Beauty is...

We found out last night that Jenna's Reflections entry won at Region and is going to State! This is our first Reflections experience with her so we didn't know what to expect. We were shocked to find out that her entry is still going!

She took this picture at the Temple Quarry site at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon last Fall. She had carried the leaves around for a few minutes and found this spot. She arranged the leaves and took a beautiful picture! We are so proud of her for artistic eye and participating. Aubrey also entered some beautiful photos. We are so proud of the girls for trying things like this. They are exploring their interests & talents and having fun doing it! I will post a more complete story, but not today.

Jenna got a medal, certificate and some gift cards to Fat Cats & Baskin Robbins. More than anything, I think her self-confidence doubled last night! Great job, Jenna Bug!

Never a dull moment

You may remember Aubrey's adventure in Springville a while back. Well, we went again today to visit the same cousins and had another adventure.

Shortly after we arrived, I was putting a few things in the fridge and the kids had gone down to play in the family room. Janika and I could smell something burning. It was getting stronger and we couldn't find the source. We were both thinking about how we were going to evacuate all six kids while the house burned down. Aubrey was sitting on the hearth of the fireplace saying "Look what I can do." That's when Janika noticed that Aub was sitting up against the fireplace cover and her hair was being singed.

For a moment my blond daughter had some brown hair. Then it kind of crumbled in our hands. Luckily Janika's mom is a hair dresser and lives two doors down. She fixed Aubrey up & cut a few more inches off her hair. (I cut about 5 inches off a few weeks ago.) It all turned out just fine. We didn't have to evacuate. The house didn't burn down. The kids had a fun day together. And now we have a good hair-burning story- but I didn't have my camera.

Sleeping Beauty

This is what happens when a two year old goes too late, gets up too early and refuses to nap. She fell asleep in her coloring book while I was making dinner and woke up at 4am. Awesome.

Craft show recap

Aubrey took some pictures of my craft show booth. the kids get more excited about this than I do. (I hope I'm not scarring them for life!) If you need a quick gift, I have more of the tiaras $1.25, a few baby tutus $5-$6, and wands left. Left me know. Also, you can see the Batman cape in the right hand side of the photo- it is reversible with Superman on the other side. My friend, Lacie, is selling those and all proceeds go to a Vietnamese orphanage. $12 each- I can get you in contact with her.

These are my corker fairy wands. Each has at least one little jingle bell. They are a huge hit with the girls! $3

Aubrey also documented the making of the wands...

These are the boy wands. Kind of hard to see. I have a few of these left for $1 each.

Time to catch up

Lots of fun things happened while I was busy with school last semester that I never documented. If I don't do it now, it might not happen. Feel free to skip the photo journal entries that are mainly for posterity's sake.
Halloween at Grandpa Great's- this is a fun tradition to have chili at my Grandpa's. This year the dinner was two doors down at Sharon & Eddie's.

Grandpa Lloyd and baby Jason (Arveseth).

Aubrey's bucket after the ward Trunk-o-treat

Lydia & Jenna's haul. I think each girl got as much candy as we passed out.

Reed, Aubrey, Jenna, Lydia- parking lot of the Parkwood Ward.

After the whirlwind trick or treating we continued to my parents' house where we took the girls and Abi & Emma around to a few more houses and then watched the U football game. Good times!

12 week appointment

I had a check-up today and everything looks great- or sounds great. At first the heart beat was hard to get with the Doppler, but it was because baby was so wiggly. We'd hear two heart beats and then a kick. It was such a relief!

Dr. Smith said that if there were going to be any more effects from the sub-chorionic hemorrhage, we would have seen them by now. (It was also nice to have a name for what happened so we don't have to call it "The Event" anymore.) I can pretty much go back to normal. Once I can kick this fatigue and nausea we should really be in good shape. Of all the strange things, I am looking forward to mowing the lawn in a few months. I know, I'm weird. I guess if I do that I'll have to break down and admit I can vacuum again. Maybe that will be our little secret...

Like a kid in a convenience store...

