Digital scrapbooking

My friend Heather inspired me to make a new chore chart. The last one I made for my kids was just words because I didn't have any cute stickers or graphics (these are from The Lily Pad). I'm going to laminate them and then they can make x's on the empty spaces when they have completed their tasks. I'm really hoping to help them develop some good habits. So far we are hit and miss, which I know is my fault, I'm hoping this will help us all be more consistent.


I am teaching a photoshop elements class for a Relief Society enrichment activity so I have been putting together a class outline. The above page of Charlie was the result of me learning about masking - what an awesome time saving feature that I never knew about. This pink page below of Becca is my sample of what we will learn to do in the class. Since it is a beginning class I made up most of the page and the class will just learn how to add a photo and the text. If any one sticks with the class then I will show more details and skills.


However, today I found a great resource for those of us who are trying to learn digital scrapbooking using photoshop elements. Two Peas in a Bucket (a digi scrapbook website) has free video tutorials which are amazing. On the right side of the page is a section called class lessons and so far they have 7 lessons posted. It is incredible to watch someone doing it rather than trying to read it out of a book, or even someones post online. My skill level has increased much just today from watching some of those videos.

super hero

Tom is a funny boy - very creative and imaginative. The green thing on his face is from a two pack of juice bottles and even when it was still on the bottles he saw the possibilities a green piece of plastic had. He was carrying the green thing around and asked me for some tape. Next thing I knew he had it safely taped to his face and was a super hero - it was just bonus that his shirt matched his mask - made it look like an authentic outfit. He made me take pictures of him from all sides (thus the shot of the back of his head). I was surprised at how well scotch tape held that on his face - it didn't come off until he pulled it off.

Tom really is a super kid - he loves to be helpful. Right now his big thing is his birthday - which isn't until July, but talking to him you would think his birthday is next week. Every day he tells me the details of his birthday party - a pinata, swimming, birthday cake, camping out, cousins, etc. - and that he is so excited that he will get transformers for his birthday.
Tom also really loves his preschool and every day that it is not preschool (Sun, Mon, Wed, Fri, Sat) he is counting down to when preschool is (Tue, Thur). I'm surprised that he is still so excited every time for preschool.

The next big holiday around here is St. Patricks day. I don't know about the rest of you, but I have never really made a big deal out of St. Patricks, but looks like this year we are going to go all out. Last week when were at Target the boys convinced me that they needed green shirts for St. P - they did not want to get pinched and they didn't want a shirt that just had some green on it, they needed green shirts. Target only had one green shirt to choose from - so they got matching green shirts. Today Charlie informed me that he wants to have a party on St. Patricks and have all the cousins come - I'm not much of a party person, so they will have to convince dad to help them put a party together.

Sunshine and warm weather

The sunshine and warm weather has gotten us outside, therefore my house is a mess and I am never at the computer anymore. Tuesday the kids and I spent the afternoon in the "jungle" - an empty lot kiddie-corner behind us. The neighbor next to the empty lot has a trampoline and let the kids jump on it. Today we (except for Charlie, who was at school today) spent the afternoon at the park with my cousin Annie and her baby, Ellie. After we picked Charlie up from school and he found out we had spent the afternoon at the park he also wanted to go the park, so I obliged - I didn't want to go home and have to face the mess - it is seriously bad - tomorrow I'm dedicating the day to cleaning the house (the kids are grounded tomorrow - so they have nothing else to do anyway, except help me clean).
Yesterday afternoon was spent at the dentist. Poor Charlie, who has already had two molars pulled had to have another tooth pulled and a silver cap put on the tooth behind that one. His molars are nothing but trouble. The dentist is doubting how long the silver cap will save that tooth - it might have to be pulled before it's natural time to fall out. I'm hoping the problem is just with his baby teeth and that his permanent teeth won't be so troublesome - but seeing that my molars are all fake or full of fillings isn't a good omen for him.

My sister Susan has been in Hawaii for the past week (hi Sue) - how lovely would that be - a week in the beautiful tropics with no concerns or responsibilities. A vacation sounds very nice about now - except, as much as I love and adore my children it would have to be a kidless vacation. Jeremy and I took a kidless vacation 3 years ago (when I was pregnant with Becca) to the California coast and the Sequoias - it was a great vacation. The year after that we went with kids (and Aunt Deb along to help us with the 3 kids) to San Diego and Sea World. I love San Diego - that was our third time there - and that is still where I would like to go on another vacation. Jeremy thinks he would like to go on our next vacation to Disneyland - I'm not sure I'm ready for that. Last year, as a test run, we took our kids to the Lagoon. It was great and we had a lot of fun, so I'm not sure what my hesitation is about Disneyland - well, except for the cost. I figure, well the kids loved the Lagoon, it was fun, they want to go again, why not just go to the Lagoon - I just have a hard time shelling out so much money for an amusement park. Of course I've never been to Disneyland before, but can it really be worth that much more money?

Create

There are some really beautiful videos out that combine music, pictures and the words of the apostles that really bring a new depth of meaning and inspiration to the words and message of the apostles.
This video is from Elder Uchtdorfs message last fall at the womens sessions of conference about creating as a means of finding joy.

Too funny - Too bad it's true

I had to share what I found on someone else's blog about the stimulus package:

Sometime this year, taxpayers will receive an Economic Stimulus Payment. This is a very exciting new program that I will explain using the Q and A format:

Q. What is an Economic Stimulus Payment? A. It is money that the federal government will send to taxpayers.

Q. Where will the government get this money? A. From taxpayers.

Q. So the government is giving me back my own money? A. No, they are borrowing it from China . Your children are expected to repay the Chinese.

Q. What is the purpose of this payment? A. The plan is that you will use the money to purchase a high-definition TV set, thus stimulating the economy.

