New Family Pics

Josh falling in love

Yesterday morning, Josh came out of his room after waking up and had a great big smile on his face. I'm always excited to see Josh in the morning, but especially when he's smiling. :D I asked him how he was doing.
"Great, I had a really good dream"
"Oh yeah, what was your dream about?"

"Falling in love..."

(me trying not to laugh)"so who did you fall in love with?"

"the white girl...she had really long hair. She was a princess and she gave me magic stones. They could even go in dirt AND sand."

"wow sounds pretty cool." ....LOL

What a crack up! It made me laugh.

Calvin and Hobbes

We took the truck over to the shop to get some things fixed. Its pretty close to our house but Josh was complaining that he was tired so I brought the umbrella stroller in case he didn't feel like walking. I had just pulled him out of bed so he was a little cranky and of course needed to bring his stuffed Lion with him.

After leaving the autoshop, Josh decided that he wanted to let his Lion ride in the stroller and he would push it. It made me think of Calvin and Hobbes because for the next hour we went walking around the neighborhood playing at a couple of different parks and Josh did not want to take the stroller home because he wanted his lion to come with. The Lion sat patiently in the stroller while Josh swung on the swings and chased Dakota around and climbed on the big guns (military guns in memorial park). It was really funny.

Josh's First Primary Program

I always enjoy the primary program each year. The children do such a great job and its so fun to see their energy and their beautiful smiles as they say their part and sing the songs. But this year was extra special because it was Josh's first time. We had only practiced his lines for 2 Sundays. When he got up there Sis. Shapiro asked if he needed help and he said no. But he stood there for a minute and he looked at me. I gave him the cue for his 1st part by mouthing the word to him so he just looked at me to prompt him when he got stuck. I was so proud of him. He said it slowly enough that you could understand him and he talked in a normal voice...(while practicing he often went really fast and would use silly voices so I was a little concerned). His lines were "After this earthlife is over and my body dies, I will one day be resurrected. Because of Jesus Christ's atonement I will be able to live with Heavenly Father again." All I had to prompt him was the words "After", "one day" and "because". It was so sweet. The rest of the time he had a hard time sitting still. He didn't sing a whole lot but he swung his arms back and forth to the beat of the song and he would say "bop" to the words. He was the percussion for the music. LOL...our little beat-boxer. After church we asked him why he didn't sing very much. He said he didn't know the words, only a few of them. So I told Jason, I need to do better next year at helping him know the songs. The Spirit was really strong in the meeting and touched my heart. Its awesome that we can know at such a young age that we are "chilren of God"!

My Amazing Husband

So this week has been a rough one. On monday I "tossed my cookies" (name that movie) 5 times. I was so weak and frustrated from being so sick. I told Jason how I was doing and told him in tears that the house was a mess and I didn't have dinner made. He told me not to worry about it and that he will come home and take care of me. So we grabbed some take out and came home, but I couldn't keep the food down. So he got me some apple sauce and that seemed to work. Then I took a bath and he read to me. (One of my favorite things for him to do. His voice is so soothing to me) Once I got out of the tub we moved to the bedroom and he continued to read to me a Josh. It was so wonderful. Then on Tuesday, I was able to keep food down but was feeling very weak and still nauseated. That night, I didn't have dinner made either and when I told Jason that Josh just had a bowl of cereal for dinner, he said he was fine with that. -What a sweetheart! On Wednesday I was feeling pretty good, so I baked bread and made home-made pizza and breadsticks. Then Thursday night a good friend called me at 6 and asked if we'd eaten dinner yet, (I was just planning to have left-overs) so she brought us yummy home-made chicken noodle soup and bread and brownies and then she stayed and helped me clean...deep clean (walls and ceilings). So I feel very blessed this week that even though I haven't felt the greatest, I've had a VERY understanding and sweet husband to help take care of me and some great friends to help me out. Thanks Erin! and Shalee. and of course thank you sweetheart for making me the luckiest woman in the world to be married to such an amazing husband. I love you.

Beautiful Sabbath

Can I just tell you how much I love this time change?? When you wake up on a beautiful Sunday morning and realize you get another hour to do whatever you want. The leaves are absolutely gorgeous b/c it rained last night and so their colors are more vibrant than ever. Its a beautiful day.
So something interesting is happening in my life right now. Before I get into it, I need to give some background. All growing up, one of my life's goals and dreams has been to be someone that inspires others to be better. I've wanted to do that through testimony but especially through the power of music. So in essence I've wanted to be a motivational speaker and do musical firesides. Having had no experience in that, I've been pretty intimidated to put anything together. However about 6 years ago, I started feeling this really strong impression that I needed to do it. But, I let fear get in the way and the rest of life took over so it never happened. Because of personal experiences in the last 3 years I've developed an even deeper and greater understanding of the atonement and so that pressing desire to share my testimony has become even stronger. Back in March I had emailed our stake music chair and had mentioned to him my desires to do a musical fireside about the Savior and the Atonement. The reason I mentioned it to him was to have him as a source of experience that I could draw on in putting something together like this. I didn't hear back from him until a month ago. He's been attending our Sunday school class on music and how to use the hymn book more effectively etc. He stopped me after class and brought up the email. He said he would love to help me with it. It would probably need to be on a ward level b/c it would be a lot harder to do it on a stake level as far an approval from the stake presidency goes. That was my intention anyway so I was excited to know we could start working on something. Then 2 weeks ago, he came up to me and told me that he'd just gotten out of a meeting with the stake presidency and they thought it would be really good to have a musical fireside on the Savior and asked if he could put something together for Easter. So he told me that if I would be able and willing he'd like to delegate that to me, and that he would get it ok'd with the Stake Presidency. I felt humbled and honored and of course agreed. So that's been the most pressing thought on my mind as of late. I know its 5 months away but I know that it takes a lot of preparation and due diligence to make something like that a success, but I've felt a calmness and humility that the Lord will be able to use me and many others in the stake to get His message across. I'm very excited for the opportunity to bear testimony of Him and to testify of His power to heal us. I love my Savior and I want as many people as possible to feel of His great power in their life.
I'll probably need feedback from all ya'll when I start to get something together. So be ready to help me bounce ideas off of you. ;D Have a beautiful Sabbath!