Oh Dear...The Computer

So I have not been able to keep up with posting or reading everyone's blogs because our lovely computer decided to fry up on us. The problem we were having was that we've owned it for 1 1/2 years and the manufacturer's warranty was only for a year. BUT....luckily we bought it at Costco (I LOVE COSTCO!!!) and they extend the warranty for up to two years!! So we called the support number last night and they are having us send it in and they will look at it and could possibly send us a whole new computer!! That would be lovely, but that it is the best case scenario and with our luck that probably won't happen, but hey, it's worth a shot to at least see if they can fix it. So, that's our going ons lately and hope that everyone has a good Christmas and New Year's!!! Love ya everyone!

Decisions...Decisions...

So, I've already started to try and figure out some sort of "birth plan". With Chase and Logan I was induced and had an epidural. Pretty routine and uneventful. Well, I'm kind of deciding to change it up a bit. My goal is to try and let myself go in to spontaneous labor. The hard parts about that are 1) Ray is going to be in Salt Lake for HOSA competition March 18 & 19. I'm due the 19. That makes me a little nervous because he will be on a bus with the kids, he can't just drop whatever and drive himself down here. 2) My hips. I have some sort of issue with my hips when I'm pregnant so that they continually pop out and give me excruciating pain. But when this happens, I can't walk. My hips just drop out right underneath me. It's the worst at night and Ray will have to help me walk because it's just not possible on my own. This time around, it's started a lot earlier than with Chase, so we'll see how able I am to let myself go into labor.

The second thing I'm thinking about doing different is not getting an epidural, but some sort of narcotics through an IV. Before anybody gets up in arms about this, it's not that I don't LOVE the epidural. It's just that I react super easily to pain medication and an epidural is kind of tricky to not get too strong. With Logan it was too strong and resulted in a bad delivery process, but with Chase I had them give me a lighter dose and it was fabulous. So my thinking is, why not try something different and see if it works? I know I'll feel a lot more and it won't be so "numbing", but I want to try it and if I can't take it, then I can get an epidural. I don't know, just something I've thought about because my mom had the IV narcotics with 2 of us, and an epidural with one, and pretty much natural with another. She said that she enjoyed the IV thing so I want to give it a try.

I'm sure there are tons of opinions on this subject and just kind of curious what your thoughts are. I've talked to my doctor about it and he thinks that in my situation this would be a good alternative, but what do you think?

The Skeletons in My Closet....

Are these super cute little boys!!!

This is one of their new favorite play spots, eventhough they're not supposed to play there. The like to go in Chase's room and pull all of the blankets off of the shelf and climb up there. I couldn't resist taking a pictures of them together, they're just so stinkin' cute!!!

Other than that, we're just hanging out not doing much. I've kind of went in to this "hermit mode" and just hang out at home with the boys. Chase has been getting some molars in that he doesn't like too much and Logan is just crazy Logan. It's been though because he likes to "talk" to his baby sister and gets so excited to have her come out of my belly. He'll be such a good brother! But while on the topic of baby sister, we've come up with a few names that we like. What's your opinion? (Eventhough we'll still choose whatever name WE want! =) ) Here they are, and they are subject to change, they're just what we like at the moment:

Sydney Ann Miller

Kaylee Ann Miller

Rylee Ann Miller

Well, that about sums it up around here, hope you are all getting ready for the holidays and not forgetting about Thanksgiving!! (All the stores seem to have left this important holiday out and it makes me so sad.)

IT'S A GIRL!!

Can you believe it!! We're going to have a girl!! I am so excited that I just can't stop smiling! I mean don't get me wrong, I am a little nervous because this is uncharted territory for us, but it will be such a fun adventure! Ray is definitely the nervous one. The poor guy is terrified of taking care of a girl, but I know he'll be fantastic!!!! Here are a few shots from the ultrasound.

Her little girl parts, and yes, we had them check all possibilities for boy "things" to be hiding!