Q. But isn't that stimulating the economy of China ? A. Shut up.

Below is some helpful advice on how to best help the US economy by spending your stimulus check wisely:
If you spend that money at Wal-Mart, all the money will go to China .
If you spend it on gasoline it will go to Hugo Chavez, the Arabs and Al Queda
If you purchase a computer it will go to Taiwan .
If you purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico , Honduras , Chile , and Guatemala .
If you buy a car it will go to Japan and Korea .
If you purchase prescription drugs it will go to India and Canada .
If you purchase heroin it will go to the Taliban in Afghanistan .
If you give it to a charitable cause, it will go to Nigeria .

Tom and Becca

How Do I Love Thee

Here is a beautiful video perfect for Valentines Day

You can do hard things

If you think you can't do hard things, think again. Watch Nick and he'll show you that trusting in God makes all the difference.

Marriage

I read an article by Oliver DeMille in which he talked about marriage as the central relationship in society. He quoted a journalist that said that women with children think of themselves first and foremost as mothers. This is confusion. If you are married with children, you are first and foremost a wife.
This statement got me thinking - do I put my role as wife first? With four young children they are quite vociferous in their demand of my attention. I know that sometimes my husband wonders where he fits in. Fortunately we do have a built in babysitter (my dear sister Debbie lives with us) which allows us the flexibility to leave in the evenings after the children are in bed.

I watched a movie last week - "Fireproof" which was about a married couple that was ready to call it quits when the husband's dad asked him to take the Love Dare - a forty day journey to love and serve his wife with no expectations of her. This movie really got me thinking about my commitment of serving my husband. My husband is good at serving me and thanking me and showing such kindnesses. This morning, after working a 12 hour night shift, he cleaned the whole kitchen, loaded the dishwasher, washed the hand dishes, wiped the counters and swept the floors - what a fabulous thing to wake up to - a clean kitchen - a bouquet of flowers couldn't have been more beautiful.

On a scrapbook blog that I visit she mentioned that her mother had a tradition of doing the "14 days of Valentines" where she would do one thing each day on the days leading up to Valentines Day. I thought this was a great idea. I've never made too big of a deal out of Valentines - but I think it's time I started - a time to go the extra mile in showing my love how much I love and appreciate him.

Happy Groundhog Day

Baby Lydia is wishing you a "cool" day.

These photos are courtesy of 4 yr old Tom (who is convinced that on his next birthday he is turning eight. In fact, today he had a tape measure he was using to measure how old the other kids were). Tom put the sunglasses on Lydia and then insisted that I take a picture. I told him to go get the camera for me and when he came back he decided he needed to be the one to take the picture - he then proceeded to take pictures of many other things around the house. Kids love cameras. I love digital cameras - I would never have let him run around the house taking pictures of whatever he wanted with a film camera. Digital is fun because they can see on the camera screen what they took a picture of and then the pictures can be loaded on the computer for them to see their artistic work - all at no cost.


So, my challenge for myself is to eat wholegrain breakfast, which is going great, but dinner was a little lacking. Jeremy went to work tonight before I made dinner, so I gave the kids leftover macaroni, which they love, but I do not, so I didn't eat anything. I didn't know what I was in the mood for, I did eat a slice of bread. So, just now, realizing that I didn't have dinner I settled for a cup of hot cocoa and will call that good enough for tonight. I'm too "moody" sometimes when it comes to eating and fixing food. The rare times that I make a weekly dinner menu I don't usually stick to it. I wish I had a gizmo like the Jetsons had - like a vending machine, but for dinner, type in the code and walla - dinner.

I'd really be fine if our bodies only required feeding once a day, or maybe once a week.
Have you ever pondered why eating is so constant - I mean, we only go to church once a week, why not only eat once a week. I actually have pondered on this before, and as much as I would like to give up eating I know that there is purpose in the need for "constant nourishment" for our physical bodies. The Doctrine and Covenants tells us that all things physical are spiritual also. The constant need for physical nourishment is a reminder of the constant nourishment that our spirit also needs. I enjoy spiritual nourishment and meal planning more than I do physical, however, I still find the same struggle with getting it in - ie, making it a priority.
I think my next challenge will focus on spiritual nourishment.

Joyful baby Lydia

Return to Health - Challenge 1

In effort to achieve more energy and health I've decided I need "progress" (my goal for this year) points of small things I can add to my daily routine.

For this week and maybe the next few week my challenge is:

Eat whole grains for breakfast

I am a cereal lover and could eat it every meal let alone every morning for breakfast. Now, potentially, there is nothing wrong with cereal, but as the start to the day and as a mainstay food it falls short in the nutrition category. I'm sure there are healthy, wonderful cereals that categorize as whole grain (like All-Fiber, but seriously, who could really eat that every day - gag).
What I mean by whole grains is "whole" as in not processed - which even rolled oats are stretching it because they are processed - they are rolled. The more whole version of rolled oats are steel cut oats, which, by the way, are 10 times better than rolled oats - I felt so jipped when I found out about steel cut oats. All this time I thought I hated oatmeal, but really I just don't prefer rolled oats that are cooked.

So far one of my favorite whole grains that I've found is actually a medley of grains - corn, wheat, oats, nuts, dried fruit - it's called "Dee's Cereal" and I buy it at Harmons. Because all the grains are cut small (not processed, just cut) it cooks quickly. My kids love oatmeal and whole wheat pancakes, so that is what I usually feed them.

So here's to my first challenge - if you like, join with me on my adventure and we'll do this together. Let me know what other great breakfast options there are - what are your favorites.

Hair and kids

Lydia in her new bouncer - she loves it for about 5 minutes at a time - then she wants to be held again.
Look at that sweet face - she is so adorable!





















Jeremy currently has a beard. I love it, but he continuously is threatening to shave it off. He has such a baby boy face that the beard makes him look more like a man. Either way - he is a handsome man and I love him.






I got my hair cut last week - I wasn't going for that short of a cut - but I'm glad it ended up that short - I love it! It is super easy to do and stays looking nice the whole day. When I had long hair it always ended up pulled back in a pony tail sooner or later.






My children are ever adventurous and last week decided to rearrange their room. Charlie took his mattress off the top of the bunkbed and put his shelves and some chairs on the platform. His mattress is on the floor, where it has stayed since last week and so far they still like the arrangement. With his mattress on the floor there isn't much floor space left. This arrangement might end sooner than later because it is starting to bug me - I don't like stepping on the mattress to get to the window and to get to the dresser.

