Gratitude

I'm a Fall kind of a person - I love everything about it: all the new school supplies, the structure that back-to-school brings, the colors, the smell of leaves on the ground, the cooler weather, the pumpkin patches, the new menu that comes with the change in crops, putting extra blankets on the bed at night, fuzzy footed jammies and I especially love the Fall holidays.

(from last Fall... I don't have any cute fall pics yet.)

I love the season of gratitude. Our family tradition for 6 or 7 years now is to put up a Wall of Thanksgiving each year that we and anyone who comes into our home can add to everyday.

And this year I've started something new and will continue this past the season. It's an online gratitude journal called Happy Rambles.

Once signed up, they automatically send you an e-mail at the end of each day and ask you the question, "What are you grateful for today?" All you do is reply to the e-mail (can be text and/or pic) and send. Then it's stored and you can go in at any time and look at your journal, and I even think it's printable.

I've tried doing a gratitude journal before but it never lasts long. I love this because of the constant reminder and how easy it is. I've been doing it for 10 days now and it's been neat to see how my perspective has changed thus far.

"We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have."

-Frederick Keonig

I'm thankful for my boys and I'm thankful for my new find that reminds me to recognize what I already have around me.

Happy Autumn and happy season of gratitude!

Missionaries

Back in August we finally got the chance to feed the missionaries! We used to share missionaries with 6 stakes. The mission just changed it so our stake has it's own set of missionaries now, so we get the chance to feed them more often.

Logan was so excited to eat with the missionaries (his idols). When you ask him what he wants to be when he grows up, he says, "a missionary."

Dinner time was crazy as usual between a boy who won't stop talking and a boy who just yells a lot. At one point Logan left the table to go to the bathroom. I noticed he was taking a long time but I didn't question it because it was a welcomed silence at the dinner table so we could actually have a conversation with the missionaries.

He came out a while later in completely different clothes. He said he wanted to be a missionary too. He missed a lot of the meal because of this... I can't imagine how long those buttons must have taken him.

Once he noticed that the missionaries had backpacks, he ran back to his room to put his on too.

The missionaries were good sports about getting a shot with Logan. Somehow I think this day will come all too soon when Logan's the taller one in this picture.

Preschool

Another Logan post.

"Too bad all the people on Earth aren't made out of words like on Word World the show. I want to be made out of words."

Logan started preschool 2 weeks ago. He was so cute that day. He was SO SO excited, especially because we had gone to an open house the night before. He loves going to preschool and I love it too. I love the extra one-on-one time it gives me with Linc, but I also love the preschool and Miss Morgan.

Here are some (ahem... ok a lot) of shots that I captured that morning.

We started out the morning with a hair cut and a father's blessing.


He was so excited for his super heroes back pack. I tried to make the cute little Toy Story back pack the obvious choice (I want him to be little as long as possible :) but despite my best effort, he went with the big-boy-choice.

The first day was show & tell. Of course he chose to take his boots to show.

Brother hugs before leaving


While Ben was putting him to bed the night before, he said he wanted Ben to take him to preschool, not Mommy. Ouch.
So Ben went in late to work that day so he could take Logan. (But of course I went too... I couldn't not go). Lo was so excited to ride in the truck with Dad. We were 5 minutes too early so they waited in the truck for a bit.

Gathering activity... Lo drew a dinosaur.
Miss Morgan


And here are the school photos they just had done last week.

3 girls and 9 boys... I think this class will keep Morgan on her toes
Logan is in the yellow class and this is his class roster.
He's only had preschool for 5 days now so I was surprised to see that Logan already knew everyone's names except 2 of the boys.


Lo and Miss Morgan

According to Logan

So glad to know everyone has talent...

(Tonight while Logan was brushing his teeth)

"Mom, you're the best reader in the world.
Lincoln is the best page-skipper. And the best growler in the world.
Daddy's the best sick guy and biker guy in the world.
Logan's the best Flash guy in the world."

According to Logan...

Jacks
(He wanted jacks to go with his bouncy ball so he drew some. :)


Party invitations for a non-existent party

I woke up to find 11 invitations to Nana's birthday party (Mom, I bet you didn't know you had a birthday party, did you?) One of every color, all written on.

Fire station/Playground with a dance platform

Green slide and red fire pole.


Lincoln throwing up
A comb

Lo wanted a guitar like Ben's so he made one.
Another play ground

According to Logan, he is his father.

And according to Logan he is Spiderman

Our Christmas tree that sits on our porch.


Instruction manual for Lincoln's new booster seat.

(I took all the straps off of it and couldn't figure out how to put it back together, so I was looking for an instruction manual online and Logan brought these "instructions" to me, declaring that I didn't need to find the manual after all)

A barn

pizza

Airplane

A flag (that Linc's obsessed with)

apple and a truck with he and Ben driving to the hardware store

self explanatory

cell phones for everyone in the family

Activity sticks
(I made a jar of activity sticks for him a couple weeks ago and so I woke up a few mornings ago to find that he had created some activity sticks for me in return. Thoughtful guy.)

Dinosaur

This kid makes everything out of paper.

He told Ben the other night, "The next time you go to a bike race maybe you can bring me back real keys and a real cell phone. I don't want to have to make paper keys anymore. And I don't want to have to make a paper cell phone anymore. I want real metal keys that actually work."

Washington Part One

At the very end of June we made the trek up to Washington to visit our families.

Don't let the delay of this post fool you... we loved every minute in Washington. In fact, we loved it so much we took a plethora of photos (big surprise). So I have been putting off weeding through them and having to deciding which ones I want to remember the most.

We left straight from Midway (on Father's Day) and drove 13 hours to Spokane. One of the first days we were in Spokane, we went to Riverfront Park like we usually do when we're in Spokane.

Ben had never seen the falls in the Spring when they're full and waters actually gets misted up onto the walk.

The Looff Carousel. We love riding carousels, but especially this one - it's the best out of all the carousels I've ridden on.

The garbage goat. Push a button and he sucks garbage out of your hand.
We actually remembered to have garbage with us this time around... usually we go into he carousel to pick up a brochure, just so we can rip it into pieces to feed the goat.

Radio Flyer slide (climb up the back and slide down the handle)

Logan preferred the blocks over the slide

They had just been trying to catch bugs with no success.

And feeding the ducks, of course.

By this point the boys were hot and there's a splash pad at the park that I have never seen before so we let the boys get in and play around. Luckily we had an extra change of clothes in the van.

Ben took this shot... nice Ben.
The main reason we went to Spokane when we did was so we could see my nephew one more time before leaving for the MTC. He was called to serve in Brazil but is currently serving in Detroit, MI waiting for his Visa.
The second day we were in Spokane we got to have lunch and dinner with him. For dinner we went to the closest churrascaria which was in Coeur d'Alene. Yum!
Me and Cory. He'll be a wonderful missionary.

After dinner some of us walked around the board walk since it was only a few blocks away. It's the World's longest floating boardwalk and usually a classic "to-do" when we visit.
The first day we went to the Japanese Gardens on the South Hill. Ben had never been before so I was so excited to show him how beautiful they are!

Love how curious Logan is


Ben's science lesson #243: How to identify a Japanese Maple. :)
Just kidding, Ben. Logan loves learning from you.

Logan was OBSESSED with a sick coy (that was actually dead). He was starting to decompose a bit I think and he was missing an eye, which Lo couldn't NOT get over. He couldn't take his eyes off that fish.



The Lilaa Garden was right next to the Japanese Gardens so we strolled through since they're my favorite flower.
I couldn't stop smelling them... mmm...
More pics from Spokane to come. Lots more :)