The Zieglers

On Thursday we drove up to Mt. Green to visit my sister Holly and her family. The boys had so much fun with their cousins. It was a perfect day to be there, because even though there was a lot of snow out, the weather was warm (maybe not for our AZ friends. . . but for us) and beautiful!Today however, was a sad day. Noah has been sick for a few days and extremely cranky. Today Hyrum woke up and got into bed with us with a fever. . . he finally threw up in the afternoon and then started to feel better. Anyway, he basically watched movies most of the day. After his bath he insisted on: "Wrap up!" and so this is how he watched Toy Story II.And now I get to relax:PS. After a visit to the Dr's office yesterday I learned that when a babies diet consists of apples, bananas, chicken noodle soup, cucumbers, and milk it is okay if their poop is white. In case you wanted to know:)

Our Life in Pictures

Two of my favorite boys asleep for a long winters nap.Noah's favorite horsie!I love cooking. . . but I learned today that if I'm busy at the stove don't leave a newspaper on the table. Dinner only took 30 minutes to make. . . it only took 15 minutes before Noah was on my leg and Hyrum was reeking havoc. Dinner was still worth it. I can either have a spotless house, or a yummy dinner and a clean house later. . . I prefer the latter. Go food!:)Who says little kids can't help with housework! A few mornings ago Hyrum gathered these together and made this beauty. When he put the apple on the top he said "Moroni! Temple!" He's so funny. We have a great view of the temple out the window and so he loves building and drawing temples.

My lost friend

Yesterday morning I was blowing my hair dry when out of nowhere it blew up. It was the weirdest thing I've ever experienced. I've gone through a hairdressers share of blow dryers. . . and I've never even heard of this happening. It was a travel size blow dryer, that I've been using for the past few months because my regular blow dryer is being very temperamental (sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't). Anyway, out of nowhere there was a pop noise and pieces just blew out. Spontaneous combustion? Little pieces were all over the bathroomThank you for making my hair smooth and dry. You will be missed.

Things that are important

This morning the boys and I were playing in the basement, and I was overwhelmed with love for them and sorrow for all of the torn families in Haiti. I felt sympathy for those Mothers searching for their children, alone and afraid. I thought of the scripture in Jeremiah 31:15 that says:

“Thus saith the LORD; A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rahel weeping for her children refused to be comforted for her children, because they were not.”

I have never experienced anything in my life that would cause me true, deep sorrow, and I hope I never will. This horrific event has made me really think about what I have and what is most important to me. These people had little to claim as their own other than family, and now many people have lost even that. How do they go on? How can they start over? I hope to never have to answer those questions for myself.

I sit on a comfortable couch, in front of our flat screen TV in our big warm house. Our movie collection needs to be re-alphabetized, my closet needs to be re-organized, and my hair needs to be colored . . . all stuff that, when it really comes down to it doesn’t matter. The most important thing right now is gratitude. I am filled with love for my Lord and Savior, and for the Faith that I have in Him and his ultimate grace that will save me when I stand before my Eternal Father and offer Him what I am and the best efforts I have put forward. In that day I will stand alone without worldly possessions, without the clutter of ‘to-do’ lists. My one companion and help when all else is left behind will be Jesus and I am grateful to know Him and believe in Him. I am filled with love and gratitude for Brett and our two beautiful boys. They are everything to me. Brett is my Eternal Companion, help, guide, and friend. With the event of the earthquake in Haiti I realize that I spend the majority of my time doing or talking about the ‘stuff’ that just doesn’t matter and I want to be sure that I spend more time each day on the essentials of true happiness. With that said I encourage anyone who reads this to take some time to thank God in prayer for all that you have. When the fast food line is going to slow, when commercials are taking too long, or when the internet isn’t connecting quite fast enough . . . please pause and be grateful.

I had to explain to Hyrum why I started to cry while we were playing this morning. I told him we needed to stop and pray for some friends far away that have owies and can’t find their Mommies or Daddies. We knelt and prayed for them. Remember the people of Haiti in your prayers too.

The twins

Hyrum has a little buddy that lives down the street. They are so funny to see together because they look SO much alike. I frequently mix them up at church. The funny thing is Ethan has older brothers that are twins, but I think he and Hyrum could easiely be mistaken as the twins. This morning Hyrum said, "Ethan, play, play dough, ok?" So we invited him over and as you can see they had lots of fun being 2 year old boys together:I let him wear his pajamas up until he had a time out for hitting (sorry Ethan), and then he had to put on real clothes. . . he dreads getting dressed.

Brothers

Hyrum was 18 months in this picture. Noah is almost 11 months in the same shirt. It's funny to me that Noah is so much bigger than Hyrum ever was. They are such cute boys! Hyrum is getting better about sharing and playing with Noah. The other day he was playing in this box and kept yelling "Noah. . HERE! Come play!" . . . ok, so Hyrum does a lot of demanding that Noah play with him, but it's still cute.

Rockin' Christmas

Being the first year in our first home we wanted to have Christmas at home with the boys, but we also wanted to surprise Brett's family for Christmas. . . luckily because the boys are so young we were able to do both. We had a home Christmas and then drove down to AZ for the actual Christmas day. We had a ton of fun seeing all the family and playing. It was a Rockband Christmas and here are some fun pictures of us bustin' a move and rockin' like its 1999: