Photo Shoot

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Merry Christmas everyone! Time for a little update on our blog.......I know you've all been so anxious! The last three months have been just like the rest of our lives........CRAZY! We decided that we had outgrown our townhouse after Eli was born, and we started looking for new housing options quite awhile ago. We found a nice little house much closer to many of our friends in Michigan that we moved into a few weeks ago. That makes move #7 for us. If we have to move again in less than 3 years, I will literally set fire to everything we own in protest - mark my words! I can't express adequately how difficult it was for me to mentally wrap my head around this move. The very thoughts of packing up a box made me want to hurl. It took Ben actually taping together the first box, putting it in front of me, and practically holding my hand while I put in an object to get me through it. Fortunately for us all, we did it, and not without a lot of help. God bless the Elders Quorum and the willing members of it to spend hours helping to do the painful grunt work of assiting people move! Another nice aspect of this move was our ability to fly for free. I was able to drop off the kids in Utah while I flew back to be with Ben on his days off to pack up and move our things. I believe it was a much less traumatic experience for them than it otherwise would have been had they been with us during the whole process. Now that the move is behind us, I am happy to say that the house has turned out to be just what we needed. I had my doubts. I am not above admitting that I am extremely vain and have been spoiled to live in places throughout my life that are nice, clean, and new. This is my first experience living in a place that is maybe not AS clean, not AS nice, and not AS new. The townhouse we came from was only a few years old, and we were the first ones to live in it....nice, new, clean appliances, carpet, paint, hardwood, 2 1/2 baths......ahhhhhh, that's my kind of place. Our new house is older, kind of smells funny (like a cabin), and only has ONE BATHROOM!!! The trade off is that the new house has a fenced in yard that you can see from the kitchen, a playscape for the kids, an extra bedroom, and.......(drumroll)............A BASEMENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It has a partially-finished, fairly large basement that has become a fantastic playroom for the kids, and I can't tell you the euphoria that I feel when the kids are running around in my face while I am making dinner or working, and I can look at them and say, "Go downstairs!" It makes me giddy just thinking about it. I HATED not being able to send the kids anywhere to play in the townhouse. Sooo, even though I had to sacrifice some of my vanity, I am going to admit that this house is much healthier for all of us. Ben knew this all along, and he tried to convince me of it. He maintains that he is "always right," which we all know is not true, but he is usually right in making big decisions, and he was definitely right about this one. Sorry I doubted you honey. :)

That is our biggest news by far. Hope you are all enjoying the Christmas season this year! Here are some pictures from the past three months. Daxton had his fifth birthday (we had the party in our garage in the townhouse). Elijah is almost crawling. Jacy turns 3 in just a few days. We took the kids to see Santa, and they really enjoyed it. Jacy was a little hesitant and didn't want to get too close. Elijah just goes along with anything. Daxton is much more aware this year of Christmas and what it is all about. He composed a letter to Santa and asked for a "red kar," an "unbrelu," and a "choo choo chran." I enjoy the fact that he has simple requests, not brand specific or lavish. He's a sweet boy with a good heart, and very practical. Just like his dad.

We hope that all of our friends and family have a wonderful Christmas this year! We have some exciting trips/celebrations in our near future, which may necessitate a blog posting before another six months go by.....time permitting. We love you all!

Love,

The Johnsons

Going Biannual

I have a confession to make.......I hate blogging. Not because I don't enjoy keeping in touch with friends/family, and not because I don't feel that it's a good way to accomplish that, but because I feel guilt for not keeping it updated and for not posting the latest pictures of my kids and funny stories to share. Our lives have been changing too often for me to keep up with the blogging business; so, I've come to a conclusion. Our blog is now going to be updated biannually. Twice a year. Summer and Christmas. That's my plan. Take it or leave it. Sorry to disappoint!

