Thoughts.

1.  So I went to the doctor a little while ago – different one this time, a specialist.  He said he could yank my tonsils out if I wanted, I said no thanks, and he said okay.  He was nice.  We have a plan for the next time I get strep (IF I do).  Anyway, the point of this story is that I had only Talmage and Orrin with me, and he asked if I had any more, and I told him that I have 5 kids, and he was surprised.  Then, when asking me if I had gotten strep a lot as a kid (I didn’t), he asked if I had lots of siblings, like maybe 7?  And I said, 8 in fact, and he said, “Are you Mormonic?”  Ha ha ha haaa!!  Why yes, yes I am.  I guess.  :)

2.  Talmage and I were swinging in the backyard and looking at the moon and he said, "If we rode an airplane to the moon would we see Jesus? Or Santa?"

3. One night I heard Talmage crying a little bit, so I went into his room and found him on the floor. I said, "Did you fall out of bed?" and he said, "Yes. But I didn't hurt any of myself."

4.  So, last week I was in such a bad mood, and I was feeling all angry at Brett and lonely and isolated and my life is so pitiful boo hoo hoo poor me, and then I called my sister and she cheered me up and then we played all weekend (the kids had Monday off for Pfingsten (pentecost)) and I feel better and wonder what I was thinking.  Isn’t that how it goes.  So, a while ago I read this article on keeping marriages strong/happy/existing, and I found it rather interesting because usually when I read anything like that, it’s written by a church leader or member, but this wasn’t.  There were several points that rang true to me, but the main thing I liked (rather guiltily) was this:

12.Make a husband pact with your friends.
The husband pact says this: I promise to listen to you complain about your husband even in the most dire terms, without it affecting my good opinion of him. I will agree with your harshest criticism, accept your gloomiest predictions. I will nod and furrow my brow and sigh when you describe him as a hideous ogre. Then when your fight is over and love shines again like a beautiful sunbeam in your life, I promise to forget everything you said and regard him as the most charming of princes once more. The husband pact is very useful because you want to be able to vent to your friend without having her actually start hating your husband. Because you don't really mean all those things you say. And she, the swearer of the pact, knows this.

Always I hear “NEVER NEVER criticize your husband to anyone” and I know that that is the right and the best thing to do.  But, reading about the husband pact felt like I found the law of Moses as compared to the higher law of never saying anything at all negative about him to anyone ever under no circumstances; and I felt like – YES- I can actually KEEP this law!  Now don’t think that I go about blabbing to people all the annoyances I have with Brett or his imperfections or whatnot, but sometimes doesn’t it just feel good when you’re really frustrated to get on the phone with your sister and fume a bit, and then you’re done venting, and you can go on with life?  Which is kindof how it was last week—my sister was understanding, gave me sympathy, and reminded me of my own life theory of the bell curve, and how it will swing back to the positive.  And I felt better!  And I don’t think it damaged her opinion of Brett, because I think she –without ever having to read about it!- just kept the pact.

5.  There were other good points on that list, so here’s the link if you would like to go peruse. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lydia-netzer/marriage-secrets_b_1459770.html?ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

I like number 4, 5, 8, 9, and 14.

6.  So, I totally forgot to ever mention this, but Jethro went to a ski camp in Celerina for a week when Brett and I were in Morocco.  Later he wrote a letter to a friend of his, and I read it before putting it in an envelope, and saw this:
I am pleased to tell you that neither me nor anybody else experienced a mortal injury from a ski accident.
Right now in addition to Star Wars fever, I’m also addicted to fighter planes, like the F-15.
p.s. Sorry if I have lots of mistakes or ununderstandable writing.

7.  So, we have two different computer screens now, after the new computer was brought to life, and the color is really off between them.  IT’S KILLING ME!  No really, because I have to edit on the left screen, because that’s where I can pull up windows, but I think the left screen is the one that is off.  More off?  I don’t know.  So I edited all of Hazel’s baptism pictures on the right, then had to do all this mumbo jumbo and now when I see them on the left, it looks bad.  Grrrrrrrrrr.  Brett has tried messing around with the screen to get them correct, but hasn’t been able to match the left to the right.  What can I do?

