We Heart Mumford and Sons!!!

Dear Mumford and Sons,

We love you! Please come to Utah. That is all.

Love,
The Zito Sister's

These are a few of my (Erin's) favorite things----bearded men!

Bearded men.....I love them. I wouldn't say I necessarily love a long beard, but a nice trimmed beard is so lovely. But that's not exactly all this post is really about. It's about 2 bands that I have recently discovered that I love. My friend Emily is a DJ on KRCL Wednesday nights and she has introduced me to a whole new world of music. Wednesday night Emily, our friend Jake and I went to a concert here in SLC at Kilby Court. The Head and the Heart was the main band. They are amazing. And mostly bearded. (See pic below)

And one of the most amazing and passionate bands I have heard in a long time is Mumford and Sons (shown below). More beards.....love it! I LOVE their album. There is not a song on there I skip over---except for one that is explicit, but I love the edited version "Little Lion Man." Every time I hear this lovely band from the UK I want to do a little jig. Their songs are poetic and beautiful.

And last but not least.....I am going to see Thor tonight with some friends for the sheer fact that Thor ( Chris Hemsworth) is such a lovely, bearded man! Thanks to all you beardies out there! :)

Chopped my hair!

So, I did it. It was sort of on a whim. I had scheduled a hair trim with Parker and the day before decided I wanted to just chop it off. I chopped off somewhere between 9-10 inches. I have so much hair!

These are the pieces of hair Parker sectioned off to cut. He likes to call these my hair nuggets.

This is Parker and me after the cut. I love it. It feels so light and it is so nice to have short, soft hair. I love it! I think short hair suits my personality more, but my hair is much easier to hande when it's long since it's naturally curly and I can just put it in a pony tail or a side braid.  But I love it and Parker did and always does a great job!

41 years ago today...

These two crazy kids...

Tied the knot...

And they lived...

 (haha)

Happily ever after!

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!

Thank you for falling in love and being the best parents anyone could ask for!

(Sorry about the quality of some of these pictures. I had to scan them in and it didn't work out to well) :(

Mommie's for the Weekend!

This past weekend our brother and sister-in-law got to spend some time in sunny St. George for Lisel's pharmacy training. Lisel's parents and some of her brothers went down with them so we got to tend the kidies! My parents, Erin and I all took turns taking care of the kids. Our weekend consisted of going to the park, blowing bubbles, changing lots of poopy diapers (our mom did most of that bless her heart), waking up early in the morning, baths, Disney movies, Ammon rubbing his food all over his body and saying the word "no" a lot, Zach explaining scientific formulas and telling jokes, Lily talking about unicorns and princess', Caleb jumping on everyone and saying "What?!", Landon wrestling everyone and giving the bottom lip, and much more. It was so much fun! They wore us out but I enjoyed every minute of it! Their parents came home Sunday evening and while I think we were all a little relieved that one that they made it back safely, and two that life would be going back to normal It felt lonely without them. Luckily our other brother and sister-in-law were there for Sunday dinner and stayed a little longer so we could have some time with our other little ones which was very exciting especially since we got to see baby Max again! Yay! However after they left I had a bit of a breakdown. I'm not sure if it was due to lack of sleep or the fact that I missed them. Probably a bit of both but maybe more the latter :(

 I can't wait til we get to see all the little ones again! I'm so blessed to have each and everyone of them in my life. I am one lucky girl!

Warning: picture overload!!!!!!!

Smiles for Life, March 2011--Dominican Republic

I have been meaning to post this for weeks, but I am just getting to it. Exactly a month ago today, I left with a team of dentists, hygenists, assistants and volunteers across the country headed for the Dominican Republic. I have been fortunate to go 2 years in a row, and aside from my mission, both trips have been some of the most memorable, meaningful experiences in my life. My dear friend and Bishop, Greg Anderson, runs a non-profit organization called Smiles for Life. They raise money and send dentists down 3 times a year to do humanitarian dentistry. Esperanza International works with Smiles for Life and they are an amazing organization that gives micro loans to mainly women in the community. They are an incredible group and so much fun to work with. The associates of Esperanza are those who receive the dental work. It's a really great partnership! We did 4 days of clinics, 1 day of painting and fixing up a yard, and a day and a half of rest and relaxation at the end.

Esperanza picked us up from the airport.

We went shopping and to this lovely plaza in colonial Santo Domingo

This was the group awaiting dentistry at our first clinic

The team working

Playing with the kids

Emily and I hanging out with some kids

Santo Domingo temple

The restaurant we went to Sunday after church

I loved this Dominican Security worker. He was lovely!

Vicky Valle and me. Vicky and her  husband, David, started Esperanza Internation. She is amazing!

I worked with Dr. Gloria last year and assisted her this time as well. She is one of the Dominican dentists we work with.

Greggers! My favorite!

Al trying to pet a pig!

This was the whole team on the last day of clinics.

This is Kelaini teaching the guys how to dance

On Thursday we all went to paint some houses and build a long-drop for an associate of Esperanza and her family.
We had to take special trucks on a dirt road up a huge hill. It was really beautiful



Reaching the home of Yocimara and Juan



Checking out the houses to paint

Could these little guys be any cuter?

Painting!

These steller men built the long-drop!


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Sandra planting flowers!

More painting



Our resort we stayed in the last day and a half



Last night in the DR.


I had such an amazing experience and am so grateful for all the wonderful people I met and all the amazing experiences I had. I could post a million pictures and talk about it for hours, but I thought I'd rather let the pics do all the work.
If you would like to know more about Esperanza, you can visit http://www.esperanza.org/ and if you would like to know more about Smiles for Life, you can visit http://www.smilesforlife.org/.



This is my favorite pic, so I saved it for last. After our last day of clinic on Wednesday night we were all getting off the bus and just started jumping in the pool in our scrubs.  It was such a blast!