The Next Step

This week was a big deal for Gabe; twelve is a big deal!  I just love how he is growing and learning and I see his understanding of things increase.  He's a good boy, er...young man.  This week he was ordained a deacon in the Aaronic priesthood.  He's super excited for the responsibilities that goes along with this office.  

 Gabe's a good example to Jake.  It's pretty amazing to think that as my Gabe accomplishes each milestone Jake is merely 19 months from it and then its done!  It scares me a bit, to be honest!  Especially when I think of what's ahead in the next 6 or 8 years.  Even in the next 3~

 Todd and I are both very aware of this and have vowed to take every opportunity to love and teach and play.  These boys are the world to us and we feel extremely blessed to have them as our sons!

Testing for Green on St. Patty's Day

Gabe and Jake were so excited when they realized that Green belt testing day was on St. Patrick's Day!  Now there's luck! 

They both did so well and looked very prepared and ready for this testing.  I am so proud of them.  Both Grandma and Grandpa Sparks and Nonna came to watch.  Way to go, guys!!

Here's Jake waiting for them to call him to demonstrate Orange belt form

Answering with confidence!

 Gabe doing his form

 Jake doing his form

 Jake sparring

 The only time Gabe can beat up on a girl!!!

Cousins and Friends

I'm not sure when this happened exactly, but these four have become the best of friends and lately have been spending their weekends together.  Last night Jack and Andy came over to play in the snow with Gabe and Jake.  After a few hours they got cold and wet and came in and had hot chocolate and something to eat, Played video games for a bit and went back out again.  Then today Gabe and Jake went to their house and spent all afternoon there.  It makes me so happy that they like being together.  I never had the chance to grow up around my cousins and it makes me sad when I hear Todd talk about all the things he did with his cousins since they were mostly nearby when they were young.

I had to document these late night Fridays spending their evenings together!!  I love these guys!!!

My Mother-of-the-Year Nomination's in the bag!!

I got woken up to Gabe begging me to stay home today.  His argument?  Snow.  Six beautiful inches of it in our backyard!  At first I furrowed my brow and just said, "whatever".  but he begged even harder saying that if we waited until after school, it would probably be melted.  I got that!  Every bit of snow that we've received this winter, which really isn't much, has been gone by the latter part of the day for the most part.    Part of the deal (Gabe's idea) was that they would do some major cleaning.  Without too much more pleading, I caved!  I think the idea of clean bedrooms for the weekend sweetened the deal for me.  I can't lie!!!

I posted my deed on Facebook and as more and more people commented, I realized that these are the things remembered!  The exception.  The one thing that never happens.  It's these types of moments that are the memories that our children remember best!

I went to a funeral this week that made me realize that these are the times that will be the happy memories of my children.  Todd's uncle Denny died after battling Parkinson's disease for 35 years!  Each of his children had wonderful moments, simple moments, that were the thing that they spoke of fondly as they remembered their father.  Most of the children only knew their dad with this debilitating disease.  But even so, he somehow remained the fun-loving father that all of us want to be.  It was a lesson to me.

Now if I could have only been the fun mother that was out there in it.....well, who said I was perfect?  Poco a poco!!

Family Night

This year our family has the "Pass of all Passes" from Seven Peaks which give us several venues and activities that we can do for either free or very discounted.  We found that we could go bowling for  just the cost of the shoe rental.  So we decided to up to Sandy to go bowling with the boys for family night.  It was a fun time and we enjoyed a 50 cent ice cream cone at Macey's for desert after.  I love being with all my boys and sharing some good times.

 Todd and Gabe

 Ooooh, nice form, Gabe

 come on......little more to the right......

 Jake was trying out the "Granny"

 Spare?

Yes!!!

 Fist bump from dad!

 mmmm....funnel fries

 Jake enjoying his cone

 Dad already enjoyed his

 Love the faces of my happy boys!

Day 2

Orange Belts

My Boys tested last Saturday for their Orange Belts in Tae Kwon Do.  I am so proud of them for their efforts and they are doing so well!  I think Master Kim is happy with their progress, too.  I didn't really push it for today's pictures, but at least I have an entry, right?  But these are my favorite subjects to shoot!

