Goals and Catching Up

My goal for this year is to blog at least once a month.
It seems like a very attainable goal, and since tomorrow is the last day of January, I thought I'd spend a little time catching up.

For those of you who don't know, I'm now 27 weeks pregnant with our 8th child.
We have been told we will be having a baby girl, which all of us are VERY excited about.
The problem however, is deciding on a name.
We've narrowed the list, but may end up taking it to the hospital in the end and deciding on a name after we see this little one in person.

We went out the 2nd weekend in December and took our annual family pictures.
My sister, Rebecca was kind enough to come out and help us take our pictures and get some really fun shots.
Here are some of my favorites:

We've spent the last month (since the week before Christmas) fighting pneumonia in our home.
Four of us ended up with it....Pat, myself, Stephen and Isaac...with Pat and Stephen having it the worst.
Just this last week, we also had a health scare with Pat's mom, who started bleeding internally and was air-evaced out of her small town to a hospital near us.
She was in the hospital for almost a week, and so Pat's dad stayed here due to his need for companionship due to his memory loss.
He was able to go to the hospital some of the time, but spent a good deal of time here as well.

Christmas was wonderful.
I truly tried to simplify, and felt like in the end, I was able to focus on family and traditions.
My favorite activity of the holiday season was decorating the tree and house as a family.
It brought me a lot of joy to see the younger kids play with the nativity set and enjoy "Baby Jesus".
Pat also decided to take the kids to the dollar store to get gifts for each other.
It was sweet, and sometimes a little comical to see what each child chose for his/her siblings.
(Stephen got 4 cans of silly string!)
My mom and my sister were able to be here for the days surrounding Christmas, and Mom and Dad John came up from Kearny for Christmas dinner.

Our New Year's Eve was very low key as Stephen had been diagnosed with pneumonia and still hadn't started feeling truly better.
We played games, did a puzzle, and watched a movie...and then went out and lit sparklers at midnight.
Everyone was up for the New Year except Stephen.

On the weekend of January 8th, we took our kids to see Wicked, the Musical (in Tucson).
We had given the kids (minus Isaac) tickets to the show for Christmas.
It was 2 days after I had been diagnosed with pneumonia, but I had started an antibiotic, and was actually pretty functional that day.
We have been singing the songs all month long...and enjoyed making the memory together.
We realize that time together is the best gift of all...and the more we can do to build lasting, fun memories, the richer our children will be in life experiences.

Our year ahead looks full and promising!
New baby in late April or early May,
Emily graduating from 8th grade,
Pat and I celebrating year 18 of our marriage,
Nate turning 12 and receiving the priesthood,
Pat graduating with his Master's degree (hopefully by August),
Stephen turning 16(!!) and getting his learner's permit (and hopefully receiving his Eagle scout so he can get his driver's license)...
And those are just the big milestones!!

Wish us luck getting everything accomplished!

Baptism Day

Bekah's baptism was in July...almost a full month after her birthday.  She chose to sing a song as her musical number and did a fabulous job.  

She loved every part of the day.

With her siblings. 

And her parents.

  

Alone, and a close-up of her special pearls.  She had a matching necklace.

Auntie, Grandma Jennie and Grandma and Grandpa John were all able to be there.

She was baptized with 3 other children from our ward.  Here's a picture of the 4 of them. 

(l-r: Rebekah John, Paige Jensen, Emilie Potter, Teagan Lunt)

  

As we left, she and her Auntie traded shoes.  They wore them like this for the rest of the afternoon.  

I love you, my dear sweet girl!  

Thank you for choosing to be baptized.  

Back to School 2010

A couple of things strike me about these pictures.
1)  My kids have grown so much over the past year.
2)  Breaking out of the summertime routine of sleeping in/taking it easy is rough.  I can see the tiredness in my kids faces.
3) Stephen needs to pose for a back to school photo!  He started way back at the end of July and I didn't take his picture then.  I'll plan on doing it in the morning.
4) Emily and Nathan's pictures were lost as I edited this blog for publication in book form.  :(

Thomas--4th grade

Rebekah--3rd grade

The first time for Sam getting a picture on the first day of school.  I don't remember what he was mad about!

Samuel--First day of Kindergarten!

Sweet Freedom's Song

Independence Day.


It is a day that fills my heart and soul with joy and pride, honor and respect, and remembrance. 

I desire to open my heart and pour the feelings I harbor within myself into my children...and yet, I know that it is only through the things I do, and the things I say, and the things that I teach them that they can begin to experience the feelings that I treasure each year as this day arrives.

I remember the Fourth of July celebrations of my youth. 

The parade, viewed annually from my great-aunt's home situated conveniently on the main street (West Cleveland in St. Johns, AZ) was one of the highlights of the day. 

I distinctly remember my grandmother, and my mother gently teaching me, and then reminding me in years to follow, to honor the flag and those who bore it as it passed. 

My hand rested over my heart, and I stood, straight and attentive, as the breeze played the cloth from the flag forward, creating images that are still vivid in my memory today. 

I did not know at such a young age that my great-uncle had died in World War II, or that my great-aunt, whose steps and curb I frequented each Fourth, had served as a cook in the United States Navy. 

I did not know that my family had given their service and their lives in defense of my very freedom.

That knowledge, even today, swells my heart and brings a lump to my throat. 

I am grateful for the sacrifices, large and small that countless numbers of men and women have made, and continue to make, EVEN TODAY, to ensure our freedom. 

I love the words to this song: 



God Bless The U.S.A.
by Lee Greenwood


If tomorrow all the things were gone,
I’d worked for all my life.
And I had to start again,
with just my children and my wife.

