Big Changes

Today was a Sunday to remember for Andrew and myself. The LDS church does several things different than any other church in the world, for one there is the Temple [I'll come back to that] and another is the Patriarchal Blessing. There are others, but these are what I'm focused on at the moment. A Patriarchal Blessing is what Andrew received today. If you are a worthy and active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and do NOT have yours, I challenge you to do what you must to get it. I got mine 6 months after I was baptized and it has played a very important role in my life. Going with Andrew this afternoon was an AWESOME blessing and I'm so happy things worked out that we had good friends to care for Evelyn during that time. Whether you are a member or not I can not share much of the experience due to the fact it is a very personal experience and can not be taken lightly. I just wanted to say that if you don't have yours you should learn all you can so that you may understand and receive it. It is priceless and, as far as I'm concerned, essential part of every church member's life.

Backing up in time a few hours now... today was our last of 7 Temple preparation classes. I will miss this sooo much!! Aside from the class being informative and deeply spiritual I loved having the chance to get to know our wonderful Bishop and his wife better. I'm very pleased and thankful for the Brother and Sister called at this time. Without their special spirits staying in tune with Heavenly Father's promptings it's likely we may not have strived to attend every class. During class today I felt very strongly impressed we should NOT wait until our fifth anniversary in Febuary to be Sealed as a family as we had decided. I was afraid I was getting my emotions confused with the Spirit until I told Andrew my feelings, and he said he got the SAME IMPRESSION! Heavenly Father is SOOO awesome! It was decided that we will be attending the Boston Temple just as soon as we can be interviewed and set the appointment. Praying things will all work together despite the usual opposition from the advisary at such critical events.

Also today I was asked to fulfill a calling!! It's not one I would have picked for myself at this time, seeing as it will take me away from Relief Society, however I trust in our Heavenly Father and know that he has way better plans for me than I could ever come up with for myself. =)


All this AND I've been pondering the idea of becoming more serious about my love of photography. I brought pictures to my therapist and she became very enthusiastic about a future career [very soon] for me. I've made a rough draft of a fliar showcasing my work and details to make plans. It's not really that I want to make money [though it would be really nice!] but I want to challenge myself and expand my range, WHILE giving friends and neighbors frame worthy pictures without the sticker shock. I HATED when we had pro shots of Evelyn for her second Christmas and only walked away with 25 Christmas cards 8 wallets and two 8x10s, with a MUCH lighter wallet. =( So I want to help people keep their memories even in this hard recession. Well, we shall see how the Lord wants me to go with my talent. He has given it to me for some purpose even if it's just to bring joy to myself and my loved ones.

Sightseeing, Birthday and the Temple Oh MY!

LOTS has been happening in our little home. The past week has been busy, busy, busy!! We had a great visit with Gramma Seavy and I'm so glad she got to come stay with us, but I'm ready to get back in our routine of things. All the FUN just wore me out!! I don't know how I kept going and going all that time.

First We went to Boston and bought tickets for the Freedom Trail Tour. The tour by it's self was 2 and a half miles, but we figure we walked about 5 because we weren't sure where to go and then did some sightseeing on our own.

I think it's fascinating to see how small the historic buildings look compared to our skyscrapers of today

Then we got to travel a little out of the way to see the Boston LDS Temple. The only temples I had seen before were Nashville, Memphis, and Seattle. Boston was the most impressive to me, maybe because we plan on getting sealed there!! However if Andrew gets out of the guard and hired somewhere else we may go anywhere from Seattle to St. Louis possibly even Portland, Oregon. I don't care where we are, as long as we become sealed as a family for all time and Eternity.

We went to Nubble lighthouse out at Cape Neddick and enjoyed the beautiful weather and God's hand crafted scenery on Evelyn's 3rd birthday.

Her party was wonderful! I'm very happy I reserved the party room at McDonald's and let them take care of just about everything. I know Evelyn had a great time and I'm pretty sure her friends did too.

