Randomness and lots of cousin fun!

I love that the kids have so many cousins. Evie has quite a few girls her age on both sides. She doesn't see any of them on Owens side, though. She has a boy cousin on Owens side that we see often and they get along pretty well, but surprisingly, her and her cousin Abby play very well together! She is 2 1/2. We have been handing down Evie's most recent clothes to Abby. According to her mom, she loves all of them! I do have good taste ;) anyway, this was from a bag of clothes we gave her a month ago or so. It had a princess nightgown in it and Abby wanted to wear it so badly. She kept asking her mom to put it on her, but she kept telling her to wait until night time. The next thing we know, we see this!

I love how Evie gets her tounge into it while she is concentrating.

What a good big cousin! Evie didn't realize there was a button on it and so she was trying to unbutton it while it was stuck on Abby's head! Abby just stood there so patiently! We had a good laugh over it!

 Cousin Reagan is in first grade and has fun playing with Evie and Zayne. In this case, Ring -a- Round the Rosie.

Zayne is such a funny little guy! So full of personality. He has a favorite blankie that I have mentioned before and he has a little musical monkey that he has grown attached to - he can't go to bed with out it and when we go in to get him in the morning he has to have it. He turned 18 months at the beginning of the month. He is not a fan of nursery and has recently been into climbing up on things - like the bar stools :(  he doesn't really say any words, but he does say the beginning sounds of words. He knows where his nose, ears, eyes and mouth is. 

He loves waving! He loves his grandma and grandpa! He gets very concerned when people's things are not with them. My mom has a water bottle that she always has with her. In the mornings Zayne will grab it and wait at the bottom of the stairs for my mom.

He loves his sunglasses!

 We celebrated Grandpa Johnston's birthday at the beginning of the month. He let the grand kids blow the candles out! Evie seemed to enjoy it :)

I feel like I have been babysitting a lot lately. We watched my sisters little girl and their dog for three days while they went to Seattle for some medical stuff. The girls did really well together. On the the last night I got brave and invited all of the girl cousins over for a sleep over. Probably won't do that again! The girls had fun, though! I love how creepy their eyes are in thus picture! Haha!

Sweet little man loves to be outside. We helped Grandpa rake up leaves a couple Saturdays ago. It wrecked major havoc on my lower back, but by the next morning it was a little better!

 

This girl loves to help me cook! We made pumpkin chocolate chip bread a couple Sundays ago. It turned out really good!

Zayne loves to be pushed around in things. His new favorite thing is being pushed around in the shopping cart, and Evie loves to play along by going shopping and I am the checker. Fun days!

Evie and Felicity decided to make masks one day. Pretty creative girls!

Owen was a wonderful husband ( like he always is!) and watched the kids while I went to the double feature of The Hunger Games. It wasn't just my kids, it was my brothers youngest kids too. We watched them for a night while they were in New York. I loved the movie! I thought the movie was as good as the book. Makes me want to read another good book, but when do I find time?

This was what my kiddos were doing while I was at the movie. Felt good to get away and have some me time :)

So we were rejected from 2 of the 3 jobs we interviewed with. Owen had another interview this morning, but it would be a lot of travel. Sometimes I want to throw my hands into the air and say "what do you want from me?" Our last unemployment streak went for a year and a month......so I really pray we don't have to go that long this time. I won't apologize for posting about our struggles. I refuse to make people believe that our life is perfect and that we never get discouraged or depressed. This is our family record and I know that people reading this are probably genuinely interested in my family and our lives. I won't apologize for sharing spiritual experiences or faith building experiences. This is our blog and I hope someday my children can read this and know that I have a testimony of my Savior, Jesus Christ and my Heavenly Father. I won't apologize for the length of my blog posts, the amount of pictures posted on an entry or the lack of pictures not posted on any entries. I write my blog for my family, and not to impress others! This is a place I come to share my personal feelings and experiences and they are important to me and my family.

I like sharing quotes that have inspired me or have spoken peace to my heart and this was a recent one. Dallin H. Oaks said -

Healing blessings come in many ways, each suited to our individual needs, as known to Him who loves us best. Sometimes a “healing” cures our illness or lifts our burden. But sometimes we are “healed” by being given strength or understanding or patience to bear the burdens placed upon us. He heals the heavy laden.

