Thursday, December 31, 2009
Happy New Year!
2009 held many exciting things for our family. We spent the year in our new home filling it with memories and adventures, and I have a hard time believing the whole thing has come and gone. When I think back over the year I am overwhelmed with how much our family has grown, how much we have been able to accomplish, and just how much we have been blessed. This past year we have added a second car, tons of fish, and a dog to the Swilor house. We were able to visit family all over the country and be visited by a lot of family too. We made the decision to get out of the military, and then with the help of a lot of prayers and a lot of fasting made the decision to stay in, at least for now. Our sweet little Kendall started Kindergarten, handsome Bryan learned to write his name, and I tried in vain to keep them from growing up. I made them promise to stay little forever, but I am beginning to see that it just can't happen. Which is sad - I definitely miss my little babes - but fun too. The older they get the more fun we have just playing and being together. I'd like to make them promise that they'll grow up slowly, but I just can't seem to make time slow down for anything. And Ethan and I are kept on our toes with their growing personalities and constantly adapting our parenting to try and keep up. Ethan turned the big three-oh, which means I am officially married to an old person! (This is a joke, if you don't think it's funny you are officially old too! Don't worry, we can still be friends.) But he is still the gorgeous man I married and every year we spend together proves him to be more loving, more generous, more positive, and more hilarious than any other person I know. I'm grateful for every moment I have with him. The year has also been a reminder of just how much our Father above loves us and is aware of our family. We have been blessed in ways too numerous to list and often times too personal to describe, but we have strengthened our belief in the power of prayer, the miracle of service, the blessing of fasting and the importance of family, just to name a few. We have spent the whole year in the comfort of a home and always with enough food to eat and clothes to wear. We curl up at night in the summer with cool air, and more recently with warm blankets, and for all of these gifts our heart is full. We have spent some of this year like years past away from each other, but we have a steady income and a love that crosses oceans. We have been healthy, safe, and for the most part happy. Yes, 2009 has been good to our family. We were able to make and stick to a budget and finally get out of debt. We slowly acquired a little food storage and saved some money for a rainy day, and while this did require some sacrifice we know that the little we did is nothing compared to the help from the Lord in accomplishing these goals. The more we try, in little ways, to be obedient to our Father in Heaven and the words of his Prophets the more abundantly we are blessed in every way. One of those blessings has been the friends that have come into our lives. We have a plate in our Kitchen that reads 'Friends are the Family we Chose for Ourselves' and we love our friends that have truly become like family. Your support and friendship have definitely been one of the crowning jewels in our 2009 memory! So while I take a minute to think back on the past twelve months I am overwhelmed with not only how quickly it has flown, but just how much of it is burned into my heart forever. There have been rough times, trials, and loneliness to teach me that while it is not fun to be stretched, it is rewarding to look back and see how much we have grown. All of this fills me with excitement for the future. There is a lot on the horizon that is scary and unknown, but with the love of our family and faith in God I am ready to see what this New Year has in store. So bring in on 2010! I can tell, it is going to be a great year!
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Totally Wicked Picture NONtage
A couple of weekends ago we had our last little family outing before Ethan had to leave again. We were going to head down to Kansas City just as soon as Kendall got out of school Friday, so Bryan and I spent all that day doing laundry and packing and getting the house ready to leave. I made a super detailed list (just because I like to try and pretend I'm an organizer) and I was sure that we had absolutely everything taken care of. We dropped Moosey off with my mom and dad, and then stopped down in Bellevue to pick Ethan up from work and headed down to Kansas. By the way, I love road trips with our family. Even though Kansas City is only a little over three hours away there is just something fun about being stuck in a car together that really makes me happy. We have this one special gas station we always stop at when we head south on I-29. There really isn't anything special about it except that we always have to stop for a potty break or to get someone something to drink, and over time it has become our official rest stop. I love that. (And I love that they have a nine pound meal, and if you can eat it in under an hour it is free, if not it is $45 dollars. Pretty sure one of the main selling points is the half a pound of gravy served with it. I have never tried this challenge, but I like to think that someday I will!) And I love that Kendall and Bryan always come up with some sort of silly game or song that is super cute at first and then after about thirty minutes really starts to get on our nerves. Yep, I pretty much just love road trips. It was a little past our "special" gas station when I realized I forgot the camera. Boo to me. So we had this way awesome, totally spectacular, and practically perfect vacation with absolutely NO pictures to show for it. This makes me really sad. So I have decided to walk through the vacay with the non-pictures that I wish we had.
