Our talks

So on Easter Sunday I gave a talk in church. The week before AJ gave a talk in primary his first talk ever! He did such a great job! I was able to incorporate his talk into mine. Which works out perfectly now so you all can read both of our talks :) This post is a boring no picture post so you are warned.

My talk today is on What Easter means to me. Whenever I give talks I am always afraid I will not talk about the right thing & all of the normal jitters that people get when preparing for a talk. But this time I have really enjoyed preparing for it. It gave me a chance during a pretty hectic week to reflect on the true meaning of Easter.

President Thomas S. Monson said in the April 2010 General Conference..."What mortal being faced with the loss of a loved one, or indeed, standing himself or herself on the threshold of infinity has not pondered what lies beyond the veil which separates the seen from the unseen? Centuries ago the man Job-so long blessed with every material gift, only to find himself sorely afflicted by all that can befall a human being-sat with companions and uttered the timeless question If man die, shall he live again?" This question has been asked and pondered over & over again through the years. I myself have questioned it many times before...But I will get to that in a moment.

Right now I would like to tell you about last week. Last Sunday my son AJ gave a talk in sharing time which just so happened to be very similar to what my talk is today. It was on the Atonement. It was not very long, only a few minutes, but to me it had such a big impact. I would like to share it with you...

Jesus died so that we could all live & have the choice to follow in his ways.

Jesus Christ was the only one capable of Atoning for all mankind.

Through the Atonement He suffered for all of our sins so that we could be resurrected & those who will obey his gospel will receive the gift of Eternal life with God.

As I watched and helped him give his talk I felt so many emotions. But mostly I felt proud & amazed. Proud that he went up and gave it with such confidence, he has a speech delay and can be really shy sometimes. And amazed that at the age of 3.5 he understood what he was saying and that he said it with such enthusiasm.


Easter has always been my favorite holiday. When I was younger it was because every year we would go to my grandparents for a big Easter egg hunt and family dinner. But as I grew and learned the true meaning of Easter it meant so much more to me.


But that all changed in one moment. This is when I started to ponder on Job's question. If man shall die, shall he live again?


When my daughter passed away in October of 2006 I started questioning Faith. After her passing right before the holidays my cousin, Danelle, who is more like a sister to me, told me that God only gives us what we can handle. At the time I thought that is ridiculous. Why would God do this to me?? Leave me here with out a child and motherless.


But everywhere I turned in those few months after her passing I would either see the missionaries out and about, meet someone who was LDS, and even flipped through the channels early one Sunday morning and found myself watching and listening to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.


Then 1yr & 10 days after her passing I understood everything. Why she had to go, why I had to stay. It was so I could find the gospel and be baptized. And to once again find the true meaning of Easter. That we will live again and that Jesus Christ died so we could have the opportunity to live, no matter how long or short our Earthly lives are that man WILL live again after death that we could live for eternity as families.

Easter Egg Hunt!

Our 2nd anual Easter Egg Hunt went great!! There were ALOT more people there thanks to new friends & my family! My sisters & nieces & nephews all came down and stayed with us. In our house there were 11 extra people. But that is another post. It was super windy on the day we had the egg hunt. But we still had fun! We had candy, sandwhiches, drinks, chips, cookies, candy, eggs & more candy! We had a blast and even though we were unable to do coloring & make our bunny ears due to the wind we still had fun!

AJ & all of his eggs!

AJ & Ian

All ready to hunt! We had about 600 eggs for everyone to find!

Alanna, Kaci, Nalani, Oaklie, Malaki & AJ all looking at their eggs!

Flat Stanley!

My nephew Malaki was so nice & sent me Flat Stanley. For those of you who do not know who Flat Stanley is he is a kid (in a book of course) who was laying in bed when a board fell on him & made him Flat! He then was able to do some pretty cool things and pretty much travel anywhere because he was able to slide under doors & through cracks. So anyways my job as Flat Stanleys temporary owner was to take him to cool places here in Vegas then send him back to Malaki so he could share with the class what fun adventures he went on!

