A fortunate visit

My FIL had a job interview here in Dallas this week. He said the job was a long shot, but it was a free flight out here to see us!  He got to come visit us on Thursday night after the interview, stayed Friday, and left just after lunch on Sat.  It was nice timing since I had a dentist appointment on Friday morning. Grandpa was a fabulous babysitter and Matt didn't have to try and work from home while I was gone!

Dean LOVED having grandpa here and made him play World of Goo (a great physics game that is not really a little kids game, but is somewhat kid friendly. It's one of Dean's passions!) with him any spare moment he could.

It was really difficult to get a good picture of everyone looking.

Of course we had to fit in an obligatory game of Settlers of Catan since we never get to play it unless family is in town. (We don't really have any other couples we hang out and play games with...)  I love that game because I often do quite well and I feel like I win as often (or more) than Matt. There are not many games I can say that about!!!  I felt like I was in a total hole the whole game, not getting any resources, not building anything. But finally the last few rounds my 8 on ore and 6 on wheat FINALLY panned out. I won with 3 cities, one settlement, the largest army, and a development card victory point! (I was red.)

These were seriously the only pieces I had on the board!

Family Pics 2010

We just had family pictures taken a couple weeks ago. It was hot (93* when we finished at 9:30am) and past nap time for Walt, so I was happy we got as good of shots as we did. I think it could have been better if the weather had been more favorable. We were seriously wiping sweat off our faces the entire shoot.

It was the first and last time he will wear those shoes.

Last photo of the day.

Not really a keeper, but it's pretty accurate.

cute hug.

Walter is such a snuggler sometimes. Especially when he's feeling shy or tired (both here).

Squishy hug. Not sure he appreciates that one...

Love this one.

It's too bad the best pic of Walter was not the best of the rest of us.

It's too hot! No more pictures please!!!

Get me out of here!

That camera looks very interesting!

Aw sweet. This is so not Matt's style, but it makes for a cute pic.

Not sure I like the new uploading and what not. It makes it more difficult to move pictures around in the post and add real text (as opposed to captions).

Arlington Highland Games/ Scottish Festival

Last weekend we had the opportunity to go to the Highland games/Scottish festival here. Other than the fact that it was 103*, it was quite fun. Whoever schedules the games really needs to move it to March or October!!! It would be better suited for us whities. Seriously, not 10 minutes after getting out of our nicely air conditioned vehicle and slathering our bodies with 70 spf sun screen, we had a woman offer us some sun screen for the boys since they were already so flushed!!

We tried to keep them pumped full of liquid, and we applied a second coat of sun screen about half way through the day. After this horribly mottled face picture, I took walt to the bathroom and wet a paper towel to blot him down. The pic. of Dean with the blue ice was at the very end of the day. He fished around in the lunch bag and pulled it out to put on his belly!

We enjoyed the children's tent (where Dean made a necklace), the music tents, a long awaited traditional scottish meat pie, a fried mars bar (Matt had that while I went to the car to get more water and had the audacity not to save any!), Irn-bru, a delicious burger and slinky fries, and it was fun watching the actual games. We were unfortunately at the harp tent when a hammer was thrown over the fence and landed in someone's windshield!! Now that's not something you see every day. I actually heard her on the phone crying in the bathroom when I was changing Walt. Poor girl.

We were all quite worn out by the end! It was a good day.

Happy Memorial Day

Thanks Grandpa and all others who have fought to preserve our freedom.

Mother

A few weeks ago my mom contracted MRSA (a life threatening staph infection) and has been the sickest I've ever known her to be. Last week while on her sickbed, she had a very real, very clear dream of leaving her body and meeting her ancestors in the afterlife. Luckily for me she woke up! While I know she is mortal, I can't imagine losing her now. She is a fighter and is getting better.

Even in her sickness, she continues to dedicate her life and her energy to helping others improve their quality of life through nutrition and optimism. Not only has she helped those she knows, but she's helped friends of mine she has never met!

Dear Mother,

I have always felt loved and accepted by you.

No matter how busy you are (and you're ALWAYS busy, even on vacation), I know you have time for me.

You are always busy and you can't fathom boredom. That is just plain awesome.

