I long for civility!

I love 'Downtown Abbey!'  Some may turn their noses and refer to it as nothing more than your basic soap opera, disguised in English gowns and maid uniforms.  It may indeed be just that, but it entertains me, and there is not much out there that is smart, elegant, and well written.  This past weekend, I was ill and spent the entire night of Friday on the couch watching episode after episode.  My children even enjoyed it, and were caught up in the storyline.  We actively booed the villains, cheered the heroes, and cast votes as to the characters in that gray area of moral fence sitting.  I love how the English use their language.  They have the ability to say the kindest,  meanest, sharpest, funniest, clever, spot on retort  leaving their prey wondering if they have just been complimented or if they are bleeding profusely from a word inflicted wound!  I love it!  The Dowager is the best at this game of mental fencing.  I leave you with some of her best.  Enjoy!

Auntie Em! Auntie Em!

There are few things that will put me into a bad mood real quick.  My children fighting is chart topper, along with having to fix a car or an appliance.  Right at the top of that list is the wind.  I am not a fan!  Today, in the great Land of Enchantment, we are in for a very windy day.  One knows it will be awful when the wind speeds are up to around 40mph before ten in the morning!  Ugh!  It grates on my nerves!  There are many beauties to behold in the southwest, unfortunately, Springtime is not one of them!  Today I will be holding onto my hat, my car, Molly and Tabby's backpacks, and the occasional door.  Hopefully I will find myself on the right side of the rainbow tomorrow!

Moving Out

Well it is official. We are out of the house now. Emily has been working her tail off in order to get things ready and to do be honest that is quite a task with the two boys. It was sad to spend the last night in our home. We spent a lot of fun times there and if it were not for the future I might even dwell on it. We are really excited about moving up to Logan. I am excited to finally after all of these years start my real job. Even today I am getting run down at being a resident. I have learned a lot and look forward to showing how much I really did not learn.

I think I can do this blog stuff mabe

Jack singing to Charlie

This was like the perfect video and highlight of things in our home.  Jack and Charlie really are good friends as long as Charlie can handle the hyper nature of Jack.  Jack for the most part is really gentle with Charlie, but really there are times . . .  Anyway the video is really cute and thought that you would enjoy it.

Standing tall.............

Last night at Young Women, we had the opportunity to write our testimonies.  I took that challenge and wrote down my testimony on a simple piece of paper.  Knowing this paper might actually get to someone, somewhere, I took the time to articulate my true feeling about my Savior, Jesus Christ.  It was a moving experience for me.  I was touched as I watched the girls pondering their own words, they took great responsibility for what they wrote.

After we finished, we tied our testimonies to yellow balloons and let them go into the night sky.  Because of the city lights, they seemed to glow like a cluster of stars for a long time. It was beautiful.  I know we were all hoping that someone might find our words and that it might make a difference in someone's life.  It was a special moment, and one that I was grateful to experience.

Here is a link to the Youth theme for this year.  It is an uplifting happy song.  Tabby likes to dance to it! ;)

Enchanted!

Bret and I went to see 'The Artist' this weekend.  It was lovely!  A beautiful movie that captured the best of 'old' Hollywood.  I will warn you, it is a silent movie. Don't let that scare you off!  I promise, it is good. The musical score blocks the annoying munching of popcorn, so don't worry about having to sit and listen to people eat for two hours. 
Here is a sneak peak.... I found the leading man completely charming!  I love that smile!

 

Post Call

A common occurrence in our home is dealing with life after working all night. Unfortunately I have been covering in the pediatric ICU over the weekends which means that each weekend I have to pull a 24 to 28 hour shift. These times are disheartening for a number of reasons most of which I will not go into but suffice it to say that they are very long shifts. When I get home tired it is always a blessing and sometimes a curse to find an anxious two year old to greet me. Today as I drove up I could see him peering through ur front window waiting for me to show up and when he saw my car start bouncing up and down running to hide. You see his new game is to hide when I get home so that I have to find him. The only difficulty comes up when it is time for me to get some sleep. For example today, I fell asleep with him sitting next to me trying to play my iPad. Then about 30 minutes later he woke me up trying to give me a pretend hammer to smash the pretend bats that were flying over our heads. Finally I awoke with about three different trains on top of me as he eas making a new route over the bed. Of course Emily would keep him out of the room if I did not insist that he be allowed to play. When you are away from home this much it is difficult to make these firm boundaries as something so small as sleep.

