Fun pics

Here's Nelly with an "ow-eee" on her hand, eating lunch with Mommy at Kneader's...yum.

Here's Nelly posing. She's a lil' show-off. I don't know where she gets it from...

Snuggles!

Motorcycle at "Cookie Cutters"...waiting for Briggs to get his hair cut.

More snuggles. This was our last Sunday at our Alpine ward. We will miss all of our sweet ward members and neighbors!!!

Snuggles again. We are loving this new phase for Chanel. She finally is nice to us. No, I'm serious. She was a mega-beast up until the past month or so. She now can have a tickle war while giggling the whole time. She used to laugh for about 2 seconds, then find something insanely dangerous to throw at her opponent, while growling and screaming. We are holding our breath on this one. Let's just HOPE she remains a sweetheart!!!! Pray for us! Ha ha.

At Cookie Cutters. Briggs loved it. He sat in a race car and had suckers and balloons...nice touch. Sorry it's all out of order. It does that when I get pics off my iPhone.

This was an adventure: stuck in the McDonald's drive-thru. Why? You ask? Well, I had nowhere to turn, after finding the note on the board that stated, "Our system is down, thank you for your patience". The problem: it was 11:45 am. Brigham has school at 12. I was trying to get a "quick lunch", so he wouldn't starve through school...by 11:56, we were finally at the ordering window. I saw an opportunity to cut right, so I bailed. I hurried to B's school, fed him a piece of bread that we found in the car (I'll admit: it had a teeeneeeey lil' bit of white-ish mold on it). At this point, I was desperate, okay? Anyway, he is still alive, and I made it to lunch with my friends.

One more story. I went to my first girls night out with some Saratoga Springs friends, which was totally awesome. They are all so fun and nice. Some silly things happened though. Crystal, my adorable neighbor, planned for us to go to a musical at the Scera Shell Theater in Orem. It was called "Bugs". I was really excited, because I love musicals. I hadn't seen it before, but was ready for something new and fun. All 7 of us sat in our seats, and waited for the show to begin. A teenaged girl came out and welcomed us to "Bugs", and thanked us for supporting this kids, and announced upcoming summer camps. We all looked at each other, and put it all together. This was a childrens theater group. I got the giggles, and couldn't stop laughing (as quietly as possible). Poor Crystal! She thought this was a normal musical, since the man on the phone told her that it was a wonderful show, and well worth our $6. We could barely contain ourselves. She kept saying, "I'm soooooo sorry! I'm so sorry!" I thought it made the night even better than if it had been a normal play or musical. The kids came out on stage, wearing really shabby bug costumes, and sang their lil' hearts out. It was ironic, since many of us like girls night out for the fact that we get away from children for a couple of hours.... We sneaked out at intermission, laughing our guts out.

I was so excited to meet another Heather, who was in Latter-Day Celebration (the same choir Jonathan and I met in) the year before me. We had a ton in common and tons of people we both knew. It was great. Well, we went to Chili's, because we were starving. I ordered salmon. Bad idea. I ended up with a fishbone stuck in the back of my throat! Ewww! I went to the bathroom, to see if I could see it, and pull it out. It looked like a white sliver stuck back behind a tonsil. Yuck. It was so creepy! I was a little scared, so I called Jonathan. He said he had the tools to take it out (my cute EMT). By the time we got home, though, it was gone. Weird.

Well, things are off to a fun start, I know! Ha ha!

March went out like a lion

Hi friends and family!

I wanted to update all y'all on what's been going on for our family for the past month. As I said before, we have moved. Love it! Saratoga Springs is beautiful and we have fallen in love with the people already. We have adorable neighbors, who have stepped it up to help us out a lot. We have a few old friends out there who are wonderful too.

On moving day, we had an army of people who showed up to help. What a nice surprise! I cannot believe the amount of time my friends put into our move. Some spent well over 10 hours packing, driving, organizing...etc. Unreal!!! Listen, you Alpine-Nay-sayers: there are many amazing, solid, Christ-like people from Alpine. I love my Alpine friends.

The house that we moved into is so fun. It is very open and roomy, light colors, lots of windows...we feel at home already. We didn't have to buy any furniture, because it all just sort of works! The only thing we're saving for is a big ol' flatscreen TV. (whatever, Jonathan!)

We have planned out our yard, and are begging for the weather to change so we can start digging. My first goal is to put in a garden. I don't even care about the grass as much as the garden. So, we'll have to get it all piped and plumbed and built...but I'll be happy if I can have a full-blown garden this year. I'm really excited about it!

