While you were away...

found this in my drafts...



So Jacob and Cora have been gone it seems like for months! However, they were only gone last week and then a few days this week. I have tried to do something fun with Owen and Sadie while they were gone so they didn't feel too left out. I know Sadie has missed Cora so much!
Last week while Jacob and Cora were off at camps I decided to take Owen and Sadie to Jungle Jim's It is an indoor amusement park geared toward younger kids. I don't think Sadie has been here at an age to enjoy it. She had a ton of fun!

We also took our weekly hike, to Bell Canyon. We only went to the lower lake. It was beautiful but it was also smelly! Lots of ducks swam around and we saw a few fish close to the bank. We did this hike with My mom, sister-Bridgette and her kids Tommy, Adam, Katrina, Kyle and Caleb, I also had a friends Daughter Lindsay.

Anna, my sister, flew in on Thursday to run a half Marathon with me on Friday night so here is a picture of us at the start line!

Saturday we went crawdad fishing. We took the little girl across the street, M.J. She was fun and loved being with the kids. She didn't like the crawdads at all and she fell asleep in the chair. She is adorable. :) Cora and Jacob were home for this!

Anna flew home on Monday morning. SO sad to see her go. This week seems like a blur. I have spent a lot of my time getting school stuff ready. I am on the parent organization board so I have had a lot to do!

Jacob and Cora left for the Super Activity on Thursday morning to Flaming Gorge. They were so excited, it meant another two days alone with Owen and Sadie though! Thursday we chilled around the house and also did a little shopping. Friday was the funnest day for me. I was volunteering at the school most of the morning and also registered the kids for Junior High!! ACK! Then we were gonna head downtown. I decided last minute to take tracks so I didn't have to worry about parking and road closures. We were going down the Tour of Utah Stage 4 finish line. The Tour of Utah is a 6 day race around northern Utah for elite cyclists! They had a big expo/carnival thing going on! The kids raced banana's:

Then we walked around and got tons of free stuff. Don was volunteering so he was also there and we saw him occasionally. There was a HUGE screen TV that they had a live feed on so we watched them ride through Magna, a small town West of Salt Lake. It was soo cool to see them ride and know exactly where they were. We slowly made our way through all the vendor booths and saw the finish was coming close so we went over to secure some finish lie spots. I noticed a TV across from us and we quickly figured out they were close. I watched the TV. a few pacer cars started to come through and the helicopter (we were watching the live feed through) came past us and started circling. finally watching the TV I saw them turn the corner to the street we were on!! It was soo exciting to se





Oh my goodness this post is full of fun pictures and that is only week 1!!! I am gonna close with that and will post again in a few days! Hopefully time doesn't escape me because the best is yet to come! School starts in 11 days and I still have so much I want to do. How sad huh? My kids are excited to go back! For me, it starts a new chapter. I am looking for employment. I hope I can find something fulfilling but flexible! I want something that is challenging but something I can enjoy and look forward doing. is that even possible?

Sunday Special

I feel an overwhelming desire to make my family strong in the gospel. I always have felt a little something. but now it is huge! The world gets scarier every day! My children need to be prepared!
I decided in the spring to read the Book of Mormon again. It has been a long time since I had. then in June I was issued a challenge to read the Book of Mormon in 40 days. I said no because I was already toward the end of Alma and wanted to finish before I started over. But the challenge issuer said he would set up the reading challenge for me starting where I was. No getting out of it right? It was incredible to read the Book of Mormon so quickly. To spend hours a day in the words of our prophets of old. It comes down to about 7 chapters a day but if you get behind to catch up is extremely hard, but I did it!! I finished! And now I can finish it again and count it for reading it twice in 2012!

Yesterday at church, during Sacrament meeting. Well it was during the opening song, Owen said he wanted to bear is testimony. I told him We could go home and talk about it and he could do it next month but he insisted in doing it. I asked what he wanted to say so he told me. Then I asked if he wanted me to help him. He said no, so I asked if he wanted to write it down and read it and he said yes. I wrote it down for him and told him I would go up with him (part of my challenge was to bear my testimony on the Book of Mormon). As soon as the counselor sat down we went up. He was so good. It just warmed my heart.

So as I was reading about Moroni building walls up around his cities. I likened it to building up walls around my home/my family. but not real walls. I am talking their testimonies. I want to give them every spiritual experience I can. I will go out of my way to do something little. I took Cora to do baptisms for the dead the day after her birthday because she was gone the whole week after. She is so excited to go with her friends too!

Like I said when I started this the desire to keep my family strong in the gospel is so strong I can almost feel it. It makes me want to cry. Where is the boundary that I don't force it though? In the Lord's hands I can do anything! Whew!



Each step, each day of my journey should move me progressively closer to Him. He doesn't expect or even want me to "run faster" than I am able. In fact, there may be days when I can't run at all. I may just be able to walk, crawl, or scoot, but my job is to be diligent or faithful as I move forward—no matter how small my progression.

-Kris Belcher