Wednesday at the airport was one of the most exciting days of my life! There was an electricity in the air as our family, along with other missionary families, gathered together to welcome our missionaries home.

Here we are waiting for Elder Bearnson to come down the escalator:

I was lucky enough to get the first hug and as you can tell, it was very emotional for me:

Steve was next:

Then one by one each family member got a hug. When Sage embraced Kade I was close to sobbing:

She clung on to him the entire time at the airport and hasn’t left his side since:

I love this photo of Brecken whispering in Kade’s ear:

Both girls faithfully waited for Kade and made these signs:

Kade and Collin immediately went back to back to see who’s taller (I think Collin won):

Here is the group that met Elder Bearnson at the airport:

What a perfect birthday present for me! I love this kid!

Kade left a boy and is now a man! He’s still fun loving and personality plus but he  also has a new confidence and maturity–I’m a proud mama!

Thanks for all your excitement for our family and your support on this journey.

Ohhhh–nine more months until Collin leaves. Okay–I’m not even going to think about that right now!

I love you all!

Lisa

P.S. Thanks to my dear pal, Pam Taylor, for showing up at the airport and capturing this special memory on these photos.

The signs have been hung. The house has been cleaned. Kade is in the air coming home.

This sign is front and center as you drive into our neighborhood. It celebrates FIVE young men coming home from their missions within four weeks of each other.

My sweet friend, Janette, made this sign. The “Welcome home” has glitter on it. Sooooo cute!

Words can’t explain the joy I feel! My baby’s coming home in two hours eighteen minutes!

I’ll share photos soon!

Thanks for all your support while traveling this path.

Love, Lisa

Only two more days until Kade will be home!! My heart is racing, there is a perpetual smile on my face and the gloomy January weather doesn’t feel quite so gloomy. My boy is coming home and I can hardly wait!

My pal, Nani Bertola, helped me do something rather crazy last Friday. Since we are in celebration mode with Sage’s birthday Saturday, Konsti’s birthday yesterday, Kade returning home on Wednesday and my birthday on Thursday, we filled close to 250 pearlized balloons and they are currently floating on my ceiling!

We put high-float in each balloon and so far they have stayed up. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that they will last until Wednesday night! Sage thought this was the most magical thing she’s ever seen (the ribbons are hanging way down which is a cool effect) and Konsti thinks we are just crazy Americans!

I also made these fun banners:

Because I used repositionable adhesive on the letters, I will quickly change out “Konsti” and Sage” tomorrow for “Elder Bearnson.” I used a variety of American Crafts paper and of course, my Perfect Layers tool to make the matting on each flag the perfect size. Go here for instructions on how to make your own banner. Tip: Save all your extra paper scraps from the larger banner–they are the perfect size to make the smaller banner!

Saturday morning we blindfolded Konsti and Sage and took them to breakfast. Sage had a party last night (we went to the Muppets movie–loved it!) and last night our dear friends, Pam and Myron, made an amazing birthday meal for all of us complete with Red Velvet Cake!

Konsti and Collin went to preference last night. I think Collin shocked his date by wearing this tux:

He had to wear his red high tops and a “Michael Jackson” glove! Gotta love this kid! He beats to his own drum!

His date was super pretty in her off-white dress:

Konsti chose a more traditional tux and his adorable date wore a vintage dress:

These are the moments and I can’t ask for anything more.

I CAN’T WAIT to share the details about Wednesday!  Thanks for sharing my excitement with me!

Love, Lisa

I’m pretty sad. For the fourth time, my cute wrought iron white board has once again broken. When one of the kids was goofing off and broke it I had to put a smile on my face and remind myself, ‘People are worth more than things!” (I’ve purchased the same one four times!) It’s okay–for now I’ve made this magnet board work for Kade’s countdown:

Words can’t describe how super excited I am to have Kade home! Today we are moving sleeping arrangements around and making room for Kade. We definitely have a full house! Konsti is in Kade’s room and we don’t want to uproot him. Stefyn, Steve’s daughter, moved in with us in November so Brecken moved downstairs with her and Kade will be in Brecken’s room until Konsti goes back to Germany in June. Whew! Did you get all that?

Saturday is Sage’s 11th birthday and Sunday is Konsti’s 17th birthday.  For their birthdays and Kade coming home, my pal is coming over on Friday and we are filling up 200 high-float helium balloons and are going to float them on the ceiling. I have a super high ceiling in my main room so it will look cool–200 balloons with ribbons dangling down! If any of them don’t “make it” before Kade gets home, we’ll just add more.

