FHE

We have the assignment "scribe" for FHE but we never really have anyone record anything in our family journal anymore, so maybe I'll just do it on here :).  Kelly was the scribe this week, but in case I forget to have her write about it, I'll just tell it myself.  Switch it if she does it.

Jack was the lesson this week.  We've been wanting to do our series of Baptism FHE's for a while now, since Luke is getting so close, so Nate just took over and taught that instead :).  We talked about bearing one another's burdens with pitcher of water and then holding everyone's "burdens" in your hands outstretched.  Luke was the first victim.  He was pretty tough though.  I love the analogy that things, ALL things, are tough if you hold on to them too long.  That we need to just let it go.  And in accordance with the Gospel- allow other people to help lift our burdens.  It's easier to have help.  I love that.  So I don't know what the rest of the lesson was like because Jack was.... tired.  I took him up to bed.  Nate said it went well. 

Charity was the treat, we had donuts :) mmmmmmm

I loved that Luke did Do As I'm Doing for the opening song :).

TEMPLE SQUARE!!! With the IDAHO MAYNES'

So we FINALLY made it to Temple Square to see the lights!  What a relief that was ;).  I was seriously stressing that we weren't going to make it :).  Sounds extreme, I know, but that is seriously one of the biggest highlights of my holiday season.  Everything about that place reminds me and takes me back to when Nate and I were dating.  It's just a magical place.  I love the feeling there too.  The Spirit of it all is incredible.  

So since the Idaho Maynes' were going we decided we'd just tag-a-long with them :).  

We met up in the North Visitor's Center, looked around there for a while and then went out to see the lights. 

I loved going seeing new areas of temple square I'd never really been.  That's what's fun about going with other people.  And they take pictures for ya :)

I just had to put both of these, one with our Angry Bird son 

and one with Luke :)

Unfortunately they had to leave earlier than we thought, to get back on the road home, so it was a short little hang out.  But we loved it!  We are so happy when we get to spend time with them.  Our kids and their kids get along so well.  It's just fun.  

After they left, we went over to "our spot" where Nate proposed and found that the whole area was being used for snow removal.  There was a huge mountain of snow blocking the waterfall and "seat".  That was a bit of a bummer, but then Nate reminded me that it was the "perfect view of the temple" that made that spot special,l so we decided to just turn around and take a picture there :).  

If only I could photoshop the two shots I got, one with the temple all lit up and blacked out family with the this one where the temple isn't as bright as I'd like it.  Oh well.  So anyway- good times :).  I can't believe I didn't have someone take a picture of Nate and I together!

We did get one of me and the kids :)  Which we never do!  See posterity!!  I did exist!

Charity got this picture of the latern in Manual :)  Nice job, Charity!

And this one too.  Very cool.

The rest of these are her works of art as well.  Such a beautiful place to spend a Sunday evening.  

The "bubble lights"... my favorite :)

Not September

I think I'm going to discontinue my "Journaling week of" posts.  I don't feel like they're interesting enough.  And they're too long.  I went back to read through some old stuff from a few months ago and it is SO HARD to find anything!  I need individual posts on stuff.  We'll see how good I am at it, but for now....

So anyway.  

This post is about how much I HATE my period right now!!  Glad you started reading :) ?  I am dying.  If it's not sad enough to find out that I am not expecting, wondering if I ever will be, I have to feel like garbage, bloated and in excruciating pain on top of it.  Frustrates the CRAP out of me!!  And I don't think the hormones are helping.  Ugh.  So anyway.  Time for me to be done.  Til next month.  I really thought this was going to be it.  I hate being wrong.  And in pain.

Journaling first week of the new year!

BACK TO SCHOOL, BACK TO WORK, BACK TO THE GRIND
Everyone went back to their whatevers this week.  Kind of a bummer.  We had such a great time with Nate off from work for 10 days and the kids home from school.  I can't believe it's over.  I think my favorite thing about the whole break was how much resting and relaxing we did at home.  With all the new board games we kept ourselves very busy and entertained.  I loved it!!  Oh, and my other favorite part was that everyone was sad to go back to school!!!  That's never happened.  I was almost happy to see them so sad :).  How rude am I.  Just meant that they'd had fun at home and didn't want the break to be over.  And that!  is all I care about :)!!!  1-2-13

