Emma's Baptism

 The night before the Baptsim Emma was just so overcome with emotions of grattitude.  She bore her little heart out to me of how thankful she is for her life and our family and all of her blessings.  I can't even believe that this girl is mine.  It is the most humbling truth to my little soul that I have been placed with the responsibilty and blesisng of being her Mother.  It is a divine calling that I take more serious than anything else in my life.

 The bapstism was said to start at 9:00 a.m.  So my family and ward members show up to an empty building, apparently our ward was told misinformation.  Look how tired the little girl's faces are.  Everyone was a good sport and drove around for an hour before returning to the church at 10:00.  It did give me a chance to breathe and not be so overwhelmed.  I was upset at first, but in the end it was a blessing.

We are very blessed with such a loving and supportive family and ward.  I stood up and snapped this photo right as we were getting started.  This didn't capture all of the people, but it gives a general idea.  Perhaps it is frowned upon, I don't know, but I thought I better do it quickly before someone gives me the tsk tsk finger wag. 

 Our friends the Malmbergs got up at 6:00 a.m. to make the effort to be here to support Emma on this day.  We are so thankful to have such devoted friends.

I am so thankful for all of these faces in this family photo.  Every one of them has played an instrumental role in helping shape Emma into the amazing young lady she is today. 

Emma and Jaken are best of friends.  These two little cousins have literally grown up together.  It warms my heart to see them so devoted and supportive of each other. 

After the baptism we came back to our house for breakfast and to watch Emma's life reflected by a 3 song DVD.  

 Although it is not actually photographed, I served a menu of breakfast casseroles, yogurt parfaits, and orange rolls.

After all of our family and friends left we had a family nap.  I had been up since 5 a.m. the night before.  Then we went out to eat at Texas Roadhouse, Emma's favorite restaraunt.  After we took her to buy a new bike with all of the birthday money she had received.  On our way home we got cold stone ice-cream and came home for opening gifts and watching a movie together as a family. 

This photo below summarizes so much for me and reminds me to keep things simple!!  After decorating the entire house, taking Emma shopping, giving her multiple gifts, not only from myself but gifts from family and friends, going out to eat, having a life reflection dvd all about her, buying a new bike, participating in the Baptism covenant, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and having an entire day devoted to her.....what was the highlight you ask?  The most enthusiasm I saw out of her all day is when she opened the gift that had the Paris Brabie doll that has been sitting in my collection for years, the gift that was free and took virtually no effort to deliver. Look at the face on these two little girls.

February

 For Emma's 8th birthday we gave her an early gift by letting her get her ears pierced.  She was VERY nervous when it actually came down to it. Her facial expressions in these photos say it all.

 Can I just say how much I love these little girls.  They truly are best friends.  Their favorite reward is to have Lydia come to school with Emma for lunch.  Emma is so loving to her and protective.  She loves showing her off to her friends.

Lydia didn't want to be left out of the earring excitement, so we bought her some clip on earrings that she was rather proud of. 

We took Sophie with us to lunch at El Toro Veajo.  It was DI-VINE!  The girls bought best friend necklaces (which is ironic, they don't play all that much.) Check out that fried ice-cream!

 Annie came with me and Emma one day to drive all the way to Midway to have Emma's Baptism Photos taken.  The ice castles were well worth the drive! 

 

This poor little deer didn't survive the winter season, which is strange, because it wasn't a particularly harsh season.  It broke our hearts to discover it take it's final moments under our house.  This little deer and it's mom were frequent visitors in our backyard over the last season. 

Here's what Ryan has been up to....voo-doo witch craft magic spells.  I mean really, calculus, are you kidding?  Surely these equations aren't used in real life. 

We had our traditional pink breakfast, heart attacked the girl's doors, and got them matching outfits.  These are the handouts each girls gave to their classmates. 

 I let Emma have a Valentine's party with her friends from class down at the fun park.

 

 The main gift this year for Valentine's was a plethora of new cats.  Yeah, we got three cats.  It didn't really work out, three cats is a lot!!  So we ended up with just the adult grey one, she's turned out to be an incredible mouser cat!  Just what we need for living in the country.

Our REAL Valentine's party was spent a week later up in Midway.  We got a hotel night at the fabulous Zermatt Resort.  We ate out at our favorite Mexican restaurant and then spent the next day doing this amazing tubing run!  This has been my favorite celebration as a family to celebrate how much we love each other.

Emma is our little gymnast.  She is CONSTANTLY doing cartwheels, constantly!  Sometimes when we notice she's getting a little ornery, we just have her do a series of round offs or cartwheels and then voila!  She's herself again.

We sold our beloved Jeep.  We have LOVED this Jeep.  It's what we brought our first born home form the hospital in.  This Jeep has helped us pull strangers out of the snow, seen us trhough many camping trips, taken us into the mountains for exploring or to the lakes for Kayaking.  The girls LOVED standing up through the sunroof while we drive around the neighborhood.  We've loved having this car be such a great part of our family and we are very sad to see it go.
 

Ironically enough, whoever bought this Jeep still lives in Logan, so from time to time I find myself parked next to them. 

Sweet little Lydia is so into her mommy right now.  The best part of her day is if I will play Barbies with her.  It's a real struggle for me to rewind my mind back into Barbie mode, but Lydia's enthusiasm and delight helps me to put my inhibitions aside and embrace role playing. 

One morning I woke up to breakfast in bed from Lydia.  This little sweetheart literally did this all on her own. This was probably the highlight of my month!

These are some of the oldest friends I have, they date all the way back to newlywed years.  We've seen each other through some really rough transitions in life.  We try to get together quarterly.  This is the only photo I took on our last gathering.  We met up at Farmington Station for shopping and a delicious dinner, and of course obscene amounts of laughing.

I've recently made a discovery....Zulily.  It's an online shopping store that offers a wide variety of boutiques that let you pay one flat shipping rate.  This Goonies shirt is one of many purchases I have made lately.

Could you just eat this little girl?  I sure could!  She dressed herself up in all of my accessories and told me she was ready to go!

Meet Pengi.  This Penguin has been a source of comfort for Emma for two years, which is a little strange.  The girl was never really overly attached to a Binky, blanket, or specific stuffed animal.  Yet, this Penguin has filled her heart and become her number one companion. 

February has been the strangest month.  Check out the above photo, typical scene, and yet the below photo is taken in the same month.  What?!  Can't complain though, we love it!

Ryan has been working with Miss Pip to practice riding without training wheels, which is learned by riding without any pedals at all.  It is the cutest thing to see someone so tiny cruising around the neighb