My baby turned 2!!!!

I can't believe my little guy has turned 2. It seems like just yesterday we were so desperately trying to have another baby and feeling like I never would and now here we are celebrating his 2nd birthday. This little guy is the light of my life. He makes me smile and laugh on a daily basis. I love that he says "my mom" anytime we tease him about me being someone elses mom.

I love that he is full of joy and laughter. The pure joy he gets from sitting down with me and reading a book, or wrestling and being thrown on the bed by Travis.

He is always willing to help and wants so badly to be a "big boy". He LOVES his older brother and sister and wants to do whatever they do. One of his favorite things is to run around the house playing with them, they will hide and he finds them. Although I am not sure he knows this is what they are doing, lol!

We had one of our friends come over to have ice cream cake with us and he was loving it, he kept on saying "happy-day". Now, anytime he hears "birthday" mentioned he says "happy day" too cute.

I can't imagine my life without this little guy. He completes our family and reminds us of what is really important as he cares about nothing but being with his family! He is such a sweet little guy and everyone he meets instantly falls in love with him, as we all have.

Christmas 2008

First off, I need to say a HUGE thank you to my wonderful dad who bought and mailed me a new cord for my camera so I could finally upload these.

Here is the kids with our "rice krispie ornaments" we made to take over to Justin and Amy's house. They didn't look like they did in the book, but they were good.

Ally with a wierd look about to open her gift from Grandma and Grandpa Rowley. She made out like a bandit this year with a huge dollhouse complete with like 8 rooms of furniture. She loved it.

Gavin and Grady so patiently waiting for Grandpa to call out their name for their santa gift on Christmas Eve

Cayden trying to peek in his gift instead of just opening it, goof ball.

The little kids all lined up ready to eat on Christmas Eve

Cayden making fun of my one eye!! Little stinker. (Grady had scratched my cornea and I got to spend all day Christmas Eve in pain and with an eye patch, fun fun)

Our two musicians making their debut...

I just love this picture of Gavin...."I am so done with dinner, can we please get to the presents".....

Enough Already...

I have so patiently been waiting to make any post in the hopes that maybe the millionth time I tried to upload my pictures from Christmas it just might work. Well, I give up, I am posting with NO pictures.
We had a good Christmas, we were able to spend a few days in Az with all of our family. I have the most wonderful family ever and I am so grateful for them. That being said it does take some time to readjust once we are home. The readjustments go something like this; you mean I have to cook dinner tonight. Yes kids you have to go to bed, I know Mimi and Grandpa let you stay up late and watch movies and stuff but we are the parents and now you have to go to bed. NO MORE JUNK FOOD!!!! Do we really have to go to work tomorrow? Even though we had to adjust to real life again when we got back we are glad that we went.
Our time there consisted of Christmas Light drives, Cafe Rio, strawberry waffles Christmas morning, Christmas Eve at Grandma and Grandpa Rowleys, presents, excited children, tired children, games and good food.
Since we have been home it seems it has been really hard to get back on track, we still haven't set up the trampoline that Santa brought the kids. I got sick the day after we got home with a terrible head cold. Travis a few days later was SICK in bed for like 3 days and had a MOUTH FULL of canker sores for over a week (still fighting some of them). It has been crazy. We are all on the up hill now so knock on wood. Luckily the kids never got sick.
We also celebrated Grady's 2nd birthday on the 7th of January. He is SO much fun. He makes me laugh on a daily basis. I honestly don't know what I would do without this little man in my life. Lately he has been really attached to me and anytime I leave the room he says "my mom, my mom". It is so cute. He is growing up way too fast. He says EVERYTHING!! He will mimick everything you say and he has gotten really good at putting words together and forming short sentences. On the days he goes with me to the gym he is really loved by all. When it is time to leave we walk through the gym to the back door (where my car is parked) and he tells EVERYONE "bye". All of my co-workers love it, he also tells anyone working out "bye". It is the cutest thing ever. I love him sooooo much.
I was teaching Cayden how to make rice krispie treats tonight and asked him to grab me a paper towel from under the sink for something. He got them out and said "how come they are all wet?" Sure enough a nice leak. Our disposal has a random whole in it. UGH!! My dishwasher is TERRIBLE and doesn't work well, it doesn't drain water at all and doesn't dry, I have been washing the majority of my dishes by hand and now this. Oh well! Travis tried to put some super glue or something on the whole and see if that will work, if not looks like we get to buy a new disposal and washer. Oh the joys of owning a home, right?
That about sums the last month up, oh except some really neat things for my friend Lori who has breast cancer, but that will have to be saved for another post.

