playing catch up

there is a lot I have said I was going to blog and havent yet. So, I'll skim over the holidays with a few pictures here. :)

We were so very busy and had so very much fun these holidays. It would be less crazy if we didnt have all the girls birthdays in it all as well. Mine is in November, then Char, Bea and Is's birthdays are in Dec. Addy's is in the beginning of January and so its just inevitable it's crazy. I keep telling myself that I wont do a bunch of parties and do a crazy celebration for each of them, but I either get talked into by the entire household, or I do it to myself. :) I am swearing I wont do any parties for this next year!! (lets see how well that works)

Besides the birthdays, we did have a great time on our break. The kids were home for 2 weeks and so was Chris, so we milked up all the time together and had a great time.

I got a new camera and I just am not totally sure I like it yet. I just have to get used to it and it'll take better pictures if I knew about it more, but geezz, I just want a good picture and you wont see all of that here this time. But, it is still totally fun. :)

A few of the cousins at Granny's house! :) THanks for the yummy family dinner!! It's always nice to get together with the Lherons for a quick few hours.

Christmas was good stuff with the kids. Kids and Christmas! Its got to be good. Dinner and Santa's plate of cookies and reading Christ's birth and teaching the kids about the true meaning of the holidays by serving others. All that stuff. :)

We are so proud! We figured out how to make the perfect turkey! YOOHOO! It's only been 12 years of marriage and we are just figuring it out. I give ALL the credit to Chris, but HEY! I took a kickn picture of it.. so yea!

Christmas isnt Christmas with out some kind of yummy desert. So, I made a black forest Chocolate cake (all scratch of course! those are even canned cherries I canned. :))

THE plate of cookies for Santa and his reindeer. Scarce looking now that its on the huge charger plate. Hahah! Oh well, Santa and his wife were eating too many goodies anyway. :)

Spending time enjoying a few gifts. Coloring and some awesome new socks. :)

We had lots of fun just enjoying each other and making us all laugh. :)YAY!

Service(taking dinner to a friend) and Snow (taking forever to get dressed)!

Our awesome friends THe Jeff and Sarah Brightons came to our house for another visit!!! We really enjoy our life long friendship with them. We have a few pictures here of our time playing and playing and playing together! :)

Rachel and Isabel painted together. And then I think they had more fun posing for the pictures. :)

Happy NEW YEARS!! This was the very first picture of the year! We ran outside and yelled and yelled and realized it was still freezing cold! (Isabel is with her friend)

Isabel is 12!

She turned 12 on the 23rd of December

baby Izzy

has grown to a beautiful young woman.

sniff sniff. (her turning 12 has been harder than sending her to Kindergarden!)

We had a great time celebrating with yet again a late night with jammies and movie. Its her all time favorite activity.... party and pjs and movies and friends. :)

just a few friends...


lets snack!

Julius Cesar

Isabel's 6th grade class put on the play of Julius Cesar.

It was really quite entertaining. The kids all had parts and had to memorize TONS of lines. Isabel chose to have a non speaking part, did all the calligraphy for the props and was also the lights guy. :) Its fun to see all the kids that I see when I volunteer or when they are over at our house hanging out (they are too old to play, right) in action, doing their best at something.

This is a picture of the inside of the school on the left wall foyer. The middle and high school art kids have some murals up and are learning some techniques. Its pretty fun going to our awesome charter school.

its been tooo long!

My keyboard got into an accident right after the last post.

KIDS!

They are so expensive! :)

At least this time it was water that fried the keyboard and not bodily fluid. Yep, we've been through a few keyboards.

This one is a loaner keyboard until our nice ergonomically correct one comes soon. I cant type as well on this one, so I don't want to take the time to. But, I have missed sharing! And, I treat this blog like our scrapbook in a way too.

Thankful

This song moved me today. I am afraid I am an amature and don't know how to put the actual song on my blog. If anybody does, let me know. :)

Thankful

by Josh Gorban

Somedays, we forget to look around us,
Somedays, we can't see the joy that surrounds us,
so caught up inside ourselves,
we take when we should give,
so for tonight we pray for,
what we know can be,
and on this day we hope for,
what we still can't see,
It's up to us, to be the change,
and even though we all can still do more,
there's so much to be Thankful for,
look beyond ourselves,
there's so much sorrow,
it's way to late to say, I'll cry tomorrow
each of us must find our truth,
it's so long overdue,
so for tonight we pray for,
what we know can be,

and everyday, we hope for,
what we still can't see,
it's up to us, to be the change,
and even though we all can still do more,
there's so much to be thankful for,
even with our differences,
there is a place were all connected,
each of us can find each others light,
So for tonight, we pray for
what we know can be,
and on this day, we hope for,
what we still can't see,
it's up to us, to be the change,
and even though this world can still do so much more
there's so much to be thankful for.

