June from my iPhone

Pieces of June from my iPhone that are little snippets of life.

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Atticus has really taken to Daddy as his role model. 

Milayla puts a smile on my face when she takes the rice to their little kitchen rather than the apartment kitchen. Pretty sure she is anxious to get some real cooking done!

A lovely trip to The Hague Temple in The Netherlands. And finally some summer weather to welcome us there. 

I love the warm welcome there always is at the temple and all the smiles that greet the children. The kids have loved getting to meet the temple workers there and spend time in the waiting room. I can't wait until we can all go in to the temple together. It will be beautiful. 

With the summer weather it also meant that we could enjoy a little time at a nearby playground after enjoying the temple yard. 

Atticus had his orientation day at his kindergarten. The kindergarten and workers are great, but he may not end up going there (may write more on that later). We really were blessed to find a kindergarten that has been such a pleasure and so patient with us as we try to understand the system in another language. We toured quite a few kindergartens before finding this one.

We've enjoyed plenty of trips to the library, but imagine the kids' concern when we walked in one day to find this:

It gave them quite a startle and rightly so! And then there have been trips to stock up on some summer clothes. Milayla is pretty keen on trying everything on. And she loves practicing getting dressed.

Like this for example - she ran off and came back in this lovely ensamble. Aside from her seasons being a little mixed up (winter boots and a swim suit?) we were pretty impressed with her creativity. And we are absolutely loving her closed-eyes camera smile.

Milayla is progressing at high speed. She has been helping out in the kitchen and with cleaning so well, asks to go on her bike every day, and practically lives at the piano or at the book shelf.

 Birthday's of little ones usually means checkups at the doctors as well, so that has filled some of our time. But otherwise, we have been trying to get out as much as we can to enjoy the gorgeous flowers that are in bloom.

This picture at the doctors' office always makes me smile. The text at the bottom says "never give up". So true. And such a humorous way to depict it.

 We've had lots of sensory play with the kids, both inside and outside. The waterplay park at the lake has been a choice spot with the nice weather.

 I am remembering why we love the city park so much. It is really rather dark and dreary in the winter time, but it is definitely lush and beautiful now. Between the playgrounds, greenery and animals it is a fun time for everyone.

I've been doing better at planning weekly one-on-one time with each of the kids as well. Boy, does that make a huge difference around here. And it is such a blessing to spend that time with them as individuals to really work on that relationship and learn who each of them are.

 Atticus and Milayla are so much fun to have in the kitchen as helpers. I never knew that making crackers could be this funny :). I love these kids.

The kids also help set the table and take the food to the table. Milayla can now reach dishes from the counter top and decided to try and grab her bowl from the counter, but it tilted too much when she grabbed resulting in yogurt all over her arms and face. I don't think she minded too much.

We made a special shirt for Daddy for Father's Day. And Atticus was pretty excited about his paper airplane shirt for his birthday.

 There is no shortage of great reasons to celebrate in June!

 Lots of discovery walks to learn about plants, flowers, bugs and sun.

And it's always nice when a trip to buy new shoes for the kids ends up turning into a visit seeing firetrucks, rescue boats and vintage police cars. The kids were pretty excited about it.

And lots of gospel studying happening around here, too!

 I love summer. And I love getting to soak it in with these great people :).

Father's Day 2013

The kids worked really hard to put together some surprises for Father's Day and came up with a game of Jeopardy - Father's Day edition (Mommy helped :) ), Father's Day menu, a banner, and some verrrrry special prizes (that's right, we made Jason work a little bit harder for his presents this year, it was pretty fun).

I was so proud of all their work, and so were they. So when the big day came we were all pretty excited to celebrate and to give Daddy some spoiling. 

I'm kind of in love with the fact that the kids came up with a way to the Father's Day banner together (they both wanted to color the whole thing and had a disagreement on the colors). As a result, the banner turned out super creative, even making the letters into people, and Jason loved it. 

Breakfast was a hit with everyone. I think those oatmeal fruit squares are going to be a new "special breakfast" favorite around here. Which is great for me because they are pretty easy to make.

We caught a great photo of the kids with Jason before we headed off for church. And even had our family home morning lesson beforehand as we knew we had quite a bit going on in the afternoon. We're early risers around here...can you tell?

