A More Christlike Year

A few weeks ago, I attending a Relief Society meeting geared toward becoming "Guardians of the Hearth." One of the break-out sessions I attended had to do with improving personal and family scripture study. An idea shared was taking each of the headings about Christ in the Topical Guide and basing a Family Home Evening lesson on it. We've only been able to have a few, but I've loved doing it so far! My favorite was the first lesson, when we talked about Christ and his names (and their meanings) and Clark and I shared our testimonies with our daughter. We then walked into her bedroom and reminded her that the pictures above her crib are of Christ as a child or interacting with children. It was a simple lesson, but I felt the Spirit. :) I'm so excited to go through the rest of the topics and finish up next February!

Here are two of the pictures I have hanging on the nursery wall:

"In His Light" by Greg Olsen

Liz Lemon Swindle's "Be It Unto Me"

In case you're wondering, there are slightly more than 52 topics, but a few don't have scriptural references and a couple others are so similar that I combined them. In case you want to do this with your own family, here are the topics:

Jesus Christ
Jesus Christ—Jehovah
Jesus Christ, Advocate
Jesus Christ, Antemortal Existence of
Jesus Christ, Appearances, Antemortal
Jesus Christ, Appearances, Postmortal
Jesus Christ, Ascension of
Jesus Christ, Atonement through
Jesus Christ, Authority of
Jesus Christ, Baptism of
Jesus Christ, Betrayal of
Jesus Christ, Birth of
Jesus Christ, Condescension of
Jesus Christ, Creator
Jesus Christ, Crucifixion of
Jesus Christ, Davidic Descent of/Family of
Jesus Christ, Death of
Jesus Christ, Divine Sonship
Jesus Christ, Exemplar
Jesus Christ, Firstborn
Jesus Christ, Foreordained
Jesus Christ, Glory of
Jesus Christ, Good Shepherd
Jesus Christ, Head of the Church
Jesus Christ, Judge
Jesus Christ, King
Jesus Christ, Lamb of God
Jesus Christ, Light of the World
Jesus Christ, Lord
Jesus Christ, Mediator
Jesus Christ, Messenger of the Covenant
Jesus Christ, Messiah
Jesus Christ, Millennial Reign
Jesus Christ, Mission of
Jesus Christ, Only Begotten Son
Jesus Christ, Power of
Jesus Christ, Prophecies about
Jesus Christ, Redeemer
Jesus Christ, Relationships with the Father
Jesus Christ, Resurrection
Jesus Christ, Rock
Jesus Christ, Savior
Jesus Christ, Second Comforter
Jesus Christ, Second Coming
Jesus Christ, Son of Man
Jesus Christ, Spirit of
Jesus Christ, Taking the Name of
Jesus Christ, Teaching Mode of
Jesus Christ, Temptation of
Jesus Christ, Trials of
Jesus Christ, Types of, in Anticipation
Jesus Christ, Types of, in Memory

Brandon Mull

A few years ago, Michelle and I went to a book signing for Shannon Hale and, while waiting to get things signed by her, met Brandon Mull. We chatted for about 45 minutes and it was really fun! Anyway, since then, I've really gotten into Brandon's literature and, last Wednesday, Clark and I were able to go to the Provo Library and listen to Brandon talk about his Beyonders sequel. Here are a couple of pictures from the event:

9 Months Old

Happy nine month birthday, daughter!

You've done so much since your last birthday! You started being able to sit up from completely laying down, which has definitely made changing your diaper a lot harder. :) You also learned how to clap and you almost always do so when you hear the word "yay" or you hear others clapping (especially crowds on TV, lol!). And, biggest of all, you started crawling the day after Valentine's Day. I was so happy for you! You can also pull yourself up on edges of things and walk around and between things like our coffee table and couch. I'm sort of scared to find out how early you'll be walking.

You've also been eating a lot of different things. You've been able to eat bread (and we'll just give you a pizza crust and you suck on it) and cheese (which you think is funny). You've also tried pasta and you love sharing ramen noodles with me.

Your stats from this doctor's appointment:
Height: 28 1/2 inches
Weight: 19 lbs 2.5 oz

Marriage Challenge

I saw this post and decided I needed to try it out because I'm always looking for ways to be better. :) Hopefully it's awesome!

Too independent for her own good

The little stink found one of her almost empty bottles of baby food and tried to feed herself. I got the complete mess on my phone, but before she did that, I was sitting next to my regular camera and got these shots:

A bath and a walk

Today was a little rough because Azucena has a bit of a cold. I gave her bath, hoping the warm water would help her breathe. We tried to stay indoors but when the temperatures got into the mid-60s, we just had to go out. Don't you just love her smile?

Mobile

I have been reprimanded for not mentioning on this blog that Azucena has already started crawling. It first happened the day after Valentine's day, so it's nice and easy to remember. She started to pull herself up a while ago (like, Christmas? I wrote it on her calendar) but she couldn't do much about it until recently. In fact, this weekend she began moving from one anchor to another (e.g. the couch to the coffee table, etc.).

Yeah . . . mobile babies are fun, but stressful.

Not pictured: Azucena eating potatoes right out of the bag. (I didn't take a picture because she did it while I was working on raw meat and my options were to take it away immediately; clean my hands and take it away; or clean my hands, grab my camera for a picture, then take it away. I went with the second option.)

Standing/almost standing pictures:





The crawling pictures:

Kaiah's Birthday!

We're so happy that we got to celebrate Kaiah's birthday! It was such a fun party with good food, cute decorations, and lots of family. Happy birthday, cousin!
Blowing out the candle:




I thought these decorations were so cute!


Here's a family shot with our Mickey Mouse ears: