Mother's Day

 We are lucky that Dessa is here to celebrate the girl's birthday with us and Mother's Day. Jason made a delicious breakfast and it was fun to be together before church with no meetings for me. I spoke in Sacrament Meeting today about women's role in the plan of salvation, Heavenly Mother and the doctrine of motherhood. It felt good to testify of those things! But I was super glad when I was done. Quinn and Cathy both spoke in their Sacrament meetings too. Funny. I had to teach RS, our teacher called last minute and was sick. I didn't want to ruin any ones Mother's Day morning, so I taught. It was fine, lesson by Pres. Benson on the Book of Mormon.

You can tell Jason took this picture....but I love him!

Luke has started to only wear bow ties to church. It is really cute. His church shoes right now are suede loafters, classic southern with the red sole. He looks adorable, of course Noah does too. It is fun to see my kids grow up. It is still odd to me that my kids are Southern, but they are. This is their home.

Happy Birthday Grace & Sophie!

May 7, 2016  - First Temple Trip

Grace and Sophie turned 12 yesterday! Our ward had a youth temple trip already planned, so Jason and I came with them. Jason baptized both girls. It was a special day. It is hard to believe that my girls are old enough to go to the temple, be young women, wear makeup, etc. I am so grateful for them and the amazing people they are. I learn so much from them and am so thankful to be their mother. 12 years ago we brought them home from the hospital, our tiny 5 pound babies, on Mother's Day. It was fun that Mother's Day was the weekend of their birthday again this year.

After the temple we went to Trader Joes, specific Sophie request, and then out to eat at the Cheesecake Factory. These silly girls and I laughed about David Hasselhoff jokes, it started when Sophie said our waiter looked like that German life guard guy! He really didn't, to me at least, but was super annoying so it made it easier to listen to him.

 The girls asked for Ben & Jerry's ice cream cakes. It is the first year I have not made theirs, they tasted yummy and were cute, not as cute as we hoped honestly, but still fun to do something different.

 Grandma Smith made special Young Women bags for both girls. Grandma Hardy gave them each a birthstone necklace. Both special things to remember their birthdays by. They got their own temple recommend yesterday too, another special way to remember their birthday!

Jason was home all week and it was wonderful. He was out of town 3 of the 4 weeks in April. I'm glad he doesn't have to do that very often. This week he has a quick 3 day trip and then doesn't have any other work trips scheduled!

Highlights of the week: we planted the rest of our garden Saturday and weeded the entire thing. The kids worked without complaining once we got going. It was kind of amazing. It helped that it was cool outside and cloudy. Sophie was laughing at us trying to grow onions. Everywhere you look wild ones are growing...

Luke got a chance to pitch at their baseball game this week. Noah did last week. They both did well, but it is very apparent that we need to practice with them. Their team needs a third pitcher. I am going to try to get out with them this week to practice. They won on Saturday, always fun. Luke had 2 rbi's on a great line drive that got his team ahead.

Grace and Sophie had temple recommend interviews today after church. Still seems to me that they are not old enough to be YW. They are excited to turn 12 and go to the temple on their birthday, a little nervous about young women, but very tired of primary!

 

I have been super bad about keeping up on my blog. I am going to try and at least do a post Sunday nights. I love this picture of my girls, almost 12, playing in the creek. Sophie wanted to try to catch tadpoles, they didn't find any. But they did find these huge freshwater clam things. Maybe because the creek runs into Lake Brandt the clams or mussels or whatever are huge? No idea. But it was fun to watch. I know times like this will be farther in between as they grow up more and more. I so want them to keep experiencing the wonder of the world around them.

Our sweet buddy Connor with one of the baby rabbits. He could't get enough of them, and he LOVED the chickens. When I made him come in the house he would just stand at the back door and say chicken, or black chicken over and over! It was sweet and fun for my kids to be around a toddler.

 
Me, Katie Bagley, Marilyn Arny, and Cristy Flores

Happy Birthday to me! My RS presidency had a surprise brunch for my birthday. It was so nice and I was really surprised! Yummy cake and breakfast. Katie was just released as our secretary so I wanted to get a picture of us all. I can't believe it has almost been 2 years. Sometimes it seems like so much longer! My presidency is so wonderful, they work so hard and do so much for me and our ward.

