Spring/Summer 2003

In the process of preparing little Brandon's slideshow (it may take a little while), I have found some fun old pictures. Since I am still waiting to convert a ton of disks to CD, I thought I would share all the fun pics I found from Spring/Summer 2003. This is five years ago! Brandon was three years old and Ethan was one year old! Five years seems like an eternity ago. That was when Brandon was traveling ALL the time. So, we had frequent flier miles and were able to go to Disneyworld. That summer we also went to Texas to visit with Brandon's family there. Other special inclusions from five years ago: pictures of my Grandma Hall who died from cancer, Ethan's first birthday, and an Easter egg hunt at my parents. It brought a lot of feelings up to see all the pictures of the past. Strange to see where you were five years ago. Parts of me wish we were back there........I wonder where another five years will take us. Hopefully, somewhere great!

Birthday Wishes from the 2nd grade!

OK, by now you probably see how sentimental I can be. Little Brandon came home from school with a book from his 2nd grade class. On the front it said, "Happy Birthday Brandon from Mrs. Olsen and your 2nd grade class! I just have to say, the book was SOOOOO cute. Each child in the class drew a picture and wrote a letter to Brandon with wishes for his birthday. Through reading the letters, I realized how well his classmates and teacher know my sweet, little Brandon and it touched my heart. They know about the character Brandon has made up and often impersonates; otherwise known as "TIGERSCRATCH"! They know of his love for Transformers, Webkinz, animals, sports and his desire to meet certain sports players. Impressive for 8 year olds. I have to say, boys at this age are so cute. It is frightening how technology saavy they all are and how they already want IPODS and cellphones!!! Scary day!

Clearly, his teacher knows Brandon's interests! He has a GREAT teacher!!!

A child's rendering of an IPOD and cellphone! It definately is a different world for our kids than it was for us!

His friends know he loves sports!
A cake and transformers were a wish from another friend!

Another friend wished for Brandon a Lion!

This may have been my favorite. Don't you love the Toys R Us and the Brandon "just for boys" store?

And a pink cake, from a girl, of course!


I know, I may be nutty to record all the letters from his class, but it is just too cute!!! (I didn't do ALL the mispellings the kids did, just some that stood out! It's part of the charm!)

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you...your very own library full of books and one of every Transformer! From, Mrs. Olsen

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you a pet transformer tiger named tiger scratch and Boozer action figure. Zaden

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you a spider monkey. It's name would be utah monkey boy it comes with a collar and five bananas. I wish for you to be a football player and then you had a football that had all the Blaze football team signed it. your friend, Kyle.

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you your own shark. It name is Sharpee. Sharpee comes with what ever you want to come with it. Your friend, Taleya

Happy Birthday Brandon. I wish for you...a cheese cake with a candle on it and a Happy Birthday! Your friend, Ashley! P.S. Your cake is pink.

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish you a car and a house. by Savannah.

Happy Birthday! Brandon! I wish for you your own store called TOYS-R-US Your friend, Aspen P.S. And a store thats called Brandon's Just for boys.

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you a transformer named Tiger Scratch that transforms into a tiger. And for you to meet the Jonas brothers and eat with them and for them to give you one-thousand-billion (1,000,000) dollars. and a dog named Punchuruni! Your friend, Sam

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you a...great white shark named Sharpie. You can ride him in a shark tank. It's verey verey big OK. Your friend Hayden

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you a shark and a seahorse. And all the candy in the worlde From Madison

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you a SS-4 with a Wii in back from Camron

Happy Birthday friend! I wish you a....Chevy Camaro that is named Optimus Prime that has the all spark cube.

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you...Deron Williams, and Carlos Boozer to be your brothers! from, Jade

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you...a lion and its a nice lion. It never roars. And it comes with lion food! Your friend Sienna

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you to go Africa and I wish you will have fun. Your friend, Natalie

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you ...a big ice creme that was strawberey flavor and with strawbereys in it. Your friend Kennedy

happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you a giant Boozer head that says You Rock Brandon! and a NFL football that always threw spirals. Your friend Carson

Happy Birthday Brandon! I wish for you....A big boozer head and a signed Boozer jursey your friend Mitchell

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for a I pod that has all the songs you want sulger boy ever thing and it would be white. IPod that comes whith a phon that is your blackpich black (I think he meant pitch black) with micy mouse. Your friend Billi

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you to have a happy birthday!! from Calista!

