Arizona Forever

Nursing blanket clips

2012-02-15T21:41:00.000-07:00

I see clips to make any blanket into a nursing cover, they range anywhere in cost from $5 to $30. I started thinking about how nice it would be to have them but I didn't want to spend the money on it. I looked for clips to make my own, but I didn't really find anything. Until I found a set of sheet straps at the grocery store. I paid about $4 for a set of 4. Sure they don't have some ultra cute fabric covering them, but it works. Since there are 4 in a pack I have extras to keep in the diaper bag, the car, my house... I could always cover it if I really wanted the cute fabric.

Twins- 6 months!

2012-02-15T21:25:00.000-07:00

Its crazy that our girls are now 6 months old. They are rolling around, pushing themselves up, getting ready to crawl any day now. They are too cute. They still look really identical. But we don't know if they are identical. It drives my mom crazy that when people ask I don't just say "they are identical". Instead I answer "we think they are identical." If they ask anything else then they get the explanation.

Happy Birthday ARIZONA!!! 100 YEARS!

2012-02-14T09:06:00.000-07:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY MOST FAVORITE STATE!!!

100 YEARS OF BEING AN AWESOME STATE OF THE UNION TO LIVE IN!

100 YEARS OF BEING ARIZONA TOUGH!

by the way have I ever mentioned I'm a 5th generation born ARIZONIAN?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Goldfield Train Outing

2012-02-12T08:47:00.000-07:00

On the way out to Goldfield, we stopped at a museum park, walked around and took some photos of toddlers.

the toddlers had a ton of fun running around,

playing on the stagecoach, wagons,

pretending they are in jail.

When we got to Goldfield, Sara and her children met us. We bought the tickets to ride the train and had a half hour to burn before the next train ride.

The train rides extremely SLOW around the old western town. It takes about 20 minutes.

I almost think my son was more entertained by watching the train rather than riding the train.

The toddlers loved it. They were so happy to be there.

That evening all my son would talk was "the train". The next morning he begged me to go back to see the train, but it was time to go home not take another outing to the train.

NammaNamma

2012-02-11T22:30:00.001-07:00

My sister and mom gave the girls apple slices to nam on. While Rose got the concept of namming, Nellie sucked on it as though it was a pacifier. Considering that neither of them have any teeth yet they did really well with their apple slices.

2012-02-11T08:20:00.001-07:00

My Uncle Dave passed away Jan 25.

The funeral was that weekend. I hadn't planed on us going back up to my parents again so quickly but it was what was needed.

My uncle was a man who loved serving people. He loved to see others in good health and smiling.

He was a convert to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He never served a mission himself, but he was one of the best examples of a member missionary I've ever known. He loved to share what brought him joy in his life with EVERYONE he could.

There were lots of family in town that came to remember and be my uncle. Here is my Aunt Tammy and my Uncle Jim hold my twins.

Here is my Aunt LeeAnn with the girls.

The last photo is my Aunt LeeAnne and Uncle Richard. It was good seeing all the family and spending time in Mesa. Now it is really going to be a bit of time before we go back up to Mesa.

Jeanne came to dinner

2012-02-10T08:12:00.001-07:00

My friend Jeanne and her son came over for dinner.

I made cilantro chicken served on brown rice.

Our boys enjoyed playing and we enjoyed having adult conversation.

the Count Down

2012-02-09T09:52:00.002-07:00

My husband is coming home.

Not forever yet, but for r&r.

We made a chain to count us down to seeing daddy again.

Matching Swimsuits for Matching girls

2012-02-08T22:09:00.000-07:00

I found these matching swimsuits, almost more leotards than swimsuit.

They were so cute we had to do a photo shoot with the twins.

two darling girls

They actually rolled and around and smiled and cooed. All while its in the middle of winter.

the size on these suits are 12 months- yet they fit my almost 6 months old right now.

I guess I'm going to need to purchase a new swimsuit for actual swim season.

I doubt these suits will still fit come May.

bubble Bath

2012-02-08T21:50:00.001-07:00

Jan 21

"I have a beard- just like daddy"

Al has discovered the fun of playing with the bubble during bath time. He had fun making beards for himself and showing me that he can be just like daddy. Cute stuff.

Talking to Daddy

2012-02-07T11:25:00.000-07:00

With daddy deployed we only have Skyping.

Everyday we look forward to his call. We

gather around the computer to talk to him.

WE LOVE YOU!!

Getting Organized

2012-02-07T09:34:00.004-07:00

I've been all about organizing. It all started with putting the Christmas stuff away and trying to get it to fit and be organized. I then started organizing some things in my closet. From there I wanted to organize my cupboards. I have been frustrated with our cupboards. thave ey are narrow width, narrow depth, and very tall with only three shelves. I end up with a TON of unused space. Over the 3 years we've lived in this house I have slowly been trying to *cheap* solutions to my unused space.

First I have been collecting the containers of the Costco brand Kirtland Signature Chocolate Covered Raisins and Almonds. They are all so useful. I pulled them all out. The flour container is from the Costco brand Kirtland Signature Animal Crackers. I put in the smaller containers: long grain rice, lentils, cracked wheat berries, and whole flax. I have a goal to use more whole, unprocessed grains. I figure if they are handier I'll be more likely to use them.

My husband wants to save jars for various uses, but in the mean time they are taking up a TON of space and leaving a TON of unused space. I cut out hard cardboard to create a second shelf. All of these use to take up two shelves and a half. Yeah I have shelf space again.

I did the same with these awesome 60's glasses. They use to take up a bunch of space in the back of this shelf. These cups are just awesome but not for everyday use. To store them I used the cardboard to stack the smaller cups on top of the larger cups.

Spice cupboard. This is metal stack-able shelves.

I had multiple boxes of fiber bars. I decided to combine them all into one box. Cut a whole in the bottom side, taped the side closed.

I had a bunch of boxes of Jello and pudding. I took the long heavy cardboard boxes (granola bar and fruit snack boxes from Costco). I organized in the box according to type and flavor.

Cut up this box as a tea bag dispenser. I've had the boxes in there. One box for each type and it was a mess.

Would you be interested in how I made it.

I used the gallon ziploc bag box. Four types fit across, and the height is the same as a tea box.

FIRST:

measure out the four sections, and cut lips out for each section.

SECOND:

cut out the back side on three sides and tape up the ziploc punch out door.

THIRD:

Measure out cardboard for the inside dividers. Make them the same height and depth of the box. You'll need three of them.

FORTH:

Tape, I used packing tape, the board standing up on your divider markers inside the box.

FIFTH:

Place tea bag packages inside box in the dividers. Close the box, tape the top on the punch out lip. It will be just enough to hold it closed so that it can stand up without falling out the back.

SIXTH:

Place labels on front above each cut out lip so that you don't have to pull out a bag to know which flavor is which row.

5 months

2012-02-05T11:22:00.000-07:00

My girls are getting so big.

They are now 5 months old.

4 1/2 months

2012-02-03T11:21:00.001-07:00

2 Jan 2012

4 1/2 months

Look how big the twins are getting.

Christmas Day 2011

2012-02-02T11:05:00.000-07:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS, even if it is late.

Christmas morning we went to church at 8:30am. Then we came home and opened a few presents.

We took a break while my brothers' went to their ward.

The girls were so adorable in their plaid taffeta Christmas dresses.

Happy birthday Uncle Rex. As the norm we had a birthday/ holiday gathering for Rex and for Grandmother Dorothy.

My parents had a full house. Lots of family and many more friends. Rex is such a popular kid and every year his Christmas Night Birthday party is very well attended.

Merry Christmas

Christmas Eve

2012-02-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

We tried to act out the Christmas Pageant. We thought the children were old enough to do it simply. It didn't last long. Their attention span lasted about 3 verses.

Brunch with Uncle Justin

2012-01-30T10:59:00.000-07:00

Uncle Justin met us for brunch at Denny's.

This was the first time he got the opportunity to hold the girls.

Framed it

2012-01-29T09:47:00.000-07:00

When we were married my husband told me we wanted this map from his Grandpa in IA.

Its not as old as it looks. Its circa 1967.

In Feb 2009 we brought it home from IA with us.

In September I took it to a framing place and had it framed.

I wanted a frame that made the whole thing look older. Old looking frames

are not cheap. But I figured that it was going to go up in our home for

many years, making sure the quality we wanted was there.

In December I finally got it up on our wall.

Temple Lights

2012-01-27T09:42:00.000-07:00

For FHE on the Monday after Thanksgiving we went to see the Mesa Temple Lights as a whole family.

It was cold. We made sure we each had a coat and we went out to participate in a holiday tradition.

Our children were all thrilled to be around so many Christmas Lights. I learned that all my hard work trying to teach my son colors hasn't been in vain. He was pointing out all the colors and telling me what color lights they were.

To Decorate or Not to Decorate

2012-01-26T09:26:00.000-07:00

Since we were going to my parents I wasn't going to decorate.

Then I realized that, if we didn't decorate our tree my son

wouldn't get to decorate a tree this year.

I felt guilty denying him of this holiday activity. I gave in and put up the top 2/3

of our Christmas tree. I didn't put any of our decorations on the tree that

are even sightly breakable.

Al really enjoyed himself putting it up.

He wanted to put more and more and more on the tree.

I had to stop him and put away the rest of the

ornaments so he couldn't put more on the tree.

Proud Grandparents

2012-01-25T21:05:00.001-07:00

We've been spending a lot of time up with my parents.

These pictures were taken Nov 20th.

My parents are so happy being grandparents of twins. They love their girls so much.

They love all their grandchildren.

Every time we leave to go back home, they are asking when are we coming back.

Fall Fair

2012-01-24T08:58:00.000-07:00

My nephew's school was having a fund raiser fall fair. They do it every year. This is his first year at the school and our first time going. It was before Thanksgiving, I'm still playing catch up on my blog posts

Grandpa and Grandma came too. The biggest hit of the fall fair was the "train" cars ride and the balloon swords.

Five Kids in the Car

2012-01-23T08:52:00.000-07:00

My sister and her two children went for a drive with us for the afternoon.

These cousins love being cousins and spending time together.

Thankful Wreaths

2012-01-21T08:41:00.000-07:00

We invited our play group over to make 'thankful wreaths'.

They wreaths turned out really cute. Al was proud of his wreath.

How did we make it?

Supplies:

construction paper
paper plate
scissors
glue
crayons

How: Cut the middle out of the paper plate. Find a leaf or a leaf on the internet. Use it to trace leaves on the construction paper. Glue cut out leaves around the edge of the place. Write with crayon things you're thankful for on the leaves.

Seeing the Muppets

2012-01-19T21:25:00.000-07:00

Thanksgiving weekend we went to see The Muppets with my siblings.

This was the third movie we've taken my son to see. Each time we've gone to a movie

I start worrying if he's going to handle sitting in the theater well.

My son started to get wiggly about an hour 15 min into the movie.

We kept him and my niece quite by feeding them fruit snacks.

Its the same method I use in church when it gets really bad.

We loved The Muppets!!!!!

Love Loved Loved the MUPPETS

go see it!!

My family are huge Muppet fans.

We loved this movie, we have been

singing the songs

quoting the movie

and

talking about it

ever since seeing it.

Thanksgiving Day

2012-01-19T20:41:00.000-07:00

Grandma Campbell made sure that she got some pictures of the girls before we all sat down for dinner. Grandma is always behind her awesome camera.

After dinner Al played with the stroller with his cousins.

There was a ton of yummy food and lots of family down in Casa Grande.

Uncle Rex's new car

2012-01-19T20:32:00.000-07:00

Uncle Rex bought his first car November 21st. Its a Honda.

Way to go Rex!!

Fall in Arizona (it feels like winter)

2011-11-16T10:44:00.000-07:00

Happy Fall

This is not Arizona fall weather. This is Utah fall weather. We are freekin' COLD. I have turned on my heater. We have snow on our mountains. And I have to bundle up my children to do anything. Its been this way for a week now. I am cold. November in Arizona is suppose to be cool enough that you can start to ware pants, but still warm enough that you can ware pants if you want to. NOT suppose to be so cold that pants are requite and so are closed toe shoes and long sleeves.

This was one of the warmer days we've been having.

Yes its nice not to be in the 100's anymore. And the snow on the mountains are beautiful. And this area really really needs the rain and the snow.... but I'm just cold. Its too early. We are still in Fall and this is Winter weather.

