Monsoon!!!

I love monsoon season. We had a great warm rain shower and though i have literally 9 loads of laundry to wash, dry and fold, we took the opportunity to have some fun. Laena and i jumped in puddles, played ring-around-the-rosie, and just ran around. We had a blast and made some more dirty laundry for me to do.


Carson just sat inside the door and ripped up a phone book. Good little man.

Summer Vacation!!!!

So, we went to CA for a while for our big family vacation. 1st, Me and the kids flew into sacramento to spend almost a couple weeks with my family.

This is us in Tahoe. My brother ran in an awesome relay and we were there to annoy the heck out of him.


Then we went to this beach house! It was amazing. Winston's mom rented it for the week and we spent the time playing games, boogie boarding and relaxing.

Winston and i spent a day in San Francisco. We saw the broadway play "Wicked". AWESOME!!!


After the beach house, we went to the lake with my family. Laena loved the tube. We did some skiing, wakeboarding and a whole lot of laying around. Perfect.

My dad, the stud.

Winston, also pretty studly.

Carson's 1st chicken leg.

Carson loved the canoe!

Laena is discovering the world with megan.


It was an awesome trip. Thank you to our families who made it possible. We had so so much fun!!!

I'm Thankful For...

Ive found myself fairly unhappy lately and realize that it is solely my fault because i have a ton of things in my life that are amazing. I need a thankful list. I'm giving myself 5 minutes to put it together, cuz that's all i should be sparing today. So here it is, the things that i'm thankful for and/or that i love about my life at this point in it:

-My entire family, extended included up to all 4 grandparents, are alive and generally healthy! Nothing is stopping any one of us from living our lives to the fullest, which is pretty amazing.

-Carson:
*My son will sit on my lap, all swaddled up, while i do this.
*He is always ready to give the biggest smile he can, even if i just left him to scream in his bed for 5 minutes before i got him.
*He's still not crawling. Hehe, i know this may be odd, but we just got all our rugs yesterday and i don't have this house babyproofed yet.
*He takes and loves a bottle.
*He adores his sister.
*He refuses to sleep in my arms. Bed or carseat only.
*He's dang cute.

-Laena
*She says "I sooo tired, Mama. I go nigh-night?" Yes!
*She doesn't get out of her bed til i go get her. She sings to herself, tells herself jokes and beats up her dolls.
*She can sit and watch a movie and give me time to myself.
*She loves all things girlie: purses, princesses, head bands
*She has this ear for music that astounds me. She knows when an intro to a song on the radio is a piano and knows that notes and bars mean music.
*She never has been one to get into things she's not supposed to. I never had to babyproof anything and she understands what she is allowed to touch.
*She shakes her booty and makes me laugh.
*She has a dark sense of humor that i totally understand.
*She's a very pretty little thing.

-Winston
*He understands me.
*He gets me to talk about things when i need to and lets me sulk when i need that.
*He loves our children so so much.
*He gives amazing back rubs even tho he rarely gets it in return.
*He loves his job because he get to help people out and save them money.
*He finds me attractive even tho i rarely do anything with my hair or face, don't have any jeans that fit so live in sweats and am carrying extra weight.
*He will lay in bed with me til i'm asleep even if he has no intention of sleeping for a few more hours.
*He reminds me of what's important and what's good in life.

-2 whole wheat eggos with butter and yogurt on top equals 200 calories. Yum.
-I got 6 rugs for our entire house and bedding for Laena for $94 with tax! Tah-tah cold tile!
-Our water heater sends out some awesomely hot water, which makes rinsing dishes before they sit there for a couple days unnecessary.
-We have a landlord who gets things fixed the day we tell her we have a problem.
-We always have too much food. So much better than not enough.
-Smoothies in our new blender and that i can't even taste the broccoli and spinach i add to them.
-I have good friends and i love their kids.
-A vacation in june to look forward to.

Well that was 10 minutes of thinking and that's it for now. I love you all and i love my life!

Just some updates!

I haven't posted for a long while, we have been extremely busy. Here are just some pictures of the kids since january!

Laena is doing pretty good with potty training. Princess books and candy helps!

Carson loves baths! He is soooo much stinkier than Laena ever was. Such a boy!

Laena loves daddy's clothes!

Carson seems so much bigger than Laena was. I swear her feet didn't touch the bottom of this toy til she was like 7 months. Carson is already 4 months old!

Here's Carson chilling with his friend Jane.

Grandpa got Carson to fall asleep.

Laena went to California for a week and a half to spend time with Grandparents and to give me some time to figure some things out in my life! My cousin took some pictures of my little ham! She's coming home tomorrow, miss her sooooo much!

Laena is Two!

I am very lucky that when Laena turned 2 last week, she didn't quite know what that meant. We were able to be very flexible with our birthday festivities.

Monday, we snagged Kiya and headed to 'Bounce Jungle'. There are 7 different blow-up bouncy things go run amok with. I don't know what Laena's thinking here, but Kiya's ready for some fun!

There were video games in the lobby that were almost more fun than the bounce houses.

Winston's mom (Ya-Ya, as Laena calls her) sent a huge box full of presents. It was all Laena's idea to wear some of the wrapping as a hat.

Yes, those slippers have blue foil toenails and brown hairy knuckles. Laena took them out and said 'Pretty Shoes!' It's the 1st time i've questioned her taste level, i think they are pretty cool tho. There was a 'Where the Wild Things Are' theme going.

Then on Sunday, we had a mini party. Laena and Jaeden thought it was the funniest thing to hug each other so hard that they would fall down. Best buds!

Laena is very excited to be TWO! She will randomly run up to me and say 'Mommy, I two?!' and then answer herself with a gleeful 'Yeah! I two!!!' She is my favorite little girl, the bright spot in any sad moment. I love you, baby girl!

Carson the Martian

My little Carson has bronchitis! Laena was sick for a week and we thought we had squeeked by without everyone else getting it. Nope. It is true: the sickness is 100 times worse for a baby than anyone else.

This is a nebulizer with a head gear that makes Carson look like a little alien. It's kinda cute, funny, sad, heart-breaking at the same time.

Can i just say something?! If you have sick kids and you know you are going to be around another family with a newborn...don't. Or please at least warn the family with a baby that your kid has a cough and you don't know if it's contagious, but leave it up to them whether or not to put their children's health and their financial well-being in jeapordy! Sorry...pet peeve!

CHRISTmas thru New Year's

While Winston's dad and step-mom were here, we went and visited their time-share condo in Tucson. Carson was having fun.

Laena was doing this with her shirt. We tried to get her to stop, but she was getting attention, so she proceeded to go get my heels and parade around. Hehe.

Laena LOVED the snowman ornament on the tree. She had me hold her up, until i got smart enough to just move it lower.

Laena's favorite present: dress-up high heels from Grandma Suzie. 4 Pairs of sparkly, feathery, shiny fun.

Laena would come get heels, then go ride the horse. Then change to another pair of shoes, and ride again. Those were the only 2 presents she really needed. I should've saved the rest for her b-day the 19th.

Grandma Karen (Laena calls her 'Ya-Ya') got Laena and Carson PJs with matching gingerbread men on them. They were so so cute. Laena's favorite clothing choice are 'Jamas'.

I was getting ready for New Year's Eve and Laena wanted me to get her ready too. So i curled up her hair and did some makeup. She was so careful with her outfit all night.