Scotty's Baptism

Man I love my Scotty.

He is just such a great kid to be around. He loves life and loves telling stories about what happens in his life. I get a play-by-play after school of the soccer or football game he played in. Inside recess about kills him, but at least his clothes are clean after school.

When it came time for Scotty to be baptized, he was so excited to take this step. He has a testimony of the gospel and he knows that His Heavenly Father loves him. I asked him a few months ago if he wanted to be baptized. He looked at me strangely and asked if it was an option. I told him of course it is an option. It is his choice when and if he gets baptized. He told me of course I am going to get baptized. I asked him why and he told me "because it is true mom!" As far as the when of his getting baptized, he chose to wait a month and be baptized when his aunts, uncle and cousins that live in Kentucky and Florida could be here. When I asked him if he was sure, he looked at me strangely again and said, "Mom, family is way more important than waiting 1 month!" We talked about baptism being such an important ordinance that waiting much longer than a month wouldn't be worth it and that he needed to have this ordinance done. Great conversations!

By waiting a month that meant he wouldn't get baptized with his best friend who is 3 days older than him. One day his friend's mom asked me if we would mind if he waited the month too so they could be baptized together! Now everything was perfect! How great to be baptized with your best friend!

I love how much Scotty loves his dad and there was NO question who he wanted to baptize and confirm him. His dad!

Man we love our Scotty!

At the church they dressed all in white - thankfully Corry had his new white pants!

We gathered as a family. It was so great for Carter and Kyler to watch and be apart of Scotty's baptism!

My eternal family

Scotty was washed clean in the waters of baptism and then given the gift of the Holy Ghost.

These are his friends that as we were taking the picture, I couldn't help but think they would all be out serving missions at the same time. What great young men (and how quiet the street will be when they are all gone!!!)

I couldn't help throwing this picture in! He sure loves Scotty too and we love him! What a great example Scotty set too for the younger kids around him!

Then it was on to the party!!! Scotty had his sandwich piled high (with his banana peppers) ready to go out to the party barn. All the kids went out there and it was so quietish inside! We love our party barn!

Aunt Liz brought a chocolate fountain and Scotty thought that was WONDERFUL!!! I wasn't so excited about the mess when I saw it, but it turned out great! Very little mess (in the house) and a whole lot of happy children!

Thanks to all the family and friends that made it such a wonderful day for Scotty!

New Years Eve

We spent New Years Eve Day looking at houses for my parents and thought we had found the PERFECT one!!! Alas, it was not perfect due to the fact it faces North which means extra snow shoveling in this part of the world. My mom also did not like the kitchen cabinets. Bummer!

Anyway, after that it was time to make sure Corry's temple pants fit him (he has been renting them for years because I don't know how to hem his pants). They didn't. The distribution center was closed and would remain closed for the holiday the next day. We have an 8 year old getting baptized tomorrow!!!! Yikes! Thankfully as we passed Mr. Mac, my dad said we should check there. Thank you Daddy! They had some and they weren't even very much money! Yea!!!

While we were off doing all this, the kids had gone sledding and then Scotty had spent a few hours in his room building his lego airplane. he put the entire thing together by himself. Way to go stud-muffin!

After that it was a night full of homemade lasagna, games, movies, laughter, and snacks! I think everyone's favorite part had to be the glow sticks though. We spent a long time playing with these! (not quite as long of a times as our Uno game though!)

Kimi spelled her name

What a great night and how fun to share it with my family, my mom and dad, and Christina, Brian and Kimi! I am so glad they could come up!

Piano recital, Christmas again and late night Sonic run

My amazingly awesome crazy aunt drove through a scary snowstorm on icy roads to get here for Scotty's baptism! She truly represents to me what family is about. She comes to everything she possibly can, often at great sacrifice, to support our family. I sure love her!

Anyway, they got here and Grammy and Grandpa got here just in time for the kids' piano recital. They did a wonderful job on their pieces and Alli even got up and did hers! She wouldn't say her name and Sister Steele had to sit by her on the bench, but she played!!! Way to go Alli! Missy had played one of her pieces in Sacrament Meeting the Sunday before. She did a great job and when she sat down I asked to see her hands. They were shaking a million miles a minute! She said her foot was shaking so hard too it was hard to use the pedal! She did and even better job than I had thought being able to play through all the shaking!

