Wish her luck!!

Sarah is really excited to audition for an upcoming kids show. As most of you know, she's pretty much an extrovert and is always happiest in the limelight! She heard about the auditions and immediately grabbed the phone, dialed the number and handed it over begging me to sign her up. I did. Tomorrow we'll drive into Dallas for a 2:30 audition. If things go well, she'll be invited back for a 2nd one. If not....we'll chalk it up to a neat experience. Jeni took these pics of Sarah for us to take. Isn't she pretty?!
Oh, I didn't forget to blog about Austin graduating....I'm just waiting on the pics to post! Thanks to all of you who suffered through the 2 1/2 hour graduation ceremony especially since the majority of you could have left after "H"!!! We love you. Congratulations, Austin and Jordan! Pics coming soon.

No Matter Where He Is.....

Austin had his senior pics taken a few days ago by Jeni :) and this was one that I thought spoke to all parents of teenagers! I think I may have to follow him around with a camera and catch some other random times/places that he texts. I'm thinking that maybe if I texted him I'd learn a lot more about him than what I know now! Jeni took a lot of great pics of Austin...now we just have to choose which one to put in the graduation announcements! How about a vote? I'll put a few of my favorites on the blog and you let me know which one you like the best.

Picture #1Picture #2

Picture #3

Birthdays, birthdays, & more birthdays!

April seems to be the happenin' month for our family (and the Hopewell's and the Bjorn's!). Austin turned the big 18 on the 20th, Bruce turns a bigger number tomorrow and Craig will be 22 on Monday! Wow...I have three adult children...isn't that wild?! So let's see....three birthdays in my family and a wedding anniversary; a birthday for L. Bruce on Tuesday; a birthday and an anniversary for Jessica & Svend. HAPPY BIRTHDAY/ANNIVERSARY TO ALL OF YOU!

Exciting news for the calendar: Austin will graduate on June 3 @ 7pm @ the University of North Texas in Denton Super Pit Coliseum. WOW!

Presenting Mr. & Mrs. Craig Tyler!

My heart is full!

Craig took out his own endowment today. Just saying the words brings me to tears of gratitude and joy. When he finally entered the Celestial room, I couldn't keep the tears at bay. They just flowed! I am grateful to the Lord for answering our prayers.

He especially answered them today as we seemed to literally be in a fight with the adversary to get to the temple. Here's a list of a few of the things he threw in our path: no power due to Tornados during the night, Craig's clothes were in the washer (again a no power situation); we went over to Grandma's to get ready and Craig brought the wrong shirt - it was Austin's that required cuff links!) remember how I remedied that at Austin's homecoming...well paper brads work wonders!; an accident on 635 caused us to have to reroute to get around it; Darlene (Katie's mom) forgot her temple recommend IN JAPAN!; Roxi & Grandma got there at 5 minutes to session time....believe it or not we all kept a smile on our faces and got through it. Then, as soon as we got out of the temple, we got a frantic phone message from Ashley that her delayed plane in Idaho caused her to miss her connection to Dallas in Salt Lake. The closest they could get her to Dallas today was to fly her into Austin. She's still not here. My friend, Sylvia, went to pick her up and they'll be pulling back into town around 2am! She missed the Horlacher/Tyler dinner tonight, but at least she'll be here before the wedding.

In spite of that, I find myself in awe at how much we've been blessed. I know that Heavenly Father hears our prayers and answers them. I know he doesn't always let things work out the way we think they should and yet He knows what we can handle and what will help us grow spiritually. I think we have to take a step back sometimes and recognize the hand of the Lord in our lives and also recognize the influence that Satan can have on us if we let our guard down. I'm so grateful to have been in the temple with my son today. I'm thrilled that tomorrow he's going to be sealed to Katie. It's all so overwhelming and wonderful!!

Senior Prom 2008 - An Evening in Paris (they wish!)

So, last night was Austin's senior prom. His date is a friend of Katie's that came into town a couple of days ago for the wedding. She didn't have a dress, so we went on a quest for the most modest and inexpensive formal we could find just 5 hours before prom. Meanwhile, Austin was washing the car, and anxiously waiting to find out what color the dress would be so that he could get a corsage for Kayleen. Well, we found a dress at Ross...it would do and the price was right. We rushed home so that Kayleen could get ready. It was already after 5pm and dinner reservations were for 7. Austin, of course, could be ready in 15 minutes. Girls, however, take A LOT longer!! I'm sure Austin thought it was worth the wait, though, because Kayleen looked gorgeous!

They went to Macaroni Grill for dinner and apparently got to color while they waited for their meal!! Can you tell which work of art is Austin's?

These were taken after "after-prom" at about 3:45am. They were supposed to stay until 5am and then go to breakfast, but they didn't have enough energy! I hear Jordan made it until 8am before he crashed!

Bridal Shower Fun!

My future daughter-in-law

Thanks to Roxi & Jeni we had a wonderful bridal shower for Katie. Even though we were few in number, it was a lot of fun and Katie was thrilled with all the great stuff she received for her pantry!! There were a few things I would've liked to add to my own (like all the cookie and brownie mixes)! My V.T. took a ton of pictures at the shower, but the one above is my favorite....doesn't Katie have GREAT fashion sense?!