Happy birthday Brandon I wish you had all of the transformers in the world! And a big cake! And a white mouse webkin your friend Emma (P.S. you rock!)

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you...a transformer dog and it made 1,00000 and 100000000000000000 dolers. Yore friend Sage.

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you all the transformer books in the world, a white IPod and a Black cell-phone and a dog only for you! Your friend, Claire

Happy Birthday Brandon I wish for you...a sell phone that you could call your friends with and it was pitch dark. Also a IPod that was white! Your friend, Caroline

Happy birthday Brandon I wish for you to meet dron willims and be feamous sport player. your friend Jessica

Happy 8th Birthday Brandon!

Happy Birthday Brandon! Wow, the time goes by so quickly!!! I can't believe Brandon is eight years old today. I will never forget the way he came into this world. I was due the first week of June, but he decided to come early, for Mother's Day. I woke up at about 5 a.m. on a Sunday! I woke up my husband Brandon, freaking out, as I was uncontrollably peeing all over the bed. My husband quickly assured me it was not pee----especially since it wouldn't stop. We realized my water had broken!!! Usually I wouldn't have been that stupid, but hey, I wake up a little stupid, plus, I had never had a baby. Back then, I was also blonde, so what can I say!!! I was still working full time and had planned to take the birthing class the next week! OOOPS, too late for that.

So, we rushed to the hospital. I got the pain shot, which put me in dreamland. My parents, and best friend Tyra were there, along with my husband Brandon of course. It was such a pain free birth and such an easy birth. I remember even telling Brandon the next day, I could do that again tomorrow. It was such an easy recovery too. Anyway, Brandon was such a beautiful, perfect, little baby boy. He was six pounds, six ounces and a dream come true for us.

Prior to his birth, I had a miscarriage. We had been married for four years before Brandon came along, and by the time he came, we were SOOOO excited to have a baby!!!
We had moved into our Springville home a month before he was born, and it was beautiful to bring a new baby home. We could not have been more thrilled. Brandon was such an easy, beautiful, fun, happy baby.

Here we are eight years later. I am so grateful Brandon is our firstborn. He is a great example, a great big brother, a great son, and an incredible little boy. He loves to play football and basketball, enjoys reading, plays piano, and has a huge heart!!! He is very determined to be righteous which brings me great joy. He says beautiful prayers to Heavenly Father and wants to be like Christ. A Mom cannot ask for much more in her sweet, baby boy! I always tell him no matter how big he gets, he will always be my baby!!! Thanks Brandon for being such a wonderful son. I love you for always!!! Happy Birthday Brandon!

Tagged Again!

4 jobs I've had:
Intern Therapist for Provo School District Elementary Schools
Intern Therapist for Wasatch Mental Health, Adult Outpatient
Therapist for Wasatch Mental Health, Vantage Point
Therapist for Timpanogos Family Services

4 movies I could watch over and over:
Actually, one of my annoying trademarks, is I don't like to watch movies more than once. My husband laughs as I never remember them, but I still don't like to watch a movie again!

So, four movies I have really enjoyed:
DAN IN REAL LIFE
JUNO
CINEMA PARADISO
BABY MAMA

4 places that I've lived:
New York
New Jersey
Ecuador
Jerusalem

4 shows that I love:
Intervention
American Idol
Survivor
Wife Swap

My favorite foods/dishes:
The Pie Pizza
Training Table Cheese Fries
Tepanyaki steak & noodles
Bean Burrito (La Casita, Springville)
Brick Oven pasta

4 sites I visit daily:
My Google Reader (to check all the blogs of friends and family)
email

4 places I have vacationed:
San Diego
San Francisco
The Bahamas
San Antonio

4 places I would rather be right now:
somewhere quiet
San Diego
Hawaii
with my husband ALONE anywhere!!!

Tagged:
if you are reading this, you are tagged!

Escape

Well, I have been reading the book "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop & Laura Palmer. Carolyn Jessop was the fourth wife of Merril Jessop who is currently the leader of the YFZ ranch. She was married to him for fifteen years and had eight children with him. I admire her strength and courage in leaving such an abusive environment, even though she didn't have a lot of resources to do so.

