Braces

On September 2nd, Savannah got her braces off!  She was lucky and only had to wear them 16 months.  Here she is the day she got them on (May 2013).

And here she is the day she got them off.  She has grown up so much in the last 16 months!  And now she has beautiful straight teeth!

 

I think Savannah loves seeing her straight teeth just as much as I do.  I'm finding an aweful lot of selfies on my phone these days, flashing that beautiful smile. 

One thing I want to mention about the pictures above.  There is a growing trend among girls her age to make faces in their pictures - duck face, pouty lips, etc.  One night Scott and I had gone out grocery shopping, and returned home to find selfies of Savannah and our neighbor, with their tongues out posing rock style for the camera.  I sat Savannah down and told her that pictures like those were not appropriate.  I told her they were not representative of the Daughter of God that she is.  I told her that with social media now, once a picture is put out there, there is no taking it back.  I explained that her pictures needed to portray the type of person she wanted others to think she is, they need to be her "best self".  And since then she has done awesome with taking pictures.  Cocking an eyebrow is about as crazy as she gets.  I appreciate that about her.  I love that at the age of 12, she understands that "Standing in Holy Places" has such a broad meaning, including the types of pictures you take.  She truly is beautiful both inside and out!

Kate

This little girl is such a girlie girl! She loves dressing up in pretties. And her sisters love helping her dress up (from sticker earrings, to fun outfits). After my three little boys, it's just fun having a girl again!

Pictures

Last night, I sat on the edge of Nate's bed and read him and Aaron a bedtime story.  As I walked out of their room, I noticed the screen saver on the computer scrolling through pictures, and I sat down to watch.

I watched for 20 minutes as the images of my life flashed on the screen before me.  Pictures of babies being born, grandparents who are gone, family vacations, holidays, birthdays, family pictures, first days of school, lost teeth, baptisms, blessings, so many memories in the pictures.

As I watched, I found myself wishing I could rewind all those years and live them again.  They have truly been wonderful.  I wish I could go back to when my family was small, and I would focus more on the joy instead of the work.  It seems like yesterday that we were just starting out with one or two kids.

I watched pictures of squishy little babies, and my heart ached.  That stage of life is passing, and I wish more than anything that I could just have babies forever.

I watched the pictures.  They are the highlights, condensing the last 13 years down into a matter of minutes.  It went by that fast.  All those years.  They flew by.  I watched and realized that there are so many things that I thought mattered, that really didn't.  The things that mattered were those little faces, staring at me through the screen. 

I realized that Sara had bangs till she was 3 or 4, and she looked adorable, so I shouldn't worry about trying to grow Kate's out already.

I remembered what an adorable little boy Josh was.  And remembered that he had a sweetness that matched his cuteness.

I remembered how hard Aaron was when he was younger, and realized that we have made so much progress over the last three years with therapy and understanding his diagnosis.  Those years were so very hard, and I wish I could have seen that things would turn out ok, for both Aaron and for me.

I remembered that once upon a time, Savannah was little and carefree.

I looked at pictures of me through the years.  Most of my life I have not felt pretty and wished I could be different.  I looked at pictures of me and realized that my favorite pictures of me were the ones where I was surrounded by my kids.  My kids make me happy, and that makes motherhood beautiful. 

  
I remembered how this little boy could take my breath away with his sweet little grin.

I remembered that Nate was just a little thing when I sent him off to his first year of preschool.  I'm glad I'm waiting with Owen, and have him home with me still.

I remembered how up until this moment, we thought these 6 kids were all we needed. 

And I felt such overwhelming joy that we decided we needed to bring our little Kate into this world.

And I was reminded how lucky I have been to have this man by my side through it all.

Sod

Monday (Labor Day) brought another day of hard work.  I thought Saturday had been hard, but Monday was much harder.  We called around to 4 or 5 different sod places before we found one that was open and had sod we could pick up that day.  We borrowed our friend's trailer, and had to make two trips out to the sod farm to get all the sod we needed.  Owen loved seeing all the tractors.

We literally worked the whole day, just finishing as it was getting dark.  I worked till I could barely still stand.  It was more work than either Scott or I had anticipated, and it wasn't really anything the kids could help with (the rolls of sod were too heavy for them to lift). But, we got it done, and our yard looks so much better now.  I am ready for all traces of this construction to go away.  It has controlled our lives for a year now, and I am ready for things to be back to normal. 

Camping in the Backyard

We fixed our yard Labor Day weekend.  We tilled the ground up on Saturday, and on Monday we laid sod.  And through it all, we bribed the kids with a campout in the backyard if they would help with the work.  Saturday night a storm rolled through, so we had to wait till Sunday night to put the tent up. 

Scott borrowed a projector from work, and we let them watch a movie through the screened wall of the tent.  They thought it was pretty much the coolest thing ever.

Savannah watched the movie with the kids, but didn't want to sleep out in the tent (she got enough tent sleeping at girl's camp).  It took a long time for the kids to settle down to sleep, but finally they were all sound asleep.  And they all made it through the night!