A Thank You to Robin!

As I said before, I was pretty excited in march to see lots of green leaves poking up through the dirt. I couldn't wait to see what came up. It was like Christmas. These beautiful daffodils came up all around the border of our huge flower bed on the west side of our front yard. There must've been over 100 of them. I thought about sending Robin, one of our home's previous owners a thank you card. I should have. I imagined all the time it took her to plant those and how she must have missed seeing them this year after all that work. I am grateful for the good care she and Ross took of our home and the beautiful additions, like all the bulbs and our huge raised garden that make our home such a wonderful place to live.



These daffodils just made me smile everytime I went outside. They are little sunshines on a stem. They even survived two surprise snow storms, I thought for sure the big April snow, being so wet and heavy, would kill them for sure. They had just blossomed the day before the snowstorm. But they are resilient little things and looked none the worse for it.

Signs of Spring!

I have been so excited to see little green surprises popping up out of the dirt all over the yard. Since this is our first year in the house, and we've really only lived here during the winter months, I don't know what kind of plants we have in the yard. I am feeling very grateful to the previous owners for all their hard work planting the bulbs that make me so happy to see. Every time spring comes and the little green sprouts pop up out of the dirt I can't help but think of "The Secret Garden". I love the way Burnett describes the world coming to life again after a long, cold winter. I love spring!

Ahhh, another not-so-lovely sign of spring. Yellow jackets. Bart's* arch enemy. Our lovely wood beams in the entry of our house that I love so much are also loved by yellow jackets. I believe Bart* killed about 100 of these babies after he discovered a huge nest above one of the beams.

And, of course, playing outside again without coats, gloves, boots, etc. The girls found another use for the sleds we used in the winter. They made perfect boats for their imaginative play.

Adventure at Mrs. B.'s!

In the last post I talked all about all the hard work we've been doing the last two weeks, but we did do several fun things in between to help keep us sane and to give us some good quality time with friends before we go.

(Just a side note: My apologies for messing up the html code on this entry. My comments below don't match up with the pictures so it's a bit messy. I'll try to fix it later!)

From Blog Favorites August/September

We had the wonderful opportunity to visit Sarah and Natalie's teacher from school - Mrs. B.'s house. She has been a good friend of ours for the past two years. JoAnn was Sarah's 2nd grade teacher and Natalie's 1st grade teacher. We looked forward to Angela having her next year for 1st grade and JoAnn insisted we needed to have more children so she could have them in her classes down the road. (O: JoAnn lives in the country - out in Cornelius about a half hour west of us. She has told me so many times about her place and it sounded so wonderful and peaceful. I was so excited that we were able to plan a time for a visit this summer! Mrs. Elliott had also extended an invitation to come visit her place as well when school ended. Sharon (Mrs. Elliott) was Sarah's 3rd grade teacher last year. After talking/e-mailing to JoAnn and Sharon we decided to simplify things - and meet all together at Mrs. B.'s. Sharon is a good friend of JoAnn's and lives about 15 minutes away. It worked out to be a fabulous time!

Mrs. B.'s house and land are beautiful. It was so peaceful and amazing to see all the work she and Mr. B. have put into the place. (Mr. B. was Sarah's P.E. teacher over at Jackson elementary!) Their home was built prior to the 1940's and they have done some updates and made it such a beautiful place. The gardens and beautifully pruned trees and places to explore were the best! The kids could have stayed all day long exploring. It is such a peaceful and magical place!

From Blog Favorites August/September

We invited Jensen to come along for our adventures. She was Sarah's favorite friend in Mrs. Elliott's class and her mom helped me get a special gift for Mrs. Elliott that we took to her that day - a stamp of her signature to save her time signing all the students' Gotcha's. Side note: Jensen's aunt is the one we chose to be our real estate agent!

From Blog Favorites August/September

There were several cool, old buildings like this one on the property. Isn't it charming? I felt like we stepped back in time. So much fun!

A tour of the garden!

Walking out to the creek...



The kids had fun and got soaked. They had fun playing with Lucy, one of the neighbor's dogs who wanted to see what was going on.

Shortly after this picture Angela fell in. Poor thing. Luckily, I had the foresight to pack an extra pair of clothes for each of the girls!





