Sunday, February 17, 2008

This was a big week for us, we got to hear the sweet sound of our Manti's first laughter. It brings tears to my eyes because the firsts are always so memorable for me and I absolutely love being there for them. He is already getting so big and is growing out of his 0-3 month size, it seems too early. There is a book that I received from someone that I would highly recommend to every parent, it is Let "Me Hold on Longer" by Karen Kingsbury. The first 20 times I read this book I could not get through it without crying, because it makes me think about how precious my children are and how fast every day goes by. I really picture my family's future while I reading this book and I think that is what the author's objective was. I love my children with my whole heart and I am so thankful they chose me to me their Mom.
I don't know how anyone could not smile after looking at this picture, it is truly infectious!
Love that smile!
This picture is from this morning. I kind of feel bad because I can always get him to smile and laugh before Geoff. That's what you get when you have Momma's Boys!
Back into the old grind. I honestly do love running, but when you haven't done it for a while, it really bites. I have been at it for a week already and the first two days were so terrible, I could only run for 5 minutes at a time, but by the 3rd day I could run for 15 minutes strait, I will work back up to my 40 minute runs! I think it is amazing how wonderful our bodies are. When Geoff and I got married my wedding dress was a size 6 and 10 months later I gained 80 lbs with Eve and I eventually lost it all, then I got pregnant with Jackson and gained 40 lbs. Even though I only gained half as much, it felt like it took twice as long and twice as hard to take it off after Jackson, but I did! Than I got pregnant with Manti and only gained 13 lbs, and I am happy to report less than 10 weeks later I am back at my pre-pregnancy weight, all I can say is Good Job! to myself. I think about where I've been in my life and how far I've come. I swear, I could write a book on my own personal journey about how to keep yourself motivated about being healthy and that YES!!! anything is possible!. I really believe that loosing the weight went so much deeper than just what was on the outside, I really grew so much spiritually as well and I learned to love myself and I started to strongly feel how much my Father in Heaven loves me. I know he wants us all to be happy and he will help us through all of life's struggles, whether they are small or big, he knows they are important to us.
Happy Valentines Day to me! Isn't he a good husband? The flowers are really elegant and different than he has ever given me, the vase too, it's nice to have something different than roses once in a while. (I still love roses, their classic!)
For the last little while I would joke around and say I could easily be a mermaid because my hair was soooo long! (of course Geoff didn't mind, ha, ha) I could not stand my long hair anymore after Manti came , so after contemplating about it, on my birthday last month I got it chopped. The lady cut the layers shorter than I wanted but it turned out kind of good, I figure my hair grows really fast.
Brothers don't shake hands, brothers gotta hug!!!
Eve just being Eve! She told me lately she wanted to be a model when she grows up, here we go!
I saw some bows that people had made that were really cute and than Eve got some from her Auntie Jessie for Christmas and I thought I could make that. So I started making bows, clips and barretts which I named "Lovely Locks" and this is just some of what I had left after having 2 bow parties. It is really fun for me to make them with so many different colors and styles to choose from. I think I get more excited than Eve does about them.
At church we had an activity where we were to share our talents or things we like to do and this was my contribution.-

Some of My Favorite Things!!!
I love to....

Decorating- I'm always asking myself what's the next project? and am I sick of this color yet?

Renovating- I guess this coincides with decorating, anyway I apparently inherited this gene from my gifted Father. At one time Geoff and I were in the middle of building our fence with the help of our family, especially my Dad and he told me to cut a board on the saw and it had to fit in a certain spot perfectly, so I looked at it for a split second and cut the board, Geoff looked at the board and said that is not going to fit! I handed the board over to my Dad and chuckled to myself (thinking who is he to judge? If you know my husband you know what I mean!) The board fit exactly and my Dad looked and Geoff and said That's my daughter! So long story shorter and many projects later, I have conquered mostly on my own; crown moulding, chair railing, laminate flooring, vinyl tiling, landscaping, etc.

Scrapbooking- It is a fun way for me to describe my personality as well as my children's with color and beautiful paper,yea, lots of paper. It is also a form of geneology, so that makes me feel better and I wish I would've had one of my very own so I made one for myself and one for Geoff as a present one year.

Quilting- Although I haven't made one in a while, I cannot even count how many I have made over the years that are sitting around the house as well as ones I have made for others. My signature style is skies the limit! if I like the fabric, whether it's corduroy, satin, cotton, flannel, etc., I make it work and somehow it always turns out beautifully.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Happy Vanlentines Day!

We hope everyone had a wonderful Valentines Day! (we know Geoff's parents did they are in Hawaii, and YES! we're jelous. Geoff was very good to me this year and surprised me with tickets to see Bette Middler and he told me it was in Vegas and we were flying in for the night and I thought he was joking, but he wasn't. So anyway we go in 3 weeks, it will be lots of fun. And speaking of flying I leave in one week to go to Utah to see my new niece Emily Jayne Fairbanks,born Feb. 8th, 6lbs. 11oz. and only 17 in. long. CONGRATULATIONS to Amber and Randy. They sent me pictures on my phone and she is so beautiful even though she looks exactly like her dad, ha,ha. Geoff's family and I were talking about this same subject the other day and I came to the conclusion that it must be a controlling genetics thing because our kids always end up looking exactly like Geoff so it looks like Randy has the same kind of genes. I am sad about the new pictures because I just got a new phone which is the cool part, but I can't transfer my pictures to the new phone, oh well! I'll just have to take new ones. I am so excited to see my sister, Amber, she is my best friend in the whole wide world and I miss her all the time. I get emotional about it because it really sucks living so far away from each other, but some day we hope to live in the same town and share a speed boat.(just something we've talked about) I will have many more pictures for you all soon. Love, Sarah