Two Desert Elves

Camille

Legs

OK, this will sound so weird, but one of the first things I remember about Camille was noticing how buff her calves were. She had a baby (Trevor) who was only few months old and she was already in such great shape. I told Troy to ask Birch if she worked out. I think I'm sounding creepier and creepier. However, the truth is that I am so impressed by Camille's drive to stay physically fit without seeming too obsessed about it.

Thoughtfulness

When I think of thoughtful and sincere people, Camille comes to my mind. In the few years that we have known each other, she has done many small and thoughtful gestures that have brightened my days. Her compliments are always sincere. I honestly have never heard Camille say an ill word about someone else and I think girls tend to be more catty towards one another, which makes me appreciate this characteristic even more.

Birch, Trevor, Haley and Camille

A Fun Mom

I admire the kind of mom that Camille is to Trevor and Haley. There is no question whether her family is the most important thing to her. Her little boy is 2 and 1/2 and I can just tell how much he enjoys being with her mom. Camille seems to have the right balance of fun and discipline. I will be asking her for advice once Saku gets little older.

Camille, I already miss having you as my visiting teacher because it was more like hanging out with a friend than just visiting teaching. I hope you will have a nice Christmas break and get to spend some quality time with Birch when he is off from school. I can just imagine how excited Trevor will be about presents:)

Janae

Opposites attract

Janae and I are VERY good friends; however, we are very different in many areas. Janae enjoys cleaning and I mean, really scrubbing it clean while I wish I could afford to hire a maid to clean my house. I love food and get excited about each of the three meals and never leave the house without a breakfast while Janae doesn't eat breakfast most of the time and is more of a snacker. Janae is the PARTY host while I rather show up to the party and not worry about entertaining everybody. When I was 4 months pregnant, I was the same size as Janae was at 9 months!

Favorite moments

My favorite moments are our random long chatting sessions. We might be coming home from a run or visiting teaching or I was supposed to "just stop by" and we talk some serious talk for a long time. There are have been many "this will not leave this car" topics and I feel blessed to have such a close friendship with her.

Janae, Kaelyn, Cache, Shaylee and Chad

Bring it!

Janae and I share a competitive drive. This is mostly manifested when we play Settlers of Catan. There are people who just play for fun, but Janae and I play to win. Unfortunately, neither of us has had an extremely successful "season" of settlers this fall.

Always ready to help out

I love the fact that Janae lives a block away from me and I know I can count on her help. It might be a question about parenting, a much needed cup of sugar, ride to church or pedialyte for a sick baby boy. No matter what it is, Janae is always willing to help out. She even offered to watch Saku when he was a newborn so I could sleep and she had three kids of her with Kaylen being only 6 weeks older than Saku.

Janae, I know we both want to get away from this neighborhood, but I truly love having you so close. I hope that we get to share many Christmas seasons together because a friend like you makes life more meaningful and of course, more fun!

Two Elves from the Land of Santa Claus

Hanne

Officially the longest friendship

Hanne and I go way back and I mean 24 years and counting back. We were born a week apart. Our dads are best friends. We were baptized on the same day. We were always in the same primary class, girl scouts and young women. Unfortunately, we missed each other's weddings because Hanne was on her mission when mine took place and Hanne's wedding took place in the middle of the semester so I wasn't able to travel to Finland for it.

Similarities

Both Hanne and I lost our moms. Hanne was only few years old and I was in my twenties. Now we are both raising our first sons. Our sons seem to share the lovely quality of wanting to spend time with their moms at night. Hanne and Joonatan named their son Matias, which was one of our favorite names. Lucky for them, Matias was born few months before Saku. ;)

Hanne, Joonatan ja Matias

The Old Fashioned Letters

Hanne served a mission in Russia. We exchanged letters while she was a missionary and I loved reading those letters as well as writing ones to her. Serving a mission in Russia is no vacation and Hanne did a fabulous job with the language as well as with the adjustment to a different type of life style. I believe that there are very few things in life that would be "too much to handle" for Hanne. I hope to acquire this ability and have more "endurance" like Hanne does.

Hanne, toivon etta Saku ja Matias saavat mahdollisuuden olla yhtä hyviä ystäviä kuin sinä ja minä. Sinun ystävyytesi on siunaus elämässäni vaikka emme näe usein.

Lotta

The Third Sister

Lotta and I didn't become good friends until few months before I moved to California. However, I instantly felt that she was more like a sister than just a friend. She was an older sister who always had good advice and wisdom to balance my emotionally charged opinions and actions.

What I want to learn from Lotta

Lotta does what she feels is the right thing to do for her and her family. This might sound simple or an obvious thing; however, it has always amazed how content she is with her life. I never heard Lotta worry about her looks or boys. Lotta got married when she was 18 and other people might say it was too young, but she knew it was the right thing to do. She has four children at home and one on the way and she handles her busy life so well. She doesn't seem to worry about things that aren't truly important. I wish I could spend more time with her and maybe learn this by osmosis.

Jope, Lotta, Jenni, Noora, Aino and Rame

Great Example

Lotta has had a strong testimony of the gospel throughout her life. Yet, she seemed to understand that some of us struggle with the temptations of the world and she never judged. Lotta seems to see the good in people and I am grateful for that.

Lotta Potta, en malta odottaa että saan jutella kanssasi Jouluna ja pitää pientä vauvaasi sylissä. Ihanaa joulun odotusta.

Two Beautiful and Smart Elves

Neha

First meeting

Neha and I met during our freshman year of high school at a track practice. We had the same spikes and ran the same distances.

