Matt's day

Our Matthew is seven years old and his mother cannot believe it. So in honor of our
handsome, happy, funny guy, here are ten things we love about Mr. Matt.

Matt was such a good baby. He was so content and so very sweet from
the very beginning. He made having three children quite a breeze.

And this boy's hair—curly as can be and reddish. I loved it so much I could
hardly stand it. Until his first haircut took it away. I mourned for weeks.

And perhaps my favorite picture of Matt. It represents everything
about our boy...light and carefree and always full of joy.

Not only has he always been so cute I could squeeze
him, his blue eyes are something else.

Matt is one smart cookie. He was excited about school from the
first second. He still loves it and still has an amazing mind.

Our darling boy has the best smile and the best laugh. When Matt gets
laughing hard, everyone becomes hysterical. He finds so many
things funny and makes life good for all of us.

Matt is himself. No matter who is watching or what is going on, he just lives how
he wants. Which is why he is such an obedient soul, he does what is right and
doesn't care what others think or what happens around him.

And this boy is athletic to the core. From the time he was very young,

he could run, jump and kick a ball like you wouldn't believe. He still can.

When Matt puts his mind to something, he goes for it. Whether it be soccer or
learning to ride a bike or solving a hard math problem, there is no stopping this boy.

Matt joining our family was, without a doubt, one of the greatest days of my life.
It is a privilege to be his mom and to have him in our family.

Happy Birthday Matthew boy! You are loved.

Repentance

Yesterday, I taught Ben's class in Primary. The kids are obviously quite young and the lesson was on repentance, so I wanted to make sure and teach them well, but knew many of the concepts were over their heads. I had prepared the lesson ahead of time and it went better than I thought. Even though the kids were only three and four they participated and were really good.

I taught them the steps of repentance on their level—we need to feel sorry, we need to ask the person to forgive us, we need to try to fix it and then we need to try not to do it again. I went over the steps several times, several different ways. To illustrate them, I told a story in the manual. It was about a little boy Ricardo who goes to the store for his mother and while he is getting what she asked him to, he sees some candy he wants. When the storekeeper isn't looking, he puts some in his pocket. On the way home, he eats it and starts to feel bad. He ends up telling his mom what he did, going back to the storekeeper to apologize and giving him money to pay for the stolen candy. The kids were really into it all and seemed to be listening and I was glad.

Last night at the dinner table, Jacob asked everyone what they learned in Primary. When it came to Ben, I asked him who his teacher was. He pointed to me and smiled. I then asked him if he learned about repentance and he said "Yeah, I did." Knowing he had really listened to the lesson and that he had a good memory, I said, "And what do we do when we need to repent, Ben?"

He replied, "We give people money."

Nice.

I think that went well.

Happy Birthday Jacob!

There are literally a thousand reasons that I love and adore Jacob Allen. I cannot even
express the privilege it is to be his wife and how grateful I am that thirty-four years
ago, he was born. And because time and space wouldn't let me list a thousand
reasons I adore him, we'll go with twenty-two. (No reason, just me being
miscellaneous.) And add many a picture to back up my claims.

1. He always takes care of our family.
2. He is incredibly adventurous and extremely athletic.
3. He is smart beyond what I knew was possible.
4. He is a fabulous bishop.
5. He makes me laugh.
6. He truly cares about others.
7. He is an absolutely outstanding dad .
8. He plays the piano.
9. He tells me (and means it) that if I am happy, he is happy.
10. He is very good at his job—and just keeps getting better.
11. He loves to joke around and makes us laugh.
12. He absolutely loves soccer.
13. He teaches the importance of education by example.
14. He speaks Spanish (very well).
15. He has awesome dance moves.
16. He is a lightning-fast runner.
17. He has a red goatee.
18. He is incredibly handsome.
19. He honors his Priesthood.
20. He loves the Lord.
21. He knows the scriptures.
22. He chose me.

Happy Birthday Love! I'm so grateful for you.

With my love, Linn

Honor

I didn't go to BYU. In fact, in my younger years, as an employee of the University of Utah, I used to cheer for anyone other than BYU. Not anymore. I changed that years ago. Yes, Jacob attended BYU and loved it, but that isn't what swayed me. I came to the conclusion that I liked cheering for a team that was made up of athletes who had made a commitment to live by an honor code. I wanted to support that. I wanted to show my respect for young men and women who would make that choice. And so for many, many years, my cheers have been for BYU.

This morning I read this article. I was very impressed with the gentleman who wrote it and I am in agreement with him. Like he said, it isn't about whether you agree with the actual honor code, it is about someone making a commitment and then making the choice to not abide by it. And the school doing the right thing, no matter the month, the upcoming tournament or the ramifications.

I'm one who feels heartbroken for Brandon Davies. I can't imagine how hard this is for him and respect anyone who is honest and upfront about what they have done, even though it had to be terribly difficult. But BYU has just moved up another fourteen spaces on my respect ladder. In this day and age it is so easy to look the other way or to justify changing consequences to lessen the blow, I'm impressed. Incredibly impressed.