Here they all are with their piano teacher! She is wonderful!

After it was home to have Christmas again! Kimi tried to steal Kyler and Carters Toy Story table and chairs... She LOVES Toy Story!

Then it was time for the late night run to Sonic with Kimi. I let Miss and Fuzz come this time. We had a BLAST!!! (Even though it was about 15 degrees outside while we are eating ice cream and drinking slushies!)

Man doesn't Missy look good!

Here we all are before we head out

We put all the seats down in the back and brought pillows so we could dine lounging! love these memories with my daughters and cousin! We laughed and laughed and listed to the newest Taylor Swift album. Love these girls going on women in my life!

Christmas Morning 2010

One of my favorite Christmas traditions was that my parents would "paper" us in on Christmas Eve. That way we couldn't get out until mom and dad woke up and let up burst through the paper. A few years ago I was telling the kids about this tradition and they wanted to try it too. So here we are on I think our third year of papering the kids in the basement! Jack wasn't so sure about it at first, but the other kids love running through the paper!

It was a quiet Christmas morning too with just Maren and her family and Tyler and Holly (grandpa got a fiance for Tyler for Christmas) at Corry's parents Christmas morning.

Carter was most excited about this frog, and all Jack's toys!

Alli started off this Christmas season thinking she wanted to ask Santa for a magic wand.

A Real Magic Wand!!!!

You know one that she could turn her brother into a toad with (to much Wizards of Waverly Place for that girl!).

I had a hard time convincing her that even Santa could not make that for her!

So, she came up with a new plan. She wanted a ballerina trophy, well not so much of a trophy as a Nutcracker so that she could dance like Clara. She was so excited Christmas morning to see that Santa had come through for her!

Kyler was excited about his new bike, scooter and football

The girls got these cute hats from Grandma and Grandpa

My fav thing of Missy's is this coat. I want to steal it, but sadly I am not small enough!

Scotty was so happy with his cactus fruit and cactus fruit jelly again!

We had a nice relaxing day together and enjoyed the generosity of others. My favorite part was how much fun it was to give!

I did get a CRUISE this year though!!!!! Yea yea yea!!! I can't wait to go with Corry!

Christmas Eve 2010

Christmas was very low key this year with most of the family gone. Christmas Eve was just Corry's parents, Rob and Krista, and Corry and I.

Alli wanted to be Mary... she is carrying the baby very interestingly!

Fuzzy was Joseph and Paco was the @&#

The play was a little crazy, but they know the story and told it in their own way!

The entire cast at the end... complete with 2 wisewomen and 1 wiseman as well as a sheep that wouldn't listed to his Shepard at all!

Then it was time to open the jammies! Alli was most excited about her Princess Tiana slippers!

Scotty was excited to see BYU stuff but wasn't sure where to put them.

They ended up on his head!

Grandma was sitting in bliss after she had her head rubbed!

And Alli wearing the big sombrero - what the kids call the taco hat!

After all this it was time for everyone to go to bed! Yea!!! The kids stayed in the basement apartment and watched a movie before crashing, while the rest of us talked and laughed and put things together. It was a great night though because we were done and ready for bed at 10:30!

I have had a lot of people ask me about staying at the in-laws for Christmas and don't the kids get jealous of what their cousins got? and so on. Most years we are not the big spenders on the kids. I don't believe in going crazy for Christmas and I believe it is a good lesson for my kids that life isn't always fair and to learn to be happy for others with their good fortune. I love that my kids have never had issues with this tradition. They are just happy with what they got and happy for others and what they got. I honestly think it has been the best lesson for them to do Christmas this way. I know one day we won't be able to do it anymore, but I love this family tradition the most! Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for opening your house to the wild bunch every year!

Sad Day

One of my favorite people passed away today. What a sad day. My cousin's husband has always been so good and kind to me. He was full of life and full of fun. I was a flower girl at their wedding - man I was cute! He loved his wife, that was evident in all he did and the way he treated her. He loved his kids. He loved the Lord.

