It's that time of year again, when I document the growth of my 'little men' with their Christmas picture. I have to say, they were being impossible, and despite getting rid of their 'wiggles' on a walk, they would not all look at the camera at the same time. Never mind, this one will have to do, and it's not too bad.
This was our family 2 years ago. I can't believe it has been that long since our little family looked like this. We were very happy.
And now look at us all. We're still happy! That's because of our faith in the Saviour. We've added a few more members to our family - little Ashleigh & Nathaniel, and Tim of course. We still miss mum like crazy, but we know she's very much still with us. I guess I'm in such a reflective mood because this week is the first year anniversary of dad coming to live with us. We love having him here. It has been such a blessing for us all. Life is full and busy, sometimes too busy, there's never a dull moment around our home, and we love it.
Not your typical wedding photography pose, but Kate and Tim are not ones to go with the norm.
I guess this is a little more traditional.
So cutesy, how I love my family!
Wish I could do this full time, I just love taking pictures. Maybe one day.
As well as changing nappies, the endless baskets of washing and meals to cook, I have been re-mastering photoshop. I updated my edition and have been getting to grips with what the new version has to offer. I'm really pleased so far. The story behind the pictures is actually more important than how I edited them. This is my little sister Katy and my brother in law to be. I offered to take pictures for them for their wedding announcements. I was a little nervous, to tell the truth. My sister is really quite beautiful, but whenever I try to snap a quick picture of her, it never comes out right, but I think I did OK. The photography conditions weren't great, the sun was very strong despite it being 4pm, and although it was overcast on one side of the sky, it was blazingly bright on the other. We had fun though, and Tim was amazing. Just loved all the great stunts he pulled so that I could get some great pictures. I think we got some good ones, I'm really pleased with a couple of them. Definitely something presentable to send out to family and friends and didn't cost Kate and Tim a penny.
The most important thing is that Kate has found someone she really loves to marry. And we absolutely love him too! How great is that. Roll on February 13th.
I've been feeling just slightly overwhelmed recently to say the least. but I'm glad to report I'm feeling so much better now. My solution? Routine. My to do list is just as long, the ironing pile is just as high, the mouths that need feeding are all still just has hungry, but I feel so much more empowered! I love being organised, but with all the changes in my life recently, I just hadn't organised myself. I've discovered 1 hour is all I need! I can exercise, get ready for the day and study my scriptures in one dedicated hour! I have to get up early of course to find an undisturbed hour to myself, and despite the tiredness I feel great! I highly recommend it!
I didn't do a great job on my picture 365 for the holidays, stuff just gets in the way sometimes. So here's a quick catch up of all our activities over the last few weeks.
Nathaniel is getting so big now, he is continuing to eat and sleep well, and loves to crawl around the house.
He was laughing so hard whilst taking these pictures, it was one of those really precious moments.
I spent alot of time with the boys over the holidays, hence the lack of blogging. I don't particularly like this picture of myself, but I realise it documents the effort I place on doing a good job in looking after my boys.
We went to Legoland - just Jason, Jarom, Tayler, Nathaniel and I. We had a great time.
This ride was so much fun, and extremely competitive, Jason exhausted himself pumping the fire engine to the scene of the blaze, with Tayler trying to put on the breaks.
The new ride - the first thing we went on, it took an hour to Que for! So the following day we bought 'Que bots' - the virtual queuing system. It completely changed our trip, we had so much more fun, more relaxing, definitely worth the money. 
Took the kayaks out serveral times. Jason is a very lucky husband!.
Baby Ashleigh was blessed!
Can't believe my little brother is a daddy!
Jarom and Jason attended Brett's wedding. So good to be with friends!
This little boy is starting to be more mobile, he's edging forward all the time using his hands to support himself. It won't be long and he'll be crawling.
Jason took some great pictures whilst away. We're all a little under the weather, so we haven't been out much.
Whilst daddy and Jarom were away we had so much fun playing together especially on the trampoline.
