A few folks that I love :)

The heart is an interesting thing.  At times I feel it will burst with happiness or is being wrung out by sadness.  Some days I feel that I've given all the love that it is possible to give and other days I have more I want to share.  Life has taught me that my ability to love will increase and there is no limit-it just keeps on giving!

This little girl is such a hoot.  Hubby and I were reflecting a few nights ago on how we felt like we had to wait such a long time for her to come to our family, but we have a hard time remembering life without her.

 Had a lunch date with Christina and Brianne.  We went to high school together.  You know how there are reasons you keep in touch with some people over the years?  These two are definite keepers!

 Susan!!!  My friend Susan got herself hitched and lucky for me he is from Utah so she had to come out and have a reception here.  So happy for you my dear!!

 This is on the bus on a field trip.  Brother has so much potential; it is a great responsibility to help point him in the right direction.

 I can't talk too much about this picture because I'm still kind of emotional about it.  Elisa moved to England and this was our "good bye date".  This woman amazes me with her courage and compassion.  She has let me cry on her shoulder and made me laugh and inspired me.  Now I am dreaming dreams of a trip to see her and all the sights of literary interest I have come to love.

Odds and ends

This picture is to show two things. 1, that her hair is done and looks decent sometimes and 2, you can kind of see how the two small pony tails are a lighter color than the rest of her hair. My hair did the same thing when I was little.

We love walking on the good days.  Here is the view I had one day.  For some reason she wanted the tutu under her skirt and it was a battle I just wasn't gonna win.  Besides, I wanted to let her rock it since she won't be doing that when she's older!

One of the projects I have recently undertaken is getting my great grandfather's missionary journal onto a digital format.  My sister Annie and I have been working on it and still have a ways to go, but we have enjoyed it so much.  I am addicted to it :)  It is so much fun to see his sense of humor, his difficulties and view of the world.  Our goal is to get it done by my grandfather's birthday in August; hopefully we will be able to.

My kids are a little camera happy with my new phone, but this one was cute.  I asked brother to build me something out of legos while I was at choir-

One of the not so good things about school is they send kids home with all these new-fangled ideas- in this case about leprechauns leaving gold and doing mischief for St Patrick's Day.  When I was little we wore green and that was it.  Our leprechauns this year didn't do much, just left chocolate coins in their shoes.  Brother said they probably weren't very mischievous because our house was already messy......

Ode to my Bucky :)

K, it's not really an ode, more of a photo essay.  Mom and I decorated the birthday girl's car while she was at school......we may or may not have had too much fun tying the steering wheel to the shifter, mirrors and seat and giggling about it.....

For her party we had a nerf gun war.  Here are the youngins getting fueled up for all the fun.

Look how happy (and slightly blurry) we are :)

I love this picture!  This is my dad kicking off the festivities.  Becky said she was protecting the soda, but that's not what the picture looks like to me....

The boyfriend aiming at the girl's father.....better be careful!

The funniest person of the whole night was my mom.  She was out there in her heels having the most fun of any of us.  Brother also had a blast and has been requesting a nerf gun party for his birthday as well.

This picture cracks me up because of how well mannered and polite my mom *usually is and because the Hubby is still very careful to not vex the "mother in law" and always does what he can to help her out.  Don't let the picture fool you!

Becky wanted a minion cake and Tiff whipped out her awesome skills to make it happen.  Rumor has it our unique version of happy birthday caught some of Becky's friends by surprise :)

Happy birthday Becky!  I love so many things about you!  Thanks for being my sis; I am a better person for it.

Valentines 2013

I realize the titles of these posts are not very creative or awe inspiring......sorry 'bout that. 
Hubby had class on Valentines so we headed over to grandma's to take advantage of her famous sugar cookies.

 

We went out to dinner one night to Sizzler, our new favorite place.  Hubby paid to get my blurb book printed.  In my defense for lack of blogging I have been working on getting old blog posts formatted.  I've been busy, I promise!

January 2013

So yeah, I turn around and it's been two months since my last update.  It's almost like I've been busy or something......  I got the hubby's old phone, which was an upgrade from my phone.  Here are a few pictures from January-

We went on a field trip to the nature center by the school.

 Making his snowman craft/treat

We made something yummy at home, but I can't remember what it was.....

 

Our pipes froze....twice.  Thankfully Hubby and my dad were able to get it taken care of.  We had no burst pipes and the only real casualty was our closet, but since not many people ask to see the inside of my closet I think it will be fine :)

Hubby made a coat rack/organizer thing to hang on brother's wall.  Here are the kids (and friend) helping to paint it.

She was sick and baths help lots of things (we had our fair amount of sickness, but I didn't take many pictures of it......)

Sister playing on the piano wearing the tutu Aunt Karen found.  She wears it almost every day and sleeps in it pretty much every night.

The Forester's mileage reached 66666 and January was cold.

My boys reading books for bedtime :)  Makes my heart happy.