Our Crazy Little World

Brynlee turned one!

2012-02-02T14:54:00.000-08:00

My sweet niece turned one last week and we had a lot of fun celebrating! I can't believe it's been one year already. I remember so well sitting in the waiting room listening to cries. I remember driving to the hospital at 4am because I had to work that day. We love you Brynlee Jo, you've added so much joy to this family! Here are some photos from her week celebration!

Haircut

2012-01-30T08:00:00.000-08:00

Gage has great hair, and it grows super fast. I think he has had 20 haircuts already in his short almost 3 years. He also hates haircuts, he freaks out like a crazy person. I think the trimmer's buzzing scares him and lets face it Tyler and I are not professionals. We decided it was time for a "fun" haircut to break this fear. We dragged Kimberlee, Shirley & Krew along to help make it fun. Kimberlee loves getting her haircut so I was hoping Gage would want to be just like her. Well even with all the talking up we did about the fun place Gage walked in and wasn't having it. He didn't want anything to do with the place and I ended up sitting with him for the haircut. Once we started he did really well and even smiled a few times. After we were done I asked him if he wanted to do it again and he screamed NOOO! haha I think we might have a long haired child soon. Thankfully he looks so cute and his neckline is finally straight!

Thanks Shirley for snapping some memories!

Oh Pinterest

2012-01-24T11:43:00.000-08:00

I love me some pinterest and I have really got some great ideas from it lately. Sometimes it really gives me that boost to work out, or cook a new dinner, or try something new with my hair. Some of the pins I've been loving lately....

Huge motivation!

Source: healthyfitandtoned.tumblr.com via Amber on Pinterest

Going on week 3 for me!
Love this swimsuit for cancun!

and this outfit!
Source: reyswimear.3dcartstores.com via Amber on Pinterest

Source: polyvore.com via Amber on Pinterest

Source: iaminthearmytoo.blogspot.com via Amber on Pinterest

Next craft project

Source: iaminthearmytoo.blogspot.com via Amber on Pinterest

or a way for me to display my canvas.

Source: parenting.com via Amber on Pinterest

Fun stuff for Mr. Gage

Source: etsy.com via Amber on Pinterest

And some healthy, yummy recipes!

Source: skinnytaste.com via Amber on Pinterest

Words that make me smile...

Source: blondebirdie.com via Amber on Pinterest

Source: etsy.com via Amber on Pinterest

and hair that I drool over..

Source: wherethesidewalkbegins.blogspot.com via Amber on Pinterest

Oh I love you pinterest!

Update on little man & me!

2012-01-10T11:26:00.000-08:00

I feel likes it's been quite some time since I updated on Gage.

*He will be 3 next month and he's already so excited for it. We are also taking him to Disneyland next month to celebrate!!

*He's tall and skinny. He has a cute budha belly that we just love! I think he's gonna be just like his daddy!

* He's a huge snacker and an ok eater. He loves yogurt, grapes, crackers, fruit, fish sticks, sliced cheese (not cheese sticks) and did I mention yogurt. He just finally started liking chicken nuggets, crazy huh.

*He will not play by himself. Thank goodness for the daycare kids or our lives would consist of cars and puzzles.

*A few of his favorite toys are his bike, his explorer, puzzles, his cars, tools, and the Ipad. He can play cut the rope like nobodys business, haha! He's never been the type to get attached to anything. Never had a blankie, never really did the binkie, no bottle attachment, he's never really liked stuffed animals. I think this is a good thing. Sometimes though I wish there was a toy I could threaten to take away and he would care. :)

* He loves to whine, oh and how we love it. If things are not going his way it's not gonna be pretty. He can throw a fit with the best of them, but what 2-3 year old doesn't?

*He's a smarty and loves to learn. He can count to 15, can recognize a lot of letters, knows most shapes, and talks like a 10 year old.

* He is really shy with adults and takes quite some time to warm up to people.

* He has been completely potty trained since October. He loves to go potty in public and hates when we help him. I can only really count his accidents on one hand! He did so good!

*He talks a lot about a brother or sister, and I agree he needs a buddy.

*He's a great sleeper and still takes a good 2 hour nap a day.

* He loves to play rough and loves when his daddy is home!

*He can be so OCD about things. He has to have two night lights on, blanket and pillow in certain spots, toys put in certain spots. I pretty sure this is just a toddlers way of doing things but it can be so frustrating.

* He's the best thing that has ever happened to me, We love him so so much!

As for me and my issues, I would say they're 90% gone! I've been working out and getting my act back together and I think that has helped tons. My fingers and toes are not tingly anymore. My weakness is very subtle. When I do run my feet tingle and when I put my arms above my head they tingle too. I was told it could take 6+ months to go away and could have lifelong damage. Good news though is I'm feeling so much better, I feel like my old self again and I'm happy again! Woohoo! Thanks for everyones concerns with everything, It really meant a lot to see so many of you care. All I can say is thank goodness for insurance cause two MRI's and a spinal tap with insurance was $$$. I would run to Mexico if we didn't have it.

What not to be

2012-01-03T08:24:00.000-08:00

As I sit and watch my soon to be 3 year old cruise around the house on his new bike, it makes me a little sad. I love that everyday he does and learns something new. I love that he has his own fun personality that cracks us up daily. I love that he tries to do everything by himself and wants to "help." I love him so much that it scares me.

I worry probably too much about how Gage will be when he grows up. This fear possibly stems from my junior high and high schools years. Do not get me wrong I had it great, I was a cheerleader, I had lots of friends, and had a very loving supportive family. I had difficulties with "guys" and my weight all throughout these years. I was called fat numerous times, mostly after a boy would break up with me. I was so self conscious about my weight and my boobs I would wear gurdles, & two bras. I thank god everyday for sending my best friend Tyler to come in and sweep me off my feet. It really is true, he puts certain people in your life for certain reasons. Looking back I now have enough knowledge to know that these "guys" were unhappy with their own lives. That doing that to me would only help them, and sadly I think it did. Now in my life I'm truly blessed with an amazing family, a healthy incredible boy, a husband that blows my mind, a beautiful house, two awesome jobs, and love! {I say "men" because in reality they're not even close}. These "men" are living exactly as they were in high school. Alone, broke, needy, rude, & pathetic, are a few words that come to my mind. From what I can see they're still degrading people and haven't changed a bit. I look back and think thank you Karma. I truly believe if you bully in any sort of way it will come back and bite you in the ass.

So you ask why am I posting this? What's my point? Well maybe this post will get to someone who is struggling. Do I think this will change any form of bullies and the way they think? no. I'm mainly posting this with the goal to raise Gage to be exactly like his dad. You can really tell the real men from the boys by the way they act. You would never catch Tyler making fun of someone. You would never catch him belittling a women. You would never catch him making jokes at others expense. Gage will grow up to have respect, he will be taught to help, and to love.

Whoever is reading this we all need to stop encouraging bullies. We need to put them in their place. Thankfully I was able to move on because of many things. I still struggle with weight more then I should. I blame that mainly on these experiences. Start thinking if you've used the word fat towards someone else recently, I know I haven't.

New Years

2012-01-02T08:48:00.000-08:00

We celebrated New Years with our great friends, and had a great night. In my mind Gage just isn't old enough for New Years Festivities, maybe next year.

My New Year Resolutions for this year are... {and remember I'm goal obsessed so I'm betting you these will be accomplished}

**Continue always putting my family first. Their happiness comes before mine and be the best dang mom & wifey out there.

**Get our house on the Market this May and do everything in my power to sale it! I've been dreaming of walk in closets!

**Get pregnant sometime this year. :) I'm not telling when though, and you know I have it planned.

**Kick major arse in my new weight loss competition http://www.pushitgoodchallenge.blogspot.com/. My plan is to shed 10lbs in the competition and the other 5 before our big trip in May.

** Stop over-analyzing everything I see or hear. To Realize that sometimes I just care way too dang much.

** Not to work so much and put the more important things first.

So there you have it, pretty doable right? Well the house one scares me but this is our year, I can feel it! We deserve it! Happy New Year All!

2011 Year in Review

2011-12-30T07:44:00.000-08:00

My sister's cute New Years card this year gave me this idea, so here you have it!

January

We welcomed our new niece & cousin Brynlee Jo.

I received a daycare Grant of $1200.00

Tyler started Paramedic school.

February

We welcomed two new fish to our family, Ketchup & Mustard. They passed away in March though. ;)

We took Gage bowling for the first time, and he loved it.

Gage turned 2 and had a big pirate birthday bash.

March

We attended Brynlee's Blessing.

I celebrated my 1 year anniversary with photography.

We took Gage to Vegas for the first time, with his aunties & cousins.

Celebrated Shirley's 30th Birthday.

April

We celebrated Easter & went to five mile pass again.

Enjoyed the warmer weather and spent tones of time outside.

May

Celebrated Mothers Day, I got very spoiled.

Uncle Zach and Aunt Monica got married and Gage was the ring bearer.

Gage knows his colors and counts to 12.

June

We celebrated our 4 year anniversary.

Gage went to Lagoon and we celebrated Fathers Day.

Amber did her first dirty girl run and became addicted.

July

Enjoyed the summer heat and spent many days outside in the water.

Celebrated the 4th of July, Gage loved the parade.

We celebrated Tyler's 25th Birthday

August

We went to Sturgis for the first time and had so much fun.

Gage converted into his big boy bed and did so good!

I died my hair dark!

Tyler graduates Paramedic school with flying colors.

September

We took Gage to Vegas once again. This time with my parents & Alisha & Carlos.

Went to the fair and Gage rode his first pony.

Midvale Fire becomes Unified Fire.

October

We celebrated my 26th birthday.

Gage is now potty trained completely.

Celebrated Halloween with tons of activities.

My tingling/weakness begins.

We lost Tyler's grandpa on Sunday Oct 30th.

November

Yo Gabba Gabba & Disney on Ice

Celebrated my moms birthday & Thanksgiving

December

Celebrate Christmas

Attend a lot of parties.

Finish having a great year!

Christmas Post Overload

2011-12-29T09:09:00.000-08:00

We celebrated before Christmas with my families Christmas Party. The kids loved going up front and singing and holding the Santa signs. Gage has been in this super shy faze but as soon as Kimberlee does something he has to do it.

He was all about Santa this go around. He ran up to him and jumped on his lap. Told him he plays soccer with his dad, told him he wanted a truck, water gun, and a bike. We were super proud of him!

We decorated a gingerbread house for the first time. It was fun but we were terrible at it. The entire time the house was falling down, and we were mainly just eating the frosting. Gage loved it so that's all that matters!

We went to Zoo Lights. We weren't thinking and decided to go the day before Christmas Eve, yes big mistake. Everyone and their dog was there and it was freezing! We bundled up the kids so that was good but the crowds made it a bummer. Next year we will go way earlier in the month, lesson learned.

I had to post this photo of Tyler in his jammies, isn't he the cutest. Haha, he is going to kill me! ;)

Christmas Eve morning we headed over to my moms for a breakfast. We had some great food, and had a lot of fun with the family. We all opened up our Christmas eve jammies, and had a pretty sweet dance party.

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

That afternoon we went to a movie, just the 3 of us. Gage loves the movies and does so good during them. We went and saw Aurthur's Christmas, it was a cute one. A movie on Christmas Eve is a tradition we love!

We then we went over to Tyler's Grandparents house for Christmas eve dinner. We all got very spoiled and had a lot of good laughs.

We got home and put out the cookies and chocolate milk for Santa, along with a picture Gage made for him.

Here is a little video of Gage Christmas morning.

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

He loved his blue truck and talked about it all day, he wasn't even interested in opening the presents under the tree. We did Christmas with our little family then headed off to my parents house.

