In Remembrance of our Loving Prophet!!!

As I sit here at my computer I am at a loss for words. I am still trying to register the news of the passing of our beloved prophet Gordon B. Hinckley. I knew his time would be coming to an end, he lived a long full-filling life, but I was hoping he would live on into his hundreds. I know I shouldn't be so sad, because he is now with his wife again, what a joyous occasion that must be. I just can't imagine this sweet man, with his his great sense-of-humor, his love of people and his great testimony to not be the primary example in my life anymore. I love him so very much and will miss him tremendously. This is a tribute to one of the greatest men alive, one who has influenced so many of my decisions, and one who will continue to have a special place in my heart and home. I am grateful to this wonderful Prophet! We love you!!

p.s. Thank you Brooke for this beautiful picture of Gordon B. Hinckley. You sent it to me years ago. Its always made me very happy.

Our Beloved Friend Harry!!!

Harry Edward Molloy
August 2003-January 2008

On Friday, January 25, 2008 our sweet rabbit Harry passed away. He was definitely part of our family and we will miss him dearly. It is so sad to say good-bye to our Harry. Since we have had my brother Steve living with us this past year, we have also adopted this cute, furry friend as our own. He meant everything to Steve and to us and we know these next couple weeks will be extra difficult. It's amazing how attached you become to something so small, I guess like any pet they become your family too and add extra love and comfort to our lives. We layed him to rest in the backyard where we can visit him often and remember our fun, cuddly, hopping, pooping, sweet, loving Harry. We will miss you Harry!!

BFF!!!!

Teresa, Cheri, Jeanne, Jenny and Arianne

On my 16th birthday I met some of the most amazing women I would ever meet in my life. I had just moved into a new neighborhood and transferred to Brighton highschool. My mom decided to throw me a surprise party for my big day. She invited all the girls from my ward and neighborhood, although I didn't know them well we clicked immediately. It turned out to be the best birthday I could of asked for because I soon became friends with the greatest influences in my life. I honestly never thought I would enjoy having girls as friends as I grew up with mostly boy friends. It is amazing that we are celebrating 15 years of friendship next week. I would like to tribute this blog to the greatest girls on earth. Thank you Cheri, Jeanne, Jenny and Arianne for being there for me through some of the hardest years of my life. Thank you for getting me out of bed, for being that listening ear, for understanding, for not judging, for being a great example, for being there when I had no one else, for teaching me, for forgiving me, loving me, supporting me, for all our great adventures (China, Tetons, St. George, Vegas, Cali, Boston), for the "chess" club, dance clubs, sleep overs, parties, Boys, Boys, and more boys. Thank you for always being there for me no matter what and for bringing me back to the the things that matter most, finding a testimony! You are all inspirations to me in so many ways!! We've been through a hell of a lot, but I couldn't have done it without you by my side. Here is to the next 15 years of friendship. I love you, love you, love you. Sisters and Bestfriends forever!

Run Errands???

Lorelei and Oma together!

As I was talking with my mom today, I asked her what she was going to be doing? She told me she was going to be "running errands." As I was hanging up the phone with my mom, I said, "Have fun running errands." and we said our goodbye's. Lorelei chimes in, "But Mom, Oma can't walk, she can't run errands!" IT was so cute, because in her mind she is absolutely right. My mother can't walk and DEFINITELY can't run. She has been handicapped for most of my life and now gets around in her cool Jazzy scooter. So in the literal sense Lorelei was absolutely right, "NO Running" errands for Oma. We had a good laugh. I guess we need to think of another expression to say instead of "running errands" as it doesn't apply to everyone.

Career Changes Already???

My little ballerina in training!


So for the longest time Lorelei has decided she wants to be a doctor, of course I couldn't be more proud, because that's what I wanted to be. I love the body, the blood, the surgeries, and I'm not just talking about the fun drama on Grey's Anatomy, I truly enjoy all that doctorish stuff, it fascinates me, especially the gruesome stuff (I possibly watched way too many horror films.) Of course I didn't go that direction, so I was more than pleased when my daughter at age 3 tells me she wants to be a doctor. I ask "Why do you want to be a doctor?" She says, "I want to fix people and help them." I am so excited about this, UNTIL tonight!

While tucking her into bed,
I said, "I don't want you to grow up anymore,"
she says "but I want to grow up,"
I ask "Why do you want to grow up?"
She says, "because I want to be a Ballerina."

After a long pause, I was thinking my dreams as a doctor are truly finished, even if I would be living vicariously through Lorelei.

I then said, "You will be the most beautiful ballerina ever."

And so it is, from Doctors to Ballerinas!

Here's a couple clips of her dancing skills.
The first clip is their extensive training! Welcome to ballerina boot camp!
The second is one of her dance routines! Do you think she has what it takes to be a real dancer? Good thing ballerinas don't normally wear underwear!!!

Everyone's Doing IT!!!

Loving our baby more often is our Resolution this year!

We will almost have 5 years of complete one on one with Lorelei, before baby #2 comes.

Lorelei almost a week old.