Mom and Dad sent a small foot stool like the one that was at Granny's house as I grew up. Mom needle pointed the cover and dad refinished it. They took off the legs and boxed it up to send me. It was such a surprise, I will treasure it! I had a fun birthday, got a pedicure, went to lunch with friends and out to dinner as a family. All of our kids like Thai food now, yay Hardys! We tried a new place close to us. It was a great day.

My morning walks with Molly are so beautiful, I sometimes forget how blessed I feel to live here. It is like paradise to have our own private woods and I have to remind myself to slow down and pay attention to the beauty. This picture does not capture the early morning light, it is my favorite in the spring when the leaves are new and light green. Everything smells alive and growing. I have been listening to my scriptures as I walk lately, makes me happy and I want to remember this.

Abby, Sophie's hand, and Grace

I took the girls to a school fitness celebration. Sophie was embarrassed to do this, I tried to make her so she just stuck her hand through! There was a 1 mile race that all 3 did. Abby won for the middle school girls! Grace and Sophie only participated because the race was to benefit the Leukemia Association and they wanted to support Johnny Van Kemp. He is such a sweet boy, I have seen him several times at school make a point of saying hi to both Sophie and Grace. He knows they are shy and is just a nice kid. We are praying he can beat cancer again. Sophie dyed her hair orange, several of the kids at school are. Orange is the color for Leukemia awareness. After Graces experience with her blue hair taking months to wash out she did not want to :) Plus she said that she can pray for Johnny and help him without orange hair, which is true.

This is the picture I found on my phone this morning when I got to ward council....took all I could do to not laugh out loud. Why is it so funny? Every time I look at it I still laugh! I guess Sophie does too.

Happy Easter!

Sophie and Jason are on their way home from NYC. Daddy Daughter trip was a great success. With Easter being so early this year our cherry tree is finally in bloom for an Easter picture. We had a great day celebrating the resurrection of our Savior.

 Grace, Nicki Dodson, Sophie

The girls went to their first Young Women event this week. New Beginnings welcomes in all the girls who will become Beehives this year.It is hard for me to believe they are old enough to be in YW. Goodness. I am excited for Grace and Sophie to have all the blessings of the YW program though. There is a youth temple trip already planned for May 7th on their birthday! So exciting. Nicki is a sweetheart and a good friend to both girls.

 
  I happened to mention to Mom that since we moved we couldn't find any of our cookie cutters. So she sent 300+. Awesome! Every shape you can think of! These other pictures are of Grace and Sophie's awards assemblies from school. They both are doing so well in 6th grade, on Honor Roll. Sophie earned a special award for an online math program she spends a lot of time on. Her class was supposed to do 25 lessons by the end of the semester, she did more then 300. Because she likes them. It is fun to her. Grace got an award for her photo and a few other things. I'm so proud of them both.

We had a sports filled weekend. This is Luke and the other All-Stars from his basketball program. 2 kids from each team were invited to participate and he was so excited to be included! His team actually lost the All-Star game. It was so close all game, back and forth, and then the other team went on a run at the end. Still a really great experience. I was so proud of how hard Luke played and his sportsmanship.

 Luke is a hard worker on the court. He scraps for every ball that comes his way. The kid in this picture has got to be 40 pounds bigger then Luke.

 Noah competed in a karate tournament on Saturday. He won first place in his division for grappling (karate type of wrestling) and a second in sword fighting. I was so proud of him! He just works and works and doesn't give up. There were about 16 kids in his division, all about same belts and experience. Mike Carr karate has been such a blessing to Noah. Great experiences. Mike knows his students by name. I'm not sure how he does it but I am grateful for his influence on my son. He is so very kind and supportive while at the same time demanding the best of his students and not putting up with them not giving it. Noah was a little disappointed to get second in sword fighting, the winner got to go to a championship round and he really wanted to. So he did not want any pictures at the end of his trophy and all ribbons together. He did an amazing job!

 

 Luke and Noah's last basketball game. I am happy and sad at the same time. Both boys have had a great experience and learned so much! Plus being in the Rock Gym is fun, it is 100ish years old. I am really glad Summerfield Elementary restored it and incorporated it into their school. But I have to admit that I am always glad when we get a few less commitments as a family.