This Christmas I stayed in my pajamas the entire day, best decision yet. My parents spoiled us like crazy and the kids had so much fun! Gage's favorites from my parents was the air hockey game, the toy story helicopter, and the easy bake oven. (Ok ok that was my favorite).My sisters and brother in laws spoiled us as well, so thankful for my amazing family!

Love us!

After a very yummy breakfast we headed over to Grandma & Grandpa C. Gage was all excited to be the center of attention and he got spoiled for the 4th time. He loves his slippers, remote control car, and his Harley jacket! We got some much needed pots & pans, and enjoyed some lazy time with the family. Thanks Julie & Kurt we love you guys.

When we got home we went right outside to test out the new stuff. Gage has really picked up on the bike but will not ride his new jeep in the road. ;) We are so thankful this Christmas for time with our families and for being together! I hope everyone had a great Christmas as well!

I just love December

2011-12-12T13:00:00.000-08:00

This month has already been super busy and it's only the 12th! I love December and the non-stop madness. Lets see if I can catch you all up. The beginning of the month I had my spinal tap, which wasn't as bad as I imagined. Afterwards I had to lay flat for 24 hours, that was the hard part! Thanks to my amazing family for taking care of me and daycare. So those two days we did a lot of this....

We took Gage to his first Hockey Game which he loved. We had great seats that were 5 rows away from the glass. After 2 quarters we decided to move back and let Gage move around. He loved when they fought and when they had music on the intercom. It was such a fun family night out.

We celebrated my parents birthdays. The only photo I managed to get was this one, haha.

We have been loving our elf on the shelf Chewy! Gage loves finding him and it makes our not so happy morning boy to a happy, funny morning boy.

We had a Christmas photo shoot #1.

We hung out with great friends!

We had Christmas photo shoot #2. This was with fotofly, and it was such a great idea. I didn't want to do mall photos because lets face it it's getting silly. Fotofly dresses up a parent as Santa so your little one will not be scared. How Genius huh? They had a real Santa there too if you wanted to use them or have your little one just sit on his lap. Gage wasn't feeling the real Santa so I'm super happy we did this.

We had a friends Christmas Party #1. We made some great food and treats, we crafted, did a gift exchange and stayed up talking till midnight. So so much fun, just what I needed.

I love how my wreath turned out, thank you Pinterest. Oh and just to clarify I've done like ten things from Pinterest. I'm not one of those pinning maniacs that never make or do a thing, I've gotten some great ideas.

We had our family Christmas Party #1. It's crazy watching our families grow and I love love Christmas parties. Gage had the best time with his second cousins, it was a lot of fun watching him!

Whew there you have it! In the next few weeks we have....

2 more family Christmas Parties

2 more friend Christmas Parties

Kimberlee's Christmas Recital

Zoo Lights

Gingerbread House Making

and Christmas!

Happy Holidays!

Family Photos

2011-12-07T07:16:00.000-08:00

So my cute Family ventured out into the freezing back in November for some recent pictures. We took my tripod, and 3 cute girls so make the kids smile. I thought the pictures would turn out terrible but was pretty surprised. We had to work fast because it was super cold. It's crazy how our family has grown, I just love us!

Thanksgiving

2011-11-30T07:46:00.000-08:00

Our Thanksgiving weekend started out with us turning on our Christmas lights! For sure one of my favorite parts about the Holidays, I just wish more people did them. When I was a kid I swear it was every other house. Now I feel like people have gotten too lazy and broke. Gage loves Christmas lights and comments on the "crazy" lights constantly as we drive down the street.

We also put up our Christmas decorations and our tree!

We celebrated Thanksgiving with Tyler's Mom and Kurt on last Sunday. It was nice not having 3 meals on one day! We were able to relax and not feel rushed. Gage is not the best eater so Thanksgiving was really not his thing, he'd much rather hang out under the table and play trucks.

I love this picture, I swear once Gage sees a camera the cheese comes out. I have a hard time getting him not to smile.

He insisted on using the nice glass cups! This gave me an anxiety attack all dinner!

On Thanksgiving we stayed in our pajamas till the afternoon. Watched the parade (which Gage loved) and enjoyed some family time. We headed over to my parents around 3 and had a fantastic dinner.

We made a super cute Santa movie for Gage which he loves! He has watched it numerous times since, so so fun!
Click HERE if you would like to watch it!

We then hung out and went through the black Friday ads. I didn't have anything I really wanted but went along with my sisters and mom! Walmart was just silly, it for sure made things way worse opening at 10. Surprinsgly Vanessa and Bradon did really well getting everything they wanted. Target at midnight was even worse, and they were only allowing 10-20 people in every 5 min. Next year I will sleep all night, wake up around 6 and get the leftovers. I did really well with online shopping, Gage is all done and he is going to love his Santa gifts!

Thanksgiving was perfect this year, not rushed, not crazy, just a great time with family enjoying each other! I love you all!

For an update on me, I go in for a spinal tap tomorrow morning. I will not have the results back till mid December! :( My tingling is the same but the weakness is still pretty bad. I'm trying to change my attitude towards all this, and realize that this might not go away for awhile. I need to start yoga or some form of mild exercise to get me back into moving. I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving Weekend, now bring on December Christmas Craziness! We are going to start elf on a shelf this year. Gage has already watched the show 5 billion times so I think he's going to love it!

My thankful post

2011-11-23T12:42:00.000-08:00

I've been feeling kinda down lately so maybe this will help give me that boost. I warn you these might get a little random.

First off I'm extremely thankful for my health & my families. Yes my health has been iffy lately but things could be so much worse.

I'm thankful for my family & friends, without them life would be boring and silly. They're my rocks & my world. You know who you are!

I'm thankful for our jobs, yes they aren't the highest paying ones out there but they get us by.

I'm thankful for our house, our cars, our gas (not Tyler's gas) our power, our water, and our food.

I'm thankful for my boys, even though snoop has been a stinker lately. I'm so thankful for the ability to have Gage & thankful for a uneventful pregnancy.

I'm thankful for the most amazing husband and best friend. Without him I lose me, and without me you have no blog to read.

I'm thankful that Gage still takes 3 hour naps, because without that I just might possibly go crazy. ;)

I'm thankful for money that lets us vacation often, again without vacations I just might go crazy!

I'm thankful for peace & quiet. Working with Children all day (which do not get me wrong I love) and photography on the evenings. My life gets a little loud.

I'm thankful for technology, without it I'm bored.

I'm thankful for my hair lady (Vanessa) my nail lady (Alisha) who keep me purty.

I'm thankful for Tyler's work uniform. ;)

I'm thankful for time with my family, and starting new traditions. This year will be Gage's 1st Holidays that I think he will understand. We will be starting a few new traditions.

I'm thankful for date nights and our awesome babysitters.

I'm thankful for my silly addictions, Vampire Diaries, Greys Anatomy, Twilight, and many more silly shows. Sometimes all you need is a blanket, silence, and your favorite show to make all the craziness go away.

I'm thankful for our not perfect lives. Realizing that we are not perfect but that's ok. Sometimes It's alright to admit things are not always honky dory. But when they're shouting it to the world feels great.

Lastly I'm thankful to be alive, my life is pretty great. I'm surrounded by people who love me and only want the best for me. I need to refer back to this post when I'm feeling down. I'm one lucky girl!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

I'm excited to spend it with my family!~

Yo Gabba Gabba & Disney On Ice

2011-11-21T10:54:00.000-08:00

I bought some Gabba tickets off groupon for half off and knew Gage and Kd would love it. Well turns out I forgot the small detail that I had to pick out our seats a few days before so we got "stuck" in the last row. It turned out to be a big plus. We could still see everything but we had tons of room to dance and move. Everyone else was stuck in their seats so thankfully our bummer turned out great. The kids loved every second of it. They never stopped dancing and even made some friends. I just love these two kiddos and I love how close they are!

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

Last Sunday my parents took Gage and Kd to Disney on Ice again. (Yes so so spoiled) They had front row center and had a blast. Gage came home so excited and talked all night about the Incredibles. We are so lucky to have such awesome grandparents, thanks mom & dad!

Update on me

2011-11-14T09:05:00.000-08:00

I had my appointment with the neurologist on Wednesday. I must not have the best attitude towards doctors cause I wasn't 100% impressed. He mentioned that he thinks I either have an infection in the spine or Guillain-Barre syndrome. He said he's hoping it's GBS syndrome rather than the infection. GBS is pretty much a syndrome where all the symptoms are things I've had. The scary part is most cases the patient ends up in the hospital paralyzed for a few weeks, so I'm not really sure why he would want that. The only thing I can think of is he thinks my case is not serious. I should've asked more about the infection in the spine. This morning at 5:40 (yikes) I had another MRI but this time of the spine. This should hopefully give me some answers, hopefully sometime this week. My symptoms are better, my weakness still there but much more bearable. My hands and feet are the same but more of a buzzing feeling now rather then tingling. Sleeping has been so hard and I toss and turn half the night. I'm starting to get really frustrated. I'm trying to stay positive and be more thankful for my health. I'm just feeling lazy, helpless, and blah. I've gained 8lbs this month because of stress eating (I'm really good at that). Also this weakness has made it impossible to get any exercise so yeah that's no beuno. So there you have it, cross your fingers for me that they figure something out soon! Again I'm so thankful for my amazing family & friends.

Halloween

2011-11-06T20:11:00.000-08:00

First off thanks to everyone who had some amazing advice for me on the previous post. Things have been actually getting better. I've been on the steroids since Wednesday and the Nerve meds since Tuesday. They might be working cause my weakness seems to be getting better daily. I still have a hard time standing up from sitting and walking up the stairs is still difficult. My feet are still numb but I think since it has been that way for so long I'm getting used to it. Hands still numb but no more aching sharp pains, buttons and bra straps still a problem. ;) My appointment with the neurologist is Wednesday and I will hopefully get more answers! Thanks again!

To make times even more difficult we lost Tyler's grandpa on Sunday October 30th. He was such an amazing man, and will be missed so so much. The services were on Wednesday&Thursday and were beautiful. We love you Grandpa & Great Grandpa!

Halloween this year was the best yet, yes you would think with all else it wouldn't have been huh? The weather was the major factor in this and Gage being a trick or treating maniac! He seriously ran the entire night and was out past most. We have so much candy I think I will be throwing it away soon. We started off our Halloween craziness with Kd & Shirley and breakfast with the witches. The kids loved it but Gage was not getting close to any of them. They did a little show and he loved that. We will for sure be doing it again next year.

That night I tried to take Kd & Gage to an indoor trick or treat with Grandma Julie but that got canceled. They were the hit of the night though!
We did our pumpkin carving which Gage thought was so cool.

Tyler and I will not be winning any carving awards anytime soon. I think next year we will stick with painting!

We had my daycare halloween party on halloween and how does this keep getting bigger and bigger. I usually travel over to my moms and we party over there, but this year I had 8 kiddos so no thanks. The kids had so much fun and Gage loves being the only boy with 7 girls!!

Then we trick or treated till our legs went numb, no really they did go numb. ;) Such a fun night, watching Gage have more fun then we could handle is the best feeling in the world. I think he loved handing out candy just as much as getting candy! We hope everyone had a great halloween!~

October Bummer

2011-11-02T12:57:00.000-07:00

I'm mainly writing this to possibly get some advice from my lovely readers, share experiences, or just to let everyone know.

Starting October 2nd (so a month ago) my feet were constantly tingling/asleep. It never went away and I really didn't think much of it. I went along with my daily life, it was more annoying than anything. About a week later it was still in my feet but traveled to my hands. It was now getting worse and worse and much more painful in my hands. It's like my finger tips are on fire and the rest of my hands were numb. I still just thought it would go away and let it go. Well on October 17th I noticed I was extremely weak. I couldn't even walk up my stairs, do any form of mild physical stuff, my arms ached, my eyes were twitching, my legs felt like I had done P90x 20 times. I called my family doctor because this alone made me super worried and scared plus the numbness had yet to go away. By this time I had googled (yes I shouldn't have) my symptoms and was super scared cause the main concerns were M.S. {which turns out I was fine} Our doctor couldn't get me in till the next week, so of course I decided to wait.

