Moved

We moved to a new state.

I stopped posting a while ago

because of selling a house, packing, moving,

and doing a fixer upper while living in it.

I hope to return to this space to post adventures soon.

First Day. New Job.

As we prepare to move, I am more consistent 

about exercising before Sweetheart goes to work. 

The mornings during monsoon season bring clouds and cooler mornings.

 

On his first day of his new job, 

Sweetheart posed for a picture.

He has his pocket protector and a smile.

The sunset was beautiful and marked the end to a great day!

Blessing Outfit

Our nephew, The Great Bambino, will be making his appearance in December 2015.

Our boys wore the same blessing outfit that their Uncle Aaron was blessed.

Aaron and Rachel live in Mexico right now.

Yesterday I pulled out the blessing that these 3 shared. 

All of them have grown and can't wear this outfit any more.

The boys posed with their shared outfit.

Underfoot has grown.

He is tenderhearted, happy, and excited to live life.

He is curious about the stars and how things work.

This boy is now grown up.

He loves his family and is excited for a new cousin.

When he was blessed, he was too big for the outfit,

but we used rubber bands on the button holes in the back.

Hurricane was blessed 4 days after he was born.

Uncle Aaron drove from Idaho 

with Grandpa Kirky, Aunt Katie, and Uncle Shaun

for his baby blessing.

They did the trip in less than 72 hours.

We were thrilled to have them here!

And this boy has grown up.

He is curious, witty, and loving boy.

He continues to develop his personality.

 We are thankful for his hope and cheerfulness.

Our sons are growing up.

We loved when they were babies.

They are changing and developing every day. 

Their blessing outfit brought back sweet memories.

We know that Aaron and Rachel will make 

wonderful memories with their Great Bambino.

Pavers

We made an addition to our curb appeal. 

 See if you can tell the difference between the 2 photos.

This is when we bought our house over 7 years ago.

A LOT has changed in the front yard since this picture was taken.

This place has been a wonderful haven for us as a family.

 Here are the differences:

1. None of the original plants are in front. The tree on the right frozen to death. The tree in the front hit the roof and was planted on top of the sewer and water lines. The other plant was ugly.
2. Aloe, lantana, lavender, rosemary, and mesquite trees are in the front yard.
3. The mail box has moved 3 times.
4. The Prius wasn't ours when we moved here.
5. The red front door was painted later - not that you could see the original front door.
6. We have a double gate on the right side and a single gate on the left side.
7. The wall on the left side has been moved forward 20 feet or so.
8. The sidewalk goes around to the side gate.
9. A rock river is in place for water run off.
10. The house has been painted - the same color.

And the most recent addition is the pavers.

Sweetheart and I have been talking about doing this for 3+ years.

I wanted a steps as defined from door welcome. He wanted an extra parking spot.

We made a compromise and got what we wanted - 

a defined entrance to the house and an additional parking spot. 

The men who did the work came on a 107+ degree day.

A Loving Boy

 "God cares a lot more about who we are and who we are becoming than about who we once were."

~Dale G. Renlund

April 2015 

 Underfoot picked this flower for me. 

I love pansies. 

They are hardy and stick to it.

What a loving boy to bring Mom a flower! 

Tile Job

The tile job is going slow. 

Here is the bathroom. First room done.

The blue tape dots are the tiles that are dry.

We can walk on these (Note: There is no toilet.)

He worked really hard to take the tile from the front entry.

We wanted it all uniform.

Since I've been sick, 

Sweetheart is balancing 

work, boys, me, and the home improvement.

We've such a long way to go.

My job is to get better.

His job is overwhelming.

Motivation

We started removing the linoleum from our bathroom in preparation for tile. 

I enticed Underfoot and Hurricane by offering them 1 dollar if they scraped the floor clean.

Hurricane decided it was so much fun 

that he started removing the linoleum from the kitchen. 

We weren't planning to do the kitchen until 

after the bathroom was complete ... 

meaning that we'd removed everything and installed the new tile.

 

Hurricane has a way of motivating us.

Before and After Mirror

All the frames in our front room are black.

Except this frame was brown.

So I thought and thought about it

and decided to paint it black.

The frame now matches the rest in the room,

and the frames are seen in the mirror.

The Family

In our efforts to clean up and change rooms,

art work came down.

When Underfoot was about 3 years old,

he was painting, and I painted along side him.

This was the result.

It has hung in our library since then.

We took it down and it ripped badly.