If more of us did the right thing (and I'm talking about BYU's actions here, not judging the actions of Brandon Davies), no matter the time, the day, the number of people looking on, the lack of people looking on or what it cost us, this world would feel different. It would be different.

(And please keep in mind, the lady who wrote this is March Madness crazy
and wanted BYU to take the tournament by storm. But right is right. Even if
my March Madness wish appears headed down the drain.)

**Update: apparently the above author isn't alone in his opinions. Refreshing.

This morning I...

1. Got up as soon as my alarm went off (cue the hallelujah chorus because I do it every day now).
2. Called my husband who caught the 5:24 train to New York (and I thought getting up at 6:00 was early).
3. Ran 4.26 miles on the treadmill (I wasn't feeling like I even wanted to run today, so hurray for me).
4. Interrupted my run to sweep up a broken cereal bowl (man those things shatter on tile).
5. Listened to a fabulous conference talk during part of my treadmill time (I seriously love listening to conference).
6. Helped two kids get ready and on the school bus (well, I didn't help them get on the bus, they could manage that on their own).
7. Gave one sick boy his antibiotics for strep throat (and then called the school to tell him he was going to skip on coming in today).
8. Answered three emails (my inbox is empty, I sure love that feeling!).
9. Wrote a riveting blog post (can you even stand it?).
10. Felt overwhelmed with gratitude for my life, my husband, my children, my Heavenly Father, my Savior, the temple, the scriptures and the gospel (life is so good!).
    

The rambler is back (as opposed to the gambler)

My blogging has been stellar lately, no? I can tell it is winter, because I am not feeling bloggy. Yes, we have had plenty going on, but somehow I haven't had those feelings of "I can't wait to get a record of this on the blog." The feelings have been a little more like "Blog? We have a blog?" And so, despite that mindset still hanging around, I believe folks, it is time for a little blog ramble.

And the crowd goes wild. Or not. Either way.

The kids were off school the entire last week. They call it winter break here. If only it were a break from the winter. Bleh! Actually, the weather wasn't that bad last week. I'm just overly bitter about the snow we received last night. I was so done with the snow. When you spend weeks with snow banks higher than you, you quickly tire of it. The snow is dead to me. And I'm sure that last sentence has completely devastated it.

Where was I? Oh yeah, the kids being off school. I actually love having the kids home. And not just because I don't have to wake up at 6am to get my exercise in (although I wasn't crying about that). I truly love being around the kids and especially love watching them together and how well they get along (when they aren't fighting). Both times it happened, it warmed my mother's heart.

And the definite highlight of the week was that Jacob's mom came into town. We sure loved having her! She has so much energy and is always doing fun things with the kids. Which makes it even easier for me to continue to do nothing, so win-win for all. It is like my normal life on Benadryl. Nancy is fabulous and we are so grateful she would come and spend time with us.

One of the favorite things we did while she was here was to head on over to the CoCo Key Water Resort. (Yes, it was indoor, what do you think we are crazy? Don't answer that.) The kids had the best time and Jacob and Nancy were fun and exciting and rode all of the tall slides with them. Ben and I hung out together. The younger kids water area wasn't quite as exciting, but we had long talks about Phineas and Ferb and why he needs to quit growing up, so all in all, we're going to call it a success. And here is a cute picture I took before we left the house. Yes, Ben has hit that age when the camera is about as fun as seventeen immunization shots. Give me strength.

And while the water park was fun, there is no question that the best part of the week for Jacob and me would be the time we were able to get away for the night. Actually, it was more like leaving Thursday afternoon and returning late Friday and it was heaven. We had such a fabulous time, just talking and laughing and being together. And to not worry about the kids for a single second (they didn't want us to come back after spending so much fun time with their Nana) was wonderful. Thank you Nancy—we are beyond grateful!

We were sad to see Nancy go home yesterday, but are so grateful she came. And less than an hour after I returned from taking her to the airport, Jacob, Campbell and I were able to attend a multi-stake fireside with Elder Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and Elder Eyring, our area president. It was for the youth (Cam still has six months), but apparently there are some privileges when you are the bishop. I'll take them. It was not only a wonderful and spiritual night, but so fun to be with just Cam and talk and laugh together.

On a side note, previous to the fireside, Jacob attend a four-hour leadership training for the stake presidencies and the bishops. He came away with such love and appreciation for our leaders and the wonderful things he learned from Elder Christofferson, Elder Costa, Bishop Burton and Elder Eyring. He told me that while they shared such helpful ideas for bishops, it was also quite funny. One of his favorite parts of the night was during the question and answer portion. Apparently a question was asked of a bishop in our area, Bishop Danny Ainge. Someone asked why in the world he (as general manager of the Celtics) would trade Kendrick Perkins to the Oklahoma City Thunder? You just never know what you are going to learn at a bishops' training do you?

