A Moment of Self-Reflection

The other night Doug and I were playing a game (with his

Happy Be-lated Easter

Nowadays, it seems like Easter is recognized as the holiday of bunnies, eggs, candy, and an excuse to stuff ourselves with really good food (ham, cheesy potatoes, homemade rolls, deviled eggs - YUM!!). I just want to take a moment to express my appreciation for the real reason we celebrate this holiday - Jesus Christ. I am grateful for the magnificent sacrifice that was made so that I would have the chance to be forgiven of my many mistakes. I am thankful for the example that Jesus Christ set of love, faith, forgiveness, and selflessness. "The Savior, the Son of God, lives. He knows our hearts and loves us. He has compassion and desires to bless us."* Whether your day was spent with family and/or friends, in church, not at church, at home or in a hotel room, we hope that everyone had a wonderful and fabulous Easter celebration.
As a side note, here are some pictures of the pre-Easter Egg hunt the girls had while in Fallbrook, as well as the one they got to participate in with some of their cousins.

Fun Times in California

As promised earlier, here are the pictures from our trip. Since there turned out to be a lot of them (more than I remember taking), I split them up into different slideshows so that no one feels like they have to sit and view them all in one sitting. Pace yourselves, people...pace yourselves.

Fun at the SD Zoo, Park, and Beach

Fun in Fallbrook, CA

Fun at the SD Temple and Afterward at the Wedding Reception

Fun Times in California

As promised, here are the pictures we took while in California. Since there turned out to be a lot of pictures (more than I remembered taking), I split them up into slideshows so that no one feels like they have to sit and go through all of them in one sitting. Pace yourselves, people...pace yourselves.

Fun at the SD Zoo, Park, and Beach

Fun in Fallbrook, CA

Fun at the SD Temple and Wedding Reception

Fun Times

As promised, here are some slideshows of the pictures we took while in California. Since there turned out to be a lot of pictures, I figured I would break them up so no one feels obligated to go through them all in one sitting. Pace yourself people...pace yourself.

Fun at the Zoo, Park, and Beach

Fun in Fallbrook, CA

Fun at the San Diego Temple and Wedding Reception

California Fun

As promised, here are some pictures from our trip to California

Picture

Home again, home again...

...Jiggity jig. Or maybe, instead of jiggity jig it should be bloggety blog?

We made it back safely from our two week excursion to California. We had a blast, and now I get to take the time to catch everyone up on the events (and pictures) of our trip. It may take a little bit (especially since I can never find the adapter stick for our camera memory card when I need it), but I promise to soon have our site updated with all the fun happenings of the wedding, visiting family, the zoo, the beach, and beautiful California.

Two Little Shadows

The girls have officially entered the "copycat" stage, which is something my doctor has assured me is entirely normal for every toddler and usually precedes the "why?" stage. For the past few weeks, it seems that everything I do, say, and mumble is picked up on and mimicked by either AK or Roo. It's mildly entertaining to me, but the two of them seem to get a kick out of it - in fact, they think it is down right hilarious to act as my echo...echo......echo.......echo.......

Ahhhh...the memories of childhood games of copy cat are flooding back ("Hi!" "Hi" What do you want to do today? "What do you want to do today?" "I asked you first" "I asked you first" Why are you copying me?" "Why are you copying me?" "Mom, Tommy's copying me!" "Mom, Tommy's copying me!" "Stop it!!" "Stop it!!").

At least as a parent, I can value these current games of shadowing as a much-needed reminder to be aware of what I say and how I say it. It's not like I usually curse or swear or release profanities, the content of my speech is generally safe and guarded; I guess it just means that lately I have been much more cautious of my tone and volume and my facial expressions. Right now, the last things I want to teach the girls are sarcasm, rudeness, or insincerity. They'll have the rest of their lives to learn that, and the rest of the world to learn it from. I guess, my now overly-cautious verbiage is another attempt to keep my girls sweet and innocent for just a little while longer.

Hallelujah!

Today, AK ventured into the brave new world of fresh fruits and tried her first apple. Now, this might not seem like much, especially since she is 27 months old and should be well accustomed to fresh fruit by now, but many of you know how difficult it has been to get AK to eat much of anything other than goldfish and graham crackers. As far as fruit is concerned, AK has always been weirded out by the texture, so the only way I could get her to any fruit was to serve up the freeze-dried variety. It's not that I haven't tried, believe me - many a good piece of fruit has been wasted in my attempt to get AK converted to the joys of freshness. Just as I was almost the point of giving up, my little girl amazed me by willingly eating an apple today.

It probably seems silly that something so little could make me so happy. I guess it just goes to show that it really is the small things in life that make us the happiest!