Someone is having a birthday today..

they requested no blogging {bragging}, but I figure it's okay as long as I don't mention any names....
So, happy birthday to the person who created all of these

and these...

and whose mind is full of thousands of other projects he is yearing to create. He has put those things on hold so that he can work in a challenging career, serve diligently in the church, face endless home repairs and renovations, keep up with his photography {at the request of his family}, and be everyone's go to IT tech support.

Then there are his most expensive, time consuming, energy draining creations...

who rely and depend on him for security, love and support.

All that and he has an endlessly flawed, emotional needy wife.

At least he is adored for his efforts.

Happy Birthday!!

My Inspiration

I want to BE a good mother because I had such an amazing mother....I know first hand how wonderful it is.

I've got lots to live up to!

Saturday

Progress

A Project

Some Service
Sort of.... I think having hundreds of youth clean up flowerbeds at temple square may cause more harm than good, but it's nice they let us feel helpful.

Way to go!

Amazing job Julia, Madison, and Ali!

The recital was wonderful.

All the cousins had fun.

Cute story about the weekend: Madison dressed Miriam up as a Native American and loaded her, and little Tatum in a garden wagon for a trip to the "Honda Hills". They were gone about an hour when my dad started to worry, I should know by now that when my dad is worried something is amiss, but Julia and I weren't concerned because: #1 we use to play in the hills for hours upon hours the whole summer long and #2 they took cookies and water. Sure enough, they came home a little later with tear streaked cheeks. They had gotten lost. They cried, and then decided to pray. Madison said she just had a feeling to follow a certain trail that lead them home. Miriam said "I think I have a talent for talking to wind! The wind told me it would be okay, and there were no coyotes out today!"

They were never in any real danger since we could have found them had we all gone to look, but it is comforting to know they will be comforted when they need it.

Random...so very random

That is MY hand made famous by my niece Alicia for her college photography class final. Her theme was secrets. Aren't my knuckles attractive? I have always thought they were particularly cute.
Here's my secret. There are only a few indiscretions that receiving a gift in a blue box wouldn't make alright....but I still per fer the jewelry made by Darin & Co. best.

This weekend, we are going to attend Julia's AWARD WINNING Dance Studio's Recital. If you are in Price this weekend, I wouldn't miss it.

Is this Miriam or what?
After a few sad incidences of lost knock off jibitz, our neighbor brought home some REAL ones from his work. I asked Miriam which ones she liked the best and she loved them all! Our neighbors insisted she keep all of them and asked only for a batch of chocolate chip cookies in return. It's been over a week and not one has been lost.
So nice!

Darin had to work today. A Saturday. Our plans for a weekend away were dashed.

Funny thing though, we ended up having great day...despite the disappointment.

The kids and I took a trip to the zoo. The zoo is an interesting place in the Spring. The animals seem more animated, more frisky. For instance, last Spring, when Mirissa and I took the kids on a zoo trip, we ran into some giant desert tortoise romance. Tortoises seem like silent animals, but there is at least one activity in which they are not at all quiet. Ris and I blushed and giggled all the way to the Asian Highlands.

Today the kids and I saw a peacock puttin his best moves on a pea hen. Feathers up and shaking, side stepping, with tail feathers waving. He was trying to back the hen into a corner and WOW her with his killer moves. She wanted nothing to do with him, poor guy, she looked bored....and he was really working it! We laughed along with the family from India who were giving hilarious commentary about the whole thing. The monkeys were in rare form, there is a new baby desert tortoise, and it rained before and after we were there for natural crowd control....pretty great trip.

But the BEST PART is that we took lunch to Darin's work and got to eat with him in the break room. Perhaps this doesn't sound exciting to most people but this is the first time I have ever EVER had lunch with Darin at his work. The first time I have ever been inside his work. He gave us a tour of his company and explained how things run and what he does. We only got a tour because he was one of three people working, and most of the computers and machinery weren't running. I am married to one brilliant man.

I cleaned our washer and dryer, talked to Cristin on the phone {hopeful news} then mopped the floor while listening to "Shadow of a Bull" all while Bub napped. We watched Pingu and took a walk after Bub woke up and then Darin came home {hooray!}. He made some killer crustos {cinnamon sugar tortillas} and we put the kids to bed.

Feeling pretty content at the moment. It's nice.

Spring Days

I love how the eyes have two shades of blue, dark on the outside and light inside to perfectly match her real eyes.


My contribution...all those days making peppy posters for Student Government have paid off BIG TIME.

Off to clip fingernails and wash the kiddos {all that sidewalk chalk you know}.