Reading this book has been a bit overwhelming! It is so full of sadness, injustice, abuse, and pain. I seriously had to stop reading once in a while to take a deep breath---and to think of something else before I continued reading. It was all so heart wrenching. After reading this book, I am so sad for all the women and children of polygamy. Polygamy is such a breeding ground for abuse and pain. If you think of it, women don't always get along all that well anyway----never mind if they are sharing a husband. Can you imagine what it would be like living with someone who is sleeping with your husband?

The other abusive part of polygamy, that I hadn't really thought about, is that many of these women are fairly powerless, so they often take out their anger on the children of the other wives. Imagine your children being subject to the punishments of "your sister wives" who might be jealous or angry at you. Not such a great scenario for children!

This book was very vivid, and I was able to see into the life of someone living in a polygamist compound. This book only gave me so much more empathy for these women and children. After reading this book, I am SOOOOO glad that Texas stepped in to save these children from a world riddled with abuse. There is such a direct parallel to this book and the goings on at the YFZ ranch in Texas.

Carolyn Jessop, author of the book, was the fourth wife of the current leader of the YFZ ranch. That is SOOOO disturbing & frightening considering how abusive Merill Jessop (the leader of the YFZ compound) was to most of his wives and children. When Carolyn left Merril and her life in polygamy, this group had not yet left for Texas, but the community was getting more and more rigid & disturbing. Many women and children were being "reassigned". Can you imagine waking up one day and being "reassigned" to a new husband? That is another reason for all the "lost boys". After all these "reassignments", the new Stepdads did not want to deal with the boys. Women, like cattle, are a commodity in the community. In fact, Carolyn discussed one situation where one of the new "stepdads" marries his stepdaughter. EWWW! Talk about frightening.

Anyway, I think Utah and Arizona do need to do more to fight sexual abuse, physical abuse, lack of medical care and the lack of education found in many of these polygamist groups! I think now people are quite aware of the physical and sexual abuse found in these communities. I didn't realize that many of these women cannot seek medical care for themselves or their children without "permission" from their husband. One problem, is the community sees medical issues as a "curse" from God. They feel that if you are more obedient to your husband, then you and your children will not suffer from medical issues. You will have to read about how hard it was for Carolyn to recieve medical help for her son. Then you also begin to see the restrictions on education. There just isn't a lot of hope for children and women in this community. Especially, a couple years ago, when these people were in Colorado City, and the police force was made of polygamists in the sect. Where can one turn to if the police force is corrupt? It is really hard to believe that things like this have really been going on in America.

I think it is so ironic that this sect left for Texas. They saw Utah starting to prosecute some of these men in Utah and decided it wasn't safe anymore in Utah for their sect. They definately chose the wrong state to continue with their abusive practices. I guess they hadn't heard the phrase "Don't mess with Texas." Unfortunately, Utah is so much more tolerant of such abuses. The attorney general, Mark Shurtleff, says Utah just doesn't have the resources to step in with people breaking the law. He says there are over 10,000 children in these communities. Well, I don't know where Utah should begin, but we need to do something to help these women and children. We just can't turn a blind eye to all the sexual and physical abuse, and educational and medical neglect. The reason that there are currently 10,000 children in this situation is that Utah has been turning a blind eye to bigamy and these abuses forever. If we had nipped this situation in the bud, then it wouldn't be this bad today. Likewise, if we don't do anything right now to change it, the number of problems will only grow! Action needs to be taken. We cannot tolerate so many abuses occurring right under our noses.

I think many people in Utah turn a blind eye as they come from "pioneer stock" who were polygamist. I come from pioneer stock and polygamy existed in my great, great, great grandparents (I am not really sure how many GREATS it is, but you get the point!) So what? That was then, this is now! What is going on today is wrong. It is time to take action.

Anyway, just on a side note, it has been about a week since I finished this book. This is the type of book that stays with you after you have read it. For this last week, I can't help but think about many of the things I read---they are sort of haunting!!! I would definately suggest this book, just be prepared for a lot of emotion!

Mother's Day Gifts

I just love to get the cute cards & gifts that kids create! It's hard to duplicate the precious gifts that little kids make (or teachers help them to make!) Thanks all you teachers out there for helping Mom's have a Happy Mother's Day!