Friend magazine online

Have you seen the new options for the online Friend magazine
It now has interactive online things for kids to do - color, listen to stories, games, etc. I had a fun time using the online coloring - try it out.
The Friend is the greatest resource - I am just starting to realize the possibilities. The other day Charlie and I did the mystery word hunt at the back of the January 2009 Friend. It was great, not only as an activity to do together, but it gave him great practice with the alphabet and putting words together - what a fun way for him to learn.

Our open house trip

We had a wonderful time last week going to the Draper Temple open house. To read the details of the event click on the scrapbook page picture and it will come up big in a new page and you can read what I journaled there.


Besides that, there isn't much new to write about. We've been keeping it pretty low key here. I've been so tired lately and we haven't done much of anything - no park days, no library time, not really much of anything.

Wacky Hair

This picture page was really fun to put together. It's fun to explore photoshop elements and try new things. I'm also excited that this layout is all my own design - the layout I was using as inspiration looks nothing like what I came up with, but I couldn't get my pictures to work for the other layout and instead of starting over I just moved around the pictures and added borders and shadows until I created something that looked good to me.

The pictures are from a couple weeks ago when Jeremy was washing the kids. Usually the kids scream and hate when he washes their hair (I would too, he pours the water over the top of their head while they are still sitting up and it runs all down their face. I always have them lay back so the water doesn't get in their face). Well, in effort to prompt more fun and cooperation of the ordeal he gave them mohawks - which they loved. Tom still asks if I will do a mohawk for him with the hair gel so that he can wear his hair for the day like that - I tell him that is just for tubby time fun.

Winter Days

Yesterday was a gorgeous day and today is too - I LOVE sunny, warm days that are reminiscent of summer days. Now that Jeremy is working nights (and sleeping days) he is home in the afternoon. Yesterday afternoon we took the kids to the park and played for 3 hours. It was almost 60 degrees and the kids didn't even wear jackets. This is why I love living in St. George - not for the summers that are 115, but for the winters that are a sunny 60.







We are taking our kids to the Draper Utah Temple open house on Friday. The open house starts this Thursday and goes through the middle of March. I was sad that I missed the Rexburg Temple open house last year, so although Draper isn't near and dear to my heart the same way Rexburg is, it will still be wonderful to have the opportunity to take the kids through the Temple so that they can experience the Spirit of the Temple. Last night when I asked Charlie if he would like to go to the open house his eyes got really big, and he nodded his head up and down and finally he said, "yeah, that would be so cool". I'm hoping that the weather will be sunny and warm on Friday -our ticket time is in the morning, and we southerners aren't used to the cold.

Word of the Year

I found my word of the year! My goals summed up into one word. This year I'm not looking to achieve anything or check things off my list (things never leave the "list" they just get put back to the bottom or where ever - nothing is ever done). Last fall Charlie had gymnastic classes and the teacher would always say "Practice makes progress". That makes so much more sense than "practice makes perfect", which feels so unattainable, but to know that we can improve and become better - that is a worthy goal.

So my goal this year is to make progress - to improve and become a little better than I was last year.

2009 FHE lessons for the whole year

I've already sent an email to many of you with this file of family home evenings for the year. For the rest of you here is the link to the website that posted this great resource.
I'm using it in conjunction with my idea of having a scripture hero of the month. I'm not using the FHE lessons in the order presented, rather I am rearranging them to fit with the Hero of the month. I'm not finished planning out the whole year but so far I have my "hero" of the month and their "power" outlined, I just have to finish detailing which lessons go with each one.
Jan - Nephi - power of Obedience
Feb - Alma the younger - power of Repentance
Mar - King Benjamin - power of Service and Gratitude
Apr - Abinidai, power of Faith in Christ
May - Alma, power of Baptism
Jun - Ammon, power of Missionary Work
Jul - Captain Moroni, power of Example
Aug - Enos, power of Prayer
Sept - Mormon - power of Hope and Charity
Oct - Moroni, power of Testimony
Nov - Brother of Jared - power of Family
Dec - Jesus Christ - power of Doing the Father's Will

The plan is to each week of that particular month focus on learning more about each of these Book of Mormon people, specifically focusing on their "power" and how we can implement these in our own lives.

P.S. the download from that website it formatted funny. I've already gone through and made changes so it downloads better. If you don't want to have to reformat it all send me a message with your email and I will email you my copy.

Pictures of the Moon

I took these pictures of the moon this morning at 8:30 am. It was a beautiful morning and I almost didn't take the time away from making breakfast to stop and take a few pictures. I'm glad I did, because it wasn't much longer after I took the shots that it was too light and the moon could no longer be seen. Interesting that the difference between able to take a picture like this or missing it is only a few minutes. That is one thing I have noticed with taking pictures in general - photo moments are just that, moments or less and if you miss it you miss it and can't recreate it. The moral of this story is, take the shot while you can.

Today

Tom, aka. Max
The first picture is Tom, who is endlessly changing his name. A few weeks ago his recent "new" name was "Max" as shown by the letters on his forehead. He found some letter stickers and put them on his forehead - "so people know my name" he declared. Of course, why not, maybe we should all paste our names on our foreheads. I know it would help me out very much - I am so bad with names. Even with people who I know, I still will blank on people's names time to time.
The stickers from Tom's forehead were transferred to his Christmas stocking so that Santa would know his new name and be able to give "Max" Tom's gifts.




Today was the first day since in a while that I got out my camera. I wanted to take a picture of our new fish tank that we bought at the DI last night. We got two goldfish months ago and they lived just fine in a small fish bowl. Last night when we were at the DI Jeremy found this fish tank, with all the "trimmings" for $20 and decided that since he was the one who loved and cared for our fish, by weekly cleaning their tank, then he could be the one to decide that not only were the fish worthy of a larger tank, but they should also get some friends. We didn't buy any new fish last night, but I'm sure that will happen soon.

