Survival Food

This is called "Survival Food."

Thank you Nicky for introducing me to this sweetness. 😍

I love you for it.

Seriously. ❤

Mummy and Ghouls Night Out

So how do we look for a 20 minute costume creation while finding costumes in all of the chaos of our move?

Not Bad!!! Not bad at all MY DEER! ;)

 Kambriella and I enjoyed some much needed time together at Kambriella's "Mummy and Ghouls Night Out" for Activity Days!

 We ate the most delicious food, visited with friends, got our pictures taken, and did some crafting too.

 We colored and baked shrinky dinks and made them into magnets and key-chains, decorated sugar cookies, and ATE those yummy sugar cookies too! :)

 Kambriella is quite the artist and so fun to be around, and I really enjoyed my night with her...we stayed quite a while and really enjoyed our time together.

Thanks MY DEER for being such a sweetheart and so full of spunk and enthusiasm for life! 

I LOVE YOU!

Welcome Friends

 The neighbors have been welcoming us and spoiling us with treats!

 Ooey gooey brownies and rice krispy treats (that all the young helpers gobbled up!) and loads of fun things for the new move in...

 Sweet friends and helpers making the work load light...

 ...and a beautiful cluttered mess of things to be organized!!! Oh the fun of moving!!! :)

The Primary Program

 Yesterday was our very favorite sacrament meeting of the entire year!!!

The Primary Program!

 Kambriella and Kesslyn both sang their testimonies and said their parts beautifully. My favorite song that they sang was " I'll Be What I Believe" and I felt the spirit so strong. My heart swelled with joy...and I loved watching Kesslyn's little hands trying to do the sign language for "Love One Another." 

So sweet. :)

 We also ate dinner at our friends house, and then on our way home, we stopped by the old house and said hello to some neighbors who were out on a walk, and then the kids all played in the leaves. Including Wonder Woman there... yep. :) 

We went home and had "Come Follow Me" followed by an aluminum foil ball war with cookie sheets as our "shields of faith."

It was a good night and I'm so grateful to call this new place "home" because that's truly what it already feels like to me...home. :)

All Is Safely Gathered In

 Last night around midnight, and after a long day of moving, this was what my family room looked like overlooking the balcony...Clint and I had worked so hard all day, and then went to a regional leadership conference for the church where they taught us about being inspired and committed to learning and teaching in our families "Come Follow Me."

I can honestly say that I have been feeling this way for a long time.

With the move into this new home, and the natural opportunity to establish "righteous traditions and patterns," it has seemed only natural to me to commit this home as a dedicated place of learning, living, and loving the gospel. And together with the Lord on our side, that is what we are going to do.

 As we tucked each of the children into their beds for the night, I felt so much peace and so grateful for the opportunities and blessings that I have been given.

 We had gone out to dinner after our meeting, and then when we got home, we made everyone's beds and then gathered together to discuss what we had learned at our conference, and also to discuss our feelings and gratitude for what we would do and how we would live in our home. 

I will work each day to literally have the walls of our home be seeping with love and the spirit of the Lord.

 After our discussion as a family and reading our scriptures together, we had our first family prayer and it felt so right.

Everyone was so eager to sleep and so it came easily for everyone. Of course as I wandered the house after everyone was asleep, I thought to myself, "Yes, all is safely gathered in."...and again, everything just felt so right.

 Then, as Clint and I crawled into bed with our exhausted bodies, I was once again overcome with so much gratitude...for this family, for my Savior and my loving Heavenly Father who definitely knows how to give good gifts to His children...but most of all for this sweet and amazing man that I get to spend eternity with.

Clint, I love you so much and love how much you care for me and our family.

I could never do this alone, and YOU are so important to me.

Thank you for loving me and spoiling me, and for working so hard for our family. I love you so much and look forward to each morning waking up next to you. 

Let's do this forever. :)

Moving Day!

 It's moving day!!!

After cleaning last night, packing for the last month, and loading trailers ALL day long...

We are finally moving into our new home!!!

It's beautiful and I am so humbled and full of gratitude.

This is going to be good!

:)

Don't Forget to Make the Cinnamon Rolls!

 The other day I was walking through my house, and I started seeing all of these pictures hanging up everywhere...

 If you notice on each picture there is a similar circular swirly pattern on all of them...

 There was one hanging in the kitchen, one on the garage door, one on the silverware drawer, one on the wall by the front door, and one on the fridge!

So, what did I do?? 

I found Kesslyn and asked her about these beautiful pictures that she had drawn...

 And do you know what she said???

"Mommy, these are cinnamon rolls, and you need to make them! Don't forget to make them!"

I was DYING!!!

This sweet little girl had been asking me for days to make cinnamon rolls, and with my kitchen all packed up, I had nothing to make them with! BUT, with her constant reminders and cute little drawings to remind me to "make the cinnamon rolls" I just HAD to make it happen!

 So, sure enough, on the morning we were closing on our new home and Clint was home to help me, I found a container of orange rolls in the fridge, and a small metal pie pan, and Clint had those rolls baked just in time for a yummy breakfast before school! :)

 This little girl was SO happy and she LOVED the rolls!!! (Even though they were orange rolls and not just cinnamon rolls...) All of the kids were happy for that matter! Those rolls were gone in about 5 minutes flat!

And now, I can't wait for the next time that I will start seeing these little swirly drawings start to appear! Or maybe better yet, I should just make the rolls without needing the reminder! When a simple pleasure like this makes a little girl so happy, then it's worth the tiny bit of effort and planning to make that happen.

I am grateful my children are so sweet and loving and patient with their busy and sometimes forgetful momma...and I'm so grateful that simple pleasures like these can so easily brighten someone's day!

Thank you Kesslyn for the sweet reminders of not only cinnamon rolls, but of my most important role in taking good and loving care of my family!!!