Holiday Season

This is my favorite time of year. I love Thanksgiving and Christmas and all the holidays that wrap up the end of the year and the beginning of a new year. One thing that I am so grateful for is music. I am so grateful for the talents my Heavenly Father has blessed me with; especially singing and piano. I am so thankful for family. For my sweet husband and children. For my parents and my husband's parents. For my siblings, their spouses and their children as well as my husband's siblings, their spouses and children. I am so very close to my sister Sarah. I am thankful for her talents as well and that we work well together developing and perfecting those talents. One thing the Holidays bring on is Christmas Carols. Those are our favorites and so fun to sing..... we already have a few people asking us to sing. I'm nervous but I know this is one way to share my testimony of our Savior with others.

On my side of the family we celebrate birthdays once a month and have a Family Home Evening (FHE) tied along with it. December is our month to come up with FHE. Last year we had all the grandkids dress up and we re-enacted the Nativity story. It was beautifully done. I will post on my family post pictures and highlights from last year. This year I felt very impressed that we needed to sing the precious Christmas Carols. At first I thought we should have just a family sing along, now we are going Caroling to neighbors and friends. I'm so excited about this. Sarah and I are going to sing a few songs before we leave to get everyone in the spirit of singing. So I'll keep everyone posted on how it goes. I love Caroling and think it's almost a thing of the past so I'm challenging everyone to get out there this year even if it's only to your next door neighbor and spread some Christmas Spirit :)!!!

I am also a nurshery leader in our ward and I have decided that this year for singing time from now until the end of the year we are going to sing Christmas songs and learn a few. I have Senior Nurshery and these kids already know "I Am A Child of God" and "I Love To See The Temple" word for word. So I think they can do it. Now I just have to find bells or chimes and have some fun with it too since after all they are only three years old. They do love music time though and I think they could spend almost all of nurshery time singing....but I don't know if I can :)!!!

Halloween Pictures

This is my hunky, handsome, adorable husband and me on Halloween. We went as Tim McGraw and Faith Hill. Not exact impersonations but hey I thought it was close enough.

Jess and I have been married almost 8 years and still going strong. We still feel like we are newly weds too. We have experienced a lot during our 8 years. Jess was in the active duty army for 4 years...making me a full time army wife, and in the National Guard for 2 years....which now he is putting in his WO packet to fly helicopters for the army. He is already a pilot he just needs to build up flight hours and get paid for it. We have 3 beautiful children and we've been through a lot to get them here.

Family is very important to us. It's our most valuable possesion. I was never 100% sure that I would be able to have babies since I have endometriosis (on a severe level). So for us having children is not only a blessing but a miracle. This is us and just a little snippette of our life. And I think this is the first year we both "dressed up" for Halloween.

Bella's Lullaby

I listened to the Twilight soundtrack and my most favorite song is Bella's Lullaby. I have heard two versions of it on the internet and love them both. Not that anyone hasn't guessed yet but music is a huge part of my life and has been since I was little. My mom sang to me all the time as a child and played the piano. My sisters all play the piano and so do I, maybe that is the reason it is my favorite instrament. I've had a few people comment that they can't believe my favorite song on the soundtrack is Bella's Lullaby...... I thought everyone would have had that pegged from the first 15 seconds of the song. I've been practicing Hymns and Primary Songs but I really need to branch out a little more and play a few other songs too. I guess that I'm nervous that someone is going to critique my playing and give me a failing grade. I get stage fright too and maybe that's why I haven't done more singing. I do have to say it's easier with someone singing with me...Thanks Sarah!!! And I'm pretty shy so I really only belt it out when I'm cleaning my house. If you ever want to hear me singing then you should stop by my house unannounced in the spring or fall when I've forgotten my windows are open.... then you can hear what I really sound like. If you listen for me at church... you won't hear me.... I've perfected singing quietly or at family birthdays... I sing Happy Birthday horribly on purpose. Only my husband and kids have heard me sing it right!!! So I guess one of my New Year's resolutions should be to get over it and just sing huh???

