Rhodes Family Page

 Easter/Spring Break in St. George

We had the best spring break this week! It wasn't even a true full week, but we left on Saturday morning and got back on Wednesday night. On Saturday, April 8 we drove to the Salt Lake area. We went to Ikea, went to the Loveland Aquarium, and then headed over to Chris and Holly's house for the night. I wish I would've taken some pictures with Chris and Holly and their kids! They have two sets of twins now - the girls are 2 and the boys are 5! They are right in the midst of like, total chaos with little kids! Haha It was fun watching them and I was thinking about how I remember those days clearly, and they seemed so long at the time, but they go by really fast! I told Holly her "kid days" will go especially fast because she has them in sets of two! Anyways, we woke up in the early morning, quick did Easter baskets, and then we headed out to drive the rest of the way to St. George. 

Right before we got to St. George, we stopped at our favorite hike right off the highway called Red Reef Trail. This was our third time doing this hike, and it was the deepest the water has ever been at the waterfall part. Everywhere is Utah and Idaho has had soooo much snow this year, and it's just barely starting to get warm. This made for all the waterfalls on the hikes to be flowing! While we were on the hike, we ran into this family called the Dalbys. They live in Rexburg and I've had their daughter, Josie, in my class before. Caleb also is friends with their son, Brigham. They have 8 kids, so there was also one Avery's age and two around Gabe's age. We ended up not only hanging out with them on the hike, but also for the next few days because they were coincidentally staying at the same resort as us!

We stayed at Las Palmas this time and it was super fun! There were 3 pools, pickleball courts, and lots more.  The weather was also TOTALLY PERFECT. We really lucked out. It was in the 80s every day so we just went on that first hike, plus one other short hike to Gunlock Falls, and then we mostly just relaxed by the pool for two days. Caleb told me, "Mom, this was the first trip that you didn't over-plan." Thanks, Caleb. Here are some pictures of our adventures!

Besides the trip to St. George, we've just been trying to get settled into our new house and finish up the school year. We've been in our house for just over a month now. Teo (the cabinet guy we used on our last house too) just barely got our bookshelves in the living room all finished up. Now I just need to decorate them! We also need to patch up the wall in a couple places because they had a hard time getting the shelves in and they kind of dinged up some spots on the walls. But they look good! It definitely makes the room look better!

Caleb has been busy with track, even though they keep having to change things because of the weather. This spring has been the worst I can ever remember. I even heard Mr. Mitchell, the oldest teacher at the junior high, talking to someone in the hall yesterday and HE said it's the longest, coldest spring HE can ever remember, so you know that's a long time. We even had snow the day we got back from Saint George! That was rough. Waking up on Thursday morning to go back to school was hard in the first place... then add an inch of snow on the ground. Luckily, it melted the next day. Now the ground is basically bare of snow again, but we can see all the dirt and trash from the construction debris everywhere around our house. We are hoping they will send some guys to clean that all up and then level out everything soon. They told us they would put in our driveway "when everything dries out" so that could be June at this rate. It will be so nice when we have grass and a fence for Zeus. Letting him out is a pain. He already attacked our next-door neighbor, the Burton's, dog once already. I had let him out because he was about to barf (which he did) and then he finished barfing, looked up, saw their dog tied up just outside their back door, and made a beeline straight toward it and started attacking it! I don't know what we are going to do about him. He needs a fence. 

Also, Caleb finally got his long-awaited for ebike. He was almost going to get a dirtbike, but then at the last minute he decided an ebike would be better and I'm really glad. It was still like $1500, which is crazy, but I thin he will ride it to work at the waterpark this summer, so that will be worth it. I don't want to always drive him. 

Gabe is busy trying to excel at school and he's taking the ACT at the high school as I type this. He's been doing a prep class and stressing out about it for the past month. Hopefully, he does well. Honestly though, I don't think BYUI has strict requirements for the ACT score, so it'll probably be fine either way. That's where he's thinking he wants to go. We also celebrated his 17th birthday on March 23! It was pretty low-key. He didn't want me to invite friends over for cake, so we just had cake as a family and grandma Rhodes came over. We tried to give him an Apple watch, but he's so practical that he told us to return it the next day because he didn't think he would use it. I also got him som new ear pod things that he wanted, but they were like $20 (they were the ones he wanted)! He's a very thrifty, practical person. He will probably be rich someday. 

Avery is excited for the school year to be almost done. 5th grade has been kind of a tough year for her. She really hasn't liked her math teacher, Mrs. Zonts, and she seems like she's trying to figure out who her friends are this year. She loved being in St. George and was very mad to come home to snowy Rexburg. She likes playing tennis and pickleball and doing coloring or art projects. 

Josh has been busy with work and he had to go to Boise right when we got back from St. George for the Daybell trial. They should just shoot them both and be done with it. Quit wasting everyone's time and money. I have been busy wrapping up the school year and trying to decide if I'm staying a teacher next year. I really have these days where I'm like, "I don't want to do this next year." But at the same time, I've looked into other things and haven't found anything that I think will be better. The principal even bought me a brand-new MacBook Air yesterday. The students saw him bring it in at lunch and this kid Dawson goes, "I think he really wants you to stay." lol Yup. I often get to see pictures of me teaching on BeReal, so here is another day in the life of my classroom. 

So I probably will stay another year. I just know if I stay next year, I am basically committing myself to another three years because I will want to teach while Avery is at the junior high. Once I hit my five-year mark as a full-time employee, then I am "vested" which means something about retirement money. I probably get like $200 a month or something when I turn 60. Big deal right?

So, we will see! This trimester actually has probably been one of my best trimesters with students ever. I genuinely really like all of them right now and don't really have any that are super difficult. I am definitely ready for a summer break though!!