7 Years Ago Today . . .

. . .I married my best friend.

And more importantly, he's still my best friend.

Since our anniversary fell on a Sunday this year, we celebrated yesterday. One of my sisters offered to watch the kids for us. We had wanted to go to a movie and out to dinner, but after looking over our budget from the past month we decided to be a little more frugal. So after dropping the kids off we went and picked up a movie at Redbox and watched it at home. (You may think that doesn't sound like much fun, but a whole movie without kids in the house?? It was great!) We had a gift card from Christmas to the Olive Garden, so we went there and split a meal since neither of us were really that hungry. Somehow we still felt completely overstuffed when we left. It was nice to get 4 hours to ourselves and not be 9 months pregnant like last year. :)


Dan,
I know I'm probably going to have to tell you to read this since you don't often look at the blog, but I want to say I love you. Thank you for the love and support you've given me over the last 7 years. Our life hasn't been easy, but I'm so thankful to have you to share it with. Happy anniversary, Honey!
All my love,
Your Wife

Day of Family Fun!

On Memorial day we decided to declare it a "family fun day." We ended up choosing to go play mini golf, then over to the mall for lunch and browsing, and ended off the day with a barbecue at the home of our friends.

Matty had never been golfing before and was very excited to try. He lost interest around the 9th hole, but managed to keep going.

I have no idea what this face is about.

Matty hitting the ball...

. . . Dan searching for the ball.

As we were finishing we noticed a photo booth and decided to try to squeeze our family of four in for some pictures.
Such a fun day together!

Thankful Thursday

1. Honestly, I'm just thankful today's over. It was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day (anyone else love that book?) and I'm thoroughly relieved it's nearing an end. There were many tears and tantrums (and not all from the kids.) Maybe I'll move to Australia.

2. Jossy's singing. Whenever she hears any type of music, she starts singing along and swaying from side to side. It's the cutest thing!

3. Monday. We had a family fun day on Memorial Day since Dan had work off. I'm hoping to be able to share more about it soon.

4. Root beer floats. Not always a fan, but today was the right day for one.

5. Snickers. That was the major substance of my lunch today. Still, at least I got to eat! And it was YUUUUUMMY!!!!!

Supermom

You know what really creeps me out about this doll? Her smile. When I'm juggling a wiggly baby, a bag of groceries (actually it's more like 6), trying to keep my purse on my shoulder, looking at the caller ID on my phone to see if the call is really worth the risk of dropping everything, and carrying a mental list of all I need to do, I'm definitely NOT smiling. Is there something wrong with me? Or is this woman on some serious happy pills?

THIS one is a little more realistic, don't you think?
Though it's not totally real because her clothes still look clean and she hasn't dropped anything yet. Guess the doll makers still have some work to do.

Thankful Thursday

Having Matty fall asleep just after 7 PM.
Cost: $0

Having Jossy asleep just after 7 PM the same day because she missed a nap.
Cost: a cranky baby, but $0.

Having a nice quiet evening after dealing with hard kids all day:
PRICELESS!


Tuesday was not a good day at all in this household, but at least they went to bed fairly early. I love the quiet of evening and am thankful for every day that they go to bed early enough for me to enjoy it!

Life

I know I haven't been blogging much lately, and I even missed Thankful Thursday this week which is something I almost NEVER do. There are a lot of reasons for my absence, but a big reason is life is just busy, crazy and stressful and I can't always do everything I want to get done in a day which includes blogging. So I've given myself permission to be absent now and again if that's what my sanity needs. There are so many things I'd love to blog about, and I often start a post in my head. But by the time I try to get it down on the computer, I have either two kids crawling all over me begging for attention or I've got the two tornadoes down for bed and need to clean up their disaster areas so that they have a fresh clean slate to mess up the next day.

I can't catch up on all the posts I'd love to do, so here's just a quick glance of the past couple weeks:

Someone has improved greatly in her walking and can
now go 10-20 steps on her own easily.

Someone also likes to take advantage of Mommy on the computer and makes a mess however she can. (When I pulled out the camera to take this, she totally posed for me.) The shoe shelf has now been moved to the closet so I don't have to bend over and put them back 10 times a day.