This is the picture of us in front of our Holiday Inn. See our super rosy cheeks? That's because it was oh! so cold outside. But isn't that Christmas Tree in the Lobby gorgeous? It was the biggest tree Kendall and Bryan had ever seen. They were really cute about it. The guy checking us in asked us if we wanted a high or a low floor. We decided on a high one, and then got into an interesting discussion about why hotels do not have a thirteenth floor. I told him that I think hotels should make the 13 floor one gigantic flat that you can rent out to non-superstitious people. And besides, everyone on floor 14 knows they are really on floor 13 so you really aren't fooling anyone. The point being, if you go to a hotel and they ask you if you would like to rent the entire 13th floor, that was totally my idea!!
Okay, here we are in a super cute hotel room. That is Kendall-Bendall and BryBry looking out the window and laughing at how little the cars are -one of my favorite moments of the trip. We hung out in our room, order some pizza and root beer and watched Harry Potter as a family. Yeah, we probably could have done that at home, but seriously, it is WAY more fun in a hotel. The next morning we tried to sleep in as long as we could because Ethan and I knew how very little sleep we would be getting for the next couple of days. Well, the next week really.
Oh Look! Here we are right inside CoCoKeys. Did you know they keep the temperature in there about 80 degrees?! Awesome. We spent the morning playing with the kids in this great indoor water park right inside the hotel. Kendall loved the lazy river - she kept calling it "The Parade" which we thought was really super adorable. Bryan was too short to reach the ropes above the floating lily pads and would hop from one to one just like a frog. And both of them went down every water slide they were tall enough for (and a few that they weren't in Bryan's case) and loved it. I was so happy to have kids that love water parks as much as I do. It was a great great, great family date.
After a few hours in CoCoKeys we had some lunch and headed over to my brother's house. John and Holly live close to Kansas City and were awesome enough to let us bring the kiddos over for the night while we went to see Wicked. Kendall and Bryan always have so much fun playing with their cousins so it worked out really well. Ethan's mom flew in from Utah to see the show with us and it was wonderful to be able to see her.
All of us (Ethan, Me, Marcia, Kendall and Bryan) out to eat at some yummy Mexican restaurant John recommended to us. This is one picture that makes me really really sad not to have. The kids were so excited to see Grandma and we don't get to see them as often as we would like. I hate that we got to see each other and don't have any picture to show the kids to help them remember it. Okay, moving on before I get too sad about it.
Ethan and Me and Marcia in what we though was Kansas City's Music Hall. We parked the car and got lousy directions from the woman working in the parking garage. We ended up in this huge building hosting a car auction. We did see lots of young couples all gussied up and heading further and further into this ginormous building. I had the great idea to just follow them. We head further and further into nowhere when at last we see a big sign for some Christmas Party. There is a couple that has been walking behind us the whole three miles through the building (okay, maybe it wasn't that far, but I was wearing my super cute high heels Ethan gave me for our anniversary, and it definitely seemed that far. The shoes were not very comfortable. Did I mention they were super cute though...???) This was the little conversation we had with them.
Us: Are you going to a Christmas Party?
Them (excitedly): YES! Are you?!
Us: No.
Them: ?????
Us: You wouldn't happen to know where we should go to see Wicked, would you?
Apparently the guy had seen Wicked on a sign across the street. So we walked the three miles back, past the car auction, and finally see Kansas City Music Hall right next door.
Us in front of the marquis for Wicked. This is another picture that makes me sad not to have. Ethan and I saw Wicked when it came to Omaha earlier this year, but it was so fun to see it with Marcia. She is a huge Wizard of Oz fan and was worried that she wasn't going to like it. Of course she loved it, and we were so happy to be able to be there with her the first time seeing it. I loved seeing it again. We had fantastic seats, the cast was phenomenal, and I was reminded again that I really, really want to steal Glinda's dress. Also, Elphaba made me cry. Again. It was FABULOUS!
After the show we stopped by to pick up our sleeping babes, drop Marica off at her hotel and drove the three hours home. It was a long night. By the time we drove to Omaha, picked up Moosey from my parent's house, stopped by Wal-Mart to get one last minute item, got home, put the kids in bed, and finished wrapping all the presents (we were celebrating Christmas early before Ethan had to leave - we sent a letter off to Santa asking him to come early, and Santa, being awesome, totally did) Ethan and I got to bed about 4:30 only to wake up to excited kids about 8:00. But it was one of the best weekends we could have asked for before Ethan had to leave. We have no pictures to show for it, but Kendall came home from school with a picture she drew of us in the car and "mountains" in the back (which are really only hills) and a story about our trip to "Canziz," and it made me pretty sure that the weekend was as fun for them as it was for me. It was a totally WICKED weekend!
