Easy to ignore until....

So everyone knows that I'm 100% ok with people talking behind my back (true or not) as long as it doesn't effect my kids, and it doesn't get back to me. I like to let it be other people's problems, not mine. But today, a rumor that someone started made it clear around to my bishop, who asked me to come in and have a chat with him. Turns out something little that I did turned into a big blasphemous thing. Wow. Really? Ok, so now I'm understanding why so many women keep to themselves, and a couple of close friends. I've never had to be this way, but this IS the longest I've stayed in one place (3 years...yay). Hopefully whoever decided to START this stupid rumor can come to me about the REAL details and tell whoever SHE told that she made junk up.

Probably not.

But maybe.

Ok, so on my sidebar, I went with one of the ideas that you guys gave me on what to blog. I decided to do a different thing every day. Not saying I'll blog everyday....

but maybe

So today I wanna write on inspiration. And I have to say a blog that makes me always want to do better, especially as a mom is my amazing friend Audra's. She's my inspiration today (and most everyday). I've made it a goal for the last few months to hit my knees before my feet every morning so I'd have no excuses to not start the day with prayer. And I've done it. Ok, maybe not on our trip...I did pray everyday, but not the second I got out of bed.

Audra takes it a step farther, and I want to also.

go to her 2nd post down HERE

And there's my daily inspiration.

Oh, and I wanna leave something I'm grateful for everyday...today, Friends that know the truth!

I have found my strength

So in the car and at the dinner table, the kids always like to say, "who can ______ the fastest/most/quietest/loudest" and yea, I never win....til last night!!!!!

Jaden asked who could count to 10 the fastest....

MOM CAN!!!!

Babies and Candy...

Um, I got to take pictures of my neighbors beautiful new baby girl. SO FUN! i want one!!!! (no comments tamee, Dani or ashley)We had a killer time at trunk or treat on Friday. Of coarse, we won 1st place...again! Heck yes!!! Jase loves decorating our trunk, but he hates that it wasn't in the dark this year. He had big plans, but oh well. Um, and I'm going to take individual pics of the kids in costumes this week. They all LOVED their costumes. It was a fun year.
Last night we went trick or treating and to the carnival. Both were a lot of fun. All of the older 3 loved the haunted house, Kam did the cake walk 3x and we ended up bringing 2 huge cakes home...ugh, what are the chances??? Boston loved to yell, HO HO HO instead of trick or treat, and Jaden made over $5. Jase let's the kids sell their candy to him at the end of the night. 15 peices for $1...kit kats, jr. mints and Reeces PB cups all count for 2 candies (we make a stash of those ones to sneak into the movies), and Jaden cashed in all but about 2 or 3 of his candies. Boston made about $3, and of coarse, Kam only made $1...getting rid of her dum dums and tootsie rolls. It was an awesome halloween. Jase and I were Lucy and Ricki (cept we had a hard time shaping his hair...obviously). But it was a great year! (unlike last)

Ahh, back to life...

It's soo great to be back. Ok, except the dishes, laundry and kid's fighting . But it's soo great to hold my baby, cuddle with my Jado, have Kam asking me to help her pick out a "cute" outfit and have Boss wake up and say, "me going to ride my bike to the neighbors, bye!". They're awesome. Last night we had a late halloween and we did the phantom ghost and carved pumpkins. I love it! I LOVE FALL!!!!!

Um, and I love this! We bought Kam a crown making kit and sh eloves to make them, and thinks everyone needs one. I usually wear mine around the house, but I don't look nearly this adorable!

And Boston, he was dying that I wouldn't let him open his "boston" cookie before i took a picture...I can't tell if he's wanting to eat the cookie or just lick his boogers. Either way, he's awesome!

The last day in New England...

Ok, this is a random door in Boston that I loved. I loved ALL of the doors, and ALL of the buildings...they were awesome, but I really wanted to steal this door, and if it weren't so noticable, (like an OJ caraf that I stole from denny's one time) I'd do it! ok, that's bad, I wouldn't, well, I would if I were college Kristal, but not grown up mom Kristal. Um, and we searched and searched in the 2 hours we had in Boston to find a Boston shirt for our Boston, but we couldn't...so I toook a picture of something Bostonian.....

Um, this rat died on the streets of Boston...he died HAPPY!!!!

and yup, that's the REAL Cheers bar behind us...well, down stairs. We found this place on accident . We parked right around the corner. I really wish it was open so we could have checked it out.
Um, the foreign touristers didn't get the sign in the above pic, so I took another one.
This was our 5 hour drive...seriously ALL 5 hours through New England was like this...or better. I just shot these next few pictures as Jase was driving 70mph.


AMAZING!!! And they said tourist season is over. What? Really? We wanted to go deep sea fishing, and whale watching, but all of the companies were closed, in fact, pretty much EVERYTHING in the Hamptons were closed and had signs that said, "thanks for a great season...see you in March". REALLY? Ok, crazies!

Anyway, it was an amazing trip, and I'm glad we were able to do it. It was a great way to celebrate 10 magical years. I'll post more on those 10 magical years when they are really up...December 2nd!

New England...

Ah, and now on to my favorite part of the trip...New England! It was amazing. I'll start out with our favorite, highly recomended resturant... The Friendly Toast. We ate all 3 New Englandish breakfasts there....soo good! They had TONS of super unique breakfasts, pumkin stuff, lots of peanut butter stuff, crazy avacado omlettes, etc... And their decor was super retro. Jase and I saw a few things on their walls that reminded us of things when we were kids. And the staff was awesome. The guys all looked like they just woke up and threw whatever plaid thing they could find on, and a beanie, and the girls were all tatooed up with black hair, and ALL of them were SOO friendly. We loved it there!

