HAIR

I have had a few requests to see my hair. This maybe wasn't my best hair day, but I am loving my new do:

And Andi's hair finally stays in her pigtails... adorable:

I just had to add this picture in of Carter. He seriously played with his cars on this "ramp" for about 45 minutes today:

We watched our friend Logan tonight and he and Andi were sitting in these chairs just flirting with each other. It's a match made in heaven:

Tagged

5 TV Shows I Love to Watch:
1) Fringe
2) The Office
3) Bones
4) SYTYCD
5) House

5 Favorite Restaurants:
1) Cafe Rio
2) Red Robin
3) Roadhouse Grill
4) Pita Pit
5) Vi Thai

5 Things That Happened Yesterday:
1) Had playgroup at Rachel's
2) Went and saw Twilight with Maylin and Rachel
3) Had Direct TV installed
4) Sat and listened to some raunchy, old man named John try to sell me Verizon (I had to listen because he had information for our new resident packages for our complex) ugh.
5) Listened to Christmas music

5 Things I Love About Fall:
1) The colors- I love driving the Historic Columbia Highway and seeing all the beautiful leaves changing
2) The weather- not too hot, not too cold
3) Eating anything and everything with pumpkin
4) Halloween- it's so much fun with kids who get excited about it
5) Thanksgiving

5 Things On My Wishlist:
1) Cuddle bug
2) New sunglasses
3) Wii fit
4) To be pregnant! Really, can it take this long? 
5) A new recipe book (it's really just a photo album so all my notecards fit in... I just need another one because I have outgrown my old one)

Thanksgiving...

I love Thanksgiving and the opportunity to reflect on all of our blessings that we enjoy. (not that we shouldn't be doing that all year long, but you know what I mean). This was our first year hosting the Thanksgiving dinner. My parents were the only ones who came up, but we still feasted away and had a great time. I felt like a real mom/wife/domestic being having to do a lot of the prep work and grocery shopping. I must admit that I loved every bit of it. Dinner was fantastic! We even ventured out to the mall on black Friday and rather enjoyed ourselves. All of our Christmas shopping is done, sadly. It was just a really fun, relaxing, Thanksgiving break. We ate a lot, watched movies, and played Donkey Konga on the Wii for hours laughing our heads off! Thanks for sharing with us Mom and Dad!

On my short list of things I am grateful for:

-Being a wife to my most amazing man

-Being a mom to the two most beautiful, smart, entertaining, energetic children

-My family- all of them: my brothers and sisters and their awesome spouses (and soon to be spouse), my parents, my extended family, and all my in-laws- so thankful for you all!

-The gospel... I can't imagine life without it

-My Savior

Here are some pictures from this past weekend... 

The grandparents with Carter & Andi:

A picture of my mom and dad, courtesy of Carter:

Jefferson putting together our tree (we'll have a real one one of these years):

Me and the kids decorating the tree: 

What Jefferson and my dad were doing while we decorated:

The tree:

Grandpa getting some snuggle time with Andi: 

I paid...

$1.78 /gallon for gas today!

The kids

We had the kids weighed and measured last week. Carter is 3 ft  3 inches tall (above the 95%) and weighs 29.6 lbs (45%). Andi is 2 ft 8 inches tall (75%) and 23.14 lbs (50%). They are growing!

Over the weekend we rented "Kung Fu Panda" and Carter got a big kick out of it! He keeps trying to pull his kung fu moves by running around and kicking things.... 

Andi got an Oreo for a snack yesterday and loved it:

And today we hosted playgroup at our house. There are only 8 kids pictured, but there were also three babies under the age of 6 months, Finn was sitting at the table, and we were missing our beloved triplets. It's a full house, but all the kids love it, and so do the moms. We are off to a great start this Thanksgiving week. :)

Yep, I'm thankful for them too...

They got into our outdoor winter clothes, and this is what they came out with.

Tis the season

In the past few days I have come across three different articles/comments that have all stated that we need to live in the present and enjoy today for what it is. There is a quote by Thomas S. Monson that says : "If we live only for tomorrow, we'll eventually have a lot of empty yesterdays." I have been trying to forget about all the things that I need to do for tomorrow so I can stop and enjoy what my kids are doing today. In the process it has just made me so thankful. I know Thanksgiving is next week, so I am sure that is influencing my new found thankful attitude too.