Hence, the summer update for 2010: Since my last post, Ben was recalled by the airline that he had been furloughed from, and after an intense, frustration-filled decision-making process we determined that we would give the industry one more go. Let me assure you it was not an easy decision. If you know of anyone who is contemplating becoming a pilot who doesn't plan on staying single and sterile, refer them to us, and we will do our best to persuade them to do anything else. That being said, it doesn't take long for anyone who knows Ben to see that he is infinitely happier in the sky than on the ground. The major drawback to Ben's return to the sky was that we had to nix our house. Poof.......there goes my dream. Maybe someday, right? For now I guess we will stay in our crowded, occasionally smokey, yardless townhouse. Am I painting a less-than-enthusiastic picture? Well, let's just say it hasn't been easy for me to make the mental switch from preparing to move into more comfortable circumstances to just staying put for awhile, especially with the ever-present, ominous threat of being furlouged again and left to our own resources to figure out what to do in an economically-depressed region of the country (not that I'm bitter). :) On a more optimistic note, it is fun to see my Ben dressed up in his pilot uniform (what woman is not attracted to a man in uniform, seriously?) with a smile on his face and a spring in his step that was just not there when he was headed off to change tires every day for the past several months. I guess that makes it worth it.
The kids and I are gearing up for some major changes in our routine starting this fall - perhaps the greatest of which will be Daxton starting full-day Kindergarten. This has been giving me severe anxiety. I honestly feel like I am sending my little lamb off to the slaughter. Fortunately for us all, he is genuinely excited about school and is anticipating starting next Tuesday. I just pray he keeps that attitude up. I have so many hesitations about this whole process. My memories of elementary school are less than positive (you're not surprised, are you?). I am seriously considering having one of our medical student friends out here prescribe me some valium so that I can make it through the day on Tuesday. I've never seriously considered home schooling for a variety of reasons, and I still don't feel like it is a good option for us, but I may change my tune depending on the outcome of this year for Daxton. Maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised? Maybe.
Other changes on our horizon involve me going back to school part-time from home to finish up that degree that I never received from BYU. I did some investigating this summer and found out that I am 7 classes away from graduating from BYU with my MFHD degree, and that I can do at least 4 of those classes online. I am thrilled about this and am working out a schedule so that I can start getting these classes finished asap. With my schedule already as crazy as it is working essentially 3/4 time, taking care of the kids full-time, and taking school classes now as well, there is really going to be little time for anything else.
Well, that's the update for the summer of 2010. Stay tuned for our Christmas update with new pictures of the kids and the exciting developments of our lives. At the rate we like to switch things up, we'll probably be living in another country by then. :) Happy Fall to all!

Love, The Johnsons

LIFE

Life continues to move forward for the Johnson family. I think I'll have to give quarterly updates on our blog, because that's how often I am actually finding time to sit down and make posts. Today we have an exciting announcement....we are officially homeowners, sort of, again!!! We have decided that Michigan is going to be our permanent homebase for the next several years, and we have purchased a home that has yet to be built, but should be finished and ready for us to move in sometime at the end of October/beginning of November!!! We are very excited about this. We have moved 6 times now, and four of those moves have been cross-country. Sooo, I can't begin to express how nice it is going to feel to settle for a few years, and with the added luxury of settling in our own, custom-built home. :) Excited! So, here are a few pictures of what we have been doing. We've had a lot of visitors lately, and we have even more coming out soon - which the kids are LOVING! Happy Independence Day to all!

Day out with Thomas and Happy Mother's Day!

So on Saturday Ben got the day off to take the kids to Greenfield Village to see Thomas the Train. Unfortunately, it was terrible weather - freezing cold with that bitter, cutting midwest wind and intermittnet spells of rain and hail. Ben tells me that the kids still had a great time, and the pictures would attest to that. It was WONDERFUL to have the kids away for a few hours while I got to do whatever I wanted around the house with only Eli to worry about. When they returned back home, Jacy ran up the stairs and blurted out, "We haf a present for you!" I wasn't really sure what she was talking about, so I played along and said, "Really? What did you get me?" To which she responded, "Cookie fowers!" Daxton let out a big sigh and reprimanded Jacy because she had just revealed the Mother's Day surprise that Ben had picked up on the way home from seeing Thomas that he had been instructing them not to tell me about the whole way home. Really, it was so cute to see how excited Jacy was about it, even if it was just because she wanted some of my cookies. I LOVE cookie bouquets in all their high-calorie, high-fat, sugar-overloaded, frosting glory. Anyway, thanks honey! It has been a wonderful Mother's Day weekend/day! Happy Mother's Day to all!!!!