"I Hate This Day"

I love General Conference. So the title of this post might not seem to fit, but keep reading. I have really enjoyed the talks and music given today and can't wait for more tomorrow. It was exciting to hear about the new temples being built in Kansas City, Calgary/Alberta, Rome/Italy and I can't remember the other two at the moment. I loved Elder Bednar's talk on prayer and the talk on following the Savior given by one of the quorum of the 70 whose name I don't know at the moment. Elder Wirthlin's talk about being happy and finding happiness, even in trials - made me laugh until I cried when he told about the time his daughter was waiting for a blind date and accidentally went out into a car with a man (who seemed a little old for her) who was actually coming to pick up her sister to babysit his kids so he and his wife could go on a date! Oops. (o: I LOVED the primary children singing in the afternoon session of conference today - they were so sweet and the girls were excited to see children their age at conference!

On the other hand, the rest of the time we had a few issues. Mostly because I didn't prepare ahead of time. We had the girls listen on the couch to President Monson and then told them they could play quietly enough to listen to the other speakers. Ha - they fought and ran around and threw balls and laughed and basically ignored our requests. We finally told them they had to come sit down again and listen to the last part of conference. They were mad. I quickly printed up some of the cute conference packet papers (should have done that sooner) to keep them occupied. This seemed to be working until Natalie asked me in a whisper, "Mom, how do you spell 'I don't want to do this?" She was all ready to write down each letter. Then she showed me another paper that Sarah must have helped her spell, "I hate this day." Soon after, Angela asked me very sweetly, "I pick another movie to watch pitty peese?" Oh boy, I guess we've got some work to do on helping our kids get enthusiastic about conference.

By the end, Sarah and Natalie were putting tally marks next to key words like "prayer", "prophet", etc. as they heard them being spoken. Whew - they got something out of the last 10 minutes at least. We'll do better tomorrow. (o:

Conversations with Sarah

Tonight as we sat down to eat dinner Mickey* asked if I was okay. Sarah answered for me, "She's overwhelmed." This answer made us both laugh out loud. I've never heard her use that word before and I never said I was overwhelmed as I made dinner. Then she went on. "I can tell because I hear her saying (insert big dramatic sigh) and by the way she talks." Wow! Sarah is very perceptive. I didn't realize she watches me so much - it's a little scary, even though it was hilarious. I better think twice about all those grumpy moments and realize that some little people are very aware of my moods.

Not Your Typical Soccer Pics

Natalie is getting a lot out of soccer this year, as you can see! The top picture is sooo Natalie. What a cutie. She loves to flaunt her style even when she's going to soccer. She still wears her cleats and shin guards and team shirt, but often she requests to wear one of her skirts with the ensemble. I think it's cute and usually let her do it as long as she has shorts to cover her underwear underneath.

The bottom picture is how I found Natalie and her team after making some rounds doing team pictures. Natalie hasn't been really into actually playing, although she thinks it is great when she gets to kick the ball. One night, Jonny boy* helped coach the kids and Natalie got a bunch of goals along with almost every other kid on the team!

NOT Recommended

I do not recommend washing a PullUp with the dirty clothes in the washing machine.

The Bridge House

Natalie and cute little Anna - best buds
Angela trying out her octopus kite!
Sarah took this picture of a BIG bubble! These were a hit!
We got soaked playing in the water.

The Bridge House - I LOVE the landscaping at Bella Beach
Adorable cousins at the aquarium.
Ready to fly some kites!
I love this picture - it reminds me of Lord of the Flies for some reason. (o:

The Twinkie and chocolate money treasure was found!

I am trying to play catch up from the summer and can't forget one of our most memorable summer events! Our trip with Kelly and Lisa to Bella Beach!! What a blast! Kelly and Lisa made the long trek to Oregon and we got a beach house together for a few days. We had such a great time and I LOVED watching the cousins bond and make some fun memories together. Since this was our first trip in August at Bella Beach, I couldn't wait. August is the dryest and warmest month of the year. I couldn't wait to enjoy the sunshine and packed all our summer and beach attire. I was pretty bummed when we arrived to rain and we had rain almost the whole time! Plus it was freezing! What in the world? Oh well, we had a beautiful house to hang out in and we had breaks in the weather that we took full advantage of. Some of my favorite memories from the trip were...

