General Conference Favorites!

What an amazing couple of days! So many messages were so incredibly powerful and insightful and hopeful and encouraging and amazing and...... you get the idea!

So here are some of my top picks:

There really is a prophet on the earth! And after his talk today, we'll be asking a new question around the dinner table! "How have you served today?"


I always love Elder Bednar's addresses. Another great one...Expressing love in the family, testifying to those we love most, and constancy in living the gospel in our own homes!

Just LOVED Elder Burton's talk on the "ity" virtues.... can't wait to re-read that one!

I was stunned by the beauty of the choir's rendering of President Monson's favorite Song "O Divine Redeemer"....just so lovely....here is a link to see an earlier performance of the piece..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuBx94tpoN4

I had tingles down to my toes as Elder Holland shared his testimony of the Book of Mormon and proclaimed its truthfulness to the whole world. I can't wait to put a link in to that talk...it will be one for the ages! What an amazing teacher!

And I don't have a picture for my last favorite, but wasn't it great to stand together as one of the Saints and sing "How Firm A Foundation"? Brian and I stood next to each other holding hands and rejoicing as our children sang in harmony around us. It was a beautiful moment!

Ok, friends...so what were some of your favorites!?!?!?

Proven fact....

More evidence that chocolate does indeed bring happiness!

Welcome to fall!

First day of fall celebration!

Potato Corn Chowder
garnished with bacon and cheese
served in a warm home made bread bowl!

Now that's what I'm talking about!

Happy Autumn, everyone!

We're back in the swing of things...finally!

So weeks after everyone else's "back to school" posts, we have finally smoothed out all the bumps, finagled the schedule with a toddler around, and are ready to rejoice in a new year of learning together! Forgive me if I get a little too preachy about how much we love Home-School, and how wonderful it is (even after a crazy day) to have all my little lambies here at home, and how good the Lord is to make it all work, and how grateful I am the spirit is the real teacher, and how every day I realize that truly "all things testify of Christ".....oops, there I went! But really, it is amazing and I am one Blessed Momma to have this be the Lord's plan for our family!


So we always start back a little at a time. Four weeks ago when everyone else went back to school, we started with just Devotional, Spanish and Math. Then the next week we gave everyone their beginning of the school year blessings, (sidenote- I always type these up and staple them to the inside of their notebooks and reference them often!) and we added in Typing and History. And then came the ummm.....really challenging week...adding in English and Science and going full time....with Briella. AAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!! The schedule was have all your morning routine and math done by 9:30 ready for Devotional and the rest of school. It went pretty well ...till 9:30. After that, we were lucky to get 15 minutes without Briella destroying something and a major interruption to school to clean it up and redirect her...over and over and over again. Lotion everywhere, mom's make-up all over, dish detergent all over, kittly litter all over, entire shelves knocked over...after two days of that, all of us were exhausted. So we revamped and had everyone scheduled on Briella rotations, and though there were less messes, that wasn't all that effective for learning, either. I don't know how we made it through the week. I was praying "mightily", let me tell you, and knew the Lord would make it work, but I had no idea how. No idea. None. Whatsoever.


So I went back to the Lord and asked Brian for a priesthood blessing by the laying on of hands. I not only got immediate strength, but was promised direction and instruction on modifying the schedule. I went to bed peaceful. And woke up an hour early the next morning. As clear as can be the Lord said in my mind "start school right away". It wasn't even 7:30. We started school right away. We had a good hour and a half before Briella even woke up and were able to finish Devotional, History, and English!. We got done in an hour and a half what had been taking over three hours! It was a wonderful! We fine tuned the rest of the schedule throughout the week, and we are now back in full gear and HAPPY starting school right away !!!! Briella is much happier, too! Now once I get her up, I only need to rotate through the kids independant work, and she gets paint time, playdough time, puzzle time, momma time! The Lord worked it out for us! He is so good!


So here's to another year of learning and growing and laughing and being together in our "heavenly home"-school! And another testimony to me that the Lord knows us, knows our needs, and is ready to work in our lives as we turn to Him!

Isn't life great?

Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do....

It was time. Even this momma could see that.

But Ellie wasn't so sure.

Before....

During...

Still not so sure.

After....
Now let's see what you think, Briella. Off to the mirror we go.

Hey, mom, it's not so bad! Actually, I kind of like it!

Dont' I look cute!?!

Happy Happy Birthday Brian, Dear!

