Time Out For Women

Jamie bought my mom and I (along with herself of course :-)) tickets to Time Out for Women in Phoenix this year.  It was Friday and Saturday November 7-8.

It was really neat!

Friday night John Bytheway spoke and did a hilarious impression of Barney Fife!

Saturday Hillary Weeks sang her favorite 10 songs.

Emily Watts spoke.

Elaine Dalton, Brother Something Millett, Jennifer Brinkerhoff, Emily Freeman...

Mom bought the DVD...I will have to watch it with her again...it was great!  

Thank you Jamie!!

Too many highlights to fit in here, but I kept a journal and took a few pics of quotes I loved:

I felt a little connection with her cause I think we were the only two there with braces :-)

Vertuccio Farms

Calvin had his first field trip November 5 to Vertuccio Farms!  I got to go with him!  It was lots of fun!  (Jordan stayed with Cindy and Wyatt Hinton).

This is my personal favorite!  But they would not let the adults on this day :-(...Calvin didn't want to jump on it after finding out I couldn't jump with him (aww sweet).

This was Calvin's favorite!  They only had 20 minutes to play and though I asked him if he wanted to ride the train, or do the many other things there, he simply wanted to stay here most of the time :-)...sweet simple  joys!

They had a little snack break for us...fruit snack and caprisun
 I must mention (because I am grateful for the eye opener), that I did not want my picture taken.  Bryson Hinton was there with Dylan and asked if I wanted my picture taken with Calvin, I said "no," but as soon as I did so, I recognized my selfish/rudeness...I may not like pictures of myself, but I wasn't there for me, I was there for Calvin.  Thankfully I changed my mind and said "you know what, yes, this is something I want to remember."  I took their picture too :-).
(Do not forget, that is how life is, you are not here for you, you are here for God.  Prove yourself...become all He sent you here to become. Show him you are grateful for his sacrifice by giving your life as He did).

It thought these pedal karts were pretty cool!  He was a little pro on them...a lot of the kids couldn't pedal them consistently but Calvin was zooming around for several laps :-).
 Go muscles!!

Mrs. Moon's Midday Kindergarten Class- November 5 2014- Vertuccio Farm

They each got to pick their own pumpkin :-)!

After the Farm I brought Dylan home and was going to pick up Jordan to go home, but the boys have so much fun together and we just love the Hinton family, so we ended up staying for a while.
Cindy mentioned she didn't have dinner plans...so I suggested pizza since the boys had just gone to the pizza farm.
It ended up taking a while...but it was so worth it!  She made some delicious homemade dough and sauce, then we put our toppings together and we each made a little personal pizza!  It was lots of fun and turned out so yummy!
(Her and I went and worked out at the gym afterwards...It was lots of fun!)

The Flood

Sherwood Park after the flood.  Made it feel like we were in a nice rich neighborhood with a lake lol.
I took the kids to swim there (they advised against it, but I did it as a kid,,,and come on, this never happens...we weren't gonna miss out!  Calvin is a great swimmer, but went out a little far and I think he got scared...I thought he was joking, but when I saw panic on his face I dove in after him...fully dressed.  We saw the Morris' family there kayaking too :-). 

What a cool experience this was!  We went to the park a few times a day after the big storm.   They said it was the most rainfall we have had in almost 100 years.  It filled up our backyard but thankfully didn't come into our house.
We went to get sand bags the city was handing out for free...trying to help some neighbors (a lot of people in our ward has houses that flooded).  I tried to get involved in helping, but we had to get creative so that we were actually helping and not just in the way (with my two cuties)...we ended up bringing dinner to the men handing out the sand bags...they had been there since 5 am and hadn't eaten all day.  I want to get in the habit of serving, so that we are used to it...and when the kids get older we will be ready to help more!

Another walk over to our new neighborhood lake.

First time for everything

I Cut 4 missionaries hair on Monday while Calvin was at school.  Afterwards we had to rush out to go pick up Calvin.  I had left my clippers plugged in...
It took me a couple days to realize Calvin had gotten them and buzzed the front of his head :-).  I had thought something looked funny but didn't think twice about it...not figuring he would ever do something like that.  His hair was long enough that it covered it pretty well...I kept looking at him wondering why his hair was laying so funny and finally realized he had buzzed it.  I asked him about it and he just got that cute little guilty grin.  We both started laughing, but I tried to tell him even though I was laughing, he shouldn't do it again...

A few days later, he wanted to go outside and cut grass (which he does a lot...I have taught him scissor safety and he has shown me time and again
he is responsible enough to handle it.
Well...after a while, he walks over to me, and that buzzed area up front looked a lot different...he just gets that big smile again and told me he was "just cutting it like this."
Oh my Calvin...looks like we won't be cutting grass with scissors for a while...

Lessons learned...not so much :-).......He loves his new buzz cut!  It doesn't help that he's like the coolest kid in school now, letting everyone feel his fuzzy head (he also brought in his bow a few weeks ago which they loved).
Oh my Calvin...always keeping me on my toes:-)

Simple Joys...

