Dance Recital-December 17, 2011

The girls had their dance recital on December 17th. They were so cute and danced so well! Kate and Mayli were in the same class and they danced beautifully. Madilyn had lots of fun and of course was super cute up on stage. It was a lovely evening full of fun and entertainment. We had lots of support and visitors that came to watch them dance it was awesome!

Katelyn

Mayli

Madi

All 3 girls...boy it is hard sometimes to get a good picture

Madi's Dance

Katelyn and Mayli's dance

Mayli Turns 6!!!

Mayli Elizabeth turned 6 on December 5! She is growing up way too fast. The other day I was watching videos of the girls when they were younger and realized how fast time is flying by. The quote, "This moment will never come again...enjoy it" rings so true to life. Each and every moment will only come once and we truly need to make the most of them.

Mayli on her blessing day.

Our little baby was so tiny and in the blink of an eye turned 1...

She loved making us laugh

And now she is grown into a beautiful young lady.

Mayli started Kindergarten this year and is learning so much. She loves to learn and every day will come home and tell me something new she has learned. She already is on level B in reading and can count to 100 by 1's, 2's, and 10's. She loves to read and loves to write things. She likes boys a lot already (eek) and this year has already had 3 different crushes but her latest she's had for a couple months now. :) She loves to dance still and loves to sing too. Her favorite color is a rainbow. She loves to play with her sisters and her friends. She also really likes riding her bike, playing on her scooter, and riding her skateboard. Her favorite candy bar is a 3 Musketeers and she loves to chew gum. Mayli is very kind hearted and if someone has less than her she will willingly give all she has to them. For instance a while ago my girls and their cousins each got a stuffed cat at Halloween. One of Mayli's cousins lost her cat on the walk home and was so sad she couldn't find it. Mayli walked up to her and said, "You can have mine." And she gave it to her. She is always thinking of others and will give anything she has to help someone who is sad. She loves to help out with the baby and loves to help around the house most of the time. She is a joy to have in our home and we are so blessed that she is part of our family! Love you Peanut!

Mayli had a fun birthday. She got to go to school and bring cupcakes to celebrate with her class. I had a wisdom tooth extracted on her birthday so I wasn't in a party mood. She was so kind and understanding. Daddy took her and her sisters to Arctic Circle for dinner and then when they came home we had cupcakes that the girls helped decorate. The next night we had her birthday dinner of homemade chicken noodle soup. She was so excited. Happy 6th birthday!

Where have I been????

Where have I been...that's a good question! Life seems to have remained consistently busy for these past few months. I keep thinking one day it will slow down a bit and I can catch up. But boy that hasn't happened yet. Since I last posted lots has been going on...Thanksgiving, gingerbread houses, Mayli turned 6, Mike's mom started Chemo treatments, I got called as the Young Women's President in my ward, family came to visit from all over the world, 2 wonderful people were able to receive their endowment, a wedding, girls night, cake making, Christmas shopping and wrapping, Christmas parties, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, more family visits, New Years, my sister moved in with us, and so much more! So hopefully I can update what has been happening to catch up a bit.

Lately I've had the words from the song, 'I Like Life'...over and over in my head just randomly the words, "I like life and life likes me" pop into my head. Life is a bit crazy right now but 'I like life'and I'm trying to enjoy every moment I can. Here is the start of the updates.

I had the opportunity to make a cake for a charity and I'm so used to making wedding cakes or cakes for girls that I didn't have a lot of ideas for a cake for the men's division. After help from a few people this is the cake I came up with. It was a hit and the guy that won it loved it!

We spent Thanksgiving with Mike's family. It was a lovely day and how grateful we are for all our family. We were able to still have our tradition of making gingerbread houses. Sherie's sister Leslie made gingerbread houses for everyone. What a blessing it was to be able to have them all ready and made for us.

The girls ready to start

Madi loved decorating this year...she really loved trying out all the candy too!

Mayli and Uncle Ethan having fun.

Kate finishing up decorating

Gingerbread decorating so much fun!

Mike and Kate decorating

This was Madilyn's...she did a great job this year and did most of it by herself. I was impressed with all the patterns she did.