I just like this picture because of how good you can see her little legs and belly.

This is a profile picture. Her head is on the right and belly on the left.

19 1/2 Weeks!

So I have not kept up with regular monthly prego pics. I easily lose track of time and all I've been focusing on for prego time is that tomorrow is our ultrasound!!! Yeah!! I want to say that I'm ok with either boy or girl, but it's no secret that I want a girl. But then at the same time a boy would be ok also because all I have are boy things so a boy would just blend right into things. But, oh well what I want, the gender is already decided and I will love Yayhoo #3 no matter what!

(13 Weeks)

(19.5 Weeks)

A Boy and His Puppy

This is probably the best picture I have of her so far. It also captures Logan's excitement for his new best friend.

Our New Little Addition

Here is the newest little addition to our growing family... Shelby!

We have been wanting to get a dog for a little while but all of the dogs we looked at were in Northern Utah and we did not want to drive for that. But this last weekend my littlest brother, Trevor, had his mission farewell and we went to Idaho for it. (I am going to miss that kid like crazy!! But he will be a good missionary in Morteray, Mexico!!! Love you!!!) Anyways, we decided that since we would be traveling through that area we would pick up a dog. We found the cutest little puppy and decided to bring her home with us!!

Happy Birthday Logan!

Happy Birthday Logan!!
(Well, tomorrow officially.)

My crazy, energetic little boy is turning 3!! Even though his birthday is tomorrow, we semi-celebrated it yesterday with Kristi and Kathryn and their families with cake and ice cream. Logan has been waiting for this day for like the last 6 months and so we decided to try and make it special for him. How do we try and do that? Well, by making a cool tractor cake of course!! But the thing we neglected to remember, if we wanted a super cool tractor cake, we should have bought one from the store. This cake was a great deal of stress to me. I don't know why, but it was. All that matters is that Logan liked it and that I learned a lot from this experience. I have never made a themed cake like this before or anything so it was an adventure. It didn't turn out quite how I wanted it, but not too bad for a first attempt and Logan thought it was a big success. He gave me a huge hug and dramatically told me that he loved me, so it was totally worth it (even the trip to WalMart on a Sunday to get the needed supplies that I didn't think about the night before!)!!!

I love you you crazy kid!!! We have our moments where we butt heads, but I love playing and talking with you. You are a great big brother and I look forward to the many years of teaching you and seeing you grow! I love you!

Cat Food

Ray does not know that I am posting this and may or may not appreciate it, but I think it's pretty funny.

So, Ray went on his mission to the Philippines and would eat some pretty interesting things. Since we've been married he's made a few things for me to try and most of the time it's pretty tasty. But well, last night he decided to try something a little "different". I don't think this is actual authentic Filipino food, but more or less something the missionaries created on their own. The meal consists of: rice, corned beef, and banana ketchup (this is exactly what it sounds like). He starts the process by opening the corned beef and he starts to get grossed out just by that. He was very gracious to warn me that if my gag reflex was sensitive to not come near it, as he put it, it reminded him of cat food. He proceeds to cook it and put it on the rice and then puts the banana ketchup on it and says that that even smells not so great to him. But the trooper that he is, he still wanted to try it and I decided that this might be worth something to capture and remember. Here is the result!!

The Three Giants

So we have three HUGE pine trees on the corner of our property that I HATE HATE HATE (did I mention that I hate them!)!!!! Well, they put down a plethora of pine needles that cover everything in the front yard, they blow over the house and cover everything in the back yard, and cover our poor neighbor's yard also. This morning I got ambitious and decided, with Logan's help, to clean up the layers of needles on the corner under the trees. It was quite the project and still is not perfect, but it looks ten times better than before. Ideally, we want to take down the giants, but we'll have to see how that happens.

Ready or Not! Here He Comes!!

