O Mamma Mia!

Today is my mom's birthday. I'd love to call her and tell her happy birthday, but I can't. Because she and my dad went to Saudi Arabia and Egypt all last week through next week! So I'm happy for her that she gets to do this AMAZING trip! So happy for her. I actually got to spend her birthday with her last year (which was a lot of fun-remember the manicures?) and I hadn't gotten to do that in years.

But, to celebrate with her this year, the kids came up with some good ideas to send birthday wishes to Grandma.

Love you Mom! Happy Birthday!

swimming lessons and much bragging to do

Tyler:

At his parent teacher conference, his teacher said that he was her, and I quote, "top student". That she puts him by kids that don't stay on task because he will help them focus and get done. And she also said that whenever she has a long paragraph she needs someone to read aloud that she calls on him because he's such a good reader. He is getting top scores in all of his subjects. Yea for Tyler!

Emalyn:

At her parent teacher conference, her teacher said that she is a good friend to those in her class. She also said that when she was quizzing Emalyn on her sight words that she knew more than they'd learned in class, she's good at sounding out words and is a great reader. When her teacher asked her to count to 20, Emalyn counted to 100. Emalyn has been working on her reading at home a lot, so we're really proud of her!

Krysta:

Well, I have to mention first that at Emalyn's parent teacher conference, she kept interrupting to show the teacher that she knew all the colors of her legos... It was funny because she's normally pretty shy around strangers but we finally had to listen to all her colors before we could get back to the conference. I guess she didn't want to be left out and wanted to show off her smarts too. Also, she's potty trained! She always tells me when she needs to go now. And loves to go potty at other people's houses...which can make giving the lesson at visiting teaching appointments take twice as long...ha ha. But I never believed all those stories before about kids who were potty trained in less than a month. I've never seen a kid of mine get it so quickly. But she did and I'm very relieved and very proud of her too!

I just re-read the title of this post and realized I still need to talk about their swimming lessons. Tyler and Emalyn love the water and they are really progressing in their swimming. Emalyn is getting better at kicking, putting her face in the water, and just becoming more comfortable in the water. Tyler is working on his backstroke and freestyle strokes. He went from one end of the pool to the other on his own for the first time last Tuesday! Krysta will be old enough for lessons next year...and is having a hard time waiting.

It is Well With My Soul

In the last few months I've heard the hymn, "It Is Well With My Soul" several times, performed several different ways. My favorite is by Dustin Christensen from the Album, Nearer: A New Collection of Favorite Hymns. However, I also recently learned the story behind the man who wrote the words, Horatio Spafford. It is an incredible story. I wanted to share it here because it is a story of someone who lost almost everything, through which his faith and his trust in the love the Savior has for all of us, was strengthened. He was a Christian. His story helps me remember that no matter what happens in life, our Heavenly Father is always there and that "the Lord loveth whom He chasteneth" D&C 95:1

Someone put his story with the hymn and some of the words in a youtube video. If you want to see it go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8_EfDqF7YI