Wednesday Oct 19th I went into the E.R because the pain was so bad. I was falling, and struggling with things that were normally pretty easy, like getting Gage out of his car seat. The E.R was a joke and all they did was blood work, tell me to see a neurologist, and sent me on my way. During this time I was still doing photo sessions and falling all over the place, I'm sure my clients were thinking I was the biggest klutz ever. I'm not big on talking about being "sick" I'm one of those that keeps everything inside and only tells a select few {my poor family.} On the 24th I went into my family doctor, had some blood work, had an MRI, and was looked at like I was lying or crazy. Everything came back normal, which was great but so frustrating because my symptoms were getting worse daily. I wasn't too happy with how my doc was treating me and getting ahold of him was a joke.

Yesterday I went into Tyler's family doctor and had a much better experience. He had never seen this before, I could tell he was a little complexed. My weakness had been so bad. My numbness has gotten worse, going up my arms throbbing pain, I can barely type right now. Walking is getting difficult and sleeping is as well. He set me up with a neurologist, asked a ton of questions, put me on steroids, and another medicine for nerves. I'm feeling a little more optimistic now, like someone actually believes me. It's pretty sad, I feel like you need to chop off a limb to get any help these days. The symptoms are all still there, everything has gotten to be challenging. My family has all been so amazing even my in laws. Helping me with daycare, photography, walking {haha} & Gage. My mom has done daycare for me every time I've had a visit, with help from my sisters & grandparents. I don't know what I would do without them. Tyler has of course been amazing but I wouldn't ever expect differently from him. So there you have it my October full of frustrations. If anyone has any advice, stories, anything I would love to hear it. I'm extremely confused on what's happening to me. I feel like I'm 90 years old. If anything this has taught me to be thankful for the same stuff. Putting on your own bra, pushing buttons, texting {yes I haven't answered half of my texts lately} walking up stairs, & WALKING!

Halloween Cuties

2011-10-26T11:52:00.000-07:00

I might be a little biased but us D Girls make some beautiful babies, and I guess their dads helped a little too! Oh how I love everything about Halloween and I'm super bummed it's almost over! We have a jammed packed next few days with lots of celebrating! Gage is going to be a trick or treating maniac this year! He first said he wanted to be chocolate milk, which I thought was hilarious and so cute! I thought a lot about what I could make and the only thing I could think of was a box. There was no way he would be wearing a box all night so this was choice #2. Happy Halloween Everyone!!

My big boy!

2011-10-19T15:21:00.000-07:00

Well I can't believe how much Gage is growing up! One thing as a parent I've been dreading is potty training. I wanted to wait till I knew he was ready and he wanted to do it. We decided on last week because we had a week with not a lot planned so we could stay home for it. Day 1 we went right into underwear which he had picked out himself (mickey mouse & gabba). We also stocked up on treats, stickers, coins, and dollar store toys for #2's. With all the treats in the bathroom he was super excited to go each time. I was blown away with how good he did the first day. I was being extra careful and taking him every 30 minutes but he would go each time. I was also making sure I gave him a good amount of liquids as well. At nap I put a pull up on which he didn't like (good sign) and he woke up dry! The rest of the day he did awesome, no accidents and he went to bed and woke up dry.

Day 2 was our #2 day. He knew that he didn't want to poop in his underwear so once he started he ran to the bathroom. He had 2 pee accidents that day but still woke up dry and was excited to use the bathroom.

By day 3 he was going every hour and telling us when he wanted to go. He even would forget to get treats for going and went right back to what he was doing.

Day 4 is when everything fell into place. He told me both times when he had to #2 and he did both in the potty. No accidents, went to bed in underwear and was dry when we woke up.

We now have been in underwear for over a week and even out and about into the world. He hasn't had one accident with either poop or pee. He knows how to hold it and tell us when he needs to go. The big moment for me was on Monday morning. I was talking on the phone in the kitchen and I heard Gage come upstairs from the daycare. I walked into the bathroom and he was going #2 all by himself, without even mentioning it to me. I was so proud! So there you have it my baby is not a baby anymore. So many emotions come into play with this milestone. I feel happy, proud, but also sad. I'm so thankful it went so easy for us! Trust me Gage is one opinionated boy and I was picturing a constant battle. Just goes to show kids are ready when they're ready. Whether that be age 18 months or 3 everyone is different!

My Birthday Weekend

2011-10-15T20:28:00.000-07:00

Friday we headed over to Wendover with our amazing friends Alisha & Carlos. We had the best time, always do with them!

Alisha is such an amazing friend, she is the kinda person I could talk to for days. We have so much in common and I love spending time with her. I'm so lucky to have her in my life and I'm so thankful for our friendship!

The morning of my birthday we slept in and headed home from Wendover. We picked up Mr. Gage and headed over to Cornbellys for some fun. We had so much fun enjoying our time with Gage and just letting him run free. He had a blast and I would highly recommend this place to everyone!

I swear Gage gets more amazing everyday, words can never express how much this little boy means to me.

We then headed over to my parents for my birthday dinner game night. I decided I didn't want to do a restaurant this year and I'd rather eat in, lets the kids run free, and relax. It turned out to be the best birthday dinner yet. I got so spoiled, had the best ice cream cake, got some great laughs in during our game, and enjoyed spending time with the people I love the most.

Sunday morning we all headed over to Lagoon's Frightmares, one of our families favorites. It was the perfect day there with no lines, perfect cool weather, and great family time. It was the first time I had been in a haunted house for awhile and I forgot how fun they can be. Thanks to my amazing family & friends for making my big 2-6 the best yet. Seriously I love birthdays but this one was the best in a long time!!

Alisha's Birthday Party

2011-10-05T07:43:00.000-07:00

I love the fact that my 4 close friends all have birthdays days before mine. For Alisha's we all celebrated having a masquarade party. I love a good excuse to dress up and spend time with friends. Happy Birthday Alisha!!

Fall Photos

2011-09-26T07:09:00.000-07:00

I think he might like the camera just a little bit. He was so funny Tyler and I could not stop laughing. He would run to spots and yell this is a great spot! Oh how I love this little boy! Picture Overload!

Recent Fun

2011-09-22T08:55:00.000-07:00

I love fall, and I want to keep as busy as possible these next few months! Last week we had our yearly family trip to the fair! I think it's so fun that even though our family is crazy busy we always make time to get together! Sadly we forgot to get our big photo all together but oh well. My cute grandma even went down the big slide with us this year, yeah my grandma is cooler than yours! Gage loved it, we had so much fun!

Sunday we went to the Zoo with Tyler's mom and grandparents. It was the perfect day to go and it was dead at 9a.m. Gage loved it but I think he's more of a Lagoon ride kinda boy. Once he saw the train and carousel that's all he could think about! We went out to lunch after with everyone and had such a good time. The last few times we have went out to eat Gage has been so good! I know I'm going to jinx myself but lets cross our fingers we are finally out of the crazy restaurant stage!

Gage has been so good lately I'm so proud! He has been so polite I love it! At the restaurant he ordered his own drink, said thank you when the waiter brought anyone anything. He is getting better with his goodbyes, he is doing so well! He has such a fun adventurous personality that is contagious! He loves life and that makes me want to show him how amazing this world can be! Love you Gage!

Happy Fall Everyone!

No heat curls

2011-09-13T10:47:00.000-07:00

I recently took interest in Pinterest.com. It's a site where you can pull little "pins" of stuff you like together and keep track of different ideas. You can use it for decorating your house, clothes, kid stuff, wedding ideas, photography ideas, it has it all. I found this tutorial on no heat curls. You can find the YouTube video HERE. I'm trying to grow my hair out so anything I could do that involves no heat or damage I was interested. Turns out after watching the video it looked super easy. So last night I took a shower and blow dried my hair, next time I will air dry. After it was dried I put some smoothing serum in ( I used a knock off Paul Mitchell). I also ran some cheap hair gel in as well. It took me about 20 mins to get it all rolled up, I'm sure the more I do it the faster it would go. I used two big bobby pins to hold the back in a little tighter. I slept all night on it (so7 hours). When I woke up it actually stayed put which was surprising cause I'm a crazy sleeper. I pulled out the head band and was shocked. The curls looked great and they are still looking great 5 hours later. I ran some more serum in and called it good. A few things though.

You most likely will want to either leave your bangs out or pull your bangs back afterwards. I curled my bangs in with my hair and they just looked really silly.

The less hair you pull back each time the more curls. I wanted tight curls this time so I pulled less back each time. Next time I will try it differently, my hair is very curly sue.

As you can see in my photo the back is noticeable where the headband was and where the curls started. It almost looks like I had a hat on. I think next time I will put the headband higher. I might have to curl a few strands in the back too.

All in all I'm excited I found this. I think it will help with growing my hair out but still give me a style. If you have any other videos you've seen send them my way!

Vegas

2011-09-10T07:28:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we had a little trip to Vegas. It was originally planned for a friend trip but we changed things up. We asked my amazing parents (who I didn't manage to get one photo of) to come along and watch Gage at night. I never thought they would go for it but they said yes right away! I just love them and again so thankful for all they do for us! I was struggling with the idea of leaving Gage again so soon after sturgis. We left Friday after work and arrived in Vegas around midnight. Gage was pretty good on the ride down thankfully. Saturday we spent the day swimming (all our favorites) at the M&M Factory, Beligio, and MGM. We had a lot of fun doing things again with Gage. Yes we were just there in March but Gage completely forgot everything so it was all new to him! Gage is a pretty good traveler, he gets really excited for things and that makes it real fun. Before dinner we sent him with my parents and we went off to Pf Changs & Revolution Lounge. Saturday night was perfect! We had the best dinner with reservations. We took taxis so no walking! We got right into the nightclub/lounge and we danced the night away. Us 4 love to dance, it's so fun just letting everything go, not caring about anything in the world and just having fun! What a great night!

Sunday morning we woke up and hung out at the pool some more. We went back and took a good nap, a plus with traveling with kiddos. Then Tyler, Gage, and I headed over to the aquarium at Mandalay Bay. Gage loved it and really got into everything. It's so nice seeing your child happy and appreciative. After the aquarium we headed back to the hand over of Gage and went to dinner. We went to dinner at Diablos Cantina and went dancing that night at Rok. It was another good night!

Monday morning we woke up, hit Ihop, and headed home. Gage lost his cool about 2 hours before we hit home. He was so done with being in his carseat and sadly that's all he wanted. It wasn't the most pleasant ride home but oh well. Thanks mom & dad for being the best, we love you. Thanks Alisha & Carlos for being such amazing friends, man we are so lucky!

Where does the time go?

2011-08-29T07:23:00.000-07:00

When you get pregnant and have a child the number one thing you hear is enjoy it now. Everyone tells you how fast it goes and to enjoy every moment while they're at a certain age and stage. I feel like we did, I documented like crazy, photos, videos, while the moment was happening I was completely involved and loving it. I've always loved every part of motherhood, I think the little things I've enjoyed most. Sadly the past week I've realized that I'm starting to forget how it feels. I'm forgetting how it feels to hold a tiny newborn. I'm forgetting how it feels to be pregnant and feel the kicks. I'm forgetting how it felt to be up all hours of the night with a newborn (not saying I miss that). As much as I don't want to admit it Gage is not a baby anymore, he is getting less and less needy. He talks as much as any 4 or 5 year old. Yesterday his sentence of choice was " I don't want to do this anymore mom I'm bored." I'm not quite sure I'm ready for another baby but I'm sad I'm forgetting what's like to be a mother of an infant. So as much as you "enjoy every moment." As much as you live for the small things, life happens and you forget how those moments felt. Thank goodness for all my photos!

