This baby makes me laugh

I felt like such a hillbilly yesterday when we decided to set up the swimming pool on the driveway. Since we don't have grass yet and we didn't think it would be fun to swim on rocky soil, that seemed the only option. So Jimmy and I are sitting in the garage on camping chairs with the kids having a completely fantastic and crazy time swimming while the neighbors drove by wondering who the new kooky neighbors are.

Then Max woke up and we thought we'd see how he liked the pool. I don't think he knew what to do with himself? I love, love this photo - it makes me laugh! Poor little thing is wondering what this earthly experience is all about!Whatta you think?
Then he started splashing and found his smile again.
ohhhh, I think he likes it!
This pool I bought on clearance at the end of last summer is a super size for our kids... a vast upgrade from last year's pool. The kid's had a doozy of a time splashing their little legs.
And yes, they were so tired, they fell fast asleep last night.

The joys of summertime!

"I miss our old park"

I thought it would be fun to make a memory page about each of the houses/apartments we have lived in... like what fun things we did as a family and major events had happened there.

I was making this page about our home in Tennessee, and I asked Abe what his favorite thing about that house was. He completely started crying with big tears on his cheeks. He said he missed our old house and he missed our old park (our backyard and swing set). I told him that this house in Utah was good too and it was bigger so he could run around. He said he didn't like big houses and that he just liked little houses like in Tennessee. And he cried because we don't have any grass - just dirt. I told him digging in the dirt was fun too.

Poor kiddo. I guess he still has moving anxiety. We did love our little house in Tennessee. Hannah always reminds Abe, when he misses that house, that it was getting too small for our family (which was true once Max was born).

Abe has oodles of energy and is such a boy, but he sure has a tender heart. It was so sad to see his big sad lip and all those tears.

The other day I asked how he liked his blue wall in his room. He said he didn't like blue any more and he just liked orange. So, here we are a few days later, and in my effort to cheer him up about our Tennessee house, I asked if he liked the orange border on that page. He said that he didn't like orange anymore and that he just liked blue. Hmmmm ... emotional contrariness, I think, is the explanation here.

Wall*e at the Drive-In

We have been wanting to go to a drive-in and finally found one that was open in SLC. We knew it would be a late, late night for the kiddos, so we insisted they take naps. They took a 3 1/2 hour nap and woke about 6:30 so it worked out great. The kids stayed awake and though they were so tired at midnight, we decided this could be a fun family activity once a summer.Hannah and Abe have been so excited about seeing Wall*e. They found some games on disney.com that they have been playing in anticipation for the movie release. We usually don't hype up movies since we go to the theater maybe once in a blue moon but the kids liked the Wall*e trailers and the robot thing. Jimmy decided to turn one of our many brown boxes into a costume and the kids and I put the finishing touches on it.We liked the movie & the music was fun. There isn't much talking but I loved when the two robots introduced themselves by name. Abe liked when Wall*e gave Eve the plant and when the guy turned off the mean robot. Hannah liked when "Wall*e holded Eve's hand & when Eve kissed Wall*e" (surprise! surprise!).

If I had to do it over, I'd get there super, super early (not just 30 minutes early) and get on the front row of mini-vans. And we'd probably not go on opening night as it was crowded.

Overall, it was a good evening of family fun. We went with Jimmy's siblings and celebrated Julie's birthday. It was fun to show the kids the stars. They are rarely up when it's dark so they were amazed by all the lights in the sky.

Brown Bag Speaker

Yesterday Jimmy was the Brown Bag Presentator at the Church Office Building. Every Friday they have a speaker. His topic: Web Analytics, How to use site date to hasten the work of the Lord. My parents watched the energetic barnlings so I could go watch him speak. I was so glad that I could go because I love watching Jimmy speak in public because he gets so excited with bright eyes. He did a great job putting together the info for all the slides, presenting, and answering questions.

On a more positive note

Isn't this babe so cute? I feel like every time I blink, he grows up a little bit more.

Today Jimmy came home from work and said, "Hmmmm, Max you look a little funny today. What is different?" I told him that I combed Max's hair. Ha! He is looking rather tidy after his wash.Lately Max stares, reaches, stretches, twists in order to get his hands on the phone or the remote controls. The kid loves buttons!

nothing makes me more upset

than lying!... especially when it's my sweet Hannah Mae telling her mother lies over something completely silly.

