Rubyism

Ruby LOVES clothes, jewelry, dancing, helping, teaching, and anything that sparkles.  This girl is living up to her name that is for sure.  Bobbi brought her back these jammies from China and they are some of her favorites.

I keep telling Ruby to stop growing up and every time time I tell her this she laughs and says, "I growing mommy, I BIG GIRL, I NOT STOP GROWING!!!"  Precious Ruby please let me freeze time and let you be 3 forever! I love you more than words can say.  Being your mom is such a gift, you make motherhood a joy.

Gordonism

Last week we were running errands and Ruby got tired and wanted me to hold her.  I was pushing the stroller with Dallin in it and holding Lily in the Baby Bejorn.  I told Ruby I was sorry I couldn't hold her and that is when Gordon came to the rescue.  "Ruby, here hold my hand I will help you walk the rest of the way," said Gordon.  My heart burst with love, gratitude, and pride.  The compassion he showed her made my heart explode.  What a tender little mercy.

Traveling on an airplane with 4 small children

Well, we flew there and back to Minnesota and still had smiles on our faces.  It was only about a 3 - 3 1/2 hour plane flight so it was very doable. There was a lot of preparation though that went into place to make it so smooth.  Here are a few things we did.

1. I went to Costco the week before and my sweet mom bought the kids each a new little carry on suitcase for the trip so that they were able to be in charge of their own things.
2. I packed a gallon ziplock bag of snacks for each child.
3. Each kid had a pack of wipes in their bag.
4. Eric bought the kids headphones, charged up their Kindles, and put movies and games on them.
5. The big kids had their own pack of gum (they thought this was amazing).
6. Since we carried on all of our items we had a change of clothes for all of them.
7. Tried to breath, count our many blessings, and remind ourselves how lucky we are to have these precious children of ours.

 Dallin and Lily both slept for about an hour both ways.

 First time we have ever seen Gordon (6 years old) suck his thumb, pretty funny and had to be documented.

Eric and I switched off with the twins, Dallin wanted to be on the go but we were able to distract him with enough snacks and drinks so it made the time pass fairly quickly.

 Ruby even took a cat nap as well.

 So cute, this little sleepy head!

Ruby just wanted to hold Lily and her little hand.

Speaking at Grandma Pat's Funeral

It was a privilege to speak at my grandmas funeral service.  This is the talk I gave.

Good Morning! What a beautiful day it is to be with you all.  My name is Mariah and I am grateful to be here to celebrate the life of my grandma.  Two words come to my mind when I think of grandma: love and laughter

LOVE:

It has been said that love is making space in your life for someone else.  Grandma was an absolute master at this.  She had an amazing gift of making everyone around her feel loved unconditionally. Grandma was constantly reaching out in love to her family, friends, and even strangers as she fulfilled part of the great commandment to love one another.  Love is the beginning, the middle, and the end of the pathway of discipleship. It comforts, counsels, cures, and consoles. It leads us through valleys of darkness and through the veil of death. In the end love leads us to the glory of eternal life.  

Often, the greatest manifestations of love are the simple acts of kindness and caring we extend to those we meet along the path of life.  Grandma did this oh so well as she listened, advocated, sympathized, talked, and generally at the end of the day usually made us laugh.  Grandma often showed her love through the many hats she wore in her life as a daughter, sister, wife, mother, grandmother, great grandmother, friend, neighbor, waitress, chef, cheerleader, story teller, entertainer, and the list goes on and on.  Grandma showed her love as she reached out to others.  She exemplified this as she served her friends at the coffee shop, wrote cards and letters, cooked and baked meals for any occasion.  I have fond memories of grandma being our greatest customer as she shopped at our lemonade, bracelet, and necklace stands.  She would come out to our stand and make conversation.  She would lovely comment on how beautiful our crummy little handmade jewelry was and how tasty our lemonade was.  She made sure she bought enough from each of us so that we all walked away with a dollar or two each.  At the end of the day, when we still had most of our product left, she would come back out again and shop some more.  Her heart was so huge and she made us all feel so loved.  With the funds we had made from our sale, she would usually take us to the Dairy Queen and we would pick out a treat, awe such good memories.

Grandma’s family and (in particular her children) meant the world to her.  I can remember her saying on many occasions, “I would have had a half dozen more kids if I could.”  Her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren were her most prized possession.  As a child, I loved sitting on Grandma’s lap and looking at her mother’s ring.  She would explain every stone of her ring and what child of hers it represented.  This was a ring that she wore everyday with pride because she loved her children more than anything.

A wise man once said, “The most cherished and sacred moments of our lives are those filled with the spirit of love. The greater the measure of our love, the greater is our joy. In the end, the development of such love is the true measure of success in life. “ I’m confident that grandma reached this.  In fact, one of her favorite sayings was, “Love you more.” And she insisted on being the last to say it.

LAUGHTER:

Not only did grandma love her family but she loved to make her family laugh.  You could always count on grandma for some kind of off colored joke that would have everyone rolling their eyes and snickering.  Oh how we’ll miss her sense of humor. Her wit would make us laugh and leave us smiling long after the conversation was over. On countless occasions our spirits were lifted by her sense of humor and we felt pride for having such funny grandma.  Humor can improve our perspective and lighten our load. My friends and I couldn’t wait for her visits to California because we would all sit around the table playing cards and listen to her stories.