I'm in no hurry to rush these moments. No hurry to finish having kids and be done. I've heard a lot lately I want to have all my kids while I'm young so I can enjoy life when they're old and have their own families. Not me, I feel like life is about two stages. One being life before kids, and the other life with kids. Why rush anything, enjoy these moments now! Right now I'm happy, content, blessed, and proud. I'm so thankful to have everyday with Gage!

New Hair

2011-08-27T20:26:00.000-07:00

I've been a "blonde" all my life so this was a big change for me. I've been wanting something new and I got it! Thanks Ness for doing such a great job and not making me look like a skunk! I was super afraid of how Tyler would like it (he's a blonde guy) but I think he likes it more then me.

BIG BOY BED

2011-08-21T12:03:00.000-07:00

After we got home from Sturgis we hurried and got Gage's new bed all set up. We thought about converting his crib but decided we would just save that for baby #2 and buy him his own. We wanted something with a lot of storage and I was very happy with our purchase, it's great for him. He was so excited when it was all set up it was the cutest thing ever. He loves that his books are right there and he reads them before each nap. He has now been sleeping in his bed for a week and has done so good. While Tyler was at the station this week he woke up two nights and wanted to get in bed with me. He did this though too when he was in his crib so I can't blame it on the bed. I used to be a sucker and let him sleep with me but I stuck to it and he went back down pretty fast. The last few nights no waking and his naps are as good as ever. I'm so proud of him and glad that we didn't rush it. I love that he loves it! This last week we also stopped using straw sippy cups. If you know Gage you know that he loved to devour anything in those stupid cups. He would drink 10oz of milk in two minutes. Well we are now on normal cups and normal hard sippies and he is drinking way less thank goodness. This will help with his potty training we want to start soon. I'm not gonna rush this one I want to make sure he is ready when we start. I think we are going to go right into underwear and see how he does. I'm so proud of my big boy, this week he turns 2.5. It's so crazy how fast they grow!

Strugis

2011-08-15T17:27:00.000-07:00

Wow! What a trip! It was a lot of fun to get away and relax with good people. I really have no complaints about anything, it was a blast. When Sturgis was first mentioned to me a year ago I think I said no in 2 seconds. Thousands of bikes, nudity, crazy people, and heat sounded stupid and not worth my week of vacation. Well when we found out Brandon's dad purchased a house things sounded a little better. I recently have became really fond of the Harley and going on rides so that pushed my decision. After adding up things I decided I would do it for Tyler cause he really wanted to go. So off we go to take Gage to my parents house along with Kimberlee, Krew, Snoop, Rico and Harley. Yes Yes I know what you're saying right now, how terrible of us. Well if anyone could do it it's my mom and dad. They were more then willing too and the fact that I knew he would have too much fun and spoiled galore helped the situation. Not to mention Vanessa and Bradon and the great grandparents helped out as well. Yes that's what family is for, we would do it for them in a second that's how we do things in the D Fam. I will not lie though as we were pulling away from my parents house I did shed a few tears. This was the longest time we had been away from Gage. I do believe it's important to get away once in a while as a couple, for mommy/daddy time, but it was hard. Thank you mom and dad for spoiling and loving our sons while we played. I can not thank you enough for everything you do. We are so lucky to have you! So we are off on a 10 hour car ride, which sucked! I can't complain though as we are driving by bikes that have been on the road for days.

The ride actually went by really fast. We talked about normal things like Gorillas. We arrived in Deadwood South Dakota around 5p.m. we made great timing. The house we stayed at was perfect, we each had our own little room and tons of space. Thanks Don for being so welcoming and the hostess with the mostest. We met up with Julie and Kurt for a few then took off to kick off the trip.

I think we went to sleep at 9 the first night, we were beat! We made up for it though the rest of the trip.
The next day we took a ride into Sturgis to check things out. It's so crazy, everywhere you go or ride there is hundreds of bikes. Tyler told me that he heard there was over 300,000 bikes there this year. It was a lot of fun to people watch and ride in the cool weather. We were actually lucky to have great weather most of the trip. Not too hot, overcast, a few rainstorms but they were actually not bad.

We went and checked in for the awesome ride Don did for us. It's called the Legendary Ride and it had a limited number of openings. Dinner, and a Concert at the end. It was really cool to ride with everyone and see the crazy cool bikes.

Our ride took us to the famous Buffalo Chip Campground and holy moly was it crazy! Acres and Acres of land with tents, trailers, vendors, bikes, people, it was crazy! We had dinner and people watched until the Buckcherry/Def Leppard concert. It started out a little boring but then Shirley jumps up and says lets zip line! They had a zip line that went from one end of the concert area to the next right over all the people, it was sweet. I had never zip lined so I was kinda nervous, It was tons of fun and so glad we did it!

The concert was fun, Buckcherry was good and Def Leppard was old. Haha So thankful for Don for doing that for us, it made the night perfect! Riding home that night back to the house was so dang cold, I was stupid enough to wear shorts so the chilly canyon air was not my friend that night! That tops off day 1!
Day 2 we woke up to meet up with Julie and Kurt. They took us on a little ride to Rapid City Harley Store and boy were we suprised. The amount of bikes there was just crazy!

We did a little shopping and bike watching and headed back to Sturgis. We got some lunch and bummed around the main street. They block off a few roads in town for all Cars and only let bikes go through. My pictures do not do any justice for the amount of people and bikes.

That night we went back to Deadwood, BBQ'd up some hamburgers with everyone and went gambling. It was fun to be with everyone and I always love some Gambling.

Julie and Kurt headed back to camp and we headed back to a favorite of ours Salon #10, :). The band was really fun that night and we all (minus Brandon, boo) danced the night away! Fire!

Day 3 and we head off to see Mt. Rushmore. It was a rainy ride, kinda scary at times but it cleared up fast.
We didn't pay to go in because we were quite happy with our view from the side of the road and these photos.

We then took a little ride into Hill City and had some lunch. It was another town flooded with bikes.

After that we went to Deadwoods Cementary where Wild Bill is burried. It was quite the hike around the place but it was super creepy but kinda cool. Old places with so much history are quite interesting to me. It was another great, easy going day for sure!

We took our easy going day and made it a crazy night. We decided to head over to the famous full throttle saloon. I guess there is a reality show and it's quite good, I will start watching it now. That place was really cool and not as crazy as buffalo chip. We had won tickets from kber to a concert there that night but never ended up actually going to it. We had enough fun watching the crazies and the shows. Oh and before you think to yourself, wow amber has two beers in her hand, we had buy one get one free coupons people. We had to use them all! ;)

Day number 4 we decided to go bum around sturgis main street again. We had a little more shopping to do and wanted to watch some burnouts. We made a stop at the Sturgis Fire dept where we got Tyler a shirt and patch. I bought my new cute helmet, we did some good people watching and called it good.

That night we went to Coyote Ugly Sturgis style. It was dead compared to anything else we did the entire trip. Once we walked in they started calling girls up on stage. I always thought it would be fun to dance on the bar at coyote but I pictured it more in a crazy setting than this. Anyways I decided to get up and dance and had some fun doing it! Afterwards we went back over to our favorite salon #10! Yes it's really saloon #10 but we have quite a few inside jokes on this trip! That night we danced some more, took pictures with randon hoochie girls, gambled and won, walked the deadwood strip, ran in the rain, and laughed more then I had in a long time. It was probably my favorite night.

The next morning we woke up to begin the trek back to our babies! It was a way longer ride on the way home or so it seemed. When you have 3 of the worst backseat drivers in the car! ;)

So would I go back to Sturgis? Yes, but I have many more places on my list to do before another Sturgis Vaca. It was a lot of fun and we made so many memories. I still think I'm more of a beach, sand in my toes, ocean kinda girl or even Disneyland. Being a biker chick is quite fun though, way more carefree and crazy!

Happy Birthday Tyler

2011-08-05T07:55:00.000-07:00

I'm starting to realize I do not take enough photos of my own family. I guess the fact that I feel like I live with my camera, I might get sick of it time after time. Tyler turned the big 2-5 on the 26th. I had daycare that day so he spent the day with me at home. I think Gage opened up most of his presents, Christmas this year will be crazy.

I made him his favorite cake, I think it just might be my favorite now too!

We all sang Happy Birthday and Gage helped blow out the candles.

That night we went to Texas Roadhouse and had a great dinner just the 3 of us. Tyler had two other bbqs with family to celebrate his birthday. Dumb me forgot my camera to both of them. I love this last photo, I seriously am so lucky! Gage is getting so big and he such a good boy. He is so smart and so funny, just like his momma! ;) This has been a great year for Tyler, we are so proud of him! Love ya babe!

A weekend with Brynlee

2011-07-27T12:59:00.000-07:00

First off let me just tell you how much I hate bloggers new layout stuff. Uploading photos is a joke and organizing them is even worse! Boo blogger BOO! Last weekend we got to watch sweet Brynlee and oh did Gage love it! I've never seen him so happy! He loved making her laugh (video below) and he loved playing with her. She is such a perfect baby and was super easy. Needless to say we had a great weekend and we can't wait to do it again. Hint Hint Ness!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

My first

2011-07-20T12:19:00.000-07:00

I don't post much about my crazy weenie dog, but boy do I love him. I'm one of those dumb dog owners who talks to her pet in baby voices. Who lets their pet sleep on the bed with them. Who lets their pet get on all the furniture. Who lets their pet go in and out as he pleases. Snoop is super super spoiled. He is my first baby and he will be my last canine baby. As much as I love dogs, {really though I like dogs way more than people}. I love dogs too much, I already dread and have nightmares over when Snoop will leave us. When we go on vacation finding a sitter for him is not the easiest. He is just like a son, a very high maintenance son. He has super stranger anxiety, you know the kind where he pees when he sees new people. He is a huge protector as well, which is a big plus when Gage and I are home alone. Every little creek or door slam outside he hears and barks. My parents call him bob barker cause he will bark at any sound. Don't worry though I'm not one of those dog owners that lets my pup bark outside, that drives me bonkers too. Sometimes I really wish he had a buddy and partner in crime but honestly that's what Gage is for. Those two are best buds. They will play outside together, wrestle, and play catch. The other day I caught Gage rubbing Snoops ears and saying "I love you Snoop, I love you Snoopy!" I don't know what I would do without him. At night we sleep right next to each-other {cause Tyler can't sleep when snoops is even close to him}. Life is better with pets for sure! I love you snoop dawg! So glad you're only 4 and I hopefully will have many more years of your love!

I just love his eyes! I'm always drawn to something different, that's what brought me to him. As far as we know he can see out of both eyes but sometimes I wonder.

4th and more

2011-07-18T08:24:00.000-07:00

Yes I'm very behind with my blogging, I can't believe July is almost over! This summer has been busy! I'm for sure feeling the crazy wedding season of the photography business. I've tried my hardest to fit in as much fun stuff as possible when I'm off! We started off our July festivities with the Taylorsville dayz fireworks. We had great seats or spots, so close that we almost got attacked by a few fireworks. This was Gage's first big fireworks show that he was old enough for. He loved it and watched for a good amount of time before he got bored! We met up with shirley & fam, it was a great night!

In other news, Midvale Fire is now Unified Fire, which we couldn't be more happy about. They did a swearing in ceremony at the first of the month for the new employees. We are so proud of our Firefighter and Paramedic! Yes I said Paramedic!

