The Greatest Show on Earth!!

Back in February, we did something that was so much fun and I don’t think it ever got documented on the blog.

 

We went to the circus!  And not just any circus… the Barnum and Bailey circus.

I absolutely love the circus.  We went to a small one that came to our town last year, but it was nothing like this one.

Before the show started, we were able to look at all the animals.  The boys were ready to leave after that.  They thought that looking at the animals was the circus.  :)

Noah and Griffin were captivated the entire time.  If possible, I think I enjoyed it more than they did.  There was so much to see at all times!  We had wonderful seats and were able to see everything very well.

For the boys, the highlights were the man who was shot out of the cannon, and anything that had to do with clowns. 

This was what Noah looked like anytime there was a clown around.  He thought they were so hilarious!

And here we are with our favorite clown. 

I can’t wait to go back!

Love smart

I married a wonderful man.

He makes me feel adored and cherished.  I’ve mentioned on here before that my inlaws take the boys once a month so that Ammon and I can go to the temple.  Since we go to the temple so early on Saturday, it works out better if the boys spend Friday night with Gigi and Pap.  This also allows Ammon and I to have a date night once a month!

I have loved having this time with my husband.  I don’t worry (much) about the kids, because I know that Gigi and Pap love them so much and I’m completely confident in their ability to take care of my babies.

A few weeks ago, we took this opportunity to go to the Dixie Classic Fair.  Ammon grew up going to this fair and I had never been.  It was so fun walking hand in hand with the man that gives me “the feelings”.  He did 15 pull ups at the army booth and won a free water bottle.

He almost won a free tv at the rock climbing wall.  He came from work though and was wearing the wrong type of shoe.  Next year though, that tv will be ours!

I was just telling him the other day how awesome he is.  The guy is super smart… in all different areas.

He’s tech smart.

Outdoors smart.

Relationship smart.

Handyman smart.

Car smart.

Sports smart.

Physically smart.

Parenting smart.

Church smart.

Love smart.

He’s got so much going for him and I’m grateful that I get to be with him forever.  Our journey together thus far has been wonderful.  Growing old with my smart man is so exciting to me.

♥♥♥

gone fishin’…

A few weeks ago, we were able to go fishing at Jeff and Nanette’s home.  (Jeff and Nanette are Ammon’s aunt and uncle)  This was the boys’ first time fishing and they had so much fun!  Gigi and Pap came, as well as the Huff’s.

Pap showed them how to reel it in.

Noah and Griffin were in the sweet spot… As soon as they cast their line, they would get a bite.  I bet Noah caught 30 fish (at least!)

A Spiderman costume was a must.  He even called his cousin, Lathen and asked him to wear his Spiderman costume too.

They were catching them so fast that Ammon didn’t even have enough time to put sunblock on his face before Noah had caught another one.

Look at those shirtless brothers.  They are best friends!

Griffin is all boy.  Who knew a bucket of dirt and worms could make a child so happy?

These are a couple of the fish we kept.  Please excuse the disgusting bloody water.  Gross…

 

Noah got the hang of it pretty quick and soon, was doing it on his own!

He smiled, Griffin smiled!!  :)

Baby Griffin… who can no longer be considered a baby.

My 3 men.

I was there too!

On another note… I miss my nice camera SO MUCH!  I love that my droid has a decent camera, but oh my goodness, I crave the fantastic shots I could get with my DSLR.  I’m definitely not a pro, but I feel like I’ve been blessed with a good eye for photography.  I guess I should be thankful that I’m documenting these days.  It would be so sad if I had NO pictures.

Happy Halloween!

The night began at our friend’s house.  We visited for awhile and then headed out to walk their street. 

Trick-or-treating is not like it was when I was a kid.  It seemed like when I went out, every single house was lit up and I’d fill up my pillowcase in no time. 

Things have definitely changed. 

We weren’t having much luck at our friend’s house, so we decided to come back to our neighborhood and drive the car around.  The boys wanted to trick or treat, but not walk and walk and walk in the cold, dark night. 

I drove and Ammon and the boys sat in the back and I would let them off at the lit houses. 

At 7:58 (his bedtime is 8pm) Noah said he was done trick-or-treating.  He said he was having fun, and that he wanted to trick-or-treat next Halloween, he was just done for that night.

Griffin was having so much fun and wanted to keep going.  Noah climbed up in the front seat with me and we had a wonderful time chatting and eating candy.

