Update

Life is a whirlwind these days.  I don't know which way is up most days:).  I am trying hard not to let myself get overwhelmed, since most of it are things we have chosen and things we are excited about.

We are officially sleeping at our new home!  It has been so fun to have the "big" stuff over here and start to get unpacked a little.  We still have way too much stuff over at the other home, and things are much too disorganized for my liking, but we chip away at it a little each day.  It is coming.

My parents and two nieces, Stephanie and Mikayla, came the Thursday before Memorial Day to help and were here until Saturday afternoon.  The rest of the Alva & Wendy Barney Clan came on Friday evening and were here until Monday morning.  And they were all a HUGE help!  We got the Master bedroom, main living area, and kitchen painted, as well as the entire garage.  I was so excited to have that done before anything was in there!  Wendy and Alva are awesome painters, and my mom is awesome at the taping/prep work.  The kids had a great time playing together and we had awesome babysitters.  The older kids would come and ask me what else they could do to help!  We got several other projects done on the house and my dad measured and got the layout of the yard, and has already done several landscape designs for us!  He also ran several errands and managed to spoil all 11 grandkids with ice cream from the ice cream truck!  It is all so appreciated.

Sunday afternoon we were able to take the Barney's to the cemetery to see where Anneca is buried.  It was so special to me to be able to take them there.  It felt good to cry and remember.  The cemetery was so beautiful with the flags and flowers everywhere for the holiday.

We also had our first experience with ticks!  Kyle had taken the kids to a friends' property for a bon fire and to see their farm animals.  The man warned us their dog has had ticks.  He checked them but found nothing. (I was out of town.)  Spencer's teacher found it on his head a few days later when she put her hand on his head and felt something.  Yuck!  We found two more in Skyler's head.  I was rushing to Urgent Care to have them removed and decided to call the Advice Nurse on my way.  She was a cute Texan who told me there is no way I should go to the doctor to remove a tick.  I pulled off on the side of the road and she walked me through how to remove it.  (I had grabbed tweezers before I left, thankfully.)  And I did it!  My "mommy powers" definitely came out, because there is no way I could have normally done that.  Spencer has had some very swollen Lymph nodes on that side of his head that scared me a bit--and I did end up taking him to Urgent Care for those--but hopefully they will go away and he'll be fine.

Skyler and Spencer finished up their soccer seasons.  They both loved it and had a great experience.  Spencer has three Eastern Washington University soccer players as his coaches and they did a great job.  And Skyler had me as his coach!  He was so proud and I loved helping those darling little kiddos.  It was a lot of fun.  By the end of the season, none of them were kneeling down and grabbing the soccer ball with their hands: mission accomplished!

There has been lots of end-of-the-year school stuff happening.  Kylene's class performed plays I was able to go see, and they had a class field trip I chaperoned.  Plus a few PTO planning meetings for next year.  I loved how on the field trip Kylene kept telling me how glad she was I got to come with her.  I'm glad she still likes me being with her!

I also took a weekend off and headed to Las Vegas....to finally get to meet my sweet, amazing nephew Calvin!  I was able to be there when he was blessed and to attend my brother, Nate's, graduation from Medical school.  Go, Nate!  They are moving to Tulsa shortly for him to do his Anesthesiology Residency at Oklahoma State University.  I was so glad I got to meet Calvin before they live even farther away.  He has been such a blessing to our extended family.

We have had so much wonderful help on the house.  Besides the family, many, many friends have served me.  I have had help painting, watching kids, bringing me cookies, helping me pack and haul stuff over, letting us borrow things we need, dinner brought over, etc.  I have really felt loved!

I know there's more, but that's all my tired brain can think of right now.  Sorry no pictures, those will hopefully come later.

Happy Mother's Day to Me!

For Mother's Day this year, Kyle bought me a new house!  Thanks, honey!

Actually, it was coincidence that we ended up signing the Closing Docs on the home last Friday.  Tomorrow, May 15, is the actual "Close Date", and I will be there first thing starting to clean and paint.  We are so excited and thankful, and amazed we found it so quickly.  We aren't done with our current lease contract until July, so we have plenty of time to move.  It is about half a mile from where we are living now, so that means the same ward, same schools, same doctors, same shopping.  Phew!  I am perfectly happy with only a new house.  I have told Kyle I hope we can live in this one for the next 20 years so I don't have to move again for a very long time.  The home is beautiful on the inside, but the yard is a disaster--in fact, the backyard has never been landscaped and is dirt and weeds right now.  So, we have our work cut out for us.  But I'm looking forward to designing it and making it "ours". (With a lot of help from my dad on the designing part.)

You're all welcome to visit anytime!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful women who have influenced my life for good.

I recently read this article: Irreplaceable Mothers.  The thoughts and ideas in it resonated with me.  I so want all the women in the world to understand their Divine role and potential as children as God.  And to know how powerful we are simply because of who we are.

Find out more about the movie Nicholeen talks about in her article here: Irreplaceable. I'm hoping to see it next week!

Easter

We had Easter together as a family this year.  I must admit it was strange not getting together with extended family, but it was still a good day.  I decided to do an Easter feast with just us.  I did the usual: homemade rolls, ham, mashed potatoes, salad, etc.  It was a beautiful, sunny day.

The kids opened their Easter gifts/baskets in the morning (I tried to limit the candy as much as possible.), then we had church, our dinner, then we went to the cemetery to visit Anneca's grave.

We were finally able to put the pinwheel flower at her grave, since the ground has been too frozen previously.  The cemetery was so beautiful, full of flowers everywhere you looked.

This Easter was actually a really hard one for me.  It was the first one since Anneca's passing, and while I felt like I should be celebrating Christ's Resurrection--and knowing that, as a result, Anneca will also be resurrected, it was a sorrowful day for me.  I do well most days, but this was one of those days where missing Anneca hit me really hard.  I long to hold her, to watch her grow, to nurture and love her.  I try to remind myself there will come a time I will be able to do this, but sometimes I'm not very good at remembering that.  Life is hard.  But, ultimately, I am more grateful than ever before that the Savior loved us enough to suffer the Atonement for us, that He overcame death, and that we have hope through the power of His name.  Yes, life is hard, but I'm doing my best to learn what He would have me learn along this beautiful journey.  And to remember that, even amidst sorrow, we can have joy, because of Him.

Harms' Visit!

Barbie, Lidya, Reagan, and Tsion Harms came for another visit the end of March.  It was the last couple of days of their Spring Break.  We loved having them here!  Barbie and I just enjoy talking and catching up on everything while the kids go crazy playing together:).  Saturday we spent the morning at Riverfront Park, exploring, seeing the Falls (beautiful with all the spring run-off), riding the Carousel, sliding down the Radio Flyer wagon, playing at the park, etc.  We also drove up to see the Whitworth University campus.  Their oldest daughter, Emma, just received a full-ride scholarship to Whitworth so will be attending there in the Fall.  We're excited and hope that means we'll get to have them visit even more!

The Saturday evening after they left, Kylene and I got to attend the first ever General Women's Broadcast together.  All girls, age 8 and older are now invited to attend, so this was Kylene's first time attending, too.  It was so neat to get to have that time together.  Our Stake had a dinner afterward celebrating Relief Society.  A fun evening with my daughter whom is becoming a beautiful young woman!