Tyler officially passed his state paramedic text on Monday the 11th! He did so well and we are so thankful it's all done! I remember him starting school in January and the horror stories everyone told us. Thankfully it wasn't that bad and Tyler did amazing in the class! Way to go Tyler, we love you!

The morning of the 4th we went to the West Jordan Parade. Our great friends Alisha & Carlos saved us some awesome spots so it was perfect! It was great parade weather, a few raindrops but overcast and cool. Gage loved it! He never got bored or took his eyes off the excitement! When you're a parent watching your child enjoy himself is the best thing ever! He got so much candy and everyone would make a special effort to get him things. People would yell to each other "make sure this little boy gets candy!" He would get so excited! When the "princesses" would come by he would blow them kisses and they would do it back! I have a feeling my little stud is going to be popular with the ladies!

I wish they did more parades throughout the year, I think they're so much fun! We also went with some friends to Kenny Chesney. He wasn't any good in concert but we still had a blast!

Our summer has been filled with tons of swimming and parks as well. If you ever want to make Gage extremely happy just take him to a park with lots of slides. He loves swimming, mainly in our little pool! Tyler and I are big swimming lovers so we hope to get him into swimming lessons too!

I hope everyone is having a great summer so far! I wish this season lasted longer, I love it!

Witches and Bugs

2011-07-11T07:27:00.000-07:00

Well we have officially entered the stage where Gage is scared of things. I'm not a big fan of bugs/spiders/grasshoppers and Gage has picked up on it. He hates flies, bees, spiders, ants, any sort of bug. I swear little boys are supposed to love this stuff! He will find the smallest bug and go crazy till I get rid of it. Well a few nights ago he thought bugs were in his bed, he didn't fall back asleep after that. The next day he made me pull apart his bedding to show them no bugs.Well that ended in a day thank goodness. Last night he watched an episode of Little Einsteins (such a cute show). On the show there was a witch, well now he is obsessed. He keeps saying, NO witches, where is the witch? I don't like witches. Last night when we put him to bed he wanted the witch out of his room. We insisted there were no witches but that wasn't good enough. Tyler had to kick the witch out of his room and tell the witch to stay outside. It worked, but right when he woke up he said the witch is outside! I think this is kinda funny but sad as well. I don't want him to be afraid or worry about that stuff, but I love his imagination lately. He talks about everything, his vocabulary is out of this world. He slept over at Grandma Julies on Saturday night and slept all night in a big boy bed. He woke up and even told her, "I fell out." That means it's big boy bed shopping time at our house. I'm not finding anything I like that is not $500. Hopefully I find something good! Happy Monday All!

Dirty Girl Run

2011-07-05T07:36:00.000-07:00

We had a blast, this is something I would love to do every weekend as silly as that sounds. I was so excited to get dressed up and play in the mud! I was actually a little disappointed that there wasn't enough mud! It was way fun getting together with all my high school friends, Shirley and Kim. Kim had the great idea for the 4th of July outfits and they turned out so cute! Thanks to Shirley & Kim for taking all the time to shop and sew!

We started off the race on the very first wave. I ended up staying with Natasha and Shirley during the race. I was pretty proud of us we ran the entire way and kept a great pace. We did all the obstacles without help. I was a little worried about the climbing wall but we did it twice with no worries. He still managed to have tons of fun along the way and took full advantage of all the mud! These are just the photos our photographer Tyler Lintz Photography took. They had tons of photographers along the race taking photos of us doing the obstacles, I will post those as soon as they do! :)

It was so fun having a cheering section when we finished. Gage was so excited when he saw us. He wanted nothing to do with touching me though, he didn't like me being dirty.

After the race a few of us headed back to our house and had a great breakfast! I can't wait to do one of these again, I think all runs should be in the mud!

Slow down Mr. Gage

2011-06-29T06:30:00.000-07:00

I've come to realize that I don't want Gage to grow up. I know with growing up will come a lot of great things but also some not so great things. As I was standing in line at Walmart the other day a 11-12 year old boy screamed to his mom, "did you get my condoms?" I about died! Then his sister who had to be 14-15 yelled back, no one wants to look at your dick!" Wow! And the mother just stood there and didn't say a thing! As I'm driving home last night two teenage boys stand in the middle of the road blocking me. They take about 1 min to slowly move out of my way and proceed to throw their hands up at me as I drive by. I have to admit I wanted to run them over so bad. Out and about I just about die every time I hear a teenager talk, f this, f that. I know it has everything to do with their parents and their family life but it scares me. I hope to parent just as my parents did.

I feel like these days parents are pushing their kids to grow up way fast. I've always been one of those comparing moms, yes this is a terrible terrible thing. Is your kid sitting up? Is your kid eating 5oz? Is your kid sleeping through the night? I've always struggled to realize every kid will be different and even though our pedi would insist everything is wonderful I needed Gage to be on track in my mind. Well thankfully I'm starting to drop this and let Gage live. Let me tell you though facebook makes it hard. Everyday I see posts, my 1 year old is reading! My 6 month old is potty trained! ;) My 2 year old can sleep all night in his big boy bed then wake up and make the entire family breakfast! My 5 year old is reading on a high school level! These posts take my laid back mothering a notch back. I tell myself well if her 2 year old is doing this then Gage should be. Then I hit myself and realize Gage is super smart and he will do it when it's time! I always wonder if other parents feel this way or if I'm the only one? I guess I'm just trying to enjoy Gage right now. I'm enjoying him in this stage, which right now is an amazing stage! I'm so gonna jinx it but he has been so fun lately. He talks all the time, full on conversations that make sense. He is a joker, he helps out, he is a lover to everyone, he is more independent, and he sleeps!

Anyways I've let this blog become a we had a eventful fun day I will blog about it blog. I need to focus more on documenting other things as well. Can you believe I already have to get started on Gage's 2nd year book? I love this blogging baby book thing, best thing ever!

Lagoon and Fathers Day

2011-06-21T07:56:00.000-07:00

First off a few photos of our Anniversary date! Self timer on the first one.

We decided to take Gage to Lagoon for us to celebrate Fathers Day. We knew going on a Saturday it was going to be packed but we made it work. Gage had already been to Lagoon with my parents and auntie Shirley for my dads work lagoon day so he was a pro. He was so excited it was like Christmas to him. He talked about it non-stop, mostly about the Tigers (the train). On the way there he kept saying, we here? we here? We hit the bumper cars first, he loved these!

He was 36in so he could ride some of the bigger rides. He loved the new roller coaster Bombora, he did it twice with each of us. He has no fear at all.

He would wait so patiently in all the lines, while other parents struggled to keep their kids entertained I looked down at him and thanked my lucky stars! :)

He loved the train, the animals are really cool but sadly have no room. I have a really hard time with Zoo's and especially Lagoons animals.

We decided to do Lagoon a beach cause Gage loves the water. Well the water was cold, way cold so that didn't go so well. We only lasted a good 20 minutes there. As we were walking out of the park to leave we left his swimsuit on for the fountains. He had a blast, we had to pull him away from them starting a huge meltdown. I think the splash pad and gateway will be fun for him this summer.

He was soaked!

When we got home I took a shower and came out to this. Best thing ever, they were exhausted!

We had a great day, Happy Fathers Day to my amazing Papa who I just don't know how I would get by without! And to Tyler, who is the best Dad ever to Gage!
On the real Fathers Day I had a wedding booked. Tyler had originally planned to spend the day with his dad and family. Well before I left for Park City I took some garbage outside. It was raining way bad and Gage wanted to come out with me, I told him no and he started crying when I walked outside. Well turns out the door caught his fingers and he was crying cause of that. They were pretty smashed and he wouldn't move them. After an hour or so of no moving and them swelling up Tyler decided to take him in. I was so bummed I couldn't be there, I was a nervous wreck. Thank goodness they were not broke just sprained, the doc taped them up and sent him on his way. By the end of the night we took the tape off and no more swelling and he was moving them fine. So Tyler spent most of his day playing doctor to this little stink.

I think he enjoyed the attention!
Lastly here are a few photos from my dad's lagoon day, I got from Shirley's blog.

4 years!

2011-06-15T07:00:00.000-07:00

Today is our 4 year anniversary, wow! So much has happened in these last 4 years I can't believe it. The one thing that hasn't changed is my love and appreciation for Tyler. I can honestly say marriage has been pretty easy for us. Now I know there might come a time when it will change but these last 4 years have been pretty smooth. I believe what makes us so perfect for each other is our friendship is so strong. I would rather be with Tyler then anyone. In the last 4 years we.....
Moved onto new jobs, Tyler Midvale and my daycare opening and photography.
We have lived in our home for 4 years.
We experienced all our siblings get married.
We brought the most amazing little boy into this world, and experienced what true happiness is.
We experienced 3 pregnancies with my sisters and were introduced to the worlds cutest nieces and nephews.
We experienced loss.
We watched our friends get married, were involved in their weddings, and watched them succeed in life.
We also watched our friends break up, move on, and meet their true soul mates.
We also experienced divorce, for me a first.
We experienced hard work and long hours.
We bought new toys, vacationed to Mexico, California, Wyoming, Florida, Caribbean, Nevada.
We realized that life is all what you make it.

What I love about my life is I don't ever have to worry about my marriage. I know what I need to do to make Tyler happy and Tyler does as well. I believe without a healthy happy marriage everyone in the family will suffer. That's why we make the time for ourselves because we want Gage to see how to love and value the importance of marriage.

Alrighty that is enough of all the mushy stuff. Life is good, Tyler is amazingly good looking, and almost done with school, business is good, Gage is happy! Happy 4 years to us!
Here are a few pictures of us this last year, it's crazy how hard it's to find a photo with Mr Gage.

Zach and Monica's Wedding

2011-06-08T12:01:00.000-07:00

These are in a pretty random order but you get the point! We had a lot of fun and I'm so thankful they let me be the photographer. Congrats you two!!

Gage update!

2011-05-26T10:54:00.000-07:00

I have a lot of things I wanted to keep track of for Mr. Gage's baby book, so here we go!

Gage,
I think you will be on comedy central one day, the things you say and do constantly keep us laughing. You're so observant and you want a part of everything. I think we hear the words, "let me do it," 20+ times a day. For the most part we let you do pretty much everything. You love to pour your drinks. Get dressed, you can now put your shoes on and your pants. You have to be involved in all the cooking, we realized that if we let you help you eat it better. You always have to control the TV, you love helping us clean and put away the laundry. You have to get in the car seat by yourself, and last night you even told us you would put your own diaper on. {That didn't work out} You're getting so independent but you do need us for somethings.

Last night you went #2 in the potty willingly, it was so cute you were so proud. As for being potty trained though, we still haven't started that. I'm thinking soon though, I think you will do quite well. You love to play, you rarely sit still. You want to see everything and do everything. You love playing with kids and you make friends everywhere you go. You are really shy around adults though but warm up fast. You're around girls all the time. We can't wait till krew is older so we can have more boy interaction. You're constantly falling and scraping your knees, you love to say "I farted!" You still call me Amber but now daddy is Tyler too, daycare plays a big role in this. You love going new places and you love the park. I feel like you rarely play with your toys inside all you want to do is play outside. This last weekend we opened up our back patio doors and let you play outside alone with snoop. It was a bittersweet moment that you were old enough to play outside without us watching your every move.

You're 27 months you will be 2 1/2 in August. You're still in your crib, you just barely start sleeping better at night so we decided we didn't want to mess with that quite yet. Here is a little video from Monday of you singing your abcs, also you saying one of your other favorite words, NO!.
The end of the video is our first proof of a baseball pro in the making.

