letters to beth {i met stephanie & christian nielson!!!}

dear beth,

i am over the moon excited to tell you 

what you absolutely will just not believe,

because i can barely believe it myself!

i finally got to meet

THE

Stephanie AND Christian Nielson.

i am

DREAM COME TRUE 

excited!!!

pinch me because i must be dreaming:)

at the last minute sean and i heard about it,

and scooted ourselves on over 

to the south towne expo center

last night.

5 minutes from our house.

it was a stand for the family conference,

and there were loads and loads of amazing people that talked about

how our entire society is breaking down

because the family is breaking down.

it made me so proud of the little families we are raising in our homes.

all of our traditions,

and all of the hard work we are doing to raise happy and thriving someday adults.

and how important that work is today.

there is this book that sean and i want to read that a professor from oxford recommended called 

"The Children of Men" 

and i wrote it down so i could tell your mom about it,

but then i thought that since she is Liz 

she's probably already read it and written a dissertation on it,

or something really wonderful and great like that,

but i'm still going to tell her about it,

so she can say "fabulous, read it."

anyway, it's now sitting in my amazon cart waiting to be purchased.

it's all about what will happen to our society if people stop having children.

sad, uplifting, depressing, and moving.

that's what the professor said.

and we were intrigued.

i hope you will read it too so we can talk all about it next time you are here.

and then as we were sitting there listening to stephanie and christian speak,

i all of sudden realized that almost 5 years ago to the date 

i had organized the fundraiser for them 

in the EXACT room they were speaking.

i knew i just HAD to say hello.

i bawled my eyes out and confessed all of my admiration 

for her and all of the influence she has had on my life,

and i also told christian how awesome he was because he really is so great too,

and i didn't want him to feel left out and everything because he is great too,

and i'm not even embarrassed about any of it one bit!

because it was just THAT awesome to have finally met them.

and she was just so warm and loving,

and kept hugging me over and over again.

and we talked about our red headed babies born 1 day apart,

and then christian said to sean "oh man redheads" or something like that,

and they laughed about it like guys do,

and then we talked about

whole wheat pizza recipes,

and how much she hates physical therapists,
after sean told her he was one,

but then she said really she loves them,

because they helped her raise her arms up over her head again.

at which point sean declared that see, she really did love them.

and we all nodded our heads and smiled about it.

because she was all,

"but they're awesome because i can do this!"

and then she raised her arms up,

and christian raised his arms up with her,

and it was just fantastic!

because she really is a living, walking, breathing miracle.

and i felt like we were just getting together with old friends,

standing outside of that conference room at the sandy expo center.

except they don't know us at all,

but we know them.

which is why i would think that if i were them it would be weird 

to meet people who know all about you, and you know nothing about them.

but they weren't weird about it.

they were just the sweetest sweetest people.

and those 5 minutes totally made my entire year.

there is no other famous person i have ever wanted to meet more than them,

NOT even oprah.
like if i were dying and the make a wish foundation was all,
"what is your wish?"
i would be like,
"i want to meet stephanie and christian nielson."
no joke!

and i just feel so honored to have met them after all of these years.

and i came home thinking,

there really are no coincidences.

and what a tender mercy it was to be there last night.

having that fundraiser for them 5 years ago,

in that room,

on that day,

and we were all there together last night.

full circle.

that's what i thought.

and it was just amazing.

OH HAPPY DAY!

did that really happen last night???

it did.

and also,

it's supposed to snow today,

so i'm pretty much all cued up to turn on my christmas music when it does.

because when it snows in november,

i can't help but turn it on.

there is nothing more that i love than a furnace blaring with snow falling all around outside of my windows.

i just can't imagine having a happier life than we are living right now.

and i know that if we are good mothers, fathers, husbands, and wives

that we can take on anything.

absolutely anything that we come to face.

just as long as we have each other.

let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!!!!

tell me everything that's going on with you.

i miss you dearly!!!

love,

emiline

the mid 60's of the Fahrenheits.

1. i love mini-vans.

2. you will find that 4 out of 5 children have gum here.

3. the honda oddessy can fit 3 booster seats side by side by side

in the back bench 

correctly WITH seat belts fastened. {see #1.}

4. i love how alive this picture is.

5. boys are of their own breed.

6. so are girls.

7. i'm going to miss the mid 60's of the Fahrenheits.

here's to one more day of them:)

my shirt is still inside out.

{chase's foot looks abnormally large in this picture.}

...

at about 4:03pm today i realized my shirt was inside out.

and that it was inside out all day long.

the entire time i checked in at the front office of brennan's school,

worked in his classroom for 2 hours and 45 minutes,

picked up the preschool carpool,

and everything else i did after that.

just my luck,

it was a black shirt.

and no one but me noticed.

except after 4:03pm i could not fight the urge to flip my shirt the right side over.

don't ask me why i never did it.

ok, fine,

it was because

a. i was wearing a big chunky necklace

b. i like a lot of white deordorant

these are lame excuses,

but they are mine.

still right now i can hardly contain myself to not flip it right side out.

but really,

if i'm gonna take my shirt off now,

i might as well just leave it off.

lucky for sean;)

in other news...

chase finally fell head first into the creek at the family yard.

and it was surprisingly full for this time of year.

the creek.

not flowing fast at all though.

fortunately,

my hawk like ears heard the splash,

and he had the good sense to stand up.

he came out of that creek like a wet hen.

i was so relieved.

he was less amused.

my mom and i stripped him down to a dry diaper,

soaking wet shirt,

pants,

diaper,

socks,

and black suede boots,

and wrapped him up in a pool towel.

that darling little baby man let me hold him like that 

for a good 3 minutes before he ran off to play in just his diaper.

{it was hot hot hot! our lucky day.}

pure bliss!

about an hour later he came back for 3 minutes more.

HEAVEN.

then tonight,

after a day of what appears to be the first cold 

of the cold and flu season 

here in the gibson home,

chase let me sing to him before bed.

after i sucked the snot out of his nose,

and gave him medicine,

he put his head on my shoulder for 4 whole songs!

the

entire

time

he didn't move an inch,

except for one time when he reached up and touched my cheek with his hand.

the softest and sweetest little pudgy baby hand.

{inset angel choir singing here.}

AND

it was 67 degrees

today.

in november.

the most wonderful

BLISSFULLY

HEAVENLY

day.

{even if brennan did poop in his pants twice.}

{once in underwear.}

{once not.}

{nice.}

nothing can bring me down on a day as awesome as this! 

amen.

P.S.

tonight i cleaned out our medicine bin,

and i found that

we have 68 medicine cups.

last winter was rough.

and we worked up a solid collection.

a leaning tower of Pisa collection.

i kept 10 and threw out the rest.

also,

my neighbor and his son just came over.

good thing my shirt was still on.

but dang it,

it was still inside out.

the end:)

it does start with letter "P"

brennan: "mom, this is me peeing on the grass, 

and i even drew my underwear!"

me: "hahaha, wow that's awesome, 

what did your teacher say?"

brennan: "she didn't even see, hehehe..."

...

this might be my favorite thing he's ever drawn.

it does start with letter "P".

bahahahaha!!!