Ultimate Date Night Giveaway- part 2

Ultimate Date Night Giveaway- part 2

Pattern

As I came home today fresh from church I couldn't seem to stop my mind from wandering back to the lesson in Relief Society. Patterns. Yes we talked about patterns you use to make clothes and stuff. But it really came to head when the teacher started talking about why we use a pattern... you know less mistakes... etc. (I didn't pay good attention cuz' she gave me and another lady instructions to whisper to each other during class, but we miss understood and whispered during the crucial beginning instead of during a time when the whole class was reading a hymn... whoops!) And then she started talking about patterns to be righteous and how they were both very similar. I had to share my story to the class and I feel I must share it on my blog today as well.

I'm very aware of how easy it is to break the pattern of going to church every Sunday. You want to sleep in, clean the house, not fight with the kids, etc. Whatever excuse you can think of, insert here. In fact Zoey's whole first year of life didn't include going to church because it was at 9am and I went by myself and there was no way I was going by myself with a newborn and a toddler to church by 9am. See pattern broke. But we did the next year. Pattern fixed. Then we moved back to Idaho and I knew going to church here would be difficult. You know all alone again, not knowing anyone and on my 3rd Sunday to church the kids were HORRIBLE!! I was so embarrassed. They practically screaming at each other during sacrament, hitting, crying, throwing fits.This was just 20 min into sacrament too. Everyone around me was looking at them and me and probably thinking that I would just go out to the foyer so they can listen to the talks in quiet. Well we did end up in the foyer, but the kids just escalated, so I took them home! I was in tears because it felt like the people in my ward thought less of me, Zoey was crying because she's 2? Ginger was crying because she REALLY wanted to go to primary. We just went home. I called my hubby who is not a member of the LDS church and I just started bawling and telling him that I didn't want to go to church anymore. He was a little freaked at my outburst. But in the sweetest voice he told me to not stop going to church. That it's so good for the kids and me to go and continue and try and make friends in the church. He called his LDS grandma and arranged for her come to the following Sunday with me so I wouldn't be alone. And I'm crying as I write this because my husband is SO amazing but... while I was so close to break the pattern yet again, he encouraged and gave my optimism to keep it up and it will get better. It's just so hard sometimes and you feel like you get nothing out of it some Sundays but I always feel better when I get home. Renewed, refreshed, and loved. So while it's hard to set a pattern/example and stick to it... it's so worth it!

Easter 2011

It was a pretty great Easter. Especially since we had all our family around to be with. After the girls woke up and found their baskets we did a little egg hunt with Josh's parents. And later in the afternoon I went with Matt and his family and did another egg hunt. The kids just love egg hunting!!

Valentines Day 2011

Of course I had to do the traditional Valentine's Day breakfast for my kids. It wasn't as fancy as I think it could of been but my girls still felt special and loved by it.

Trying to take a pic of all of us together, Zoey's getting ready to kiss Ginger

Ginger taking stock of her loot she got from school :)

Nashville

I tried posting this a while back but blogger wasn't allowing to post pics, so better late than never!



Josh and I went to Nashville, TN last week. I guess it was my valentines day "gift" from Josh. But I think that's just what he says to himself to justify the trip. On our way there we had stopped at the the University of Virginia, that college was amazing. And so pretty. Did you know that President Jefferson was the architect who designed it?The best part about the trip was that my Aunt Dani watched the kids so it was just Josh and I. That was the best part! No kids. It had been over a year since we'd done a trip with just the two of us. And the car ride there was like 10 hours so we spent a lot of quality time together. It was just great. We went downtown to what they call the district and it was just lined up with bars, and every bar had a live band playing in it. Josh was in heaven! He just loves music. We also went to the Country Music Hall of Fame museum. That was pretty cool. On our way home we also stopped at Virginia Tech (we got to see the stadium where BSU stomped em'!) and University of Tennessee, did you know that that college is 3,000 acres!!! No we aren't going to colleges to see where we want to go, we just thought it would be fun to check em' out :) Like I said it was just so awesome to be alone with Josh.

What is romance?