Just today I was taking my kids out of an appointment and we had to walk to the car. Just at that moment it began to pour down rain. Not sprinkle, or mist, or even just rain, it was the makings of a flash flood. Usually this would make me highly irritated, but instead I began to laugh, hard. My kids then started laughing at me and the amount of rain that was falling on our heads and we all just sat there sopping wet, trying to get into the car, laughing all the way. It was such a fun moment that I am thankful for.

When we got home from said appointment my new nursing license was waiting in the mail. How thankful I am that I got an education. I will still have a current RN license when Jefferson is done with school, and that is such a huge relief of a safety net if something doesn't work out as planned. I am so grateful that my parents were able to support me through college and that they emphasized the importance of education. We were always expected to get good grades, to do our best, and to obtain the most education that we could. 

That doesn't only imply college education, either. We are meant to continue to learn and grow throughout life. To read and study good literature. To develop, grow, and learn as a parent and spouse and in general, as a member of society.

Mostly, I have been so thankful these past two, very long days, that Jefferson is receiving his education so that I don't have to "use" mine, at least in a professional setting. He has sacrificed so much already for our little family, and I am truly grateful that I have him by my side. I know he will be successful and that I will have the opportunity to remain a stay-at-home mom FOREVER!! 

Also, as I am having to say goodbye to some of my dearest friends as they move on, I have realized what a blessing they have been to me while we are in the "chiropractic wife" club. That's not to say that this is the end of our friendship, but it's been so nice having such amazing friends a stones throw away that can relate to exactly what I am going through when my husband doesn't get home til 9pm and is out the door by 6:15am the next morning, and having two wild kids at home. So grateful for those girls and still so grateful for my chiropractic wife friends who remain here with me, and even more grateful for my "permanent Portland" girlfriends. I am very glad you aren't going anywhere. :)

Ok, I could go on and on about everything I am thankful for, and I am sure you are going to get a post full on Thanksgiving, but I'll stop it there for right now. Go thy way and be grateful!

HELP

Now that I have my blog list to the side that posts the most recently updated at the top of the list, I can't get it to add more blogs. Anybody else run into this problem?

Young Women in Excellence

Was excellent! We had ours last Wednesday and it turned out so well. The pictures do not do it justice. Ours was an Academy Award theme. The Academy of Personal Progress. A few weeks ago we had a YWE prep night. We made these stars on posterboard with all the girls' names on it and their hand prints, and we added the YW logo on as well. (For the walk of fame)

 The girls finalized what they wanted to display and they also glammed up the invites for their parents. The invitations read as follows: 

You are invited to join the Young Women in a star studded evening of glitz and glamour at the 1^st ever annual

Young Women in Excellence Academy Awards

The 12^th day of November, 2008

Award show begins @ 7:30pm

Young Women please show up for the Pre-Oscar party @ 7pm

Refreshments served at the Oscar after party.

Star worthy attire requested.

The night of we asked the girls to arrive early to set up their display. We had a pre-Oscar party with hors d'oeuvres and sparkling cider. 

The room was all decked out in stars. There were stars that matched the value colors on the wall, then shiny star garland lined the room, as well as a ton of twinkle lights. We didn't even have the over head lights on there were so many twinkle lights! Each display table had table cloths that matched a value color. We also had a framed picture of each of the girls next to their project. (We had an activity a while back where a friend photographer came and took photos of our girls and taught them a few photography tips, so we framed those pics). 

Then the award show began. We had a red carpet lined with sparkly stars, and then that box up front on the ground was a strobe light. 

The first part of the program was the awards. We had individual awards for each of the girls that correlated with one of the seven values. I made black envelopes with the "category" on the outside (faith, divine nature, etc) and then the winner's name on the inside. As a presidency we took turns announcing the categories and awards. For each category we named a few reasons why the girl was getting the award and experiences that apply to the award (ie for good works we named some secific times that the winner had gone out of her way to serve others, etc). Then we said, "And the winner of the Faith award goes to...." When the girl won an award she had to walk in and down the red carpet. They received a personalized Oscarette and star necklaces the color of the value they won. We had their acceptance speeches written out for them and they just had to read them. Their acceptance speech was specific to the value that they won as well. So, "I would like to thank faith for giving me hope and...." That was how we introduced all the values.

 After the awards the girls sang a special musical number from the primary song book, "Every star is different." For the last half the girls presented their projects. Then we partook of star themed desserts. 

Only four of our nine girls were there, so that was a little disappointing. But, it was certainly special for the girls who were there, and they loved it. All we can do is keep preparing special, fun, meaningful activities and hope that the rest of the girls climb on board. (thanks for that reminder Mom!)