A Mother's Love

A few weeks ago, I was asked to write an article for Mormon Women, a website that both explains and celebrates Mormon Women. I think it's an excellent website that addresses a variety of topics for both LDS women, and women of other faiths. Today, my article was posted. If you are interested in reading...the article, A Mother's Love, can be found here. But do take some time to go through the site.

Hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving!

Nothing to Post

I feel like I've been very neglectful lately to our little blog here. It's not really that I don't have anything to post. In fact, I have some pretty cute videos. But I can't find the cord to download it to the computer...and I refuse to go out and buy one since we have no income currently. So, I wait, and make you all wait as well. But, here's a teaser of what's to come:

Callie Counts
Callie Does Football
Sammy Spins World

So, there you are. Hopefully you'll see those soon, because I tell you what...they are dang cute!

She Loves Me

Yesterday was pretty great. Two big things happened. Yesterday, Callie and I spent some time on the couch reading. She LOVES to read. Can't get enough. We have several counting books, and normally we count together. Well, yesterday, Callie started counting the babies on the page, and she counted from 1-10 all by herself! I couldn't believe it! Now she can't stop. It's so so so cute to hear her count.

Later last night, after Sammy had gone to bed, Callie and I were sitting on the couch together. She was sitting on my lap, facing me. I'd call out a body part, and she'd point. This girl is very clever. She's got a lot of the basics down now, so I'm working on ankle, wrist, knuckle with her. Every once a while her eyes would get really big and she'd jump up to give me a big hug. Oh, what a sweetie. During one of these hugging episodes she said "I love you." WHAT?! Did she just say what I think she said? So I said "I love you too." And she said "I love you." Oh my good heavens. I melted. I can't get enough of this little girl. And now I know, it's official, she loves me too.

Help Needed

Today we got some pictures taken. We want to use one of these for our adoption profile, so we want to pick the best one. We understand that maybe it's not the best picture of each of us individually, like any family picture -- so we're looking for the overall best -- the one that captures a good feeling. Ya know? Which would you want up on the wall. That kind of thing. (Click on the picture to get a better view)

#1 -- This one we'd zoom in a little cutting off the girls dangling legs.


#2 -- We'd photoshop Dylan out, as cute as he is.


#3 -- Sammy is a little "over-smiley" maybe. But not sure.

#4 -- Girls not the happiest, but not upset at least.

#5 -- Marcus and I are a little squinty...but we aren't sure if it distracts from our family picture at all.

Scott, it seems like you're our family photo guy. Thanks for taking our pictures...again!

Peek-a-Boo

Sammy loves holding onto the table -- and chewing on it. I love seeing her little head pop over the edge. Such a cutie!

Callie's Box

Callie loves getting into anything she can get into!

Sammy's Door

Samantha, as I've probably mentioned before, loves opening and closing doors. She has one door here, in particular, that works the best for her. Callie frequently points to the door now, and says "Sammy door." Yep. That's right Callie. That's certainly Sammy's door.

Callie's Smile

I have quite a few things to catch up on. So, this week, I'm devoting a lot of time to catching up on pictures. First topic of discussion: Callie's smile.

I happen to think Callie is a super cute kid. Not only is she just cute, but she has a personality that just oozes cute-ability. People love this kid...and for good reason. She's smart, funny, and knows how to charm people. One thing she'll have to perfect over the years is the on-the-spot-smile. That's right. "Callie. Smile." It always turns into this beauty.

I mean, she looks like she's going to rip your throat out. It's a very threatening look. I can just see 1st grade, 2nd grade, 3rd grade pictures...year after year in the all important yearbook -- this. Oh it makes me laugh really hard to think about it. But if she doesn't work on this, it may not be so funny down the road.

Now this smile...the natural, in the moment smile is much more appealing. I just think she's so beautiful when she has her relaxed natural smile. Oh, but that other one can sure make us laugh. So, for now, we're loving both smiles.

More Halloween 2009

At the ward Halloween party. Callie was checking out Sammy's wings.

In front of the big pumpkin. Callie's smile...does that look forced?


Halloween night before Trick or Treating. It was quite a trick getting a picture of these two together. This may be the best we got.



Ready to get this party started!



Sammy's warm up before going to a few houses
-- opening and shutting the door.

Halloween

Here they are...our two little fairies ... Tinkerbell and Rosetta. They were quite a hit where ever we went. We had a lot of fun at our ward Halloween party and the next night trick or treating. They were just so cute.