Mother Earth

In celebration of Earth Day....

some pictures of beautiful Mother Earth (and cute kids).

Grandma L met us at Thanksgiving Point for the Tulip Festival (after I dropped off our recycling which was kind of a fiasco....so happy about the curbside pick up coming soon). She bought us lunch and then took us to the Young Living Farms business building.

I'm getting hooked on these essential oils, luckily my mom is a distributor.

Fun day, I'm exhausted in a happy way.

Harnessing our inner Ingllas

As in, Laura Ingalls Wilder for anyone who may be new to this blog {right like my family documentation has a huge draw}. Well, just so you know, we kind of love the Ingall's around here.

Over ripe strawberries were $.50 a pint the other day so I made freezer jam....only I made a lower sugar version so it's not as sticky as normal jam....but we like it!

Please excuse those freezer crumbs, how embarrassing!

We tried out the hand powered wheat grinder I inherited from my Grandmother. Holy cow, does it ever take a lot of hand crankin' to get enough wheat to make anything! No wonder the Ingall's had to grind from sun up to sun down during The Long Winter. It's kind of fun though, and messy. We made food storage pancakes with the wheat we ground. Sounds awful, I know, but they are wonderful....warm and nutty, more like a flapjack than a fluffy pancake, just the way Darin and I prefer it. And of course, we had freezer jam and whipped cream to put on them, kind of a fiberous strawberry shortcake dinner.

We {as in Darin and Miriam} planted the early veggies tonight {leattuce, peas, radishes, beets}. We are a little late for the peas, but hopefully we will have a long fall to harvest.

Happy Earth Week!

Dancin' Queen

Today was going to be an exciting day for little M. We were going to meet Grandma and cousins at the Tulip Festival and then they were all coming up to watch M dance like little orphan Annie, and Peter Pan's lost boys at her recital. The dress rehearsal was yesterday and she looked so darling...I know I am biased but seriously, spitting image of a Madame Alexander Doll. My camera didn't have the battery in or I would have proof. I didn't sweat it at the time because we had the actual recital to take plenty of pictures.

But no....there was no dancing tonight.

Miriam woke up around 2:00 am burning up, speaking nonsense about spraining her ankle because she was spinning, her neck and hair hurting, and then hot soup going down her throat. It was so out of the blue, Darin and I were really nervous. She had gone to bed laughing and playing with Bub, never said one word about feeling bad, and woke up seriously ill.
We took her to the doctor who confirmed that yes, she is one sick little girl and no she couldn't go to the dance recital because strep throat is highly contagious.

She was pretty sad that is for sure.

But Grandma, Julia, Tatum and little Wyler came anyway! The Congratulation flowers became Get Well Soon Tulips. Julia gave her dance hair bows and Angelina stickers, how could things not seem okay after all that?

Plus, I just peeked in on her, and her fairy left some candy under her door.

{Sarah wanted to, but couldn't come because her kids are so susceptible to strep throat...they have had it like 3 times already this year. Children under two don't seem to get strep, and we were careful to keep Miriam away from everyone.}

Nothing of my own to say.

Life is spinning by while I tumble around with it. I have not been stopping to think about or notice things, so I don't have thoughts or ideas of my own to share. I did however, read a few things that have been floating through my mind for a few days. I think I want to get them down so I can keep them.

The first is from the BYU Magazine, which comes to Darin L. and Catherine G. every quarter no matter how often Darin calls to let them know we are not who they think we are. It's a good magazine so I don't mind and I get a kick out of the Alumni updates.

About Laughter, from an article writen by Patrick Madden.

"Laughter is a form of internal jogging. It moves your internal organs around. It enhances respiration. It is an igniter of great expectations. " -Norman Cousins

On fashion, from Cardigan Empire blog by Reachel Bagley

"Shake your lovely head at: garish accessorization, trends ill suited to your essence, chintzy extravagance, ostentatious consumption. Discriminate and radiate, the truly stylish lady knows when to say "no thank you."'

Amen sister. I can't wait to use the phrases "chintzy extravagance" or "Ostentatious consumption" in a sentence. I really really REALLY want to avoid trends ill suited to my essence. It's just that I am still trying to figure out my essence.

Get the lead out...that is all.

Easter Sunday

My dad asked if I was going to post pictures of the kids in their Easter clothes for him to see. Are you kidding? I live for excuses to dress my kids up and Easter is just about the best reason there is to pull out the finery.

