Christmas Letter in March

To everyone who received a Christmas Card from me this week, this is my explanation:
I'm hoping maybe it will be LUCKY to send Christmas cards in March!!! Just kidding, the real reason the cards are so delayed is because I'm frugal. I ordered all my cards, but thought we would be moving the end of December, so I held on to them thinking I could send cards and our new address out at the same time. But then we didn't close on our old house until the end of January and didn't close on our new house until the middle of February and then what with unpacking and all... March Christmas Cards!
Some of you may have a bunch of questions right now, so let me see if I can clear some of them up. Last September, quite unexpectedly, David transferred to a new state park, Jordan River OHV Center, three hours away and began working 4 days on, 3 at home. We missed him lots! Then in November, we sold our home. We moved out right before Christmas and stayed with Dave's dad for a wonderful holiday season. Unfortunately, the loan kept getting stalled and we still hadn't closed after the first of the year, but we decided to move up closer to Dave's work anyway. So, we moved in with my parents in thinking it would be just for a couple of weeks, but it ended up being six. They were great about it, and we enjoyed being with them, but when we finally moved into our new home on February 19th, it felt great!We miss Monroe a lot, but enjoy the advantages of a city, like having a library full of books and more shopping choices than Wal-Mart. More variety in just about everything, really. And it's a lot of fun to be closer to my family after 18 years.
2008 was an eventful year for us. January
Davy turned 10 and received his Bear award from cub scouts. He is a very physical boy. He loves bikes, motorcycles, sports and building things. He is also very loving and hugs me several times a day. I love it!
February Dave took the kids to Arizona to help get his Grandma's house ready to move. She has been living with Dave's mom for some time and they decided to sell her house. David has a lot of memories there as it was just up the road from his childhood home, so it was a bittersweet trip. After a long illness, his dear Grandma passed away last week. We attended the funeral on Saturday and spent some time remembering all our great memories of Grandma. She really was the sweetest lady ever.

March and April were quiet months. David had his birthday. He had fun playing basketball at 5:30am with a group of guys at the church three days a week.
May Bekah turned 12 this May and entered the hallowed Young Women shrine. She has continued with the violin and clogging and really loves her friends. She would be with them 24/7 if I would let her. And they love her right back. She has already made a couple of new friends here in our new neighborhood and stays in regular contact with her Monroe friends as well.
June is always a big month for us with baseball, youth camps and our family reunion. We bring summer on with a bang. Davy made the all-star team this year and did a great job at 2nd base. Darci turned eight. She is starting to try some new things. She was on a soccer team and joined a singing group. Since our move she has started gymnastics. She keeps us laughing all the time.
July Elisabeth turned 6 this year. She is full of life and fun. She loves to collect things in boxes and purses. If I'm ever missing any random thing, it's likely to show up in one of her drawers. She was part of a singing group with the other girls and performed for the big 24th of July celebration in front of a large audience and did really well. We also had a fun trip to Arizona to celebrate Dave's sister's 40th birthday.
August the highlight was Darci's baptism. See post down further on the blog.
September My grandma invited us to a special party to celebrate her 86th birthday. She told us all how much she loved us and we had a little talent show for her.
October I had my birthday. This year I was really involved with my kids as usual, but started teaching some classes where we invited other home school families to join us. It was rewarding. I also continued with piano, teaching 10-12 students. I finished up my class work for my masters and just have my thesis left. I'm not sure what I'm going to write about yet, but I find myself thinking about freedom a lot lately. Do you think we, as a people and as individuals, love freedom enough? Since December, I've been in kind of a little bubble just managing through all the transitions, but now I'm excited to get back working on these things that I'm passionate about.
November Nicole turned 14. She is still an avid reader and has really excelled with her piano this year. She has fun with her friends and is a great help to me. It's tough to be the 1st child in the family and have so many responsibilities, but she takes it all in stride.
December was different for us this year as it was spent packing, house hunting and living with parents, but as we make this transition we know we are watched over and we are thankful everyday for the tender mercies of the Lord. We hope you find them in your lives as well. I'd love to hear about them. :)

Cousin Party!

We had a little cousin party on Friday to celebrate Dustin's 6th birthday and paint with Elisabeth's new paints. It was so much fun that the party didn't end until 10:30. The only bummer is that not all of our cousins' live close enough to come. We miss you Houston's and Buck's.

