Count Your Many Blessings

So things get crazy, and sometimes I forget to stop and breathe and remember how blessed I really am.  Life is too short to hurry through it, even when things don't seem to be going the way I think they should! So, here's my top ten list of blessings. Nothing out of the ordinary, but I just felt the need to put it in black and white, so here they are in no particular order:

• Faith.  It doesn't come easy to some, and I'm thankful that's not my burden. My faith has helped me through some pretty hard times, and I don't know where I'd be without it.
  
• Health. I can't remember the last time I was really, really sick.
  
• A good husband who loves me despite my many shortcomings, and encourages me to be better without nagging.
  
• Happy children who really do try to do what's right..
  
• Good friends that I don't thank often enough for being good friends. Thank you!
• Extended family that are always there when we need them, and are counted as good friends. (See previous!)
  
• Our home--it seems a little small at times, but it provides a refuge from the world and it's filled with love and that's what counts.
• Freedom. Even with all the outrageous stuff happening in our country, we still live in the most amazing place in the world.  I hope we can keep it that way.
• Good books. The Scriptures, classics, biographies, sci-fi, children's literature--there are sooooo many good stories in which to immerse myself and my family that we can learn and grow from.
• Good music.  When I need a kick to get going, there's music for that.  And when I need to calm down, there's something for that, too.  Or, when I just feel like dancing. . .well, you get the idea.

There you have it.  And I could go on.  But I think I'll savor the quiet of this Sabbath morning, in my refuge from the world, with some good reading and music together with my family in this wonderful country that allows me to enjoy all these blessings.

Life in Lots of Pictures and Links

DANCE FESTIVAL- Rehearsals took place over the course of several months.  The performances were fabulous, and took place Friday and Saturday July 25 & 26.  Brooke, Dallin, and John were in three different dance numbers--Disney Waltz Medley, Footloose, and Getcha Head in the Game, respectively. The following pictures show Brooke at practice with her awesome partner Alex, along with the costume pictures, and the performance.  I wasn't able to get good shots of Dallin and John during the performance, which is a bummer, because they did great.  The last picture shows the choir part of the performance, which Chris and I were both a part of.  (They really didn't need my voice, but Chris can sing, and they asked for 1 couple from each of the wards in the 12 stakes that were participating, so it was a package deal.)

SUMMER VACATION-  We had a great time visiting friends and family in Utah as part of getting Brooke to Provo, Utah to take the bus to Rexburg, Idaho so she could attend Especially For Youth at BYU-Idaho.  She had a blast, and made some great friends, and even reacquainted herself with her first
friend, Rachel.  Chris, Jared, Noah and I got to visit my fabulous BYU-Provo roomie Teresa and her family in Tooele for a couple of days, where Chris went mountain biking with Teresa's hubbie Jesse, and the kids (Jared, Noah, Jaret and Kaysen-Bryant, their middle son, decided to stay home and pack for Scout camp) Teresa, Chris and I went to the Kennecott Copper Mine--fascinating!  I regret to say that I failed to get a picture of their entire family together.  I had such a wonderfully refreshing time with them, and I wish we lived closer--they are an awesome family!   From the Wilson's, we went on to Salt Lake City for a few hours, since Jared and Noah are too young to remember Temple Square.  They especially liked the view from the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, where Noah took a great picture of the temple.  On the way back the car, we saw some gorgeous flowers with huge bee flitting from blossom to blossom.  From Salt Lake, we went on to South Weber to visit the Morgan clan for a couple of days.  We had a blast with them, as always.  Jared and Noah got wet a lot--there's a great park with all these sprinkler toys, and we also went to the water slides at Cherry Hill.  We also celebrated a birthday while we were there, and all the Morgan brothers had  a  photo op together.  Unfortunately, it wasn't all fun and games.  Chris had homework to do almost every day, as he has to take classes in order to be certified to teach English language learners. (Don't get me started. THAT'S a topic for another post!)  He found a great spot outside the Morgans home to get a good wireless connection.  Also, we tried to sleep outside one night, but it was SUPER windy (we found out the next day that records had been broken) and we ended up taking the kids inside at around 2 in the morning. All in all, we it was great to see everyone and to let all of our kids play together.  From South Weber, we went back to Provo to pick up Brooke, and then down to Cedar City to visit with my parents.  Actually, they live just north of there, in a place called Enoch.  The boys got a chance to get a little wet in the splash pool, and Brooke and I went to see Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Verona at the extraordinary Utah Shakespearean Festival.  We've seen several of Shakepeare's comedies there over the years, and always thoroughly enjoy the experience.

BAND CAMP- As you can tell by now, John and Dallin did not accompany us to Utah.  John was at Scout camp (where he didn't take any pictures, but I'm going to try to get some from his leaders) and Dallin spent his time at get-ahead summer school and band camp.  The pictures below show him playing at the culmination of camp for all us proud parents.

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL- Brooke, Dallin, John, and Chris started school on August 25.  As usual, Dallin wasn't too thrilled to have his picture taken, Brooke's a ham, and John likes the tree pose.  Chris had to include his emergency lunch stash in his picture.  Jared and Noah started school last Thursday the 4th here at home again this year (I didn't take pictures--bad me.) We're going through California Virtual Academies this year, and it's taking some getting used to on all of our parts. Much more rigorous and structured than what we did last year, but hopefully not tediously so. We're still waiting for some materials to come in, and sometimes the online stuff doesn't always work right,so that's a little frustrating, but to be fair, they've had a huge enrollment leap from about 6,500 students statewide last year to almost 10,000 this year.

Anyway, that about sums up what we've been doing the last month and a half.  I have been very blog-shy as of late, just feeling not much inspiration or creativity.  So, this post is the result.  Not very exciting or creative or funny, but at least it's something new to look at!