The afternoon brought plenty of games, excitement, father's day wishes and fun. 

Luckily for Jason, he won the grand prize in the game of Jeopardy because the kids REALLY wanted to give it to him!

I mean, when you are planning on turning your Daddy into your own personal car mat, why wouldn't you be excited for him to open up his gift. 

The kids worked so hard coloring the shirt; Atticus on the letters and Milayla adding sunshine everywhere that they were pretty excited to finally get to use it. 

Jason was such a great sport about it. He quite enjoyed his little back massage.

 Then it was on to dinner. And with this picture, you can see the kids' handprints on the front of the shirt - so fun.

 We sure had fun surprising Jason. HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

General Conference Study Journal

Back here I mentioned briefly that I was working on a General Conference study journal. Well, here is what it looks like (with all my scribblings in it).

I am so grateful that I have this thing, it has really accelerated my learning and my ability to apply all the incredible messages from General Conference. What a blessing it has been as I have been in extra need to places to fill myself with spiritual nourishment. It has also reminded me of some good study habits to have with prayer and scripture study as well, which have been great to start applying again.

Originally, this journal started out as a little "book club" where a few of us would get together and discuss the conference talks as opposed to books. It was a great idea, but after a couple meetings it fizzled out. While I am still really hoping the group is able to start up again, I am glad that it was around long enough for me to pick up this lovely gem of a habit.

And with that in mind, I am due to go study and ponder a talk. Oh, and if you are wondering where to get one of these, I think there may be a few different people who make things similar to this. Mine is from the Red Headed Hostess and I really like it (I ordered the already printed one from Amazon, not the download one). Enjoy!

A Sunny Day at the Beach

We were to happy to finally welcome summer at the beginning of June (though it seems to have only stayed for a short visit..). As soon as sunny days and warm weather hit, we knew exactly what we needed to do. Plan a relaxing day at the beach with friends, a picnic and the first bike ride of the year out to Snuten Lekker (and organic farm in the Blockland that makes delicious ice cream). So we recruited the Wekerle family and made it happen. So glad that we did. It was a great day. Can't wait for more summer weather so that we can do it again!

Milayla was pretty happy to play in the sand donning her white sun hat. As cute as that hat is, it sure makes it hard to get a good picture of her beautiful face. 

The kids loved playing with the water play park.

Henry and Niko definitely made the most of all that sand.

And Jason and I even got to try our hand at tight rope walking. Sadly, we aren't naturals, but I think we have both come to terms with that.

The ice cream trip was a big favorite. The boys were pretty excited that they all picked the exact same flavours. Funny how that happens..

Martin and Michelle. We feel pretty blessed to know such a great family!

Milayla has hit this funny stage where she plays around with her style of walk when she wants to be goofy. Oh, and she stops to explore everything. A little piece of straw, pebbles, sand, bugs...everything.  She is definitely eager to learn!

The kids had fun playing at the farm playground with the toy tractor and bobby car. Watching them was quite interesting as they had both picked something that was a little difficult for them to ride (Milayla on the Bobby car over all the bumps in the path and Atticus using pedels that didn't work very well) but they never gave up - not once. And all their efforts paid off, not to mention, they loved working at it. We made sure to compliment how hard they both worked to figure out each of there vehicles to which Atticus gently reminded me, "it's because we can do hard things, Mommy.". So true. So true.

And of course, us adults soaked in some sun and conversation on the sidelines.

Then after a visit to some of the animals it was time to hop back on the bikes and go home for some much needed baths.

A good, filling day. Can't wait for Summer to come again ;). 

Atticus is 4 - Official photos

You can sure tell that I take a lot of photos around here. Atticus knew just what he needed to do. I had so much fun taking pictures of our little 4-year-old. So handsome, sweet and funny and growing up so fast! I love how the pictures turned out, he has some great expressions and smiles. You can really tell how much older he looks in these photos; can't believe it! 

Enjoy the photos!

Power of Moms article

With bits of spare time here and there I have been trying to write down some of my thoughts on motherhood. I'm sure you have noticed a few writings on the blog here and there. Well, one of those writings made it's way onto a lovely website called the Power of Moms. Be sure to check it out. Also, please take a look around at all the other great things they have on their website. 

Here is the link to the article. Enjoy!