Isn’t it amazing how sometimes the best things come about because of the worst?

p.s.  I can’t wait to be a grandma.  Especially one like Grandma Wilson.

Sometimes you have to take matters into your own hands.

This magical magnetic creation is made using Dani Mogstad’s “Take Me Away” vacation kit (digital):

The other supplies needed are magnetic tape, scissors, a magnetic tin (mine is recycled), and sand:

I made a fun label and printed my sandcastle sections and decorations.  Then I stuck them to the magnet strip and cut around.  I also glued some real sand onto the castle pieces.  I got a big bag at Walmart for $3 and used the rest in a tub for more sandcastle building.  When I had a nice size collection of pieces I put them in the tin.

Here are a few photos to get an idea of how big the tin is:

Wow, Katey was being a ham:

The kit was then ready to be assembled as desired.

Here’s just one of many possibilities:

Here’s to a summer filled with sandcastle building (real and magnetic)!

p.s.  Jacob’s first creations using the kit:

He even took the photo.  (Because, obviously that is what you do.  ;) )

We stopped at the temple on the way home from church for Mother’s Day photos – a fun tradition (2 years running now.  :) ).

LOVE this one of Katey!

Autumn and Drewby crack me up!

My favorite overall.

At dinner time we had Cafe Rio salads with the fam and got to talk to Erin on her mission in the Philippines.  Hurray!

A few of my favorite Moms.  :)

Happy, Happy Mother’s Day!

or not. Here’s me:

1. I love ice cream – any time of year. But I prefer certain flavors with the seasons. Peppermint and Chocolate with orange slices – “gummy drop” style – cut up on top. yum. – trust me, like orange sticks, but better. in the winter and Chunky Blueberry Cheesecake or any sherbet flavor in the summer. I haven’t picked favorites for spring or fall yet – I should get on that…

2. When I was younger I based how well my day had gone by the food I ate. I few journal entries: “today was a good day, we had tacos” “today was not so good, we had spaghetti”

3. I have had some very vivid dreams. A few have been animated and one was even in comic book form. I had to read what was happening. My reoccuring childhood nightmare involved the Count from Sesame Street chasing me up a huge flagpole and then taunting me from below – “One scared Becky… wah ha ha” (thank you? Julianne for reminding me).

4. My other dream jobs (besides being a mommy) include being a librarian in the children’s book section and an “all natural light” child portrait photographer.

5. The last one is why I would love a barn someday. The loft will be my many-windowed photography studio and the bottom could house all of Jim Bob’s wood-working tools. …and we will have sweet barn dances on the weekends.

6. Put lemon in my water and I am a happy girl. Jim Bob buys them up for me regularly. I have a container of lemon slices in my fridge just waiting. I am a happy girl often.

7. I make up for those “okay” dinner nights with fabulous desserts. Yes, we have had pb&j with carmel apples swirled in chocolate; pancakes with peach pie; pasta roni with chocolate fondue… and the list goes on.

8. Once, before we were courting, I dared Jim Bob to do a cartwheel in a sprinkler. He did. That’s when I started to fall in love with him. We went on our first date the next day. Months later, I *knew* I was in love when he brought extra kleenexes to church because he knew i was sick. Not only that, he even offered me his pocket to put my dirty ones in. We were engaged the next day.

9. I cannot play the trumpet well. I only played it for a semester though, so that might be part of the reason. Violin is in the same boat. Tuba, on the other hand, I rocked. I only played it one semester, but I was amazing. I even co-composed a tuba/piccolo duet called “Ticcolo Waltz” and performed it for my scoring and arranging class (Marsha on the piccolo, me on the tuba). That also was amazing.

10. Give me an outdoor picnic over any restaurant any day.

11. Sounds like I am very much like my sisters. We are all trying to or have learned the guitar. I don’t have great aspirations. I just want to know enough to play around a campfire. Just a few of the classics – “Little White Duck”, “La Bamba” and a few of my other favs. Right now my 2-year-old plays my guitar more than I do. He calls it “playing rock-n-roll”.