Pictures!!

I had to post this pictures because I thought it was so cute. We were trying to take a couple family pictures and this is her cropped from one of them. Such a poser!

Grady "helping" at our garage sell we had on Saturday
My handsome boy at our ward Christmas Party.

Ally and some friends singing karaoke at our ward partyMy sweet hubby and me

The family

This was so funny, we were having dinner and we look over at Grady and he had piled peas inside the bed of the toy truck and convertable car. Gotta love little boys

After we got our tree set up I told the kids I wanted a picture of them and the tree. So, they thought it neccessary to lay down below the tree to not block it at all. Goof balls! Oh, and what do you know Ally is posing again!

This was Gradys attempt at helping us with theChristmas Tree

Silly Boy

Christmas Spirit.....

I have REALLY struggled to get into the "Christmas Spirit" this year for reasons unknown. It could be that I am working and have had NO time to do anything Christmas thus far. It could be the lack of money to do anythng Christmas this year. Or it could be that I haven't tried very hard. I decided last night to attempt to try and get myself in the spirit of Christmas. I sat down with the kids last night and read them a story titled "The Giving Chest" it was a good little Christmas story about the gift of giving. It helped a little. The kids enjoyed the book so it was a success. Then today after work I met Travis and good ol Target to do our FIRST Christmas shopping this year. With money so tight, as it is for everyone, we really werent' doing a whole lot and it made it a little more meaningful to make sure the few things they were getting were "good". That also helped a little. I am starting to feel the Christmas Spirit. We have our ward party tonight and I am really hoping this will finish off the job of getting me excited for Christmas. I also hope to take goodies to some friends Monday night with the fam for FHE. What are some things you have done to get you and your family in the Christmas Spirit?

Spelling Bee....

So, my amazing 8 year old little boy made it into the school spelling bee. He won 1st place out of his class and is now headed to the school bee which is going to be between the 3rd, 4th and 5th graders. He just brought home THE LIST of words to study. Yikes! There are over 1150 words to study and let me tell you, they are NOT easy. A few examples:

*incriminate

*omnivorous

*bellicose

*obsequious

*ostentatious

*magnanimous

Yeah, he is in 3rd grade! Holy Cow.

We are so proud of him for making it regardless of how well he does in the big one. He is such a smart kid and always tries to do his best in everything he does. I never have problems with him and his homework or anything. He just comes home and gets it done. What a great kid!

Stomache Flu, UGH!!

We got home Sunday night from Az. and all was well, I was feeling good about that I had already done most of my laundry at my moms before we came home, the kids were in bed, I was busy making out my workout plan for the next morning (I was supposed to start teaching my new class MOn. morning). and Trav and I were just talking about "stuff". I went to bed thinking about all of my stuff to do the next day: work, get out christmas stuff for FHE, clean, grocery store, etc etc. Well instead I wake up around ten with a HORRIBLE stomache ache. About 1 am it started, the throw up, I won't go into details but it was not pretty. I spent all night on the family room floor. Needless to say Monday I was EXHAUSTED and still felt horrible. My friend, who watches Grady on Mondays and Wednesdays, came and got him and watched him for me anyways. HUGE!!! I was able to rest all day, which was so good since every time I got up I got sick again. Travis was amazing, cleaned the house, bathed the kids, played games with them, the whole deal. My good friend Rhonda knew that I was sick and was soooo thoughtful and brought dinner for the fam. I love good friends! I am feeling much better today. Now, I am just trying to build up my strength to go back to work tomorrow. I HATE the stomache flu and anytime I get it I remind myself I am so GRATEFUL that I will not be pregnant again, EVER, and that this flu only lasts a few short days and not months. Ha ha! Now lets just hope nobody else gets it.

Thanksgiving!!

We had a wonderful trip to Az for Thanksgiving. Lots of food, family and fun! The kids of course had a lot of fun with all of their cousins who were in town. This year Cayden was especially happy because my cousin JoJo and his family came into town and his cousins Calvin and Noah were there this year too. It was a treat for him since he is usually surrounded by girls, mostly! I always take my camera with me every where we go and then NEVER take it out for pictures. I don't know if I feel stupid busting out the camera while it is just random normal things going on or what my problem is but now I am regretting not taking more pictures. Here are the very few I took when we took the kids rappelling with my family. Well, they were supposed to post under this but they posted above, sorry. We had so much fun rappelling and I am so proud of Cayden and Ally, they both did it. If you have never been it is SO fun but scary to get over the edge and I am so glad they went and liked it so now we can make it a family activity. Emily has some more pics from rappelling so I will get those and upload them too.