Konsti got quite the surprise. His dream is to go to a Dirk Nowitzski Maverick’s NBA game (Dirk is German). The Mavericks are coming to Salt Lake City on Thursday night to play the Jazz. My neighbor was nice enough to give us two second-row tickets (for Konsti and Collin) including a huge buffet beforehand. Sage and her friend, Olivia, sent Konsti on a big treasure hunt around the neighborhood to find the tickets. Of course Konsti is ecstatic!

Guess what I did last Friday? It’s my dream to make homemade wheat bread with fresh flour from my grinder. I honestly have never known how to make bread although my mom made it growing up. Nobody makes it better than my friend, Angelyn. So Friday she came over and we made beautiful bread!

Here it is before it was baked:

And here it is afterward (along with Sage’s homemade strawberry jam):

It was sooooo easy! No hand kneading and we let it rise only once. Try it! You’ll like it! Here’s the recipe:

Angelyn’s Whole Wheat Bread

6 cups warm water

12-14 cups whole wheat flour

2/3 cup oil

2/3 cup sugar

3 T. instant yeast

3 T. dough enhancer

2 T. salt

Mix together water, oil, sugar, yeas, salt t and dough enhancer in Kitchenaid or Bosch mixer. (I have a Bosch and use the beater made for kneading.) Slowly add flour while mixing. You’ll know when you’ve added enough because the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl. Continue to knead for 10 minutes. Break off into five even amounts and form a loaf into five greased (I used Pam) bread pans. Let rise until the dough is about  one inch above the pan. Place all five pans in a 350 degrees oven and bake for about 45 minutes or until golden brown. Immediately take out of bread pans and cool on a wire rack.

Hmmmmmm. Enjoy the feeling that fresh bread brings to your home. All the kids were so excited by the sight, smell and taste of the bread when they returned home from school. And I felt so liberated! I finally learned how to make bread and it’s so easy!!

Hope your Martin Luther King holiday is going great!

Lisa

I got through Christmas, a trip to Vegas and Arizona, the kids starting back to school and Steve’s birthday. Now I’ve got Sage’s birthday, Konsti’s birthday and then . . .

Yep–We are counting down the days until our boy gets home from his two-year mission for our church. He’ll be here at 4:09 p.m. on Wednesday January 25th! Oh–I get a bubble in my heart every time I think about it! I can hardly wait to give Kade a great big mama hug!

Other highlights over the past few weeks included this fun trip to the Grand Canyon (South Rim):

It was Stefyn and Konsti’s first time seeing it! It always takes my breath away. Can’t believe the beauty that’s on the earth.

Hoover Dam right outside of Las Vegas is an amazing sight too:

We also went to Cirque Dei Soleil’s Mystere (it was good but “O” is my favorite so far) at Treasure Island in Las Vegas. We ate the buffet at Treasure Island too and it was great (complete with cotton candy).

We had a great time in Mesa, Arizona. The wedding of Steve’s nephew went off without a hitch. Stefyn and Brecken single handedly cooked  a wedding luncheon for 120 people. It was delicious! Great job, gals! We also enjoyed the Mesa, Arizona temple lights (if you live in the area, you must go next year) with Karla and Bob Libbey (I met her through scrapbooking) and the boys had fun golfing in the 70 degree weather. All in all a fun trip.

Well–It’s late and I’m off to bed to dream about our entire family being together soon.

Hope the new year is off to a great start for you!

Sincerely,

Lisa

(It really is Christmas night but for some reason it says the 26th!)

Just want to wish you a wonderful holiday season from the Bearnson clan:

Here is a link to my Christmas card. You can read about all our family happenings here. My friend, Karen Clauson (a Heritage Makers consultant), designed my card and another pal, Judy Pasley, took the photo.

We’ve had a wonderful day attending church, opening presents, visiting family, eating and . . . we had a 40 minute conversation with my missionary! Kade is happy, healthy and we can hardly wait–only 31 more days until I can give him a big hug in person. However I’ve been a little down since our conversation. I sent two packages a week ago (one to be opened on Christmas Eve and the other Christmas morning) and he didn’t receive either one of them. He was totally cute about it but I have to admit I shed a few tears. It’s the mother hen in me coming out!

I met my pal, Pam Taylor, at a photo shoot  with her granddaughters and Santa on Thursday. It was only a five minute shoot but the results were amazing. Sage was with me and as we were leaving she said, “I’ve never had my picture taken with Santa.” Okay–major guilt! Have I really never taken Sage’s photo with Santa? I seriously couldn’t remember a time either. So, although Sage knows who Santa really is, I had to make an appointment for that night. Just had to share some of the results with you:

Here’s the really cool part. Steve wasn’t with me so we used the Santa they had on hand. But in most of the photos, the dads dressed up as Santa. What a brilliant idea! There were no screaming children because none of the kids were afraid of Santa. It was just their dad dressed up! Also, the price was amazing. It was only $20.00 for a photo session and the thumb drive with all the proofs. Now Sage can’t say she never had a picture with Santa!

