Blessings...

I was able to attend an endowment session at the Idaho Falls Temple this morning at the crack of dawn. For once I was alert and awake through the entire session, and I gleaned from those two hours so much by way of gratitude. First of all to my Father in Heaven and my Savior, Jesus Christ. My thoughts were drawn to the movie "The Testaments" and the scenes where the savior experiences deep anguish of body and soul in the Garden of Gethsemane, on the Cross, and the torturous abuse in between. He suffered on behalf of millions and offers me a chance to repent and improve my life, using his atonement as an integral part of my life and spiritual progression. I am grateful to Him and to my Heavenly Father for sending His Son.

I am also very thankful for the scriptures, they are a balm to my soul when I most need it. Last week I finished reading the Book of Mormon. I've lost count of how many times I've read it, what precious doctrine and teachings are in every page. In finishing my reading, near the end of the book when the Nephite Nation is just about destroyed, it amazed me at the darkness and hopelessness they were living in, when just a short time prior they were living in the greatest light right after the Savior visited the America's. What a blessing it is to read about these ancient peoples who have gone before.

I also reflected greatly on the blessing of Temple worship and ordinances. It is a privilege to step inside the walls of the temple, to sit quietly in beautiful place where the noises and disruptions of the world are left outside. I tried to imagine for a second of my life without these quiet hours in the Lord's house, and I felt despair in the thought. In addition to the blessings I've already listed, how much more I have been given? A thoughtful husband, two sweet boys, the Gospel, a roof over my head, food to eat, an education, clothes to wear, extended family who love and support, friends who care... and the list could go on and on.

I look forward to this Easter and to General Conference this weekend (and its the weekend of the big move for my mom, into her apartment here in Poky!!). All blessings to be recognized and gratitude to share!

Diapers aren't cheap!

I cringe every time I buy diapers, because they are so expensive! But yesterday I didn't cringe as much because I was able to work out an awesome deal on diapers! Allyou.com has coupons that you can print, and this past Saturday I got an email from them with their current coupon deals, one of which was a $3 dollar off coupon for ANY size of Huggies diapers. I was stoked, that is a rare coupon! So I went hunting for a good bargain on diapers, hoping that they were on sale somewhere. I didn't have to look very far. On www.iheartwags.com, I looked at the future sale ads for Walgreens and found that Huggies diapers were on sale for $8.99 a pack and when you purchase 3 you get $5 in Register Rewards, good for any future purchase in Walgreens. So here is a summary of my diaper purchase last night:

3 Packs Huggies: $8.99 each ($28.59 w/ tax)
3 $3 dollar coupons: less $9
$5 in Register Rewards: less $5
GRAND TOTAL: $14.59 (108 diapers size 3)

I pay $0.16 per diaper when I purchase the Parents Choice brand diapers at Walmart ($15.86 for 96 diapers size 3), but for this deal I paid $0.13 per diaper on a name brand!!! Now that is a deal...

A Birthday for Corey!

My brother Corey is a great guy! Hard-working, honest, a great family man, and I could go on and on. We celebrated his Birthday, his life, and had so much fun doing so! On Friday him and his family surprised us by calling up and asking if they could come down for a visit. So we had 6 guests (Corey and his family and my mom) over on Friday for a great lunch, games, cake, and a cool car show at ISU. Then to top off his pre-birthday celebration, we went to Olive Garden... so yummy! The bummer thing about dinner though was we had a sick little Elena, and Daymi spent half the dinner in the van with her.

Here is Corey with the gooey Chocolate cake I made

His real Birthday was on Saturday, and from what we heard he had an enjoyable day at home with his family. On Sunday they hosted a family dinner at his house, complete with fun games, a great meal, enjoyable company, and perfect homemade birthday pies (compliments of my mom).

Brandon had to give Corey a good birthday
light-sabre battle

My hubby Mike enjoying the afternoon

Mor-mor playing games

Sly Daymi with her cards
(P.S. If you haven't tried the card
game Monopoly Deal, you definitely
should, so FUN!)

Umm, this is quite the picture to try and explain...
Corey's friends from work gave him a gift containing
the weird items that he is sporting... and in order to
eat his pie, he had to put this stuff on!d

Couponing Fun

My sister Melissa turned me on to couponing while I was in Illinois last month. She and Wes are professional couponers and while I am not yet at their expertise, I have started and am improving my skills. Here is how I like to use coupons in my shopping:

On Monday I go to the Newspaper office and pick up 3 Sunday newspapers (soon though I will be getting the regular Mon-Sat subscription and 5 Sunday newspapers delivered to me which will cost me $17). From those newspapers, I take out all of the coupon leaflets, which include Smart Source, Red Plum, and P&G Saver. I also take out one copy of the stores weekly specials, like Walgreens, Albertsons, and Fred Meyer to name a few.

