Livin' Life to the Fullest: January 2016

Thursday, January 14, 2016

It's been awhile . . .

Dear Friends and Family,

What an exciting year it has been for our family. Last year (November 2014) we bought a house. It has been a very good move for us and it's so wonderful to have a place we can call our own.

At the start of 2015, Bethany was called at church into Young Women's as the 1^st Counselor while Scott became the Ward Executive Secretary (but later in the year was released and called as Ward Mission Leader, which he continues to do today). Very busy callings, but it's good to serve (check out lds.org for more information about our church responsibilities).

Scott has continued working on his MBA at Portland State, which he will complete by the end of March 2016!! He is also enjoying his job as a Process Engineer and is happy to be working with his degree in chemical engineering again.

Bethany taught another round of free dance classes last Spring for about 6 weeks at our church building. She had 4 different classes with about 40 students total ranging from the ages of 3 to 10 years old (boys and girls). She was also involved with helping to plan the Graham family reunion, which turned out to be a lot of fun and she loved being with all her family in one place. Bethany decided last year to take a break from figure skating, but definitely misses it. Lily, Maggie and Esther also keep her busy with their day to day activities from school, swim lessons, soccer, etc.

In July, Lily finally earned herself a dog. Bethany researched for a long time to know what breed would be best for our family and we found a beautiful Red Nose American Pit Bull mix at the Humane Society named Zoey. She came trained (except on the leash) and with a little adjustment, we have enjoyed having her with us. Also in July, Scott and Bethany were a Pa and Ma for our Stake Youth Pioneer Trek and they taught square dancing during the trek. We had a lot of fun, even though it was very hard work, but we had a great “family” of youth and it's so fun to still hear them call us Ma and Pa.

The day after we got back from the Pioneer Trek we found out that we were going to be having another baby!! We recently found out that we are going to be blessed to have a little BOY join our family come April 8^th. The girls are all ecstatic to have a little brother. We also found out from our recent ultrasound that he is healthy and growing well. We have definitely felt the love of our Heavenly Father upon hearing this news . . . Bethany's prayers for the last several months had been that she could just be home with her family during this pregnancy and that prayer was answered!

As for our girls . . . Lily is a great student and is becoming fluent in the Spanish language through her Spanish Immersion program at school. Her soccer and swimming skills improved a lot over the past year as well. At home, she is such a great helper and enjoys reading anything she can pick up.

Maggie is starting to learn how to read and write. She is very kinesthetic and picks up sports and dance quickly, and by the end of the summer she was swimming in our pool with no life vest! We will hopefully be getting her into the Spanish Immersion program too when she goes into Kindergarten next year. Maggie is so great at telling stories and jokes, but also keeps us on our toes with her many capers.

Esther is definitely our little peacekeeper. She loves being cuddled and trying to copy everything her sisters do. She can pretty much repeat anything you say to her back. Esther loves to play dress up, color, and play with playdough.

We are so grateful to our Heavenly Father for the many blessings we have seen in our lives this year and we look forward to a wonderful new year! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

I am hoping to start this up again, so if you want to see more posts let us know that you're reading :-) Thanks!!

Here are a few pictures from 2015!!

Lily's Spanish-Immersion dance class