So - she tells a lie so she won't get in trouble about something.

Then I casually talk with her off and on all day trying to figure out if she really knew about it or if she's lying.

Then finally when I told her she would get more in trouble for lying than just about anything else, she came clean and said she had lied.

So now what? because she came clean and finally told the truth does she still have a consequence. Perhaps a consequence but not as severe?

What think ye about this?

I even had planned a great family activity since the kids wanted to do something fun and now I think it will have to be postponed. Isn't that the pits when a child telling a lie could ruin the evening for the entire family.

I know that I've told you this...

A few months ago I bought several shutterfly.com 8x8 books on Ebay because they were a great deal. But I have to use them by June 30 and I guess I wasn't anticipating how ubber busy I would be with our move and all. So I've been wildly arranging pages and such to get all my books done this week.

I know I've mentioned this book several times, but today I'm super excited about it because it's finally going to be printed.

I wanted it really simple so I did white pages, rounded corners on the photos, and all the colored 'have i ever told you' tabs on the outside of each page.
I try to have even number of pages about each person and then a few about family things. I love reading Jimmy's memories about his childhood or mission and the kids love hearing all the stories. I'm going to try and make another one before the 30th. Ummm, we'll see if I can get to that.

So anyhoo... it's something fun to bring joy to my day.

Now Hannah is asking if we can do something fun today. Hmmmmm... what to do about that? Swimming maybe. It's hard without grass to put the pool on - eh?

Catch a Spark

After writing my utterly whiny post about laundry, I read this talk my friend Lexie referred to me from Sheri Dew from 1998. I loved it! It was just the inspiration and perspective I needed today.

I loved her introduction about practicing the piano and having a vision.

These are my favorite quotes from her message:

Just as my spirit was stirred by the majesty of those dramatic musical passages and the possibility of performing them flawlessly, through the power of the Spirit we can often "catch a spark," as Joseph F. Smith taught us, "from the awakened memories of the immortal soul, which lights up our whole being as with the glory of our former home" (Gospel Doctrine [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1939], 13-14). It is the Spirit that will also shed light upon our ultimate potential—the grandest finish of all.


"Mother told me there would be days like this . . . But she failed to mention they could go on for months at a time."

There are times when days feel like months and when life feels like the test that it is, days when the vision and hope of a Big Finish are dimmed by immediate demands, days when one might wish for a mortal exam that was a little more manageable.


Yes, life is a test—of many things. But at the risk of sounding simplistic, may I suggest that the mortal experience is largely about vision—our vision of ourselves and our ultimate Big Finish. And vision is determined by faith. The firmer our faith in Jesus Christ, the clearer our vision of ourselves and what we can ultimately achieve and become.


And perhaps nothing is more vital today than having a vision, manifest by the Spirit, of who we are and what we can become, of our intrinsic value to the Lord, and of the unparalleled role we must play in these latter days. We are literally the offspring of God, his begotten sons and daughters, with the potential of exaltation (Acts 17:29; D&C 76:24). "The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ" (Romans 8:16-17).


Light is a key to vision! And Jesus Christ is the ultimate Light, the "light which shineth in darkness" (D&C 6:21), the light which chases "darkness from among [us]" (D&C 50:25). Faith in Jesus Christ is the key to vision, to seeing ourselves as the Lord sees us. So to improve our vision, we must increase our faith in and connection to the Savior.


Truman Madsen has said, "The cruelest thing you can do to a human being is to make him forget that he or she is the son or daughter of a king." There is a direct relationship between our personal experience with the Lord and how we see ourselves. The closer we grow to him, the more clear and complete becomes our vision of who we are and what we can become.


Do you believe that the Savior will really do for you what he has said he will do? That he can ease the sting of loneliness and enable you to deal with that haunting sense of inadequacy? That he will help you forgive? That he can fill you with optimism and hope? That he will help you resist your greatest temptation and tame your most annoying weakness? That he will respond to your deepest longing? That he is the only source of comfort, strength, direction, and peace that will not change, will not betray you, and will never let you down?


Elder Henry D. Moyle said: "I have a conviction deep down in my heart that we are exactly what we should be, each one of us. . . . I have convinced myself that we all have those peculiar attributes, characteristics, and abilities which are essential for us to possess in order that we may fulfil the full purpose of our creation here upon the earth. . . .

