Spring Break

 Way back in the fall Ellie found a bunch of misplaced bulbs and planted them in the backyard by our lilac bush. We kinda forgot all about it until the end of March when we started to see little green shoots coming out of the ground. So Ellie made a nice rock border and a few weeks later we had beautiful daffodils. What a wonderful Spring surprise! Ellie loves the outdoors and gardening.

 As always, we LOVED General Conference. I saw this idea on Pinterest for making a Conference board where you can keep track of the speakers and their topics (and some other stuff), so I spent a lot of time making it (and even bought a laminator). The girls liked it, but we really didn't use it much. The thing we all really enjoyed, aside from the talks, was the bag of candy assigned to each apostle that we would open at the beginning of their talk. :) We consumed so much sugar within those two days!

 We spent our spring break at the West's house... house-, dog- and hamster-sitting. As with every other time we've done this, it was super fun for the girls, but by the end of the week I was SO ready to be back in my own home (even if it is 1/5 the size and 100+ years older)!

Ellie + Mommy = LOVE

 We went to a beach in Niantic after spending some time at the Book Barns and a fabulous 50's candy shop (where we spent WAY too much money on junk).

 We had the missionaries over for dinner and our Sister States (not pictured) was on splits with her sister trainer, Sister Jones (pictured above). Aaron asked Sister Jones where she was from and she said Wyoming. She is from a tiny little town called Otto right by Burlington, WY (the town that my parents grew up in). I told her we were probably related (because I'm related to most people in that little area), and lo and behold WE ARE!!! It was so cool to meet my (distant) cousin out here in CT!

 Carly loved practicing back flips and back handsprings on the West's trampoline. She's such a good little gymnast.

 Sandy + Aubree = nervous love

(We love Aubree's glamour smiles)

 We went to Devil's Hopyard, a state park just 40 minutes away, and enjoyed the waterfall and other beautiful scenery of new spring.

 I love the vibrant green of the moss that grows on everything!

Aaron + Camile = LOVE!

Sledding in Arlington, Mass. This is the park we play at when we go to the Temple. There is a beautiful view of Boston from this hill. 

 Carly got glasses in January. She was so amazed at the details she can now see.

 Aubree and I take playing house pretty seriously. I had a baby this day. I've never had such an easy (and short) pregnancy and delivery. Aubree is such a proud big sister.

Aubree is famous now. She was in the newspaper a few weeks ago. (Story time at the library)

Ellie was baptized by Aaron on March 1st. It was a beautiful service. There were several people from our little branch there and several friends and neighbors who aren't LDS. We were especially grateful that Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Leon, and Nanny Nette and Grandpa could be there.

This is the only picture I have of Leon and Kathy here with us. So sad! Aaron and Kathy are doing family history and Leon is reading scriptures (pretty typical).

 Also while the grandparents were here we went to Newport, RI to the National Museum of American Illustrators. We love Newport! My parents stayed in a hotel while Aaron's parents were here, so the girls got to spend a couple nights at the hotel and go swimming. After Aaron's parents left my parents moved in with us for the next week and a half. They cooked, cleaned, fixed up, did laundry, entertained and spent quality time with the girls.

We also went to Haverhill, Mass to see the statue of Hannah Dustin (my 11th great grandma on my Dad's side). I wrote a post about her here. We also got a little pamphlet that told us her story and also included a letter she wrote to her church when she was much older. It was so cool because she included some of her favorite scriptures in it, and specifically which scripture she had in her mind during her captivity - Psalm 43 and Psalm 118:7. She said, "… I am Thankful for my Captivity, twas the Comfortablest time that ever I had; In my Affliction God made his Word Comfortable to me…" We had a family home evening lesson a couple days after visiting her statue about how trials can bring us closer to Heavenly Father and he can comfort us during hard times.

One morning Grandpa saw Aubree sitting on this bench and she explained to him that she was in timeout. So Grandpa held her on his lap and told her about a time when he was a little boy and tried to carve something and ended up cutting his hand. He also told her about how life was sometimes hard for him too when he was a little boy and how he liked to have his Mom hold him close and she would bounce him on her leg. (Now I know why my Dad likes to bounce his grandkids on his lap.) It was so sweet to see my Dad hold her close and show her such love and sympathy.

The picture hanging above my Dad is a puzzle that Ellie sent to Nanny Nette and Grandpa for Christmas. After they put it all together, my Dad "engineered" it into about 8 pieces, plus edges, and sent it back to us to put together and keep. (They have no where to put it now that they're homeless.) So, we put it together and then I glued it and framed it for Ellie's birthday.


We LOVED having family here - we are so lucky to have such wonderful grandparents for our kids!

