The setting

We live in a rural community just west of the mountains. Our city has a small town feel without being too far from bigger city amenities. (I love that I can get to Target, Wal-mart, and Costco within 15-20 minutes.)

Our favorite thing about our home town is the trains. Every weekend restored engines and passenger cars mosey through town. As a mother of two boys IN LOVE with trains, I feel this is a fabulous place for kids. At least once a year we board the trains and take a 50 minute ride through two towns and past some beautiful falls.

The schools are another perk. When Braden turned three we had some concerns about a few things we felt he might be behind on. At the suggestion of a friend, I took him into the school for some screening and they determined that he qualified for some help through the school. That meant that he would receive free preschool four days a week and bus service to and from school! Braden was so excited to be going to school with his big sis. I was thrilled that they were willing to help him out with the few things they were concerned about. This program has helped him excel in so many ways. Now Braden is finishing his preparations for Kindergarten and is starting to read and do math! Tanner has joined Braden in the preschool program as a tuition student. I will be forever grateful for the great start that the school district provided for my sons.

Tanner and Braden dressed for the Preschool Barn Dance Fall 2009

As soccer fans, we couldn't be happier with the youth soccer program in our area. Almost every family has children involved in soccer. It's huge here. Ryan has coached Gracie's team the last three years and loves the chance to pass his love of soccer on to "his girls". This year he bribed the girls with a package of Starbursts if they scored a goal. It's amazing how much a package of candy can motivate a group of 7 year olds.

Beautiful moutain views and lush farm country shape our community. Ryan grew up in the mountains and I grew up in farm country. This perfectly combines our favorite surroundings as children. Quick side note: When I was little, my dad would tell crazy stories of why things were the way they were. One of my favorites was the Marshmellow farm explanation. Many hay fields in the area, roll their hay and wrap it in white plastic to keep it from getting wet. These rolls end up being pretty large. While the farmers are in the process of collecting and wrapping the hay you can see random white rolls in the field. As a child, my father told me that these were marshmellow fields! A couple of years ago, while we were on a family drive, our kids noticed those white balls in the fields and asked what they were. I quickly told them they were marshmellows and while they were amazed at their sizes, it has stuck. Ryan and I always chuckle when we drive past the hay fields in the late summer and hear the marshmellow farm commentary from the back row.

The neighborhood in which we live is a fabulous place for a family. Some of our kids' best friends live within five houses of ours. Because we live in a newer community, everyone knows each other and is extremely active in getting to know each other better. When it's not raining, it's common to see kids on bikes or powerwheel cars out front. We've had six cars (mustangs, corvettes, jeeps, backhoes, gators, etc.) going at one time before. Our kids LOVE riding bikes and driving cars.

There are plenty of sledding opportunities in the winter too. Our neighborhood park (less than a half mile away) is the home of an igloo everytime it snows. We still haven't been able to figure out who builds it, but everyone loves playing in it.

A few other unique opportunities that our community offers are the rec center and pool about 10 minutes away (with a great swimming, dance, art and more soccer classes), the opportunity to serve the lower community during flood season, and the quick walk to the library.

Hard Copy Profile

I've been learning the art of Digital Scrapbooking this week in preparation for our Hard Copy Profile that the Agency will have on file. Sheesh, it has taken me a long time to figure it out. These aren't perfect, but they are my first attempt, so I'm pretty proud of how they turned out. When you take a peek remember I am a novice. Oh, and I can't take credit for the layout of the first one. I purchased a template to help me get started. :)

Traditions

There's a bunch in this house so get comfy. To break it up, I'll list them in weekly, monthly, and annual sections.

Weekly:

Monday nights are family nights. We have a rotation chart that helps us keep track of who is doing the gospel lesson, music, prayers, activity, and treat. This is a great way to spend time with the kids one on one because we make the treat together and I help them serve it to our family afterwards, or we color something or create a game for the lesson, etc.

Friday nights are movie nights. We either rent, purchase, or check out (from the library) a movie that we haven't yet seen and veg on the couch as a family with a big bucket of popcorn.

Saturday mornings Ryan loves to make the kids some kind of egg breakfast. Sometimes it's scrambled eggs with cheese, eggs and bacon, eggs and hashbrowns, eggs and toast, fried egg sandwiches, and occasionally pancakes or waffles.

