Good Friends

Our friends the Montminys came over to meet little Miss Macy.

How adorable are these girls?

Noé, Kaleb, and Duncan got all dressed up for Grace's formal Sweet 16 party.

Kaleb went on his first date with darling Emma.

(They went bowling and got pizza, and I was only freaking out a little bit that I have kids old enough to date!  And Noé was only a little envious that she didn't beat Kaleb to having the first date, ha ha!)

I have been blessed with wonderful friends everywhere I have lived.  Kaleb and Noé have a fabulous group of youth that all enjoy hanging out together.  I hope as each of my children grow up, and wherever we may live, that they are all blessed with amazing friends!

We HEART Macy!

My dear friend, Mary wanted to throw a baby shower for me and Macy.

I told her I would love a get-together with all of my Chapel Hill sisters, but I didn't want anyone to bring a gift- we have been so spoiled already!

But my dear friends want to spoil me and Macy!

They all pitched in and got us gift cards to Toys 'R Us/Babies 'R Us, and...

a new stroller & car seat combo!

I am so humbled by their kind generosity.  And I can't wait for the weather to warm up to take Macy on lots of walks outside.  It's so awesome to have a car seat for both of our vehicles too (as well as a seat to carry Macy around in, as our other car seat isn't removable)!

Macy also got this beautiful print for her bedroom.  The only thing I'm sad we didn't get was a picture with all of our friends!

As luck would have it, the Christmas stocking I ordered for her also arrived on the same day.

I love this sweet girl of mine and it is so wonderful that she is so loved by so many others too!

Thank you Mary, Rebekah, Cathy, Andrea, Renée, Ashley, Annick, Catherine, Maggie, Marion, Brianna, Rebecca, Julie, Kristy, Sheri, Niki, Fumiko, Alissa, and Rhonda for making us feel so loved!  We love you too!!

An Airplane and a Farm

(Image source vectorstock.com)

I don't want much-

Just a FARM to raise my family on for the 9 month school year

and

an AIRPLANE to travel to each continent and visit a new country during the 3 month summer vacation every year.

See, I'm just a simple girl!

My idea of having an airplane and a farm came from this quote I found back in 2009 by Carl Burns:

"A child on a farm sees a plane fly overhead and dreams of a faraway place.  A traveler on the plane sees the farmhouse and dreams of home."

I dream of both, ha ha!

3 Signs

I saw the above sign on Pinterest a while ago, and thought, "Yes, I can do this!  I can accomplish whatever I want to."

A while later I saw this sign, and thought, "This is really me.  I can't accomplish the things I want to because I am JUST SO TIRED!"

Today I saw this quote, and thought, "This is who I want to be.  Some days I am proud of what I accomplish in a day, while many other days I am ashamed for not accomplishing more of the things I want to.  I don't want my life to be a series of checklists where I only feel good about myself if I have checks by each item on those lists.  Don't get me wrong- the items on the lists are important, and I still hope to accomplish the most important ones (even if it is slowly, but surely).  Until I accomplish those things though, I don't want to be stressful!  I want to be joyful!  I'm tired of beating myself up over my perceived failures.  I want to like myself again and be kind to myself and focus on the things I do achieve each day.  I have so many wonderful blessings in my life and I want to be joyful and truly appreciate them every day!"

Here is THE LIST of things I want to accomplish in the short and long term (or part of it, since it's never-ending, ha ha):

HOME

Get completely unpacked, organize all of our belongings, keep our home tidy AND clean, and decorate every room.

Get our yard cleaned up.  Up our curb appeal in the front yard and make our tiny backyard more useful.

FAMILY

Spend more quality time with each of my children and husband.

Live the gospel by doing the small and simple things consistently- prayer, scripture study, family home evening, etc.

Create fun activities and traditions to bring joy to my kids now and happy memories in the future.

Visit our extended families as often as possible.

Get everyone involved in extracurricular activities (and win the lottery to pay for this, ha!).

Help our kids prepare for the day when they leave our nest to have happy and successful lives.

Plan lots of reunions (yearly if our kids live far, weekly if they live in the same town) so we'll know our grandkids well.

PERSONAL

Lose lots of weight- pregnancy weight and then some!

Exercise more and strengthen my joints.

Cut my hair and color the ton of gray I have!

Continue dreaming of traveling to each continent.

Follow the Holy Ghost to strengthen my relationship with God and Jesus Christ, and be a light of Christ to help others develop/strengthen their own relationships with them. 

ENRICHMENT

Be available to help anyone out at a moment's notice.

