The Keeshkabobs <3

Christmas Morning

2012-01-16T17:32:00.000-08:00

I know it sounds kind of bad, but one thing my siblings and I look forward to each year is what the tree looks like on Christmas morning. How many presents are under it and how high they are stacked. I think most of us are over the "what we are getting and how many" stage and are now onto the "how much are we giving, I can't wait to see if they like it" stage. We also wrap EVERYTHING and usually in bigger boxes than are needed just to make it look like more. This year though I think was my last year thinking like that. My first thought when I saw the tree was "This is way to much, even for 10 people." Pretty intense, huh?

I do have to say that out of everything stockings are my favorite part of Christmas. I look forward to opening my stocking more than my gifts under the tree. Santa treats me VERY well. I got flowers (for my hair,) jewelry, dvds, cds, gift cards and fuzzy socks... and hardly any candy, which I was happy about. It never gets eaten.
Since Christmas fell on a Sunday this year we all woke up and went to church. It LOVED going to church in the morning. It was so wonderful to feel the true spirit of Christmas prior to doing the whole commercial side of christmas. In church on Sunday I sang with the ward choir. It was fun to stand between my mom and sister and hear all of our voices blend together so well. I think when you are in the same family your vocal cords must be similar and made in such a way that they blend with the other member of your family? Maybe? At least in my family we do. I sang a duet with my sister. I sang the lyrics "On a star lit night, neath a sky so bright. The angles sing carols of love. Of a baby asleep in a manger bed, sent from heaven above. Sleep oh tiny precious one sleep Gods chosen son." While my sister sang the 1st verse of silent night. It was beautiful together the way it was arranged. It was also really cool to sing a duet with her. We have never been able to do that before. Shortly after our duet my dad gave the concluding talk. It was beautiful. He touched on all the major things I wanted to hear and be reminded of on Christmas. I was sitting on the stage and tears were steaming down my face. His words words beautiful, the spirit so strong and my whole family within feet from me. I don't know how many more Christmas' we'll be able to spend all together as we grow older and my siblings get married and have kids. But I hope we do it often because I have never been more happy than I was on Christmas day.

After church we all went home and took pictures in front of the tree. Usually we were in our PJ's but since we all were in church clothes and looking pretty we decided to take advantage of the situation and snap a few pictures. Don't worry though. We didn't stay in our church clothes for long. It was unanimous that we all must put back on our PJ's if we were going to open gifts.

Christmas Eve

2012-01-16T05:17:00.000-08:00

Christmas eve was wonderful this year. That morning my friends from church Aaron, his wife Kristina, and Michael came over for breakfast. It was lovely to spend time catching up on each others lives. Once again it felt just like old times. Although we were missing our friend Laurissa who was part of our "fantastic four" when we were in high school, but her family has since moved away from our town so she was not there. After they left Mike and I went to the mall to pick a few things up. We came home and gathered the family together to learn the 4 part harmony to silent night. Once we felt like it sounded good, it was off to caroling, which i already posted about :)

After Caroling we came home and had delicious soup for dinner. But we were all very anxious to get the Christmas eve traditions rolling.

Every year on Christmas eve we all get a new pair of PJ's for that night. I love new PJ'S!!

please notice that in this picture Andrew is 1/2 naked putting on his new PJ's... some things that are tradition, maybe shouldn't be once you reach a certain age... lol.

so precious

Famous McKnight Butt shot.

Of course KT and Andrew preformed the popular Christmas song "Baby it's Cold Outside." The sound so pretty together. After the concert was over all the kids went to the basement for the night. The boys brought down their mattresses and we all watched Elf to go to sleep. It was sooo wonderful being together. I love the pictures we took. The boys always hate how many pictures I take, but I don't care. These are some of my new favorites.

Merry Christmas Eve!!

T'was The Week Before Christmas

2012-01-16T05:00:00.000-08:00

This year I was able to go home to Ohio the week before Christmas. It was probably the first time in several years (maybe even since I lived at home) that I was able to do that. You got to love the schedule of a teacher.

I flew home on Saturday Dec 17th. I had been sick with a stomach bug all week so I opted for the 1st class upgrade for the fight home. I LOVED IT. I was the first person on the plane, my seat was huge and comfortable, I was given a drink the second I sat down, presented with a basket full of treats rather than just handed peanuts. It was amazing. It will be hard to fly coach from now on.

I went to bed as soon as I got home that night.

Sunday we went to church. When we got home I helped my mom make dinner. My grandparents arrived and we all hung out. Then I we all went to Katie's concert. After the concert we came home and hung out and the kids played a game called "Last Word." I'm not sure how you are suppose to play it but we made up our own rules and it was a lot of fun. We all were laughing non-stop. Infant, at one point I was laughing so hard I was crying (which believe it or not was the first time that has ever happened to me.) It was a memory I will cherish forever. Now that we are all getting older we enjoy spending time together and we don't fight :) That is a good stage when your family finally hits that point.

Monday my mom and I went out to Amish country. I love it out there. We also went to wal-mart and ran a few more errand. When we got home we got stuff together for Elizabeths class party. Since she is in 5th grade they still have parties and my mom was scheduled to help out. Naturally I tagged along. We were in charge of games and we played a really cool one. We gave them a bag with eight groups of paper. Each group of paper was the letter needed to spell a christmas song. They had to unscramble the letters and spell the song. Then they all stood up and had to sing it. It was sooo much fun for the kids, teacher and other adults. I directed the activity. As soon as I got the classes attention another mom looked at my mom and said "is she a teacher?" Got to love my natural classroom control. After that we went home and began to get dinner ready. It is to bad that my families favorite dinner is one that requires so much work, but man is it good. We all ate dinner together which was wonderful, it's not often that all of us are home and was are able to sit down for a meal more than once. I think we had dinner together all but 2 nights I was home.

Tuesday- My mom and I went to Zanesville, where my mom grew up, to visit her parents. My Aunt Becky and her son Kyle came up from columbus to visit as well. It was nice to spent time with my moms family. Unfortunately we were only able to stay for a few hours before we had to get home. Tuesdays are busy at my house with all of my sisters activities. We drove them around town and picked up pizza for dinner (as tuesday is now pizza night at my house.) That night after dinner the kids made the traditional batch of christmas sugar cookies. Unfortunately this year the boys mostly watched "The Grinch" while the girls decorated. But the tradition was carried out which is the important part.

Wednesday all five kids and my mom braved Canton. It was busy and traffic was awful. My mom had errands to run and the kids had to get all their christmas gifts for each other. We went to Target, Dick's sporting goods, Khols, Michaels and Steak and Shake (for lunch.) Then we went to the Mall for a good 3-4 hours. My feet were so tired from walking back and forth and my shoulders sore from carrying all my bags and purse. My dad met us up their that evening and we all went to play lazar tag. It was a blast. They were pretty slow so it was only my family in the whole room. Andrew picked the perfect spot to pick people off from and I was getting frustrated. So I formed an alliance with my sisters so we could go get him. It didn't really work but we had fun anyways. We cornered my dad which was pretty funny, but I felt bad that all his little girls had teamed up to get him. After lazar tag we still had to go to Sam's Club, Jos A Banks and Walmart. We didn't get home till about 11pm (only 10 -11 hours after we left.) When we got home we found that the dog had eaten all but eight of the cookies we had made. What a shame, Those were good cookies!!! Lucky dog.

Thursday was spent mostly in my PJ'S watching How I Met Your Mother and Storage Wars while I wrapped gifts with my sister by the fireplace. Thats about all I remember. I was in a wrapping frenzy.

Friday my sisters and I went to run errands to find a few last minute gifts for people. We had fun spending time together as sisters. It isn't very often that we get to do that. They are both growing up so fast. I am so excited that it doesn't feel like they are 9 and 13 years younger than me. I love the bond that is growing as we get older and the age gap is less and less noticeable.

That night my friend Michelle, from high school, came over to see my family and I. I love it when you have friends that you may not see very often but when you do it is like nothing has changed. You still laugh at stupid things, the conversation flows just as easily and you feel "at home" with them. I hate that I live so far away from so many of my friends who I have that bond with. But I look forward to times like that night when we are able to reconnect and make new memories. After Michelle left Mike showed up. He had been driving all that day to get there. When he got there the ping-pond challenge began. He told everyone that the first person to beat him would win $10. I think everyone gave it a try, multiple times, but he still won. He remains undefeated on our table at home.

Ceremony of Carols

2012-01-08T13:25:00.000-08:00

When I was in high school I was in an "elite" women's choir called Ladies Ensemble. Every Christmas we preferred a concert called Ceremony of Carols. It was a tradition. We would sing a few fun christmas songs at the beginning then we would do a work by Benjerman Britten called Ceremony of Carols. It is written in old english and has about 8 or 9 songs in it. We started practicing in October and the concert was right before Christmas. I preformed in the concert all four years of high school and loved the music. I even had a solo my senior year.

My sister is in this choir now. She has used my old song book to learn her music the past few years and this year she had a solo. I haven't been able to go to the concert since I was in it. This year I can into town the day before so I could go see her sing. It was so fun and took me back to high school. It made me miss my girlfriends who were in choir with me. Where has the time gone? My whole family went and we had a great time... well I did... my brothers weren' sad when it was over.

Katie singing her solo

The 5 McKnight kids

sisters

mother daughter love

mom and dad

my awesome grandparents and I

Cookies for Santa

2012-01-08T13:13:00.000-08:00

My mom makes loaves of bread for her friends and neighbors for Christmas. I've done that for the past few years but with only a kitchen aid to assist me it was much to time consuming. So this year I thought I would make some cookies in a jar. It was fairly easy to make but ended up being much more expensive than I thought it would be. So I will need to find something more affordable for next year. I wish I could take credit for the recipe but I found it here and made it work for christmas.

Here is the recipe if you want to try it at home. It is delicious and should be made year round. The texture and taste are phenomenal.

1 1/3 cup all purpose flour, spooned into measuring cup & leveled
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup cooking oats
3/4 cup m&ms
3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup white sugar
1/3 – 1/2 cup chopped pecans

Add

1 slightly beaten egg
1/2 cup butter (melted slightly in the microwave)
1 teaspoon vanilla

Mix wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Use the back of a large spoon to work it all together. You may even need to use your hands to get everything incorporated.

Then roll the cookie dough into 1 1/2 inch balls, place on a parchment covered baking sheet and bake for about 10 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven. I got about 26-28 cookies out of these.

Start with a 1 quart smooth Ball jar. I found these at Hobby Lobby craft store.

Layer the ingredients in like this:

First: flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt
Second: oats
Third: m&ms
Fourth: chocolate chips
Fifth: brown sugar
Sixth: white sugar
Seventh: chopped pecans

Pack each level down really tightly. I mean it. Pack it in. Or else it won’t all fit. Also, I added the chopped pecans last, because if the ingredients were too much or not enough, then I could add more or less pecans to adjust. I’d rather sacrifice nuts than chocolate, you know. The ingredients should be flush to the top of the lid when you seal it up.

Night out on the town

2012-01-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

The Saturday after Thanksgiving Mike and I had a wonderful evening in the city. We started off the night by going on a city lights boat tour. We had dinner on the ship while it sailed around lower Manhattan and passed the Statue of Liberty. The city is beautiful but light up at night it is breath taking.

After the cruise we headed over to Radio City Hall of Music to see the Christmas Spectacular. Even though it was still November it seemed most of the city was already lit up and ready for Christmas. I loved all the decorations and lights out on the streets. It was simply enchanting.

If you have never been to Radio City, you must go. It is absolutely beautiful inside. It almost transports you back into a different time. A time when ladies and gentleman had a lounge in the restroom and dressed in their best clothes to go to the theater.

The show was simply stunning. I love watching the rockets dance. They are impeccably in sync with one another. It is just incredible.

I love the act with all of the dancing Santa's.

This is Mike's favorite number. The March of the toy soldiers when they all fall down slowly. It is amazing to watch.

The nativity number at the end always gets me in tears. I love how in a society where people are trying to take "God" out of the constitution people still aren't afraid to include Him in their Christmas celebration. They play a melody of Christmas songs as the 3 wise men travel to see the Christ child. They bring in live camels, sheep and a donkey. Pretty impressive and very moving. I LOVE it!

Thanksgiving 2011

2012-01-08T11:46:00.000-08:00

This year we were in Utah for Thanksgiving. It was our first time spending a major holiday with Mike's Family. It was also nice not to be hosting a ton of people for Thanksgiving dinner. Don't get me wrong. I love hosting, but it is a lot of work so it was nice to take the year off. I even got to sleep in :)

Although Mike and Bryant both really missed a competitive turkey bowl this year they made sue with what they had. They rallied the nieces and nephews and held their own turkey bowl on the front lawn. Although the competition wasn't as tall as they were use to they still had fun and made some good memories with the little ones.

Thanksgiving lunch was wonderful (of course.) It was my brothers first American Thanksgiving in two years. He loved having all the traditional foods and I think he had 2 or 3 plate of just noodles.

As dinner settled Mike and Bryant were sneak attacked by the youngins. Before they could fully digest their food the kids wanted to wrestle with them. It was pretty funny watching them get beat up on. I was upset that my camera lens was dirty.

The rest of the day we watched football and visited with each other. I did a little online sale searching gearing up for the day after Thanksgiving sales.

That night Bryant and I went to go see the new Twilight movie. We viewed it as more of a comedy rather than a drama. I think people were confused as to why we were laughing when the content was so serious.

We went to walmart at about 11pm (they opened at 10) it was a mad house and we went home without stopping anywhere else. Instead I got online and did all my shopping there. I was pretty impressed. I think I will do black Friday online from now on.

Friday we headed back to CT. It was sad to leave everyone but we knew we would see a lot of them in January in Costa Rica :)

When we got to the airport we went to check-in and all of a sudden I heard my name. I turned around to see my best friend Cynda from Ct waving at me. We knew they were coming home the same day we were but were on a different flight.... however, a turn of events put them on BOTH of our flights home. So we traveled to Denver then to LGA together. It was fun having these unexpected travel buddies. On our flight from SLC to Denver they were in the seats right in front of us. Then all four of us and all of our luggage crammed into mikes little mazda and made the drive from the airport home. :) It was a surprisingly fun travel experience.

Utah in November

2012-01-08T11:01:00.000-08:00

We got into Utah around 7 or 8pm on Saturday November 19th and I was sooo "air sick" I went right to bed.

Sunday morning Mike's dad came home from ward choir practice and asked if I wanted to sing with their choir in church that day. He played the piano and taught me he song. It was a lot of fun! I loved learning a new song and singing in such a large ward choir. I also loved singing with my father-in-law. He is soo amazingly talented!

After church we went to Mikes sister Heather's house. I spent some one on one time with my nieces and gave them a manicure. It is hard to believe how old they are getting. I loved talking with them, I much prefer one-on-one time with my nieces and nephews over only seeing them when they are all together. I love getting to know them all better.

Later on that evening we had dinner at Mike's sister Camille's home. That was a lot of fun as well. We stayed late and played games till I couldn't stay awake any longer.

Monday I got to go on a little shopping trip with Mike's sister Camille. I love being able to go to Downeast when I am in Utah. We also grabbed lunch at Cafe Rio, I really wish they would franchise into Stamford or New York.... sooo delicious.

That evening we went to dinner with Mike's Parents, Grandmother, Aunt and Uncle at Chuck-a-rama. It was my first experience and I don't know that I'll be back. The food was good enough but buffets and I don't do well together. I always walk out way to full. After dinner we went to the Hale Center Theater and saw the show "My Fair Lady." I had never seen it all the way through before, but I absolutely LOVED it!! Now I know what people are talking about when they say "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain."

Tuesday Mike and I stopped at In-N-Out for lunch... another place on our list of places we have to go when we are in Utah. After lunch we headed down to Provo to pick up my brother Bryant who is at school at BYU. I was so happy that we were able to spend time together over the Thanksgiving holiday. We filled his fridge and pantry up with food then headed back up to Farmington. We went to a piano recital for sister Jessie and niece Lauren, both did very well and it was fun to be able to see them preform. After the recital we all rushed to the Joseph Smith Memorial building for dinner. It was Mikes mom's birthday and we all surprised her by being at the restaurant when she walked in with dad. It was fun to visit with everyone and have my brother there getting to know Mike's family.

what a beautiful view of the temple

After dinner we went to the Miles home for cake and ice cream with the kids (who stayed home from dinner.)
The kids LOVE wrestling with Mike. As soon as he walks in the door they are hanging on his legs trying to knock him to the ground. He loves it. He's going to be a great dad someday.
Wednesday I started all my baking. I made 2 apple pies, raspberry jello salad, slush for punch and noodles. The house was pretty busy with people dropping in to say hello and visit. That afternoon a ton of us went to Bookdocks and had a blast. I think there were 20 of us there I think. It was fun to do all of the different activities with everyone.

