Its Great to be 8!!!!

Jailyn turned 8 on her birthday and we had a blast celebrating her birthday all week.  We opened her birthday presents on Tuesday night (Birthday Eve) because she had girl scouts on her birthday the next day.  She got:
Scriptures, with her name on the front, from Grandma Angie  & Grandpa Dan.

Scripture Journal, Scripture stickers, Scripture Highlighter, Lenny the Lamb and a Child of God necklace from Grandma Cathy & Grandpa Jim

Bracelet Weaver and a birthday party from us.  

Once our kids turn 7 we give them the choice of $50 to buy whatever they want or we will buy presents for them, or they can have a birthday party that we go all out on and we don't buy them anything.  It is just to expensive to do both.  Last year Jailyn chose the money and still has $10 left over and this year she chose to have a birthday party.  So on Saturday we had a blast with a paint/colors inspired theme.  Here is some pictures from the party.

Palette Cupcakes (skittles for the paint colors, pretzels for the paintbrush).

 

Rice Krispie treat paint brushes.

 

 Aprons for each girl.

 Paint station: Paint, Brushes, palettes, and canvas.

 Cute paint brush jar (actually its just a pickle jar).

 Jailyn focusing on her painting of a bird.

 The finished product!! I took a picture like this of all of the kids that we are going to send to them in their thank you letters.

 The group shot after all the painting was done.

After the painting we had taco salads for lunch.  Taco salads are one of Jailyns very favorite meals and they have a lot of different colors; tomatoes, lettuce, meat, olives, cheese, salsa, sour cream.

We had a great week celebrating Jailyn's birthday and can't wait for her baptism day in December.  We are so blessed to have Jailyn in our family.  She is so talented, creative, kind, patient, happy, crazy and a bit ditzy at times.  She is such a big helper and the official "other mother" of the house.  I don't think I could do it without all of her help.  

I love this girl so much and consider it one of my greatest blessings to call her my daughter and have her call me Mom.  Can't wait to see where this girl will go!

Learning to capture my kids

 Rich bought me a camera for our anniversary and I am having so much fun learning to use it and capturing my kids in their everyday lives.  Tennessee has so many amazing backdrops and with my adorable models it's easy to capture perfection.

Mr. B; The Man

 Lauren Lindsay

 

Andi Lu 

 

Jai Bug

  

The Kids

 

 The Sisters

Tennessee Halloween 2012

There are a lot of things here in Tennessee that Utah's got nothin on and Halloween is one of those things.  Halloween in Tennessee is celebrated like Christmas.  There's lights, blowup toys, projector movies, hay rides to trick or treat on so that you don't have to walk, and not only do they hand out candy, they hand out smore's, hot chocolate around their fires in the front yards of ritzy homes (500K), dance parties with mostly adults, loud music at every house and amazing people at every door. 

This year was no different in the Farnsworth household we ALL dressed up for Halloween and had a blast.  Here are the kids!  Keep in mind I asked them to act like they were who they dressed up as.  Don't get to scared!!!

This is Andi Lu.  She is a fierce ghost, not the nice kind.  I made her costume out of a white sheet I had about  five minutes earlier because the other ghost costume we had was too small.  I love surgers!!!

 Lauren wanted to be the nice ghost with green makeup and not a green face.  She was the cutest little witch and even had an awesome witch laugh...Yeeheheheehee!

 Mr B is of course the famous Mr. Fredrickson.  He was so handsome and loved having balloons tied to his back and wearing glasses.  When the glasses fell off of his face we couldn't move until they were back in position.  What a cute old man.

 Jailyn was a mermaid again this year and she was so cute and I wish I would have taken some up close pictures of her face because we sequined her face and she looked so amazing.  I think she is a mermaid in Hawaii participating in the local Luau

 I dressed up as a pirate this year and Rich dressed up as a motocross racer.  We didn't get a picture, but don't worry we were sexy and awesome....as usual!   Can't wait for next year!

to crochet or not to crochet?

I started out this month with the desire to learn to knit.  That came to a stop really quick once I realized that I can't control 2 needles at the same time.  So now I am learning to crochet.  It is very difficult and very soothing all at the same time.  I am going to make so beanies and slippers and this is something that I am going to make for Jailyn's baptism. Whatcha think?  I have been buying my patterns from Etsy and have fallen in love with YarnBlossomBoutique.  The patterns are easier to read than most of the other ones I have found and she has a lot of videos to watch on Youtube which has helped me a lot!!!
Wish me luck!!!

9 years!!! WHAT!

Nine years ago I was blessed to marry the best man in the world...sorry to all of you have had to settle for someone else. :)  I knew that I was marrying the right man for me 9 years ago, but I didn't realize the I would love him more everyday.  When I see him love our four beautiful children I am weak in the knees.  Rich is always concerned with how I am doing and is willing to do anything to make sure I am okay.  He is always kind his children (which makes me the bad cop).  He is a great provider and even though he doesn't always love his job, he loves me enough to keep me at home, "living the dream" of being a stay-at-home mama.
Rich is the best partner, friend and lover that I know I can always count on.  He makes me feel like I am the only person in the world and like I am the most beautiful woman in the world.  Rich truly makes me giddy inside and I still get butterflies when we kiss and when I think of the lifetime and eternities I have to spend with him!  I am the luckiest girl in the world!!!

For our Anniversary we had a fairly low key day, which was awesome!! We didn't have to be anywhere (except church) and had no schedule to follow. After church I made a delicious Beef Wellington, with garlic butter potatoes, broccoli and apple juice. 

Rich gave me a new camera for our anniversary; it's supposed to be for both of us, but I have been playing with it soooo much! It is so much fun to try and learn a new skill especially when that skill captures memories of my children and family.  We also gave each other a date jar that has 10 dates for $20 and a fun new game called "The Lovin' Game (if you want more info you will need to ask about it). haha. 

Rich is my everything, my super hero, my baby-daddy, my strength, my own, my help and my love.   Here's to 9 years and hoping for at least 9 billion more!

Heres what we've done in 9 years

1 marriage

2 universities

3 states

4 children

5 vehicles

6 person family

7 diamond ring

8 ...? 2008 didn't have a baby! ha ha

9 moves

 

2003

2004

 2005

  

2006

  

2007

 2008

 

2009

 2010

 

2011 (couldn't find a pic together but this is the same night)

  2012