" . . . that allotment which has come to us from God is a sacred allotment. It is something of which we should be proud, each one of us in our own right, and not wish that we had somebody else's allotment. Our greatest success comes from being ourselves" (Improvement Era, December 1952, 934).


Guilt does not originate with the Savior, who invites us to step to a higher way of living and a more ennobling way of thinking, to do a little better and perhaps a little more. Promptings that come from him are hopeful and motivating rather than defeating or discouraging.


The Savior doesn't want us to be paralyzed by our errors but to learn and grow from them. He sees us as works in progress. (does this refer to bread-making abilities too??)


If the adversary can keep us so distracted that we never really seek, embrace, and commit ourselves to the Lord, then we will also never discover the healing, strengthening, comforting power available because of the Atonement.

Jesus Christ illuminates our vision of who we are and why we are here and gives us courage to move forward in the journey toward our heavenly home.

The chore that never ends...

When I was a teenager my sisters and I heard the song:

"This is the song that never ends
It just goes on and on my friends.
Some people started singing it
not knowing what it was.
And they continue singing it forever just because
this is the song that never ends... ... ... ..."

So when I was a Junior in high school, my family took a drive across the country to a conference my dad had in Virginia. We stopped at a bunch of church history sites and such. With 3 silly girls in the van, we started singing,

"This is the trip that never ends.
It just goes on and on my friends ... ... ..."

We actually loved that trip but we did have long hours in the car. I'm sure it drove my parents bananas.

Well today as I was sorting through mountains and mountains of laundry, this song came to mind,

"This is the chore that never ends.
It just goes on and on my friends... ... ..."

I know it's really silly to take a photo of my dirty laundry for I really believe I won't miss it when it goes away someday. But this is part of my life right now.

It's never a good thing for the laundry situation when mother is sick for a week and the laundry piles up for a few weeks during a move. Should 5 people even have this many clothes?

We've got a batch for jeans, darks, mediums, lights, whites, brights, reds, and towels/burp rags. Usually we don't have that many batches but I had to do some extra sorting so they were realistically-sized batches.

The new idea I had for my laundry situation in this house was to get the kids those little green baskets for their room. When it is full, they will bring it to my bathroom where we have all the laundry baskets in a row and they will sort it themselves. That part has worked well. But until today I didn't have any of our laundry sorted in an orderly fashion. Tis done now and we're on our way.

I'd love if all my loads were as small as the reds and brights. It wasn't hard carrying those mini baskets up and down the stairs. I'm thinking the smaller the loads, the better for me not feeling overwhelmed by it all so constantly.

I better get back to trying a batch every morning. sigh...

Our New Environment

I thought I'd share some pics of our new environment. I always think it's fun to see some one's surroundings and home where they spend their life each day.

The Jordan River Parkway trail goes around our neighborhood but we have an easy access just down the road. It's been fun to go on walks there with the kiddies. I love that there are cows across the river and it smells like the country. Pretty close to Sugar City, I'd say!!! Hannah thinks it stinks, but I love the fresh country air.

And here's the view in and out of our little neighborhood here in Lehi, a photo of our boxy house, and my favorite part of our house - the openness.

I love the space in the kitchen because in our rental we only had like 1 cupboard and 4 drawers. And I love that we aren't stepping all over each other here. Our house has some great things like big enough square footage for our little fam. But with big homes/small prices everything isn't fancy-pancy. But we're so grateful for our home and I think we'll like the ward and neighborhood with the down-to-earth people. I've really tried to get a few things organized. Most of my house is in complete shambles still with brown boxes strewn everywhere. And remember the laundry baskets I packed in my van... well, some of them still need to be unpacked. Yikes!

But one obtainable goal was the pantry. Remember how my mom came and helped put together the entire kitchen... what a life saver that was. Hannah helped me put the rest of the food on the shelves. It's still a slight work in progress as I need to label my baskets, my half & gallon containers, etc. (if I ever can find my labels packed in the bottom of a box).

A shelf-reliance may never be in our future, but I'll try my hardest to keep my cans of food storage lined up and rotated. Oh - and in my 3 1/2 gallon buckets I store white flour, sugar, and rice which we rotate through all the time.

