We have had a great week. Gail continues to have success with her Pampered Chef business. On Saturday (28th) she did another show here in Elko and was able to book two additional shows from that. In a few weeks she will be traveling to Salt Lake City to do some shows there as well. On top of her working at the daycare and keeping up with the boys, she has been very busy.

Andy continues to be quite busy with work, church and the boys. This last week was relatively quiet in terms of court appearances and such. He was out in Wells on Wednesday doing a few trials. Otherwise he spent the week preparing to begin the juvenile representations which begin Tuesday July 1. He and the boys got to the pool a few times and he went to swim laps in the morning.

Everyone had a very exciting day Saturday. Matthew began a new program that provides respite care and works on some socialization skills. While he was doing that Andy and Nikolas went golfing. They had a great time. Nikolas did very well on the golf course and he would play for a while and then just want to ride in the golf cart.

The weather continues to be fantastic. It has been in the 90's the last week, with beautiful blue sky and sunshine. The evenings are wonderful because it dips down into the 40's. It has been strange because we have gone two weeks without any rain.

Finally, we hope you are all doing well. We want to send out a big happy birthday to our cousin/nephew John as he celebrates his birthday. Until next week.

This past week it has been absolutely beautiful in Northeastern Nevada. The sky is so blue and with no clouds it is neat. We all had a busy week. Matthew began summer school and he was quite excited about that. He continues to struggle a bit, but this week we all attended a meeting of the Northeastern Nevada Autism Network and met some other families dealing with this, which was very helpful. Andy and Gail learned quite a bit. The boys are enjoying their summer. Nikolas attended a sleepover on Friday night at a friend's house in Spring Creek. He came home Saturday and reported he played X-Box and got to shoot a BB gun. Matthew attended cub scout day camp on Saturday. He came home reporting he did archery, shoot BB guns and even made a marshmallow gun that was neat. He seemed to have a great time. While matthew was at cub scout camp, Nikolas and I enjoyed some time at the pool and he actually swam a bit. He is making some great progress.

Andy had a busy week, mostly as he prepares to begin representing the juvenile cases that will begin on July 1. He spent quite a bit of time at the juvenile court observing and speaking with various people in the county involved with the programs.

We had a nice visit with Gail's Dad, Uncle, Brother and Brother In Law on Friday evening. They were all hear for the Rumble in the Rubie, which is a motorcycle rally. It takes place downtown Elko and was neat. Gail, Andy and Nikolas went over on Saturday afternoon and walked around. Nikolas got to go on a ride in a motorcycle and he said "it was fun." The rides were given as a fundraiser for children's neurological research. Andy went back that evening for an outdoor concert featuring the band Nazareth. The best way to describe it was a quote he brought back. There was a biker standing next to him who repeatedly yelled "You guys kicked "#$%" in '78, and you still kick "@#$" now." I do not think anyone under the age of 40 really appreciated the show and the only people really into it were those old enough to have probably bought their albums in the 70's. Andy reported the show was good.

That about sums up our week. Hope you all are doing well.

Our catch up week (with pictures)

We are all so very proud of Matthew. Below is a picture of the Bat mobile, Matthew's entry into the pinewood derby this year. He and Andy worked hard on it, with a bit of help from some member's of our Ward. This year Matthew made it to the second round and eventually ended up in 4th place. He did a fantastic job.



As promised from last week's post below are some pictures from our trip to Boise. The first is of all the cousins at Chuck-E-Cheese's. Below that you can see our pictures from the Old Post days we went to in Murphy, ID. You can see our budding cowboys: Nikolas; as he practices his roping skills and Matthew practicing his branding skills.

Nikolas and Matthew did a great job during the one room school house art lesson. I really liked the teacher's hat. Throughout the day there were different lessons, all done as if it was June 7, 1875. As we said last week, the whole event was really neat. Nikolas got a kick out of the tractor display, his Grandfather would have been proud of him.

This week went fairly smooth. The boys are enjoying playing outside. Friday, Matthew found a lizard around our apartment and had to keep it as a pet. We took some pictures and as Matthew went outside, the lizard jumped down and ran away, so no pet. Nikolas is enjoying all his birthday presents, specifically all his outside art supplies. Our sidewalks never looked better. Matthew will start summer school on Monday and he seems excited to begin.

Andy and Gail continue to be very busy. Andy had a particularly busy week and is looking forward to the next two as they are relatively quiet. He will be using this time to get systems in place for the beginning of his representing all juvenile cases. This begins on July 1, 2008. Monday, the 9th was a rough day as he saw a client sentenced to a long time in prison. The sentencing was very emotional and the hearing went on for nearly 1 hour as there were many witnesses testifying.


Gail had another Pampered Chef show Friday night and seems to be picking up business, which is good. This last weekend it has been absolutely gorgeous. The boys went to a Nevada Department of Wildlife Fishing Derby in Carlin on Saturday. Nikolas won a fishing pole and tackle set. While they didn't catch anything they had a great time.