Insomnia, Faith and The Brother of Jared

Over the past few months my ten-year-old son Gabriel has had a very difficult time staying asleep.  He will usually go to sleep without too much problem, but he will only stay asleep for three or four hours before he wakes up.  I think he freaks himself out a little and makes himself scared instead of turning over and going back to sleep.  At that point he goes into his little brother's room and gets into his little twin bed with him and will either go to sleep, or turn on a movie and watch it while Jake is trying to sleep.  Needless to say, Jake's very annoyed at Gabe for interrupting his sleep!  We've tried pretty much everything we can think of, short of drugging him--Which, admittedly, we did try Nyquil one night, but to no avail!!  We are all very frustrated and at our wits end!

A few days ago we were starting reading the Book of Ether in the Book of Mormon where it talks about the Brother of Jared seeing the finger of Christ and then later seeing Christ.  It, then, describes his tremendous faith.  Gabe was so impressed by this story and asked his dad if he (Gabe) had faith like the Brother of Jared, would he be able to sleep?  We were so amazed at this boy's understanding a practical application of this very basic but fundamental principle!  These are those pay-off moments that parents wait for!  Wow!  Todd reaffirmed this to him and as he said prayers with him and tucked him in that night, he prayed with so much intensity and asked to be blessed with that amount of faith that he needed to sleep and stay in his own bed.

The next morning he came into our room and told us that he slept in his bed the whole night!  He slept pretty well, but did wake up during the night.  Instead of getting up and going into Jake's bed, though, he said a prayer that he would stay in his own bed and not be scared.  He stayed in his bed!

How grateful I am tonight.  I'm overwhelmed with love and gratitude to God for giving me so many precious gifts; my family, my faith, and the scriptures.  I can't and don't want to imagine my life without any one of these things.  I feel so very blessed to have a gospel centered home and to know where I can go for answers to anything or any problems that cross my path.  I love my Gabe...

Can't break with tradition, right?

Ahhh, been waiting for this day for a while, now!  As much as I love my boys, I will NOT miss the constant fighting that has been going on in my house for the past 3 or 4 weeks!  So off they go to 3rd and 4th grade and hopefully they will be busy enough that I won't have to hear them picking on each other for a while...(yeah, right!)  Anyway, here they are ready and off to school.  I always take a photo of them out in front of our house, so I decided not to break with tradition and snap a few as they were leaving this morning.  They are pretty cute, I have to say!

 My little 3rd grader!

 Ready for 4th Grade

 Wow, they even look like they like each other!! Who knew?

And they're off!

Me!  Peace!  I think I'll go take a bubble bath!!!

A Mamma and her Cubs!

This week we had pack meeting and both of my boys got awards.  Jake was so excited that he earned his Bobcat!  He was so cute and so proud

 and so was I!  He loves being in Cub Scouts.  That was a hard few months as most of his friends had turned eight months before him.  So he has been eager to work on his scout stuff.  I actually turned my camera over to Heidi Rivera, one of the other moms, and thrilled to actually be in a picture with my boys!  A rarity for sure!

 Gabe got his religious square knot this time around as well as a few beads and arrowheads.  He only has about three more requirements to finish his Bear.  I can't believe he will be in Webelos in October!  His scout shirt is looking a bit snug, too!  He sure has grown a lot this year!  I sure love my little cubs!

It Rains....

I know you can't tell, but this picture was taken right as a rain cloud was moving across the bay.  People on the beach saw it coming and scrambled to gather their stuff and leave the beach.  I had walked over to where Todd and Gabe were body surfing and got a few shots in before the down pour!  They didn't really notice since they were in the water getting rolled by the waves.  I quickly hurled my camera under my shirt and zipped up my camera bag and headed back to our stuff.  Jake was curled up, head and all,  under a beach towel sitting in one of the chairs.  By the time I got back to my chair the cloud was gone and took the rain with it, and the sun was coming back out.  Yes, it rains in Hawaii and I love how most of the time it's just a quick pass over and then, the sun's back out like nothing ever happened!  The best part was that the beach was deserted and stayed that way for most of the day!  So we had the beach to ourselves for a lot of the day!

I love this shot of Todd emerging from the wave!

Father and son body surfing!  They had such a great day!

This cool little canopy has been at the beach this whole time.  It's kind of Gilligan's Isle-esque. (this is for you Stormy!

This kid got so much sand in his cast yesterday that despite my attempts to clean it out with the sprayer, his bed had mounds of sand in it this morning when he woke up!  He hasn't let that thing get in his way of fun!

Catching just the right moment!

The other night just as the sun was going down, I grabbed Gabe (who is always up for modeling for me) and my tripod with my flash attatched and tried doing some off-camera stuff.  I thought this turned out pretty good for my first try solo.  It helps to have a cute model, too!