I'll have the usual.

It's early, but we went out to eat last night and I ate a giant burger and fries (we went with the Allreds and knew half the people in the restaurant... seriously. Not kidding. Everyone was there for $5 burger night). Because of all the food I'm not hungry so I'm resisting cooking breakfast. I had weird dreams all night and so did the kids. They watched a Curious George episode yesterday where they go inside his body and the germs are singing. It was absolutely too much for Liesel who started screaming for me to turn it off. I ran downstairs, but was too late. Both girls woke with nightmares and Felicity woke up to eat once. I'm trying to wean her in time for the backpacking trip to the Grand Canyon. She still nurses morning and  before bed and sometimes once at night. 

This week was pretty good. I've felt really restless and want to be with people (per the usual) but everyone is always busy. I was able to get out with Leslie to hike Corona once this week, but otherwise we've been playing on our own. The girls are really pretty great hikers and will hike for up to three miles. L could go farther, but Hannah is only 3. I'm so excited that Catherine and Lindsey are coming down today. Every time this happens I have the hardest time waiting until they show up.

There has been a higher amount of stress lately. Brian getting ready for FLETC and feeling anxious and me with my business. I wish I was booking more, but I'm doing everything I can to make it happen. I contacted all of the major venues yesterday and gave them free photos I had taken at their property. I re-did my website etc. But I still only have 4 weddings for the whole year. Maybe Heavenly Father knows I can't handle more this year, but the competitor in me feels nervous that this is the end and I would rather turn away business than not have inquiries. 

Had a great family night this week on Martin Luther King that Brian was in charge of. He and I both got a little teary-eyed. Liesel has been surprising me lately with her sensitivity to the Spirit and keeping the commandments. The other day Hannah put herself to bed during dinner and didn't say her prayer. L was so stressed really wanted to wake her up. She said, "But mom! Heavenly Father really wants to hear from her!" 

Last week we were biking on the path with the Allreds. She and Owen were way ahead of us and reached the community garden. They decided they wanted to go into the greenhouse (a giant dome of triangle shaped glass). After they shut the door and played for a while, they tried to open the door which was locked. They started to get scared. L suggested they say a prayer. She prayed that they would find a way out and she told me, "I thought I should try to push the glass and see if it was a window. It opened up and we crawled out onto the hay [bales]." She listened to and followed the Spirit and she shared that story for her talk on Sunday (but I had to tell her everything to say because she did not want to talk!)

Felicity started crawling for real last week. It's a total game changer. She's like a little vacuum and I already found a tiny rubber band in her poo. This age is so scary. Her personality is coming out more and the girls love playing with her. She laughs so easily I love making her giggle. Sometimes I'll be doing something normal and carrying her and an action or movement I do will make her laugh. It cracks me up. 

Hannah continues to be a little entertainer. She honestly makes me laugh several times a day. She does this one eyebrow up, one eyebrow down look when she's disgusted or mad that reminds me so much of Kevin. It makes me laugh every time (much to her disapproval. Do not laugh when she's being serious)! 

Both kids LOVE the trampoline. I'm so glad we bought it. It's nice to have something else to do outside each day and it makes me feel happy as well. I miss yard work and can't wait for gardening season again. 

Christmas photo album.

The first big snow of the year. 

I organized a primary activity to sing Christmas carols in the nursing home. It was fun to see the kids sing and I think it was a good service opportunity for them-- but in all honesty, Dee (who used to be in 2nd ward before she got too sick) was the only one who really seemed to enjoy it. :) The rest had this look on their face like, "hurry up so I can get back to watching QVC." 

Liesel in her tumbling class. She's in the back behind the girls.. her teacher just told me she's not shy anymore and is doing great. I think she likes being with the older girls.

Felicity's first Christmas. 

Christmas Eve Party. Dressing up as the nativity with the Allison, Sarah and the Allreds. 

Christmas morning breakfast

Christmas morning afteramath

Hiking up Negro Bill Canyon on Christmas day. 

Family shot!

Ryan and Kiyomi's house! I was amazed at their kids. They are teenagers and they were playing with my kids! I seriously loved seeing their family. The whole vibe is so cool, they are so much fun and I was so happy we could see them. 

At the beach with the Hatch Family!

Hello Disneyland! And 80,000 other tourists! 

The next day at Disneyland. Liesel (who is sick) getting ready to ride Thunder Mountain again. 

Hannah and grandpa kept saying it was a "thumbs up day!"

One small piece of a ridiculously extravagant parade. But they didn't throw candy, so it had nothing on the Moab parades. :)

Brian stayed with his Dad and his brother Matt to play at Disneyland while I took the kids back to the hotel around 6:30. All day L had been saying she was sick. I knew it was serious when she said she didn't want her ice cream cone. At 9:30 Brian texted me a picture of all of them on Splash Mountain and I had just pulled Liesel off of her bed covered in throw up. I couldn't resist the humor of texting him back the current crime scene. My favorite part is Hannah sleeping peacefully next to it. 

The next day in San Diego. L was feeling much better at this point. 

Feeding the seagulls at Coronado Island. 

One of my favorite nights of the trip. We drove all day from San Diego to Las Vegas back to Allison's apartment. Sarah had all the trimmings for personal pan pizza's and we each picked out a treat from the store. Hannah picked a candy bar, Liesel picked Smartfood popcorn, I picked Clausen pickles and B picked Kiefer. We ate lots of yummy food, played a New Year's game where we reviewed our favorite memories from 2015 by choosing color coded pegs, watched the new Mission Impossible and spent time with Allison and Sarah, which I always love to do. 

