Here are some of the things we will remember about New York

Playing toys. It was the first thing they both loved to do.

They got tickets and took us to a Mets baseball game! So much fun!

I saw the cotton candy man and knew we had to get some. This is the girls stuffing their faces.  It was a definite hit!

This was our view.

Proof! The scoreboard. The Braves won! Woohoo! :)

These two loved sitting next to each other in the car. Giving each other high fives.

And briefly holding hands. They're cousin buddies.

Brooklyn Bridge, with a neat little glass-encased carousel. Our girls enjoyed themselves taking a ride on it!

No idea where the kids are looking, but since the adults are all smiling so nicely, this is the picture you get of us all there. Except Kamber is taking the picture.

On our way to cross the Brooklyn bridge, which we ended up not crossing, we found a delectable little chocolates shop. We had to verify that its good tasted delicious. Aftyn appears to be giving it some thought.

We all tasted a little something, quite happily. Yummy chocolate spoons!

Some of us were not satisfied by our tastes and we yearned for more. And also cried for more. Little chocolate mouth. :)

Today was the day that our nearest family moved back to Idaho. With them, besides all of their clothing and kids, they took a little piece of our hearts. But we will remember all the fun we had with them and we're so grateful for all the fun times and all the fun things they shared with us about New York!
Truthfully, I was a little bummed this afternoon after getting the call that they were on their way.
Heavenly Father really does know our trials and struggles because then tonight I went to the Relief Society Broadcast and immediately I was uplifted and I no longer felt sad as I sat there surrounded by the love of the women of my ward. I am not alone. We are not alone. And no need to fear because we've been doing good for a good while now. And we'll just keep on keeping on. With lots of help from our Father in Heaven.

Tidbits From My Dentist

Today I went to the dentist.

It was the most horrific hour of my life, thanks to a tooth 

that has been hurting me for a little while.

My dentist is an elderly, unsmiling, tenderhearted Jewish man.

When I first met him, I thought he and I might butt heads a little bit.

He's stubborn and thinks he's always right. 

I'm stubborn and tend to think I'M always right.

A match made in heaven!     :)

Today while working on said tooth that was horrifically painful 

and never got completely numb,

I was administered at least 20 shot pokes in a vain attempt 

to help me to stop feeling nerve pain

as he hovered just above said nerve for the majority of the drilling. 

In the middle of it all, after I had cried in the dental chair

but I'm not sure he saw, 

he told me I was a scaredy cat. Good thing I knew he liked me.

 I just laughed. And thought of all the other places I'd rather be 

and other things I'd rather be doing, such as giving birth to a child naturally.

 And tried really hard to control the shaking of the lower

 half of my body.

When all was said and done and that dang tooth had a beautiful filling 

on it, he turned to me and said, "You are a very brave girl".  

Aw gee, Doc. You sure know the way to a girls heart. 

 I'm telling you, in spite of appearances, I know he likes me. 

And that's what really matters.

(I hope you can tell, this whole post is written very tongue-in-cheek.

If you can't tell, well, you've been informed!)

A Little Trip To Sam's Club

 I pushed the cart full of our purchases over to the counter and made my order.
"One pretzel and one drink please. And can I get an extra little cup?"

With cup(s) in hand, I awkwardly pushed our cart over to a table, depositing our cart and my girls securely next to a table sufficiently close to the drinks dispenser and the counter where they would be calling that my pretzel was done.  I filled up my big cup, grabbed a lid and what seemed a sufficient amount of napkins for the 3 of us.

I deposited my big cup, little cup, napkins and straws on the table and then turned around to deposit my kids at the table. Aftyn across from me, and Bronwyn next to me.

I managed to pull the straws from their paper packaging before too many little hands reached for the big cup of pop, secured the lid so that the drink wouldn't spill if tipped and even managed to get the napkins set in the middle of the table. Go me.

Next came the call we were waiting for. I quickly decided it would be unsafe to leave Bronwyn sitting there in case she decided to come after me, so I snatched her up on the way to the counter and then quickly re-deposited her back in her spot next to me.

Something about food and hungry kids, suddenly there were lots of grabby hands and not enough of my own to help them.  I thankfully managed to deposit a hot pretzel piece of front of both girls, Aftyn had her own cup of pop and Bronwyn was happily sipping away on her own straw that was nestled next to my own in my big cup.  "Ahh", I thought, "I made it." The kids had their food, and now we could get down to the business of filling up our tummies with a little snack and get on with the rest of our day to other fun things I had planned.
     We sat there, quite happily, for many many minutes. The pretzels cooled quickly, but before a sufficient enough time had passed Bronwynnie grabbed her pretzel and held it to her mouth to begin her chompfest. I quickly asked her, "Is it hot?" to which she readily nodded her head. I happened to glance up at that moment and noticed a lady at the table next to ours was watching this exchange with a smile on her face. Which of course made me smile because of my little girl. I just love this age.

We waited a few more moments and then happily dug in. I finished my half of the pretzel quickly and then waited for two little girls who were taking their time and looking at all the people around us, and the ceiling and the drink dispenser and anything else that interests a 3 and 1 year old.

Aftyn, at one point, pointed in the general direction of a middle aged woman sitting nearby whose head was shaved and asked, "Is that a daddy?".  Awesome.

