The Great Outdoors

Okay, most of you will probably think I am a horrible parent for saying this, but the funniest thing happened yesterday! We took Andi to the park because it was a beautiful day(we are being hazed lately, 60 degrees one day, and 6 inches of snow the next, lame.) Anyway, a couple of the ward people were there with their dogs. One is a pug, Spanky, that Andi chases around and Spanky is used to her. The other was a big ol Lab puppy who was really high strung. Well Andi decided the lab was more entertaining than Spanky and kept following it around, but being a high strung puppy it was running around like crazy. So the dogs owner calls for it and it turns around and runs, flying by Andi and missing her by maybe an inch. Seriously, you could see her hair wave by the breeze the dog created. Anyway, she thought that was pretty funny and went after the dog just in time for him to turn around and body slam her. She was of course really upset so that was the end of the park, but we got in all on video ;)

So here are a few pics of Andi playing outside with Thad.

We have discovered that Andi really, truly, hates dresses. I used to think that it was just because it got in the way of her crawling, but now that she is walking and still gets mad when I put one on her, I have to admit. She hates them.

Oh, and the computer is her favorite toy. We've had to start shutting her out of her own room because we find her like this ALL the time!

In other news, Thad is home this weekend, but flying to Cali the next two for interviews. So Andi and I get ditched again! But we are going to Bako the week he is going to be in Texas. A week is just too long to get ditched like that.

days go by

First off, Andi would like to thank her Uncle Walter & Aunt Stef for the fabulous outfit she is wearing in this picture. She fits into it now and I realized when I was dressing her that she needed a jacket to wear with it, and since none of her jackets would look good with it, we had to go buy her a really cute denim jacket. She really is more stylish than I am these days.


And this picture is really how we find her sleeping lately. Legs hanging out the bars and everything. Which means we will never buy her a daybed because she will kick the bars out the back of it like I used to do ;)


Things are starting to get back to normal around here. Work will be calming down for me after this weekend because I will have most of our fall/winter vacancies filled. Who knew people looked for fall housing in January? Thad is almost caught up with his school work from being gone last week and is scheduling interviews with the companies he talked to at the competition. He is also interviewing people to take over our jobs for the Schanks. So he is busy, but looking forward to having something decided as to post-grad employment.

hail the conquering hero

Thad is home! It has been a long 4 days. But it seems that it was worth it. Thad's team took 1st place for the heavy civil division, and 4 other BYU teams took 1st's in their divisions. The recruiters were all very impressed and anxious to be talking to the BYU guys. I wasn't wild about this competition thing before, but it turns out that it is quite the bargaining chip now for job offers. The companies know who Thad is and a bunch offered to fly him out(to their offices) for interviews in the next couple of weeks. Now Thad just has decide who he wants to talk to. The only downside to the winning is that he now has to go to Nationals in Texas mid-march. And with flying different places on weekends for interviews I'm gonna get ditched a lot in the near future. oh well, it's worth it if Thad finds a job with a co he really likes.

Fraggle Rock

Does anyone remember that show fraggle rock? Well, And i's hair is getting long in the front and gets in her eyes all day long. And of course she waits till she has food on her hands to wipe it out of the way, so he hair always has something in it. We have cute little clips, but she yanks those out after 2.3 seconds so they do no good. So I finally found some tiny rubber bands to pull her hair up with, and now she looks like a fraggle. But at least her hair is out of her eyes and clean.
Earlier this week after a grocery store run I realized that Andi has been walking for a while now and there is no real reason I have to carry her to and from the car. So I took her out of her seat and stood her in the carport and she ran straight for the snow. I hadn't realized that she has never walked around outside by herself before. It's been so cold and snowy since she started walking that she hasn't been able too. But she really liked it.

We have survived day one without Thad. Andi and I usually get in fights around dinner time because she's still a bit picky about what and when she wants to eat for dinner, but we did not need a referee last night and had a good day. But I will be glad when he gets back. It's almost 11 and I'm still in Pj's, Andi just has too much for me to do this morning ;)

The Fashion Plate

So this last week Andi has really become interested in her clothes. I came in to get her from a nap a few days ago and found her like this. She had pulled her socks and pants off and was playing with them.And almost everyday no matter what she is wearing she brings me her yellow sweat jacket so I can put it on her. This morning I haven't even gotten her dressed yet, she's still in PJ's but is wearing her jacket because she brought it to me and stuck her arms out waiting for me to put it on her. Thad is leaving Wednesday at 4 am for the CM competition in Reno and doesn't get back till Saturday night. So if you are bored please call me or e-mail or something cos I'll be bored.

the hunt is on

It has begun. Thad had his first job interview today, and has another one on Thursday. The guy he talked to today was up in Heber and they build ginormo homes in Park City. And he tried to hire Thad on the spot. . . as in start full time tomorrow. But Thad reminded him he was still in school and had another job commitment, but the guy was really bent on hiring him so asked him how many hours a week he could possibly give him while still in school. So the guy said he'd call again in a week. Anyway, it seems right up Thad's alley as far as smaller company that rewards for hard work and ability to move up the ranks quickly. Only catch is we'd be living in Heber!
After this summer with Kiewit Thad really is looking for a small company and I'm thinking that means we are going to get stuck in Utah. I mean, how many out of state "small companies" are going to send recruiters to BYU or the CM competition in Reno? but hey, Heber is better than mountain view, WY. . . Target, Costco, the mall, all within a 30 min drive back to Provo. I have been anxiously awaiting the interview/job hunt time but now that it's here it's a huge decision to make and I'm a little stressed about it. But I am very excited at the same time.