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

You're 30lbs. 35.5 inches, in 2t-3t clothes, size 8 shoe. You know some colors, can count sometimes, everything is on your terms of course. The other day we were asking you if mommy was a girl or boy, you said girl. What is daddy? boy. What is grandma? girl, what is grandpa boy. What is Snoop? You replied, Dog. :) On saturday uncle Zach and aunt Monica got married. You were the ring bearer and you did so good. You walked down the aisle while holding the flower girls hand. You dropped the pillow about 5 times though, ;) Once you got to the front all hell broke out. The other 2 year old flower girl decided she wanted to climb on the banister, so of course you had to run over and join in.

Thankfully Zach and Monica didn't care much but it wasn't pretty. I will post more photos from the day later! It was beautiful, we are so excited for them!

Everyday you say something new, do something new, it's so crazy! I look at you all the time and wonder where my baby went. I want you to stay my little boy forever, and I cry just thinking about you growing up. I'm so thankful that I get to stay home with you to watch you grow. Even though somedays I wish I could have a day of silence, ;) We love you Gage, you make us so proud.

Loving it!

2011-05-18T15:32:00.000-07:00

Some things I'm loving on right now..
This book, seriously it has helped me so much in understanding Gage. It's a great read!

My new shoes!

Well I'm loving Vampire Diaries, but the season just ended. This show really makes me laugh at Twilight and sometimes I ask myself why did I ever get into it. Vampire Diaries is ten times better!

My adorable stud and the Harley, yes Tyler mark my words I need to go on another ride!

My super cute new swimsuit! I'm also excited for the pools to open soon!

I eat yogurt and granola almost twice a day lately, I'm obsessed!

That's all, just some random obsessions lately! We all know I have an obsessive personality! ;) haha

Mothers Day Weekend

2011-05-09T08:48:00.000-07:00

Mothers Day weekend started out great with the Race for a cure. For mothers day my amazing hubs got me and Gage this sweet new toy!

Gage and I really enjoy it, it sure beats the old stroller we were running with. We ran the 5k again with Natasha, Bradon, and Garrett. If you've never done this race you would not believe the amount of people that participate. It's really amazing to see. I was really proud of myself for one running the entire time, but two pushing Gage for all but maybe 2 min of the race. Hopefully this will be Gage's and I new bonding exercise!

He actually fell asleep 5 min into the race, who does that? He slept for the entire race as well. This last year we have lost two amazing ladies to breast cancer. We ran for my great friend Mika's beautiful mother Monica. We also ran for our amazing neighbors and friends mother Rochelle. Two lives that fell short because of cancer, cancer really does suck!

Mothers day started off a little rocky. I did wake up to beautiful flowers, a sweet card, and endless kisses from my boys. We did our traditional breakfast at Mimi's Cafe. That place takes reservations and we always have had great experiences. Well this year our waitress sucked, now I was a waitress for awhile so i do have appreciation for them. Well she was terrible, and Gage was antsy and whiny. So breakfast could've have better but that's what you get with a toddler and waiting right?

After breakfast we headed over to my grandparents grave. We sure miss them so much. I know they would enjoy their great grandkids and they're watching down on us and they're proud!

We got home and decided to take Gage to his first movie. We went and saw Rio, which was so cute! Shirley and Kimberlee went with us as well. Gage and Kd were awesome during the movie, for the most part Gage watched 75% of it. Just another sign that my baby is getting too big.

We came home from the movie and put Gage down for this nap. We ended up falling asleep for 2 hours as well. I can't remember the last time I took that long of a nap. It was so nice but made me feel really lazy as well. We woke up and headed to dinner at Grandpa and Grandma C's. We had a great dinner and enjoyed some great company with family.

I'm so thankful for not only being a mother but having such amazing mothers in my life. My mom has always been my best friend, my hero, my support system. I want to be the mother she was to me to Gage. Being a mom is hard, it's challenging and it's crazy at times. I would never go back to my life without Gage though. He is so much to me that I hope one day he understands. I feel like you can't truly understand the love of your parents until you become a parent yourself. I love you Gage, you're my world. I hope everyone had a great mothers day as well!

I Believe

2011-04-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

I saw this on another mom blog and I loved it! These might push the wrong buttons with some people but everyone can have an opinion right?

-I believe that family is always first. My parents and siblings are my best friends. My husband and son are my world. Nothing should ever come between family!

-I believe people complain way too much! I'm sick, I'm tired, I'm sore, I'm broke, I'm bored! I've been working on my complaining a lot lately and make sure I only do it to a select few. Most people don't want to hear about how much your life sucks, do something different and change it!

-I believe that hard work always pays off in the end. I want people to know me, I want to impact people in their daily lives. When I die I want the line to be out the door of my supporters. I want people to say, "oh that's Amber, she was amazing!

-Sometimes staying home and cuddling with my family is the best thing.

-I believe that people who don't plan are just plain CRAZY!

-I would much rather be known as the nice girl then the bitch.

-I believe in doing your own thing and not being a follower.

-It's so important to have goals, and when you accomplish them you better let everyone know!

-To appreciate everything in your life, and tell everyone how much you love them often.

-I believe music always makes me feel better and run faster!

-I believe everyone is put in your life to do something. Whether it be good or bad if you don't learn from each of them you're the one missing out! I'm thankful for every good and bad person that has come through my life.

-I believe parenting is a daily stress, but when Gage wraps his arms around my neck and kisses me I want 10 more kiddies.

-I believe we work hard to play hard. If I don't get my 2 vacations a year I'm not happy!

-I believe in having a clean house and nice yard.

-I believe in going out of your way to make someone happy. I also believe in getting rid of the bad in your life, and keeping only the worthwhile.

-I believe in having a savings and backup if anything were to happen. I don't believe in credit cards.

-I believe that life is short, kiss the ones you love, laugh with your family and friends, wear what you want, say what you want, compliment someone daily, say thank you, don't change what makes you, you!

Easter Weekend Picture Overload

2011-04-26T09:48:00.000-07:00

Easter Weekend was a blast, Gage really had so much fun! Having kids always makes the Holidays so much better. We started off the weekend with An Easter Extravanganza at my parents! Before we left the house though we took some cute pictures of my Easter Stud!

We started off with a Easter Egg Hunt, Gage's first! He loved it, and was quite good at it too! He managed to get all the eggs with the money, good job Gage!

My parents went overboard (as always) and we got some pretty sweet stuff!

While my parents cooked the Easter Feast we colored eggs, another first! It was a lot of fun, and like everything Gage does he had to go fast! We even had to color some eggs double time cause he couldn't get enough!

My mom got my dad & the boys matching shirts! So of course we had to take photos of the boys "Just like Dad!"

Dinner was amazing, I think it even topped Thanksgiving! Thanks Mom & Dad for everything, we sure are blessed!

Easter morning we woke up to do a hunt with our little family. Gage didn't care at all about his basket or presents he only wanted the eggs. He actually found his basket first but proceeded to look for the eggs! Silly Boy!

We then headed up to 5-mile pass just like the years past. We really love spending Easter up there, we have a lot of fun! Once we got there we opened Gage's easter basket from Grandma & Grandpa C. They got him some really cute stuff, thanks so much!

We then had A 5-mile hunt, Gage would even cover his eyes while they did the eggs! So Cute!

It was perfect weather till about 4 but we just hung out in the trailer and stuffed our faces! Gage loved every second of the 4-wheeling. He loved his helmet, he played on his 4-wheeler for awhile, then made us take him over and over on the big ones. He has no fear and would beg us to take him on the hills or wooptee woos!

Such a perfect Easter, I love that Gage is getting more understanding of things and he gets excited too! Here are a few videos I've been wanting to post. The first one is Easter, Don't pay attention to my sweet pajamas and Tyler and I discussing our flip camera troubles! Seriously that thing will not charge!!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

This video is HILARIOUS at first, Gage was super tired at lunch one day. He was falling asleep in his high-chair but still wanted to eat! After are a few randoms!

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Speaking of randoms.... How cute are my boys?

Gage has learned a new trick thanks to daddy, he is obsessed with it!

Kimberlee started t-ball and she is the cutest one on the team! Gage has been practicing so next year when he's 3 he can play with kd!

Lastly my cute little stud, this is how he sleeps most of the time! Love it!

Mr. Gage

2011-04-11T06:36:00.000-07:00

Oh Mr. Gage, I hope you know how much everyone just loves you. You really do bring out the best in everyone and just looking at you my life is perfect. You make the worst days the best. You make boring things exciting. You make normal comments funny. You make life amazing! Nobody could have ever prepared me for motherhood. I thought I was prepared as can be. I did daycare since I was 16 I knew all the ins and outs of kids. Well when you arrived you changed everything I thought I knew. You have taught me so much about life, what really matters, and how to have patience and just go with it. I love being with you, I love showing you off, I love watching you play, I love our seldom cuddle time, I love your big smiles, I love when you say, "I love you mama," I love when you grab my cheeks to kiss me, I love when you repeat everything we say, I love when you play with your friends so nicely, I love when you get excited for the smallest things, I love that you love to go shopping with mom now, I love that you love your dad so much, I love that you and snoopy are best friends, I love that you have no fear and will do anything and try different things in life. I just love you so much Gage, writing this post I get teary eyed because words will never be able to express how much you mean to Dad and I! One day you will read this and hopefully know how much you're loved.!

You do something new everyday and you so so smart! You're getting so independent! Lately mom has been getting baby hungry. If your mom wasn't such a huge planner I would think you were ready for a little brother or sister. I guess you're just getting too big that I feel like my baby is gone! You're such a great talker, you talk all day! For the most part we understand everything you say, good and bad! :) You recently have followed in moms footsteps with photography, you love playing with the camera and taking self portraits. But you do love the camera, these pictures show just that!The last week you have liked going to the potty. Once we put you on there you go right away! Before this you didn't really like the potty and when we would mention it you would run away. I think for right now we will just use it when you want and maybe start really trying after a month or so! You eat like a champ at home, whenever we are in a new place you eat terrible! You're finally sleeping great! If you do wake up at night, we can go right in and tell you to go back to sleep and you do! This gives mom big hopes with the big boy bed transition, which we will be holding off as long as possible! You've been really shy lately when you meet new people, after about 20-30 min you warm up and all is well. I could go on for days but I leave it at this now. I need to do better at keeping these little things "journal ed" cause I love looking back at it.

Happy 30th Shirley

2011-04-01T08:17:00.000-07:00

Shirley turned 30 last weekend and we had a lot of fun celebrating with her. Brandon surprised her with a weekend in a beautiful condo in Park City. I really think she had no idea we would all be there the first night and her friends would join her the second, good job Brandon!

We lucked out and got the king size bed room with a huge bathroom!

We spent the night eating, watching a very cute video we made for Shirley and playing games! It was a fun relaxed night!

Happy Birthday Shirley, we hope you know how much you're loved and appreciated! I don't know another person who even comes close to you! You're my inspiration of exactly what I want to be and look like at 30, you're beautiful inside and out!

In other news my boys love our new couches!

I've been running the last few nights and it's amazing how nice weather and exercising outside has made me a completely different person! I'm loving it!! I think I even convinced Tyler to get me a jogging stroller, because I have the best running partner ever!

Home upgrade

2011-03-27T18:19:00.000-07:00

I have the hardest time doing things to our house knowing we don't plan on being here much longer. We are saving up a lot in the hopes that we will be out by summer/fall next year! We for sure will have to be out before we have more kids but that will not be for another 1+years. Well I'm starting to do little things that will make our house more saleable (yes I made up that word). We painted our downstairs hall, still have to paint a few parts. Kitchen cabinets, baseboards, railings, ect. My goal is to do something, even if it's small to help our house every month. This month we did something a little bigger.

Before...

After....I guess this helps cause it makes things look better. I love the way it brings in the light from the bay windows! We still have an ottoman coming, and our big rug. I love it so much this way though that I might have a hard time putting those down. The day after we got the new couches we sold our old ones for more then we thought we could, double plus! These were a little present from uncle SAM, a Caribbean cruise next year will be present number 2!

