Proud of Alll

I've just been so impressed with what everyone around me is doing that I felt like I should take a moment and give them all a nod of appreciation.

Jer has been training for a marathon... he ran 18 miles today. My sister has been really working hard to finish school and will be the President of her honor society next semester as well as applying to do a masters degree. A friend of mine who has never been athletic has just started running and is doing really well. Another friend and her husband just signed the contract on their very first house. My other sister has been working hard to lose weight... I don't know how much she has lost so far but I know it's at least 60 lbs. My sister in law has been taking wedding pictures and is marvelous. My brother is just getting his first salary paid job... and is probably going to be making more than most people make on their first one. Ada is starting to talk in sentences and going to nursery on her own. My mother in law has figured out why she's had insomnia for the last 10 years and has finally been able to start getting full nights of sleep. What great and amazing people to be accomplishing so much! I'm excited for all of them.

More pictures

Here are some more pictures of Ada! My favorites... of course.

Ada was reading books in our entry way and it was fun to watch all of her facial expressions while she read.

Ada and Grace

Cheeser in a box

Cousin Emma and Ada napping

Babysitting again...

I was babysitting again this morning... I think it's a lot of fun because Ada gets to see other people, and because it's fun to get out of the whole routine thing. I watched Ada's best friend Lizzy this morning... it was a little adventurous... not hectic, just exciting. First I ran out of tissue because she's teething and sneezing up a storm (not that I usually have very much tissue to begin with... I keep forgetting to buy some). Then she wanted to watch Mickey Mouse, and our tv doesn't work so I put on a old Mickey cartoon that I have... she thought that was weird because it wasn't Playhouse Disney version, but she was okay with it. Then when Ada woke up I put some cereal out for the two to eat, and at first they were doing good, then they decided that it was funner on the floor than in the bowl. I cleaned that up and started doing dishes when it got really quiet... I went to find them and they were in my bathroom busy cleaning my shower with a toilet brush. Hmmm. I washed their hands and got them out of the bathroom, cleaned up the bathroom a little and closed the door so they wouldn't do it again... and I find them dumping more cereal from the box into their bowl and from there onto the kitchen floor again... sigh. I guess I'll learn one of these days that it's easier to keep an eye on them than to clean up the messes after they've already made them. Oh well.

Newer pictures...

I wanted to put up some newer pictures of Ada... I feel like she changes faster than anything else in my life and it's hard to not forget that she's always growing... here are a couple... I think that the one from Christmas makes her look like her cousin Henry and the one on the piano looks like I did as a little kid. And she's still gotten bigger in the last couple of months... I just don't have those pictures on my computer yet.

 

Finger People

We had a marathon day on Saturday... that meant that Ada was babysat most of the day... she stayed with some friends of ours during the day and then my mom invited her over to spend the night. She had a little bit of a rough night... I would if I didn't know where I was in the middle of the night too. My favorite part though was when we went to pick her up in the morning my mom had drawn little faces on each of her fingers with a ball point pen. That's what she used to do to us as kids to keep us quite in church. Ada was just fascinated by these little people on her fingers! I asked her if she's said hello to them yet... so she looked down at them and using her opposite hand... waved each of her fingers at herself one at a time and kept saying,"Hello!" Then she took her thumb and gave it a big kiss.

Link

Jer posted some videos of our cute daughter on his blog, so here's the link.

http://jergal.blogspot.com/

It's a private blog, so if you want to see them you need to have an invite from Jer. Just ask... he doesn't mind friends and family sooooo much!

Brownies... mmmm delicious

Ada is Jers daughter... she has always liked chocolate, but she's never been able to vocalize it before. My sister, Janelle, had Ada in the high chair and had been feeding her dinner. At the end she cut up a mint brownie and gave her part. Ada gulped it down and asked for more... then when Janelle put the rest of the brownie in front of her Ada clearly yelled, "I LOVE THAT!"

Ada... again

This morning I heard Ada playing behind me while I did some mightyauthors work. I could hear the phone turning off and on so I turned around to look... She was sitting in a baby chair that I'd gotten out to babysit the other day, holding a highlighter and pen in one hand and dialing the phone with them in her other hand. Then she'd hold the phone up to her ear and say, "Hello?"

Sherri Dew

I know... I don't usually get too serious in my posts. I had something that I've been thinking about and I felt like I should write it down.

I was invited by my mom to hear Sherri Dew speak at her RS Stake Conference. I'm sure that Sherri has a lot to do, and it was neat to be able to hear her speak. She spoke mainly about communication. She talked about how important communication is to us as humans... especially in our modern world of email, blogs, cell phones, etc... She talked about how when our communications are interrupted for even a day, we are desperate to get them back and how that is the way that it should be when our communication with our Heavenly Father is interrupted. She talked about how every prophet since Adam has taught about two things... (1) Jesus Christ and (2) us in the latter days. She talked about how Heavenly Father would never send someone... especially a woman... that isn't capable to deal with these times and their events. She said that us women are very influential in all the lives that we touch... it is part of our nature... and part of who we are as children of God. She also talked about how there are only three things that we need to succeed (not survive... but succeed) in this dispensation. First is to truly know yourself... who you are and why you're here. Second is to know who Jesus Christ is, know Him mission, and know how it affects you today. And third is to know how to receive and interpret personal revelation. One thing that struck me at this point is that all three of these things are not steps and they are something that is accessible to anyone... they are not high and lofty things only attainable to choice spirits. They are every day... as long as anyone really has the desire to truly do them. Two more things that she said had an impact on me. She talked about how it has taken her over 30 years to learn how to understand the revelations that the Spirit brings into her life, and how she prayed not only to receive that revelation but to ask the Lord to tutor her in understanding them. How often do we receive answers to our prayers and we don't know it or how to interpret those answers?

She gave me a lot to think about and she reminded me of an impression that I received during this last General Conference. The economy was just starting to look like it wouldn't recover quickly... I was worried because we had spent our savings on buying our house and we hadn't recouped it over the year that we'd lived in it. If our family had an emergency, we didn't have much to fall back on. But listening to all the talks in conference, the spirit settled my heart. I was told that it didn't matter if we still owned our home 4 years from now or if Jeremy didn't have a job. These were all temporary things and they didn't serve us in the long term. All that mattered was what we decided to do with our lives, our family. I was told that all would be well, no matter what came. I was grateful for that personal revelation.

Images...

You know those websites that have pictures or stories that contradict themselves? I saw a real live one the other day.

Jer's favorite upper end car is a Z3. They are nice looking, classy sports cars... They aren't too common because they're so expensive. We were driving down state street and saw one. Jer was so excited and going on about what a neat car it was... The best part was that it had a Papa John's pizza delivery sign on the top. Is that just an indication of our economic status, or did some teenager borrow their dads' sports car to do his working shift?

Good morning Jeremy

I have to write about this because I don't want to forget it!

We spent the night at Jeremy's parents house because we had gone to watch a movie and stayed late, and Judy and I had a quilting class early in the morning. We slept in the same room as Ada. She went to bed at her normal time, where Jer and I went to sleep at about 3 am... The problem was that Ada decided to wake up at 7:30 instead of 9:30. Since I've been pregnant, Jer has been getting up with Ada in the mornings unless he has an amazing amount of work to do that day, so Ada stands up in the portacrib and holds up the stuffed duck that grandma had put in there with her saying, "Look Dad, Quack-Quack!" The best part was how chipper and alert she was... where Jeremy after only 4 1/2 hours of sleep just kind of groans and says, "Uh..." I couldn't help but laugh!