Princess Spaghetti and the Leaf King -

Blogged by JME

I love kids! I love their excitement, their hunger for learning, their innocence. They say the darnedest things, show unconditional love, and forgive without another blink of an eye. What an example they are! Aside from my little one, my nieces and nephews are the most special to me. Watching them be born and immediately start learning, growing, and developing has been amazing to me. I've had fun watching them become who they are now and am excited to see who they become as they grow older.

 

Recently, we had Pookie and her family over for spaghetti dinner. I loved watching Jocy waltz into my house with her Rapunzel dress on. When I asked who she was, she confidently told me, "I'm Rapunzel," and with her imagination, she really is Rapunzel when she wears that dress. You can see by her face that she enjoyed her plate of spaghetts very much. Sometimes, I wish I could dress up like a princess and eat spaghetti to my hearts content, not worrying if I have it smeared all over my face, and when someone asks me who I am, I can say with confidence, "I'm a princess!"

 

 

 

 

I had a really great time last month when Skunk came over to my house to help me rake the leaves.  He was such a wonderful raker, and I was surprised at how much help he really was.  Of course, raking leaves isn't just about work.  You got to have some fun with it, right?

After working so hard to rake a huge pile of leaves, Skunk takes a little break.  I can see that he's eyeballing the pile, trying to figure out the best way to take it. 

"Tell me when to go," he yells to me.

On your mark, get set, go!  His face is lit up as he runs for the huge pile of leaves he just neatly finished raking. 

 

I love his face in this above picture as he leaps into his pile of hard work.  This is what childhood is about, ladies and gentlemen, finding joy in the simple things. 

 

Wow!  That was super duper fun!!!  I want to do that again!

Just gotta just fix my pile here . . .

One . . . Two . . . Three . . . Go!

Who knew leaves could provide so much fun for one afternoon. 

My favorite Skunk comment of the day came after we had raked and bagged all of the leaves.  He said, "That was so much fun!  We should save these leaves and when Christmas comes, we can dump them out and do this again."  He then proceeded to try to get the bags of leaves into my house so we could 'save' them. 

I love having the example of these wonderful children.  I can see why our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love them so much.  I look to them as I try to follow the words of King Benjamin when he taught his people to become as a child, "submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.  Mosiah 3:19"

Election Day - Blogged by N8 and JME

We wanted to use this funny video to remind everyone to use their God given right and vote today. 

If you want to sing along, here are the lyrics: 

I'm standing in a pimento shower.

I wanted the music first.

In the tragic square of the fresh prince

there won a perfect brown baby.

 

The guards can see we're all out of weapons.

No machetes.

Lotion raw bruises,

Lotion raw bruises.

 

Drink or sip.

A wench at our hotel.

Both government anchoves

when they laugh at you you'll drown

 

Eye of the Sparrow.

This girl slipped on my arrow.

Happy Halloween - Blogged by JME

I'm a few days late in getting this post out but better late than never.  Our little family had a fun Halloween.  N8 and I probably enjoyed it a little more than June Bug.  I'm sure she wondered why we were cutting holes into big orange round things and why we put her in a red and black outfit with so much padding and a hood that kept falling down over her eyes so she couldn't see.  She also may have questioned why so many people were coming to our door and why daddy kept running up the stairs to start the fog machine each time the doorbell rang.  She did have a blast though.  Maybe she loved watching us run around or maybe she was picking up our excitement.  Whatever it was, though, while we cleaned the kitchen after our yummy chili dinner and handed out candy to the trick or treaters, she sat in her yellow bird bouncy that Aunt Pookie gave her and kicked her legs and squealed over and over again, her face lit up in a huge grin!

Bug and Skunk spent Halloween with their dad this year, so they came over super early to see June Bug and get their picture taken in all of their Halloween gear.  As you can see, both Bug and Skunk were Ninjas and sure played the part well.   

N8 carved both his and June Bug's pumpkin this year.  I carved my own.  I tried to be creative and carved a mouse using two tops for the ears from some other pumpkins we had gutted, baked, and pureed to freeze for pumpkin pies this year.  I got a lot of complements.  Some told me they loved our Mickey Mouse pumpkin (I'm glad they could tell I was trying for a mouse) and others said they loved our Tigger pumpkin. 

 

Tigger?  Or mouse?  What do you think it looks like? 

June Bug only went to one house this year, but we picked the right one.  This is my neighbor and friend.  She serves with me in the Primary Presidency at church.  Unbeknownst to us, they were giving out full sized candy bars and she was so nice and let me and N8 each pick out a candy for "June Bug." 

 

 

N8 picked a Mounds chocolate bar and I picked out the peanut M&Ms.  Lucky for us, we have the sweetest little one who loves to share, especially her Halloween Candy.  She let N8 and I have all of hers this year.

 

We hope everyone had a wonderful and safe Halloween!