Chase is finally walking!!! He started walking before his birthday, but it was just a couple of steps here and there and with bribery. But tonight we were just sitting on the couch and he came walking out of the kitchen clear over to us!!! I didn't have the camera nearby to capture it the first time, but we got a shot of him walking a while. It's so fun!! But if I thought him and Logan got into trouble before, well, I think they will give me a run for my money now!

Vampire Maybe?

What do you do with a biter?? Chase is nonstop biting everything!! He crawls around with his mouth open and ready to attach to anything and everything he can. It can be the couch, blankets, remotes, toys, Logan, or me. We don't know how to deal with this because Logan never bit. Yesterday Chase bit Logan on the arm that left teeth marks all day (and bless Logan, he didn't retaliate at all!!). But today, I put Chase down for his nap and I could hear him making some odd noises so I went to see what he was doing and he chewing on his crib!!! He's leaving teeth marks behind and everything!! What do you do??



I don't know if you can really see the bite marks on the bed. I don't claim to be a photographer.




What do you do with a kid this cute?? Especially one that will go put his own diapers in the garbage! Love him to death!!

Life Right Now.....?

Well, so lately things have been kind of "off". It seems like that no matter how hard I hard try, things just will not work our right now. I'm sorry that my posts lately have just been about me complaining, but I want to keep things "real". I don't want to sugar coat my life. This is considered my journal, so I want to write things as they are, so..sorry that you have to deal with it.

Anyways, I'm tired of not feeling good. Things seem to only be getting worse, the further along I'm getting, well, the less I want to eat and the more tired I am. I just have to remind myself that it's nothing permanent, and the kids are worth it. I feel like such a pansy complaining about some nausea and tiredness. I have some friends that throw up nonstop or they are literally on their death bed just trying to survive through the day, but yet I can't seem to help feeling sorry for myself.

The other struggle, my baking. Or should I say the lack thereof. I have no desire to have any treats around my house, which is extremely unusual. The other day I attempted to actually make something, and I couldn't make it work. I tried 3 times!!! Talk about frustration and a blow to the self esteem. I consider myself a fairly good baker, so when I fail like that, it doesn't make me feel too great. So, if anyone has any recipes for Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls, I'm open to any new recipes. And yes, this is a very trivial thing to bother me, but well, it doesn't take much to get to me right now.

The next BIG struggle right now is that we can't seem to get our car fixed!!! It squirts antifreeze like you can't imagine. We took it to a mechanic and was supposedly fixed, but this morning it decided to overheat again and lose all of its antifreeze. Not happy. Not one bit. The problem is, we don't want to put too much money in this car because we need to get a bigger car that we can all fit in once the baby is born. What to do, what to do.

And the last thing I'll vent about is my kids. Not something I should probably complain about, but they are so difficult right now!! Don't get me wrong, I love them to death, but the complete lack of respect and obedience on Logan's part is no longer acceptable. The yelling, tantrums, ignorance....it is just out of control and I'm not quite sure how to go about handling it. Chase is also at the age where he is just into everything and not wanting to take naps like he should. It just feels like I've lost complete control of everything at the moment. I'm hoping for a better week and get a better hold of things.

Something that I wanted to do with this pregnancy is to take monthly pictures. My sis-in-law, Kristi, did this with her baby and it was fun to look at the growth. So, I'm starting my pictures at 3 months. There's just not much need to take any earlier, not a whole lot there. It was fun to see the pic though, I'm not as big as I feel!!! I looked at the picture and realized I don't too big. Whew, kind of a relief.




Well, all done here. Sorry again for the vent out, just feels good to get things out. I know it's nothing too major or big, but it's what's going on right now in our lives so it seems big. We'll survive, just need to remember to rely on my Heavenly Father and keep the faith that everything will work the way it i supposed to.

Chase's Birthday, and Mmmm...Cake!!

Chase had his first birthday this last week!! Wahoo!! He is now officially a big boy! It wasn't anything eventful or spectacular, but we had presents and some birthday cake a few days later.


