The weight of the holidays but also the joys..



My home at Christmas time, when it
actually snowed!!!

Mama and my nieces



Daddy, me and all my nieces



The Holidays are wonderful!  Lots of family, food, and laughs, but with them for me comes tears both happy and sad, and memories that pull on your heart strings.  As the time gets closer to Daddy's birthday on November 26 of next week and the two year mark of his passing into Eternity on December 6, I can feel my heart growing more and more tender each day.  So if you see me and the tears are just rolling, just give me a hug and know that I'm okay I just have to let them out.  My dad always said,"That tears are the safety valve of the heart, so that it won't explode." The holidays are hard and tough but I love them!  There's nothing better than being surrounder by love ones and cute little kids that still believe in Santa Claus! 

Christmas of 2007

My little Loves

Keagan

Kenna, Keagan, and Me

 So 6 years today, cute little Keagan came into this world!  These are my little loves, Calum, Kenna, and Keagan.  I was their nanny for 2 years and I love them as if they were my own!  I miss you kids so much!  They have grown up so much!   I can't believe it, Keagan started kindergarten this year, Kenna is now in the double digits (10) and Calum will be a teenager in the summer!!  So this post is dedicated to Keagan and his cute personality!  Keagan loves big trucks, trains, and anything with wheels!  He is full of energy 24/7 and never slows down.  He is the youngest but he plays right up there with his older brother Calum!  Keagan is a tough little boy but has a heart so tender.  

Us with our cool goggles

Beautiful Kenna

Calum

Sibling love

Keagan & his serious face

When he is not trying to be a hard core man, he loves to snuggle and give you hugs and tell you that he loves you!  When I use to bring the kids over to my house to play, I would always tell my parents bye before we left and Keagan would always call my parents what I called them, so he'd say "bye mom, bye dad"!  My dad and I took the kids to Lazy 5 Ranch one summer and Keagan was so excited but a little scared at first.

My little loves

He sat on my dads lap the entire time and would only feed the animals if my dad helped him!  When my dad passed away, Keagan would say to me, "your dad was really sick, but he's in heaven now", and he would ask me, "do you miss him" and it would just bring the tears because even though he was only 4 1/2 he could tell I was hurting and just wanted me to smile and be happy.   Keagan, I love you and happy birthday little love!!

Song of the Month: "Keep on Trying" by Poco

Bones, one of my Favorite TV shows!

Work these days....

I like varied in my life....hence why I work as a Saleswomen in a Hot tub store and as a Special Education Teaching Assistant at a Preschool for children with special needs and all in the same day! So in the early afternoons I am an Aide for a Special Education teacher at Riverside Preschool!  These are the wonderful women that I work with that are also my best friends.  We love to get togehter and jam out playing Rock Band till wee hours of the night.  Over the summer we went on different hikes each week together.  Some of the hikes were Crimson Trail, Wind Caves, White Pine Lake, Jardine Juniper, and the River walk!

So after I work at Preschool, I go to work at ClearWater Spas!  Amazingly I actually loved learning how to Sale spas and learning just how wonderful these tubs can be health wise.  So here I do anything from stocking inventory, to ording parts, to filing papers, to anwsering the phone, to saleing the hot tubs.  I pretty much just do what is needed and I love it!  My boss is awesome and has a super cute family that I sometimes get to babysit!  He has two little boys that I just love!  My favorite part of the job is working with the Spazazz, which is aromatheray crystals that have different purposes for any pains that you might have.  Also this is my favorite time of the year to work here because of Toys for Tots.  We always do this deal that is good until mid-December, that if you bring in 10 toys, that are each at least $20 than you get $1000 off of a hot tub purchase!  Every year we fill this whole hot tub with toys!!  I just love to imagine the children's faces when they receive these toys for Christmas!

Follow it..

"Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossoms had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two."

-St. Augustine

“For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart.  It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul."
-Judy Garland

"Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some stay for a while, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never, ever the same."
-Anonymous

North Carolina, I sure do miss you

Oh sweet Carolina, I sure do miss you these days.  What I would give to taste the sweet goodness of your Cheerwine and and Cherry-lemon Sundrop slushies.  I want to run barefoot like I did for 20 straight years of my life.  I want to run along your beautiful beaches and bury my toes in the sand.  But most of all, I miss my family and the family parties!  I love Utah, don't get me wrong.  There are days when I drive down 4th North and the view of Logan Temple and the most gorgeous sunset you've ever seen, setting over the Wellsville Mountains, literally takes my breath away.  I love when that happens.  The mountains, the church, the weather, the people, and the adventure that dwells here in Cache Valley has a special place in my heart.  Now given, here in Utah, food is not like food in the South.  It's actually healthy and quite good for you.  Hardly anyone uses real butter and when they know you've used real butter, this look of terror comes across their face and they no longer have an appetite.  They just don't know what they are missing out on.  I saw my grandma cook in the kitchen everyday with real butter, everyday, at least a full stick of butter was used....and she's 99 and still kicking.  In fact she is healthier than me :) and she is one amazing cook!  Oh sweet Carolina, I still bleed baby blue and I sure do miss you!

Family Ties

My nieces and nephews are growing up so fast!  I miss them so much!

This is Spencer!

Taylor is a teenager and taller then me! She's been taller then me since she was 11!  Taylor and Ashton are little soccer stars and pretty much kick every teams butt! 

Jayden is such a stinker but the cutest little stinker ever!

Brittany's more like a sister to me.

Family I miss you!