Trying to prepare myself for another baby.

I have to look at her pictures to remember how little they really are.

There is no turning back now!!!

New Year's Resolutions 2008!!!

• Spending our last 6 months cuddling our little girl Lorelei, before a new baby comes!
• Relearning what a baby is! I'm scared.
• Getting off mild bed rest, so I can exercise, clean my house, pick something off the floor if I need to and stop nagging everyone around me to help me. I'm going to go insane!
• Trying to keep it under 30 lbs of average weight gain in pregnancy (I've already asked about a tummy tuck as an option. I figure I'm going to be going under the knife anyway, so while they're in there just fix a few things, the doctors just laugh, but I'm dead SERIOUS!)
• Welcoming a new baby around the middle of July (That is a resolution!)
• Trying to catch up on scrapbooks before another baby comes into play. I'm only 4 years behind on Lorelei's scrapbook. Hooray!

SANTA, PLEASE COME BACK!!

Santa Came!! Hooray!! I got a new Barbie Scooter, Ponyville, Swim Baby, Cheerleader Barbies and Chocolate Santa's Galore! Thank You, Santa!
Uncle Steve and Lorelei ready to begin the present opening.
Christmas Morn!!

Telling Santa what she wants for Christmas! Chocolate Santa's and Rainbow Dash!
Did he just ask me if I have been a good girl this year? Uh OH!
Christmas Lights!
Mesa Temple


Happy New Year!!! How am I going to get Lorelei to behave this year? I have no more ammunition to use anymore. Santa was my new bestfriend and now he's gone. Do I really have to wait for another 11 months to use the line, "If you do not behave Santa will not come this year," or "You stop throwing that tantrum, because I'm going to call Santa right now"? I used these lines on so many occasions that I forgot what I used to do for discipline before Christmas came. Thank you Santa and I will miss you for all my disciplinary needs. See you next year!!

Here our the last few pictures of our Christmas 2007!

We spent a fun-filled day Christmas Eve going to the movie, "Enchanted," seeing the temple lights, coming home to frost cookies for Santa, reading Christmas stories and getting ready for Santa and his Reindeer to come visit. We spent a relaxing Christmas with just the three of us and Uncle Steve. We mostly spent our day opening presents and then passed countless hours opening the toy packaging that was tied up with wire, ties, strings, glue, plastic, etc. Why does everything have to be tied down twenty times? Who can even open those damn things? After much frustration we have finally gotten them all open, only to find we have no place to put them. I guess it's time to clean out all the closets to make room!

Gingerbread houses, Santa's sleighs, candy canes, OH MY!

We not only made a Gingerbread house this year, but Santa's sleigh as well. Chad and Lorelei hard at work on creating the perfect holiday Gingerbread house. It turned out beautifully! I was the general contractor, Chad was the architect and Lorelei was in charge of design.

Lorelei was so proud of her masterpiece.
We then moved on to Gingerbread Sleighs with our friends. Unfortunately, the sleigh was not cooperating and fell apart about five times. We didn't add too many decorations because the frosting was not sticky enough! Oh well, better luck next year!

I want a new blow up doll for Christmas!

Jessie, this one's for you! Since moving from Iowa I've been on the lookout for that perfect house for the holidays. I think I may have found one that topped our favorite corner house in Coralville. I just wish these pictures would do it justice. It is seriously AWESOME! Everytime I pass it, I think of Jessie and I waiting for the next holiday to come around to see what new blow up dolls they had gotten for that year. We were always anticipating Christmas, of course. I now have something to remind me of my holidays in IOWA. This is for all my Iowa friends who loved that festive corner house!

Cracked NUTS!

We have started a new tradition! Last year we took Lorelei to the Nutcracker for the first time, and to our surprise she sat still the whole time. We now have made this a Christmas activity to do with her Nana. We had a great time watching all the beautiful ballerinas as well as the dainty men dancing around. We bought her the book "The Nutcracker" and during intermission we read it to her. It helped her understand what was going on. When we asked Lorelei how she liked it, she exclaimed at the end of the show, "It was TOO long." However, We TRULY did enjoy it. Lorelei has now been dancing around with our Nutcrackers at home!

"I LIKE SMILING, SMILING'S MY FAVORITE!"

SITTIN' WITH SANTA
"SANTA, I KNOW HIM!"
RUDOLPH AND SNAPPY THE ELF
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Tis' the season to be JOLLY???

So much for starting out our Christmas season being JOLLY! After Thanksgiving is over and we are done stuffing our guts with leftovers of Thanksgiving dinner, we are then prepared to make the trip up into the attic to get out our 6 bins of Christmas decorations. One by one we take them out, trying to figure out which one has "what" in it. We finally find all the strands of lights and decide let's decorate the outside first. We are all happily in the Christmas spirit. Look how beautiful Chad and Lorelei decorated it. It was DANG good! Happiness fills the air, we are so excited that the tree is finally finished. We go inside to relax and about 15 minutes we look outside our window to see our beautiful tree, lightless! What the hell? The next day Chad tries this again, we go buy new lights, string them all around and beauty fills the streets again. We go inside, look outside our window about 15 minutes later and IT'S GONE. So after 4 attempts of decorating that DANG tree, we are throwing in the towel and saying, "Bah HUMBUG."

