Silver Lake

We have arrived in the beautiful beehive state!  

Last night we went for a walk around Silver Lake with Brad & Elisse. 

Bradshaw loves his Uncle Brad and often calls him "my friend."  

Brad pulled logs out of the lake and pointed out the beaver teeth marks; and then found the beaver.

You can't tell from the picture, but this Elisse is pregnant and due today. 

(Yeah, no fair right?  She is so tiny.) 

See!  Told ya. 

Be Strong

Today we read a conference talk entitled Be of a Good Courage.

One story stood out to me.  An older teen was advising a 12-year-old on how to "remain faithful and virtuous."  The older teen said “When you walk down the halls of your school, you might, out of the corner of your eye, see something that catches your attention, something that doesn’t seem quite right. You may be curious and want to look. My advice to you is this: Don’t look. I promise you’ll regret it if you do. Believe me; just look straight ahead.”

Dustinn and I had the same response.  What is this girl seeing?  Pornography taped up in lockers?  People making out?  Drugs?  What? 
And then my second thought was just how much the high school experience has degraded since I was there.  Maybe I was naive or just plain blind but I really enjoyed high school and felt like most of my peers, religious or not, were a great examples to me. 
My younger siblings, age 16 and 14, sometimes slip hints that high school has changed a lot--that there is a lot more experimentation, confusion, sadness.  ...What do you think? 

Have you heard the  youth theme song?  It's really uplifting/empowering.  (Check it out!)

Fort Worth Stock Yards

Our little cowboy's paradise.

Reading Buddies

Presenting.....

the newest full-time missionary: Lindy!who: my little sister Lindy
when: September 2010-March 2012
where: Montreal Canada
how: French-speaking

A few months ago Lindy "turned in her papers," which is colloquial for submitting an application to become a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.   Applicants must be members of the church of at least one year and passApplying includes multiple interviews with ecclesiastical leaders, medical exams, essays, as meeting strict moral standards in our church saying that she met all the requirements and would like the opportunity to spend 18 months devoting herself to teaching others about the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Lindy has no say in where her mission location will be. There is a missionary committee that prayerfully seeks answers to where each missionary should go. Lindy is going where God can best use her. (Incidentally, this is the first of a million times as a missionary that Lindy will say, "I'll go where you want me to go dear Lord, I'll do what you want me to do.")

Lindy is an excellent French speaker and is very excited about her assignment.

Serving a mission is a BIG DEAL. It is not easy. Not only are you apart from your family, with minimal contact (2 phone calls a year), but you put your heart and soul into sharing and the gospel of Jesus Christ and most reject it (which feels like they are rejecting you.)

There is no obNo one pressured her to go. Lindy decided she wants to serve a mission. She is looking forward to this (relatively short) period of time when she can consecrate all her time to seeking God's will and serving others.

I was lucky enough to serve a mission (long ago haha) and in the words of Robert Frost, "I took the [road] less traveled by and (for me) that has made all the difference."
It is priceless to me. While it included some of the worst days of my life, it also included many of the best days of my life. My mission taught me, among other things, that Priesthood is the power of God on earth, and it is every bit as real as electricity, and much more powerful. It made it clear that Jesus Christ is aware of every little child, in every little village, in the far corners of the world. It made it clear that Jesus Christ is living and actively leading His work on earth.

I'm excited for Lindy and our family as we follow her adventures in Canada.

What Dustinn and Bradshaw have been doing for the last hour...

Water World

My parents have a family pass at the community center, which means we can go with them for free (awesome!)  The swimming area is so cool.  Bradshaw's favorite part is definitely the lazy river (although he begs for the big slides constantly but he has to be 42".)  

  

Mmmmmm Sonic

(Did anyone else notice that blogspot's uploading of images has really changed?  Moving pictures is overly sensitive, but I'm sure it'll increase convenience and options once I'm more familiar with it.)

So we went to Sonic on Saturday.  Olivia is a big fan.
I got the chicken strips sandwich.  It's a dollar menu item so I expected the "snack size" (as other place's call it.)  Nope. It was a full-size sandwich, fresh and pipin' hot, and the chicken strips on it were impressive!  One-ups any other place's dollar menu imho.

