Who has the most amazing brother-in-law? Me! I'm heading out of town this week and I (being the awesome person that I am) destroyed a rotor....so, Mike stepped in to save the day and get my car in safe driving condition. Can I just say that I love him??? (because I do).

Did I mention that it is 30 degrees outside right now? That's right. 30 degrees...and I am inside the nice, warm house blogging about his mad skills.
Thanks Mike!

Mikayla's baptism

My darling daughter turned 8 in October and decided that she wanted to be baptized. I had big plans to send out cute little invitations with her picture weeks in advance, but--well, life happened and we ran out the door at 7:30am the day before to take these pictures at the Mt. Timpanogos Temple. It was so cold, but Mikayla didn't complain as I dragged her around to get as many shots as I could of her in the white dress she was so excited to have :)

As you can see, we were lucky to have so many (many) friends and family members that were able to come and make the day special and memorable for her.

Grandma Cori and Papa Craig

Grandma Debbie, Great-Grandma and Grandpa Johansson

Hugs to you, my sweet little girl. I am so proud of you for striving to keep the commandments and live a Christlike life. It is such a privilege to be your mother.

Aubrey has been watching old home videos of Mikayla's dance recitals when she was 3 and just waiting for the day that she was old enough to start taking dance class. When September rolled around, I got her signed up and she was absolutely thrilled.....up until we got there. As you can see, her nerves got the best of her. Smile, Aubrey:

We sat together and watched the first class, but the following weeks she decided that she was going to "be brave" and just do it. Now she love, love, loves it. Her favorite part? Dancing with the scarves and blowing up a balloon with her class (below). The kids hold hands up close, then stretch out as far as they can. Miss Barbara choses a child to pick what color the balloon will be each time. As you can imagine with a class of 10 little girls, the "balloon" is always pink or purple. Not for my little Aubs, though. Her balloon was turquoise. Naturally. I just love that little bug.

Mikayla has done dance (loved it) and soccer (not so much), but over the summer she was really interested in tumbling, so I signed her up for a gymnastics class--and it turns out she's pretty good at it. Some of the pictures are blurry, because this not-always-prepared mom ended up using her phone to snap some shots.

The above picture is towards the end of a (very long) contest to see who could balance on the beam the longest while standing on their toes. I think the instructor had to finally call it a tie because Mikayla and the other girl could have gone forever!

I sat here in front of my computer contemplating a recap post--for about a second--before deciding to just pick up right where we are. So--this week began school for the girls! Mikayla and I had a girl's afternoon out to do some last minute shopping (because we still hadn't found the perfect backpack) and hanging out just the two of us. There was ice cream involved, too...(of course!)

Some shoes and accessories--and we were set.

Aubrey has been asking me every morning for the last two weeks if that day was the first day of preschool. Finally on Monday, the answer was yes! Here's my cute 3-year-old next to her cubby

...and next to all the daily charts. She did such a great job making new friends and following all the rules--I'm so proud :)

Mikayla started 2nd grade just this morning at our brand new school--Traverse Mountain Elementary (yay!). I had strict instructions not to make a big deal when she left with her friends to walk to school, so I did my best (but it was hard).

Isn't she beautiful? I'm the luckiest mom :)

Better late than never

Many thanks to my family for their support and encouragment--