Traditions

We have some pretty serious hard-core traditions in my family - mostly around holidays, but I'm finding that even small things can become tradition with just my girls. Take for instance our Saturdays.

After we get chores done at home in the morning, we'll head to the gym. The girls LOVE playing there, and while I wish I could say I love being there too, it's good to get it out of the way!

Then we go grocery shopping, then to Costco. E.V.E.R.Y. Saturday. This is usually a 4-5 hour journey, so by the end, the girls are beat, and so am I! I'm in no mood to go home, unload everything and make lunch, so Costco pizza and hot dogs it is!

They look forward to this every time, and love it! And the best part of the day - finally getting home for a nap. Phew!

Farewell Jill! - August 19, 2010

My dad is a busy prosecutor for the State Attorney General's Office. In short - he puts the bad guys, the REALLY bad guys in jail. Lately, he has been put on the big, nasty ugly cases - the ones that are all over the papers. Poor Dad.

And to kick him while he's down, his amazing, mind-reading, cheerful, lovely secretary decided it's time to retire. Poor Dad!

We love Jill. She has been a ray of sunshine for my dad at his job. She takes such great care of him (and loves to hear about my kiddos too). We were so glad we were able to go her retirement party.

Good luck to you, Jill. You will be missed!

Immigration Interview - August 17, 2010

Night after night Wow would come home from work and we would study up on U.S. History and citizenship in preparation for his upcoming immigration interview.  Yikes! We drilled those 100 potential questions over and over and over again! And despite two (yes TWO) years of U.S. and American History in high school, I learned more those few months that I ever remember learning in school! For instance, I had no idea that Nancy Pelosi was next in line if something happened to the President and Vice President. Scary! (And I just thought she was on some media-induced power trip!)

Seuao and I showed up at his appointed time for his interview and test. Visiting the US Citizenship and Immigration Services office is really not on anyone's top ten list of favorite places to go. It's old, it's dirty and about the most unfriendly place you can imagine, second only to the Social Security Office. As we waited, we noticed that EVERYONE around us had attorneys with them! Aaah! A little intimidating! We have literally winged this whole process on our own, with some coaching along the way from others who have ventured down this path, but no attorneys! We wondered if maybe we had missed something! We waited and waited. Finally they called Seuao in, and I waited and waited some more.

When the door opened and I saw the smile on his face, I got chills from my head to my toes!!! He passed the test! Next stop... Swearing in Ceremony!!!

August 2010

I guess by August we were too pooped from all the partying to take any more pictures!

That doesn't mean we didn't keep busy!!!

We went to our ward picnic at Wheeler Farm.  We had a fun hay ride and enjoyed spending time with friends, but it was so hot hot HOT!  Poor Lily was turning red and totally sweating!  Now that's HOT!

We had another combo birthday party in Logan for Mom, Sarah and Granny.   I don't think any of them particularly appreciate sharing parties every year, but what do you do when all of their birthdays are within one week???? 

We actually did do a sibling gathering for Sarah later on in the week.  She requested my famous White Chili and we hung out at Dave & Lex's for a little while.  You'd think we like to get together or something!

We went to Seuao's friend's son's first birthday party.  There's nothing like a Samoan first birthday party!  Lots of barbeque, lots of people and lots of fun!

Dad's right hand (and left hand) at work decided it was time to retire!  We all were so sad!  Jill has been such a support and friend to Dad, and she will definitely be missed.  The office did a really nice open house for her, and Mom came down and the girls and I went to it.  Jill is wonderful, and we all will miss her!

Dave's birthday - yeah another birthday!  Lex threw a surprise party for him, complete with lasagna and ice cream pies.  Yum!

Lily's First Haircut

(Summer 2010)

Yeah it took me a while, but I finally decided it was time to trim Miss Lily's hair.  Thankfully it wasn't too painful for Lily or Mommy!  Our darling neighbor did it for us.

Here is the before:

Yeah.... pretty straggly

 


And the after:

Then after we promised her a popsicle....

Aaah bribery - its power is amazing...

The Debate

Well - I've let this lonely little blog slack off in a major way. 

And I miss it.

I keep thinking of things I want to blog about - stories I want to share (and remember!), yet I feel so held back by how far behind I am!  This is not new territory for me - back in the journal-keeping days of my youth, I remember getting "behind" and spending hours and hours catching up.  Of course now I am grateful I made the effort, but blogging feels different.

I am primarily doing this blog as a "family history" of sorts - I have friends who have printed theirs out in lovely hard-bound books, and I too have visions of chapters of my family's history lined up on my bookshelf, so therein lies the debate.  Do I go back and catch up so I don't have a big gaping black hole?  (Insert the myriad of other perfectionistic dilemmas here...), or just acknowledge my slackerness and just move on? 

I also know that others read this blog (if anyone has honestly hung around after this ridiculous hiatus) and catching-up is a considerable pet peeve for some....

Opinions, anyone?

Happy Birthday to MEEE!

In the middle of all of the summer craziness comes my birthday!  It kind of turned into birthday-week this year!  Papa took us out to dinner the night before:

Wow ended up with the day of my birthday off work, so I took the afternoon off and we went to see The A-Team and Sarah and I went to get pedicures!  I got to visit my Old Ladies that night and when I came home, Wow had a few gifts for me - the Larry Miller book that I mentioned a few months ago that I wanted to read (it actually is REALLY REALLY good) and a new iPod!  He did good!

A few days later, Sarah organized a sisters get-together.  Beck brought her girls down early and we hit the splash pad:

We had a homemade (and BETTER) Cafe' Rio lunch at Sarah's house after.  It was a GREAT week - and made turning 30-something so much better!