Thursday, November 30, 2017

Bye, Bye Moroni

Ruger has been pretty fascinated with  the big equipment that has been showing up around the site.  
And Daddy took him on a ride on one!


A few days later the angel Moroni had to come down.
Hyrum had said a few times that when Moroni came down that he wanted to watch it.  So I picked him up early from school so that he and Ruger could watch it together.




As you can see, Ruger wanted to go after it!  Thank goodness our neighbor was right there to go after him.
Later we looked up and saw...
...Daddy at the top!
Then I ran into Sister Rickner.  She was helping with cleaning out the temple.  She lives in OKC now but I grew up with her in the Grove Branch/Ward.  My memory of her will always be how good she was to me after we moved to Oklahoma after Hyrum was born.  I was in a real dark place and she made it clear that she cared for me.  She even brought me books and stuff to try to help me with the depression.  Those small things meant so much to me then and still does.

Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Oklahoma City Temple

This is one of those posts where it is hard for me to put on some of the pictures.  It truly does not do justice for the beauty of this temple of God.
 For the first few weeks, this was our view from our back porch.  We read scriptures at night as a family and to be able to open the blinds to that sliding glass door and see this as we read is just such a blessing.  It really is.
 There were a few storms that we got to see light up behind the temple.
 And Ruger having to get in the picture!
 The Sunday after the temple closed, our family took pictures.


 This sweet boy loves the temple.  I mean, he has a real love for it.


 I love how Ruger is holding on to Brigham in this picture.

This picture is going to look something like what we are sending in our Christmas cards this year.  How David and I started off almost 16 years ago  married in this temple.  Who knew that in 2017 we would be living just across from that same temple with 4 children?!  

We are truly blessed.

Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Halloween 2017

Our church had a trunk-or-treat and dinner a few days before Halloween.
 Ruger has been watching Cars over and over so I thought it was fitting that he be Lightning McQueen.  Even now, he still likes wearing his "Ka-Chow hat" anytime he can.
 Hyrum was a Creeper from Minecraft.  His and Ruger's outfits were nice because they were actually pajamas so they get to wear it over and over.
 I'm not sure what Brigham was but he wanted it to be all black and to have a hooded cape like thing.



 Look at that "creeper"behind Levi and Ruger.  C-R-E-E-P-Y!
 Looks like Brigham got a taste of his own medicine!

Sunday, November 19, 2017

Combined Pictures of Nanny/Poppy Time

Nanny and Poppy brought Ruger back on a weekend so they stayed the night with us.  But first we went to a trampoline place to show them what the boys love to do.



The boys almost always choose to go to one of these trampoline places for their birthdays back in Utah so we were really happy to find one here in Oklahoma.
Ruger and Nanny took a little break to enjoy the massage chairs there.
 We took pictures at the temple before it started to get torn down the next week.
 Fast forward a few weeks later.  Me and the boys went to Jay for the weekend.  David couldn't come with us because we left during the week and he had to work.  Plus, he really needed to get the truck fixed that weekend anyway.
 When Nanny and Poppy had been to our place to bring Ruger back, they were wearing these shirts.  Hyrum loved them!  All Nanny had to do was ask if Hyrum wanted one and it was there in the mail within a few days.  I wanted to make sure that they all wore it on the same day so I could get this awesome picture.
 Nanny thinks its pretty cool that Hyrum likes bath bombs so much.  So she bought stuff to make homemade ones for when we came.  He got to make it with his cousins and Nanny.  Mom has always been good at doing crafty stuff with the grandkids.
 The reason we came down to Jay was because there was a scrapbooking convention in Grove that weekend.  Mom and my sisters usually do this every year.  I haven't been able to do this in years due to being so far away.  
 This was a continual joke through the whole weekend!  Mom knew, from years past, that at the convention there would be music played that she wouldn't like.  So she brought these headphones.  
 We, of course, used every opportunity we could to point out that her most despised music artists were on the radio...even when she wasn't paying attention and didn't have to put those headphones on!  We'd sing along, tease her and tell her it was over with, she'd take off those sound canceling headphones and then have to hear her "favorite"music after all!  Yep, we are brats!



 Apparently we are ghosts in this picture.

April won a prize in this picture.  We all won a major prize on Saturday night.  Mom entered us in the talent show.  We sang Garth Brooks' song, The Change.  We won 1st place. We won gifts but the biggest gift of all for me was to be able to perform in front of so many people and not feel like I was going to have a major anxiety attack.  It was so weird.  I have never liked performing in front of people.  Not even when I was growing up and didn't even know what anxiety was.  But I did.  I was nervous, of course, but it wouldn't be until years later that I would experience anxiety.  

When Mom told us that we would be performing just a couple weeks before the convention, honestly, I just didn't think about it.  I couldn't.  I was dealing with so much internally that I couldn't.  I'm not joking when I say that I only practiced the song twice by the time I got to Jay.  That is so very not normal for me.  But I just couldn't.  Maybe I was afraid I'd freak out.  Maybe I was just to messed up to even think about worrying about that. 

But the convention was perfect.  I just relaxed.  I didn't worry about anything.  The only thing I struggled with was my body.  Because I have been doing so poorly, my body has been hurting.  So I was in a lot of pain that weekend.  My whole body ached but most of all, my eyes were blurry and my head just pounded.  But honestly, I've been dealing with this for a long time now.  It felt normal with the exception of not worrying.  That part was so...I don't know how to describe it.  It was very much what I needed.  Sunday was the first day that my head didn't hurt so bad and my body didn't ache much at all. I tell you all this because I think it has somewhat to do with the performance.  I just couldn't worry about it.  I just couldn't.  Plus, I had the comfort of my sisters and mother next to me.  My heart didn't race one bit while up on that stage.  Not once.  

If that isn't a miracle, I'm not sure what is.