Seriously? What is romance? My friend was over last week and we got to talking about it and I think everyone has their own idea of what it could be. Maybe it's your special someone who buys you flowers and candy and jewelry. Or your special someone who cleaned your house for you. Or whisked you away on a mini vacation. Or took the kids off your hands so you could sleep in, take a bath, finish a project, go shopping, etc. I think that we have these preconceived notions on what we should expect romance to be (you know, candy, jewelry, flowers, sexy talk, all the time). But it's not all about the gooey stuff. Sometimes I forget because Josh is not a romantic kind of guy most of the time, but every now and then when he is and when I look back at the times that he has done small gestures for me... man it just blows me away and I fall even more in love with him. I am one who doesn't particularly doesn't care much for Valentine's Day. I love making the kids a morning breakfast, but I love even more remembering why I love Josh and remembering. Happy Valentine's Day!!

Dulles Air and Space Museum

On Saturday Josh wanted to finally go to the Dulles Air and Space Museum. We've been the one in DC and have yet to go to the one practically down the road. It's free admittance but parking is normally $15 but when we got there it was FREE!! woohoo!! So that just made the trip that much more better!! It was quite amazing. Basically it was like a hangar (a huge one) filled with every type of flying contraption. We saw a plane called a Blackbird, it's like the fastest EVER. On its final flying day it went from LA to Dulles Airport in 1 hour 4 min and 20 sec. Don't you wish that you could travel that quickly? So cool. There was also the space section where they had all kinds of satellites that were once up in space and an actual shuttle. Pretty neat. They also had a portable planetarium. Very beautiful. The girls loved it. There was an actual space suit out on display and you could touch it and put on the gloves. Zoey was very afraid of this "spaceman". She didn't want anything to do with it. The kids did great. There were a couple of meltdowns ( I've got 2 girls, I was happy with the amount) one was while we were waiting to go on the elevator to go to the observation tower, Zoey just freaked for a bit and we let her. She was on the ground, face down, and the she proceeded to lick the floor!! Disgusting and slightly embarrassing since we had an audience. Needless to say that she now has a cold.

Here's the blackbird! Very sleek looking huh?

See how Zoey won't even look at the suit?

Wow, it's been a while!

I was just going through my blog and I noticed that it has been a lllllloooooonnnnnnnngggggg time since I last blogged. Man, facebook makes me lazy! It's just so easy to post something quickly on there and have everyone know right then and there. But I'm going to try and do something here more often. So there has been halloween, thanksgiving, christmas, a birthday and new years since I last blogged... Since I live so far from most family we didn't really do anything.

• Halloween we went trick or treating with some friends from church.

• Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve was at Aunt Dani's house, which was AMAZING!! It is just such a blessing to be able to spend those wonderful holidays with this family. P.S. I made the shirts! Aren't they adorable?

• Zoey turned 2!! My big girl. She is just the sweetest, chubbiest, most loving little girl. She LOVES to give snuggles. She loves her big sister and would do everything she wants to do. She's already completely potty trained (I know it's crazy). She brings so much joy in our lives. Kids sure are wonderful.

• Josh had to work New Year's, but the girls and I were invited to our friends house to bring in the new year and it was a blast. The kids even stayed up the whole time!!

So those are the past things that I didn't really blog about, but deserve mentioning. Ginger LOVES going to school. Last week school was closed for most of the week because of the snow and Ginger didn't like that one bit! Especially since pajama day was that week. But she got to do it on Monday. She loved wearing her pj's to school.

Austin is living with us and we love having him. Especially the girls. They love their Gunkel! And we love having a live in babysitter. ;)

I'm active in church again. Which is wonderful. I now teach the CTR 7 class (7yr olds) last year I taught the 9-11 yr olds. They are so sweet. I also play church basketball and I love it. It feels good to "work out" at least once week. We might start doing some Zumba on fridays to get an extra work out in the week.

Josh and I are doing great. We love living in Virginia and have loved exploring all of our surroundings and enjoyed getting to know the Kynaston Clan (who are one of the most amazing families EVER). But we feel a change a coming. I don't have the details, which is frustrating. But prayers for guidance and clarity for us would be more than welcome.