Advertsements from the good ol days…

My friend from Norway sent these advertisements to me and some of them just made my eyes pop out so I just have to share them!!Lynn wrote: Wow. Some of these ads smell of conspiracy. If you can, it is worth it to read some of the small print. Wonder what ads from today they will pull out in the future…

A few from ‘the olden days’ – worth a look and a laugh. You’ll never see these ads again ! image001 image005 image003 image017 image012 image010 image011 image006 image013 image014 image004 image007 image002 image008 image016 image009 image015

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How to express the feeling of parenting perfectly…

I’ve always tried to figure out how to explain why parenting is so satisfying and Mike figured out how to say it perfectly today. He said, “Hannah, you are just like a giant chocolate teddy bear… I just want to snuggle you and eat you up all day!”

You know the feeling?! Snuggling with a teddy bear and eating chocolate – combined – at different times throughout your whole day.

These are the feelings of contentment and satisfaction that come when you experience raising children and seeing them grow daily.

General Conference

General Conference in our church happens twice a year and each year each time it happens I’m amazed at how uplifted I am by it.

I often wonder if my friends who are not LDS would also benifit from the words spoken. I think they would so this is an easy way to share it.

If you want to listen and/or see the sessions that were broadcast all over the world this weekend (March 31 and April 1st), click on “View Now”

http://www.lds.org/general-conference?lang=eng

If you’d like to know some of the things we are taught in our church, this is a great way to hear an “overview.” Some talks are deeper than others, some more specific but all are good and encourage us as Mormons to be better people…better parents, spouses and disciples of Christ.

 

Just to give an overall summary of what Conference is….

There are 2 “sessions” on Saturday and 2 on Sunday. President Monson is the leader and Prophet of our church currently.  We also have 12 Apostles who work closely with the Prophet and members of the Church all over the world.

General Conference is held in a huge auditorium called the Conference Center in Salt Lake City, across the street from the Temple that the pioneers built when they began settling the valley when it was only a dessert.

If you want to know more, a good place to start is http://mormon.org/

 

As President Monson said at the end of the second Sunday session, “May these words spoken help you to be even better than you were before you heard them 2 days ago”

I feel that they have helped me to want to be better…now I just have to go do the things I have been prompted to change in my life!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from us to YOU!

Here is our Christmas card/letter this year.

I’m sorry if we didn’t get one to you before we left for Utah. (It’s a big step in the right direction that we even got one made this year!

Love to all!

Click on the link below to open the letter… (it won’t download to your computer)

Lowry_Christmas_2011

Our favorite photos of Hannah Joy

These photos are some of our favorites. It shows her personality, daring, fun-loving, darling little girl from birth to present we’re sure gotten a kick out of her in our lives!

Summary of our last 8 months!

Well, our little Kaiya is now 8.5 months as of this post, and I feel as though I’m just coming out of weird black hole. For the past 6 months I’ve daily thought about topics or thoughts I’d like to blog about but actually sitting down to get it written is a different thing all together!

A few times this week I was ready to give up (like when I was biking downtown for the 3rd time in one day – we live at the TOP of a big hill – to another meeting for my job after teaching badminton, picking up Kaiya from the babysitter, after dropping Hannah at her daycare – which I HATE doing – before dinner) or pull my hair out (like when I thought Hannah was napping but to my horror found she had spent the time taking off her poopy diaper and smearing her poop all over her room!) but alas today is a better day so I’ll write.

I think I’ll use this opportunity to give a little update about our lives and then I really hope to be better at this whole blogging thing in the future! Sorry to all for being so miserable at keeping in touch!

I’ve had a few ahh-ha moments recently that has made me realize how all emcompassing having children is as people have commented on something that has been happening for 2.5 years and I feel like it was yesterday!

When I try to figure out where the time has gone, I realize Mike’s and my life has really changed in the last 2.5 years!