That’s all.

Our home.

So, since we’ve decided to stay in Switzerland for a while longer, the idea came up to perhaps move into a bigger apartment because with seven people in our 3-bedroom smallish apartment, it can be a bit squeezy.  BUT, there are so many things we love about where we are.  Shall I list?
Good things:

1. Kids can walk to school.
2. Kids (especially Hazel) have good friends here.
3. Our neighbors are really nice and have never complained about our kids.
4. We live in a BEAUTIFUL spot!!
5. We have milk right around the corner (farm fresh even), so  essentially we never run out of milk.  That’s awesome, in case you were wondering.
6. We’re at the end of a long dead-end, so traffic is a non-issue.
7. We have a farm around the corner, and the woods around the other corner.
8. Close to Bern and church.
9. Big windows.
10. My downstairs neighbor is a chef and often gives us food.  Honestly, it’s AWESOME.

And bad things:

1. Nasty orange and green tile.
2. A little tight, and all one level (my dream is to someday have a downstairs so that I can send the kids down and they’re not always right under my feet).

That’s about it.  Oh, and I should have put on my good list that it is pretty affordable.  If you get even a little bit bigger in size, the price can just skyrocket.  Crazy Swiss prices.  So, we keep an eye on available apartments, but it would have to be a pretty ideal situation for us to actually move.  And in truth, it doesn’t feel the small in the summer, mainly in the winter. Besides, even 'bigger' isn't much bigger.  Basically, we're an American-sized family trying to fit into Swiss-sized residences.
Shall I show you again how pretty it is where we live?
        
 
It’s also very pretty in the spring rain, in the autumn, in the snow, and more snow, and even fog.   Who could leave this?

Day to day pictures.

I have so many pictures waiting to be posted, so I will just start dumping.

Wrestling.

                  

I brought out a little shade tent and set it up in the front room and the kids were so excited you’d think it was a Disney Land attraction.

      

Piggy back races.

                      

Beautiful daughter.

So, the other night I took Hazel out for some pictures.  She wore the gorgeous dress I had an amazingly-talented seamstress make for her (more info on that later) to wear at her baptism, and we curled her hair (it fell out in 2.2 seconds, even though I pinned the curls up for an hour thinking that would help them stay in), and headed to the temple.  It was so much fun, and I about died when I looked at the pictures.  I have such a beautiful daughter (two, in fact).  Hazel is wonderful and I love every little thing about her.  She is so perfectly Hazelish.  Here is the video.  Two points if you know what movie the music is from, it’s one of Hazel’s favorites.  (As always, make it big.)




If you feel the need to gush about how pretty she is, I won't stop you.  ;)

Mother’s Day Pictures

I had Jethro take some pictures of me with some of the kids the other day.  Too bad I didn’t then take a picture with him.

Talmage didn’t want to cooperate.

 

I love that funny face.

 

Pretty much I have to kiss that kid’s face off cause he’s so cute/

And these pictures were from the Sunday after mother’s day.  (Tricky, I know.)

 

Brett took a bunch, and then we were done and I really quickly looked at them, and they were all super duper white and blown-out.  Which was a shame.

 

So then he took some more.  But by then, Orrin was really done.  But I think Ethne looks super duper cute.

 

See?

Also here where she’s laughing is adorable.

 

Okay, so the other day we were in Bern and we went to the awesome store that sells English paperbacks for one frank, and there was a Chicken Soup for the Mother’s Soul, and since it was so cheap I bought it.  So I read it and it made me kindof sick.  I mean, taken a bit at a time, the stories were mostly really sweet and good, but read all at once it was just overkill.  I mean, listen to this:  “We adored her.  She was our everything.  This was a joyous woman, an eternal optimist, always smiling, always humming, her words punctuated with an easy flowing laughter that caused her to toss her long, soft brown hair over her shoulders.”  Give me  a break.  But the whole thing was like that (not with writing just like that, thankfully) but all about the sacrifice, the love, the selflessness, the sweetness, the blah blah blah of their mothers.  Basically  I came away from the book feeling more like I’m a terrible mom instead of inspired. 

