LB3

Lucy Belle is three!!!  I love this age.  So much independence, personality, sass, cuteness, etc.  Really this age is where everything she does is funny and cute, however if Shelby or Joey did some of the same things they would be annoying.  Haha!  Sorry, just how it is.

Lucy's birthday is at a hard time.  I feel like we are just catching our breath from Christmas and my busiest work time, plus this year we were dealing with the tornado and sickness.  So rather than a party we took the girls to Build-A-Bear and Cheesecake Factory on Saturday night.  They had been begging to go to Build-A-Bear for months, so Lucy was perfectly happy with this.  They had lots of fun choosing their bears, stuffing them, dressing them, and naming them.  Lucy chose the special Cinderella bear that sings and comes with glass slippers, a gown, a wig, and a crown.  It is actually really creepy looking.

The next morning Lucy woke up to presents and King Cake for breakfast.  She was very excited to get a new car for her dolls and a new dress for church that day.  She also brought cookies to share with the nursery.  

I L.O.V.E. how she holds up three fingers.

Later, mom and dad, and Stacey and Jarren came over for dinner and cake and ice cream.  Lucy requested a "purple cake that changes to blue."  So I made a blue cake with purple icing.  I am no professional, but I was proud of my first ruffle cake.  It actually looks nothing like it is supposed to, and I know exactly what I did wrong with the buttercream, but whatever, it was fine.

 

Look at her expression when we were singing to her...

Lucy is definitely the baby of the family and the queen of the house.  In fact, she told me the other day that she was a "queen of the highest order."  I started laughing and she looked at me and said, "Well that's a good attitude to have!"  She cracks us up daily and is such a joy in our family.  Happy 3rd Birthday, Lucy!  We love you!

New Year

The day after Christmas was a little crazy.  The weather was weird.  It was super hot, yet very windy and the wind was cold.  We decided to go ice skating despite being in a tornado watch...because we live in Texas and tornado watches are not all that uncommon.  I wasn't really sure how the ice skating would go, but we all had such a good time.  Definitely something we should do more often.

After some yummy BBQ, we headed back to mom and dad's house.  At this point we kind of forgot about the threat of bad weather because it was fine all day aside from the wind.  Dad (who had just been called as Bishop maybe a month earlier) left the house to go extend a calling to someone.  For some reason I was prompted to open my phone and check the weather.  I saw that Garland was under a tornado warning and yelled for my mom to turn the news on.  Sure enough they were talking about a tornado that was headed to Garland. She called my dad and told him to hurry back home.  It wasn't until that point that our phones started getting the emergency alerts and we heard the sirens.  So, we got in their closet and waited.  Still, we weren't too concerned because this happens often enough to not be too scary anymore.  The thing that bugged me was how eerily quiet it was outside.  Not one leaf was blowing.  And despite it being dark, there was a yellow-ish haze.  Brianne and I drove right through where a tornado was hitting one time on our way home from Tupelo (before the days of cell phones), and it was the exact same.  We had every tv in the house on a different news station.  When they started saying street names we recognized that weren't that far away we got a little nervous, but still had no idea the extent of any damage that had been done.  The tornado finally passed and we knew there was another bad wave of weather coming, so we decided to head home before it got there.  Just before we got to the bridge to get home, a cop came and blocked it off.  We turned on the closest street to go through a neighborhood to try and get around the block and were left completely in shock.  Houses were gone.  It looked like New Orleans after Katrina.  Here is the path the tornado took.  It went straight along the lakeshore in Rowlett, which means it was within 2 miles of our house.  Our neighbors said you could hear it.  What's scariest of all is that dad was going to visit someone that lived in the path of the storm.  Had we not called him back home when we did, he could have been caught in it.  I totally believe I was prompted by the Spirit to check my phone when I did.

The next week Jeremy and my dad went out nearly every day helping with the clean up.  It was a bit nuts.  That Saturday (Jan 2), I woke up with a fever.  I was supposed to go volunteer with the relief effort, so I took some Theraflu and felt better and went anyway.  By the time I got home that afternoon my fever was 104.8.  The next week is pretty much all a blur. I ended up having the flu and pneumonia, and I was lucky enough to find out the hard way that I can't have Tamiflu or cough medicine with codeine...both things that would have helped me a ton but instead made me even worse.  I am pretty sure the night I was dry heaving (because there was nothing in me to throw up) for 4 hours non stop I thought I was going to die.  It sucked.  On the bright side, I did lose 6 pounds and met one of my goals for the year within the first week.  So there's that.