Go-Karts and Lazer Tag

2012-01-07T20:02:00.000-08:00

While we were in Utah we went with Mike's family to Boondocks. We have so much fun there. We did the go-karts together and that was hilarious. I accidently hit Mikes cousin Brett and spun his cart around. He was stuck that way till everyone passed him and he could turn around. I think I laughed for a good 5 min over that. My nieces and nephews rode along with some of the adults. They would try and race my car.. but I always won. When there is no danger of serious bodily harm I am a speed demon ;)

The other activity I LOVED was lazer tag. I have never had so much fun doing something like this before. I was having so much fun I was high fiving strangers (granite I thought the stranger was Bryant, everyone looks the same in the dark.) I think I played 6 or 7 games. I was on fire.
I was the Green Goblin in this game. I led my fellow red team member to victory with over 20,000 points.
How much do I love my brother? He was my partner in crime during the games. We would shout directions to each other as we took down the enemy. We made a great team. It was a blast!
They also had the arcade that we played at for a while. No 500 ticket bonus this time but still a lot of fun. Mike spent most of him money playing the basketball game. He did really well and broke the high record for the day. My little Michael Jordan!

Turkey of Thanks

2012-01-07T19:53:00.000-08:00

I thought this turkey was cute. I made them with my kids at school. They told me what they were thankful for and I wrote them on the feathers. The week before Thanksgiving Mike went on a business trip to Chicago. When he got home I had this little friend and a tostada waiting for him on the kitchen table. In addition to it's adorableness it smelled pretty dang good. The orange juice, cinnamon stick and cloves gave it an autumnal aroma.

Baked Goods

2012-01-07T19:32:00.000-08:00

I love baking in the fall. Two of my favorite go to recipes this fall were my apple pie and apple cider doughnut holes recipes. I LOVE them!!!

{A funny story about this pie. I made it for a get together with friends. I was running late so the pie came out of the over a few minutes before we walked out the door. I carried it to the car with the hot pads and I figured I would set it on my lap. I got in the car and rested the pie on my lap and began to put my seatbelt on. As I did so Mike started driving away. Since I was not holding onto the pie it slid back on my lap and tilted. This allowed a ton of carmel filling to come through the lattice top and spill ALL over my leg. Not only was this messy BUT it was HOT, HOT, HOT!!! I screamed and I couldn't do anything fast enough because I still had a hot pie on my lap and hot pads on my hands. I ran inside and did what I should have done in the first place, put the pie on a baking sheet. My leg was pretty red were the hot mess spilled, luckily it healed well :)

These little guys are so yummy-- but CAUTION: if you don't give them away to friends... you will eat them.... all... in one night.... ekks!! :)

Halloween

2012-01-07T19:08:00.000-08:00

This year halloween weekend was a little unusual. We had a FREAK snow storm (our only snow storm of the season as of Jan 7th.) It hit on Saturday Oct 29th. The week leading up to it reports said it was only going to snow a little, a light dusting that would be gone by sunday morning. Then on Saturday comes and it is a mess outside. Our ward had our planned a trunk or treat for that day. I had asked to take the twins with me. I left my house to go pick them up and a drive that should have taken 10-15 minutes took an hour. The snow was sooo wet and heavy that as it piled onto the trees (who still were full of leaves) branches started to fall on power and cable lines.

Luckily, I got Pinky Pie and Star Song to the party safely. They had a lot of fun. Halloween is WAY more fun with kids. That night we were suppose to go to a halloween party, but were lame and stayed home because of the weather. We (especially me) hate going out in the snow.

Halloween was a Monday so I was at school, which was fun. All the kids brought there costumes to school. We had a halloween party and paraded around the school for all to see. The Pre-K and Kindergarden teachers always dress similar for Halloween. This year as you can tell we were the "Pear Tree Pumpkin Patch." Please notice my pumpkin was carved as Cinderella and had sparkly vines.

This was as festive as we got around our house this year. Mikes not a big halloween person and I could go either way. So we had chili for dinner (a halloween tradition for him) and watched tv. I was glad I didn't but any candy since once again we had no trick or treaters. Which I don't understand since we have little kids that live in our small strip of Condos. Maybe they don't celebrate Halloween?

This year our pumpkins didn't even get carved :( Sad. Maybe next year we will be cooler

Corn Maze

2012-01-07T18:54:00.000-08:00

Mike and I have made it a tradition to do a corn maze every Autumn. It is kind of silly when you think about it. We drove about an hour to walk around for 30 min weaving in and out of corn stalks trying to find our way out. We have fun though. We secretly race others in the maze and try to beat them to the next marker. It is a fun tradition that I hope we continue. If nothing else the drive is beautiful and the company is lovely.

Apple Picking

2012-01-07T18:23:00.000-08:00

Way back in October Mike and I went to our favorite CT farm and picked apples and pumpkins. The weather couldn't have been more beautiful. We picked four bags of apples of all different varieties. I had a lot of fun making those apples into apple pie, apple sauce, apple crisp and then eating them for snacks. I can't wait to go again next year. After picking apples we went to the little farm store and bought some delicious jam and apple butter. On our way home we stopped at a Crackle Barrel for a late lunch and it was surprisingly delicious. It was the perfect Autumn day with my favorite guy.

Christmas Eve Memory (that will last forever.)

2011-12-28T18:36:00.000-08:00

(My family on Christmas eve ready to carol.)

Many years ago (maybe 20 or so) my parents wanted to do something on Christmas Eve for other people. With my dad being in school we had very little money so giving gifts to a family in need seemed out of the question. Instead they decided that their small family would go see some of the people who had to work on Christmas Eve who may be missing their families. To these people we would sing christmas carols and deliver a small token of our appreciation for their service to our community, a loaf of my moms blue ribbon wheat bread.

We went to the fire department and police station and caroled to them and thanked them for working to keep up safe year round. They seemed to really appreciate our visit and even gave us a tour of the fire department. Over the next few years it became a family tradition to go carol to the fire department and every year they were waiting for us. We also added to our route a small number of neighbors and friends we would go sing to and give a loaf of bread, our holiday gift to them.

Then we moved from Columbus to New Philadelphia. When that christmas eve came around we went to home teachers/ visiting teachers/ neighbors and friends, not the fire department, police department or anywhere else where people were working. Many people looked forward to it, others didn't seem to appreciate it as much, but we still went because it was tradition. The amount of people we delivered bread to increased significantly and my poor mom dreaded christmas eve as she knew she would spend her day making over 20 loaves of bread.

Now we are all a little older. All of the older kids have been in "elite" choirs and have a pretty good ear for picking out and singing harmony. So we gathered everyone in the piano room this year to learn our parts so we could sing "Silent Night" in 4 part harmony. It sounded good and we were ready to go blow away the people we normally carol to.

Before we left I made the comment about how we use to go to the fire department. Elizabeth, my 11 year old sister, wasn't born when we lived in Columbus and didn't even know that is where we use to go. My brother Bryant had said he wanted to do something for someone else on Christmas eve, something special, but we couldn't think of anyone who really needed anything. Then my dad suggested "Why don't we go to the hospital (where he works) and sing to the nurses and patients who are there." We all loved the idea, and off we went.

On our way we sang carols and realized that between the four oldest kids we had learned all 4 parts to "Carol of the Bells" and practiced so we could add that to our performance as well. When we go to the hospital we went up the the second floor where my dads patients were. We walked through the halls and sang "Silent Night," "Joy to the World," "Hark The Harold Angels Sing," "Carol of the Bells," and "We Wish You and Merry Christmas" all with beautiful harmonies. We saw tears in the eyes of some of the nurses, one came up and gave my dad a hug. She thanked him for bringing his family on Christmas eve. We knew they appreciated our small act of kindness. We all felt so good inside. Then we went to the ER and sang to them. They sang a long with us and it was like a scene from a movie. It was really neat, and we felt like we were spreading "christmas cheer."

But then a little inspiration hit my father. My grandfather had a friend named Jack who he has know since the 1950's. He served with Patton's Army in the Battle of Bulge in WWII. He met my grandfather serving in the air national guard and they have been friends ever since. He is 90 years old and a patient of my fathers. In fact, he was very sick earlier in the week. His wife was very worried and thought he was dying. My dad fixed him up and got him home two days prior to Christmas eve. He lives about 15 minutes away from the hospital and my dad said "why don't we go see Jack and Hope." We all though that would be a great idea and off we went.

When we got there we sang all our songs and Hope had tears in her eyes. They invited us in for a few minutes. When we got inside my mom asked Jack how he was feeling and he just sobbed. I'm not sure what was running through his mind but you could tell he was touched that we had thought of them that night. He gave us all hugs and kisses, told us some stories about "Mac" (my grandpa's nickname.) His wife thanked us over and over again and told us how grown up we all were. All I wanted to do was cry. I was so overwhelmed with gratitude, with the spirit of Christmas and the joy that overcomes you when you do something for someone else.

We had wanted to do something for someone else and we had. We knew we had truly made their Christmas eve special and they had made ours one we would never forget. It seems such a small act but it has changed me just a little. I always want to find that person who needs us on christmas eve, who may be alone or sick or working and not with their family.

What a gift/blessing it is to be with your whole family on Christmas. To have not only your parents, siblings and spouse but your grandparents with you as well. I feel so blessed to be 24 and still have all my grandparents, aunts, uncles siblings, ect in good health and alive. I have always felt this way, but this year I felt it so much stronger. I love my crazy family and our silly ways. I loved having them all together and I love all the memories we made.

Opps!!

2011-11-01T18:11:00.000-07:00

So I've been bad.... really bad. I was so good about my blogging in the summer. {Oh the summer. What a joyous memory, if only it would come back.} Now my blogging is more like... I'm to tired to think of something whitty... it's just not very frequent.

I have had to prioritize my life and blogging is basically at the bottom. We have been having a lot of fun this Autumn though. We have....

*Been apple picking

*Pumpkin picking

*Done a corn Maze

*Made homemade apple pie {with the apples with picked}

*Made apple cider doughnut holes

*Halloween gatherings

*Celebrated Canadian Thanksgiving {Thank you Megan!}

*Ward trunk-or-treat

*Freak snow storm

*Halloween Parade at school

*Field trip {with the children} to a nature center

*Some depressing and exciting Ohio State football games

*Enjoyed long drives with beautiful fall foliage.

*Plenty of trips to Stew Lenards

*Made plenty of Chili, Broccoli Cheddar, Vegtable and Spinach egg drop soup

Maybe I will get some pictures of a few of these occasions up here soon. BUT not tonight. Tonight I am off to bed at 9:30 so I can get up and go to the gym at 5:30. Gotta love early mornings!

Taking a Stand

2011-10-12T16:54:00.000-07:00

You know what is hard? Having the things you believe and hold so dear, the very things that define you, be mocked, criticized and ridiculed. Having someone come out and tell the world that you are not christian and that you are a member of a cult. To see books published and websites dedicated to twisting the things you believe into lies. To have a broadway play written to point fingers at your standards and make others critical of your beliefs. Then to have people see all of the above material and then pass a harsh judgement about you without any thought of "I wonder if all of this it true...

Well it's NOT!

I can not believe the amount of attention The Church is getting right now. Between Mitt Romney and John Huntsman running for the Republican Presidential ticket, the broadway musical "The Book of Mormom" and the "I'm a Mormon" campaign I feel like that is all I see these days.

It is hard to stomach sometimes, hard not to jump up and scream "YOU'RE WRONG!! You idiot! Do your research!" But that wouldn't be very Christ-like, would it?

On the bright side there have been many not of our faith who have began to "stick up for us" if you will. Journalist like Anderson Cooper calling out the Rev. Robert Jeffers on his claims that Mormons (who by the way prefer to be called members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints) are an unchristian cult. Others who write negative reviews of "The Book of Mormon" musical because no faith should be under such scrutiny.

So this is what I say. If people not of my faith are willing to stand up for me and my brothers and sisters of the church, than so will I. I'm not trying to "convert" others to the LDS faith but rather educate them. So when someone tried to tell them, "those mormons are weird because they don't drink alcohol." They might say something like "While I enjoy drinking myself, mormons aren't weird. They live a high health code which includes not eating/drinking any substance that might prove addictive or harmful. In fact, I think I'll skip the wine with my dinner tonight." LOL. Ok, fine. Maybe they wouldn't say it quite like that, but you get the picture.

Also why do people make fun of us or find it so hard to believe that Joseph Smith received a book of scriptures (the Book of Mormon) from an angel on a hill. While the rest of christianity has not problem believing that Moses received stone tablets (the 10 commandments) from a burning bush on the top of a mountain?

So to those people who say we are not Christian I say this: #1 Go listen to this guy, Jeffery R Holland, tell you why we are Christians. I would like him to be my 3rd grandfather (along with the rest of the 1st presidency and quorum of the 12.) #2 One of our number one beliefs is "We believe in God the Eternal Father, and in his Son Jesus Christ and in the Holy Ghost." We also believe that it is through the atoning blood of Jesus Christ that all men are saved. That seems like a solid Christian belief to me.

My next few blog posts I plan to highlight the articles of faith . I know 99.9% of the people who read my blog are LDS but for the .1% who stumble upon my blog I want them to be clear on what we believe. I want to do my part is spreading the truthfulness of the things we believe. I want to have my testimony recorded, so that there will be no doubt in the generations to come, That I knew with a surety that Christ LIVES. That he died on the cross to take away my sins. He suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane so that I might be redeemed from my sins. He knows and loves me personally. He is aware of all of us, not just me. I know that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God. Just as the heavens were open to the prophets of old, they are open once again. It doesn't make since for our loving Heavenly Father to leave us with no modern revelation in a world that is so consumed with wickedness, pain and suffering. I know that the Book of Mormon is true, it does contain the record of the people on the Americas. It goes hand in hand with the Bible. There is no way a boy with a minimal education could have compiled that book. I also know because I have read it, many times, and I have prayed about it. I have received my own personal witness of its truthfulness and you will too. If you read it then pray about it with sincerity having a real intent to know for yourself, you will receive the same witness, and then you too will not be able to deny it.

"4. And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ^aask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not ^btrue; and if ye shall ask with a ^csincere heart, with ^dreal intent, having ^efaith in Christ, he will ^fmanifest the^gtruth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.

5 And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may ^aknow the ^btruth of all things."

Moroni 10: 4&5

Weekend in Vermont

2011-09-28T19:14:00.000-07:00

A few weekends ago we took a trip to Vermont with a bunch of our friends. After Irene hit we were afraid we might not be able to go due to flooding and washed out roads. But even after several road closures and more than a few detours we all made it to our cabin. We got there late friday night and had to be up early the next day for the race.

The whole reason for going on the trip was for people to run a race. Most did the 5k while 3 did the half marathon. The rest of us that did not run were on babysitting duty.

Mike ran his first 5K since we have been married. He didn't run at all to train but counted his biweekly basketball nights as his training. He actually did really well. You can kind of see him running in across the finish line at 26 minutes and 46 seconds. Not to shabby for no training.
He even got a nice little medal. Note to self: find a race that will give me a metal for finishing. I actually have been running a lot lately. I have been doing interval training on the treadmill. I am getting a lot faster and it is fun to see the progress. The only problem is my shin splints. I am learning to power through the pain, but some days I get off the treadmill and can barely walk. Even after I stretch I still limp a little. I really hate feeling limited.... blah.
Back to Vermont. Here are the runners. Ben, Camille and Tim were our 1/2 marathon runners. They all came in within 5 minutes of each other. It was a lot of fun to cheer everyone on and to be outside on a seriously beautiful fall saturday.

After the race the runners needed a little nourishment. We asked a local were a good place to eat was and they directed us to this great little diner. The food was delicious we shared onion rings, onion strings, mozzarella sticks and had some of the biggest burgers ever.
The only sad part was our group was to big to sit at the same table so half the group sat at one table...
and the other across the isle way...
After lunch the men were anxious to get back to the house to watch some college football and the women were anxious to hit the outlet stores in town. They had some fantastic stores but after some very costly trips to J. Crew and Ann Taylor we had to head home before we spent our husbands whole paycheck. It was a lot of fun to go shopping with the girls and get some awesome deals!

