Weekend fun!

We have had a GREAT weekend, playing with friends, kicking off Halloween with a stake party, losing teeth, playing board games, and feeding the sister missionaries.  We've been really overwhelmed at how inviting and kind this ward has been to us.  I hear from someone in the new ward every day, rather it's text, phone call, email, Facebook message or comment or even hanging out at my house.  We've had people bring us hand me down clothes for the girls and offer baby food and other kid items that they don't need.  It's amazing!  And although I haven't been shy about not being overly happy with this move, the people are making the transition infinitely better.

I will admit, as I was going through the ward calendar and putting in all of Marty's obligations for his new callings (1st councelor in the Young Men's presidency and Varsity Scout Leader...busy, busy) I was feeling a bit overwhelmed at all the time we would have to be without him.  But with how kind the people here are, inviting us to movies, play dates, farmer's markets, story time etc., I think we'll be ok.  Luckily my callings won't require nearly as much time (ward librarian and enrichment leader).

Anyway...wow, we went off track here, didn't we??  SO...back to the fun weekend we had.

We started out by going to the dollar theater with our friends on Friday night to see Planes: Fire and Rescue.  I took the older three girls while Marty stayed home with Molly and Brody (the movie started at 7:30 p.m., a little late for the little ones).  The girls had a GREAT time and loved sitting with their friends giggling and talking.  We were so grateful they invited us!

Saturday started out with the stake Fall Festival.  A little carnival type thing was set up in the parking lot at the stake center.  Each ward had a booth with a little game and treats.  It was a ton of fun!

A zombie, a pirate, a princess and a vampire...I think we covered most the bases, except super hero

The brown dress and the red cape on the right are Brielle and Claire dancing at the "Dance Party" booth.

Hula hooping vampire...probably laughed the hardest about this image

Hula Hooping Zombie

They also got their faces (and hand for Addison) painted

After the carnival, we had to run a couple errands.  It wore our little pirate girl out!

Later that day, Claire pulled out her SECOND tooth in the last four days.  She has another one that is loose as well...I just love those gap tooth grins!

Then we busted out the game Fibber...way fun!

Followed by Moustache Smash

 Sunday we fed the sister missionaries.  The girls had their fill of showing off their sweet dance moves to a captive audience.

And finally (if you're still with me here...sorry for my lengthy post!) just a few random pictures to wrap it all up.

Brody is growing up, even though I tell him not to.  He's a rebel I guess.  This is comparing him coming home from the hospital to 3 1/2 months old.  My baby is getting huge!

Made this cute wreath at super Saturday...I like it.

Finally decided to hang some pictures and add some decorations to the house to make it more homey.

Claire is the most patient sister ever!  Molly is always following her around, watching everything she does, and Claire just goes right along with it.  So grateful for her!

  Brody in the BCG's (Army glasses)

Claire helped feed Brody while I made dinner.  Marty was out of town, so we were flying solo.

And there you go...more than you could have ever hoped to know about what we have been up to. 

 YOU'RE WELCOME!

A Fair, Conference, Cute Kids, Face Swapping...all the good stuff!

Time to unload some pictures....YAY! 

Molly LOVES her baby brother...she calls him 'Roby'...which is actually a character from the horrible show Yo Gabba Gabba.  But I can see how Brody and Roby could get confusing in her mind. :) 

I finally somewhat organized my side of the closet... 

Marty's side looks a little more like this...

(does this count as throwing him under the bus?  In his defense, he's been working a LOT since we got here.)

This past weekend we went out to a fair.  It was a really small town little country fair with lots of horses, Civil War reinactment type things, carriage rides, booths selling cowboy hats and boots and animal skins...pretty fun.  The kids all did the blow up slide:

Addison

Brielle and Molly (Brielle was nice enough to take Molly)

Claire

 Then there was a bounce house that they had basically to themselves 

There was this wood cow that you could "milk".   The girls had fun with that.

 We also got to do one of those old time carriage rides, like the old Wells Fargo type stage coach.  Me and the girls all rode on the top of it, and we thought we were going to die.  When they started to go, one of the horses wasn't cooperating and he was going up on his hind legs and smashing into the other horses...I feared for us being up on top.  But he luckily calmed down and we went on a nice ride.  We didn't get any pictures...too busy trying to stay alive. ;)

After the fair, we got little ice cream cones.  Molly stuffed most of hers in her mouth at once.

 Brody didn't get an ice cream cone, but he was still happy! 

 That weekend was also General Conference.  Brody enjoyed all the talks...obviously 

 The girls kind of listened...even our little witch.

 Addison drew a portrait of her frog...we thought it was pretty good. 

I was changing Brody after a little spit up, and just couldn't help but take these funny pictures of his onesie on his head. 

