Pizza for Karen....$10.61

Chinese food for Seth....$10.25
Junkfood run to the corner gas station....$9.67

Making a pregnant woman happy....PRICELESS!

The First 5..... (closed)

Let me explain....I took part in a little crafty pass along my friend did. It goes a little like this:

The first 5 people who comment on this post will receive a little hand-made something from me within the next week or two. But here's the catch, you have to be willing to do it yourself.

This is what a got from my good friend. It's a cute little cupcake stand. I love it.


So have fun, comment, and I don't know what I'm making you yet, but I'm sure you'll love it...and until you get it, you can be thinking what crafty goody you will be passing along!

Boys and Trains and Tape

I love these boys. They are becoming such great friends and I love it. I just had to get a shot of them hanging out together in my big chair. They are so cute!


We have been experimenting with new track formations. It was been really fun. I love the hill we came up with to go from the table to the ground. It really shot the trains down the hill. I think I liked it more than the boys did, although Sam was very excited that we got to use some tape to help hold it together. Tape is his solution to anything right now....making truck and trailers, broker toys, ripped books, broken crackers....

Bangs

Well, I finally did it. I cut bangs. I tried this back in July, but didn't fully commit and they looked terrible. So Saturday I got bored and decided to try it again and fully commit. I cut my own bangs! They aren't perfect, and I'm sure anyone who's a hair stylist looks at them and gasps, but I like them. It's fun to have a new look and try something new. After all, hair grows, right?! :)

I LOVE Church

This last week at church was great. I have been going through a really strong desire to study and read my scriptures and lessons for Sunday. It has been wonderful. I have made it a goal to keep up on Sam's Sunbeam lessons so that I can talk with him about what he is learning and reinforce it. I have also been reading a nursery lesson each week and planning it as my Family Night lesson. Seth has always really been good about getting our lessons read for Elder's Quorum and Relief Society, but I haven't ever done my reading and studying for Sunday School...that is until now.
This year we are studying the Old Testament and believe it or not I am VERY excited about it. I feel like the Old Testament is so foreign to me because it's not scripture that I can jsut sit down and read. I have to really study it and link it with other standard works and modern revalation.
Our ward just called a new teacher and he is amazing. He's the type of teacher that you always wish for because you can tell he prepares, knows his stuff, relys on the Spirit and sticks to the scriptures.
Well, I sat by my new good friend Melissa, who was just baptized this last year and I learned a lot from her. She too had her scriptures out, her lesson guide, and pen. Wow! I thought. Here she is just a "new" member and she knows better than I do how to prepare. I was so grateful I had prepared and that she was able to teach me a great lesson that day. How quickly we forget what's really important and how we should be using our time!
So class was the best I've been to in years. Even though the teacher didn't read all that was assigned, he talked about what we should be getting out of the lesson. It was so nice to know what he was talking about and to be able to contribute because I was prepared. And because I was prepared I was able to gain spiritual knowledge and confidence. That was the best part.
After class I had a few comments about what perspective I had. While this was a compliment, it was a little odd too because I knew that it was just me expressing what I had learned from preparing for the lesson. I know I have gained a lot of knowledge this last week and I want it to continue, so I have to continue to prepare. After all, if ye are prepared, ye shall not fear.

Another fun thing happen on Sunday. I don't know why this always happens, but it seems like all ward choristers go through a phase of wanting to sing Hymns that are not well know. Well, that's what happened. Out closing Hymn was a doosy! I am usually really good about singing even if it's not familiar to me, but I gave up after the first verse. Then Seth and I looked up at the Bishopric and all 3 of them and the High Council rep were all up there repressing giggles and trying to sing. It was so funny. We got their attention and didn't help the fact. It was a fun moment of sillynees together!

You're onry. Make a Treat.

That was more or less what my sweet husband said to me on Sunday.
I was onry. I didn't mean to be. It just kind of happened.
So I did what needed to be done. I made a yummy treat
(My mom gave me for Christmas a "Quick Treat Kit." It was amazing. She is so inspired!).