Winter Birthdays

We have three winter birthdays all within 2 weeks of each other - not bragging, just complaining ;) - Ellie, me and Aubree. And this year both Ellie and Aubree had birthday parties with friends. And guess what? I am not a party planner. At all. I get really stressed about all the little details AND the big picture. During all this planning I read the book "Heaven is Here" by Stephanie Clark Nielsen and it helped to remind me that everything that was stressing me out was actually a blessing. Ellie and Aubree are both alive to celebrate another birthday. I am alive and healthy enough to plan and carry out birthday parties for them. (Last year we all went through the flu during our birthday season.) Aaron has a job, so we can pay for presents and parties. Not to mention, these are parties I'm planning. PARTIES. Not PTO fundraisers or funerals or church lessons, but parties. So, really it shouldn't be that stressful. (But I still had to remind myself of that at least once a day for about three weeks.) Here are some pictures:

 This was Ellie's cake for our own family celebration. A cute little round ball… or is it?

 Surprise! Piñata cake!

Her birthday party was a cake decorating party. I made the aprons for each of the girls and a cake for each of them to decorate and take home.  The girls all had a lot of fun with the decorating - some of those cakes have more icing than cake.

Next came my birthday:
Aaron and the girls usually make me breakfast in bed for my birthday, but this year they decided to clean the entire downstairs (kitchen, dining, family rooms) before I came down in the morning. Such a great birthday surprise! It really got my day off to a great start. (In all my slobby childhood years I never dreamed that I would appreciate a clean house for my birthday. I'm becoming my mom. ha ha!)

Aubree and I had a cozy indoor picnic (notice the space heater behind us) for lunch. 

 Yummy Japanese take-out for dinner. 

And we ended the night with a few episodes of The Cosby Show. It was such a wonderful, low-key, happy birthday!

And last but not least, 

 This silly girl celebrated her GOLDEN birthday on February 5th!

 We had a tea party with a beautiful new (used) mismatched tea set. We had some cute finger foods and the girls made fascinators (the huge, fancy headbands). This party was especially stressful because there was a big storm on the day of the party. Oh the joys of winter birthdays! So, I cancelled the party, rescheduled the party, then switched it back (looking back it's doesn't seem like a big deal, but at the time I was a wreck.) Only one of her original guests was able to make it, but luckily school was canceled so we invited some neighbor friends over that normally would have been at school. In the end I'm glad it worked out the way it did. We had a wonderful time with some friends that we don't get to see very often.

And the night before Aubree's birthday the girls decided they really wanted to cut their hair. It was Aubree's first hair cut. *sniff* They look super cute, but I miss their long hair. 

Christmas in Connecticut

(Thanks for the post title Carolyn - it does sound lovely)

Christmas was so relaxed and enjoyable this year. We stayed at our house, just the five of us, and didn't go anywhere or see anyone (except a few neighbors here and there) for Christmas Eve and Christmas day - it was wonderful! (Although I think we all would have loved being in ID and UT with family as well.)

I really wanted us to do better this year at keeping our focus on Christ this Christmas, but it didn't seem to be happening. I think I wasn't doing a very good job myself at keeping that focus. So, a couple days before Christmas I asked Carly - when her mood was right (we are definitely at a point where we have to wait for just the right moment to introduce certain subjects with her) - if she would please plan something for our family to do that would help us remember the true meaning of Christmas. Carly is such a planner and organizer and so I think she was pleased to be asked. She found a little presentation idea from the Dec. Friend magazine and wrote down all the parts and got it all organized. We did this on Christmas Eve and I think we'll make it a tradition - it was really neat (so neat that the edges of our vision started to fade into perfect whiteness - as shown below).

We were trying to decide on a nice Christmas movie that we would all like to watch, and Aaron was a little skeptical when we chose Little Women, but it turned out to be a great choice. (There are a couple different Christmas scenes, so it definitely qualifies as a Christmas movie.) I love the March family and the fact that it's a family of girls. I love that they live in New England. I appreciate their love for each other even though they aren't perfect and don't always get along - makes me feel a little better about my own little family. I love the simplicity of their life and their work ethic (such a good reminder when so much of Christmas is centered around commercialism and what I want). And of course I love the love story.

All day we had been telling Aubree that Christmas was tomorrow, so as we were sitting on the couch before bedtime she asked, "In the morning is it tomorrow?" She's so cute!

Christmas morning was so fun! It's so wonderful to see kids open gifts and see the surprise and delight on their faces!

Carly MADE this basket (from pieces of wood, to an actual basket!) at school and gave it to me for Christmas.

