Home

What a blessing it is to have your own home. Before March, I didn't realize how wonderful it was to have my own home with my husband coming home every night. Then Jeff went away to work... and then we spent the month of August "homeless" living with family. Now I give thanks everyday that we are together and that we have a place to call home.

Today we just stayed home and hung out. We kicked back and enjoyed being together. I took some time to sort through the four boxes of Carson's old clothes and determine what to keep for Jonas (since I know Grandma will supply him with some clothes of his own). I now have a sizable pile of little boy clothes in my hallway that are going to be divided into a DI pile and a pile to take to Kid-to-Kid and see if we can get any money.

Jeff has been an angel today and taken the boys and played with them. I love my children, but it was nice to be able to get some things done!

I spent a good part of my afternoon printing off new recipes I found online. I tried a new peanut butter cookie recipe and they turned out pretty good. It has NO flour in the recipe. Here it is...

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg

Mix and cook at 350 for 8 minutes.Seems like it might be a decent recipe for when I am teaching Home Ec...that is if I have 7th graders again.

Sorting through all of Carson's old clothes made me nostalgic and I looked up a picture of what Carson looked like at 4 months. I think he was bigger than Jonas is; Carson was pretty chunky until he learned how to crawl at 6 months. I still need to go do Jonas' 4 month well-baby so I know how big he is!

Carson

Jonas...its okay sweetie, bald is beautiful!

Floor Time

Jonas has been spending a lot of time playing on the floor. Here are some pics and a video. Excuse the background noise in the video...it was 2:30 and time for Curious George one of the few cartoons Carson watches.

New Apartment Part I

We've had our furniture here for a week and a half now and I am finally getting some rooms put together. Its been slow going with two little guys needing my attention during the day. Not to mention I am a super organizer and have been going through everything and clearing out the clutter. My new motto has been "Simplify". Everytime I've debated on whether or not to keep something because we might use it later I've just had to think "simplify" and off it would go to the DI pile. We've made two loads to the DI and I plan on a few more.

Our living room, dining room, and kitchen are all one open area. Here is the living room looking in from the dinning room.From the corner where the coat closet is....The boys bathroom. It is bigger than the bathroom we had in our old apartment! New rugs and shower curtain courtesy of my favorite store...Target!
Master bathroom. It is pretty compact so hard to get a good picture.

And I had to take a picture of my new Scentsy plug-in warmer that I have in my bathroom...love it! Carson's room...for now. We'll be moving Jonas in there in a few months so we've left one wall empty to make way for his crib. Oh how I wish I could paint those boring white walls!!!

Other corner in Carson's room. Yes I know the pictures are crooked...long story, but they'll be fixed soon. Curtain aren't hung yet because I need to make new ones. The window is much bigger than the last one.I'll post more pictures when the other rooms get done.

On a side note...our good friends' little boy, Peter, fell out of a shopping cart on Tuesday and fractured his skull. He is in the hospital. Any prayers on his behalf would be appreciated!!

My Little Cowboys

Tonight we went up to Park City for dinner with Grandpa Larry. A little explanation is required here....Larry is or was Jeff's step-dad. Larry was married to Jeff's mom, Leah, when she passed away and has since stayed active in our lives. He has remarried now to a wonderful woman, VJ, who treats us like her children.

While we were visiting tonight Carson asked Grandpa if he could ride Chico (the horse). Grandpa obliged and the boys spent most of the evening outside riding horses while us girls stayed inside and planned scrapbooking days. Here are my two handsome little cowboys! No, Jonas didn't ride the horse. I was standing behind him holding him up...do you think I'd let my 4 month old on a horse...no way!

Alex, Braydon, and Carson. I love the helmet, Alex!

Just a Note

So I've finally found some time to update the boys' blogs. Check them out! Now that we are settled and have the Internet I plan on having them updated more regularly. I've also noticed that a lot of you are checking our blog but not leaving comments....what's with the comment famine? We'd love to hear from you all!

Look how he's grown!!

During the past month of transition something happened....Jonas outgrew the newborn stage! While I lament that he no longer looks or acts like a newborn, I rejoice that he is developing so well! He will be 4 months on the 26th. I have no idea on height or weight, I still need to find a Pediatrician down here for his 4 month check up and immunizations...but he is getting chubby little thighs that are soooo cute. The other day I finally gave in and packed all the 0-3 clothes and brought out the 3-6. He is now sitting up so well and we have been putting him in the walker because he loves to be upright. As of late, Jonas has been acting like he wants food. I keep telling myself that he is still only 3 months old, but last night it was so obvious that he wanted something to eat. He stares at the food when we eat and acts like he wants to grab it. So Jeff gave in and fed him some mashed potatoes last night at dinner. He is almost 4 months old and that is when Carson started on solids. Here is a video of Jonas' reaction. He is crying because he wants more to eat. That is what he would do...start crying when he'd swallowed a bite because he was loving those taters and wanted more!





