In my Next 30 Years

Warning: self-reflection to follow.

So, it is finally upon me.

I will be officially 30 years old in 11 hours. For most birthdays I usually agree to my birthday starting at Midnight on the 13th. This year, however, I can wait till the official hour. I have been thinking a lot about it all lately. I have gone back and forth between the ideas of "oh no, I'm so sad I'm thirty" and "no big deal, I'm still awesome:)". For myself and just for the sake of writing down my feelings at a milestone like this I'm going to share my recent emotions here. It is a pretty weird feeling that I will no longer be a "twenty-something". I truly am having a hard time wrapping my brain around the fact that I attended my 10 year high school reunion 2 years ago! I wanted to record what I'm feeling right now...so then I can look back when I turn 40,50 etc. I'm sure this will probably seem hilarious then. In a lot of ways I am really excited to turn 30. In your thirties, you are truly a grown up. I know I already am one, but when you are still in your twenties it is still easy to tell yourself that you are younger than you are. Even when you are in the tail-end of the twenties...you are still in your twenties. Once you turn thirty...there's no denying you are an adult. Full on, an adult. This is a good thing.

Mostly, I am just trying to think about how young I feel, but appreciate all the wonderful things I have done and learned in my first 30 years .To quote one of my fav's Tim McGraw, "in my next 30 years", I want to do so much more. I guess I am just feeling reminiscent because I feel like this is just a great evaluation point. I feel like for me, in this particular stage of my life... starting this lifestyle and getting ready to move across the world right now is pretty great. It will help me divide my life into sections that round out nicely. Pre-30 life until FSO. Post-30 life after FSO. I like it when things work out nicely like that:) I guess that is why I was born a "Decade Baby"!

I decided that I wanted to write down some highlights, and make a few little goals just for posterity sake. We'll see when it's all said and done what life brings... but as for now I am pretty happy with the results and the possibilities.

In my first 30 years:

-played, played, and played in dirt,trees, "the rocks", playgrounds, backyards-you name it. I feel like I had a fun childhood.

-learned to drive, and got my licsence

-graduated from high school

-attended and graduated from BYU with my Bachelor's degree

-met my fabulous hubby and got married

-went to Europe for the first time, and multiple wonderful trips since

-had two beautiful children

-had two corresponding and only surgeries thus far of my life

-lived in 15 different homes in 4 different states

-drove on nearly every square mile of I-80 from literally coast to coast except a 40 mile stretch in Indiana

-went to Madagascar and La Reunion-truly a trip of a lifetime

-made many AMAZING friends that now live in nearly 20 different states and soon to be 10+ different countries

-made mistakes, cried, regretted things

-was proud of myself, happy, and laughed A LOT.

-learned I DO NOT like to be upside down on any amusement park rides

-ate a lot of licorice

-had way to many other awesome experiences to even write down. In thinking about all the many things I could add to the list, one thing is clear. I have been very, very blessed. I am in awe. How thankful I am for all the amazing experiences and people that have made my life so rich.

In my next 30 years:

-want to visit all the places on my top 25 list. There are some good ones... I won't bore you with the list in this post. maybe another time though.

- want to finish building our family

-learn to make bread (yup, I'm pathetic. can't do it)

-brush up on my piano skills

-be a better friend and sister

-be the best mother and wife I can be

-read more books

-ACTUALLY LEARN FRENCH!!-also, hope to learn several other languages too

-make it through a FSO career without too much turbulence. yup. not my favorite thing. I'm praying for many good flights:)

-take Noah to a KU game

-buy a house one day

-take my kids to DisneyWorld

-make a quilt for every country that we live in

-enjoy the traditions that we have made so far in our family, and pass them on to our children.

-watch my children grow up, get married and hopefully give us some grandchildren!

ok. that is enough of my thinking for one night. I just felt like I wanted to write something. To have something to remind me of this milestone in life. that's all. I'm done. If you made it through, thank you for reading.