Mountains and A Grain of Sand

I was listening to a song the other day on the radio and the words caught my attention. I often go through life, as I think we all do, rushing about trying to get our "to do" lists done. Making sure that everything in the house is spotless, the kids are fed and off to school or home from school and then it's off to work, home from work and put the kids in bed while packing lunches, reading scriptures and saying prayers. There's quite a few more activities packed in just one day but for the sake of carpel tunnel I'll just assume you get it. Sometimes I worry about all the wrong things. Or I get so caught up in a certain situation that may be going on in my life at the time that it completely consumes and swallows me whole. This is where I tend to forget important things. Sometimes this mountain that we are climbing seems so all encompassing and when we get finally "get over it" and look back it's actually just a grain of sand blowing away in the wind. But what is left behind can sometimes be a hole as big as a mountain.

These past several months I have really learned a lot about myself and patience and that even though there is some horrible thing happening right now... down the road it's going to seem so insignificant in relationship to what we could have focused on or where we are going. Sometimes I find myself being upset with a situation at work or with friends or extended family and I beat it to death in my mind and I pray about it over and over and over and over again until I think Heavenly Father wonders if I, Joleen, believes that He hears my prayers and in His time will answer them. I have to be patient and turn some things over to the Lord to finish taking care of in His time and in His way. But as I am thinking and beating it out trying to figure it out..... I'm missing out on opportunities I could be spending with my precious babies or my sweet husband or extended family.

So what I have learned is that trials will come and most of them are best handled head on and to do all I can do and then pray about it and talk to my Heavenly Father and leave the rest in his very willing and very capable hands. I am watching miracles happen in my life and my little families life at the moment and in due time I will share those with you. For now I will leave you with just a little taste of one such miracle. I miscarried another baby :( just a few weeks ago. While I am still a little tired and lacking a little energy I am feeling rather well. Jess and I thought that this time I would be able to carry the baby full term. Many don't realize just how many miscarriages I've had and when I tell them... people think I'm making it up. So it's huge for us to feel like this baby was it. Well we lost the baby but in all of my reflecting and reaching and praying and growing these past few months.... I was blessed with the knowledge that around this baby's due date there is something that will be going on in our lives that will make it much harder on us if I were to be pregnant or just have given birth. I think I know what will be going on in our lives but as I am not 100%sure I'm not ready to reveal our speculation.... but this I do know..... Miracles happen and I am so blessed.
--J

More Twilight Fun

Liz with her pumpkin cupcake. Very creative!

Sarah's Twilight cup cake

Sarh with her cupcake.

And Miss Sarah (on Bella) her self. This was so much fun. I already have requests that I do another one. This time I'm thinking of a red carpet theme for the movie release... What do y'all think??? So Any whoo.... be thinking and send me your ideas or you can volunteer to help me too and I won't turn you down I promise :)!!

--J

Twilighters

Last Friday night we had a GNO with a Twilight theme. I haven't figured out how to put more than 5 pictures on a post so I was limited to just 5. I have all of them on my FB if you want to check them all out. Anyway.... Here is Prom Bella and Renesmee. These were some of the party favors. Thanks Jen they were awesome... and I love the tags.

We decorated cupcakes. Mine was supposed to be Edward so I posed as "kissing" his cheek. It's silly I know but Jess really likes this pic so I'm good with it.

This is Broken Leg Bella getting bit by Victoria. LOL this was so fun. Dressing up is great and what girl doens't like to... especially around Halloween???

These are more of the party favors. They are coffins filled with candy "blood bags", red finger nail polish and Eclipse mints. And yes we put vampire teeth around the napkins. There are endless possiblities out there.

We played Twilight Jepardy and had some quick facts and a Bella's Birthday Quiz too. We're sad everyone wasn't able to make it. We had loads of fun though and I'll post sarah with her twilight cupcake next.

--J

Twilight

So I took a "which character are you most like in Twilight" quiz on my FB and it said I was most like Alice. I have always wanted a Porsche and I love to shop and almost went to FIDM so I could see it. Then I took a different quiz in the bloggin' world and it said I'm most like Esme. It said : "You are thoughtful and care very deeply for your family. A loving home is of great importance to you and you always try to make everyone feel welcome. You have a great capacity to love and are sensitive. You are firm when you need to be, but people trust your judgement and appreciate the kind way you always handle things."

So I'm Esme in the bloggin' world and on FB I'm Alice. I guess I'm a mix of them both. What do you think???? Anyway... it's all for fun so don't think I'm going to change my name or mix both names to make a new one :)!!
--J