ginny talking

So Ginny is finally talking. Which is great, and really darling, except now we're discovering how demanding she is! Cup! Cup! Juice Juice! Bubbles (candy) Pease (please) ! Swimsuit! (She has decided she doesn't want to wear clothes, just swimsuits.) No!
She's singing a few more songs--head shoulders knees and toes, jump little froggy, and the Say BOO song from veggie tales.
She has also learned how to say Sam's name, and Emily's name. We're still learning on getting her to say Max's name.
Also, she likes to color in little notebooks, then she'll proudly hold up her picture and say, "See!" In fact anytime she has done something she is proud of she says, "See!" It's really cute!

happy moments

I was talking with a friend about happiness, and how since that is the goal of our existence, why is it that I always feel more stressed out or worried than happy. The scriptures say that man is that we might have joy. They also say that keeping the commandments brings us joy. Now, I think I do a pretty good job of keeping the commandments and living the gospel--not perfect, but I do try pretty hard. So, I got thinking about the first commandment, to love the Lord with all my might, mind, and strength, and I think that I need to work on letting go of all of the busyness and stress of the world, and re-focus on spiritual things, taking care of my relationship with God and family. Also, my friend said that she thought it was important to take a few minutes to recognize our happy moments. So here goes--my top ten, recent happy moments.

1. Sam giving me a huge hug and saying, "I have the best mommy in the whole world!"
2. Talking to Max on the phone, and hearing him tell me all the details about how he had earned his Tae Kwon Do belt (camo). He was so proud and happy--and knew that he had worked hard for a goal and accomplished it.
3. Putting Ginny to bed, and have her snuggle her head on my shoulder as I sang to her.
4. Emily's happy chatter, telling me about her stories and computer game as I wash dishes.
5. Visiting my sisters in Provo--holding Nancy's sweet baby, and hugs and kisses from my nieces and nephew.
6. Coming home from my trip, to the hugs and kisses of my own kids. And, finding the house clean and an apple pie!
7. A nice conversation with Trevor, discussing the books we were both reading--about Joseph Smith and Abraham Lincoln
8. Attending the RS session of conference, and discussing the principles afterward with a friend.
9. Playing the piano--I was practicing a lot to play for a wedding. But it was really fun to spend a lot of time at the piano.
10. Playing games with the kids--lite bright, puzzles, and coloring with Sam and Ginny--reading with Max, uno and upwords with Emily.

back from Utah

Just got home last night at about 10:00 p.m. I had a really fun time visiting Nancy and her kids. It was really fun to be there at the same time as Sandi, too. Nice to spoil my nieces and nephews--and her little baby Lance is such a snuggly little darling. He is is so TINY! I mostly played with her kids, helped with cooking and dishes, held Lance, and canned peaches. Anna and Leah really liked the liitle skirts I had made for them and their dolls. And Nancy and Sandi really liked the sweet picture of mom that I had blown up and framed for them. I wish I lived closer to both of my sisters. When I got home last night, the power was out, and it wasn't fixed until about 2:00 this morning. So we lit a whole bunch of candles and slept all together on the living room floor. I was really happy to see Trevor and the kids. The house was pretty clean, and they had made me an apple pie! It was a nice homecoming.
Too bad everybody was so crabby this morning. Back to real life! Everybody was just tired from the late night.

photos

Sam's cowboy outfit, pirate hats, etc.

Here is the cowboy costume that I sewed for Sam's birthday. Also, Sam and Ginny had fun with newspaper pirate hats one day. Tutu and Papasan sent the cute robin costume for his birthday. They love to dress up!

photos of kids

these are some recent pictures of the kids. Dressed up for church, etc.

picture of me and my sister

I've been working with some old photos, etc. Here's one of Nancy and me right after we moved to Utah in 1976. I'm about 6 and Nancy would be 3 or 4.

busy week

It's been a busy week--although not with my usual things. I was able to have some good visiting teaching visits. I also visited Suzanne M. who used to be one of the sisters I visit taught. She had a stroke awhile back and is not doing very well. Today I'm going to Peoria to visit Julie O. at the hospital. She's expecting triplets and is stuck in the hospital until their arrival--still many weeks away. It's actually been nice to not be so busy with my classes etc that I actually have time to do some of these other things. Yesterday was mado's birthday--so I baked some pumpkin bread and took it over to surprise her. I think she was pleased. Trevor and I have decided to go ahead and try to sponsor her sister and her fiance to come to the United States. I don't know if they'll approve it, because it's not like we have the greatest financial resources, but we can at least try.
So, I'm trying to get the paperwork done for that.
There was a terrible Hurricane (Katrina) in New Orleans--much of the city is under 20 feet of water! Oil reserves are affected, so the gas prices now are appalling! over $3.00 per gallon! Trevor rode his bike to work today, and I even used bikes last night to return videos and take Mado her birthday treat. Max came with me on the bike ride and did really well. Sam rode behind in the bike trailer.
Emily had her friends over after school yesterday for a book club. Reminds me of the book club I had with my friends when I was about her age. She's a lot like me. They talked about books, ate oreo cookies, and then jumped on the trampoline. Emily's always got grand ideas.
Ginny is talking so much!
New phrases--"Here it is!" "Come in!" "I want some." "Cup please." She's become a little parrot--echoing what everybody says. It's funny how kids start talking just all of a sudden. She also looks more grown up because her hair is getting longer and we can put it in pony tails, etc. She also loves to put on "make-up" when mommy gets ready in the morning. Girls are so different than boys!

