NEHS

 This last month Eliza went through the process of applying for the National Elementary Honors Society. It was a long application process where she had to list specific examples of how she has shown responsibility in service, community, and leadership. I have mixed feelings about this because what 9 year old has "appointed or elected leadership positions" to list? All the same, she really put a lot of effort into this application. Aside from filling out the long list, she had to ask for 2 letters of recommendation. Also, she had to write an essay that had a long and specific writing prompt. AND she had to do it all. We could give suggestions, but she had to write and fill out everything.

 Then, there was this awkward time when her teacher threatened to not let anyone in the class join because one kid put a sticky note on another's back that said "kick me." That situation got totally out of hand with so many threats and lectures. Fortunately she didn't follow through with that particular threat. Cause seriously I would have gone all mama-bear on her for not letting my kid in this organization after she put so much time and effort into the application. Not to mention there is seriously no way she put the sticky note on Teagan's back.

 *Deep breath* Anyway, the ceremony was really sweet and formal with kids lighting candles from the four pillars of the Honor Society. Service, Responsibility, Leadership, Scholarship. Eliza picked to light her candle from scholarship because she thought it represented her best. I think she could have picked any of them. She's amazing.

 She is lighting the candle in this picture. I am so blessed to have such an wonderful girl. Last week, as a family we were studying in the new "Come Follow Me" manual and did the activity of making a jar with slips of paper in it that are ideas of how we can help do "the Father's work." So we all brainstormed ideas, wrote them on slips of paper, and each morning this week we drew them to see what we were going to try to do that day. One day, Eliza drew "speak kind words." Apparently, at school that day, the slip of paper got dropped out of her pocket, and her teacher found it. The teacher shared with the class the next day, how it inspired her to speak more kindly. Eliza told the class that it was her's and explained a little bit about what we were doing. Mrs. Perks asked Eliza to share what was on her slip the next day. She even told Eliza to write it on a special board, and they looked up a quote to go along with it. Mrs. Perks said that she could do this everyday. Pretty cool.

NEHS Essay

by Eliza Pearson

The National Elementary Honor Society's goal is to serve. My definition  of service is quite simple. The two most important things are that you are helping others and your motive for serving.  It is not service if you are trying to benefit yourself or get praise. Service, too, requires sacrifice- time, energy, money, etc. Something else I really like about service is that it makes you and the people you are serving happier.

                One reason I want to be in this year's Kyrene Monte Vista NEHS Chapter is because I want more opportunities to serve others. I love to serve! I think it is fun. There is also a good chance I will get to tutor. I think that would be fun for me to interact with younger kids and educational. Also, I would be good at it because I have two younger sisters I help all the time.  Further, I would like the chance to improve our school and community. I believe that if everyone worked hard to improve those, the world would be a better place. Finally, it would be good to develop the feeling that hard work can be enjoyed.

                School is very important for two main reasons. Obviously, one is learning. I think that there are two different kinds of learning--education and life lessons. Education is learning things like PEMDAS (the order of operations) and spelling. Life lessons are things like learning how to manage strong emotions: things you will use forever. The second reason is that you can interact other kids your age. You can learn to collaborate, get along, and work with others. You need these skills to be successful in life. It is important to contribute to the community because other people will have greater happiness. For example, if we look out for our neighbors, our neighborhoods will be safer.

                Lastly, I intend to make service a part of my life. I will look for people to serve every day because Henry B. Eyring once said, "When you meet someone, treat them as if they were in serious trouble, and you will be right more than half the time. " If lots of people are considerate and put other's needs before their own, we can make a difference. I like this African proverb: " If you think you are too small to make a difference, you have never spent the night with a mosquito.''  I will practice serving others now. I want to make service a habit.  I will serve as much as I can in my life.

New Years Interview 2019

These News Year's interviews are great. We have a lot of fun doing them. My favorite this year is how John's needed to be split into two parts so Holland could go to the bathroom. I sure love this family of mine.

