Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Happy, happy birthday Kenna dear!

Our first born is 9 today! This pic was taken around 7am! (notice how we are all dressed and ready to go?) ugggggg! I really enjoyed last week! Anyway, look how beautiful they are! =) I can't believe it was nine years ago we were in the hospital in Silver City NM!

I love Kenna for the following reasons:
  • she's beautiful
  • smart, very smart
  • kind
  • selfless
  • loving
  • wise
  • full of faith
  • looks for good in others
  • intuitive
  • self confident
  • great at jump roping
  • loves the outdoors
  • loves to read
  • is understanding
  • loves her family
  • is a great student
  • tall
  • silly
  • is patient with me
  • has a beautiful smile
  • she's a wonderful big sister
  • she's VERY compassionate
  • always thinking of others
  • a little shy





I love you Kenna!!!!! Glad you had a great birthday!!!!!

Friday, March 19, 2010

Recognition night

Last Friday night we got to see what the wonderful little 8-11 year old girls in our ward are up to! Each one on them added something special to the program. Tumbling, art, playing piano, jump roping, skits, cooking, violin playing were only a few of their talents. They had a great time!!

Koko and K(Goodlife's daughter) performed a skit about Holly and Anna. A missionary and a convert soon to be missionary. It was great! Between Goodlife being in Drama and me just being dramatic, these two might have a chance in acting! lol
I am so thankful that I have a program like this available for my daughters! I am thankful for their leaders!! The girls are taught so many lessons in many different areas of life.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Spring Break '10

My grandma Sally came down to play with us this week!!
We started off the week with a fun game of put put golf.

They sure are checkin out the hole!!


This is what Bay's second shot looked like. On every hole. She put the ball centimeters away from the hole then put her club right behind it then quickly but steadily set up to push the ball in.


This picture sort of sums up out golf outing!


On Wednesday we went down to the Fort Worth Stockyards. It was a lot of fun. The girls wanted to ride horses! Grandma Sally really wanted them to have the opportunity to ride horses. So here they are! They all LOVED it! Bay was really mad that she didn't get to ride all by herself! Koko road Dylan, Lou road Jojo and Bay was on April.



The Stockyards usually have extra fun stuff during spring break. They had a petting zoo set up. I thought this picture was interesting!
I felt really bad for these poor animals! They had a very small area fenced in! There were a ton of little petting zoo animals. Then they added in a bunch of people. It was probably a 15x15ish space. You know, looking at this picture I only see one animal! HaHaHaHa! I was taking this picture from the edge of the fence! They needed to do a little crowd control inside! Oh well...the girls loved it! It was cute!
Today we went to Castle Park in Benbrook. It was awesome! I have only been there once before. This time it was crazy busy! (not as bad as inside the petting zoo, but close!)

I am so thankful for my grandma! I am thankful for her health! I am thankful we are important to her!! =)
We have had a great time! Look at these three beautiful girls! awwwww

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

funnies

It has been a long time since our last post!! WOW!
I have cute random things people around me have said!

Bay says 'huge much' but really means whole bunch!

me: "Mathew, are you diggin for gold?"
Mathew: "NO, boogers!"

When I asked Bay who my friends are, she said a few names then said Young Women's. lol in that specific case YW meant Julia & Jennifer. Sometimes it means mutual other times it means the girls. Can I just say that I love my calling!!!

When watching TLC "A baby story" (btw I have not watched much TV lately and when I catch a glimpse, its usually iCarly or some Disney Princess movie! I was cleaning my room/bathroom and wanted some background noise and the girls were in their toy room! ) I noticed Lou is in the room really, really watching! She said, "it's coming out in a different spot" I asked her where she thought it, the baby, came out of. She said her belly button. Trying to hold it together I simply said maybe her belly button is really low. hahaha

Mathew: "My grandma is ....different." It was so freaking funny! He did a sort of flick of the wrist when he said different! I think he was sayin that she was a different grandma, not Bay's grandma.

dang...
there were so many more. I just can't think of them right now. Oh well, I'll add more later.

Monday, January 18, 2010

Fire, promptings and new friends!