Matty and his grandpa checkin' out the yard.
Even though she can totally walk on her own, Jossy still prefers a buddy.
I just had to show how I spend most of my day.
No wonder I don't get much done at home.
Good thing I love this little face so much.
Matty finally got a ride on Uncle Sean's 4 wheeler.
He LOVED it!!
Dan got to take a turn too. Kind of funny to see a guy
in a suit on that thing. (We'd just come from the temple.)

Here you can hear him having a good old time (as well as Jossy calling after him.)

Hope all that made up at least a little bit of my absence.

Oquirrh Mountain Temple

Today we got to go to an early open house for the Oquirrh Mountain Utah Temple. This was our third new temple we've toured in the past 18 months. (We also saw the Draper and Rexburg temples.) When I asked Matty what his favorite part of this temple was he said, "The rooms." Good answer. The temple is a lot like the Rexburg Idaho one. My dad said it's the same design with a few modifications.

One of my favorite things was the pattern and design in the windows and glass throughout the temple. On the windows to the outside, it looks like they have little star shapes in them. But when I looked at them for a minute, it really looked more like someone was peeking through curtains, spreading apart the folds with two little fingers. I liked that idea, that the temple was like peeking a little bit into heaven. I wish I had a picture to show what I mean, but I guess you'll just have to go to the public open house yourself. You can reserve tickets online now.

Thankful Thursday

1. Today. Today wasn't perfect, but parts were wonderful. I took the kids shopping with my mom, got an early morning nap, watched the kids play and laugh in the sprinkler, received some great news from a family member, got to see my niece dance in a recital, watched Matty's excitement over the recital, got to see Jossy clap for the first time, came home to a clean house thanks to my husband, and got to eat at a little bistro with some extended family. Busy but happy times! I'm thankful for the memories of today.

Matty loves to walk and dance with Jossy.

Her face was SOAKED and she didn't care at all!

My sweet niece has special needs so her mommy helped her stay standing, but she knew the routine all on her own! She got a little overwhelmed with the environment and didn't make it through the whole dance, but I was so impressed and proud of her!

These cousins are so sweet together. They're such great friends!

2 Little Monkeys. . .

. . . jumping on the couch.

Luckily no one fell off and bumped their head. . . this time.

I had washed the slipcovers today and while I was trying to get them back on, Jossy climbed up and discovered how fun it is to jump on the couch springs. Matty had to join her of course. I scolded for a moment then got the camera. I think I sent some mixed messages. :) It was just so cute to see them laughing together jumping like crazy on the couch, I couldn't help but take some pictures.
I love my little monkeys.

Eleven Months!

We're nearing the finish line of Jossy's first year!! To be honest, I'll be happy not to have to keep taking her picture with this koala every month since she no longer wants to hold still EVER!

Jossy's had many firsts this month including first steps, first tooth, and first word. When Dan leaves for work she loves to chase after him out the door. (I'm pretty sure she's trying to escape.) Then she gets so excited when her daddy comes home. Jossy is becoming a total morning person (which is a little annoying for a night owl like me) but she does NOT wake up so nicely from her naps. She's slept through the night a few times, but typically still wakes up once or twice. She loves to eat . . . as long as it comes from OUR plates and not HERS. Seriously, we can have the same thing as her and she'll refuse to eat her own but scarf down ours!! She loves to wave and can point at things she wants.

Jossy is still a ball of energy. She goes from one thing to the next and loves to take things apart. We call her Destructo-baby. She also loves to climb and get into things she shouldn't. She LOVES her big brother. If he's a ways away but within eye sight, she'll holler after him and try to get his attention. They love to have screaming matches (WHAT JOY!) and splash each other in the tub.

We definitely have our hands full with this little beauty! :)

Love It

I've taken way too many pictures lately and have gotten behind in blogging due to my computer constantly crashing. We've somehow been to the Tulip Festival FOUR times in the last 2 weeks (don't ask), so you can imagine how many millions of pictures I have that I'd love to share. Here are just a few quick faves:
So did you see it? Inside the red tulip? I didn't until Dan pointed it out to me when I was showing him all the pictures I took. The stamen looks JUST like a little ballerina with a tutu!! Isn't that amazing?! What luck!!

I have so many more I want to share!! I'm thinking I'm going to have to start a photography blog soon just so I have a place where I can share pictures I think are cool but not inundate this blog with them.