Margie's Blog

Christmas was great this year.  Santa did his best to get the girls just about what they wanted and after the girls patiently waited for each sister to open their goods they played pretty well with one another and shared toys for the next few days. 

Christmas Eve and they are ready with new jammies, cinnamon rolls and reindeer treats for Santa.

Christmas morning and anxious to see what Santa left.

Woo hoo!  A Disney princess castle for this little one.Shawn’s parents came down a few days later for a visit and we took them to see the Elk get fed at Hardware Ranch and Shawn took the crew to a USU basketball game while I put my feet up at home.

Waiting for our turn to ride the wagons around the 500+ elk.

And now I can start counting down until baby brother decides to join us.  Less than 50 days left!

This year we only have one girl attending dance (Paige and Brooke have opted for Hula lessons this year).  So it was nice to only have one girl to prep and attend her Holiday recital for.  Morgan did great and is loving attending dance.

We kicked off the Holiday season with the girls helping me decorate the Christmas tree.  Then we headed to Idaho for the annual family gathering where Santa visits to give the kids presents.  Sydney and especially Morgan was having NONE of it this year.  Morgan gets a bit of sensory overload and when the room erupted with cheer at the sight of Santa she melted.  And that was the end of Santa for the season for her.  She wouldn’t go near him the other times we came across him at the mall or other events.

Paige and Brooke were happy to visit with Santa but when presented with new jump ropes from him Brooke was greatly disappointed and said she didn’t even know how to jump rope.

The family has a tradition of giving daughters the middle name of Marie so here is a gathering of all the Maries in attendance that night.

I knew the holiday months would fly by and they did.  November brought a piano recital for Paige and Brooke, my birthday and Thanksgiving with Shawn’s parents.  Oh and all the preps for Christmas.  Don’t forget that.  I think that took up a good chunk of my spare time where I could do something other than clean, cook, rest my feet and tend to kids.

I’m another year older!  What year?  I think I’m done counting for a while but enjoyed my cute girls.

I’ve been slow to blog for a few months now and that is pretty odd for me.  I think baby #5 might be slowing me down just a bit but that’s okay.

The girls had a fun & chilly Halloween this year.  They didn’t last trick-or-treating for too long because of the cold but they enjoyed dressing up and getting a little candy to dig through.

We carved pumpkins that had grown in our little garden.  Morgan and Brooke both had girly ones which they were quite pleased with.

Our costumes were pretty cute as well with Alice, Rapunzel wedding, 50’s girl and Minnie.  I think I got my money out of that Minnie’s costume by now.

Morgan’s preschool had a little costume parade and sang a few songs they had learned.  Always cute to see the preschoolers dressed up and singing.

Last fall when we visited my parents for Thanksgiving I got permission for my birthday present to buy the cheapest annual passes to Disneyland for the girls and I.  We went a few times then, came back in February and spent a few more days exploring and I figured that was going to be it.  But with a pregnancy in the works and the passes expiration fast approaching I thought we better squeeze in one more trip before we take a while to focus on baby next year.  With the convincing of my mom we decided to fly to help with my horrible pregnancy legs.  The girls thought it was an especially fun treat to get to fly this time.  I haven’t taken them on a plane since Brooke was about two.

We took full advantage of our passes and spent Monday through Friday exploring Disneyland and California Adventure.  We managed to experience something new everyday that we didn’t do the day before and each day we walked away having had a great day.  We generally were in the park by the time it opened each day (either 8am or 10am) and stayed until 3-4pm each day.  Going first thing in the morning is a great hint.  Wednesday we were there at 8am and we walked onto several rides for the first few hours and really got all the rides you don’t want to wait more then 10 minutes for done that morning (Dumbo, Story Boat, Peter Pan, Matterhorn, etc.)

Being there several days gave us the chance to meet characters and bump into them when the crowds were lighter. On Friday I found Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Pluto were walking around Thunder Mountain Ranch with hardly any lines to visit with them where Wednesday I had waiting 20+ minutes with Sydney to meet Minnie at her house in Toontown.  But she’s Sydney’s favorite so it was worth the 20 minutes in my book.

At California Adventure we worked it out well where Shawn would take Paige and Brooke directly to California Screamer.  They rode it 3 times in a row while I got in the fast pass line for Radiator Springs very first thing in the morning.  The line sometimes looks long but it moves quick and it’s worth waiting 15 minutes to get a fast pass before they run out instead of waiting over and hour for the standby line later on.  Then we’d meet up with Shawn and ride Toy Story together.

We took time Monday night to come back for World of Color.  We took the little girls home to get dinner and settled for bed then took Paige and Brooke back for the show.  It was an awesome show.  I wish there was some sitting room for my tired legs but other then that the show itself was a blast.

Friday I knew we would be more beat so we took our time and moved more slowly.  My mom and sister came along and I took advantage of my sister by sending her off to grab fast passes while the rest of us slow pokes migrated to the next destination.  Mom took time to save us a bench for the parade in the afternoon and the girls enjoyed seeing that for their first time.  And we all enjoyed the stage show of Mickey’s Magical Map.

I think this post can go on forever because we hit almost every attraction and show they offer in the 5 days and had a complete blast.  Sydney talks about meeting Minnie and other characters daily now.  I’ll have to start saving my pennies so we can go again in a few years.

A week ago we had a weekend off from our regular church duties so we decided to seize the opportunity and visit Shawn’s parents in Idaho.  The girls love to have some Grandma and Grandpa time but with busy schedules we don’t get up there near enough. 