Next I write my menu and grocery list for that week. I then scan the coupon leaflets for coupons that would match what is on my grocery list. This week I had Scotch-brite scrubbing products for my dishwashing needs, and I found matching coupons. I noticed that at Walgreens you could buy toothpaste for 3.99 (I had a 1.00 coupon on top of that) and in return you would get a $4 catalina good for any future purchase. So I took my coupons and used the catalinas from purchasing the toothpaste to fund my scotchbrite purchases. I had to add some fillers, hence in the picture you see bubbles, m&ms and 2 cadbury eggs. So here is my purchase...
What do you think I paid for this? My out of pocket expense was $13.94. How much would all of these products cost me if I had paid full price? $33.67!!!! That is a savings of $19.73, which is great! The cool thing is, I needed them anyways.

Albertsons had a pretty cool deal this week as well. You could take any coupon in that was worth up to a dollar and have it doubled. So I bought three packs of feminine pads, which would have cost me $11.09 but only paid $4.92 after 3 $1.00 coupons that were matched by the store, for a total of $6.00 off!! I am loving this!

Craft Time

Saturday was a fun day, because I was able to spend it with some pretty awesome women. Grandma Moore hosted an Easter Craft Day at her house where we made cute Easter Bunnies. Grandpa Moore picked out the wood, which he wasn't too happy with because the wood was labeled as choice, and he didn't believe it held up to that description. He cut the wood out and sanded it down. Grandma Moore got all the craft supplies gathered and ready for all the fun, which started at 1:00 on Saturday. Who was able to come (at least while I was there)? First there were my grandparents, then my mom Carolyn, my sister in-law Daymi, my cousins Rebekah and Sarah, Jessica (my cousin Jared's fiance), and my uncle Brent and Aunt Debbie (spectators). We had a lot of fun chatting and making a super cute Easter bunny. I can't wait until we get together again!!

My creation

Daymi's creation

The group of Bunnies (there are some missing...)

Debbie REALLY didn't want me to take a picture...

Jessica, Sarah, Rebekah working on their craft while
Brent and Grandpa Moore watch

My mom gluing flowers in her pot

Grecian Chicken Salad

For all those readers of my blog who love food and like to try new recipes, have I got a post for you! This is my favorite meal, hands down! Try it, and I promise you will not be let down!

Grecian Chicken Salad
2 cups chopped cooked chicken
1 cup seeded chopped cucumber
1 cup seeded chopped tomato
1/3 cup sliced green onions
1/4 cup lemon juice from concentrate
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp dried basil leaves
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
2 cups shredded lettuce
4 pita bred rounds, halved

In medium bowl, combine chicken, cucumber, tomato, and onions. In jar or cruet, combine lemon juice, oil, sugar, salt, basil, and garlic; shake well. Pour over chicken mixture. Cover; marinate in refrigerator for 2 hours. Serve in pita bread. It is optional to serve with lettuce. My mom likes to eat the salad over lettuce, not in the pita bread.
NOTE: This is DELICIOUS and healthy, especially with whole wheat pitas.

Mike's new truck

Mike has wanted an Chevy S10 for quite some time now, and I think part of it has to do with the fact that his oldest brother Steve has one. The time finally came, we just couldn't handle the one car situation, with Mike having school and work obligations, and me needing to run my errands and what not... so he went and purchased our second vehicle, a 1993 Chevy S10. It is a good little truck, only 95k on it. The best part, I no longer have to drop him off and pick him up from school, or go without the car for a whole day. How exciting is that!

The lyrics

I was at choir practice this week, looking through the new music that we had been given. I was so thrilled to see that "You Raise Me Up" was in the mix! Michael and I chose this song as "ours" to dance at our wedding to, and has meant so much to us in our marriage. It speaks of what we do for one another and how the love of our spouse raises us up, helps us to be better than we would be otherwise. I love Josh Groban's version of the song and so I thought that this would be very similar to his. I was wrong though, and soon found that the rhythm had been changed in the version that we are singing. The big surprise came when we started practicing the song. We decided to sing it through before doing parts. We sang the first verse, no surprises in the lyrics. Then I realized that there was a repeat sign, and flipped back to sing the second verse . . . I was moved to tears as I sung these words:

There is no life, no life without its hunger.
Each restless heart beats so imperfectly.
But when you come and I am filled with wonder,
sometimes I think I glimpse eternity.

I was going to wait and surprise Mike at the Friends and Family concert that we put on annually, but I just had to share with him these lyrics. Music never ceases to amaze me with its ability to uplift and inspire me. I am glad to have been introduced to this second verse, it provided a quiet moment of remembrance for me, to think about my marriage, about my glimpses into eternity.

