Nov 1

I have been connecting. Thankfully I have connected with many people that had fallen from my loop recently. People that made a difference in my life and helped me become who I am today.

I had hoped to write this November one thing each day that I was thankful for. So as I sat here pondering early morning, early morning, on the first day of November, where to begin, where to start this month of thanks... someone came to mind.



This is Amber. Oh, the simplicity of that small sentence. How vague it must be to you, but to me it speaks volumes. Today is her birthday. I have thought of and remembered Amber every year on her birthday since we became fast friends in the 5th grade. We haven't always stayed in touch, but I have always thought of her.

Amber was like a sister to me for many years. She traveled with my family on summer vacations. One of which was here, to San Antonio, for Fiesta, when we were what 12? 13 Maybe? I cannot take a riverboat ride downtown and see the rock wall outside of La Villita and not think of Amber. Oh the memories.

Remember when I fractured my tail bone and couldn't walk?
Remember the hours we played Nintendo?
Remember the walks home from school?
Remember when I fell through the wood bridge into the icy water?
Remember the scorpion that crawled on my pillow?
Remember doing make up in the car?
Remember the innocence?

Another time that I think so strongly of her is when I think of my baptism. By then we were not so much the closest of friends, but we were friends. And she was a valuable part of that process and decision of my life. I remember being invited to her house on General Conference weekends. Hmmm... missionary work at it's finest I see now.

Losing touch with Amber was not planned but finding her has been good for my heart. I cannot imagine the joyous reunions we must have in Heaven, if finding someone on earth means as much to me as it did to reconnect with her this month.

I sense that she has had more than her fair share of trials, heartaches and struggles over the years and I wonder, how I could have repaid my debt to her, repaid the kindness if I had been there, kept my baptismal covenant to bear burdens with her.

She is a special person that has grown into a beautiful women, wife and mother. She is talented, intelligent and has the best smile of anyone I know. I am indeed thankful for her, her testimony, her friendship, her charity - for it played an influential part in my life. And by touching my life, she has touched so many others my dear friend Amber... so many, many more.

Happy Birthday Amber. And thank you from the bottom of my heart.

For Shauna, who inspires me

And all you other women out there!

I wasn't going to dress up this year. Have I looked at my own to do list? I didn't need one more thing to do. To prepare. To think about. To ponder. To pray. To... wait - that was a tangent.

I want all you Superwomen out there to know I truly 100% was going to simplify and give myself some breathing room this year - Kids could wear what they wanted from the dress up box and me... I was a Mom and that was okay.

At 5:45p.m. (party starts at 6 across the street) I finished the soup to take to the party, I ran upstairs to comb my hair and changed my smelly-ran-around-all-day shirt when it I started hearing voices.
You could just put on the witch's hat from last year.
You could rat your hair and be a crazy lady.
You could do something.

So I did.
I changed the clean-not-smelly shirt I had just put on to a purple shirt, took my tiara from my nightstand - (yes I really keep a purple tiara on my nightstand, my sisters will understand), pushed in my amethyst earrings that I love so much because my boys gave them to me, ran downstairs to grab the purple cape from the coat closet and brushed some make-up on my sweating face seconds before I was in the kitchen ordering help to carry the soup and goods to the neighbors because it was 6:01 and I hate to be late.


Who am I?
"I am convinced that with a tiara and a cape that I could save the world.
I am a Mother."

This may be my favorite Halloween ever. . .

Remember how Noble prayed us good neighbors?
Bless that boy, bless him!

Tonight we gathered at one of those good neighbors homes with a handful of other people and had soup and bread before we sent out our trick or treater's. Oh the warmth of being with other wonderful people and eating their yummy yummy food!


Oh the joy this bring my heart. And this was only about half of them.
-
-


I finally get to use the line, the pun, I have been waiting for the right time to use. . .
Ladies and Gentlemen I give you (drum roll please)
"Brooks and Dunn"

Does it get any better than this?
This was not planned. This was not intentional. This happened all on it's own.

My great Mom captured at a great time!
Sadly - as you can kinda tell in the picture Hewy wasn't feeling so well. He concluded his night with a hurting tummy and yes, throw ups. All you moms out there can I get an "Ohhh, oh, sorry!"
And this was pre-candy. Poor kid.

See, Hewy not feeling so festive before trick or treating.
See, Liam "scratching" his nose?
I told him it looked like he was picking it and to let me take another. But that was just, *sigh* soooo annoying that he ended up looking totally annoyed and wouldn't look at the camera. So you get the picking the nose picture. Mother Justice I call it.

Okay, but really.
It was a great night.
I think this may be my favorite year so far!

The Costumes

here they are
the stars of the night


Sir William

Our noble Noble

Little Hands H.

And this guy crashed our party.

my attorney. . .?

This is how my dear sweet straight laced husband went to work dressed today.



