Attitude of Gratitude

This is a personal post here....Just a few things running through my head that I felt needed to be said.  This month I have had many small moments and experiences where I have been able to truly feel the love of our Heavenly Father in my life.  These experiences have led me to truly comprehend my deep sense of gratitude for ALL that I have and enjoy in life each day.  Life is a great gift!  I am reminded to  remember what really is important in life and what is not.  I try so hard to keep that perspective each day as I raise my family, interact with people, and find ways to serve.  I have so much more to learn. There is still plenty more faith, hope, and charity that I need to implement into my life.  I sometimes feel I don't have much to offer.  But this past month, I have been able to have opportunities to help "bear one another's burdens, mourn with those that mourn, and comfort those that stand need in comfort." (From the Book of Mormon, Mosiah Chapter 18)  I have felt the Spirit in ways that I haven't felt in a long time.  I have felt it's guiding powers as I have forgotten myself and committed to serve and sacrifice in ways that I didn't think I could.  I have been stretched for time, energy, and temporal resources.  It's been an overall amazing experience.  I go into this Thanksgiving holiday with an attitude of much much more gratitude than I have ever felt before!

Give Thanks....

That Halloween is over!

So much effort and hype with costumes, parties, and candy!  With the weather miserably wet, cold, and windy all week long, the community post-poned trick-or-treating to tonight (Nov 1.)  They had to drag it out one more day....


Ellionna: a pretty lil' flower.   Yep, she has decided sit up this past week all by herself.

Makenzie: A butterfly fairy.  Tyler painted her face here, but this was after school when it had been worn all day.  She got to dress up 4 times in the past 2 weeks.

Jordan: Wall-E!  If you remember, he wanted a Wall-E birthday in February. I guess he wanted to carry it on throughout the year.  Very random!  I don't get any credit for the costume.  I made it, but all the creative juices came from my sister-in-law who made the same costume two years ago.  I just picked her brain and copied her!  Thanks!

He did have little robot hands, but left them at school.

Gavin:  When I asked him what he wanted to be for Halloween back in September, he randomly said, "A Bird!!!"  Well, he never changed his mind.... except wanting to be a red bird after I made it blue.

Ready to head out!!

Faces!

Our computer has some fun effects and these two have way too much fun with it:

So does Tyler:

And even Gavin:

Of course I stay out of it!

Halloweening It!

Tyler has a guy in the same residency that is talented in many different areas.  He loves photography.  (He took our family pics from last year.)  And he knows how to throw a great party!  Every year he throws a HUGE Halloween party.  He does all the decorating and goes all out.  We were excited to be apart of it.  Tyler and I were under obligation to dress up, something we have not done in a long time!  We decided to do this ....

So I never got a real picture of us!  Tyler's friend had a pitchfork for us, so I was going to wait to take a picture.  Well, the pitchfork got misplaced among all the party stuff, so we had to use a random beat up rake.  He had a photo booth there and we got pictures there, so this is the best I have!

So I had to take pictures of all the decorations.... Yes, a male put this all together!  

And here are some of the fellow residents that he works with:

Fun times!

Air Force Museum

Tyler took the boy scouts up to Dayton to see the Air Force Museum.  Jordan was happy to accompany them.  They can probably give more details on what they saw, but for now here are the pictures.

Mitt Romney Rally

We got a surprise this week!  

Mitt Romney stopped in for a rally at our small lil' Ohio town!  Tyler already had plans with the boy scouts to go to a museum in Dayton, but I took the kids and went.  Makenzie has been talking about the election in school and she also knows that Mitt is a member of our church, so she was very excited to see him.  It was a good experience! And it was fun to see my kids cheer him on.  

Before it was time to go, I told Gavin that we were going to see the future President. After everything was all done, he kept asking where was the "present?"  I guess he thought "President" was "present" and he was going to get something more out of it!  He got a flag and a "Mitt" hand--  what more did he want? :)

NINE

I can't let it go by without mentioning that we have now celebrated NINE wonderful years of marriage!!!  Here's to another 99 years (plus eternity)! I love you!