School Days

Well Mike has been in school for a little longer than a month and this friday he starts harvest break for 2 weeks, so I thought I better get something posted of him! :) This year Michael has Mrs. Shumway and he loves loves loves her! It's been a lot of joy seeing him so excited about school! Katie definetely misses him during the day and hopefully this 2 week break will help with that. She just lights up when Mike gets home. Michael is doing so well with controlling his sensory sensitivities and doing much better with focusing on his work. He loves to read and is 1 of the top 3 in his class right now in reading. So proud of him! Without further delay here are some pictures of the last little while... tada!

First Day of School and rearing to go!

And Katie Turned 1! When did that happen?!

My goodness it's been quite awhile since i posted!
Todayis Mother's Day and what a wonderful day to remember all the wonderful people in my life and all the blessings I've been given!So....

I am thankful for:

a home, may not be the most beautiful or expensive, but it holds so many wonderful & irreplaceable memories.

spring weather... hope it makes a stronger appearance soon, but non-the-less happy with what we've got.

Mrs. Weist!, Michael's kindergarten teacher. she is so talented and has been perfect for Michael!... couldn't ask for a better "first" teeacher :)

Steve's job providing for our family! very thankful!

that i get to stay home instead of working outside the home. thankful i get to be here for Michael, Katie, & a littleneighbor girl. :)

thankful for the friendship I have with my mom. glad i can talk to her about things and ask for advice.

thankful i get to help in Mike's class each week and the help i get with Katie so I can do that!

thankful I still enjoy to learn... because i have a lot left to learn!

thankful for my hubby, can't imagine having this life without him.

thankful for the Temple! Thankful that we are sealed together!!!

Grateful for our Savior, His ministry, His love, & His understanding of our needs.

So thankful for my children! Love, love, love Michael, Josh, and Katie! can't wait to have all of us together again!

and the last for today... I am thankful for Hope... it's not just wishing, it's doing our part for things in the future.

2 yrs ago...

2 yrs ago at about this time, Steve and I were loading up our twins in the van, we didn't know that we would only come back home with Michael. Today and tomorrow are special days in our family, they are the days when we felt the most pain and yet also two of the days that we have been able to feel our Father in Heaven's love the strongest and the magnitude and significance of the Atonement the most. The wounds are still raw on occasion and tears are still shed at times, but with the Lord's help we have been blessed abundantly with peace, comfort and joy in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

We have a testimony of our Savior, Jesus Christ. We know that He came to succor His people to come to Him. We know that He gave His life so that we may all live again. We are thankful for our Heavenly Father's plan of happiness. We may not know all the details, but it is enough to know and to trust that He knows. We have a testimony of the Gospel and Eternal Families, we know that that gift is real! What a glorious blessing to have in our life!

Oh our darling, Joshua. We love you, we miss you, we look forward to the day that we can hold you again!

Random pics from throughout the 2nd half of the year

like i said, random pictures! too much fun, i just love my familia so very much!!!

so many things to catch up on!

boy, I am not so good at this journaling thing lately! So let's start with

THANKSGIVING

our Thanksgiving was busy like always, we went to Steve's family gathering first and then to the Woolstenhulme side. It was nice to see all the family, but I must admit I don't know how much longer I can do this... This year we did a count down to Thanksgiving, we had so much fun with it!!! Each day we had an activity to do each day that went along with what we were thankful for that day. Our favorites were:

Steve's favorites
*kitchen: we cleaned up the kitchen and then made some treats for others... I think we made scotcheroos that day with a note that said "Happy 18 days til Thanksgiving!" one friend we took them too was take a little of guard, but said that we could take them a treat for every day until Thanksgiving :)
*neighbors: Steve helped get treats ready for neighbors and just in his style loves to do sweet things for those around him.
*pies: I spent the day baking pies, Steve and Mike took them to members of our ward and then enjoyed the leftovers!

Michael's favorites:
*neighbors: he and Kourtney(our neighbor) took 2 liters of soda to some neighbors of their choice with a note that said "just popping in to tell you we are thankful for you!"
*brothers: Mike chose to send a green balloon to Heaven so Josh could have that from us. We each gave it a great big hug and kiss and sent it up to him.
*hands: we spent (tried to) the day drawing, coloring, playing etc to use our hands. We even made those lovely hand turkeys :)

My favorites
*Jesus Christ: we did a little FHE all about Christ and His mission on earth
*pies: I baked pies all day, then Steve and Mike took them to people in our ward
*home: that meant I got some help cleaning up the house! hooray!

We have been so tremendously blessed this year as always, what a wonderful wonderful way to remember!

Later that night we helped decorate Grandma Bean's family Christmas tree... it was great fun with all the cousins and thank heavens that Katie was pretty good that day!

DECEMBER

December started with a bang, sort of! I chose to make most of the Christmas gifts that we gave to others this year and man I was busy! I had so much fun! My house wasn't as decorated as I really enjoy, but it was ok... next year will be different. I will have to go get pics of the things I made and gave away... silly me!
Some of the things I made were: a bathrobe for Mike, a stuffed owl for Katie, fleece socks for Steph with a cute white flower on the side, a felt pizza kit for our niece Didi, a zipper flower brooch for my mom, Desert of the month club for Steve (not my most creative), candy boxes for vts, teachers, etc that my mom showed me how to make, mustache cups for some family and

friends, fun headbands for our niece McKenna that included one with a zipper flower, snowflake, ruffles, and then some bobby pins, I made rice bags, ribbon and pearl necklaces, I can't quite think of what else at the moment, but I had such a wonderful time doing it! Steve and Mike got into it too,
Steve painted me a nativity, sewed me pj pants (yes he learned to sew), he made Mike stilts and a lap desk, and he made Katie some burp cloths.
Mike made (with Steve) stilts for his cousin Harrison, a marshmallow gun for his cousin Isaac, (with me)cloths pin magnets for his grandmas, caprisun juice pouch coin purses for two of his aunts, and then a cupcake ornament for his teacher Mrs. Weist.
I don't know if I have really ever had a Christmas quite like this one... we put so much more thought and love into each gift because we made them! I think it will become a tradition in our household! (i know sad, the only pic I actually took)

