My reasons for blogging this evening are two fold:


#1: Have you seen this documentary yet? Because you must! I'm pretty sure it's at every red box in the country.

#2: I'm looking to put together a killer sacrament meeting bag for my kids. I need your ideas. What's worked really well for you? We've had the same go-to bag for about 2 years now and we desperately need something new. I (read: Katie) am putting together a new photo/gospel book for them tomorrow. I'm also jumping on the file folder game band wagon. I don't want too much stuff, but if you have any great ideas, I'd love to know! 

Okay, I lied. Three-fold. I just can't resist. I'm in Utah spending oodles of long-overdue time with my family. I'm still in awe that Katie and I had baby girls within two months of each other. Just look at how cute they are!

 Frankie and Cora

Cora and Frankie

And because I'm with Katie, you can bank on many wonderful photos and a blog face-lift in the near future! :)

Cousins and Conference are the best

You may or may not remember this post about the cousins my kids have on my side of the family. But I would be remiss if I didn't mention that my kids are lucky enough to have close to same thing on Brad's side too.

This is Ella. She just turned eight. Last weekend we went to "The Motherland" (Brad's affectionate reference for Ohio, in case you forgot), to see her be baptized (awesome) and her baby brother be blessed (also awesome).

After Ella comes Preston. Who would not, for the life of me, smile for my camera. But who is darling. And only 2 weeks older than Nick (Mindy and I had the same due date but she was lucky and went early).

And here's Brennen, who's less than 2 months younger than Chasey boy. And a red head. (jealous).

And finally, meet Griffin. Mindy and Phil's 4th child. About 3 months younger than Cora. Also a red head. (double jealous. you'd think with having it on both sides of the family that at least one of our kids would have red hair, right? wrong.)

And it's a good thing with all the boys running around that these 2 GIRLS have each other.


We love going to OH. The kids play themselves to exhaustion. Not only because of the cousins but because of the S P A C E. We're a little short on that in our little town home. Chase pretty much drives this car around Brad's parents house non-stop.

They make forts and chase Ella and go on hikes and wrestle with anyone that will let them (lucky that they have wonderful aunts, like Miranda).

There's always games involved in these trips. I love this shot of these three grown men begging Ella to sell something or buy something or give them something (I really have no idea. Monopoly -- not my kind of game).

I spent the better part of an hour trying to get a photo of Cora with her feet in her mouth. It's a constant these days, but she always pulls them out when I pull out the camera!

 This weekend has been relaxed and conference filled, which I l.o.v.e. Yesterday I laid on the couch with Cora girl while Brad and the boys "quietly" did legos as we listened. So edified. So refreshed. So inspired.

This morning we made whole wheat banana-flax seed pancakes for our special conference breakfast and enjoyed a wonderful jammie day together. The next month will be family filled and

I C A N ' T W A I T!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!