the love voice {kinder thanksgiving}

6 thanksgiving centers,

about 10 glasses of spilled water,

23 paper bag vests,

13 pilgrims,

10 native americans,

turkey slices,

olives,

turkey candy corn feather cookies,

marshmallow counting,

paper turkeys,

bingo,

and

a partridge and a pear tree.

meet ryann.

brennan's first crush.

:):):)

he has a look when she's around.

this sweet 5 year old,

dreamy eye kind of look.

and he always makes sure she sees his work when it's done.

like when he bites his turkey cookie,

and he wants her to see it.

"ryyyyyyaaaannnnnn, look at my cooooookieeee ryyyyyaaaannnn"

{insert image of cheezy smile here}

in his sweet voice.

you know,

the kind of voice you'd use when you're talking to a baby, 

but not the high pitched kind.

the "i'm going to marry ryann"

because i really like to be around her,

and her hair is pretty kind.

and really,

she is just the cutest little thing.

someday he's going to kill me for this.

but for now,

i'm just gonna document it all:)

yep, i know it {horse manure}

Cade: "Hey mom, do you know who's in love?"

Cade's Mom: "Yes, me and dad."

Cade: "YESSSSSSS! Who else?"

Cade's Mom: "Britt and Cameron."

Cade: "I knew it! Emily and Sean are in love too. I know it!"

.....

last night sean shoveled horse manure for 5 hours.

and i spread it out with the kid's little red mini snow shovels.

the stable man loaded sean's dad's truck in 5 minutes with his tractor.

twice.

once in the morning, and once after dinner.

EXCITING:)

who knew i would ever be so excited about horse manure?

with the kids in bed and fast asleep after dinner,

we de-mulched the second bed of manure in the backyard 

for the last two hours of the sun turning to dark. 

under what looked like a full moon.

we talked about our day.

funny things the kids did and said,

plans for sean's tuna fish lunch on friday,

and about how smelly manure is when the wind sweeps right in front of your nose 

when you're laying it out in your garden beds.

the cold air felt so good on my sunburned neck.

{i wore sunscreen all day, and still my neck feels like it's on fire.}

then we talked about where we were planting what,

and sean found a carrot that never got pulled last fall,

to which i declared how much i despise growing carrots,

and how this year i was growing the corn there,

and beans instead of carrots somewhere else.

we finally came inside at 9:51pm.

the full moon teasing us with our work we could barely see.

and i could hardly wait to wake up this morning to it all.

i now have all flower and garden beds mulched and ready for summer.

our yard looks like a million bucks:)

ESPECIALLY

my garden beds!

oh the garden beds!

that will be rota-tilled and planted this memorial day weekend.

i am SO excited!!!

it's planting time.

and

do you know why?

b/c he LOVES me.

sean.

not the stable man.

sean.

yep:)

i know it!

happy memorialing to you and yours.

the pancakes he saw on rachel ray {mother's day}

6:51am-chase wakes up, sean puts binky in, everyone goes back to sleep.

sometime with a 7am in front of it-brennan wakes up and wishes me my first happy mother's day of the day. he has to say it twice, b/c i had my ear plugs in the first time and had to take them out to hear him say it a second time. he kissed me and hugged me. i will always remember the cute smile he had on his face. i love him.

{sean makes card with pictures of he and the kids on the card, including the morning's shenanigans.}

{to be placed on my breakfast in bed tray.}

{all while i am still fast asleep.}

9:34am-brennan with a tall glass of orange juice that i for sure thought he was going to spill, sean with a tray of food and a baby man on his hip, and max with a giant smile, bring me breakfast in bed. i feed them bites of sean's raspberry and blackberry infused, topped with honey butter homemade rachel ray syrup, kodiak cake pancakes. we pass the orange juice around. i open my card and pampering day present. the kids were SO excited. i loved it, even in my half awake state. sean tells me he found the pancake and syrup recipe while watching rachel ray's cooking show at a patient's house, who he was stretching, who was watching it. get it? so cute:)

9:42am-sean shoos the kids downstairs and tells me to stay in bed and relax, read a book, or whatever. i call my grandma joy, and drink some more juice with my pancakes while he feeds the kids breakfast downstairs. i lick the syrup off of my plate. it's amazing syrup. i call my mom. we chat.