I know for my New Year's Resolution I said I would not eat sugars or desserts, but I think I need to revise that. I need to eat them VERY sparingly and in moderation. I know that sounds funny, but that's a very hard thing for me.
So here's to hoping this sugar blast helps keep my spirits high! :)

My Little Stars

Star Wars Fest 2010

We're having our first annual M/C Star Wars Marathon. I am sitting here tired as can be and we are only half way done. It's actually been very fun. We've had late nights, fun times, good treats, and we've learned a lot as Seth has been "educating" us on all things Star Wars.
The week has also been complete with a PowerPoint presentation I helped Seth put together about the original Jedi Council members (I can guarantee that is a sentence I would have never said in my life had I not married Seth!). :)

I even built all my Star Wars Mr. Potato Heads for the event! :)

The True Story of Mr. and Mrs. WAM

I just had to get out!
For the first time in literally years I was bored.

Yesterday was a long day. The boys felt it too. So when I got going today I decided to do something about it.
We went to "Grandma's House". Seth's mom wasn't around so we hung out with "Grandpa". It was such a fun day. I love my father-in-law so much. The boys had a great time playing trains with him in his newly "remodeled" train room (Mom M decided to relinquish her dining room to the boys and their trains). Dad M just talked and hung out with me all day. He even took me and Sam out to lunch while James and Mom M took naps.

It was a great time. He of course chose to eat at what he knows to be one of my favorite places to eat....The Cheesecake Factory. It was so da-lish. (I had their new Caramel Chicken-it's to die for)
We had such a good time talking. I learned of his Home Teaching experiences that are near and dear to him and it let me see more into his sweet soul. I then asked him to tell me about how he and Seth's Mom met, since I for some reason had still never heard the story.

It was a great story. It was even better to see and hear him talk about the story and the way he looked and spoke when speaking of Mom M.
Bill (Dad M) worked for a movie theater in Provo to pay his way through BYU. During the summer he was to go up to Idaho to cover for the theater manager there who was going on vacation for a week.
His first day there he saw "a beautiful little blond in a mini-skirt taking tickets" as he tells it. He said she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen and that he knew right away that he was going to marry her. He said "she really did take my ticket that day".
He said he was also drawn to her due to the fact that she wasn't a member of the church (LDS) and so he got the missionaries in there right away. He has always been very missionary minded.
Well, that was the summer that they met and that November they were married. He said it was the same for her too. She got that conformation and knew he was the one.
She moved down to Provo and began at BYU. She got baptized before they were married. They were married in a Presbyterian church, by a Presbyterian minister and were then sealed a little over a year later in February.
So he tells me this story and then says, by the way, did I mention I was engaged when I met Karla (Mom M). I stopped and said, "what?!" He said it all worked out well in the end, after all, how could it not when everyone involved felt the rightness of him and Karla.
To end the story he said, "Every time I see that engagement picture of us I think, how did a goofy looking guy like me get a looker like her."


I loved the day I spent with my father-in-law. It was good to get to know him better and see how alike he and Seth are. They are both such loving, generous, brilliant, missionary minded, valiant men who knew right away who they really were going to marry, even if they had both been engaged before then and didn't hesitate in doing so.....and I'm so grateful neither of them did! :)

Wii love Friends

Funny story....so Seth came home from church and said that my friend Aymee was mad at me because she had been trying to come over and bring us dinner but I didn't ever answer my phone, so he said he invited them over for dinner! :) I was like, okay, so she wanted to bring me dinner, so you invited them over for dinner?! :) But I was very glad he did. We hadn't seen them in so long.
Aymee came over and did most of the cooking and then we had dinner, played the Wii and hung out. It was a great night. I don't think I've laughed that hard in a long time.

I love being around people who I can just be myself with. And Dave and Aymee are defiantely that. I am so grateful for family and friends. I have come to appreciate them all so much more these last few weeks. Just more blessings I am counting....

Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam

Sam is officially a Sunbeam. I can't believe it. He just turned 3 two weeks ago and is now in Primary. It was fun to walk him to Primary. I didn't get to stay and peek on him (my back still didn't want me to be sitting, so it was a short day at church for me), but I thought about him all day.


The neatest thing happened this last week. Sam's teacher, (a great friend and neighbor of ours) Brother Koller, called and told us he would be his teacher, that the lesson was going to be on "I am a Child of God" and he wanted to know a few things about Sam for the lesson. That was so awesome. I loved that he called and I knew he was preparing and excited to teach my son. I was overwhelmed and comforted. I am so thankful for people like Shane who live the gospel, love it, and share it. What an example to me. We are blessed to have him as Sam's teacher.