I sat and thought tonight after I got the message of his passing and wondered how you could bear the loss of a loved one without a knowledge of life after death? Without a knowledge of eternal families. It is awful to bear with that knowledge!

Going back to our evening with Sister Beck last week, one of the sisters asked "How can we be comforted with the loss of a loved one?" She reminded us of President Monson's talk in last April's Conference entitled "He is Risen" . I just went back and read that talk again with tears streaming down my cheeks.

Amid many wonderful parts of the talk, one of the last statements was powerful to me:

"My beloved brothers and sisters, in our hour of deepest sorrow, we can receive profound peace from the words of the angel that first Easter morning: 'He is not here: for he is risen.'"

The Savior's Atonement and Resurrection made it all possible for us to live again. How blessed I am to know this and how blessed this sweet family is to have have their eternal bonds to each other in place through the sealing power and through righteousness.

Love you Clay.

Final Update

What a ride. The boys left last night going home to their first foster mom, Ally. We are so excited for them, although sad they are gone. They finally got to go home to people they love dearly. Ally had them for 10 months before they came to us. Her husband, being older, did not want the responsibility of caring for these very young children into retirement. When they found out that we were not adopting, they knew as a family that they wanted them to come "home". Ally and I have had some beautiful communication the last few weeks that have brought meaning and purpose to all my WHY questions.

Ally is talking about going back to church since Kyler loves primary so much. I used President Uchtdorf's talk about patience from April 2010's conference in my FHE lesson on Monday. I gave everyone a marshmallow and told them if they could hold it and not eat it then they would get another one. Shockingly they all did it!!! Even Carter (Corry helped me out by eating his to make a point). Then I reminded the boys that as much as they love and miss their birth parents, if they will patiently wait, Heavenly Father has something even better in store for them. I shared this will Ally and attached the link to the talk. She responded later that she had read the talk! Whether or not they will take this opportunity to return to church I don't know, but I believe we were sent to give them a reason to go back.

We bought the scripture story set for the boys at the distribution center and after we brought them home, Kyler went looking for our set to find out where we were in them. He told me he needed a marker for his scriptures so we found one and he had us mark where we were in his scriptures.

We had many tears at our house yesterday and decided to pull the girls from dance and just go to dinner as a family. We had a wonderful time, laughing and eating delicious Tepanyaki - yummy!!!

Tuesday night I had the chance to hear Julie Beck speak at our Relief Society Meeting. She talked about the importance of being in training - just like an athlete needs to train, we need to train by doing the simple everyday things:

Make everyday a prayer day

Make everyday a scripture day - whatever you can do that day, but everyday

Take time to ponder

Attend the temple

Why do we need to go into training? for those difficult times. If you are in good condition you can get through. This spoke to me so much because I was feeling so thankful I was in fairly "good condition" when this journey began so that I could get through when I felt alone. The Lord was always with me even when I didn't know it. I am grateful for the lessons learned these past 3 months and for all of you being my angels!

Love you all and thank you again!

A Really Hard Day

So a few days after I had made the decision to not adopt the boys, some DCFS workers came to talk to us about it. My heart sank. I was so nervous for the meeting and was a bit stressed out. The morning of, I woke up to this:

I have daring girls! They are so good and kind and knew I needed something to brighten my morning! They had even all had a sleepover the night before in their twinner dance pants!

Gingerbread houses

We went to Cassie's house to make Gingerbread houses one night. The problem was that in the kit they gave us red and yellow marzipan. Kori and Scotty started making yellow snowmen. There is just something seriously WRONG with a yellow snowman!!! EEEWWWW!!

All the kids got into the decorating, but I think Alli had the most fun this year being big enough to really do things.

Fuzz and Kelsey always have a great time together!

Missy had a great time decorating too - too much FoodNetwork watching in our family!

Then sadly the house started falling apart

A little at a time

until

it was

completely wrecked!

The kids had a great time though and too much sugar was consumed! Here are the final products of a very disturbing snowman family created by Kori and Scotty!