It's that time of year

So it is now almost Thanksgiving and i still have not even posted a really good picture of my KatieLynn! Mike has been such a good sport and tries to be ever so "helpful"... we've been really blessed by the Lord this year and are grateful for the love we have been able to share as a family and the many blessings we receive daily.
This year for Thanksgiving we decided to do a countdown to thanksgiving by focusing on something we are thankful for each day until thanksgiving, but decided that wasn't quite enough so we rounded out the month and have 30 days of specific thankfulness to celebrate. We've been thankful for our kitchen, that day so far has been my favorite... i made pies all day :), we've been thankful for our ears and listened to wonderful music all day, we've been thankful for prayer and had a special family prayer where we could only say thank you to our Father in Heaven for all He has given us, we also had a day where we were specifically thankful for brothers and we sent a special green balloon full of our love to Josh up in heaven.
What a wonderful time of year to be celebrating the blessings we have been given! I'm so excited for the rest of this holiday season, hopefully we will be able to carry on being thankful everyday for all we have been given!
P.S. we are thankful for our family and friends!!!

The night before Katie was born... saying seriously... why am I going home?!

our little gaggle! ;) & Michael with his new glasses, he's doing great with them!



Doesn't he look charming?! love him!

Little Katie on her blessing day! oh my darling

So kindergarten is awesome! I wish that it would have been that cool when I was little. Michael's teacher, Mrs. Weist, is amazing and Michael just loves her so much! I have been so proud of Michael and with how hard he is working.

update

So many things have happened that I feel very behind and I'm not sure where to start!

Events:
On July 27, 2010 We welcomed miss KatieLynn to our familia! She was born @ 2:17 p.m. and weighed 8 lbs 2 oz. She is healthy and a pretty easy going little girl, but man does she have some projection in her voice already! When she was born she scared Dr. Nelson with how loud she was :) She is such a wonderful addition to our family and we feel really blessed that Heavenly Father sent her to our family!

Mike:
Michael really enjoyed the summer, I think? He played t-ball and absolutely loved it! We started reading this summer and he is really picking up on sounding out words correctly! I love it... he even read me a whole book the other night! Proud mama moment *sigh* We made some new friends and he played to exhaustion on occassion. He went camping and the highlights according to him were the lightning storms and the fact that he stepped in cow poop. :) what a cutie! He is trying to be really helpful with Katie and loves her oh so very much! He has his moments of wanting the attention and has an issue with it, but all in all he is doing much better than I thought. Michael loves singing the primary songs, at home, he has a little stage-fright and doesn't really sing the songs right at church, but he tries and I love to hear his voice singing the beautiful words to the tender songs. Michael loves to sing "I am a Child of God" to Katie when she is crying and it has helped her calm down a few times. AND Michael seemingly had the final say on what to name his baby sister. ;)

Steve & I:
besides getting ready for a new little one, Steve was finally busy with work and we were able to catch-up on some bills. We enjoyed trying to decide on names for our little girl and had our hearts set on Katelyn Marie, but after 24 hrs of having her in our arms... it was definitely wrong and we realized she was Katie Lynn. We feel so blessed to have the families that we do and are so thankful for little children Heavenly Father has sent to our home.

Having a new little one in our home has been an interesting transition after the passing of our JoshuaJay. There are days when it seems as if Josh was just here a week ago and that Katie has been here for months and months. Katie seems to be an answer to prayers of pain and sorrow and has become a balm of Gilead of sorts for the wound that has been left in our family since Josh passed away. We know that our family will be ALL together again and we are so thankful for the sacrifice that Christ has made in our behalf.

Good Things to Come

So I took the title of this post from a MormonMessage by Elder Holland. Lately it's felt as if the world is kind of cruel and unforgiving place and I'm sure that I've done my part in adding to that, so when my friend posted a link on her facebook page to Elder Hollands message it brought tears to my eyes.

In the past week it seems that another one of those milestones hit me harder than I expected, 18 months. It's been 18 months since I last held my boy, my Joshua Jay. Still miss him, but I understand more of his mission that he is on now. I've been very blessed to be on this journey, I know blessed is the word I used. I haven't enjoyed very much of it, but as I and my family have learned to and experimented upon the Lord's promises, we have been given courage, comfort, and the ability to look beyond what is immediate and look to what is eternal. It's an amazing feeling to know, I mean to really know, that someone you love is working and waiting in the Spirit world.

i've had a lot of mixed feelings lately as the birth of our daughter is approaching, feelings that I didn't think I would experience. I've felt guilty, anxious, and a bit depressed. But again trying to have faith in the Lord's plan worked out. even with my the little bit of faith I have had at trying times, the abundance of what the Lord has poured out upon our family has been amazing. So many prayers have been answered in unexpected ways, thankfully we have been able to accept them even when it's been a way we haven't enjoyed.

We've had our challenges, we have our challenges and are trying to keep our chin up.
I haven't really gotten to my point, but really my point is good things come, you just have to hang on. If you have an opportunity, if you want a quick 5 minute pick-me-up Elder Holland's message "Good Things to Come" is excellent (I'm sorry I don't have the link)

"Don't you quit... you keep trying, there is help and happiness ahead. Some blessings come soon, Some come late, and some don't come until Heaven... you will be alright in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come." ~Elder Holland

P.S. 1 wk 2 days until we welcome our little girl.