Vacationing at Zion's!

Last month we headed down to Zion National Park with our wonderful friends Stacie and Dan and their two kids. Taking vacations with friends is the best way to do this! Highly recommended for the future.

Here's a panoramic pic I took of the surrounding area!

Here's the rock I was talking about!

Killer squirrels that live at the park. They have huge signs around with a man's hand completely bit from a killer squirrel--freaked us all out! Don't feed them!

It really was beautiful down there!

We did it!

All the kids did really well! Some of the hikes were two or three hours and while they did complain a bit, overall they enjoyed the scenery and playing!

Cousin Time!

Archie's brother Logan and his family all came down this weekend for vacation! They stayed with us for 4 days! Fun times for little Gabe since he has no siblings :) It was a full calendar with the Dinosaur Museum, swimming pool, splash park, Discovery Museum, movies, and all around kid mayhem!

It's great for Gabe to see his family since Uncle Logan and Aunt Sarah and their four kids live in Oregon. Now they are headed off for more than two weeks worth of camping and dinosaur site exploring!

It was fast and furious but oh so fun!

Another July

With trying to finish of my medical transcriptionist  course I've been a bit busy and don't have a lot of time to blog so here's the long overdue update.

We had a great 4th of July with Ty and Cristi my bro. and sis-in-laws and their three kids along with a couple of their friends. We barbecued, played games, and ate lots of not so good things! Gabe had fun running around with his cousins and getting into good clean trouble! I just can't believe how big he is now. He's running all over the place and getting into everything! I wouldn't have it any other way.

He says "dada, mama, kitty" and other stuff too, but we have no idea what those are! Lots of just 'goo-ga-ga'! We love it.

He's still not a big eater, but he still loves his fruit, bread and peanut butter, oh and yogurt. He also loves eating whole apples too. I peel off the skin and he just dives on in! He's also going crazy with the utensils; he loves feeding himself yogurt and apple sauce. He's also pretty good with the fork and getting watermelon on it or his waffle pieces.

It's crazy cuz sometimes I think he'll have a really hard time with something and then he just proves me wrong and dives on in! Like I wasn't sure how he'd do with using utensils (obviously 18-month-olds aren't going to be able to use them all that efficiently), but I thought he'd be mad that I wasn't feeding him anymore. Nope! He loves it! Which is great for me since I don't need to sit there and feed him anymore!

Another funny thing...Gabe's hair. I just can't do a thing with it! I still think he's too young to sit down for a professional cut so I just trim what I can while he's in the tub...now he looks like Little Lord Fauntleroy...so cute, but grows out of control! It's so pretty, though.

We've also spent a ton of time visiting with friends and family over the last month. Almost every weekend has been spent somewhere or us having others over. Gabe has loved it! Gabe got to experience his first outside pool with my friend Autumn and her kids! He loved it.

This last weekend we set up our own outdoor pool and just sat out and soaked in the sun! We even got some of the neighbor kids to come over and enjoy.

It's been a great month and it's always so amazing to watch Gabe learn and grow. He loves books, or at least having Archie and I read them to him! He's got a few favorites. He also enjoys watching The Wiggles and Blue's Clues.

Let's see...Archie is also heading to Singapore next month for his work. He'll be training employees there for two or three weeks. I wish we could all go...

Still plugging through my online course and enjoying life!

Sunday Outing!

It was a really nice day yesterday so we decided to grill up some hamburgers and head outside for a picnic on a blanket with the Gabester! Archie created some delicious burgers and we had a nice time playing and talking! We found that Gabe is not a big fan of the prickly grass and so would only stay on the blanket...though, we did get him to at least pick a few blades of grass and then return them to their proper places! Very cute! We are all very excited for warmer weather and thus more opportunities for outside play.

Happy Birthday To Me!

I turned the big 2-9 on Friday. Pretty crazy. My first birthday as a mom, so that was fun! Little Boog helped celebrate all day long! I went to Target and got something for myself while the lights went out there for about five minutes! I was afraid looting would start to ensue if things didn't change...but alas, the lights came back and all was well with the world.

Archie got me a few books and....a Wii! We saved up and got it. They're finally available without waiting in long lines or getting up extremely early to buy them. It's kind of like all I'm going to get for the next five birthdays! So it's worth it. When Archie got home from work we headed out to Emmett's and Ethel's for some dinner! Super yummy. But they were all out of scones, so we got a milkshake instead!

Saturday my sister DeAnn agreed to babysit Gabe while Archie and I headed out to do some birthday celebrating! We watched the movie "Up" in 3-D! So good, I loved this movie! Then we got completely rained upon with hurricane winds and rain! The drains were overflowing there was so much water. The weather has been so crazy out here in Utah...lots of thunder storms...I hear an island volcano erupted and has thrown off our weather patterns. It was pretty fun to drive in...OK, I wasn't driving, but I had fun! We finally made it to the Cheesecake Factory! Such a yummy treat! I got shrimp and chicken pasta Jambalaya. Never had it before; it was good, but I probably won't get it again. Archie got his all-time favorite Cashew chicken and rice! We also got guacamole made-to-order! Super yummy and Archie got some buffalo wings. We went all out and got lots of food to take home, and of course, cheesecake for dessert! We shared Adam's Peanut Butter Cup! Super delicioso!
And we also got Gabe his blessing outfit! So cute! Then it was off to pick Gabe up and head for home! What a great birthday!

