Loosh

Okay, another video of Lucia playing "Kashmir." This one was filmed at the Josh Groban concert in Salt Lake. It must be from an official concert DVD, as it is professionally done. The audio is much better on this one than on the video I posted from the Pittsburgh concert. You can also get a much better idea of what was happening on the stage during the performance.

Embedding was disabled for this video, so the link is: HERE

Disneyland

On January 24th, we went to Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure. My sister, Aimee, and her business partner, Mike, were going to Anaheim for a convention. They both decided to bring their families along to go to Disneyland before the convention started, and they invited us to meet them down there. My cousin, Garrett, who is presently living in Los Angeles, also met us there.

The kids (and adults) all had a great time hanging out at The Happiest Place on Earth.

My favorite moment of the day was when Luke got to meet Pluto. Garrett captured their encounter with his camera:

(Thanks, Garrett, for emailing the pictures to me!)

As far as my favorite ride, I've got three words for you: TOWER OF TERROR. Loved it. I've been on it many times (at Disney's Hollywood Studios and Disney's California Adventure) and it never gets old.

I'll post more pictures from the day as soon as I get them from our camera to the computer.

Costumes

I've been going through the pictures on our computer and I came across several pictures of the kids wearing costumes. Like I've mentioned, I have not been very good at journaling over the last 15 1/2 years, so I am now playing catch up. This blog is most likely also going to end up being a scrapbook of sorts, because (let's be honest here) I am probably never going to scrapbook.

Parker and his best friend, Daniel, were luchadores for Halloween when they were in 6th grade (2007). I stayed up all night sewing Parker's cape and mask. Admittedly, I didn't start sewing his costume until really late on October 30th, and I was freestyling it because I didn't have a pattern, but also, I'm just not a great seamstress. My seam ripper and I got really well-acquainted that night.

Jack was a caveman that year. I sewed his Flintstones get-up out of faux fur from JoAnn's Fabrics. Next, our family consumed an entire bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Tim then cleaned and sterilized the chicken bones, drilled holes through them, and strung them together for a lovely prehistoric-looking necklace. (For the record, I am not a fan of KFC, but we needed the bones, and we needed them fast. Desperate times called for desperate measures.) I think that necklace was Jack's favorite part of the costume. He went to the school and told everybody that it was made out of real bones. When I went up to the school for the costume parade, several teachers and parents came up to me and said, "So, we hear you guys made Jack's necklace out of real bones." Apparently, Jack gave them all an in-depth description of exactly how it was made. He was very proud of his necklace.

After making Parker and Jack's costumes, I was too tired to do much in the way of a costume for Luke. We ended up putting some temporary tattoos on his arms so that he could be a "street tough," although I don't know many street toughs who still use pacifiers. (Well, I guess I don't know many street toughs, period.) I don't know if you can tell, but in that first picture, Luke's got his pacifier in his mouth. It's a dark-colored pacificer, so it blends in with his beard and mustache. Tim was in charge of drawing the face and body hair on Luke and Jack because I was too tired to operate an eyebrow pencil by that time. Maybe Tim was also too tired, because Luke's eyebrows looked a little wonky.

Good times...

Bloghopping

Is that even a word?

You know when you are visiting one friend's blog, and you see a link to one of their friend's blogs, and you click on it, and then you click on another link to another blog, and you go from blog to blog, and pretty soon you are so far away from the first blog you were visiting, and you feel like you've met all these new people along the way (even though they have no idea who you are, and you are pretty much just a blogstalker)?

I love it when that happens.

This blog was pretty fun: http://www.turleybenson.blogspot.com/

I don't know her, but I want to be her friend!

Luke just came in and said, "Mommy, I want to see your blog."

I think that's a sign that I need to get off the internet for now.

PS-I just asked The Google if "bloghopping" is a word. It is. (Well, according to some, it should be two words. Blog hopping.)

Jack

Jack's self portrait that he painted in art class about 2 1/2 years ago. You can tell that they had just had a lesson about Pablo Picasso and were asked to paint a Picasso-esque self portrait.

Nine years ago today, John ("Jack") Thomas Suorsa was born. He wasn't born till 10 days past my due date, so I was very happy when he finally arrived. He has a cool date of birth -- 2/2/2000.

Jack is such a fun kid. One of my friends, Karen, an artist who often volunteers to help teach art at Jack's school, says that Jack is a "free spirit" and joy personified. She said that she loves to watch him when he's drawing -- he gets totally into it.

Jack loves art. He takes after his Grandpa Burdell and a few of his artist uncles. He goes to art class once a week after school with another one of my artist friends, Yovanna. Jack and Yovanna have a wonderful relationship -- he would live at her house if I'd let him! He loves her studio -- he feels so at home there. Yovanna is his second mother.

Jack also loves music. He takes piano lessons and wants to learn percussion next year in school. (Tim and I want him to learn the trumpet. We'll see...) He'll probably be in a rock band someday because he is already a rock star.

Jack also loves playing with his friends. He is definitely a social creature.

Jack, thanks for being part of our family. You are a good son. We love you. Happy 9th Birthday!

Dirty

Here are some pictures that Tim took of Parker and Jack a few years ago when we lived at our old house. I had forgotten all about them until yesterday, when I came across them on our computer. I remember when these pictures were taken -- I was inside cleaning the house and Tim came in and said, "Luisa, you have to come outside and look at your boys." I knew when I heard those words that I was going to find a huge mess of some kind. This is what I found:

Maybe they were having some kind of spa treatment. Whatever they were doing, the boys took those shorts all the way to Tide Country.

Joy

There are lots of days when my kids drive me crazy. This was not one of those days. Today, I was very proud to be the mother of Parker, Jack, and Luke.

Parker stood up during sacrament meeting (the family worship service at the church we attend) and I thought he was going to leave the chapel to get a drink of water or something. Instead, he went up to the pulpit and shared his testimony of the gospel of Jesus Christ. (For those who aren't familiar with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we have a fast and testimony meeting once a month, usually the first Sunday of the month. Those who are able to fast come to the meeting fasting, and any who feel inspired to do so may share their testimonies.) Parker talked about some chapters in Helaman (in The Book of Mormon) that he read yesterday which pertained to missionary work, and he talked about how he is preparing to someday serve a mission and share the gospel of Jesus Christ. I didn't know he was going to share his testimony -- I don't think he even knew he was going to until he did it -- and I was very proud of him. He is such a good boy and he has such a strong desire to do what is right. He is a very good example to his younger brothers.

Then, in Primary (the children's worship service), Jack gave a talk on the importance of families and how families are ordained of God. He wrote the talk out in his own handwriting (he has excellent penmanship -- Tim says Jack's is neater than his) and he did such a nice job. Sometimes Jack can be a little silly, but he was very serious when giving his talk today. I was very proud of him.

And then there's Luke. He is 3 1/2, so obviously there are days when I don't know what to do with him. But today, he tried very hard to sit in Primary and be a good boy. It's hard for the little Sunbeams (the name of the class for the 3-year-olds) to sit still for that last hour of church, but Luke is getting better and better at it every week.

The feelings I had today about my boys reminded me of a scripture from the Third Epistle of John 1:4, which says, "I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth."

I recognize that Tim and I have a huge responsibility to teach our children the gospel in our home and teach them right from wrong. I pray that they will continue to choose the right long after they leave our home and go out on their own to forge their way in the world. I pray that they will continue to walk in truth.