3rd time is a charm?

After fasting and prayer we have decided to move back to Utah. We will be moving (for the 3rd time in a year) as soon as our house sells. Dave will start mid to late July. We have made some good friends here that won't be forgotten (who BETTER come see us in Utah) and are excited to get to see some of our dear friends in Utah again. Keep us in your prayers to sell the house quickly. As Chase would say, "Peace out".

It's all downhill from here...

We celebrated (for 3 days in a row) Dave's 40th b-day. We started off by having a family party with his favorite, traditional b-day cake; chocolate cake with pink, peppermint frosting. We spent the evening with good friends, the Anderson's, at "Outback Steakhouse" (thanks again for treating us Jeff and Laurie). On Saturday night we went over to the Gregory's house and they treated us to fillet minon on the barbeque....cooked to perfection, if I might add. Thanks for the yummy meal Jason and Megan. Then, on Sunday evening we had a suprise party for Dave and he was surprised:-). It was fun to see his reaction. Here are some pictures to document the weekend event.

Dave's suprise b-day cake with him on his motorcycle.

The missionaries took him out to visit a new member that just happen to not be home (hee, hee) so that we could set up and suprise him. This is him not knowing what to say as several friends from church were there to suprise him.

This is the family gathering. I love the "action" in this photo. Too many candles to put on a cake so we had 5 to represent his most prized possesions:-).

The girls and I made signs and put them up at the entrance onto the main street from our neighborhood so Dave could see it on the way to work. If it wouldn't have been for one of the girls calling him and distracting him while he was passing it he might have seen it:-). He saw it when he came back home though. I should have taken the picture before the rain but they said, "20....30...Happy 40th birthday, Dave Boden....It's all downhill from here" ( the 30 sign is on the ground).

We also stuck this on the back of his car before he left for work (hee, hee).

Dave got a combined Father's day gift/birthday present this year. A new barbeque. One side is propane and the other is charcoal. He loves it! Happy 40th b-day, honey. Hope it was a good one.

Wicked...Cool!

We had alot of fun going to "Wicked" with our friends, the Andersons and the Pattersons. The Musical was AMAZING! I am going to take the kids next time. I know they would LOVE it.

Our good friends Dave and Kimberly Patterson. They are fun to hang with. They are hilarious!

I love Jeff and Laurie (pronouned Lori-that was for you cutie...LOL) Anderson. They are awesome!

Our illegally taken picture. Oops. I am so evil. Glad we took it though since we had to rush out of the restuarant without eating anything but our appetizers to get to the musical on time. I wanted to take it in front of this trailer we saw on the way that had a huge picture of "wicked" poster on the side.

Happy 8th b-day to Chase. Meagan and Jenna!

Look how cute they were at 6 months...

and now time has flown and they are 8 years old!

We celebrated at a place called "Skate Daze" by roller skating, riding in the bumper cars, riding the indoor roller coaster....,

playing laser tag, eating cupcakes...

all with good friends they have met at school. Chase, however, invited 4 of his friends who ended up not being able to come because they are all on the same baseball team and their game changed 2 days before the party. SO..., Chase will be having another b-day party just for him after school gets out.

Boy, time has flown! They are just as cute to watch together as they were when they were babies and toddlers. Happy b-day you three!

Baptism

I am finally getting around to posting pictures of the triplets baptism. It was so nice to have so much family around to show their love and support. Thank you to those who could be there and to those who wanted to be there so bad but couldn't.

It was a very loud baptism with all the kids/babies but it is amazing to me how the spirit can still be felt through it all. I just sat there thinking and praying in my heart that my children would live their lives so that they could always feel the spirit even through the "noise" of everyday life. I am sure that every parent would agree that all you desire is for your children to live righteously and that they will gain their own testimonies of the gospel and that they will share those testimonies, thus strengthening themselves and others around them.

We have had a few struggles here in Omaha and I have to admit that I have been tremendously "stressed" and I do not handle stress very well, I will admit. When I have stepped back from the situation(s), though, and looked through God's perspective I know that it is to strengthen our family bond. I have felt an even stronger desire to keep my family close. I have a stronger testimony of how important it is to make your home a refuge from the world. I want to do more things with my children so they know how important they are to me. I want them to be able to feel an almost tangible difference when they walk through the door into our home.

I am realizing that the older your kids get the more fervent your prayers become. I am so thankful for the strengthened testimony that our Heaveny Father is there and that he will help you through your trials. You cannot go through them alone and He is always there bringing thoughts to your mind through the Holy Spirit to calm you, to comfort you, to guide you as to what to say and/or do.

I love my children! I love my husband! I love my Heavenly Father! and someday, I will look back on these experience we are having and, through God's help, see more of his perspective of why we are here and what we can/have learned. Love to all!

Surprise visit from Kandis!

On Wednesday the door bell rang and when I went to answer it it was my good friend, Kandis, visiting from Utah here for the tripelts baptism this week!!! WOW! I was in shock. It has been a very fun visit. Here we are in downtown Omaha at the Old Mrket Place. It was a beautiful 80 degrees:-) Thanks Kandis!!!

My trio!

Happy 8th birthday this month to my beautiful triplets; Meagan, Chase and Jenna. They are truely best friends. It was so fun to see them interacting for these photos. They made me laugh and tear up with joy and love for them while watching them. They have such a special relationship. So many fun pictures but I only posted a few.
(Thank you to Trinity for making time to do this for us and for her wonderful talent of capturing their sweet personalities)

DISNEY WORLD!!!

We went to Disneyworld this last week and has SO much fun. We met my brothers (Greg, Nate, and Tom) and my SIL's and kids there and had a blast. The weather was perfect (except for Friday mornings 45 min. down pour) and the company was just as great.

Here we all are at Hollywood Studios.

Here are Chase and Meagan posing like Sleeping Beauty and Prince Charles.

My little pirate girls. I love this picture of the two of them.

This is everyone except Tom, Jane and their 3 kids. Their kids are younger and so they did their own thing most of the time then we'd get together in the evenings. It was fun to say "17" when asked how many in our group at each ride.

Here are the kids posing at one of their favorite rides; TOWER OF TERROR! We love that ride. I think we went on it 4 times. Our other favorites are Splash Mountian, Rockin' rollercoaster, Space Mountain, Expendition Everest, Test Track and Soarin'.

Gotta have a picture with Mickey. Tyler claims to be too old to pose with Mickey.

Pinewood Derby time....

Ryan was excited about his car this year. He picked out the design and had fun painting it (with Mom's taping job to help with straight lines). His certificate was for most "aerodynamic".

Ryan's car is second from the left. Out of 4 races he won 1st place twice and 2nd place twice. He came in 6th place in the end...pretty dang good if you take into account there were 26 cars/scouts. GO RYAN!

We are off to Disneyworld in less than 12 hours. We'll post some pictures:-).

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

All dressed in green so as not to get pinched, all 5 kids are dressed for school. Actually, after this picture was taken Ryan and Tyler went and changed their shirts so they weren't wearing green and then had me draw a green four leaf clover on their arm so someone would pinch them thinking they weren't wearing green and then they could pinch them back 10 times after they showed them they were.
(On a side note, it looks like Chase needs new jeans...LOL)