We are off to sunny Arizona tomorrow. Steve’s nephew is getting married on Thursday in Mesa. We are stopping by Las Vegas for a Cirque Du Soleil show tomorrow night  and then a tour of Hoover Dam the next day. On the way home, we are touring Skywalk at the West entrance of the Grand Canyon. We want Konsti to have the total American experience while he is here.

Hope your day was Merry and Bright.

Love, Lisa

Sorry for the delay in updating my  blog. Steve and I went to Hawaii on a short  vacation and it’s taken me over a week to get back into full swing.

The holidays are underway at my house. You know how Kristy Banks made me a mantel scarf for the Halloween season? Check out the one she sewed for Christmas:

Also I just purchased the painting of Mary and Joseph with a shepherd boy looking on to display on the mantel. Love the perspective of the child in this painting.

So look what I’ve been making today! Tags that double as ornaments:

My pal, Marci Leishman, hooked me on to the free artwork and the idea of tags and ornaments. Of course you need the Perfect Layers tool to create it. Check out how cute they look on presents:

You can go here for the the free artwork:

and here for complete instructions from Marci on how to use Perfect Layers with this project:

You can also enlarge it for a frame and use Perfect Layers to creatively use a matting around it:

I promise to write again real soon! Hoping this is the most wonderful time of the year for you and you are taking time out for you! (Sage and I have been reading a Christmas story every night together.)

Love, Lisa

P.S. Forty more days until Kade’s return. But who’s counting???

P.S.S. It’s still not too late to order Perfect Layers for Christmas. It’s the perfect gift for any crafter at a perfect price!

Life has been CRAZY busy and in just a few short hours (our flight leaves at 5:55 a.m.) my hubby and I are going on a short 22nd anniversary get-away. I’ll let you know where I went upon our return!

Some really great news! Collin’s football team, the Lone Peak Knights, won the 5A state championship and had an undefeated season. This photo of Collin sacking the quarterback (which caused a fumble) was on KSL.com. Just had to share it with you:

I think I might have to get in touch with the photographer and buy the rights to this photo (and enlarge it for Collin for Christmas). It’s a little sad that this part of Collin’s life is over. He’s been playing football since he was eight so it’s already a bit of an adjustment. Upon high school graduation, he plans to go on a mission for our church.

Other good news! Only SEVEN more weeks until Kade is back home with us. Now that the two years are up, I can finally say that it went kinda fast. The first year was a little painful but the second year really flew by. He comes home the day before my birthday–best present in the world! I CAN’T WAIT!!!

Thanks for your continual prayers on behalf of my dad. There are many complications with his health. It seems he gets better from one thing and then something else alarming happens. I know he feels your love and support and prayers and so do I. I will keep you posted.

Hope your Thanksgiving was great! Mine was filled with too much food, a fun turkey bowl game, an okay blockbuster movie and lots of love and laughter. Oh–and I bought a new game and we played it nonstop. It’s called Dicecapades and is really fun! A must-have in your game collection.

Hope you’re staying warm! Luckily I’m going somewhere warm!

Love, Lisa

Words can’t expressed how much I’ve appreciated your support over these past two weeks. I’ve felt your love and I know Heavenly Father has heard your prayers in behalf of my dad. Here’s an update:

Thankfully my dad is still with us but continues to fight the hardest battle of his life. He lost the ability to walk and is having to start over from scratch doing the simple things in life. He’s been moved from the hospital to a rehabilitation center near their home. Yesterday I sat by his side for several hours and he kept saying how much he loved me and wanted to hold my hand. I asked how he was feeling (he had a very rough day) and he said “I’m dying.” When he says that, our family’s standard answer is “We all are!” I continue to be buoyed up by my wonderful mother and the unique relationship she and my dad share. She is by his side 24/7. She slept at the hospital on a very uncomfortable recliner and continues to stay with him at the center. It’s a very difficult situation but she handles it so courageously. Thanks again for all your messages of hope and cheer. I’ll keep you posted! During this ordeal I’ve still been able to find joy in the journey. Here are a few happy thoughts on this dismal November day:

Happy Thought #1. While going through this tough ordeal, my pal, Hilary Weeks, gave me a sneak peak of a song on her new album. You MUST watch this video now called Beautiful Heartbreak! It’s simply amazing and will make you cry. If I were in the video, I’d be holding up a sign that says “Aging “Parents.” Watch the video and you’ll know what I mean. It can be purchased here on iTunes and is from the album Every Step.

