Smith Family

The very last primary program that all 3 of my kids will be in except... this picture is an accurate representation of how each kid felt about the primary program. Brandon was just not feeling it. Would not get up to do it and I didn't want to force it. The girls did a great job though and I loved watching them up there. I had to sub as the pianist for the practice, and Brandon didn't have any problem doing that, so I at least got to see him do his part.

We started off the Halloween season with our tradition night of Hocus Pocus, pizza and a treat. I normally do orange soda floats but saw the BOO shakes and thought we would try them out. They turned out cute, but I think I prefer the floats. They were vanilla ice cream shakes with lots of cool whip on the top. The following week we carved out our pumpkins! The kids are getting better and better with carving each year. Soon they won't need our help at all! Which is kinda bitter sweet. I didn't get a picture of them completed but Audrey did an owl, Brandon a ghost and Melanie a cat.                                    The Trunk of Treat was the Saturday before Halloween and the young women were in charge. I had downloaded an app to help make invitations for young women things and was asked to make one for the ward trunk or treat. I don't feel like I'm great at making them ...

Audrey had her first orchestra concert this year and did awesome! I'm impressed how much she has advanced since school has started. She loves her orchestra teacher and class. 

I wish there was so much more I could do to celebrate and let Elliott know how much we love him. We decorated the door and put birthday cards for him along with some of his favorite treats out after he had fallen asleep so he was surprised in the morning. That night he chose Torchy's to eat at. It was the kids first time and they loved it! They really do have the best queso! He works so unbelievably hard for our family. Out of all the asylum officers he was the only one who received a 5 star rating based off his interviews and performance this past year. Getting married young comes with some challenges but I feel lucky that I get to be the one to support and love this guy. I get a front row seat watching him grow into the man he has become. We love you so much!  I asked for a picture and instead he gave us a series to enjoy!

Look at this cute little girl! Brandon wasn't too concerned with dressing up for Spirit Week but Melanie is all about it. We scrounged this up about 15 min before school and thought it was as good as it was gonna get for decades day!

I try and eat lunch with the kids whenever I'm at the school volunteering. They especially like it when I get a Little Cesar's pizza to share with friends! I like meeting their school friends and seeing how they interact and get caught up on how things are going. Both of them have found some good friends. I wish middle school had more volunteer opportunities so I could meet Audrey for lunch, I'm gonna need to surprise her and take her out sometime.

Audrey loved having her friends come over. We went to the store to get a cake mix so they could bake a cake. Since their names are Deena, Natalia and Audrey they decided they were DNA. It makes me so happy that she has found some good friends here.

For the past few years I legitimately couldn't remember how old I was and would have to do the math every time. I'm thinking 35 is a solid easy number to remember and I think it's gonna be a good year! This is what 35 looks like! This week started off crazy. Monday was chill, but Tuesday was when the madness started.  I somehow managed to get put in charge of Box Tops at the elementary school and was invited to a meeting along with all the surrounding schools to hear a presentation from headquarters. They are switching the program from cutting out clips on boxes to scanning receipts and it was interesting to hear why they are switching it up and upcoming changes to the program. Houston is roughly a 30 min drive with no traffic but it took a solid hour to get there by 9:00am. By the time I got home I had enough time to eat and pick up kids from school! Once we got home it was off to Activity Days and Scouts. Wednesday I had to attend the PTO board meeting to repo...

My girls are pretty good about taking a shower or bath every day or other day, I don't need to remind them they just know! Apparently that part of Brandon's brain doesn't work quite yet. I had to remind him last Wednesday when I did their laundry for the week that he had ZERO pairs of underwear for the week. A WEEK!!! I told him we need to maybe make assigned days to take a shower or bath because that's not okay. Brandon always wakes up early and gets his chores done, bed made and breakfast eaten and cleaned up before most of us wake up. So this morning, as usually, he was chilling on the couch as Elliott was walking out the door for work. Elliott asks Brandon, hey when was the last time you took a bath? Brandon slyly looks up with a grin on his face and says, "Nobody know, dad." 🤣🤣