Add a strawberry limeade and, as Bradshaw would say, "Yum yum yum yum yum--delicioso!"

Our 2-yr-old today:

"okay, time a nigh-night. [fake yawn & stretch] I' tired."

Barefoot Days of Summer

Date Night

My favorite outings
are:
monuments at night
&
summer concert series

my peeps

It's baby chick season around here.
Lots of chickens=new chicks everyday!!

Bradshaw loves "kick-ins".

This chick hatched minutes before.My dad has a barn about 500 ft from the house. The first time I took Bradshaw out to the barn, he saw the hay stacked high and, in stunned awe declared,
"cowuhboy."

And then just stood there with his mouth hanging open.

Farewell Virginia; Hello Texas!

We bid adieu to Virginia on May 6th. We split the LONG car trip into 4 days. Day 1: Alexandria, VA to Outer Banks, NC


The Outer Banks is a thin peninsula of land surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean. I imagined it to be quaint (ie all food and restaurants would be located on the mainland)—not the case. Anything you need can be found on this thin strip of land; .....plus homemade candy shoppes, drive-through-beverage-centers that look like a car wash, the worlds largest hammock, life-size dinosaur mini-golf, a store built like Noah’s Ark. and numberless thin, tall beach homes. Even our hotel room was along the beach. We arrived after dark and went to sleep.


Day 2: Outer Banks, NC to Asheville, NC

We spent the first half of the day enjoying Outer Banks:


At 5:30 we pulled ourselves, the kids, and some of the hotel bedding out onto the sand to watch the sunrise. It was cold and windy and we all cuddled while Bradshaw adamantly told the sun, “Wake Up!  Waaaaaaake Up!”


We went back to hotel, got dressed more warmly and drove 10 minutes down the road to Coquina Beach. It far exceeded our expectations. It’s in a nature preserve and we were the only people on the beach. Bradshaw loved running in the water and laughed when the waves knocked him over several times. He ran through flocks of seagulls and taunted some crabs. He was encrusted in sand from head to toe. Olivia was shoveling fistfuls of sand in her mouth as fast as she could and pouting when her parents gave her a cookie instead.

Then we went to 15 minutes down the road to Jockey Ridge State Park, where we climbed and rolled down sand dunes. Bradshaw was fearless and had the time of his life. (We also watched someone learning to hang glide. Talk about the perfect place to learn!)

da metro

a good time was not had by all...

Saudi Arabian Soil...

Passport DC is one of the coolest things we did while living in Washington D.C.

On May 1st, 35 embassies opened their doors to the public. Dustinn and I wanted to visit them all but knew we wouldn't have time. We agonized over picking favorites.

We went to Saudi Arabia first. We showed ID and entered the grounds. To the left of the embassy, under the shade of trees, men dressed in traditional clothing were serving plates of chicken and rice (with this delicious spice.) I asked a man if we could join his table and after shoveling a few bites in my mouth I realized I was sitting cozy at the men's table while all of their wives were staring at me from another table. Awkward.

Traditional sitting areas were set up in the embassy, there was a fashion show, Olivia and I got our hands painted with henna (funny story: Olivia was asleep in my arms while I was sitting having my hand painted. Meanwhile across the room men were dancing and singing along to a stringed instrument. This elderly woman next to me, drew a deep breath and let out this ear-piercing noise. She made an o- shape with her mouth and was flicking her tongue rapid-speed. Does anyone know what that's called? Anyway, Olivia, who was sleeping, immediately joined in screaming at the top of her lungs.) We had our names written in Arabic and tried to take a family picture in traditional clothing but Bradshaw didn't want to.

All the Saudi people helping put on this event were sooo kind and welcoming. The guides were all dressed in traditional clothing (see the man in white below) and were everywhere to answer questions and volunteer cool stories.

source

Next we visited Botswana (homeland of my
beloved mission trainer: Kenewang Mbisana).

Then we visited Columbia. The embassy was palatial;
plus they were handing out roses to all the women. :)

Last of all we visited Thailand. Yummmm.

P.S. For anyone who lives in the dc area Passport DC activities continue through May 22th. You'll love it!)