I truly feel like The Lord has blessed us by lightening our burdens. It was humbling to have to move in with my parents, but we have been very blessed to have a place to go. One thing I have learned through out this trial is that everything I have has been a blessing from The Lord. Nothing in this life is ours except our relationships with others, knowledge gained, and our testimonies. At any moment everything can be taken away from us - our house, car, job, etc. anything temporal is not mine and I will not be able to take that with me when I die. I guess I'm comparing where I was the last time we were unemployed to where I am now. We have grown so much in just the last couple of years. Owen and I have both agreed on that. Our priories have changed quite a bit and we are both very content with the things The Lord has blessed us with. When you are young you think that having lots of money is the most important thing, but we have realized that if that is your only goal in life, then you will not be very happy. This reminds me of the scripture in Matthew 6:24 - "No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other;  or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." I'm not saying we want to be dirt poor the rest of our lives, I am just saying our whole point in life is not to be better than someone else because of the amount of money we make and we realiz that the "things" we have don't define who we are or how important or unimportant we are. We are so grateful to have learned that valuable lesson early on!

Patience is a virtue

It's amazing how one week, day, or even minute you can feel so hopeful, excited, and upbeat and then the next thing you know you are feeling totally discouraged, depressed , and hopeless. This could be due to my extreme lack of sleep. Ever since we moved into my mom and dad's house, Zayne has been waking up once a night. He is getting some teeth and I'm hoping once they come in, he quits that habit! It's draining all of the energy out of this mamma. It's amazing what a good nights rest will do to a person - it provides energy to workout, which helps motivate me to eat healthy, which helps me to be more optimistic and a better mommy and wife. 

So, update on the Salem job. We never heard from them. 2 weeks went by and Owen sent them a follow up email. Never heard back. So the next week, he called and the guy apologized by saying they just finished up harvest and were hoping to make a decision in a week. Well, this week came and went and still didn't hear anything. Owen and I talked quite a bit about moving. During the initial two weeks of waiting, we both decided that it wouldn't be so bad to not get an offer from them (there were various reasons). We decided that we wanted to stay here in the area and asked Heavenly Father to let us know if that was the correct path we should be pursuing. Within the next couple of days we found two jobs that were local and he had an interview on Friday, then got a phone call from another job for another interview for Monday. On Sunday night we found ANOTHER job here and sent Owens resume. After his interview on Monday, he received a phone call from the job we applied for on Sunsay asking for an interview on Wed. So three interviews in the matter of 6 days. Pretty good, huh? So why am I feeling discouraged? Because, the lack of sleep that I mentioned above, and the fact that interviews are very anticlimactic. You get excited because you get an interview and then once it's over, it's over. You don't get offered a job on the spot and you have to wait a week or more to find out if you get it. You initially have no control over the situation past the interview process. The only power you possess is faith and lots of prayers and fasting. The only thing I can tell myself is if it's meant to be then it's meant to be. There is a conference talk given by Elder Richard G. Scott given in April 2003 entitled "The Sustaining Power of Faith in times of Uncertainty and Testing" it is an amazing talk that I have read many times through out these last 8 months. In this talk Elder Scott says, "We can accept His will with peace and assurance, confident that His infinite wisdom surpasses our own ability to comprehend fully His plan as it unfolds a piece at a time." With that being said I have total trust in My Heavenly Father and I trust that He knows what's best, even when I can't understand an answer or a perceived lack of an answer to our prayers. At times, actually all of the time, I wish this part of our lives could be over, but I know The Lord has good things headed our way - this we have been promised. In elder Scott's talk he also quoted Brigham Young as saying, “God never bestows upon his people, or upon an individual, superior blessings without a severe trial to prove them.” 

^{I love this quote and I feel like we have been through a severe trial, so I'm looking forward to some superior blessings....I'm hoping :)}

We feel like the multiple job postings was The Lord's way of telling us that if we wanted to stay here, close to family and friends, that he would provide a way for us. At least for the time being, anyway! We are praying to hear good things within the next couple of weeks. I'm glad we never heard back from Salem because if we had, we wouldn't have kept looking for jobs and we most certainly wouldn't have seen the three jobs in the area. We are really hoping we get to stay here. And that's an update on our job situation.

BEWARE - picture overload of Halloween Fun!

 We love Halloween around these parts! When else to you get to dress up and have an excuse to eat lots of sugar AND get lots more sugar for free?!