Some of the Beehives in the ward are desperately working to earn their YW medallion before the program changes at the end of the year. They decided to throw an Activity Days Camp to get some of their goals passed off and my girls LOVED it! Melanie doesn't turn 8 until next year but they were nice enough to let her come and Audrey was able to get to know the beehives better before she joins them in January. They were there Friday night and most of Saturday. I loved hearing how much fun they had and am glad they are building bonds with the girls in the ward.  While they were gone Brandon and I were able to hang out and get some pizza together. There is this place called Mod Pizza down the street we had never tried so thought we would check it out and it's pretty cool! It's like a Subway for pizza, you get to pick any topics you want and they cook it right up for you. We were fans! And I'm always a fan of hanging out with this dude.

I was asked to give a talk a couple Sundays ago. I KNEW as soon as Elliott was called to be in the bishopric my days were numbered and of course I was the first person he asked to speak! I was overwhelmed by the response I got from baring my testimony, I don't know if we realize how rampant faith crisis's are and how they are effecting so many people and families. I wish there was space at church for those struggling with testimony, and way for them to know that they are still wanted there. We want them and need them. I wanted to share it here so I can remember what this time felt like. I wanted to end my talk by baring my testimony. I've been debating how vulnerable I wanted to be here because I haven't born my testimony in a few years and the reason for that is because I lost my testimony, at least a significant portion of it. Faith crisis seems to be the new cool term to call it but I can guarantee there isn't one thing cool about it, it's earth shattering ...

When the AC goes out, we go out to dinner! It went out Sunday night around 9:00pm so the kids were already asleep and not effected, but I felt like I was basically roughin it like a pioneer that night! Eventually we fell asleep. I spent the rest of the day at the elementary school working on PTO stuff to avoid the heat and when I get back it was 88 degrees. The guys finally came to fix it around 4:00 but it was too warm to cook anything. So we checked out a place we haven't been before, the kids were in a pretty goofy mood and we had a fun time!

When we moved here and knew how intense Elliott's schedule was going to be we made it a priority to have a date night every Saturday. It's something we both look forward too every week. Last month was a challenge because last Saturday we had a ward BBQ and the week before a bishopric dinner. This week we almost didn't go again because I had a sacrament meeting talk to prepare for and Elliott had a class he needed to prepare for, but we realized it had been 1 year and we needed to celebrate. It's hard to believe one year ago he and I drove out here with all our stuff and moved him into a little apartment. It was the absolute worst saying good bye and leaving him behind, after he dropped me off at the airport and drove away I ran straight into the bathroom sobbing and had to take a min before going through security. I can't express how happy I am that time is over! So even though we didn't have a lot of time we wanted to at least sneak out for some tacos and ice c...

The girls love to do my hair and make up. You can take a guess at which one did which hair style! I will say that I am pretty impressed with how well Audrey has gotten at straightening and curling my hair, I think she does a better job than I do! I am always impressed with Melanie's creativity.

Audrey found a friend that lives in our neighborhood. Her name is Natalia. Her parents are from Guatemala and she's a really sweet girl. They talk on the phone a lot and were so excited to go to the orchestra party at the skating rink yesterday. She's just growing up too fast!

We caught our first bug of the school year! I was worried it was strep so I took her down to urgent care to get her tested. The doctor said it just looked red and swollen but didn't see any white puss spots so we'll just treat it as a virus. She spent the day building forts and watching movies. Her teacher called me the other day to let me know shes doing really well, and can't believe how good of a reader she is!

It was a scary and intimidated process buying a house. The kids and I were in Arizona and Elliott was in Georgia for training and wouldn't be done until the week of Thanksgiving. Which meant neither one of us was here to physically walk through houses. We wanted to be in a home before Christmas and so the timing was extremely tight. We started looking for homes, and had put in an offer on one that I fell in love with from the pictures. We had put $1,000 down, had the inspector come out and had one day left to decide whether we were moving forward with it or not. Elliott did a drive by the night he got into town and didn't have a super great feeling about it. The next day when he did the walk through he knew it wasn't our house. I remember him calling me while I was sitting at church in Arizona and telling me this house wasn't going to work out. I was devastated. I walked out of Relief Society tearing up because we were running out of time, I wanted to spend Christmas ...