I am happy to report that this has definitely been (so far at least) one of the best summers yet - passing up 2010 and 2012 if that's possible. The only downside is that I keep dreaming of what life would be like in warmer weather year round. Would I get sick of it? Never. Would I miss a white Christmas? Probably not. California always sounds like a good idea to me.

Mostly, though, I wanted to get online to share some thoughts regarding two years of marriage and our two year anniversary this past weekend, but have unsuccessfully sat for the last twenty minutes typing, deleting and then re-typing what I was hoping I could put into words. But I can't. There are too many things I want to say and too many things I want to describe. So I'll just say this:

A few weeks ago we left town for the weekend and sat at dinner in a little table tucked into the corner of an "Irish pub." People were talking and singing loudly and our waitress kept forgetting our order, but I had that brief moment where your brain takes a picture as you hold hands across the table and think: I am lucky in every way.

Now, these moments don't come every day of course, sometimes I feel like our lives mirror chickens with their heads cut off -- but I was gratefully reminded that day, that moment particularly, of how lucky I am to have Max. Sometimes I think about that night over two years ago before we were ever married, as I cried overwhelmed with the future and Max (as per usual) reassured me with his hands on my shoulders: "I will help you, and you will help me, and we will love each other." I guess in a nutshell that's what these two years have been: everything from our first apartment, paying the bills and working hard to create our future; or even the simple things like watching re-runs of the Twilight Zone in bed at night, and waking up next to each other every morning (which is way more glamorous in the movies than it has ever been in real life) - all of it. I will help you, and you will help me, and we will love each other. Max is the best decision I've made and the best companion I could've picked for the small adventure of a life together. I am lucky in every way.

 

And yes, I finally threw together random clips from random videos I've taken over the last two years... This has been on my to-do list for quite some time now, and I finally got around to it last night (ha!) Voila. Two years in two minutes. I sure do love that Max of mine.

let it go

Max and I are still teaching Sunbeams (the three and four year olds) in our ward. Some people imagine that this calling might make you go a little crazy after 18 months, but we're still going strong ;) Actually in all honesty, we absolutely LOVE it. The kids are the cutest and really, when you teach lessons like "I am grateful for fish" how can you not love what you do?

Anyway, when we get to class and have our own opening exercises we've noticed that the opening songs over the last few months have rotated mainly between Jingle Bells and Let it Go (I don't know one four year old not obsessed with the movie Frozen) So I thought I'd share a video of our little Alice passionately singing this solo:

CUTEST EVER. Alice also can't really pronounce words with the letter "R" which is why we may/may not have her recite every Sunday: "I really love my perfect purple wonderful family." Is this mean? Because it makes our day. Every time.