Beginning of Summer

Haven't posted in a while - life has been too crazy and I'm less crazy when I get more sleep :)

I barely made it past the point of no return tonight and I'm sure it would've been wiser to go to bed than blog because I still need to catch up on sleep after pulling an all nighter to sew Lily's baptism dress this week....but here I am - trying to add some good memories to the old blog! Life has been a bit stressful lately, but I am trying not to live in panic mode and focus on the positive. 

Mike and I just celebrated our 15th anniversary and his mom watched the girls for us the entire day and let them sleepover. It was awesome. (I totally intend to post photos, but not tonight.) It was a much needed break, and I really didn't realize how much stress the kids add to our lives until we picked them up again the next morning... Don't think this means I don't love you, Lily and Sierra reading this in the future... Someday when you have kids you will totally get me. It is just a big responsibility being a parent and you two just happen to be going through a particularly needy stage at the time and your mom and dad are stressed about making a living, and keeping you safe and happy in a crazy world - that's all! And that's a lot! But we're still super glad we have you and you bring a tremendous amount of joy into our lives and actually relieve stress at times when you are being funny or extra helpful. Especially helpful. I love helpful!!

I feel like a bad mom for not posting any of the cute/funny things my girls say and do lately and for forgetting many of them. I have a few written down to post later somewhere in my desk. But for now I just wanted to say how much I absolutely adore these two small humans!

Lily can be quite the fashionista. She assembled these two outfits to pretend to be door to door salesgirls and trick their Dad (with much giggling). So tricky! Sierra looked so grown up in that long skirt that is really Lily's and hiked up to her shoulders under that jacket! :D

Here is another fashion ensemble by our littlest model:

I love my girls so much. We had a blast getting out and enjoying the sunshine in our little kiddie pool. These faces say: "This is the life!"  I so need to take more time just enjoying time with my precious children.

  They are so fun and silly!

Lily had a big milestone week now that she is almost 8! -- She baked her first batch of cookies all by herself with only a little instruction to get her started. She cracked the eggs and got the hot pans out of the oven and everything. She made snickerdoodles which turned out so good and softer than mine, and the experimental chocolate chip one for her dad turned out so good she made a second half batch because the first just wasn't enough. I was so proud of her for seeing it through even after her neighbor friend came over and cleaning up after herself! And milestone 2 - she finally learned how to blow a bubblegum bubble!

I love this picture of them drawing Father's Day cards for Mike and their Grandpa's. 

 Lily's for her Dad

 Sierra's

It is so fun to see their skills develop in a concrete way like this :)

 Lily and her awesome dad on Father's day

Don't know if you remember how Sierra wanted to win the Golden Shoe award during the Fund Run at Lily's school? Well, maybe her 2 laps counted for something - because Lily's class won the shoe! I had to take a picture of Sierra with it when we visited Lily's class near the end of school. Lily was a parrot in a play she wrote with her classmates performing a scene from the book Matilda. 

 Don't think they make them cuter than this!

 Not exactly cooperating for my picture, but cute nonetheless!

We took the girls to the lake last week and it was so beautiful, though we kept getting clouds coming over. Hoping to get some more hot clear days soon this summer so we can get out and really enjoy it!

This sure is a beautiful world we live in! Hope you are having a wonderful summer!

Just Us

I never would have pegged Mike or I as a gnome people, but he planted this guy
he'd bought to take a photo of in our yard the first day we got the key, and I love it :)

Well, this post has been a long time coming. We've been in our house over a month now! It's just us! And it's great to feel that everyone in the home totally supports and loves me! Such a great feeling!!! So, so can not even do it justice with words so insert dramatic pause here ........ We can do our thing, our way, without worrying about bothering anybody! ...So even though it's not our dream house, and we've had a lot of sadness about the decision to leave beautiful sunny San Diego... I'm really glad to be here right now feeling a little bit more like the me I was meant to be with each passing day. Finally growing up :D

We're in!