Neha in two words

Loyal and talented. Neha was one of my first friends in California and I know I will be friends with her until we are too old to remember that we are friends:) She always remembers my birthdays, we exchange emails and phone calls on regular basis no matter where we are living. Once you are friends with Neha, you have a friend for life.

She is also extremely talented. She is attending medical school in Virginia, she cooks fabulous meals, she is athletic and we even shared some sweet pottery times in our ceramics class.

I love this family. Troy's mom and Neha's mom were cracking each other up at our wedding reception. They are a family of talkers and I absolutely love being in their home.

What I admire about Her

Neha is so driven. She had a dream to be a doctor and she is fulfilling it. It has taken her across the country and I know it is hard for her. However, she will be such a blessing to her future patients and I admire her sacrifice to achieve her dream.

Something Memorable

Neha got her belly button pierced during our sophomore year and I totally wanted to do it with her. My dad said "no" and I actually listened. Neha also has a sweet flat stomach to sport that belly button ring. Also Neha brought a cupcake to me when my boyfriend broke up with me and I was obviously so (the way high school girls are) devastated.

Merry Christmas, Neha. I love you.

Sara

What do I want to steal from her?

I want Sara's style. She makes looking classy and chic seem so easy and effortless. Even in this picture below, her hair looks sexy in the wind where mine would just look messy. In high school, I loved borrowing her clothes. Sara wore the dress from "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" to our senior prom. I wish I had a picture to show you.

An Unfortunate Event

My mom slammed the sliding door of our mini van on Sara's fingers. It looked like it hurt so bad and my mom felt so bad. Sara was nice enough to pretend that it wasn't so bad to decrease my mom's anxiety.

They got the "good looking" genes in their family.

What most people don't know

Sara makes life look easy. She graduated from college in three years. She is attending Berkeley Law, which alone says enough about this girl's brain capacity. She is beautiful and fun. When hard things happen to her, she has an amazing inner strength to get through the difficult times. I dare to say that much of her strength comes from her mother. And I know Sara will pass that strength onto her children one day.

Sara, I hope this year we will get to see each other. I am sure your holiday season will be full of love and laughter. I miss you.

It's About People

Christmas has always been an exciting time in our family. My parents were fabulous when it came to giving us just the right presents. We enjoy way too much delicious food, take time to reflect on the birth of Christ and spend time with our family. During Christmas time, everything slows down and we usually end up spending several days together inside the house. We eat leftovers of the Christmas meal and chocolates and don't really leave the house except to go on walks(when we had dogs) or enjoy the snow if there is any.

One of my favorite memories is the making of Christmas greetings to our friends. Many years, my mom would make something such as homemade candles, wreaths or baked goods and we would take these to our dear friends. I think one Christmas we ended up doing some caroling, which must have been slightly painful to our friends.

I would love to start this tradition in our home; however, I have procrastinated and many of my closest friends are far away. So each day of December will be a small Christmas greeting to my friends on my blog. I was supposed to start December 1st, but I was too busy with Christmas decorations so we are starting a day late. Maybe next year, I will record some Christmas caroling for you and post it here;)

Giving Thanks

This year I am grateful for

The ability to learn new things

(such as crafts, decorating and cooking)

And watching my baby boy learn new things every day

Having a home that is a place of safety for my family

Even when the house value has dropped and keeps dropping

Having food and enjoying with 100%

(while wishing that certain calories wouldn't count...after I eat three pieces of pie)

Silly moments that remind me to not take life too seriously

Is there anything better than laughing with your loved one?

My heart is also full of gratitude for having a husband who is supportive and loving, enjoying every day with a little boy who guarantees that life is full of wonder, knowledge of the the gospel of Jesus Christ, Troy's work so I can stay home, family that loves us, friends who make life's good times better and bad times more bearable and having a good health and strength to do the things I need to do and love to do.

I hope to teach Saku the importance of expressing gratitude to our families, friends and most importantly, to our Heavenly Father who has blessed us with everything that we have.

Five Months of Fun

Saku reached the all important five month milestone last week. Since there wasn't a doctor's appointment this time, there are no official numbers to share.

*Eyes are still blue

*Hair is blond and finally, there is more of it

*Size two diapers

*Very impatient with nursing

Saku's new tricks

*Rolling over ALL the time

*Eating rice cereal and whatever else mom and dad give him

*Sleeping on his tummy

*Usually wakes up once a night

*Loves to play "where is Saku" as we cover him with a blanket

*Loves (really really loves) his jumperoo

*Likes walks in his stroller and gets in a trance when the stroller is moving

*Likes to be thrown up in the air

*Likes it when mom and dad throw him between each other

*Graduated to a more solid poo, which makes dad want to vomit each time

*When he is tired, he seems to freak out when other people(besides mom and dad) hold him or even smile at him.

*Other times, he seems very social and loves giving smiles to strangers

*Loves "the Book of Mormon stories" song and clapping

Saku is very good at putting his pacifier into his mouth and loves playing with it. He also finds it hilarious when mom puts the pacifier in her mouth.

I prefer to run by myself; however, he does make an adorable running companion. Plus it is always an incentive to run faster when you have a screaming boy in the stroller. Fortunately, he likes the stroller most of the time because I don't want to run that fast all the time:)

We try to prevent him from watching TV by facing his jumperoo the other way. He is too smart for us and turns his head around.

Your Favorites

Since I gave my home country a small tribute. What are your favorite things about your country? For most of you, it will be about the U.S. I would love to know what are THE things about America that you love and cherish.