Friday Foto: 2 1/2 years ago...

A lot can happen in just 2 and 1/2 years.

Things that have changed since this picture was taken:

1) Taber is no longer a grad student
2) We don't live in my sister's basement anymore (where this pic was taken)
3) My sister doesn't even own that house anymore
4) My handsome nephew Devin, who was a freshman at BYU at the time, is now a handsome return missionary.
5) Teya can talk, has longer hair, doesn't suck a binky, doesn't sleep in a crib, is potty trained, and is now a big sister!

Things that are the same:

1) Taber still wears that shirt
2) We still cheer for the cougars
3) Devin is still a stud
4) Teya still has that adorable smile
5) and she still LOVES wearing footie pajamas.

Wonder what the next 2 1/2 years will bring...

What else is there?

The other day I was watching The Swan Princess with Teya and a scene in the movie REALLY caught my attention and got me thinking. There's a prince see, and he is betrothed to this princess but he never gives her the time of day when she's younger and an "ugly duckling." Then she grows up and is gorgeous and as soon as he lays eyes on her he tells the king to arrange their marriage. Well the princess is a smart girl and she asks, "Why do you want to marry me?" And here's where it caught my attention. The prince answers, "Because, you're BEAUTIFUL!" And she says, "What else?" And the prince looks really confused and says, "What else is there?"

What else is there?! How am I going to raise my daughters in this world where Beauty is worshiped and people ask, what else is there? How can I teach them that their worth has nothing to do with the clothes that they wear, the shape of their bodies, the color of their eyes, the way they fix their hair. What else is there? There is sooo much more, but when everywhere they turn they are bombarded with false images of "perfection" how can I teach them to believe that beauty really DOES come from within? I know it has to start with me believing that MYSELF!


Brinley has the most endearing scrumptious little rolls of chub that start at her wrists and go all the way up her arms. (see above picture) I adore them and smile every time I see them. Yet at the same time I berate myself for my own little collection of rolls and speak of them with disdain every time I catch a glimpse in the mirror. Why do I do that? I would never pinch her rolls in disgust or think they kept her from being wonderful in any way. So why do I feel like they keep me from being wonderful? I'm pretty sure Heavenly Father looks at us the same way we look at our children, with adoring, loving, accepting eyes. He doesn't care if I have a flat stomach, or perfect hair or amazingly long eyelashes. He doesn't care if I'm wearing name brand clothes or if I shaved my legs today or not. He looks at my heart, is there beauty there? I hope so. Because I could spend all day, every waking hour, trying to perfect my outward appearance, but if I neglect developing inner virtues, no amount of exercise, dieting or makeup could really make me beautiful.

Right now I'm coming to grips with the fact that no matter how much I exercise, I will never wear the size I wore when I was 15 again, and that's okay. I'm not 15, I'm almost 29! I've had 2 babies, I am not a model and no one ever sees me in my underwear so why the heck do I think I need to have a model's body anyway?! How can I teach my daughters to love their bodies and to feel beautiful as they are? By loving my body and feeling beautiful as I am. When I was 21 I wrote a poem about this. I found this poem the other day and feel the urgency to love myself even more now that I have two daughters who are looking to my example. It's a little cheesy, and maybe even a bit silly, but it has some good reminders for me, so I'm putting it up here to help me remember to love myself, imperfections and all.

I'm learning to love the girl that I see
When I look in the mirror and know that it's me.
I'm learning to love my thick inner thighs
and the zits on my face that I try to disguise.
I'm learning to love all the hair on my toes
and the fact that 5'2" is as much as I'll grow.
I'm learning to love all the folds in my tummy
and the cellulite dimples that speckle my bummy
and the way my eyelashes are short thick and stubby
and the way that my smile makes my cheeks look real chubby.
I'm learning ot love the person I am
and I'm learning to love how I fit in God's plan.
I'm learning to love all my quirks and my "isms"
for learning is freedom from vanity's prison.
I choose to be free from the chains of deception
that bind me to falsified views of perfection.
I refuse to believe that my body is ugly
if I size 4 or 5 fits around me to snugly.
I'm learning that beauty is more than skin deep,
it's the sum of our souls, it's the values we keep.
It's the way we develop our talents and skills,
it's the way that we conquer adversities hills.
It's the way we treat others, and God up above,
it's the way that each day we are learning to love.

"What else is there?" I can think of a few things right now: There is kindness, gentleness, hard work, dependability, forgiveness, humility, generosity, graciousness, wisdom, warmth, caring, sacrifice, service, knowledge, faith and love. Those are the qualities of some of the most gorgeous and beautiful women I know. Those women might not ever make it on the cover of a fashion magazine, but they are stunningly beautiful. Next time I'm tempted to talk bad about my rolls or any other wonderful part of myself, I'll remember that : )

Friends in high places

Now I'm not one to do a lot of name dropping, (mainly because I don't know any famous people) but for the record, I just want everyone to know that I am friends with Angela Baldwin, Maria Tedjamulia, and Taylor West. Those names might not mean anything to you now but give them 10 years or so and I'm POSITIVE they will all be famous. : ) Maria and Angela are both amazing singers and Taylor is a renaissance man who is so good at so many things it's hard to keep up with him. Anyway, last Thursday Taylor, who is the Republican party co-chair for our senate district, invited Angela, Maria and I to sing the national anthem at the Maple Grove gubernatorial straw poll.

