Andi: "Mom, I'm sick. I need a Prince."

Carter: "Mom?" Me: "Yes Carter?" Carter: "Jesus... He's so real."

Is it Christmas yet?

We have this elderly fellow in our ward who is somewhat jolly looking who happens to have white hair and a big, white, full beard. When he walked into church today Carter turned to Jefferson, squinted his eyes, and somewhat inquisitively asked/said, "He looks like a Santa.(?)"

The Harmon Fam

This is the Harmon Fam from our trip down to Utah.

The girls (& Grandpa Harmon for some reason) :)

The guys:

And other stuff...

A few weekends ago our friends had a couple extra tickets to see the Idaho's hockey team, the Steelheads, play and they took us along! We had a great time. Made friends with the old hockey guys behind us. Enjoyed popcorn and cokes. Saw a few great fights. And we won. What more could one ask for?

(don't mind these terrible photos of me)

(Funny side note: Michelle grew up only about an hour and a half away from me, in a neighboring stake, in a tiny town that I actually know somebody from. We were both surprised that we had heard of each other's towns before)

Last weekend we made our way down to Utah. First stop was actually Twin Falls for Jefferson's cousin Tara's wedding. We got to go to their sealing and it was a beautiful ceremony. Tiffanie and Ali so kindly watched our kids and stuffed them full of gummy bears. Carter was finding gummy bears in his pockets all day.
After the wedding we drove on down to Utah and stayed with my sister Summer, her hubby Josh, their little girl Reece, and her 38 week baby bump. Sam & Nikki came down to play. We had pizza and just sat around talking.
Summer, Josh, Jefferson, & I stayed up way too late playing games, eating junk food, and laughing our guts out. I thought Summer was going to go into labor. Three words: Indian. Tuxedo. Reservations.

The kids loved playing with each other and riding on Reece's four wheeler. They all slept in the same room, which was hilarious... for them. They stayed up talking and laughing way too late as well! We let them veg out a little the next morning since they were a wee bit tired.
Jefferson hasn't been back to Utah since we moved almost four years ago, so we took advantage of the opportunity and visited some old college sites of ours. We visited BHT's and the Nasty 9, where it all started. We drove around campus and past more old apartments and reminisced. Good memories. Then we went and let the kids get some wiggles out at the play place at the mall. Sam & Nikki met us there and we just hung out for a little bit. (i love this pic of Andi with my bro)

We then drove up to American Fork (where Carter was born) for a little family dinner on the Harmon side. Jefferson has a cousin who passed away and since not all of us could attend the Monday funeral services, we decided to have a potluck and all get together. We had such a good time with family. Everyone is getting so grown up!

Andi was seriously in heaven. There were so many beautiful teenage/twenty something girls there who were willing to let her rifle through their purses and play with their phones and put on "lips."

Here is Sara, Lisa & Amy, and where Andi spent the majority of the night.

Carter also didn't mind all the beautiful girls. Here he is with Shelby. He got shy when I made him turn for a picture.

Another favorite place of Andi's... with Hailey, McKayla, & Jessica.

It was great catching up with everyone and supporting the Harris family during this time of loss. My SIL Ashlee took some group pictures, so I'll have to steal those from her and post them up.

Speaking of Ashlee, we watched her cute kids the other day while she went and got her hairs did. The cousins all played so well together. No fighting or hitting or stealing! The loved sitting out back drinking their lemonade. Hooray for warm weather!

I think I am mostly caught up for now. Phew.

What do you do on the first day of spring?

Go for a walk & bike ride.

Wash the car.

Hunt for bugs.

Play Frisbee.

We love spring.

(technically it wasn't the first day of spring, but it felt like it with our upper 60 degree weather)

St Patty's Day

Apparently, after looking at everyone's blogs, normal moms serve green pancakes for breakfast on St. Patrick's Day. Not me, I served green oatmeal. (I do pink pancakes on Valentine's Day) My kids did eat every last oat out of their bowl I might add. Of course there was a St. Patty's Day craft using their cute little hands to make shamrocks.
And we all wore green so that we wouldn't get pinched. Carter was on the look out. The second I put Taytum in her pajamas that night (which were purple with no green) you better believe that Carter gave her a nice big pinch. Nothing hard or anything, all in good spirit, but still... I think he had been waiting all day to catch someone not in green.
We finished out our very green day with corned beef and cabbage, green jello, and green lemonade.