We divided three meals that we knew we would eat at the house up and assigned different couples to be in charge of them. We shared the responsibility of Saturday's dinner with the Johnsons and Elmores. We decided to do a crowd favorite, Cafe Rio Chicken/Pork salad with black beans, cilantro lime ranch dressing and rice. It was soooo delicious!! And we made the perfect amount.

After eating our dinner on the deck and watching the sunset we headed up to the game room and all crowded around the TV to watch the BYU vs Texas game. It was so much fun hanging out, playing ping-pong, chatting and cheering on BYU.
The ladies took a little break during half time and took a dip in the hot tub. It was quite the bonding experience but we ended up missing most of the second half of the game.
After staying up late playing games and visiting we got to sleep in the next morning. Well those of us without children got to sleep in. Some of us were even lucky enough to be feed breakfast in bed. Yes, that is my husband feeding Ben bacon in bed... strange.

After a delicious breakfast we went over the a ski resort called Stratton Mountain. It was a cute place but kind of deserted for a weekend.

We took a Gondola ride to the top of the ski slope which was really cool. Unfortunately it was a little foggy so the pictures don't do the breathtaking view justice.

A few of us went on a little hike (about a mile there and another mile back.) The trail I believe is apart of the Appellation trial and lead to a really cool fire look out tower. It was a little scary though when you climbed to the top and the wind would blow and you could feel the tower shake.. very scary. The view from the top made the whole hike worth it, even if I was against it at the beginning (I was not dressed properly for hiking.)

After the hike we went back to the house for a seriously amazing "farewell" lunch. It was kind of bittersweet to leave such a fun trip... but I have a feeling we'll be going back in the future.

Back to School.

2011-09-20T16:45:00.000-07:00

School started about three weeks ago and I have been trying to catch my breathe ever since. We definitely got off to a rocky start. We {the teachers} started two days after hurricane Irene hit. The campus I work at had NO electricity and NO running water. It was pretty hard setting up and feeling organized when we couldn't do a lot (no copier, no lamination, no computer, no printer, no using the bathroom at work.) We finally had to start taking work home with us, which is no fun.

But all the frustration of setting a classroom up in the dark went away when I met my class. I LOVE them. You would too. I wish I could put a picture up to show how cute they are, but I'm not allowed :( I have made some good friends this year. One little boy told his mom I was his favorite teacher! YAY! He is so adorable. He is a well mannered, tiny little boy who reminds me of Stewart Little. When we asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, he said... "Strong." Precious.

Another of my new friends LOVES the Disney Princesses. In fact at recess the first week of school she requested I call her "Queen Sleeping Beauty" and she called me Cinderella (who she thinks I look like.) I play with her a lot when I can since she is a little shy. Today at lunch they were talking about "best friends." I told the table of girls that they could have a lot of best friends. One of the girls asked "but who is your first best friend." I said I have lots of BF and I like them all the same. Then my little friend says "Like me, I'm one of your best friends, right?" How precious! I love my job!

Did I mention we have 7 kids in our class this year? And 2 teacher +1 shadow? Those are pretty good ratios. It makes for fun, easy days. I still leave exhausted. Trust me. But I haven't left feeling stressed or unhappy yet. Which is a good sign.

My favorite time of the day, although I am tired and just want to sit down, is when I get to see these kids. I babysit these guys (since April) after school three afternoons a week from 3:30 to 7:15. I can't think of a better babysitting job. They are so well mannered and fun to be with. I love the twin girls, who are 4 (the same age as the kids at school.) But these girls I get to hug and kiss and love on when I tuck them in at night. I really do love them, all four of them. The oldest boy {9} is a huge sports guy and I often find myself pitching tennis balls or throwing a football with him. The second oldest boy {7} has the largest imagination I have ever seen. I wish I could be so imaginative again. I have fun with these guys. And I can't imagine my afternoons without them. They make me smile... and really want twin girls :)

Remembering

2011-09-11T19:25:00.000-07:00

I haven't ever written down "my" 9/11 story. I've always felt like it was too similar to many other and insignificant compared to those who where in lower Manhattan that day. As I have thought about it more I decided I needed to record it. Because I do remember, like so many others, where I was on that day the world stood still and just watched. My children will want to know what I remember from the day they will only hear about. It is important to record because even though I wasn't there this single act changed our country and me forever.

It wasn't until the beginning of 4th period (10:00 am EST) that I finally heard the news about the twin towers. I was walking into my health class when a friend of mine came into the room and said "We're going to get bombed. I just know it!" I had no idea what she was talking about till I looked up at the TV that was on and saw the horrific picture. Smoke, fire, one tower missing. I was confused. what happen? Where was this? I didn't even know what the twin towers were. I had seen them many times but didn't know what they were called. I had never been to NYC at that point but my heart already ached for the piece of the skyline that was missing and all those whose lives had been lost or changed.

As the minutes went on other student began to fill me in on the news. It was a plane that had been flown into the towers. A United airplane. They weren't sure where the flight originated from but my thoughts immediately jumped to the safety of my Uncle Tom. He was a pilot for United. I didn't have a cell phone back then. But I wanted to run to the office and call my mom to find out if he was ok. Logical thinking would have told me that with hundreds of pilot working for United that he was probably ok. But I was not thinking logically, there was no logic in this. Who would hijack a plane of innocent people? People with children, spouses, mothers, fathers. And then fly that plane into a building full of more innocent people? There is no logic in that.

Then I saw the second tower fall. My heart ached. So many lives lost. I thought of the families of those people. Empty seats at the dinner table, children whose father/mother would not be there to tuck them in at night. Firefighters, police men and port authority workers who were there to help, gone. So heart breaking. My mind jumped to the quote by President Roosevelt after Pear Harbor "A day that will live in infamy." This was the pearl harbor of my generation. This was our call to rise to the challenge and make our nation whole again.

The rest of the school day was spent with the teachers in front of the TV. Reports came in about flight 93, and the pentagon. The pieces of the puzzle were being sorted. We were attacked. By a group of terrorist. They hijacked planes. One brave group of people saved the nations capital a major lose and their plane lay burning in a field in PA. That flight flew over Ohio. If you look at the route it took, if flew right over my hometown.

When I got home my mom was waiting for me at the bus stop. We hugged and cried a little. It was good to be with family at a time like that. She confirmed the safety of my uncle and we walked home. It was my brother Bryant's 12th birthday. As you can imagine none of us felt like celebrating. We all just sat and watched. My younger sister asked lots of questions, how do you explain something like that to a 5 year old? We ordered pizza and ate in the living room. No one talked much. We just sat and watched. At 10:30 at night we finally sang to my brother and he got his birthday gifts. I don't think we even took the traditional family picture around the cake. Then we had family prayer, a very long family prayer. We prayer hard for those who were suffering and thanked Heavenly Father for our safety and for the blessing of living in the Promise Land. A country that was founded on the motto "In God We Trust." For if we put our faith in him, he will guide us and protect us.

In the coming days, weeks and months we saw something our nation hadn't done in years. We came together. Suddenly it didn't matter what political party you belonged too and what religious group you were affiliated with. You were an American and we were proud to be.

10 years later I live in the NYC metro area. I go to the city frequently and see the new skyline. The one without the twin towers, but with the new freedom tower in it's place. It stands as a symbol of hope, rebuilding, healing and pride.

10 years ago I knew no one that was directly affected by 9/11. Now I know several people who were in the city that day. Some running for there lives in lower Manhattan. I know people who lost close friends and coworkers. I know the city. I recognize street signs and buildings when I see the footage from that day. It's a little more personal now.

Today I watched several specials on 9/11. As my heart broke and my spirit sobbed I felt something else too. I felt pride. Look at how our country pulled together. Look at all those brave people who rushed to the aid of strangers. Look at the people who came from all over the country to clean up debri. Look at those Americans standing together. Since then we have cleaned up, rebuilt and found those responsible for the tragic act.

I am so grateful to live in the USA. Grateful to have the gospel in my life that brings peace to my soul in times of crisis and unsurity. Grateful to have the knowledge of the plan of salvation. To know that the families that were torn apart that day can be together again through Heavenly Fathers plan. Grateful to be an American.

"Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved home and the war's desolation!

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just

And this be our motto: "In God is our trust.

"And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!"

Labor Day in Ohio

2011-09-07T18:47:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how I did it but I convinced Mike to drive all the way to OHIO for Labor day weekend this year. We left at 3:30 on Friday afternoon and got there at 1:15am! Traffic was HORRIBLE getting out of town. It took up about 3.5 hours to get to the Del Water Gap and it usually only takes us 1.5 hour to get there. After that it was 6.5 hours or easy driving. I had Mike listen to the book "Maze Runner" on the way there so it kept him alert the whole way there.

Saturday Morning we got up and went to the Gym with my dad. With his sports medicine and nutrition background he is a great person to have lead your work out. It was seriously one of the highlights of our weekend. He is a stud!

Later that day my Aunt Becky stopped by, which was nice since she lives in Columbus (2 hours away.) It was good to see her even if it was only for a little while. We of course had the OSU game on, even though it wasn't very much of a game. I hope we can keep our head above water this year and stay in the top 25. It will be pretty tough though with all the drama that has unfolded over the past year.

That evening we drove about 2 hours north to the Johnson Farm Chapel where we attended the wedding reception. The reception was for Jenna and Robbie who were absolutely adorable together, but I didn't get a picture of the happy couple. I did however get a picture of her beautiful sisters and one of my dearest friends, Sarah! It had been far to long since I had seen my former maid of honor and roommate. It was wonderful to catch up and I really hope to see her soon since she only lives about 5 hours away!

My beautiful sister was ecstatic to go to the reception since her boyfriend is the brother of Sarah and Jenna (what a small world huh?)

Aren't my sisters beautiful?

Sunday we of course went to church in the morning. It was actually my second fast Sunday there in a row since I was there just a few weeks ago. We had a lovely Sunday lunch together (this time we missed Bryant since he is now out at BYU for the school year.) I even got to take a short Sunday nap, which was BEAUTIFUL!!

That evening my dad did his back to school fathers blessings. I haven't had one since I was married. I am going back to school though and I am in serious need of guidance, direction and comfort. So I got a blessing too! It was pretty special since my dad, grandpa and husband all stood together to give me my blessing. The words spoken were also very special. What a huge blessing it is to have the power of the priesthood here on earth. To be able to have the men I love speak as a mouth piece of the Lord and tell me the things he would have me know. Amazing. It is a memory I know I will NEVER forget. It was the highlight of my trip and made all the driving worth it. I am a truly blessed women.

That evening we had a few family friends over for treats and games. My mom and I's friend Sheryl was there. She helped so much with my wedding and threw me a beautiful bridal shower. I never gave here anything to show her how much I appreciated her, so three years later I finally gave her little gift. That was also one of the highlights of my trip. There were so many people who helped so much with my wedding and in my frazzled bridal state I don't think I ever thanked them properly so starting with Sheryl I am trying to show my appreciation.

Monday morning we just visited with my family until 11:30 when it was time to make the journey back. It was another horrible drive. It was pouring rain the whole way which made it really hard to see. We only had a little traffic but because of the rain it took us another 9.5 hours to get home. LAME. Don't worry Mike had book # 2 (The Scorch Trials) to listen to on the way home.
At any rate even with all the time in the car traveling for only a few short days with my family IT WAS WORTH IT. I can never get enough family time and the older I get it still doesn't get any easier to say goodbye. Like I said I am a blesses women.

Can your cat do this?

2011-08-25T16:45:00.000-07:00

Thats right, she is using the toilet. Almost fully potty trained Epps is a genius cat. We have been using the citikitty training kit. You put a pan into the toilet and then remove a ring each week till there is nothing left. Epps is down to two rings and always runs to the toilet to do her thing.

Rosalie on the other hand is struggling. Our toilet always runs and makes noise and I don't think she likes it. Don't know what I'm going to do about that. But I'm about done cleaning up accidents.

But still pretty cool! My cat is as smart as Mr. Jinx!

3 Year Anniversary!

2011-08-24T06:29:00.000-07:00

I LOVE celebrating our anniversary and valentines day. I try to do my best to do lots of little things that let the hubby know I love him. Typically about 2 weeks before I start searching the internet for great lovey ideas. My favorite website right now is The Dating Divas! AMAZING! There website is very well organized so you can quickly find ideas for different types of dates and special occasions. I get a lot of little date ideas from them as well. This year almost all of my ideas came from them, but I put my own touch to the ideas.

When Mike woke up in the morning he found this "TIME" magazine waiting for him in the bathroom. It was his invitation for our date that evening.

(I made that :) I am very proud! )

The inside gave him the important details for the evening.

While he was in the shower I snuck out of the house and put a CD that I made for him in the car. Along with a poem and some candy that went with the poem. When he left the house, I suck to the window to watch him find his treasure. I think he liked it, and now he had a romantic CD of songs to listen to on the way to and from work :)

1) At the Beginning with you - Anastasia Soundtrack

2) Keep Me Forever Falling - Carmen Rasmusen

3) You're the Inspiration - Chicago

4) Livin' Our Love Song - Jason Michael Carroll

5) Just Another Day in Paradise - Phil Vassar

6) When I Fall In Love - Celine Dion & Clive Griffin

7) Then - Brad Paisley

8) When you say you Love me - Josh Groban

9) Your Man- Josh Turner

10) So Close- Jon McLaughlin

11) You and I - Michael Buble

12) The Good Stuff - Kenny Chesney

13) Can't Help Falling in Love - Michael Buble

14) Somebody Like You - Keith Urban

15) Love Story - Taylor Swift

16) I'll Stand By You - Glee Cast

17) All My Life - K-Ci & JoJo

18) Don't - Billy Curington

19) It's Your Love - Tim McGraw

Mike had a little surprise up his sleeve as well. He sent me 3 flowers ( 3 = how many years we have been married + Past, Present & Future ) that were absolutely beautiful!!

I spent the morning with my friend amanda making these delicious cake balls. I have been dying to try them for quite a while now. I did red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting. I tried to dip them in white chocolate, but they looked awful! lol. So I opted to just decorate the tops. I liked them better that way though I think. Covered in chocolate they were way to rich. After they were done I headed over to Mikes work to give him a little afternoon treat. Word has it his co-workers really enjoyed them as well. Mike of course loved them and was surprised to see me :)

For our date we made a time capsule! How fun. I used a hat box and modge podged some cute scrapbook paper all over it. I think it turned out great! I had papers for us to fill out on the table.

What did we put in the time capsule? Well we answered some all about me questions. We wrote three goals for the next 10 years. Then we wrote down what our lives are like now and what we think they will be like in 10 years. It was pretty fun Mike thinks we will still be in CT and he will be working at PA. I just hope that if we are still living here in 10 years we can afford a house. I hate paying more for rent (that goes no where) then my parents pay for their mortgage (which goes to the principle of their home loan.)

We also took pictures of the cats, our house and favorite places around town. We of course had to print off some articles and jokes about the big east coast earthquake we felt yesterday. (Which by the way I was pretty excited to feel my first earthquake. At first I thought it was the wind then the shaking got stronger and I knew it was an earthquake and I just sat there thinking of what I should do if it got stronger, but not doing anything. lol. I would die if a real earthquake hit. lol)

We each took 15 minutes to write each other a love letter...

we didn't read them, but sealed them up and put them in the box...

Then it was off to dinner at the Capital Grille in Stamford. It is a lovely restaurant complete with valet parking.

They had our table set up with heart confetti and an anniversary card. What a great way to set the mood for a romantic dinner date.

We both had stake and it was AMAZING. I never get stake when we eat out but this was a great decision. Best stake ever.

For dessert we got ice cream, raspberry sorbet and an expresso cake on the house. It was delicious. All of it. I was surprised at how much I loved the raspberry sorbet, it melted in my mouth and was so full of flavor. UMMM...

When we got home I gave Mike his anniversary gift. I made him a vase filled with some of my favorite memories we have made together. I even left some space for the memories we will make in the coming months and years.

I think it turned out really well. He read a few of them and we decided to read a few more every night. I also made it to match the color scheme in our bedroom so it doubles as a decoration :) 2 in 1!

