This is a home! This is a place to live...Oohhh, a fireplace, are you kidding me!

We are moving.  I can't believe it.  We have been looking and praying for several months for an affordable home that has more room than the home we currently live in.  The Lord answered our prayer in a most unbelievable way.  Sometimes I still can't believe how it worked out.

We are doubling our home size and reducing our payment by quite a bit.  It's really amazing!

Our new home is about a mile away in Canton.  The elementary school and middle school are different so Calvin, Spencer and Cameron will be attending different schools in the fall.  Luckily all of them have friends in their grade at the new school.

Our new house has a really great size family room with a wood burning fireplace.  It has 4 bedrooms including a master bedroom with a walk in closet and attached bathroom.  We are finishing a bedroom in the basement for the boys.  They are going to have an awesome mancave!

The yard is 1/4 acre with forsythia, peonies, lilies, pretty trees, iris and a garden area.  It's perfect.

The rooms are painted great colors that I love.  The carpets are clean.  The windows, roof, furnace, a/c, driveway are all new.

It's really perfect.  Except for one thing.

We are getting it from a family that we know and really like.  They have to move away for an employment opportunity.  It makes me sad that they are leaving.  We got the keys from them this week and went over that afternoon to look around.  They left flowers and a gift for Teddy on the counter.  Very wonderful people that I will miss alot.

But I'm so happy to be moving.  I'm so excited!  Now to coordinate it with giving birth...

It's no contest. The guy had nothing! The ship went down, he got into a life boat, I mean, come on.

I'm having a baby in a few weeks. My due date is May 5. I've got 18 days until my due date to be exact. But my babies are usually late so I probably have more like 25 days. I'll be glad when this pregnancy is over. It's been a toughie. Emotionally lately I've been feeling like a wreck. My eyes are leaking all the time.

It's the same old thing. I miss my mom.

I miss her so much when I have a baby. A few months ago I took a meal to a friend who just had a baby. Her mom greeted me at the door. She whisked the meal to the table, got it all set out and had my dishes washed and returned to me before I was done snuggling my friend's new babe. I want that too. I want my mom to come here and stay a week or two and watch my kids so I can get extra sleep and drive the carpool so I don't have to worry about it and catch up the laundry and dishes and reorganize my cupboards and refold all my sheets. I want her to hold my babe and smile at me and tell me how he looks just like I did when I was a baby.

It's just not fair.

I feel like a selfish 13 year old girl when I say those words. It's just not fair.

NieNie never says it's not fair. People dying of cancer never say it's just not fair. People with infertility issues never say it's not fair. I have so much in life to be thankful for. And I am thankful for my blessings.

Why can't I just get over this?

I have a lot of faith. I really do. I believe with my whole heart that someday I am going to walk with God and He is going to show me the super important reason why I had to spend most of my mortality without a mother. And He is going to hug me and it's all going to be ok.

But it's not ok now. And now is what really matters to me now.

Mom Academy Awards

The 3rd Annual Mom Academy Awards were held last weekend and they were spectacular, as usual. The location, home of Sue Barfuss, was primo this year. It was lovely to have so many fun, talented, wonderful women together for an evening.

This year, we once again gave out the coveted "Spoony." 30 moms were awarded their Spoony in 30 unique categories. New this year, were tributes written by husbands and children, and read aloud to each mom. After all were read, few dry eyes were left in the room. It's nice to be appreciated by those we work so hard for day in and day out. I love the Mom Award's night. I'm so glad so many people were able to participate this year!

Here's a complete list of the winners:

Patti Banka: Most Well Read Mom

Sue Barfuss: Renaissance Mom (Cuz she's so good at everything)

