just another day

Today was rather ordinary for us but I have a quote in my bedroom that reads;

Enjoy the little things in life,

For someday you may realize they were the big things.

So I guess ordinary is actually rather extraordinary!

We have company, Auntie Jenn, Rob and baby Max are visiting YEAH!  We love smothering Max in kisses. Every time we see him he seems to have grown exponentially. Company actually happens rather often and we had a quick turnaround this week with back to back guests as Gramma Hinko slept over on her way through town and then Auntie Jenn came down with her peeps. We LOVE having company visit!

There was the usual school pick up and drop off. The mornings when we are early enough we park a block away and walk Amelia. This morning though she just wanted to sit on my lap and talk by the front door of the school, so we chatted, played some eye spy, played a letter game they play at school and I just relished in snuggling my big school girl close. Parents walked by and smiled and I know this won't last forever, her wanting to snuggle me rather then have a few minutes with friends before the bell. Stella stayed home with Auntie Jenn getting in some Max snuggles!  We are on a quest for a new backpack because Amelia's zipper busted beyond repair :( but I refuse to pay a ton of money so we made 3 stops and finally gave up. What was successful was quickly grabbing a few groceries with the ladies, a cookie always helps of course!!!  The afternoon brought beautiful weather so there was some biking, a front porch snack and then Daddy wake up before we ran off to violin lessons. I even squeezed in watching a bit of the political debate because I need to know where I want to through my vote. Post dinner on a Monday means Family Home Evening and it was fun to help Max do Ring-Around-The-Rosie with us (our gathering song for FHE).  I love when lessons are fun, we feel the spirit and the bedtime rush goes smooth.  Tonight we started a new bunny chapter book that Amelia earned for diligent violin practice, she was so excited. Today was definitely another busy, crazy, fun, ordinary beautiful day!!!!!!

~ Momma P

dance festival

 Things got pretty thrilling for our little dancer on the weekend, she had her first dance festival.  It was emotional and exciting. There were both tears and smiles!  Her teacher is fabulous with littles and the student helpers just rock as well.  Things got pretty real for us as we have had a parent make-up tutorial and strict emails with specific instructions, gosh it certainly a culture one has to learn.  It was exciting though to watch....except when there were tears ;)

Stella made the perfect side kick! Gosh how I love these women, Amelia's chill thumbs up and Stella's super smile!!!! So blessed I tell ya.

~ Mrs. P

Chicks ROCKIN our world

Things have been THRILLING at our house!  

Seriously, little chicks have been ROCKIN our world. Wednesday morning was actually day 20 but we noticed a few eggs had cracks showing and the entire day we were in and out of the den peaking in on the incubator to see if there were any changes. It wasn't until 11 o'clock when everyone else had gone to bed did our first little chickie hatch out. Grandma Hinko was sleeping so I called and woke Alyson to tell her the news.  I had been up folding laundry eagerly waiting.  It was incredible to watch and I ended up staying up until 1:30 and was able to watch another two hatch out, it was so cool!

Amelia Ann usually sneaks into my bed sometime after midnight and when the woman woke and tried to come she noticed me in watching the new chick and was pumped up! It was fun to see her all sleepy smiling and so excited.

Thursday continued to be a day of 'watching, watching, watching'.

One of my hopes with this hatching was that my little Joy School people would be able to witness a hatch and they DID!!!!!!  

It felt bit like we have been living in this perpetual edge of your seat, excitement, anticipating every new little chick....waiting each arrival and then naming and looking at their unique colours combinations. It has been an incredible experience!  We have made it a learning experience too because I am a nerd and that is how I roll. We decorated the box, we have graphed and have written about a chick's life cycle and read poems, oh and the best was watching my little Joy School people do the chicken dance!  It has been a blast.  

There is just something amazing watching life unfold before your eyes.  It has been such a wonderful experience for our family

~ Momma P

cutest pirate ever

This chick is probs the cutest pirate ever!!!! I was able to be in her class TWICE this week for a literacy day and then the class pirate party!  Such.a.blast.   I am grateful for good friends and a sister who I can swap kiddos with, because I know the days of getting to be in her class all of the time come to an end.  Sooooo I will take it when I can get it!  Also who doesn't like calling other people 'scallywags' and 'landobers' seriously so fun :)  I am eager to have a similar experience with Stella Bella in a few years. It is fun to watch who your kid is in their own environment!!!

~ Mrs. P

the man

We have been missing the man.  He is here, he is around BUT he is working like crazy.  I can't help but miss him for many reasons but have learned I need to chase the missing him blues with thankfulness and busyness...this works for me in keeping the shutdown burnout disease from creeping in!  I will take the quick squeezes and kisses when I can and hold dear our Sunday nights (his one day off).  It could be tougher and we really do have a good gig going BUT we do miss the man like crazy.

~ Mrs. P

park day beauties

Stunning spring weather, a fun park and good friends....what more does one need?  Definitely the top three things on our gratitude list for the day.

~ Mrs. P

more like sisters then cousins

Captured these 'SUPER' girls in their super hero shirts the other day ;)

I tell Alyson often that I am so grateful our littlest women have another.  They have such fun together, play together and bug each other in such a way that they are more like sisters then cousins.  I just know they will grow to be good friends!  Lucky little ladies to have one another.

~ Momma P

the greatest gift

These two goof balls are simply the greatest gift and if these are the only two folks that join our family here on earth we are counting ourselves extremely blessed.  I know that all children are miracles but truly our children are miracles!!!!!  The last few months I have gotten a bit sad each time it was confirmed that I was sadly not pregnant so Graham took a minute and did some calculations....we have a 2.5% success rate for conception....all of the possible months of our nearly 13 year marriage went into that number....not really sure if I am happy to know that or not hahahahaha!  What I do know is that it has made me again look at our little women as the greatest gift I have been given and the greatest responsibility I have here.