That boy is so wonderful…

At 8:40pm, we made Griffin stop.  People were starting to turn their lights off and we already had PLENTY of candy.

I loved our evening together, as family.  Here are a few pictures from before we headed out.

 

Noah’s trying to hold Griffin still so I can get a picture of him.  He wants to do anything he can to please me.  Noah insisted on wearing his worn out Spiderman costume trick-or-treating.

While Griffin is just fine being a stinker.  Ay ay ay…

I could only get this super fake smile out of him.  He has loved this costume to death.  He wants to be a garden gnome next year too.

Noah’s First Wolverine Costume

If you came over today and asked Noah to put on his wolverine costume, you’d see something like this.

Gigi got this for him for his 5th birthday, and he LOVES it!  But before he got the real thing, there was this one.

One day, he just decided to make his own.  He was tired of waiting for the real one and knew that he could do it.  He was so determined.  He colored it all the right colors, cut it out and made me take pictures so that we could show Dad.  :)

He doesn’t like it when he puts a costume on and people think he is the real thing.  So on this costume, he wrote “NOAH” on the mask so people would know that it was really him.  : )

Check out those claws!

Noah is such a fun kid.  When he gets into something, he is ALL in.  At first, it was trains.  Now, it’s superheroes.  His favorites are Wolverine, Spiderman and Batman.  In fact, for his 5th birthday, he wanted 3 cakes.  1 for each of his favorite superheroes.  But that’s a different post…

I love that he followed through with a thought he had.  He wanted a costume, knew he couldn’t have the real one, so he made his own.

And he did a fabulous job, if you ask me!  ; )

A day at the pool…

At least once a year, Cortney invites us over to her parents’ home for a swim party.  This pool is so amazingly landscaped and is absolutely gorgeous.  I have posted about it before, in this post.  My boys love being able to go and spend time swimming with their cousins.

 

At this time, Griffin did not feel comfortable swimming on his own.  He had to have his “cube” (tube) and his arm floaties and then he was fine.

He enjoyed just floating around the pool, relaxing.  I forgot my camera, but was so glad I had my phone with me so I could capture this shot.  Man, he’s cute!

 

This picture makes me laugh… Look at his toes!!  Don’t worry, I’d still love him even if his toes really looked like that.

I didn’t get many pictures of Noah because after a few minutes, this is where he was.  You may think that you’re looking at a pile of towels…

 

Nope!  It’s Noah.  He’s just like his mommy.  We get cold VERY easily, especially in water.

Thanks for having us, Cortney!  Can’t wait til next year!

Ward Halloween Party

The youth were in charge of the Halloween Party which meant that I had lots of responsibilities while we were there.  I knew I wouldn’t be able to take pictures once we got there, so we took a couple before we left.

 

Nerd Alert!!

Ammon and I dressed up as a nerdy couple which we can already pull off pretty well.  We’re pretty nerdy…

Griffin, of course, was not in the mood to take pictures, while Noah is always willing to do whatever I ask him to do.  Here he is kissing Griffin.  (Noah’s idea)  This year, Noah got to choose from a slew of costumes.  He chose to dress up as Batman for the ward party and Spiderman for trick-or-treating.  Griffin HAD to have this garden gnome costume as soon as he saw it.  It is one of the cutest costumes I’ve ever seen.  He has gotten so many compliments on it.

It was a fun party.  We had a hot dog dinner, costume parade, halloween games, and a trunk-or-treat.  There were tons of people there.  A lot more than we expected, but it all went well.  I am so glad that people used this party as a missionary tool.  Hopefully, the visitors we had will come back. : )

Do you know this guy?

Oh, Griffin… He is one of my very favorite people.  Look at him all pensive and handsome.  If I told you how many times per day I kiss those cheeks, you’d think I was kidding.

I think the correct number is 647.  Pretty sure…

He is so silly.  Ammon says that’s his gang sign.  Haha.

He is definitely one of a kind.  He likes to do his own thing, his own way.  He is very loving and still lets me baby him a little.  I think he always will.  He’s just that kind of kid.  Has so much need for physical affection.  I couldn’t be more happy about it, really.

He does not make my job as his mom easy, but always worthwhile.

If you don’t know him, you really should because…

HE. IS. AWESOME!!