Don't you just love days that are out of the ordinary?!

I love being an Auntie!

I am privileged to be the aunt of this handsome little fellow here:

Welcome Jameson Paul Stewart. Born March 16th. 8lb 1 oz. 20 inches long.

Proud parents are my brother Sam and his beautiful wife Nikki:

Aren't I lucky?

Funnies

We passed a barn today and Andi says, "Look Carter, a chicken's house!"

And we have been having a lot of wraps these days for lunch. We all are loving them, but my kids call them "wrappers." Makes me laugh.

Being a mom is my favorite

(and being a wife too!)

Ambidextrous

Note how he even holds the pen correctly in both hands.

Dresses & skirts & skorts, oh my!

As previously mentioned, these are the only things that Andi will wear without throwing a huge, melt to the floor, cry and beg, tears and terror, tantrum. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em? No, I'm not insisting on wearing skirts, skorts, or dresses every day, but I am now into making them for Andi so she has more options. This was the first one I made, repurposed out of an old t-shirt of mine that had a bleach spot on it. Here is the tutorial.
I have never sewn a ruffle before, don't judge. Both Andi and I are thrilled with how it turned out, so be expecting to see her cute little booty in more of these in the near future.

Sittin' up like a big girl:

Almost:
And I know it looks like she's dressed like a boy, but I swear her shirt has ruffles and a bow on the neckline and she has a clip in her hair. And I know nobody actually probably cares.

Get your craft on

A few of my girlfriends and I get together for a craft night once a month. We rotate whose house we go to and they get to choose the craft for the month. We just barely started doing this, and I really should have posted last months' craft night with Tamra and her red glitter lips. Anyways, this month we did these super cute flower clips at Mandy's. They are super simple, cheap, and cute- three of my favorite things!

All you need is costume silk ($2/yard at Wal-Mart) in various colors. 1/8 yard will get you tons of clips. I kid you not. We also used tulle in two different sizes ($0.75/yard). Then of course embellishments for the middle; buttons or pearls work real nicely. I also used a pink diamond brad on one that is super cute. And lastly, hot glue, alligator clips, and ribbon if you want to cover your clips.

Simply cut different sizes of circles/ovals in the color of fabric you want, starting big and getting smaller. Hold a lighter near the edges to melt them and make them curl up a little. Glue it all together. And there you have it. I know, not a great tutorial... it's 3:00am. What do you expect?

My beautiful girl modeling one for us:

WARNING: These are highly addicting to make once you realize how quick and easily they come together. I have since made more and just got some brighter color fabrics to make even more!

Workin' Woman

So, after much prayer and thought and talks and prayer and paperwork... I am a working woman. I am working pediatrics for a home health organization part/quarter time. It is such a blessing.

I got together with a friend from chiropractic college a couple of weeks ago and she happens to work as an RN too. She told me that her agency was in need of more nurses and that she would be happy to put in a good word for me if I ever decided to head back to work. I hadn't really been thinking about getting a job, mostly because I don't want to be away from home and also because most jobs require 3 months of full time days to orient and I was not willing to put in that much time away from my kids. But, when my friend told me about this job, I had a really good feeling about it.

I went to work on getting my Idaho license. As luck (or divine intervention) would have it I barely made the deadline of getting my Idaho license before a lapse in time would have required me to take another test (and pay a few more $$$). I was able to get my license simply by endorsement from Oregon since my license is still current there... and fill out a bunch of paperwork.... and pay a nice fee.
I went to fill out an application at this agency and just expected to drop it off and wait to hear back, but the supervisor was in so she took me right back, interviewed me, and hired me on the spot. I know that's probably pretty common for nurses because they are usually in pretty high demand, but still a blessing nonetheless.

I have been met with some skepticism over my decision to work. It's been hard to talk to some people about it, myself included. A woman's place truly is in the home. And even though this position is only night shifts every other weekend when Jefferson can be home with the kids, it will take a toll on my role at home in some way, no matter how small. I am grateful that we have prayer and guidance from our Heavenly Father to let us know that this was the right decision for our family.

My patriarchal blessing even mentions my education being means of sustaining and maintaining our home. I have always skimmed over that section because I never wanted to think about the implications of it; never wanting to have to work as a professional. But again, how grateful I am for my education and that I have a degree that I can use. And that I can get a job so easily, that pays so well, that is so flexible.

Thank you mom and dad for my education!! I appreciate it more today than the day I graduated.