How is it that organizing a closet is so much more fun than anything else? Perhaps it's because I know it might stay like that for more than 10 minutes.

What inspires me to take photos?

I had a friend ask some questions about what inspires me to take photos.

I do take a bazillion. One reason - we are home almost all the time and I like to think it's a hobby and that maybe someday I'll improve that skill through practice and maybe it's to add spice to my day. But here are a few of my answers I wrote a while ago that I thought I'd post for any interested peoples.

She asked, "How do you take such good pictures?"

My photos aren't awesome. In fast, most of my photos are lousy (as in lighting, clarity, saturation) until they've been run through photoshop elements and sometimes that helps salvage the photo... but sometimes the photos are hopeless. I know nothing about aperture or all those other fancy photographic terms. I have been trying to work on composition so I can arrange for a balanced photo. Mostly I think it's fun to take pictures of my silly kids and pretend like it's a hobby. And I like increasing the contrast in my photos so they pop out at me.

I don't pretend to know much about photo editing, but here's my attempt. See - there's nothing professional about this photo.

I saw this sunset on my drive home and knew I would be able to see it out my bathroom window so I ran upstairs so I could capture the sight. I know in 4 months it won't be there any more because once the house next store goes up, I'll have to say goodbye to the mountains and hello to brown stucco.

I think that photo is so-so lovely ... but this next photo run through soft light filter, a teeny-tiny saturation bump, and slightly burned edges makes it look more like what my eyes really saw (my camera just can't capture the light and such because it's dorky... or I'm dorky... not sure which...)

What inspires you to take a picture?

I came across this quote that kindof shares my inspiration for journaling and photos.

Quote by Rebecca Cooper, "When I sit down to scrapbook this ordinary life of mine, something always seems to happen. As I look at pictures of our little family doing what we do every day, I start to see things in a different light. Boring becomes beautiful, ordinary becomes extraordinary. Scrapbooking has this funny way of changing my perspective and reminding me of what's most important. It helps me find joy in the littlest things - perhaps even in changing all those dirty diapers. (Well, maybe that's pushing it.)"

So - I guess I feel like taking photos helps me see the little things in my life that I'm grateful for (and we all know those days that are sooooo hard and we're soooooo tired) but I try to find perspective by trying to appreciate my life in the present. I want to see the good and that is one way to try to capture it.

I think about all my memories as a child. And I don't have photos of every single day of my life. I don't have photos of swimming at Ricks and then going to get Millhollow yogurt afterwards. And I'm not sad that I don't have photos of those things, because I remember them fondly without having to see a photo.

So - sometimes I wonder if I'm just bazerko because I take photos of things that I don't need to. I don't think you need a photo of every single thing for it to be memorable. Just rambling through my thoughts...

How can I try to take more pics of ordinary stuff?

Taking a Photo-a-Day really helped me think about all the simple things in my day that someday I might miss. I don't know that laundry is one of those things I'll miss... but I'll miss the kids dirtying the laundry I suppose. I know my kids will grow up so fast and because I love, love little ones with all their funny sayings and squishy little faces and fingers, I guess I want to capture our every day life so that I can look back on those photos and remember.

Do you have to have a super fancy camera?

Nope. My camera is a cheapo Olympus that is 4+ years old. It's missing a pixel in the center which always ends up looking like a wart on someone's nose. It really doesn't make good enlargements because it has only 3.2 megapixels. But it's small and I can squish it into my pocket. I don't mind letting my kids use it occasionally because it's so dumb of a camera. And I suppose I'm in hopes that they'll drop it so I'll have to get a new one. Sigh...

Sooooo...nothing earth-shattering here.

But I'm glad Coralee asked the questions because it really made me think about why I do what I do... blog like a maniac, take photos like a maniac - all in my attempt to gain perspective and fully appreciate and learn from my life, my family, my experiences.

A brighter day

Most of us have been sick all week long here. A few days this week, I was so wiped out and wanted to hide in bed and sleep all day. And we all know that can't quite happen when you're the mother. So I was dragging myself around a bit. And one day, my eye caught this sightand it cheered my heart
and made it feel a little brighter.
I love my spatula bouquet that reminds me of all the sunshine my friend brings to me.