It was so much fun singing with such talented ladies, hobnobbing with some of the candidates for governor, and seeing Taylor in action as he emceed the whole event. (Not to mention having a place to wear my high heels to other than church! It's been awhile...) And as a bonus, I now feel more enlightened on the race for governor and enjoyed seeing a little bit of politics in action!

Maria, Angela and I just before we sang. They called us the Maple Grove Republic Women's trio. (Random side fact: Both girls were with us on the Ragnar trail! Angela ran in van 2 and Maria's husband ran as well.)

Hobnobbing with the candidates. I loved walking through there and having everyone reach out to me, shake my hand and butter me up. Sure they were probably just after my vote but still, it made me feel important. : )

Here is a little video that Angela's husband took of us singing. Enjoy!

Friday Foto: Alaska Grown

Taber got on a missing Alaska kick the other night so I thought I'd put up some good old AK pics. His parents don't live there anymore so we don't go back as much, but we did go 2 years ago when Teya was Brinley's age. Crazy thing about that first picture is you'd think it was taken in the middle of winter but that was actually taken in May!

Here's one more from that trip. I had to throw it in because Brinley is now rockin' the same sprout hair do that Teya did at her age!

09-09-09 Party

Happy 09-09-09 Everybody! When the numbers align that perfectly there's really only one thing you can do: Bake a cake!

It was Taber's idea actually. I guess way back on 08-08-88 He recalls baking a cake to celebrate the date. I guess if it made a big enough impression to last in his memories for over 20 years it was worth doing with our kids too. The girls and I had fun baking the cake, filling our tummies with frosting (and putting some on the cake too) making decorations and learning about the number 9. Teya has found learning numbers a little more challenging than letters, so this was a fun way to really make number 9 stick!

Brinley helped too, but this was the only picture I got of her, complete with marker and ketchup stains on her shirt from decorating and eating.

For the grand finale we sang "Happy 9 day to you" and we all helped blow out the candle.
It was a memorable ending to a memorable date.

(This post has been brought to you by the number 9.
And the letter C, for Cake! Yum....)

Happy Campers

This weekend our friends Maile and Dave organized a big labor day camp out. It was our first time camping with the girls and even though I was nervous about the kids being able to sleep, they both did awesome! I think all the great activities like s'more roasting, exploring in the woods, fireworks, and watching the campfire really wore them out. I thought we'd have to lay with them for awhile to get them to fall asleep but we put them down a little after 9 and Teya just hit the pillow and was out! Brinley required a little more coaxing, but after a couple lullabies and back rubbing she was gone too. With both girls out we headed back to the campfire for some good chatting and bonding time with the other adults.

Teya woke up once in the middle of the night because she had to go potty. It was pretty cold though and when she realized she'd have to get out of her sleeping bag and brave the outhouse she changed her mind and just held it till the morning! (bladder of steel!)

Anyway, It was a really fun time and great to know that our girls are champs when it comes to camping! Enjoy the pics!

Yummy S'mores!!

Chocolate S'more face

Some pics of the campfire crowd. I think there were around 13 families that came. It was a great group!

Teya exploring the "spooky woods"

Our cute little tent. It looks small but it actually fit all four of us really well!

I brought the girls in the tent to change them into their jammies and they got all crazy hyper in there!

Teya was pretty excited about the sparklers! Huge props to JP for bringing those, they were a big hit with the kids.

This is Brinley right before we put her to bed. She was SOOOO tired! (can you tell? : )

And here she is waking up in the morning with Daddy.

Can't get enough of her big fat cheesy smile! How can you not be happy waking up to that face?

And one more Brinley smile. (couldn't resist) This one is during breakfast with some granola remnants on her face. The epitome of a happy camper : )

Friday Foto (and video!)

Today's Friday Foto is from earlier this week when Teya had her very first visit to the Dentist. Doesn't she look so grown up in that chair? I can hardly stand it! She was so brave and did a great job.

Sadly she does have a cavity that we're going to have to get filled. I think it has to do with the fact that she hated brushing her teeth when she was little. We'd have to pin her down and she'd scream, kick, writhe and cry. It was so horrible that being a light weight 1st time mom I might've just skipped it a couple times. Luckily now she's a great brusher and the good news is she's taught Brinley to love brushing her teeth as well. So even though Brinley is pretty much guaranteed to need braces (the poor dear has her mother's crooked teeth) I don't think she'll have any cavities, at least not when she's three.

Here is a great video of the girls brushing their teeth together. Brinley spits and everything, all thanks to the good example of her big sissy. Gotta love the persuasive power of older siblings!