I miss it

Portsmouth, NH is where we'd move if we were forced to leave our current circumstances. ALL of the streets look like this. The houses were all amazing, everything was soo clean and EVERY SINGLE PERSON THERE was so friendly, like they'd known us forever. It was almost creepy, but such a great chance from the previous (NYC) where everyone glared at us for smiling.

This is me in front of my favorite...Stonewall Kitchen. I LOVE IT THERE! i wanna own one.
And if we were ever, heaven forbid, forced to move to the amazing Hamptons, we'd live in this house. Can't see all of it here, but just trust me, it's screaming our name.
And we'd go to this church...right after we went to the LDS church every Sunday...just cause it's cool looking.
And no doubt! We'd eat these Pumpkin Whoopie pies EVERYDAY! My new favorite fall dessert. I bought a mix to make them, they bettered be as amazing as this one was.
Ah, and now onto Maine...and it's amazing light houses. It was crazy to see them in real life. They're awesome. I felt like we were seeing some super endangered animal or something.
Ah, and the picture that motivated me to get back on weight watchers. haha. But seriously, doesn't it look like we're in a painting? It was amazing. Oh, and it was great to find somone that actually knew how to work my camera to take the pictures. There was this old guy with my same camera, and he was excited to take the picture. Thanks old guy.

This one was my favorite. I only wish we could have gone up it.

And this one was super super far out there, I think it's about to fall apart. But I thought I'd include it since it's rusticly looking.
Ahh, I love New England. I really don't understand why we're all not living there. But anyway, more to come from Maine, NH, and Boston!

Financial District

Of coarse Jase needed to ride the bull. Of the 2 million tourists there, he had to be the one to jump up on it....

And yes, Wall Street. Tons of guys in fancy suits with all kinds of high tech devices looking down on us little people. Awesome!

Statue of Liberty....

Like everything, we were a bit shocked that again, it costs $20 a person to ride the ferry out to the statue of Liberty. So we decided to just view her from the mainland. So I decided to take a bunch of picture....but I didn't tell Jase....obviously....

Then we got some people who didn't speak English (I think we were the only ones in NYC that did) to take this one....see the little, bitty, blurry statue of liberty behind us?

Um, we're in NYC people! We're not going to not pay their outrageous prices to see amazing things just because we're broke! So we did, we hopped on the ferry. And it was SO worth it. It was amazing.

Recognize these two????

Me either. They just gave us their business card with his e mail address on it and asked me if I'd snap a few and send them to them. They were really friendly, which was weird in NYC, so I couldn't say no. So of coarse, we didn't get any pictures of US in FRONT of the statue, but here's one of us BEHIND her.
FOOD! Seriously food is my favorite part of traveling. We had everything from frozen hot chocolate (below...from Serindipities) to Brazilian Steakhouse, to Grays Papaya hot dogs! It was fantastic!!!!! It is weird though, that in NYC, you're literally bumping elbows with the people next to you. Everything is soo close and so confined. The subways were pretty gross, and interesting, but buses got pretty jammed during rush hour, and the streets were nuts!
Speaking of crammed. Um, our hotel...barely fit a bed. It was clean, but seriously the smallest most expensive room I've stayed in. We even threw the old "10 year anniversary" card out there, no upgrades. This is our hotel....and my life partner.

One more checked off...

So our things to do before we're 40 list..ride in a real NYC yellow taxi...CHECK!

Obviously we're not good at taking pictures of ourselves....that's why we never do it....ugh....
Um, it was pretty much the 2nd most scared I've ever been on the road. 1st would be Jamaica...even our taxi driver that was from Jamaica agrees that NYC doesn't hold a candle to Jamaica's crazy driving. But it was still MUCH crazier than anything in Az. They dont; have lanes, and they come an inch or two from each other's cars...seriously!

Central Park...

Our hotel was pretty close to Central Park so it was one of the first thing we checked out. It was SOO beautiful. Honestly the most beautiful thing in NYC. There were all kinds of different colors, but still super green soft grass. There were castles, playgrounds, paths, and even a really hilarious mom and stroller exercise group.Um, I made my hair extra big because I knew it would fall quickly....um, yes, too big here, but look at the next post....too flat...sad.

I was just kinda excited to see all of the NYC taxis.

The Met....

Before we hit the empire state building, we went to the Metropolitan Museum. um, HUGE! Seriously I had no idea it was that big. Or that expensive. We saw that it was $20 a person (so was the ESB) so we walked around the lobby contemplating for a bit, then my Ferris Bueller of a husband said, follow me. And he snuck right in with a school group. And it's a good thing we didn't pay because we didn't stay for too long. I wanted to see too many other things. Oh, this first shot is just a typical NY side street (the main streets are much crazier...and dirtier)
This was our view of the Met as we walked to it...I didn't feel like going in front and taking a shot...especially since there were two million buses and street vendors in front of it. But it was HUGE!
Jase and his ancestors. There were SOO many different amazingly kept artifacts from Egypt. It was nuts. And the next day is when we heard that 2 more mummy's were found. That's just freaking awesome that they're still finding them. But seriously, look how well kept this is!

Um, and I wish the Met would will this piano to me. It's amazing!

After the Met we hit Time Square. Why is everything smaller and less amazing in real life? haha. It was pretty cool though, and pretty busy. And yes, some stranger pretty much laid on the ground to take this picture. I love when strangers sacrifice (pride) to get a good shot. Thanks lady.