Aside from all of that, things have been pretty good.  Our ward split on Jan 3, which means new callings for pretty much everyone.  I was called into the Relief Society presidency, and Jeremy was called into the Elders Quorum presidency.  Things are going well so far and I am excited to finally be in a calling where I can meet all the new people that move in.  Work is still busy and I am not sure if there is such a thing as a slow period any more.  Jeremy has been busy as well, as they have decided to send every new AE to Jeremy for training.  Lucky him.  

We are looking forward to this year and all (we hope) it will bring!

Christmas 2015

Christmas Eve was pretty much perfect.  Brianne, Brian, and Claire were in town from Baton Rouge, so we had them, mom and dad, and Jaron and Stacey over for dinner.  After failing the past two years to cook a decent prime rib roast, I decided this year to make a center cut tenderloin roast.  The smoke detectors may have gone off twice but it was worth it. I am not even a huge meat eater and I loved it.  We followed up dinner with decorating cookies for Santa, opening our presents from Buddy (pj's) and Grandma and Grandpa (the girls loved their aprons and cooking utensils!) and then driving around and looking at lights.  As we were pulling back in the driveway an airplane just so happened to be flying overhead and the girls FREAKED OUT (in a good way) thinking it was Santa.  They ran out front to throw some reindeer food on the lawn then ran up to bed.  I am pretty convinced that 8, 5, and (almost) 3 are the perfect ages for three kids at Christmas.

Christmas morning was equally as great and everyone loved all of their gifts.  Santa sure delivered-and even got Shelby the trampoline she asked for.  We are really happy about that as it has already provided hours of energy-depleting entertainment for the girls.

We finished out Christmas with a wonderful dinner at mom and dad's.  It really was a wonderful Christmas for us. We are truly blessed.

The Most Wonderful Time

It has been an awesome December so far.  I have said it 100 times already, but this has by far been the busiest I have ever been with work.  Going into December, I knew that things would only get 5,000 times busier, but I didn't let that stress me out.  There are a million activities I love to do with the girls and Jeremy, and even though it means I may only get 4 hours of sleep (or less) a night, I do it anyway.  I love it.  I'm pretty much a 5 yr old kid.

So far this Season we:

• Rode in the Rockwall Christmas Parade with Singers Company

•  2nd Annual Britt/Jordan Ginerbread House Night

 

• Sang with Singers Company at the nursing home.  Little bit I want to remember about the night: after the girls finished, most of the girls and parents left pretty quickly, but I had the girls go around and say Merry Christmas to all of the people that were there.  We have spent enough time in the nursing home with Jeremy's grandparents to know that most of those people hardly get any visitors.  The little old ladies there were so cute and just loved that the girls were speaking to them.  This particular lady motioned for Joey, so she went over and told her "Merry Christmas" and the lady asked if she could kiss her cheek.  Joey looked up at me kind of nervously, but I nodded and she got close and allowed her to kiss her cheek.  Then the lady told her Merry Christmas and kept asking again and again to give her a hug and kiss her.  One of the aides came over and said, "WHAT is she saying?!".  We told her what happened and she was so confused and excited.  She told us this 98 yr old lady was notorious for being the meanest lady in the nursing home.  She was never happy.  It just goes to show you what a little kindest and compassion can do for someone. 

 

• Went to the Ward Christmas party

•  Had the friends and family show for Singers Company

•  Went to Ice! at the Gaylord.

 

•  Went to Shelby's play at school.  She was "Ma" in Pecos Bill.  Technically not Christmas related.  But it was in December.

•  Joey's cute teacher hosted the whole class at her (parent's) house for cookie decorating and stories.

•  Jingle Bell Run at school.  All of the girls' friends loved Lucy.

 

• Class Parties

 

• Holiday in the Park at Six Flags.  The only picture I got was of Lucy while we waited for Jeremy and the girls on one of the rides.

• Christmas Sunday.  My favorite Sunday of the year.  I love all the music, and I thought I gave a pretty good lesson.

 

• Caroling with some of the ward members that live in our neighborhood.  Loved seeing the faces of the people we caroled.  

In between all of that there has been decorating the house, making cookies and treats, watching Christmas movies, driving around and looking at lights, buying gifts, writing letters to Santa and Buddy, finding Buddy each morning, and getting texts from Santa.  Up next is delivering goodies to members of the ward, Christmas Eve, and Christmas.  I am sure we can think of a few more activities as well to throw in there!