Believe it or not.

When the Hollywood version of Pride and Prejudice came out I convinced Kelly to watch it with me, however I was so disappointed in it and told him how much better the BBC version was. I finally convinced him to watch it (all 6 or so hours of it). Guess what ~ as manly as he is ~ he liked it. Ever since then (about 3 years ago) every winter we spend 4-5 evenings watching it again. I really think every time I watch it I like it even better. Have you seen the long version? Have you convinced your sweetie to watch it with you? Maybe when you see Kelly next don't let him know that I posted about this for all the world to see, or I guess if he teases you about anything you have this in your back pocket.

What a difference a year can make!

Well I should totally be cleaning my bathrooms right now but I will seriously do anything to avoid that task. I already have dinner in the crock-pot so it's O.K. for me to post to my blog rather than clean right? I have just been thinking about 2008 since it is gone now. It was such a busy year for us. It really flew by! In January we had a newborn baby (born in Dec. '07), in February we sheetrocked, in March we sheetrocked, in April we finally finished sheetrocking, in May, June, and July we trimmed, painted, hung doors, stained wood, laid laminate floor, trimmed, and painted more. We really were beginning to think it would never end. In June I told the kids just a few more weeks of hard work and we will be done. Well that turned into a few months. Finally on August 5th we moved in! We were so grateful to be most of the way done. There are still a few pieces of trim left to do and our front door needs to be stained (problem because the instructions make it a 4 day process and it is the only thing between the inside of our house and the outside/dirt/snow/mice) I'm sure we will come up with a solution sometime. Oops I almost typed about spring '09 yard work to be done. Back to 2008. Now we have a beautiful 1 year old, 3 other wonderful children, and are thoroughly enjoying our new home. One of my favorite quotes goes something like this
The days go by slow, but the years go by fast
As I look back over the last year that quote rings so true. We have had some really long days, yet I don't know where the year has gone (make that years). This isn't what I planned on blogging but Kelly and I are the Gospel Principles teachers in our Ward and in the last lesson that we taught part of it was about the trials that we have here on earth. The manual says "We learned that all of us would have trials in our lives: sickness, disappointment, pain, sorrow, and death. But we understood that these would be given to us for our experience and our good. If we allowed them to, these trials would purify us rather than defeat us. They would teach us to have endurance, patience, and charity." (pp. 14-15 Gospel Principles) I pray that I can choose to be purified by my trials, and have the endurance necessary to make it through this life successfully, and gain patience and charity!
I just tried to upload pictures but it won't work for some reason so I guess you just get my thoughts for this posting. I hope that you have a wonderful day, now I have to get back to what I was avoiding.

Christmas

I have been enjoying looking at everyones Christmas posts so I guess I'd better do a quick post before it is too late. The kids have been back in school for 2 days now. I miss being able to sleep in (as much as you can with a 1 year old)! Over Christmas break our family spent lots of time together. We watched Bolt in 3D it was really neat. On Christmas Eve we went to Grandma & Grandpa Stott's house. It was so fun to see everyone who was there.

It took some looking around but I finally found matching dresses for

Britnee & Taylor. I think they look precious.

Christmas morning did not dissapoint.

Jake & Colton both got Castle Lego sets, over 950 pieces each. They both worked on them for about 3 hours on Christmas morning. It was great entertainment.

One of the finished castles.

After Christmas my Parents, McKay, and Tate were in town. It was great to see them. Kellys parents were also here and Grandma Atkinson took Britnee and Taylor to Build-a-Bear. Britnee had so much fun dressing her penguin.

Happy Birthday Taylor

Taylor is 1 today!

Can you believe we made her wait a whole year for this!

Here is her birthday car ($10 on black Friday) and already worth every cent, she loved going back and forth to her brothers and sister on it. I think that Jake is doing some sort of break dancing in the background.

I saw this cake on the back of a box and thought it was so cute I had to make it for her 1st birthday it was quite easy too (which is a must for me) I don't even like to frost cakes.

I can't believe that she is 1 year old today. The time goes by so fast and my little infant is gone, it makes me sad but yet it is so fun to see her reach each new milestone.

Here is my sweet newborn, Taylor, Britnee had made her into a "princess"

Close to one of her first smiles



My 11 month old beauty

Christmases Past

Here is a picture of my Mom (Janis) in 1955 she is about 1 1/2 yr. old.

The card was actually included in a scrapbook that my Great Grandma Stott

gave to me as a gift on a Christmas Eve at her home in Choteau.

She always made wonderful handmade gifts for all of her

grandchildren and Great Grandchildren.

I love the handwriting of my Grandma Stott it is still

the same over 50 years later!

This picture was taken in 1976 I'm guessing on Christmas Eve.

It is Grandma Stott, me and Uncle Jim (don't we all look young!).

1977

I'm sure that my Mom made that cute little nightgown.

This is Nels and I (Emilee).

The next 2 pictures are from Christmas Morning 1980.

The lower one is of Chase and I. You can't really see it but the stocking

I am looking in has Chases name on it I guess he wasn't looking

at it quickly enough for me.

My Mom always made me a pretty Christmas dress.

Well here are some pictures of Christmases Past. I have such wonderful memories of my childhood Christmases. Now I get to enjoy the wonder of Christmas through my children! They bring so much joy to my life.

F.F.T.

We decided to have Family Fun Time once more outside

before the really cold weather sets in. On Sunday the high, yes high,

temperature is forecast to be -7. BRR!

Kelly and I originally implemented FFT when we would want to go on a walk and all we would hear from certain members of our family was "I don't want to go", "I'm not coming", "Do I have to come", "BORING", etc., etc., etc.

We would smile and say "You have to come its Family Fun Time."

Apparently Kelly can use that line on me now when I don't want to go down by the river and it is only 29 degrees. Well I went and we all had fun! We roasted hot dogs and ate cheetos. I stood by the fire to keep warm and it did feel good. Taylor had her first taste of a cheeto and thought it was pretty good. The kids love it when we do things like that and I know that memories of roasting hot dogs by the river will help to make our family stronger.


It looks a bit desolate but I love it anyway!

Family Fun Time

Give it a try!

THANKSgiving

Well this picture was intended to be the last picture for this blog but I guess it gets to be first, one of these days I will get it figured out. As the sun was setting this evening I had to take a picture. I thought that it looked beautiful. I am thankful for all of the beauty on this earth.

This picture was supposed to be my 2nd to last picture. This was Tate's excitement over Thanksgiving weekend besides my family visiting of course.

Here is a picture of us right before our wonderful Thanksgiving dinner. Sorry McKay I didn't mean to cut off half of your head.

Here is a picture of Britnee, Grandpa, and Colton.

Colton, Uncle McKay, and Britnee. McKay and Tate were such good sports about wearing turkey hats. You had to know that the pictures would make it onto my blog! I am so thankful for all of my family! Tate's picture of the turkey hat is also supposed to be here but I don't know how to insert a picture into the middle of a blog any advice? Is it possible? Maybe I will have a random picture blog soon to post all of the picture that I have missed over the last year.

Here are Kelly and I posing in our almost matching striped sweaters. Aren't we cute?

And one little passionate picture to end with!

I really do love Thanksgiving time. I love that we take a little bit of extra time to think of all that we are grateful for. I feel so blessed in so many different ways. Especially when I take a few minutes to think of all of my blessing and all that I am thankful for ~ I can't help but smile!