10:15am-i get in the shower, brennan comes in once. sean comes in twice. chase gets put to bed for a nap. no idea what max was doing. bless her. so easily entertained with herself.

sean's parents and grandma arrive for hellos, hugs, and flowers.
get ready for church, search for my phone.
start roast in crockpot and try to get to church by 2.
when it starts.
yes, i'm serious.
2pm.
awful, except on mother's day when it works out really GREAT:)
grandma carol meets us at church.
comes home with us from church.
dinner.
sit on the patio.
push the kids on the swings.
pull chase out of the dirt.
scold brennan for throwing sand in the sand box.
sean changes max's underwear that she peed in.
dessert.
pajamas.
bed.
sean does dishes.
call family.
tango more family.
call more family.
bed.

 {above: my beautiful mom on mother's day, and the happiest baby man alive.}

...

my favorite part of the day?

when sean collapses and tells me he doesn't know how i do it every day:)

b/c he's been in the kitchen making food, cleaning up food, taking people to the potty 50 times, and put kids in time out for what feels like the entire day.

i laughed really really hard.

and smiled SOOOO big:)

in an 

"i'm so appreciative you love and appreciate me, and our life is so crazy funny AWESOME"

kind of way.

i love these babies.

i love that man named sean.

i love my mom and sandie.

my mother in law.

my grandma's,

past and present.

my friend's moms.

and the many other moms i look up to in my life.

happy mother's day to all,

and to all a good monday!

{below: me and sandie two years ago at the lake house, dinner out. she is such a doll!}

......

ANNNNNNNNNNND,

last by certainly not least,

HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY

to my awesome DAD!!!!!!!

at the right bold age of 66 he is more fit than most 25 year olds.

really, it's true.

i dare you to try the single water ski.

i bet you can't.

he still can.

go dad.

aloha.

nine {heartbeats fast}

"

The day we met,

frozen I held my breath.

Right from the start

I knew that I'd found the home for my

Heartbeats fast

Colors and promises

How to be brave

How can I love when I'm afraid to fall

But watching you stand alone

All of my doubt suddenly goes away somehow

 

One step closer...

I have died everyday waiting for you

Darling don't be afraid I have loved you 

For a thousand years 

I love you for a thousand more 

Time stands still 

Beauty in all she is 

I will be brave 

I will not let anything take away 

What's standing in front of me 

Every breath 

Every hour has come to this 

One step closer..." 

"...I have died everyday waiting for you 

Darling don't be afraid I have loved you 

For a thousand years 

I love you for a thousand more 

And all along I believed I would find you 

Time has brought your heart to me 

I have loved you for a thousand years 

I love you for a thousand more 

One step closer 

I love your for a thousand more

One step closer..." 

"...I have died everyday waiting for you 

Darling don't be afraid I have loved you 

For a thousand years 

I love you for a thousand more 

And all along I believed I would find you 

Time has brought your heart to me 

I have loved you for a thousand years 

I love you for a thousand more."

-"a thousand years" 

by christina perri

...

i love with you.

forever.

and for always.

my sean sean.

young bucks {phillip phillips}

last night sean took me out.

i put on makeup.

curled my hair.

and tried on about twenty shirts.

really, i'm not exaggerating.

each time i tried on a shirt i texted linsey the picture of me standing in front of the mirror.

i got a LOT of thumbs downs.

it appears i may need to update my going out apparel. 

finally, i decided on my blue lacy shirt.

jeans.

and chucks.

with a necklace AND earrings.

this is big business around here people.

HUGE!

we went to sushi and then to PHILLIP PHILLIPS.

i could hardly contain my excitement the entire day.

sing me the phone book PHIL.

sing

me

the

phone

boooooooooooooook.

seriously,

he's just that good.

and we sat there all cuddled up on our seats together, 

and i thought about how surreal it was to be watching him 50 yards away. 

singing all of the songs we listen to almost every night around our dinner table.

and the songs we hear him sing on TEE-VEE!

he made fun of his dancing skills.

or lack thereof.

goofy was how he put it.

he held his guitar the way he does.

all crooked, but just right.
like he was making love to it right there on stage.

he talked about his grandpa/smoker voice from singing too much, 

and grandpa socks.

and then about his grandpa.

he made us beg for home.

we stood up.

we sang.

we clapped.

we yelled.
we danced.

and then he sang thriller as an encore.

the entire drive home we blasted songs by phil through the speakers in sean's car.

and i told sean i felt like a young buck again.

then i teased him about how he was swerving all over his lane.

and he said it was b/c he had such a pretty girl in his car to look at.

what a charmer.

i love him and the sweet things he always says to me:)

we talked about our dreams for the future,

how much we love our kids and our life,

and about the first concert i went to 15 years ago.

