April

Art work from Rebekah. This is Mal's dragon eye from Descendants. 

 

A double decker tree house (inspired by a double decker bus).

I purchased a Mediterranean cookbook and have been trying a recipe a week. This is a take off on basic bruschetta. Don really liked it. 

It was our turn to clean the church. Rebekah had a friend over and she decided to stay and clean with us, with ice cream promised as a reward. They both wanted Blue Moon ice cream. 

Indiana colors after a storm are the best. 

Don bought me an air fryer.

Air fryer nachos. Don really like that as well. 

The effort to organize the house continues, complete with a hammock for the stuffies. 

I took a seed class at the library. They suggested making your own greenhouses. I didn't have any clear milk jugs, so I did the following. 

Don got a new app on his phone. 

Basic conversation in the Walker household:

And, the house got another ceiling fan. This one is in the master bedroom. 

April Books

 

I was expecting this to be a history of life on the Mississippi, but it turned out to be the author's travelogue as he went down the Mississippi on an old style boat. There were historical bits here and there but other than that I didn't care much for it. 

Yet another genre I need to stop reading. Explorer thinks he can do better than all the other doomed explorers and decides to head an expedition into the polar regions. Trouble ensues. Most freeze to death. Few survive. Those that do are traumatized for life. 

Kind of like a box car children story. I think Rebekah would enjoy this series if she could get over her mother recommending it to her. 

And speaking of Rebekah, this book on making and keeping friends was remarkably fabulous. Age appropriate, and time appropriate for many children have lost the art of interacting with one another because of the great emphasis put on screen time. Highly recommendable. I bribed Rebekah to read it. She said it was good but mainly for others not for her. Ugh. 

Fun story if you can get over a lot of language issues. And I mean a lot. Almost stopped reading multiple times. 

I recently decided to delve into Tolkien, his works and his life. I wanted to read this series again but ultimately decided on audiobooks just because I don't have time to sit and read like I would like, and these books are huge. This was a good audio version. I had forgotten how much was in the first book that the movie didn't use. Ultimately a great good verses evil story. 

I finished the second book with my mom. Have to admit the first book was much more insightful. Turns out I'm not a huge Paul fan, but I still learned some, mainly for reading / studying with my mother. 

Absolutely fascinating and easy to understand lecture series. Turns out Astronomy is pretty amazing. 

I purchased this a long time ago and started reading it but never completed. I found it on audio so I gave it another go. This supports my opinion that there are reasons authors do not publish some of their works. This was unpublished at Tolkien's death; his son completed the tale and sent it out for Tolkien fans everywhere. It's middle earth meets greek tragedy, complete with brother unknowingly marrying sister story and everything. Not recommendable. 

Fascinating! Highly recommendable, especially for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who have any interest in the apostasy and the restoration. A fantastic read. 

Mid 1970's sci-fi / historical fiction. Does this whole time travel thing. It's actually pretty good. I felt it ended quite abruptly, however I'm not sure she had much anywhere else to take it. 

I was hoping for insights into the various president's lives and personalities, but it really was about Clint Hill. And mostly it was John F Kennedy's assassination, with a few other things about other presidents. So, not a huge fan but it was okay. 

Don's Birthday

I asked Don what he wanted to do for his birthday and he suggested forgetting about it. I told him that was not an option so he said Gene's. 

Grammy, Rebekah, and I joined him of course. Nothing says celebration like eating as a family in the car.

Then we headed home for cupcakes. Rebekah did the honors. 

Then we sang.

Then there was some forced interaction between Don and Rebekah. 

Not really forced. She loves her daddy. 

She loves him enough to try and lift him up for birthday spanks. 

Happy birthday Don! You are much loved!