Our Fish
It's true, that if it weren't for Jeremy cleaning out the fish bowl they would either be swimming in the dirtiest water ever, or they would be dead. I figure I have enough to do without having to clean a fish bowl.
Our fish are strange fish. When they lived in their small bowl I noticed that when I would feed them they would swim to the bottom of the bowl and then wait until I was out of sight until they would come up and eat. They did not like to be watched when they were eating. Now that they have lots of room to roam and places to hide it is even more evident that they do not like to be watched. When anyone comes near by they dart back and forth very quickly and then "hide" by the plant. I say "hide" because it isn't really hiding at all. They turn their face toward the plant, but it's not like they go behind it or in the middle of it, they just face it and then just sit there until we walk away. I never knew that fish could be so entertaining. It really is interesting to observe them.

Becca

Becca is a joy! She is two years old, so she also can be a handful - always getting into things and always wanting to do things herself - "I do it" and "I did it" are two of the most common things she says.
Becca is so cute with baby Lydia. She can't quite say Lydia, it sounds more like "I deea" and Becca loves to say "I deea, no, no, no" and gibber at her and try to get her to laugh. Becca talks a mile a minute and has lots of stories to tell, we just can't understand her, as grandpa Scott says, who knows what language she is speaking.
Becca loves to sing. At church she will hold the hymnbook (sometimes upside down) and sing "la, la" during the songs. Her favorite song is "I love to see the Temple" and she sings along and knows almost all of the words. At bedtime she has us sing that song to her over and over and over again.
When she says "no" she has the cutest and funniest inflection in her voice - like when we are looking at a book and I ask her a question she loves to answer "no", but it's the way that she says it is so cute and funny - and the face that she makes when she says it.

Happy New Year

After I posted this the first time I was playing around in photoshop and trying new things and completely changed the scrapbook page from the original - first one (which is the one I played around with) is more dramatic than what I usually do, but I like it.

Using a tutorial that my neighbor Allison gave me I made the "slide" template and then put my photos in the slide to make this scrapbook page. Making the slide template was easy and just took a couple minutes. It's fun to learn new things and be able to create my own things to use on my scrapbook pages.

Happy New Year to all. I never did do any Christmas cards to anyone - so don't feel bad if you didn't get one - no one did.

I'm excited for the newness of the new year. I like to take time thinking about what I want to have happen in this next year.

One goal I have for this next year is to work on gaining the skill of storytelling - in order to not only tell existing stories, but also to make up stories. Currently I don't have a skill for telling stories and I've decided it is a skill I would like to develop, so thus my goal to work on it in this new year.

I find that I have an easier time planning FHE if I have an outline of what to focus and then just fill in the blanks of what to do each Monday. This year I'm borrowing an idea I read somewhere to have Book of Mormon Hero's for each month and then break it off in subtopics. For instance, January the hero is Nephi and some of the subtopics are - Nephi followed the prophet (so the lesson would be about prophets), Nephi kept a record (ie, journal), Nephi kept the commandments. One reason this idea of Heros works for me is because of my boys and they are at the superhero age, so it seems nice to help them have heros that are definitely worth looking up to.

Baptism

Last month my niece and nephew, Kayla and William Smyth were baptised. It was the week before Thanksgiving and all my family was able to be there - it's been three years since the last time we were all together.
So even though, at this Christmas time we are not able to be all together, we were recently all together and it was wonderful!

Tomorrow night we will be with Jeremy's family at his parents in Pine Valley (where all the snow is).

Snow Bunnies

We went to Pine Valley (45 minutes north) Wednesday night and stayed all day Thursday. We were out on a drive Wednesday afternoon looking at the little bit of snow that dusted the mountains in Ivins, just west of St George, when we decided to go to Pine Valley to stay the night. We called Jeremy's mom to see if it was okay to come for the night, she said yes, just come as soon as possible because the snow was really coming down and it would be dark soon. Because it would have added 45 minutes (or more) to go home, grab supplies (like coats and pajamas) we decided to just stop at the grocery store and get some diapers and then head to Pine Valley. That is one reason for the lack of warm clothes on my children (as pictured) when they went out to play in the abundant snow on Thursday. Even if we had gone home we wouldn't have had too much more proper snow clothes, but the kids do have warm winter coats, we just didn't have them on when we went for a "car ride" that turned into staying the night at grandma's house. The snow boots are ours, but the hats and scarves are courtesy of grandma (she even made them).

Giving to those who need this Christmas

There is a story "The Secret Giver" in this month's Friend magazine about a family who secretly gives gifts to a family in need. My boys really liked this story and are planning who they want to give to and what they want to give. A few weeks ago I told my kids that we wouldn't be buying any extras any more (like the occasional happy meal, or toy from the dollar store) I told them that Christmas would be coming soon and we need to save our money to buy gifts. Yesterday they asked if we could have happy meals for lunch (which it isn't really the "meal" that they want, just the toy that comes with the meal. Someone once said, "It isn't the toy that comes free, it's the meal that comes free with the toy you paid for"). I asked them if they remembered what I had told them a few weeks ago. Tom got all excited and said, "Oh yeah, we have to save money to buy our secret gifts to give".
To help with keeping the true spirit of Christmas we have been doing an activity in this months Friend, Stories of Jesus, Tell Them to Me, which lists a scripture story and picture from the GAK, one to do each day of this month. We are also learning the song "Picture a Christmas". I am recently called as the primary song leader so I figure I need to practice with my kids to learn how to best teach the song to the other primary kids - it gives me a chance to have a live audience to work with, rather than having to practice in the mirror or something.

Lydia's baby blessing

I never did get a picture of Lydia in her blessing dress. She wore the same dress that I wore for my blessing and the same dress that Becca wore. I never got a picture of Becca in it either. The dress is still draped over her bassinet waiting for my good intentions of putting her back in it to take a picture. Both girls got rashes on their face the day of their blessing and the commonality is the dress. I think Lydia is too big to wear it anymore - she is only 3 months old but moving into size 6 months. I guess I should at least try.

Temples

I found these photos online and thought they were beautiful and needed to be shared.

