A New Calling

I have a new church calling. I was most recently doing Compassionate Service. I was the Assistant Compassionate Service Leader, though the last couple of months I was filling in as the Compassionate Service Leader, too. I have to admit, that I feel like that was a tough calling for me. (Aimee H. if you are reading this, perhaps you will agree). Trying to find people to take in meals and meet other needs of people, sometimes on short notice or for weeks at a time could get pretty stressful and worrisome for me. Though I know I was blessed with the strength to carry the burden and bring blessings to others' lives.

I have been asked to be the Enrichment Leader. I look forward to this, because it will be something that is scheduled and I can plan on, and know the day and time, and it doesn't have the spontaneity and randomness that my previous calling did- which is something that I've never been good at- I like predictability.

I've served in the Enrichment before, once as the Assistant Enrichment Leader, and then when I was in the RS Presidency, I was the counselor over Enrichment. - Those were back in the days when it was an every month event. With it being 4 times a year now, our ward really tries to make those 4 Enrichment Meetings something of a spiritual nature, where the sisters leave feeling like it was worth their while to leave their homes, to come and feel the spirit, strengthen their testimonies and be uplifted spiritually, and return home with a renewed spirit. We leave crafts to the Enrichment Activities. I love this about our ward. I've gone right to work on our December Enrichment Meeting, and feel like everything is falling into place- Tender Mercies are all around.

I Love My Birthday!

I have always, always loved having my birthday.

This year, it being a "big" year of a birthday, my husband made sure everyone knew, everywhere we went, that it was my birthday, and it was the big -----

(fill in whatever age you think i may be here)

I started the day with breakfast with the gang in bed.

Then went to Kindergarten, to volunteer in Blake's class. Nothing like going back to Kindergarten for an old Lady like me. Blake told his class it was You-Know-Who's birthday.

He insisted I wear my green necklace, (so I did) and said that his teacher would think I was beautiful.

Later that evening, Ryan was asking him if all the kids in his kindergarten class said his mom was beautiful, and Blake said, "No, but I sure thought she was the prettiest one there!"

I had a date with my favorite 4 handsome guys that night.

They took me shopping at one of my favorite stores, and each picked out a gift for me.

Then we had dinner at a yummy Italian place, ate lots of chocolate cake, let the kids take pictures of us, and got to blow out my big 'ol candles.

I was treated to lots of hugs and kisses

A fabulous and delicious time was had by all.

*

Commerating a Birth

Look who's One!

Everyone gathered 'round the nursery for breakfast in, er...uh...near bed.

How's the birthday suit working for you?

(uh, Mom, will we see one of your birthday suit on your Birthday?)

Thrashing open of presents

No pictures allowed Ma'am

Its my Party, and I'll cry if I want to

cry if I want to

cry if I want to...

You would cry, too if you had a mouthfull of teeth coming in-

guess thats the price we pay for being so stinkin' cute and toothless for 11.5 months

I made this cake for a combined birthday celebration we had with our family, celebrating several October birthdays.

A New Birth

An Update on our crawly friends:

After they all crawled into their "cozy cocoon", as Blake always says- like thats the correct name for them, we moved them into their butterfly house to hatch. I believe this picture was taken on day 7ish of them being in their cocoons. There are 4 hanging, and one laying down (Remember about Killa?)

On about day 9 we had some interesting things happening.

Sorry, you have to look through the mesh, but if you look closely, I think you'll be able to tell whats going on.

All 5 butterflies have hatched and like to fly around and drink the sugar water solution we made for them- per instructions from our butterfly house.

They are so interesting to watch.

They are Painted Ladies- thats the name of the butterflies.

Its supposed to be warm the next few days, and it has to be above 55 to release them.
We will let them go tomorrow.

I Heard Its Your Birthday!

So, whenever its my birthday, my twin sister and

I always race to call each other first and sing:

"I heard its your Birthday, (inject guitar solo here by making a nee-ner, nee-ner, nee-ner)

Its my Birthday, tooooooo!"

She beat me to it today.

But I think I'll over take her with a blog tribute

Happy Birthday Old Girl!

Nee-ner, nee-ner, nee-ner

Wish the old girl a Happy One!

Pumpkin Patch

We went for our annual pumpkin patch run today.

