October 2012

 October started off with a weekend visit from my brother Scott, his wife Kelli, their two kids Landon & Alivia, and Kelli's parents, John & Terri.  This is Landon above riding a pony at Gardner Village.  He loved it!  We had such a great time with them!  They got here Thursday night.  Friday we went to Gardner Village, the Church Art Museum downtown, the LDS Visitors center to see the temple replica and to the temple for Mike to tell us all about the symbolism on the outside of the Salt Lake temple.  It was really fun and the babies were so good about missing naps and getting drug all around.  We really liked getting to know Kelli's parents, they were super easy guests and so gracious.
One of the main reasons they all came was to participate in General Conference.  On Saturday there are two, 2 hour session of Conference.  We watched the morning one from home and then the afternoon one we went down to the Conference Center with Scott & Kelli and Kelli's parents watched all the kids!!  It was so amazing to be there and hear our Prophet speak and the Apostles.  The Spirit was so strong and I knew their words were true.  President Monson said in his talk on Sunday:  "We are familiar with the truth found in 2 Nephi in the Book of Mormon: “Men are, that they might have joy.”I testify that much of that joy comes as we recognize that we can communicate with our Heavenly Father through prayer and that those prayers will be heard and answered—perhaps not how and when we expected they would be answered, but they will be answered and by a Heavenly Father who knows and loves us perfectly and who desires our happiness.
Wow, have I ever seen that over and over again in my life.  Many times my prayers have been answered in unexpected ways.  I am so grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who knows me and hears my prayers.  I see His hand in my life every day.

 Ok, here we are in the blazing sunlight.  We can't bear to hardly look forward.  Tommy just gave up and closed his eyes tight!  This is at Gardner Village.

 Here is Erica holding sweet sweet baby Alivia.  She is the most feminine sweet little girl and it wont be long and she and Emmy will be playing dress up together.

 Landon and Bryant had so much fun together.  Bryant loves younger kids so much!  He is a wonderful big brother!

 October was hard as we saw my Grandma Helen deteriorating and letting go of life.  She passed away on October 4th.  A year and a half ago Grandma had a stroke and then she fell and broke her hip.  That put her down in a bad way.  She was in a rehab center for months and then sent home in a wheel chair.  She went from the bed to the wheelchair and back to the bed for the last year and a half.  It was so hard for me to see her like that.  That wasn't the Grandma I remembered.  It truly was a blessing that she could pass on to the next life because her quality of life was so poor.  She was 87 and had lived a long good life.  Her funeral was a celebration of her life and I know that she loved watching it from heaven.
I love and miss her so much.  I grew up in the same town with her and Grandpa.  That was a special treat to live so close to Grandma's house!  My Dad is the oldest of 7 children.  Our family was the only one that lived in the same town with Grandma Helen and Grandpa Jess.  We had countless visits with Grandma and Grandpa.  I remember tea parties, dress ups, tire swings, and playing in the yard for hours at their house growing up.  I remember one day as a teenager going in the basement with Grandma Helen and she started pulling out all of her material.  She went through each piece one by one and told me what it had been intended for and where she found it.  I remember getting bored but now I look back on that time as a treasured memory with just the two of us. We had countless meals, walks and visits together.  One time my sister Holli and I took a trip with Grandma Helen to Las Vegas to stay with our cousins the Goddards.  We had such a fun time.  It was definitely a childhood highlight.
Grandma Helen was a wise woman who always tried to follow the example of Jesus Christ.  She often quoted poetry.  She loved to sing and teach me how to harmonize.  She loved music and much of her funeral was music.  My Dad spoke and did such an amazing job.  He talked about different trials Grandma faced in her life and how no matter how hard they were, she always stayed faithful to her Heavenly Father and her Savior, Jesus Christ.  I certainly miss her and will until we meet again in Heaven.

 Here is Bryant, Anders and Mons at the church in the cultural hall after the funeral and luncheon.

 Here is my Dad's family from left to right:  Richard, Marilee, David, Janet, Dad, Mom, Grandpa Jess, Ann, Louise, Patrick, Marilyn, Kathy & Steven.

 Here's my immediate family with many of us missing!  If you can believe it we are a group of 41 people now!  That's just my parents, siblings and nieces and nephews!  I'm not even going to try to name everyone in this picture!  There we are on the far left.

 The babies stayed at my parents house all day.  I knew I would enjoy the funeral and all that went along with it much better without them.

 This is Mons, Anders, Maryjane, Anna, Kennedy, Brynn, Erica & Quincy.

 These are my sister Tamara's girls, Quincy & Kennedy.  They stayed at Grandma's house all week with us and played with Bryant & Erica.  My kids were in heaven!  They LOVE Quincy & Kennedy!!!  It was Kennedy's birthday so we had a party!!!!

What is Bryant doing?!?!  That's cute Erica!

 Here's our Tommy Boy after a bath!  We are at Grandma & Grandpa's house.  He is really really happy to have my lip gloss double fisted!  I laugh every time I see this picture!

 Wow, don't mess with me.  If he could talk he's saying, "Mommy, don't even THINK about taking your lip gloss away from me!"