Here is a picture of Carson eating his mashed potatoes too. As you can tell from the background noise in the video he was quite jealous that Jonas was getting all the attention. He insisted I take a picture of him.

Moving Day

Last Saturday was moving day for us. We went back up to Idaho to load up all of our stuff. My step-dad was able to find us some trailers...a huge blessing as it saved us $450+ because we didn't have to rent a moving truck. What a busy day...loading furniture, driving 4 hours, unloading furniture, spending time with family...but an amazing day anyway. A big heroic thank you to everyone who put in soooo much time and effort. You know who you are and you know that we love and appreciate you. The hardest part of the day was watching all of our family leave. I wanted to cry and Carson did cry...because he wanted TyLee to come back and play with him. They get along great and had fun playing the whole day.

We are finally starting to get settled in and I'll post some pics soon of our new place.

Thoughts on Transition

I've thought a lot the past few days on transition. I am one who doesn't do well with change....a thing I know isn't healthy. I had a teacher in high school that once suggested Who Moved My Cheese? a book about how we need to be flexible and change with our circumstance. I still haven't read it...probably because I'd have to learn how to adapt to change if I did. Anyways, I am slowly adapting to living in an entirely new place. The first few days I was grumpy, sad, and so homesick. I DID NOT want to be here. I knew that my attitude was making it worse, but didn't really care. I kept comparing where I am to where I came from and it definitely wasn't helping me adjust.

Yesterday I decided to get up and get out of the apartment early. We went out to Jordan Landing and did some shopping for items we needed such as new shower curtains and garbage cans. I decided that it is just going to take some time to make friends and get involved in the community. I am looking for a preschool for Carson...hopefully we can make some friends that way. I am hoping we'll make a lot of friends in our ward and I am going to try to go to playgroup tomorrow...if I can find out where it is. Our biggest challenge now is not having any friends to go do things with. I know that Carson gets lonely during the day and we've been going up to Salt Lake to play with cousins in the afternoon. Carson is a lot like me and has a hard time with change. This was our conversation last night as we were driving home from Salt Lake:

Carson: Are we going home?
Me: Yes
Carson: Are we going to our new apartment?
Me: Yes
Carson: I don't love our new apartment.
Me: I'm sorry.
Carson: I just want to go home because I love our old apartment so very much.
Me: Our home in Rexburg?
Carson: Yes, Rexburg. I want to go home to Rexburg.

Yes, Carson, I want to go home to, but we can't and so all we can do is learn to change and get to know new people! Hopefully we can do it sooner than later!!

Girls Night

Friday night I hung out with two of my friends from high school....Molli and Cressa. We wanted to get together before I left for Utah . It was great to catch up on what we've been doing. Cressa has a little boy, Conner, who is 1 1/2 and has another baby due at the end of January. Molli is working at a counseling center in Blackfoot doing pysco-social rehabilitation with children.

We hung out at Molli's parents house-kick back to high school-and played Wii until about 11:40, when Cressa and I decided it was time to get our kids home--Molli called us old folks for leaving so "early"... motherhood definitely changes your opinion of a late night. Good times. Its always great to be able to get together with good friends and spend time reminiscing and having fun!

Weekend Over

Wow, its already Monday again....I mean Tuesday, but it feels like a Monday. Jeff is back in Salt Lake after a wonderful visit this weekend. I am here in Firth, taking care of my cranky baby... he's teething. Yes, already at 3 months. He is drooling, chewing, screaming, feverish...oh yeah, and has two big bumps on his gums. My kids tend to teeth early, fast, and furious. Carson had all of his teeth including his one year molars by his 1st birthday...looks like I'm in for that again. Oh well, best to get it done and over with.

Well, in another week we will finally be in our new apartment! I can hardly wait to be together again and to have my own home. The boys and I are finishing out this week in Idaho, then we will head down to Utah on Saturday. Monday night we get to check in to our apartment. We won't have any furniture because it will be the 13th before it arrives, but it'll be fun "camping out" until then. I've got the car packed with essentials like the air mattress and cooking utensils. The night of the 12th we are headed back up to Idaho to pack up all of our stuff and then on the 13th we'll be headed back down with it. We had to wait until the weekend so we would have some help. I know this week will go so fast, it always does when we are at Grandma's house and playing hard. Keep in touch everyone!