From Josh Groban's album, Noel

Happy Birthday my Beatrice!!

Baby Beatrice

My sweet Beatrice is 3 today!!

Its tough showing 3 fingers if you never have before! :) but, we almost got it!I know this is blury, but she is soo cute still!!about to open her present last night. :)glued to her gift!! :)

she could hardly sleep last night because HAD to be with Ariel at all times.I threw a tiny party for her today. I envited 1 friend over and we had a tea party. It was awesome!And, here is another cake! :) I think it turned out pretty cute. Bea LOVES it! :)

it's mom's amazing carrot cake recipe! oh gosh, its to die for!

Cut it!

Beatrice wanted her crust cut off her PBJ. I was taking too long to get to her, so she took matters in her own hands and climbed up to the pencil cup and got some scissors and took care of business! :)

Charlotte's photo shoot

I love this blouse she's wearing. One of those favorites that has lasted for years.

Yep, that is a window seal. Hazard for having "free spirited" children. Dang it.

She loves looking out the window. Standing against the wall is the new COOL!

and ready to pounce... still doing it and it's STILL a cool trick!

Can you just love those CHEEKS!!!!

Charlotte IS ONE!

Yep, it happened! Its been a year since my sweet baby Charlotte was born.

This picture was taken when she was 4 days old.

I saw a miniture baby in the doctor's office the other day and really had these crazy mixed emotions. Ranged from..."ohhh... i want another one of those tiny things!!" to...."look away! oh that makes me tired just looking."

CHarlotte as a ONE year old!

Here are some highlights of our big day. We all had a really fun time with her.
Everyone helps with everything!

I am no cake decorator. I always think I can do anything but as I got into this project, I remembered.... OH! I didnt get that talent in my blood from my mom and sister Jo.

But I had a really fun time making a cute cake for the baby's First. Its a tradition to do a little doll cake for the girls. This is a half ball cake pan. It worked perfect. The cake was super yummy. I hate cake mixes now, so I made this off the Hershey's baking chocolate box. I had fun decorating it by myself after all the kids went to bed. I had to, because Bea's 1st bday cake turned out way worse than this. I let everyone help with hers. :) haha. It was still yummy, like this one.

Proud of that girl!

Isabel was invited to the Young Women classes this past Sunday. (a few weeks early, just for the day) She was presented with, along with all the YW, a 21 days Closer to Christ program. I am so proud of her because she is really diligently working on it every single day. Its so fun because when she reads the scriptures for the day, or has to write her testimony about the scriptures, she comes to one of us and we really really have wonderful talks. These talks are letting us know that having daily scripture study with our family is really benefiting her knowledge of the gospel. She is becoming a wonderful girl. Sniff Sniff. I am happy she is a happy young woman.

What have I been up to??

Oh gosh, what am I NOT up to?

I have been SEWING a ton! Drapes for a friend, teaching Isabel's friend how to sew, and finishing like 10 Christmas gifts (if I told you, you might know your gift, so yeah, not going to.) , sketching a lot of new designs and seeing more and more ideas to do. I am not sure if I'd be officially diagnosed with ADHD, but I have a hard time focusing on one thing when it comes to creating things, so I have a lot of things going. I just get SO excited about ideas that flood my brain!! Woman thing, but maybe its a Leslie thing. Chis is a good man for putting up with my head. It's not for the faint of heart. I think that is yet another reason why we have a basement and a section just for my "stuff".

I've been working out hard to get rid of the Pecan pie that sucked to my body. When looking up how many calories that pie had, I freeeeeked out and asked Chris if I could just through the rest away.... His reply was, "Lets not do anything drastic!" :)

Christmas cards were sent out! Earliest ever! They were perfect too.

Christmas shopping for the kids is DONE! It was easy when Chris really only wants to shop at Costco for everything that exists at our house. (all it needs a fabric store too and we'll be good to go) Two hours, a few presents for each kid and while we were there a weeks worth of groceries, $$$ later and DONE! Oh that Costco. I think we stayed in our feeble budget and it worked!

I've tried for weeks to get a video of Charlotte dancing to any music she hears. Its adorable! She sees the camera and comes right for it. She likes to see the pictures on it, just like all the kids do. I even hid the camera under a towel to video her, but that just made her more curious! :) out smarting a baby is actually tricky sometimes. Her birthday is on Sunday and I hope to have something by then!!

And of course, it wouldnt be me if I wasnt thinking about the lessons I've learned in the past few days and time in my life. Its amazing how so many of our stories really are so similar. Satan wants us to feel so alone. Its just one more tricky thing he has on us. BUT the coolest thing is that we will always have an opportunity to have more knowledge than him. We can know everything that our Heavenly Father knows, if we just SEEK for it and ask. He really does give us what we want. Be careful what you ask for!! :)