Nightmare Mayor Costume

2011-11-15T05:00:00.001-07:00

As I said in the previous post, I love to make and design costumes. My brother came to me wanting to be the Mayor from the motion picture "Nightmare before Christmas" He had already decided to just ware his suit, get a spider for the tie and find a red ribbon, but he needed the hat. I designed how to make it and made it for him.

Here is how we made it:

2 Styrofoam cones tips cut off and glued thin ends together.
2 polyester witches' hats
~ 1ft of grey/silver duck tape

it turned out AWESOME.

Fairy Godmother Costume

2011-11-14T07:00:00.004-07:00

My friend Amanda, wanted a fairy godmother costume to go with her daughter's costume of Cinderella. She asked me about making one because she knows I sew. I would totally love to make it. I love making costumes. My husband and I have discussed actually advertising the fact that I do custom costumes.

How we made it?

1 pattern for a Jedi hooded robe (cut on fold so that it was closed)
1 large old blue king size sheet
2 yards of pink fabric

My favorite part is that I used a Jedi costume pattern to make it. Cut the outside from the blue sheet and the lining from the pink. We didn't line the whole thing just the sleeves and the hood. Then we made a waist belt tie to give it more shape. Looked awesome. thanks Amanda for giving me that chance. I've missed doing sewing.

Train! Historic UP844 travels though SE Arizona

2011-11-14T00:18:00.000-07:00

Thursday 10Nov2011

we went up to Benson to see Union Pacific Historic Steam Engine train 844. It pulled into the train stop and blew its whistle. It was huge and LOUD. My son hid behind me and covered his ears every time the whistle blew. At first I worried that he was scared of the train and I had now ruined trains for him from here on out but that wasn't the case, it made him love trains more as my husband put it he realized the "awesome power" that a train is. He love it.
We only got to see the train for about 15 minutes and it was totally worth the 45 minute drive to Benson.

Friday 11Nov2011-Happy Veteran's day (THANK-YOU TO ALL TO SERVE OUR COUNTRY)

My in-laws and my family drove to Tucson to see the train again. It was on display all day in the Union Pacific train yards. We first went to Michaels and JoAnn Fabrics. Then met up with my sister's family at the train yard. This time the train wasn't on. It wasn't blowing its whistle. But instead they had stairs up to the cab so that turns could be taken in looking into the cab. You could also walk all the way around and stay as long as you like
All this for FREE. Besides the gas to get to the train this did not cost us a thing.
If you'd like to learn more about the UP844's journey from WY looping through CO,TX,NM,AZ,CA,NV,UT and back to WY check out the following website.

http://www.up.com/aboutup/special_trains/steam/details.shtml

Happy Halloween

2011-11-13T23:27:00.002-07:00

Happy Halloween

We had a long Halloween time. We went to my sister's ward's Trunk or Treat/Fall Festival on Wend. night, Friday was my parent's Trunk or Treat. Saturday we went to the Balloon Festival (that was suppose to have trick or treating so my son wore his Sparky costume), then Monday we went to my mother-in-law's office party cubical to cubical trick or treating. That evening we went to Aunt and Uncle and Grandma and Granpop's and we were done.

Little Al was "Sparky" the ASU Sun Devil mascot.

My sister's family did a Star Wars theme, with her husband as Darth Vader, she was Padame, her son was Luke Skywalker, and her daughter was Leia.

My son was totally interested in this candy thing. This year he got that he was getting candy, but I don't think I got him to actually say "trick or treat" to someone even once.

Love this photo. Grandpa is trying to talk Princess Leia out of her Almond Joy (he says he wanted to give it to Grandma)

My original costume idea didn't work out the costume as designed on the pattern looked HORRIBLE on me. So I only used part of it and said I was a Woods Nymph. We had fall flowers and leaves coming out of every part of my hair.

My girls went as "Salt and Pepper" Rose was Salt and Nellie was Pepper.

They were just too darn cute! Wish I could say I made Little Al's "Sparky" costume, I purchase it 2nd hand from someone who had made it for their 2 yr old. I made my costume. I made the girl's hats, they are just knit and I found a pattern online. But their onsies and tights I bought.

Happy Halloween

Figure it out and move on with life

2011-11-13T22:56:00.000-07:00

Life doesn't stop. You can't just sit in your house and wait for your children to grow up. There are still things that need to get done and things to go out and do. Life lately has been about finding things that work for me as a mother of a toddler and twin new born girls.

I am grateful for the double universal car seat stroller that we were given and the Moby wrap that someone gave us. Without those two things I don't think leaving my house I could be functional.

I meet people all the time who say that they have no idea how I'm doing this, or are in awe that I'm brave enough to leave my house. My answer is almost always something to the effect of "well life doesn't stop, so I had to figure it out and move on with life."

Singing time Idea: Singing Mustaches

2011-10-24T00:07:00.000-07:00

My friend made these for her son's birthday party and I thought about how if I was still the Primary chorister that I would totally use these one Sunday.
how they're made:
foam sheets, trace or draw various mustaches.
Cute them out. glue to popsicle sticks.

There you are, go have fun and be creative.

Fall Wreath

2011-10-16T22:25:00.000-07:00

I'm not a crafty person. You may disagree with me but craftiness is not a first or second or even third nature to me. I always look at other people crafts and think I wish I could be crafty like that.

A friend of mine posted this link on her facebook page

I used the same looping idea they used, but I looped multiple times. Instead of the Glue Dots I used Styrofoam glue to connect the fabric to the Styrofoam. If you want to make such a thing I recommend the Glue Dots, the Styrofoam glue took forever to dry and it took forever to glue it. The Glue Dots make it quick and easy. I just was lazy not wanting to go to the store to get them.

I wanted to make my wreath a fall wreath. So I can put it up as soon as fall starts and leave it up until right after Thanksgiving.

I love Fall

Cloth Diaper Photoshoot (2months)

2011-10-16T22:03:00.000-07:00

I only have 2 diapers that fit my babies well. I wanted to take some cute pictures of them wearing their cloth. I'm no photographer. In fact these pictures are comical to me.

Rose

Rose on the left and Nellie on the right.

We can tell them apart by Rose's birthmark on her left eyelid. Its the only way we know for sure on how to tell the difference.

I laugh every time I look at this photo.

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look at my darling babies.

Al's New Hat

2011-10-16T21:45:00.000-07:00

Al found this hat at Crismon's Baby Boutique in Mesa (on Stapley). It was so cute and he loves hats so much- I just couldn't deny him. Even though the hat is a bit small on him. He wants to ware it all the time. It looks like the "UP" hat. Its adorable.

Breastfeeding in Australia

2011-09-20T11:48:00.000-07:00

Breastfeeding in Australia: This is a combination of a praise and a rant.

I met a lady at the park the other day. She is from Australia, has twin fraternal girls who are almost two and a half. She husband is on a exchange program through the Australian army with our Army. They have lived here about a year and a half.

We were talking about caring for twins and tips and stuff. I said that I decided when getting home from the hospital that I had to figure out the feeding them at the same time thing and how it would have never been possible without the twin nursing table I have. She agreed. The nursing table is wonderful. She then started ranting on how the United States is so NOT breastfeeding friendly. How people scowl at you if you feed in public, even when you're covered. Most of all she hates that there are no public Mother's nursing rooms in the United States. She said that in Australia its is super breastfeeding friendly. That almost every public building has a Mother's Nursing Room that you can use at anytime. That public nursing is encouraged and no one bats an eye at you. She talked about how ever since Australia went to a public health program it has instituted policies to encourage breastfeeding, make it easier for mother's to breastfeed and discourage the use of formula. She said that the attitude is now that you nurse your baby until they are two.

I wish that we had public Mother's Nursing rooms all over the place. My son would never let me cover up. I couldn't, he would cry and scream and flat out refuse to eat if there was anything covering him. I live a good distance south of town. So when I go to town I go for the day and get everything done that I need to. Which meant staying in town to feed my infant. Since I couldn't cover up that meant finding a secluded shaded place to park (which really isn't easy to do in the summer in Arizona) and sitting in my hot car feeding my baby. I had no where to go. Why is it the breastfeeding is so looked down on here in the States? I know there are movements out there trying to raise awareness of how breastfeeding is so much better than formula. That there are more and more hospitals out there trying to encourage nursing and hire Lactation Consultants.

My mom remembers her mother saying that in her day it was looked at as a sign of poverty to breastfeed. Because that meant you were too poor to buy formula. Why is it that so many women just give up on nursing without giving it a good try. Even if you have to suplement, the advantages of nursing are so great- how can you afford not to give that to your baby. I don't understand the hundreds of women who eat healthy and to everything "perfect" during their pregnancy because they want the "best" for their baby, and then buy all the organic expensive stuff afterwards because they want to give their babies the "best". But when it comes down to it the true "BEST" for you baby is the milk that you make for them, yet they don't give that to their baby.

To encourage breastfeeding, Australia has started a number of campaigns. This video is a commercial that they made. Also the Australian Breastfeeding Association rates and gives out award to the best public Mother's rooms out there. That is awesome. On their website you can see what all these places rate.

Top reasons to Breastfeed:

You immune system becomes theirs, if you have had a vaccine or have build immunity to any infection you give them that immunity. With this there is no reason to seclude you and your baby for the first few months of their lives.
If they are ill, your body will be making the antidote. They will get over the illness much faster and build up their own immunity to it faster.
Your body made them, it knows exactly what nutrients their body needs. Your body makes milk designed to be exactly what they need for that stage of their development.
With the exception of a few diet items you may need to change, they will always be able to eat your milk, unlike babies who have problems with various types of formula.
Bonding between you and your baby happens on a level that just doesn't happen with bottles
Your hormones are better balanced when you breastfeed. These hormones will help your body return to "normal" faster.
I'm not a "Mother Nature Knows Best" person. But I am a "Heavenly Father Knows Best" person. I believe that this is how Heavenly Father designed it to work and he designs things best. I believe there is still benefits out there that we don't know about that science may yet uncover.

I wish our country could be more Breastfeeding Friendly like Australia. I don't want the Government to have to get involved. I just wish that people would become enlightened and realize that the "inconvenience" is nothing compared to the benefits. I wish that Breastfeeding would become the norm and formula would become the rare exception. And to accommodate this I wish public places would design in Mother's rooms into their design. Maybe this will become a reality someday, instead of just a dream.

One Month with Twins

2011-09-20T10:28:00.001-07:00

The twins are now a month old. They are both about 8 lbs. You can see the difference is 3 lbs. Their cheeks are getting chubbier, and so are their tummys, arms, and legs. But they are still small for 1 month olds.

A friend of mine had their little baby girl this week, she weighed 8lbs 10oz. I laughingly told her that her "newborn is bigger than either of my one month olds"

We're just doing day to day. The highlight of the day is when we get to talk to daddy though Skype. I'm trying to get them to stay awake more and more during the day so that they will learn to sleep at night. We're doing mostly good with it.

When we left the hospital, they made us rent their carseats because our carseats didn't adjust small enough for how small our girls where when they were born. The photo is of the hospital's carseats- which I have already returned to the hospital. We are now in our own carseats.

I have finally got brave enough to use the Moby wrap to carry both girls at the same time on my person.

I'm grateful to have such a carrier. I finally found some multiple baby carriers online at a Multiples specialty store and it was $130 before shipping for their twins carrier. Also the twin nursing table I was let has been a blessing too, that too is a 2nd hand item someone gave to me that I don't know how I would live without it.

Al is trying to be a good helper. I'm glad he wants to be a good helper. Its hard sometimes to let him be a helper. After all a 2 year old can physically and attention span wise only do some much.

I've survived so far and I'll continue to figure it out and keep moving on with life.

I have really good kids.

They're Here (Announcing the birth of our Twins)

2011-08-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

Short Story:
Doctor decided I needed to be induced. Checked into the hospital Tues night but due to no room in the inn (labor and delivery), I sat around the hospital until Wen night when at 9pm my doctor broke my water sac on Baby A, presenting baby. Baby A was born at 1:06am. Baby B being breech my doctor was awesome and delivered her fully breech, born 1:10am.

