"Magical moments are embedded in ordinary life." I have loved this quote from the first time I read it. In the hectic and rigorous and sometimes mundane routine of being a stay-at-home mom, those magical moments are there. And I look for them, and I live for them. When I took Dallin B to school today I noticed they had Thanksgiving posters hanging on the wall announcing what they were thankful for. One was thankful for Belle, another for some toy, another for his friend Calvin. Then one displayed that he was thankful for his mom, dad, and brother. I surge of hope rose in me as I searched to see if there was a name on the paper. It did describe our little family after all. And sure enough there at the bottom it read, "Dallin". It's simple, I know. It's also just the words of a 3-year old, possibly even prompted by a teacher. But for me it is all the same- magical. This whole system of being a family works and my efforts do produce something. It's the same little feeling when one of those little boys comes climbing into my lap asking just to cuddle. "I want to be your cuddle bug" is usually how they say it. This is the pay off. Among the ordinary moments these are the ones that stand out for me.

Now onto the ordinary moments... kind of. We all know what this weekend was- BYU/Utah. Happy for some, sad for others. But when you have good food and fun people around, doesn't everyone go home a winner? Probably not. But that was the idea with having "The Bash". You're kind of forced to be a good sport and fake a good mood when you're around others. And I think it really has helped. Despite Yosh's announced "state of mourning", he has seemed to recover from the loss rather well.

Definitely some Utah representation...

but probably a lot more BYU fans.

And although BYU did not win the game they did take home the win for the half-time trivia game. That's gotta count for something, right?!!

And the kids had their own football game going on...



The bouncy house was quickly turned into a football arena and it kept them occupied for the full 3 1/2 or 4 hours. Don't quite know who the winner of that game was.

Now I would like to repost this pic and invite you to look closer. Yes, 4 Utahans were in attendance. That's right 4 of Yosh's high school girl friends (notice the space between the two words please) were here for the weekend. Lots of fun. I always enjoy watching Yosh interact with his high school friends, and always get a sense of satisfaction watching him hold a normal conversation with girls. He's a funny one. He'll sometimes tell me the story of when he was in 6th or 7th grade and knew that other boys were calling girls "just to chat." So one night he decided to give it a try. Apparently, it was a miserable attempt and he made absolutely no sense of talking with girls. Although that bafflement stayed with him for a while, possibly even through high school, he has made huge improvements!! Ha ha!! Anyways we went to Twilight of course, and critiqued the whole movie, til 2 in the morning even. That might be a record for me say in the past 4 years of how late I have stayed up. And then when they left I was in SHOCK to see a Houston's gift certificate on our table. Seriously, how did they know that the mention of Houston's hawaiian fused rib eye makes my mouth water, possibly more than any other food? I swear I never mentioned it to them. And somehow they pulled out the impossible! Loved it, thank you! And please don't tell Yosh about the gift- I will be using it all to myself! (I'm not kidding...)

Fun weekend!