The girls hanging out at the school, waiting for Addison's parent teacher conference. 

 Molly wanted to go ride her bike one morning, so we went walking around the block.  Brody obviously enjoyed it. 

AND...some more fun with face swapping.

The ones with Addison never turn out great...she's WAY more tan than I am, so it looks funny.  But we tried anyway.

And finally, a cute video of Molly.  We've been working a lot on her speech and answering questions.  I just think she has the CUTEST little voice ever!

3 Months Old!

Brody is 3 months old today!  Apparently the first three months of a baby's life is referred to as the "4th trimester".  Who knew?  So I guess we are graduating out of the 4th trimester today, and we have mixed emotions.  As I said to him this morning, "You're three months old today!  I'm not OK with that, but I am OK with it at the same time."  It's nice as they get a little older and start to settle into somewhat of a routine (not much of a routine, but better than those first few days of life).  But it's sad that they grow SO fast at the same time.

Brody continues to just be a little ray of sunshine.  We are all smitten by him...and he's becoming quite the charmer in our new ward here too.  Hard not to be popular when you're so dang cute...and I guess it's also because he's the only baby in the whole ward.  (Yep...ONLY baby.)

Here are some ADORABLE pictures of our sweet boy.

Concentrating hard, silently mocking the crazy people trying to get him to smile

Practicing his kung fu

He's starting to coo like crazy, I love the faces he makes when he's talking to us

Staring at Daddy...trying to decide if he thinks Daddy is funny or not

Yep...Daddy is funny

I love whole body smiles

We're SO grateful he's in our family!

Why?

Feeling defeated and discouraged tonight after a sad conversation with a sad little girl that really left me asking the same questions as her...WHY?

This evening, I had just put the 2 year old in bed and came out to find Brielle crying alone in her room.  I don't mean like a little teary, or maybe annoyed...I mean full on crying.

I asked her what was wrong, not sure what to expect.  And she just started sobbing.  She misses her friends in St. George so bad, and she's having a hard time.  She had THE BEST group of friends there, the best friends she's ever had.  They were the cutest, sweetest girls I had ever met as well. She asked so many questions that I just couldn't really answer.

- Why did we have to move here?

- Why are we the ones that always have to keep moving?

- Why couldn't daddy's boss have fired someone else and let daddy keep his job?

- Why couldn't daddy find a new job in St. George?

- Why couldn't he just work at Walmart there so we could stay?

- Why can't we just go back?

I wish, so much, that I could have answered her questions better.  But really all I could tell her was that I didn't know the answers.  That I was equally as frustrated and wished things were different as well, but that if we focus on all that's hard while we're here, we'll just be miserable, that we have to make the most of it.  

I tried to come up with some comforting things about "opportunities" we'll have here that we couldn't have in Utah.  But all I could muster was that we'd learn there are good people everywhere, not just in Utah or in the church, and that we'd have more opportunities for service here maybe.  

That was all I could think of.  

Truth be told, I want to know the answer to the questions as well!

Her list of questions are basically the same ones that run through my head on repeat day in and day out.  WHY?  Why are we here?  Why does this keep happening to us?  Why can't we just land somewhere and stay put?

Brielle continued on saying how hard it is here, because there is nobody like her St. George friends.  And she's right, it's very different here. She has one friend that she talks about.  She doesn't make it sound like she necessarily really likes this girl, but that it's someone who's been nice enough, so she spends some time with her.  My heart is just breaking for her!  

Another thing that makes it hard here is you aren't assigned to a school based on where you live, you just randomly pick a school to send your kids to.  So there is no neighborhood cohesiveness where all the kids go together.  In fact, there is only one family in our whole neighborhood that has kids going to the same school as ours.   

I told Brielle I understand how hard it is to move and leave friends behind.  But she told me I don't truly understand, because I never moved as a kid after I started kindergarten.  Which is true.  She said as an adult it's easier because I can still keep in touch with my friends on Facebook or call and email them as much as I want.  She was upset because she doesn't have phone numbers or addresses to write any of her friends.  She feels completely torn away from them.

And you know...she's totally right.  It sucks.  This is a very hard situation that I feel was completely out of our control.  We were not happily looking to leave Utah and found this.  We were forced out because of circumstances we could not control.  

The "why's" may just kill me...because I am not patient and I don't want to wait and figure it out.  I just want to know why I have to put my sweet girl through this hard time, take my family away from relatives - again - to a place that doesn't seem to hold a lot for us.  

And it really makes me mad.  And sad.  And homesick.

I wish the conversation had ended with us hugging and laughing about all the fun we could have while we were in California...but it didn't.  While we did hug and talk, we are basically both just going to bed feeling sad and confused.

I hope for answers and clarity soon, because right now it makes no sense.