My goals for the month of April?

Finish downstairs paint! Seriously will this job ever end!!

Shop for daycare grant stuff, FUN!

Yard work, yes it's spring time, woohoo!

Upgrade front room wall decorations.

Clean Blinds.

Clean Windows Outside.

My personal goal, get back on track with diet and exercise. Seriously I've been in a huge rut for the past month. I would get to the gym one day then not go for 4-5! I've gained 5lbs back and 5lbs on me shows!! Seriously why do I do this to myself. I work so hard to lose then gain it back in crappy eating! This cycle has got to change. I'm running a 5k April 30th,& May 7th so this will be motivation. Plus our big dirty girl race is in July, I'm so excited for this! Hope everyone has a good week!

Vegas {Picture Overload}

2011-03-19T17:33:00.000-07:00

Vegas was the perfect getaway, exactly what we needed. To start off Tyler found out right before school started that he had this week off for spring break. We didn't think he would have any time off from school so we decided we needed to do something. We didn't want anything big (I wanted Florida but haha that wasn't happening) so Vegas it was. I know a lot of people think Ew Vegas and kids, smoke, dirty, alcohol, blah blah blah, I'm not a big fan of you people. ;) Vegas is actually great for the kiddos, Gage and Kimberlee had a blast. They have tons of kid stuff, we actually didn't get to some of it. Gage was super kid during the entire trip. He slept great, played great, listened, and had so much fun. As a mom you know that if your child behaves your life is heaven!

Day 1 we left around 8a.m. We took two different cars to have more room and what not. We added Kimberlee in our car in Beaver, Gage was way happy about that!

Pulling into Vegas for my quite possibly 30th time in my life it was 70+degrees and the sun was shinning! Perfect!We checked in and didn't waste anytime hitting the strip. It didn't take us long to realize we might just look like sister wives with Tyler, 3 kiddos, and 3 ladies! haha M&M Factory was first, they loved it! Gage was hilarious during the 3d show, he kept trying to grab all the things coming at him.Shirley bought Gage & Kd these M&M phones that were a huge hit the entire trip. This is Gage talking away as we walked the strip.
That night we went to the Bellagio, then Caesar's Palace. We went to dinner at the cheesecake factory then made the walk back. Kiddos were tired and so were the adults!
Day 2. We woke up, got ready and headed to Ihop off the strip. Such a great idea, we ate a lot off the strip, avoided crowds, and wait times! We then headed to the dolphins at the mirage. I think Kd&Gage talked about dolphins non-stop the rest of the trip, they loved it! Perfect day for it too, it was hot, I actually comtemplated jumping in a few times!
We then headed back to our 'Castle' and got ready to swim! Perfect swimming weather and Gage warmed up to it fast! Kimberlee was a swimming fool and she helped Gage get the idea fast! If you can't tell from these pictures swimming was a big plus with our trip. Our families back in Utah were getting rained on and it was cold, haha!
That night we headed to a little park off the strip. It was really cute and Gage was extra excited to see the slide! He really has no fear with things like this and just goes, this will probably get him in some trouble eventually!
That night we went to Chilis for dinner, and bed by 9!
Day 3. We spent this morning at Circus Circus. It was a perfect time to go, and Gage and Kd were the only ones on most rides. Thanks to Shirley they didn't have to ride alone on most of them!
This was probably my saddest moment as a parent. Gage was not a fan at all of this train, his face says it all. I wanted to yell "stop the ride" but he got through it and maybe it made him stronger? Probably not!
After Circus Circus we went swimming again, another great afternoon by the pool!
It was our last night in Vegas, we did dinner at Panda Express=classy! Then waited in line for the pirates show. We had front row seats, kids were excited as can be, then of course it was canceled because of wind! We were pretty bummed.
We walked the strip a little that night then called it a night. We went to bed pretty early every night which is a plus with having kiddos. The sleep was much needed and enjoyed!

Day 4 was St. Pattys Day!

We packed up and headed home. Gage was so good in the car, he slept, watched some movies, colored, read, and sang to us a lot! We couldn't have asked for a better vacation! Great company, great weather, great entertainment, great kiddos, we loved it! I'm so happy we have vacationed lot already with Gage. I think it's very important to get your kids in different environments, with different people, having different schedules. I'm already brainstorming our next family trip! :)

Brynlee's blessing and a few extras

2011-03-08T07:38:00.000-08:00

We started off the weekend with our Valentines date presents for each other. We went to dinner, Jazz Game, then out with friends! It really was such a perfect night! Dinner was good and fast, the Jazz game was way good, our seats were great and they won! Now if you know me you know I'm not the biggest sports fan. I enjoy going to the games but it used to be for the mascot, cheerleaders, food &drinks! Well I actually watched this game, yes the entire game! I loved it, and actually caught myself booing when the other teamed made their free throws (is that what you call them?) In reality any night with just the hubs and I is a great perfect night!

This is Jamie, if you haven't ever met her you should, she makes me happy! We are night and day, but she puts up with my crazy planning and I put up with her crazy spontaniousness. Love you Jamie!!

Sweet Brynlee got blessed Sunday, and it was perfect! This was the first time my little family had been to a LDS church in years. It was during little mans nap time so I was a little worried of how he would do. He had a slumber party the night before with his cousins Kingston & Graycee. They were up till 11:00 partying and running grandma & grandpa like crazy! Well I guess this was the trick to getting a super enjoyable, happy, funny, obedient child. Gage was so incredibly good this day that I started thinking of no more naps, but I don't think that would go well. Whenever we took pictures he would give this smile....
So of course we had to take tons!!
He was so good during church, I was such a proud mama! For the first half he just sat next to Grandpa and listened and watched, he was so calm. During the second half, he had some milk, marshmellows and colored with Kimberlee. Two funny stories... During church they have ward business where they swear new callings in and what not. Well they have everyone raise their hands for yay or nay. During this Gage raises his hand during the nay part, keep in mind this was our first time in church. He is such a ham! Second story, while he was coloring Woody & Buzz he made sure to yell out Woody, Woody, WOODY, a few times. I guess this is why moms don't take these sort of things for kids to color during church. It just didn't sound too great.
Doesn't he just look so handsome in a suit!
See wasn't lying about the smiles, I guess he is a photographers child!We then went back to Bradon's families house for a luncheon, and wow the food was great! Brynlee's blessing was so special, I caught myself getting teary eyed during it.
Even in the car he was a hoot! What a great weekend, full of people we love and want to be around! Some other good news, my mom and I received the daycare grant we applied for! We each get $1200.00 to spend on new stuff! We get to start buying the end of this month! I'm so excited for some new stuff for the kiddos, they sure deserve it! Photography is also going so well, I have 5 weddings booked, and one in the works. I'm doing things a little differently this year with scheduling cause of Tyler's school. I'm only booking out a few months in advance, not like last year when I booked for the entire year pretty much. When I open months up I book out fast, so I guess I'm doing things right. I have the best clients ever, and thankfully I've never really had to advertise! This Sunday will be one year since my first session, can you believe it! I have learned so much since I started, and I'm 95% self taught!! I still have so much to learn and I still learn something new with every session! Photography has been the biggest blessing, it has taught me so much about myself and what I can do and handle. I've had some rough times but it was made me better in the end! I'm extremely proud of myself this week, so go me!

Tyler is doing so well with school, we are so thankful he doesn't have to work while going. Midvale has really done so much for us! He is so smart and when he talks to me about things I'm so lost! Things will be getting a little more crazy in the next month or so when his clinicals start. I think he's really excited to get going with those!

Life is good!

Gage's Pirate Party

2011-02-28T08:43:00.001-08:00

Well it's over and I feel like I can finally relax! The party turned out really well, he had a great turn out and seemed to have a lot of fun! He was super shy at first and wouldn't let anyone put him down but once more kids arrived he warmed up! Thanks Everyone who came, I know how busy life can be! We really appreciate it!
His first reaction walking in, he just gave everything the blank stare, haha!
When we sang Happy Birthday to him he sang along with us with a smile on his face! He loved blowing out the candle, it was so cute! The Pinata was a lot of fun! Note to self though don't fill a pinata with hard candies, they break with impact! :)Gage loves opening presents, so much that once he opens one he grabs for the next! I was exhausted afterwards trying to keep up with him. He got super spoiled, thanks again everyone!
Right after the party my sisters convinced us to go to Wendover with them. My mom & dad had offered to watch all 4 kiddies while we went, they're crazy! So off we went, we didn't do too well but we had fun! I'm so lucky to have these two, words can't express the friendship we have! And yes another bowling trip was made yesterday, I think we should join a team!

Gage's Birthday #1

2011-02-24T13:06:00.000-08:00

Gage had such a good Birthday day, we were all pretty exhausted at nights end! He got to spend it with most of our families and he was extra spoiled. His party isn't even till tomorrow but he already got...
a sand/water table.
Car track set
Barn set/ Harley puppy
Outside play BBQ set
Outside picnic table with umbrella
A motorcycle suitcase
A "pirate"swimsuit
Some sweet jeans and a yellow (as he calls it Triangle) car.
A real working firetruck ride along car (it's pretty sweet!)
And lots of clothes!
Wow where are we going to put all this? Makes me way excited for Summer and outside play!

We spent the day of his birthday with a few visits from people and playing with his buddies. After Tyler and I got off work we headed to incredible pizza (which is now party planet.) Everyone was able to come, we were so excited! Gage loved opening his gifts, he didn't waste any time! He ate his salad, he is on the biggest salad kick and wanted to play.

He loved all the games and for the most part he was able to do everything. He got to bowl again, it was the cutest mini bowling alley. Ride in a go-kart with mom & dad, and run around till he was exhausted. I love just letting him run free and be a kid!

When we got back home and his cake hadn't even been touched we decided to hurry and sing to him. He loved it, all smiles, clapped, and blew out the candle all on his own. He loved it so much we had to relight the candle a few times and let him do it again. He picked out this cake, and chowed down on it. Actually the day before his birthday when we picked out his cake he insisted when we got home to have some. Tyler and I couldn't resist so he had his birthday cake for the first time the night before! We are such pushovers!

Thank you everyone for the birthday wishes, and for everyone that came along for the night! He was so much fun, it made all the money & work worth it. Now wish me luck for his party tomorrow. Snow is coming and I'm crossing my fingers it isn't as bad as it sounds!

My baby is TWO

2011-02-21T11:48:00.000-08:00

I feel like I've been planning this for forever. What can I say I love parties and birthdays and I believe you should make them BIG! I can't believe 2 years ago I experienced the best moment of my life. Tyler and I couldn't imagine our life without Gage and I'm pretty sure he knows how much he is loved! It all started with this.... Then a year ago we celebrated his big 1st! I swear Gage is going to be a comedian, he keeps us laughing constantly. Some favorites...
-I'm pooping, and he says this even when he's not just so we don't change him.
-When he hands us things he says "Here Honey."
-He always laughs at himself when he "farted."
-He loves to do things that are "naughty" and will say "Look at me!" Yes we are in trouble!
-He loves to dance, here he is dancing to his favorite song!

-He has started a new habit that he likes to do while watching cartoons and in the car.
-Thanks to aunt Shirley he loves anything dress up. That usually is girlie stuff. I consider him very lucky because he has such good buddies! This is his other best friend, they're two peas in a pod! Lucky for him he gets to see his friends daily!
-The other day we were sitting on the couch reading a book and he counted with us to 10. I about died! He also knows tons of songs his favorites are, ABCS, Twinkle Twinkle, Itsy Bitsy, and If you're happy and you know it!
-He is a great eater, he loves fruits, veggies more then any kid I've seen. He has to be in a weird mood to eat chicken nuggets, corndogs, mac &cheese, not your normal kid!