But the cake!!! Oh my, it is quite the cake. My mother-in-law sent me an email with some recipes from a friend and there was this one for a Fudgy Raspberry Torte. I haven't been baking much (can't stomach much sweets lately) but I decided to give it a try. It's very good, but very rich and it makes a BIG, heavy cake!! Here's the recipe for it:

1 pkg. chocolate fudge or Devils food camke mix

1 1/3 C. water

3 eggs

1/3 c. vegetable oil

3/4 c. chocolate chips, divided

3/4 c. ground pecans (I left them out, not a nut fan)

1 1/2 c. cold milk

1 pkg. (3.9 oz) instant chocolate fudge or chocolate pudding mix

1/2 c. seedless raspberry jam (I just used the jam I already had with seeds and it was fine)

1 1/2 c. whipped topping

1/4 c. powder sugar

1/2 tsp almond flavoring

1/4 c. finely chopped pecans

Fresh raspberries

In mixing bowl, combine dry cake mix, water, eggs and oil; mix well. Add 1/4 c. chocolate chips and ground pecans; stir until combined. Pour into 3 greased and floured 9 in. round baking pans. Sprinkle remaining chocolate chips on top. Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks to cool completely. In a mixing bowl, beat milk and pudding mix on low speed for 2 minutes or until thickened. In a sauce pan melt jam. Brush over the top of each cake. Place one cake on a serving plate, spread with half of the pudding. Repeat layers. Top with third cake layer; spread top with whipped topping mixed with powdered sugar and almond flavoring. Sprinkle with chopped pecans. Garnish with raspberries. Store in the refrigerator. Yield: 12 servings.

*The recipes doesn't call for Oreos, but I add some crushed Oreos between the layers when you spread the pudding and then also all over the top and sides. I thought it added some good texture.

(The cake looks crooked here, and it very well could be crooked, but I'm pretty sure I had the camera at an angle. =) )

Question and Answer Time

These were some questions that a friend did on her blog and it looked like fun. Kind of makes ya stop and evaluated what kind of person you are. But oh well, I am who I am! Give it a try!

1. Do you cook every night? More often times than not. The meals are not fancy or anything extreme, but we eat everyday. Lately it's more of a struggle to fix something because nothing sounds too good.

2. What kind of laundry detergent do you use & why? Whatever smells good. Not too picky.

3. Do you do laundry every day or loads at a time? I try to do all the laundry once a week, but with Logan still trying to be potty trained, I have to do a few random loads throughout the week.

4. How often do you eat out per week? We don't eat out every week. We try to budget to eat out like once a month. Sometimes it's more than that, but not usually, too expensive and it's not very fun wrestling and fighting kids in the middle of a restaurant.

5. Where do you usually eat out? If it is a quicky, it's pretty much always Wendy's. But for a nice sit-down meal, it varies. We eat a pretty good variety.

6. What is your favorite retail store? I love Target clothes, but where WalMart is right down the street, I'm usually there. It's just so convenient and usually cheap.

7. What's your favorite thing to drink? Juice. We drink ALOT of juice at our house. We go back and forth between the Crystal Light juice and Koolaid. Right now I drink a lot of water too because of doctor's orders.

8. Do you take vitamins? What kind? Prenatal vitamins and that's it. Not a vitamin person. My kids are lucky if I even remember to give them to them.

9. What percentage of the household chores to you do? 99.7%

10. Do your children do chores? {Or will they, did they, etc} I wish!!! Logan is not exactly good at helping. We're working on getting the picking up toys part.

11. Do you go to church? Yes

12. Do you have a housework schedule? No really. Tuesdays are my laundry day and other than that, I just try to keep the house cleaned up. Before I go to bed I try to get all the toys picked up and things put away and the kitchen semi-cleaned. It feels much better in the morning if things are kind of clean.

13. Do you keep a working budget? Yes, being payed once a month requires a budget for us.

14. What do you do at night as a family? We eat dinner together and then just kind of relax together. Nothing too serious or anything. We like to take walks, but right now it's still kind of hot for that.