This one is my house.

Daddy decorated Juliet's for her

Mayli's house. She made the 'tree' all by herself.

Mike's house

Katelyn's house. She frosted and decorated all by herself this year!

The next weekend we had a bridal shower for Amy. Afterwards I had the fun opportunity to be able to go help Amy get ready for the bridals and groomals at the temple. I was so grateful for the wonderful opportunity to be able to be invited and help out with this day. A special thank you to my dear Michael for letting me go while he took care of the kids.

Amanda looked gorgeous! It was freezing outside but we had a great time!

Beautiful Amanda

Ethan was mesmerized by her beauty and was quite speechless when she walked out.

Seriously gorgeous!

It was so fun to able to share this special day with them. Thank you for letting me be there!

Madi's Fieldtrip

Madi went on a fieldtrip with her school. It was so fun and they got to learn a lot. She was so funny and being so shy. She got a coloring book, a sticker, and a firetruck eraser. She was pretty excited and had fun seeing all the neat things.

She is so cute! :)

Life-A New Normal

My poor blog has been so neglected lately. It seems life has been in a whirlwind the past couple of months. I rarely find time to sit and relax and when I do find time I just want to relax and not worry about anything. So hence my blog has been quite neglected.

It is crazy how your normal can change in an instant. A few weeks ago Mike's mom was diagnosed with cancer. The phone call no one ever wants to get but so many people do. We had just arrived home from San Antonio. I had just left the pediatricians office and my phone rang. It was Mike's mom calling to tell me they had just found out she had cancer. I froze not knowing how to react to the news I just heard. It has been quite an eventful few weeks. With so many things...crying, waiting for results, fear, more waiting, love, still more waiting for results, time with family, seeing amazing support of an amazing woman, spiritual experiences, tender mercies, testimonies strengthened, and so many other hard and yet wonderful things.

I love my dear sweet mother in law. Too often we take those we love for granted. I shared my thoughts on her blog and if you'd like the read them you can click here:

http://cheereveryday.blogspot.com/2011/11/weekend-with-family.html

We finally have gotten a treatment plan for Mike's mom. She will start chemo therapy on December 5th. Please keep her in your prayers. She will need a lot of strength to endure the things that will be happening to her. We know that our Father in Heaven is mindful of us and that this is happening for a reason and it is for our good. Life is going to be a new normal right now and that is ok. We can endure because we have a Savior who loves us and knows how to succor us. Life will be wonderful because we have each other and the gospel.

Here is Mom with me, Amanda, and SaraAnne.

Love you girls!

Trip to San Antonio

We went down to San Antonio to go to our niece Kylie's baptism. We drove down there...crazy right? It is a 2 day drive but we had a good time. Here is some pictures from the fun vacation.

Here we are before crossing the Colorado state line.

Crossing into New Mexico

Finally to Texas! We had fun driving and got to stop in Roswell, NM the 1st night. It was so funny to see all the alien stuff they had. We also got to go to church on Sunday in Roswell. It was so wonderful. It was weird being a place we didn't know but as soon as I saw the church a peace came over me and it was wonderful to be able to step into a place of familiarity. It was so great.

We had so much fun while in Texas and got to spend Halloween there. Here are all our 8 girls all dressed up ready to go. They were all so cute!

Kate was a genie

Mayli was Tinkerbell

Madilyn was a fairy

Jewels was a little bunny

A pic of all 4 girls

Here is Juliet while we were trick-or-treating

Here are the bigger girls while we were trick-or-treating

We decided to go see The Alamo because Mike and the girls had never seen it. It was fun to and see the history there. We had a fun time looking at everything.

Here is Mike and the girls

The girls by a cannon

Mayli and Kate by the flags

Me and the girls in front of the Alamo

It is beautiful down there

We went to the duck pond later that evening and the kids had so much fun feeding the ducks.

Celeste and I took the girls to Minitown. They had so much fun!

Later in the week the rest of the family flew in and we had fun together. We went back to the duck pond and every one had a great time.

Here is a picture of us all. We were only missing Ryan, Hannah, and Evie. We had a great time and it was wonderful to go to Kylie's baptism. It was a fun vacation.