So, in spite of the lack of blogging, life is good. We are really happy. We are together and we have the gospel. I truly couldn't ask for more. I'm so grateful.

Oh and to top it off, every morning when I wake up, I count down the days to March Madness. Sad, but oh so true. I feel excitement to the deepest part of my soul. Nineteen days, if you lost count. It is like Christmas and the first day of school and summer vacation and Valentine's Day and my birthday all rolled into one.

With sugar on top.

Wa.

Hoo.

!!!!!

Spelling B-E-E

The beautiful girl below was chosen to participate in our town wide spelling bee. They picked twelve students per school, put them on two teams and then had the three elementary schools in our town compete again each other. Annie was chosen as the team captain and was pretty excited about that.

The format was different than most spelling bees (I'll explain verbally to anyone who cares to know, as it would take some time to explain here) and there were not words to study beforehand (they wanted them to focus more on the rules, which makes perfect sense because the English language is a stickler for the rules), but it was good. And Annie was darling and confident and did her best. Her team didn't end up winning, but we were sure happy to be there to cheer her on.

We sure L-O-V-E our Annie girl!

Annie and horses

If you wanted to describe how Annie feels about horses, love wouldn't be a strong enough
word. She is absolutely obsessed with them. So naturally, when she was assigned the task of
making a Valentine's box, it had to be a horse. We think she did a pretty amazing job.
No surprise there, she is a pretty amazing girl.

Our Mad Hatter

Two weekends ago, our darling Cam was in his second school play, Alice in Wonderland.
As you can tell from the photos below, he was the Mad Matter and he did so well! I truly
would have been proud of him no matter what, but he was honestly just incredible.
He didn't seem a bit nervous, played his part perfectly and had a great time.

We are so grateful for Campbell and the great things he chooses to do with his time!

Loved

Yesterday, as I hopped off of the treadmill and came upstairs, I was greeted with an incredible number of post-its notes over every surface of the house. They were everywhere! Walls, counters, cupboards, tables, books, pictures, doors, mirrors...you name it, they were on it. And as I looked closer I realized every single one of them had a reason that I was loved. Jacob had filled out an unreal number of them and the kids had tried their best to catch up to him. I don't have the words to tell you how much I loved it or how much it meant to me.

Below is just a small sample. And the picture isn't to focus on the actual kind things my family wrote, although I'm beyond grateful and it brought me to tears, but just to show you how loved I felt and how thankful it made me to be the proud wife and happy mom to the five people I love most in this world. Honestly, I told Jacob an expensive piece of jewelry or a car or a trip around the world wouldn't mean more to me than my sticky note attack. And I wasn't even remotely kidding.

Best. Valentine's. Gift. Ever. Hands down.

Happy Valentine's Day!

These darling Valentines are what our kids are giving their classmates today.
I borrowed the idea from here and the kids thought they were pretty awesome.
They were fun to make, they didn't involve candy and they were different.
Win, win, win for sure.

And these are what awaited our kids on the table when they woke up.
Yes, we are still doing our yarn ball tradition and it still appears to be as exciting
as it was the first year we started it. Maybe even a bit more with Ben old
enough to really get into it. Tonight can't come soon enough!

Happy Valentine's Day friends!
Here's to hoping your day is as sweet as ours.

Baptism

Jacob's favorite

Trying a new look

Just plain darling

In line

Happy Birthday Linn!!!

One of the best days in my life happened exactly 34 years ago today...and I wasn't even born yet
(I'm much, much younger than Linn, you know). And for the last 13 years, I've been able to
share in the celebration of that wonderful day--both because you deserve it (and far, far more)
and because I'm eternally grateful that somewhere in there you said "yes" while looking at me.
My words inevitably fall short, and my meager gestures even shorter. But...I love you—always!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LINNY!!!

One of my favorite photos I've ever taken

I love my mom and dad.

I've been through the desert...

...on a horse with no name.
Well, maybe it had a name. I really don't know.

A few weeks ago, Jacob had a business trip to India. He was gone about a week and finally headed home. Unfortunately, the day he was supposed to land in Boston we had a huge snow storm on the East Coast. He made it as far as Dubai and was stuck there until his flight could go through to New York. From the time he left India, until the time he stepped into our home, was 57 hours. Not his quickest trip back home.

But the craziest part of the story is that while he was stranded in Dubai, he just happened to ride horses through the desert with his brother, Justin. Only in the Allen family would you get stranded halfway across the world, at the same time your younger brother happens to be there on business. And instead of going out to dinner, like a lot of people, you would of course rent horses and ride them through the desert. It makes complete sense if you are an Allen. I promise.

Thanks for bringing along your phone, Justin, I love this photo.
And I feel bad we don't often see you and your cute family.
But no worries, I'm sure Jacob will be headed to Mongolia
 sometime in the future. And (Allen) odds are, you'll be there.

My Hope is Found

I happen to love Owl City. Our whole family does really.
And just when I didn't think I could be more impressed with
Adam Young, he went and recorded this song. I love it.