15. How do you prepare yourself for a new week? I don't. My philosophy is well, ready or not here it comes!!

16. What do your mornings look like? Nothing extreme. Wake up and get Ray's lunch ready and get him out the door. Then the kids wake up and and get Chase a bottle and Logan insists on having a cup of chocolate milk and then it's usually off to the gym. But in the process of converting to exercising in the evening.

17. What time do you get up in the mornings? My alarm goes off at 7 am for Ray, but I usually go back to sleep until Ray gets out of the shower.

18. What time do you go to bed at night? That depends. Right now I'm falling asleep on the couch about 9:30ish. But typically we don't go to bed til about 11.

19. How do you manage all of the paperwork that floods into your household? I try to keep it organized in a file box, but it mostly ends up in a pile on some drawers.

20. How do you keep your household organized? I don't know if I would go to the extent to say that it's organized. It's not a cluttered mess (I think) but everything does not have a proper "home". It works for us.

Stupid Hormones.

So pregnancy is nothing too bad for me. I don't really get sick or anything, but....THE HORMONES!!! I mean seriously, I can't even stand myself right now. I'm up, I'm down, I'm all around. Example: last night I got all mad at Ray and caused a stupid fight. Then this morning I'm feeling terrible for treating him like that so what do I do? I wait for him to come home and then I'm in a bad mood and treat him and the kids like dirt. I mean seriously??? What is wrong with me? This isn't just a mild case of mood swings, it's bad. I'm totally aware of how I'm acting, but I can't do a thing about it. Well, that's a lie. I do do something about it, I cry....alot.

I'm going crazy! I don't like the way I am right now and I don't want my boys and Ray to take the brunt of it. Hopefully something will level out some time soon. I'm just tired of feeling like the crazy one.

Sorry, to lay this out to everyone, but I just needed to vent. Most of you who read this are girls that have hormones and maybe know what I'm going through a little bit. Just please don't think I'm a mental basket case. I'm not normally like this, well, not this bad at least. I love my family and want the best for them. I hope they can put up with me til it goes away.

Could It Really Be.......

BABY #3!!!!

Yes! We are expecting again!!! As of right now we are due March 19, but so far I've had 3 different due dates from the doctor, so we'll see what happens. Here's the story on how the confusion started.

We decided that we were going to start trying for another baby thinking that it would take a few months because that's what happened with Chase. Well, after the first month went by and I hadn't started the day that I was supposed to, I took a pregnancy test and it came back negative. OK, not going to think too much about it. A few more days go by and still no period, so I take another test and it also comes back negative. Not it's kind of weird because I am an extremely "regular" person. So I kind of worry what's going on, me being my paranoid self and take a couple of more tests through out the week (I was so tired of peeing on a stick!). BUT.....after a week and a few days of being late, I got a positive test!!! It was a very light positive reading, but hey, it was two blue lines!!!

I call to make my doctor's appointment and he said that he wanted me to come in even though by that point I was only 6 weeks. I go in and they do an ultrasound to make sure the baby is where it is supposed to be and he asks if there was a chance that my dates were off because either my dates were off and I was actually only like 4 weeks along, OR another miscarriage! At first I said, "No, I'm very regular." But after thinking for a few seconds, I remembered how things were not regular with the tests and told him about it. We decided to do an HCG level test that day and another in a couple of days and the levels should double. Well, they didn't double, they only halved. The nurse said it wasn't a great sign that everything was ok, but it could mean anything so they had me come in the next week for another ultrasound to see if the baby had grown. At the time of the ultrasound, Ray was gone to Provo so I was a nervous wreck not having my support rock there with me. But when the nurse started the ultrasound, (I was not looking at the screen because I was convinced that I was miscarrying and didn't want to see it) she was like, "And there's the baby's heartbeat..." WHAT??? There's a heartbeat!!!?? Talk about unexpected news!! She laughed pretty hard at my reaction. So it looks like that I just ovulated differently this time and that I'm just not as far as long as I thought. We've done another ultrasound since then to make sure things are still ok and everything is great!!! What a relief!!