The Maxwell is 6 months old

I can hardly believe this babe has celebrated his half birthday. It seems like I was just recovering from a c-section and moving across the country with a wee little thing. And here he is so tall and smiley and happy.I took him in for his 6-month appointment. Here are the stats:

27 1/2 inches - 75%
17 lb 11 oz - 50%
43.8 cm head - 50%

(sidenote: Hannah and Abe love weighing in at the doctor. Last time Abe weighed more by a pound or two, but this time Hannah was 41 with Abe being 40.8. I think it's funny they are so close in weight)

I guess that looks pretty well-rounded for Maxwell. I thought he might be more on height because this babe is growing like a weed and I can't keep him in clothes that fit. I guess that's how babies are.

I had decided to buy 12 month clothes because I'm tired of him growing out of clothes so fast. Then I bought some jammies from Children's place that were 12 month size and they just barely fit him. Are baby clothes shrinking in size? or is it just my kiddos. Yikes!

Max is practicing on sitting up but we still have to really watch him so he doesn't fall right over on his head.

He wasn't rolling over much until we moved into this new house. He kind of has his own space where he won't get trampled by the running kids. Now he is improving on rolling over both ways though he still gets stuck on his back in bed when he wants to be sleeping on his stomach. Wah, wah, wah he cries!

If you need something spit-up on, Max is the man for the job. He's still spewing forth oodles, but now his baby food prunes and bananas are mixed in. Uuummmm!

If you need a smile, Max is there for ya. We think he has the cutest little toothless smile of all time. And he loves to smile. When he gets really tired, he laughs so hard at anything and everything. He brightens our life.

The other day when he was sick, he was the most snuggly little guy. It made me realize that he's starting to become more wiggly. I love when he'll still snuggle into my shoulder.

He's also in the stage to try and swipe everything. He is reaching for the phone, the camera, pens, our food, silverware. He sure is a curious kiddo.

Maxwell recently received the honor of joining us at the table for meal time. We got rid of his high chair due to bulkiness and now he sits in a booster on a dining room chair. He sits between me and Hannah. Hannah spends most of meal time trying to pick up the toys Max has thrown to the ground. He seems to sense that he's one of us now.

So - yep - we'll keep our babe - spit up and all. He's a total cutie. I can't imagine our little family without his cheerful little spirit. We love ya Maxie Max!

I feel kind of dumb...

for going private. But oh well! We'll see how it goes for a few months. Let me know if you hear of anyone I missed out on sending the invite to.

The eternal internal debate...

... is whether or not to go private with my blog.

And I guess I'm going to bite the bullet and just do it. Sigh...

I don't really want to because it bugs me to have to log into my own blog and I know people don't like to have to log in to see others. What!! - and no google reader feed- arg!!! And sometimes I come across someone's blog that I know but I don't have a way to contact them to be invited. Sigh...

Mostly it's for my peace of mind that I'm going private because I think about it every day and I have enough to worry about.

I've never heard of a real person having problems with their blog and predators though I hear the warnings all the time from FBI authorities, but I guess I don't want to take the chance. Perhaps I'm taking more of a chance taking my little family to Walmart - probably! You never know who lurks about. sigh...

I'm not out to exclude family, friends, or friends of friends, so comment with your email address or send me an email to happyfam{at}gmail{dot}com, if you'd like an invite. I know I don't have everyone's email who reads the bloggy so be sure to email me.

sigh... wouldn't it be nice to live in a safe, safe world with no boogie-people. sigh...

Facebook

Jimmy signed up for Facebook for his job in web analytics research dealing with social networking or something of the sort.

So I decided to start an account to see if I could find some long lost friends (yoo-hoo friends, where are you??) and I was curious how it all worked because I hear from the youth and young adults about 'writing on my wall' and such.

What a curious phenomenon Facebook is. It's completely wild with connections.

I was amazed how many people my age or older are on there. It is a fun way to find old friends and keep up with people. It's so different than blogging. My college-age sister-in-law thinks blogs are funny and such a 'mom' thing.

Even though I'm not interested in spending all my time on Facebook, I think as a parent or YW leader of teens, it's good to be aware of their online world & see what contacts & friends they associate with. And I know it can be a good clean fun social thing too. But I can also see lots of drama coming forth amongst teens and young adults about who has the most friends or people not adding you as their friend, etc.

In other stakes & wards we had trouble with youth posting inappropriate photos & their parents were unaware of their involvement on Myspace & such.