Amy Benson: The Coolest Mom

Ramona Bertrand: Most Patient Mom

Penny Bitner: Best Hair and Makeup Mom

Yoshimi Burnside: World Traveler Mom

Buffie Christensen: Do it Yourself Mom

Rachel Clawson: Great Decorator Mom

Courtney Cope: Outdoorsy Mom

Stacie Dalebout: Mom who is always thinking of others

Angie Gardner: No Sleep Mom

Leah Goering: Savvy Shopper Mom

Kristie Hicks: Social Butterfly Mom

Senta Hill: Mom with the Best Sense of Humor

Serena Humes: Newest Mom

Kayla McEwen: Multilingual Mom

Nadine Medley: Most Supportive Mom

Valerie Mercado: Sporty Mom

Teresa Murphy: Most Organized Mom

Lisa Nielsen: Volunteer Mom

Mari Noble: Iron Chef Mom

Anna Onofrio: Best Blogger-Seamstress-Crafty Mom

Esther Rogers: Fashion Plate Mom

Teresa Strum: Miss Congeniality Mom

Cathy Sullivan: Scriptorian Mom

Bethany Swalberg: Mom always Serving others

Jennifer Vos: Taxi Mom

Tami Valgardson: Happiest Mom

Deanna Wilkerson: Most Experienced Mom

Becca Winder: Musical Mom

"Yeah. It's a beautiful name for a boy or a girl. Especially a girl... Or a boy."

I started working on Family History when I was 8 and received a Book of Remembrance at my baptism. I'm 37 now and not completely clear as to what the Book of Remembrance is for. I kept papers in it that were important to me. It came with some sheets to be filled out like the Family Tree and Personal History. The book is now in the garage in a box. I haven't really done a great job at remembering it. But I did enthusiastically fill out the Family Tree page when I was 8 with the help of my parents. I really found the whole thing very interesting who I descended from. My dad worked on family history quite a bit during my childhood and gave me a great head start when I was an adult.

I've worked on Family History as a semi-serious hobby since Emily was a baby. I love finding people in my family and making it possible for their temple work to be completed. Since marrying Chris, I have worked on his side of the family as well. I have long been interested in finding the Vos' that first came to America from Holland. I could never find them. There seemed to be no information on them out there that I was reaching. I kept them in the back of my mind, hoping that someday I would find them.

A few months ago, I was called as a Family History Consultant at our local Family History Center. Although I would give my right arm to serve in Primary, this is the next best thing. I go to the Family History Center for three kid-free hours a week and work on Family History. I'm supposed to help people who walk-in and need assistance. So far, I have helped a few people but I don't know as much as the "pros" that have been there for years and years. I'm sure I will learn more as time goes by and be a better aide to those who come in looking for help.

One night, one of the pros asked me if I wanted him to help me with one of my family road blocks. I showed him the info I had on John Vos born in the Netherlands in 1839. I had him on US Census' for various years in the United States. I knew he got here. But I didn't know when or how or with whom. I left the info I had with the pro, who's name is Al by the way, and headed home until next week.

The next week Al greeted me and let me know that he found lots of stuff for me. I was excited. He started to show me page after page of what was information on my John Vos and his ancestors. John came to the United States with his parents in 1855. He was 16. His parents were Dirk and Bonna Vos. They brought John and their seven other children with them on a ship. I was able to look at pictures of where they came from in Holland. I can only imagine what their accommodations were like on the ship and what it must have been like to travel across an ocean with all those children. As Al was showing me pages of information, I fell in love with this family. I feel like I know them somehow. And unless you've ever done family history and connected with someone from the past, you might not understand what I mean. Dirk and Bonna, I want to be your friends.

I sat there that night very choked up looking at the pages, entering information into the computer and finding more information because I was able to piggyback off what Al had started. I was so excited and enthralled with everything I found and learned. Those of you who work on family history know that other people are about as interested in hearing about it as you are about hearing about someone's daily work out at the gym. Their eyes glaze over and they give you a faint smile and nod occasionally. It's just not everyone's thing.

But I wanted what I found(or what was found for me) to be shared and remembered. All I could think of was to name our little Teddy's middle name Dirk. I kept thinking about Theodore Dirk and how we couldn't forget about Dirk and his family if one of our kids was named after him. So I went home and proposed the idea to Chris and he agreed and so there you go. No one else thinks it's a really great name. Some people laugh out loud when I tell them. But I don't really care. It's a middle name, which isn't used as often, and it means something to me. Hopefully someday it will mean something to Teddy too.

I seriously cannot wait to meet Dirk and Bonna in the afterlife and talk to them and find out all about their life in 1855.