What a wonderful day! I am soglad to have Mike in my life and to celebrate our love and life together. What a beautiful life we are living together. We are so blessed.

"In the end I want to be standing at the beginning with you"

2011-08-23T19:01:00.000-07:00

Today is Mike and I's three year Anniversary. WOW! Time just keeps flying by. We had an excellent anniversary this year which I will blog about later. I wanted to devote this whole post on the best decision of my life. :)

I can't think of anything more beautiful for me than my wedding day. It really was a gorgeous day but even more beautiful to be in a house of God. To be kneeling across the alter from my best friend and having my grandfather who I loved so dearly be the officiator. To have my parents, both set of grandparents, YW leaders, seminary teachers, best friends and my new in-laws who I loved so dearly all there was perfect. From that moment on our lives changed forever.

We have been blessed beyond measure in our marriage. Most people warned us that the 1st few years would be hard but it never was to me. I do have to say I think a lot of that was because we weren't in school and we were (for the most part) financially stable. At any rate we have very few disagreements (like the time I forgot to mention to Mike that our 2nd cat, that he didn't really want, would cost $100. I made the Johnson's saty at our house till 2am playing games so that maybe when they left he would be to tire to tell me how upset he was... wrong. He had plenty of energy to tell me just how he felt about that. Luckily, we are good at working out our differences and moving on. Now we just laugh about it.) Mike had become my best friend, confidant, travel companion, lover, therapist, guidance councilor, comforter and companion and I wouldn't have it any other way. These are a few of my favorite wedding pictures. They all remind me of song lyrics that describes the way I feel about Mike.

We were strangers starting out on our journey
Never dreaming what we'd have to go through
Now here we are and I'm suddenly standing
At the beginning with you

We were strangers on a crazy adventure
Never dreaming how our dreams would come true
Now here we stand unafraid of the future
At the beginning with you

In the end I wanna be standing
At the beginning with you

And now you're my whole life
now you're my whole world
I just can't believe the way I feel about you, girl
Like a river meets the sea,
stronger than it's ever been.
We've come so far since that day
And I thought I loved you then

Well, it's ok. It's so nice
It's just another day in paradise
Well, there's no place that
I'd rather be
Well, it's two hearts
And one dream
I wouldn't trade it for anything
And I ask the Lord every night
For just another day in paradise

I feel so blessed that we can be living our {fairytale} love song together every day. It really does feel like just another day in paradise with my forever love :)

Happy three year anniversary Mikes! I love you!!

Budgeting.

2011-08-13T13:07:00.000-07:00

So this weekend I wanted to do something fun. I didn't want to sit around the house all day or run errands. I've spent all week doing that. I wanted to get out of town. I have to teach on Sunday so we had to stay kind of close to home. We had so much fun in FL at the pool /lazy river, I thought maybe a water park would be fun. There is one located an hour and a half from our house. Perfect, right? No. Mike's coworker who grew up around here said it was kind of trashy and to keep driving about a half hour past that and go to 6 flags in MA. Not a bad idea. It was a water park with REAL rides. So I have been looking forward to it all week.

Friday night (at 11:15 when we got home from the temple) we start talking about our trip the next morning. Mike starts to show some hesitations about the cost. We don't really have a budget, we just try to get good deals and not buy things we don't need. And after some recent looses in the stock market (gag) I think he is just playing it a little more conservative. He noted that we have a trip to VT planned in a few weeks, I am planning on buying new work clothes, I just had to have my car fixed and we still have to pay for the rest of our Costa Rica trip soon. With all that coming up he couldn't justify spending $100+ to go to the water park, especially one without a lazy river. I agreed it probably would be wise to just stay home and do some errands together.

So where do we go? Costco. Mistake. Luckily there were no blender, mattress, sunglass or knife companies there doing road shows, but they did have some nice things. Coats, vests, pants, jeans, shirts, shorts, food, thankfully the samples are free. We go to the check out and our bill was over $200. We would have saved more money going to 6 flags. lol.

I think we need some help. Three years of marriage and still no budget. What will happen when we have kids? We need to figure this whole thing out. Maybe I should pay more attention to my mint.com alerts telling me I have gone over my "budget" in certain areas.

Any suggestions on your favorite ways to save? How do you manage your budgets? Are you good about sticking to them? I need some suggestions that are practical & easy.

Home in Aug

2011-08-10T05:12:00.000-07:00

I was home for 8 days and somehow these are the only 2 pictures I took. Shame on me!

Some of the highlights of the trip home were:

*Having my good friend Mike from high school come over on Sunday for dinner and games. It was fun to catch up with him and spend Sunday with my family like we did when I was in high school.

*Spending time with a newer family in my ward. My family has become good friends with them, as they are neighbors as well. What is funny is that the husband and wife served their mission with my sister-in-law Maryle and they all lived in Provo together.

*Going to dinner with my whole family (that is a very rare occasion.)
* Helping my mom organize the basement

*Sorting all my families DVD's (400+) by category, then typing out the titles and organizing them all in some DVD storage boxes. That task took 6-8 hours.

*Helping my mom organize her closet. Nate Burkus would be proud.

*Going to the pool

*Having a Harry Potter marathon (again) with my brother Bryant.

*Going to dinner with my brother Andrew

*The stray cat that kept coming around the house to play with me.

*Going for 5 mile walks with my mom in the morning

*Having my dad give me some good fitness instruction and running with him.

*Long walks with my brother B at night (the bug bites all over my feet were NOT a highlight)

*Seeing Harry Potter 7.2 again

*Seeing people from church @ a purse party hosted by my moms good friend Sheryl

*making homemade key lime pie

*Eating delicious homemade chocolate cake from Lisa

*Eating tons of fresh veggies from my parents garden.

*The visit from my grandma and grandpa

*My grandpa (for the 1st time) asking me when I was going to give him great-grand babies. He has been waiting a while I guess :)

*Being at home with my whole family!

Lucky

2011-08-10T05:00:00.000-07:00

The rest of the time my mom and sisters were here we basically just hung out. We went to Stew Leonard's, costco, the mall, a movie and the pool. We played games and watched movies and laughed. The girls had a lot of fun playing with the cats. They would make beds for them and play games with them. I think little Rosalie was sad when they left.

On the last night they were visiting my sisters requested that we go to Lucky's for dinner. Cynda came with us since both our husbands were participating in a guys game night (where they played risk.) The restaurant was playing "Gone With the Wind" on the TV and the girls really enjoyed that. They wants to stay till it was over. We said, no way!

We packed up the car that night and headed back to Ohio first thing in the morning.

Beach Picnic Date Night

2011-08-09T17:14:00.000-07:00

Since I had kind of neglected Mike while I had company and I knew I was going to be going back to Ohio with them for over a week I wanted to go on a date night with Mike before I left. I also wanted to make it a little more fun than the regular date night. So I wrote him a poem and indicated what time he should be home for our date and that he would have to wear a blind fold. I dropped the poem off to him at work that day with his lunch. When he got home that night I let him change then I stuck him in the car and off we went.
I took him to the beach. The sand at this beach is a little nicer than at the other beach in Stamford so we laid out a blanket and I began to unpack out dinner. I spent a good 30 minutes getting everything put together and in the car before he got home so he wouldn't see anything. I was so proud. I packed chicken salad (from Stew Leonards which is the best ever,) cheese & crackers, salad, fruit, water and sparkling cider with 2 champagne glasses. The only thing I forgot was the bottel opener and crackers. Since I was planing on eating the crackers with the cheese and chicken salad... that basically left us with water, salad and fruit.
We still had a lot of fun though. It was a lovey night and I brought speakers to listen to some music with. We just laid on the blanket and talked. I also printed off some funny questions we could ask each other, first date style. It was one of the best dates we have had in the past few months.

For dessert I made chocolate covered strawberries which I did NOT forget. They were sooo delicious. I can convinced the only type of chocolate to melt is ghirardelli's chocolate chips. DELICIOUS!! The perfect ending to a great night!

Secret Admirer

2011-08-09T17:06:00.000-07:00

One night while my family was here we had a knock at the door. I told Mike he had to answer it because it was 9:30 at night and I was to scared. When he opened the door he started to laugh, then came back inside with this little treasure.

"Roses are red
Violets are blue.
I love cats
and so do you."

From,

Your Secret
Admirer

We both took turns guessing who it could have been and if it was my friend or one of his friends. But I'm a pretty good detective. I know what to look for in cases like these (I watch a lot of CSI.) I looked at the handwriting and determined right away that the gift was for me and it was from.....

....Cynda. I later got a full confession out of her. We got a good laugh about it and have been respectfully displaying our gift out in the open. However, I think our duty of displaying it is up now that it has been 2 weeks or so.

Girls Only Trip to NYC

2011-08-09T16:53:00.000-07:00

The last week of July my mom and sisters came to stay with me. I was really excited for their visit but even more excited that I could give my sisters there own room to keep all of there stuff in verses my living room. The last 2 times they came we lived in my 700 sq ft apartment and shoving 5 people into that was messy! So having 2 bedrooms and 2 floors to my house really made the stay much more enjoyable for everyone.

We of course had to spend at least one day in NYC. We took the train in and navigated the subway all around the city.

We went to the Museum of Natural History First. They both love "Night At The Museum" so they had fun trying to see some of the same things from the movie. I was really struggling though. Three stories of things I have sen numerous times, not my personal idea of fun. I would have preferred some interesting art pieces.
We left the museum and headed to central park. My mom has been dying to spend a good chunk of time there. We found 3 benches in the shade over looking a lake with some skyline as a backdrop. There we had out lunch and took a nap. It was the perfect place to rest before walking around for the next few hours.

One of my favorite sites in central park is bow bridge.

On our way out of the park we passes a Dip & Dots stand. I couldn't help myself. I love them to much to say no any time I see them.

After our long walk in central park the girls were exhausted but we took the down to canal st in china town. We walked around and looked at all the little shops and they got a few little souvenirs. Then we started walking through little Italy. It was dinner time and all the little Italian restaurants were starting to smell very, very good. We stopped at one and shared a pizza and a calzone. So delicious! Then it was off to time square (which is my #1 least favorite place in the city.)

We went into the time square information center and I was mesmerized by this wall. It had tons of little notes with people from all overs the worlds hopes and dreams for 201l. They said people wrote them on new years eve. Some of them were pretty silly but others kind of touching.

"I dream to become someone that will make a difference in the world."

"A year of love, laughs and happiness. xoxo"

They also had "the ball" on display in there. It was pretty cool to see it up close and all the detail in in.

Our main reason for coming to time square was to get a picture of the big billboard the church put out that says "I'm a Mormon." It was hard for us to find. They have some TV's with advertisements on them and we say a 15 second Mormon add. Which was pretty neat. Then we were about to give up and go home when I spotted it (corner of 47th & Broadway.) We were so excited to see it. Pretty cool I think.

After that we took a cab to grand central (mom was about to die over how awful this guys driving was.) We were home before 10pm with dirty feet and a lot of good memories.

Harry Potter 7.2 @ Midnight

2011-08-09T16:48:00.000-07:00

I am a huge Harry Potter fan. I grew up reading the books, seeing the movies in the theater and wishing I was a wizard too. So naturally I was really excited for the last movie to come out. I had a lot going on the weekend it was coming out and wouldn't be able to go see it Friday or Saturday and knew I wouldn't be able to wait till Monday to see it. Therefore there was no other option, I had to go to the midnight show, and I couldn't go alone. So I had to bride my dear, sweet husband (who had to work the next day) with $60 from my own personal "stash." Plus I had to buy his ticket and pay for the treats with my own money as well. I know that is pretty steep. But I did it.

So we get to the theater in that is 5 blocks from our house at 11pm. They are completely sold out. I was pretty sad after all my hard work used to get Mike to go. So I used his phone to look up other theaters. I had heard there was one in Norwalk which was only 20 minutes away. I called the theater and they said they had tickets. Since I had never been there I asked for directions coming from the 95 (The main highway.) She was confused and said she couldn't get me there from the 95 but that it was right off the 5 and easy to get to. Now I was confused but I thanked her, hung up and got on the 95 hoping to use Mikes phone as a GPS. But it kept saying there were no matches found. Finally I started typing in the address letter for letter from the website when I saw Norwalk, CA. I called a theater in CALIFORNIA! No wonder the poor girl was so confused. Luckily I did find a theater that was close to the 95 and we barely got off at the right exit. That theater had tickets. We got our seats, Mike got his icee and popcorn and I was ready for the movie to start.

There was only one preview before we heard the following "Voldemort holds the elder wand and thrusts it into the sky..." We all laughed thinking it was some type of a joke. Then we all realized this was the actual movie and someone was telling us exactly what was happening. It was a movie for blind people!! I was so upset. Long story short, 1 o'clock am comes and we are in a new theater, and the movie is starting all over again. We watched the first 1/2 hour all over again (minus the "subtitles?") I LOVED the movie though. Mike slept through the whole thing. He would wake up every once in a while, give me a look of disgust and tell me to stop crying. I wanted to smack him.

I did cry a lot. Not only was it sad, moving, touching and amazingly well done for a book to movie adaptation (in my opinion) but I was sad to say goodbye. It was like a piece of me was gone and I wanted it back. I still wanted to believe in a magical world, muggles and owls that carry the post. Harry Potter it has been a great 15 years! You will forever be in my heart and on my shelf. I miss you already. xoxo

Cats and their catnip...

2011-08-09T16:46:00.000-07:00

When we got back from Utah I decided I wanted to try and "potty train" our cats. You know like Mr. Jinx in Meet the Parents. The training kit came with a pack of cat nip. I left the kit on the bed while I went to get the bathroom ready. When I came back, this is what I found... catnip all over the bed and the cats licking it, rolling around in it and loving it. Then eventually fighting over it. I think they really liked the stuff, they were out of control for the next little while. Those cats are so sneaky, they sure know how to keep me on my toes ;-)

Farmington Festival Days Parade

2011-08-09T16:40:00.000-07:00

On our way back to Farmington we stopped in Rexburg again to meet up with Mikes sister Becca (who lives there) and his twin Melanie and her family. They were also visiting Eric's (her husband) brother who goes to school there. We walked around campus and saw just how much has changed since the 3 years we have been gone. It was hard to even feel like it was our old school because so many things have changed. It was neat to see the progress and feel that the Spirit of Ricks was still there. We even witnessed a flash mob of the choir students singing "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." Aaron, Becca's husband, was a part of it. They sounded really good!

The day after we got back was Farmington Festival Days. They have a parade in the morning. The kids LOVED it because of all the candy they got. I on the other hand felt horrible, my sinuses were not friendly to me AND I had a cold sore. So I really struggled the rest of the day. I ended up with a sinus infection when I got home. But I'm glad all the kids had fun.

CT Family Reunion in Island Park ID 2011

2011-08-09T16:21:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite parts of our trip out west was the 24 hours I got to spend with this cute little girls (and the rest of her family.) We had a little "CT family reunion" while we were in ID. We met the Stokes at the Johnson's family cabin in Island Park. We had an absolute blast with them. Twenty-four hours wasn't nearly enough time to catch up on all that has happened in the year since the Stokes moved.

K got to have some good bonding time with Uncle Mike and Aunt Kristin.

As well as Aunt Cynda and Uncle Ben. It is hard to believe that she has grown up so much. Last time we saw her she was barley talking and now she is potty trained, talking, and FULL of personality.

The men also enjoyed some bonding time. There was a water trampoline (jumpy) on the lake and they had a lot of fun playing 500 together. I was surprised at how well they could catch the ball while jumping on a trampoline.

The ladies enjoyed bonding in the form of gossip (well not really gossip, just filling each other in on our lives in the past year.) We also got to spend some time with Tucker. It was our first time meeting him and we feel in love. He has the brightest, bluest, most beautiful blue eyes!

Of course it would not have been a real reunion if bocce was not played numerous times.

After a while we decided to take the boat out on the lake for some tubbing.

The Stokes family went first. I was surprised how fast Ben was driving with the little ones on board but they LOVED IT!

Mike and Jared went together and they were hilarious to watch. They were screaming like little girls. They had a ton of fun though and got a lot of air on the tub.
Then Mike and I went. I was a little nervous and 100% sure than Ben was going to try to flip up and I was terrified to be stuck in the lake with who knows what lurking around my feet. I don't know what got into me but I was so scared and ended up almost in tears. It was fun but not being in control of how fast we were going really got to me. I know, I'm a baby.

