Mother's Day Pics

On Mother's Day when we went to Kevin's Dad's house Emily wanted to play outside for a bit and she decided to put rocks on the stepping stones out front. She diligently looked for all the "pretty" rocks (the more rounded ones) and carefully placed one rock on each section of every stepping stone. Beautiful darling!
Since Allison was born Emily misses being the baby of the family. Every chance she gets she plays baby and especially loves getting in the crib, bassinet or baby bathtub. Here she is with Aunt Lynn oohing and aahhing over her. Later we put Allison in there with her - she loves that too!

Emily's school had a "tea party" in honor of mothers the week before the big day. Me and Allison got to go have morning muffins with Emily and her class and then we stayed for a little show. The kids were really cute reciting the Pledge of Allegiance and the first five presidents of the USA. They also sang a song but I don't think any of the kids really knew it, or at least they didn't sing. Not as cute as the primary kids singing in church, anyway!

Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers out there...a day late but hey, we're all trying here! So my talk in church went fine. We had one youth speaker (with a rather long talk for a youth speaker) and three adult speakers so it was a pretty long meeting. But good. My talk was fine, I told kind of a sad story and everybody was crying. But it was a good example to my point. Then Emily got to give her very first talk in Primary. It was about families. She did a good job, too.

In the morning Kevin got up and made orange pancakes for breakfast. YUM. Then I got to open my present (have I ever mentioned how excited Emily gets about presents?) that Emily picked out. It was a box full of candy and Izze sodas. YUM again. If you have never had an Izze, they are made with pure fruit juice and sparkling water. Very tasty but not full of sugar. You can find them at Target, but still not as available in grocery stores. There are flavors like clementine (as opposed to regular old orange) and pomegranite. That was fun. Later we went to Kevin's dad's house for dinner and had some delicious New York steaks. YUM YUM YUM. It was a yummy day.

Thankful Thursday 3

I was asked to speak in church next week (Mother's Day) so I have been thinking a lot about motherhood lately and many of my dear friends who have been going through some big trials with their families. A husband killed in a car accident. A young son diagnosed with a potentially life-threatening and rare disease. A baby daughter lost just days after birth. An unwanted divorce. A lost chance of having any children, despite wanting them very badly. I have thought about each one of them and how strong they are to keep on going and the faith that they show through the difficult times. I have been really inspired. I don't know why some have seemingly harder trials than others, but thinking about it all I have been more thankful for my own blessings, that I have not been called to have those kinds of trials (not yet, anyway), and especially thankful to know these wonderful women who are examples of courage, strength and faith in their roles as mothers and wives. Ladies, if you read this, I hope you know who you are. I love you!

I am thankful and humbled just to be a mother. I think motherhood is probably the toughest job out there, not to mention the longest lasting, and to be entrusted with raising children is a big thing. I am thankful for my own mother, who taught me more than I could ever try to expound upon, and who is a big example to me of unselfishness and willing service. I am thankful for my grandmothers, who taught my parents to live good lives, so they could teach me. I am thankful to have two beautiful daughters, both healthy and strong. I am thankful for all of my mom friends who share their insights and wisdom with me. I am thankful that even though I feel inadequate as a mother, my three-year-old still thinks I am the best. I am thankful for my knowledge of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and that when my kids ask questions about the eternities, I know what to tell them. I am thankful for friends, relatives, teachers, singing leaders, daycare providers and sometimes even strangers who have taught my daughter and made lasting good impressions on her. I am thankful to know so many amazing women in my life and to be able to learn from their examples and share joys and heartaches with them.

Some of you may remember Julie Beck's talk from the LDS General Conference last October entitled "Mothers Who Know." I am supposed to use some of that in my talk on Mother's Day, so I have been reading it and trying to decide what parts to focus on. I haven't decided which parts yet, but I have thought about all the mothers and good women I know. I think many of you are women who know - you know who you are and you know who God is, and that's what keeps you going. I am thankful for all of you good women out there. May God bless you and strengthen you, as I pray he does me. Thank you all for enriching my life!

TAGGED with your middle name

I was Tagged by my friend Annaleesa with the instructions to describe myself with words starting with the letters from my middle name. And then Tag 3 friends.

I suppose I could leave it blank like she did since I wasn't actually given a middle name at birth, but now I have taken on my maiden name as my middle name so I'll use those letters, not necessarily in order, and probably using the first words that come to mind:

No Nonsense
Loving
Optimistic
Sensitive
Energetic

If you don't agree, well come up with something better! I think those fit me, at least most or part of the time!

I tag Tamara, Jessica and Tara. Good luck ladies!

San Diego Surprise

We took a quick weekend trip down to San Diego to surprise Kevin's mom for her birthday April 4. It was my first time to go to San Diego, so I was really excited, even though it was just for the weekend. Kevin arranged everything with Grandpa Dave before we went so he knew we were coming, and when we finally got there around 10:30 pm she was REALLY surprised! We got to see the hummingbird's nest outside their front door, and go to the beach and the San Diego Zoo. It was a short but fun trip.
When we went to the beach we had Allison in the stroller so I didn't really go down to the water, but we had a nice walk and of course Em's favorite part was walking on top of the wall. Any chance she gets she's walking on walls, bricks, stepping stones...
And what kind of beach trip would it be without an ice cream cone? Chocolatey drippy messy yummy ice cream! We also watched the artificial surfing machines going, which I just found out my friend Jessica got to try out on her recent trip to San Diego with her hubby. Lucky!
Saturday we spent the day at the San Diego Zoo. Grandpa Dave was able to get some free tickets from his mom and brother, so we only had to pay for one child admission - awesome! The SD Zoo is really large. The zoo I work at is only 18 acres, and the SD Zoo is around 100 and very hilly. It seemed enormous. They had so many animals that I had never before seen in real life, like polar bears, koalas, and of course, PANDAS! It was exciting. Although I do confess that I was scrutinizing and comparing all their habitats and visitor services the whole time...I concluded that they have a really great zoo, but I like the fact that you can get a lot closer to the animals at our zoo. Yay for us! And it seemed really amusement-park-like. Which I guess some people might really like (all the extra stuff to buy and what not), but it was a little over the top for me. I just like to focus on the animals.

Em was of course fascinated by the map. She had to hold it almost the entire time and pretended (well, in her mind she probably wasn't pretending) that she was finding our way through the huge park. She did a good job, even though she had it upside down most of the time!
And what would be a trip to a big famous zoo without the $10 souvenir cup? Em adored it, and the cool thing was you could get unlimited free refills, even with Icee, so we filled it up about five or six times and felt it was worth the money. Next time we are going to buy one of these on the way in, rather than towards the end!
I don't know why it's so hard for us to get a whole-family photo. I think we have taken maybe one of all of us in the past four months, and I haven't gotten a copy of it from my mom yet. Allison is in the stroller, so this kind of counts I guess.
Besides the zoo, we also got to go out to Hope and Dave's favorite Hawaiian restaurant, tour the Gaslamp district, visit Little Italy, see their new house that they are buying, and enjoy being together. What a great trip. Happy Birthday, Hope!