Are we sick yet?

For the past six years, we have been making donuts on Superbowl Sunday.  It is messy, it takes time, and I am usually pretty tired on Sunday.  That said, my kids really look forward to this day, and of course that makes me happy.  Molly loves to roll out the dough and cut out the donuts. Tabby likes to shake them in the bags of sugar, and there is usually a dance involved (lots of booty shakin!). Brigette likes the chocolate glaze. Dallin is in and out of the kitchen with pithy and sarcastic comments about the state of affairs in the kitchen.  It is funny how each child has developed their own role in this process.  Of course we all help eat and then are sick for the rest of the evening!  It's fun to start traditions, especially when they are semi successful!  Which this year's batch of donuts have been dubbed as the best!  Without bragging....... they were AWESOME! :) 

I leave you with our favorite/disturbing (Brigette found it very disturbing) commercial from the Superbowl........

Eliminate Sprite

Hard to believe that a can of soda could be so effective. Last night as we were leaving Costco I decided to grab a soda for my wife because sometimes she needs a little Coke pick me up. While looking at the drinks I thought sure why not and called Jack over and asked him if he wanted a green soda. Since the little guy thinks the color green is the best thing ever. I grabbed the soda and we all headed home. Now of course my son has had soda before but we hardly ever let him have a full soda all to himself. The result of this quick intake of sugar was incredible. He was literally bouncing off the walls. He jumped on top of Charlie a number of times and thought the couch was his personal trampoline. It took the threat of placing one of his trains in timeout that final got him to brush his teeth. Luckily for us the sugars falls as quickly as it peeks and he crashed in his bed within 10 minutes. Lessened learned at the very least we will think twice before we all the green brew to be so easily offered.

Matt Signing On

Right now I am supposed to be listening to a lousy talk on newborn jaundice. The good thing about finally being in my third year of residency is that a lOt of the information is really second nature. I thought I would share our sinner experience past night. My wife thought that it would be a good idea to have the missionaries over more often. Especially with Jack getting older not to mention the smaller chances we may have living in Utah. So the sisters came over last night. They arrived right at the same time that I was pulling not the drive. Unfortunately Jack had fallen asleep later in the day and was still asleep by the time hat I got home. Emily had tried to wake Jim up several times but to no avail. Well as you can imagine Jack was not excited. He then proceded to pout and cry. When it came down to it he wanted me to hold him all throughout dinner. He really is dramatic at times throughout the whole dinner he was lying across mylap while I sat on the piano bench trying to eat. Periodically he would let out a little wimpper and cry. He hardly would even poke his head above the table that was even after a couple of stern talkings in the hallway. Finally after the Sisters had left who were not your communicative type, Jack finally perked up and acted like nothing had happened. So much for our missionary experience.

Groundhog day!

 Mr. Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow today, that means 6 more weeks of winter.  That news delivered, I propose we think of happier thoughts. Summer! (See what a giver I am? :) I live for winter and the rare day that we actually have clouds down here in the Land of Enchantment!) So to help those of you in colder climates I found this craft on Pinterest; firefly jars!  It looks simple, it looks easy.  Does it work?  I have no idea, but I am willing to try.  Here is the link; http://www.curbly.com/users/chrisjob/posts/10546-how-to-make-glowing-firefly-jars   

Merlin

My family loves this series.  This montage features the different knights in the series.  There is not much in there about Merlin, so I should point out that we love the Merlin Character.  It is a family series and nothing too scary!  Who doesn't love Aurthur, Merlin, and the knights of Camelot?  It can be found on netflix!  You can thank me later!  I should also add, that you will probably be wanting a long flowing cloak after you have spent some time with this series.  I don't know how many times I have mentioned the need for a cloak and a deep dark forest.