Jam 20-27, 2017 Library fun, Meeting Baby Ezra and Park/Museum Time with Grandma R

We enjoyed the new learning centers at the library this week, FINALLY meeting my sweet nephew Ezra Mcrae Heath and spending time with Grandma Ralph at local parks and discovery museum!  
Gracie getting so good at doing the monkey bars all by herself!!! SO proud of her, she;s only 3 and a half!!!
Love that sweet contagiously happy smile from the little 15 month old boy! He loves any kind of music, playing the kids bells and piano....and climbing up on anything and everything he can!

Beautiful sunsets, one of my most favorite things about living here....the vastly wide open sky and the majestically etched watercolors that fill the heavens with such breathtaking colors!
Loved these spiritual insights and boosts this week about optimism.  I have been studying Pres. Hinkley, since I am not able to go to Relief Society, with my new calling in the Sunbeams, and so I do the best I can to read as much of the teachings of this prophet of my youth as possible! I absolutely loved President Hinkley, his contagiously heart-warming smile, optimism and faith.  I know we will be blessed and uplifted as we study and learn from him this year.
  I know these words are true! It does the soul good to look at life with a lens of optimism, hope and strength that comes from faith in the Savior.  I know our lives are in His hands, and as we do our best to follow Him, He will lead us and guide us, guard us, protect us and will ever still give us aide.  :)

Cousins at the discovery museum!! These kiddos are the best buddies!! Counting these wonderful blessings and thankful for these times together.

Feb 11-18, 2017 Valentines and flowers!!!

We had a nice week full of love starting last Sunday! Here are some of my sweet Sunbeams helping decide which choices in different situations helped us feel The Spirit. We talked about how we can feel the Spirit when we love others and decorated hearts and had heart-shaped pretzels for snack. These kids have such hearts full of love, enthusiasm and desire to do what is right. :) So thankful I get to be with and teach these cutie-pies the gospel each Sunday!


Family Sunday Selfie!!! Sunday is one of the days I look forward to most each week!! Not only is our house usually pretty clean (because we've spent time doing chore auction and singing to Disney songs while we clean together on Saturday), but we get to hear uplifting spiritual music, renew our baptismal covenants at church with the sacrament, and spend quality non-rushed time together as a family. Sometimes we try to learn about a new ancestor for our Sunday activity, or pile on the couch and read several Friend Magazine articles together, or go on a family neighborhood walk, or call a grandp or geandma/ family member for a face-time chat, or we spend time around the table playing family games like monopoly cards, Mexican train dominoes (new for us this year), or Qwirkle, or nines. I just love not having to stress about the usual daily grind, cleaning, or going anywhere and just getting to be around my dear other half and our favorite little people around! :)
  
Sunday tickles and Sunday smiles

Monday, after a learning day of homeschool work, we checked out some different building options nearby. We have been looking for a different home layout which could accommodate the hopefully growing family of ours longer than just over the next 2 years. (Our dining area is just pretty narrow and tight for more than 6 or 7 people.) These two snuggle bugs waiting and playing on the stairs in the model home.  

Gracie presenting some coloring pages during family home evening. We had our lesson on love and service. We talked about different scriptures that teach us about love using conversation hearts to give us clues and played Service Love Bingo afterwards--- we really like this 2nd annual family night tradition!!   
Joshy loves going up onto the fireplace whenever it's time to sing so he can swing his arm and "lead the music." So adorable!!

Our Gingerbread hearts and homemade rolo treats! Love these little love bugs and teaching them about the greatest source of love, hope, peace and strength can receive comes from our Savior and sharing that with others!

Valentine's morning breakfast!! My other J-half surprised me with flowers-which I always love and bring such beauty and make this time extra special to be remembered so sweetly. :) We had mango orange juice to honor Daddy's love for mangoes from his mission, pumpkin waffles-my all time fave, pancakes with ice cream on top (only on special days.... Haha it's a tradition on Daddy's side haha), strawberries, pineapple and smoothies!!
   

Love this thoughtful, hard-working, faithful, determined, time-efficient, quirky, competitive, fun and goofy husband of mine. :)
 
Will you be my VALENTINE!!!? They loved their special Valentine chocolate boxes!!!   

Valentine's hugs!!! I'm so thankful for my Valentine who has worked so hard for our family and for our Father in Heaven for blessing us with these wonderful sweethearts!!!  Goofy tongue smiles and all... Had to do a double take! Haha! Oh for real life pictures!

 Snuggles and cuddles with our little loves!
 
The kids had a great time at our Classical Conversations Homeschool Co-Op this week, learning about World War II leaders and painting some shapes in motion after the style of Degas!! Katelyn did her presentation on having the kids guess what was inside her box with a set of clues. Her clues were... It's smooth and found in nature, it can be lots of different colors, usually creamy colored or light browns, and this one was found in WA on the coast. It was a moon snail!!!! From Grandpa!!! Woo hoo! We had lots of fun learning about them this week too! Some the the massive ones can completely slide themselves entirely under the same in 7 minutes....very speedy for a snail and pretty crazy how they bore holes in other shells with their proboscis to eat their own food! 

