What Fun!

We've been having a marvelous time this last week.  It seems that we have one sickness after another rolling right on through our poor little ones.  Fortunately they were able to enjoy a few fun activities!

Daddy put together Family Home Evening, something we probably need to start doing more regularly...  oops.  (Kayda is going to plan next weeks, she is very excited).  We talked about the resurrection and decorated giant bunny cookies!!! Gotta love the things you find at costco!

 Daddy was helping Dillon put the pictures in order. 

 Kayda knew all about it already so she went through it very quickly.

 Carson just wanted the camera...

 Decorating our bunnies!

 If there was ever a time for a case of red eye... it was too perfect to pass up!

 EAT YOUR EASTER BUNNY!!!! EAT IT!!!

Grandma H went shopping with me last weekend, she decided to buy Carson these cowboy boots.  Grandma and Papa G had already supplied them for the other two...  Anyway, he likes to randomly put them on and wander around.  CUTEST THING EVER!

 Why hello cutie!

 Kayda loves to read!

 What makes a better fort than the kitchen table?

 Since the kitchen table was otherwise occupied I snagged a blanket and we had a top ramen picnic in the family room.  The reason I need a blanket is for Carson, he has a tendency to drop noodles between his mouth and the bowl.  Of course, he's the kid that decided to boycott the blanket.  Notice he has lounged out between the couch and the blanket?  I tried just moving his bowl back onto the blanket, he immediately grabbed it and set it back on the carpet.  I tried again, he did it again and then grinned at me!!!  Little stinker!

 We picked up a farm animal grow kit at the store tonight.  The look like little pills, you stick them in warm water, the capsules dissolve away and you're left with sponge animals!  The kids loved them.  I figure I can pick up some paint and we can use them to sponge paint a farm scene later.

 Waiting...

 Showing me "where we're at"

 Getting bored waiting... 

Check them out!  Horse, ram, turkey, bull, goose, pig, chicken, duck, goat, cow, sheep and rabbit.  What a great spontaneous evening!

Kayda's Parent Conferences

On Wednesday we had Kayda's parent/teacher conference.  It was actually more of a student/parent conference.  Kayda actually ran her own conference!  She has a checklist of things to do, things to share, things to read, etc.  Kayda is a VERY thorough little girl so our conference took longer than most.  She wanted to read the WHOLE book, then share EVERY page of her math worksheets, etc.  It was super cute.  She, of course, is passing with flying colors, the teacher is VERY impressed with her and really enjoys having her in the class.  I was informed by the speech pathologist that Kayda no longer qualifies for speech!  That's pretty awesome!  But the speech pathologist is going to keep Kayda in until the end of the year to get the "r" sound down before she's exited.  We are so proud of our sweet girl.  She is growing up FAR too fast.

Enjoying the new place

We have REALLY been enjoying the new house.  I haven't been so great about taking pictures but here is are a few snapshots of what we've been doing.

 Cookies!

 This is Kayda with her neighbor friend Alexis!  Alexis comes over to play more days than not!

Kayda decided she wanted to help clean, Carson tagged along. 

 Meanwhile, Dillon was playing cars in the bathroom sink!

 Carson got distracted, but Kayda kept working!  Later the boys ended up in the bath while Kayda and I cleaned their bathroom.

 Dillon was being a monster!  Actually I think this particular photo he was ACTUALLY mad... Carson kept trying to take Dillon's blanket and anybody that knows Dillon KNOWS how he feels about his blanket!  Carson was still entertained though, I don't think he could tell the difference between "Monster Dillon" and "Angry Dillon".

 If Carson is wearing a onesie or zippered jamas, really anything that can collect toys, he will start to do just that.  Collect toys.  Kayda, Dillon and I were quite entertained by him.  See the car?

 In it goes!

Now lets do a little dance and try to get the 5+ cars out of the onesie!  He did this for a good ten minutes!

Our house is slowly starting to feel like home.  It's an odd feeling, it feels like we've lived here forever but it also feels like we barely moved in!  We finally moved the swingset down and Grandma and Papa G gave us some fruit trees that we planted in the backyard.  We bought bulbs and other flowers to add to the front gardens but first I have to finish weeding them!  We love it.  We are slowly turning into hermits.  We don't really want to go anywhere.  If people want to come over that's fine and dandy with us but we don't want to leave home!  

We have other cousins?!?

Kayda and Dillon know about their other cousins.  They know that they exist, they occasionally skype with them, and they have a few memories of them.  However, since they live across the country we don't get to see them.  It has been years since we've seen them actually.  Well, lucky for us Aunt Kirsten, Mason, Owen and Raelle came to visit Grandma and Papa G!  Since we don't live far from them that means we got to see them!  We spent a few different occasions with them.  They came to visit us a couple of times, the first was to see the new place, the second was because Kayda was in school and we couldn't go that way.  We also went to Grandma and Papa G's to see them and were treated with Chuck E Cheese!  Unfortunately Mason and Owen, often time Dillon as well, move too quickly for me to get many pictures!