New Year - New Heights

Seth and I sat down and listed things we wanted to improve on this year. I was especially excited about this because last year was the first year that I actually made one of my goals all the way through the year. It was a great feeling.
I wanted to document our goals better this year because it seems like we always just "talk" about them and forget what they actually were.
We broke them down into the different aspects of our life. I think this will really help us be realistic and better rounded.

Physical
Workout/walk 2-3 times (or more) weekly
Cut out sugars and desserts
Eat out only once a week

Emotional
Date night with spouse twice a month or more
Family dinners at table
Planned weekly family activity
Have someone over for dinner at least twice a month

Spiritual
Read and study Sam’s Primary lesson each week
Kneel for prayers
Family night every Monday night

Financial
Stay within my monthly budget, do not go over
Only spend my money after the 1st of the next month

Wish us luck. We know we will be blessed as we strive to meet these goals. They came with a lot of prayer so we know they are right for us.

Our New Year

We LOVE 2010! Bring it on! We didn't stay up to welcome it. We do that much better by getting a good night sleep and waking up refreshed. We did go to my sister's last night to have dinner and watch some football, but we didn't stay long due to my still uncooperative back.

We woke up and got some breakfast. Our new tradition we decided to start. It was a low key morning at McDonald's which we and the boys loved. We were the only ones in the play-place and that made it so fun.



Later in the day we caught a movie (our other tradition we decided to start). We went and saw The Princess and the Frog with Seth's parents and his niece, Emily. It was a great flick. Disney got some of it's magic back. It was fun to see it and have a new princess to see the little girls googling over! :) I highly recommend it to all. One one who really stole the show though, was Princess Tiana's friend. She was a hoot!

We then finished the night with an amazing train track for Sam to play with. I was pretty impressed with myself (just tooting my own horn). We used as much space, track, and trains as we could! He was in heaven.

2009 in Review

2009 Was an amazing year. As I thought about it I just wanted to go through and refelct, record, and count my blessings. It's been quite an adventure looking back and it's taking longer than I thought, but here are the pieces as I get to them...
My life is definaltely more organized and recorded from Easter on. That's when I started blogging. I am grateful for this blog. It has been a great way to keep a "journal" and keep in touch with my close family and friends. Through it I have learn the value of keeping a record of my family.

January...

February...

March...

April...
we had a great Easter at Bear Lake with Tressa


May...

June...

July...
found us in Palm Springs for a T family reunion

Sam had his first moving-going experience (Ice Age 3)

and James first steps

August...
brought us fun trips to Lagoon

family passes to fun places around (like Thanksgiving point)

play dates outside

sleepovers with cousins

James' first haircut

and Seth's birthday


September...
brought morning walks

James' first birthday

and great times in Bear Lake, including the boy's first boat ride


October...
Grandpa M introduces the boys to his train collection

our first Pumpkin Patch experience

Sam's first play date

and a great Halloween with Thomas the Train and Donald Duck


November...
Makiah's Baptism

the chair war

and an amazing week at Disney world with Seth's family


December...
Sam's third birthday

our first visit to the Festival of Trees

drives all over to see Christmas Lights

making and eatting lots of yummy treats

parties and Santa

and a wonderful morning of family and presents

New Year's Eve (from a horizontal point of view)

Well, it's New Year's Eve and I am still flat on my back. It's been almost a week and my back is still out of commission from whatever happened to me on Christmas day. Thankfully I have the most amazing husband in the world who has completely taken over and been the best Mr. Mom and husband ever. I can't believe how great he has been...and it's not because of him that I haven't realized that, it's because of me.
I have learned a VERY VERY important lesson from all of this. Not just the obvious "take better car of yourself", but the more important one...I need and love my husband even more than I've realized lately. I have just gotten myself so busy that I have done everything myself and not allowed Seth to be the amazing man he is. My love and affection for him has grown so much this week.
He has picked up, carried, cleaned, done laundry, bathed the kids, run errands, made food, did dishes, helped me dress, brought me anything I could possibly need, scolded me whenever I tried to get up and do something.....
I am so blessed to have such a wonderful, worthy, strong man love me. He is the best man, friend, father, and husband. I am so grateful I have eternity with him, because anything less wouldn't be enough.