Here is the long story (not for those of you who hate birthing details)
Last Sunday my husband arrived back from his deployment for his RandR. RandR planned to be here for the birth. Due to the distance we live from our doctor and the hospital we were planing to deliver, we went to Tucson to stay for however long it would take. Tuesday morning when we arrived in Tucson I had an NST (nonstress test) and then a doctor's appointment. The NST went well, and so did my doctor's appointment, when the doctor checked me I was dilated to a 6! Not in labor. So we discus that although our hotel is 8 minutes from the hospital, it isn't 8 minutes from the delivery room and if these babies come anywhere near as fast as my son, then we might end up delivering in the hospital lobby. So it was decided that she'd induce me that night, show up at 8pm to the hospital. But by 8pm the hospital was hopping and it was super busy and there were no available beds in Labor and Delivery, but I was considered Pre-Term labor and they put me in a room to wait. In the morning we did an amniocentesis to make sure they were actually ready to come out (SUPER PAINFUL- rather have contractions than that ever again). Their numbers were good so we were a go. Still just waiting on a bed in Labor and Delivery to open up. I was so upset, I felt like a prisoner in the hospital and that they were never going to move me to L and D unless I went into full labor. Finally around 8pm they said there was going to have a bed open. At a few minutes before 9 my doctor broke my water on Baby A. Contractions started, but even after 2 hours I hadn't progresses a ton. After a lengthy discussion I finally gave into a low low dose of Oxytocin. This really kicked the contractions into gear. I was able to stay on top of them, but they were hard and didn't always let up with a break in between. Then the nurse boosted me to a higher dose. This almost made me pass out. I couldn't take it. I started to not be able to breath and my face was flushed. I asked the nurse to lower the does back down. I was so grateful that she complied because I couldn't do those high contractions. After all a woman can only take so much with no pain reliving drugs. At about midnight they wheeled me into the surgery room. Because Baby B was breech they had to be ready in case a c-section was needed. Baby A still wasn't far into the birth canal so we had a lot of pushing to do to get her down and out, born at 1:06am. Then the high risk doctor assisting my doctor was looking at Baby B through the ultra sound, she was telling everyone to prepare for a c-section. My doctor was so awesome. I am so grateful we felt inspired to go with her. She told everyone to hold on, reach up inside, grabbed Baby B's feet, pulled her partial out. Broke her water sac, then reached in again tucked her arms safely down and pulled out the rest of Baby B, born at 1:10am. Wow that was intense on my end but I am so grateful that she was comfortable doing that rather then resorting to a c-section. Awesome.

Welcome back all readers....

We named Baby A, Penelope. And Baby B we named Rosalind. We are going to call Penelope, Nellie, or just P is what our toddler calls her. Rosalind we are going to call Rose. I wanted to call her Roz, but my husband doesn't like Roz, but we were both will to go with Rose. They are new and beautiful and so tiny. The Pediatric nurse who discharged us said that she wouldn't have felt comfortable discharging us if this was my first pregnancy, they would have kept us at the hospital at least until Sunday sometime. But because I was showing I knew what I was doing with nursing and taking care of them she was comfortable sending us home with our babies who were born pre-term at 36 weeks and 2 days. I am so grateful everything worked out well. It was a great stress in my life. Now my stresses can change to learning to take care of two babies at once with a toddler running around.

Daddy's Home

2011-08-08T08:24:00.000-07:00

We had to request Daddy's R and R leave like vacation time so that he could be for the birth of these babies. He got home Sunday late morning. Yeah! We drove to Tucson yesterday morning and picked him up. Came home, he showered and then we went to sacrament meeting as a family for the first time is a little over 3 months. It felt so nice Now my paranoia about having to go though child birth without him can be put to rest. We did have a joke that if these babies came before he made it back then he was relinquishing naming rights to these babies. So now he has all his rights to naming back.
Now that Daddy is home we need these babies to come on their own. I don't want to wait to our induce date, Aug 18 Thursday an induction is scheduled at the hospital. I think that next Monday would be the best day to have these babies.

Friends to Visit

2011-08-08T08:00:00.000-07:00

My roommate from college lives in the New England area. Each summer since they have moved out there they do a long summer road trip stopping in Wisconsin, Utah, and California. Each summer she has talked about coming all the way down south to come see me and my family but the long and the short of it is, my home is too much out of the way. Last summer she decided that no matter what they were making a stop down here. that was also before we knew we were going to be expecting at that time, let alone with two. But the plans were made. After a doctor tried to paranoid me into voluntary bed rest (not entirely sure what he real point was), my sister suggested that I let my friend know my situation and have her cut her plans to come see me. I felt fine about it and figured if they only stay a couple days it was still better than nothing.

They stayed from Tues to Saturday and it was fine. Our children got along great! My son would even still take his naps and go to bed on time. Two things that never happen when his cousins come to visit. We spend a lot of that week at the park, playing outside, and going to the pool. My friend did most of the cooking, not just because she was trying to help out the pregnant woman, but because her daughter is deathly allergic to all milk and dairy products. I never knew dairy was in so many products that you'd never think about. Since I'm Gestational diabetes and she has her milk allergy, we must have been an odd crew when ordering food when we ate out.

I loved having my friend come visit. I felt a little bad taking time away from her family members visiting time. But it was so much fun and I have missed her greatly. I said she was my roommate in college. We have actually be very good friends for much longer than that. We met at BYU music camp when we were 15 years old. We have kept in contact all that time, when we got to college we became roommates, I took classes with her husband (we had the same major), I went to her wedding, and when I finally got married she came out for mine. One Thanksgiving when we were roommates, she came home with me for the holiday break. We learned that my mom and her mom were roommates while young adults. Such a small world.

Thanks for the visit. I really should visit you, but at least for the foreseeable time to come I don't see any road trips in our life.

Baby Shower for Twin Girls

2011-07-26T09:47:00.018-07:00

My mom and sister threw me a baby shower for these twin girls. Everyone must love picking out girl clothes because we were given so many more clothes items then we did with my son. It was going to be a smaller family and close friends shower, but just about everyone came and it was a big group.

Sometimes I forget that when you're inviting just family even we have a huge family then add in a few friends and we have a big group. I wanted to talk to everyone, but it was so busy and I hardly had the time. My sister did a great job planing. She enjoys putting things like this together. She wanted to play some twin games. She came up with two.

The first one was called "Is a twin or has twins" I've pasted it here, see how you would have done:

· Justin Timberlake

· Sarah Jessica Parker

· Elvis Presley

· Shawn Marion

· Singer Duffy

· Celine Dion

· Vin Diesel

· Millionaire tycoon William Randolph Hurst

· Lisa Marie Presley

· Ed Sullivan

· Liberace

· Isabella Rossellini

· Denzel Washington

· Jane Seymore

· Julia Roberts

· Broncos quarterback John Elway

· Mariah Carey

· Mohammad Ail

· Actress Parker Posey

· Actor Andy Garcia

· Eva Green

· Terminator Linda Hamilton

And the answers...

· Justin Timberlake-twin(Laura Katherine, diedafter birth)

· Sarah Jessica Parker-has twin girls, (MarionLoretta and Tabitha)

· Elvis Presley- Twin (Jesse Garon, died atbirth)

· Shawn Marion- twin (sister Shawnette)

· Singer Duffy- Twin (sister katy)

· Celine Dion-has twins (Boys 2010)

· Vin Diesel-twin (Brother Paul Vincent)

· Millionaire tycoon William Randolph Hurst-twin died at birth

· Lisa Marie Presley- has twins(Finley andHarper)

· Ed Sullivan- twin, died in infancy

· Liberace- twin, died in infancy

· Isabella Rossellini- Twin sister (Isotta)

· Denzel Washington- has twins (Malcolm andOlivia)

· Jane Seymore- has twin boys

· Julia Roberts- has twin (Hazel andPhinnaeus)

· Broncos quarterback John Elway- twin brother

· Mariah Carey- has twins (Monroe and Moroccan)

· Mohammad Ail- has twin girls (Jamillah andRasheda)

· Actress Parker Posey- twin (brother Chris)

· Actor Andy Garcia- conjoint twin, brotherdied shortly after removal

· Eva Green- twin sister Joy

· Terminator Linda Hamilton- twin sisterLeslie

How did you do?

The other game she came up with was done on Power Point. She would show a picture and we'd have to guess who the person's famous twin is. Most of them I didn't even know who they were. I'm not up on my current celebrities.

We had a great turn out to the shower.

Thank-you to all who came. I wish I had been able to catch up with each of you.

Uncle Justin and Winnie the Pooh

2011-07-26T08:28:00.003-07:00

The last couple times we've gone up to Phoenix I haven't contacted my brother-in-law. Busy, oversight, forgetfulness, lack of knowing what to do, all are to blame. I don't want him to feel that since my husband isn't around he isn't going to see his nephew. So this trip up I made the effort to contact Uncle Justin and see if he had time to meet us for breakfast or lunch some time. I even threw out there that if he wanted to he could join us in seeing the new Winnie the Pooh movie (came out July 15). He jumped on breakfast and going to the movie. Cool. Saturday July 16th we went to breakfast at Denny's (side note- really diabetic friendly place to eat).
Then after breakfast we went over to the movie theater. My in-laws had given us gift cards to a movie theater in our Christmas stockings our first Christmas. We had used a little on each card over the past 3 years, but never seem to use them because we don't live near the theaters the gift cards are to. So I made a point of us going to one this time, after paying for 2 adults, 1 child, popcorn, water, and soda, it only cost us 3.50. Sweet. Winnie the Pooh was really cute. It was enjoyable for my son, and I really liked that it was cleaver, cute, and done in the traditional Winnie the Pooh style. Yes its not a movie I would choose to go on a date with my husband to or see with my girlfriends, but really enjoyable. My son handled the theater experience really well. The movie itself was only 1 hour and 3 minutes, I don't think he would have done with a much longer movie. We saw CARS 2 on my father-in-law's birthday and I had to take Al out once just for the change of pace. So Pooh was just the right length. Also now he finds stuffed animals of Pooh or pictures of Pooh and holds them up and says "Pooh", you can also prompt him by saying "Winnie the" and he smiles and finished "Pooh"- cute.

We had a good time with Uncle Justin. I didn't think he'd be interested in the movie, but he was interested in getting some Uncle time. I forget that out of my son's uncles (not counting my brother on a mission), Uncle Justin gets the least amount of time with Al and the least amount of quality time. I was glad he had the time to meet up with us and get some uncle time.

4th of July Weekend

2011-07-25T08:18:00.006-07:00

The weekend of the 4th of July my sister's family came down to play. We went to splash time on Saturday morning, and dinner at Denny's that evening. Sunday they came to my ward with me and then instead of going over to my in-laws for dinner, my in-laws joined us at my house. On the fourth, we went to my ward's annual pancake breakfast. The primary children preformed and after breakfast the children rode their trikes, wagons, and bikes.

In the afternoon we went over my in-laws home for a cook out. Yummy food and then it started to rain. The children played in the rain and got so soaked. When we brought them inside they got to play in their diapers while we dried their clothes.

Lizzy and Al are so cute, same size and all running around in diapers. Tuesday we went to Bisbee and then my brother-in-law went home.

My sister and her children stayed a couple more days and then drove with me to Tucson on Thursday. It was fun having them down. We love having visitors.

Going Good

2011-07-24T10:02:00.001-07:00

my sister caught me off guard with this photo, 31 weeks

Everything is going well with these twins. They are growing at a healthy rate. We're doing good. Twins are a lot more trouble getting them to full term than I'd want to deal with. Not only do I have my weekly doctor's appointments but now they want me to go to the hospital maternity ward for NST monitoring (non stress test) twice a week. It just takes so much time out of my life to be doing all these appointments. Every time I go I should expect it to take an hour, but the baby on the left is a trouble maker and keeps moving behind her sister so we can't read her for the full time, so it gets extended. When the one on the right is done with her ~20 minutes she decides she is done completely and kicks the monitor until it goes away. How do I end up with such stubborn children? The nurses at the hospital are going to know me real well after all this.
In addition, I'm gestational diabetes. I had already been eating a gestational diabetes diet since 24 weeks. My midwife had recommended this with my son and it made since. She recommends all her patients to eat this way for the last couple months of their pregnancy even if they passed the glucose test. She says that it helps you and your baby gain "the right type of weight". Well with Little Al I only gained 13lbs total and he weighed 7lbs 6oz so I felt confident that eating that way helped. So I had decided to eat that way. Now until week 27 I wasn't super strict on it. I would eat something here or there. I took the one hour test and failed it. Since I had already made the commitment to this type of diet, I declined taking the three hour test. I just didn't feel like I could handle it or the stress of doing it. So my doctor got me a glucose meter and I test myself regularly. The hardest part about actually being GD is I can't every once in a while say oh well and eat something. But I can't now.
Overall all the frustrations of this pregnancy haven't been that bad. Nothing that I can not cope with. I was telling my chiropractor the other day when getting my adjustment that if this back pain from carrying two is the worst thing to happen during this pregnancy I should feel blessed. Sometimes I can't help but wonder if the only reason everything is going so perfect for twins is that Heavenly Father knows that with all the other trials in my life right now the last thing I need is to be on bed rest in the hospital worrying about my son. Whatever the reason, I feel very blessed.

