Ft. Lauderdale Temple Open House

We are so blessed to have a new Temple come to our area of South Florida. It is just under 2 hours to get there, and we are sooo happy and grateful for that. If you don't know much about LDS Temple's and how they work, check out this helpful and informative website. Before Temple's are dedicated, they are open to the public to walk through on guided tours. Ryan was able to be an usher one night and had an awesome experience. Last weekend, we decided to go down as a family and take Ellie and Brinley through. Brinley has been so anxious to see the inside of a Temple. They were both pretty crabby after the drive and then to be quiet and reverent for another hour kind of killed us all. Ellie has been teething so bad lately that we are just pretty exhausted of her crankiness. Nonetheless, Ryan and I had a wonderful time being together at the Temple and I will never forget seeing my family together in the Celestial room! 

I hope Brinley felt the spirit and will remember that day of seeing a Temple! The Ft. Lauderdale Temple is gorgeous. The inside is very focused on our region and how tropical it is. There are paintings in there I have never seen before. And the Brides room has this green and blue glass blown chandelier that is OUT of this world. I always pay attention to Brides rooms because I didn't have one! We have the Temple dedication on May 4th and then after that we will be able to go do some work. So so exciting. All those who are super close to Temples, don't take them from granted! We haven't lived this close to a Temple in 4 years and I just want to cry I am so excited.

The other reason why we went down to Ft. Lauderdale was because my good friend from High School is living there with her family while her husband is in school at Nova University. We played with them for the day and we had so much fun! Friday night, we were able to get a babysitter because the MARINERS were in town playing the Miami Marlins and we got tickets for the baseball game! It was our first ever double date after having kids so Ryan and I had a blast. So much fun.

^^Ellie and Brinley sitting with Brooke and Macy. 4 kids 4 and under! 

^^looking for turtles in their pond

^^and Ryan caught one!

Thanks for being such wonderful hosts!

just a few favorite moments

I love Instagram. I love taking pictures of randomness throughout the day. And I love having a good camera on my phone. Who knows if we will ever buy an actually camera-camera! 

^fitting my double jogger inside the new SUV is heavenly!

^jogging over the bridge to the beach. It was killer!

^up at the top of the bridge. Amazing views!

^Undies-on-our-head club

^Beach day with friends-Ellie was around somewhere!

^my girls :-)

^farm day 

^and strawberry picking

^Panara for lunch

^hey girl :-)

^Library time

^potty breaks are verrrry interesting when Ellie doesn't have a stroller to be strapped into :-)

^first dentist appointment

^perfect teeth!

^family jog

^our favorite park is right under the bridge and it has the best views

^our friends haha

^back the next week to the same farm to do more strawberry picking!

^diva, I mean Brinley, just started another round of swim lessons

^cruising together in the subaru so that daddy could drive down to the Ft Lauderdale Temple Open House to help usher.

So many wonderful moments in the past month and I am so thankful to have them documented so I can remember them forever. Love being a mom and I love living in South Florida! 

Weekend Recaps

Ever since the girls and I got back from our 2-week stay in Charlotte, life has been busy! I feel like we haven't had a slow weekend and because of that, we haven't really had an opportunity to recharged for another upcoming week.

The weekend following our return back to Florida, we had the opportunity to attend a wedding of one of Ryan's law school friends. It was such a fun day. We got dressed up, hired a babysitter for the night, and drove 45 minutes north for the wedding. The ceremony was so beautiful. The bride and groom looked so happy and we really enjoyed all the wonderful words that were spoken by their Pastor. The groom's sister was an American Idol finalist so we really enjoyed the few songs she sang during the ceremony. Ryan and I danced all night and got home late. We had so much fun!

The next weekend, I was fortunate to get Saturday off, so we jumped on the opportunity and decided to make the drive to Orlando for a very much needed Temple trip (read all about LDS Temples here). We are gearing up for our very own Temple dedication at the Ft. Lauderdale Temple, but we needed to do a session. Ryan went in first to do a session so I watched the girls and by the time he got out, the whole Orlando region had a tornado warning and we decided to head home. I wasn't too disappointed that I wasn't able to do a session myself because I just went with my Mom the previous week. The girls had fun walking the Temple grounds. Brinley is so excited to go to the Ft. Lauderdale Temple Open House and she kept saying, "Mom, can I pleeeeease get a sneak peak inside of the Temple?" Sweet girl. 

This past weekend was General Conference (learn more here). Unfortunately, I had to work for most of the weekend and was only able to watch one session. I miss those lazy General Conference weekends with nothing to do except eat good snacks and hear spiritually inspired messages from our Church leaders. I appreciated the messages I did hear and I can't wait to go back and watch and read the sessions I missed. The benefit of having East Coast conference time is that we have our entire morning before the first session starts.

So on Saturday, we were able to attend Family Day at the Oceanographic Society put on by the Bar Association. They had so many fun activities going on, a goodie bag for the girls, and a sponsored lunch! We love the Oceanographic! We fed the stingrays (read, Ryan fed the stingrays), and learned more about how we can keep our beaches clean and the animals safe. It is the beginning of sea turtle nesting time so we will start to see turtle nests marked off soon. This is the summer to go out on a night beach walk to see the nests hatch but those don't begin until June. 

On Sunday morning, we decided to head out for a beach walk. We are so lucky to live in such a beautiful area and I hate how often we take it for granted. I was able to watch the first session on Sunday before heading into work.

Grateful for a wonderful weekend spent with my favorite people!