Once back, it was off to the pool. Everyone, including Andy had gotten way to much sun. The boys finally got home about 4:30 and were exhausted. After dinner, it was movie night and early bed. The boys had a great day together. Gail went to a party in the morning and then enjoyed some peace and quiet.

This morning the boys surprised Andy with Breakfast in bed for Father's Day. He was pleasantly surprised with the toast, chocolate milk and grapes.

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there and we hope you have a wonderful week.

We had one busy week last week. The boys enjoyed their first full week out of school, Gail and Andy survived the first full week of the boys being out of school. The week started out well. Unfortunately, Gail was not feeling all that well on Tuesday, so she was home from work. Andy had quite a busy week work wise and so he was not home much, even in the evenings.

The big excitement this past week was of course Nikolas celebrating his 7th birthday. On Thursday evening Andy and the boys drove out to Wendover to meet our cousin/nephew Gareth. He came back to Elko with us and the next morning we all piled into the van and headed for Boise. Friday was Matthew's turn to not be feeling well. He woke up that morning very nauseous, but really wanted to go. The fact he, his brother and Gareth stayed up very late didn't have anything to do with why he was not feeling well. We had a nice ride to Boise and about 4:30 that afternoon all the cousins met at Chuck-E-Cheeses. 8 kids and 5 adults, so do the math and you will find that it was a bit crazy. The kids had a great time and 3 hours later we had gone through about 360 tokens, not to mention the pizza. We arrived at Gail's parents' home about 8:30 and tried to put the kids to bed.

Saturday morning we all drove to Murphy, ID to go to the Old Outpost days. It was fun. There were covered wagon rides, a cattle drive, a branding demonstration, pioneer cooking demonstrations and a old school house where the kids had an 1875 art lesson. We had a great time and took a few pictures we will try and post. That evening we gathered in a park and had cake. Nikolas reports he had a great birthday.

Sunday we drove home, all exhausted and ready for some sleep.

Busy Week

We had one busy week in the Mierins Family. Monday afternoon, Memorial Day, we decided to go on a little family trip to see the Ruby Valley Wildlife Reserve. We had to travel through the mountains on a road call the Harrison Pass and saw neat things, including various rock formations, beautiful desert flowers and even some cacti. We have added a couple of pictures below.

Once through the mountains we came to this beautiful valley where the reserve is located. We saw some amazing birds there, including this one below that has a blue beak. We still haven't figured out what it is called but there are many of them at the reserve. This place is worth the drive and well worth the sites. One the way home we saw golden eagles and about 8 vultures dining on a deer on the side of the road. The vultures were huge and had red heads. Very cool.

Tuesday morning Andy flew to St. Louis to attend a conference on drug courts. He learned a lot of things and came back with some ways he can improve his role on the local drug court. While in St. Louis, he did a bit of touring around, including taking in a baseball game at Busch Stadium. Now for those of you not familiar, Busch Stadium is the place where in 2004 the Red Sox won the 4th and final game of the 2004 World Series to win their first world series in 86 years. The stadium that exists today opened in 2006, but if you look to the right of the picture below there is a hole in the ground where the old stadium was. Andy removed his hat and bowed his head in reverence as he walked around the area of the old stadium. By the way the Cardinals did win that night. They played the Astros and Albert Pujols hit a shot of a home run. Not to be outdone, Carlos Lee and Lance Berkman of the Astros also hit a 4 bagger. It was a great game. If you look at the picture inside the park, Andy sat on the 2nd tier behind home plate.

Andy stayed at the Hyatt Riverside, which is literally next to the Arch on the Mississippi River and in front of the Old Courthouse in St. Louis. Below is a picture showing both things. Andy went on a tour of the Courthouse. The Court is significant for two very important things, it is where Dred and Harriet Scott filed suit in 1857 for their freedom as slaves. It is also where Virginia Minor sued in 1872 for the right to vote based upon the 14th Amendment. Well, as we know the ever sagely US Supreme Court ruled against both parties when their cases made their way to them. The Court ruled that slaves were property and not citizen's and therefore not entitled to the protections of the Constitution. Well not to be outdone and demonstrating their judicial fiat, Minor, who was white, but a woman, while a citizen, was not entitled to vote, because the Constitution did not guarantee the right to vote to all citizens. It is amazing to see how far we have come as a nation.

Before leaving St. Louis, Andy did have lunch at the restaurant of one of the creators of KC Masterpierce BBQ sauce. It was good. He flew home Saturday morning and was glad to get back to the desert. Friday was in the upper 80's and quite humid in St. Louis. Everyone was glad Dad made it home safely.

Everyone else had a great week. The boys are now done with school and seemed to survive. Both are excited about the summer. Nikolas honed his bike riding skills and we have included a picture of him being the daredevil he is. Gail had a very successful Pampered Chef party on Saturday. Saturday evening we all went to the Lion's Club Fair in town. Nikolas enjoyed riding the rides. Matthew decided he was going to use his money to play some games and he ended up winning a nice watch.



That about sums up our week. We hope you all are doing well.