Growth Rates

Clearly this blog isn't as organized as it could be and neither is my life. I took the girls in for their well check in 2017 at various times of the year, but unfortunately wasn't with their birthday like you are supposed to. The year 2018 was even worse. I finally took them in for a combined well check visit and flu shot appointment in mid-November. Neither of these stats I have recorded yet. So here we go.

Eliza 

5/17/17

8 years

49 lbs / 13.87%

49.5 in / 28.95%

11/14/18

9 years 8 months

55.2 lbs / 9%

52.5 in / 32%

Miriam 

10/10/17

6 years

40 lbs / 15%

45 in / 33%

11/14/18

7 years 4 months

44 lbs / 12%

47.25 in / 25%

Holland

5/17/17

2 years

22.6 lbs / 5.44%

34 in / 65.54%

19.25 in / 89.03% (Head Circumference)

11/14/18

3 years 6 months

28.6 lbs / 11%

36.5 in / 12%

Little Sunbeam

 Oh, my sweet Holland, how can you be growing up so fast? This last Sunday, in addition to being the first Sunday with two hour church and the Come Follow Me curriculum, was Holland's first day in Primary as a Sunbeam. She grew up way too fast for me recently: first, switching her car seat to forward facing; second, starting sunbeams?! It probably helps that she is small for her age, and she acts younger than her little buddy Sophie. I delude myself into thinking she is my baby even though there are life events telling me she is growing up.
At 3.5 Holland loves playing kitchen, toddler legos, looking at stories, watching movies, and eating pistachios and other treats (especially gum!!). She loves her balance bike, baby bear, and doing tricks. She really loves bossing people around, painting, and doing things herself. Holland is still loving reading lesson, but depending on the day I am more optimistic or frustrated at her progress. At least she loves it though. We still struggle with her not having potty accidents, but it is definitely less of a problem than it used to be.  She loves preschool time, especially at Sophie's house.

Holland has us all wrapped around her finger, but she is also still 3 years old. This means, we are pretty sure she is about 70% pure delight and 30% pure terror. Those percentages might have been switched today because of some epic tantrums plus a sweet moment when she hugged my face and told me "You are my good buddy."
Another great moment recently was when I told her that she was cute and she replied with, "I think so!" You ride the confidence forever, my little one.
Another sweet moment was when she asked to color a picture, "Can I color a picture of my beautiful family?"

It was less sweet, but hilarious when she threw a full temper tantrum because "I want it to rain inside!"
Holland is really obsessed with curly hair vs. wrinkly hair. I am not really sure which one she thinks she has compared to what other people have, but she gets real offended if you tell her she has wrinkly hair. "I don't have wrinkly hair!!"
Other things are more acceptable. "Here are my happy panties, Mommy."
She has started asking "Why not?" a lot! It is funny to remember how Ellie used to say, "Why?" and Miriam used to say "How do you know?" at this exact stage. What funny girls!
Less funny is how obsessed she is with making kitty, doggy, and baby noises, which all amounts to the same thing. Little whiny squeals.
One hilarious day was when she told me, "I have everything I want." This was right after she pooped in the toilet. Later than day after I had to go, "Are you proud of yourself, Mommy?" She cracks me up.

Look how tiny she looks up on that front row!

Also, something funny. Check out this picture Holland drew of me. I am feeling a little chubby since the holidays, so I am not sure how I feel about this. :) 

12 Years!

12 years with this guy. I am the luckiest girl in the world. I could just leave it at that, but I can't resist bragging about my man. He is the smartest, most considerate, loving, faithful person I know. Not to mention, he's super hot, obviously. I just loved how we flow. I couldn't imagine a better partner in life. He's the kind of guy that I don't dare tell my friends the full truth about how great he is and all the ways he serves our family because I don't want them to feel bad about their husbands. 