12. I have gone sky diving. I loved it. I would love to sky dive again.

13. Some of my happiest childhood memories involve playing in a hay loft and canning in a sunny kitchen full of produce at my grandparents house.

14. Many of my other favorite childhood memories are in the side yard of the house I grew up in playing “fruit salad”. … Oh, and the day that my mom gave us each a quarter of a cream pie. I will always remember that warm summer afternoon.

15. One of my favorite breakfasts is still a maple bar and cold milk (thanks to Sawtooth Foodtown and a similar-loving {craving?}) sister).

16. The best “beauty” tip I ever learned was from another sister – on those days you just can’t quite make it into the shower – put a little baby powder in your hands and rub it into your hair line. goodbye grungy shine – hello fifteen minutes.

17. Sprinkles and sparkles are two of my favorite words.

18. My favorite “club” I ever belonged to was the spy club that met during recess during elementary school. We kept faithful logs of our “spyings” and collected dues to pay for … snacks.

19. I consider one of my greatest talents the ability to fill and tie water balloons so quickly.

20. A fresh stack of books from the library makes me happy. So does fireplaces, s’mores in the wintertime and lights with dimmer switches.

21. I used to love surprises for gifts. I thought that showed true love. Now I LOVE having a whole list of gifts that I would like. Then I get “surprised” with which one Jim Bob picks from that list. works great. two happy campers.

22. I love having a “loose” menu system. A little structure with lots of flexibility. ready? Sunday=slow cooker, Monday=soup,salad,sandwich, Tuesday=pasta, Wednesday=breakfasty food, Thursday=homecooked goodness (meat and potato-type), Friday=pizza, Saturday=Mexican. Each Saturday I pick the meals for the next week. It’s similar to how my mom did it growing up. I think I might even have the same Tuesday/Wednesday nights.

23. My roommates in college teased me because I ate way more tortillas than bread.

24. I used to not like country music. I hadn’t even listened to it much. One of my roommates my sophomore year in college introduced me to Collin Raye. I loved. I bought the CD. It’s probably a good thing I love country music now that my hunny is a DJ for the local country station. I love listening to my husband on the radio, especially while I’m making dinner and cleaning the kitchen.

25. I love listening to him even more when he’s reading a book just to me.

* He loves directing music.  He does it during church, when we sing as a family, during movies and oh, anytime.  He has a “leading-singing” stick (that was commandeered from the back of a kite) that he carries with him everywhere – even to bed.  SO sweet.

*He loves music videos.  Daddy wasn’t sure if his favorite was the “Ooh Ooh song” (Sugarland), “Gone, Gone, Gone” (Allison Krauss and Robert Plant), or “Crush” (David Archuleta).  Andrew piped right up with “Gone, Gone, Gone“.   So, that’s his favorite for now.  He loves jamming to that one.  It is so catchy!  And the video has bubbles, disco balls and tinsel.  :)  

Andrew also really thinks it’s cool that there is a piano by the water in the “Crush” song.  so cute.

* Drewby is a GOOD sharer.  He even offers sucks of his suckers to his siblings … and parents.  But only if they offer in return.  He loves his cowboy boots (no photo yet – for shame!) and every time we put them on he says “Erin loves these”.  Erin is his western-swinging, hay-bucking beautiful aunt.  Andrew also loves his adorable motorcycle jacket from his aunty Ruth.  He calls her Ruth-a.

*Andrew is fascinated by computers.  He even loves the one that has been broken for 10 months and is just a shell of a thing.  He also carries treasures around with him all day.  Tools, trains, and a camel I guess where his buds this time.  He is a happy-go-lucky, wonderful, essential puzzle piece in our family.  His hair is always messy – not to mention his face, but he sure is cute!  We LOVE our sweetheart Drewby.