Thank you for reading to us and teaching us to love learning and to work hard.

You value family time and togetherness. I can't remember missing FHE ever.

You value creativity and fostered our talents.
In a time when your contemporaries put shag carpet in their kitchens, you opted not to so your kids could drive their little racing cars, play with play dough, and watercolor.
You also allowed me to set up a stinky darkroom in your coat closet and paint hand prints all over my bedroom walls. You often spent more money on music lessons than on food.

Thank you for valuing our opinions.

I learned to work hard with you by my side.

You taught me the basics I use today: cooking, cleaning, sewing, creating, mothering, piano, and much more. I may have honed some of these in later years, but you taught me enough to feel confident that I could learn!

You are the most selfless person I know. I remember feeding hungry vagrants sandwiches in our front yard. They came to us because they knew you would help them, and you did.

You see people as children of God. Every person has an interesting story and you are able to see and appreciate that.

You are the most supportive mother I know. You attended every sport, music, theater, dance, speech & debate, etc. performance for all 7 children if at all possible. That is some amazing scheduling! But we all felt so important.

You have an amazing testimony of Jesus Christ, the scriptures, and the gospel. Thank you for being so stalwart in your testimony and for living what you preached.

We knew then and we know now that we are your most important work.

Thank you mom. I love you.

Spirit of Elijah

We just got home from a date night to the temple. I think it's the first time I've been to the temple since having Walt. So, it was the first time in about 9 months!

While my parents were here they showed me how to use the new.familysearch.org. It is sooooo much easier and cooler than the old program, and it's pretty awesome that you can get names temple ready and printed out from home. So, I updated some family info. from the PAF my in-laws gave me 2 years ago and I got about 8 names that we could take to the temple.

So, we did baptisms tonight for those family names and it was very refreshing. Neither of us has done baptisms since we were in high school (I guess I probably did some my freshman year of college. Yes. I must have. But I received my endowments when I was 19, so it would have only been that first year for baptisms.) A member of the Temple Presidency gave a little talk before hand (we slid in right before a single's branch) and that was nice.

We set a goal to go once a month now that Walt's big enough to leave, and I really want to do family names every time if at all possible. It's exciting. One of the names we had tonight was Walter Carrington, the great, great, great grandpa that shares our Walter's name.

La Santa Semana (Or Semana Santa if you want me to have correct grammar) : Loaded with Pictures!

My parents were here the week leading up to Easter. We had a great time with them here. They got here late one night, so when Dean made his way to my room in the morning, he had a little surprise waiting for him in the living room. I heard him talking to my parents, and as I came out he was climbing into bed with them to "snuggle a little bit". It's been 8 months since he's seen them, so I was glad he took right to them again. They brought a fun little bunny that sang, tapped it's foot, and wiggled it's ears. They boys loved it.

We didn't do tons in the way of activities while they were here. Mainly we just did normal things like watching Dean ride his bike, go to parks, and the like, but that's really what my parents were here to do. Just spend time with us.



They left for a few days to go to Houston to visit friends. While they were gone, Dean kept asking, "Where grandma and grandpa is?" We were happy to have them come back in time for Conference and Easter.

Dean was excited to show grandma his "beautiful eggs" that we dyed. And we had a quick egg hunt during a song in the afternoon session of Conference. He didn't get tons of candy from the Easter bunny this year. It was just the right amount to consume all at once, feel like he got a lot of sugar, but not have the gorge last for days and days.

We had 2 Easter dinners. On Saturday we had the ham, crash hot potatoes (red and sweet...YUM!), roasted asparagus, and salad. On Sunday we had Israeli Couscous with grilled vegetables and Mediterranean Chicken Satays. I'd hoped to make pitas and hummus and a few other Mediterranean dishes, but with 2 little ones, conference, and company I decided to keep it simple. It was nice.

It was sad to have them go. We just wish we lived closer than a 14 hour drive! We'll see them again in July for our family reunion. I'm grateful they're such dedicated parents/grandparents. They really try to see every child and grandchild at least once a year. With 7 kids and 20 grandkids spread across the country (from AZ to NY!) that's a real feat! We love you guys!