{the best we could do for a family portrait}

Darin was a good sport, he wore the yellow and blue tie that coordinated with my navy skirt and yellow sweater which matched perfectly with Bub's nautical outfit and tied in with Miriam's yellow dress (am I hearing gagging sounds coming from anyone?). Well, I owned and loved the Sweetheart Family Barbie Dolls when I was little {brunette Barbie, Ken, little blond haired doll, and a baby boy....all in matching clothes all the time}. I need to thank Darin for making my 6 year old dreams come to life....he EVEN let Miriam wear the silly Easter Bonnet even though he thought it was ridiculous.

Handsome guy, with a bit of a bad attitude today.

Except when we went for a walk to the duck pond, he was happy as a clam the entire time. We all were, except for when Miriam lost a Jibitz (which I later found) and then when she fell off a rock. That girl is a total over-reactor, you should hear her scream!

Our church service was wonderful. I am so grateful for those who prepared lessons, music and talks for the rest of us to enjoy.

Darin Bub and I took looooong naps {Miriam listened to her new Scripture Scouts adventure and colored}.
I tried to have a dinner that resembled what Jesus would have eaten. We had fish, unleavened bread, olives, and feta cheese. It wasn't truly authentic since the fish was mahi-mahi, and we had strawberry shortcake for dessert, but it was fun.

Tonight as we talked about the true meaning of Easter Miriam asked "what is the true meaning of Halloween?" and just as Darin was about to explain she said "Oh! I know, it's the celebration of the Holy Ghost!" and then proceeded to make scary ghost sounds. Oh how I love that screaming, over-reacting, constantly talking, imaginative little girl and her non-verbal, teasing, silly walking, sly, bad attitude little brother....and they are ours for eternity.

Bunny Day

I tried to make a clear distinction between Easter {tomorrow} and "Bunny Day" {today}.
Today we celebrate Spring, and this year that included:

Hidden baskets filled with bubbles, a small trinket, and new swimming suits
Found the hidden boiled eggs so we could have our BHB {big hearty breakfast}
New Spring outfits
{purchased last summer on clearance...I get such satisfaction from doing that! I have to document it here because Darin just doesn't get excited enough by my bargain hunting}

Neighborhood egg hunt.

Everytime I volunteer to organize something I stress for no reason. This worked out so well, was so easy, and was great fun for kids and adults! It would have been fun to have a brunch along with the hunt but I was afraid of getting rained out by the forecast. It did begin to rain just as Darin went out to hide the eggs, but it was warm and overcast for the entire afternoon.

We hunted eggs, blew bubbles, played with plastic frogs, and friends for the rest of the afternoon.

Happy Hoppy Bunny Day!

Good Friday

Such a happy photo.
I love dying eggs...and eating them with green pink blue or yellow stains from the shell.

{we used those foamy stickers to make pictures on these eggs and when we pulled them off they left some stickiness behind. It would be perfect to add a little glitter, I wish we would have had some.}

We met Alicia for shopping and lunch.

So fun to see her and, so glad we had a good excuse to go to the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory.

After lunch, Bub and I took a nap that was interrupted by a phone call reminding me that we were asked to clean the church this week. I don't like to admit this but, I groaned as I hung up the phone. There are a zillion good reasons to be willing to serve with gratitude, but I just wasn't in a good place at that moment. Luckily, Darin was nothing but positive about it, and then Miriam was ecstatic about it! So, we snarfed a quick dinner and ran off to the church ready to clean. As I was washing the windows, I remembered again that it was Good Friday. All week long I had been trying to focus on the real meaning of Easter and this opportunity to serve was just handed to us! We got to clean the church on Good Friday to have it spic and span for Easter Sunday. All the sudden I felt so grateful for any little offering we could give.

...and for all you ward members that read my blog, be assured that every single door handle on the top floor left side was completely drenched with cleaner and wiped clean by Miriam. They have never been so germ free.

The last sunny day

It's raining..... it's pouring....again. We had a few days of glorious sunshine when the kids played outside for hours and hours but we are back to rain throughout the weekend. I don't mind the rain, in general, I just prefer to kick the kids outside. I am also planning a neighborhood egg hunt, which I am realizing will be in the rain. Rain or shine the egg hunt will go on!

anyway... while it was sunshiny we had to go back to the Gateway to exchange a sweater.


Miriam was sure to bring her money this time to pick up something she saw at the Planetarium on our last visit. She bought a mood ring. I have to admit, it's pretty cool. She is constantly evaluating her mood depending on the color of her new treasure "wow, I must be relaxed....see how green it is??"
The ring also caused me some mothering refection. Miriam picked up a dolphin ring at first, I showed Miriam the flower rings, which had much bigger mood stones for the same price and said she should get one of those instead. She deliberated for a long long time and finally decided on the flower. Then at home we had two or three discussions about how she wished she would have gotten the dolphin one. I told her she had 2 choices: 1. get over it 2. earn $2.00 and I would take her to go buy the dolphin. She said she didn't want to spend more money on ANOTHER ring that did the same thing. "Why did you get the flower?" I asked. "Because I wanted to make you happy" she answered. This was a small thing but it made me think...