What is your favorite season

Yesterday I bought a Circle Journal and the idea is to share the journal back and forth between two (or more) people. I bought it to share with my husband. I find it easier to write what I'm thinking than to share it outloud sometimes, so I thought this would great for sharing things with my husband that I might not otherwise share.

That is what I love about blogs - a place to share our thoughts that we might not otherwise vocalize and we can see into others and come to know them and their hearts. I'm glad for those that let me in on their thoughts and their lives - I'm glad to be a part of yours and to let you be a part of mine.

I thought I would share my journal entry today "What is your favorite season of the year". If you like either respond back in the comment section or put a post on your own blog.

"My favorite season of the year is this season - whatever time of year it is, the current season is my favorite. When fall begins I think, "Oh, I love fall." I love it getting colder, I love the pretty color changes of the trees, I love the wrm days and cold nights, I love the smell in the air.
When winter comes I think, "Oh, I love winter". I love the beauty of snow blanketing the ground, I love the winter holidays - the energy of the season, the smells of baking, the tastes of hot chocolate, the sights of decorations, the sounds of music and the feeling of love. Winter means time indoors, together as a family, playing games, eating together, celebrating together, and warm, cozy fires.
Then comes spring and I thing, "Oh, I love Spring". I am so happy to see the snow melt and the buds on the trees - new life is on its way. Spring is refreshing and invigorating. I love spring flowers - the colors, the smells. Growing up lilacs were my favorites, I would gather armloads and bring them to my bedroom and let the scent fill the air.
Summer comes quickly after spring (at least in St. George) and I think "Oh, I love summer". Summer is for fun and outdoor play, for baseball games and water fights, swimming and hotdogs, for staying up late and gazing at the stars.
I think the best part about life it that things change - there is always something new to look forward to.

I invite you to be part of my circle journal and to share your favorite season with me. It doesn't have to be long like my response was - I just tend to be verbose - even a sentence would be great.

Recent photos

I have been going through my pictures and realized I have a lot of pictures I've taken recently. I thought I should put some of these on my blog for family to see.Grandma Smyth stayed with us for a few weeks after baby Lydia was born. Here she is with Charlie and Tom.

Grandma Smyth with Becca and Lydia.

One night Jeremy was putting Becca to bed and he laid Lydia down by Becca - it was too cute to not take a photo of them together.

Every once in a while I try to do Becca's hair. I tried hair rollers, but all they did was make her hair extremely poofy. This was worse than her normal hair, so I wet the poof down and let the natural look be the look of the day.
One day a few weeks ago I heard the kids all laughing together and found them on the front lawn enjoying ice cream. They had carried the baby and her chair outside and luckily didn't try feeding her any of the ice cream.

Sweet sleeping baby Lydia.

Charlie loves his baby sister. He is always carrying her around and playing with her.

What a sweet face. Lydia is an angel baby. She is just happy to be - but don't leave her alone, she loves interacting with everyone.

Sharing my testimony

The Ensign conference issue came today in the mail and I read all the talks from Saturday morning session. When I read Sister Silvia Allred’s talk about missionary work I really identified with her statement about the impact her mission had on her life – “I learned to rely more on the Lord, to seek the guidance of the Spirit, and to feel and overwhelming love for God’s children. My knowledge of the scriptures and my understanding of the doctrines increased. So did my desire to be obedient and to keep the commandments with exactness. My testimony of the Savior and His infinite Atonement was strengthened.”

I served a mission in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1997-1998. I truly loved the people of Russia, and my testimony of the gospel and of Jesus Christ were strengthened – in fact all of the above quote from Sister Allred is true for me. One thought I had while reading this talk was if I am a return missionary, who went abroad to share the gospel with others, and if I have such a strong conviction of the truthfulness of the gospel and the restoration of the gospel then why do I have such hesitation in sharing the gospel with others? Why do I hesitate to pray to have missionary opportunities?

Today as I pondered that I had the thought that I don’t doubt my testimony or conviction of the gospel (I’ve always known the gospel to be true and known that it was restored in its fullness through Joseph Smith) the thing that I doubt is other people believing it. I don’t doubt my testimony, I doubt the ability of others to believe. I forget that it isn’t by our minds that we are converted, but by our hearts – more specifically by the Holy Ghost speaking to our hearts, telling us that it is true.

I have an attitude of fear which needs to be replaced by an attitude of faith. I also have a lack of confidence in my ability to share the gospel in an effective manner. Again, that goes back to thinking that it is me that has to be convincing, which is not true, it is the Spirit that does the convincing. I just have to live the gospel with diligence and never be apologetic to others for living the gospel and keeping the commandments. If others object to the way I live then it’s not me they have a problem with but God’s laws, for I live my life according to God’s laws.

Sister Allred gives two fundamental truths to keep in mind:
1 – have a clear understanding that God loves all His children and desires their salvation
2 – Our message of Christ and His restored gospel is the most important gift we can give

I know I have a powerful testimony of the restored gospel, I felt it very acutely last Sunday when I bore my testimony. I know this is a gift from God, not given to me to keep to myself, but to share with others.

I’m looking forward to reading more of the conference talks and being reminded about what was spoken at conference.

Upholding the Constitution

Proposition 8, in California passed, but that doesn't mean that the fight is over. This was a very controversial issue and it's not likely to go away - we are going to have to continue to fight for traditional marriage and for anti-traditional marriage to not be propagandized to our children. Also, as was pointed out, this wasn't just and issue about who can or cannot get married, it's about the Constitution and who is and isn't allowed to make and amend laws. Orson Scott Card wrote an article, Upholding the Constitution that is worth reading.

He explains "there should never have been a Proposition 8.In order to make such a radical change in human behavior and custom, the proponents of gay marriage should have followed constitutional, democratic process and persuaded people to support it until a majority was achieved....small groups of dictators (pro gay) have simply taken it upon themselves to deny universal human practice and remake the law as they saw fit, without waiting for democratic process. ...No branch of government was ever intended to have the power to dictate new law without other branches of government having a chance to stop them or at least slow them down.... But they think only in the short term. They don't mind leaving democracy in a shambles and making the Constitution a joke, as long as they get their way on this issue. ...As much as I think gay marriage is a terrible idea, grounded on neither science nor common sense, we should be even more concerned that our republic is in the process of ceasing to be in any meaningful sense a democracy."