Nathan's special object he had his class guess had the following clues: It has holes in it, it's found usually outside and something lives inside it. It was a wasps nest!! (One we knocked down from our trampoline thispast summer! Lovely huh!) Way to go kiddos for being so brave and presenting some pretty neat items to their friends! 

 
On Friday, one of our friends invited us to go to the Dallas Arboretum which was absolutely breathtaking and beautiful!! We were amazed at all of the incredible blooms and variety of plants, flowers, and waterfalls! Even though Nathan got a Hairy Potter slice in his forehead playing in a grove of branches, he quickly was up for playing again with all the beautiful fountains and lush green, grassy hills to roll down with great friends. That seemed to make up for all the hurt, and we were thankful to find Washington-esque grass here amidst the somewhat drab plant winter of shrubs around here lately. It was a beautiful place and so refreshing and we are thankful for the Presdients 5 dollar day discount and great friends to make it all worth it!    
An amazing Texan sunset with a huge widely massive expanse of sky rolled out on the horizon before us... So magnificent and beautiful! 

 
These sweet kiddos sure keep my days bouncing with energy and activity, but these precious moments of them happily all bundled up for sibling sleep-over Friday night bring so much peace and warmth to my heart. Sure love them and especially when they love being with each other as best friends and buddies. 
Before his haircut... And After, a day later because I forgot to get the first after shot...hehe. :) Handsome boy!

 

Katelyn's own creative beaver teeth from carrots! Haha...gotta love these innovative minds! 

Jan. 13-17, 2017!!

We were so thrilled that Liz and Austin called us up early Monday morning this week to see if we could watch their kiddos so they could go in for a doctor appointment, they had to move up, because....drum rolll please.....Liz was having all kinds of contractions through the night, and they weren't going away...so it was likely...she was about ready to deliver their sweet baby!!

We were happy to re-vamp our home-school day a bit and have some friends to play games with, do our language arts, math and reading with....and because everyone did so well with their lessons, we made a quick trip over to our local playground too on their "gator' jeep! Turns out, about a few hours in, Liz did deliver a healthy baby boy! They named him Ezra McRae Heath!! What a strong, meaningful, less common, biblical name along with an ancestral middle name and he just seemed to be the perfect blend of Isaac and Andrew when they were babies! So cute!

Isaac was so sweet after we came back, because he wanted to make a cake for his newest baby brother on his 0 birthday!! Hehe...what a fun family tradition we started together! haha.  Way to go on that idea Isaac and all of these great and willing helpers in the kitchen! Here are some highlights of our week!
  
Joshua getting SOOO excited to shoot the "BAHHHH" into the hoop with Daddy! He was all smiles after Daddy lifted him up high to help him get a slam dunk! I had to snap a picture of this budding basketball star and his talented Daddy coach!
    Someone got some good sleep that night after a tiring basketball game! ;)












I just love the peacefulness and preciousness of these sweet little ones when they sleep. I always want to remember these times too as sweet and simple as they may be.











Another cool highlight of this week was that we started a 31-day-Read-Aloud-Revival Challenge where the kids try to read at least 15 minutes aloud each day for the entire month of January and at the end of each week, they all get to choose a reward prize paper. The first week they drew a movie night, the next week they chose to have one less mandatory chore auction chore, and then this week----we all got to go out for frozen yogurt at a new shop that just came into town! It was super yummy, and you can't pass up an all-you-can-fit-in-your-cup for $3 deal on Thursday.  This family sure enjoyed mixing, blending, sampling and piling on lots of scrumptious flavors! Hooray for reading! We really are so proud at the amazing progress K and Nathy have been making in their reading!! Even Gracie likes to memorize books like "The Red Hat, Blue Hat" or "Ooops Book" or nursery rhyme books too! So proud of this bunch!

 Ggg


Love this handsome hubby of mine.  :) My partner in just about everything!


I had my yearly check-up after baby this week too and saw that the thank-you letter I wrote to by nurse mid-wife was hanging on her wall.  It was a tender moment to remember that special experience and meant a lot to me that she would want to remember it too! 

That same day. Grandma R arrived to help take care of little baby Ezra and the Heath family. We were thankful we got to spend time with her and cousins playing at the park a few days after she arrived!  
This girl is such a talented clumber! She can take on any challenge and overcome anything! Go Miss K!
This boy would barely slow down enough for me to snag a pic with him looking lol....he was always on the go! Happy as could be going down that slide over and over again!
Yep, YOU, little J, we love YOU!!!

On Saturday, we were invited to a birthday party for our cousins-cousin (practically part of our extended Texas family) Preston at Jared and Sereen's house.  It was superhero themed, so the kids got to climb through a "spiders-web" made of masking tape, make super-hero masks, play pin the shield on Captain America, and eat yummy cake and ice cream! Cousin times are some of the best of times! 
So thankful for family nearby so we can share some fun times together and build memories to last a lifetime!