So, I am 10 1/2 weeks right now and doing good. I don't throw up, kind of just not possible for me. For some reason my body just doesn't ever throw up, not complaining, but sometimes I think that if I could just get rid of things I would feel better. But for the most part, I'm just tired and emotional. Poor Ray, I can get quite the mood swings and he has to deal with the brunt of it but he just takes it in stride. So, there's my story and sorry if it is a jumbled mess and doesn't make sense.

We're Back!!

Hello everyone! We are finally up and running again! Our computer is working again and we are finally back in town and settled down. There has been quite a bit that has went on, but I will try to keep it semi-short (yeah right, don't count on it. My posts are always long! =) )

To start off, I got new tile in the kitchen and my awesome pantry completed!! This was quite the project but totally worth it. We had to remove brick from inside the pantry so we could add in the door to have direct access from inside the house to the garage. And by the way, removing brick is not one of my favorite things to do! Anyways, after that was accomplished Ray and I set to work chiseling up the old tile in the kitchen and and scraping up linoleum in the laundry room. When it came to put down the new tile, Trevor (our handyman) came and helped. I am so pleased with the finished project! I couldn't ask for better. Now we are trying to decide on new countertop and then we will also paint the cabinets. I can't wait!



After that project, we went to Panguitch for Pioneer Day. We stayed at Ray's aunt's cabin with all of his family. It was a fun time, crowded, but fun. While we were there we went to the parade and it was quite the show. Afterwards, Logan got brave and wanted to ride one of the horses. There was a young boy that was completely willing to give the kids a ride. Logan and Kassi decided to ride together. I was so proud of him because he has been so scared of horses that he usually just runs away. Way to go big guy!!

(We stopped at Cedar Breaks on our way to Panguitch. It was an amazing view.)

After that, we came back to St. George and Ray had to turn around and head to Provo for a week for a class and then I was going to meet him in Provo and take the truck up to Idaho. I would hang out there and then he would meet me at my parents house and then go camping for a few days. Well, Monday, the day after Ray left, I came home to see water streaming from my ceiling! Not just an occasional drip, but constant streams of water coming from two vents in the kitchen and water all over the entire kitchen. Upon further investigation, there was water also steadily coming from the Logan's doorway and the entire hallway was completely saturated with water! Not the welcome home gift you usually want, especially not when your husband is out of town! So I call Ray and he tells me to turn off the water (duh...don't know why I didn't think of that in the first place) and then he told me to call his dad who was thankfully in town. So Dave, and once again Trevor (are you sensing a pattern that Trevor helps us out a lot?), with Linda and Kristi came to help clean up the mess. We got the Shop Vacs going to suck up the water and Trevor and Dave climbed up in the attack to see what was going on. What had happened was that the water line to our fridge runs in the attic and there was a joint connecting two pipes, well, one of the pipes came off the joint and so therefore, that equals water running from my ceiling. They pulled out all of the wet insulation and we set out fans everywhere to try and dry things out. Thankfully, the mess looked worse that what it actually was. The only problem now is that our house kind of smells pretty musty and unpleasant. Not quite sure how to fix that, but we'll figure something out. Needless to say, I was a little nervous to leave town the next day for a week and a half. But Trevor willingly said that he would check on things for us while we were gone.

(Logan had to help vacuum up the water with his sunglasses on. Pretty darn cute!!)