Mom's 60th

My sister's and I planned a surprise 60th birthday party for Mom. It was a lot of fun. She felt good that so many people care about her. To throw her off the scent, we told her we'd go to the temple with her the morning of her birthday. It was really nice. We hope she's here another 60! P.S. Love that handsome hubby!

Teeth Happenings

Nicole got her braces off! She is equally excited.


Elisabeth lost her first tooth! Woo Hoo! She was so excited.

Back on Blogger

My life has finally settled down where I feel I can get consistent with my blog. My goal is to write weekly or whenever I have a great Mother Moment. So here's an update on us:
We are now living in my parents' basement waiting for our house to close and then we will be able to finish purchasing our new one. It's nice to be here and have my children be my only responsibility. I'm so used to being heavily involved with church callings, home school clubs/classes, piano students and my own education, that this is a big change. A nice, welcome one. And all the more sweet because I know it will be short. And that's good, too, because life is about serving and growing, not living in sweet little caves.
I am so glad we're a TJEd family. It has made the moving transition so much easier. As soon as the holiday break was over, we were able to pick up right where we left off without any worries about teachers, friends or new school routines. My children are doing really well with the move so far. I'm really proud of them.
We did start a chore chart here at Grandma's. Well, I really don't make charts anymore, but everyone picked an area of the house to be in charge of. I was getting a little worried that the perpetual vacation we've been on was going to be hard to come back from. Besides, it's good for them to feel that their contributions help everyone out.
Family update:
Elisabeth has her first loose tooth! She was so excited, she ran up to Dad yelling, "My loose is tooth! My loose is tooth!" She also got a Webkin for Christmas and spends a little time on the computer each day taking care of them.
Darci has been having a blast living so close to her cousin Rachael. They really have a lot of fun with each other. Rachael introduced Darci to her Didge (have no idea how to spell it), an electronic game console, and she really likes it.
Davy has been my snowMAN. It has snowed a ton since we've been here, and he is a trooper to go out and shovel. Sometimes several times a day.
Nicole and Bekah have had several opportunities to babysit their cousins. They do a great job and I think it's a big relief to their Aunts and Uncles to have babysitters that love, love, love their kids.
Dave works and I cook and learn with the kids. We also started a Biggest Loser contest with the family, so I have to stay away from the sweets which is a big challenge for me. A challenge I embrace, so watch out fellow competitors!
My sister started a book club, so this week I'm going to read EMMA by Jane Austen.

I thought I was Done with This

When David got a job three hours away two months ago, I knew I would miss him terribly, but I never would have predicted the tail-spin of immaturity I would let myself get sucked into. I thought I was a grown-up now. The ever more noticeable lines on my face tell me I am, but my actions lately are more like a three year old throwing a tantrum. Not a throw myself on the floor, scream and yell till I'm blue in the face kind of tantrum, the eat whatever I want and stay up all hours watching TV kind of tantrum. The kind of tantrum where I know I really ought to be organizing for moving or spending more time with the kids, or at least doing some dishes, but instead find myself zoned out in an endless online house hunting expedition. Have you ever been on one of these downward spirals? The less I do, the less I feel like doing. When the going got tough this time, I checked out. Or am I stating this too strongly? I still taught piano, a scholar class and my own children. Our budget is still on track and the house looked good enough that someone bought it. Christmas preparations are under control and the children don't smell bad. It's just that, personally, any down time I could find, I filled with meaninglessness instead of the important things, even some of the essential ones. I thought I was done with that bad habit. I guess I just wished I was, because when the going got tough, I bailed. But time is consistent and today, this moment, I can start being done with immaturity again.

Playing in the Leaves

One of the best moments in life, is seeing your children building relationships with each other. They probably think they're just having fun, but I see bonding. Yeah!
One day, Davy and Darci went outside and raked up tons of leaves in the neighbor's yard. Then they came in and got Elisabeth, so excited to through her in the leaves. Then they took turns burying each other. Fun times! Now my front yard is covered in little leaf rooms. They rake the leaves into "walls" and play house inside the rooms. Bekah, Darci and Elisabeth, not Davy. I think he would want me to disclose that.