Tayler, Nathaniel and I spent the day together. We wet into town and watched a movie at the cinema and ate at Burger King. Doesn't Nathaniel look absolutely ridiculous in this outfit, I can't believe I actually let him go out looking like this.
Grandpa's old microscope. He brought it with him from Nottingham for the boys to use. They were both so excited when we got it out of the loft for them to use. I didn't realise that this was dad's when he was a young boy (a little older then Jarom), he bought it because he had an interest in it, who would have know then that he would do a degree in microbiology and then turn it into a very successful career. Jarom was absolutely fascinated, Tayler too, although his 6 year old attention span wasn't quite up to sitting and not touching. Jarom really loved it, even more then I thought he would. I'm so impressed with his understanding and desire for learning. He asked Grandpa endless questions, and really started to grasp concepts like the structure of single cell organisms and how they divide and multiply. Incredible.
We took the musical toys out of the loft for Nathaniel to play with. He's sitting up now, so he can enjoy playing with them. Boy are they noisy, we don't get a moments peace. The boys decided to form a rock band, with Nathaniel mixing the discs, Jarom on tambourine and drums and Tayler on bongos and maracas!
A whole weeks worth of pictures - I love it! Jarom decided to play with little Nathaniel in an empty cardboard box, oh the fun they had. Nathaniel really did love it, Jarom made him this sweet little peep hole, and I couldn't resist playing peepo through it.
Mac & Cheese, the boys favourite, we had it for dinner last night, but I made a huge pan full, so it's left overs for dinner tonight!
Jason headed off to YM's camp, so I made some treats for him to take with him. I find myself on an eternal quest for the perfect recipes, I think I may have found the best one for American style chocolate chip cookies - yummy! This recipe came from good old Martha Stewart.
We headed of to IKEA and Costco with the boys in tow. It rained all day today, absolute buckets of the stuff, so indoor activities were a good idea.
This shot is a little blury sorry. Tuesday was a day without any computer games or television, we call it a 'T-Day' in our family (because the chosen days are Tuesday and Thursday), but the reward in the evening was a movie night with popcorn. Tonight's movie 'Horton hears a Who'. Boys really enjoyed it.
I'm sure many a holiday day will be spent like this. We did head out to the Libary later to start the summer reading challenge Quest Seekers - we do it every year!
Today is the start of the Summer holidays for my boys. So looking forward to spending some quality time together. We have lots of fun activities planned - trips to the London temple, Legoland, museums, parks and of course the beach. I know I'm late coming to project 365 (a photograph a day for a whole year), but I've really wanted to get involved for some time now. I thought it would be a fun way to document the holidays for our family. The photograph above was taken last weeks on the boys penultimate day of school. I'm actually amazed those t-shirts still look so white. Usually they're filthy after a day at school. I was doing a photo shoot for a friend's son and granddaughter at church, and decided to leave the backdrop up for a few pictures of the boys. I got some really cute ones, my boys know just how to pose.
It's almost the end of another school year and Jarom will be entering year 5 when he goes back to school in September. He's had a great year, his confidence has grown so much and he has continued to do so well academically. My only worry about him is that he continues to make really poor choices with friendships at school. We have tried so hard to encourage him, but he keeps returning to the same boys, or so it seemed. He's not a big 'sharer', what happens at school usually stays at school, he works hard and so likes to forget about school when he comes home. I guess I was worrying a little, and as he is going into a new class next year I thought I would go in to speak with his teacher.
We really love his teacher Mrs. Clark, she really is wonderful, and gets on so well with Jarom. She reassured me that he continues to do well, and he is making some good new friendships, he isn't hanging out with the same group of 'naughty boys'. I expressed that I was concerned that he would be labeled with the 'naughty boys' if he was with them, I have to admit I'm not even sure that I would trust him not to get involved in bad behaviour in the end, if he was always hanging out with the bad crowd. She calmed my fears by saying - "We know your son well, he's a very good boy. Trust him, he really has a good sense of right and wrong". At that moment I actually felt the Spirit witness to me that what Jarom's teacher was saying was true. I should trust my son more, he is a good boy. Also that we are doing a good job as his parents, what we are saying and doing is working. I also remembered the words of his blessing as a baby - "We ask thee to bless this young man... with a character of goodness in his soul, that he will yearn for righteousness, that he will learn to do good, and want to choose the right always". I'm so glad Nanny recorded Jarom's blessing for us, he has been blessed with a good sense of right and wrong. I feel so blessed to have Jarom as my son, he is a really fantastic young man.