While he was here we went to see the M&M's, a race car, the flowers at the Bellagio, church & he was able to eat our annual green breakfast for St. Patricks Day!

Favorite Pictures!

So over the last few months while I was taking snap shots of the boys, and I must admit 1 of the pictures was posed, I have just happened to get some awesome shots and wanted to share them with you.

These 2 of AJ were posed well I placed him in the tree. He did the rest :) The second one he I love the profile of it.

Just cause I think this one is a great close up :)

All of these of Erik were un posed! He was just loving the sand!
The first one it is just something about how he is sitting & the back round I don't know but I love it!

This one was just a perfect shot! I did not even realize it until we got home. But with his smile & pose & the seagull flying in at just the right time I love it!

I love this one because of his shadow. Again I just love how he posed himself in all of his shots!

Final Day- Disneyland!

So our last day we went back over to Disneyland! Our plan was to wake up a little later than normal, go to the park, stay there until the fire works since we had been jipped and they had no parades while we were there, then drive home & get home around 3am. Thankfully it did not work out that way. It was a Friday so the lines for rides, which had been pretty non exsistant all week, were longer and we had to wait around 20min or longer per ride. I know that does not sound bad for Disneyland but being as all week the longest we ever waited was around 3min, 20min is a long time! Another thing was the boys after all week of no naps, long days, and not enough sleep it was finally getting to them & they were super cranky & for the first time they actually took a nap while at the park! And not just a 5min snooze between rides they both slept for around an hour! So we ended up leaving around 4pm. Which was good because I was super tired too and had to stop a few times on the ride home so we would not crash. We still had a blast at the park & we went on all of our favorite rides on last time.

Both boys were SO excited to go on the carousel!

That is until we actually got on the horses! AJ was not too happy!

Meeting Pluto again!

I guess Erik thought the dirt was sand and wanted to roll around in it like at the beach? Arli picked him up as soon as as this picture was taken.

All tuckered out!

Day 4- California Adventure

California Adventure-

We had a blast! Even though alot of things were closed down we had a TON of fun! AJ & I went on a lot of the big kid rides like Soarin over California & The Tower of Terror! These were a first for both of us. I loved both AJ on the other hand was super scared on Tower of Terror. He could not wait to get unbuckled when the ride stopped. While AJ & I were on the rides Daddy & Erik got to meet Pluto(I had the camera with me on the ride when Erik met Pluto so lucky us we were able to meet him again the next day in Disneyland!), Tow Mater, & Lightning McQueen! And play in the water! At California Adventure they have a new thing, which we actually saw them building last year when we went, it is called The World of Color. It is a water show that is awesome! It is 100 times better than the Bellagio water show and even has clips from Disney movies that go along with the songs and dancing water. We had a blast even though we sat for over an hour to get the perfect spot to watch it. While there we also got to meet Sulley from Monsters Inc., Chip & Dale & like I said before Tow-Mater, Lightning McQueen & Pluto.

AJ & I on Tower of Terror! Blurry pic but you can see how terrified he was while I was laughing. LOL I know I am such a mean Mommy! But hey I figured that he loved space mountain he would be fine on this.

A funny story about this last picture. AJ lost his shoe in the pitch black, crowded deck while waiting for World of Color to start. I did not even notice it was gone for about 30min. And I was not about to let him loose his brand new Nikes. So looking like a crazy woman I flashed about a dozen pictures of peoples feet until I found his shoe. LOL The looks I was getting were hillarious!

Day 3- Santa Monica Beach

This year it was actually warm enough for us to go to the beach! It was also Erik's first time ever at a beach and to say he loved it is an understatement! He absolutely loved rolling around in the sand! And when I say rolling I mean rolling! LOL He also loved the water as we knew he would since he is our water baby! But if we got too far out he had to be held and I took him pretty far far enough to where the water came up to my waist with out waves, with waves it would come to my chest.