This is our favorite patch to go to. They have tractors for the kids to sit on, a childrens corn maze, and wheel barrows to throw your finds in.

Its run by a family and they have good pumpkin prices and all else is free!

Our littlest pumpkin

Our Medium sized pumpkin

Our Oldest pumpkin and Pa finding the perfect pumpkin

Later that Same Day...

Within hours the caterpillars have changed into their more harder, cocoon looking selves.

The one on the far right I nicknamed Killa. He was crawling around "bugging" all the others while they were trying to hang so still, and they kept trying with all their might to bat him away.

It was like he didn't know what to do. He was just crawling all over like,

"Doi-uh, what er you guys doing? How does this thing work? What am I supposed to do now?"

Then within minutes of the last guy going to cocoon appearance, he decides to finally drop down and give it a go.

Perhaps he was lonely with no one left to bug.

Oh, and I said there was five caterpillars, and there are, one just fell down to the bottom while he was shaking around in his cocoon, but I think he'll still be okay.

I had originally thought it was Killa who had made him fall- hence the nickname, but I don't think it was anymore. After watching how much shaking goes on while they're getting on their cocoon, I decided maybe it wasn't Killa after all.

Watch them Grow..

For Blake's birthday he got a Bugville Butterfly house. You send away for some larva, they come in the mail, then they grow through their life cycle and when they emerge into butterflies, you let them go.

We got our little cuppy with 5 little caterpillars last Saturday. They have all the food they need in this cup (all the brown spots), so you really don't have to do a thing, except make sure they don't get too hot or too cold. This week we have woken up every morning to find that they have grown bigger and bigger and bigger. This morning it looks like they are working their way towards making their cozy cocoons. When they are all in their cocoons, you move them to a butterfly house made out of netting until they come out all metamorphosised.

We'll keep you posted!

Milling Around

We spent last evening Milling Around with the Witches at Gardner Village.

They do some pretty neat displays that they create with witches that they have made. They have some playing baseball, a witch flying a bike across a pond, a Witchey Poo outhouse, and on an on. Here we are at a witches brewery and sitting for a spell.

Spoooooooky.

Look Ma!

Looks who's riding without training wheels!

The Whammer

We just about met our match. He left destruction in his path. Its been 2.5 years since we mingled, and I guess he figured it was time for a reunion.
Sleep? We've gotten very little. Food and energy, even less. Puke has been spewn just about everywhere and the toilets hardly had a rest. And we've been filled to the gills with Gatorade and Pedialyte.
Yeah, its Stomach Flu.
Hoo-Weee!
Ever notice how these things keep you puking all night, then you're wasted for the next day? Why can't it be the other way around- puke during the day- so you don't feel like you're missing out on anything (Say, sleep perhaps), then during the night you'd sleep like the exhausted baby you feel like.

It started Monday night with Ryan, and by midnight, the two older boys had joined his ranks. I was kept darn busy cleaning out puke bowls, and changing and wiping whatever had the filth on it, and making sure all kept hydrated, and to the bathroom as needed. Tuesday (Day time of course) and they all rested and slept. But come Tuesday NIGHT and Mom had succumbed to the tossing of cookies, too. Followed by a cookie tossing here and there out of the boys, as well. We made our bedroom into a cookie tossing market for the second night in a row. ToDAY (Day time, right) all are feeling much better by this evening. I think we're on the mend. Thank You to Ryan's Dad who came over last night to stock the fridge with the drinks, brought Tylenol for the aching bodies and fevers, and blessings for all.

Going Down and Coming In

We have been working with Jason on figuring out how to go down stairs, now that he knows how to come up them. We rarely keep a gate on this small set of stairs, and instead, we just always stop him as he approaches the top of the stairs. We turn him feet first and give a verbal "Feet First" and help him down the stairs. The other day, I watched as he came to the top of the stairs, backed around and went feet first down the stairs.

Good Job Baby!


You'll probably have to click on this picture to enlarge it, so you can see that, 2 weeks shy of turning one, we have some teeth coming in, at last!

We are the Champions

Tee Ball has come to an end.

Yes, it is true, we won every single game and got trophies.

Of course there was no taking score, striking out, and everyone got a trophy.

Small details.