Easter part 2- The Poconos

So on actual Easter weekend, we hopped in the car and headed to Noah's parents house for a quick surprise visit! The boys both loved shouting SURPRISE when his dad opened the door. It was really great. We were able to also do some of our favorite things during our short visit-most of which included our favorite foods. We checked off some REAL cheesesteaks from our favorite place, Pizza from that same awesome place, the pretzel factory and Callie's Candy factory. We definitely love to eat when we are there! I got a fun shot with my boys and the Easter Bunny, (they would only get close though because he had a basket of suckers)

The Easter Bunny also found these giant AWESOME solid chocolate letters, bringing respectively a "R" for Ronan and a "P" for Porter. The glare made it hard to get a great picture, but they both loved them. Porter's basket is unfortunately not pictured as well....I've tried 5 times, and the photo will not load. hmm. no idea why. I give up, sorry.

We finished up the morning with a great Egg Hunt outside. They both did a pretty good job actually of finding even the tricky eggs! What good lookers I have!

Ronan, being very serious here. He was on a mission.

And yes, the Easter Bunny brought Dinosaur Eggs this year. What can a bunny do? That was all that was left. They LOVED them though. Good job bunny:)

And for one last side note, we have discovered that completely unknown to Noah- on his old weathered basketball hoop in the backyard, was an omen. In looking up at this fabulous old hoop, which I'm told was used for countless hours of memories- is Porter's name. Who even knew Porter was a brand of basketball hoop? We had absolutely no idea this was the case when we named Porter, we came up with it totally on our own for different reasons! Maybe it was subconsciously why Noah liked it?!

Back to the story...so yes, we had a fabulous time with the grandparents and the boys can't wait to go back and play some more! It was a terrific little trip, full of candy, traditions, playgrounds, cravings, and family.

After we got home, the Easter Bunny found some things that he forgot to put in the baskets in PA, SO he dropped by the next Sunday morning too! It was General Conference on actual Easter Sunday for church, so it was a perfect opportunity to let them wear their outfits and have a little more traditional Easter Morning as well. These boys, I tell ya!! Two rounds of Easter Baskets. Very lucky indeed.

Easter part 1- The Incredible Edible Eggs

Back before our lives got CRAZY busy, we kicked off the Easter season with some traditional egg dying! This is one of my favorite little traditions, and we also love doing it with good friends! The boys love to get creative, and then getting to go on an egg hunt. We were thrilled to be able to do it this year with Kesli and Ryli before they left. We all had a great time, made some beautiful eggs, and even went on a hunt the next day around the apartment. We did this activity multiple days early from Easter, so after that initial "practice hunt" those eggs were eaten, sorry bunny. He had to buy some more plastic ones at the store later that weekend:)

I love it all. These are some of my favorite moments. I hope my boys will enjoy them as much as I do when they look back on their crazy lives.

It's the little things. The beautiful accomplishments!

just because...a list of "happys"

ok, so I've got about 6 other fully blogworthy posts to get to. April was jam-packed with goodness! In the meantime, I will simply post a list of things that are making me happy lately to tide you all over. I know, I know the suspense will be killing you.

-happy to be home with my husband

-happy that I and the boys are happy to be back with DADDY. Maybe now I will get some sleep without two kids wanting to sleep ON me. No idea what got into them. Either way, I'm glad they are in their own beds again!

-had a fabulous trip, and got to see tons of family

-spent much missed time with lots of friends, both me and they boys. They love all their buddies!

-ate some YUMMY food lately! (although tonight at dinner, at a restaurant which shall remain nameless...because I do really like them usually...there was a bug. Yes, a bug in my soup. eww. yuck. gross. We got free desserts though?! silver lining I guess)

-got GORGEOUS "I missed you" flowers from my hubby. I missed him too!

-is still loving our new car. I was happy that the "new car smell" was still there when he picked me up from the airport!

-watched the movie How to Train Your Dragon, loved it, and am now excited that there is another great "little boy" movie out there.

-got our housing profile and am super excited to finally get a mental picture of everything! Going to go shopping for new towels tomorrow:)

-loved having "girl's nights" last week

-stocked up on some great cute fabric while out west!

-tulips. they just always make me happy. and they are everywhere right now. love it love it.

-chuck. my favorite tv show. 3 seasons in, and finally the payoff. been fans since day one, and just love it all. Jeffster especially. I wonder if they have their songs on Itunes?

-happy that I now know I can fly with two kids by myself! (shortish flights anyway:)

-Found a blu-ray copy of Rick Steve's in Istanbul. yay!

-the strawberry frozen custard at the place off Arlington Blvd.

