Reasons to Celebrate

The end of February/beginninf or March was a time we'd been looking forward to for a long time!!

My baby brother came home from his mission on February 28! It's been so good having him home! He's always been so cool and easy for me to talk to! I really missed him!

It was fun to go meet him at the airport, spend some time with the fam and welcome him home!

 

My sister-in-law Melody is so awesome and brought all her kids to the airport, even though my brother Brian was stuck at work (and she's pregnant!)

Grant, Chase and Brig

Cousins really do make the best friends! Emmy and Remi are so cute!

I was especially glad Grant got to go meet Dal at the airport when I realized he'll probably be the last missionary Grant will get to see step off a plane until these two get home! We got to go to their baptism and that was equally good for Grant to see! As soon as we got there, they gave Grant a big hug and started to ask him if he was going to get baptized too when he was 8.

I'm so thankful for the good examples my kids have to look up to!

The other long awaited event this month was...

Our little Saw Man is brace free!!

For 12 hours of the day anyway! He's doing SO great!!  I can't say enough how proud I am of his long suffering little spirit! I love getting to hold and snuggle with him finally, without the casts and steel holding me back! And I'm definitely making up for lost time...poor guy! ;)

We got to spend a few consecutive weekends in the Valley and see friends and family. Grant and Remi got to see their BFF Coz (who happens to be my BFF's daughter)

The kids were so excited that we got to spend some time with Grandma Mary too!

And they even got to see their UT (now AZ) cousins!

It's hard to believe that the time we looked forward to so much, and at times felt like would never come, has already come and gone! I seem to get caught up in the little stressors of the day and so often forget to sit back and live in the moment and count my blessings. Even looking at these pictures of things that are happening in our life RIGHT NOW already makes me miss these times!

There are a lot of material things we'd like to have that we don't, but we definitely have reasons to celebrate every day! Things like....

Beautiful Biz walking out to the woodpile to help her dad chop wood.

Everyone wants to take a ride with Sawyer!

Getting to play in the snow

A LOT of it!

Then we got to go bask in the sun in Mesa the next weekend

Remi's hair is finally getting long enough to start having fun with it

Rembos continues to keep the mood light around here! I saw her playing with these crayons and she kept yelling "Help! Help! Help, Mama!" I told her she didn't need to yell, I was standing right ethere and could hear her. She looked at me and irritated like and said, "No. DIS (holding up a crayon) is Mama!"

My Mistake.

Later on, I saw her rolling "Mama" off the edge of the table as she yelled, "Look out Mama! It's dangerous!"

Grant started wrestling. This is his stance :)

The results of Remi, my "helper". (That's garlic powder and the whole house smelled like it for a week. Not to mention the breadsticks were SPICY and we're now out of garlic powder!)

Seriously, now! How can I not feel like the luckiest mom EVER?!

He's FINALLY eating solids! Here he is all spaghetti-faced, getting clean.

I guess she's made her stance on stuffed animals clear.

Remster got to come visit my work with me the other day, so I could turn in some paperwork. She had to take a picture by the purple fishy. She looked so cute in her brother's pagamas, I let her wear them all day (and maybe a few more days after that! ;))

While we were gone, Mike sent me this picture of him and the boys at home. I think it's one of my new favorites!

I came in the living room the other day, after putting Sawyer down for a nap and found Grant and Remi like this. That alone is enough to make a mom want to celebrate!!