On Sunday we were given a gift. A very dear, sweet sister in our ward remembered about Mason's birthday. She asked us months ago!
She gave him a £2 coin, a chocolate bar for all of us to share and included a sweet card. What an amazing woman! Thank you very much, Sister Mary!!
Mason is a year old today! I feel so very blessed to have him. He has been our little miracle baby. For those of you who don't know about the things we've had to go through with him, here's a list:
Here are some newborn pictures of Mason. I love his hair!!
Here are some pictures of Mason's first haircut. He was 2 1/2 months old.
He really is a miracle and we love him so much. He is such a happy boy and is constantly smiling. He loves to give kisses and has recently started hitting his head to his Mom's head to show affection. He also loves to grab noses! He still will only say forms of Dada, Dad, or Daddy even though I'm persistent about trying to get him to say Mama!
The downside we face now is carrying this 30+ pound boy around. We take the stroller EVERYWHERE! He climbs and crawls everywhere and is constantly on the go and putting EVERYTHING in his mouth. I love that he's exploring and learning, but why can't he just sit still sometimes? He wears me out!
Here's a picture of Mason from a couple weeks ago. He sits as tall as his car seat.
I didn't have any early pictures of Mason because the laptop we brought with us died and we haven't had a chance to fix it. Thanks to Shaila for providing me with the newborn pictures and thanks to Melanie for the pictures from Mason's first haircut!! I appreciate you both for sending me some pictures so quickly.
Jayni LOVES to take pictures. I let her carry the camera around for a bit when we visited the Gadfield Elm Chapel. I love to see the pictures she takes because it lets me see things in her eyes. She's quite the little photographer.
I love that you can see her feet!
This is Brother & Sister Head. They are in our ward and serve as the missionaries at the chapel.
She didn't get Tom & Mason's heads in the shot, but can you blame her? Tom's REALLY tall! Is it just me or do you think Mason looks enormous too? He is quite the big boy!!
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this picture. I love seeing her little shadow.
After church on Sunday, we came home and had a quick bite to eat and then headed to a quaint little chapel. This chapel is the OLDEST LDS CHAPEL IN THE WORLD. England is rich in church history and we're very lucky to live so close to a lot of the places.
The church was sold when the Saints were asked to move to America so that the poorer Saints had an opportunity to go. It then became a ruin and local members of the church were able to purchase the property in 1994. They had to build it back up and in 2004 they donated it to the church.
I would give you all the history of the chapel but I think it would be more beneficial for you to read about it yourself and urge you to do so. It's a great story. Gadfield Elm Chapel Information
Here is a plaque that gives a brief description about the chapel. Sorry if it's hard to read.
When we were there, the missionaries gave Jayni a rock to color on.
They let the kids color on them and then they have the choice to keep them or leave them behind at the chapel. They do this because the pioneers would write messages on rocks and drop them along the trail to inform the next group of travelers about things. Jayni's rock is the second down on the right. She ended up taking her's at the last minute though.
Jayni enjoyed playing Hide and Seek...
...while Mason enjoyed crawling all over and eating the grass.
We had a great time being able to do this as a family. What a great opportunity it has been to live here. My testimony has grown so much and I have such an appreciation for the Saints here in England. They are wonderful people and I have learned so much from them.
Friday evening we had some dinner and then went to a trail that Tom wanted to check out that he passes on his way to and from work. It's located in a little village called Ombersley and the trail runs right along the River Teme.
It was so beautiful to see all the wildflowers along the path and hear the chirping of the birds. We got there around 6:30pm and it was still really warm out.
I kept stopping and taking pictures of the scenery. I'm sure I was driving Tom crazy, but I wanted to capture as much as I could knowing we won't be living here much longer and not knowing when we'll be able to return.
The countryside of England is so beautiful! We tend to avoid the motorways and drive through the countryside instead. It's been nice being here long enough to see all the seasons. Although fall is my favorite season, spring has been so beautiful here.
A little ways down the path we came across some sheep. Even though it was across the river, we could hear the baaing. Jayni loved it!
Can I say Tom really needs a new pair of glasses? He's had this pair just a couple months shy of 3 years. I swear he has to tighten them every few hours so they don't fall off his face. They sit crooked and in my opinion are looking a little outdated too. I love this picture though! The kids seem so happy and I know they love their Daddy so much! I'm pretty sure they know how much they're loved too!!!
I've been wanting to share with everyone this amazing cathedral that we love to visit right here in Worcester. I think one of the reasons we like it is because it's free to visit!
Worcester Cathedral has been a place of prayer and worship since 680 AD. The present building was started in 1084. We've been told by a member here that the Worcester Cathedral inspired Brigham Young and that's how parts of the design of the Salt Lake Temple came about.
