NEW BRAUNFELS
We love our annual trip to New Braunfels! We camp for 10 days and have a lot of adventures. We were in the truck with all the kayaks to have a lot of fun playing in the river where the campground is located.
We took an adventure to the Children's museum in San Antonio which has a clever name: DOseum! Love it. We had a great time playing around.
The robot copies whatever you do- isn't technology amazing!
This was the older kids favorite section. It was the Spy Academy. When you enter the room you are given a certain mission and you have to solve puzzles and mysteries to complete the mission. The kids (and Derek) could spend all day in there completing a variety of missions.
Learning how to swing.
It is so beautiful here. We love the scenery and going on a bike ride is the cherry on top.
Playing card games
They have a park there where we like to go hiking. It reminds me of Utah hiking.
There is a train that travels around the park (the park is a pretty good size park). Emmett was super excited! He really enjoys trains right now.
It is fun to see the kids laugh and talk together. Our hope is that they become the best of friends throughout their lives.
One morning, Ashlyn an Dad went for a hike/run. The view looks so breathtaking!
Emmett is learning how to write all his letters. Working on his special letter E (because E is what his name starts with).
Swimming at the RV park
More hiking! A new trail near Canyon Lake!
Canyon Lake has become such a fond lake memory place for our family. It is beautiful and it doesn't have many people. If we could during the week, we get the place to ourselves at times.
The water is perfect temp, clear water, and beautiful view. We love to jump of the cliff in the water. The kids got lost for hours playing with the big rocks that they would throw and have to find it.
There is a certain street that is very hilly and it is like a roller coaster. Derek drove us up and down the street three or four times because the kids were having so much fun!
One of the days that we were doing homeschool and Brinley and I read together in her school work about George Washington Carver. He was born enslaved and went on to become one of the most famous scientists and inventors.
When we were done reading about him for many lessons and chapters, we learned that there was a museum about him. We looked up where it was and it was in Austin (an hour away). So we made a special trip to go see the museum. Brinley was super excited!! Sadly that part of the museum was closed for renovations, but Brinley was able to teach us all about the facts that she learned about him.
Brinley and George Washington Carver
We learned a lot about Black History and Juneteenth (which I recently heard about since Black Lives Matter).
- Juneteenth is a holiday celebrated on 19 June to commemorate the emancipation of enslaved people in the US. The holiday was first celebrated in Texas, where on that date in 1865, in the aftermath of the Civil War, slaves were declared free under the terms of the 1862 Emancipation Proclamation.
After the museum Derek and I had to take the kids to the BEST BBQ EVER!!!
Terry Black's and have them experience the deliciousness.
Then we enjoyed the rest of the day at McKinney Falls State Park in Austin. We spend hours jumping of the cliffs and playing in the water and falls.
This is a place that we want to come to again. The kids didn't want to leave. We left when we could bare see because they wanted to soak up every minute of daylight!!!
Isn't it just gorgeous
I love surprising the kids and we were spontaneous and surprised the kids with a pass to Sea World. We have never been before as a family and the kids had a great time. I love homeschooling and the freedom that it brings because we enjoy doing adventures in the week because there isn't many people. It was a blast to ride the roller coasters with the three olders and Derek and Emmett, Desi, and I spend the day riding smaller rides and meeting the characters. It was a fun, fun day!
The shows were a lot of fun too!
The kids were able to feed the seals with real fish!
This show was our family favorite! It was so entertaining and had a high school theme and seals. We laughed throughout the show
During the trip, Claire finished her first grade work!!!
She was so excited!
Canyon Lake walkway
It has been a long time since we hung out with our friends. We met up at a museum. The kids have such a good friends group that we are grateful for.
Ashlyn has been doing an online program that is for girl tweens ! It is such a great program that promotes growth mindset, goals, fun things like hair dos, how to deal with friends, and much much more. They have videos and zoom calls once a month. It is called I Believe in Me! The sent her a welcome package and she loves the program!