We stayed up late into the night talking, laughing and reminiscing. I didn't want to go to bed. But for the record. This is what happened when we tried to go to bed. Ben and Cynda shared their room with us and we slept on an air matters on the floor. Long story short 20 minutes later Mike and I ended up on the floor in a completely defaulted air mattress. All while Ben and Cynda slept in there luxurious king size bed soundly beside us. We got a good laugh about it in the morning.

It was really hard to say goodbye to the Stokes. I still get teary thinking about it. We were really lucky that the Johnson's let us crash their family gathering for a day to spend time together. It was just like the good 'ld days when we first moved to CT. What great friends we are blessed to have. Until next year guys! xoxo!

Rexburg Reunion

2011-08-09T16:18:00.000-07:00

While we were out west we couldn't pass up the opportunity to head up to Rexburg. On our way up we stopped at the IN-N-OUT Burger they just built in Centerville. Mike and I had a bad experience with them a year or so ago, so we wanted to give them one more chance. They won us back. It was delicious for a fast food burger, mine was gone before Mike had a second bite. :)

Once we got to Rexburg we drove around to a few of the places that we have fond memories off. So naturally my old building at The Ridge was one of our stops. Mike and I had our first kiss on valentines day right at the very top of the steps. *sigh*

For dinner we meet a few of my old roommates for dinner at Cragio's. It was fun to see them and catch up a little bit. Unfortunately, we didn't get to hang out to long. My poor friend Abby came straight from vacation to the pizza place with her family. Her kids were ready to be home so they had to leave a little earlier. But it was nice to be together for a while. I hope to one day get all of my old roommates together for a reunion.

The next morning another one of my old roommates (Steph) met me at my hotel for breakfast. It was fun to be able to catch up with her. I felt pretty lucky to see 4 of my old roommates all in 24 hours.

4th of July

2011-08-09T14:59:00.000-07:00

This year we were in Utah for the 4th of July. We started off the day by watching a few sisters and cousins cross the finish line after running a half marathon and a 5k. We were planning on running it with them (the 5k.) But I was way to sore from my cousins personal training class, I could barley walk, let alone run.

After a nap, a great BBQ and quite a few games of pinochle we went and had a little firework show. It was fun to watch the kids get excited over the fireworks. Even funnier to see how much our 2 year old nephew LOVED them and how scared his 5 year old brother was of them.

At one point Lincoln was even crying because Ben was getting to close to the fireworks. He was so scared for him.

After the show we went to the back deck which overlooks a good portion of the valley. We could see tons of fireworks going off. A lot from people just lighting them off on their own. This year Utah made the big ones legal so everyone was lighting them off. I have to say though my favorite part of the day was after all the firework show. Heather and I sat at the piano and sang some fun broadway songs. It was a lot of fun to sing with someone who loved broadway as much as I do.

Stadium of Fire

2011-08-09T13:15:00.000-07:00

Saturday night was the Stadium of Fire. I didn't really even now what it was till recently {I'm from Ohio, remember.} It is held at the BYU football stadium and they have a patriot concert then have a big name or two give a concert that is followed by fireworks. So awesome, even more awesome was that Brad Paisley was there as the main performer!! Be still my heat, country music!!!

Before the show started we went to find some treats. Guess what I found? DIP & DOTS. I was seriously in 7th heaven. I don't know what could make it better.

The show started with some parachuted coming into the stadium to the music of "I'm Proud to be an American."

So cool. Then they had a large dance group preform and they sent out big beach balls into the crowd to hit around, which was really very fun!
David Archulette was the "opening act." He sounded good but his stage presence was just ok. If I was a 14 year old I would have been swooning over him I'm sure.

Then Brad came on and I got to rock out to some of my favorite country songs. I miss country music soo much on the east coast! He seriously rocked it! He was an awesome performer and there was never a boring moment. I was even able to catch a few cool pictures on my camera, even though I was a million miles away.

God Bless America, Good Bless Country Music and God Bless Brad Paisley for one heck of a night!

Minute to Win it.

2011-08-09T13:04:00.000-07:00

Friday evening we all got together for dinner and Minute to Win it games. Mike's sister Camille and her husband were in charge of it and did a fantastic job!
We all had our cameras out so we could get pictures of things like this...

and this...

For Mike's challenge he had a stack of 32 cups that he had to stack evenly then unstack before the other two people.

He did really well...

then the whole thing feel as he was trying to re-stack them all. Don't worry he still won.

My father-in-law and grandma got the BEST/HARDEST challenge. They had to stack 3 golf balls on top of one another. Sterling is about as competitive as Mike and was so frustrated that they wouldn't stack for him. "The divots don't line up" he kept saying. Meanwhile grandma just slowly, steadily, calmly just keeps trying. ..

And it paid off. I LOVE this picture! I don't know which I like more. Grandma's look of pride and happiness or Jeff cheering for her in the background. For sure one of the most memorable moments of the whole reunion.

{Dayton} Family Reunion

2011-08-09T12:39:00.000-07:00

At beginning of July Mike and I headed to Utah. There was a big family reunion and we didn't want to miss out. Mikes mom and her 4 siblings, their families and their mother were all meeting in Midway for a weekend of fun. They use to have these a lot when Mike was a kid but as families got larger and kids grew older it became less frequent. They were all pretty excited to be together after quite a while.

The first night we all had dinner in a little pavilion at a park. It was nice getting to see some of Mike's extended family that I don't know as well. Even some of his mom's cousins showed up.

Friday was my mother-in-laws day to be in charge. They rented out a bowling ally and all 40 + of us went bowling together. She even organized us all into teams. People she thought would have fun together but that didn't all get to see each other very much. At first I was a little nervous not to be on the same team with Mike, but I had a lot of fun visiting with his Aunt and cousins.
I didn't do to great at bowling but I managed to get a strike or two and a few spares. Mike managed to catch me midair when I got my first strike! I was a little excited.
After bowling we went to another park, that was very nice, and had lunch. Two of Mikes cousins from out of state got there that morning so it was fun to be able to catch up with both of them. Such sweet girls. I love having fun cousins. In fact one of them, Angelica and Kirk, are moving out to the East coast in a few weeks. I think Philadelphia just got a lot more fun :)

24 (my age, not the TV show)

2011-08-09T10:59:00.000-07:00

I had a really great birthday this year. The day after I got back from FL we had a combined birthday party for myself and two of my friend's husbands. It was so much fun. We had a BBQ and a lot of our friends from church came. Which is always fun to get together with big groups of friends. I felt pretty special to have so many of the people I love like family there.

Of course since we had 3 birthdays we had to have 3 separate cakes. Can you guess which one is mine? What was even better is that they were 3 completely different styles of cake. We had one traditional (mine), one ice cream and one cheesecake. There was certanly something for everyone and they all tasted amazing! Although the heat mixed with the juice in the strawberries kind of made mine look not so great. lol.

All the kids and dads played in the big field together. It was pretty fun to watch. What great dads!

And of course all the moms got to visit with each other. Which was much needed.

Tim's Birthday was June 25th (The day before the party.)
Jordan and I share the same birthday of June 27th (which was the day after the party.)
Also, apparently you are not suppose to sing happy birthday to yourself? hum...

The next day was my actual birthday. I had to go in and babysit in the morning. When I got there they had a balloon out and cupcakes on display. The girls told their mom my favorite flavor of cake is coconut (which is true.) So she bought me a huge macaroon and a coconut cream pie. Sooo thoughtful. Before it was time to go she had the kids sing to me and I blew out candles and they all gave me homemade cards and a gift. I got a gift card for a really nice spa in Darien to get a mani/pedi. So excited to use that! I was totally take back by their generosity. They didn't have to do any of that for me, I have only been sitting for them for a few month. I really lucked out with this babysitting job and plan to do it as long as possible.

That night Mike got home a little early and fixed me a great dinner. He made a great margarita pizza w/ fresh tomatoes, mozzarella and basil (from our garden.) It was soo delicious. Ben and Cynda came over for my birthday dinner. After we played acquire. It was an aweful game for Mike and I. We basically watched the Johnson's play while we sat cashless on the other side of the table. Hence the fancy message on my yogurt pie "Happy Birthday & Sad Acquire." I really do love Mike's sense of humor. He knows how to make me laugh and get over things fast :)

I felt really lucky to celebrate my birthday 4 times this year and with so many wonderful people! Even Epps loves my birthday, well more like the strong on the balloon I got...

Note to self: Next year for your birthday at least put on make-up ;-)

All Good Things Must Come to an End

2011-08-09T10:00:00.000-07:00

On the last night we were there we all went out to dinner at a nice restaurant on the resort. The food was delicious! But it was more fun for everyone to sit at the table and talk, tell jokes and laugh.

After dinner we went to a family bar that was having a Karaoke night. Mom and all the kids but Bryant got up and sang. It was fun to watch the audience when Andrew, KT and Liz sang. You just don't expect people to be that good. And they were. Elizabeth sang concrete angel and sounded so good, especially for a 10 year old. Andrew sang "Your Man" which the ladies loved. I sang "Jesus Take the Wheel." I hadn't heard it in a while and started singing the harmony with the back up people. I had to laugh. Of course I would do that. I always sing harmony when I listen to songs on the radio in the car. Luckily I got it together and finished it ok. Mom sang "The Rose" it is her staple Karaoke song. There was another family who had 4 people sing. We sat next to them and joked around with them all night. When we got home it was time to clean up and pack. Which was a harder task for some than others...

Is this not sick? This is the room that my siblings shared. The girls in one bed, the boys in the other and the clothes anywhere they wanted. Mike and I lucked out on our room. It was big, with it's own sitting area and bathroom. Glad we didn't have to share with any of these guys... that could have been ugly... and smelly.

My parents packed the van and left early in the morning. I don't think I have ever been so sad for a vacation to be over. I wasn't just saying by to vacation but to my family. The rest of the morning the house was very quiet, too quiet really. Grandma and Grandpa stayed in the condo next door so I went to say good bye to them, which was also sad. Them Mike and I played one final game of putt-putt and headed to the airport.

We had gone through security, taken the tram to our gate and eaten lunch when Mike realized he had left his Ray Ban Sunglasses in the rental car. Since we had an hour and half before the flight he ran out to see if he could get them. After waiting there for 20 min and Hertz not being able to locate the car he had to come back empty handed. Unfortunately he stood in a long line at security, then it ended up being the wrong line. By the time he went through the right security line and took the tram to the gate he was 5 min from missing the flight. Luckily he made it and we both got home on time but not the sunglasses. They were never able to find the glasses, which means someone {an employee} stole them. How lame! So now we will need to buy another pair, this time we will ensure them :)

Best thing about Florida in the Summer

2011-08-09T09:41:00.000-07:00

Luckily we didn't spend all our time in FL visiting the parks. We actually could have spent one more day at Disney and didn't even us our tickets to universal. It was to hot and I was not going to wait in line and fight crowds in 98 degree weather with 100% humidity. I love the pools at the resort. All the kids would float down the lazy river holding onto each others intertube (so we could stay together) we ended up causing quite a few traffic jams. But we didn't car. We were making some pretty fun memories. I love being on vacation because everyone gets a long. My family is still pretty young with two sisters still in school. So naturally they tend to annoy each other when we are at home. But on vacation we are all friends. I wish I would have gotten some of my own pictures at the pool but we never brought much to the pool with us.

We would go around the lazy river a few times. Then go play a round of putt-putt then go down this huge inflated water slide. Then we would repeat with a nap or two in the middle. One afternoon I was pretty worn out that I feel asleep pretty hard next to my grandparents. An hour or two later my grandma is yelling my name trying to wake me up because a HUGE storm is rolling in fast. They sky is black and the thunder is getting louder and louder. I grabbed Mike's stuff beside me and all the towels. I through the towels in the dirty bin and ran to find Mike and the boys who were finishing up a game of putt-putt. Mike asked where his phone and car keys were. I panicked. I didn't see them. He told me they were wrapped up in a towel... GULP. You mean the ones I just put in the bin that not have over a hundred of other towels piled on top of them. At this point the storm was right over us and the lighting close. We are all wet and by a ton of water. We all started to panic. Luckily there was a towel under the chair I didn't see and when Mike went back to the seat he found his stuff and we were able to make a quick escape!

The huge pool and putt-putt was about 5 minutes away from our condo. Right across the street from the house was another small pool that was never very crowded. After lunch we would go there and swim/play water games.

As I am not a big golfer I didn't go golfing but all the men did. They had a good time in the 98 degree heat. It was pretty brutal. We told them to take good care of grandpa in that heat. Mike got one of the best scores but is convinced he does not golf well in FL. But regardless of the scores and the heat I know they all had fun. And how could you not when you are golfing on a course that looks like this?

Magical Birthday Celebration

2011-08-08T19:23:00.000-07:00

It's no secret that my first 2 days at Disney on this trip were not quite as magical as they have been in the past. In fact I had one horrible night there. However, my day at Magic Kingdom with the girls made up for it all.

We had reservations to have breakfast at Cinderella's Castle. Sigh.... How magical it was. We were greeted by Cinderella at the door then lead upstairs to our table. It was beautiful. The food was just as good as I remember, especially the stuffed french toast. It was even more fun to watch my mom and sisters. They really enjoyed themselves. We were able to meet Snow White, Aurora, Arielle and Belle. We also got wands and a wishing star!

Since my birthday was 4 days away we decided to celebrate it at breakfast. They gave me a card signed by the princesses and a birthday cupcake.

Suffice it to say I was more than in 7th heaven.

After breakfast it was off to conquer the park. We were lucky enough to catch the Fairy Godmother, Lady Tremaine and her two daughters (Anastasia and Drizella.) I love getting pictures with the characters.

We rode almost every ride in fantasyland (minus dumbo and the teacups, they make us sick) in 2 hours. We didn't wait more than 8 minutes in line. I think that was my favorite part. Not waiting in line for the rides :) We even saw Mickey's Philharmagic, a classic in my eyes.

Then we walked over to Frontier and Adventure Land. It was getting later in the day, the crowds were getting bigger and the temperature hotter. Not a fan. But we still managed to ride Splash Mt, Thunder Canyon, Pirates, Haunted Mansion and Jungle Cruise. All the rides worth riding in that area of the park. I had my birthday pin on all day. I got so many happy Birthday's from random people and cast members. I even got a few gifts.

My mom isn't a fan of roller coasters. Somehow we convinced her to ride Splash Mt. She was seriously terrified the whole time and hanging on ready for "the big drop." When it finally happened I'm positive she thought she was dying. The picture turned out really funny. The look of fear in her face made it completely worth buying. So she went up and bought a copy. The cast member at the desk saw my birthday pin and asked me why I was celebrating my birthday there. My mom jumped in and told him I was more of a kid than my little sister when I was there. I admitted the truth to that and he promptly printed out another copy of the picture {free of charge} and wished me a happy birthday. SCORE!

After we rode all the rides we wanted we headed back to the gift stores. I had a request from the kids I babysit to bring them back cotton candy. I asked one of the cast members making it if she thought it would survive the journey home. I told her about the cute twin girls and their request. She came back with two chocolate pops covered in sprinkles. She told me she would normally give me one for my birthday but she would give me two and I could give them to the girls. I was pretty excited. Free stuff!! yes!
On our way out we stopped at town hall to see my cousin (well Mike's cousin) SayJay who just happened to be "Friends with" Cinderella that day. It was so fun to see her, she was amazing and beautiful. She totally backed up the line talking to us :) We even got to take a "Princess Pose" picture together. So fun. Later that night she came over to the condo and hung out with Mike and I. It was so much fun to spend time with her. I love that by marriage I finally have cousins my own age who I love and can laugh with. Marriage is the best :)

Dismal Day at Disney

2011-08-08T18:40:00.000-07:00

Wednesday the boys and I were scheduled to go to the parks together. Unfortunately, Andrew woke up with a migraine so he wasn't able to come to Animal Kingdom with us. It was an adventure just finding the public parking lot. Some how we ended up in cast member parking. I kept saying this all looks to familiar. But it was cool to show them a little from when I worked there.
Once we got in the park we worked the system and got a fastpast to Kali River Rapids and waiting in line to ride Mt Everest. The line wasn't the bad since that park had just opened. I some reason remember it being a little faster than it was. That is the problem about growing up going to cedar point. Nothing is fast enough unless it is going 100+ miles and hour.

The heat and humidity were killers. Even at 10 o'clock in the morning you were sweating bullets. My dad loves animals so we of course had to go on the safari. We actually had to wait in line for too. A whole hour. I was not impressed with the wait ;-) But it was worth it when we finally got on and saw some really cool animals and a very close distance. I didn't use the zoom for most of these. Pretty cool to be so close (and with no cages) to elephants, giraffes, lions and so many other African animals.

After only about 3 hours it was lunch time and we were all pretty hot. The resort we stay at sits up against the Animal Kingdom so we were pretty close to home. We decided to go back home and have a FREE lunch in a COOL room and maybe even take a dip in the pool. And so we did. Around 2 o'clock Andrew was feeling better and dad was motion sick. So Andrew took dads place and we went back to Epcot to ride Soarin' over California. To bad the fastpasses were for 8:00pm. Bummer. So We had to wait in line for over an hour. The only perk was it was inside and we had Mike's iPhone to play trivia games on. Oh and we had lots of snacks so we could keep up our strength.

After waiting in line for about an hour and a half and seeing the lines were that long everywhere. We said FORGET IT! We went back to the house and swam in the lazy river, played some putt-putt and took a nap. Later that night I told Mike that I really wanted to go back to Epcot to watch the night show "Illuminations," eat a funnel cake and have dinner somewhere on the world showcase, maybe Mexico (since we love Mexican.)
Being the wonderful husband he is he gave into my demands. We got there and were both pretty hungry. Since Mexico was first on the world showcase we stopped there. The menu was small (as we were eating at a "quick service" place.) I was on the phone when he ordered so I was a little distracted. When we got the food we both had ordered the same thing (we never do that) and the food looked disgusting. It tasted the same way it looked. So I saw some nachos that looked good so I got those with some guacamole, you can't go wrong with guac! WRONG. It was all TERRIBLE! Like the worst dining experience ever. I chocked down my food since I just payed over $40 for 4 tacos, nachos and guac! Robbery! To make it worse we were outside eating hot food in the heat. That alone makes you sick. Not to mention it was gross food! I was not happy but still wanted a funnel cake. Poor Mike was pretty sick from eating all that disgusting food. He had it about a 1/4 of the way around the world showcase before I had to leave him on a bench to die while I continued my journey for a funnel cake in solitude. I finally got the object of my desire (and yes, that was worth $6.50)and ate it as I walked back to find my dying husband. Can you imagine how pathetic I looked. Some worn down chick, walking alone, shoving a funnel cake down her mouth. It had to have been a sight worth seeing for those people watchers. When I found Mike he was DONE! He did not want to wait an hour for the show, and surprisingly I didn't want to either. I had been burned by Disney. We used our fastpasses from earlier and road Soarin' again. That never gets old. We were out of the park right as Illuminations started. I wasn't even tempted to walk back, I was done with walking, done with fighting crowds, done with Disney, especially in June. What made it even worse was knowing I had to do it all again the next day. I know. Words I never thought I would say. I was cranky!

American Idol Experience

2011-08-08T18:06:00.000-07:00

On Monday the whole family ventured together to Disney's Hollywood Studios. We got there before the park opened and had a plan of attack (as one must when fighting the crowds at Disney.) As soon as they let people in the park half of us took off to get a fastpass to Toy Story MidwayMania (seriously the coolest ride. You are in a car with 3D glasses & a "gun thing" and you go up to 5 different screens and play 5 different carnival games and try to score as many points as possible.) This was obviulsy the rest of the parks idea as well. The line for just the fastpasses was huge even when I got there and I was basically running to get in line. The rest of the family was off to audition for the American Idol Experience. Andrew and KT went to audition together. We were all pretty nervous. We didn't want one to make it and not the other, but the producers told them before they auditioned that since they were siblings it was likely only one would be chosen. They wanted variety in the show and assumed they would be to similar.

While the whole family waited to find out what was happening Mike made friends with a squirrel. He even got it to eat out of his hand. Pretty crazy huh?

After about an hour or so these two came out of the auditions both wearing there "Golden Ticket." They both made it and were put in two separate shows the 1:30 and 4:00 shows respectively.
To celebrate we went back to Toy Story Midway Mania. It was a ride everyone could ride and wanted to ride (Which is hard when you have an age range of 85 to 10 year old.) The only down side was we didn't have enough fastpasses. I went to the people working the fastpass distribution kiosks. They said they never had extra tickets for the ride. I told them about my siblings and them not being able to get tickets because of auditions. Then she looked a little harder and found just the right amount. It was magical. She hugged me and wished them both good luck with their performances. So all 10 of us were able to ride the ride together. I love the magic of Disney :)

With Andrew and KT both being in a show and having to be over an hour early for the show we had a very limited time to do things. Luckily their big sis knows how to work the fastpass system and asses line wait times. Both were able to ride Rockin' Roller Coaster twice before KT's show!
The whole experience for them was pretty incredible. They got to work with a vocal coach on there song and go to hair and makeup. They got the whole star treatment! About 350 cam to Kt's show at 1:30 and Probably 500 to Andrew's show at 4:00. So they both had decent crowds as well.
KT sang the song "Bubbly" by Colbie Caillat. She did awesome. Her tone is very much like Colbie's so she rocked it. They judges loved her. They told her she looked like Barbie and was as sweet as cotton candy. They told her to not worry about looking at the lyrics but the crowd next time because she had the song down. The other people competing against her sang "What Hurt's the Most" and "Reflection." In the end the Boy advanced to the final show. His whole choir of over 100+ were there to vote for him. I thought if KT didn't win the other girl would since she rocked her vocals. But oh well. KT didn't care and loved every minute of it so she was a happy girl.
After KT's show we were on our way to ride Tower of Terror when these street performers saw Andrew's American Idol tag and asked him to sing. He sang Josh Turners "Your Man" in his deep, sexy country voice. I think they were surprised. Then we told them KT had just done the show they pulled her up and she preformed "Bubbly" again. I was recoded the whole thing and they saw me and came up to me and asked if I sang. I told them "Not like these two" but KT told them I sang awesome Disney songs. So they had me come up and sing. I sang "Part of Your World." They told us we were a talented family with great teeth. LOL. Thanks. I got it all on camera so I will need to post that some time. We went to Pizza Planet for lunch then back to watch Andrew's show!
Andrew is honestly a natural. I thought he was amazing. He sang "I don't wanna be" by Gavin Degraw. Of course it isn't as much of his style as Coldplay or Josh Turner but they only had 100 songs to pick from to sing. We are all a little bitter with the judges. They didn't give him as much love as we thought they should have. They we different judges than KT had. KT's judges told all the performers to stop moving around on stage and just sing, so that is what Andrew did. He took center stage, made eye contact with the audience and just sang. They told him marketing wise he was a dream come true, but that he had basically had stage fright since he didn't move (since he didn't think they wanted him too.) At any rate he did not advance to the finale either. They other two preformeres were in there late 20's with kids and sand "Hot Stuff" and "I Hope You Dance." The lady who won the round was pretty good and did rock it so what can you do?

After the American Idol let down the grandparent and parents left the 6 kids with the keys to the van and headed home. We took the fairy to Epcot to see if there were any fastpasses left. But being the middle of June and 6 o'clock at night. There was nothing but 90 minute lines and humidity.

We went to drown our sorrows in the soda at club cool. The free samples of soda across the world is always a must when at Epcot. I think we drank our weight in the stuff. Italy was just as gross as I remembered and Japan was still my favorite. CHEERS :)

Luckily we were able to ride one ride. Mission Space. It is actually the only ride that scared me a little. You are put in a simulator that spins you around so fast you hit G force speed and feel like you are in a space ship. The skin of your face is pulled back and your eyes water. If you close your eyes or look sideways you will begin to feel the spinning and for sure get sick. I was a little worried to take my 10 year old sister on the the ride. Especially since she is still afraid of rides like that, but they boys talked her into it. Luckily we all enjoyed it and felt like we accomplished something at Epcot. So off we headed to The Magic Kingdom. *sigh*

Notice how many people are at the park? I was astonished. I had forgotten how crowded the parks get. I was disgusted. To many people, to many screaming kids, no fastpasses left, long lines and people, humidity and people! We went to the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor Comedy show. Then got some food to give us the strength to fight the crowds for the firework show.

Luckily we were able to score some of my personal favorite seats. The street curb outside the Edy's ice cream store. I was able to enjoy a little dessert before the show. In the end...

it's moments like this....

and this...

...that put the magic that is sometimes lost in the crowds, lines, humidity, heat and dehydration back into Disney. I always get teary watching "Wishes" in front of the castle. As the tears rolled down my cheeks this time I thought "this is silly why are you crying?" and then I decided it was the lyrics being sung

"Star light, Star bright,
First star I see tonight.
I wish I may, I wish I might
have the wish, I wish tonight.
We'll make a wish and do as dreamers do.

And all our wishes...

Will

Come

True..

and that all of my dreams and more are coming or have come true!

Downtown Disney & Fathers Day

2011-07-11T18:40:00.000-07:00

The 3rd week of June Mike and I headed down to the Orlando FL area. My parents and grandparents both own timeshares at a resort in Kissimme. This was our first time back since the summer Mike and I got married, and Mike's first time ever. I was so excited to show him around the beautiful resort (which wasn't as beautiful with the drought, not nearly as green as usual.) It was exciting to be with my family on vacation, everyone was in a good mood and there were few disagreements. The first thing I wanted to do was go to Down Town Disney for dessert and to walk around.

The resort is about 10 minutes away from the parks so it was a great set up. As we made the drive that night I started to second guess my decision, the clouds were really dark and ominous and looking like they were going to wreck havoc at any moment. We wanted to go to planet hollywood for dessert but I forgot how insanely long the lines are in the summer. So we walked all the way around to the other side of downtown disney to go to the giridehli place. Just as we started to get close... I could feel the wind pick up and the sky starting to rumble in the distance. We had already bought tickets to a movie in 30 min so we couldn't afford to get stuck in the rain on the other side of the place. So we made a beeline back to the theater. We used our best NYC native skills and maneuvered our way around tons of people. It was very impressive.

We made our way into a Ben & Jerry's right as the storm started. We took advantage of our location and got some ice cream for dessert. Then headed to the theater for the movie. We saw Pirates of the Caribbean on Stranger Tides. I really liked it, just not the 3D part, that made me a little motion sick.

Sunday was Fathers day. But our father and mother spent most of their day at a mandatory meeting for owners. Boring. So all of us kids hung out together, which was a lot of fun.
We spent a lot of time either in the lazy river or putt-putting. I'm sad I don't have any pictures of us doing these things at all while we were there. I just never wanted to bring my camera to the pool to get wet.
We went to the local grocery store (Publix) to get stuff to make the fathers day dinner. The guys saw the lottery machines and all realized they had never bought a lottery ticket, so much to my disproval. they all bought one. $6 down the drain, but for the lesson on never winning at the lottery, it was worth it.
I started to make dinner when we got back from the store. Then we went to buy all of our park tickets at shades of green. When we finally got back we sat down to our nice fathers day dinner. I made my staple chicken parm dish (which is to die for) and Bry made a brazilian salad, for dessert we had a german chocolate cake. I think my dad and grandpa were happy campers.
After dinner we all went out to play some more putt-putt. It is really a staple of our FL trips. 5-6 game a day minimum.

Mike was very happy to score a hole in one to beat the boys. The guys were pretty competitive with their putt-putt scores all week. We made some fun memories. My favorite part was after we got back we ended up having a little mini talent show. KT and Andrew knew they wanted to audition for The American Idol Experience the next day at Disney's Hollywood Studios so they sang a few songs for us. Then Liz, Bry and I all sang for fun. Grandma loves music, and loves to sing so she was in 7th heaven listening to all of us. It was pretty fun and got us all excited for them to audition the nest day.

Lobster Dinner

2011-07-10T20:33:00.000-07:00

At the end of every school year the school I work for hosts an end of school year lobster dinner for the faculty. It is held a private beach club right on the water. If you like sea food then the food is fabulous and the ambiance enchanting. Mike and I aren't the biggest sea food fans but gave it a whirl. Mike was brave and tried the lobster whole. He had to have some help as to how to crack it open and eat it. I think he enjoyed the first few bites but could have stopped there. I had a bite and hated it. It wasn't so much the taste but the texture of the lobster I didn't care for.
After the dinner there was dancing. It was actually pretty fun. I don't get to dance very often. So anytime I get a chance, I take it. Unfortunately Mike is not a dancer so we didn't stay to much longer but it was till fun. I am lucky to work at a school who values it's employees. It was a fabulous evening and I look forward to next years event.

Andrew Hits NYC

2011-06-29T10:24:00.000-07:00

When I was in High School I was in the school's elite choir called the Delphian Chorale. Both of my brothers have been in the choir and I know my sisters will follow suit when they are old enough. Each year the choir goes "on tour" When I was in it we visited Chicago, NYC and Europe. This year they returned to NYC for the first time since I was in HS. I was really excited to see my brother preform. He even had a tiny solo in my favorite song, "He Never Failed Me Yet." They preformed in St. Paul the Apostles church which is located across the St from ground zero. They did wonderful despite the fact it was super hot and the church has NO A/C!
I LOVED seeing Andrew. I was surprised that he spent as much time with me as he did. It was good to get him one on one and talk to him about life. We went on a harbor cruise around the city and he got to see the Statue of Liberty and some breath taking views of the city.

After the Harbor cruise we went to dinner with the group somewhere in midtown. I forget the name of the place we went, but thats ok because the food was just ok.
We got to walk through time square after dinner. Andrew thought it was pretty cool.
The original plan was for me to say goodbye after dinner. The group had tickets to see "Wicked" and since I didn't buy one I wouldn't be going. To my surprise the group ended up with one extra ticket and invited me to join them. I was trilled. I have seen Wicked on Broadway 2 times prior and loved it both times. I was more excited to see it with Andrew. I was anxious to watch his reaction to the show and all of its splendor.
After the tour guide showed the group where the theater was he told us we had an hour to go out and look walk up and down Time Sq. I told Andrew we should go find him a souvenir so off we went. As we walked away from the theater I noticed the sky was looking a bit ominous and that a storm was coming. And I was right. While we were inside one of the shops it started to pour. But we didn't have the luxury of just waiting it out in the store since we had to be back in time for the show. So Andrew and his best friend Caleb decided to start running back the the theater. It was every man for himself. LOL. I got a pretty big laugh out of the whole thing though. I used a bag as an umbrella and managed to get back without being soaked. It was very memorable.

The show was wonderful (naturally) and I loved every minute of it. However, Andrew was sooo tired from all the walking and heat of the day he feel asleep several times during the show. I had to keep waking him up during the songs I knew he would be sad if he missed. During intermission I went and got us a drink and a snack. The woke him up and we were able to watch the second act together without him drifting off. After the show we were able to be a part of a question and answer session with some of the members of the cast (Boq, Fiyero, the understudy for Elphaba, a dancer and one of the costume and make-up people.) It was really cool to hear them talk about the industry. When it was all over I took a taxi (the first one I ever hailed and rode in all on my own) back the grand central and headed home. I was very tired the next day at work but it was all worth it. One of my favorite memories with my brother ever!

Jared and Maryle Visit

2011-06-29T08:48:00.000-07:00

On the Monday after our busy saturday (cfa/fundraiser) Mike's brother Jared and his wife Maryle came to visit. They came late on Monday night and stayed till Friday.

Tuesday we spent most of the day getting ready for there next few days in the city. I did take them to the mall where we looked for some Yankee attire for the game that night. We ended up going to Modell sports for our shirts. Mike came and picked us up after work and we headed to Yankee Stadium.

It was a beautiful night for a baseball game. We all wore our new Yankee shirts and felt like real fans. The Yankee's played the Red Socks and ended up loose but it was still fun (especially since we were all closet Red Sock fans.) I have to admit I paid minimal attention to the game. I was content watching people and playing on Mike's phone. It was fun to be there but watching every second of a baseball game just isn't as exciting for me. College football, that another story.

One of the highlights of the evening was the chocolate shakes from the Johnny Rocket Stand at the Stadium. Mike got one last year and has been dreaming of it since. I'm the type of person who likes to sample lost of sweets but not have a whole milkshake or anything like that to myself. I asked if we could share one and I would only have about a 1/4 of it. Mike decided that would not due. He wanted one to himself plus some of mine. So we got two. Mistake. The milkshakes were delicious, but to rich for any of us to finish. From now on Mike and I will think a little more carefully when we order our food.