So the clear solution was to take a picture to remember

and move on.

Here's to moving on and grateful this family is my favorite!

Home Improvement

We traded the rooms around. 

The Grandma Room (a.k.a. Guest Room) 

was moved to the end of the hall. 

This room used to be our library (a.k.a. office.)

We thought room could use some paint.

Here are some before shots.

We would see this quote every day at the end of our hallway.

We decided to keep the stripe down the middle.

The original stripe was the primer coat.

The original owner painted the greens but not the white.

After:

We kept the green but softened the color green.

This is the only "girly" room in the house.

The cast iron bed is one of my favorites from home.

The doll is an embroidered pillowcase from my great-Grandma Smith.

My Aunt Karol made it into a doll.

The rocking chair and little green frame were also embroidered by Grandma Smith.

She did the work in 1941.

The blessing dress is my Grandma Bodell's dress.

It hung next to her bed for as long as I could remember.

Lake Powell

Grandma came for a visit right after we returned from Cancun.

She came before the family went to Lake Powell.

 

She read to the boys and played with them.

While she did that, I painted bedrooms.

Her help was much needed.

Hurricane took her picture.

We drove to Lake Powell.

Our family shared a camper with T-Bone and Auntie M's family.

We each took a meal to cook.

In Flagstaff, I have a favorite thrift store.

Boys were given a gift by Grandma that they took with them.

Hurricane chose a ball. Underfoot chose a book.

We had a lot of fun but didn't take any pictures.

Fall Break: Color Changes

We came to Utah for fall break.

We arrived at Grandpa H's house.

Out the window of his house were these beautiful colors.

The pictures were taken early in the morning.

The sun is coming over the mountain.

One week later we returned to Emigration Canyon.

The colors changed a lot within one week.

 We sure enjoyed the cooler temperatures and the colors.

Bunsen Peak

Bunsen Peak is named after the same man 

who the Bunsen Burner was named.

 The trail is 2.1 miles long one way.

The ascent was hard with a 1,278 ft elevation change.

We trained to hike but weren't prepared for this.

Underfoot started to struggle once we got toward the top.

His Uncle Beck came by to offer to carry him to the top.

I asked him not to help Underfoot to the top 

because Underfoot needed to conquer the mountain on his own.

Hurricane started to cry as well. 

Since he was hiking with Dad, 

Sweetheart helped him get to the top.

He was glad to see his cousins at the top.

Once we reached the top,

Underfoot was SO PROUD of himself.

He kept saying that he made it.

I'm grateful to Uncle Beck to not help him.

Sweetheart was our rock.

He kept us going and was positive.

I was tired - physically and emotionally.

There was a lot of changes in the last 3 weeks.

Even with the excitement of the changes,

I was tired.

Our sons were blessed to have their Dad.

We made it to the top. 

Our descent was hard as well.

I had promised that I wouldn't carry our boys on any of the hikes.

Near the end, they needed to be carried a little.

The car was a welcome site.

We know we can do hard things.

Kinder Grad

Underfoot was promoted to the 1st grade. 

Principal G and Underfoot

 The elementary school held a graduation

 with each child's name being announced 

along with their hoped for future profession. 

 Hurricane thinks his tongue should be out in most pictures.

Underfoot had mentioned his future profession to us 

before it was announced, 

and we smiled and thought great.

Mrs. T, kindergarten teacher, and Underfoot

 Little did we know that

the teacher would say, 

"GJ wants to be a mechanical engineer, 

JL wants to be a mechanical engineer, 

Underfoot wants to be a ninja, 

MM wants to be a chemical engineer." 

Underfoot and Miss T, classroom helper

He explained later that a ninja is like a spy who does only good things.

I walked out of the school thinking, 

"oh boy, a ninja," 

and I turned to a friend and said, 

"He reminded us all that he is 6 

and it's awesome to be 6."

Joy School Hike

It had snowed.

For the 2nd time this year here. 

So for anyone that doesn't live here,

that is a really BIG deal.

Especially when we only get snow once a season.

We went on our hike for Joy School! It was quite successful. 

The schedule said to take them on a field trip to "discover."

I thought the wash was as good as place as any.

We heard the bell from school, barking dogs, and saw dog and/or coyote tracks. 

We saw roots, tracks, 

cactus fruit that had been eaten and frozen, 

and jumping cholla/teddy bear cactus.

We noticed a lot more things. 

We saw snow and ice and talked about the difference between them.

They did great!