We celebrated our anniversary over the course of a couple nights. One night we went to dinner. Another night we had divine chocolate fondue. He even let me beat him at a couple of games. We still love playing games together. I surprised him with a little love note and a new pair of work pants. He surprised me with a flower and some money for a luxury item of my choice. :) Actually our real present to each other is to go a highly recommended play in March. We just reserved the tickets. I am excited to go on a 'real' date with my sweetheart. 

I can't quite believe how the time has flown, but clearly it is passing. I am itching to photoshop my wrinkles out, but I can't deny that we are getting older, just like we are supposed to be. Also, the last 12 years have been magnificent. I don't want to erase the evidence of that time. I mean, c'mon, I get to be with the love of my life and these three darling girls. I couldn't imagine a luckier wife and mother. 

Christmas Break and Visit to Utah

I didn't take that many photos this Christmas break, but it was still a wonderful Christmas. Actually, I am able to supplement with photos that my sisters-in-law texted me. We started out the trip right, by listening to an engrossing audiobook on the drive up there. We finally let the kids listen to Harry Potter. (We have not let them read it before because we wanted them to be old enough to appreciate it.) We listened to the first book on the way up and the second on the way back.  It was great for so many reasons. First, we switched Holland's car seat to forward facing. The novelty of facing forward for that first drive really kept her happy. This meant that we didn't need to turn on special songs for her, and just gave her books and toys to look at and play with. Also, I took a motion sickness pill that made me sleepy, which made the drive go a lot faster for me. John and the older girls were thoroughly entertained by the book, and I have listened to it and read it enough that it was fun to doze while half listening. Best drive yet, I think. 

The next day was my birthday, and we went to David and Patti's church to see their Christmas program. After my mom made me a spinach cake, and we had a yummy lunch. Then we went to the Pearson Christmas dinner. We had a fantastic Mel's Kitchen Cafe recipe that we love. I got to pick because it was my birthday. Lemon Garlic Chicken Wraps. Delightful! After we had pie and other treats. :) 

On Christmas Eve, we had an earlier celebration with my family, during which we did a Nativity. Eliza got her dearest wish and got to play Mary. I also had an angel and a sheep. It was so darling. 

Then, of course there is the rice pudding. Instead of doing an almond, I suggested we do a craisin instead because of the allergies in the group. We think Sammy ate the one craisin, and Luke got the other, like always. We hate him... :) 

Prize was a bag of chocolate covered mangos. Delish.

After the rice pudding and nativity my grandma recited the Christmas story from the Bible to us with David's help. She has done this my whole life. She can't really read anymore because her vision is so wonky, but it was still tender. 

We love our cousins!

That night we stayed up and wrapped way too many gifts. I know we said that we went overboard last year on gifts, so we really tried to be more moderate this year. So we spent less money, but still got them a TON of stuff. It didn't help that my parents gave the kids a lot of things from Jolene. They were sure spoiled!

We started out the day with eating breakfast first, and then doing our little devotional. We sang some Christmas songs then dug in. It was a great morning.
I didn't take any pictures with the presents unwrapped. We got them all a bunch of movies: some expensive, some used from Goodwill because we need to delete the ones we ripped from the library. Holland got just some little things: watercolors, bubble bath, Kid's Crest (she loves it!), and a gear toy from Costco. Miriam received different things from Ellie for once: compass, magnifying glass, binoculars, books, ear muffs, and a purse she can color on. Eliza got a nice science book, a couple of cheap books, a nice waterbottle, and a calligraphy pad. They also gave presents to each other. The highlight of that was Ellie receiving the game "Pie Face." It is a hilarious game during which people often get whipped cream in their face. Perfect for a 9 year old. It makes Holland a little nervous though, even though she loves it.
Daddy got new church shoes, a toy for his desk, and a head massager. Mommy got a foam roller for sore muscles, calligraphy things, and a new paper cutter. In theory we are going to get some lighting work done on the house as part of our Christmas present too. We'll see. Things are feeling expensive right now.
We also did fun stockings and got yummy treats in the stockings from Grandma.

