Welcome Home

Today we got to spend the day with my family, which was totally fun as always. There were many here ... which I'm sure was a delight (and overwhelming) to my parents. :)

Yes, my Mom and Dad returned home from their mission Thursday, much to the delight of many. :) This is the banner my sister made to welcome them home (with some of the grandkids who were there to shout and cheer as they pulled up):


They had been in the car for way too many days. :) After leaving Omaha, they decided to drive to South Carolina to spend time with my brother's family. Then they brought my two nieces home with them. (All of us here are excited about that, because we haven't seen Hailey and B for four years now!) After leaving South Carolina they drove across the country to arrive in Utah Thursday afternoon. I called to find out how close they were, and they said they were .7 miles away. That .7 miles seemed to take FOREVER as we excitedly awaited their return! :)

My parents are the most selfless people I know! They were very blessed for their service, but their service wasn't without sacrifice. This is only a partial list of what my parents missed to serve for 1 year:

- Tyler's baptism
- Cris' ordination to deacon
- Alyssa's wedding (their first granddaughter to get married)
- Dustin and Heidi's engagement and Heidi's bridal shower
(Fortunately they got to come home for two days for Dustin and Heidi's wedding!)
- Aspen's birth
- Austin's birth
- Gavin's birth
(Kimmie went to them for her baptism :)

For some people this may not be too bad, but my parents live for their kids and grandkids, so I know it was hard to miss so many special occasions. But, hey, we all survived. :)

Although they missed many things, they had experiences on their mission they wouldn't have had at home. We know that was exactly where they needed to be for the past year. They've had the goal for a long time to serve, and now they have done it. Here are pics of them meeting Gavin for the first time:


And you can see Austin is also happy to have them home:

(Shayla's been telling people he's so happy because G&G are home. :)

And speaking of Austin, this is how cute he looks in Gavin's borrowed Bumbo:


Needless to say, Ridge Way is going to be seeing our car a lot more often in the days to come. :)

Ty Guy got his Wolf

Tonight is pack night, which reminds me that last month at pack night Tyler earned his Wolf Badge. Hooray! He had actually earned it the month before but for some reason didn't receive it, so he got to receive it when we had lots of family in town. (Mind you, pack night was too late for all the little ones to attend, but he got to show aunts and uncle when we got home.) He LOVES, LOVES, LOVES scouts and has awesome leaders. He earned a bunch of arrow points in addition to his badge, as you can see below:



Way to go, Tyler!

And having pack night tonight just reminds me that a month has gone by without me sewing on his new patch and/or arrow points, and nearly four months have passed without me sewing on his religious knot. Sigh. But he loves to earn them. When he has his birthday in about six weeks Paul and I get him in our den -- it will be a blast! :)

Pinkalicious

Remember how I said that Shayla is totally into Lazy Town (where the main character has pink hair)? And her favorite book in the world (which she can read herself) is Pinkalicious (where the girl turns pink from head/hair to toe)? No wonder she wants pink hair:


One day I should try to buy her the "Stephanie" costume from Lazy Town. I'd do it for Halloween this year, but we already have an Ariel costume. :) In the meantime she can stick with this kind of pink hair ...

Randomness abides

So I don't know that I've posted a "real" blog for a bit. I've been busy. And I've been having fun. We loved having family in town for about 1 1/2 weeks, and we're sad Paul's bro and sis don't live closer. (His bro's family came from Arizona and his sister's family from Washington -- we're smack dab in the middle for them. :) Our kids LOVED playing w/their cousins and were sad when they had to leave. I'm glad they have cousins on both sides they love playing with.

Today I had a mini mission reunion at my house. One sister was in town from Brazil, so another flew in from Georgia (where she is living after having served there), and other sisters from nearby came for a visit. My only comp who came was one who lives in Springville, and still we don't see each other nearly enough. So sad to lose touch with people you had such wonderful experiences with!

This week I also completed the first week of the "Couch to 5k Running Plan." I thought I did pretty good. :) I outpaced my buddy a little bit, but I think it's because she started a juice diet the same week. (She's lost 10 pounds so far ... but I'm still not convinced to do it myself quite yet.) In any case, we're very excited and we're going to run our first 5K on Sat., Sept. 11. I'll have to miss part of our Relief Society annual retreat for this, but I think it'll be worth it. I've had a goal to run a 5k for a bit, but I'm finally using this plan to put it into action. Now if only I could get my eating to improve a bit ...

And the best news is that I get my parents back this week!!! I am thrilled! They finished their mission a week ago and then drove to South Carolina to pick up my nieces. They'll leave SC tomorrow to drive across country to return home. We're so excited to see them -- and my nieces whom I haven't seen for four years. I have barely scrapbooked while my mom's been away, and she'll kick me back into gear. We're also thrilled to have my baby sister Rebecca join us (although we haven't talked her into scrapbooking yet) since she's joining the ranks of the SAHMs. I'm so glad -- I don't see my sisters nearly enough since they're all busy working! :)

And with that randomness I'll include a random pic. My bro and sis-in-law gave us some pretty nice banana chairs, and I'm surprised at who loves them the most:

Little Stinker Part II

I got Austin's three-month pics back and they're cute. However, I'm still so bummed to think how much cuter they could have been if he had been smiley. Sigh.

Here they are ... I saved my favorite (the one smile) for last:

Sharks, for Grandpa

I think every little boy thinks sharks are cool. To add to that, my boys get a shark on Finding Nemo named after their Grandpa (Bruce). So, Grandpa, here are your two newest grandsons thinking of you ... (okay, probably not, but they're cute anyway!).

Austin & Gavin:


This pic looks like synchronized flailing:


Yes, for those of you who know my dark-haired sister: The dark-haired baby is mine and the blonde is hers. Go figure.



These cute boys are sure to be buddies!!!

Little stinker

So, I decided for Austin's three-month pics I'd just pay a professional and get good ones. I didn't want to have to worry about posing him, getting the right lighting, using the right background, etc. So I took him to get his pics taken.

My perfectly happy boy? Not so when getting professional pics! The little stinker was tired and barely cracked a couple of small smiles. Sigh. Good thing he's cute even when he doesn't smile, because we're going to have plenty of those.

After a short nap I came home and started feeding him, and he wouldn't even eat he was smiling at me so much. So I put down his bottle and snapped a few pics:









Once again I have been shown that kids don't perform on cue ...