His secretary and another co-worker sent me a picture of him. Probably making sure I knew he left the house looking like he did. Honestly - I am so glad he gets into the spirit of things. They both said "He was a hit!"
(He even met with clients like this!)

sneak peek

I don't have all the Halloween pictures because I used two cameras tonight.
but here is a sneak peek.

oh the disappointment

The boys had worked on cleaning their room for two days. I had given very specific guidelines. "This needs to be under the bed, in the corners, inside the closet clean." Imagine then their disappointment after TWO WHOLE days of cleaning when I went in and saw the clean vacuumed floor and then... oh wait what's that under your bed?


This is what they pulled out.

Oh the disappointment they felt.

Annual Pumpkin Carving Party

In Utah this was a big deal. We invited all of our relatives. It was common to have 20-30 people at our Annual Pumpkin Carving party. It has become quite small since we moved to Texas. BUT we sill have fun.

brotherhood at it's best

Just the other day I walked out to check on them and this is what I saw...

FHE / Psych

For FHE a couple weeks ago Alec asked us to draw a picture of our family. Then we had to tell what we drew and explain it. It was a psychology experiment of sort to do a mental health check on our family I believe.

The funniest part of that was when Alec was describing his picture he realized he drew the path leading away from the golf course to the tree of life before the end of the hole. Which really he put the golf course in there because it makes him happy but then the path left the fairway and he didn't make it to the green! :) Ohhhhh. It was fun to see and hear how everyone sees our family.

Now, this is keeping it real Ami!

As I was going through my basket of purses this morning my friend and neighbor Ami called to talk to me about Halloween plans. She mentioned she had looked at the blog and that I was just so real with it. So here is just how real it gets around here. I was going through old purses for an upcoming RS project - those in the ward - be on the watch. Once I found three that would work I needed to empty them so that we could fill them up with other enriching goodies... and this is what I found.


1) more receipts than I will ever miss
2) more ticket stubs than I realized I ever went to
3) several books of matches - in different purses from the same restaurant, Alamo Cafe. We all know I don't smoke... maybe I was just stocking our emergency preparedness pile?
4) Plenty of suckers, including one that was opened and had been sucked on.
5) a few girlie hygiene products - just in case.
6) a diaper
7) different purse than #6, Ziploc with wipes
8) My, Alec's and all three boys library cards.
9) several rubber hair bands and a clippie
10) gum: Trident, Altoids cinnamon
11) a Superman sticker from the doctors office.
12) two toy cars
13) a total of $38 cash
14) Buddy Bucks - only Texans will understand
15) hand lotion
16) a copy of last years Christmas card
17) our CD with all of last years family pix on it
18) My Sweethearts business cards - I never have one when I need it, apparently because it's in the other purse.
19)various make up, eye shadow, lip gloss, mascara
20) a bottle of Beautiful perfume
21) hand lotion, three
22) stamps, in various denominations
23) various loose change
24) all the pens I have lost in the last year
25) an entertaining look at myself

frozen - my apologies

I'm sorry, so-ooo sorry. To those that may have been trying to contact me via my cell phone please accept my apologies. You see, it started acting up while we were in Dallas a couple weeks ago. It has connection. The time is always right on it and I can get my emails, just sometimes much later than they were sent. But it seems not all the calls are getting through AND the ones that are, I can't pick up. I am so sorry as I have no idea who has called me and who hasn't the past two week. Spread the word. And if it's you... I am so sorry for technology.

For Shawnie... and a few extras

I took this first picture just for my Cousin Shawnie. I pulled out the 3T box this week and was delighted to find the "I'm a Keeper" shirt that Shawnie gave to Noble, and then Liam wore it and now Hewy is wearing it. Thanks Shawnie! They are all keepers.

Hewy loves him a hotdog.

Concentration and fine motor skills. I was impressed that H-y could bead the necklace the other day without help.

Can you tell what this picture is? This is Hewy holding on to my leg. Mothers you all understand. We don't make this kind of thing up. Toddlers really do hang on our legs at the darndest times. I think he was tired here. What is the instinct to do this though? Why have Mothers through time not kicked this outta of kids habits? It seems so sweet and tender, but I have to tell you... it can be quite annoying. I do love him so anyway.

Neighborhood Halloween party

Our Neighborhood hosts a Halloween party every year.


Noble was pretty happy to win at the cake walk.

There were all kinds of games: bean bags toss, balloon darts, bobbing for apples, fishing game, etc. etc. I don't know what Liam did to win this skull, but you can tell he had been bobbing for apples.

Hewy became the holder of the goods. Liam ended up winning the cake walk and got the whole tin of cupcakes! We were good on cupcakes for awhile!

TIME OUT

Time Out for Women is an event that Deseret Book hosts and travels around the country to all of us that live outside of Utah - they do it in Utah too, what am I saying. This past weekend it was San Antonio's turn again. I went two years ago and had a wonderful time so when San Antonio popped up in the schedule again I knew that I was going.