Kitchen Warriors

It may have taken us 3 1/2 hours, and I may never attempt such an ambitious recipe again, but Maria and I are claiming kitchen warrior status for the homemade lasagna we made for our men last night! Here is a link to the recipe http://mylasagnarecipe.com/ Let's just say it involved us cutting up fresh basil leaves, grating a pound a real mozzarella, and throwing in spices I've never cooked with, like fennel seed. Oh yeah, we are hard core!!! (all you REAL hard core chefs are like, "aw, cute, Becca thinks she can cook now... bless her heart") But seriously! We felt so accomplished! (Of course, I think it would've taken me 5 hours without Maria and I probably would've had a meltdown somewhere in the middle) Still, I'm patting myself on the back for trying something new. I'd also like to mention that we made homemade bread rolls, fresh green beans, and a strawberry poppyseed salad for extra credit. Our men were quite appropriately blown away, and I'm giving myself the weekend off cooking because I EARNED it! : )

Keeping it Real Campaign 2009

So I was blog surfing yesterday and came across the Let's Get Real 2009: Perfect people lie Challenge. I found it refreshing and somewhat liberating, but I didn't know if I had the guts to do it! After thinking it over, a couple of things have convinced me to be brave and snap some pictures of my house in all it's natural glory.

1) Every time anyone comes to my house unannounced I find myself bumbling out disclaimers like "oh please excuse the mess, it's normally not like this..." who am I kidding? Of course it's normally like that. I have little children. Even if I followed them around cleaning 24/7 I don't think the whole thing could ever remain tidy for longer than 15 minutes. (unless I had them in straight jackets, but that's just wrong...) So yeah, I think step 1 is for me to stop the denial and accept that my house is a house that is lived in, and therefore, messy.

2) I was talking to my friend awhile back about "The blog induced depression" That one can go into after reading about other people's "perfect" lives. Well we ALL know that NOBODY'S perfect, so here's to a little bit of imperfection!

3) And finally, I read this quote off another friend's blog who accepted the challenge and it just really hit home to me. She said, "I'm learning that I'm only going to be in this stage of my life once...and then it's going to be gone & if i don't make the most of it & try to enjoy each day...messy house or not...I'll look back and regret it...everything turns out to be okay. eventually things get put away (it may be days later), but it all gets done, eventually!"

So without further ado, I bring you, My house.

First stop is my living room. That's Teya on the couch plugged into some cartoons. Yes, I let my child watch a full length cartoon every day while Brinley naps because dog gone it! I need some quiet time too! On the floor is an empty puffs can, wipes from changing Brinley's diaper, Brinley's clothes that I stripped off her before putting her down for a nap, and a freshly drained bottle that I gave her to help her sleep because I am a soft bellied sucker who doesn't have the heart to wean her from the bottle even though she's almost 14 months old.

Next is a close up of the TV stand. Why are there 7 DVD's out of their cases? No wonder Teya's cartoons always skip...And maybe someday I'll think of a better place to keep my hand weights, but today is not that day.

Here's a closer look at our table. Ramen noodles stuck to the table top. Teya's slimy frog to accompany her for lunch. And toy shelves in my dining room because let's face it, that's where all the toys end up anyway!
Let's visit the kitchen shall we? More bottles. I really need to buckle down on the bottle weaning. I will say that the sink actually looks pretty good! (it should considering that I am constantly loading and unloading the dishwasher all day long)

Kitchen counter with a can of Slim Fast, a tribute to my futile attempts to break up with junk food. At least I'm trying...What else? Wipes, baby shoes, my purse, and the mail. Sometimes my counter doubles as a desk, but more often it's just my catch all when I walk in the door.

Here's my "desk" (a.k.a. cheap card table with all our electronic junk thrown on top) I see snacks, my empty bowl from lunch (blogging makes me hungry) the diaper bag, oh and that's a little egg timer by the computer because I'm trying this new thing where I limit my computer time. (As I've already spent an hour on this post I will say that the egg timer isn't working...yet...)

Heading upstairs (brace yourselves, it's about to get scary!) but first, the stairs themselves. Laundry that I need to take up, a bag of stinky old rags, and notice the lovely crayon markings on the wall. Thank you Brinley.

At the top of the stairs is my room. I'm only posting this little corner because you can only be so brave... Bed isn't made, my jeans never made it to the hamper, more wipes and clothes from one of Brinley's many spontaneous diaper changes. Monty's dog food bowl that he drags in our room to eat and his special monkey Zander.

Our loft. Uh... yeah. I think I pulled all that camping stuff out 2 weeks ago to make room in the guestroom for my parents. Then I just left it there because we're going camping this weekend. I guess at the time I thought, "why put it away when I'm gonna use it again in three weeks?"

And since I won't post pics of the bathrooms or my closets of shame, I give you my own crowning jewel, Teya and Brinley's room. No need to describe the beauty you see here. Although I would like to point out the lovely Dora blanket that I draped over the window to block out the light when they sleep. Someday I'll put in curtains, but once again, today is not that day.



Whew! Well it feels good to have that off my chest. Try it if your feeling brave. It's pretty liberating. Also I would like to apologize to my Mom. I know you raised me better than this, but really Mom, we can't all be superhuman cleaners like you! : ) And now I bid you farewell, I think I have a house that needs to be cleaned!