Develop my talents to bring more purpose and joy to my life and to bless the lives of others.

Spend time with our friends as often as possible.

Return to my Heavenly Parents with all of my loved ones.

I love turtles/tortoises and need to remember slow and steady wins the race!  I also need to remember that a positive attitude makes a huge difference!  When I was in high school I went to a student council conference and in one of our classes we had to repeat several times getting louder and louder each time, "I am awesome!"  I need to repeat this every day to believe in myself, do good works, and be joyful while doing it!

Macy's Blessing

Today was a special day for our family. Our little miss Macy received a name and a blessing at church.  We were missing our extended families, but are so grateful for our dear friends here.  Kevin, Gregg, and Dave stood in the blessing circle with Leonard.  (Daniel was the cute Deacon that held the microphone too.)

Today was also the day of our first family picture.  (Finally!)

I love this girl (and her crazy hair)!  Seriously, she is channeling Albert Einstein's or Don King's hair, ha ha!

Sweet angel didn't make a peep while her Daddy gave her a beautiful blessing.  Her Daddy loves her so much and she loves him.  But, big yawn, she was getting so tired of taking pictures.

The poor girl was getting hangry now, so we had to stop taking pictures so I could feed her.

We love you sweet Macy Marie!

Watch out World!

Or at least watch out drivers in Ottawa!

These two will be coming soon to a street near you!

See You Later Alligator!

Goodbyes are no fun, but we're so glad Grandpa came to visit!!

I often wish I could buy an island and then move all of our families and friends there to live with us.  What I love most about living in Ottawa is the people- we have wonderful friends!  But what I hate most about living in Ottawa is the people that I miss- we are so very far away from all of our extended families.  Leonard and I have lived in 6 countries and have met terrific people in each spot.  I just wish I could see all of my loved ones as often as I'd like, sigh.

Easter Weekend

It was so weird to me when we first moved to Canada and I learned that Spring break (or rather March break) didn't coincide with Easter.  However, I have learned to love the 4-day weekend just for Easter here.  I also love our new Easter decor!

We started our festivities on Friday with coloring 30 hard boiled eggs.  We didn't have access to Easter egg dye last year in India, so we used markers instead.  This year we could have got the egg dye, but we chose to decorate them with markers again.

Macy slept through our arts and crafts time, but I know one day she will create little beauties of her own.

Ta-da!  Everyone did a great job!  I love seeing the creativity!

Saturday morning the kids discovered that the Easter bunny had come!  He brought them new baskets with chocolate bunnies, Cheetos carrots, marshmallow peeps, sequin eggs, and new teddy bears!  He also filled more eggs with more candy for their hunt later.

I took individual pictures of the kids with their candy baskets, their baskets and bears, and with their eggs from the hunt.  I'm just sharing my favorite one of each though.

The Easter bunny even brought a basket for Grandpa!

The kids scored on their egg hunt finding inside Cadbury creme eggs, Reese's peanut butter eggs, Oreo eggs, M&Ms, Hershey's eggies, Reese's pieces eggs, and jelly beans!

(Teague arranged everyone to sit in rainbow order, so my son- ha ha!)

Macy got all the eggs!

I added bows to each bear so the kids can tell whose is whose.

(I know I have 7 kids and there are 8 bears, but you know I'm still dreaming of having one more little babe!)

On Saturday and Sunday we watched all the sessions of General Conference.  On Sunday morning we feasted on Palachinkas.  On Sunday evening we feasted on Easter dinner!  Since we had a ham for our Epiphany dinner, we did a turkey this time complete with cranberry sauce, stuffing, green bean casserole, funeral potatoes, deviled eggs, rolls, and sparkling cider. 

For dessert we had strawberry-rhubarb pie a la mode.

Our festivities also included watching It's the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown and HOP.

I am so grateful that my Savior, Jesus Christ atoned for my sins, died for me, and was resurrected!  Because of Him I can be forgiven, live again after death, and spend eternity with my loved ones.  There is no greater gift!

#17

It was so wonderful, humbling, and testimony-building to be a part of a world-wide Solemn Assembly to sustain Russell M. Nelson as the seventeenth president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  We thank thee, O God, for a prophet!

Green Cupcakes and Jumanji

In honor of Grandpa Green-eyes visiting, we made green frosted ice cream cone cupcakes.

Poor Macy was sleeping so she missed out, ha ha!

Grandpa treated us with a trip to the movies.  We showed the kids trailers for 8 different movies and then had them do a secret vote.  Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle got the most votes, so off we went.  Thanks Grandpa it was fun!