Daisya got to play with Buzz before the game. 

Thanks grandpa Johnson for a great night at the Ball park...

Our other sporting event was arena football. 

Thanks to Ed for the tickets.

We've been fans of Ed since he played for the UofA.
 It's been fun watching him over the years, (Baltimore Ravens then Detroit Lions).
I'm so glad we got to see him during his first season with the Blaze.

Our goal was to spend as much time outside as possible;
 since in Tucson it is too hot to do just about anthing during the day. 

Donut Falls was our first hike of the season...

It was a perfect hike for our family.
 We soon learned however that the more we hiked...

the colder it got.
We were not expecting snow...

We were so young and foolishly in love.

Today, our youth is disappearing before our eyes,

but I am confident that our love remains strong.

You invoke within me a passion that that I never knew existed.

I am the person I am today because you encourage me to be the best me that I can be.

You have made me a wife, a mother, and a friend.

Whenever I see you I still get butterflies in my stomach.

13 years ago I gave you my heart and in return you have given me an eternity of bliss.

I promise to give you the best parts of me,

to love you completely and passionately every day of my existence.

Thank you for an amazing life, heres to the next 13...

I love you Tyler,

If there were no words

No way to speak

I would still hear you

If there were no tears

No way to feel inside

I'd still feel for you

And even if the sun refuse to shine

Even if romance ran out of rhyme

You would still have my heart

Until the end of time

You're all i need

My love, my valentine

All of my life

I have been waiting for

All you give to me

You've opened my eyes

And showed me how to love unselfishly

I've dreamed of this a thousand times before

In my dreams i couldnt love you more

I will give you my heart

Until the end of time

You're all i need

My love, my valentine

And even if the sun refuse to shine

Even if romance ran out of rhyme

You would still have my heart

Until the end of time

Cuz all i need

Is you, my valentine

You're all i need

My love, my valentine

The beginning of the end...

Yesterday morning I had the bitter sweet opportunity to take my dear husband to the airport for another six month assignment in the Philippines.  You would think that I would be used to this by now, but yesterday had an overwhelming affect on my spirit that I could hardly contain myself the entire day...I found myself weeping at everything I looked at; each thought I had brought about great sadness.  I was feeling overwhelmed with emotion.  It was not until this morning when I began to understand what I was truly "feeling".

This really is the beginning of the end of this chapter in our life;  a chapter that even though it has had its moments of incredible joy, has also been filled with so much adversity, pain, sorrow, grief, disappointment, frustration, rejection, and discouragement.  But with all the opposition, comes a hope for a better day,the reality of all that we have learned and the peace of what we now have to offer.

 "In the pain, the agony, and the heroic endeavors of life, we pass through a refiner’s fire, and the insignificant and the unimportant in our lives can melt away like dross and make our faith bright, intact, and strong. In this way the divine image can be mirrored from the soul. It is part of the purging toll exacted of some to become acquainted with God. In the agonies of life, we seem to listen better to the faint, godly whisperings of the Divine Shepherd."  
(President James . Faust, Refined in our Trials, Liahona Feb. 2006)

When we finally accepted the need for change in our life, we were humbled to the reality that we are not completely in control of our lives.  We had been fighting for so long to stick to our plan, that it did not occur to us that maybe our plan was not completely in sync with our Heavenly Father's plan for us.   After much fasting and prayer, we realized that we needed to be a little more flexible and trust that there is a plan outlined for us.  Even though it may be different from our plan, we need to be more faithful in accepting that our Father's perspective is greater than ours and with that perspective comes the knowledge about what is best for us.  His path will eventually lead to blessings, which we all need.  The amazing part is that once we changed our hearts, the shackles were removed and the stress subsided. We can actually see the light at the end of the tunnel.  So here we are today with our house sold, Tyler in the Philippines, the kids and I packing up all of our things awaiting the storage facility where they will stay until Tyler returns from the Philippines.  As for the kids and I, we will be in a state of limbo for the next six months.  We're calling it our regrouping phase, or to put it another way, "mom needs a break real bad phase".  It will consist of extended vacations to Utah, long over night visits with "grandma", etc.  The truth of it is that we have turned everything over to our Father in Heaven.  We don't know what our future has in store for us, but when the time comes for us to be called, wherever it may be, we will be ready.  When Tyler comes home, we truly will begin the next chapter of our life. The sky is the limit for our family.  We do know that even though the last four years have been difficult, we will be able to take the experiences we have gained from our trials and draw from them for the rest of our lives.  They have been shaping us into the people we need to be, so that we can be prepared for the purposes we have been sent to this earth to accomplish.  So here's to our future, may it be bright...


After the trials will come blessings...

March and April in a nut shell...

For such great Report Cards we took the kids to Amazing Jakes.  It's one of our most favorite places...