I think it will be a challenge to know all that teens are up to - period!, but I can see how being a 'friend' on Facebook, Twitter, or Myspace with them, would let you into their world a little bit.

I wonder what the youth will be into online or on phones when my kids are teens? Scariness!

Don't grow up kids ... but if you must, then please grow up sweet!

Our Daily Project

The project for today was putting together the bookshelves for the kiddos. They were almost half-off a few weeks ago and I figured they would be great storage for the kid's rooms.

Abe helped by holding shelves and using the screwdriver. He thought it was cool to be 'Abe the Builder'. Can he do it? YES HE CAN!
He was mighty proud to see his shelf put together because he helped work on it.
Hannah's went much quicker because I knew a bit more what I was doing. Hannah did a super job managing the screwdriver. She screwed in most of the screws even when it got really hard to turn. You go little muscles!Her bins don't exactly match the wall color (sigh... oh well...not that anything matches in our house anyways), but she adored the princess one. I couldn't bear to buy more than one as I don't want her to have a totally princess room.
Max was pretty patient to wait for us to build the shelves. He didn't get new shelves as he doesn't need too much storage quite yet, but here's the color of his accent wall (which I think is darker in reality).
And just for fun if anyone cares to see ... these are the curtains that I love for our living room. The color is Rocky River Faux Silk by HOME at Target. I'm excited to get the downstairs painted a slightly darker neutral tannish than what's in the kid's rooms. I'm thinking the colors will be calm and inviting... and hopefully not too drab.
In other moving news: we still have oodles of boxes we are working on unpacking. Most of us are tired and sickie so not much work is happening as of late with all that. Life seems a whirlwind right now but things will come together and we're excited about our new adventure in this house.

I went to the grocery store...

and upon checking out...

moving quickly...

holding the sauce...

slip...

drop...

crack...

crash...

splat...

sigh...

It's always a good idea to slow down a tad bit, isn't it? And if you can believe I've never dropped a glass jar - nor have my kids dropped a glass jar at the grocery store, so I guess it's good that it was a first ... but hopefully the last.

And then I went outside and smelled freshly cut crops... not sure what... but it reminded me of Idaho. I like it here!

“Awake, Arise, and Come Unto Christ”

I've been waiting for the 2008 Women's Conference transcripts to be published. When Brittany shared part of this message I looked up the talk by Sheri Dew and I LOVE IT!

I think it's just the motivation I need to put myself in gear. I've been in a bit of a slump lately and am lacking in energy and motivation for just about everything. It seems like I'm always trying (or sometimes not even trying) and never quite getting there (can't get there if you don't try at all, I suppose). But as long as I keep on keepin' on, I hope the Lord will make up the rest somehow.

Go and read the talk for yourself, because it's great and it will make you laugh and smile and feel good and make you want to go forth with cheer, but here are a few of my favorite highlights:

“Awake, Arise, and Come Unto Christ” (see Moroni 10:31–32). I invite us to awake to who we are and to the expansive reach of our influence as women of God. To arise by making of our lives a ministry, as the Savior did. And to come unto Christ by walking away from the world."

Here are just a few of Lucifer’s lies: That men are smarter, have all the power, and are more important, so if we want to have influence we should be more like them; that marriage and family are confining; that motherhood is menial and a waste of any talented woman’s time; that women are perpetually frazzled and failing; and that a woman’s value is based on her size, shape and what she accomplishes outside the home."

Here is the truth about womanhood. Our Father gave His daughters a divine endowment of gifts that give us unique influence. ... Our Father also gifted us with the nature to nurture, keen sensitivity to the Spirit, selflessness, discernment, and heroic faith. No wonder our Father placed us at the heart of the family and thus at the center of the plan of salvation. We are the Lord’s secret weapon. Pre-mortally, when our Father described our role, we must have shouted for joy because of the ennobling stature He gave women in His kingdom. The world won’t tell us this stunning truth, but the Spirit will."

The Apostle Paul said it best: “It is high time to awake out of sleep . . . The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light” (Romans 13:11–12).

If we truly want to walk away from the world, our single most important pursuit is to seek to hear the voice of the Spirit. I don’t think it will be possible to survive spiritually in the last days without the Holy Ghost as our constant guide. The Spirit is the ultimate protector and judge between good and evil. The Spirit can detect the slightest variance from truth and alert us to all spiritual danger, because the Holy Ghost speaks “of things as they really are” (Jacob 4:13), rather than as they appear to be, and shows us “all things what [we] should do” (2 Nephi 32:5).