The subtitle of the magazine is “Celebrate your child’s love of learning”. It is full of ideas to do just that. It is by the makers of Family Fun magazine, another of my favorites. Family Fun is full of fun crafts, recipes and travel ideas. I have subscribed to it for years and have used lots of ideas from it.

This magazine though is full of learning-related articles. The articles I have read have been about imaginary friends, teaching your children how to work, and how to answer those science questions that come up (like why is the ocean salty). This issue also has a fun article on “outing your inner child” that teaches adults how to play again and one on learning games for the wading pool. Fabulous! The writers are top notch and there is enough content to keep this reader happily busy for a while. Add in the ideas I plan on using from this magazine and it is well worth the money.

I love the focus of this magazine. The photography is simply gorgeous and the feel of this magazine is amazing. The magazine is a larger one, the pages are thicker and they smell wonderful. Yeah, I might be a tad obsessed. Especially since it’s only my second issue, the second issue ever printed. But I believe in love at first sight. And this is it.

The layout I am working on is this week’s entry for the Ultimate Digi-Scrapper Contest.  That’s right I entered a contest.  It began May 1 and will end June 4.  Each week a number of people are eliminated until there is one winner.  The challenges thus far have been neat and the prizes are unbelievable.  We are in the Second Round (wahoo – I made it).  There were 388 (at the last count I saw) that entered, and 200 made it to the next round.  The first challenge was to “Put your best photo forward” and scrap one of your favorites.  My layout is here.  After the contest I will post the picture for the actual layout.

For this week we are to scrap about ourselves – “Through Your Eyes”.  An “all about me” page, which I have not done before.  So it has been a challenge and also fun.  It’s good to get some of this stuff down for the future generations to see and know.  Jim Bob was a sweetheart and did a photo shoot of me yesterday.  We got some fun pictures and I am using four of them on my layout.  I *think* it is finished and will post it tomorrow.  Link coming soon. 

Night all!

Our kiddos were sick this morning. Jim Bob and I discussed today how good they are, even when sick. We woke up to Jacob calling from his bedroom. He just said that he had thrown up. No screaming, thrashing around, nothing. So calm and sweet. Autumn threw up later this morning. She was also calm, looked down at her clothes and hands and said, “messy” in this little voice. Awww. So, definitely not hard as a mommy to take care of them and snuggle the day away. I called and took care of my church responsibilities and then stayed home with the young uns. Jim Bob went to church and taught Sunday School. He said it went well. always a good thing to hear. The afternoon was spent napping and then we visited family in the evening because the kiddos were doing much better. Our brother John leaves for his 2 year mission this Wednesday. We were thankful to spend some time with him tonight. He will make a great missionary, but we will all miss him too. Especially a sweet little girl he calls “princess”.

p.s. Happy National Scrapbooking Day to everyone (yesterday). Happy National Astronomy Day as well (yesterday too). My love for Astronomy was rekindled when we visited the Lowell Observatory in Arizona last year. It was full of wonderful exhibits and information. I could have stayed there all day. But alas, the Grand Canyon called too. Anyway, two of my loves all on one day – beauty! Plus I watched the National Collegiate Gymnastics Championship on TV yesterday morning. That was pretty darn neat too. Happy, happy.

The oh-so-handsome and thrilled graduate:

A photo of our happy family:

A photo of our large happy family:

Autumn just loving the tassle:

… and her reflection in the floor:

A photo of Jim Bob and I … and the flowers given to us by the ladies at the Utah State Extension (in honor of JB’s graduation – and our new baby). :

Jacob took this great shot of his daddy – fun, eh?:

Jacob trying on the robe and cap:

And finally, Jim Bob with his Aggie white and blue M&Ms:

Photo borders by Kim Crothers, star doodles by me.

… and there you have it. The evening in pictures. It really was wonderfully exciting. I couldn’t stop smiling – and Jim Bob couldn’t either. Once again – I am so proud of my man!