Rainy Wednesday.  It is kinda funny because the hills are looking green.  I am not used to seeing green hills, everything is usually brown and sandy.  Loving the rain.  Anyhow, we had quite the weekend, and I thought I would just give an update.  Sunday was kind of rough.  Chloee went to all of this trouble to pack a really great diaper bag, including crayons, coloring books, treats etc, and then she left it at home.  I think she decided that she did not want to share her art kit after all, and she left it on purpose.  Because I watched her pack it, I only assumed that she would bring it, so we had literally nothing to entertain the kids with and keep them quiet.  Except for a stuffed unicorn, and a stuffed moose.  How could I forget that Dill and Mo brought those dum things.  Dill got her unicorn confiscated when she kept throwing it at Ryan and nailing him in the head.  He discreetly put it under the bench.  Mo kept wapping me with his until Ryan took the moose too.  Which left nothing except for a few programs to doodle on, and a broken purple pen.  Mo and Chlo fought over the purple pen loudly, until I sided with Mo who had it first.  My older kids were really distracted too, and they laughed about who knows what during the entire testimony meeting.  And I miss Jamie these days.  She helped me keep some semblance of order on the bench.  It is interesting how much we lean on our oldest until our oldest grows up and moves out.  It is kinda unfair.
     Anyhow, I survived sacrament meeting (barely) but kinda wanted to die.  But, Ryan and I had our lesson to present, and Dill refused to go to her class.  She insisted on going to class with Sags, but Sags is in my class.  So, Dill ended up distracting our class for the hour, and participate was the last thing on her mind.  She had her dum unicorn, and the kids got throwing it over her head, and she ended up goofing around under the table for a large portion of the hour.  After the wrestling matches on the bench the first hour and juggling dill the second, I was in desperate need for a few moments of peace.
     However, after a quick lunch, Ryan decided he wanted to go for a ride on the range, and he wanted to shoot for a while.  There was on old well he wanted to locate.  Anyhow, sounded like a plan, but he wanted everyone to come, so everyone piled in the van.    The biggest problem with the family rides is the noise, fighting, and dum songs sung over and over.  Dill also had an annoying horn that had been bestowed upon Mo around Halloween time.  The noise that it makes is similar to a kazoo but much louder.  We listened to someone blare on that thing the whole time, and honestly, I have become pretty good to tune that kind of stuff out, but my teenagers, just do not roll with it.  So, along with the blaring noise from the horn, was the constant request from the teenagers to make me stop whoever was tootling on it at the time.  Along with this, there was a ton of scuffling and fighting going on in the back.  The complaints were nonstop, along with bawling, screeching, and complaining.  Mo stuck his feet on Dill's face and somehow poked her in the eye.  Chlo had been injured or wronged by Moroni as well, and the girls were all squishing on the other seat with Oak, and no one was rolling with that whole situation very well either. 
     On this particular drive, Ryan was looking for an old place that they had visited as a kid.  I was kind of annoyed and concerned because the whole entire drive was up a wash....a very sandy wash, in a large 12 passenger van, with zero 4-wheel drive, next to no clearance, and bald tires.  Sand and the van usually do not mix well, and we end up stuck.
     So, I must insert at this time that my definition of stuck, and Ryan's are two very different things.  In my opinion, if you are delayed because your vehicle will no longer move, then you are stuck.   Ryan's opinion is that if you can somehow dig out, then you are not stuck, just delayed.  Well, it isn't like we don't have heavy equipment that can get us out if necessary, but I do not like being delayed either way.  Especially with the noise and racket going on in the back. 
    So, back to our drive, I was fine if the tires were moving, but anytime he slowed down to look at a cow, or a cow track, we would start spinning tires in the sand.  I would then get just a tad short tempered about the direction we were taking...just up the wash further and further.  Anyhow, we stopped at one point and got out for a bit.  Then, he decided we had not gone far enough after speaking with Cliven, and so we all got back in and rode up the wash further.  We eventually did find the spot where he was interested in finding.  It was grassy, green, and sandy.  The day was pretty nice and warm.
     I am not sure what Chlo's motivations were, but she immediately removed the shovel that Ryan had brought with us and began intently digging.  I asked her what she was digging for, and she let me know that she was digging Moroni's grave.  I am still not quite clear on her motivations for this grave.  She was way irritated with him on the drive, but she did not act so mad that she wanted him dead, and so maybe she just wanted his future resting place to be out on that sunny spot on the range.  When Dill heard that Chlo was digging Moroni a grave she became insanely jealous and began to cry.  She wanted a grave dug for her too, and I tried to let her know that a grave was really nothing to be jealous about.   Needless to say, that Moroni's grave was way too shallow to fit his scrawny little body into.  Oak also began digging graves, and so the day progressed with a few shallow graves dug in the middle of the desert. 
     The other girls were laughing and eating cobbler, and were mildly ticked off when Oak kicked dirt in their cobbler.  Dill became famished, but refused cobbler, and became irate that Wazz ate the last graham cracker.  So, when we did finally pack up and go, Dill's whines for non-existant graham crackers added to the usual annoying noise on the ride home.  Dill was also on my lap at this point, wallering to and fro.  When Ryan came to a set of tracks in the wash and began slowing down to find out what had made the tracks, I was kinda short with him.  I did not want the torture of all of the whining and fighting to be prolonged, and so I just told him that it was just a bug that had crossed the road.  Well, it was a cow.  Several, in fact, and Sage began laughing at the thought of a bug leaving noticeable tracks.  Hey...I just did not want a bawling Dill to be bawling while Ryan traipsed clear to the ranch to fetch a tractor, to fetch us outta the sand trap.  So...no, I had not seen the cow tracks, but I did not want him to slow down.  There were several long-eared cows Ryan was now interested in.
     We then stopped to visit Cliven and Carol for a bit.  The rest of the week has kind of been a blur.  Ryan and I had to go to Santaquin for some grain for the fair animals, and the sheep.  Dill got pretty restless on that trip as well.  It is days like yesterday when I really miss my Jamie.  She would have kept Dill home and spoiled her rotten.  There would have been no noise and whines from the back seat. 
     I have noticed an increase in stupid and petty fights in the mornings between Chlo and Oak.  This morning was another knock-down drag-out.  It is almost always over who has to feed the pigs that day.  Chores are good for them if they would just actually get them done.