Birthday Blues

Kimball Benjamin Matusek

1 Month

1 Year

2 Years

3 Years

I still can't believe I missed his Birthday (I was in Illinois) and I also missed his Birthday Party at Leo's Pizza, (because Mike and I were at Physician's Redicare with Brandon, who had an accident and his bottom teeth went through his lip)! But, we do have some pictures, which eased the sadness for me a little. My little boy is 3! And I am so grateful for him in my life. He is a respectful son, a patient big brother, an exciting friend, and a great student (he loves to learn in "School" with mom and at nursery on Sundays). I saw on my friends blog, Amy and Chad, their post of their 3 year old's Birthday and decided to do the same thing and post a picture for each stage of his life. He had a great birthday party, or at least that is what Mike and I heard through the grapvine. He loved his Transformers Birthday cake (which turned out to be a great recipe!) and enjoyed playing with his friends and cousins who came to the party. We had 21 people at the party, a pretty good turnout!

Well, here is to another great year with my Kimball!

Lets hear it for Illinois!

**Disclaimer: For this post, you will just have to bear with me. I put a lot of pictures in this post!

I flew to Illinois on February 3rd to help my parents with their big move. Big is an understatement, it was a massive job, which is why I was so glad that I went! Mike and I decided to ask my brother Corey and his wife Daymi to take care of Kimball while we were gone, so we could save on his plane ticket. I took Brandon with me and Mike stayed in Pocatello during the week and on weekends made the trip to Rexburg to be with Kimball. The plane ride with Brandon was, well not very fun but we survived. We got to work as soon as we got home with plans for our 3 weeks. When we got to work, we dug in and didn't stop until the job was done. Brandon did well, and made two good friends, specifically Rowdy and Browny, my mom's dogs. Rowdy thought that I was hurting Brandon, every time I would play with him. So he would come and nip at Brandon, trying to make sure he was ok. Brandon didn't like this, and soon found a hiding place, amidst all the boxes...


My brother and his girlfriend Kayla came up from Missouri for a visit, and I just love this picture of my Brandino with his uncle Brandon, so cute! We had a great time with Brandon, even if it was a short visit.

I created a moving blog to start selling larger items on craigslist.com. We kept working and we soon had half of the house packed and we were ready to host a LARGE moving sale. We set up my parent's living room for the moving sale, as well as the kitchen and garage. We sold over $1000, and still had a large pile of items that we donated to St. Vincents Thrift store.
After the sale, we were visited again by family. Melissa, Wes, and their 4 kiddos came up for Presidents Day Weekend. We enjoyed lots of Wackee 6, Dirty Rummy, and Monopoly card game, not to mention ALL the wonderful food we ate that weekend.

Megan LOVES Mor-Mor's Dogs

Weston and Jenna enjoying a flic

Wes watching the gals play games

After our long weekend, I followed the Newcombes back to their house in Aurora, Illinois and spent the night. My sis and wes taught me the ins and outs of couponing... I don't know if I will ever be as good at it as they are though:)

Kyla is so talented, that she needs 2 microphones!

Weston was having a great time eating his gummy worms

Sisters!

Megan, Tiff, Jenna, Weston and Kyla

After my drive home from Aurora, I had a poignant moment as I pulled into my parents cul-de-sac. I stopped the car, turned off the radio, and took this view in...
... and thought of the many wonderful memories I have here, many on the front porch, in the driveway, on the grass, in the garage, and hundreds more inside.

My trip was winding down at this point. We had only 4 days until we were to travel out west. On Thursday the 18th of February Corey Flew in from Idaho to help us. Melissa, my mom, and I went to the Chicago temple before we picked him up. This is my fave picture, it tells a funny story. We got home to Melissa's house after the airport and her keys wouldn't work for the front door. So we knocked, and rang the bell. After a minute or so, one of us said "I wonder if he had to go to the store?" And then someone else "I wonder if there was an emergency?" At this point we weren't panicked, we were all laughing pretty hard, and it just got worse as the scenarios we put out there got more outlandish. "What is he is unconscious?" "Or in a Diabetic coma?" I seriously know that these conditions are not funny, but goodness, we had a serious case of the giggles.

I snapped this pic of us standing waiting for Wes to answer the door.

Turns out he was in the shower:)

We treated ourselves (with the help of a $50 gift card Mel and Wes had) to BD's Mongolian BBQ.

Walking to the car after BD'S, my mom was miserably cold

Melissa's the mastermind of this photo...

And after all was said and done, and the truck was packed, we left...



And had a LONG trip to Idaho (especially through Nebraska) . . .

The end!!