My visit to the California in February

I have the first cold I have had in a long time.  So I finished watching the Harry Potter DVDs, starting with the 3rd one.  I am amazed how after reading them so many times I have imagined the scenes in my mind so many times that I was wondering if those scenes would be on the screen.  I was surprised how many things I would swear were in the  movies weren't there.  Does anyone else see pictures in their mind as they read?  I assumed everyone saw things in their mind until I started studying Autism.  Anyway it was great fun and I cried at the end again of course and wanted to read the books again.  Don't know that I will, but the thought has crossed my mind.  After that I got out Avonlea and started watching those.  It's kind of nice to be too sick to do anything, but not so sick that you can't watch movies.

I read Pres Monsons opening talk the other day and it was soooo good. It talked about how one of the reasons for Conference is to gain comfort.  His opening talk did just that! Read it if you haven' already, it's not very long.

Seems like I am forgetting some things but that's what happens when you wait too long to post.  I am going to add some pics of Aliese's b-day and my trip to CA at the beginning of Feb. 

The first thing I did I already blogged about, that was going to Wish with them and seeing what that was like and watching Aliese and Anna sing.The next day was PE.  I loved it, watching a group of kids that aren't sports people, playing soccer, gotta love it!

We had a valentines party with all the SO Cal girls and kids. Aliese made these very delicious as well as beautiful chocolate covered strawberries.

 Making valentines

Do you think girls love babies?

 The valentine party table!

Heart Shaped Croutons

  Picture to put in some frames they painted.

Aliese's B-Day

Aliese is really good at this game!

Rebecca and Steve got her this great gift!

I think Steve was tired in this one.

The next day was time to go home and I realized there wasn't a pic of me, so Aliese and Anna took one with me.  I don't know where Gracie was.  The sun was very bright!
It was such a good time!  I loved every second of it!

Well, I have decided that the reason I have such a hard time posting is because I will take a ton of pics when I visit or someone else visits so it becomes overwhelming and I keep thinking I will do it the next day. Sooooo I am going to just blog as I go along and then add pics to the bottom of the post a little each time.  Hopefully I will catch up!

Lately my life has been filled with filling the callings in primary, (finally done with that one) and subbing in Primary, and learning about Autism.  We have two moderate to severe Autistic brothers.  They are one year apart, 6 and 7 going on 7 and 8 next month.  It has been quite a journey and I have learned so much.  I have had great compassion for them and their family.  As Steve has said more than once, "alot of your conversation when I talk about Primary is Alex and Xander.  I have grown to love them very much.  I have gone from wishing they weren't there to now being so grateful for this experience and being very grateful they are with us.  I won't even begin to say it is easy.  I am so grateful our Primary is small it makes it easier to help them and in the process teach our sweet junior primary that not all people are the same and that we don't have to be afraid of people that aren't like us.  That some people appear to be not smart and in reality they are very smart and just can't communicate their thoughts.  Today Alex who is in first grade and almost 7, read the word baptize before the primary counselor  could say it for him.  It blew us all away.  I can't imagine being trapped in a body that won't let me do or say what I want and need to say.  I am going to attach a video that one of our counselors sent to me.  It is something I think we should all know.  There are many misconceptions about autism, such as, they don't like to be touched, that they are all the same, etc.  Anyway I will stop, but it has been a big part of my life lately.  I have to say, one of the things that has made me very happy was yesterday at our Easter party.  They both talked in sentence style for the first time with me.  Most of the time, sentences are very hard for them. Alex came to find me when he wanted an Easter basket, I wasn't handing them out, I was doing something totally different.  In other words they know me, trust me and feel loved by me.  The huge turn around for all of us was when we started talking to them like we would any other 6 or 7 year old boy, and not overreact to their autistic ways.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4XMlhCfp3Q

I loved and was grateful for Conference.  I can't wait to read them all again.  One of the comforting things for me was that their was no talk of the economy, wars, the world coming to an end or anything like that.  Just keep the commandments, Jesus loves us and atoned for us, Heavenly Father answers our Prayers and etc.

I let my house get out of control and finally got it cleaned because we had company, and it feels sooooo much better.  I don't think I had mopped the floor since Christmas.  Pretty sad.

Besides thinking about the reunion and other things that I have to do, I have been realizing how soon we will be putting our house up for sale.  I need to start getting things organized, given away and cleaned up!  Steve wants to put it up for sale in July now.  So in other words I have the next two and a half months to get my house ready to be sold!  I will need to get it ready by the middle of June, because we are going to California for Rebecca and Steve's sealing, babysit Lizzie's kids, come home, 5 days later is the reunion, then at the end of July, Megan's baby is due.  Soooo I will need to be all ready before we go to California.  And you know something, I'm glad.  All the less time to stew an worry about it!

I want to start painting again.  I'm not quite sure how that is going to happen, I haven't painted much without a class. So I need to decide if I want to sign up for a class or just go for it!  I haven't put up my paintings that I did in Missouri. I realized the other day that I haven't put them up because I felt like they weren't just my strokes.  Then the other day I was talking to someone about my paintings and it hit me, they are all me. The teacher may have come around and put her brush on my paintings more than I wanted her too, but I realized that mine looked different than the rest of the class.  The others mimicked her work almost exactly.  When that came to my mind I realized they are me and mine.  I don't know if that makes sense but it has motivated me to want to paint and to hang up my paintings.

I also realized the other day that I need more moderation in my life.  I get on a track and go mach 1 with my hair on fire.  Then I crash, feel bad about myself and get up and do it all over again.  I had a few days this week where I actually did several different things throughout the day and it felt good.  It will be a trick for me to keep it up, yesterday I felt myself going back to the "lets play one key" thing and I realized how exhausting that is!  I don't' feel nearly as tired in the middle of the day when I vary my activities.  Wish me luck!

In February we went to Megans, we had so much fun!  Here are a few pics, the bag is my toiletry bag. 

 Love you all!!!