At least once each weekend we make a trip to the park for hide and seek, tag, playing soccer or racing the dog. Penny, our mini schnauzer, loves coming along.

Monthly:

One Saturday every month we do something exciting for the whole family. Last month we went to a local farm/carnival and played in the pouring rain all day. The kids jumped into the hay jump, rode the roller coaster and train, sang with the entertainer, picked out pumpkins, fed the animals in the petting zoo, and rode ponies.

Other Saturdays have been spent at the Science Center, Zoo, and the Children's Museum. (We just bought an annual pass!) Camping, fishing, hiking, and swimming are some other examples.

On average we get together with my family monthly. We try to celebrate everyone who has had a birthday that month over dinner and presents and ice cream.

Annually:

We attend two family reunions. They are always held over a weekend at a state park or other campground. Our family camps out in our little tent trailer. It's not the fanciest but it keeps us off the ground, has cushions to sleep on, two outlets for electronics (or a space heater), and a small, cold-water only sink. It also allows us to bring more bikes and toys along. During the reunions we usually spend lots of our time swimming at a lake or river, riding bikes with cousins, playing card games, hiking or visiting nearby parks, and sitting around the campfire. We also usually have a large family paintball battle, which is a lot of fun.

We also try to go camping a few other times every year. For example, we are some of those annoying Memorial Day weekend campers. It's the first weekend of camping season and after staying indoors for the winter, everyone is pumped to get outside. There is also a large church ranch up in the mountains that we like to go to. We get to go fishing, ride horses, and paddle around in canoes while we are there.

We go sledding. This started a couple of years ago when we noticed a lot of snow in the mountains and wanted to go play. My whole family came along and the competitive nature of the men started bubbling. Pretty soon we had this huge, snow-packed jump they had built and were trying to see how far they could fly off of it. Lately we've combined our sledding excursion with my family's Christmas party, which generally involves staying at some small cabins at the church ranch.

Don't worry. No one laying on the ground after the jump was hurt in the stunt. The sledder cleared us all. Although I must say these men are ALMOST professionals. Don't try this at home.

Sometime during the holiday break we typically spend time with Ryan's family in New Mexico. Most people think it's hot in NM all the time. Not where they live. They almost always have snow for Christmas. Traditionally we do game nights, snow ball fights, more sledding, rockets and ice skating/swimming among other things. When we go visit in the summer, we love to go swim at the community swimming pool that is 2 houses away, where Ryan was a lifeguard in the summers.

At our house birthdays are a special day. We allow the special person to pick their favorite dinner, cake and ice cream flavor, and then they eat off of the CELEBRATE plate. While we eat, each person in the family gets to share something that they love or appreciate about the birthday boy or girl. We also do candygrams for the birthday person.

Family Pictures

The last time we took family portraits, we ended the day with letting the kids snap their own pictures. I was pretty pleased with the outcomes.

Gracie's picture:

Braden's picture:

Tanner's picture:

Our family and adoption

While Ryan and I have begun this adoption application process, we have tried to be open with our kids. We had a family home evening just on adoption and dedicated it to talking about what kinds of happy things could happen through the miracle of adoption.

We talked about what it would be like to meet a mom that Heavenly Father chose to deliver our baby and how that baby would be lucky enough to have the love of two families. We talked about how old our baby might be, what they may look like, and where they might live. We talked about how after we had our new family member for a little while, we would get to go to the temple and our whole family would get to go inside and be made an eternal family through our Heavenly Father's power. We talked about as much as we could. I still get emotional thinking about how happy that day will be.

I found out from Braden's sunday school teacher that he was telling his class about how we were going to get a baby! She was so confused until I explained that we had just begun the application process for adoption.

As we take the last steps of completing our application we are getting even more excited. The other day I was watching a baby girl of my friend's when I went to check on the boys who were playing in the backyard. I opened the door holding the little girl to tell the boys that we had friends here. Before I could say those words they came running up to the door. Tanner screams to Braden, "Look. Our baby!" It was the sweetest thing.

Our beginnings

Ryan and I met during our freshman year at BYU. I came to school with a boyfriend at home in Washington. Before leaving for school, it was decided that I wasn't going to miss out on the college life and sit in my dorm. I struggled because I missed my boyfriend a lot, but it only got worse when I was left behind as my roommates went out to play.