So, the baby really wanted a Dunford donut this morning (aka a gas station donut). After we dropped kids off at school, I took Lydia to the gas station to get one. I don't think she has ever been inside a gas station before. I also never realized that basically everything in convenience store is junk food. She walked up and down the aisles going "Wow. Look Mom!" She so wanted to try all these treats that were beckoning her at her eye level. I don't think we can ever go back- I don't think she'll have any restraint if I tempt her that way again!

Attempt at crocheting

I was trying to figure out how to make this little baby swaddler from here.

So far, mine looks like this: I think my baby would fit in it right now. I can fit my thumb in is and that's about it. It looks like a Barbie hat to Aubrey. *sigh* Guess I'll pull it out and try again...

Blessing of obedience

Last week Tim had a church meeting on a week night. It was a regional meeting with 5 stakes, consisting of Bishoprics, Elder's Quorum presidents, & High Priest group leaders. Considering how many people that entails for 5 stakes, it was not very well attended.

A speaker came to talk about the new Family Search program for family history. He got excited about the program and came home and started working with it. He showed it to me and suggested that I might be able to find some of my ancestors- who have been impossible to find so far. I found my great great grandma, Catherine Bromwich Long and saw that someone had submitted her information, presumably someone who is LDS, since it was ready for temple work.
I found the submitter's email & my mom emailed her. My mom has since come to find a third cousin. Alice is in her late 70s and a member of the church, living in Washington state near where my mom's ancestors lived. They have already shared information and filled in missing pieces for each other. She is a descendant of Catherine's husband's brother, so they are third cousins. You might not be super excited to find a third cousin, but my mom has no first cousins, so this was big for her. My mom's parents were both only-children, so there is no extended family. Here in Mormon land that is unimaginable!
It has been really amazing to find a living relative & find out about our family members who have been so hard to find. This might never have happened if Tim hadn't made the effort to go to a meeting right after a long day of work. Thanks for being obedient, Tim!

Reverence

Yesterday, we were singing Before Thee Lord, I Bow My Head as the closing song in Sacrament meeting when Tim leaned over to tell me that it always reminds him of a carnival. After listening for a few bars, I noticed that the first part does sound like calliope music on a carousel. Then he started bobbing up and down like he was riding on a horse on a carousel. Every time he slowed the ride, Aubrey (who was sitting on his lap) kept saying "UP! UP!"
Then words reminded us of the part in Mary Poppins when the horses leave the carousel: "Break off the shackles off the earth." We almost lost it and I told him he had to stop bobbing unless he had a funnel cake for me!

On hold

So, after much deliberation & agonizing I have decided not to take classes this semester. As you may have noticed last semester, I really don't like to get bad grades and I don't think I could give school my all this semester and still take care of my family, myself & the baby. I can hardly make dinner some days, so the thought of homework & tests was pushing me over the edge.

I am writing this here so in a month when I'm kicking myself for taking a break when I had barely started, I will remember that I prayed and prayed about this and felt no peace until I decided to drop my classes. It's not like I was one semester away from graduating, so it is not the end of the world. This is my last time with just Lydia and I don't want her to spend that time with PBS Kids while I'm studying!

So, there you go.

Literal Lydia

I love to ask Lydia the same question every day because her answer cracks me up.

Whenever she says or does something clever I ask, "How did you get so smart? Did you just come that way?"

Without fail, she gives me a funny look and says "No, I came THAT way." Pointing which ever direction she most recently came from. It loses something in the translation, but OH she cracks me up!

Yummy stuffed pizza bites

We tried this new recipe last night and it was a HIT! When I told Tim what we were having he sounded really hesitant, but throughout the meal he kept telling me how good they were!

You can find the recipe HERE.

We tried a few variations including mushrooms, bacon, pepperoni, and pineapple. Instead of buying fancy (expensive) mozzarella cheese, we sliced up about four string cheese sticks we already had. Also, I thought I had Italian seasoning, but couldn't find it, so I substituted oregano.

Jenna helped by slicing the cheese and mushrooms. Aubrey helped me fill the squares. Everyone really enjoyed this from start to finish! We also dipped them in ranch dressing in addition to the pizza sauce. I already got more dough to try some other variations. This will be a frequent guest at our table- a guest that we will EAT!