There is no simple formula for learning to hear the voice of the Spirit. But purity is key, for it makes us a more pure receptacle. The scriptures are key, because they teach the language of revelation. The temple is key, for there we learn how to come out of the world and into the presence of God while in mortality. And regular personal worship is key.

We are followers of Jesus Christ. And we have been His followers and have loved Him for a long, long time. Nothing is more important than working and sacrificing and enduring for Him. Let us be the generation of women that finally walks away from the world. If we will Awake to who we are, Arise by making of our lives ministries, and come unto Christ by steadily becoming more holy, we will have a degree of influence the world and the kingdom of God have never felt before—an influence that has no limit and no end. We can do this. I know we can."

Benign Essential Blepharospasm

I think I have that - yeah that! -

Blepharospasm: "a focal dystonia - a neurological movement disorder involving involuntary and sustained muscle contractions of the muscles around the eyes. Benign means the condition is not life threatening. Essential indicates that the cause is unknown, but fatigue, stress, or an irritant are possible contributing factors." Wikipedia

OK - or it could just be a basic eye twitch. I've gone through periods of eye twitching before, but the past week or so, I've had crazy twitching in my left eye. I don't think it's permanent but goodness - it's annoying. I'm guessing it from fatigue ... so why am I blogging - I should be sleeping. zzzzzzzz...

Wade (my optometrist brother-in-law) is soooo laughing at me right now. He and Amy are my 'go-to' people for any medical question I have big or small. And most of the time, I'm a big hypochondriac. But hopefully my basal ganglia is okay so my eye twitching will subside.

Dust and shelves and knobs

The sawdust is piling up, but we now have a few new shelves installed in the master bath, pantry, and kid's closets. All the curtains are up so we aren't a fish bowl anymore. And my man, Jimmy, also installed the hardware in the kitchen today.We didn't have handles on the cupboards in our rental house and I realized how much I missed them. I love having handles on the cupboards - especially these pretty ones. Enjoyin' the little things!

Wind, wind, and more wind

You know how the wind ALWAYS blows in Sugar City. ALWAYS! Well, I think I've moved to the closest place to home with all this wind in Utah. The weather patterns from both valleys collide right on my house.

Today, our swing (unattached at present) completely blew all the way across the yard. Dude - that is a heavy metal object. I was worried it might blow into the neighbors sliding glass door or something.

After a phone call to Jimmy (not quite sure why I thought calling him would help it blow back in it's proper place), I went out to get it and could hardly walk to drag that huge thing back to the shelter of the house.

Abe thought the wind was super cool blowing into the house (welcome layers and layers of dirt on my floor and counters!). Wow - I thought I left Hurricane land of Florida and Tornado land of Tennessee behind. I do remember though, in Tennessee, that if the wind started blowing I consciously thought - "wow the wind is blowing." In Idaho you never think that, it's more like, "Wow, the wind ISN'T blowing." These are the wild, wild winds of the West!

I seriously think they should set up wind farms everywhere here, we could have completely free power. I bet my engineer husband could somehow build us one right here in our yard. Right honey??

My wonderful parents

Yesterday was my parent's 41st Wedding Anniversary.
They were married in the Los Angeles Temple.
And how do you think they celebrated their anniversary?They helped clean our rental house for THREE HOURS. Can you believe how nice they are!

My brain hasn't exactly been functional so even though I knew it was their anniversary it didn't click that yesterday was that day.

When I talked to my dad about it when I finally realized, he was so cheerful and just commented that they were looking for a service project to celebrate their day. Oh dad! So thanks, thanks, thanks mom for scrubbing all the grime that I'm sure had been in that place for years. You are the best!

I just know it would have taken me 3 days with the kids to get all of that finished. I am so blessed to have such kind and helpful parents who sacrifice for their family. Happy Anniversary mom and pops!

Snicker-snocker-doodles

Today we thought we'd break in the oven and bake Snicker doodles. The other day on Wishbone, the mom was making them and I remembered that they were yummy. So - here we are on our lovely day of rest (rest from our unpacking - sigh...) enjoying some yummy treats.

