adventure's in picture taking....

My little brother bears!

my sweet Lauren!

My boys!

Oh Maddie- are you done taking pictures or what?!

you gotta love how Tristen buttoned his jacket- he said "I don't care if it is wrong", well ok then.

Thanksgiving pictures

Life...........

Well it has been quite some time since my last post and honestly I just have not been in the mood to do anything lately, sorry. Then my friend Taryn left me a message, "Where are you, how are you, why haven't you posted anything and where are the Christmas pictures?" So then I realized at some point I have to tackle this mountain I am standing in front of and go on with life. As of the last week in November, we are unemployed. Unemployed with 4 kids at Christmas is quite a life altering experience. At first when it happened, James and I knew we had to put our game faces on for the kids- this should be their funnest time of the year. But as Christmas draws closer and reality sets further into our minds- the game face is harder to continue. Life can really be a bear sometimes....
But I do want to thank our family members who have helped us out so much this month, words can not express--you all have blessed our lives immensely through your prayers, encouragement and selfless acts of giving-- I hope we can be there for you when you need it!
And despite this depressing post, which I apologize for, I do know that the Lord loves us and I have faith that this trial will be overcome and hopefully lead to better days ahead.

I have not been taking many pictures- but I will post some from when we went to look at lights, thanksgiving pictures, and our feeble attempt at getting four kids to 'pose' for family Christmas pictures (which was impossible- so I finally gave up and decided to just keep what I had taken, sometimes it is just not worth all of the fuss!)

Heaven Help us!

Well having just found out who won- and being completely physically ill-- all I have to say is, heaven help us and our children! How could America be so dumb and sell what our fore fathers fought and died for down the drain- unbelievable!!!!

A quick note..

I just wanted to say something quickly. There are alot of my friends and family that are going through hard times right now- health problems, addictions, financially, life altering diseases, pregnancy problems, and I am sure much more that I do not know about. I just want to let all of these people know that I love them, that you all are in my prayers, that Heavenly Father loves you and to find some sort of solace in the knowledge that some day we will all be together and we will be made whole and be free of the trials, worries and tragedies of this life to live in peace and happiness with all of our loved ones in heaven. Please know also that I am here for anybody who needs my help or just needs an understanding ear or a shoulder to cry on. I LOVE YOU GUYS!!

Ethan's blessing

We had Ethan's blessing today and it was beautiful! Unfortunately I was unable to get the kind of pictures I wanted- before we had to change the outfit due to a diaper leak and nobody wanted to cooperate, but he is still cute anyways!

Just random pictures

Here are just some random pictures from the last month-- Ethan's first OU game with his Daddy, Maddie- well Maddie being Maddie, my sweet snuggle bug Ethan sleeping, kool aid face Lauren, Tristen doing his (what I call)
super cheesy grin, and the best of all-- what Maddie likes to do to her Dad while he plays playstation. When I walked in and saw that I just had to grab the camera!!! Oh yeah- you have to excuse the naked picture of Ethan- but I had to get one of him in his diaper playing the so big game with Daddy!

HALLOWEEN!

Halloween this year was chaotic, and despite doing all I could to get Maddie to not have a bad, fit throwing day- it still happened, just like last year. She was good only when she was getting exactly what she wanted but when you said no- that was it. So I came home exhausted, stressed, etc.., but my kids had fun aparently so that was good. We started the night at the Johnstons with root beer and pizza, with about 7 other families (with more who trickled in when the actual trick or treating started). There were to many kids to count! Everybody tried to stay together, but there was so many families, with kids running everywhere it ended up impossible. After trick or treating in their neighborhood we came back and went to another really fun neighborhood by our house and trick or treated even longer with Christophers family the Munsons, so you can only imagine how much candy my kids have! I included pictures from that night and from the church trunk or treat party the previous weekend. I wish on camera you could see Maddies skirt, it has fiber optics on it, so the whole skirt lights up- it is really cool!! James went as Tom Hanks from Castaway and Tristen was trying all night to do crazy pirate faces- he never quite got =). The picture with Ethan and Eliza was on Halloween, all of a sudden I looked over at them in the corner and thought that the two of them just chillin in their car seats (they are about a month apart) looking at each other was cute!

The pumpkin patch

With everything going on at the hospital, we never got a chance to take all of the kids to the pumpkin patch this year=(, but I took Maddie on a windy, sunny day, and for some reason there was to much wind and to much sun because
I could not get her to look at the camera, she kept putting her hands on her ears. Silly girl...

James got so me free tickets to the circus from his work (Thanks Dr. Kirk) so I took Tristen, his best friend Christopher and Lauren to see it. We had lots of fun! But the kids were disappointed that they could not buy a bunch of food or memorabilia to take home. Well if any of you reading this have been to the circus lately or plan to go, be prepared for some sticker shock! Lemonade was 7.00, popcorn was 10.00, and cotton candy was 8.00- unbelievable!!!! I told the kids that they just needed to be thankful that they were able to go, their memories would have to come from what they saw!

Blogger problems....

Ok, I am having blogger problems! I can not figure out how to put the cute backgrounds on, everytime I do a new post it puts my pictures before the writing, even though I always do the writing first and I can not figure out how to order my posts - from the first post to the last for the month? I need a blogger tech to come to my house =)

Well with Pop in the hospital, we had family coming in and out of town so I took some pictures here and there. Here are some of those...........

November- ALREADY!!!

Well, I can not believe it is already November. It has been a long time since I have posted anything, but the last few months have been really tough. So honestly--I was not in the mood to post anything. But things are getting bearable so I figured I would give an update on what has been happenin with the Fountains.

The last part of September up until 2 weeks ago were spent in the hospital, praying for Poppa's (Larry Fountain, James dad) recovery. It was a very emotional, scary and trying time, but thanks to the love of our Heavenly Father and the gospel we weathered through. It TRULY is a miracle that he is still here with us, we went from the doctors telling us on Monday night that's it, say goodbye. To Tuesday morning a complete, unexplainable turn around. Well the doctors could not explain it, but we could.

We love our Poppa so much. He is one of the most amazing and inspiring men I have ever met! He is an amazing example of how we should be living the gospel, he has pure faith, performs pure charity and lives his life everyday living the gospel principles to the best of his ability. This was further renforced by the hundreds (if not more) of people praying for him and writing letters of how Pop had changed their life, and what an amazing man he was. He has given either his time, his money, property and support to countless individuals both members and non-members in this area. James and I are always amazed at how many people we meet that once they find out we are related to Larry Fountain, they are telling us all that he has done for them and what a wonderful person he is. I feel very fortunate to have him in my life and very blessed that he is still here with us. We love you Poppa!