-He is a terrible sleeper, I guess he always has been. We take the blame for most of it cause we never really were good at crying it out. He will have a middle of the night flip out about once a month, which could be worse. His bedtime routine that was always no problem is getting sketchy too. I know he still needs naps cause if he doesn't get one he falls asleep anywhere. Also there is no way we could move him into a big boy bed cause he would never stay in it. I guess we will just go with the flow on this one, having kids means getting no sleep right? Ha Thank heavens for coffee!

-He loves his cousins, grandmas , grandpas, aunts, uncles, so much. He is so lucky to have such close family that would and already does do everything for him.

-He has the best manners! He will say, bless you when you sneeze (this just happened yesterday) thank you, please, welcome.

-He is such a great talker he can pretty much have an entire conversation with you. He still moans and whines when he wants some things but for the most part he is doing great!

-He is crazy obsessed with Gabba again. We thought we were free of it for a little while there but oh no. Everytime he wants to watch cartoons it's for Gabba. Thankfully he has started loving Cailou, I guess he has to be just like Kimberlee!

-He loves his back tickled and to play with your hair. He would much rather prefer a forhead kiss then a lips.

-"Schoopy" and him are such good buddies. I'm so thankful for all my boys!

-He finally is getting much better with goodbyes. We used to have to sneak out but now we can say our goodbyes, I Love it! He also is doing way better with telling family goodbye!

-He learns so much from us, like the other day I was making juice from the frozen can. He got into the spoon drawer and grabbed me out a big one to stir it. Of course he hands it to me with "Here Honey." I have to say I enjoy being called honey way better then Amber!

-He prefers Tyler to do anything physical rather then me. Tyler is known for chasing around the house, blanket rides along the hardwood floor, forts, hide o seek, get mom games, I guess I'll stick with the boring safe stuff!

-He plays with himself so well, like right now he's playing with mixing cups talking to himself! Don't get me wrong though, he is as active as they come and he has never really been mellow.

-He is so independent but always has been. He has to do everything for himself. It's hard for me but I hope it continues on this way.

-Sharing has been difficult at times, somedays are great, somedays not so much!

-He has to help with everything. When we go grocery shopping he has to carry in bags for us. He loves to help clean, help put away dishes, pretty much he has to be involved in all that we do!

-He is a huge flirt, especially shopping. Whenever we get to the register it never fails the lashes do their job. I get a lot of oh he's so cute comments out shopping!

-If their is something he can jump off of he will, he loves to do things that will probably cause a few injuries in his lifetime!

-I don't know if I ever posted about his tooth but it has all came back down. It has a small chip but I just love it, it gives me character! Thankfully it came back healthy and white, the dentist was really impressed!

I know that was a lot and most of you probably skipped it all! This is mostly for my blog book! If you didn't check out his two year pictures here are a few more!

And you know I had to do it, here is Gage's past year, what an amazing year it was! Turn up your volume and listen to one of my favorite songs, it's perfect for Mr. Gage and us. Also it's crappy quality, sorry about that!

Gage, Dad & Mom love you more then you'll ever know!

Gage's first time bowling

2011-02-21T10:33:00.000-08:00

This first photo is of us on Valentines, isn't he a cheeser!

Since our Valentines bowling date didn't work out we tried again yesterday! It was a lot of fun, Gage didn't really care about what the ball did after he rolled it down but he loved rolling it. He was the perfect little boy and we now know where to take him for some cheap family fun!

Gage's two year pictures!

2011-02-18T13:07:00.000-08:00

Go check them out HERE!

I love love the way they turned out, he was such a good boy! I had a vision and it played out just like I wanted! He likes his picture taken for the most part and he is as cute as they come! Gage will be two on Wednesday Feb 23rd. Stay tuned for a few birthday posts, the next week is gonna be fun & crazy!

Day Oh I lost track!

2011-02-16T07:04:00.000-08:00

The theme for today is Vegas cause we will be heading there in a few weeks! :)

I love Tyler because he is responsible & smart! He knows when to splurge and when to not! I love that about him.

Slacker

2011-02-14T14:35:00.000-08:00

Yes I'm slacking with this love month thing, but here I am again! Today is Valentines, we celebrated last night with our traditional PF changs dinner. Afterwards we thought about going and seeing a movie but then decided taking Gage bowling sounded ten times better. We picked him up from my parents and got him all excited to bowl for the first time. We got there and it was a 45 min wait, bummer! If you have a 2 year old you know waiting for 45 min isn't ever a good thing. So we rescheduled our bowling date and went home. It was a great night though, and Tyler and I still have the best times together.

This was taken on one of our cruises, we both got so much sun that day but it was another perfect vacation together! Oh what I would give to have my pre-baby body back!I love Tyler cause he is a firefighter, and he wears a uniform! ;) hehe! Happy Valentines Everyone, today I'm feeling so grateful for the two amazing, healthy, handsome boys in my life! I'm one lucky mom & wife!

Superbowl Fun

2011-02-09T07:19:00.000-08:00

First off a picture of Tyler and I on our honeymoon! Pretty much the best vacation ever! Caribbean Cruise to Cozumel, Jamaica, Haiti (it was really pretty) and the Cayman Islands. We were celebrities on the cruise cause we did the newlywed game and everyone approached us afterwards, it was a blast!

I love Tyler cause he is an amazing dad and always puts us first! Hence this sweet fort he made with Gage. I wanted to post some pictures of Gage meeting Brynlee for the first time, he sure loves her.
We had a great Superbowl party, and even though I don't really get into the game I enjoyed spending time with my family.
Explaining my post the other day concerning two new fish....
We kept them, and oh I'm so happy about it! ;) Gage loves them though, so that made me do it!

Day 7

2011-02-08T11:54:00.000-08:00

June 15, 2007! What a perfect day!

I love Tyler cause he is my biggest fan, my pusher, my support system!

Day 6

2011-02-07T10:07:00.000-08:00

My favorite engagement picture of us!

I love Tyler because when I send him to the store with Gage for envelopes, he comes back with two goldfish! Aw lovely.

Day 5

2011-02-06T12:55:00.000-08:00

This was a big day for us! Getting engaged on a cruise ship in mexico! Nothing but us and the moon and stars. It was absolutely perfect!

I love Tyler cause he has great teeth!

Happy Superbowl everyone! Go Packers!

Day 4

2011-02-04T11:18:00.000-08:00

I'm not really sure when this was taken but I remember this golfing trip like it was yesterday. We had so much fun and I really got to see how crazy Tyler was!

I love Tyler cause he is crazy and he brings out the crazy in me! Two crazies you better watch out!

Day 3

2011-02-03T08:09:00.000-08:00

I apologize for the crappy pictures, these were scanned. This picture was right after we started dating as well. I posted it because it shows us at Applebees where we worked together for awhile. We have so many memories from Applebees, I credit it just a little to us finally starting to date. We were friends since 6th grade but made the jump to dating our senior year, I'm so glad we did!

I love Tyler today because he doesn't hold me back. He lets me go out with friends, spend time on me, and makes an effort to make sure I do all this stuff. Thanks Love!

Day 2

2011-02-02T09:06:00.000-08:00

This picture just makes me really miss high school. This was taken the day after I got my first tattoo, March 5 2004. I thought I was so cool going back to school with it and showing it off! This class was my favorite because I was teachers aid for Dr. Love and Tyler would always come see me cause he got out of his tech class early. I don't think I did one thing in that class besides flirt.

Another reason I still love Tyler is cause he treats me like gold. I get back rubs weekly, dinner made a lot, cars are always taken care of, and compliments galore! He told me a few days ago that he still gets butterflies being with me. Coming from a male that means so much! Oh how I love him!

Oh and look at Tyler's hair, haha oh how I love it! And my A initial purse in the background, remember those?

February the month of Love!

2011-02-01T19:21:00.000-08:00

I'm a big cheese ball, I cry at commercials, love a good romantic date, and love to bring on the mushy stuff. For the month of Feb I'm going to try to post one picture of me and my sweetheart, and give one reason why I kinda love him. I also need some motivation to get back to blogging!

We started dating November of 03, this was January 04. Look at my turtleneck and all my porcelain dolls, haha!!

I love Tyler cause he always makes me laugh. The other night he chased me around the house and I don't think I have laughed that hard in a long time. He knows just what to do to put me in a better mood!

Sweet Brynlee

2011-01-26T12:20:00.000-08:00

Brynlee Jo arrived Monday January 25th at 9:51p.m. after 20 hours of labor. She is so precious I'm so in love! Vanessa's labor was long but she did so well I'm so proud of her and Bradon. I got a call Monday morning at 3:30 a.m. from my mom that Vanessa was in labor. I drove over to the hospital half asleep and spent some time with my cute family before I had to head back to work.

When I left the hospital at 6:30a.m. I was pretty sure I would miss the delivery. I was bummed but with my job you don't really get sick/off days unless they're super planned. Well sadly for Ness her labor was a slow one so I got lucky! :) I got back to the hospital with Tyler that evening and we spent some time with everyone waiting and waiting! Ness was starving and her and Bradon were going on no sleep. We had a few scares but everything turned out perfectly! She was 7lbs 15 oz, 21.5 inches. She is seriously so cute my pictures do not do any justice! {just wait till I do her newborns}
I made a visit last night and will again tonight, you might say I'm obsessed but I gotta get my baby hungriness out some way! Congrats to Vanessa & Bradon I already know you two will rock at being parents! Being an aunt is so much fun and I love my nieces and nephew more then anything!

Updates

2011-01-11T12:14:00.000-08:00

Wow life is a little crazy right now but that's because I'm making it crazy! This is what we have going on...

-Tyler started school, and instead of me not seeing him as much I think I might be seeing him more! I know this will change but I'm liking it now!

-I'm revamping my photography marketing stuff. New logo, new blog, updating albums, yadayada.

-Spring cleaning is coming early at our house. Cleaning out closets, painting little things, getting rid of clothes, junk. It feels so good!

-I'm also applying for a $1200 grant for daycare, lots and lots of paperwork.

-Planning a Vegas trip in March with Gage and Tyler, possibly Shirley & Kd. Yes Vegas and Gage shall be interesting and even an entire week. It will be a total different vacation but we are so excited!!

-Planning a 2nd birthday bash for my baby who is not a baby anymore. Lets just say I'm over doing it already!

-And trying to be the best dang housewife I can be to my smarty pants hubs. I'm trying to have dinner made every night he has school. #1 I hate cooking, #2. I hate cooking but I'm working on it!

Gage is doing so well. He is so dang smart it scares us sometimes. He is almost 23 months and he is in a really fun stage right now. He is doing better with temper tamptrums. We just know that some things just need to be on his terms and when we do this life is great! And a huge plus, his sleeping has been amazing the last month. Down at 9ish up at 8ish!

He talks so much but he really is a singer. He loves to sing, maybe because I sing all day! He loves girls, maybe because he is around 5 girls all day. He loves soup (or snoop). He loves kisses, kisses before bed, I need to record our nightly routine it's the best and hilarious. He repeats everything! He sometimes can be a drama queen. He hates when his hands are dirty. He is not a fan of sweets, or meats, seriously he must have not gotten my side of the families sweet trait. I could go on for days but I'll save that for his 2 year post.

Also moms if you blog like I do with updates on your kids I highly suggest making a blog book. I love ours and I plan to do it with every year for Gage. It's the best journal! I leave you with some older and newer videos. We got a flip camera for Christmas and we love it! We went sledding last weekend with the family and Gage loved it at first, he has no fear. Then he got cold and was done after 15 minutes. We will have to take him for sure again. The rest of the videos is just my super cute little guy and how big he is becoming. I'm such a proud mama!

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com