Starnespalooza 2011

You know you've been having a ROCKIN' time when you accumulate ALL of these passes/papers on your dashboard over the course of just a few days!

Last year Nate's family came up to visit us and we made some pretty awesome memories together. We decided that we needed to make that happen again this summer so "Starnespalooza" the 2nd was created!
I'll let all of our pictures tell the story of  an extremely BUSY yet WONDERFUL 5 days!

Evening of Day 1 and Day 2: Camping and Playing at LAVA HOT SPRINGS!

Day 3 was spent enjoying the sun and fun up at the lake!

Day 4: We stopped in the middle of NOWHERE at the world's first nuclear power plant on our way to Crater's of the Moon! Why did we stop there??.....well, some of us are still asking ourselves that question! Nate (on the other hand) loved it so much he wants to go back to learn more. I felt like each second I was in that place I was just getting dumber and dumber. ☺

 Crater's was AWESOME! We climbed a volcano and then everyone else except for me strapped on their head lamps on and headed for the caves. I (being the graceful one that I am) slipped and fell off the sidewalk right by where we parked and strained my ankle. I could hardly walk to I stayed in the car and read and napped while everyone had a good time.

Then we packed up and headed back to Idaho Falls. We had dinner, said goodbye to Kelsey and Lee and headed over to the drive in movie to see Cars 2!

Day 5: We headed to church! Afterwords, the Pitchers headed up to Yellowstone.

Told you it was BUSY! Was I right or was I right? I've said it before and I'll say it again....we are pretty blessed to have such amazing family. Our boys just ADORE time spent with their cousins. Starnespalooza 2....a great success!

Cabin

So I meant to do a little re-cap of our trip up to the cabin but the past few days have been SOOOO incredibly busy! We had the 2nd annual STARNESPALOOZA up here in old Idaho Falls and so we've been playing hard with family the past 5 days.

SO...back to our little trip up to the cabin! Rewind to last weekend.

I invited my mom, sis, brother and grandma to come and up and spend a couple of days up in the mountains. It really is so peaceful and calm to be up there away from everything in the world. On Saturday Ash and her mom and grandma came up to spend the afternoon with us. My mom and Ashley's mom have been the best of friends since before Ash and I were born and both of our Grandma's went to high school together. ☺ The relationship that our families share is a very rare and special one to say the least.

Nate and the boys built some sweet boats our of scrap wood:

Then we watched them set sail down the stream!

We rode 4 wheelers, shot the BB gun, went on walks, saw some deer, and loved spending time together. I love the cabin. I'm so grateful that my kids get to go up there and make those cherished memories that my husband had while growing up.

The Birfday week!

It's been a week almost and we are STILL partying! If I knew that turning 30 was going to be this fantastic I would have had NO apprehension what-SO-ever!!!!

Rewind. Last Wednesday. I was awakened to 4 sweet faces and handed my princess crown. I was instructed to wear it all day long. ☺As Landon clearly stated, "Mom, you are the PWINCESS in our family!" After daddy left the boys and I cleaned the house and I was surprised to have a couple of friends stop by and drop gifts off. I looked like a scary witch wearing my grubbies and NO makeup! They were probably thinking...."WHOA..30 surely isn't agreeing with her!"  Then we went and picked up Jessi and her boys and headed down to Pocatello to meet my best friend since birth Ashley and her darling girls at the water park. It was Ashley's first time up here to see us and I was SO excited to have her come and stay for a couple of days!

After the waterpark we came home and had a little BBQ.

Then Ash gave my my gift. Well, she gave me MANY gifts but the ONE gift that made me cry and cry! Ashley put together a WONDERFUL book. You see, Ash and I have been celebrating birthdays for each other since the very beginning.
Here we are on my very first birthday:

She compiled all sorts of pictures of us through the years. In the book were sweet letters written from family and friends. It was the most thoughtful and kind gift I think I have ever received.

I loved this picture....I hadn't ever seen it before.

Ash is a friend like no other. I love her like she is my sister.

O yeah, I almost forgot....my big gift from Nate! I am SO excited because in October Nate and I are going on a little trip. We are headed to.........................
 
 

YAY! Washington DC!!! Nate has never been east of the Mississippi and I have ALWAYS wanted to go back ever since the good ol 8th grade trip where I had absolutely ZERO appreciation for anything I was seeing! Oh yeah...AND the best part is, we get to see our DEAREST friends the Perry's!!!

I'm counting down already!!!

.