Dads are sometimes hard for birthdays, aren't they? I try and come up with something different most years, which is really tough when I am suffering from pregnancy brain! We took a trip over the weekend to great grandma's house and the beach (post soon) and called it his "birthday outing", but the real day still needs some fanfare! Here's what we came up with:

Service Presents: The kids all did a "Dad Chore" for him as a surprise!

Christian mowed the lawn while the other kids raked up and bagged the grass.

Jonah and Indy swept out his shop.

Bekah and Briella picked tomatoes from the garden.

Kamberlynne made the cake part of the traditional "pineapple upside down cake".

Then we printed out all the pictures, taped them into homemade cards, and met dad for lunch!
He was really surprised and happy about his service presents!

The fun continued later that night...dad's favorite dinner...hotdogs on the grill and fritos! YUM!
Then candles, cake and ice cream!
We sure love you, Dad! We hope you had a great day, and all your wishes come true!

Watch out, Broadway...here come the Washburn Kids!

After our three week musical theatre camp in July, I thought we were pretty much done, but I got a call for another 2 week camp who needed a costume mistress and thought it would be a great idea to trade out for all 5 of my kids to attend! OK, sounds good! It gets even better! For their production of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast", they cast Kamberlynne as "Belle", Christian as "Gaston", and Jonah as "Lumiere"! Indy covered the ensemble beautifully with many of his own solos and lines! Even Rebekah got to star in a little kid show (I'll post that next!) The show turned out marvelously, the kids did great, and Catherine lived through the costuming (not my favorite job) and packing all the lunches (another good reason to homeschool....I REALLY don't like packing lunches)! But the big hero is Briella, who came along day in and day out, and learned just about all the songs and lines (in Briella talk!), and was the show mascot!

Here are a few videos of the musical numbers from a dress rehearsal! Enjoy! (For those of you wanting a quick peak at all the kids, check out the "Belle" and "Be Our Guest" numbers...For you die hard fans....you'll love them all!)




Here is the opener "Belle". Kamberlynne is easy to spot, look to her right and there is Indy singing his heart out. At about 3 minutes or so in, Christian...I mean "Gaston" makes his entrance! One of my favorite parts of the show!



Next is "Home", one of Kamberlynne's best vocals. She has taken her father's place as the Beast's prisoner, and is wondering if she'll ever find "home" again.



"Gaston" has alot of Christian, and he's pretty cute! Watch for Indy, too!



"Be our Guest" showcases Jonah, and he really loved his character...you can tell he had a great time! And Indy has transformed into a spoon, I think....




"Human Again" wasn't in the original Disney release, but added in the later release after it did well on Broadway. It is a cute number with all the enchanted characters, and Jonah starts it off!



I thought I had the finale...sorry! But what do you think....??? The cast was one of the youngest I've worked with, and putting together a show in 2 weeks is crazy, but we all enjoyed it! Thanks to Grandma, Pop, Aunt Amber, Connor, and our Homeschool Friends the Klopcic Family for coming to see our performance! One good thing about camp being over....NO MORE PACKING THOSE DARN LUNCHES!!!!!

14 years down....Time and All Eternity to go!!

August 11th, 1995, 14 years ago

August 11th, 2009


We celebrated our 14th anniversary at the place our marriage began, doing sealings in the DC Temple. Nothing compares to the promise of Time and all Eternity. I remember thinking on our wedding day that I couldn't possibly be more in love or happier. I was so wrong. Life has gotten even sweeter, our home has grown in even more love, and every blessing I count dear can be traced directly back to that day 14 years ago. I can only imagine the joy another few years will bring!!!

Way to go, Dad!!!!

Brian really looks forward to any chance to play sports....which come few and far between for him, poor guy! But when he gets the chance, he always pulls out his top game, and we as his loyal fans are there to cheer him on!!!! Yesterday was the Stake Church Softball Tournament for the men, and our team came home the champions!

That's what a home run looks like as it comes off the bat!!!

And as it keeps going and going and going....

And the traditional home run smooch! (FYI....this wasn't the only one!!!)

And of course Brian is a fabulous defensive player, too!
Ready positon....

Making a play on the ball...

Dad's adoring fans....


The Championship Team! As our Bishop said, "We put the "WIN" in WINTERS RUN"! Way to go, team!


Congratulations, guys! Any guesses who our MVP is??? (Hint...he's the really cute one on the far right in the front!!!!)

Hey look, they fit!

Gosh, mom! Thanks for letting me borrow your shoes! Don't they look great with this outfit!?!?

Being a girl is so much fun!