We also got him a new exercise play mat!

Wolfy also likes it very much!

Gabe does not enjoy his burp cloth on his head!

But Wolfy loves his new brother!

Memorial Day Weekend!

We all had a great weekend together! Friday my friend Ruth came up from St. George for the weekend and stopped on by! It was great to see her and her family since I haven't seen her since my wedding reception five and a half years ago!


Saturday we ventured out into the crappy weather for a bit of a stroller-hike and a picnic at the park! It was very windy!



Below is a 15 second video of Gabe getting wind in his face!!!

Saturday night we had a neighborhood kitty come around and ask for some food! My nickname for her is Sweetie! She's a very friendly kitty! I thought I'd share a couple of pics of her and my kitties!


The really did NOT like each other!! But she appreciated the food and then went on to sucker another bleeding heart like me to give her food!!

Then on Monday we headed up for our annual get-together with my extended family up in Centerville. We celebrated my grandma's 90th birthday!! She is getting up there in the age category!

It was a pretty long day for our little Gabe. There definitely was some crying sessions, but everyone just ate him up!

And we just switched formulas on him...and now he's a little stopped up...so we're taking him into the doctor to get him some stuff to take care of that and we may have to switch back to his expensive brand...GRRRR!

We enjoyed the day and hope everyone paused to remember those who have gone before us to help keep this wonderful country safe!

A Fun Weekend

Last weekend was so wonderful. My mother-in-law came down to meet her new grandson! She has seven of her own children so she's quite comfortable in childcare, which was a great help to Archie and I. She did night duty two nights in a row and on Saturday we were able to go out and eat and see a movie, even! It was wonderful to get out and feel human again! I'm so grateful Dianne was able to come up and help.

And the weekend before that my really awesome friend Catie from Oregon came down for the weekend to meet Gabe and to hang with us cool peeps!


This weekend Archie decided to take Friday off so here we are for a fun three-day weekend! Oh, the excitement never changes around here. So for our first night of the weekend Gabe decides to stay up til 1 in the morning! He's so thoughtful! hee hee! They say the colic should end by three to four months! So only one or two more to go (hopefully)!

Here are some more pics of precious Gabe!

Saturday Night Fun

OK, it wasn't really fun. I've been having some contractions at night over the last week or so and some cramping that has been really uncomfortable and painful. And last night it got progressively worse so off to the hospital we went at 1:30 in the morning or night, whichever. They monitored me and Gabe for about an hour and checked my cervix. Basically, they said that some women just get these kinds of contractions the last few weeks of their pregnancy that slowly move along the cervix, which means I'll probably have my baby early. I'm at a 2 right now. They said that most first-time moms don't get that "lucky," since they usually go late. So they filled me with some pain meds and told me to check with my doctor on Tuesday to see what else I can do to help with the horrible cramping accompanied by contractions. So I have lots of these fun nights to look forward to. And I'm officially at the point where if I do go into labor then they won't stop it! But, man, if I'm dying with these contractions and cramps now....I don't even want to think about actual labor ones....I'll be calling labor and delivery early to tell them to get the epidural and drugs ready for when I get there! I hate the pain!!!!!!!!!!! So I finally got to sleep by 4:30 this morning! What fun Saturday nights we have!!!!!!

Happy Anniversary: Five Years and Counting!

Archie and I had a wonderful anniversary this weekend, considering my large condition and the horrible snow storm we received here in lovely Utah! The first snow was about two months ago and then it warmed up and of course the weekend of our anniversary it snows!! Ain't that life for ya! We decided to keep it close to home since I was not in the mood for traveling too far. We headed up to Salt Lake and stayed at the Shilo Inn in downtown. Archie wanted to stay there since they have an elevator that looks outside. We tried it once and never again! It was really old and creaky and I have fear of heights anyway, so I really thought we were going to plunge to our deaths!

Saturday we headed over to the Leonardo Museum for the Body Worlds exhibit. It was amazing! I highly recommend it to anyone who has access to this exhibit. They use actual donated bodies that are plastinated!! Kind of creepy, but very informative. It's a bit hard to stand for long periods of time, but they had plenty of benches to help me recuperate! OK, it's not very romantic, but it was fun and we had lots of quality time together!!!!

Sunday my sister invited us to go to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas Concert!! That was amazing!!! We got to sit in on the "Music and the Spoken Word" and then the Christmas concert afterwards. President Monson and President Uchtdorf were also there in attendance and the feeling was so special and amazing! It was a great way to finish off our Anniversary weekend!

Sorry no pics from this year's outing due to no pics allowed at the museum and such. But I've added a few from previous years when we were able to get out a bit more!

This is from 2004, we went to Newport, OR and visited the Undersea Gardens and Ripley's Believe it or Not and Wax museums!

Us being goofy on Temple Square last year!

A beautiful pic of the Salt Lake City temple 2007.

2006 we were kind of in between Utah and Oregon so it was a pretty quick trip in Sandy. 2005 we went to Seattle and stayed in a nice hotel and ate at the top of the Space Needle!! That one was really fun too!