You'll notice that Haley is not in the pics.  Unfortunately she did not get to celebrate because her report card was not so great.  Hopefully next time...

Daisya and Ally riding the Train...

Tyler and Trey playing air hockey...

Daisya, Trey, and Ally holding on for dear life, on the Frog Hopper...

Trey and Daisya on the bumper cars...

After Amazing Jakes we went to the Temple to watch the Easter pageant with the Speck family.  As usual, It was FABULOUS!!!

Daisya, Daley and Trey with some of the cast members.  Yes, it's a real lamb...

Ben and Eli with the cast members...

We love Easter, and even though we do understand its true meaning, we still have fun decorating eggs and participating in the commercial side of it all...

Trey

Haley and Daisya

Ally

And here is what the Easter Bunny left for us...

Easter morning is not the same without the traditional pajama egg hunt...

"Good thing I'm so little"...

Here's one I don't need help getting...

Can't put one past Trey...

Got It...

Here's Trey at His second Pack Meeting, He received three beads...

Keep up the Good Work Trey!

Trey entered The River of Words poetry and Art Contest...

There were over 900 entries and Trey was chosen as a finalist...

Congratulations Trey!

Last but not least, we cannot forget conference weekend.  We make a big deal out of conference weekend because how often do you get the opportunity to attend church from the comfort of your own living room, in your pajamas, eating all day long...

Here's our Sunday morning spread...

You know me, I'm all about the food...

Green Beans

As you can tell by the look on Daisya's face, she is not a fan of green beans.  The other night at dinner she did the funniest thing.  Because she absolutely opposes vegetables and exercises her right to complain about them each time we eat them, we have established a "we won't give you a lot, but you have to eat all that we give you." policy.  Tyler made dinner that night which consisted of orange Chicken with stir fry vegetables and chinese rice.  Daisya loved every bit of it except for the vegetables.  She immediately devoured the chicken and the few vegetables that she can "stand".  But then the fun began.  After the first sudden trip to the restroom with a mouth full of vegetables, we knew that she had a plan.   She got real quiet and we could tell she was thinking real hard.  She said, "Um, I forgot to wash my hands.  I'm going to do that.", then she picked up her fork which had the remaining green beans attached to it and said, "And I am going to take my green beans with me."  It was at that moment that I had a really tough time keeping my composure.  I don't know who laughed first and then who laughed harder the other kids or Tyler and I.  Those darn green beans.

Bells Palsy?

Tyler and I had a talk the other day about how even though we have witnessed many trials over the last few years, we have been blessed with good health.  You would think that a person who has my good fortune could learn to keep her mouth closed.  Apparantly, We are at a point in our lives where we are ready for "progression". So whenever I get cocky and think that I am "blessed" in one particular area, it has to be tested...How else can I truly appreciate it?
So all last week and the beginning of this week I had the worst headache. Nothing I did would relieve the pain. Yesterday I started to have some wierd symptoms that literally came out of no where. I noticed that I could not wink my right eye and then by the time I went to bed, I could not close my eye at all and when I woke up this morning my vision was very blurred. I was also having trouble with my mouth. I can't  lick my lips or form my mouth around a spoon.  Rinsing with mouthwash was interesting because it all shoots out the right side of my mouth.  I was looking in the mirror and I noticed that my right eye was drooping a little and that my "smile" lines were gone. I have to admit I began to be a little concerned, because the only symptoms that I knew of with facial paralysis was stroke. Needless to say I saw my doctor this afternoon and she said that I contracted a virus that set up camp in the space where my facial nerve resides The inflamation has caused the right side of my face to become paralyzed. The kicker is that it will probably take about 12 weeks for it to work its way out of my body.  Thankfully, most people my age who are in good health,should recover completely... Lets cross our fingers...She gave me prednasone, an antiviral drug called acyclovir, and some eye drops to keep my eye moist since it is open all the time. The plus side to all of this is that I have lost about five years in the right side of my face.  My doctor said that "paralysis is as good as botox."  SWEET!!!  But, I will be willing to trade the "free botox" for normal facial function any day. (Ha Ha )
So if you see me and only half of my face is smiling at you, or you notice that only one of my eyes is blinking, know that I am not trying to start a new trend. And if you think its funny, I'm a good sport and I wont take it personally if you chuckle at my new look! Ha Ha Ha.

ARGH.  All I'm missing here is my eyepatch!!!

Magnifying Talents?

I offered to make the cake for Trey's first Blue and Gold Banquet.  It's been a while since my cake decorating days at Walmart, but I guess it could have turned out a lot worse.  I definately need more excuses to practice...

3 tier 16"square, 12"round, 8"round

It took 10 cake mixes and three quarts of heavy cream

The decoration on top was a color flow design that I made. It literally gave me a headache.