DOUBLE DATE
We got to go out with Brent and Sarah on a double date to Cold Stone.  What a nice, relaxing time that was!  I had a great time!  My favorite part was when Nate told Brent about the people talking about how he was rocking Savannah and then Brent proceeding to spin her around even harder :).  Made me laugh so hard.  That's MY brother!  Takes me back to my childhood when he does funny stuff like that.  I was always laughing at his crazy stuff.  He was/is hilarious.  I hate that we don't do enough with the Hatches.  I'm hoping that with this new schedule this year, we will be able to be more social and do more things with friends and family.  We'll see I guess.  If not- more double dates need to be in our near future, because that was fun.  1-3-14

Journaling Week of 12-29-13

LIKE A BROKEN VESSEL
Well, it's done.  I gave my lesson on this talk of Elder Holland's finally.  It felt like it went okay.  I can't believe how much pressure and stress I felt about that lesson.  It's nice to have it done.  I have almost 2 more months before I teach again.  Time to breathe.  12-29-13

FAMILY CONFERENCE
We sat down with the kids on Monday to discuss some of the new changes for the year.  Just with how we run things.  I found out that things really aren't as bad as I sometimes feel that they are.  It was nice to get some feedback from the kids and know how they feel about our family and how our home is run.  It's a big job with so many people, but I think we're all a good team.  I'm so grateful for the kids that I've been blessed with.  That they have the ability to see the benefit of hard work and that they know how to help out and serve one another.  It's such a blessing.  I couldn't do it without them.  12-30-13

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
We rang in the New Year at home this year!  At the last minute we invited the Maughan family over.  They are a lot of fun to hang out with.  It was nice to have them over.  We played a few games, beat the kids at the game Beat The Parents :), ate goodies, and said goodbye to the Maughans a couple hours before finally ringing in the new year!  Everyone stayed up til midnight except Jack Jack.  The kids all banged their pots and pans and ran around the neighborhood screaming and such.  The one night that's okay :).  Bradley had made a noise maker out of a plastic Penguin bank :).  I love how these kids get into their holidays :).  I was feeling really bad that we hadn't done so many of our traditions this year and we had really just taken the whole season easy, but I kept hearing comments from the kids about how much they loved this year, and how it was the best Christmas break and such.... made me not feel so bad :).  So we'll catch up on some of our traditions next year.  Some of our neighbors that do really amazing fireworks now have some new competition in the ward.  A new couple moved in and he is apparently very good with fireworks as well.  We had quite the show on New Year's Eve!  Lasted a good twenty minutes at least!  I loved it!  We were freezing, but watching fireworks :).  Good times.  Here's to a new year!!  12-31-13

Christmas Day!

Christmas Morning, this is what we woke up to!  So exciting! :)

Christmas morning went a little differently this year as well.  Nate wasn't home in the morning, so I made the kids wait til at least 5:00 before "waking up" and getting out of bed.  They sort of waited :).  Would have been a short 2 hours of waiting for Nate to get home from work, but instead, he fell asleep and didn't wake up until after about an hour of crazy "WAKE UP!!!" texts from me.  He finally rolled in around 8:30.  That was a very LOOOOONG Christmas morning.  He came home, the kids scoped out their stockings and then Nate finished making the Creamed Eggs on Toast.  I had prepared most of it luckily.  We sat down to eat and everyone spoiled me with birthday gifts.  I got all the board games I had been eyeballing all season!  Nate knows me too well.  I've been loving having something to play anytime we're bored!!

After breakfast we made our way to the living room and finally. had. "Christmas morning"!  It was so much fun!  I love seeing my kids faces all morning.  Their reactions to their own gifts, but even more, their reactions to their siblings opening THEIR gifts.  It's really neat to watch them get excited for each other.  That's my favorite part.

We always start with the gifts from Santa, youngest to oldest:

Here's Lukey coming over to get Jack's for him :)

Jack was not a happy camper at this stage in the morning.  He didn't last too much longer after he opened this present.

Erika was next.  She had told Santa to "surprise her".  She wasn't sure what she wanted.

I think she was surprised!  Queen Elsa doll!!

Now Noah's turn.  He had asked Santa for the "Tiger Plane" that he had received many years ago but subsequently "lost".  About a year ago, out of nowhere he came to me and said, "Mom, I asked Heavenly Father to help me find my Tiger Plane and he told me that we took it too the D.I."  And that was that.  I felt bad because I was the one that had taken it.  I thought he was done with it.  In my defense he hadn't played with it for months.  SO anyway.  He asked Santa for a new one.  