Little did we know this pizza would make a second appearance at about 2am. Both hannah and Felicity threw up all night long and on the long drive home. I was able to get in a run before it hit me, but it was not a fun sickness. Hannah keeps telling the story, "remember when I was at gram-ya's house and I threw up?" 

 All I can say is, home looks pretty darn good after a week on the road with sick kids. 

And might I add we didn't unpack the car for three days. 

And when we did, we discovered a pool of frozen throw-up in the base of F's carseat. 

All I can say is, home looks pretty darn good after a week on the road with sick kids.

January's here.

I'll write about our Christmas and vacation when I locate my phone. All the photos are on there and L lost it in the church today. We met up with some other moms and let the kids run wild while we chatted. Best rainy/cloudy/dreary morning activity. But suffice it to say, I'm glad we went and I'm glad it's over. We drove home with both Hannah and Felicity throwing up in the back seat. But it felt so good to be home. 

I went for a long run and felt so good.

Brian set up the new trampoline while I was gone and loves to tease me that he didn't know Santa actually brought it for me... haha. But it's true. I love to jump on it. I love to do seat drops, back drops, flips, handsprings, round offs... all while watching the cows graze, the birds fly overhead and the portal change colors as the sun moves across the sky. And I love that I get that laugh from Liesel  (you know, the one I live for) every time I bounce her high in the air and she lands rolling on the tramp laughing. 

I got sick on Saturday late afternoon. I was throwing up a lot, but I also knew that it would be over in 24hrs. Kind of jump-started my new years weight loss resolution haha. 

Since we've been home, the kids have been playing with their Christmas toys. They didn't get a chance to enjoy them before we left. L put together her entire Lego Animal Rescue Base almost entirely by herself. Hannah has built some beautiful Duplo houses. And Brian and I have tried to iron out all of the kinks in our life: the cars, my Biz, FLETC, de-junking, house maintenance etc. 

January is kind of a depressing month for me. It's so blah. It's usually a time for me to stress about things but also to feel lazy. I'm standing at the top looking at a new year and I have ideas and plans and I'm excited... but you can't really start gardens, or get outdoors, or take vacations, or really do much of anything in January. I always feel like I'm stalling. 

Brian went back to work yesterday for the first time in nearly two weeks. To say that I'm going to miss him this year doesn't cover it. He's my other half. 

In other news we bought a minivan on Tuesday. A minivan that fills me with a lot of guilt. Guilt that our friends gave us too good of a deal, guilt that we probably shouldn't have accepted the deal and guilt that others didn't get the same deal. Our NPS friends had posted it on a Moab Classifieds Facebook page and I saw it within 6 minutes. I was so glad because this never happens to me-- I always miss the deals! Brian was at a SAR meeting, so as soon as he got home we decided to look at it the next morning and told the we would buy it after our test drive. It was too good of a deal to pass up and I LOVE having the extra space. 

the girls playing wedding in their room. Actually, this is Liesel playing wedding and Hannah following orders. 

They have loved having their own cameras. They carry them around capturing the things they think are special. I went through to see when they took photos of: their christmas chocolate, lots of Felicity, silly faces of each other, lots of mom and lots of their legs, the ceiling and unidentified blurs. 

My baby girl. 

Liesel getting ready for her wedding (yikes!) and Felicity's constant smile. 

Hannah takes a bow. 

A Merry Christmas

Christmas Eve: 

Hannah's usual perch when anyone is in the kitchen-- and Sarah was in the kitchen a lot on Christmas Eve! Here she is making pasta dough for the homemade ravioli. yum!!

here she is rolling out the dough

Liesel dressed in head to toe red for Christmas Eve and Here is Felicity looking all hipster with her top button snapped, touching each tomato. I need to add that every single tomato simmered for over 6hrs, so all Felicity germs were most def dead by dinner. 

our Italian feast this year included: Tuscan white bean and sausage soup, Italian salad, homemade ravioli and parmesan encrusted pork chops. Each of us had our own bottle of Sanpelligrino and for desert we had a hot chocolate pudding with italian cookies dipped in it. 

me and the group

Leslie and the group

Kids table. They filled up on their own veggie try, breadsticks and juice. 

Felicity's first Christmas.

Christmas Eve was a great day filled with people we love. We did a little program, dressed up for the Nativity and shared our thoughts about Christ. After the kids went to bed, Brian really wanted to watch The Return of the Jedi, which we did. I would have preferred something more Christmasy, but I couldn't kill his enthusiasm. We wrapped presents, stuffed stockings and then went to bed. I wish I had taken photos of Christmas morning. Brian and I were up before the kids at about 6:10am. He was excited and couldn't sleep. They were up though, within a few minutes and we were all ready at the top of the stairs at 6:30ish. It was a beautiful white Christmas morning. It had snowed all night and felt magical. The kids loved it and spent forever on their stockings going through each and every thing so excited. It was great opening presents. Allison had given us Christmas pancake molds and so we made some festive pancakes. Brian and I went to workout at the gym together mid-day and I was sore for the next five days. The kids played with their gifts and we played with them. We hiked up Negro bill Canyon in the snow and had a snowball fight. All of us against Brian and he creamed us. We watched Muppets Christmas Carol and had a wonderfully relaxing Christmas Day. 

Hannah's Duplo house-- I have been amazed at how every time you build with these, it's totally different. It's amazing!! The girls both love this thing. Hannah now does this Asian peace sign in every photo; "Aunt lindsey taught me dis!" she says. :)

The girls pounded their Christmas candy all day. This is Liesel working on the outhouse part of her Lego rescue base. 

Felicity is starting to crawl-- especially when she's motivated by a discarded ring pop within her reach. I walked into my room and found her eagerly sucking on this ring pop.