Finally there is news!

For those of you who have not been following on Facebook, or who are confused because we are confusing people, here is the story about how Jason saved the day. Once upon a time we moved to Texas to start a business with my brother James. We put our heart and soul into it for a year. After a nasty hurricane and a lean Christmas, the family Livingston decided to let Uncle James continue his journey alone. And though it was sad to part both families were happy for eachother. Jason had received an email from an evil enchantress in a far away land who promised us much gold and a way to make all of our problem go away. All we had to do was wait for her plans to come true. We waited for 6 weeks and nothing happened. We found much comfort in prayer, services and the love and support of our friends and family. One day we knew we had to take our destiny in our own hands. Jason started to work full time at getting a new job back in the corporate world. He was diligent and spent 8 hours a day sending letters, resumes, and calls out into the mist. Slowly he began to have phone interviews, then face to face interview and then video conferences. Each week we slowly moved towards our future. I worked at a scrapbook store and our hero bravely did the dishes, made dinner and took the kids to the library all the while never loosing focus of his goal. February and nearly March had passed. Every day we would receive a letter saying "congratulations you have moved to the next level!" without an offer of employment. We stayed strong encouraging each other, becoming very philosophical and pensive about life. Until one day the call came. An offer! We whisked the children away to Austin to look at the fair city that could become our home. We loved the beautiful landscape and hills, the downtown and artistic mood of the city. We loved staying in a hotel with a pool and fine dining at Kobe's. The family rejoiced!
Our Prince Charming had indeed conquered the beast UNEMPLOYMENT on his own merits and with the help of a Loving Heavenly Father. Said Prince is now in Washington DC on a consulting assignment before he begins work in Austin April 20th. He will also be traveling to SLC next week. The windows of heaven have been opened to us. I, the fair maiden and the children will remain in Houston until the end of the school year. We will be putting our house on the market soon and getting ready for the next chapter! Again thank you to all who kept us in their prayers. It worked! If you need anymore details you can call Jason, he is happy to talk about his new company!

What's with all the camping??

This week was spring break for the kids. Since Jason still is waiting for job offers I am still working, but I had two days off this week. So I decided for the sake of the children we could go camping. They have been bugging us for years to go. Not to mention that Walmart was having a sale on the ten man 3 room tent. Who can say no to that?? We figured out where we could camp for cheap and which of out two failing cars we could convince to go and we ended up in Huntsville about an hour away. The first day was great. We saw the huge Sam Houston statue, we set up our camp, swam in the lake, roasted marshmallows etc. The second day I told the fam we must hike! That is my favorite part about camping, being in the woods. I didn't know my kids were kind of wussies. Jason and I talked it over and realized that we were raised on Little House on the Prairie, the Boxcar kids, Louis L'Amour, and Goonies. I know I spent a lot of my youth hanging out in the woods imaging various survival scenerios. So anyways there was a lot of grumbling but I got my way anyways. After about 15 minutes there was a big gust of wind and the temperature dropped like 10 degrees. Then we heard the wind coming. But we were at the far end of our loop trail so we just kept on. By the time we made it back to the tent it was raining and around 50 degrees. We were so not prepared! But we managed (through a trip to Walmart and a space heater) to last another 24 hours. Thank goodness for huge duvet's and a puppy who was willing to sleep in my sleeping bag! I am proud of us, we survived! I can't say I loved it but the kids definitly did and that is worth it.

Valentine to My Best Friends

Febuary Haps

I think we crammed a lot into the years shortest month! I had lots of projects as usual but in the end I think we did alright! First I had a youth activity that my young women were in charge of. We decided to do it on Social skills and it went great. We used Napoleon Dynamite and made a DVD of what not to do. I also got to hearken back to my dating days and let them in on my 3 phase dating system. Valentines rolled around and it was pretty fun. I kicked it off with a little pancake luv for my kids: Then we went over to Uncle James' house for a V-day party. He went all out with the dry ice punch and strawberry shortcake.

Later that night we got together with our favorite couples the Howe;s and Jordy's to make our own Melting Pot restaurant. We ate great fondue and then had a chocolate fountain afterwards. Jason made a great love mix on the ipod and we played the newlywed game. The only thing we didn't do was take pictures!! Cortney made everything beautiful and we all surprised each other by giving gifts! I will post what I made the girls later.

The next week we had Thinking Day which is a girl scout holiday where we celebrate diversity. Our troop made a display for France. I had fun showing off speaking French and talking about chocolate.

Last but not least, this past weekend I went camping with the Young Women in the ward. I told myself it was just a big slumber party but it was exhausting. All the dramatic highs and lows were there! But my favorite thing was being able to share the young women with Jana and let her be a leader with me and Cortney. I also love all the girls I get to hang out with and pretend I am not a mom in my 30's. The weather went crazy and dropped twenty degrees during the night and we had major gusts of wind. the only thing keeping us our tent down was our bodies! I came home and had a looooonnnnnggggg shower and went to bed by 10. I can't believe March is here already. Even though these are crazy times for us and we have NO FREAKING IDEA what the future holds, I got to give props to the man upstairs for allowing us to have so much fun in the meantime!!