 So after a week in AZ Julie got to come home with me and spend 2 more weeks!!!!  Here we are together at "Time Out for Women" put on by Deseret Book.  Mike's Aunt Virginia Pearce spoke at it about forgiveness.  It was an amazing two days and a great break from the kiddos!  Erica and Bryant said, "What Mommy, you are going to time out?!?!"  Yep, just for me!  We had a great time and I am glad Julie was here to go with me.  We also went with Jane, Jodi, Jennie & Ruthie.

 Happy Halloween!!!!  This is the school parade.  They walk by so fast I barely got spiderman's picture!

 Erica is a vampire.  I didn't edit the red eye on purpose!  I must tell a story about this black wig she is wearing.  Julie and I picked it out together.  Julie is such a tease and she suggested that I put it on just before the kids got home from school and act like nothing was different.  So, I did.  I wish I had a hidden camera!  Their reaction was nothing like I expected it to be.  I opened the front door to welcome them home and they both melted!  Erica came up to me and hit me and shouted at me "I hate you!"  Then she started crying.  Bryant sat on the ground and said, "Oh Mommy, it's awful!  Did they do that to you at the salon?!"  Julie then came up behind me and snatched the wig off my head.  We all started laughing so hard!!!  Here Erica had tears on her cheeks and she was laughing SO loud and hard!  It was such a dramatic experience!  I will never forget it!  Guess I better never dye my hair black!  Bryant was really cute and explained 4 times about how Erica really doesn't hate me, she just hated that black hair!  It was so cute of him to be so sensitive.  Great joke Julie!!!

 Two little pumpkins!!!!  After I got their costumes on they started hugging each other over and over again.  It was SOOOO cute!!!!

 More hugs!

I'm so glad they love each other.  I guess getting into pumpkin costumes is a traumatic experience and they needed to share in the pain.  I think Tommy is saying, "Hey Emmy, isn't this awful?  Don't smile at her!  She did this to us you know!"

 Here are my two little pumpkins!!!  Every year we have a Halloween dinner here with Mike's family.  This year the weather was so beautiful we did a backyard bbq!  I grilled for the first time in my life!  Mike always does it, but he had to work up until dinner, so I had to fire up the grill.  I was a little stressed about that part.  I tried to light the grill but it didn't work, and it didn't work, and it wasn't lighting!  I was getting stressed!  A fervent prayer was heard from above and finally I got the grill lit and the burgers and dogs were delicious!!!  But I will still leave the grilling to the man of the house.

 She makes a cute pumpkin with that orange hair!!!!

 He is such a little love.

 The twins usually wear leather bottomed shoes.  So I put these black shoes on Tommy for the first time that night and he froze!  He refused to take a step in them, it was so funny to watch!  He even resorted to crawling!

 Emmy Doll & Julie.

 Here are the 4 munchkins!  I love how Bryant is holding Emmy.  She doesn't look very excited about it.  Tommy's costume also came with striped tights but I had to leave the boy some dignity and just put him in black pants.

 Halloween night was such great weather. The high was almost 72 that day.  We had a great time walking the neighborhood and seeing friends.

 Here is Erica with her friend Clara.  Clara is dressed as a pumpkin vine.  Very creative.

He looks like such a concerned little citizen!  He's wondering what he's doing in this "get up" and why he's out so late, in the dark!  Oh, and it's not like anyone's giving ME any candy!

 Two little pumpkins sitting in the double stroller!

 It was sooooo hard to get a good pic of these two together.  They love to run away and wiggle!  I think this was the best shot of them together all night.

 Happy Happy Birthday Julie!!!  We got to celebrate with her last year as well!  We took the kids to Hotel Transylvannia, had a treasure hunt for her presents and then went to Chili's for dinner.  Then we had banana cream pie for dessert!  And with Julie around, of course we played a few rounds of Rook!

Bryant loves Julie's tickles and Erica loves Julie's nightly stories.  We miss you Julie!!!

 I love to pull out the camera when they are naked in a diaper!!  It's only for a few seconds a day before I dress them, I promise this isn't how they hang out all day, but it's a great picture moment!

 Big Boy!!!!  Tommy now says:  nigh nigh, Dada, Mama, and Uh oh.

 These two love each other so much!  Tommy just sees Bryant and starts laughing.

 Double trouble right here!!  These two couldn't care less about their toys.  They just want to empty drawers and cupboards and my pantry!!!!  They empty it and I put it back, that's our song and dance around here!

 Say what?!  She now says:  Night night, all done, uh oh so sad, Mama, Dada & Hi!  Why would she say "Uh oh so sad?"  That's what I say when she gets into something she shouldn't.  I really try to let my babies do almost everything but I have a few things that are off limits, like opening the oven, climbing on top of the dishwasher when it's open and playing in the fireplace.  Beyond that they are pretty free.  If they get into one of these three "no no's" I sing an uh oh so sad song and put them in their crib for a minute.  They catch on real fast and point to the thing they shouldn't do and say, "uh oh so sad" and walk away.  It's too cute!!!

They look SO BIG!!!!!  They are growing up too fast!!!!!  They are such toddlers now and I can't get over it!  How did they grow so fast?!?!  Obviously they are good eaters.  They love cereal, fruit, cheese, beans, yogurt, meat, soft veggies, crackers, bread and milk!  These two peanuts make every day better!