Halloween

Well, according to my kids, "Halloween is the BEST EVER!" That is what Tom and Charlie kept saying yesterday. Of course who doesn't love getting dressed up in something fun and then getting lots of candy from people.
What they dressed as:
Charlie - Grim Reaper
Tom - Ninja
Becca - Tinkerbell
Lydia - witch
Jeremy - as self (nurse)
Jenni - as self

We started out the day with orange pancakes and green dragon milk (credit goes to Jeremy for making this fun breakfast for the kids). The kids loved it and commented "Dad spoils us too much". The kids wore their costumes all day long, so by the time night rolled around they were dirty. Trick or treating for us started at the Bloomington Hills circle park where all the neighbors park their cars around the park, some of them decking their cars out with halloween decor and while Jeremy stayed at our van to pass out treats I walked with the children from car to car to load up on loot. It is so fun to see everyone dressed up - a lot of the adults dress up too. Everyone is so creative - there is such a variety and little duplication.
I enjoyed halloween when I was young. Every year there was a Halloween carnival at the elementary school with games to play and treats to eat and everyone dressed up. I like the sense of community when people are gathered together celebrating - that is probably why I enjoy going to the circle park on Halloween, to gather with others and enjoy it together.

After the trunk or treat at the park we stopped at a couple of houses and then came home for dinner (yes, I do know that it is a bad idea to start the gathering of the candy before a nutritious dinner is in the stomach, then the little ones just eat the candy and dinner is neglected, but my timing is always off on these things). I took Charlie and Tom to a few of our neighbors after our late dinner and Charlie wanted to do just one more and one more. Soon we were a couple blocks away and poor Tom was tired (it was 8:45 pm). When we got to the Murdocks house he asked Sister Murdock if she would give us a ride home. I didn't realized that he was so tired and was surprised he asked her, but glad because then we were able to go home without one more and one more, because Charlie was a die hard and would have kept going.

This morning, on advice from a neighbor, we portioned our candy out into baggies so the kids can have controlled amounts from time to time - I think we have our year's supply of candy. We had the boys help assemble the bags, I thought this would help them take ownership for the idea and not feel jipped that we weren't going to let them just have free access to the candy at all times.

When Becca got up this morning I noticed little red dots on her head. Of course it worried me, I didn't know what they were or how she could have got them. I had Jeremy look at them and he was concerned too. We decided we should bathe her and then take a good look at them (her hair was wild from sleep and the hair gel I used last night in getting her ready, also, I thought maybe the spots were a reaction from the hair gel). Well, thankfully after her bath the spots were miraculously gone. What ever they were, the soap cleared them right up. I still can't imagine what she got on her head that created rash like spots, but they washed right away.

Visit to the Nature Center

I'm adjusting to life with four kids. Really it's going rather well, I'm just not getting to things I used to do (like posting on my blog page or scrapbooking). I still do manage to take my kids out quite often - we love going to the library and to the park. Last week I took them to the Nature Center. There is a trail that goes past a small pond, it had 7 ducks swimming around, and there are many plants and trees native to this area. It was a beautiful day and the boys were busy gathering nuts and leaves from the trees.

Yesterday we blessed the baby - Lydia Lucille Taysom. Yes, we finally chose a name for her. We had decided Lydia a while ago, but didn't get her middle name decided on until a few days ago. Lucille is after Jeremy's mom's mom (technically his grandma, but she died when Susan was 12, and the only grandma he has known is Betty Ann).
Saturday was Charlie's birthday, he turned 6 years old. Last week he asked if we could start his birthday at 6 am, I said I wouldn't be awake yet, but if he wanted to get up that early he could. We did follow our yummy tradition we started of having birthday cake for breakfast and he got to open his gift from mom and dad. Saturday was also Charlie's first day of gymnastics at the city rec center. He enjoyed the class and did great at learning to do cartwheels. He has been practicing and is getting good at them. I tried doing one today to see if I still could and sure enough I was able to do it fairly well. Tom kept trying to do one, but he was trying to get his head in on the action and ended up doing more of an awkward somersault.

New Baby girl

We are so happy to have baby number four join our family. We don't have an official name for her yet, but we are thinking Lydia.
She joined us early Tuesday morning, August 26, at 2:37 am. Having labor start on and off for the past week or two made for a short birth. I woke up at 1:40 am, at 1:45 contractions started, at 1:55 I woke Jeremy up because the contractions were coming hard and fast, at 2:00 we were headed to the hospital. We arrived at the hospital about 2:10 and when they checked me I was 9 cm dilated. I was so glad, the contractions were very intense and I knew birth had to be close. Luckily the doctor lived close and he made it there in time to break my water so I could start pushing the baby out.
It was all such a whirlwind. After the baby was safely in my arms I mentioned to the doctor that I had only woke up an hour previous. I think they were all a little surprised how quickly it all happened. However, we knew quick was a possibility because on Monday at my checkup (just 14 hours previous to my labor) I was dilated to 5 cm.
My stay at the hospital was longer than I wanted, but much shorter than any of my other babies and we came home just after 4 pm that same day. The kids were glad to have me come home. They love the new baby and especially Charlie, love to hold her and love her. The kids are insistent that her name is Lydia, maybe Jeremy and I will just have to except it and quit trying to decide if that's really who she is.

