The Big Night

Bruce had to leave out of town to a Veterinary Continuing Education conference last week. (November 7-12) He was gone saturday-thursday. Poor Bruce. This is what he missed last week:

Saturday- Daddy/Daughter Activity Day Hike for Emma

Sunday- Primary Program Practice (Only the practice, but since I'm Primary President, I wanted him here to help with Sophie for this!!)

Tuesday- Ashlin's highschool dedication that she spoke at and they showed the video her group made.

Thursday- Emma got an award in her "Character Counts" assembly for "Trustworthiness"

Poor Bruce, he was so sad, and said, "Turns out a father of 6 kids can never leave out of town or will be missing something." We managed to make it through though:

-Lucky for Emma, her GRANDPA (my dad) took Bruce's place and took her on the special hike, and Emma was excited for a date with Grandpa! He picked her up in his cool black jeep.

-The primary program practice was stressful, I was wishing I had my husband/Co-primary president!! He is the best and most helpful and supportive husband ever in my calling!!! Oh well.

-Ashlin still had lots of special guests to come see her in her moment of glory. Me, Dallin, Emma, Grandpa, Aunt Chrissy, Vanessa and Rachelle all came!

The night before, I loaded up all the kids and we went to the mall for FHE (don't worry, we had a lesson afterwards at home) and she got a new outfit for the big night!

This is her group standing with the principal. It was real official and a bunch of town people spoke at the meeting, then at the end, the student body president introduced this group, and they each spoke a few lines (that Ashlin wrote) to introduce their video. It was SO neat to see their video on the BIG huge screen in the auditorium, and see all the pictures Ashlin took! Such a neat night for her! She was stressed because she forgot her lines a little, poor Ashlin, but it sounded great! You are always harder on yourself then anybody else is.

We video taped the night for Bruce to see! And he watched it with Ashlin right when he got home.

And I was so proud of Emma at her assembly that Sophie and I went to. Emma always gets so excited to see me at school (more than Ashlin or Dallin ever did). And she sat by me through the whole assembly, with her head on my shoulder or arm around me. I love Emma's school!! They do such a good job trying to reward kids for positive behavior. None of my kids had ever been chosen for this before, just a crazy coincedence that my kids got TWO awards in one week!

Although Dallin didn't get chosen for the assembly, teachers have little pads and they write up little "character counts" slips when they witness a child doing something praise-worthy for the kids to take home. Dallin just got this one. It is amazing how motivating a little positive reward is!
And its a little messed up how, while Bruce was gone, I managed everything pretty well, and never lost it. Then Bruce got home, and since I didn't have to do it all alone anymore, I sorta fell apart then, and he had to see me wiped out, lose my temper, and cry the morning of the program because I was stressed. Then I was just trying to convince him that I really handled it so good while he was gone... funny how I can wait to fall apart until there is someone there to pick up the pieces! I LOVE YOU BRUCE, SO GLAD YOU CAME HOME TO US!!!