It's good, and scary, and life changing for sure! Scary because now we have a mortgage payment. Scary because now it is just us responsible for listening out to the bumps in the night. And this house makes a lot of noise we can't attribute to other people being here! Our fridge makes so many knocking sounds at times I've thought about taking videos of it to post --it's just so ridiculously noisy! ...It's been a transition - with definite periods of sleep deprivation. In some ways we miss bunking in with family... But over all it's really, really great that it's just us! I have danced wildly and freely in the front room with my 3 year old without fear of looking ridiculous to anyone in the house because it's just us!!! Our little family being out on our own has been a much too long time in coming so it's going to take us a while to get used to it!

It was like Christmas getting all the toys out of storage - they did not want to go to sleep the first night!

There are definitely more things to do when you move into a house of your own than when you are renting a space! More things to change and repair, and for us this time, more space to spread out in! We have always been pretty quick unpackers and were doing pretty well getting things organized in the house the first few days so I didn't really think it would take as long as it has to really get settled. But we had quite a few projects to do, and children to take care of and school starting, and all the moving and cleaning was pretty exhausting on our poor bodies!

Lily wanted to help give her Dad a back massage.

Stripping paint off and refinishing a table we were gifted took us a few weeks, but it turned out very nice...and after eating at a small folding table with our kids trying to take over the only 2 big folding chairs and tipping over in them all the time - it was super nice to finally be eating at a regular table again!

So glad to trade in this sweet set up for this one!

I didn't really expect to do much in the way of decorating for some time. Not wanting to spend any more money, and as artists we've usually had too many things to hang on the walls, but now having a whole house we have quite a few big blank spaces we still need to fill. I've been looking forward to finally printing some of our family photos to hang up. We never had any space for them before! I don't have a big budget, but I found some frames at Ross for great prices and made a family photo wall in our dining area for just under $100 prints included. I've kind of gotten in the habit of not buying anything to decorate because we just didn't have the money to spend or the space to store it, so now it feels weird to spend money on decorating! But whenever I look at our photos it makes me happy - so I think it's worth it :) You have to admit it - just doesn't feel as homey staring at a blank wall.

Earlier this month we had our first general conference in our own home. I made our traditional homemade cinnamon rolls and we decorated for Halloween. I'm enjoying having our little homemade decorations fill in the gaps and make it feel fuller in here.

Pumpkins by Sierra & Mommy

 Ghost by Lily

Lily helping me get out the Halloween lights we made before we had kids
with face paint leftover from her school carnival the night before

My littlest cutie hanging decorations in the window

I feel so blessed...so even though life is not perfect, and I could make a list of things that are lacking about our home and yard -- the goods outweigh the bads and I'm counting my blessings! Will try to post more updates soon!

Beach Partay!

Our ward beach party was tonight and we needed something fun to do so we put all fears of radioactive particles floating over from Japan aside and headed to the beach! It was so nice. So nice. Though mostly overcast, the sun winked at us a few times. Ever sunny in SM - we forget about June gloom until we head west! But despite a little breeze it was so pleasantly warm. Our family really needed it. Aside for that one awesome afternoon jumping off the edge of sand dunes into the soft sand below with my friends - I could take or leave the beach as a teenager - never felt great in my swimsuit or cared much for getting all covered in sand, and I'm not really a great swimmer. But since being married the beach has become sort of an escape for us. A peaceful place when we just need to get away. I have so many fun memories of going there with my family. I love it. I love the smell of it. I love the steaming hot shower on my skin after being out in the sun, sand, wind and water. Best feeling ever. So grateful for the natural beauties of this earth that refresh the soul!

Here's some photos from today...

 Heading out - can't get over the cuteness of this girl!

 Scenes like this are giving me flashbacks to little Lily!

more flashbacks

 But Sierra definitely has a personality all her own!

 

 Looking so mature little-Girly!

 Giggling over the waves.

 Looking for pretty stones

 My three sand artists!

 It is really hard to catch Lily smiling and looking my way long enough to get a photo, but when her friends started showing up she was all smiles! Definitely need to get this girl together with friends more this summer!

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 Smiley Sierra and her little friend Leslie

"Baby!" - Sierra loves all things baby...caught her pointing at one here. You could pretty much just call something the "baby ______" and she will go for whatever it is. (Aww, baby!)

I love my kids so much! So happy to see them have so much fun today!