Time Out for Women

This past weekend I had the wonderful opportunity of attending my very first Time Out for Women.  I was able to go with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law.   My mom met us in the convention center.  When we were walking back to our cars, we realized that Mom parked RIGHT NEXT TO US!  In all of downtown Richmond, she parked in the space right next to us.  We thought that was pretty awesome.

As you can tell from this picture.  :)

We were able to hear so many wonderful presenters.  My favorite was this man.

Brad Wilcox.

This guy is amazing.  Ammon and I heard him speak at a homeschool conference a couple years ago.  We’ve also read his book, Continuous Atonement.  Talk about a fantastic read.  If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend that you do.  His talk at this Time Out was so inspirational.  I loved every minute.

Side note:  He used to be Megan’s stake president.

My other favorite speaker was Mariama Kallon.  Her story is unlike any I’ve ever heard.  I was in awe of her ability to quote scripture and the Spirit she spoke with was undeniable.  I will never forget her…

The rest of the conference was fantastic, but those two talks made the trip totally worth it.

I also had the opportunity to meet Linda Eyre and Shawni Pothier.  I’ve looked up to these two mothers since I became a mom 5 years ago.  They co-authored my favorite parenting book, A Mother’s Book of Secrets.  I have read quite a few books by Linda and will forever be grateful to her for the things I’ve learned through her books.

The theme for this year’s Time Out for Women was “Choose to Become”.  I feel very inspired to be become the woman that I was meant to be.  I am so grateful that I was able to attend this conference and that I was able to go with these women.  I love that I was able to share this with my mom.  That we can talk about the things that we both learned while we were there.  I can’t wait til next year’s Time Out for Women.

Atlanta… here we come!!

On my way…

My wonderful Grandpa passed away this past week.  For this reason, I am currently on a flight to Vancouver for the services.  Actually, I'm on my way to Houston.  And from Houston I’ll go to Portland where my mom will pick me up and take me to Vancouver.  I would say I’m a fairly nervous flyer.  Ever since we took a family trip and encountered some pretty wicked turbulence, flying is just not my thing.  Especially by myself.

This morning, I had to say goodbye to my 3 boys.  This was not easy for me to do.  Before I left, Ammon offered a beautiful prayer.  During this prayer, I got a little emotional and started to tear up.  As soon as Noah saw this, he started to tear up too.  He didn’t admit to it at first.  Ammon asked him if he was crying and he said, “No.  Tears are just coming out, but I’m not crying.”  The more he locked eyes with me, the more tears flowed down our faces.  Ammon told him that it was ok to cry if he was sad.  This allowed Noah to let go and just feel the emotion he was having.  I picked him up and we hugged for a long time.  I had to pick him back up as soon as I set him down.  It was just too hard to leave my baby when I knew he was so sad about me leaving.  I kissed them all and told them that they were going to have lots of fun and that I would see them on Tuesday.  About 3 minutes after I left, I texted Ammon to see if Noah was ok.  Of course, he was completely fine. 

I made it to the airport and got checked in.  I got to the front of the security line and I handed my ticket and my driver’s license to the woman.  She asked me if I had another picture ID.  I told her that I did not and she informed me that my license was expired.  I had to have a supervisor come look at all my credit cards, my license and my social security card before letting me through.  She said I might have some trouble coming home…  I sure hope not!  I need to get home asap.  Stay tuned to see how that goes…

So, I boarded the plane and it’s a small.  Scary small.  One seat, an aisle and then 2 seats.  That’s it!  I’m sitting in seat 14A.  I’m right behind the emergency exit  and ironically, I have a window seat AND an aisle seat.  Take off was rough.  No one to tell me it was going to be ok.  No one to hold my hand.  I miss Ammon.  The 2 women next to me are loud.  Before takeoff I was fairly annoyed with how loud one of them was being, but during takeoff, I found myself so glad that she was saying things like, “is that such and such river?!  what road is that?!”  It helped me focus on something other than the anxiety I was feeling.  So, I listened to the annoying lady and watched a couple in front of me hold hands and I pretended like that was my hand in Ammon’s.  Call me crazy, but it helped!  I’m feeling alright now.  We’ve been in the air for about an hour and a half and I’m just now feeling normal.

I took pictures of the clouds from my window.  Noah and Griffin will love these!

Testing…

Just downloaded Windows Live Writer and am currently using that to type up this blog post.  I’m going to publish it and hope it works.  And… publish.