My baby girl

Last night was rough so my brain isn't completely awake yet, but i wanted to jot these things down before i forget them in my "mommy haze"

evey sings Jesus wants me for a SunBEEP! those that don't know, it's supposed to be sunBEAM!! It's sooo funny! i'm going to try to get it on tape , er... dvd... anyway, i'm going to make a movie of it when ican get her to do it on camera.

evey crawled in bed with me and bug this morning and went back to sleep. about 9 i woke up and my moving woke her up, but i wasn't ready to get UP yet so we both just laid there edward between us. i wasn't facing her and my eyes were closed but i heard her start saying, Ohh, he's soo sute [cute] when i looked she was ever so gently rubbing his cheek and i could see her face was beaming with love for her baby brother. yeah, she's done this before but i usually tell her stop don't wake him up! but this morning i was so touched at her emotion i let her do it. besides, what better way to wake up than your big sister loving you. =)

also, evey will be starting joy school on thursday. audrey's mother came to me with the idea for our girls and a few others to include some basic preschool like lessons in with snacks and playtime once a week. her mother has given her some lesson plans. we will be alternating at each others houses, who brings snack, who teaches. this seems like an answer to a prayer. evey needs social interaction more than just nursery at church, but a preschool we were looking into won't take her cuz she's not potty trained, and anything else would cost.. a lot. plus i get to meet and interact with the other moms. the only one left out is edward, but he's too little to be offended, lol.

Goodbye and Good Luck

Elder Henderson, you will be missed. Your sweet Spirit has blessed our home many times. You have been a blessing to our family in many ways. We've laughed, we've prayed, we've learned and Evelyn even colored with you. Good luck in your next area! Heavenly Father has decided it's time to bless more people with your personality.

Bottle of paint + three yr old + distracted Mom =

My first reaction? Oh. MY. GOD.

Then trying to stifle my urge to LAUGH my butt off!! Here's what happened.

I admit it, I'm a shopaholic... groceries, clothes, crafts.. doesn't matter, I'm in "the zone", on the hunt.. for a bargain. I had been combing the A.C. Moore craft store for everything I needed to continue my crafts and then some. I had put Evelyn in the basket because she had been running off, out of my sight, freaking me out. She wasn't happy about it so I kept her content with some objects I had no intention of buying.

Then I put four bottles of acrylic paint I DID intend to buy in the basket with her. I thought she'd look at the labels, maybe bang the bottles together to see what they'd sound like or even toss them back out of the basket on the floor... they had SAFETY SEALED PLASTIC on them. Am I wrong to think she couldn't open them???

Apparently so. I was so enthralled in the clearence isle I didn't even suspect she was being unusally QUIET and GOOD. MISTAKE! My Mommy radar must have been on hiatus, because I was oblivious. It wasn't until she spoke to me [I don't recall what she said] that I looked at her.

I had to put everything I had been looking at down and go directly to check out. Which Andrew was probably happy about, seeing as I have an addiction.

I really wish I'd had my camera right there in the store. It was too funny. I was worried about her touching stuff and they'd make me pay for it, but at the same time I was already planning to take pictures as soon as we got home and thinking of how to decorate for the scrap page! LOL. Am I sorry this happened? Not so much, the checkout lady felt sorry for me and scanned a coupon she had at the register for 40% off one item, it all washed off, made for a funny story, and taught me a well needed lesson.... NEVER underestimate the curiosity of this little Angel.

just another day in paradise

A week has gone by since my last post, but that's better than a month. The kids were sick last week. Evey caught a bug in nursery at Church, and by Friday Edward had it too. I know she caught it from someone at church because on Sunday every parent with a kid in Evey's class had been sick or was still sick with the same thing. Bugg is still dealing with it. I can hear the congestion when he wakes up in the morning from laying down all night. Evelyn still has a cough. Sometimes she'll say "mommy I not coughin ne more, I feelin better" when she's gone a little while without coughing. She's always saying stuff that makes us laugh or surprises us to how smart she is. Here are the latest gems..