We have felt very welcome in the stake and ward. There was a new stake formed, called the Saratoga Springs South Stake, which we are a part. The stake conference was amazing. We were surprised to find our kids were almost perfect for 2 whole hours. The spirit was strong. Most of the talks were testimonies, since many were the newly called presidency members. The ASL translator was fabulous. We watched him most of the time, especially during the songs. Wow. He was so expressive and awesome. Jonathan bumped into Jason LaRue, an old mission buddy. That was cool, because Jonathan went and stood by him when we sang "Called to Serve", as a surprise. They hugged and had a lil' moment. ;)

Our Bishop came over the other night, and we chatted for about an hour. He is so cool. The next day, he called us to ask us to speak on Easter Sunday. Mixed blessing! I have already loved studying for my talk, but can't put it all together. I am speaking on Christ's Ministry on the earth. Jonathan is speaking of the Atonement and the Resurrection. Kinda big topics, eh? I'm thinking of focusing on the Savior's power to heal. I hope I don't bawl through the whole thing!

So, the kids are adjusting well. Briggs is in the same preschool, but at their Saratoga Springs location. He loves it. And I love it, since it's $35 bucks cheaper every month! ?????? I know. I guess I didn't realize how expensive the other location was...oh well!

Thank you to all of you who helped me so much! You have made this move soooo easy and fun. And I feel blessed to have kept so many good friends, even through all of my ups and downs. I don't deserve you. xoxo

My alibi...

It's been a LONG time since I've posted anything on my blog. I can explain.

We have sold our Alpine home to the cutest, nicest people. Ned and Cindy. They came to our home with my friend, Charlyn, the week after we took our home off of the market. We had felt so bugged with how the market was going, and how much effort went into every showing. Any of you who have sold a home before...you understand. It's a nightmare.

They walked through our home and loved it! They kindly offered to allow us to stay while we find a home. We found one! It's in Saratoga Springs (shown above). It is a 2-story, cute house. What's even nicer: it's 1/2 the price of our Alpine home. Translation: we're finally down-sizing. However, it doesn't feel like it, because the home is so darn cute! It's very open and spacious inside. I'll post some pics soon. We should be closing on it within the next week!!!

Ned and Cindy have been so wonderful to work with, we can't believe such honest people actually exist!

I have not had much time for blogging, emailing, calling, or really ANYTHING, other than packing, cleaning, running errands to get both houses in order....the whole bit. I appreciate all of you who have shown us such support! We are so thrilled to be moving, but will miss our ward and neighbors here in Alpine. We have grown so much here and have met life-long friends. I hope Saratoga Springs can handle us!!! We're a little crazy!

xoxo

A day in the life...

Here's Chanel....she's 2. Enough said.Brigham always cheers up Chanel. He's a champ.

Loves!

Trying to kiss each other.

Watching the David Foster concert on PBS. Holy cow, it is an awesome concert. The kids were dancing all over the house.

I love this one.

Chanel on the trampoline.

Oops!

Strut your stuff, girl!

Chanel in her new Sweater.

Our wonderful friend, Alicia Guerrero, made this sweater. Yes, it's hand-made! Many hours of labor...just look how adorable!!!!!

Here is a wide array of pictures (poor quality courtesy of my iPhone) of the last few weeks. I'll get that battery charger for our real camera soon! Enjoy!

Dino Museum with Grandma!!!
Note B's leg.

Cutie pies!

The Fam!

Brigham's first swimming lesson last week. He loved it.

The kids before school. Jessica is Brigham's buddy.

This is Chanel, taking after her name's sake in fashion...

Brigham wrestling with L.E. out at the Haynie's home. Blurry, because they were going crazy!

More Dino Museum...

Sleeping in the car on Christmas Eve, in new PJs from Grandma and Grandpa

Brigham is zonked, too....and with his trust "Brown and Green" to comfort him, there's no turning back.

More of L.E. and Briggs.

More fashion....

Bubbles!!!!

Shaved head...like Dad.

Christmas Eve...we had some visitors to our home. Mr. and Mrs. Claus!!! John and Sheri Sundwall from our ward. They are always so sweet to our kids!

Grandpa John-John, or Santa Claus with B.

Why no pictures of Chanel? Oh, because she was screaming in fear.

B and Joshua at Grandma's house.

Happy kid at the doctor's office.

He had just come from the dentist, where I noticed a scratch on his eyeball. He got drops and we went home...the whole time...he was happy. Chanel was happy too, because she had the full attention of the Neeleman kids at their house. She didn't want to come with me when I went to pick her up! Thanks, Christine!!

This is our most prized possession. It's a print on canvas of Mark Mabry's "Ascension". It is huge!!! We were honored to receive this print from Mark a few month's ago. Jonathan and I hoped to get it framed, but knew it would cost some bucks! I sneaked it to Robert's in early December to get framed for Jonathan. A few days later, J's parents were here at our house, and he wanted to show them this awesome print. He couldn't find it in our house, so asked me where it was. I said, "oh, I put it up, so the kids wouldn't bother it." He was like, "soooo, where is it?" I said, "It's put away." Then, he caught on. His mom just smiled. We laughed about it, and I told him that it was SUPPOSED to be a surprise. Oh well. It looks so great, we don't care that the surprise was ruined.