After the Friday night performances I stayed downtown so that I could just get up and go the next morning. I left feeling enriched, edified, uplifted, encouraged and ready to be anxiously engaged again. And I have to say that it wasn't as good as it was two years ago. But obviously, still good.

The only pictures I took of the two days are the two desserts I had on Saturday for lunch. We found ourselves at a buffet - and there for I had two desserts. It was my TIME OUT anyway. Time Out to refuel.

Would you protect yourself with a potato chip?

Last week we attended a "Water Fest" for homeschoolers that was hosted by San Antonio's water company, SAWS. (San Antonio Water System) I just want to send out a BIG "oh-yeah!" to them for such a wonderful event. It was free. It was free and phenomenal. So often free events are not so worth my time, but this one, this one rocked. At the gate they gave each child 10 tickets, rides and other activities were one ticket each. Snack could also be purchased with the tickets, popcorn 1 ticket, soda 2 tickets, apples and oranges 1 ticket... etc. They could also earn more tickets by attending classes that lasted for 20 or so minutes. My boys attended a class on the Edward's Aquifer, a dinosaur class, a river council class, the water cycle, and a class on plants/trees. They also learned how to detect leaks and how to keep the rivers clean. It was cool, I thought so and so did they! Cool School.


Noble about to ring the bell at the top of the rock climbing wall.
They let Noble climb in his crocs, but they didn't let other people - I don't know why they let him. Liam had sneakers and socks on and when a homeschool friend, Lily, didn't have socks and closed toed shoes... she borrowed Liam's socks. I warned her they were boy-socks and I couldn't tell her how long he had worn them, but she wanted to climb, so she wore his socks and her sisters shoes.

This is Liam after he climbed the wall.
Note the torn jeans that he loves and wears 5 days a week.

This picture is blurry, but the memory is important enough to me to post anyway. The Dinosaur guy was hilarious. He had the boys rolling in laughter. I know it is was one of those things where you had to be there in order to understand just how funny he was, but the title of this post comes from the Dinosaur guy. My boys loved it.

These were beaded necklace/bracelets that we made. Did I mention there were crafts too? And it was free!

My Attorney

I found myself at Fulbright and Jaworski's website today and looked up my husband. I just love this picture so I copied it. If I had more time I would write all the advantages to being married to an attorney. Maybe later.

*Post Post
Advantages:
I can say "I'll ask my attorney..." or "let me consult my attorney..." and not have to pay a cent.
I also know we are never going to be pushed around. Like when our way-to-full-of-himself neighbor threatens us with a made up consequence and my attorney who doubles as my sweetheart for eternal life says he'll look into the legal ramifications of that... and the neighbor is immediately sputtering and backpedaling. I loooooove that. It's kind of like a knight in shining armor, being stood up for to a bully, kind of thing.
He speed reads everything I don't want to read.
He is an excellent proof reader catching tiny teeny mistakes - okay, sometimes that's annoying, but I see the good of it too.
I never have to read the fine print because he already knows what it says, and he speed reads it to make sure it doesn't say something it shouldn't and he crosses things out he doesn't agree with.
He "knows a guy" or gal, for just about everything, have a tax question, a real estate question, a wills and estates question, a family law question, an IT question, you get the idea...
People answer his calls when he leaves messages that say "This is Alec Dunn with Fulbright and Jaworski..."
He has a secretary that makes travel arrangements.

Stay tuned I may think of more.

favorite whoops

I have a picture slide show on my desktop sidebar that goes through not only the pictures of mine stored on my computer, but also pulls pictures of friend's online albums that I have visited. It is one of my favorite things and makes me smile at least once a day when a memory picture pops up, or there is someone I haven't seen awhile smiling back at me or in the case of these pictures... my whoops pictures.

I don't think I took a single one of these pictures. But I love them.
Whenever I see one of them on the slide show I smile.
Happy mistakes.


This is Liam, twirling in our Salt Lake house - I recognize the berber carpet.
It makes me think of carefree days, joy and laughter.

This is Noble, and I am pretty sure he took it himself. I love the blue eyes, but what I love about those eyes is I see the wonder and the mischief in them. If I push this button with the camera facing this way a picture of me pops up on the back.

And this.
The Yellow Cup on Counter, A Child's Perspective by: Liam
(Okay, just look past the grimy edge of the counter and see the real art here.)
There have been times in my artistic photography life that I have been jealous that I didn't take this picture. It is one of my all time favorites from all of the thousands of pictures I have stored digitally.
Now - years later, I love the memories associated with it. The counter of my too, way too, small kitchen in Salt Lake, the sliding door looking out into my green backyard, the edge of the frame of the apple picture my husband surprised me with one year. But you probably don't see all that - you probably just see the same yellow cup on the counter that Liam did - from a child's perspective.