 The next day Ash and I  packed up the kids and headed to Mesa Falls...ironic because that is where I took the boys for my birthday LAST year! It was a PERFECT day...no people, beautiful and sunny....everything was going SO smoothly. Well, up until this point anyway. ☺

Then as we headed home we started hearing this crazy loud noise. Ash was like, "Pull OVER...I think you have a flat." We jumped out of the car to find that yes indeed, we picked up a nail somewhere. I have never in my life had a flat tire so I immediately called Nate. He was a good 45 min away so we resorted to plan B. I ran over to a Port of Entry that we had just passed and asked the 2 men there for some help. They were happy to help. About 3 minutes later another man with a tow truck stopped to help. The scary looking yet very nice men had us back on the road in 30 minutes. I love Eastern Idaho.

 Good people over here I am telling ya.

We laughed and laughed. Of course something like this had to happen to us!

THEN....we headed up to one of my favorite places on earth:

Ahhhh...the cabin. A post for tomorrow.

The BIG 3-0

(The clouds and the moon tonight.......so beautiful.)

Wow. The day is juuuuuuust about here. I'm sitting here watching the last few minutes of my 20's fade away. Rarely do you ever hear anyone say, "I can't WAIT to turn 30!" and I too have spent years preparing for this event with mixed emotions, a little bit scared to move forward yet excited to see what the future holds. Thirty is by no means "OLD." I've heard it referred to as a time when life really begins. BUT I would be lying if I didn't admit that I'm a little apprehensive to embark on this new decade.

It's a bit early to have an authentic mid-life crisis— But when approaching a milestone birthday, I think it's only natural to stop and take stock of life. To compare your list of dreams with your list of realities and assess where you are in the journey. To ask yourself whether you have achieved what you had hoped to by now, and if not, is it too late to do so? To accept that your body will NEVER ever again look like it did when you were 16, and finally realize that maybe you don't want it to. ☺

For as long as I can remember, my primary goal in life was to be a mom. It's not the most glamorous path a young girl could aspire to, but there was nothing I could imagine wanting more. My maternal instincts were beckoning to me louder than my drive for a career and I felt compelled to follow. I knew my education was very important though and I had to learn to manage the challenge of finishing college with a baby at my side. Nothing motivated me like my Dallin. And none of my education goals would have ever been met if I didn't have my supportive husband and family cheering me on the entire way.

 With three pregnancies under my belt, most of my twenties were spent sacrificing my body to various little tenants who toiled away for months, kicking the walls and banging on the pipes until they finally evicted themselves to scream at me face to face. While others my age were getting their masters degrees, and interning at jobs, my years were spent supporting my husband, celebrating births, nursing newborns, taming toddlers, and potty training preschoolers, often all at once. But I emerged through it all with something I hold more precious than a high-paying job: my three beautiful boys. Many can argue that forgoing a career was unwise, but I’m content with the course of my life so far and I can’t imagine it being any other way.

If you told me 10 years ago that by the time I was 30 I was going to be a law school widow, live on food stamps for awhile, have a zillion dollars in student loans, move 7 times, have a young child with developmental delays, have a husband with a brain tumor, be a Young Women's president, experience job loss, have to leave my first house, and most recently have to deal with the heartbreak of infertility I probably would have locked myself in a closet to avoid my fate. Would I really though? Nah. There have been SO many incredible and good things to be thankful for. The good FAR outweighs the bad. I am blessed with the BEST husband I could have ever dreamed of. He is so kind, thoughtful and sweet to me. We are crazy about each other and my love for him just continues to grow. I have 3 handsome boys that bring me so much joy and teach me so much more then I could ever possibly teach them. They have revealed to me both my talents and my weaknesses. I am quick to know without a doubt that the difficult times have shaped me and helped me to grow into the person that I am today. After all, thats why we're here right?

There are times when I look at my boys and am completely amazed that I am old enough to be a mother at all. (Especially with how tall Dallin is as of late!) The surprising curveballs life can pitch makes me wonder what will shock me before I turn 40. What will I be like as a person in ten years? Will I find the balance between motherhood and womanhood? Will I have a career? Will I travel? Will I embrace middle age and start to wear mom jeans and complain about the crap on the radio?

 At 30, I am now old enough to have the confidence to stop apologizing, the wisdom to stop trying to fit in, and the ability to enjoy the fact that I never will. I have been celebrating my birthday for the past 17 days in such a fun and secretive way doing all sorts of little random acts of kindness for others and it has been so incredible and rewarding. I want to write all about it but I think I'll keep those experiences as a gift to myself. ♥ And finally, I have forgiven myself for the indiscretions and weaknesses that I succumbed to during my twenties. The past is the past, and a new chapter is opening before me. I am concentrating on being a person I would want my boys to be. And I will no longer try to squeeze into the mold of a perfect daughter, wife, and mother and instead start to carve a new mold: the perfect me.

Ready or not......30 here I come!