The girls got this typewriter for Christmas, (my neighbor sold it to me for $10!) and have been writing all sorts of stories with it. I would highly recommend this as a gift for any kid who loves writing (thanks for the inspiration Shawna), or for a kid that you want to get writing.

 Here is Aubree's first work of fiction:

 She sounded out some of these words with only a little help from me (and some words all by herself). I am so proud! For a girl that has never been formally taught her alphabet I thought this was pretty impressive!

Aaron's Grandma Helen passed away a few days before Christmas, so Aaron's parents flew him home for the funeral. He left the day after Christmas and was gone for 5 days! I was not to happy with the arrangement, but what can you do? I was glad that he got to go to see all of his siblings and a lot of other relatives he hadn't seen in a long time. He said his Grandma's funeral was beautiful and inspiring - she was such an example of kindness and love. (I think funerals are always some of the most spiritual and uplifting meetings, and I love the eternal perspective gained after going to one.)

The seven original Kathy and Leon Parson kids:

Troy, Aaron, Holly, Justin, Brett, Franci, and Jordan

A couple days after Christmas we headed to the West's to house- and dog-sit for 10 days. It was just the girls and I for the first 5 days until we picked Aaron up at the airport on the evening of New Years Eve. The first couple days we were here it was close to 50 degrees outside - so the girls had some fun running around out there. I try to make our stay here as much like a vacation as possible. So, the girls watch too much TV and I buy frozen meals - it's pretty cool.

 We had our last church meeting here on Sunday which is a little bitter sweet. This was the place where our beloved little branch was created, where kids came outside to go crabbing after church, where Sandy the church dog joined us for our meetings, and where our branch started to become a family. But, we are excited to be moving on too! It will be nice to not worry about the wear and tear on someone's beautiful home (even though the West's were always very inviting and uncomplaining about it all). And it will be SO nice to have our own (rented for now) building in Westerly. We will be meeting at another chapel for the next few months until a building is ready for us.

I captured these rare, but precious moments while we were at the West's as a reminder to me and them that they really do love each other.

 Some cute hairdos (because it doesn't happen very often)

Sandy the church dog, and Ellie enjoying a book. It's been so nice to see Ellie read a book on her own for pleasure. This has just happened in the past few months.

New Years Eve was celebrated by picking Aaron up at the airport, eating a lovingly reheated frozen meal with sparkling juice, and watching Despicable Me 2. We went to bed at 9:30. When we lived in Utah we used to celebrate the new year with New York, but now that we are in the NY time zone we need to find an island in the Atlantic to celebrate with (London is 5 hours ahead - probably too early).

I just finished reading "Heaven is Here" by Stephanie Nielsen. It was a really good read and definitely reminded me of all I have to be grateful for. I want to be a better wife and mom.

Hey! It's been awhile.

Due to Facebook, Instagram, and lack of self-discipline I have not been a very dedicated blogger. But, I do want to have these pictures on our internet-journal, so here they are with some captions:

We celebrated Thanksgiving with a few other families from our branch this year. Here is our Thankful Tree that we had in our dining room:

Aubree LOVES purses. She has about 8. And they are all full of the most random, and sometimes important things (like the DVD from the library that we now owe like $8 on - and we never even watched it!)

 Here's a little faith promoting (and kind of funny) story that has to do with Aubree's purses. The day of General Conference I was frantically looking for these little prophet cards that I had put on the computer desk just a couple days before. They were no where to be found, and NO ONE knew where they were! Well, about 15 minutes before Conference starts I finally think to say a quick little prayer to help me find them. A few minutes later the thought came: "look in one of Aubree's purses". Of course! And what do you know? Yep, they were in one of her purses!

This is a sample of the randomness that comes out of one of her bags.

Also, Aubree learned how to jump rope recently.

Happy Movember!

Crazy hair day for Carly. Look how long Ellie's beautiful hair is!

Christmastime!

I love having this banister to put a garland and stockings on. And I love having a cute little girl to pose with the garland!

 (when you grow a beard it's not cool to smile in photos)

A local ballet school invited some of the 2nd graders to be elves in their nutcracker performance - for FREE! The 5 weeks of ballet lessons would be free, the costume would be borrowed, and she would get the experience of being in the Nutcracker - awesome! Only I didn't know at the time that the tickets would be $40 A PIECE, and the ballet shoes are $20, and the week of the performance would include 10 HOURS of rehearsal time! And to top it all off, Ellie was only on stage for 10 minutes and the whole time she was sitting on a prop - not dancing, not even moving. A little disappointing, but even so she is so cute even just sitting on a prop and she did get ballet lessons, and I got to see the Nutcracker. AND Ellie and I had a special dinner date before the performance - dinner dates are always fun!