Richardson Report

For some reason my last blog post didn't post and even though I knew it - I didn't have time to fix that.  So three weeks late for your viewing pleasure, that blog post is below. Now we are home from Idaho.  It was a good trip.  About a week before we left I was not sleeping and feeling highly stressed and after some conversations with friends and a few heart to hearts with myself, I determined that I was worrying about things I had no control over and resolved that I did NOT want to remember this wedding as a super stressful experience!  I wanted to be able to enjoy the day!  So with that end in mind, I went back over the things I knew that *I* needed to do, updated my lists, put my processes in place, and stopped thinking so much about everything else.  Prayer figured into this as well.  And I stopped feeling stressed.  I haven't slept great in months, but I slept better.  When we got to Idaho, I had very short to-dos for each day and fel...

3 weeks until W-Day.  It's feeling very surreal that it is ACTUALLY GOING TO HAPPEN that my eldest is going to get married.  Mom - I just want to apologize now for putting you through this at such a young age.  It's not until walking in your shoes that I fully realize what I did to you.  I'm sorry. On the good side of that coin, I think we're basically ready.  I have a little to-do list but mostly it's stuff that I can't take care of until the last week.  So I'm turning my attention to Christmas and my family for the next couple weeks.  We have two weeks to do all our pre-Christmas celebrating so the  Christmas season is feeling too short and rushed.  But I'm hoping that the actual Christmas Day will be quiet and peaceful.  We will get back into Grants Pass two days or so before Christmas when I will purchase a boatload of food to see us through the holiday and hopefully sequester myself with my family for a long weekend and just enjoy...

I did a post that had some pictures from our trip.  BUT our internet was having issues and who really wants to see photos of a vacation they didn't go on.  I know I only like it sometimes...but sometimes I would rather have gone myself.  ;-). Suffice to say, Josh and I had a great week together and our kids were alive when we came home - which is about all we wanted. I wanted to share some things today. First, we had our Primary Program.  If we could have videoed this we would have.  Faith does not sing Primary songs.  Instead, she head-bangs along to every song with a huge grin on her face.  It was hysterical. One of Kenna's friends has anxiety and had a full meltdown as she waited in line to say her part.  Tears streamed down her face.  It was so sweet to watch Kenna quietly whisper in her ear to comfort her, and hold her hand to cheer her up.  Kenna is a nurturing soul and she cares deeply for this friend who needs her. I had ...

 School has started!  Brynne and I snuck away for a quick BYU/OSU women's soccer game.  BYU rocked it. My friend Julia's niece played and scored.  fun! Two days later Brynne got her wisdom teeth extracted.  Not so fun.  Her darling friends brought ice cream! Logan and Faith are buddies and it is so sweet! On Friday we went to the Grants Pass football game.  Josh and I both lucked out with friends who invited us and one child to join them. Here are Ella and Kenna - and my friend Heidi photobombing them.  ;-) And Megan and Natalie And I went with Amy Faith's imagination has taken off.  She plays pretend All. Day.  Long. She especially loves to play with the baby toys in my closet. Natalie lost a tooth.  This is what she sent the tooth fairy.  I drew an amazing fairy picture back. We left for Hawaii.  You know it's going to be a great tr...

Where is the time going?  I want all my kids to stop growing.  I definitely want summer back.  I need more weekends in my life and fewer meetings.  Time is too short with my family these days. August flew by.  It was amazing.  Amazingly busy.  Without further ado - here is some of our fun....  Natalie had private swimming lessons with this darling guy from church.  It was a really good experience for her and she learned a lot in two short weeks! Richardson cousins came for a long visit and my kids were very happy.  I'm keeping this photo of Sam for his wedding.  I'm sure he'll want to see it then. Faith doesn't often play with kids her age - this was a banner month of her! Pear picking started.  Logan and I had a mother/son date at the pear farm.  He's so cute! Amazing sunset one night... Faith became obsessed with card games.  This one she made up using face c...