They dove into the toys, found the hidden costume box and spent hours dressing up in “creative” outfits.  Grandma and Grandpa were great sports and saddled up their three horses so the girls each got a quick horse ride around the pastor as well.  Grandma was ready with cookie dough chilling and ready to be spread out to make ghost cookies.  Hopefully Brooke didn’t sneak too much cookie dough.  She is always my dough sneaker.

I snuck away and found the extra white cardigan sweater for Paige and Brooke at Target that I had been looking for and restocked on church tights for them as well.  Essentials in a house with four girls where we attend church weekly.

We listened to uplifting messages on TV for general conference all weekend but with this season of my life being full of little kids I was well aware I’d have to re-read/listen to them after the weekend was over.

So far I’ve gotten through reading the first Saturday session and here are my highlights of what I loved.

Elder Hales gave the promise “that if you will listen [to conference], you will feel the Spirit well up within you.  The Lord will tell you what He wants you to do with your life.”

“What is said is not as important as what we hear and what we feel.”

He quoted President Harold B. Lee who taught: “The only safety we have as members of the church is to . . . give heed to the words and commandments that the Lord shall give through His prophet.  There will be some things that take patience and faith.  You may not like what comes from the authority of the Church.  . . .  But if you listen to these things, as if from the mouth of the Lord Himself, with patience and faith, the promise is that ‘the gates of hell shall not prevail against you; . .  . and the Lord God will disperse the powers of darkness from before you, and cause the heavens to shake for your good, and his name’s glory’ (D&C 21:6).”

Elder Soares spoke on meekness as a Christlike quality.  I appreciated this quote from Preach My Gospel, “Christlike attributes are gifts from God.  [These attributes] come as [we] use [our] agency righteously. . .  With a desire to please God, [we have to] recognize [our] weaknesses and be willing and anxious to improve.”

Sister Stephens spoke on the priesthood (or power of God).  She also talked about the importance of renewing our covenants weekly. “Latter-day prophets and apostles have taught that when we worthily partake of the sacrament, we can renew not only our baptismal covenant but ‘all covenants entered into with the Lord.’”  I think about a year ago was the first time I realized the sacrament was and opportunity to renew all our covenants.  It makes me ponder and reflect on those covenants even more frequently with that new knowledge.

She also shared this quote from Elder Ballard that I liked: “Our Father in Heaven is generous with his power.  All men and all women have access to this power for help in our own lives.  All who have made sacred covenants with the Lord and who honor those covenants are eligible to receive personal revelation, to be blessed by the ministering of angels, [and] to commune with God.”

My favorite tidbit from Elder Dube’s talk was a quote from Elder Holland: “The past is to be learned from but not lived in.  We look back to claim the embers from glowing experiences but not the ashes.  And when we have learned what we need to learn and have brought with us the best that we have experienced, then we look ahead and remember that faith is always pointed toward the future.” (“The Best is Yet to Be,” Ensign, Jan. 2010).

That one might need to be printed out and put up to remember this week.

Elder Bednar spoke on tithing.  I loved his examples of blessings that come from paying our tithing.  Blessings that can be easily overlooked.  He taught “The imagery of the ‘windows’ of heaven used by Malachi is most instructive.  Windows allow natural light to enter into a building.  In like manner, spiritual illumination and perspective are poured out through the windows of heaven and into our lives as we honor the law of tithing.”

He also spoke on the sacredness of the tithing the church receives and how the council on the distribution of tithes operates and honors these sacred sacrifices by members.

President Uchtdorf closed the session talking about those that join and leave our church.  He recounted reasons that people join our church, “Here you will find the authority to act in [Jesus Christ’s] name.”  People who  join with us “have many opportunities to transform their talents, compassion, and time into good works.”  And our journey to discipleship, “Our daily walk with Jesus Christ leads to peace and purpose in this life and profound joy and enteral salvation in the world to come.”

He spoke on doubts and faith as well.  “One of the purposes of the Church is to nurture and cultivate the seed of faith—even in the sometimes sandy soil of doubt and uncertainty. . . .  We must never allow doubt to hold us prisoner and keep us from the divine love, peace, and gifts that come through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

I apologize for the book report if this bored you.  It was a great exercise for me to review what I learned though and hopefully I can share more tidbits from the other 5 sessions of conference as I study them.  What was your favorite tidbit from Saturday morning session?  I’d love to hear.

Paige’s birthday was this past week.  Last year she got enough attention to last two years with a big party, baptism with lots of relatives and a piano house concert all focused on her awesomeness.  So this year she was warned that it would be toned down quite a bit.  I made her a cake, had a few presents I had collected over the year for her and kept it simple.  Her big present for 2013 was a new bigger and better bike.  Shawn and I made sure to snag one at a good Labor Day Sale this year since Brooke and Morgan were both growing quickly and we needed to move everyone up a bike size.  The girls have gotten into riding their bikes around the neighborhood together, with their dad and with friends.  It’s nice that when the restless hours of the evening come and I’m trying to put dinner together they often find themselves outside riding bikes for a few minutes until it is all ready.  Winter will squash that joy all too soon.  

It’s always a little crazy to reflect on your oldest child’s birthday and the day you became a parent for the first time.  How overwhelming the whole change was.  But I’m glad she came first.  She is a great leader in our family and helper for me.  I love her and glad she is always so confident in all areas of life.

Little sisters trying on big sisters’ new boots.

She doesn’t look too excited about the cake that I barely had enough time to get the icing on it.  But it still tasted fine despite the lack of decorations or creativity.