The stain glass windows are beautiful. Unfortunately the pictures don't capture what you see in person.
You can see a little more detail on this one.
This is a picture of a portion of the ceiling inside the cathedral.
We have been so fortunate to be able to see things like this here in England. The buildings here are so much older than the United States. That's so crazy to think!!
Brace yourself...this is a long one!
I may have posted our Home Sweet Home post too soon. We had decided on Tuesday to come home because after Tom finishes school the end of May, we will no longer be provided with a car and we need to move out of the house we rent through the basketball team by August. So after finding all this out we assumed the best option for us would be to come home since we didn't think we'd be able to rent a house or get a car because we don't have credit established here in England (we tried to rent another place after a couple months of being here, but were unsuccessful because they wanted us to pay 6 months rent up front and we didn't want to do that in case we needed that money to fall back on).
So, Tom went into work on Wednesday to let them know that we were planning on heading back to the States. He was planning on quitting that day so that he can focus this next month on his studies so that he can make sure to pass his classes since he won't be able to retake any of the classes next year since he won't be playing basketball.
He ended up taking on a full schedule of classes, even though he didn't have to because he'd be able to take classes next year, and also because the plan was for him to continue playing basketball next year. He's glad he did that because he'll be able to get his Master's Degree this year, as long as he passes all his classes.
Anyway, after he told the company he works for about our plan to head home next month, they asked him what they could do for him so that we would be able to stay. We didn't anticipate this since he just started working there the first week in April. So, he was told to go home and talk to me and come back Friday and let them know what it would take.
So we talked and thought we'd like to see what they could do for us because we've enjoyed living here for the most part (basketball season was long and stressful!). We also haven't felt we've been able to enjoy seeing different parts of England or neighboring countries because of basketball, school, work, etc. But is this enough to stay? We are so far away from our family!
Tom went in and let them know that we won't be able to get a house or vehicle on our own and that we don't have any furniture and that they'd need to up his salary a little so that we can afford a better place to live and a car to get us around. They felt like that would be easy enough to fix, and they'd be willing to figure something out because they see Tom being able to bring in a lot of money for the company to make it worth it. The owners of the company are going to come up with a plan and get back to Tom early next week.
So, now it's a waiting game and a lot of praying! We have that to consider and yesterday Tom was told he could return to his old job back in Boise, which he loved. We both really feel deep down that we'll return to Boise. We really love it there and we have great friends in the area and our families aren't too far away either. Too bad we sold our house!! Oh well, we needed that money to be able to get through these last 8 months. Thank goodness we stored our BIG American refrigerator though. (Note to self: post pictures of the appliances we use here in England.)
Sorry that this post is so lengthy. I get wordy in the wee hours of the morning and a little off track too. Probably because my thinker is so exhausted!
Here's a video of Jayni surfing or doing the hula, I'm really not sure which. You might want to turn the volume down on this one. Some teenagers started running around and the girls are shrieking annoyingly.
Jayni is just running around having a good time.
Now she gets completely soaked. You can hear Mason talking through parts of the video too. He has yet to say a real word though.
I love walking to the city center of Worcester, the town we live in. We go down there to walk along the river and feed the ducks, swans, and pigeons. Jayni and I love it and Mason is just there for the ride, doesn't seem to care either way.
Tom was able to join us on our walk yesterday. We had such a good time! It was the first day they had the fountains on and Jayni immediately wanted to get wet. I warned her that if she did that she would be cold and I didn't have anything to keep her warm when we walked home. She loves the water so much and Tom and I knew we'd end up with a wet child.
I thought this was a funny shot. I've learned when taking pictures with the kids to use the continuous shot feature on my camera. It captures things so much better. I just have to delete a bunch of pictures but it is so worth it. This was when she was just splashing in the water, but that didn't last long.
Jayni was putting her head in the fountains and came back saying her eyes were hurting. I think the chlorine was bothering her. The smell of it was pretty strong.
Here she is soaking wet! She had so much fun and it was so fun to watch her.
This was Mason as he enjoyed watching his sister get all wet. I wanted to get him out and put his feet in the water, but by the time I thought of it, we started feeding the birds and then carried on with our walk.
We walked along the river and then ended up at the canal. Here's a shot of the canal with some canal boats. Jayni loves this area and watching the boats go through the locks to get from the river to the canal or vice versa.
This walk from our house and back is about 4 miles. I love it when I get out and do it but I tend to not be able to motivate myself sometimes. I've done it a little more lately since the weather is getting better and I love seeing my winter flab shed away. A little slower than I'd like but at least I can see the results!!