My reflection: I want to be happy about the decisions Miriam makes, but I don't want the responsibility of her unhappiness if she doesn't like the outcome of my decisions for her (or her PERCEIVED pressure from me). I have learned one thing completely in my 32 years of life and it is this: I can't MAKE anyone else happy and no one else can MAKE me happy. I have tried to take over others happiness many times, and have been disappointed and hurt every time. I do think it's my responsibility as a parent to give advice, or say what I would do in their situation but I need to be able to fully accept it when my kids choose differently. Also, I think there will be times when I need to NOT give my opinion or advice simply because my kids will purposely choose the other way.
What I need to work on: expression opinions without emotion, being clear when giving advice/opinions that they have to live with the decision so ultimately it's up to them, knowing when to keep my opinions to myself, disconnecting my happiness/self esteem from my kids choices.

On to some 'livin green' stuff. The planetarium had this display where you turned a crank to power a 25 watt incandescent light, a florescent light bulb and a light emitting diode (whatever that is). It took A LOT of hard cranking to power the incandescent. The light emitting diode shown the brightest with the least amount of work. It made me want to be more diligent about turing out the lights.

Off to clean the house!

Conference Survial

I love that General Conference and Palm Sunday coincided this year. It makes the beginning of our Easter celebration week seem even more special, especially after listening to Elder Holland's talk on the last week of Christ's life. Perfect beginning.

My plan of attack for conference this time around was to do crafts with the kids during the morning sessions while listening to the radio...really loudly. Bub goes down for a nap just in time for the afternoon session, so we had Miriam do her conference packet then. I would say it was a success, although the minute I stop doing something with my hands I am lulled into a peaceful conference slumber. Thank heavens for the Ensign.

Ta-Da! (messy but cute-thanks Family Fun magazine)

Growing up, my family had two conference traditions: big breakfast Sunday morning (check) and doing something active as a family between sessions (my favorite was flying kites). On Sunday we took a family walk to the church well (for my chlorine free water) and collected nature items to remind us of Christ's Atonement. The Gospel Art kit pictures are up, and the goal is to talk about Christ's last week everyday this week...nothing fancy, just a song or a story. If I try to get too elaborate I tend to disappoint myself and lose the spirit of the celebration.

Before Miriam took the picture below she said:
"I am going to take my self portrait...please don't delete it and put it on your blog tonight. I will check for it tomorrow"
So this is for Miriam...the self portrait artist.

Happy Easter!

It's Raining

We haven't been able to go outside to play for a long long time. When we woke up to more rain this morning Miriam reminded me of the promise to take her to the planetarium on "some rainy day". So today became "some rainy day".

Bub's ultra short hair is due to my second attempt at cosmetology. My friend Tashina evened things out for me but we had to go super short. It's a good thing he is so darn cute with my cutting skills.

Tom Foolery

The old starburst corn trick (mixed in REAL corn ha ha).

Then the classic juice/jello.
I left Miriam in charge of carrying out our April Fools jokes since I had Young Women's tonight. She said it went well, Darin didn't say much but he is a good sport about these things. Bub ate the corn like it was business as usual.

I made sure the Young Women remembered what day it was by putting an olive in their cupcakes. Miriam and I took some extras over to some friends...I hope they are still our friends.

In other news: we rented Sky High from the library and I was reminded of how much I adore that movie. Seriously, it's not moving, or life changing but I could watch it over and over and over again. It's such a great movie for families. I need to remember to pick it up for our personal library.

Watching Sky High reminded me that Stephanie Meyer (of Twilight fame) had thought of Danielle Panabaker (Layla) as a possibility for Bella. She would fit the Bella I had in mind...not the brooding emo Bella they choose.
Chillax, I still like the movie, I'm just sayin'.........

Stephanie was also considering Steven Strait (Warren Peace) as Jacob, which would have worked, but I like who they cast as well. From the beginning, I was always Team Jacob.

Why all the Twilight opinions now, after all is said and done? Well...Darin finally agreed to listen to the books if we could put them on our Ipods so he could listen while doing other things. He LIKES it, and I love reading it (listening) together. I like seeing his point of view, plus it's romantic, and romance anywhere you find it is a good thing.

I have said it before, and I will say it again....the book is not a literary work of art. It can be a tedious read at times, but the story line and the ideas are amazing.

Still proud to be a Twilight Fan.