Oh, you know you want to :-)

So I thought there may be a better response from the few who actually read this blog than all my "acquaintances"  via facebook (though I may do that too), but my big brother is working on an animated project which will be submitted to BYU and the Church's Friend department, and he needs assistance in raising funds. He is only asking a $1, though you can always expound upon that :-) We need more support for good wholesome media and how much would it hurt to support this project? $1?
He explains it pretty well, so just check it out here.

If you feel so inclined, give your support. If not, thanks for looking anyways.


(Did I mention he's helping my mom deal with a personal family trial this week and is sacrificing his time and own funds to do so???  So again, just $1?)


(oh and feel free to share with anyone you know who may be interested :-)

One word says it all...

I have a few pictures from the past couple of months that I've snapped that can all be summed up with just one word each...

Sharing

Creative

Cooperation

Anticipation

Revenge

What would you ask?

To start off, I believe everything that happens in our lives is for a reason. Whether it's to teach us something and help us grow, or to maybe prevent something else from happening that would be worse... there's always a purpose. Sometimes, we may not ever find out the reasons until after this mortal life.

Many of us are inclined to ask, "Why?" to Heavenly Father when a particular experience or trial may be beyond our understanding, like the death of a loved one. Even though there is always a reason, we may just have to wait to see what it is.

But do you ever just wonder some questions, and maybe try to find some silver lining or reasoning behind them? I'm talking about those things that, no matter how hard you try, you just can't understand?

I've always kept a small, mental list of questions that I want to ask when I move on to the next life.
Some I'm sure I know the answer for, but they still are on my list.
(Ex. Why do women have to go through so much in the creation and bearing of children, while men don't...and then become helpless when they have a cold?? OR Why do some women who are clearly a size 16 insist on wearing clothes that are a size 8...in public??)

The list is still growing... but these (2, so far) questions are ones I will never know the answers for until I die:

1.What is the reason for cockroaches? They don't benefit any other creature on this planet and are pretty much invincible as a whole. They can find millions of ways to invade your home, even the most airtight, immaculately clean house, and will resort to eating the particle board in your furniture, if nothing else. They smell horrible and make even the most calm person scream in horror at the sight of them. WHY WERE THEY EVEN CREATED???

2. How is it possible that even when my husband wears a white shirt with no color whatsoever, he will ALWAYS have BLUE bellybutton lint? Even when he wears a red shirt, it comes out purple! And he always has a layer of white between any shirt he is wearing, which never becomes tinted in any way. HOW IS IT POSSIBLE???

Do you have any questions like this? Ones that only will be answered beyond the veil of this life?
I'm challenging anyone who reads this to either:
A) Leave a comment with a question that you'd ask. ~ or ~
B) Create a similar post on your own blog that also issues this challenge, then let me know in the comments with your blog address.

I'm just curious... WHAT WOULD YOU ASK?

Carissa ain't the only one with moves...

This video is kinda long, so unless you have a spare 4 minutes, you can just watch the first part to see BOTH girls getting "into the music"... not that the whole video isn't amusing (minus the last 10 secs or so)

We get to see this stuff on a regular basis, but thought it would be fun to share.

Aren't we so nice?

I know, you're lives are now so much more fulfilled.

You're welcome.

(This post was actually written back on August 7th, but the video wouldn't show up each time I uploaded it...and then I was going through and found it...with the video all uploaded. Weird... So if the girls look a month younger, that's why...*hee hee*)

Under Construction

I've been, and will probably continue, working on a new *look* for the blog, so please bear with me while I play around. I'm trying to figure out what is most pleasing to the eyes, so if something looks funny to you and/or hurts your eyes, let me know. It's all a work in progress. :-)

Oh and I got a new toy:

because my former camera died a sad, but quiet death. 

I was testing it out on the girls,

Who were happy to oblige. :-)

Our Theme Song

So my mom posted this on facebook for me to see, and I thought it was great! We like Taylor Swift (All 4 of us), so this made it even funnier because we've sang the original a few times.

I see why ice cream cakes are so expensive...

Eddie's birthday was yesterday. We didn't really do much, mostly because Lexi and I have had this chest congestion crud. Ed went out on a outing with Carissa, then just hung out at home. That evening we had homemade chicken noodle soup in bread bowls. Those looked pretty.

Eddie's cake- not so pretty.

It look like I was sloppily throwing on frosting but I really was trying to put it on without it sliding down the sides, unsuccessfully.

 It looks like it was bulging in the middle, but it wasn't. See?

Here's some of where it still slid after I hurriedly put it back in the freezer.

But it tasted good, so whatever. Still have a lot left over, but it's kinda hard for Ed to bring it to work to share, what with its melting factor and messiness.

So hopefully it's gone before it doesn't taste good anymore. But maybe that's why the cakes cost so much...they are very hard to do. But then again, they don't have much of a leftover life, so it's not worth buying one unless it all gets eaten right away, which never happens. It's a catch 22. 

Curse you, ICE CREAM CAKE!

The things I do for my sweet husband :-)

Our Family Outing to the Dole Plantation

Since Eddie had to work on Labor Day, he got Tuesday off, so we packed up the girls and headed up to the Dole Plantation.

We planned it all out...

We started at the

which we did most of.

 Halfway through, I realized we should've used the restrooms beforehand. Fortunately, we were ok and make a straight shot there afterwards :-)

A smooth salesperson managed to sell us some cute leather bracelets for the girls with their Hawaiian names engraved on them, but the pic of the small things just were blurry. But they're cute, so you can use your imagination.

Next, we rode on the

Waiting and eating snacks

Getting ready to go

and a few pictures during the ride:

Lots'a Pineapple

green little garden in the middle of the fields of pineapple

a cute little girl who stole my camera

Wooden standup figures to show what workers look like

Assorted pineapple growing around the plantation

And shots of us as "Pineapple people"

and then we fed the fish

 And then we finished off by getting lunch and browsing the gift shop, and wrapped it up by getting some pineapple whip... some yummy soft serve sorbet made with fresh pineapple juice, before heading home. The girls were exhausted by the time we left :-)

Teaching Moment

So having my degrees in education, I like to use any opportunity as a teaching moment that I can. If Lexi is in a cooperative mood, we work on her writing to actually form letters and numbers, and if she's not, she just freehand colors and tells me about what she's drawn.

Yesterday, Lexi and Carissa were coloring on the back patio with chalk, and Lexi drew what looked like a flag. I told her that and she change it to a boat. I praised her and she drew another one and added a round thing to the side. I asked her what it was. She said "It's a whale".

Just making sure, I wanted to make sure she was enunciating correctly and asked, "whAle or whEEl?"

"Whale"

"a whale?"

So she drew another picture.

"See...whale."

(still unsure)"Whale or wheel?"

(sighing with frustration, then as clear as a bell) "It's a whale, Mom. You know, like a fish??"

Yep, she knew exactly what she was saying :-)