In Church, Sunday during Scarament meeting, we were singing a hymn and I was holding Edward in my lap because he was being a little fussy. Suddenly Evey said [in a not so quiet voice] "come on Edward, shake your booty!" I was embarassed and stifling a laugh at the same time. Lately when Edward is fussy because he's bored I stand him up and make him "dance" while I sing. A favorite from when Evey was his age is "shake shake shake, come on and shake shake shake, shake your booty [ow!] shake your booty [ow!] This usually makes him smile and laugh, and so does Evey. I guess she put it together that because he was fussing, and we were singing a song he should indeed "shake his booty"

Another thing is Evey still refuses to use the potty. She LOVES her sesame street diapers. The diapers have most of the characters on every diaper, but one big picture on the front of the waist, it may be cookie monster, grover, elmo, earnie or elmo and zoe. She usually goes through every diaper in the box to get whatever character she's in the mood for. Usually it's cookie monster. The other night Andrew was preparing to change her diaper when she said she wanted a cookie monster diaper, Andrew was impatient and told her there are no more cookie monster diapers. Evey quickly responded, "of course there are."

While I work on the Scrapbook Evelyn loves to watch and try to help. She tells me when I need "gue" [glue] and if i should cut or write something. Often times I give her some true scraps to play with to keep her from playing with my real materials. I let her glue them to plain paper she then says "ohh, I yove my frapbook" or she'll point to my pages and say "ooh, what a pwetty frapbook!" I can't help but smile when I glue something down or add a hand drawn embellishment and she exclaims "that's a great idea!" or "you do-min [doing] a good job!"

I'm planning on buying her a real scrapbook and allowing her to truly help and be involved with the decorations. How much more precious will it be that we did it together rather than mommy all by herself. I can use the pictures of her time spent with Audrey, and her upcoming birthday party and everyday pictures to show her personality. If I can find and buy an inexpensive Tinker Bell costume for Halloween [in her size] I want to take lots of pictures and use Tinker Bell stickers for the pages. Tinker Bell and Mickey Mouse is her new thing. She prefers to watch MickeyMouse Clubhouse over DORA even. I've had to set the DVR to record it the two shows on Disney at 6 am every day so she can watch it when she gets up. And then I can't delete it because like any kid, she wants to watch it over, and over, and over. I prefer this MUCH more than Spongebob. She has a fit when he comes on instead of the Nick Jr. shows. She whines until I change the channel.... =) I'm so proud, haha. She recognizes him at the stores, she'll say "yook it FongeBob" [she can't the 's' for some reason] but she never wants the toys or anything to do with him. Again, I must say, I'm so glad. I dread the day she gets the Spongebob epidemic.

Edward can't talk or do much of anything yet, of course he will only be 4 months on the 19th. But I have noticed he watches tv just like his sissy. How can he not though? The 65 inches dominates the room whether the volume is on or not. But he prefers the kid's shows, again, just like his sissy. When he's sleepy I can most times turn to Noggin and put him in the swing. He's so distracted he doesn't realize he's falling asleep. Then I can do what needs to be done, or give Evey some 1 on 1 time for a while.

He's also already reaching for things. Evey was late to be interested in anything other than mommy, so I'm really happy he's reached this milestone. I bought him some teething toys when he started chomping on our fingers and drooling like a fountain at 9 weeks. I picked an adorable soft stuffed bear with rubber teethers for the paws. He LOVES it. He chews the ears or nose, but it quiets him at church and at home so that's what matters. This was the first thing he started reaching for. Since then he's grabbed the toys on the toy bar above his bouncer, the keyboard when he sits in my lap while I type, and even a cheeseburger while I ate and laid him in my lap. Sometimes I dip my finger in my cup of juice and then put it in his mouth for him to taste. Last time I did this he fussed and fidgeted when I wasn't giving him any. I couldn't get it to him fast enough, he loves new tastes, even spaghetti sauce! He's going to be fun when he starts baby food in a couple of weeks.