Sydney Sue, I love you!

Sydney turned 12 this year.  What?!  This girl is still one of my top four favorite kids ever!  She wasn't all that excited to go to Young Women's and even asked if she could still be in the Primary program.  That all changed after she came to Young Women's for a week or two.  Then she was happy to cut all ties to primary.  We even got to go on a baptismal trip just a week after her birthday.  Love our new temple and love these girls!!

Twelve is the last year that we do birthday parties.  Sydney decided to have a game night with a whole bunch of friends.   It was pretty crazy.  Something about this age makes girls think they need to scream and be louder and more dramatic than everyone else.  I seriously wondered if the neighbors were going to come knocking asking us to keep it down.

However loud they are, I am so grateful for these friends of hers.  She has been lucky in the friend department.  Many of these kids have been here since they were toddlers.  They are a good group of kids.  I hope they all remain friends for a long time.

They had tied themselves in a not and had to untie without letting go.

Conner Nielsen was the only boy who ended up coming.  Sydney and Conner have been friends since they were two.  It wasn't a big deal for either one of them to have him there.  But, it was a big deal to a lot of the other girls.  They spent the night teasing and commenting about it.  I found it a bit annoying and inconsiderate.  I finally told Sydney she needed to tell her friends to stop.  But, it made me grateful that my girls aren't silly about boys.  They've both never gone through the "boys have cooties" stage.  They have friends that are boys and are comfortable around them.  It's no big deal.  I think part of that is because we don't allow teasing at home and part of that is because they're just awesome girls.  Hopefully, things stay this way because I think it will make teen years a lot more fun.
 

Sydney requested that she got her own birthday cake because she wanted to reenact this scene from her first birthday. (But, with clothes on, of course.)

Here is that chubby baby eleven years later.

This girl loves to play.  She is so fun and is so easy to parent.  I've always said that Sydney makes me look good as a mother.  I am so grateful for her kindness, her patience, her forgiveness, and her desire to do what is right.  Love her!!

Aiden's New Room

This wonderful boy turned nine this year.  So, as is tradition, he we I got to redecorate his room.  He chose navy blue and orange as his colors.  To be honest, Aiden was more excited to see all the boxes that his new furniture came in.  This boy loves to play with boxes.  He builds forts with them, makes arcade games, colors on them with markers, creates tunnels etc.  I ended up gathering a few boxes from neighbors to give him as birthday gifts.

I painted over the blue stripes on his walls, which really ended up snowballing into a total repaint, but newly painted walls and trim are so wonderful.  So, I didn't really mind.

I was really excited about this motorcycle artwork.  It's made from scraps of paper, which have been put together so it's 3 dimensional.  I think it's interesting to look at.

 
 I also re-stained his dresser.  I bought this off craigslist years ago and still love it. Restaining it really made it beautiful.

 We added these board and hooks along the wall for him to hang stuff. 

 Aiden's room has two very deep windowsills.  He's always tempted to sit on or jump off them so I felt like I needed to give them a purpose instead of leaving them blank.  The one on the right is now a window seat and the one on the left has been turned into a shelf.  He's also really enjoyed the magnetic chalkboard hung between the windows.  I got the coolest old frame at the thrift store, painted it blue and inserted a piece of sheet metal with painted with chalkboard paint.  I love it when a project comes together like that.

Notice the DogMan books.  That and the Bad Guys series have rekindled a love of reading- YAY!

I love the orange metal chair!

Did you notice the awesome floating desk?  As always, I had a vision and Brent had to figure it out.  There may or may not have been some choice words expressed while building this.  The walls are never square, the cuts aren't exactly straight, and the boards aren't always true.  But,  I am so happy with the way it turned out.  It's cute and functional for Aiden.  He has actually gone upstairs several times to do his homework here.  

See the hinges? The top opens up for storage.

It was a fun project for me to do and I feel like Aiden won't outgrow it.  I am happy with the way it all turned out.  Sure love this boy and his new room!

Our Temple is Here!

One of the reasons for our busy summer was the Tucson Temple Cultural Celebration.  I wholeheartedly volunteered to be a ward captain because I knew it would be an awesome experience.  Basically, I was in charge of 10 youth and all their costumes, hydration, rides, etc.  The weekend of the dedication was spent outside on the baseball field for two days rehearsing.  It was pretty hot and miserable.  

Emma sitting in the stands listening to instructions.

Our stake did a rodeo dance.  Each stake also had their own color of t shirt.

Our stake did a rodeo line dance and a missionary hip hop dance.  Emma was one of the singers that was pre-recorded for the missionary song.  It was fun to hear her voice over the load speaker.  

The captains spent the hours running around with costumes, spraying kids with water, filling water bottles, fanning people with anything we could fine, watching for signs of heatstroke and keeping up moral.

 Me and two other leaders from our ward.  They were awesome!

  

 Finally, the performance day came.  They got to listen to President Uchtdorf speak and they performed under a beautiful sky. 

The next day, we attended the temple dedication.  Brent sang in the choir in the celestial room and the family got to watch in a nearby sealing room.  It was wonderful to sit there with three of my kids (Taylor isn't old enough yet).  I had some great experiences teaching them about the temple and bearing my testimony about the work that is done there. 


I am so grateful and excited for this temple.  Since the open house, I have felt a sense of ownership for this building.  It is beautiful.  I am so excited to be able to go more often.  I can get there in 45 minutes, attend a session, stop for lunch with friends and still get back before school is out.  I know the work done here is eternal.  I know that when I attend the temple, my family and I are blessed.