Jimmy set up the computer so I could find my recipe. The printer isn't set up so I wrote it on this piece of paper - the only one I could find. It was a drawing of Hannah's about baptism from church that for some reason they had to crinkle in a ball or something. Writing something long-hand took a while. I'm so spoiled having a keyboard, computer, and printed.

Anyhoo... the kids loved making cookies. They almost enjoy the dough more than the cookies.I let them roll the cookies in cinnamon and sugar and Abe's little blobs were so funny shaped but they flattened just right. We are grateful to have a window and light in this oven. In our rental house, we couldn't see a thing in there. Little blessings!!!

A bunch of silliness

Do you see how tired this baby looks? He has not slept much this weekend. We need to get back to a normal routine for his sake.Today I decided I ought to start consistently feeding Max baby food. He's not very good at it yet, so I haven't made many efforts. But practice makes perfect - eh?

But that funny baby - he is always swiping things. Once he swiped my zucchini off my plate - no joke! Once he tried to swipe a tootsie roll from the doctor's treat basket. Today he swiped the spoon and tried to gobble it up.

As for Hannah... ever since I told her about Kait being able to go cross-eyed, she has been practicing it. Here's her best effort with that.

And Abe kept trying to sneak into the picture so I took one of him winking.

Back to the Future - didn't we just move?

Remember this post from January about being up to our eyeballs in boxes? Well, the boxes are back. This is the same living room in our rental house a few days ago.

The kids have been a little unsettled about CHANGE. Abe decided he didn't like our new house. And he didn't like blue anymore so he didn't care about his room....until we moved in and he loved running around and around in circles in his room with all the space.

Here are the kids sleeping on mattresses on the floor Friday, the night before our move, because Jimmy had taken the bunk bed apart.
Look how content Maxie has become to moving boxes. He's snuggling right up. We put his mattress on the floor too since the crib was disassembled. I didn't want him to fall off so I was trying to block the way down. Don't worry - we moved him far from the edge.
Here are the kiddies yesterday, the big moving day. I let them pack some clothes and since I figured it would be warm, we ended up with flip flops, short sleeves, and shorts. But it was quite chilly and slightly raining.

We scavenged and found a jacket and pants (Hannah in boy jeans). We ended up buying them both new tennis shoes since they needed some for sports this summer anyways. I loved Abe's shoes with his outfit.

Mom and Dad took the kids while the boys were unloading the truck. It was such a help. The kids had fun at Cabela's and Abe loved McDonald's play area. Thanks for watching the barnlings!

I know the kids always wonder why I want them to be in a picture when the sun is shining. They need to always wear sunglasses I guess. Big truck, eh? We filled it 1 1/4 times.

A huge shout out of THANKS to Steve and Ryan who stayed FOREVER lifting and carrying and sweating. We didn't have as many helpers as we anticipated from the EQ so we really appreciate all who did more than their share of work. May you receive countless blessings for helping us.
We could hardly keep Abe from getting run over because he was so excited to see the truck and how big it was. Here he is pretending to drive. See the glee on that boy's face!
And finally - the laundry room. Julie loves the laundry room color. I've done 2 batches thus far and each time I thought - hey, this is cheerful. So glad we painted that room such a Sensible Hue!

Last night we were so wiped out. Jimmy worked so hard physically to haul everything and then install some curtains last night. He's a good man! We basically feel like a fish bowl here. Nobody has fences and though our neighbors have blinds, we haven't quite gotten that far yet. So much to do... so much to do... so much to do...

But I'm way excited to be in this house and be able to get settled in our ward, our neighborhood, and get organized. The next few weeks will be hard but also fun to get stuff in place or thrown out.

When people serve me and my family, it makes me realize how much we all need each other. Thanks to Tia Beebs for watching Hannah and Abe for 6 hours - yes! 6 hours - on Friday so mom and I could pack up the entire kitchen.

This was one of the best things for us. We loaded everything into boxes and laundry baskets, brought it over, and unloaded it.

So yesterday when we moved in, our kitchen was set. I made a non-fancy dinner of noodles, white sauce, and peas, but I've never had a move where we actually ate a sit-down meal the night we moved in. Thanks mom for making that possible.

Yeppers - we're on our way and just need to barely clean the rental and then dive into the hundreds of boxes to be unpacked. Phew - we're still alive!