Happy Thought #2: I saw this idea on Pinterest and knew I had to make it my own. Brecken has a big space on the wall under her vaulted ceiling and this is what we did this week:

It was super fun and easy to do! I simply gathered 12 old frames I had around the house (the more eclectic the better) and choose 12 pieces of patterned paper that matched her room. (Most of the paper is from the American Craft’s Crate Paper line.) I cut the paper to fit each frame, then placed American Craft’s sticker numbers over the top of the glass. The next step was to hang the frames in a circle, then place the clock movement in the center. The tricky part for you will be to find a clock movement. You could remove the hands from an old clock or I can try to talk my pal, Angie Sheffer, into selling some to my blog readers. Angie is the owner and creator of For All Time Clocks (see “Happy Thought Number 5″ below!). Let me know if you’re interested in buying a stand-along clock movement and I’ll see what I can do.

Happy Thought #3: I LOVE the American Crafts sale each November and December. If you live in Utah or a nearby state, it’s definitely worth the time to stop by! As you know, Crate Paper is one of my favorite lines of paper.

Happy Thought #4: Collin’s football team remains undefeated. Today is the 5A championship for the state of Utah. It’s televised live at 2:30 p.m. on KJazz. Be sure to tune in and cheer the Knights on to victory. Collin is #51 Defensive End.

Happy Thought #5: If you’re looking for an affordable, unique, amazing gift, be sure to check out this deal on beautiful personalized clocks from For All Time Clocks. This clock is front and center of my home and I always get so many compliments on it:

I’ve given many of these as gifts:

Go here to place an order for a clock. Be sure to put LISAB25 into the discount code–this will give you 25% off all 18″ and 25″ clocks. This is a great deal for a great present. All orders must be place by December 1st to ensure Christmas delivery.

Well, I’m off to the football game! I’ll let you know the results. Hope you’re having a great Friday and staying warm!

Love, Lisa

I mentioned in my last post that last Thursday I was going to spend a good share of the day with my dad on his birthday. My mom had an appointment elsewhere so I was so excited to spend some quality time with just the two of us. I had the day planned: a trip to the campus where he was a music professor for over 30 years, lunch at an amazing restaurant and a ride up the canyon to look at the end of the autumn leaves. But life rarely goes as planned.

I was greeted at my parents home by an ambulance. It’s all a blur, but I saw my dad helplessly laying in the back of the ambulance on a stretcher. “No, ” I screamed in my head! “This can’t be happening on our special day together and especially on his birthday!!” I spent the next 11 hours in two emergency rooms watching test after test be taken on my dad.  He was in a lot of pain and delusional for they majority of the time. I sat by his side, feeling completely helpless. It’s too hard to explain what’s happening to my dad–his white blood count is up, his legs completely quit working, his blood pressure is very low, he’s had a lot of pain in his head and ear and the list goes on and on. He was finally admitted in ICU and as I write this, he remains hospitalized. Can I just say that it STINKS to watch parents in their elderly years! This is absolutely NO FUN!

As I’ve sat by his side over the past week, I’ve had a lot of time to ponder the great life of Robert Downs. Here’s a just a few things I love about this man:

1. Throughout his entire life, he’s ALWAYS been kind–even in the midst of trials and tribulation.

2. I’ve never seen my dad have a temper–he truly has always remained very calm.

3. When I turned 16, my first car was a stick-shift Toyota Corolla. Once when I started the car, I forgot to put the clutch down. The car went jerking forward though the automatic garage door making a huge hole through the door. My parents came running out of the house thinking there was an earthquake. When my dad saw me crying in the car, he gave me a hug and said “Remember that people are worth more than things. I’m glad you’re okay.” Truly words of wisdom to live by.

4. My curfew was always strictly at midnight. Once when I was driving home from a friend’s house at 12:06 a.m., I saw my dad pass by me on the other side of the street obviously out looking for me. When he arrived home, I was furious at him. I said “Don’t you trust me, Dad?” He calmly looked at me and said “I trust you but I don’t trust everyone else who’s out there.” More words of wisdom to live by.

5. My mother is the most important, most beautiful person in my dad’s life. Yesterday he called me by his bedside and said, “Do you know how much I love your Mother? Please promise you’ll always take care of her.” They have been holding hands non-stop for the past week.

Thursday night I ran to my parents home to collect some essentials for my mom so she could stay at the hospital. On my dad’s dresser was this photo:

There I am, Daddy’s little girl. A sweet peace came over me as I stared at this photo. I know everything will be okay. I have a strong belief that families are forever and that no matter what happens, I will see my dad again!

Please keep our family in your prayers. It truly is a hard time but we are still finding joy in the journey.

Thanks for being there for me!

Love, Lisa

P.S. I created the perfect matting around the photo with Perfect Layers. Although the photo is old around the edges and in it’s color, I was able to freshen it up with some layers. Perfect Layers is still one of my favorite tools ever. Also love the new designs from American Crafts Crate Paper line.