I just want to point out that I do not share this experience to boast or puff myself up!! Only to inspire and encourage you!

On Jan 12th I was coming home from the gym. Turning into our neighbor hood and saw thick black smoke. I had a strong prompting to go check it out. I thought that was kinda silly because we live in a huge neighborhood and someone should have been on top of this! I kept going in the direction of the smoke. I didn’t hear any sirens. I began to wonder if anyone was inside the house, were they safe. A young man and I pulled up to the burning house at about the same time. He was already calling 911 and pounding on the door. No one came. The fire was coming from the back of the house on the side where the gate was. Between the two of us, we were pretty much non stop pounding and ringing the doorbell. We then went from neighbor to neighbor knocking to see if they knew who lived there and if they had their number. Looking back, we, the young man and I, didn’t think for a second that they might not be home! Finally, right before the fire trucks got there the owner came to the door. Shocked, he asked what was going on!! We exclaimed that his house was on fire. We all ran in. I kept asking if she had any kids. She sort of paused then said that she was out back! WHAT??? Lou, the dog, was out back!! We really couldn't get to her. He ran to the back of the house opened the door and the smoke came pouring into the house! His wife was really scared. Their back door is by the pantry and the pantry by her closet. She could see and smell the smoke and she totally freaked out. She started collecting precious jewelry. I told her I would get that and she should put on a shirt! Poor girl was just in her bra. Then we started getting as much out of the house as we could. Her home looked like a model home! I wondered if they really LIVED there! Tori, you would be proud! Anyway, there was a second of panic. I almost froze. What do I grab? What if this was my house? We ended up only having time to get a few special blankets, jewelry, pics and computers. We put as much as we could into my van. They soon were able to get Lou. I got to hang out with him. Lou is a pit bull. I know that if they are raised correctly, they can be great dogs! But I was asked to hold Lou’s collar which was around her thick neck! I was a little more afraid of her than running in and out of a burning house! She was scared but stayed right by me! The lady kept hugging me thanking me. Telling me she knew there were angels on earth. Right then I had another strong prompting to give her a Book of Mormon. All three of them were safe. There was damage to the back wall. Mostly smoke damage inside. As we were pulling away from their home, Bay kept asking me if my friends were ok. I am sure Bay got the impression we were friends because she couldn’t stop hugging me! I was happy to be hugged and give her the support she needed right then! I tried to reassure that my friends were safe, even Lou the dog! I told her the firemen came and put the fire out! Ok mama!

I happened to tell a couple of friends about my prompting to give “my friends” a BOM. The next day she asked if I had done it yet. Nope, not yet. I still really had a strong impression it needed to be done! I tried to make cookies Wed night, but that was a flop. Stupid baking soda! Well, at least I tried! I didn’t dare take them flat cookies. Later that night another friend asked If I had done it yet. It was still a big fat no!! I explained the cookie situation and she quickly said that she had cookie dough in her frig and I could come pick it up after going to the gym. That brought another silly thought. Who can keep cookie dough in the frig for that long?? She said she had made the dough earlier that week. But she displayed self control and gave me that dough. Many hours of the day passed. The big girls had just come home from school. I was so tired and asked them to wake me up at 4:15. They did but I kept telling them 15 more minutes! When I could finally wake up it was 5:00. I went to the frig to get something quick for diner; I had a stake auxiliary training at the stake center which is about 20 min away in good traffic. As soon as I opened the frig door and saw the cookie dough staring right at me, I felt this huge feeling of disappointment! I felt like Heavenly Father was so sad I had not done this yet! He had given me every opportunity and I did not do my part. So I pulled out the cookie dough and a baking sheet and turned on the oven. Then I sat down to type the letter. I just talked about how I was prompted to check on her. This is one way God shows us He loves us. I also told her that I didn’t think of myself as an angel, but a tool of the Lord. So I went to print then sighed and clicked cancel. I hadn’t added anything about the BOM. So I added that we believe in the Bible and BOM. We read and study from each set of scripture to learn more about our Savior and how to be more like Him. I then added she could call me anytime and I would share more about this wonderful book! This was hard because I didn't want to leave our names but wanted to so she would have the opportunity to call. When Koko saw what I was doing, she sat down and wrote her own little note! It was so special! We had our BOM, card, letter, cookies, & dog treat for Lou, the dog and off we went. By then it was 6:00 and we had not eaten! We drive up to their house and Bay rang the bell. Then, again a few seconds later. I thought to myself that I had at least tried. Just as I was going to put the items by her door I asked Bay to ring it one more time. Then the door opened. Tears were flowing down “my friends” cheeks and she said she had been looking for us! They had been driving up and down the streets of our neighborhood! She was so happy to have found us!! I wish we would have had the time to stay. Bay was happy to see the fire gone and our friends were just fine! It felt so good to do the right thing. It took a LOT for me to listen! It was amazing that I made it to my meeting on time with no traffic! Those of you who know 820, just might believe that was a miracle in itself!!! When President Hadley addressed us, he asked us to have courage. Go and do the hard things. I was so glad I had listened to the promptings and not have to feel the guilt and disappointment!