I was always fascinated with grandma’s outrageous stories.  Like the time she had just done the laundry and hung it on the line to be dried when suddenly a whole slew of her and the neighborhood kids decided to have a mud fight right in the middle of her clean sheets.  She laughed, rolled her eyes and made a fist as she told the story, I of course thought it was hilarious.  Going out to eat with grandma was always a hoot too.  I remember one time she insisted on paying but when she went to reach in her pocket for her money she quickly discovered she couldn’t get it out because her pants were on backwards, we all had a good laugh.  Grocery shopping with grandma was always comical too.  Costco and Trader Joe’s were some of her favorites because she rotate through the sample stations 2 or 3 times each.  There was a cheese shop that we enjoyed visiting in the mall too that had amazing samples and grandma would stick her toothpick through 3 or 4 pieces of cheese on each try.  She always had us in stitches.

There were many times in grandmas where she could have been discouraged however she was able to make light of most situations and laugh about it.  I believe her humor helped to extend her life and made the lives of all those around her more enjoyable.  Come what may and love it…

Over the years as I have reflected and laughed with her about the many funny stories she told, it has aloud me to really count all of the many blessings I have in my life.  She has helped me to more fully appreciate so many things that could easily be taken for granted.

I’m eternally grateful for the positive impact that she has had on all of our lives.  Grandma, Thank you for your guidance, example, smiles, love and laughs you have provided us throughout the years.  Thank you for believing in us and for being all of our biggest fan and cheerleader.  Thank you for making us each feel so loved and valued.  You have played such a huge role in all of our lives.  Grandma, we cherish the moments that we have spent together and are thankful that we have such a wonderful angel looking over us today and always. You are deeply missed and we all love you so very much.  What a sweet reunion it will be when we meet again.  Until then, we love you and dedicate this day to you.

Magical Times in Minnesota

This past week we went to Minnesota  for 5 days with our whole crew and had an absolutely magical time.  We went out there to celebrate the life of my grandma who passed away back on January 9th at the age of 89.  She told everyone that if she went in the winter time that she didn't want everyone coming out during that time but to wait and have a party in the summer time, and that is exactly what we did.  My mom rented a house for my parents, my brother, his wife and their son, and us to all stay together.  It was super fun.  We spent tons of time at my cousins beautiful place on Grays Bay. Gordon has decided that he wants to now live in Minnesota.

The babies were sure cute at almost 14 months old but were doing a lot of teething so they weren't as chipper as they normally. However, they were still darling.

 We went on a boat ride around a nearby lake and it was sure beautiful.

 Eric spent a ton of time in the lake with the kids and I think they all had the time of their lives.

 Gordon just LOVES his cousin Patrik and the two of them got to spend a few days together.  Gordon also caught his very first fish and was OVER THE MOON excited.

 Having little cousins to share in Gordon's excitement of catching a fish sure helped too.

 Gordon caught a sunny.

Each night Justin, my brother would read stories to the kids before bed, Ruby wanted to sit on his lap every night.

 The day of grandma's party we were all in Hawaiian atire.

 Justin had the magic touch with our munchkins, especially Lily.

 Precious 3 year old Ruby had a BLAST playing with her cousin Lincoln, they were like brother and sister, it was darling.

 I found a new hobby... someday?!?  Paddle boarding is AMAZING.  My uncle and I paddled around the bay together and it was so fun, I can't wait to do it again.

 Ruby loved my cousin Nicole too, they were very cute together.

 I think we are ready to move in.

 Dad serenaded us with ukulele music each night, it was dreamy.

Eric was the man in the airport carrying a million things, believe it or not we were able to carry on all of our things minus the car seats.  Overall it was a fantastic trip and it was wonderful spending good quality time with our family.

Happy to be back at Legoland

A few months before the babies were born we let our Legoland passes expire because we figured we would not be able to get much use out of them, and yes we were right!  I seriously feel like I'm just starting to emerge after a year.  Going anywhere besides the necessities by myself has been a challenge to say the least.  However, in just the last month or so I feel like we are just beginning to get a small grip on life again.  Gordon has been begging us renew our passes (and of course since he is the boss in our family...practically... or so he thinks) we went along with his idea.  It's so fun to stop by the park for just an hour or two during the week.  The kids are really happy to be back too.

Family Time

This past month Dallin has had a little bit of a cold.  We actually thought he had an ear infection because he is always tugging on his ear.  I took him in and luckily he doesn't have an infection but is just teething.

 The twins sure love the water table.

 I turned around for a minute and they had about 50 wipes torn out of the container, oops!

 Ruby told us she was going to take Gordon's and my picture... cheese!

 LILY!!!!  You are just so cute!

 Running to Home Depot is just so fun with two shopping carts and 4 kids... NOT... but we made do.

 They are getting so big!!!

 Ruby has decided she wants to help with EVERYTHING... including packing lunches in the morning, fine by me!

 Making more memories with Bobbi and Grandpa when they visited.

 Ruby wants to make the fruit salad too.

Because according to Bobbi... "Grandma's can't say NO!"  Sooo she got the kids a Shave Ice at the local park.

Love having them here!