1. Shopping at Safeway and dinner prep with Lisa - sounds ordinary, but it was fun to hang out with my sister-in-law that I never get to see! I enjoyed our dinners around the big table together too.

2. Visiting the Newport Aquarium on one of the rainy-er days. Besides the fact that I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE fish and learning about ocean life, I loved watching the cousins experience it together. Sarah and Kelton held hands through the aquarium almost the entire time and were always pointing at something cool. I liked seeing the wonder as the kids looked at jellyfish, pet starfish and watched big sharks swim right over our heads.

3. I loved meeting our little nephew, Corban, for the first time since his birth in May. (I still need to meet little Sammy - drat these 1200 miles from family!) I loved getting to hold him and snuggling with him. -Sigh -

4. Doing art projects and games with the kiddos for inside entertainment. We painted ocean scenes, had a treasure hunt and did HUGE GIGANTIC bubbles on the porch. One of my favorite memories was when we all - adults included - played Sardines in the house. It was hilarious! We laughed a lot and had to be creative to find places to hide where everyone could fit!

5. Buying kites for the kids at an awesome kite store in Newport and testing them out on the beach during one of the dry spells! They each got their own kits and were so cute all flying them. Kelly and his brother I am married to* - tried flying a stunt kite for a while which was a bit entertaining.

6. Watching the kids all play by the ocean and taking zillions of pictures. At one time, I was the adult in charge of making sure none of our kids got swept off in the sea. It was so fun to just observe and get a glimpse into the world of being a kid. They were hilarious. I got a lot of bum shots of Cameron and Anna. They stood on their feet and leaned over playing in the sand, almost with their heads down between their knees. Then when the waves came, they'd jump up and run. One time, Anna didn't see the wave coming and it made her do a little somersault. She was soaked, but wanted to keep playing!

7. The adult time after we got kids to bed was so fun. Kelly and Lisa are so much fun. I can't remember all the things we laughed about while we played games and hung out together. With the kinds of subjects Kelly and Frank* bring up it's probably better I don't remember them. Oh I remember one conversation starter, "If there was one commandment you could take out of the original 10, which would it be?" That sparked some funny conversation.

8. Lunch at Arctic Circle in Newport and the snazzy sunglasses all the kids got with their kids' meals. Kind of ironic since we didn't need to use them. Simple things like eating corndogs together were so fun. I love family!

9. Seeing Mr. Magoo* having so much fun with his brother. They are pretty funny. I think a highlight for them was buying the live crab and cooking and eating it together. And we will never forget the look on Cameron's face when he saw the crab and then watched his uncle place it in a pot of boiling water.

10. Natalie and Sarah and Angela, for that matter, couldn't get enough of holding Corban. Natalie even preferred holding him to finding the treasure in the treasure hunt! The kids were all so cute together. I remember one time with all of the adults were downstairs with the baby and it was eerily very quiet. I decided I better check on the kids. They were all huddled in the big closet in the boys room playing Tinker Toys together. I think Anna had fun having some girl companions and she really bonded with all of our girls, but especially seemed to love to be with Sarah and Natalie.

Gardening at the Temple

Ha - I have to laugh after my last post - I noticed I am wearing my BYU shirt. Anyway, last Saturday I took the girls with me to a service project at the Portland temple with the youth in our ward. Daddy had to teach a class at church that morning. (You may have noticed the man to whom I married is not ever mentioned by name (o: long story, it's a little annoying, but I love him anyway!) So the girls and I got up early (after our late night at the gymnastics show) and traveled to the temple to plant pansies. The girls and I had fun with the "big kids". Natalie tagged along with Whitney a lot and some of the young women played with the girls and helped me out with them. All the girls, young and old, especially enjoyed when the gardener started pulling out a big patch of zinnias and let them have as many as they wanted to carry around.

During our visit, I had a conversation with my girls and one of the young women about why the temple is so special. I talked with one of the young women, who isn't a member, about how marriages performed in the temple are forever, not just in this life. And how any children born into the families of 'sealed' parents are also sealed to their parents. She was cute and said how pretty it must be inside and how she hoped she could get a "pass" to go in someday. (here's a link with more info if you're curious http://http://www.mormon.org/mormonorg/eng/basic-beliefs/membership-in-christ-s-church/temples-and-family-history#d)

I also talked to Angela about how the temple is Jesus' house. I forget how literal three year olds are and had a funny conversation. "Das where Desus lives? You see Him?" I explained that we don't really see Him in the temple, but we can feel Him in our heart. She replied pointing to her chest, "He in my heart in my body?" This was a tricky concept. (o: I told her we can feel the Holy Ghost in our heart when we think of Jesus. We feel love and happiness. Then she asked, "Where de Holy Ghost?" We continued this conversation throughout the visit and several times she said things like, "Is that the Holy Ghost over there?" pointing in some bushes. She was fascinated with this subject and showed that she understood the most important concept when she affirmed, "Jesus lubs me."