Anxiously Waiting

As much as I tell myself to be patient, I'm just not being very patient these last few weeks of my pregnancy. Last night I thought for sure I was going into labor - I had an hour of very consistent and close contractions that were much more than braxton hicks, but then they suddenly went away and I've had nothing all day. I'm at week 38, so it really could be any time now, or it still could be another few weeks. I'm really not very good at waiting. A couple weeks ago my doctor asked for my prediction and I gave him today's date. Well now that today is almost over and I'm still pregnant and my prediction was wrong.... now I just have to wait more. Bummer.
To keep myself distracted I've been reading a lot. I'm too tired and lazy to motivate my self to do things like housework, or scrapbook, or even blog. So, I've been reading a lot. The past two weeks I've read 4 books - two were over 600 pages long - Stephanie Myers books - her last in the Twilight series, "Breaking Dawn", and her other one, "The Host". I liked them, but I don't know that they will make my favorites list (hope I don't offend any Twilight fans, they were good, but probably just a one time read for me). Although they are large books, 600+ pages, they read very quickly and I think they only took me two or three days each to read.

I've been working with Charlie on learning to read using "Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons". We are half way through the lessons. He is doing so well. Costco is carrying the "BOB" books right now, which are great little easy readers for beginners. They seem very simplistic in story and in illustration, but I think that is what appeals to kids, Charlie loves them. It's been a nice bonding experience working with Charlie learning to read. Although most days he doesn't really want to do his lessons, it only takes a minute or two to convince him to do it and I love the sparkle he gets in his eye when he accomplishes the lessons and is proud of himself for reading the words and the stories. When we were at Costco buying the BOB books, Charlie also saw a book about the body with a wealth of pictures and information about the make of the body. He is very interested in the body and how it works and begged me to buy the book. The first night we had it we spent about an hour looking at it. He would decide what part of the body he wanted to know more about and we would look it up in the book and then he would look at every picture and ask me to read every paragraph on the page. In particular he was fascinated with the brain. The picture in the book had the different area of the brain colored in various colors to distinguish the different functions of the brain. At first he thought it was cool that our brain was so many different colors, so I had to explain it really isn't. That particular diagram showed what part of the brain coordinated with which sense. Today Charlie asked me which part of the brain memories are stored in. That wasn't one of the things that page talked about, and I don't know the answer, so I told him we would have to look it up in his book. I love that he loves to learn.

Praising our children

The following is from the blog teaching self government

and I wanted to share it here so I can always look back on it and remember that I am setting this as my goal for this month - to look for the good and to praise my children much more often than I currently do. It is easy to get caught up in trying to correct our children and for me that starts a downward spiral of noticing more of the naughty things that they do rather than the good.

A reader said that praising doesn’t come naturally for her. In fact, praising seems fake and annoying to this mother. She asked:

I don’t want to be a cheerleader, always saying “Good job” no matter what—I want to say things that really matter, that I really believe, that are true. I guess what makes it hard is when I know (or think I know) that I’ve taught them how to do something better than they have done it, or that they should be capable of doing some things without always having to be praised for it. I know you said in your presentation that we could never give too much praise, but how do you stay real? How can I change my mindset from being critical, to seeing the positive, while still helping my children improve and expecting them to behave well and do chores and other things well?

I wasn’t raised by parents who praised me all of the time either. I mostly remember trying do anything I could to keep my parents from knowing I did anything wrong, because I dreaded all the negative comments. Yes, I learned a survival skill; dishonesty. From my experience and observations, if people are not praised enough, they usually start to hide many things about their lives from people who love them to avoid negative attention. This is significant to me.

Years ago when I started doing foster care we were told to praise 6-10 times for every correction to the youth. This was overwhelming to me. Praising didn’t come naturally for me either. I would often remember to praise, but stumble over the words. I would think of praising and let the thought pass, because I didn’t want to appear weird to the foster youth. During this time of no praise, I noticed something. I was making a dark cloud hang over my home. I was all about expectations and not nurturing. I was driving away the Spirit.

Even though I recognized it, I was slow to change. Praise just didn’t roll off my tounge smoothly. I think most of society is like this. Too bad too, because freedom comes from praise. I made myself praise each child 20 times per day. I kept track. After a few weeks I was doing better. After a month I noticed that my whole family was happier, and I was by far the happiest. I was looking for the good in the people I love, how can that not make you happy?

Training yourself to look for the good in others, especially those closest to you, frees you from the bondage of pride and selfishness in your relationships. I have also noticed that it only takes one critical person to make a home full of critical people. Likewise, it only takes one person to start praising to change the whole mood in the home to love and support.

As to the fakeness of some people’s praising. The praise could seem fake to a person not used to praising, or it really could be fake praise. Some people do fake praise. I don’t like fake praise. If you praise, mean it. A normal praise for me is a lot more than a “good job”.

I say things like, “I love the way you walked into the kitchen just now and saw what needed to be done in order to get dinner done on time, and chose to just start doing what needed to be done. You are a great problem solver! I think that I will probably have time to hem that dress you needed to have hemmed because you saved me so much time. You are an incredible help to me. I don’t know what I would do without you. Thanks.”

To avoid being fake, just tell them how you really feel. The problem comes if you have conditioned yourself to not feel like people deserve praise.

Should people ever get to a point where they don’t get praised for every thing? Yes! I am not suggesting that we parents praise things not worth praising, or praise for brushing teeth every day as long as they live in your home. My children know that as they get older they will not get praised for the same things younger children get praised for. Some people have the belief that children should be babied by praise, and never be expected to behave like an adult; who doesnt’ get praised very often. I am not one of those kinds of people. I would never recommend enabling people.

That said, most parents I know expect perfect adult behavior from their children before the child has an understanding of how to control their body or emotions like an adult would. Basically, we are impatient. It takes more talking, teaching, patience, and energy to keep teaching our children what they need to behave like in all the many different situations. My rule of thumb on this is: If they keep making the same bad decisions, then they are not ready to graduate from being praised when they perform the behavior correctly.

To change your mind from seeing only negative to seeing things to praise about you must see your family through different eyes. When you are negative you are looking through your own selfish eyes. I often sit and watch my children interact with each other and try to pick out what their intentions are for all the things they choose to do.

My daughter was given an instruction to clean her room. About 15 minutes later she was found cleaning her brother’s room. Her room had barely been touched. I went to my daughter and told her that she didn’t follow instructions because she was supposed to be working on her own room, so she had earned an extra chore. She immediately asked to disagree appropriately. She said that she heard her little brother crying in the next room because he was overwhelmed by the mess he had to clean up in his room. She told him that she would help him clean his room to ease is anxiety. She was planning on going back to her own room.