Shoe Fetish, first writing, and tithing

Ginny has a real fascination with shoes recently. She wants to wear hers all the time, and come up holding them in her hand saying, "shoes!" I think she knows that when we put her shoes on her it usually means we are going somewhere. The other day she decided that we ALL needed to wear our shoes. So, she kept bringing me different pairs of shoes to put on, and when Trevor tried to take his shoes off she shrieked! Then later when I lay down on the couch for a bit I kicked my shoes off and she spent about 20 minutes trying to slide my birkenstocks onto my feet, which kept slipping off. Finally she got distracted by a bandaid on my toe, and gave up on putting on the shoes. Too funny!
Also, Sam has taken a sudden interest in writing and a little bit of letter recognition. He hasn't shown much interest at all up until this point, and so I haven't done much with him, but this week he sat down and made a puppet with 2 little eyes, nose, mouth, and hair. Pretty good! So we sat down together to make a birthday card for his cousin, and he drew some little balloons, and then I asked him to try to write his name, and he actually did pretty well! The S was backward, but he managed to get a pretty legible A and M. And then later we were reading a book with Max and he recognized the letters we had practiced together. He starts preschool in a couple of weeks.
Yesterday Max took his tithing money to church--to pay on the money he had earned from the garage sale. All week long he kept saying that he didn't want to pay his tithing because he wouldn't have very much money left, but we talked about it a lot--what Heavenly Father does with the tithing money, how we pay our tithing to help people and be obedient, show our faith, etc. Well, anyway, right before church without my asking him he went and got $1.30 out of his wallet, and brought it to me to pay his tithing. Then, Trevor helped him fill out a donation form at church, and he took his money up to the bishop before the meeting started. The great part came later after church, though. He came up to me as I was making dinner and said "Mom, I really felt the Holy Ghost when I paid my tithing." A happy moment for my mother's heart!

First day of school!

First day of school! We are ready for a more structured routine, I think. I got up and went walking with Colette this morning at 6:00 and when I got home at 7:00 Max, Emily and Trevor were all up and getting ready. It was nice because everyone was ready early, and we were able to have family prayer together before everybody left for school and work. I walked to school with the kids to help them find their teachers and classrooms, but it turned out that they had the kids find their teachers and line up on the playground behind the school. I did go in later to just see where their classrooms were, and sam and Ginny played on the new playground equipment. Both kids did have some friends in their classes, so that's a good thing for helping them make the transition.
This is Emily's last year in elementary school! Unbelievable!
And Max is already in 2nd grade. They grow up too fast!

8/20

Two more days and school starts. I'm a little sad, actually. I'm really going to miss having Emily and Max at home. Ginny and Sam love having the older kids home to play with. Emily is a big help to me. Things will be a little quieter, which will be nice in a way, but I'm going to miss the kids. Emily and I had so much fun on Saturday when we went to Chicago with her friend Amy and Amy's mom. We packed a lunch and went to the American Girl store, where we were absolutely in little girl heaven. The girls had a hard time deciding how to spend their money! It was a little overwhelming, but loads of fun! We went to the American girl broadway-style show, which was darling--good singing and a nice story about a group of friends who act out stories from the American girl books. I know Emily and Amy really loved it. Emily bought the Josefina doll, which she has been saving for for a long time. And she bought Josefina's weaving outfit. Now her doll Felicity and Josefina can dress like each other. And, this morning Emily came upstairs dressed Josefina/style herself, and wanted me to braid her hair like her doll. She looked pretty in the skirt that we made together last week, a white blouse and rebozo from one of her scarves.
Last night when I was singing to Max as we put him to bed, he said to me, "Mommy, I want to tuck you in bed tonight and read you a story, so come and wake me up when you are ready to go to bed. " Cute!

Birthday boy

WEll, today was a really busy day. WE got up early to get ready for a garage sale. The kids worked hard, both in cleaning, setting up, and managing the sale. I was proud of Emily and Max for working so hard. Max was quite the lemonade salesman. Emily did great making change and helping people find things. They didn't make a ton of money--about $12 each, but that's quite a bit of money for a kid. So I think it was a success.
then, we had a birthday party for Sam. It kind of stressed me out to get ready for it--cleaning up, preparing games, making cake etc. but it was worth it because SAm had a lot of fun. As he helped me make the cake, put up balloons etc. I could see that he was really pleased that all of this attention was for him. I had made capes and super hero masks for all the little boys, and we played super-hero games. Saving the world and all that. I think they all had fun. But now I'm completely exhausted.
Whew!

family photos

Okay, so I'm going a little nuts on these family photos--but I just thought this was a good place to have some pictures of all the people we love so much.

The "Fonnesbeck/Gardner family" (Nana's clan) summer 2004 at a picnic in Provo canyon. Aunt Judy, Rob, Sheri, Nancy, Karen, and kids, Heidi, Marilyn, Sam, Trevor--kids
Cousins in the Ellis backyared--Max, Anna, Leah, and Sam--Aunt Sandi with cute Great granddad Ellis
Grandma Carol with baby Ginny summer 2004. Ginny was about 9 months old. About 5 months before Carol passed away.

Papa and Grandma Ann with Trevor and kids at the beach in Oregon. Mo's chowder. Yum! Tide pools and sand castles, and sticking our toes in the ocean. Lots of fun!

family photos

Cousings Roman and Malcom with the kids, Grandma DeJean and Uncle Blake and Aunt Sydney. summer vacation 2004. Ellis family at Miller park zoo. summer 2004. Aunt Nancy, Papa, Leah, Adam, Sam Anna Max, Grandma Ann, Emily

more family photos

My cute boys! Max and Sam in the batman costumes at ages 4 and 1. Max at age 5 (almost 6) with our new piano.



Trevor at the park with new baby Sam--fall 2001






Baby Sam--summer 2002. playing at Fairview pool.