Bronwyn was done at this point, so I tried to get Aftyn to finish quickly as I could tell things were deteriorating and our perfect moment of enjoyment was all used up. And just at that moment as I gathered all the garbage together, I heard Aftyn say,"uh oh, that's okay Mommy". She had been trying to finish all of her pop and somehow managed to spill the remainder on her shirt and on the floor. Our perfect moment had ended. I agreed with Aftyn and told her, "That's okay Aftyn."

And we hightailed it out of there.  Threw our garbage away, left our crumbs and pop spilled on the floor. I wasn't taking anymore prisoners. We were gettin' while the gettin' was good.

If I could freeze this moment, this is what my life looks like right now. Thankfully, it's not always leaving messes for other people. This was just a good day. :)

Aftyn's Haircut

Reed hasn't seen it yet.

 I'll update later to see if I give him some sort of heart attack. :)

UPDATE: In Reed's own words "I really REALLY like it!".   :D

It's Time

Hey all you people who wondered why I seem to have fallen off the edge of the blogosphere!

We have been having so much fun lately now that we've committed to doing/going to one new place to us a week.  Last week we went to Kimball Farms and took no pictures but ate some incredibly delicious ice cream. I'm trying to talk Reed into going one last time before they close for the season in October.

(I've been evading the blog writing because chronologically my next post would be about a visit we had a few weeks back to visit Reed's brother and wife and kids in New York. Except, see, I'm not ready to publish those pictures and think about the inevitability of them moving in approximately 10 days. Back to the Other Side of this great continent. Leaving us, sadly, with no fun family to visit and no more planned trips into NYC with people who are veterans of driving there and who know personally the fun attractions to be seen.)

Instead, here's a little update about our family!

Let's start with our main man. Reed has been back in school for about a month now and in his usual fashion took a pretty laid back approach to his classes until last week when it suddenly hit him he's a little behind in his classes and has to catch up or else it'll be pretty crazy until the end of the semester.  So we've been seeing less of him lately but I'm pretty used to this already thanks to last semester. This semester feels like a breeze compared to last semester. We're not just moving in, and starting school and finding our way around this crazy town. We're pretty well settled into a routine and know our way around. We went to a school sponsored get together last Friday night and really enjoyed ourselves. They had lots of free food, live music and it was fun to walk around campus with the girls and show them more about "Daddy's school". Aftyn loved it! I'm sure the cotton candy will only make her MORE excited to visit Daddy's school in the future, in the hopes of having more. :) On the calling front, have I mentioned Reed is now the Elders Quorum President? This can make for a pretty hectic week depending on how many people are moving within the ward. Thankfully, it's been quiet on that front for a couple of weeks.

I wonder if a paper Reed would be as good as the man himself? :D

As for me, I am trying to do my usual juggle of cleaning, cooking, parenting and trying to do something I find to be fun like sewing. I haven't been able to find much time for sewing lately but that would be because I'm working on losing those last pounds of baby weight, so I've been expending my energy in working out when the girls go to bed. That usually wipes me out. :)  I'm still the 1st counselor in the primary presidency here and I have really learned to love that job. This last week at church I had to fill in at the last minute for the primary chorister. That was interesting, and I've decided since it could happen again that I need a fun "schtick" that makes me stand out and makes it fun for me to substitute for that calling. Any primary choristers have any good ideas of what my thing could be? I am certainly accepting any and all ideas.

Aftyn. Recently instead of saying "yes" to everything she has started responding with "yeah" and a sullen sort of head shake that reminds me of a teenager. I don't know what to make of her lately. Seems like she's suddenly having a hard time in certain areas of life. Hopefully it will pass soon, but if not we'll keep on hugging her and having fun family times that seem to bring back the sparkle in  her eyes and the smile on her face. I'm also trying to come up with ways that we can get together with friends at least once or twice a week as I really think that would help too. I love this girl and want to help her to be happy, I just think lately that she's feeling sad and I'm trying to figure out how to help her out of this funk.

Bronwyn is our little star shining brightly. She makes everybody laugh, and if we're not laughing then we're probably trying to chase her down and stop her from being naughty. She has so much personality. She likes to nod her head when appropriate and says "a-huh". She loves to give hugs and lately even kisses. She has the hardest head, and usually without knowing it will bonk me in the head quite hard while trying to snuggle into me. She loves to dance, and play with Aftyn. She loves books and generally anything Aftyn likes Bronwyn likes. She finally had a significant growth spurt this last month and grew 1 3/4 inches! :) Because of that growth spurt, she has finally started to fit into 18 month clothes, and has started to feel like more of a toddler when I pick her up. We sure love her infectious smile and her giggles. Especially when her giggles and Aftyn's giggles are combined. What a sweet sweet sound.

Evidently, Bronwyn does not care for mustaches. :)

A Recipe For Fun

The ingredients to make a great day?

   Take a nice holiday. How about Labor Day!

Add in a nice trip to the coast to see a few schooners, 

A 1/2 pound of freshly made chocolates,

lots of lovely ocean air,

warm but not too hot temperatures,

some sand,

a little dip in the ocean, 

lots and lots of walking,

a healthy curiosity of new places to see and a love of adventure,

2 very patient girls who loved being outdoors all day

and a whole day to play and relax as a family !

It was a perfectly perfect day.

Oh My Little Babies!

                                It's easy to forget sometimes that even when they're not tiny,

                                                 they can certainly still be little.

                                                 Oh my sweet little Aftyn girl.

                                Want some proof? Look here
                                                                                  here
                                                                                         here
                                                                                              and here