harry pottery barn

we recently embarked on an adventure i made up called, 

reading aloud/reading allowed.

 we have all different levels of reader in the house that i need to cater to. one of my kids likes to throw books and scribble in books and rip books. another one of my kids LOVES reading and being read to and reading on her own and she finished her BOOK IT! sheet for the month in about 2 seconds flat. another of my kids recently wrote on an adjective/verb/noun finish the sentence school assignment, "i DO NOT like reading!" full points for the correct verbage and nounage, but a little disheartening as reading is my absolute favorite thing to do. 

confession: i actually do not enjoy reading aloud very much. reading all alone-YES! reading with kids climbing on me and asking a bajillion non-sensical questions about things i could not possible know the answer to-NO THANKS! so, i decided that as a family, we would read a whole entire, big, long book together. i chose a lesser known title, harry potter and the sorcerer's stone. the book gave a few of us false hope as none of the spells actually work and not everyone appreciated my use of a britishly southern accents but, even the child who "hates" reading, would ask if it was time to read again. we revamped our bedtime schedule and set aside about 30 minutes a night most nights of the week. it was fun to see reading as an incentive to hurry and finish dinner/clean up bedrooms/takes baths so that we could pick up where we left off the night before. we started the night before school started and we finished it last night. 

it was one of those experiences that i will reflect upon in the future when i am having moments of kid overload or mom failure because it was such a success. reagan and i can now claim that reading aloud is not the worst thing ever. i can't wait to start the next book. 

octoberfest

optional title: smells like 30-something spirit

the #1 reason why i am not a "professional" blogger(other reasons may include lack of widespread popularity, bugaboo sponsored stroller posts, gratuitous pictures of my perfectly coiffed family doing fun things most people can't afford wearing clothing that requires re-mortgaging our home, adequate punctuation and proper capitalization and really great photography featuring my impossible to replicate crafts. other than that, i'm the total package) is my lack of consistent blogging. so, here's the rest of october in a nutshell. (help, i'm in a nutshell!)

thomas and i celebrated the 12th anniversary of our first date on october 19th. like we did 12 years ago, we went to the macaroni grill. i ordered the chicken parmesan again and we talked about our glorious life together.

this was our dessert and it was a total disappointment. i'm at the point in my life that i'd rather make my own dessert than pay for a restaurant to mess it up.

when we got home, all the kids sat on me. who would have thought 12 years ago we would already have it all?(photobomb by the toilet! it is like part of the family.)

in other news, blythe has continued her independent spirit streak. 

she also readily informs us of when she is ready for a diaper change. i think potty training at 18 months sounds pretty swell.

and she never met a bag she didn't like. her faves are the $200 designer bags at tjmaxx. you can't teach that.

i don't know what is going on here:

on saturday the 26th, i ran my 5th half marathon. i spent the last two months "training". i use "training" rather loosely because i ran distance every saturday and that was about it as far as a running schedule. some mornings i would get up before anyone else except seminary kids and go for a quick neighborhood run so that i could still get the kids to school on time. 

my pre-race drink of choice was pepto bismol because i do not like to play games with my stomach. it has one job, get me to the finish line. 

the weather was a freezing 30 degrees, a 25 degree drop from the saturday before. 

i ran with my friend, holly, who ran zero miles in training and signed up the week of the race and did amazing. because she's amazing. it's always more fun to run with a friend. 

the best part for me was the whole fam damily at the finish line. they weren't excited to be there, but i was sure excited to see them! 

since i burned 1,360 calories during the race, i ate everything that i don't allow myself to eat.

culvers!

deep fried cheese curds!(the pepto bismol was good foresight. i am a prophetess.)

and a double butter cheeseburger.

 my dad used to refer to me as pocahontas growing up because i liked to wear blankets around the house. saturday i needed them to help me stave off hypothermia. it took me hours to get warm again. my southern bones can't handle that!

our church trunk or treat was that night. i wore sweat pants and a striped sweatshirt and called myself a referee. 

my darling, beautiful children were harry("but i'm actually reagan")potter and two bumble bees. thomas was "a casual dad".

they had so much fun and i ate all their skittles and fruit flavored tootsie rolls.

this past sunday i wore an outfit that was almost entirely thrifted and so i feel the need to brag about that. 

genuine red tag levi's jacket- $5.25(i know!)

trina turk button up- $1(for real)

jcrew no. 2 pencil skirt- $4.25(what?)

"i solemnly swear i am up to no good."-blythe simpson

o heidi of little faith

what was once one of the most dreaded weekends of the year is now one of my most favorite weekends of the year. general conference weekend is the weekend where we as Latter-day Saints, are able to listen to the prophet's voice and the words of his servants. what was once so boring and tortuous as a youth, is now a treasure trove to me. this general conference weekend had a bonus. my dear friend, amy, (running partner extraordinaire) was sealed to her family for time and all eternity in the columbia, south carolina temple. we believe that families are forever and that families are sealed together by the keys of the priesthood in the temple. 

Matthew 16:19  "And I will ^agive unto thee the ^bkeys of the ^ckingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt ^dbind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

however, getting to the temple an hour and half away on a friday afternoon is easier said than done. it took some planning and a lot of faith, but miraculously, thomas was able to get away from work meetings to come home and i pulled the kids out of school early to accomplish this goal. it was stressful and i kept thinking that trying to accomplish such a worthy goal should be a lot easier! i had given up about 10 minutes before thomas walked in the door. o heidi of little faith. in retrospect, it worked out perfectly but it was not how i thought it should go and that is what makes things hard. i had to concede that i don't know everything and i don't have to have control over everything to make things work. 

needless to say, it was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life. 

i know families are forever. these families units are not coincidental or simply a good idea. they are divine and inspired. 

i was a bawl baby during the entire service. it was a wonderful reminder of how i need to work to make my marriage work and the beauty in the marriage covenant.

the most touching quote of the day was from amy's eldest daughter, noel. she was overcome with tears in the temple. it softened my grizzled, tough heart. when asked about her tears she said, "i knew the Spirit would be strong, but i thought it would be like at a baptism. i didn't know i could feel the Spirit so strongly." out of the mouths of babes!

my dear amy

and what we are really like:

my dear friend karina. 

at the same time on thursday, karina and i both received a text from amy talking about how excited amy was to be ironing all the kid's clothes for the temple. karina and i had been discussing how we were going to get to the temple with 7 children between the two of us that need to be picked up from school at various times and required different childcare needs. after amy's text we both knew we just had to make it happen. so we plotted and planned and it worked. james 2:17 Even so ^afaith, if it hath not ^bworks, is dead, being alone. we can't sit on our hands feeling sorry for ourselves that our situation is not ideal expect things to work out how we would like. we have to facilitate miracles. we can't drive a parked car. 

after the temple experience, enjoying conference was icing on the cake.

the kids were sort of reverent so we could listen to most of the talks on saturday and sunday. i enjoyed so many speakers, but a few talks really spoke to my heart. elder uchtdorf was wonderful and i especially loved elder christofferson's talk. elder nelson was so inspiring i acutally heard a whip cracking: self-mastery is reason over appetite. freedom from self-slavery is true liberation. and elder eyring said some wonderful thoughts about marriage that really hit close to home.  

and lest ye think we all sat quietly and absorbed every iota of instruction, this is what a lot of our time together "listening" and "watching" looked like:

and instead of uplifting and educational activities for the kids to do, i just tried to keep the fighting to a dull roar. i did take the time to straighten both mine and scarlett's hair during a session. SO LONG!!!

                                  

one of my best weekends for sure!