Mommy & Erik catching some waves!

What did I tell ya??? Rolling in the sand lol

AJ loved the sand and did not like the water too much. Although he did chase the waves as they came in. And unfortunately since he is blessed with his mom's light skin & I forgot sunscreen (I know bad mom award of the year) he got burned :( And it was bad. But we bought his magical green hulk cream (aka aloe vera gel) and it made it all better. He called himself the hulk every time he put it on. lol This boy & his super heroes!
Trying to out run the waves!

Cheese:)

You can see his sunburn:( I will have to find my picture of it.
It was pretty bad I still feel awful!

Day 2 Disneyland!!!!

Disneyland Day 1-
This year was our best year ever at Disneyland! For one both boys were SUPER excited! AJ especially he knew from the moment we told him where we were going that we would meet Micky and go to Disneyland. About a week before our trip I was putting a Disney movie on for him at bedtime as a special treat as soon as the castle came on he says to me "Mommy a castle, dat Disneyland" I agreed with him. Then the next thing he says, which was very big for him since he has a speech problem, was "Mommy I want to go see that!" "I wanna go to Disneyland." I was so proud of him because in that first sentence he had 7 words! That was the first full sentence he had ever said! I was so proud and if I could have I would have packed him & the family up & we would have left right then :) But anyways AJ knew pretty much everything that was going on. Erik was just super happy to meet Mickey Mouse, Buzz & all of the other characters. Erik was really lucky too when Daddy & AJ went to go on Space Mountain Erik's idol walked out! Buzz Lightyear! This was of course with in an hour of the park opening & after meeting his other idol Mickey Mouse! Both of the boys love all of the rides and loved going on the train around the park. And when we went on the mini roller coaster in toon town both boys held their hands up and went "weeeee" the whole time and did not even hold on! Oops scratch that Erik went the whole time without holding on AJ did hold on after the first little hill.

The boys on the shuttle ready for Disneyland!!!

I love these next to because it is like a step by step of Erik meeting Mickey Mouse!

Me, Erik & Buzz!!!

Erik meeting Goofy!!

Daddy & Erik on Dumbo!!!

I could not decide which one of these pictures of Erik with Woody & Jessie I liked best. I am always a fan of having people look at the camera. But the top one of Erik looking up at Woody & Woody down at Erik just makes me melt for some reason. Maybe it is because I know how much Erik loves Toy Story.

The mini roller coaster!!

Erik on the Buzz ride
I don't know why but I really love this one of Erik

AJ on Space Mountain!!

California Vacation Day 1!

Science Museum-

On our first day of our 2011 vacation we thought it would be fun to check out the science museum that is 5min from Disney Land. It was super fun & the boys had a blast! We stayed there for about 3-4hrs then just went back to the hotel to have a nice relaxing evening since the next 4 days we would not have another chance to do that :)

This was actually really cool but at the same time gross. It showed how your body works. The teeth chewed, you could watch your stomach digest food and then we all know what comes next and in the little window you could watch how poo comes from your body. Like I said gross, but AJ could not get enough of it and would laugh hysterically every time it pooed. He sure is at that 4yr old mind set & total boy when it comes to bodily functions.

The boys working on their rockets! I love the look of concentration on AJ's face

The boys dressing Elmo! They played in this area for about an hour & would have stayed longer if we would have let them :)

Rock Climbing!

AJ was a little scared and this was as high as he got. But he is a tad bit afraid of heights so to get any feet off the ground for him was great!
Right after I took this picture Erik made it up to the green handle support thingy that is right above his right hand :) Then he fell. But being the boy he is got right up & did it again :)

Erik doing some awesome shopping! All fruits :)My boys at the hurricane simulator

Unfortunately for Erik Mommy does not take a vacation from discipline :(