to tell him happy birthday, but I just got voicemail. So, happy birthday little brother!

This picture of me hugging him is one of my favorites of us together as children. He is probably wishing I'd let him go huh!? Anyway, Brett I hope you had a wonderful day and hope you know I love you.

My mom called this afternoon and they made it to Cleveland for their mission. She said the weather was good while they were traveling and they are busy unpacking and trying to find grocery stores and stuff. They are excited to get working on Monday morning.

Work is crazy busy!!! It is good, but I think that is why I am sick this week. I've been working from 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. every day with little time to even eat or get ready for the day. I just haven't been eating well enough or getting enough sleep and it finally caught up with me. W have around 135 loans in process right now and have been hovering around that number for the past 3 weeks or so.

Sean is working with me and it is fun to be able to work with him again. He is wanting to get us ramped up to do more processing so he will be doing processing, training and marketing to other brokers to get business in the door so that when the low rates on VA government loans go away, we can still stay busy with other stuff. So, I think it will be good. I think it will be great when we get someone else trained so maybe we can take a vacation. I don't even remember what a vacation is.

I have been digital scrapbooking a lot lately and I am teaching a digital scrapbooking online class that has been really fun. It is interesting to see what the ladies have come up with.

We are in full swing with basketball with Tyrel and Trevin. It has been fun although I wish Travis would have played this year. I really enjoyed watching him last year.

We finished Travis' science experiment presentation board this morning. He did an invention instead of a project. He invented an electric ukulele. Funny huh? It wasn't too difficult, he got a ukulele, he got a pezioelectric pickup, he put the two together and plugged it into an amp. You don't really get the "electric" hard rock sound because the strings are nylon, but it does amplify the sound. We had fun making the presentation board. He painted it blue and then we made palm trees, coconuts, a sun, a title and a surfboard to decorate it with. He has been practicing to play "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" for two weeks now, so he is going to wear his Hawaiian shirt, a lei, and his swimming trunks and play his song in his little booth. He is pretty excited and I was excited to see him spending his time on something other than playing World of Warcraft. I'll post pictures after the science fair on Tuesday because I want to get him with his costume on. He has been trying to round up a grass skirt and a coconut bra, but no luck so far.

Photo Challenge

My Aunt Terri had a fun challenge posted on her blog. Here is the challenge and you can all join in on it also.

Go to your My Pictures Folder, find the 6th folder in that folder, and so on going to the 6th one until you get to the actual photos, find the 6th photo and post it on your blog with an explanation.




So here is the result of my search. This is from a photo shoot I did for Todd and Haylee in 2005 in Spanish Fork. I think Corbin is looking at Uncle Sean instead of me. Aren't you the lucky ones that get posted on my blog! I'm jealous that Haylee always looks so dang good in every photo I take of her. She is just photogenic like Tyrel is. I only ever have to take 1 picture of him. They always all look good. I have been called upon at various times to do family photo shoots. It is fun and I like doing it although I'm not the greatest at getting little children to pay attention and smile. I have ended up with numerous children in tears even though I bring treats.