Blessings you didn't know you wanted but needed

As you can tell from my lost blog, my husband and I were chaperons at youth conference. It was held at a college campus about an hour from our house. When we were asked to do this my immediate thought was it would never happen. My husband wouldn't be able to take two days off work and who in the world would be able to watch my kids from Thursday morning until Saturday night. I shrugged off the idea and went about life. Thank goodness for my husband. As soon as he heard the opportunity presented to us, he knew we would go. He didn't know how but he knew we needed to be there. In just a short amount of time things miraculously fell into place so that we could attend. I went with the thought that we must be going because some youth really needed us and that somehow we were the only ones that could touch their hearts. Now, having been to the conference and come home I really have no idea if that really happened. I can say though that I have been truly humbled to be in the presence of the youth. In those short days they became a blessing in my life that I didn't even know I wanted but needed. Their testimonies of the Savior and their humble desire to follow His example gave me renewed desire to have that spirit in my life more fully. Both my husband and I have returned with a greater appreciation for one another, a greater desire to put ourselves in places where we can serve more, where we can spiritually grow more. My husband said it was as invigorating as a two week vacation. Yes, we were tired when we came home. They packed a lot into those three days but it renewed our spirits in a way that I don't think we even knew we needed. Now my thoughts wander to those youth and pray they do stay strong. One boy was sharing his testimony and ended it by saying "I'm all in. I want everything that my Heavenly Father wants for me, I'm all in" I echo his words. I'm all in. I will not be weary in well doing, for I know I'm laying the foundation of a great work. I know that by small things, (like attending a youth conference) great things are brought to pass, even if I wasn't expecting them.

Just Breath!

After so many trips the last month, I thought life would slow down for us. I have purposely chosen not to do everything available so we could have more down time at home just working on projects and chillin. Last week we started a container garden with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and squash. In about a month we will plant peas and lettuce. This is all new to me so we shall see if anything actually grows. Let's just say there are no green thumbs in my house so we are gonna need a lot of water, sunshine and faith!! We also spent one day pulling weeds in the yard and my body hurt the rest of the week. Not fun but it was simple "get back to basics" slow down stuff.

Just when I thought life would slow down, my husband and I got asked to chaperon Youth Conference this week which is all day Thursday through Saturday. I know it doesn't sound terribly long but when you start thinking of who will take care of the kids for that amount of time, and getting off work, it starts to make your mind spin. Luckily my sister-in-law has agreed to come out and watch the kids. Thanks Mal!!
Hopefully she will still like the kids after the weekend...hee hee.

I have started making crazy lists. Lists of things to take, lists of things to go buy, lists of food to get for them while we are gone, lists of things they could do while we are gone, lists of things they shouldn't do while we are gone, lists of things I need to clean before we leave (don't even get me started on how it freaks me out to have someone else in my house going through cupboards and drawers looking for things they need....I'm literally organizing things in my sleep!) lists...lists...lists! I just have to keep reminding myself that it's three days...three little days and everything will be fine. Just breath.

I'm actually looking forward to being there and hope it will be a fun experience for my husband and I to do together. We actually met at a youth conference when we were 14 so I'm sure it will bring back lots of memories. It's the getting ready that may do me in. That's right....breath. Hey I never got to use my Lamaze during any of my child births so maybe it will come in handy now!

Florida or Bust!!!

For the last two weeks we have been in Orlando, Florida. We decided to rent a house down there by all the parks instead of staying in a hotel room. It ended up being so much nicer! The house wasn't huge or fancy but it was absolutely perfect. It was 4 bedrooms/3 bathrooms with a pool and we spread out, enjoyed ourselves and swam every moment we could. I want to buy this house. It was what we need, not more not less and our family would really use a pool. I think we would actually save money having a pool cause we wouldn't want to go anywhere else.

When we asked the kids where did they want to go, T said Sea World and H said Disney. We ended spending some time at both and can we say hot, hot, hot!!!! Florida is okay in June if you are poolside,...put me in a park, in line, with a million people and all I do is melt. We made the best of it and had fun things like popsicles and lemonade smoothies to cool us off. Also a lot of the afternoons that we chose to go to a park ended up including an afternoon shower that cooled us off...and sometimes drenched us but what are ya going to do- it's Florida in June! One of the highlights was when K got chosen to be part of the live Disney Hollywood Studios Back lot show with boats, torpedoes and lots of water. It was awesome!! Here we come Hollywood!!

My husband also has some family and friends in Florida so we took time out to go visit them. They were so much fun and made us feel so welcome!! Thanks again guys!!

We also visited Gatorland where the alligators were a little too close for comfort if you ask me, not to mention the boa constrictor that was just hanging out in this little house with no cage. You can better believe we ran from that exhibit. The kids loved it though and K even got to hold some exotic birds which he loved.

I have to say my favorite thing about the vacation was getting to spend time with my family and doing it poolside....putting together two of my favorite things! It was so nice getting to see so much of that guy I call my husband. He is so busy with work when he is at home that we miss him a lot.


Oh I almost forgot to mention. We drove to Florida. That's right...about 15 hours in the car with three little boys. It went amazingly well for all the worrying I did. There wasn't too much screaming and complaining and H didn't have to go the bathroom more than once an hour! Yippee! Seriously, the kid has the size of a pea for a bladder! I also decided before we left that one way I would save money was I would make our dinner meals in advance at home and freeze them. We put them in a cooler with a bunch of ice and they were still frozen when we got to Florida. It ended up being great cause we got the yummy food we love without having to cook it each night. I highly recommend this cause it was a huge money saver and time saver!!

Well, now that we are broke, we will be here for the most part for the rest of the summer. Come and visit us if you like....of course there won't be any food here cause we are broke so bring some!! hee hee!! seriously....please!!

Swim Lessons

Okay so it's time to play catchup with the blog. Right before we left on a two week vacation, we spent the week before at the pool. Everyday, H had swim lessons and then we would stay and play with friends. It was a lot of fun but by the end of the week we were exhausted. The thing about H is that he has always hated putting his face in the water. He can doggy paddle with the best of them and get to where he wants to go but he hates the water on his head. I knew I needed to call in reinforcements. Miss Lainey is one of the swim team coaches at our pool and she was absolutely wonderful with H. The week he took swim lessons actually ended up being a rather chilly week for June. H has no body fat to speak of so I had to keep bribing him to get back into the water (even though I knew I wasn't crazy enough to get in!) He did really well and by the end of the week he was putting his face in the water and starting to really use strokes to get around the pool. Thanks again Miss Lainey!!