BFD5.

when no one but a few of us knew who blink 182 were ,

and i saw green day set their drum set on fire for the first time.

that didn't make me feel like a young buck at all.

once we got home we had some snacks, i washed off my makeup, and we went to bed holding hands.

yep, we really are that cheesy.

it's my favorite way to fall asleep.

especially after a night out on the town with my man.

 THE END.

baby, it's HOT outside.

THAT'S HOT!!!

really nice.

even at the end of may,
i love a good snow.
b/c by august i've had it with the heat.
dr. scout master on the other hand,
along with the rest of the state of utah,
do not appreciate this kind of weather right now.
but if going out in a snowstorm on may 24th to take a picture of the snow for your wife is not love,
i don't know what is;-)
hey, i was nursing a baby, i couldn't go out there!
baaaaaaaaaaahhhh!!!
...
p.s.
the power went out with a BANG! last night.
it was almost 5am.
i was up feeding max.
i always forget how dark and quiet things are when the power's out.
it was really nice.
i was thinking about my pork in the crockpot that didn't have power anymore.
listening to max breathe with a stuffy nose.
i asked dr. scout master if he thought the pork would be ok.
he mumbled yes and rolled over.
after that i slept like a baby.
smelling pork.
which isn't so nice at 5am.
or 8am.
but dinner cooking all day while it's snowing.
that's nice.
really nice.

acquiring 6.

in 6 years we have acquired
2 bachelor's degrees
one doctorate degree (t-minus 2 weeks!!! hurray!!!)
2 children
7 jobs
far too many student loans
two states of residence
two cars
20 boxes of teaching stuff
a garage & several closets full of more "stuff."
and a partridge and a pear tree.
i think we'll shoot for more.
or forever.
whichever.
click below:-)
"all i wanna do-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo is love you!"

tutu me shower

tonight, brennan taught me how the shower works.
he stuck his dimpled cabbage patch fingers up the tub faucet,
and i sat there watching the shower pully thing go up and down, up and down.
and then it hit me.
i'm an idiot.
or at least, i'm a product of the 21st century who has mostly never cared to think about how things work.
the convenience of things.
like simple machines in showers.
like how that little nossel probably blocks off the water pipe to the tub, sending it up the pipe to the shower spout and out at me.
duh.
why have i not thought of this before?
seriously, it's ridiculous that i was feeling as if this were some sort of life changing moment.
but that was exactly the reaction i had.
like some sort of super nova had just exploded in my brain.
sitting with my legs crossed, hunched over the tub, blowing bubbles at my 2 yr old in the bath.
genius.
...
in other news...
i'm officially in love.
funny how it takes time.

i love the look in her eyes.

it takes my breath away.

i hope she will learn quickly what an amazing little woman she is.

and not be afraid to let it all shine.

these eyes are nice too:-)

mercy, i'm a sucker for that blue, striped shirt.

...

big thanks to grandma sandie (gram) for the tutu outfit.

all of my dress up dreams have come true, lol.

finger's crossed!!!

i hope he says YES!!!

(now, hurry to get my hair dried before the boys get home from church. this getting ready with 2 kids stuff is tough!)

kinz got her first bath today too.
happy 1 week miss max:-)

my valentine's gift to sean.
awwwww...

and she smells like baby lotion too;-)

5 yrs to eternity & beyond

"I don't want to get up baby, let's turn off the phone
I don't want to go to work today or even put my makeup on
I've got better things to do than my todo list anyway
Hide under the covers and waste away the day
Let's just lay here and be lazy, baby drive me crazy...

"...All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo

All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo

is love you..."

"I got my whole life to change the world and climb the ladders

Looking at you looking at me is the only thing that matters

Come a little closer baby, we can talk without the words

Hang a sign on the door, please do not disturb

Let's just lay here and be lazy, baby drive me crazy..."

click on the pic to see what's on my jacket

"...All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo

All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo is love you

Give me a kiss, from that Elvis lip,You don't want to miss this..."

"...All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo

All I want to do wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo is love you wo woo

All I really want to do is,

All I really want to do is,

All I really want to do is love you, and love you, and love you..."

"...Come a little closer baby, we can talk without the words

Hang a sign on the door, please do not, please do not, please do not, please do not disturb

When I lay down in the evening all I really want to do,

When I wake up, when I wake up in the morning baby,

all I really want to do is...

wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wo wooo..."

-sugarland "all i want to do"

all
i

want

to

do
is

love

with

you.
emily loves sean

forever and for always.

to eternity & beyond.