Go UTES!!

Last night the University of Utah played the Oregon State Beavers in Salt Lake (football, just in case you didn't know it's football season) Many of you might not know that even though I technically graduated from BYU (which many family members have hopefully forgiven me for "defecting"), I attended most of my collegiate years at the U of U and have been born into a family with deeply rooted love and loyalty to the U of U. I am proud to say that no matter where I went to school or moved in life, I never quite being a U of U fan. I was kind of a brat in college and wore my U of U paraphernalia at BYU - especially on game days. (For those not familiar with the deep rooted rivalry between these two schools, you may not appreciate how brave I was to do this. Honestly though - I think it would be braver to wear BYU attire at the U - those frat guys can be unpredictable!) I also decorated my car, etc. Good times.

Anyway, back to the game!! What an awesome game. The Beavers had an awesome game last week against USC and actually won! We were excited because I like the Oregon teams when we're not playing them. And USC is one of the top ranked teams. It was an amazing upset. So the Beavers came to this next game with that exciting win just behind them. Utah has also had a great season - 5-0 and they have a pretty strong football team. (My husband would probably insert here that it is not as strong or ranked as high as BYU - blah blah blah (o; )

Almost the entire game was neck and neck and with just two minutes left to go the Beavs pulled ahead with a touchdown 28-20. Drat - it didn't seem good, but there was still hope. Lo and behold the Utes scored quickly and got a 2 point conversion to tie! That gave Oregon possession again with around 1 minute to go - plenty of time to make another touchdown. But the defense held them and the Utes got the ball back with seconds to go. They got the ball as close as they could for a field goal and in the last second of the game Sakoda, the local hero in Utah today, got the winning 28 yd. field goal! WAAHHOOOOOOOOOOOO! It was one of the best games I've seen in a long time! I had fun texting my sister who was there and the girls - during the part of the game they were awake - kept saying they could see Chris, or grandma and grandpa. Natalie even said that she swore she heard grandma cheering! (o: Who are we to doubt - I'm sure my mom was pretty loud at the game!

I happily wore my U of U shirt to the gym today and loved seeing the replays on the TV tuned to ESPN. No one made any comments, I guess the U of U and Oregon State rivalry isn't as strong as BYU, but I'm sure I ruffled a few feathers - surely someone there had seen the game. I am kind of a brat, aren't I? Go UTES!!

Lenka!!

In the last post I mentioned how much we LOVE music in our family. We listen to music together a lot and one of our most FAVORITE performers right now is Lenka. My music loving hubby discovered her album a little over a week ago on I-Tunes and we are all hooked. We've listened to her album all week driving around and at home and we each have our favorite 3-4 songs. She has an awesome voice and really fun and creative songs. We crank up the volume and love to sing along. Check out her website http://www.lenkamusic.com/news and you can hear one of our favorite songs, "The Show" and see the music video that goes with it. We heard this song for the first time on the radio today, so maybe some of you have heard of her. That must mean other people have discovered her... Happy listening.

Some Crappy Pictures From an Awesome Night!

My friend Angie called me about 5 weeks ago with an idea to do a girls night with our little girls and take them to a gymnastics show at the Rose Garden starring the recent U.S. gymnasts from the Beijing Olympics. I thought it sounded like fun and at the time the Olympics were still going on and I knew Sarah would be thrilled at the idea of seeing some of the "famous" people she had been watching on T.V. Well, as you can see from my dinky cell phone pictures, Angie got us AWESOME seats! We could see the color of the girls' fingernail polish and Angie even got to give several of the Olympians a high five as they ran past just in front of us.
This is Paul Hamm on the horse with the recent U.S. men's gymnastics team all around him. They each jumped up to do their thing. I thought it was a little cheesy that they had the guys with no shirts on, but the older ladies behind me sure loved it.
Sarah and Natalie were my fun little dates.
After several attempts and one "almost", the girls finally got the autograph of Ashley Amlick (I may be spelling her last name wrong - the last two letters of the last name could have been "ek" or "ch") She may not be an Olympian, but she performed that night and the girls were excited to get an autograph. She's a local girl that could be a future Olympian - wouldn't that be cool? (o: Anyway, she was very sweet to make our girls feel special and I think she had fun signing autographs. (o: Just before we found Ashley, our group of girls was one person away from, I think, Alicia Sacramone (one of the Olympians with brown hair (o: ) There were some very sad and upset girls until we found Ashley.