My favorite was this card from Little Brandon. It was so cute. It cracked me up. It is good to see what your children know about you and their perception of you!




I am going to write out what Brandon wrote in his card so I can always remember it!!!

With Love from Brandon

(Questions about Mom with Brandon's answers. In parenthesis, I have included some thoughts of mine!)

How tall is she? 6 foot
What color are her eyes? Blue
What does she like to do best? Go on date!
What is her favorite thing to eat? Cickin (His way of writing Chicken, which is one of my LEAST favorite foods!)
Where did she come from? New York
What is her favorite thing to say? NO! (OK, maybe I need to work on that a bit!)
What is her nickname? Punkinhead!
How old is she? 36 (Actually, I am 35.)
Where is her favorite place to go? The Mall! (I rarely go to the Mall)
What is her favorite thing to fix for dinner? Sandwickes

Then here is his letter to me:

Dear Pumkinhead,
I love you sory I cald you Pumkinhead. I love win you and me go on dates. Love, Brandon

Little B is such a sweetie, I am so glad I am his Mom!!!

Here are the magnets Brandon made me (at school with his teacher's help!) Aren't they sweet? Sorry they are so out of focus, but you get the idea!



Here is the hand print Ethan brought me from school. This is what happened to it, before I even had a chance to look at it. I guess that is usually what happens when a six year old boy is holding something fragile!!! I still appreciate the sweet efforts of my little Ethan and his kind teacher!!!

Mother's Day 2008

You tend to get a little more cooperation for pictures on Mother's Day!!!

A Special Birthday Date!

At the Blaze game!


They gave away roses to the Mom's at the game!

With the mascot!

With the parentals!

Little Brandon with all the signatures on his football!

Putting up one of the posters he made!


For little Brandon's birthday, we told him we would take him on a birthday date. So, for weeks, he has been planning what he wanted to do. He has been racking his brain for what would be the funnest thing to do for the date. He finally decided he wanted to go to a "Blaze" game. Little Brandon was SOOOO excited. He even insisted on making posters to hold up for "the Blaze" during the game! He spent hours on Saturday, making three posters! Little Brandon goes to lots of games with his Dad, but I have never joined them. It was SOOOOO cute how little Brandon would dance to try to get on the megatron. He was so enthusiastic and is such a sports fan. Luckily, we had bought a little football for him, and afterwards the players stayed to give autographs. Brandon got a jersey, and got it signed by his favorite player, and also got his football signed by a lot of the players. He could not have been more thrilled. It touches my heart to see how much children this age love to spend time with their parents. This birthday date idea has been such a great tradition for our family.

A Girls Day!

"The Last Supper" quilt

On Saturday, my Mom and I had a great time spending the day together. We had a blast! We talked, talked, and talked some more! It was very therapeutic! One of the fun things we did was attend a Quilt Show in Sandy. Many of the quilts were gorgeous works of art. It made me wish I had more time to devote to quilting. It would be so amazing to be able to make a quilt like some of the ones we saw! Anyway, it was a great Mother's Day treat to spend the day with my Mom!!!


Some quilts in the show that I enjoyed seeing! I would love to develop a talent for quilting!

Who Knew?

A cute Daddy!

Scary faces!

Who knew? It is a song from Pink, but also my thought tonight after watching my kids delirious in laughter, playing with three balls. My parents had Brandon and Ethan for a little while, and so we had Benjamin, Madison, and Dylan. They each had a ball, and could NOT have been more thrilled. My husband was so cute playing with all of them. What is more attractive than a father playing with his children and making them shriek with laughter? Not much in my opinion. The kids loved all the Daddy fun tonight, and I had so much fun taking pictures. Anyway, my question is Who knew balls could be SOOOO much fun? Sometimes I am looking so hard for the next best thing rather than enjoying the simple, easy things of life. Another benefit---if you are looking to get great smiles from your kids for pictures, give them one of these balls and snap away. Balls are a great camera prop. Who needs Kiddie Candids and their lame feather dusters? Balls are so much better! Just some random thoughts for tonight! I know, I am full of them!









A little tuckered out after all the Daddy play!

Yeah, Benj was really tired. We let him stay up a little later than Maddie and Dylan, but clearly, we should have put him to bed!