The Cove

While my in-laws were in town we went to this beautiful place in the Great Smokey Mountains called Cades Cove!  It is so great!  We love all the beautiful things you see and the company could not have been better.  Here are a few pictures!

This first picture is of some dear we saw in a beautiful field

 The kids with Grandpa!

 This is Bensons pose for almost every picture!  Thumbs up dude

 Grandma and Grandpa!  While Grandma was wearing this shirt some folks from Kentucky asked if she was a Jimmer Fan! 

 Adilynn had so much fun.

 These two were the best of buddies!

 The view

Sonshine

We were so lucky to have Doug's parents come in for the weekend to visit and see Brielle's Sonshine musical theater show!  It was so fun to have them here, even though the life around the Rose home is crazy, I hope they had a good time!  Thanks Guys for coming, we LOVE having you here.

We did a lot of running back and forth to and from Brielle's show.  She had performances all weekend, and she did such a great job!  Thanks to all the friends that came, it really meant a lot to her.  Here are the pictures from the performance and also a video of her SOLO!  You cant hear it very well, but she did a great job.  We were so proud of her, she was not even nervous!  The people that put on this program are amazing.  We are so grateful Brielle was able to be a part of it!

 This is Brielle and her friend Addi she met through this!  They love each other!

 Daddy and the star!

 Grandpa and Brielle

 These are our friends the Matsons that were in the show as well.  We love these kids!

Life according to Benson

Benson was sitting on the couch yesterday and said, "Mom, I only really like people that understand me.  (Not the way he speaks, but the emotional understanding.)  I then replied, Well, who really understands you?  He said, "Holly, (a little friend of his)  Holly really understands me.

I was seriously cracking up for about ten minutes!  He was up to some serious thinking.

Hide and Seek

If I am ever wondering where Adilynn has crawled off to my first place to look is here. She takes out all the shoes and just likes to sit and play. Man I love this little girl!

Life is good

I am 29 today!  I guess I have finally reached the age that I will stay forever.  (Don't women always say when asked there age that they are 29?) It has been a wonderful day.  Most of you who know me know that I love birthdays!  I think it is fabulous that you get to celebrate one day a year just because you were born!  How great is that!  You get to celebrate the fact that you are you, and people are so nice to make you feel important.  I have to say that this birthday has been one of the greatest.  Thanks to wonderful family and friends, and facebook, I truly feel loved. 

The day started with a wake up call from Doug, he is so sweet and he wrote me an awesome email that made me cry.  Then some of my dear friends took me to lunch today (some couldn't make it and I missed them) and they surprised me with an awesome gift!  I went to lunch without any kids because one of my friends sweet husbands didn't have work today, and he volunteered to watch my kids for me! (Thanks Taylor).  That was  a treat by itself.  Lunch was so fun just to be with the girls, thanks for all the sacrifices made to get there to celebrate.  Then I came home and since have received a few more gifts, and phone calls, and even had a dear friend bring us pizza and cake so I didn't have to cook tonight while the hubby is gone!

I feel so grateful that I have so many wonderful friends and family in my life.  Life really is good.  I have been reading a lot lately about the compassion of our Savior Jesus Christ, and I feel that one of the greatest ways he shows compassion is giving us people in our lives to love and help us.  After a few trials and hard days, this birthday is a reminder to me that we are all loved and I am truly thankful.

Seventh Heaven

My beautiful Brielle turned seven today.  It seems unreal that she could be so old.  Time goes by so fast.  She was able to have a fabulous birthday.  We started the celebration on Saturday because Doug couldn't be here to celebrate today.  So we went out to IHOP Saturday morning.  The kids LOVE that place almost as much as Chick-fil-A.  Then we came back and opened presents, and they were able to play outside before it started raining.  (It snowed on Sunday by the way.  What?  I thought snow in March only happened in Utah!)  Then she got to go to another little girls birthday party, and come home to eat her favorite dinner which happens to be Doug's delicious alfredo pasta!

Then on Sunday the kids in Primary sang happy Birthday and she got a few birthday surprises.  Then we went to our friends, the Copelands, for a special birthday dinner. 