I continue to have moments of sadness creep into my heart. I recently saw one of our neighbors emerge after a long winter and she had an adorable pregnant belly.  I smiled and waved from across the street, it was the best I could do and as I got into my car the tears rolled down from behind my sunglasses as I thought I would have had a pregnant tummy like that if only...

Can't camp out in that grief though. Feel it and let it go has truly become my creed. I have sweet people in my life who are sensitive and say or do the very thing my heart seems to need, not just in regard to our loss but life in general and I am so grateful.

Back to our little women being our greatest gift, THEY ARE! This is motivation for me to step it up more. Step up aspects of my life I need to and I am thankful for the motivation.  I am a woman who needs motivation so perhaps knowing the 2.5% statistic is a good thing ;)

~ Mrs. P

an egg-celent idea

 A few months ago we were visiting Auntie Linda's farm and Alyson kind of brought up an idea AND it has so far been pretty egg-celent! (see what I did there?)  We were there and witness a chick hatching from its egg, it was so rad!! Alyson suggested we give it a try.  We have a source for eggs and a resource to send the babies to.

We borrowed the incubator and all necessary supplies from our Great Aunt and are 10 days away from hatching some baby chicks in my den :)  It is mostly exciting, although slightly terrifying!!  Hatching chickens is a 21 day process so we tried to line things up so Stella's little Joy School friends will be here the day they are due to hatch!!!!!  I host JS this month and am sooooo pleased to offer this experience to our little friends. I was able to find really great stuff online to print out and my girls are heavy into the YouTube Chicken Life cycle videos. I have been looking online and there really is a ton of great, free activities that we are able to do :)

The care is very simple; humidity around 40 and temp 37.5c. Add water and slightly adjust vent to manage those two variables. The machine it self turns from side to side so there is no rotation required. Literally we just add water and check it. I must say though I completely understand where the saying "old mother hen" comes from. The first night we set the eggs I probably checked them 100 times before bed!!!!!

 Amelia and Stella are anxiously anticipating the chicks - me too honestly!!!!  I changed out the chalkboard to match what is happening in the den ;)  I am so grateful Alyson encouraged me to help her do this for our ladies.  Neely and Jacey even received little toy chicks in their Easter baskets so they are practicing gentle hands, love it.

Stay tuned for adorable updates!!!!!!

~ Momma P

the Great-Grands

 Any day we get to hang with these adorable people is a good day indeed!

My grandparents, my ladies Great-Grands are pretty much the best.  We drove into the city with the Bird ladies, met up with Leslie and had a lunch that filled our bellies and a visit that fed our souls. Oh how blessed we are to have them close and how lucky I feel to call my Gma a friend. They model a marriage that I aspire to and show such service and unconditional love....truly wonderful examples.

My Gramma's vision is almost gone, where she now sees various shades of grey or only high contrast like black on white. She is AMAZING!!!!!! Amelia crawled up on Gramma as she lay on the couch, Amelia had the Friend magazine in hand and began talking with Gramma about the pictures.  It was a tender moment to hear my sweet Gramma explain that she couldn't see the pictures anymore and then listen to Amelia describe the image of a mother holding a baby.  I sat across the room with tears in my eyes. What grace Gramma shows as she faces this challenge, what tenderness she shows to those around her.  I so want to be the kind of woman she is.  She strives for goodness with all of her Might, Mind and Strength, you can just see it!! 

So grateful for my Gparents or Great-Grands (to my ladies)!!!

~ Mrs. P

Easter Weekend

I have not made blogging a priority lately and gosh as I downloaded pictures from my phone and camera I was so sad that I hadn't recorded more of our 'stuff'. So here I go.

How awesome is Easter?  

We were given a set of 12 Resurrection Eggs from our Auntie Amy, so for these 12 days before Easter Sunday we have been opening an egg, looking at the object and reading the story/scripture that coincides. Super cool! There is such a wealth of resources at our finger tips as parents and I am very thankful.  www.lds.org has a section of bible videos which has wonderful 5-10min narrations that the girls like to watch about the life of the Savior.  Seriously so much goodness out there to help us all remember that the focus should be on our Savior Jesus Christ.  My Facebook feed has been full of beautiful msgs, videos and music!! I am constantly calling the girls to come watch.

 Of course some fun Easter crafts and egg decorating happened.  Amelia said that I apparently "don't play with them"....tear....but did say that I do CRAFTS with them - that is good I guess!

Some fun festive FOOD is a must!

 I LOVE the magic of childhood!!!! The Easter Bunny visited and left some pretty fun stuff ;)

 Egg Hunters

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We clearly LOVE chicks and bunnies at our house.....
we also LOVE Jesus Christ.
Because of Him the joy I feel with my family has a promise of forever,
 Because of Him my soul finds peace in the midst of sorrow and
Because of Him as I try my best, when I mess up I know there is a way to fix it.

Happy Easter ♥

~ Mrs. P

easter photos

My sweet cousin Emma has mad skills with her camera so when she offered to come out to our little city to do Easter Mini Shoots - I totally wanted in!!!!   Bonus, the bunny is our Toffee Elsa!

I did a massive back up of pictures on our external hard drive and looking through photos made me all nostalgic, then seeing these.

Stella's face is so mature, her hands those of a big girl. 

 Amelia's smile and crossed legs make her seem so old. Tears!!!!!!

Photos to be treasured.

~ Momma P