Youth Temple Trip

I love working with the Young Women in our church. They help keep me feeling young.

I had to opportunity to go to the Temple with these girls on a youth temple trip.

I loved helping them inside the temple. I love being able to teach them and learn from them.

I was grateful to serve in the temple with my boys too. It was an AMAZING experience to be there with both of them in the Temple. I love these two boys with all of my heart. It will be only a few short years before they leave on their missions and we return to the temple again with them. I enjoy being a mom and raising children in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I love to see the Temple. I'm going there someday. To feel the Holy Spirit. To listen and to pray.

Boys of Fall

I love the boys of fall. I love Friday night lights and Thursday after noons. I love high school football. I love watching the freshman game, JV game, and the varsity game. Every week football consumes my life for a couple of days. I love it. Most of all, I love all three of MY boys.

On the day they took football pictures they invited parents to come get photos taken with their senior football player. I asked if I could get a photo taken with all three of my boys instead of just with Este. The coach told me if I have three boys playing football, I can get anything I want. I did just that.

Positive Peer Pressure

Last week we noticed that all the young men in our new ward wear suits to church except for our three boys. Which means that part of our moving expenses now include suits for the boys.

The boys noticed that all the young men in our new ward have short hair. They each requested shorter hair when they had their hair cut this week.

I am happy to say they are no longer the shaggy slackers from Utah. That is what I call positive peer pressure.

Spring Update

This past spring has been very busy, thus my blog posts have been few and far between.

There were school programs.  Savanah participated in her class poetry program.

 For one of the poems she had to "bandage" a fellow classmate. I was such a proud mamma and nurse.

They also had a 2nd grade program. Savanah is right in the middle.

There were dance recitals. Vanessa danced in all her glory not smiling once. It takes a lot of concentration you know.

April Fool's Day dinner was burgers and fries. They don't even look realistic but the cookies, frosting, green coconut, and caramel fudge "fries" were a big hit.

There were dangly teeth,

that finally fell out. Yeah! (I hater danglers.) Here is a look at the photo Vanessa took with my camera showing off the loot of cash she got from the tooth fairy.

The tooth fairy resorted to putting money under her pillow at any time of day because she kept forgetting to do it at night while Vanessa was asleep.

There was LOTS of spring soccer. Enough to warrant it's own post. Stay tuned......

There was a friend that move in. Random.

There were field trips. I went on the kindergarten field trip with Vanessa. She LOVED the fact that I rode the bus with her.

The kids enjoyed visiting the local zoo.

We celebrated the last day of school. Yeah!

Of course, we didn't miss our annual bon fire burning all the work from the school year.

Something about s'mores cooked over burning kindergarten papers that makes them tast even better.

 AJ joined the all-boys-braces club. You are looking at a nice $12,000 investment right there. (They all better marry cute girls after the money we spent on their smiles.)

Our orthodontist, who drives a Porsche for which we contribute money to on a monthly basis, makes a mold of their teeth. When you look at their teeth outside of their lips,  it is makes them look even worse. Then the orthodontist holds up the mold and with a smile on his face and says, "Only $4000 to fix this." Okay, tha may be a slight exaggeration but you get my point.

There you have it. A season of fun all wrapped up in one post.

Reading Rewards

Last June, the boys and I started a contest to see who could read the most pages during the summer. We laid the ground rules for our contest. For example, we couldn't re-read any books and at least one book had to be non-fiction. The contest was page for page with each person competing individually. With Aaron as the mediator, to settle any disputes, the race was on.

What's the prize for winning? Well, it's actually more like a punishment for losing. If I read more pages than the boys, they had to watch New Moon. If they read more pages than me, I had to read a series of books called Vampire Plagues. (The boys want me to concede that real vampires don't kiss girls and sparkle in the sunshine. All I concede is that vampires are not real and therefore, the author can have them do anything he or she wants.)

The race was nice. Throughout the summer whenever I felt they were spending too much time playing video games, I didn't say I word. I simply started reading. The boys would see me reading and go into panic mode. They would spend the rest of the day reading.

I read some great books this summer. For my book reviews see my goodreads list. The problem is: I lost the contest. Each of the boys read almost 1000 pages more than  me. Something about all my varied responsibilities kept me from reading as much as I would have liked to.

The end of the summer was marked by the release of Mockingjay, the third and final book in the Hunger Games trilogy. AJ and I went to the local bookstore's midnight release party. It was AJ's first release party. We arrived early (When did 10:00pm become early? That's my regular bedtime.) to find the store empty. Yep, just AJ and me with the workers. We browsed the store and waited and waited. Around 11:30, groups of college aged girls started arriving. AJ and I were the first ones with the book and he was happy even though it didn't turn out to be much of a party. It was still fun spending all that time together.