Today is her actual birthday, so I went to her school and ate school lunch with her.  That was so special.  her cute little friends Ally and Sarah got to come and sit by us!  Then after school we went to the library (another one of her favorite places), and then home to open a few more presents from great friends.  Then we ended the night at our friends house, the Matsons.  Their daughter has the same birthday as Brielle so we had a joint Birthday/FHE dinner. 

Overall it was a lot of celebrating and fun.  She is such a special girl and I don't know what I would do without her.  She is the most stubborn and strong willed child we have, but she is also the sweetest and most caring and loving child we have as well.  When I went to eat luch with her at school today, I think I saw every kid in her class ask her if she would sit by them at lunch.  She loves everyone no matter what they wear, or look like, or talk like.  She wants to be everyones friend.  That is one of her best qualities.  She is such a big sprit in a teeny tiny 40 lb. body.  We love her so much! 

Her Cake..Of course it has to be something really girlie with her!  She LOVES ballet and wanted a ballerina cake, I thought she might be disappointed when it was just the slippers, but she loved it!

Loving her brothers and the Barbies they picked out for her!

This is such a sweet picture!

This is the cake that I made for the little girl Sarah who we celebrated their birthdays with!

For REAL!

One of the hardest things in life is to be real.  To just be you no matter who is watching, or who you are talking to or who you are with. It sounds easy, but if you think about it, it is hard to be really you.  We all want to fit in.  That is ingrained in us since childhood.  We all want to have the most friends or to look the cutest, or to have the nicest house or the best kids, but is that REAL?  If it is I will never make it.  But I can be myself all the time no matter what my hair looks like and that to me is reality. 

Society is pushed upon us daily, but in the middle of all the outside forces looking on my life I want to always remember that I am a child of God and that is enough.  I don't have to be the best, but I always have to be my best self.  God created me and gave me the things in life to make me happy and if i am always trying to be someone I am not, I will be miserable.  So my new pledge to myself is to ...keep it real.

My friend Toni is pretty real. She really doesn't care about the judgement of others. Alice is pretty real too. She will tell you just like it is. Click on their names to check out their blog posts, and see for yourself.

Kids always keep it real..even when fall down in front of everyone

 

Or when they have a big gap in their teeth and will still give a toothy grin!

 

Or when they have a big scratch on their face with a bandaid on it.

Or when they are just REAL!!

One-derful!

We had such a great time celebrating Adilynn's birthday! She was the best of the kids by far to watch eat the cake, she just dug right in with no hesitation! The kids loved watching her. We just had a little dinner and cake and presents here at home with the family. Simple but sweet. I still can't believe she is one. ~sigh~

The Cake
The Messy birthday girl!

This is what she was doing while I made the cake! She put the "hat" on herself!

Happy Birthday Adilynn!

Today is the day. My baby is one year old today. I really have mixed emotions because I am so happy she is getting more independent and can feed herself and get around, but I am so sad because this is the LAST first birthday I will ever celebrate with one of my kids. We love this little girl so much. She brings me so much joy and happiness, and I can't imagine my life without her. She is my little buddy and I am so grateful for her. I wanted to make a list of things we love about her so she can read it when she is older. So here it goes:

1. She is always happy. She rarely cries and is just able to go with the flow.
2. She can say words like mama, dada, "is it" (meaning where is it?, drink, and binki.
3. She has no fear about things except when it comes to walking, she is kind of a wimp. :)
4. She LOVES to dance, especially when she sees Doug. She always shakes her shoulders for him.
5. Her hair looks so cute in a ponytail on top of her head.
6. When she crawls she drags her left leg under her so she can go faster.
7. She gets into EVERYTHING, and her favorite spot is to climb onto the dishwasher door.
8. She LOVES her brothers and sister. She gets so excited to see them every morning.
9. She goes to sleep so easy, and she sleeps about 12 hours every night!
10. She loves to eat bread. She would eat it for every meal.
11. She only weighs 18 lbs., but she eats more than the boys do! (I guess she has her dads metabolism)
12. She has a little spunk to her and she will scream really loud if it gets too crazy around here so she can be heard.
13. She likes to growl at you and then laughs when you do it back to her.

We are so happy Adilynn came to our family! Happy Birthday little girl! (I will post pictures of the cake and party later!)

the outtakes