Going to the Zoo with OMA!

Lorelei had a great time with her Oma in town! She especially enjoyed being able to cruise around on Oma's scooter. She thought it was a lot of fun. Lorelei enjoyed all the attention she got from Oma. She got extra bonding time, since there were no other grandchildren to compete with. They played games, went to the park, sang songs, and spent a day at the zoo together.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Lorelei's Pine cone Turkey!

Oma & Opa coming down for Thanksgiving! We had Thanksgiving dinner at our house this year. We invited the whole family down for Thanksgiving, however, only my parents were able to come. I made everything from homemade pies, to gravy. I can't believe I pulled it off, it was insane, but I did it!
It was DANG good!

Grinch Name!

http://www.yourgeekfriend.com/GrinchName/GrinchName.php

What is your Grinch Name? My Grinch Name is "Scroogeyfrown Crustynoodle"
Makes me nauseous just thinking about it!

What's Tithing?

"Mom, Dad, What is tithing?," Lorelei says, as we are in the car coming home from church. We respond by saying, "tithing is where we give money back to Heavenly Father. If we have 10 pennies, we give one penny back to Heavenly Father and keep the other 9 pennies. He blesses us with everything we have, so we give back to him some money to help him build churches, temples and other things." As we continue home, she becomes reflective and deep in thought. She then declares, "I want to pay tithing to Heavenly Father," and then asked, "How do I give tithing to Heavenly Father?" We said that she could give it to the Bishop or one of his counselors, like daddy. We told her how proud we are of her, but thought it would end there. However, when we got home, she collected all of the coins she could find in her room and brought it into the kitchen to show daddy. She wanted daddy to bring it to the bishop, so he gave her an envelope to put the money in. Later in the evening when daddy was leaving for the YW program, Lorelei ran to find her envelope and insisted that daddy take it to the bishop. So he did. I guess we will be bringing her to tithing settlement next Sunday, so she can declare that she is a full tithe payer!

Primary Program at Church

This year Lorelei is a Sun Beam at church, which means this is the first year she got to participate in the Primary Program in sacrament meeting. It was absolutely hilarious. Lorelei had two parts, which we had months to practice and she had them both memorized. Her lines were, "I have faith that Jesus will help me keep the commandments" and "I can help my mommy and daddy." It was absolutely adorable. Of course, as they start the program with the music you get all teary-eyed as you see your little girl up there forcing out a word here and there to one of the songs. Suddenly, embarrassment flushes over you as you see your little girl, sticking her tongue out, making obnoxious faces, flashing everyone as she pulls her dress all the way up, picks her underwear out of her bottom, and yells out "hello"to one of her friends in the audience. Then her turn comes to say her part. She starts to say something and realizes the microphone is no where near her mouth, so she yanks it down as close as she can get it, almost in her mouth. All flustered, her teacher whispers in her ear the first part of her line, so, she gently WHISPERS the exact part into the microphone, then realizing she needs to speak up, she yells the second part into the microphone. Everyone had a good laugh. It is at that moment that you couldn't be more proud of your little girl, in front of all these people as she does her lines with power and conviction. Way to go LeiLei!!! You did it!!!

Happy 7th Anniversary!

We went to Scottsdale for a nice evening out.

After a yummy Italian dinner, we went on a Gondola Ride.

We relaxed in the boat as our gondoleer sang opera to us.

It was very romantic!

Almost like being in Italy, but not quite!
Honestly, I didn't know we could make seven years happen!! Yes, marriage has good times and bad times and we've had many of both. Sometimes it feels like a roller coaster ride, (which normally I happen to love.) But truly marriage has taught me a lot of things. It has taught me lots of patience, acceptance, sacrifice, endurance, hard work and compromise. The communication is still something to come in the future. As much as I would like to believe there are fairy tales of complete bliss in every one's marriage, I have learned that it is much more like a soap opera. So, here's to seven more years of soap opera life with my sweet Chadwick. Happy Anniversary to a hard-working, sexy, talented, athletic, great sense of humor, intelligent, witty, good looking, loving husband and father!

HOORAY, Jenny comes to visit me!!

Sedona, Arizona
Jenny on Bell Rock
Montezuma Castle
Lorelei and Jenny watching the Orangutans at the zoo Saying good-bye to our fun-filled week of Jenny

I have had the pleasure of having my best friend Jenny come visit me for the week. We have been best friends since we were 16 years old. Her husband surprised her and bought her a ticket down to Phoenix for her birthday week. We had so much fun together. We went up to Sedona for the day. We went window shopping, had lunch, went hiking on Bell Rock and then went to see Montezuma Castle, (basically, an ancient castle built in the side of a mountain) which was so cool to see. We had fun watching movies, going to the zoo, enjoying Boba and Bing (Chinese desserts), temple, shopping and having fun. I miss her already and I'm waiting for my next visitor to come!!!