After getting ready for the day we went to John's parent's house and chatted with them for a while and had lunch. Then it was over to Kayla's house for the Deru gift exchange and Lucas Christmas dinner. And it was fabulous. Kayla gave us a lot of craft equipment and a light board. We gave Marc and Miriam's family nerf guns and citrus from Arizona. Aunt Carol always spoils us with gifts for each kid and something great for the adults. This year she knocked it out of the park with delicious salad dressing for us. 

Then we had an amazing Chinese dinner. We rounded up a lot of electric skillets and all cooked the food together right before dinner. I can't even imagine how much time and money it took for Kayla to prep all of that. I think there were 11 dishes! She had everything chopped and sauces made. We just had to cook it. It was so amazing and delicious. The only hiccup was that all of the electric skillets kept tripping the breakers. John and I ended up cooking in their summer room where we did jumping jacks and high knees to stay warm.

But holy guacomole it was good!

 I don't have any photos of this, but after the amazing dinner, my grandma handed out heirlooms from the family. Each grandchild got two things. I received a cup and saucer from Hazel Hudman Cobabe and a plate from Jane Ann Webb Hudman. They are beautiful and are now in my china cabinet.

After presents we all kind of rushed home because it was so late and unfortunately it was snowing on the drive home. I don't drive in the snow anymore because I live in Arizona, but I had to drive that night because my parent's need John to drive one of their cars. Let's just say all of the other cars were flying by me.

The next day we played at my parents house and David and Patti's family came out to visit for a good chunk of the day. We visited my Grandma, but it was the worst I have ever seen her. She seemed so confused and ended up accidentally calling us late that night, and my mom had to go help her to bed. It breaks my heart to see her in such a condition. 

The following day was better. I started out the day by going to help my mom pick out new downstairs furniture. Then we went as a big group to see the play "Mary Poppins Returns." It was so fun and perfect because everyone from the youngest to the oldest could enjoy it. I am patting myself on the back at how well that family activity went because I organized it.

After the movie we "moved" to John's parents' house. We stayed with them from Thursday night  to Sunday morning. We had a lot of fun with them. We actually spent one day buying lights to put up on our house next year. We played the new game that Matt gave us with him while he came up to visit. We actually spent an afternoon at Kayla's house to let the kids play, and she showed us how to use the fun ink rollers she gave us. 

On Saturday morning we went to David and Patti's house to have the Deru Christmas breakfast. Best part of Christmas. We love that homemade sausage, eggs, hash-browns, and fruit. We had some pomegranates and oranges from AZ. It was so fun to have a big hurrah with them again before we left town. The kids played and watched a movie, and the adults got to chat. It was great. 

On Sunday morning we attended the Sacrament Meeting to listen to John's nephew Jensen give his talk before his mission. He did a great job, and even did a beautiful musical number with his dad. After the meeting we skipped the family gathering because we wanted to get to Southern Utah before the forecasted snow hit. We started book 2 of Harry Potter and that drive went surprisingly fast. Wahoo! We beat the snow, and we got to the hotel in Hurricane before dinner time. This was really fun actually because we had time to just relax with our little family. 

We broke out Pie Face again, and a bunch of other games the kids got for Christmas. It was great. Holland maybe got a little restless while we were playing games, but she cheered right up when after dinner, bath, and devotional, we let them watch one of their new movies! 

Actually this hotel was awesome. It was really cheap, $42 a night? And it was much more spacious and nice compared to the cheap casino hotel we typically stay at in Mesquite on our way home from Utah. This space was perfect so we could spend time together there as a family and eat an already prepared dinner.

Oh, and it had a free breakfast in the morning. There were waffles, muffins, cereal, oatmeal, and yogurt. My family loved it. Honestly the only weird thing was that since we were staying two nights they didn't clean our room until the next evening. I was getting worried that the garbage wouldn't be emptied. 