Bye Bye Calling

2011-06-29T09:54:00.001-07:00

Its no surprise that they've decided to release me- I'm expecting twins and my husband is deployed. They were worried I had too much, or am about to have too much on my plate. Both the bishopric and the current Primary President has has me to stay around and help the new chorister get up to speed with our plans for the program and feel a bit more comfortable with her calling.
I'm a bit disappointed that I was released. I had worked everything out in preparation for these babies and had made arrangements afterwards. I had it all figured out. I won't have much of a role in the primary. I'll post anything I do have.
Good luck to all ya Primary Choristers.

D-Backs Game

2011-06-28T08:45:00.001-07:00

I love baseball. I love College football more, but I do love to watch baseball. My husband's first love in sports in baseball and college football second. So we're a good match in that respect. My team is the Arizona Diamondbacks. My husband's team is the Chicago White Sox. He lived in the Chicago area as a pre-teen for a few years and became attached to them as his team. Its not a big deal. He will cheer for the D-Backs whenever they aren't playing the White Sox and I'll even cheer for the White Sox when they aren't playing the D-Backs. When do they ever play each other? Good question. Mostly only in spring training. One is a National League team the other an American League team. But on a rare occasion they will have an inter-league game during a season. This year was one of those rare blue moon occasions. We had seen it on the schedule. Arranged for that family to go with my in-laws. Then my husband was offered the job that sent him to the Middle East. My in-laws and I decided to still make this our seasonal game. My husband would have been happy the White Sox won the game. I lost in two ways. Not only did my team not win, but my toddler, who last year did so well at the game, just lost it right before the 7th inning stretch. So we went home early (although after seeing the final score, I don't feel as bad). Another reason it was bad, was all the walking and sitting without being able to put my feet up made me swell so bad. I was still swollen at church the next morning. I did enjoy myself. But seeing all the food I couldn't eat- gestational diabetes, was really torturous. There are so many things available (everywhere even the ball park) that caters to gluten in-tolerances (wheat allergies), but nothing for diabetics. Aren't there more diabetics in this country than wheat allergies? Oh wait we treat most diabetics with insulin shots and those of us that are dealing with it by diet only are just out of luck. Back to the game, I don't regret going. I did enjoy myself, I would do it again.

I made this design for a shirt for Al to ware to the game. I was so proud of it. But because of the mail not being delivered because of the post office being closed, because of the wildfire, it wasn't delivered in time for us to ware it to the game. Rushing to get it together I bought a t-shirt at Walmart and some iron on paper and printed and ironed. It didn't even last the game. Sure enough the wonderful looking original was in the mail box when we were allowed back home.

Swimming Lessons

2011-06-27T08:14:00.000-07:00

Al picking up rings, lft- Miss Britney teacher

Last summer we did swimming lesson through the city. I felt they helped little Al so much in getting comfortable being in the water. He had so much fun. So this summer I made sure I got him into a session. I felt like this year would be more important not just because he needed to re-get-use -to the water but because him motor skills are becoming stronger and I thought he'd be ready to learn more basics this year. Which he did. Its a mama and me swim class. There were two of us in the class who had toddlers there and were expecting. Selfishly I enjoyed class because it gave me a change to enjoy the less weight of the babies on my body. Al seemed to enjoy the class too. Although he would refuse to do something when the teacher asked him to do it. It wasn't a matter that he couldn't do it, just that he didn't want to do it when asked. Grr, stubborn kid, I wonder where he gets it (mmmm).

I would love to do another session of swim lessons. But we'll see if we can fit it into our family craziness going on this summer.

Too Close to Home

2011-06-26T09:06:00.002-07:00

Most of you have heard about the Wildfires that have plauged Arizona. The Wallow fire has made headlines all over the world for being the larges wildfire in Arizona history. When you hear about disasters in the news they rarely affect you personally.

Sunday afternoon, a few hours after the fire started

The Wallow fire isn't the only fire burning in Arizona. In Southern Arizona we have two wildfires burning, the Horseshoe Two fire and the Monument fire. The Horseshoe fire has been burning for a few months now. Not threatening many homes or structures. The Monument fire started Sunday June 12th. It started on the Arizona/ Mexico boarder, just a few miles from my home. That first night it almost looked like they were going to keep it under control. I woke up Monday morning with a faint smell of smoke in my home, it alarmed me and then I remembered the wildfire. As the week progress the fire came closer and closer destroying 40 homes on the way toward my house and raging over the mountains. Wen. night I had a number of friends given mandatory evacuations. I offered my guest room to one of them, her response was that they were going to go all the way to town and not take the chance of needing to be evacuated again. That was a fair point. With the way the fire was moving, it looked like my neighborhood was going to be evacuated too. I am grateful I already had plans to go up to see my family in Phoenix. Because of the preparations I needed to make so that if we were unable to come home I had the important stuff (ie: documents, photos, computers, guns), it took me a few extra hours to leave the house on Thursday. Thursday morning while I was getting ready to go, our neighborhood was put on pre-evacuation status. My neighbor's son asked when that would mean we'd have to go. I explained that our friends were where evacuated on Wen. were put on Evacuation status Monday night. So it could mean anything, a few days from now or as little as a few hours. I left for Phoenix around 2pm, at 4:30 my neighborhood was put under mandatory evacuation. When I say that I'm grateful, I'm grateful that was already where my mindset was. Sure it took me longer than planed to pack up my family for what was going to be a simple trip up to Mesa. But in my state, expecting twins and having a toddler with my husband deployed, if that hadn't been the plan I think it would have been too much stress for me.

fire moving closer, was in Miller Canyon

The whole time I was in Mesa I couldn't keep myself off the computer. There was a community facebook page started called "Monument Fire az" that I was on all the time. That along with the city of Sierra Vista web site, and the SV Herald's site. It was so addictive, and it was so scary as that fire crept closer and closer to my home. I hadn't taken much with us. Only what we needed and what I felt we couldn't have replaced by our insurance. Reports of more homes and structures gone. Photos emerged on facebook where the smoke engulfing our neighborhood. I knew the firefighters were doing everything they could to save homes. It was out of my hands and I just had to trust Heavenly Father that He knows what will be best for our family and what we can handle.

the smoke is over my neighborhood

In the end our home was one of the lucky ones, no homes in our neighborhood were lost. It is sad and scary to see how close around our neighborhood the fire came. We came home yesterday (Saturday). The power had been out in our house for days. So we had to throw away everything in our freezers and fridge. But at least we still have a home. Our home didn't smell as much like smoke as some of our friends and neighbors have reported.

across the HWY from our neighborhood

I am grateful to be home and for those who are fighting fires so that we didn't loose our home and that so many of the homes in our community were saved. I am grateful that it is behind us now. A scary time in a quite town. We have friends that were not as lucky. There are over 60 homes in our community gone. Also there are two restaurants (in an area with 3 restaurants and a post office), that are gone, some of the walls barely remain. All in all its sad to see the damage. It will be a long time before our community recovers. I was all just too close to home.

One last thing I have a great ward and support system around here. Half my ward called me or came by before or after the evacuation to make sure I was okay. I had 2 of my husband's former co-workers contact to me to see how I was. I had multiple messages on facebook from family and friends worried about our situation. I felt very watched over.

Teaching: My Country 'tis of Thee

2011-06-12T07:48:00.002-07:00

Our ward's 4th of July pancake breakfast consists of a program before breakfast. Every year the primary children's part of it feels like a disaster for me. I already blogged about that so I'm moving on.
We are suppose to preform two songs: "My Flag, My Flag" and "My Country 'tis of Thee". I made new visuals using coloring pages off the internet and Photoshop for "My Flag, My Flag" and if you want to download them, you click on each one and save as to your own computer.
This morning I decided that I better make new visuals for "My Country 'tis of Thee" because I can't find my old visuals I used last year. Since I put in the effort I thought I share them with you too. None of the photos are church copyright approved so on pictures. They are all just from the internet. I do my pages in black and white so they cost less to print, you can color them yourself, and my printer is on the fritz when it comes to color. Hope these help someone. Thanks for stopping by.

ASL for Stand for the Right

2011-06-06T08:53:00.000-07:00

I haven't had a camera that could record video in a while. Now that I have a new one I thought I would film it for anyone who still cared.
I have the chorus for "If I listen with my Heart" up on YouTube

And the song "Stand for the Right"

As always my disclaimer is that I am not a professional nor an amatory interpretor. I have never taken a class in ASL. I learn from actual interpretors, parents of deaf children, ASL books, and the internet. I create simplified ASL using a sign here or there to help the children remember the words, in contrast to just making up an action to a phrase. I hope this helps those out there who would like to teach actual signs to their Primary age children. Thanks

Teaching: My Flag, My Flag

2011-06-05T12:20:00.000-07:00

Our Ward's annual Fourth of July Pancake Breakfast always features the primary children singing a few Patriotic songs. Finding the time to teach them, not to mention wondering who is going to be there that holiday morning is stressful. Last year the Senior primary learned the songs really well, Junior not so much. But the JR kids get to hold the flags and look cute so I wasn't too worried. Except that morning the only children there on time (because we were first) was families with only JR primary children, I had ONE SR primary child. GRRR, its one part of my calling I wish I could ignore.
Any last year I created hand draw really badly done visuals for My Flag, My Flag. This year I decided to make something using Photoshop that I wouldn't feel stupid for passing on to the next chorister, and I could use next year if they don't release me.
Since I went to all the effort I thought I'd share them with all ya'll.
Most of the pictures I downloaded off the site color me good - a free site for downloading coloring pages. I wanted to make sure I gave their site credit, and let you know these are not from the church.

I you need to do some patriotic songs I hope these help you. Thanks for stopping by.

Teaching: Fourth Article of Faith

2011-06-05T12:11:00.000-07:00

For June, our song choice is the 4th Article of Faith. Between adding in an extra song, being out of town for summer stuff, being due in Aug/Sep, and trying to teach all the songs before the end of July, we knew we wanted to make this as simple as possible for us and the children. I still haven't taught the 3rd verse to Praise to the Man. I was all prepared to do it last Sunday, but when it came down to it the children weren't ready. I'm beginning to think that maybe we'll just skip it and only do the first verse.
For the Fourth Article of Faith I typed out the whole thing, with each principle or ordinance on its own page. Then glued a picture from the Friend Coloring pages

Used this one, cut apart, for baptism and for the Laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost

used this one for Repentance

I used another picture of Jesus, but this is the only one currently in the Friend.

Review Praise to the Man (Last Minute Sub)

2011-05-17T17:04:00.000-07:00

We had gone to Mesa to visit my family, while there I felt impressed that I was needed there a big longer. So we stayed and I found a last minute sub to take over for me. I had to think of something quick and easy. Also using the supplies I had left in the closet.

I started with the maze I made. Its an easy visual with different applications for a sub to use. Then I remembered Kathleen's activity for the big words in her blog 'the Children Sing'. I started thinking about using the words in the maze. I told the sub to print/write all the big "hard" words that we had on the blue papers. Fold them up and put them into the maze. Have the children pick what way to go through the maze, when they get to a word, review what word's meaning and how to say it. Then sing the verse with the word and have the children stand up when they get to that word in the song. This will help the children recognize where in the song the words come and give them practice singing it over and over without just singing it.
I haven't spoken to my sub yet to see how it went but I'm hoping for a positive report.

Its official TWO GIRLS!

2011-05-16T20:56:00.000-07:00

Thursday the 12th of May we did a 3D ultra sound with my husband there just before his leaving us on Friday. We did it through Peek of You in Chandler. It was the same place we went to see our son and learned he was a boy not a girl.

This time we learned that they are both very obviously girls. Baby A (the one on the bottom left) would show us not only what she was, but she was letting us see her sweet face.