Except for one thing that I loved and actually felt like I could relate to- a Family Circus comic, where the mother is at her door while holding her screaming baby, a toddler pulling at her pants and her other kids crowding near her,  talking to a lady who has come and handed her a pamphlet and she answers her, “OF COURSE I’d like to be the ideal mother.  But I’m too busy raising children.” 

Anyway, I sure love my kids- they are the best!  I’m the luckiest mom ever!

Amy’s wedding.

These pictures are a bit late.  Oh well.  So, when I went to Arizona in December, we did more than just bowl.  There was also a wedding.  And I wanted to post some pictures because I had such a great time there and pictures help me remember.  I stole these pictures from all over- my brothers and sisters and the professional photographer and everything.  Also, they are all very out of order.

First, here is my sister Amy and her husband Kam.  Aren’t they so good-looking?

 

And with their kids- her five and his two.  Their seven.

These pictures are from one night at Amy’s house just hanging out and talking and eating chocolates and having SO MUCH FUN!!  You see, it’s really my family’s fault that it is sometimes hard on me to be so far away.  If they weren’t so cool, it would be easy to never see them.  Dang family.

And this picture of me is yucky horrible, but I just love my mom in it so much that I am sacrificing my vanity and putting it in anyway.  Look at me being so noble.

 

Lindsay and Sterling thought something was funny.  Probably they looked at my Dad. 

At the wedding reception. 

Ethan, now the only unmarried in our family.

Me and my only little sister Lindsay. 

 

    

The original family.  From left to right: Mom, Wyatt, Megan, Derek, Amy, Ethan, Lindsay, Me, Kami, Andrea, Dad.

 

And the rest of our family of course including spouses and grandkids.  Only missing Wyatt and Lindsay Ann’s four kids (though it was three at the time), and Brett and our kids.  Sniff sniff.

 

 

 

Some of us at the hotel.

 

I took these awesome family pictures for Megan and Jared, so I definitely had to post them.

I think this kissing picture is so super duper duper adorable cause they’re laughing and smiling so cute.

 

Ethan and I were each other’s dates.

Sidenote- I don’t really love how my hair was.  It’s not terrible or anything, but the reason I mention it is because I paid someone to do it, and then it was just kindof so so, which is a letdown.  But at least I am validated when I say how hard my hair is to curl, because the lady was like, you’re hair is super thick but super fine and straight.  It took a long time.  Then I wanted her to have it in a side-messy-bun-thingee, and she tried and tried and couldn’t get it to stay, and finally I’m like- uhh, just leave it I guess.  Lamesauce.  But at least she took some thinning shears to it, so it was worth the money.

  

We always do a picture like this at the weddings.

 

My sister Kami and her husband Leo and their familia.

 

My brother Derek and his wife Brooke and their kids.

 

My brother Wyatt and his wife Lindsay Ann.

 

My sister Andrea and her husband Tim and their family.

   

One night we went to see the lights at the Mesa Temple and we had a good time.

 

Okay, this picture is funny to me because if you can find where I am, I am sitting next to Ethan and Wyatt, leaning over and Ethan is laughing and Wyatt is saying something ridiculous.  This is right before the wedding ceremony, and let me tell you, I could barely keep from laughing out loud throughout the whole thing.  They kept saying stuff like how they were going to order pizza so that the pizza delivery guy came right in the middle of the wedding, or how they were going to tear off their clothes and jump into the swimming pool and stuff along those lines (except funnier).  I was dying.  It was a good night.  After the wedding we all had lots of yummy soup and desserts and hung out and then they started playing dance music and we all (well, some of us, some people had to leave) went crazy on the dance floor and had an all-star time.

The end.  I wish they could get married all over again so I could come visit again.