I’d thank my lucky stars,
to be livin here today.
‘Cause the flag still stands for freedom,
and they can’t take that away.

And I’m proud to be an American,
where at least I know I’m free.
And I wont forget the men who died,
who gave that right to me.


And I gladly stand up,
next to you and defend her still today.
‘Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land,
God bless the USA.

From the lakes of Minnesota,
to the hills of Tennessee.
Across the plains of Texas,
From sea to shining sea.


From Detroit down to Houston,
and New York to L.A.
Well there's pride in every American heart,
and its time we stand and say.

That I’m proud to be an American,
where at least I know I’m free.
And I wont forget the men who died,
who gave that right to me.

And I gladly stand up,
next to you and defend her still today.
‘Cause there ain’t no doubt I love this land,
God bless the USA. 

The knowledge we impart to our children, our friends and our neighbors must be strengthened by the assurance that we have been given this land of freedom by a gracious God, who desires that we defend this land of beauty and liberty, not only with righteousness, but also with courage and strength...even in the face of controversy.


I had a hard time singing the final verse to our national anthem on Sunday, simply because I know there are men and women that stand today between their loved homes and war's desolation. 



Star Spangled Banner
By Francis Scott Key


O, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand,
Between their lov'd homes and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserv'd us as a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!



May our trust truly be in God, and may we wave our flag proudly o'er our homes, o'er our hearts, and o'er our families, today and every day.



HAVE A BLESSED AND BEAUTIFUL INDEPENDENCE DAY!

I laughed...

Not when my husband looked at me and said, "I didn't get you anything for our anniversary tomorrow."  But when I replied, "I didn't get anything for you either."

The good part about that whole conversation...I really don't need or want anything from Pat for my 17th anniversary tomorrow.
A date, like we have planned, will suffice quite nicely.
Being with him is the best gift I've been given.
Being with him eternally...even better.    

Year 17

In 1993, I made one of the best decisions of my life.
I chose to marry my best friend.

This year, this month, we celebrate 17 years of wedded bliss life together.

It wasn't until last year that we discovered how wonderful it was to spend an extended amount of time together.
The only time we had spent away from our children overnight, together, was in the hospital as I was giving birth to another sweet child.
As wonderful as those times were, they weren't romantic by any stretch...and our minds were very much preoccupied with the event of that day.

Last year, for numerous reasons, we made the critical decision that in order to repair, preserve and strengthen our marriage, we needed to spend time together...alone, as a couple.
Truly, it was probably one of the best decisions we have made as a married couple.

This spring, we knew that going on a "couples retreat" was imperative.
It wasn't a question of IF we would go, but simply WHEN we would go.
We set our budget, discussed places we'd like to go, and discussed which dates would work best.

It was at the end of April that my sister sent me an e-mail stating that tickets to Hawaii were at rock-bottom prices.
We have wonderful friends (Dawn and Jeff Peterson) who live on Kauai, and although we had often talked about visiting them while they lived there (over the course of the past 3 years), we knew that it was outside of our budgeted realm, and we'd just have to wait.

It only took one phone call to Pat to tell him that tickets were within our budget to start planning for our get-away to Kauai.

We were blessed to go over Memorial Day weekend, and suffice it to say, it was FABULOUS.

We both have Kauai fever...we would go back in a heartbeat if we had the finances to take our family.  Our friends were AMAZING tour guides and hosts.  THANK YOU PETERSONS!!!

Here are a few pictures of our trip:

                                                        Dear friends, Dawn and Holly...at Smith's luau                                                                                        (where we were serenaded by a Love Boat like singer... :-/ ).                                                       Na Pali Coastline...only accessible via hiking.  It's GORGEOUS!                                                              A close up of me and the top part of the sand castle Pat and Jeff built at Hanalei Bay.  

                                                        And the full castle...along with a little kissing.  :)                                                                                                                                           A Hawaiian sunrise...over the ocean.                                                         The second sand castle of the trip.                                                            The greenery and growth on Kauai was amazing.                                                                                            I snapped this shot after we had boogie-boarded through a long, dark irrigation tunnel that came out at a beautiful waterfall and swimming hole.  

Blogger's Aside

It used to be that I thought of my experiences in blogging terms and phrases.
I viewed my life through the "bloggers lens".
Many conversations and situations were either deemed blog-worthy or not, and respectively, either found their way to my blog or were abandoned and forgotten.

In the year since I have moved, I have found that my blog is oft forgotten.
I can contribute it to a number of things:
The ease and instant gratification of having a facebook account,
The acquisition of a new laptop and consequently a loss of my numerous pictures (because it's just SO much harder to sit down at the desktop with all of my pictures on it, AND there is no easy way to download my pictures to my current laptop, and I have the opinion that you can only blog for so long before you NEED a picture or two to brighten the entries),
The loss of my anonymity amongst my readers (living in a place where so many more people blog, most of my readers now actually know me, and for some reason that intimidates me),
And finally,
I've lost my original motivation to blog.

I am a comment lover.
I am grateful to know that what I write has an impact on someone else, on YOU.

I read a few blogs,
And yet, I don't comment often on the blogs I read.
Call me a hypocrite then...I know I sow what I reap, especially on the comment front.

And so, as an aside, I have some decisions to make regarding my blog.
I can step it up, and put a little more time and energy into it.
That would mean changing my original focus from feeling like I have an impact on others and turning my focus inwardly toward my family and myself.
I can abandon it altogether.
(Ok--I don't like that option...forget I mentioned it).
Or, I can leave it as it is...sporadically posting here and there...when I feel like it.
Or...maybe there's a thought I haven't encountered yet...do you have a different thought that could influence me?
I'd love to hear it.