 After the breakfast the next morning, we headed into Zion National Park. It was technically New Year's Day and kind of surprisingly busy, especially considering it was freezing. It was the coldest day forecasted in that week and the high was in the 30s. Even still it was great. We stopped at the visitor center, found out that we needed to ride a shuttle around, grabbed our gear in the laptop bag (clearly we weren't prepared to be without our car) and set off to go on a couple of little hikes.

We went to the farthest stop first and worked our way backward. We hiked about 2 miles on Riverside Trail. It was really nice, especially in the sun where it was a bit warmer. We were fascinated by the icicles hanging down from the seeping rocks. 

 This is the same trail that takes visitors to the Narrows, but there is no way we were getting wet when it was that cold. I was surprised at how many people were doing it though. They had all kinds of gear on to help them stay dry and warm.

We'll just stay on the bank, thanks. 

The kids did pretty well (especially Ellie), but Holland needed to be carried almost the whole way. We didn't have any kind of stroller or carrier, so she spent a lot of this hike in John's arms. The rest of the day she mostly got carried on my shoulders. 

 When we got back we had the chilliest lunch ever. We were even in the sun, but there was a cold, cold wind. It was still yummy though. We had planned our meals before heading to a grocery store in West Valley, so we had delicious flavored cream cheese on bagels for lunch and hummus with pita chips the night before. We finally got warmed up on the the shuttle heading to the next spot. My hands were so cold that John even offered to let me put them on his stomach. He's a tough guy.

 Our next stop was crazy! We stopped at the Weeping Rock, which is actually less than a half mile hike. BUT it has elevation change, and the ice was crazy! Once again I had Holland on my shoulders, and I am so glad we didn't take a tumble. The ice was so thick in places we had to hang onto chains on the side of the trail that had thick layers of ice on it as well.

 We made it back, phew!

This is a fun spot for us though because we took a picture in the same spot on our honeymoon, a couple of years later during a family reunion, and now with our three kiddos. 

Honeymoon, Jan 2007

Family Reunion, July 2010

Check out the layer of ice on the trail and chains! Also, same coat as the honeymoon! 

Family trip, Jan 2018 

We had to do one more hike before we called it a day. Once again it was great, except for how cold it was. Honestly though, I think it was less cold and windy. But Miriam and Holland were feeling emotional about how cold it was, so it was an effort to get through that hike. Worth it though. They can be tough.  

Frozen waterfall!

Cheered up enough for a picture on the way back. 

Ellie took one of me and John.

A kind stranger took a photo of our family. Holland was not in a participating sort of mood.

John was a champion and carried Miriam on his shoulders almost the whole way back. 

 See Holland's sad face? It is kind of funny and sad to me. 

Can you spot us on this fun bridge?

It is a gorgeous national park. I am glad that the government shut down didn't stop us from being able to visit. 

We really got through that last hike by talking about all the fun things we were going to do after. We kind of love doing trips just our little family because we can go at our own pace and call it a day when we want to. That night we went to Cafe Rio in St. George for dinner. Super good. Then we had cocoa, played games and watched movies before bed. My kids were in heaven. 

 The next day we drove almost the whole day to get back home. It was sad that there was such a long drive left. Good thing the treasures my kids were given didn't break. We finished the audiobook with only a few minutes left of the drive, and I made balloon animals for the kids. We even got home in time to start some laundry, and get unpacked a little.

Unfortunately John had to get back to work the next day (our anniversary!), but the kids and I still had a couple of days to play. We played games, unpacked new toys, and went to the gym where they could play.

One day we even made slime. That is the kind of activity I really don't love, but I am happy that my kids are happy. I love days like that.

Overall, our trip was great. We didn't even catch the flu this time (the first time in three years!). We all had a wonderful time seeing family and celebrating the holiday. I had a harder time than normal with not staying at my own house. I was just forcibly reminded that everyone has their own kind of crazy, and when you are staying with people for days on end, we definitely see that more. That is how family is though. You get some crazy along with the awesome.