Of course I accepted her disagreement and she earned no extra chores.

She showed me that she was really governing herself by deciding what would be the best thing to do at that time. I decided then that I needed to give her more credit. She was doing what I would want her to do. I just didn’t understand the situation enough to know it. Seek to understand them. Give them credit for being the good child that they are.

Praise as often as you can. Praise brings the spirit into your home, it unites your family, gives the children a reason to care about choosing the right, and it frees you from all of those feelings of dissappointment that can ruin a day or a life.

Lagoon trip

We aren't doing a vacation this year, so we sandwiched in going to the Lagoon in the middle of the week. Tuesday night we drove to Payson and stayed the night with some friends, then Wednesday (yesterday) we went with those same friends and spent the day at the Lagoon. We've never taken our kids to the Lagoon before and the most of a ride they have ever been on before is the quarter rides outside of Walmart. We weren't sure how much they would like it or not. Tom absolutely loved it, even some of the bigger, more "scary" rides (scary for kids). Charlie liked most of them, but the Bat ride he wasn't too fond of and when we were on the Tidal Wave he asked me if the first time I went on that ride if I was scared - he was a little scared and not really sure he liked that ride. He loved all the little kiddie rides. Becca wasn't much of a fan of the rides. The picture of her in the airplane ride is one of the few rides she went on, and I was afraid she was going to try to bail out (good thing the seatbelts sinch down nice and tight). When the ride first started she almost started crying, then she looked like she was trying to decide if she liked the ride or not. By the time the ride was over she was more than ready to get out and was not happy that it took so long for the ride attendant to come undo her seatbelt.
Going to Lagoon A Beach in the afternoon was a very nice way to get out of the heat for a while. It was in the 90's and humid - so not St. George hot, but hot enough that the water felt very nice. The boys loved going down the water slides and I enjoyed that I finally got something to do. Being 8 months pregnant I didn't go on many rides - the pioneer log ride, the tidal wave and Puff (the little kids roller coaster that goes around 3 times for total of 30 seconds). So it was nice to go in the water and splash around and play with the kids.
After the Beach we went on more rides for and hour or two more and then by 7:30 pm we packed up to head home - we drove back to St. George. It really was a quick trip up and back, but it was lots of fun and worth the drive. We borrowed my sister Debbie's car - a Toyota Corolla, definitely not a family car, but worked very well on saving gas - I think it cost us about half of what our mini van would have cost to fill with gas.

Love my Freedom

First, I have to say thank you to Summer from Summer Time Designs for this free "Freedom Kit" digital scrapbook paper. I can't believe she designs these wonderful kits and then lets people download for free - but I'm glad - she has cute stuff. She had lots of cute embellishments, but I guess I'm too simplistic to figure out how to use them in a layout - I usually stick to one or two papers and pictures and words. So it's not that I don't like using embellishments, I just don't know how.
The only 4th of July pictures I could were from 2005, I guess I need to take more pictures on the 4th.
Recently I've been reading books about George Washington "The Real George Washington" and "The Making of George Washington". It's been fascinating to learn more about the "father of our country". Truly, if we could have more leaders like George Washington our country would be better for it. Washington was a man of values and principles and didn't do things for his own gain. He was very strict in obeying the constitution and not doing anything to go against it. He was a driving force in getting the constitution to be just and fair. Washington was God fearing and gave all credit to God for everything - he was such a humble man. He did not want to be president, he felt there had to be others more qualified to lead the new country, but finally submitted to the will of the people. They recognized what a great leader he was.
Reading these books has given me a greater appreciation for our country and for the sacrifices that were made to establish our country. It has also made clear to me my responsibility in being a more informed and active citizen. I want to read and study the constitution to gain a better understanding of the foundation of our country.
Here is a quote from Washington's inaugural address "no people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the Invisible Hand (God) which conducts the affairs of men, more than those of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency." And I think this statement still holds true for us today - we are kept free by the hand of God and if we fail to acknowledge this there will come a day that we will no longer be free.

Tom's Birthday

Tom's birthday was last Sunday. He turned the big four, but he is already saying that he is "four and a quarter" - always wanting to be older and bigger. The sepia toned scrap page is a letter to Tom. I saw this idea - to write a letter to each child on their birthday, and thought it was a good idea. Tom is the first one I have done this for, but I hope to do it for each of my children each year.
Tom was so cute - he was so excited about everything. He loved the cake that I made for him - a tractor-dirt cake, every boy's dream cake. His response was "that's the cake I always wanted". This is my first time being creative with a birthday cake. The reason I did it is because the kids always see the cakes at the grocery store and look at all of them, trying to decide which one they would want for their birthday, but I just refuse to pay so much for a cake. The dirt cake was easy, I just crumbled up some cookies and put it on top and then added the little tractors I got at the $1 store. The other thing Tom got really excited about was the pack of gum he got as one of his gifts - he hugged it when he opened it. Tom is funny with gum. He chews one piece of gum for about 5 minutes, then adds another piece, then another, maybe throws away the big wad and withing in 1 hour has consumed all his gum. Of course, he did share some with Charlie, but I was still surprised at how quickly they went through all 5 packs of gum.
Since Tom's birthday was on a Sunday we did some stuff on Saturday to celebrate - mostly at Charlie's request. He said that we couldn't do anything fun on Sunday for Tom's birthday so we needed to do it on Saturday. Tom chose to go to a movie. Jeremy took the boys to "Wall E". I didn't go because I knew Becca wouldn't sit through 5 minutes of it, so there was no need to even try, so we went gift shopping and then made Tom's cake.
The reason it says "Chuck E Cheese" on the bottom of Tom's birthday letter as one of the names that he is called is because he insists on us calling him Chuck E Cheese. I'm not sure why this started, but one day he announced that his name was now Chuck E Cheese and periodically this is the only thing he responds to. He is always asking me how to spell it and now when he spells it on his own he says "c h u c k e e s e" and thinks he spelled the whole word.