This week...

Well here is the latest with the Roses down here in sunny Florida....

• Today Matt and I had to speak. Since it is the 165th Birthday of the Relief Society, we had to speak on Women. My topic was Women's Role in the Plan of Salvation. Matt's was Honoring women of Faith. He did such a great job. I am just glad to have it over with. I was a little worried that Gavin would scream his head off the whole time. I think he did just 1/4 of the time. Finally he gave up and fell asleep in Matt's arms. I was very proud of Matt.

• Gavin, Gavin, Gavin. He has turned into quite the mommy's boy! I can't set him down for 2 seconds. He falls asleep in my arms and I think I can set him down and about 2 minutes later he is screaming at me, which if he could talk I know he would be bawling me out in not so nice terms! Luckily he is so fun to hold, and I am just grateful he is good for me and not screaming all day long like one of my other children when he was a baby. (We won't mention any names:) But Gavin is so smiley now and it makes it so fun and worth every minute. He is growing like crazy and is already into his 3-6 month clothes. Oh yesterday was so tender....we had our Stake Relief Society Birthday Brunch. I took Gavin and Matt took Luke and Emma to his football game. So I walk into the brunch and our Stake President, President Pratt, who is also an OBGyn was there. As the brunch started he immediately came over and snatched Gavin out of my arms. I thought Gavin would turn on the tears and that I would have him back in my arms after about 5 minutes. But it turned out that he had him through the whole brunch, even through the speaker!!!!! It was so sweet of him!!!!! I told President Pratt that I didn't think my insurance would cover his services! :)

• Last Sunday Emma was the spotlight child at Primary. She was soooooooooo excited! They have you take home a little paper bag and you have to fill it with 3 things that tell about the child. She put in one of her dance shoes, a puzzle piece (she is the puzzle queen and loves to work on them), and her favorite dolls shoe. She had to carry the bag all through sacrament and wouldn't let me even touch the bag. Then she just sat up there grinning from ear to ear when they spotlighted her! I can't believe how big she is now and that she is a Sunbeam! My little girl is growing up! Her Sunbeam class is full of wild little boys and then there is sweet little Emma (she is actually very sweet and calm at church), and another little girl. So they are the favorites. In fact the first couple of weeks the teacher wanted her to sit on her lap and so now every week she goes and automatically gets on the teachers lap. Today there was a substitute, Emma didn't care, she just went and hopped onto the substitutes lap! :)

• Emma and I had the greatest day together the other day. We had to get the cars oil changed and tires rotated. That doesn't sound like the funnest day, but it turned into a fun one! We knew the car would take about an hour or hour and a half and so I brought the stroller for Gavin, and then Emma has a matching stroller and car seat for her baby that Greg and Wendy gave her. So we dropped off the car and Emma and I went for a long walk.....both with babies in their car seats in their strollers, and we both had our sunglasses on. I have to admit that it was the cutest thing to have her by my side. We walked down a couple of blocks to a nearby store, walked around the store. Stopped for lunch there, then we walked to Lowe's and walked around the garden department. We stopped and sat on every outdoor swing they had on display. Then we walked back 2 hours later and the car was ready! It was nice not to have to be doing something or hurrying somewhere...we just walked. Because there was no hurry to be anywhere I didn't even care when Emma would stop every 5-7 steps to pick the "flowers" (they were actually weeds). What a fun day!

• We are trying to hire a new pest control company and so last week I had about 3 different pest control companies come out and give me quotes. I don't think they have the company Truly Nolen out west....anyway they are this pest control company that has these crazy looking cars that look like mice! They are a yellow Volkswagen bug with giant ears and a huge tail on the bumper. Kind of cheesy, but Luke and Emma thought it was the coolest thing ever! In fact they think we should definitely hire that company. Anyway now Luke is really into bugs. He heard me talking to the guy and telling him that I have spotted 2 silver fish bugs in the house. The guy even had a picture of a silver fish and so Luke got to see what I was talking about. Well after thinking about this silver fish for the last week Luke's wheels were turning and yesterday in the car he asked "Mom, are there gold bugs?" I didn't know what he was talking about and so he said "Well there are silver fish, so are there gold ones too?" I thought it was so cute. All I could come up with was that there were goldfish that are truly fish! :)

• We also had an electrician come out to look around and see why we are always having breakers blow and light bulbs go out...so this one company said it would be $69 to have them come out and then we could pay by the job for whatever was wrong,. I forgot the guy was coming and I had just returned from grocery shopping. It was a crazy moment...Gavin was screaming and wanting to be fed, I was trying to unload groceries, and then just as the guy comes to the door Emma, who was helping me unload groceries, drops a glass bottle of spaghetti sauce and it shatters all over the center of the kitchen floor!!!!! So he comes in and can see things are crazy. So he goes and looks around the house for about 15 minutes and then comes back to me and says "Ok it will be $69 for this visit and then to test everything and see where the problem is it will be $197 and then we will give you a different quote to fix whatever is wrong" I about had a heart attack...I was thinking did I miss something? Why pay $69???? I thought that was to see what was wrong and then I would PAY to FIX things. I called Matt kind of frantic. Matt said that was a bunch of bull and don't pay anything! But it was $69 to have him come out, which made me sick! Matt said he would talk to him, but I knew I could handle it (although it is very uncomfortable to tell someone face to face that they are ridiculous! In my head I am thinking be a real woman and stand up to him!) So I tell him, "sir I think there was a very big miscommunication....I thought the $69 would be for you to look around at the things you would be fixing and not just to have you come and say hi." I told him I didn't feel comfortable hiring them because I could see I would be getting all kinds of quotes that would start adding up....then I told him I didn't even want to pay him the $69. He said "OK we can do 1 of 2 things...I can either leave right now and you don't need to pay me, or.." I stopped him right there and said "Yes please leave". So he starts to leave and Luke is not helping the tension in the air as he is saying, in front of the guy, "Mom don't make him leave, mom that is so mean!" For some reason Luke always gets a little attached to all the service people we have come out to the house, the lawn guy, the bug guy, now the electrician guy! :) Anyway that was a long story but a very proud moment for myself to stand up and save money! :)

Well it is getting late and I am exhausted...we have been trying to do yard work and get the house in shape for all of our guests this week!!!!!! My mom and dad come in on Wednesday, Tyler and Anna and family come in Friday morning early, and then Kim and her 2 girls come in on Friday night! We are going to bless Gavin on Sunday. We thought it would be a cool missionary opportunity to have friends come and so we invited 6 of our neighbors to come to the blessing and Matt invited about 10 work people. Then we are going to have a lunch afterward and the missionaries will be there too! So far I know of 2 neighbor families that will be at church and 2 of Matt's friends from work will be there. It will be fun!