Being in the same ward, Ryan and some friends decided to visit the ward girls in David John Hall during visiting hours. Ryan stopped by my room and we chatted for a while. He noticed what he called my "shrine" to my boyfriend (which was really just a few snapshots) and kind of took a few steps back. Soon enough he got up the courage to ask me out.

He called late one Friday night after getting home late from studying and asked if I had eaten dinner yet. I had already eaten so he asked me if I would come with him to Hogi Yogi for ice cream while he ate. We had such a great time talking that he asked if I wanted to go bowling next. We had a fun night and walked back to the dorms. I was so impressed with how kind and gentlemanly he was and that he really was so interested in everything I thought and said. That got my interest going. He looked older so I thought he might be a return missionary. There was no way I was going to write to a missionary...

After a few more dates and a lot of careful orchestration, Ryan asked if I would go out with him on Valentines Day. I had just learned that my boyfriend at home was going to come visit for the weekend, but would be flying in late Valentines night. I told Ryan that I could go out with him as long as I was home by the time my boyfriend's flight got in! That's when Ryan kindly said "Well, if I am going to take you out on Valentines Day, I was kind of hoping that you would be my valentine. Think about it and let me know if you want to go." I felt so stuck. It was nice to have a good guy friend at school. So I thought about it a lot and when Ryan called to follow up, I told him that I would love to go out with him on Valentines Day.

We were exclusive for about a month when Ryan received a mission call to serve in the Chile, Santiago South mission. We were so excited about the call. Secretly I had hoped he might get called to a mission in Washington, but that wasn't the case. We made good use of our time together before Ryan flew off to Chile in June of 1997.

I wrote to my missionary as much as possible. He wrote weekly. Neither of us were hoping for a situation like this, but I wanted to see what might happen with this guy someday.

About six months before Ryan came home from his mission I started dating a guy in my student ward. Ryan and I had decided that waiting around for two years for a relationship that might not even work when he returned was silly. After two weeks I realized the relationship with this other boy wasn't something that I was ready to persue and wrote to fill Ryan in. It was something awkward like "Hi, I'm sorry I haven't written for a while. I think your letters have been stuck in the pouch (they were) because I haven't heard from you for about two months and during that time I dated someone from my ward. That relationship is over now. So, how are you doing? I miss you."

Ryan came home from his mission the end of May 1999. I drove 11 hours to see him for the first time in two years. It was such a happy reunion. I remember driving into his hometown at 1 am and getting about two blocks from his home when I noticed this crazy driver off to the right. The driver parked his truck right in front of me when I was stopped at a stop sign and I saw Ryan climb out. I threw open the door and ran as fast as I could. I couldn't squeeze him any harder. (I'd like to say it was one of those magical hugs that you swing around in a slow-motion circle, but I don't think it was. It was perfectly us just standing still.) It was so great to have him back. We had a great weekend visit and then I headed back to school.

Ryan began school again in the fall and started to get scared that I had dated someone else during his mission. He claims that he was ready to marry me when he got home and then he found out more about the relationship I had and was nervous that he was acting too quickly. He started to date other women at school and I became a wreck. It was so hard to give him the space he needed when I was so glad to have him home again. After six months of hoping that we would get back together again, I decided to try and move on. He needed space and I needed to focus on something else for the sake of my sanity. It wasn't long after I decided to leave him alone, that Ryan started coming around again. Oh, what a relief. After three years of knowing him I was more than ready to get married. Three years is a record breaking dating term at BYU. We kept dating and dating and dating and dating. Then we started talking about marriage and after another 7 months, he FINALLY proposed. (I had given him a time frame or I was going to break up with him and have fun my last semester at school. Turns out he already had purchased the ring and was going to propose on our anniversary, but had to speed up the timing before he lost his chance!) He took me up to the moutains in Provo and said the most significant words I could have ever heard in the four years we dated. "I'm ready to commit to you for eternity. Will you marry me?" This cute elderly couple cross- country skiing behind us snapped our picture as Ryan told them "we just got engaged!"

We were married in the Salt Lake Temple May 1, 2001. Talk about a happy day. It had finally come.