Happy Birthday Grandma

It's Grandma Marsha's birthday today and the girls made some videos in honor of it. The first is them singing a song she taught them...





And here's another one just for fun....

A New Play-set

Some friends of ours gave us a play-set that they didn't want anymore. I spent a good portion of the morning trying to figure out how to put it together without even knowing what it was supposed to look like. But, I triumphed. Elizabeth kept saying (as all the pieces would crash down), "Maybe we should wait for Daddy to come help us". I showed her! :)

Here it is in all its glory

It was worth it, too, since they spent most of the day outside playing on it. It was another beautiful, warm day.

I like this picture

And this picture. Natalie was walking towards me and talking.

The kids pretending to sleep again.
This is why I am scared to have a boy. I'm pretty sure little boys don't spend frequent, extended periods of time pretending to sleep on blankets. I could be wrong...
Maybe I just have lazy kids. I'm really not complaining, though. :)

Here is a random picture of the girls coloring nicely together. At the time, I felt the need to capture the peaceful moment.

And, I wanted to post another funny thing Elizabeth said at dinner the other day. Out of nowhere she suddenly announced, "If you don't love yourself, you can't get married." I have no idea where she got that from but Joe and I both agreed that that was very true.

Cute/Funny Moments

Here are some moments that I wanted to record:

We had our Family Home Evening lesson on praying this week (we've been having struggles in this area). Joe was talking about kneeling when we pray and this happened...

Joe: "So why do you think it's important to kneel down when we're saying prayers?"
Elizabeth: "Because Heavenly Father loves the children and all that stuff..."

She has already mastered the art of saying rote phrases that she thinks we want to hear to speed things along to the treat. :)

This next one happened yesterday when I was asking the girls to clean up some marbles.

Elizabeth: "Natalie, pick up those marbles. Get those ones. Good job."
Me: "Elizabeth, you need to help clean up, too."
Elizabeth: "But I'm the sayer and Natalie's the cleaner."

Also, Elizabeth was playing Curious George games on PBS Kids today and Natalie woke up from her nap and started watching her play. She was kneeling on the seat behind Elizabeth watching intently. Elizabeth was being so cute and letting Natalie pick the games. Then, she said to Natalie, "Give me kisses when I get it right". So, Natalie started kissing Lizzie on the cheek when she'd win the little games. It was really adorable.

Weekend Fun

We went to Joe's last intramural football game on Friday and I finally got a picture of him playing. They had a good season, although it ended with some disappointing losses. He's had a lot of fun playing and getting to know some of the other first-year guys better.

Here he is on defense.

We went straight from the game to visit the Sacramento temple. The girls hadn't been to see the temple in much too long and they were so excited. In fact, they insisted on singing "I Love to See the Temple" over and over until we got there. It was a nice family activity. It's always good to feel the peace that comes from being at the temple.

Here are some pictures of them walking around the grounds
(the only ones I could get before our camera battery died)

On Sunday, I happened to dress Natalie in an outfit that Elizabeth used to wear and that she is wearing in one of our favorite pictures of her. We decided to try to recreate the picture with Natalie.

Elizabeth, at about 20-21 months

Natalie, at 23 months

There are definite similarities. I think they are both pretty darn cute. I need to do this more often; it was fun!

Being Lazy

Well, Blogger is working again so I wanted to post some more new pictures. We had a lot of rain here lately and the girls and I used it as an excuse to stay in and relax. In fact, one rainy day I found them like this:(Elizabeth was only pretending to sleep)

One night, Joe went back to campus in the evening so the girls and I snuggled together and watched the first half of Little Women. I was happy that they were actually kind of interested in it. I love that movie and I get tired of watching the same kid movies over and over. I always loved watching girl movies with my mom and I'm looking forward to doing the same with my kids. I've already brainwashed them into loving The Sound of Music. :)

Here are some more pictures from a lazy Sunday afternoon. We love spending time with Daddy on Sundays!

Daddy playing snake for his girls (they always request this)

Mommy and Natalie

Daddy and Lizzie

Natalie trying on Mommy's shoes

Having trouble...

I've been having problems with blogger for a few days now. For some reason, when I press the picture icon in order to add pictures to a post, nothing happens. The other buttons work fine, including the video one, so it's really weird. Has anyone had this happen to them and know how it fix it? Thanks...

P.S. Prop. 8 passed!! What a miracle. If only people would let the majority decision stand.... No matters what happens, with the passage of Constitutional amendments in Florida, Arizona, and California, a major message has been sent about what the American people hold dear: that marriage is indeed between a man and a woman.

More Halloween, etc.

A friend of mine sent me these pictures from our first Halloween party and I just had to post them.

How can you resist that chubby face?

Here is a picture from trick-or-treating Halloween night. The girls were loving life. After they got their candy, they would turn around immediately and say to us "I got an M&M/lollipop/etc., etc.!" and then would turn back around and say "thank you".
My sister-in-law Shari made a really yummy pumpkin roll about three years ago and I've literally been craving it ever since. I finally got around to making one and it really hit the spot. Here is the recipe if anyone's interested. Yumm...

I'm no food photographer but it really was good

Here's a random cute picture of the girls one morning.

Are they sisters or what?