Some cute and annoying things from the night...

During the show, a Disney rock band KSM performed several numbers. When they came out with their punk rock hair and crazy outfits and started playing the drums and guitars, Natalie got a huge grin on her face. She thought they were so cool. Sarah loved it too. The other little girls plugged their ears and didn't care for those parts. I guess that made it obvious that our fam loves to rock! (o: We often crank up the music at our house and in our car and have many favorite songs from The Who and Aerosmith to Neil Diamond and Hannah Montana. (o: Rock on!

Natalie was so smitten by the "rock stars" and the gymnasts, she insisted, in the middle of the show, on making a sign to hold up to show her love. All I had were some small pieces of cardstock I brought for autographs. She worked for 5-10 minutes on a cute little sign with a picture that said, "I love you girls and boys". I helped her with the spelling even though I really didn't want to miss any of the show. She was so cute and held up her little sign as often as she could. (I had to tell her not to hold it up the whole time to cover up the people's view behind us. This made her pretty mad.) What a cute little thing. Sarah got really into the show too and liked Natalie's sign idea, so she made one too. What supportive fans they are.

Now an explanation for the crappy pictures... Did I, the picture crazy-woman forget my camera? Was I having so much fun I forgot to pull it out? No. Not only did I bring my nice digital SLR camera, I also brought my mini camcorder. I wanted coverage of this event! As we went through the part in the line when the guys check your bags for dangerous things and food (so you are forced to buy a drink and a hot dog for $10.00), the older gentleman took interest in my camera slung around my neck. He started taking off the lens cap and fiddling with the lens. No one touches my camera and fiddles! This really, really bothered me and made me feel a little violated. I pushed his hand away and told him to stop touching my camera and tried to grab my lens cap. He called a younger guy over and pointed at my camera who told me that "professional" cameras were not allowed. Then he looked in my purse and saw my video camera. It hadn't even crossed my mind that either would be a problem (I guess I don't get out to these sorts of events very much). It was not clear on the tickets and I have never heard of the rule that point and shoot cameras are okay, but SLRs are not. The camcorder thing, I'll admit, I should have known.

So it turns out that three of us in our group brought SLR cameras and we were all escorted over to a counter where we were told to turn them over. We all had some very valid concerns with this request. Where will our cameras be held? Was there a tag or official way to sign them in to ensure we got the right ones back? Who had access to our $1000 cameras? The answers were basically, behind an itty bitty, easily accessed counter. No tags to keep track of whose camera is whose and basically any employee or sneaky patron could do some camera shopping behind the counter. LAME. We were not about to turn over our cameras. Then we were asked to return them to the car. We rode the MAX. Hmmmm. Finally, we found a very sweet friend in our group who did drive and took all the cameras to her car. Grrrr. It was all very frustrating. So that is why I have crappy cell phone pictures. Man, we were sitting so close, it killed me to think of the awesome pictures I could have gotten. Shawn Johnson's eyeball, for instance. I laugh when I think that I almost brought my telephoto lens with me too. So much for those plans. (o:

Despite this little setback - the night was sooo much fun and we had a great time hanging out with good friends and each other. We did get some cute group shots with Kelly's "legal" camera. I'll have to post those later. The main parts of the night that stand out were watching Sarah and Natalie's faces during the show - priceless, eating hot dogs, nacho chips and ice cream on the floor at the Rose Garden with our big group - almost priceless, KA-Ching$$$ (I'm going to invest in stadium food courts - they seem to be doing well), watching the awesome athleticism of the Olympic gymnasts with my jaw open half the time. I especially loved when the men's team did the number at the end doing tricks on the uneven bars to some hip hop music and adding tons of personality to their moves and dismounts - amazing and funny at the same time. The ride to and from the show on the Max with Shannan and Angie and the girls was fun too. The girls were sooo hyper on the way there I wondered if there was applause when we got off. (o: Good times.