So after that, me and the boys made it safely and without any drama up to Idaho to my parents house. A few days later Ray met us up there and my brother Trevor also came up for the weekend (he's been working in Utah doing construction before his mission). We had family pictures taken on Sunday (my family does NOT do pictures) but they went so well and everyone cooperated so well. When we get them back, I will post some. But then on Wednesday we went out camping with my parents, Caleb my brother, and my Uncle Bruce with his family. We were totally excited to go because Ray and I hadn't been out to Sawmill Canyon since we were first married. I had forgotten how beautiful it was out there. I had also forgotten how stinkin' cold it gets out there!! Holy cow, we almost froze to death at night. It didn't help that it decided to have HUGE lightning and thunder storms most of the night accompanied but unreal amounts of rain. All of that is fine and dandy unless you are sleeping in a tent that leaks at the seams!!! We were able to manage it alright and we didn't get too wet, but the poor boys got pretty cold so on the second night they both ended up in our sleeping bag. We definitely stayed warm with four people sharing a bed. Other than that, we had a blast riding on the four wheeler and just hanging out. The boys loved all of the dirt and Logan enjoyed the freezing cold creek. But oh well, as long as he had fun. But after the first night of rain, we decided to try and move our tent to see if it would help with the rain-in-the-tent situation. Chase was asleep in his bed in the tent so we just put a blanket on his bed to help keep him asleep and we put him outside next to a tree while we moved things. Just as soon as we set his bed down, there was a loud crack and we look up and a tree was falling down coming right at us!!! I yell at Ray and try to move him (the tree was closest to him) and Chase at the same time but there just wasn't time to function. Thankfully, blessedly, the tree narrowly missed Ray and Chase. Talk about shaking you up a bit. I was just so thankful that nobody was hurt and the tree didn't hit anybody's trucks or trailers. The Lord was looking down on us that day.

(The tree is the one laying off to the side of the bed. Too close for comfort!!)

Well, we decided to load up the next day, we needed to head back to St. George because Ray starts school on Monday and we were tired of freezing. We made it back down to wonderful St. George without any problems and it feels so good to be back at my own house. It was a fun vacation, but a week and a half is a long time to be gone. Hopefully, things slow down here a little bit, I'm not cut out to deal with all of this drama. It's no wonder I have to many gray hairs!!!

Hey there everybody! Not that I'm good at posting anyways, but I won't be posting for quite a while. Our computer broke, again, and then we're also going to visit my parents in Idaho for a couple of weeks and they don't have Internet (yes, they still live in the dark ages). So, hope everyone's summer is going so good and we'll talk later!

Hiking Fun

So since this last weekend was Free Park Weekend, we decided to go with Kristi, Trevor, and precious little Emily to Zions National Park. I love that place! It has such an overwhelming beauty that I can just sit and stare at. I've only done the Emerald Pools hike before, so we tried a different one this time. We really wanted to something like Angels Landing, but we had the kids with us so a low key hike seemed the better choice. We ended up trying Watchman's.



The small plateau that you see right through the trees is where we hiked to. It was a beautiful view at the top.

It was a perfect hike to do with the kids. Logan did terrific on the way up, but by the time we started back down, he got tuckered out and only wanted mom to be carrying him. The problem with that was that I was already packing Chase on my back, and that is not a light load! But with Logan on the front of me, it actually kind of evened out my balance and we could cruise right along until my knee started giving my fits. But I am so proud of Logan for how well he did, that's a big hike for a little guy. It was about 3 miles round trip with some pretty good switch backs. Chase did good too, he just hung out on my back and slept, couldn't have been any better!


Trying to pack both boys! What a heavy load! Sad thing is, I almost weighed this much when I was pregnant! Ugh...



All of us eating lunch at the top.
Riding on the bus. Logan thought it was so cool!!!

After the hike Logan wanted to ride around the the shuttle buses. So we took a little ride around the park and he loved it! He loves watching the school buses drive past our house, so it just tickled him pink to be on a bus himself. After the bus, we wanted to take Logan through this incredible tunnel in the park. This tunnel goes right in to the mountain for about a mile and a half! It is kind of intimidating, but cool at the same time. Logan kept saying that we were like Thomas the Train going through the tunnel. All in all, it was a super fun day, tiring, but fun.