I feel like this year has caused so much growth and learning about myself, my beliefs, and what I want for my future. I have made (hands down) the hardest decision of my life, which was leaving a church that I absolutely loved and lived by with all my heart.
I went through a lot of growing pains during these last 6 months and it has been incredible for me. I have seen so much growth, understanding, sympathy, gratitude for others and the church, and even dips of grieving and really processing things. As I look back on my spiritual journey, it was a year of researching information, processing it, but the hardest thing was to actually taking action- which in my case was to step away from something that I absolutely loved! As I am writing this I am in tears because there are times that I miss it, but I am incredibly grateful for where I am at in my journey that it has taken me to get here. I went through months of sadness and anger going on a rotation. I felt like I was on a ride that I didn't want to be on and experience.
One of the things that I did was such a turning point for me was I attended an event with one of my former mission companions and a close friend from dental school, for Ex-Mormons and it reminded me of Time Out for Women. It was in Park City and there was about 100 ladies there that attended from various ages (oldest was 80 to 18: majority was around my age). It was so bonding to be surrounded by women who were going through a similar experience as me. There were a variety of speakers that shared wisdom that they have learned through their journey.
A couple of things that I learned from this event was that no one has the "right way" of how to live without the church. The church has given me ALL the answers my entire life and I wanted to feel in those holes, but I realized that I need to find them myself, not be told by someone else how to raise my kids outside the church, how to feel my spiritual cup, how to think of God, Jesus, and much much more. I need to look inside myself.
Another lesson I learned from the experience was that I was judging others and we were all judging each other. It turned into this running joke between all the ladies that I met because we would judge, (how much into the church were you? did you serve a mission? did you leave because you want to sin (a common myth)? do people dress modestly, swear, drink? Judgment is so natural, but it was sad to realize within myself how much I have judged others and how much I have really been judging myself. All the thoughts that I had about others leaving the church reflected in the mirror about me. How am I judging myself now?
I also learned and still continue to learn this lesson over and over again: Don't care what others think about me and my reasons for leaving the church. When I shared with others that I left the church, I feared what others would think and say about me. Most people that I am closest to said, "you are the last person I would think of to leave." I would totally agree with them because there are times that I can't believe it either. I first felt like I needed to defend my decision for leaving (without going into details because I didn't want to hurt anyone's testimony), but at the retreat I learned that I need to take ownership of my decision and soon peace followed. I know why I made the decision that I did and that is all that matters.
The biggest thing that I experienced from this retreat was healing. There was so much sadness and anger that happened before the event, I didn't want to be stuck there. One of the activities was a burning ceremony. We wrote things that we didn't want to carry anymore and we sat in a circle and watched it burn. It was very spiritual and gave a lot of hope for a future. Super healing.
A lot of healing continued for me on the airplane home. I wrote an appreciation letter to Derek and my mom (my biggest supporters). I also went through my whole life expressing appreciation for the church and how it helped shape who I have become and the values that I cherish. It has helped me become who I am today! I went through various seasons of my life and found appreciation. In my own therapy session with myself, as I got to this current stage I expressed appreciation and love, but also said goodbye. The best way to describe is saying goodbye to a really good friend that you loved a lot. It was a beautiful process.
Paint session
Biking adventures with dad
We hired to get some renovations on the house and we were stuck in the room doing school and being upstairs all day... right after that we decided to stay at the KOA in the trailer during the renovations.
This is our night routine. Derek and I reading a book to the kids before bed.
Ashlyn finished handwriting
1st day at Mothers Day Out!!!!
Such cuties have fabulous teachers: Emmett is in Ms. Staci's class and all the girls are in Ms. Krisit's
They really enjoy it!
They planted a garden, do fun crafts, go on adventures, and it has great!
Mom and Dad love Tuesdays too because we get a lunch date!
I started taking an adult dance class which is Jazz and Hip Hop. I absolutely love it and I feel like I can really get into the flow. I have really enjoyed dance so it has been a lot of fun to get into again!
This was my first dance class since college.
So fun!!!
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