Now the contest is to see who will be the first in our family to finish this book.

One of my favorite books of all time is Outcasts United.  It is the story of a woman in a small town in the deep south who started coaching a soccer team with refugees from all over the world. The team is called the Fugees. It is an inspiring true story that I believe everyone should read.

A few weeks ago I was able to attend a lecture on campus from Coach Luma Mefleh, the coach of the Fugees. She was amazing! I love her story and I thought for such a humble person she handled speaking to a crowd of thousands well. I was more impressed with her in person than I was as I read the book and that's saying a lot. I want to be like her when I grow up.

After the lecture, I waited in line to meet Luma. I told her I believed that one person could change the world and thanked her for proving my theory. In return, she gave me a card signed by all her players.

I've never had an autograph nor met a famous person. It was a great experience for me. I save the card not just for her autograph but for all the players' autographs. I hang this card on my bulletin board so I can always be grateful for what I have and look for opportunities to serve others. That's one of the many rewards of reading. For more information about the Fugees see their website http://www.fugeesfamily.org/

Back to School

Yank my heart out and stomp on it! I don't like this time of year. I love summer. (I still have lots of photos our fun summer so, stay tuned.) I love just hanging out, taking it easy. I love spending all my time with the kids. I love not having a schedule. A while back, I looked at the clock when it was around 3:00 pm and thought, "It is so nice I'm not thinking about when school will be getting out and the kids will be coming home. They are already home!"

Alas, the time has come when they do have to go to school. (I seriously would home school my kids but my in-laws are both public school teachers so it's a "no go" in this family. I also realize that there is more education that takes place in school than mere book work and that is important too.)

Esteban is starting the 7th grade. I know. I know. I can't believe he is that old either. He is excited to take Spanish. When I need to talk to Aaron and the kids are in the room, we speak Spanish. That might have to change now.

Ethan is in middle school, in the 6th grade. He was lost only once today. Whooooohooooooo! He managed his locker and changing classrooms quite well.

Here are my older two boys headed off to school on their bikes. I so wanted to go with them but, I'm not "allowed".
The elementary school has back to school night on the night before school starts. AJ (4th grade) and Savanah (kindergarten) found their classrooms and met their teachers last night. Savanah starts school next week (I'll write an entire post on how different the school system is here compared to Texas.) Anyway, I thought the school did back to school night so the parents wouldn't go the next morning. I found out today that most parents still take their kids to school on the morning of the first day. I hate those "I'm such a bad mom!" moments. Here is my AJ as I sent him out the door by HIMSELF.
The worst part was the fact that AJ is fine that I wasn't there with him. Ethan informed me that AJ wasn't a baby anymore and I need to get over it. (That's easy for him to say, he is not the mom.)

Anyway, that is my depressing day. I do have to say, the house was pretty quite comparatively speaking and when I cleaned the kitchen, it actually stayed clean! Maybe there is a silver lining after all!

First Day of School

The boys went back to school on Thursday. Gone are the days when they quietly posed for pictures on the first day of school. Those were the days................

These are the pictures I took this year. As you can tell I tried to sneak up on them while they were discussing their day. I took the pictures in fast succession.

Now you all know why there are 10 pictures of the girls to every 1 picture of the boys on my blog. (Here's a word of advice to those of you with young children. Enjoy it while you can because the day is just around the corner when they will get attitudes.)

Other than the pictures, the first day of school went well for all three of the boys. Esteban (6th grade) started his first day of middle school. He was happy that he was able that he remembered his locker combination and found all of his classes.

The elementary school had "Back to School Night" the night before school started. We were able to find classrooms and meet new teachers. Both Ethan (5th grade) and AJ (3rd grade) told me they didn't need me the next day. They didn't want their mommy to take them to school. Again, enjoy your little ones.

The End of the Season

We have been in the midst of soccer for the past month and a half. The season ended last week and, although it has been fun, I'm happy to get my life back. We had practices every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Each boy had two games a week. In other words, we have lived on soccer fields lately. This is how Savanah felt about it by the end.

Vanessa said," Take a picture of me, too."
Little league soccer is a blast! The kids, coaches, and parents become more intense as the kids get older. It was fun to watch on three different levels. Esteban traveled to neighboring communities, Ethan traveled some, and AJ stayed mostly in town.

The boys really enjoyed themselves. Every team had the same reversible jerseys. The home team was blue while the away team was yellow. I think it is important for them to learn about teamwork. Plus, it gets them outdoors and exercising. Here are some of the highlights.