We were so surprised to see that Santa had delivered!  Since they aren't even in the stores anymore!  He must have had one of his elves make it.

Lukey's turn.  He had asked Santa for Mario Galaxy 4 or 5. 

Clearly this box is too big to be that....

Baseball stuff!!!  COOL!!  Santa is so smart! 

Hopefully he will play with them when the snow melts??

Bradley was next.  He had been talking about a remote control truck for the past month!  It was on several letters to Santa.  Then at the last minute he started asking for a claw machine. 

Santa brought him the RC TRUCK!!!  He looks less than thrilled... I don't know :).  

Kelly's turn.  She didn't know what she wanted either.  

Santa surprised her with a Google tablet!

Charity thinks that's a pretty cool gift.... maybe because hers was exactly the same size!!!!

Santa should have wrapped one of them differently.... 

So after the Santa gifts, we open our family ones, that we drew names for... youngest to oldest...

I had Jack- I gave him a toy piano.  He was too grumpy to enjoy it.

Noah had Erika- 

he gave her a stuffed pony that he KNEW she would LOVE 

and she did!!  

Bradley had Noah

He gave him a Spider-man watch!  

Noah was very excited about that!

Kelly had Luke.  She gave him a NINTENDO version of MONOPOLY!!  Luke's two favorite things in one :).  Who knew you could find such a combination!

Luke's face says it all :)

Nate had Bradley.  Got him a basketball hoop for his room.  

That's their new thing together.  I think he liked it, he played with it ALL DAY!  

(Nate had to be so tired that day.  I keep forgetting to thank him for even attempting.  It was pretty crazy to have to work the mid the night before.)

Charity had Kelly.  She had wanted to get her a Caboodle with a whole bunch of girly lotiony/perfumey stuff in it, but wanted to get the kind she would like.  So we tricked Kelly by telling her that we needed to pick out stuff for her cousin and just grabbed everything she liked :).  It was a lot of fun for Charity to trick her :).  

Kelly was so surprised and laughed about how it was all the things she'd picked out :).  So fun.

Jack had Charity.  I helped him pick out a cool game of Scrabble Flash.  No hug picture, Jack was sleeping :).

Luke had me, he gave me a cute pink clutch.  My phone fits in it perfectly along with all my wallet things... it's way cute.  I totally love it.  I wish I'd gotten a picture of our hug!

Erika had Nate.  She gave him 2 cans of his favorite flavored almonds.  It's their little bondy thing :).  She was so proud of herself :).  And I think Nate was happy too.

So as always, the rest of the day was a bit of a blur.  I was SO TIRED!!!  I couldn't sleep most of the night since Nate wasn't there, I think I got to bed around 3:00.  So technically I got more sleep than Nate... but who's counting :) HA!  But anyway- we opened a few more presents.  Then spent most of the day visiting with family, playing games, playing games, and playing games :).  I don't think I left the living room all day.  Not even to shower... gross, I know.  

Our first visitors were Grandma and Simon.  They showered us with gifts as well.  And we gave them theirs.  That was a lot of fun.

Heidi and John came next. 

They gave us a cool Balloon Popping game and some cool Moon Sand stuff (I can't remember what it's called, it's better than Moon Sand and not as messy)

We got them to play lots of games with us.  That was fun.  I think we all wore Heidi out though, she had to take a nap later :).

Grandpa and Dawn and Steve and Jauslin came while Heidi and JOhn were there, and we all sat around and played games and talked.  It was a lot of fun!  I love that everyone comes to me on Christmas :).  Spoiled I know.

Nate, once again, remembered my birthday, as usual, and had a delicious ice cream cake for us to celebrate!  It was so yummy!!!  And really cute!  I loved the stripes.

If only I'd showered.

and gotten dressed.

Once Bradley got his hands on the camera, we got lots of abstract shots of the afternoon.  

symbols of Christmas '13

Playing with Heidi and JOhn in the sand box :)

Sequence with Lukey

Nate and Noah building with Noah's Lincoln Logs from Grandma Hatch

We all crashed at the end of the day.  I don't think I've been that tired since.... well.... last year!  Good stuff :).