 Evie started out by wanting to dress up by wearing a Unicorn. I found this at a second hand kids store for $6 bucks! Evie assured me that she wasn't going to change her mind. Next thing I knew she was going to be a princess riding a Unicorn. Made sense, right? Then she eventually ditched the Unicorn and just became a princess - pictures to document below :)

 Evie loved this Glenda the Good Witch Mask at Michael's, so I naturally had to get a picture :)

 I came up with an idea to make Zayne into a werewolf for Halloween this year. I put quite a few hours into this project with LOTS of fabric glue. And isn't he the cutest, darn werewolf you've ever seen?!!! I loved how it turned out. I was pretty proud of myself! He got lots of compliments :)

This was taken the Saturday before Halloween. My sister was in charge of her Halloween party for their ward, so we helped her with it and enjoyed the food, fun, trunk or treat, and games :)

This is Evie as Tangled, with the intention of wearing the Unicorn. It lasted all but a couple of minutes and then she told me, "Mom, my Unicorn is getting tired." HA! Love that girl!

She got a princess painted on her face at the party, which she absolutely loved!

 I wish this picture hadn't turned out blurry :( Grr! My sister was the Queen of Hearts and her Husband was the Mad Hatter from Alice and Wonderland! They both looked Awesome!

 Owen wasn't able to attend. He helped my dad work on my mom's car all day, I don't think he minded missing the party, though ;)

 Here is Evie doing the doughnut string game. I love Zayne in the background! Every time I look at this picture it makes me laugh! He looks so creepy, just staring at me! HA! 

This is Zayne's costume from the back, just in case you were curious ;)

Zayne loves his aunt! Maybe it's because she looks a lot like me?!

I had to throw this picture in - It was really rainy one day and so we put Zaynes rain boots on and got his doggy hat on....he just looked really impressed :)

Grandma has lots of Halloween wigs around. This was one of them!

Evie was invited to walk with the kids at Aunt Beth's school the Thursday before Halloween. Her and her cousin had lots of fun :)

I guess we are making a tradition of getting together and making fun Halloween treats for the family Halloween party the day before :) Mickey Mouse Mummy cupcakes! I thought they turned out pretty cute!

Good work, ladies!

After we made treats, we went back to my mom and dad's house and carved pumpkins!

 Here are the finished products! Evie really wanted the bat kitty...this was my attempt:

not too bad!

another wig :)

Me in all of my w itchiness, not to be confused with anything else ;)

Owen was going for Mr. T - he uses any excuse to shave his hair into some strange fashion!

Everyone thought I looked like my niece with my straight hair, so we obviously had to get a picture together!

My niece dressed up like little red riding hood that had been attacked by the big bad wolf. Her and Zayne totally coordinated and didn't even know it! Allie thought it would be fun to take Zayne around for trick or treating, but no one was giving her candy because they thought it was part of Zayne's costume or something?! So, I took him the next time around and Allie got lots of candy :)

 Group shot!

My dad's costume was awesome! Captain America :) He loves super heroes!

Daddy and Zayne. Man, Owen is really handsome. I even kind of like his Mohawk! ;)

My sister has a neighbor that came by with her family. Her husband had this awesome werewolf costume! Zayne was not too fond of it. We tried our best to get their picture together!

It was a really fun Halloween! We had lots of fun taking the kids trick or treating and they even had a little haunted house set up in one of my sister's neighbors backyard. I had gone back to the house because Zayne was getting cold, so Evie kept trick or treating with the other cousins and adults. She ended up going through the haunted house before they realized what it really was. After they returned and told me about it, my sister and I headed over to check it out. It was scary, especially if I was only 4! BUT, Evie slept great and hasn't mentioned it since. Guess we lucked out on that one :)

Zoo time!

A week before Halloween the weather was beautiful and perfect for a trip to the zoo, it was also half price day, so that worked out nicely! I was watching my niece that day, so my mom and I took the kids over to the zoo for a few hours.

This was the monkey right when you walked in. Zayne loved it!

The have a fun jeep that the kids can sit in and pretend to drive :) they all had fun taking turns on it!

Another picture of the monkey. He was a cute little thing. There was also a really cute baby monkey that had just been born :)

The girls always love the penguin exhibit :)

I love all of the beautiful colors that fall brings!

I loved the tiger! Such a beautiful animal! The lions were really pretty, too. And the giraffes, ok, so all of them! Didn't get a picture of the other animals :(

Zayne loved the big giraffe slide. My mom took the picture, and that is the reason there is a finger in this picture :) that's ok, mom! Thanks for taking us to the zoo! It was lots of fun :)