christmas cards...

Brandon decided that for some of his relatives we could do cards and pictures for christmas, and of course i couldn't pass up the fun of making them! so here's how they turned out...
*notice the cute snowman one, Brandon decided he would let his creativity come out and make one...i love it!

6 months...

...some of the best months of my life.

: )

here are a few things that have been adding happiness to my life...

- house. i kept watching them out of order but Britt just bought me season 1 so me and Brandon have been watching it all the time. what can i say its a great show!

-a trip to la including rain, little toyko, farmers market, disneyland, and my momma! makes for one wonderful birthday trip.

-My birthday! i mean who wouldn't be happy on there bday! especially when it consisted of pizza for dinner and my favorite pumpkin cheese cake for dessert! (i guess britt thought i liked math and made my cake 9+8+3=20 :))

- dinner with the girls at my favorite Italian place...so yummy!

- Brandon is officially the best gift buyer i've ever met! he got me a white pea-coat, a pizza stone, a yellow hankie, an antique heart locket, and the best loose leaf tea i've ever had!

- and then the best discovery of the month! this amazing ice cream! its like heaven...its sweet cream ice cream with swirls of hawaiian lehua honey. its so delicious.

- my morning ritual has been combined with my obsession of playing hearts on the computer. and this morning billy joined in on the relaxing morning : )
needless to say my life has been busy and amazing. and i'm loving it : )

its true. i wanna be taylor swifts friend...

playing house...

i love bookstores! especially the kids section... : )

so my parents are in alaska on a cruise and i'm playing mom for the week...its not the easiest thing going from no children to 5 but its fun and exciting. : )
we've gone to olive garden, gone shopping, made pizza, bought lots of food, watched the hannah montana movie, made milkshakes, gone to the pool, went to farmers market, ate and drank lots of starbucks, went to mcdonalds, done a lot of cleaning, stayed up late, woken up early, laughed, cried, and now been sick. yup Jo decided to get a fever and Lydia decided to follow suit and do the same as well...
needless to say its been an exciting week!

handon.

yeah this has pretty much been my life lately...

and i find it quite amazing.

The Orphanage...

When I was staying in Nepal a couple came to see the orphanage I lived at, I totally forgot about it untill today when I was going through my letters from the kids and came across there card. They wrote a nice little page and posted some super cute pictures.
you should go see how adorable my family in nepal is...Our Father's House

this rain makes me want my tin roof in nepal back...

I tried my hand at making samosas the other day. The dough was a little to flaky for my liking but it still tasted delicious. I had never tried garbanzo beans before going to Nepal but now I really like them. I mean they kinda taste like nothing but I like the texture and the slight flavor they do have : ) I've learned that I really miss the flavours of Nepal. They use like the same 5 spices in everything, its become almost like a comfort food to me now. I couldn't even tell you how many garlic cloves I peeled and ginger roots a cut up at the orphanage!

this inspires me:
"The seasons remind me that I must keep changing, and I want to change because it is God's way. All my life I have been changing. I changed form a baby to a child, from soft toys to play daggers. I changed into a teenager to drive a car, into a worker to spend some money. I will change into a husband to love a woman, into a father to love a child, change houses so we are near water, and again so we are near mountains, and again so we are near friends, keep changing with my wife, getting our love so it dies and gets born again and again, like a garden, fed by four seasons, a cycle of change. Everybody has to change, or they expire. Everybody has to leave, everybody has to leave their home and come back so they can love it again for all new reasons."
-Donald Miller

David after the dentist

If you feel like a good laugh you need to watch this. I found it quite funny...

John Winthrop

So one of our bookstores in the mall went out of business so of course before it did I had to go check out the deals. I got this really cool book called The Greatest American Speeches. I love hearing speeches because there so inspiring and passionate. Kinda a random book for me to buy but so far I love it.
The first speech in the book is by John Winthrop. In 1645 he was accused of exceeding his power and him and other magistrates were impeached following an incident in which people believed that they had involved themselves unnecessarily in a local election. I thought the speech he gave when leaving office was really quite good.

"When you see infirmities in us, you should reflect upon your own, and that would make you bear the more with us, and not be severe censurers of the failings of your magistrates, when you have continual experience of the like infirmities in yourself and others.
...This liberty is maintained and exercised in a way of subjection to authority; it is of the same kinda of liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free. The woman's own choice makes such a man her husband. Yet, being so chosen, he is her lord, and she is to be subject to him, yet in a way or liberty, not of bondage; and a true wife accounts her subjection her honor and freedom, and would not think her condition safe and free but in her subjection to her husband's authority. Such is the liberty of the church under the authority of Christ, her kinda and husband.
...If you stand for your natural corrupt liberties, and will do what is good in your own eyes, you will not endure the least weight of authority, but will murmur, and oppose, and be always striving to shake off that yoke. But if you will be satisfied to enjoy such civil and lawful liberties, such as Christ allows you, then will you quietly and cheerfully submit unto that authority which is set over you, in all the administrations of it, for your good. Wherein, if we fail at any time, we hope we shall be willing, by God's assistance, to hearken to good advice from any of you, of in any other way of God. So shall your liberties be preserved, in upholding the honor and power of authority amongst you."