Jordan loves to do everything himself...and he is pretty dang good at it :-)!
 I love when I catch him on his toilet reading to himself..
"Henry is a happy hippo, who hates to whine or fuss...:-)"

I delivered some Mary Kay this morning and had some time to kill before it was time to take Calvin to school.  We stopped by the park by Gilbert Greens and had some fun!  We had to leave early because Jordan stepped on something and cut his foot open :-(.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE our new house!  One of my FAVORITE things to do is just go out in the backyard and watch/listen to my boys!  They crack me up!  They get along so well and I love seeing them take care of each other...they are both very protective of each other :-).  Motherhood is WONDERFUL!!

The missionaries came over for Elder Erickson's (his companion was Elder Coulston) 18 month mark...he wanted to burn a pair of pants, and against my advice, he also burnt a bunch of  Journals.  Mid Summer fire in phoenix :-)...lol...we had fun!

Camp Out!  I love that these boys love to be together!  We had fun...I always start out on the floor with them...
but they move around so much I usually end up in my bed :-).

A favorite bathtub activity :-)...Ho Ho Ho

This was all Jordan's idea...He would not let me feed her.  He was so sweet and gentle with her.
A lady in our ward the other day told me that he came up to her daughter and gently held her little face in his hands and was speaking so sweetly and gently to her...it melted her heart.  What a sweet boy Jordan!!

Too Cute...Feeding ducks at Freestone Park...I just love his little feet!

Freestone Park

Calvin loved feeding the ducks right out of his hand!  

Freestone Park is one our FAVORITE spots!

Of all the places to sit on the couch, they usually choose to sit cuddled up together.  As irritated as Jordan looks in this picture, he really loves Calvin's love :-).
I am so thankful they are such good buddies!

Random "don't want to forget's"

I saw this and didn't want to buy it haha, but liked it :-) 

These were our favorite picks from the Library this time!  Both Calvin and Jordan could recite all the books ...obviously Calvin a little better than Jordan, but Jordan could recite the Cookie Dough one really well :-)!

I took Calvin on a special date on Tuesday August 19th (not really for any reason).  I told him we could go anywhere he wanted (and gave him a few suggestions).  He didn't like any of my suggestions...he wanted to go to WalMart and play in the game area.  He was having fun but I wanted to make it more memorable so I told him we were going on a treasure hunt.  We would go in an isle, I told him to close his eyes while I went to take a picture of something, then he had to find it.  Then I would close my eyes while he took pictures of things for me to find.  It ended up being a lot of fun! 

:-) While taking pictures at WalMart Calvin snapped some pics of his cute little feet...I thought it was too cute too!

Calvin's 5th Birthday Weekend

Calvin's birthday was on Thursday. We had a party that day, then took off for Lakeside on Friday as soon as he was done with school!

My mom had the house all decorated!  Looked awesome!!  She had Cupcakes, Candy prizes, a big bucket of gifts, and a fun game for Calvin.  (after helping some lady clean up her house all day long...she is amazing!!)

The boys played "pin" the cupcake in "Calvin's" hands :-).
Calvin won!

This isn't the greatest picture but it shows how awesome Grandma Barber is playing
with the boys in the McDonalds Playland!

Holding Grandma and Grandpas chicken :-)

The boys had some friends over...they put Jordan on the air mattress then would jump off the couch, launching Jordan into the air for the other boys to catch him in the air.  They were having a blast.  They took the air mattress out on the trampoline too and were launching each other out there (Calvin took part out there more).

        On Saturday we went to Timmy and Davey's soccer game.  It was fun cheering them on!  

        After that we went kayaking!  I didn't even bring my camera...we were busy having fun!  My mom took Calvin out on the lake...he wanted to swim though so they went back to the dock and swam with Grandpa. Jordan and I went all the way across the lake...he ended up falling asleep.  

It was SOOOO fun!   I LOVE nature...I feel so happy and at peace outside!  Thank you for a great birthday weekend!

        

Nothing is as constant as change

We got homework from Dr. Broadbent to do something you THOROUGHLY enjoy for 20 minutes every day (it CANT be something that needs to be done.  The goal is to be able to become your own best friend...find true happiness within yourself.) One thing I have really enjoyed is going up on the rooftop watching the sunset, looking at the clouds, or the stars! Here is the view from our rooftop!

Tammy Quigley let me borrow "As a Man Thinketh"...an EXCELLENT book!  This was one part I really liked and thought worthy of putting here to always remember.

This month I started babysitting Bastian and Brianna Almazabas.  Carol got a job with the Mesa school district so it has been a blessing to us both!  It is definitely an adjustment for everyone, but a great learning and growing opportunity! They are sweet children!

One of our favorite things to do (of course...it's Arizona)!  I love capturing their sweet and simple joys!

I got to go to the temple.  I saw a bunny on my way out :-)....cute.

We had the Nicoll's and the missionaries over for dinner.  The Nicolls are a wonderful little family in our ward!

My boys LOVE to read!  We got some great books at the library!  Calvin is even starting to read on his own.  It is so fun to hear them both recite books from memory too...they seem to feel so awesome :-)...and they are lol.

Calvin wanted to go to the play area at Walmart with his birthday money from Grandpa Sanders.

Lyle fixed our washer and dryer so now our old matching set is back!  YAY!!!  Thank you handy man!

We had a huge hail/wind storm and our lemon tree fell over :-(