This is the picture of us in front of our Holiday Inn. See our super rosy cheeks? That's because it was oh! so cold outside. But isn't that Christmas Tree in the Lobby gorgeous? It was the biggest tree Kendall and Bryan had ever seen. They were really cute about it. The guy checking us in asked us if we wanted a high or a low floor. We decided on a high one, and then got into an interesting discussion about why hotels do not have a thirteenth floor. I told him that I think hotels should make the 13 floor one gigantic flat that you can rent out to non-superstitious people. And besides, everyone on floor 14 knows they are really on floor 13 so you really aren't fooling anyone. The point being, if you go to a hotel and they ask you if you would like to rent the entire 13th floor, that was totally my idea!!
Okay, here we are in a super cute hotel room. That is Kendall-Bendall and BryBry looking out the window and laughing at how little the cars are -one of my favorite moments of the trip. We hung out in our room, order some pizza and root beer and watched Harry Potter as a family. Yeah, we probably could have done that at home, but seriously, it is WAY more fun in a hotel. The next morning we tried to sleep in as long as we could because Ethan and I knew how very little sleep we would be getting for the next couple of days. Well, the next week really.
Oh Look! Here we are right inside CoCoKeys. Did you know they keep the temperature in there about 80 degrees?! Awesome. We spent the morning playing with the kids in this great indoor water park right inside the hotel. Kendall loved the lazy river - she kept calling it "The Parade" which we thought was really super adorable. Bryan was too short to reach the ropes above the floating lily pads and would hop from one to one just like a frog. And both of them went down every water slide they were tall enough for (and a few that they weren't in Bryan's case) and loved it. I was so happy to have kids that love water parks as much as I do. It was a great great, great family date.
After a few hours in CoCoKeys we had some lunch and headed over to my brother's house. John and Holly live close to Kansas City and were awesome enough to let us bring the kiddos over for the night while we went to see Wicked. Kendall and Bryan always have so much fun playing with their cousins so it worked out really well. Ethan's mom flew in from Utah to see the show with us and it was wonderful to be able to see her.
All of us (Ethan, Me, Marcia, Kendall and Bryan) out to eat at some yummy Mexican restaurant John recommended to us. This is one picture that makes me really really sad not to have. The kids were so excited to see Grandma and we don't get to see them as often as we would like. I hate that we got to see each other and don't have any picture to show the kids to help them remember it. Okay, moving on before I get too sad about it.
Ethan and Me and Marcia in what we though was Kansas City's Music Hall. We parked the car and got lousy directions from the woman working in the parking garage. We ended up in this huge building hosting a car auction. We did see lots of young couples all gussied up and heading further and further into this ginormous building. I had the great idea to just follow them. We head further and further into nowhere when at last we see a big sign for some Christmas Party. There is a couple that has been walking behind us the whole three miles through the building (okay, maybe it wasn't that far, but I was wearing my super cute high heels Ethan gave me for our anniversary, and it definitely seemed that far. The shoes were not very comfortable. Did I mention they were super cute though...???) This was the little conversation we had with them.
Us: Are you going to a Christmas Party?
Them (excitedly): YES! Are you?!
Us: No.
Them: ?????
Us: You wouldn't happen to know where we should go to see Wicked, would you?
Apparently the guy had seen Wicked on a sign across the street. So we walked the three miles back, past the car auction, and finally see Kansas City Music Hall right next door.
Us in front of the marquis for Wicked. This is another picture that makes me sad not to have. Ethan and I saw Wicked when it came to Omaha earlier this year, but it was so fun to see it with Marcia. She is a huge Wizard of Oz fan and was worried that she wasn't going to like it. Of course she loved it, and we were so happy to be able to be there with her the first time seeing it. I loved seeing it again. We had fantastic seats, the cast was phenomenal, and I was reminded again that I really, really want to steal Glinda's dress. Also, Elphaba made me cry. Again. It was FABULOUS!
After the show we stopped by to pick up our sleeping babes, drop Marica off at her hotel and drove the three hours home. It was a long night. By the time we drove to Omaha, picked up Moosey from my parent's house, stopped by Wal-Mart to get one last minute item, got home, put the kids in bed, and finished wrapping all the presents (we were celebrating Christmas early before Ethan had to leave - we sent a letter off to Santa asking him to come early, and Santa, being awesome, totally did) Ethan and I got to bed about 4:30 only to wake up to excited kids about 8:00. But it was one of the best weekends we could have asked for before Ethan had to leave. We have no pictures to show for it, but Kendall came home from school with a picture she drew of us in the car and "mountains" in the back (which are really only hills) and a story about our trip to "Canziz," and it made me pretty sure that the weekend was as fun for them as it was for me. It was a totally WICKED weekend!
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