On Sunday, I got a call from her!!! I was so dang excited to hear her voice!!!!! I thought she was calling to find out all there was to know about our church! She was calling to see if we were home so they could drop something off. I was out visiting teaching but told her Michael and the girls were home. I called Michael to give him a heads up. All he said was “there’s blood everywhere, gotta go” then click!! Oh boy! I really wasn’t worried about that! They ended up coming right then! They could see that it was bad timing and just left the gifts. She also wrote a letter to me. It basically said that she respected us for giving her “the book” but they only believed in the Bible. Then she invited us to go to her church!!

We have planted the seed hopefully! She didn’t return “the book”. I hope it will sit as a reminder to her of God’s love for all of us!

Another cool part of this story it that last night Koko and I were working on things in her Faith in God book. We were discussing the Holy Ghost. It was a perfect teaching moment. I asked her what she thought would have happened if I didn’t listen to the first prompting. We discussed that others would have helped her and maybe there could have been more damage to her home. Then I told her had I not listened to the first prompting, I would never have gotten the second! The second prompting was the most important! I might have missed the opportunity to help “our friends” know about the Book of Mormon, Another Testament of Jesus Christ!!

I tell this story not to brag or try to make myself look better or anything of that sort. In fact, I was very humbled! It's embarrassing to have had that many promptings and help and still not follow thrugh!!!

So if you receive a prompting, no matter how small or silly it may be, act on it!!! You never know what the next prompting may be!

Sunday, January 3, 2010

Cool new look!

I LOVE to find cute handouts for my Young Women lessons! I had been searching on different YW blogs and came across instructions on how to make my own handouts! I really wish I had not learned this, one could spend a TON of time doing this!!! Anyway, the trick is to save a blog background as a picture. Then insert it into a program such as Word add a text box with super cute font and voila!!

Tonight I came across www.hotbliggityblog.com. They have super cute backgrounds!!! I just had to change our blog lay out!!

I need to do MAJOR catch up post. I am working on this!! I got a new camera for Christmas and I am trying to learn it! A girl can only do so much at a time! =)

Monday, December 7, 2009

An elf named Joy!


You guys are NEVER going to believe what happened after school today!!!!! Mommy was on the computer and the girls were putting away backpacks. All of the sudden the doorbell rings. When we opened the door there was a little elf and an envelope on the porch!!! There were no cars around and no one was at the door, just her!!!!!!!
We quickly opened the letter. It said that her name was Joy and she was sent by Santa himself to our house! She is watching all of us and will report her findings to Santa! The note said we could talk to her and leave notes with her. She will get them all to Santa. She does not like loud or angry voices. She is happy to be assigned to our house. She knows we love each other and how excited we are to celebrate Christmas.
Also, she knows we will celebrate with the love of Jesus Christ in our hearts because that is our gift to Him on his Birthday!
Joy is not allowed to talk or move while we are awake. She can only use Santa's magic in the middle of the night.
WOW!! This is so exciting!
An actual live Elf in our house!!!!! I sure hope she will be able to report that we have been nice NOT naughty!!!!!

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