I had a lot of fun...

Boys

Trey had a friend over today for a play date. They were working on putting together one of Trey's Lego sets. I heard Trey start humming a tune. Within a few seconds, his friend jackson starting humming along:

J: "Where did you find that song anyways?"
T:"I don't know, I found it in my head."
J:Oh, cool...

I had to laugh. What a great conversation...
They continued to sing while they were playing legos...
I love moments that make me smile. Had to capture the singing on video...

Another Learning opportunity

Last night for FHE, Haley was in charge of treats.  We decided to make sugar cookies.  I gave Haley the recipe and told her that she could make them while I was cleaning up the kitchen from dinner.  (She took six months worth of lessons from Young Chef's Academy, so she is pretty comfortable in the kitchen.)  She got out all the ingredients and put them into the bowl and began to mix.  After a couple minutes she was getting frustrated because the batter was really dry and crumbly.

 I asked her if she followed the directions and added all the ingredients.  She assured me that she did.  Well, after talking with her for a few minutes, she discovered that even though she added all the ingredients, she did not read and follow the directions. Instead of making the cream and slowly adding the flour, she quickly threw all the ingredients in the bowl at one time which made it hard for the cream to be distributed.  Needless to say, the cookies came out extra crunchy. (Which is not a Johnson Favorite).  I am grateful that Haley had this opportunity.  We are always busy around our home and don't have a lot of extra time.  We were able to talk about the value of time and how important it is to carefully follow directions, not only to ensure that you do a good job, but that that job is done right the first time.  Needless to say, we were able to enjoy cookies as a treat, it just took a little longer than we would have liked.  I bet next time, we'll only have to do it once...

Recognition

While I was driving the kids to school the other morning, we had one of those little moments that you just have to smile at.  We normally drive down Camino De La Tierra through the Rillito to get the kids to school.  Since there has been so much rain, the river has been closed for about three weeks now.  Now we take I-10, which takes a lot longer to get to school.  This particular morning, we left in plenty of time to get to school, but for some reason the traffic was really backed up at Orange Grove and I-10.  We had forgotten to say our family prayer that morning and since we were not going anywhere anytime soon, I asked Trey if he would say the prayer in the car for us.  He did and when he was praying, he asked that we could get to school on time.  Even though we left in plenty of time, the current back up of traffic made me question whether we would make it.  As soon as Trey concluded the prayer, the traffic opened up.  Trey said, "Wow, did you notice that as soon as I said amen, the cars began to move?"  I loved that he automatically made the connection between his prayer and the traffic clearing up.  It was a great moment for my family to see an immediate answer to a prayer.  We did make it to school on time that morning, and had it not been for the traffic suddenly clearing up, we would have been late.

Visit with Grandma Reed

Grandma Reed came into town this past weekend and we had a family picnic at Riverfront Park.  It was so much fun.  There was great food, good company and football.  What more could you ask for...

Grandma Carol, Grandma Reed, mandy, Ally, Tyler, Daisya, Trey and Haley

Christi, Daniel, Grandma Carol, Grandma Reed, Vickie, Jim and Mickey

Jeff, Dawson, Grandma Carol, Holden, Grandma Reed, Alissa, and Nannette

Jeff, Grandma Carol, Grandma Reed, mandy, Kathy, and Vickie

Grandma Carol, Grandma Reed, kali, kathy, Richard and Neal

The Whole Family

Playing Football

It was a great day, the only thing that was missing was Paul and his wife Frajelle.  Hopefully Next Time...

Blue and Gold

One week after Trey joined Scouts, he earned his Bobcat award.  I am so proud of Trey.  He has such a can do attitude.  He reminds me so much of his Father.  When he gets his mind set on something, he see's it through to the end, no matter how difficult the tast.

This is Trey doing the Football Cheer...

I was so honored to be able to receive a pin from Trey because of his accomplishments.

Keep up the Good Work Trey

Rodeo program and Grandparents day at Carden!

Wednesday February 24, the kids put on a program at their school in honor of Rodeo days and Grandparents day!  

We started the day off with a special spaghetti lunch and rodeo with Daisya's kindergarten class.  The day before, they learned about churning butter and the class actually made their own.  I have to admit it was pretty good...

They have their stick horses and laso's and are ready to go!

Time for a practice gallop around the court...

Now onto barrel racing...

A rodeo world not be complete without a an attempted steer laso...

The rest of the program was performed by all of the kids.  They sang and danced and we all had a great time:

Time for the Virginia Reel...

Daisya cuttin' some rug...

Trey Tearin' it up...

Poor Haley actually had to dance with a boy...

does she look a little embarassed?

Grandma Carol and the Kids...

Happy Grandparents Day!