Summer Fun

So far our summer has been pretty relaxed and not a whole lot going on. A couple of weeks ago my mom, Audree, Chloee, and Grandma Gene all came down for a couple of days. It was a short visit, but it was a lot of fun!! I love watching Chloee and Logan play together. They do so good! But I think my favorite part was that Chase was nonstop smiling and Grandma Gene! All she had to was look in his general direction and he was all smiles!! It totally made Grandma's day!

Well, the week after they left, my dad woke up one morning and said that he missed Chase and Logan and he wanted to come visit. So the loaded up in the car and drove to St. George on a spur of the moment trip! We were excited to have them come visit. The first day they were here went swimming and the Rec Center while Ray was at work and then on Saturday we went fishing. The fishing wasn't all that great, but it was still a fun outing. It was a lot of fun having them here!

As far as the boys go, Chase is not officially crawling and literally in to everything! I am nonstop pulling out of some sort of trouble whether it be is playing with the cable box/VCR/DVD/playstation stuff or playing with the outlets (yes, I need to get the outlet protectors put in, I have them, just have to find them), or trying to playing the bathroom and suck on the toilet seat. He is aslo pulling himself up to low lying objects and stands in the stink bug position. He seriously went from hardly rolling over to all of the sudden moving around nonstop! I can hardly keep up with him.

And as for Logan, well, we're trying the potty training thing. He does just fine if I tell him every now and then to go potty, but if i leave it up to him to do it by himself...well, I have lots of laundry to keep up with now. He just doesn't care if he pees on himself and his underwear are all wet! I don't understand it! I'm just holding out hope that if we keep at it, it will eventually click in his little head what to do. He's a good kid, just not catching on to this yet.

Ray is finishing up his last week of his summer job and then I'm so excited to start tiling our kitchen, laundry room, and pantry. We have a lot of work for all of this to happen though. We have to put a door in the dining room so we access to the pantry that also leads to the garage, but I am so excited to have room to put things! I need this pantry terribly!!! The part I'm not looking forward to it choosing the tile. I know, that's backwards, but we're just not finding anything that we really like. But whatever we choose will be better than what's in there right now.

Well, that's about it around here. After the projects are done, I'll post some new pics.

The Great Outdoors

So we decided to go camping this last weekend before it keeps getting any hotter. We drove just outside of town to a place called Baker Reservoir. Ray had went fishing there a few weeks earlier and had good luck with it so we decided to take Logan there. But unfortunately, the wind was blowing terribly and the water was too choppy to get much accomplished but we still had a lot of fun. Logan's style of fishing was to "throw" or cast the line out then put the fishing pole down and to throw rocks in the water and yell at the fish, "Here fishy, fishy, fishy...Come eat the rocks!" It was pretty cute.

For our camping spot we did it wussy style and went to the paid camp ground site. It worked out good because it had good tent sites and a restroom close by. Logan's activity of choice was looking for lizards. There were just these little lizards running all over that would come sit on the lava rock to get warm and Logan thought it was way cool to chase after them and go for walks to look for them and then try to feed them rocks as well. We were able to have a fire and at first I was a little nervous as to how Logan would respond around it, but he was so good about it. He was very careful walking around it and never tried to play in it. Chase was a super good camper! He just smiled and played and slept the whole time. Part of why he was so good was because we found out at the doctor's that he has allergies, even though little kids his age aren't supposed to be able to get them. Anyways, the doc told us to give him Children's Zyrtec, but it does make him a little drowsy. So we gave that to him for the first time when we were camping and it made for a pleasant Chase.

(Getting ready to head home. Logan wanted to ride in the back so we rode there just through the campsite. )

(We call this Logan's clown picture. You can't really tell from this pic on the blog, but he has Doritos cheese all of his mouth and then a red punch mustache on top of it. He looked pretty goofy, but hey, we're camping right, that's what you do!)

(My boys relaxing by the fire and just having a good time.)

(Chase was having a great time. He loved being outside and scooting around in the dirt. He couldn't have been any better.)

All in all, we had a really fun trip and we hopefully want to be able to make a couple more trips this summer.