 Yes I actually love these horse rides... You just can't tell by my face.

 Kayda and Dillon used teamwork to help Carson play on the toys!  What great big siblings!

 Papa G with all SIX of his grandkids!

 Carson loved dancing with Grandma G!  I'm not entirely sure why he didn't smile basically

 Dancing on the big screen!

This was one of the days they came to visit.  We all went over to our neighborhood park.  Carson wasn't interested in playing on the toys though.  He wanted to push the stroller, by it's actual handle which he can't reach on his own!

Home Sweet Home

We painted a few rooms before we moved in to help it feel more like home, I'm just sharing pictures of the rooms that are already painted and I'll add more as different spaces get done.  I'm so excited to keep poking my way through and gradually make this a bright, beautiful, colorful home!

 Family Room

Kitchen

 Den/Playroom

 Kayda's Room (she got to choose her color)

Dillon's Room (he also got to choose his color)

So far we are LOVING our new home!  Kayda has been to school three times.  She is a little hesitant and misses her old school but she is a trooper and is still putting herself out there to make new friends.  We've been to our new ward once, I hung out in nursery the whole time with Carson since it was his first time ever. There were several ladies in there, all of which were really nice.  We definitely moved into a family area.  I guess a good portion of the people in our ward come from our neighborhood and probably about 30 kids get on Kayda's bus at her bus stop (just K-2!!!).  We've taken a little break from moving, though Papa seems determined to keep it moving (thanks Dad and Mom).  We're just waiting to bug the uncles to see if they can help us move the swing set.  Other than that pretty much everything is here.  We like to walk to the neighborhood park, sometimes ride our bikes and today we had the whole family ride bikes down the trail to Kayda's school so she could show us how she can go across the rings on the play ground.  Kayda did great on the ride, what a champ!  The ride was 3 miles round trip, Dillon hung out in the bike trailer with Carson which worked out quite nice for keeping Carson happy!  It's wonderful that it's a nice FLAT ride so we CAN ride our bikes to the store (which would also be 3 miles round trip) or to school, or to the library.  I love it.  We are excited to find the river access which the maps show coming from our neighborhood (unfortunately they aren't close enough to show exactly WHERE).  I'm hoping there will be some access in our town where we can wade in a slow part of the river.  It would be a great way to spend a summer afternoon.  Daddy is riding the train in to work more often than not and seems to enjoy the chance to wind down on the way home, he's working on shifting his hours forward an hour so he actually gets home earlier than he used to.  Life is good.  We're happy and this house has turned out to be everything we needed it to be.  

We are Blessed

Warning this isn't my average post.  I felt the need to write it like this so that's what I'm doing.

This year has been a really rough year.  Daddy and I have been scrambling to try to keep our family together, sometimes the jury is still out... but we are both doing the best we can in some terrible circumstances.  We have been very blessed to be in my parents' home while we work it out, it turned out that this is exactly where we needed to be.  There have been a lot of trials this year, deeply personal, highly emotional, seemingly impossible trials.  Some that wouldn't have been so difficult if not for the fact that they occurred at the same time.  But we are blessed.

We are blessed to have our sweet Kayda.  She has such a strong spirit that she was able to pull us all, willingly or not, back to church.  We are blessed to have two sweet boys who love with all of themselves and spread joy wherever they are.  We are blessed to have so many supportive people in our lives in and out of our blood relatives.  There have been too many blessings to count, many too personal to share online, those I will have to write up and put somewhere special for my children to read in the future.  We are blessed that Daddy has a job where so many people care about him and his family.  We are blessed to have had the opportunity to come back to church in my parents' ward, full of people I grew up knowing, and new young families, all ready and willing to reach out to the people around them.  We are blessed to be getting this new home, in a new city, with new schools, new people, new streets and a new ward.

Now we have the keys to this house.  One obstacle after another was placed before us but each was overcome.  We were led to believe that we could be in the house two weeks early.  Then we had to go to the underwriter six times, each time they seemed to ask for something that was harder to do.  Then the mortgage insurance company changed their rate so we had to switch mortgage insurance companies.  Then the closing cost credit wasn't being properly applied.  Even today, the day of funding and closing the lender decided to object to refunding us for the appraisal fees, even after approving them last week.  But now, finally, over a week after we were supposed to have our new home... it is ours.  This process started December 11th, it finished February 5th...  it was longer than it should have been and it was incredibly painful to endure.

This house represents a lot for our family.  Mostly it represents a fresh start, hope for a better future and the chance to make of our lives what we will.

We want this house to be a lot of things.  We want it to be a safe, secure, peaceful, happy and spiritual place for our children to grow up.  We want it to be somewhere that old hurts can be overcome and new, wonderful memories can be made.

We have an opportunity to change our lives from the very bottom up.  We have been tested and tried and we have been blessed.  We have been so blessed.  Our lives have been finely tuned by God.  He has been directing events in our lives for years so that we would come to this point, so that we would have this opportunity.  We are blessed.