-happy to have Porter's school application officially done, and he is accepted!

ok, I think that is a long enough list for now....I could go on, but most of you would probably stop reading:)

Colorado

For those of you who may not know, the boys and I have been on a bit of a vacation lately! (Still here in fact for another 48 hours and missing daddy terribly:) We've been out west having one last hurrah with our family and friends in Colorado and Utah; among other things i.e. a trip to the dentist and the eye doctor. In the meantime I realized that I did not bring our laptop-the one with all of the pictures from our VERY busy last month. There are multiple blogworthy events that will surely be written about as soon as my pictures and I are reunited! I decided to blog what I had though, so as not to be too terribly behind when I get home. We spent a good portion of the beginning of our trip at my parent's house in Colorado! We went ATVing (which the boys LOVED), to a petting zoo, swimming, bowling (including my grandpa and two grandmothers which was awesome) and ate tons of yummy food. I unfortunately didn't get to see everyone I had hoped too while there:( Still know that I love you guys though and we'll be back soon enough! We were just too jampacked with family fun!

Me and my little brother Grant

Uncle Grant and Roni

Aunt Katie and Porter

Dr. Dolittle here-talking to the animals

The almost whole family-minus Noah, Ryan and Uncle Grant(taking the picture)
and plus one grandpa, 2 grandmas and an aunt

We had such a fun time at home, it was a great last Colorado memory before we head to Turkey! Now the fun we had in Utah will be a whole other post.. so stay tuned!

Easter Cuties

I am falling behind again in my blogging, but this time it is just because we have had a VERY busy week with many blogworthy events and hardly any time to blog them! I just had to get these Easter pics up first though because they were just too cute!! I will post the rest of the Easter festivities here soon. With all of the gorgeous blossoms here in the D.C. area I snatched up the opportunity to have the boy's Easter outfits match the scenery! We got some darling shots with the beautiful blooms in the background. Love it. Love my boys.

My baby. Ronan is just delicious in this picture! Don't you just want to eat him up?!

Yes, I'm Porter. And I am soooo handsome. I'm being a good sport for my mom. Do I get some candy after this?

In Denial

So I (we) are in denial. I have been putting off writing this, because doing so means that they are actually gone! I have been EXTREMELY blessed throughout my life with some wonderful friends, all of which I adore and can't imagine my life without. Our recent move here to Washington D.C. has been no exception. One somewhat unanticipated benefit of joining the Foreign Service was the number of completely awesome people that we have gotten to know. Truly, there have been many. Noah's A-100 class has been full of some super great Mom's that I've gotten to know, as well as some awesome people from our church!

We've had such a wonderful time getting to know all of them, but these guys: Ryan, Kesli, and Ryli are our icing on the cake! Within only a few hours of moving in to our new apartment we happened upon these FABULOUS FOLKS. Heaven sent them straight to our doorstep. Literally! Bright and early Saturday morning, after getting in Friday evening we ran into these guys in the hall. Then....as if we were being pulled together by the universe we ran into each other only minutes later at Costco! Our boys are the same age and they were THRILLED to have buddies. Now, the kiddos were not the only ones who lucked out with this fantastic trio. Turns out Noah and Ryan as well as Kesli and I are matches made in Heaven. Having them right down the hall has been one of the funnest experiences ever!

Kesli and I - my newest "bestie" at Frying Pan Farm Park

Now here is the kicker...not only have we been beyond lucky to have them just a few doors down while here in D.C.; but beyond all odds we get to be almost neighbors again at our first posts!! Their's being in Moldova (between Romania and Ukraine) it is only about 650 miles away! When you have a whole world to possibly separate you, this is definitely closer to a good set of friends than I ever thought possible! How fun is it that we will now get to travel the world together?! There will be multiple trips made between us, I assure you:)

Above is just a small sampling of the many fun things we did with our pals! It was so fun to have some friends ready to try and do anything and everything together, even at the spur of the moment! They were also AMAZING tour guides, being that they have lived here before. I guess I will have to find my own way around now:)

They packed up and shipped out to start their journey to Moldova last weekend. sniff sniff. We have been so blessed to have them in our lives for even just a few months! We kept ourselves nice and busy with a trip to PA and friends from South Carolina in town over the last week, but now it is settling in. It is weird to see someone else coming out of their door. It makes it easier knowing that we will get to see them soon, and we can't wait! We love you guys! Thanks for everything.