Mrs. B. and Mrs. Elliott spoiled the girls. They had ice cream cake and cookies and JoAnn bought the girls cute crafts to do on our travels to Utah. How could we ever be so lucky to have such wonderful teachers for the girls?? They took such a personal interest in my girls and our family and became our friends. I am going to miss them so much. I am so grateful for the impact they have had on my girls and for the genuine love they showed them. We will never forget Mrs. B. and Mrs. Elliott and hope to come back and visit!




We got to take home some of these gorgeous squash! I was so happy since my zucchini plant didn't make it this year.

JoAnn told us about the flood in '96 during our visit. It completely flooded their basement and they had to get to their house on a boat!


The girls laugh at me, but I am taking pictures constantly during our drives around here. It is so incredibly beautiful here and I will miss all this gorgeous green so much.

This is the exit from highway 26 to get to our house. I know I've said it a million times, but it is just beautiful.

From Blog Favorites August/September

Favorite Beach Shots . . .

From Blog Favorites #4

From Blog Favorites #4

From Blog Favorites #4

From Blog Favorites #4

Every once in a while, when you play on the beach, a sneaker wave comes in much farther than the rest and you can't tell until it's too late! This happened several times this day. Rarely do you happen to catch the event in pictures because they are so random. I was definitely lucky on this Friday the 13th. So while this may not be beautiful composition or lighting, this is definitely a favorite! Mo's* cell phone almost didn't survive this surprise!

From Blog Favorites #4

Mark defying gravity and leaping over the sun! Wow!

From Blog Favorites #4

From Blog Favorites #4

Awww - so cute.

From Blog Favorites #4

The flowers at the beach are so beautiful. These remind me of little ballerinas.

From Blog Favorites #4

Our attempted photo shoot on the beach was very disappointing. The timing of when we actually could make it was at the worst time for lighting - noon. The wind was blowing our hair all over the place and we really had to hike around to find a pretty spot on this beach. There was a ton of ocean debris (seaweed/kelp) along most of it. This was not on Bella Beach, but down the street. From the highway it looked pretty. We had to really hike to get here and oh yeah, it was FREEZING at the time I took this so the girls were whining about taking their jackets off. So all that trucking around with my tripod was not worth it. We'll have to try again another time...

Girls' Camp Visit

From Blog Favorites #3

Just weeks after being released from my young women's calling, I was so excited to still have an excuse to go visit the girls at girls' camp! Gregory* had to go for bishopric/leaders night and the wives were invited to come too! Score! We had a stressful drive to camp Melacoma - the traffic getting to Washington was terrible. Once we got across the bridge, we had a lovely ride. It was so beautiful on that side of the Columbia gorge. I remembered driving that road with Lisa last year when she had just found out she'd be released.

Since we were running a little late, the girls were getting antsy wondering where we were. When we walked into the cafeteria, boy did we get a welcome! It made me feel so good. I almost got tackled by a few of the girls and a chorus of voices called out "Sister Preece!" That's the only time in my whole life I'll probaby ever get a taste of celebrity life. (o: It made my day.

From Blog Favorites #3

Nina looking cute and campy in her crafty shirt and bandanna.

From Blog Favorites #3

Hannah and Tylin not only survived their first girls' camp - it looks like they had way too much fun!

From Blog Favorites #3

Tylin looking good! And orange!

From Blog Favorites #3

A group photo of our ward at camp!

From Blog Favorites #3

Visiting with Heather and Crystal who used to be my girls, but moved to another ward last year.

From Blog Favorites #3

This is everyone listening to Gregory's* fireside talk...

From Blog Favorites #3

From Blog Favorites #3

Kaitlyn is such an attentive listener!

From Blog Favorites #3

Cute! Getting ready for testimony meeting, which was such a great meeting. So many of our girls got up and it was wonderful to hear about their experiences.

From Blog Favorites #3

From Blog Favorites #3

I think these are foxgloves, right? They were everywhere. I love being in the mountains. It was a HOT day - even for being up in the mountains, but the evening was beautiful.

Spectacular Sunset

From BlogFavorites

The day after my birthday, I was looking out the window and couldn't believe how pink the sky looked. I grabbed my new little point and shoot and took some pics with Gary*. What a beautiful night!

From BlogFavorites

From BlogFavorites