Here’s a quick summary of what I mean, more details on #1 below and #2-#5 will be described in following posts:

1. The adjustment of mommy-hood as we’ve become parents of 2 beautiful girls!
2. Becoming house owners (we love our house!)
3. New jobs for Mike and I (UI professor/Daddy and Safe Routes to School Coordinator/badminton instructor/Mommy)
4. Adjusting to small town Moscow Idaho (we’re not in Oslo anymore!)
5. Lots of visitors and traveling (which we love but it’s a whole other ball game with babies!)

1. The adjustment of mommy-hood as we’ve become parents of 2 beautiful girls!

Well it’s true, with the arrival of Kaiya (she didn’t actually just arrive on our door-step like this, although that would have been alot more pleasant!) two kids is indeed an adjustment from one. But… sometimes I feel lucky to say that two feels easier than one! I think that is because Hannah is to the age the she doesn’t need to be held all the time and Kaiya can crawl around already longer than Hannah ever could be left alone, so I already have more arms to myself than I ever did with just one child! Plus, Kaiya sleeps! (Thank you God!) so less time is taken trying to cox my baby to sleep, and since Hannah is weening off her naps (I’m terrified to say it!) there is way less time being wasted fighting over sleep!

  Hurrahh Kaiya! We love you! Super-baby sleeper extraordinaire!

No doubt about it, Kaiya is the happiest, more smiley baby that people have ever seen. I tell people that she smiles at people she likes because I want them to feel special instead of telling them that she really does that to everyone! She wakes up smiling and every time she sees a face she smiles and scrunches up her shoulders to just lure you in even more! When she smiles from across the room she’s like a magnet, I can’t help but go over to her and snuggle her!

I think pictures speak a thousand words when it comes to our girls. Their smiles and laughs get us up in the morning (I’m not a morning person! but I’m amazed at how readily I get up at 7:00am with them!)

The other day Hannah came into our room in the morning saying “Here comes Hannah!” like we should be excited! I’m never amazed to experience how I’m am actually excited to see my girls…even at 7:00am! For no other thing in the world do I like getting up in the morning!

The other day I woke up with both girls in our bed.  We had all 4 slept in together until 8:30! Kaiya was nursing in her sleep and Hannah was curled up on my other shoulder like a cat. It felt wonderful and cozy. A morning to remember….until I looked down to see Kaiya’s puke all around her head and Hannah’s milk bottle leaking all over the bed on the other side of me (I was surrounded!) A wonderful moment quickly brought to reality!

All in all, I LOVE being a Mother. Mike and I often comment to each other that these 2 little girls have added more laughing and joy into our lives than we could have ever experienced without them. Daily we laugh and smile WAY MORE than we would have without our girls. And that’s the reason we all sign up for parenting isn’t it!

Our friend Kate Jennings took these photos for us near our house in Moscow. We think she did a great job. The fields are canola seed. Thanks Kate

http://katejenningsphotography.blogspot.com/2011/06/lowery-family-summer-2011.html

Kaiya Leone Lowry’s birth

 

Kaiya Leone Lowry

6 pounds, 14 oz.

19 inches

Born Jan. 28 2011 at 2:50pm.

 

Wow! Wow! Wow! Baby #2.

We’re still feeling like we’re in stunned (and tired) stage of it all, but we have formulated these thoughts so far….

• we’re actually really enjoying baby-land again (sort of surprising and pleasing)
• we’re surprised at how we can love the second like the first!
• Kaiya and Hannah look almost exactly the same as new-born babies (it’s wild, same expressions, same movements, sounds etc.)
• we feel soooo incredbily lucky to have her here safe and sound

I also feel so lucky to be able to say that Kaiya’s birth was actually a great experience!

5:30am the first contraction, 2:40pm, the same day we had her in our arms! All in a day’s work:) The contractions progressed really well, we had amazing support from friends (thank you all!!) and our hospital stay was even nice because it was firmiliar from Hannah’s birth only 22 months ago. We arrived only 70 minutes before Kaiya was born!