Snapshot Saturday

We spend a lot of our time gardening, but it is starting to pay off.  Most of our tomatoes are doing great.  Hopefully the rest of them will catch up once they get to enjoy not being flooded.   We are getting ready to start school on Monday.  We had school lunches to discuss the upcoming school year plan.  It was a lot of fun and it got the boys excited about starting, which was a good thing.  Here are a few pictures that I have been collecting.  Some are older than others.  :)

This is the boys lighting some candles while the power was out after the tornado.  

I caught the boys all hanging out together, and it was cute, so I took a picture.

Building is what we do all the time.  These are bristle blocks, but I have seen legos, duplos, bristle blocks and knex all over the place.  

This is a site that we see a lot around here.  Joshua has learned to do this all on his own.  You need to train them young.

And here is the result!  I freeze most of the tomato sauce, but I saved this to  make Chicken Tikka Masala!  Yum!

We are now up to 21 quarts of tomatoes.  It is a good start.  My goal is to reach 150.  Eek!  I don't know if I can pull it off, but I will sure try.  

I hope you are all well and love hearing from you via text!

Hey fam!

So I just thought I'd share some official stuff with you :) I feel so accomplished and proud of myself for graduating from college, especially less than a year after having David. Now call me crazy, but I'm so excited to be doing 1 more year of school! I'm starting my cosmetology program in September! It will take less than a year and I am terrified and thrilled. 

Everyone is invited to my graduation on August 14! There will be a party afterwards!! 

Here is an email that says I graduated from Brigham Young University. An end. 

And here is my official start date for cosmetology. A beginning.

Missing...

Every week I think, "I really should blog..." and then I consider that, well, I really don't have much to say.  And then the action goes un-actioned.  (I have no idea if is is a word or not.)  But today, I am thinking how much I appreciate the pictures and short messages that keep us all connected so I will endeavor to do more...

First, WOW IS THIS FAMILY BLESSED!  Mom and I, as we have knelt in prayer, and in our discussions, have been truly overwhelmed with the love and kindness given to our family by our Heavenly Father.  Sometimes we just want to say prayers of gratitude and ponder on the goodness.  Today is one such day.  We love you all and are grateful for the sacred things happening in all of our lives. 

Last week we had our stake Youth Conference.  One of the highlights of my year.  Our youth numbers are up YOY, partly thanks to April joining our Stake.  We had a great experience.  Here are some pictures. 

We had a service project at the temple where we re-mulched paths and other part of the grounds.  Some areas could not be reached with wheelbarrows so buckets were used.  It is estimated that we filled and moved over 4,000 buckets of mulch.

April and Amanda McDonald.  Amanda was baptized the evening we returned from Youth Conference.  It was a wonderful experience to have her participate and give leadership to our youth.  Wish she were in our ward. 

The Front Royal Ward youth and leaders. 

Photo Friday

Daddy falls asleep on the floor and...

Jaime and Vida really love their swimming classes. Jaime is doing really well and
Vida loves the water but doesn't seem to love the things they're trying to teach her :)

Vida finished her tumbling class and got a little plastic medal.

Ava helping me pick basil.

Bedtime sweet sister love, after some toddler craziness where she bit them first.

Photo Friday! Boom! First one!

He really loves his bunny. We find him like this often. It's adorable. 

This Ian's Garner have spent our evenings and nights doing this week. Packing up Patrick's dad's books. 

David also loves watching the clothes go around and around. It's also so freaking adorable. 

Y'all already saw this, but it is SO worth blogging. It's one of the most coolestest wonderfulest thing I have ever done gotten....

We played hard this day at the splash pad and he fell asleep right on me! It was great and we had a 2 hour nap. 

We visited grandma and grandpa a lot while the Packard's were staying there. We went swimming and David loved it! Isn't this picture precious? 

Made it!!!!!!!!!!

So much to do, so exhausted, so blessed. We made it!

Sent via the Samsung GALAXY S®4 Active™, an AT&T 4G LTE smartphone

On Sunday I Do Pictures

Joshua making his first homemade pasta. 

Hyrum helped. 

Tomatoes!

Just chilling. 

Jacob helping me distress a woodworking project with a big old chain. 

Just in case anyone forgot our tornado. 

After everyone had been at camp, the three oldest sat down and shared their weeks, one day at a time. It was delightful to walk in on then sharing and talking and showing interest in one another. 

Joshua had "Spock" fork this morning. That was noteworthy.