I am going to be the mother of two kick boxing champs. The whole ultra sound they were kicking each other in the face. Back and forth. This is a photo of Baby B (the one more on the top and right side of me) kicking Baby A in the face. Wack Wack. Some I felt but some I had no idea the battle of space going on in there.

Here is Baby A stretching with Baby B's leg pushing against her face. Since I was almost 24 weeks they warned me that my babies have not gained much fat and would appear anemic and more fetus still than baby.

It is very cramped in there. We are 24 weeks along. Each baby weights about a Pound and a half.

Can you tell where one baby begins and where the other starts?

This picture is easier than many of the others. It is crazy. Sometimes we know that a foot has to be the other baby's because there is no way that baby could bend that way, but there is everything everywhere. It took the tech a while to even be able to see the two sacs, I had to tell her how the doctor pointed it out to the tech who does my growth ultra sounds. They are super close together.

I am grateful that we were able to do this before my husband deployed. I'm grateful he was able to be there. Our toddler came to and he kept pointing to the TV and saying "babies" then he'd point to my tummy. I don't think he actually understands but it was sweet moments for our family. I am also grateful we were able to see both of their genders. Getting serious about any names have been really hard not knowing what they were. Not saying we have them picked out. We're still thinking- a lot!

Teaching: Praise to the Man Hymn 27

2011-05-09T09:25:00.000-07:00

I know most of you out there have already started teaching this song and this will be of no help to you, but I started today (May 8th). I had a sub last Sunday the 1st and this was my first Sunday back. I had been dreading teaching this song due to all the BIG words that most of the Primary children don't know how to read let alone say or understand the meanings of. After looking at a number of other blogs for ideas and stewing over it a lot, of course prayer too. I decided that I couldn't ignore these words. Instead I wanted to emphasize them and define them and drill them into their heads. That is much more my style anyway.
To start I wrote the following words HUGE on blue sheets of construction paper (did not place definitions on the construction paper), definitions are what I used to explain:

commune --to communicate in an intimate way being in the same place and speaking face to face
Jehovah -- a name for Jesus
anointed -- set apart, chosen by God, we anoint the sick, calling
seer -- a seer is a prophet, someone who can see more then others, sees what God wants them to see
dispensation -- a set period of time in the history of the world, each dispensation has a prophet who is the prophet of that dispensation.
extol -- to honor or acclaim as the best of what it is, recognize is high value
revere -- to honor or remember in high reverence
ascended -- to go up
traitors and tyrants -- wicked evil people who betray and want power
vain -- pointlessly
mingling -- socialize, spend time with

Then all the other words I wrote on strips of orange construction paper. Then I tried to find as many pictures to go with words of the song as I possibly could. Here are some coloring pages I used. (I use coloring pages as to not use up all my ink, I can choose to leave them b&w or take the time to color them in or outline them). Many of these I cut down to be smaller, and some are not Church official pictures. As many as I could find I used from past Friends.

Traitors and Tyrants/ fight

dispensation/open

Kings

Open

commune, mingling

nations

just brothers- revere

seer

Jehovah, Jesus

man

prophet

hero

anointed

dispensation

prophet

extol

brethren

I placed the pictures next to the words they went with.

To teach I started by having the pianist play "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" I had asked her to try to play it not exactly like Twinkle Twinkle. I had the children listen to the song and raise their hand if they knew what song she was playing. when I asked them to answer I got 3 different songs: "Twinkle Twinkle", "Baah Baah Black Sheep", and "ABC's". I asked the children to think and vote which song it was. Most of them were very confused at that point. I explained that this song was written by Mozart, but we have used it for many different songs, just changing the words. WW Phelps did the same thing by using an old Scottish Folk Song's melody to write this song to remember the martyred Joseph Smith Jr after his death.

As I placed each line up, and we came to a BIG word on the blue paper, we defined and discussed the word. I had a couple teachers afterwards come up and say that it was even a good review for them because some of those words we just assumed their meanings but never really thought about it. I had the children practice saying each word correctly. We only got through the first verse (not to the chorus) but the children were really interested in the words and were trying really hard. I hope it sticks with them.

April/May Family Vacation

2011-05-08T10:57:00.002-07:00

Long post for a long week and a half.

When we learned that my husband was going to deploy I urged him to make time to visit his extended family in Iowa. He had a great granny with failing health already living past the doctor's expectations, and a grandpa who has had a number of heart problems over the past year. I felt it to be something important before he went overseas for a year.

Also before we had known he was going to get this job, and even before we knew it was twins, I had decided to attend BYU's Women's Conference the last weekend of April. I felt it was something I needed in my life, and with a new baby on the way, at least a few years before I could justify leaving my children to go.

In light of everything in the end, we decided to go to Utah together, driving up with my mom who was also going to BYU's Women's Conference, and then fly from Salt Lake to Iowa, then from Iowa back to Phoenix. Long trip but worth it was a whole family at this time.

It was a long trip. We first drove to Phoenix and spend Easter weekend with my family. While up there we took family photos, already posted in another blog post. We also did the Easter hunt thing with my sister's children and her friend's. In addition to Easter festivities, we had a Farewell Open House for our family and friends in Phoenix to say good bye to Cory. It wasn't a large showing, after all it was Easter night and some people still have family activities on going. But it was a good time for everyone who was able to come.

Tuesday we drove to Utah. I was worried how my body would handle being in the car that long. But it was fine. Each time we stopped for gas I would get out and walk for as long as I could handle it. Al did wonderful with the whole thing too, I think it was in part because of the walking around we did.

Wed. Cory and I went to the Salt Lake Temple. It was Cory's first time going to a live session. Utah was sooooo cold!!!! So so cold!! That afternoon we went to the Family History Research Library. My mom came to help. We were looking for records for Cory's family on his father's side tracing back to Massachusetts and all his French Canadian Ancestor's who immigrated there. Just while up in Utah he has been able to find so much information on a line that we had felt we had hit a wall. There is something so sexy about a man excited about doing his family history! Wed. evening we met up with some of my mission companions at a near by Cafe Rio. I have to admit that I was looking forward to eating Cafe Rio about as much as I was looking forward to seeing those mission companions. It was so great to see those girls. I miss them. They are one of the few reasons I almost wish I lived it Utah. But then I remember how cold it is and forget about it.

Thursday- my mom, aunt, and I went down to BYU for Women's Conference. While we were at Women's Conference, Cory took Al to the Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake. Al had a wonderful time. He loved the animals, especially the monkeys and turtles.

Friday- While us women were at Women's Conference, the boys went to visit Temple Square. After we were done at Women's Conference we met with Cory and Al at Spaghetti Mama.

Women's Conference was wonderful. I am so grateful for the opportunity that I was able to go. There was no class that just spoke to me as I need to go to that class because of where I am in my life. But I tried to pick my classes by the Spirit and what were close together. I believe I went to the classes I needed to. Almost all of the classes I went to were not full classes. In the only class that they had to turn people away due to space I was talking about how my other classes had been to the sister sitting next to me. She said that maybe I'm just not as "needy" as others and I'm willing to learn what I need to in any class I attend.

Saturday afternoon we flew from Salt Lake City to Chicago Midway to Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN. Then drove 2 hours to Iowa where my husband's mother's side all lives. It was after midnight when we checked into our hotel. It was Al's first airplane ride. I didn't know if he was quite understanding that we were flying. He loves to point out planes in the sky, but comprehending that you're inside one of those planes is different. During the flights, both of which I was so grateful that he handled and behaved himself very well, I tried to get him repeat that we were in a plane. Nothing. He is not much of an on command performer. While we were getting our rental car, anyone who tried to talk to him, the only thing he would say was "plane, fly, plane". It was pretty cute.

Sunday- we had found online where the ward in Mason City met. Before church we met up with my in-laws and grandpa for breakfast at the restaurant next door to our hotel. I know that eating out on a Sunday isn't a sin, but it sure feels weird to me. Also it was fast Sunday and we had totally forgot that. Not that I fast right now, expecting twins and all. It was odd for me, and yet meeting family for breakfast was my idea because I was trying to think of ways we could maximize our time with family since we were only there 2 full days. Church actually reminded me a lot of my mission. Small ward, mostly older couples. The nursery only had 2 other children there that day. And it was so nice to go to Relief Society and be able to participate in an adult level lesson. Don't get me wrong. I love primary, but it felt good to talk about gospel principles on a higher level. After church the extended family had a Birthday party for Al. I met more of my mother-in-law's family then I had ever met before, and yet most seemed familiar to me because of facebook and stories I've heard over the last three years. None of them are members of the Church, but they are good people. I'm grateful I was able to meet so many of them this time.

Monday was laid back, visiting with a few more family members and spending time with Grandpa.

Tuesday we packed up, went to visit a family friend, and then headed for the airport, this time with a nonstop flight back to Phoenix. Al did well for most of this flight too. I'm grateful he handled it all so well. Actually he has handled the whole trip really well. I was surprised how my body handled the car ride better than the plane rides. All the flights were really hard on my body. The thing that was even harder on my body was walking around BYU and sitting all day in classes.

I'm so glad to be back home. It was a long hard trip. But I feel a very important trip for our family.

Al turned Two

2011-05-07T09:31:00.001-07:00

Found a Thomas train at a thrift store- $1.30, used bread pans to make the carts

So we celebrated for over a week. He had three birthday parties.

used candy for the trains to carry in the carts

The first 2nd Birthday party-- we had before we left town, we wanted to have a birthday party for him with his friends his age. I had a hard time trying to decide who we should invite. Last year we invited all our friends to his party, not that he cared he was turning one. This year I decided to invite all the children in his nursery class (there are more then 20 children in our nursery) and a few friends his age from our play group. I was a little nervous about how many would come, but it was a Thursday evening that we had it and we ended up with 8 children and a parent for each, plus my in-laws and Al's adopted Aunt and Uncle. A perfect sized group, not too big but still enough that we weren't disappointed that we picked such a horrible night to have a 2 year old bday party.
I felt so creative. I'm very proud of myself. We had decided on sub sandwiches and then macNcheese for the kids. I had looked into the cost of jumping castles and oh my that was too much for us. In thinking about it I thought that I could make a train out of large cardboard boxes. It turned out awesome and was a big hit. I had a few games ready for us to play, I was worried they'd be a little much for 2 year olds, but frankly between dinner, the awesome train, and cake we didn't need more. It was a great party.

all it is: large boxes, duck tape, and spay paint, cost about $10 in spray paint

Second 2nd Birthday party-- was small, Monday night in addition to Family Home Evening with my parents, my sister's family, and my single brothers. We sang, opened presents, and ate cake. That was all there was to it. Small, simple, and yummy. I brought up the birthday hats and everyone wore one.

Third 2nd Birthday party-- was in Iowa with my husband's extended family and actually on Al's Bday. My in-laws were also out there and upon remembering it was Al's bday they invited all the extended family over for a birthday party. We had pizza, cake, and simple presents that were all a super hit. And gave us new toys for the flight home.
He was one spoiled kid for his 2nd birthday. By the third party he knew exactly what to do for the candle and with those presents. And he was as cute as can be for all of them.

Maternity Blouse from a Man's dress shirt

2011-05-06T16:31:00.002-07:00

I posted this on my craft blog (scrapingarizonagirl.blogspot.com). I figured there are probably other women out there suffering from the lack of variety in maternity ware. I keep thinking about how good this is for weddings too, not just family photos. Men's dress shirts come in just about any color.

Here is the link to my tutorial on my other blog. Sorry if it leaves too much out. I'm not a very good teacher. But it was a really easy project.

This is a picture of the trial shirt I made

And here is the finished shirt for our family photos

Check it out on my other blog, I hope it helps someone out there.

Family Pictures before my husband deploys

2011-04-25T22:05:00.000-07:00

So my husband is deploying here in a couple weeks. It came on sort of suddenly. Sort of because he applied last May/June (2010). In February, we were contacted that about interviewing and screening for the job. End of March he was offered the job. We discussed how this is an awkward time for our family. Also the options of when to leave since he could have up to a few months to get his life in order to leave. We've known that this was something he was going to need to do for his career since I married him in 2008. Many opportunities have come up and we haven't felt at a loss for not taking them, they were mediocre opportunities for his career. But this opportunity is the best one out there. We had made the choice that we couldn't put our family on hold just in case this job came there, and with government work you never know how that it will be before it does, and on the same lines we couldn't put this job aside just because its not a good time for our family- is a deployment ever going to be good timing? NO, it is never going to be a good time. Also we didn't want to put off Cory leaving us because we didn't want him to miss the entire first year of these babies lives.