It was a fun night. Just spending time with family we don't see all that often is wonderful.

Jared and Maryle spent Wed in NYC and had a blast. They did however pass along some unhappy news. Our favorite Mexican place in the city (Mama Mexico) had shut down. We don't know if we'll ever find a place we like more :(

Thursday I took the train into the city with them. We went down town to see my brother Andrew and his choir group preform. Which deserves it's own entry. :)

The Fruits of My Labors.

2011-06-29T06:53:00.000-07:00

June 4th was the BIG day for Mike and I. Mike took level II of the CFA and I had my big fundraiser. Like most things I do, my idea evolved from something small to something much bigger. I originally thought we should do a spaghetti dinner. After pricing it all out I knew we wouldn't make very much doing that. So we should add a bake sale to the mix and we should auction off some of the best desserts there. THEN I thought I could get a few actual items/services for the auction. In high school my choir always did an auction to raise money and it was pretty successful. The auction idea just snowballed out of control and we ended up with 50 items! Which was awesome. The only thing I didn't take into consideration was how much work it would be. I had to keep track of all the auction items coming in and who was donating them. Make description sheets for all the items. Make a silent bid sheet for all the items. Make posters to advertise the items so people would come to bid. Thats just some of the things I did. It took hours! And the worst part, it wasn't something I could delegate. It was such a tedious task that only one person could do it. My friend Cynda works with me in YW and came over a few times to help as much as she could. We are lucky things went as smoothly with the auction as they did.

Here are some pictures of how the RS room was set up for the auction

So I thought I had most of the work done with the spaghetti dinner until a few days before when I realized I didn't have centerpieces for the tables. I didn't want to spend a lot of money but I wanted the tables to look nice. That is when my awesome coworkers came into rescue me. They came up with the idea for three different centerpieces that would be easy to do and cost effective. They also got their hands on 15 vases for me to use so I didn't have to buy them. I spent a total of $30 on 17 centerpieces. THAT IS AWESOME! I wanted the whole thing to have an Italian theme so the table clothes were red, green and white (the colors of the italian flag) and the centerpieces were all very italian.

The red tables had a vase with multi-colored pasta at the bottom and spaghetti coming up the center fanned out for a full look.

The white tables had a vase filled with lemons (Italy is famous for growing lemons)

and lemon leaves sitting on top of more lemon leaves that were on the table.

The green tables had a box of empty pasta stuffed with red, green

and white tissue paper and an italian flag.

I was lucky to have a lot of help the night of the fundraiser. The girls came early dressed in black pants and a white shirt (like I asked them.) They all volunteered for the "stations" I needed them at and stayed at their post all night. The leaders and mothers were also awesome. It is a lot of work to feed over 150 people and they did an awesome job in the kitchen. I was so lucky to have them helping me.

All in all we raised a ton of money. Enough to pay for all the girls to go to girls camp and them some. It was such a blessing. When we started planning the whole thing the bishop told me 2 things. 1) don't stress and 2) let the Lord be in charge of this. I did stress, I can't help it. However, I did the best I could to let the Lord help me and he did. There were sooo many things I did because I was inspired to do them. Which sounds silly but I would wake up in the middle of the night and think "i need to call this person, check on the price of this and organize this." I was working over 50 hours a week (40 at school and 10-15 babysitting in the afternoon), preparing wed night activities and lessons (because I still had responsibilities for my calling) and doing all the house work (cleaning, meal planing, grocery shopping, ect.) since Mike was in intense study mode. As you can imagine I didn't have much spare time and all the free time I had went into this. There is no way it could have been done (and in such a successful and well organized manner) with out the help of the Lord. When it was all over I just wanted to cry, I literally felt a huge burden lifted off my shoulders.

I also have to give Mike some SERIOUS credit. He spent all day taking the CFA and just wanted to go out and do something fun to celebrate the end of the CFA. However, he came straight from the CFA to the church to do what he could to help. I have never been more happy to see him. I know what a huge sacrifice that was for him but he came. We stayed at the church until 10pm that night but we still wanted to do something fun. Our friend Ben had taken the CFA that day as well and came to the church to help Cynda. So the 4 of us decided we would go to our favorite place in stamford (Lucky's) for some post CFA/Auction dinner. After that we went back to the Johnson's place and played a game and watched a movie. We stayed up past 3am (which is big for us married people) and still made it to church on time the next day (your welcome, mom.)

I am glad it is over but have never been more grateful to work with such amazing women and girls who did so much to help. And for a husband who supports me, even when it was not convenient or fun. I'm a lucky lady and feel very blessed.

"I think I'll go to Boston"

2011-06-28T17:36:00.001-07:00

The weekend of May 20th I did my friends a big favor. I was a volunteer for their team in the New England Ragnar Race. If you aren't familiar with a Ragnar race it is where you have a team of 12 people (2 vans of 6 people) and you run a 200+ mile relay race. Each person runs 3 times and the amount of miles you run depends on what "leg" you have. It generally takes a little over 24 hours to complete. One of the tag lines is "Eat, sleep, run, repeat." I have to say I was glad I wasn't running. It looked exhausting.

My friend Cynda and I drove up to the Boston area on Friday night. We went to sleep as soon as we got there seeing as we had to wake up by 3:30 to go volunteer. When I woke up in the middle of the night I started walking to the bathroom and I stepped on someone who was on the floor. I quickly looked around and saw multiple bodies sprawled on the floor. Ben (Cynda's husband) and his van of runners were all sleeping on the floor. They only were able to sleep for about 2 hours before it was there turn to run again.

We showed up at the volunteer sight at 4:15. For the record, I am NOT a morning person. I was actually pretty bitter for most of the shift. Cynda was good to put up with my bitterness and laugh at me. That what friends are for though. Our team (the Unconquerable Soles) showed up around 5:30. Ben was the runner coming into the exchange point. He did awesome running up and down hills for over 7 miles so early in the morning. That was about as exciting as it got all morning. I spent most of my 5 hour shift writing down the time each runner came in, watching people vomit and gagging from the smell of bad BO.
I have to say, we got a great deal on the hotel room. This is a pile of over 20 used towels. That is about how many showers were taken. The whole team of 12 and the 3 volunteers all slept (at one point or another) in this room, most of us showered and all of use enjoyed the free breakfast. To top it off the Johnson's paid for the hotel with Marriot points... so we got all of that for free... PERFECT!
After breakfast we all went to the Harvard campus where the finish line and party were set up. It was a pretty cool atmosphere. Lots of energy and free stuff ;-) We also scooped out another mormon team, which is always fun. It was a beautiful day and it was fun to be apart of the whole thing.
After the team finished and took pictures we all went our seperate ways for the weekend. I was lucky enough to play 5th wheel to my friends the Johnson's and Jensen's. Mike was at home in Stamford studying hard for the CFA, so proud of him. The 5 of us walked to Mr. Bartley's there in Cambridge. It was delicious. The onion rings were to DIE for!

Then we headed to our hotel. Yes, all 5 of us shared a room. I slept on a roll away bed in the "kitchen" area of the room. Cynda and I forgot bathing suits so we decided we would go buy one. And that we did. We really enjoyed the hot tub for a few hours. We all had big plans for a night out on the town. Especially since Scott and Camille didn't have their son Peyton with them.
What we didn't factor into out "big plans" was the none of us got more than 4 hours of sleep the night before and over 1/2 of us had run a total of 50 miles combined. So we drove 15 minutes down the road to Chilli's (I had never been) where we received poor service and mediocre food. On our way back we realized that there was a Chilli's right across the street from our hotel. Nice work guys. We wanted to see a movie but we were all so tired we went to CVS to buy card games instead. We didn't even open them. When we got back to the hotel we all feel asleep talking. The next morning no one was 100% sure how they got into bed.
We spent Sunday morning in Boston. On our way to the U.S.S. Constitution we saw a bike accident in downtown Boston. The guy was riding right in front of us. He hit a big pot hole and flew off his bike. Meanwhile Ben had to swerve so he didn't run over the guy. Camille is a nurse so she was already jumping out of the car before we were even pulled over all the way. She did awesome. She got him out of the street and put pressure on the HUGE cut in his head. He was in shock and so was I. I remembered very quickly why the medical field never interested me. I was a wreck. All this guy had as a broken collarbone and a nice gash in his head. But the blood oozing out and the perfect droplets clinging to his biking outfit. Oh man I needed to sit dow. We called 911 and there were there in about 7 min. Which felt like an eternity for me as I tried not to magically make my breakfast reappear. SICK. So 20 points for Nurse Camille. YOU ROCK!!
Once we sent our new friend away in the ambulance went to the U.S.S. Constitution which is one of the oldest American war ships still in use. It was cool to see the ship deck lined with canons and the city skyline was the perfect back drop. I had to have Ben and Cynda take pictures with me so I wouldn't look like a looser all by myself in all the pictures.

We also visited Bunker Hill while in Boston. It reminded me of the washington monument. I loved the street we parked on. It was so picturesque and perfect. I only wish the sun would have been shinning. Gray clouds don't make for good picture backdrops.

Next we headed to little italy and the famous pastry shop "Mike's." We all got a cannoli (it was my first one ever and I have to say, it was good, but I wish I had gotten the cupcake.)
We nibbled on our pastries while we people watched in little italy by the Freedom Trail. Then we headed to the Italian place Camille and Scott had been looking forward to going to for months. Apparently it was on Dinners, Drive-ins and Dives (triple D) and they had great lobster ravioli. Well when we got there (after a 20 minute drive) it turns out the were closed on Sunday. Good for them for honoring the Sabbath day, shame on us for wishing they didn't.
So we headed back for CT. But we started looking at all the other triple D restaurants from Boston to stamford. We found 2 in Providence road island. The first one we watched the clip from the show that featured their food and everyone (but me) was salivating over the fisherman's stew (yuck sea food!) But they closed at 3pm on Sundays, it was 3:15. Fail. So before we went all the way to the other restaurant we looked up the hours online (thank you smart phones) and it was closed on Sunday as well. So we were pretty let down. But Cynda came through. She rallied the disappointed troops telling us about this great Italian place this Italian cop had raved to her and Ben about when they were in the area earlier this year. Ben had put the name of the restaurant in his iPhone. So Bam. we had a place to go.
HOLY COW!! That place was good. I still dream about their vodka sauce. I love that we are all such good friends we just passed our plates around and everyone sampled and oww'ed and ahhh'ed over the food. I don't think anyone ended up with their actual plate in front of them.

The rest of the car ride was full of road trip games and laughing. I don't think I had laughed that hard in a while. May was SUCH a stressful month for me since I was putting together the fundraiser. This trip was seriously what the doctor ordered for me to be able to make it through the rest of the month. I am so blessed to have such great friends (and not just these guys. So many other have made living on the East Coast some of the best years ever. And there will be PLENTY more to come.)

The In-Laws

2011-06-27T11:54:00.000-07:00

Mikes parents got into CT on Monday May 9th. We wanted to take them out to dinner somewhere nice, but we just ended up going to Lucky's, go figure. It was fun to spend time with them since we hadn't seen them in about 10 months. We caught up and ate way more fries and onion rings than we should have.

The next day we went to the city. It was a BEAUTIFUL day. We started our afternoon by going to a taping of "The Late Show with David Letterman." I'm not the biggest fan of late night shows (probably because I never stay up late enough to watch them) but it was fun. It was cool to see how all of it was done and to see the guest. I didn't know any of them well but I had seen Mark Harmon on NCIS before.
After the show we walked to Rosa Mexicano. We had heard a lot of really great things about it. It was mexican so we loved it but it didn't blow me away. I was slightly disappointed. I think my standards when it comes to mexican food are pretty high. Or maybe I just like cheap American mexican like taco bell and Cafe Rio. Who knows. If you like mexican than you will probably enjoy it.
To end a great day in the city we went to see "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying." Daniel Radcliffe (AKA: Harry Potter) was one of the leads in the show. And yes, Aubri, he was AMAZING!!! I was really nervous that as a huge Potter fan I would only be able to see him as Harry. But that all changed the minute he starting talking in a NYC accent, sang and danced. It was incredible. I can't say enough good things about the show. GO SEE IT!! Do anything and everything it takes to see it. You won't regret it. Unless Dan comes down with the flu that night and they have an understudy play his part. That would be sad.

Sterling and Joleen

Mike and I after the show.

Mike and I had to go back to work on Wed and mom and dad left for a NAC meeting in Boston on Wed afternoon. So that we the end of that short but memorable visit with them. I will say that day i the city was fun but my allergies were off the wall. I was miserable. I ended up being sick for a few days afterward. This year should go down in the books as WORST ALLERGY SEASON EVER!!

Thats all :)

As of Late...

2011-06-25T18:56:00.000-07:00

So I have basically taken a leave of absence from the blogging world for the past 2 months. I don't like it. I feel like there is a two month gap in my life. I hope to be able to catch up over the next month, but it doesn't help that I'm leaving for another vacation in a few days. In the past two months I have:

*Organizes and executed a massively successful fundraiser for the YW in my ward (which literally took up ALL of my free time at nights and on weekends for almost a whole month.)

*Was a volunteer for the New England Ragnar Race with my good friends. Which was followed by a weekend in Boston (without Mike :( He was studying for the CFA.)

*My in-laws came for a short visit in which we went to NYC and saw the David Letterman show & the Broadway musical "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying."

*Started my very first herb garden

*Mikes Brother and sister-in-law came from MI for a visit. It included a trip to a Yankees vs. Red Socks game.

*My brother Andrew came to NYC with his High School Choir. I met him in the city and spent a wonderful day with him which was topped off with my 3rd viewing of Wicked on Broadway!

*I had my last day of school for the year and was offered a contract with the same school for next year. Very Cool!!

*Spent a week in Florida with my family and had an absolute blast!! (My brother and sister BOTH preformed @ Disney's Hollywood Studios American Idol Experience and ROCKED!)

It's been a very busy but fun past 2 months. Hopefully I can catch up with all my pictures.

xoxox

Kris

The Squirrelly Surprise!

2011-05-31T18:21:00.000-07:00

This is the week. Mike's test and my fundraiser are in just 4 short days. As you can imagine I'm going nuts. I'm so stressed out I could just cry, all day long. I know I'm a baby. I've been told numerous times "Don't stress about this." Obviously they don't know me very well. Plus how can I not stress knowing the financial fate of our YW going to Girls camp lays in my hands. ANYWAYS, I'm tired, cranky and stressed. Not a good combo. I needed a good laugh.

Well I got it. I was taking out the trash to our big dumpster today. When I opened it... A MASSIVE SQUIRREL lunged out at me, jumped over my head and scampered away. I screamed so loud that my neighbor ran out of her apartment saying "Are you Ok? What happened?" By this time I realized what had happened and was dying laughing ashamed of my reaction.

I laughed at myself for a good five minutes. I don't think I've ever needed a laugh like that more.

"Just keep going. You can do hard things. It's almost over. 2 more weeks till freedom!" This is my current mantra!

If you live in CT come to my fundraiser. We have some freaking sweet auction items! A hair cut at Warren Tricomi by Edward Tricomi (valued at $350), a condo in Park City for a week in summer and winter, Jewelry but an amazing designer, a private tour of the New York Stock Exchange, guided tour of the MET museum, traditional japanese dinner for 8 and SOOOO much more!! COME, COME, COME!!

I'm Alive

2011-05-17T18:26:00.000-07:00

Friends,

I am alive. Barely. But I am alive.

Life has been a blur these past 3 weeks or so. I am overwhelmed, stressed and tired! My poor husband is feeling about the same. At this point we are more like roommates. We see each other long enough in the morning for a quick scripture reading and prayer then we say "Love you, see you tomorrow." And it's true, by the time he gets home at 10:30 or 11pm I am asleep. But it will all be over soon.

June 4th is D-DAY! Not only is it the day Mike takes the CFA test he is studying for but it is the day of the YW fundraiser I am organizing. I can't wait till June 5th!! Not only will I get my husband back, but my sanity as well :)

After that I have a lot to look forward to. The week after Mikes brother Jared and his wife Maryle are coming to visit AND my brother Andrew is coming to NYC with his choir group! The week after that is the last day of school. The week after that is FL with my Family and the next 2 weeks after that we are in Utah. Then I have the whole summer off WHILE still receiving a paycheck from school!

Work Hard, Play Hard. Just a few more weeks of hard, hard work and it's 2 months of play time!!

