{so blessed..}

Are you ever burdened with a load of care?

Does the cross seem heavy you are called to bear?

Count your many blessings, every doubt will fly,

And you will keep singing as the days go by.

At times I get so caught up in my troubles. I carry the bricks of negativity upon my back.

That's why I'm so grateful for this holiday, not only Thanksgiving, but the entire season that follows. It snaps us out of that mode we all seem to slowly drift into. Our hearts turn towards charity and we begin to see how many others there are that have nothing, and how so very blessed we really are.

I am so blessed.

Not only with the shirt on my back and the roof over my head, but blessed with intangible evidence that I have a purpose, and I don't have to serve it alone.

I am blessed with forgiveness and the Love of Christ.

I am blessed with two little angels who sprinkle my life with love, purity and laughter. dirty faces.

An honorable man by my side, showing me more love than I could ever possibly be worthy of.

freedom.beauty.progression

family. friends. strangers

health. passion. belief

LIFE.

{go, dog, go}

"Grandpas are just antique little boys" ~author unknown

I walked in on this the other day. My heart just about melted.

Words can't even describe how much it means to me that my children get to spend so much one on one time with my Dad.

Leaving behind his legacy. My house is full of empty bullet shells and old metal toolboxes. They tell a story of two boys and their grandpa. It doesn't bother me because I know the stories behind the rusty metal. The tractor rides and the canyon adventures..burning weeds in the backyard and finding treasures in the garage. These are the moments. This is what my boys will remember about their Grandpa. I wouldn't change a thing.

Nope. I wouldn't change a thing.

{3 years ago..something amazing happened}

3 years ago..on November 7th 2006.. Ashton David Hawkes blessed our lives.

7 weeks early, Ashton couldn't wait to grace us with his little presence..and now we can't imagine a day without his spunk and personality sprinkled throughout it. If you don't know Ashton, you are missing out. This kid is insane. He has an imaginary monkey (or is it? some days I wonder) that gets him through every difficult situation, takes the blame, and often causes chaos of mass proportions in our home. What would we do without "Baby Monkey"?

I took Ashton to the doctor for a check up and catch-up on his inoculations last week. WOW. His answer to every question he was asked was either "red" or "blue". "Ashton, how old are you?" "UMM..blue!" "Ashton, what shape is this?" "UMM..RED!" Then when it came time for shots, and the candy that distracts from the shots, he requested a sucker for Baby Monkey. Explain THAT to a nurse.

We love Ashton so much. He keeps us laughing during rougher times, and always has something profound to say. He's smart, he's a genius, he takes EVERYTHING apart and puts it back together again. He WILL NOT be ignored. You ignore him and he will make you regret it with a very loud broken record.

His Birthday party was a lot of fun. He sat in the corner with my Dad (who smuggled in a Mountain Dew specially for Ashton) and ate candy and drank much caffeine. We had a great turnout and he got way too many presents! How did everybody know that he loves monster trucks?

{Halloween}

Halloween weekend was awesome. Friday night we took the boys to a HAUNTED corn maze. Before we went in I explained to Jared that there would be people in there trying to scare him with fake blood and masks and chainsaws but that it is all fake and they can't scare us if we don't let them. It was SO fun! Jared only screamed a few times but once we finally made it out (17 acres!!) he was so proud of himself and let out a big "WOOHOO!!" We're not really sure if Ashton was scared, he had a sucker in his mouth the entire time. After the maze we got brownies and chocolate milk and went home and watched Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed on our 100 inch projector screen. (dave. ya gotta love him)

On Halloween day we went to the mall and trick or treat-ed. Lame. We felt like we were in a herd of cattle and all we got out of it was a handful of tootsie rolls. Seriously. But I think the boys enjoyed seeing all the other kids costumes.

Then we went to my parents house in Portage and the boys played. I cooked hot dogs over a fire for dinner (the kind with cheese in them YUM) and Dave once again worked on his four wheeler.

I took these pictures before we headed out at dusk.

The boys absolutely refused to wear their masks which I was more than ok with. I painted their faces instead, although I'm no Rick Baker!

So my Dad offered to let us take his heated Yamaha Rhino (like a golf cart with 4 wheel drive) out for trick or treating in the sparsely populated town, but I thought we were too tough for that so we put the kids in the stroller instead. We got to the corner and we were already so flippin cold! Needless to say we went back and took my Dad up on his offer! We spent about 2 hours going door to door and got a TON of candy!! Most everybody knows us, since that's the town David grew up in and it's also where we met and lived for a while. Everybody was just dumping candy into the boys bags, inviting us in, we got homemade rootbeer and full sized candy bars. Jared was begging to go home but Ashton couldn't get enough. If sugar's involved, he's all over it. Anyways, it was a blast!