In light of all this we knew we wanted to have professional pictures taken before he leaves. Not that its a good time for my body. My nose is starting to swell, I'm as big now as I was with my son at 38 weeks. And finding coordinating maternity clothes was a real challenge. We had them taken at the Mesa Arizona Temple since we were in Mesa to spend Easter with my family. They were done by Brianna Yardley. She did a great job. I ended up making my shirt from the same shirt my husband is waring. I went back, bought a 2nd shirt and then cut it up re-sewing it and made it into a maternity shirt. I plan on blogging about it on my other blog, scrapingarizonagirl.blogspot.com Here are a few of my favorite pictures that were taken....

All these pictures and more can be found on Brianna's blog.

"My guess is they're both Girls"

2011-04-06T22:37:00.002-07:00

So March 28 I was 17 weeks, at the ultra sound they looked for gender. One they were able to sort of get a look. The doctor said he would guess it was a girl.

During the consultation segment he explained the signs that they may be identical twins but in two separate (but apparently really thin) sacks. So based on that his opinion is that it is likely they are identical that would make the other a girl also since identical twins.

He also use the phrase "not seeing anything obvious" to say that's why he'd guess they are girls. I'm not going to count on twin girls just yet. Only because "not seeing anything obvious" was the exact phrase my OB doctor use right before he pronounced my son a girl in the 25 week ultra sound.

But since I'm high risk we're going to be getting an ultra sound every 2 weeks so we'll get plenty of more looks at these two.

This picture is cute, its of their feet, 4 feet right next to each other.

Singing Time without Voices

2011-03-07T12:47:00.000-07:00

Being pregnant has the consequence for me of loosing my voice. It happened last time for about 3 weeks. And I have spent the last few weeks doing everything I could to keep myself from loosing my voice. But on Sunday it was gone and I had no idea where to find it. I thought of getting a sub since there was no way possible I could sing, let alone teach the song I needed to. But inspiration came and I had a whole lesson without my voice or the children's voices.
I started by reading (using the microphone and the children were actually listening very well).
D&C 25:12
Then compared praying to singing.
Where are we commanded to pray?
What are the different ways we pray?
Do we pray without saying words out loud?
Is it possible to sing without saying words?
Then we talked about ways we could sing without singing out loud.
Here are the ways we came up with, and with the ones I note we used that song to express that song:

humming: we hummed to "I Will Follow God's Plan" with the piano
whistle
clap
listen, sing in your mind: we sat and listened quietly. I told the children that they show that they are listening and thinking about the words by showing me what the song is about. We listened to "Reverently Quietly" I don't think I had ever seen them so reverent.
Play or listen to an instrument play: wanted to do something with this one, but I was putting it together at last minute. Idea have an instrument for the children to play along with a primary song, or arrange for someone from the ward to come in and play their instrument for the children.
ASL: we have learned ASL to do along with a number of our songs we did a few of them, "Come Follow Me", "Follow the Prophet", and "Jesus Said Love Everyone".
Actions: Songs like "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes" and "Popcorn Popping" are not ASL but anyone who sees what you are doing know what you are with out hearing the words sung.

It all went so well. I don't know if it was the children felt sorry for me, having no voice, or if they were really understanding that singing doesn't always have to include your voice. I concluded by reminding the children of the lesson we did about "Music Soothing the Soul", and how there will be times in their life when they will want the comfort that music can give them but will not feel they can sing out loud at that moment. I then testified of the power music can have in their lives they have use that power either with their voices or without.

Teaching: Stand for the Right CSB 159

2011-03-02T10:03:00.001-07:00

Stand for the right CSB 159
This is a short and easy song. It will be a nice change from what we've done so far.
To start I am going to talk to the children about President Hinckely's 6 B's. (be grateful, be smart, be clean, be true, be humble). I know that this song was written because another prophet asked use to "Be true". But I think the children will relate better to President Hinckely since most can remember him. Its not like the other prophet (I'm sorry I can't remember and a google search brought up Hinckely) was the first to give the council to "be true" nor will Hinckely be the last.
I got this idea from Tifany and her Precious Primary blog post on The Army of Heleman
When I first saw the post I automatically thought that it was for this song, then I read it and realized it wasn't but still thought that using shields for the visuals for this song would be a great idea.
I had also come up with a simple ASL that I'm considering using with the JR Primary. My camera that had the video capability is dead, I dropped it. So I don't have the ASL for this or for the chorus of "If I Listen with my Heart" but as soon as I can get a camera that records I will post both.
Now Tifany used poster board for her shields. I used black construction paper. 2 papers for each shield. I also didn't put straps on the back of mine. You can do them in any color. After I did it I thought that maybe for this song, green like the CTR rings would have been a better choice. Oh well. The duck tape is a cool touch but it took a ton of time. If you don't have duck take or the time, just take a marker and edge it, that's just as good and will still look good. I used pictures from the FRIEND, either downloaded off the church site (coloring pages are great) or cut out of the FRIEND (I went to DI and bought a stack of old FRIENDS).

Really simple visual, for a simple song. Good Luck everyone.

Twins?!?!?

2011-02-23T18:31:00.001-07:00

So I didn't even know it was possible for me to have twins. I always thought they were a genetic thing and I didn't have that gene. But I knew nothing about what we do know about what causes twins. Apparently I do have whatever it is, because we're expecting twins. I had an appointment with my doctor last week and she thought I was measuring large for only being almost 12 weeks. She told me it could be one of three reasons why I'm measuring large, 1- I might just measure large, 2- I'm further along then my dates say I am, 3- Twins. Friday I went and got the ultra sound down that she referred me to, and after being told there was just one baby, the tech changed her mind. Twins. This means no home birth with my midwife, or birthing center birth. I am just in shock. My husband keeps thinking of things we don't own two of that we are going to need a second of. Twins. I just can't wrap my head around it. Well this does explain a few thing, like how sick I've been, and how I felt like I was gaining weight a little too fast, and how I'm super extra sleepy all the time. Twins!
At least I have 6 more months to get use to the idea. By the way we're due Sep 6.

Practice & Review: I Will Follow God's Plan For Me

2011-02-06T07:31:00.001-07:00

I made this board game while on my mission. It was to teach the Plan of Salvation to children. I used it for investigator families with children, unbaptized children of record, children turning 8, and for FHE when we did the lesson for a family. It was one of the smartest visuals I made my WHOLE mission. It was made with a poster board, construction paper, a black marker, and pass along cards.

The green spaces gave them life choices that told them they got to move forward and how many or stay where they are (bad choice life events). Originally it was move back one for bad choices but it took too long to play the game. The pictures such as baptism or the temple are life events and by passing the life event you'd move into a new section of life and different green cards/choices. This was also when we taught the major points of the 4th discussion (and part of the second) ie the plan of salvation and the need for baptism (and sometimes why temples are important).

How I plan to use this for primary?

Each Green space will be a card. It will have a quiz question about the song or the plan of salvation. To have the game go faster you can use a dice or have each card randomly (or due to degree of difficultly) say how many spaces to move forward. For the questions about the song, if there is any difficultly answering the question then sing the song as a group to help them remember. The more times you sing though the song the better. You can do this in two teams or have everyone be a team together because we are all trying to help each other here on Earth. It just really just a simple board game with the Plan of Salvation stuck in as steps. You could cut out pictures from the FRIEND or write the name of the steps of the plan on paper

Sample questions you can use:

My life has a _____, my life has a ______ in _____ it began
What is the line after, "I will follow God's plan for me"
What line is be before, "My life has a purpose."
What is the first stage of the Plan of Salvation?
Where does the song say it all began?
Where does the song say we was our choice to come to?
What stage of the Plan are we in right now?
How many times do we sing the word "life" in this song?
How many times do we sing the word "Follow" in this song?
What does the song say we are SEEKing?
What stage of the Plan comes after this Earth life?
Where does the song say we'll be "happy"?
The song says we will be "holding fast" to what?
Fill in the blanks "I will _____ and I will _____".
In the song we sing that we will always walk in who's way?
The song mentions 2 different homes, where are they?
After we are judged what will happen to us?
Where do we go after we die?
What kingdom do we want to end up in?
In the song we sing that our "life" is/has 3 things, what are they?
In the song we sing that we sing that "God's Light" is to (direct us from when)?
Fill in the blanks "I will _____ God's ____ for me".

Teaching: I Will Follow God's Plan for Me

2011-02-05T19:30:00.000-07:00

There are lots of good ideas out there. I took a number of the other post ideas and made them a little more mine.

To start I am going to have a gift. In that gift I am going to have this picture of a baby and Earth. I am going to read a scripture Mosiah 2: 41. We are going to list ways in which our lives are "gifts from God", Only spend a couple of minutes on the scripture and the list (I will not be writing it down).
Then we will learn the song.

These are the visuals I made up. All but a couple are visuals I had from other songs. I have also started making more generic picture visuals and put them page sleeves, I then tape simple word hits to the visual.

Star Prophecy by Joan Sowards

2011-01-19T21:37:00.000-07:00

The newest novel from Joan Sowards!! Awesome book!! I was able to read this book in its original draft and was totally amazed at the fresh perspective on an LDS Book of Mormon novel. It will be like nothing else you've ever read.
Check out Joan's blog and her blog train. She is giving away 3 copies so see her blog to find out how to win! This book is a must read and will be enjoyed by both men and women-(not just a chick book!!
You can purchase it at your local LDS bookstore or online at Amazon. Check it out!

Happy New Year

2011-01-07T12:53:00.000-07:00

New Year, New Goals. Good times, Good times to come.

For New Years weekend we went up to Phoenix. We were able to attend the temple Friday (New Years Eve) morning, since it was open only in the morning. We had decided that if the temple was open Friday it was worth the trip to Mesa. Friday evening we went to dinner at Famous Daves at the Mesa Riverview with my parents. I had never eaten there before. I really enjoyed their appetizers Nachos. That night Kristy and Christ came over, we watched the first 3 episodes of Avatar (cartoon series) with my brothers and their friends. We went out for ice cream and bought fireworks. That was New Years eve.

New Years Day we said good-bye to my family and went to Casa Grande for my husband's family Christmas party. They traditionally hold theirs the first Saturday after Christmas. This year happened to be on New Years day. We do our family gift exchange (we all draw someone's name and there is a $20 gift limit). At PePere's house's there was a train. This is Al's newest interest. He spend the whole time at the party watching the train go round and round, and waiting for someone to turn it on.

After all the family festivities we went drove back home. It was nice to be home again. We bathed Al then put him to bed.

Happy New Year.

Christmas at Our House

2011-01-02T22:54:00.001-07:00

Christmas Eve Eve Al and I drove to Bisbee to go to the Chocolate shop, they have a site and will take online orders at Spirited Chocolate. Al really liked their homemade hot chocolate, can't say I blame him it is my FAVORITE hot chocolate in the whole world.

Christmas Eve we started the day going out for breakfast at the Country House Restaurant with my in-laws. Then we went around town delivery our gift to our local friends, a small container of homemade Italian Sausage Seasoning. Sorry to all our out of town friends, I don't do shipping, but if you'd like to make it yourself here is the link to the recipe. Italian Sausage Seasoning, the key to the whole mix is to ground the fennel, you'll have all the taste of Italian sausage without the price or the fat.

Continuing with Christmas Eve, we went over to my in-laws that evening and watched "Muppet Christmas Carol" -best Christmas movie and Muppet movie EVER! At bed time we took Al home and put him to bed.

We stayed home this year, didn't make the drive up to my parents. It was a nice and quite Christmas day with my in-laws. We got up opened our gifts, took Al long enough to notice the cool gifts sitting out. Then went over to my in-laws for breakfast Christmas Quiche. We then opened gifts over there. Uncle Justin won Christmas by getting Al the most amazing to him toy ever, a Thomas the Train and track. Yes Justin won Christmas.
We spend the rest of our day relaxing, eating at leisure, digital scrapbooking and shopping, and playing a LAN game of Civ 4. Great day.