On a side note. I am still keep up with all of your blog posts. But reading them on my breaks at work on google reader, hence my lack of comments. But I still love you all and glad you all are doing well! Congratulations to all my friends graduating!

Love and Kisses,

Kris

Just Another Day (or week)

2011-05-02T14:15:00.000-07:00

I have come to the conclusion that I am NOT a morning person. Especially not a Monday morning person! Every weekday I go into work at 7:45 (I know its not even that early) and I am kindly greeted by my coworkers. It is all I can do to mumble a good morning or give a half hearted smile. I really like all the people I work with, I just don't want to talk to anyone. And Monday mornings are the worst because I really don't want to be there... I'd prefer to be in bed. So there I've got that off my chest, please don't take it personally if one morning I grumble a little when you say "Good Morning" to me.

I am a worry wart. Anyone who knows me well knows I come by this honestly as my mother and grandmother are even worse than I am. I have been trained by the best of them. Here is an example of my extreme ridiculousness. Most morning I try to send Mike a "Good Morning, I love you text." I see him in the morning before I go to work but I still like to give him a lovey text. In return I usually received a nice text back at some point in the morning. So this morning I sent him a few texts, I get nothing back. I am a little worried but decide he must be really busy. Then I see a Police car pull up. My heart skips a beat and my mind goes into over drive. Within .7 seconds I had concluded that Mike had been killed in a car accident on the way to work. That is why he had not returned my texts. The police had tracked me down to give me the news in person. It was awful, until the police turned around and left. Wrong address I guess! I calmed myself down and a little while later I got a quick message from Mike telling me he was way busy at work. Ridiculous I know!!

Second funny story of the day. It is short and sweet. My black pants zip up in the back. Today the zipper broke. Luckily I had a long undershirt on to cover my g's and a change of pants (I brought shorts to get the length okayed) to fix the situation. I hope I can fix them, they are my favorite.

In the days leading up to the Royal Wedding I wasn't sure if I was really interested in watching it. And then BAM it was 6:30 in the morning and I was teary eyed and weepy. As soon as I got home from work that night I was ALL OVER anything Royal Wedding. Six hours I spent watching coverage on it. But how could I of all people not get caught up in it. It is a normal(ish) girl living a fairy tail "Happily Ever After." I loved it! Kate looked so beautiful and demure in the dress. I also loved the balcony kiss and was happy to get a second :)

Have you ever read the book "I knew You Could?" Well I read this book to my class a few weeks ago and I choked back tears the whole time. I've been meaning to buy it at Barns and Nobles but haven't found the time. After school on Friday I went to a boy scout book sale in Darien. I was flipping through books when what do my wondering eyes appear? The very book I wanted in pristine condition for $1 !! SCORE!! I was so excited. I also picked up some other really great books. I am running out of room on my children's bookshelf. I hope my children appreciate all these books someday, because daddy isn't to happy that we have so many and no kiddies yet!

In other related news we are fast approaching the end of school and I may be job hunting again. As of right now the school is not offering the Pre-K assistants contract for the 2011-2012 school year. When I met with the headmaster he mad it sound like they would do what they could to find some type of a spot for me next school year. At any rate I'm not to concerned. If I need to find a new job I will have all summer to do so. Things always work out they way they are suppose to. I'm just not to thrilled at the idea of looking for another job.

In other unrelated news in the last 24 hours Osama Bin Laden was captures, killed and burried at sea. I have a lot of mixed feelings about the whole situation. 1) Maybe Obama took a little more credit than he should have in his speech, but good job for getting it done. 2) Bin Laden was one of many extremists and I fear with his death there maybe some attempted retribution. Living so close to NYC the only thing I worry about is terrorist attacks. It is such a big target and we live close enough to be majorly effected by bombs or things of that nature. 3) Is it morally okay to celebrate the death of another human being, even if they represent the center of evil? This quote by MLK jr. comes to mind.

"I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that" — Martin Luther King Jr

Just some thoughts. It has been interesting to watch all the news coverage. All normal nightly news shows were focused on Osama's death, 9/11 and the family and friends who are still dealing with lose after that horrible attack.

So at the end of the day I am grateful to live in the promise land. I hope and pray that we as a nation continue to worship the God our country was founded upon so that he can continue to bless us. God bless America.

Easter Baskets and Bunny Hunts

2011-04-29T17:10:00.000-07:00

Easter is one of my favorite holidays. Maybe because it comes in the spring time when my least favorite season (winter) is ending. The sun is finally peaking out, the trees are budding and flowers blooming. I love the turning in my black and brown clothes for light pinks and blues. But I especially love the personal time of reflection on the gift of the Savior. I love that Easter is more of a personal time of worship. The gift of the atonement and the resurrection are more personal events and it is nice to reflect on them privately. At least that is how easter is for me.

Our easter was great this year! The fact that the weather was nice most of the weekend really added to it. Saturday night our friends the Johnson's came over for an easter basket hunt (bunny hunt.) They put together a really fun basket for us. It had artisan bread and cheese, a sparkling cider, cookie and a pineapple (I like to think it was a play on our favorite show Psych) and a toy.

Cynda and Ben really enjoyed there basket. Ben even took his angry bird to dinner with us that night. It was a lot of fun to watch them go through their basket and laugh at all the little kid things that we put in there. It was like we were all little kids again (especially Ben.)
Sunday morning we went to church before any easter festivities took place at home (ie: easter baskets.) I took this basket full of my awesome easter cookies to church with me for the YW and the girls I visit teach.
When we got home the hunt began. It took Mike quite a while to find his basket in one of the kitchen cabinets.
He loved all of his toys and was anxious to try a few out (like the mini basketball hoop.)
I found mine pretty quick and was thrilled to see my easter treasure!
My favorite was my Tangled DVD and my Pandora charm. Mike did a good job on picking the charm out as well. It is a "cinderella slipper." Mike used a glass slipper to propose to me a little over 3 years ago. I thought it was sweet and had meaning behind it vs just another "cute" charm. He's a sweetie!
After we exchanged baskets we went right to work on preparing for Easter dinner. We had a few close friends come over for an early lunch. It was a delicious meal with great company. This means I hosted Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter this year. I have to admit that I am GREATLY looking forward to spending Thanksgiving and Christmas elsewhere this year.

It was a great day spent with a few great people. I can't imagine a better Easter Sunday.

Cupcake Wars Remix

2011-04-26T17:04:00.000-07:00

This past weekend Cynda and I decided we would make delicious cupcakes for an eater treat. We are both fans of the show Cupcake wars and love to bake. So we picked two very different cupcakes to make. The recipes actually come from the Cupcake War website!

Chocolate Strawberry Shortcake

I loved both but this one was my favorite. It was little lighter than the other. It was also 100% vegan (thank you Chloe from C.W.) But you wouldn't have known. The strawberries added to the light feeling of the cupcake as well as added a bit of freshness to it. We used a simple vanilla buttercream (with vegan butter) frosting to act as a binding agent between the strawberries and cake. It was delicious and presented beautifully! I would highly recommend it!

Caramel Apple Cupcakes with Vanilla Bean Cream Cheese Frosting and a Carmel Drizzle

This was truly a rich and decadent cupcake. It was simply delicious, but not a cupcake you could eat 2 of in one sitting. While making the cake we started to panic a bit. The last step was to add the chopped 4 apples. Before we did that we had all the other ingredients mixed and the consistency was more like a cookie dough than a batter. Obviously I had never baked like this with apples before because as soon as I blended them in the juices of the apples mixed right in and changed the "dough" into a DELICIOUS "batter" (no but really, we were licking every thing to get a good taste of this batter. And don't worry once it had been licked it was put in the dishwasher :) The vanilla bean buttercream was also full of flavor. We couldn't find vanilla paste but used the pure Vanilla instead. I think it turned out just fine. The carmel drizzle was the perfect finishing touch. You felt like you were eating a carmel apple in cake form. YUM!

Cynda and I also enjoyed frosting these cupcakes. We really felt like pros using the frosting bags and using some of the technics we saw on Cupcake Wars!

Hard Knock Life

2011-04-24T20:01:00.000-07:00

Do you know what? It is HARD, HARD, HARD to be the oldest sibling. I don't know if a lot of people realize how hard it is. Ever since I can remember I have felt like it was my personal responsibility to make sure that A) Everyone is happy and B) Everyone is making the choices that will bring them eternal joy and not temporal happiness. I also feel a great need to have a close meaningful relationships with every member of my family. I want them to feel like they (even my parents) can come to me for advice, to vent or just to talk for no reason. So it is hard on me when I feel like my brothers don't really care much to talk to me or about my opinion.

My brother Bryant just got home from his mission. I wrote him almost every week while he was gone. I cried so many times because I missed him so much and just couldn't wait till he got home. But now that he is home I sort of wish he was still on his mission. Then he would still be writing me and telling me what a great sister I was. But now that he is home and has big life decisions to make I give him my advise and opinions and her says "I can't talk to Kristin she sounds just like mom." Which I would take as a compliment but I know coming from him is more of a put down. He also looks at what Mike and I have (which is not much, but a little more than a RM college student) and says "Doesn't it make you angry that Kristin is doing so well?" Since when has that been a bad thing? I find joy in the success of my siblings/family members and friends. It is just amazing and heartbreaking that the people you love the most can hurt you the deepest.

My brother Andrew is going to graduate from High School in a month. He was not accepted to BYU but was accepted to BYU-I (a school he is less than thrilled about) and Ohio University (a school more known for its partying than academics.) He also has a lot of tough decisions to make. He is trying to figure out if he wants to go on a mission, what school to go to and what he wants to do with his life. I know that is a hard spot to be in. I just wish I could make all the decision for him. Because I have enough real life experience to know what will bring him true happiness and what will be short lived.

But if I did that I would be like Lucifer in a way. Taking away agency and forcing them to do the right thing. And we know that disrupts the plan of Salvation. At any rate these past few months I have been learning a small portion of what it must be like for our Brother Jesus Christ. I love my brothers and sister soo soo much. With every decisions I have made the thoughts "what type of an example am I being to my siblings" crossed my mind. I have done the best that I can to set a good example for them. Although my example is not as spotless and clean as the one of our Savior I feel it is still one to be proud of.

I can understand why our Savior died for us. I would give my life if I knew in turn the lives of my brothers and sisters would be improved. I would do anything to make it so they would never have to endure pain, feel sorrow or walk on the wrong path. Just as our Savior would. BUT I have to let them. I have to do my best to step back and let them use their agency. It is so hard sometimes. Especially when they make the wrong choice (and we all do sometimes.) But I still love them deeply. Even when they hurt my feelings or make fun of me, I still love them. Just as the Savior did the men who crucified him.

I'm not trying to make myself look as holy and perfect as the Savior or compare my mortal love for my family to the eternal love of our But I can finally understand it better than I have even been able to before.

So on this Easter Sunday I think of my Brother Jesus Christ and the sacrifices he has made for me, his little sister Kristin. He loves me so much, even when I forget to read my scriptures one morning or say a prayer before I go to bed. He loved me even though I am not perfect, nor will I ever be. He cheers for me and rejoices in my successes. He cries with me when I start to believe the things Satan is telling me (your not pretty, your fat, you are worthless. you'll never be good enough...) He is the greatest big brother. I love to think of him that way. I love my Savior so much. I am so grateful for Him and his atoning sacrifice, for his glorious resurrection and great love for ALL of us, no matter what. I strive to be more like him. To treat others and see others the way he does.

"He is not here; for he is Risen." He lives that we may live. He loves us infinitely and we shall love others the way he does.

So yes it is hard to be the oldest sibling, but with the example and support of my Older Brother, Jesus Christ, I will continue to do the best I know how and know that I can turn to Christ when I need sisterly advice. :)

Rainy Saturday Morning

2011-04-23T11:27:00.000-07:00

I am writing this morning in an attempt to prolong the official beginning of my day. I have been highly motivated all week and have big plans for today. However, the weather is not being very friendly. Its raining and cold and disgusting outside. Isn't it amazing how the weather truly can effect your mood. I also had a big (and yummy) breakfast this morning. So I'm full, warm and cozy in my PJ's and fuzzy sock (Oh how I love fuzzy socks.) I don't foresee me leaving my spot on the couch for a while. So to make myself feel a little less guilty, I am "journaling."

This week was a good week. I woke up early every day this week to do some type of a work out. It was nice to feel refreshed before work and to have a little extra time with Mike in the morning. At work this week I tried my very best to have saint like patience. I instituted a rewards system in my class that is working, SO FAR. Each time they are quite in the hall, get in line properly and quietly, get a good report from a specials teacher and all behave during circle time, the get a token. Once the get 20 tokens they get a treat. It is working well. They have really been trying and are getting a lot more positive reinforcement. Thats not to say that by the end of the week I was trying a lot harder to have patience than at the beginning.

Funny Story: My pre-k class and the 2 kindergarden classes are located on a different campus then our 1st-5th grade classes. We rent out 5 classrooms inside a Jewish temple. It is interesting but we make it work. Passover began on monday night this past week. So on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday we were not able to bring grains or pork into the temple in our lunches (which was very challenging for me, I would eat my triscuts on the playground outside.) We are also not allowed to celebrate easter or anything in the temple. So we read a passover book to the students to help them know why they couldn't have sandwiches for lunch. We gave them matzah and macaroons. Then we decided since most of the kids in our class celebrate easter to read the story of easter (the real one, with Christ and his death and resurrection.) After the story one little boy was very interested in the story about Jesus. He asked me questions like "Why did they kill Him?" and "Who killed Jesus?" So lets think about this. I have a student asking me "who killed Jesus" in a Jewish temple... what do you say? I paused, knowing full well that if anyone else asked this question I would answer simply "the Jews." But I'm in a Jewish temple, I can't say that. Can I? I stood there stumped for a few seconds and he asked again. Finally I told him a man named Pontius Pilate. Haha. It was close enough for the situation I was in. I had to laugh though.

On a different note I feel much more organized in my calling. My close friend Cynda was called as my advisors. We are going to have a lot of fun with these girls. I think it will be fun for the girls to see me with one of my good friends on Wednesday nights. I am one of the stricter leaders, I expect a lot from the girls (where much is given, much is required) so I think it would be easy for them to see me as a more disciplined leader that they can't relate to. But I think they will be surprised to find that... I have a sense of humor, I'm fairly sarcastic and that I love the have fun and laugh. When I think of my youth leaders that I loved it was in the moments that I saw them being themselves and having that I really felt connected to them. So I hope my mia-maids will feel the same way. I can't wait to start having more class activities!

This morning I made crepes for the first time and made a caramelized banana filling for them. Not to shabby. Unfortunately after I had mine I saw how many cal. per serving there were on the bottom of the website recipe (600!) Guess I will have to wait till dinner to eat again.

Yesterday I had some girls over to color easter eggs. I had a blast. It was so fun to spend time with a few friends while doing something fun and crafty. I had one of my new friends from work come and spend time with all my other girlfriends from church. She probably felt like she was part of a "Mormon Invasion." It was a lot of fun. I also made my easter cut-out cookies. I have to decorate them today. I hope I have enough and don't have to make any more!

They are pretty right? My favorite is one that Shelley made. It says "Utah... This is the place." then has an outline of the state of Utah on it. LOVE IT!!

Last night Mike and I went to the temple for ward temple night. It is the first time we have gone as an organized ward thing. That was fun. We left at 5:00 for the 7:15 session worried we would hit traffic on the way into NYC. Traffic was perfect and we were parked and ready to go by 6:15. Since the temple is in the Lincoln Circle area there is a lot to see and look at around it. Our friend Camille came with us and we all found a little pizza place to grab a quick slice and kill some time. It was really great to go to the temple on Good Friday. We hope to make it a tradition.

I have been feeling that winter weight lately and wanting desperately to get ride of it. It is however I little more challenging with the arrival of our girl scout cookie order, easter candy/baking and my new desire to become a master pastry chef. So I went to the gym yesterday to do some interval training. I went on the treadmill and I would run at a comfortable speed for 2 minutes then move it up a speed for a minute then move it up one more for another minute. Then I would walk for 2 min then start again. My dad said that is a good way to burn fat. It was pretty hard since running hasn't been my main form of exercise for a while. I went visiting teaching right after and didn't stretch... MISTAKE. This morning I can barley walk up and down the steps. I feel like I did after I climbed Timp! That is also why I'm struggling this morning.