{punkins}

EUW BRAINS!!

{mummies}

Dave had a really bad cold the other day and we needed to give him time to rest and in order to keep the boys quiet I got them into a craft. We cut out little cardboard people and ripped up an old pillow case and made mummies.

{creepy crawly}

Took this picture out at my Dad's house..very halloween appropriate:)

{good times}

Here's a little recap of what we've been up to the last week or so..

The boys and I made cookies together. Let me correct that. The boys made a mess while I made cookies. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Dave and I headed out to Salt Lake for a photoshoot last weekend and alas, the client never showed up. So we had our own little practice session, played around with light..and Dave got sneaky with the camera while I was "reflecting". I look really ticked but I promise I was just contemplative at that moment:)

After that we stopped at my sister Becky's house to say hi and then off to the movies we went. We went to "Paranormal Activity". Dave has been sleeping with the tv on ever since. Wuss.

~

We spent the day out at my parents house in Portage last week. The boys are in heaven at "grandpa with the hummer"s house. We raked funky yellow and green leaves and jumped in them, David worked on his new blue four wheeler and grandma gave wheelbarrow rides. She wouldn't give me one:(

All that beastly hair you see on him is now gone. The man has since shaved his head. It's a little early for midlife crisis if you ask me;)

~

The best thing of all was that Grandpa let Jared drive his tractor and they hauled dirt..just to haul dirt.

~

This is my Dad's precious. He named him/her (I haven't checked) "Meowy". I thought my Dad hated cats until this cutie wandered into his life. Sweetest cat I've ever met.

what are you going as for halloween?

While on a search for an original halloween costume idea, I ran across some pretty funny stuff..

I've seen adult Napoleon and Pedro's but this just brings it to a new level of funny-ness..

And I don't even know what to say about this one..it's almost creepy. My first thought was "wow that's a lot of paint!"

taking a craft break.

It's been a long time since I did a craft so I bought this paper mache pumpkin at Michaels for like $2 and painted it to look vintage. Then I rubbed a light stain over it to give it that old distressed appeal. Isn't it kinda creepy?

boys.will.be.boys.

Of all the animals, the boy is the most unmanageable.
~Plato

Here is a rare fight where Jared wins. Ashton weighs a little bit more than Jared does, so he usually works it to his advantage. I love this series of photos mainly because you can see Jared revelling in his victory, savoring every last moment that he has his brother pinned. And you can also see how hard Ashton is squirming to break free. I love it. Sometimes.

The boys love our backyard. It is completely fenced in which I love. But what I don't get is that although we have a pretty big sandbox, they still insist on playing in the DIRT. Go figure.

I {heart} halloween.

So we moved into a house in North Logan a few weeks ago and we absolutely LOVE it! Honestly, it's like it was remodeled just for us, the paint colors are exactly what I would have chosen, the carpet, the kitchen! I am in heaven..so of course I couldn't WAIT to decorate for Halloween seeing that it's my favorite holiday EVER! I usually start on Setember 1st, but we didn't even get our stuff out of storage until late this week, so the first thing I did was pull out the Halloween bins and get to work! (yeah, even before kitchen stuff!) Then I found this AWESOME little guy at Ross for $7..I couldn't pass him up. I absolutely love vintage halloween decor. Yeah I'm turning into freaking Martha Stewart over here, and I DONT EVEN CARE!

This mummy dude I got at Ross for $4! SCORE!

Oh and we found this human scull buried in the backyard so I am keeping it for decor. I will call CSI after halloween is over.. he he

Anyways, I promised myself one post a week and Sunday is usually when I work on my family blog..I will post more pictures of the house and the Hawkes neanderthals (meaning my husband and children) later:)

{gRanDpA's gArdEn}

My father in law has an amazing vegetable garden..I spent an afternoon photographing it..it's so peaceful in the garden..

longest.post.ever.

Holy WOW. My poor blog you've been neglected. So many things have happened since I posted last. I feel as though I was caught up in a horrible twister of emotion and struggle. Trying to run a business and a home and care for my boys was enough to make me go nutty. Yeah I went a little nutty at times. The good news is, I'm back.. And I'm ready to blog..