Teaching: If I listen With My Heart-Continued

2011-01-02T20:31:00.000-07:00

So today actually went so much better than I thought. Thanks for all of your comments and ideas. I don't dislike the song itself, I just don't feel it is a whole primary song, it would be beautifully done by a YW small group. Also I think the song had been on lds.org, but it was lost when they started to redo the website, that's about all I can think of.
First: With the loss of time from Testimonies going over, and all the confusion from the first Sunday of the year, we started really late. I had brought my 'SUNS' to welcome our new Sunbeams and do wiggle songs with them. While the Primary Presidency was trying to get everyone where they needed to go, we started having our new Sunbeams pick 'Suns'. When it was time for Singing time we did a couple more then learned the Chorus to "If I Listen With My Heart", in the end I put a short bit of ASL (sign language) to go to the chorus. The little children too right to it and loved it. I will film myself doing it and put it on the blog for anyone who would like to see it. We ended JR doing one more wiggle song with our 'Suns'.
Second: Teaching the first verse to the SR primary went so much better than I worried, still not great. It is a hard song to learn, melody and words and all. But they were troopers. And I tried to have a positive outlook and energy for them.
Third: Before primary I talked to our Primary President and the councilors and expressed my feelings and asked for their thoughts. I suggested a number of suggestions (make it a musical number, have SR primary do the verses and JR just do chorus, do only one verse...) We discuses it a bit and said we'd talk about it after church. They all saw me teaching it, heard the song, ect. After church we talked and came to what I feel is the best conclusion. I feel so good about it. We are going to start our program with this song, the first verse is going to be a solo, we have the young girl picked out and feel so good about it. This young lady has a speak impediment. For almost a year now has been taking private voice lessons as a way to treat her speak impediment. Her mother had mentioned to one of the councilors that it would be wonderful if she had a chance to preform in one of our program's musical numbers since she doesn't get recital to preform and that way she could have something in her voice lessons to work towards. The second verse is going to be sung by a small group of our older girls with the young lady who sung the first verse. On the choruses and the 3rd verse the entire primary will sing. So now I only need to teach the third verse to the entire primary, and that is a bit less daunting then the whole song. As we spoke we all felt so good about this choice. When I told my husband I just felt so comforted that this was the best choice and the choice that was right for our primary. I am grateful that the Lord answers prays and knows what is best. One of the councilors afterwards mentioned that maybe my feelings were more inspired than frustrated because if I had not felt this way we would have never come up with this wonderful solution.
Thanks again for all who read and for all who left comments. I too love to oo, la, bump, buzz, or moo to a song to help the children use the melody, we did that today.
I will record the chorus ASL and post is as soon as I can get it ready.

Teaching: If I Listen With My Heart

2011-01-01T20:50:00.000-07:00

I am really at a loss about this song. It didn't show up on the church website until a couple of days ago, so I couldn't hear how it went (I don't have a piano). I can't seem to memorize this song for the life of me. I keep singing and singing and nothing is sticking with me, I can't even sing the tune right (with or without the music). I keep looking and thinking and praying for a way to teach it and I get nothing. I feel nothing for this song, but annoyance. Its a nice song, but if I can't sing it without needing words how can I expect my little ones to learn it. Each year I'm the chorister I'm becoming more frustrated with these new songs that feel impossible to have the children learn. My youngest never fully learned "I Know that the Savior Loves Me", the more I tried to help the children learn it the more I felt like it didn't matter because I was never going to have them sing this song ever again once the program was done. I even had many SR primary who couldn't get the song. So as I am trying to learn this song myself I'm a so frustrated I want to just say "forget it, we'll do something else" but that isn't my call to make. I seriously want to cry (and I don't cry). I got nothing!
As for people and ideas from others:
Jolly Jenn has a good flipchat that is about all I have right now. What I will probably end up doing is cutting up her flip chart, putting the pictures for each verse on a poster board and adding a few extra pictures (ie walk, earth, ear-listen/hear, mouth-say/words/speaks, scriptures).
Sofia's on Sofia's Primary Idea's blog has a few ideas about ways to introduce or get the children's attention. I am going to have a head band with hearts to over the ears (I live in Arizona and have never once in my life owned earmuffs), I might let a few different children ware them. Then I plan on having lots of small cut up construction paper hearts and having the children hold them over their hears when we sing the word 'heart'.
None of this do I feel strongly about. In fact there is a part of me that wants to just do something fun, welcome to the Sunbeams and to the New Year tomorrow and talk to our Primary President about my problem with this song and see if we can come up with a compromise. One idea that keeps coming to head is only teaching ONE of the verses to my primary and the chorus, and we'd have small groups of children do the other two verses. But again I have to see how my Primary President feels.

2011 Primary Program

2010-12-26T09:41:00.002-07:00

Goal: To use the scriptures for every song and testify more, use the scriptures as much as possible to teach the children that what we learn in our songs is what is found in the scriptures.

After much discusion with the Primary Presidency in our ward and taking into consideration the council given us from the Stake (and were directed that this was from the General Board) that our optional songs should not be from the Hymn book but from the Primary Songbook. Here are the songs we have chosen for 2011 (along with being assigned).

Jan: "If I Listen With My heart" refere to the 2011 Primary Program manual, "I know that the Scriptures are true"
Feb: "I will Follow God's Plan" CSB pg164
Mar: "Stand for the Right" CSB pg 159
April: our choice "I'm trying to be like Jesus" CSB pg 78
May: "Praise to the Man" Hymn 27
June: our choices we are doing two songs-
"4th Article of Faith" CSB pg 124
"Scripture Power" Found in the Oct 1987 Friend
July: "I love to See the Temple" CSB pg 95
Aug: "The Lord Game me a Temple" pg 153

Thoughts: Our choice to do "Scripture Power" came about a day where a young man in SR while doing our Thanks-giving activity in Singing Time, choice that he was thankful for scriptures and wanted to sing "Scripture Power". The pianist actually had a copy and we sang it. For a song that came out over 20 years ago I was amazed at how many of the children knew it and were singing with such enthusiastic. I was already out of Primary when this song came out and I've never actually learned it. The song is so old, yet still so loved by the children. Can you think of a song that is the same but not in the hymn book or Primary Songbook? I have been told that "To Bring the World His Truth" (Army of Heleman song, CSB 172) was not originally in the CSB but was later added because it was so loved. I don't know by my own knowledge if that is true but that is what I have been told.
After singing time that day I went in the back and talking to the Primary President and 1st Councilor I told them that while singing I had a thought that maybe this should be our 'our choice' song. They both agreed and said that they had had the same impression while the children where singing that song. The subject of this year is "I Know that the Scriptures are True" to know that they are true you must have a testimony that the scriptures posses a power that can be used in your life. "Scripture Power" teaches them that and stays with them.
I know doing an "extra" song is hard. It makes learning all your songs even harder. But I would like to invite you to do "Scripture Power" with your Primary this year. To infuse in a new generation of children that the scriptures have power that can be used in your life. Even if you chose not to do it for your program, teach it to them as just a song to learn this year.

last note- We do a number of musical numbers by small groups of children in our program. This year we are thinking that we are going to use songs that are about people in the scriptures ie: "Follow the Prophet", "Nephi's Courage", "Tell me the Stories of Jesus", "Samuel tells of Baby Jesus", "Book of Mormon Stories", "A Young Man Prepared", there are more and we don't know which ones we are going to do, but we feel that there is teaching in having the children relate to the people in the scriptures to learn about how they can use the scriptures in their lives and have testimonies of their truth.
Thanks for stopping by, I'd love to hear thoughts about your plans for 2011, what songs you've chosen and why.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-24T08:36:00.000-07:00

Merry Christmas

Life at our House is going well. 2010 has been good to us. Cory is still at his job and I'm is still the Primary Chorister, and it was a blessed day when Alistair started going to nursery. We went on our much anticipated Mediterranean Cruise, with Cory’s parents, brother and cousin, while Al got Grandma time with Grandma Sowards. We had a fantastic trip, we went to Rome, Egypt, Istanbul, Kusadasi Turkey, Athens, and Naples. It was the trip of a lifetime. We loved all 2 ½ weeks of it.
We pray that your families are doing well and that you can see the blessings of the Lord on your households. We are grateful for the friendships and the love that we share with each one of you.

Love and Happy New Years

Ward Party and Seeing Santa

2010-12-21T20:26:00.001-07:00

Our ward party was last week. There was a short program first, then was dinner, then came Santa Clause. Al didn't handle the wait for dinner very well. I should have though about that before leaving and have fed him, but I'm just not a mother mode like that.

And as with every child their first time sitting on Santa's lap. Oh Fun.

Trimming Our Tree

2010-12-20T20:26:00.001-07:00

Last Monday night we decorated our tree for FHE.

Al kept trying to put ornaments on the tree

and then take them back off again.

Helping daddy.

Look mama the tree is done.

Singing Time Christmas Pageant

2010-12-12T10:42:00.000-07:00

A couple years ago, the Sunday before Christmas, we used the song "The Nativity Song" CSB page 52. We had a combined Sharing and Singing time. We did all the verses and had children come up and dress up as Mary, Joseph, shepherds, everything in the song. We made a stable out of a sheep with across the top with a poll on each side. It worked really well in SR primary, but the song was hard for the JR primary and we never got to finish due to time. If you choose to do this I would suggest having a copy of the words given to the teachers and maybe the oldest children who can read music.

What are we doing this year?

We are going to do another combined Singing and Sharing Time. But we are going to do it more like a Christmas Pageant. Instead of using "The Nativity Song" we are going to have a different song either from the Children's Songbook or from the Hymn book. We are going to talk about each character, read the scripture that talks about them, and then sing a song about them.

As follows:

Mary- Mother of Jesus, Luke 1: 27-31: The Angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her that she had been chosen, blessed, to be the Mother of her Savior, Jesus (find what verses you actually want to read, maybe have the children act it out). Luke 2:19 "Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart" Song: "Mary's Lullaby" CSB pg 44

Joseph- Husband of Mary, Luke 2: 1-4: Joseph had to be taxed and go to Bethlehem because that is where his ancestors were from. He had to take Mary with him since she was his wife. Luke 2:7 : Joseph was unable to find an Inn for them to stay in because Bethlehem was too busy, but he was able to find a stable/barn for them to stay in. Song: "When Joseph Went to Bethlehem" CSB pg 38.

Baby Jesus- Luke 2: 11-12, 16: Not only was Mary told by an angel that her baby was the Son of God, but Angels testified of this to the Shepherds. Jesus is the Son of God, Our Savior and Redeemer. He started this journey on Earth just as every one of us did, being born to earthly parents. He too had to learn and grow to be prepared for his mission on this Earth. Song: "Away in a Manger" CSB pg 42.

Stable- Luke 2:7, There are many different types of stables. We don't know what type Jesus was born in, it was possibly a cave that was being used as a barn. But it was a barn with animals and they used a Manger, or the animals feed troff as a crib. Song: "Once Within a Lowly Stable" CSB 41.

Shepherds- Luke 2: 8-17, Why the Shepherds? They were old in the fields and on the hills round about the city working and watching their sheep. The angels appeared to them, testified of Christ, told them where to find the Baby, and then filled the sky with singing praising God. They shepherds went, they saw, and they then testified of all they had seen and heard. Song: "Stars Were Gleaming" CSB pg 37, "Shepherd's Carol" CSB pg 40

Angels- Luke 1: 28, An Angel came to Mary bring her the news that she was to be the Mother of the Son of God; Matt 1:20, An angel appeared to Joseph to testify to him of the Baby that Mary carried; Luke 2: 8- 14, Angels appeared unto the Shepherds testifying of Christ and Singing praises to God. Song: "Far Far Away" Hymn 212, "Angels we have Heard on High" Hymn 203, "Stars Were Gleaming" CSB pg 37.

Wise Men- Matt 2: 1-12, Where the wise men were from we do not know. What we do know is they came from the east and knew the prophecy of the new star, they were watching was waiting for it to be fulfilled. What made them wise? -they were kings, rulers in their own lands, but more importantly they were wise because they knew of Christ and did whatever was necessary to follow the star to seek their God. "With Wondering Awe" Hymn 210, "The Nativity Song" vrs 4 CSB pg 52-53.

Star-bMatt 2: 10 "When They saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy"; Helaman 2: 5, in the Book of Mormon, Samuel the Lamanite Prophet prophesied that a new star would appear as a sign that Jesus had been born. Song: "There was Starlight on the Hillside" CSB pg 40, "With Wondering Awe" Hymn 210, "Samuel Tells of Baby Jesus" CSB pg 36.