Not the best of pictures, but he had just woke up from a nap. This little man has been pretty good recently, although he's had me up quite a bit at night due to teething. I've been super busy, and he's been super good.
My project for the week has been family history scrapbooks. I had about 12 huge boxes full of stuff to sort through. It was a mammoth task. One that my dear mummy never got around to doing, although she'd kept everything. I'm so glad she did. She had such a strong desire to record-keep, but just felt so overwhelmed by the process of organising it all, and other things took priority such as serving fellow sisters in the church and family history work. So that's where I step in - scrapbook loving, photograph crazy, organizing freak daughter. 
My arty project was bunting for the boys bedroom. I made this from scraps I had lying around - blue denim from a caravan I tried to redecorate, a red t-towel, and ribbon from my mum's collection. I just love it! The boys room just felt a little characterless in places, but this has really done the trick. My boys like it, I hoped they'd say, "Wow, thanks mum, you're a genius, we love it", but I got "That's nice". Never mind, I think it's really great.
Last week we had a new addition to our family - little Ashleigh Susan Shirley Mays was born. We were able to visit her and her mummy & Daddy last week. She's such a tiny little poppet, what a wonderful little blessing. Rich and Chessy really are amazing, and have really taken well to parenthood, they are both doing a wonderful job. Being new parents definitely isn't easy, and I'm so proud of them. I can't wait to see this little girly grow, I'm so glad that Nathaniel is a similar age just 6 months apart, here's hoping they'll be great buddies!
On Sunday I was officially called and set apart to work in Young Women's. I just can't express how excited I am about this call. I realise that I will always be a mother of sons, that's o.k., I really love my boys, but sometimes I crave alittle 'girl' time. This calling is such an answer to my prayers. Being called as a counsellor would be a little too heavy for me to handle, so I've been called as a YW advisor, with specific responsibility over personal progress. I love the young women's program so much, it meant everything to me when I was younger, I am so excited to be apart of it again. I even get to do personal progress again! This blog has become more of a journal for me, so every now and then I'll use it to record how I'm getting on with my own goals.
I actually sprinted to the finish line! This is us with our little finishing medals, the only time I got emotional was when I was handed my medal and I thought about my mummy. I thought about how the medal really belonged to her, for the strength she had and the battle she had fought. So after the race I went and took my medal to my mum's grave, I placed it on a beautiful flower arrangement my family had sent for mum, and just took a moment to be grateful.
What an amazing event. I must admit, there were times when I wondered whether I would actually go through with it. I remember thinking several months back whether this was absolute madness. I just don't run. I never have. After being diagnosed with asthma as a child, I just gave up on running, and never thought I could do it. I now realise it is mostly mental strength that makes you a runner. I am so grateful for Racheal's support and strength, what an amazing friend she is. I really couldn't have done this without her. I actually ran three miles! And not only that, I ran 3 miles earlier in the week, just to prove to myself that I could do it, so I ran 6 miles in total in one week! Now I've done it, I have to admit, I can't understand what all the fuss was about. It was hard, don't get me wrong, but not that hard. I keep thinking of my sister Katy, who is training for a half marathon, and Rachael, who is training for a full marathon on a challenging course and I think, what was I worrying about? So this years goal was to run the course, next years goal is to run with others. My newest little niece was born on Sunday - Ashleigh Susan Shirley Mays, I really want to run/walk with her and her mummy Chessy next year. All my family in fact. How about it? would you like to run too?
My supportive boys, wish I could run with them.
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