To close- Sing "He Sent His Son" CSB pg 34, Testify of Christ's birth and his role in the Plan of Salvation. Sing: "Silent Night" Hymn 201, or any other Christmas Song that will help bring in the Spirit.

Nativity For Singing Time

2010-12-11T20:37:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine gave me this link these printable Nativity characters are awesome.

Printable Nativity Characters, use toliet paper rolls to make them stand. I'm going to use them tomorrow, I'll have a song placed on each or refer to my Christmas pageant lesson, this would work for this. Great thing about this is you don't need to risk your nice Nativity set being broken taking it to church.

Lights Parade Evening activity

2010-12-11T14:11:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday was the lights parade. We decided to make an evening of it. We went to dinner at the Pizza Hut Bistro then set ourselves up on the street. Half the town was out to see the parade.That's not quite right. 1/3 was watching the parade, 1/3 was in the parade, and the last 1/3 of the town was at home not bothering with it.

It reminds me of two different memories:
1- Growing up we'd sometimes go to Colorado for the 24th Celebration (24th of July, Pioneer day, for those of you that aren't LDS it is the day set aside to celebrate the Mormon Pioneers arriving in the Salt Lake Valley. In the San Luis Valley, where my dad's family is all from, its a huge deal, the whole town comes out for the celebration. Having the whole town out on the street to watch the parade reminded me of everyone being out to see the parade in Colorado.
2- It reminded me of being on my mission, one year during the holiday seasons, the ward missionaries in the Niceville ward made a float to enter in the local parades. As the missionaries in the area, we walked in the parade with the float. It was so much fun.

I didn't know if Al was old enough to enjoy the parade but we were going to try and see. As we sat and waited for the parade to start Al was super unhappy. But as soon as the parade was in full bloom he was riveted! All the way until the moment it had had enough excitement and fell asleep in daddy's arms. I'm glad we went.

ASL for Hymn 210 With Wondering Awe

2010-12-10T12:30:00.000-07:00

Our primary is learning Hymn 210 "With Wondering Awe" for this Christmas. I taught it in one Sunday, but JR and SR primaries took to it right away. In fact, I taught it in a shortened primary time for JR and only used half of my SR singing time to teach it. We are doing it for our Activity for Christmas Caroling to the Extended Care Center in Town and for their parents as part of the Ward party's Christmas program.
Hope you enjoy.

ASL Hymn #212 Far Far Away (chorus)

2010-12-10T10:23:00.001-07:00

I did this with my Primary children and posted a video of it back in 2008, it is still one of their favorites. Around Thanksgiving they started asking me if we were going to do it again. "Of course we are, as it gets closer to Christmas".
We've already done it a few times.
I redid the video, the last one I never put on YouTube and I was also pregnant when I did the last one and I can see it in the video. The fact that our computer died and I lost the original file was a good excuse to re-film.

Lately I've noticed

2010-12-10T08:00:00.000-07:00

Lately I've noticed a change in my DVD buying habits. DVDs became big just before I left on my mission, when I got home from my mission I bought my first DVD player and started buying DVDs. They were my favorite movies and TV series. I loved owned TV series seasons DVDs. I had a decent collection of Disney movies, one because I enjoy watching Disney movies, but more because I hoped that someday I would get married and start having children who eventually would love to watch Disney movies. I did get married eventually (after being single for a very long time and spending a lot of money on an awesome DVD collection). Now that my son is starting to be interested in watching movies I'm grateful for the Disney collection we own.
So here is the noticeable change in my DVD purchase. In the above photo is almost of all the DVDs I've about in the past year. Do you notice a theme? First I will point out that this is nothing compared to how many DVDs I'd buy in a year as a single adult. Second, not one was purchased for me and my selfish purposed. They are all DVDs I purchased for my son to watch. Granted he may like to watch Barney more than Curious George. But I'd rather watch Curious George over Barney, I'm still selfish in that way. And Al does enjoy Curious George too. So since having children I've traded buy Veronica Mars, Perry Mason, Psych, and obscure British series for Curious George and Thomas the Train.
LOL the way our children change our lives.

Our World Has Changed...

2010-12-09T09:38:00.001-07:00

So this is small but it is a big thing to us.
This morning my husband and are getting dressed for the day. Its just a couple minutes after 6am. There is a soft little knock on the bedroom door. My husband keeps getting dressed and ignores it, even though he is standing right next to the door tucking in his shirt. Later he said that he was sure he hadn't actually heard a knock.
I opened the door. Standing there in his sleeper pjs and a toy from the family room in his arms is our 19 month old so Al. Once the door is open he walks right in and goes to Daddy.
The reason this is significant is he has only been sleeping in the toddler bed for a little amount of time. But so far he hasn't been getting off the bed. So now he knows he can get off the bed, and secondly it means he has figured out how to open the door.
The next thing we need to figure out is, what are we going to do about it? Baby door locks? another baby gate? We don't want him wondering around the house in the middle of the night, but we don't want to lock him in his room at night. Tough questions. One thing is certain, our world has changed.

Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-25T07:00:00.002-07:00

Coming Home

2010-11-24T13:02:00.001-07:00

We were in transit for about 26 hours total from the time of leaving the ship to arriving at my parents home in Phoenix. It was harsh. Then when we arrived in Phoenix I couldn't wait to see my son. I hurried out of the terminal to see him and would he come to me- no. He wouldn't come to me, wouldn't let him hug him or hold him. He went right to daddy. Hugged daddy and wouldn't let go. This lasted a little over an hour. My mom suggested that maybe its because I never leave Al for more than a couple hours at a time, While my husband leaves him everyday for hours at a time. He was more mad at me for leaving him for so long. The next few weeks our little guy has been more clingy but my friends with sons around the same age say their sons have all been really clingy lately too. So not only is it a phase its I traumatized my son by leaving him for 2 1/2 weeks. Well everything is getting back to normal. I am still living on vacation in my head. It was a long trip. But I enjoyed myself so much that I wish it was longer. Although I was happy to come home to my

Port: Naples (Pompeii)

2010-11-23T22:15:00.002-07:00

Going to Pompeii was my number one place on my list! I have ALWAYS wanted to go to Pompeii. I have always been so interested in it. As a child I wanted to read everything I could get my hands on about Pompeii. I would have been devastated if we had ended up missing this port like we did Khios.

Mt.Vesuvius is a dormant volcano in constant monitoring

This was the only shore excursion that we did not do with our the rest of our group. They decided that since we disembarked in the morning that they were only going to go to Pompeii and then back to the ship to pack. My husband's choice was to hike Mount Vesuvius. He told me I could come with him or go with his parents. I was willing to hike. Hiking isn't my favorite thing but I can do it and I did it. It kicked my rear-end though, but I went up and came back down. I was freezing, but did it.

Pompeii was cool. There was so much of it preserved. It made me wish we had also made it to the Naples Archaeological museum also. That's where all the best frescoes, statues, and artifacts. I was a bit disappointed. I don't know if it was just a tour guide and where she took us in the city, but I didn't see what I wanted to see. That's all I'm going to say on the matter.

We were rushed through the tour and then rushed to the bus and back to the ship. We made it to the ship on time. But a number of tours didn't and the ship left port over an hour late.

One last thing. Mt Vesuvius use to be one Large mountain. Now it is two mountains that are connected peeks. While we were on Vesuvius and our Volcanologist guide was explaining this to us, I had a hard time

envisioning this and understanding it. But when were in Pompeii and looking at Vesuvius from a distance, it is so obvious that you are looking at a huge mountain that literally "blew its top" off. The last time Vesuvius had an eruption was in the 40's (want to say 1944). It is considered a dormant volcano. There are evacuation plans in place and constant monitoring of the volcano's under surface activities.

Port: Athens

2010-11-21T08:57:00.005-07:00

On Acropolis overlooking the Temple of Zeus and the first modern Olympic stadium

Temple of Athena under Acropolis Museum

I was looking forward to Athens. With the unrest and riots in Athens we were worried that this port would be canceled. We did the shore excursion called "Athens on your own". The plan of this excursion is they drop us off in the middle of the city and then tell us to be back to 4:00 because the bus will be there at 4:15 we get on the bus and we'll leave. If you aren't back by that time, the bus will leave you. We decided to do this one so that we would have time to do all the things we want in the time.

Parthenon

We had a goal to go to the Acropolis and Acropolis museum, the National Archaeological museum in Athens, then to the Temple of Zeus ruins.We did it all but the Temple of Zeus, but we could see the ruins below while on the Acropolis.

The Acropolis Museum was super cool. Its opened last October (2009) and built on the active archaeological museum of the Temple of Athena/Nike. The floors are clear so you can look down and watch the active site. Also they have taken all the plasters of all the frescoes and statues, put the plasters on the Acropolis and the originals are in the museum. Also any frescoes or statues that are in the British Museum or the Berlin Museum there are plasters of them in the Acropolis Museum. Seeing everything at eye level was very cool. Also I think its cool that these artworks are now protected in environmental controlled rooms but without depriving us of seeing them where they belong.
I also enjoyed see the ongoing restoration project of the Parthenon. I wanted a documentary on it before going and to see the work up close (or at least as close as I could get) was a big deal for me. I enjoyed have the opportunity to explain the process to my fellow travelers too. For your information, the process is this, they remove each damaged piece one by one. A plaster cast is created of the missing section. Then a laser cuts the marble to be an exact replica of the plaster cast. The copy is then fused to the original marble piece and they are replaced onto the temple. Since the new marble is so much more white and shinny, its obvious what has been replaced and what is old.

To reach the archaeological museum we walked through one of the main streets. It was crowed and noisy and just like any big city street. The National Archaeological museum wasn't much of a disappointment. It had less of the big stuff in it, but it had a lot of wonderful things to see. I'm grateful we were able to go. There were many of the big famous statues there.

Outside the museum there is a cafe/restaurant. I believe its considered the Museum's cafe. On their menu they had a burger called the "Royal Castle" Burger, the description read "no comment". This was so intriguing to my husband and his brother that they just had to order it. I didn't catch everything that was on it, but it was like a gyro on a bun. Yummy too.

When done at the museum we took Athens' awesome subway system back to the Plaka to rendezvous with our group. We had some gelato while waiting and when the bus came we went back to the ship exhausted. This was the evening we went and sat in the hot tub to sooth our sore legs and feet.

Port: Kusadasi (Ephesus) Turkey

2010-11-19T21:56:00.000-07:00

Categorized stones

Brent and Brenda

This port was our biggest surprise. We had not chose this cruise because it stopped in Kusadasi, but was one of our favorite ports. Kusadasi is the port near the ancient city of Ephesus, the one of the Bible fame. But Ephesus was more than just the city that Paul preached to and wrote to the Ephesians. It was a huge important Greek and then Roman port city. It then over time it was ransacked,destroyed by earthquake, pillage, left abandoned, and then sediment covered it up.

Steve

Then rediscovered in 1860's. It is estimated that even today only 20% of Ephesus has been excavated. As the site has been excavated they categorized everything, laid it out, and as they find pieces to put together they reconstructed what it looked like. Its fascinating. I was so in heaven. There is even a section that is an active Archeological site. It reminded me about being back in Elementary school I wanted to be an Archeologist and go out on digs. It was just awesome. We both enjoyed walking around the ruins. So beautiful- so awesome.

cats were everywhere, sidewalks were

mosaics

reconstructed archway

my husband in the fou

Justin with Theater

Library at Ephesus

forum walk at Ephesus

The other thing we did in Kusadasi was go to the 'Virgin Mary House'. Its an old house that's foundation dates to the time that Mary could have been living in Ephesus. John was given the charge by the Jesus while on the cross to care for his mother, Mary, until the end of her days. John moved to Ephesus and lived there for a long time. If Mary was still alive at that point he would have brought her with him to Ephesus. This house is now a small chapel and is recognized by the Catholic church as the sacred site where the Virgin Mary lived out her days. Now I don't know if it was her home or not. I admit I'm skeptical, but there is a point at which places that are treated with a certain level of respect and sacredness have a sacred feeling. There was that sort of feeling there. I was grateful for the experience.

Virgin Mary House

In Kusadasi was the only port that I bought a souvenir for myself. I bought a leather purse at one of the shops in the bazaar. Its nothing special, but its a purse that fits what I've been looking for for a while now.