so much to say

First of all I need to rant and rave about Costco for a minute. I am so tired of them randomly not carrying things! Last week I went to get the Orange Chicken that I have come to love because we were having a little oriental night with our neighbors. So I go and it's not there. Then I went to get regular chicken this week, and for a while they were carrying a different kind that I liked better and it's gone now too. Oh, and so is my favorite yogurt! Stupid Costco! Anyway, this week became very insane on Wednesday. I had no idea students started looking for spring/summer and fall/winter contracts in January. Well apparently they do because starting Wednesday my phone has been ringing off the hook! And today I showed 10 places. and I have appointments all week to show places and appointments to sign contracts and the phone keeps ringing. I finally stopped answering it this afternoon because I needed a break and within an hour I have 3 new messages. It's nuts. Andi is really becoming quite a character. She is constantly playing hide and go seek around the house, and has learned how to get behind things now to hide. She also likes the throw everything she can get her hands on in the bathtub or toilet. And she is very quick to find toys and stuffed animals at the store. . . any store. . . every store. right now she is hiding behind her laundry bag giggling. She thinks Thad is chasing her, but really he's lying on the living room floor calling her and pretending he's going to find her.
Thad has his first job interview Tuesday. It's with a co in Midway that builds "high end luxury homes" in park city. The guy called him out of the blue Friday so he is going to go check it out. See, I told you. The minute I started getting excited about getting out of Utah he's gonna get a job here. I want to say thank you to all of you who helped in my bangs/no bangs dilemma. Here is a pick of the new hair cut.

another day

It is always something with Andi. Now that we have her ears under control with tubes she gets tonsillitis. She comes by it rightfully though, I had my tonsils out when I was 5. And it looks like she will be following in mommy's footsteps. The way things are going she's gonna get my bad eyes, bad skin, bad curly-fro hair, and hey why not my asthma too. Poor girl. If she gets Thad's metabolism though, I think it will balance out because she'll never have to worry about being fat ;)


This pic is from yesterday, and I promise she climbed in that basket herself. She sat there and played for quite a while and then moved on to play behind that table. weirdo. Oh, and yesterday she decided is would be fun to drag the trash bag around the house before Thad took it outside.
We have been trying to get her to drink Milk instead of formula now, but for some reason she won't take it. She drinks strawberry lemon aid and anything else Thad tries to give her, but don't even think about milk, that's way too weird! Although it is whole milk, so I kinda don't blame her, that stuff is nasty. But I don't see how it's much worse than her fake milk formula. Any moms out there with advice?

More Firsts

Andi has had a couple more firsts this weekend. First of all she went sledding for the first time. We went to rock canyon park which is 2 minuted from our house and we'd never been, but it is an awesome sledding bowl! And she loved it. She actually like being pulled back up the hill better than sliding down it. But it was fun.

She also tried feeding herself with a spoon for the first time tonight. Obviously she didn't do very well, but she knew what she was supposed to do, just couldn't keep the food on the spoon long enough to get it in her mouth.
Unfortunately she has also learned to climb on the coffee table with no help. At first it wasn't bad because she would crawl around and then slide off on her tummy feet first. But now she stands on it and tries to walk off. I even let her fall a couple of times hoping she'd learn her lesson, but as soon as she stopped crying she climbed right back up. So I think the coffee table might go to the basement for a little while till she understands that she can't be on it.

1 year old!

Andi turned one yesterday! We had a little party for her with Michael &Cari & little Tino. I made Andi her own cake to destroy, and she did pretty well with it. For a complete play by play of the demolition check out Thad's website. www.et.byu.edu/~tsb43
She has also decided this week that she will now be a picky eater. We started feeding her the "graduates" dinners that are basically normal people food, and she won't eat it! We've had quite the battle the last few nights trying to get her to eat. She usually wins, but only because she has Thad on her team who gives in and makes her a sandwich or bottle.
I am taking her to play group this week for the first time. She loves running around with the other little kids at church so it should be fun.
Other than that we are just settling into to the new semester routine, and everything is going well.

Terrible what? . . . and pictures

So I really think that the fever Andi had with this last ear infection has melted her brain a little, or that whoever came up with the "terrible two's" seriously misspoke just to coin a phrase. Since we have been back she has started doing all kinds of weird things. First off she screams, and not in the "check out this cool new noise I can make" way either. It's a banshee wailing scream that is accompanied by flailing and rolling around on the ground. She has done this twice in the last week and the first time she did it I was actually afraid there was something wrong with her. Then I realized it was a tantrum and laughed at her. She is such a drama queen!
Secondly she makes these weird faces all the time. And will make them on command. If you make them at, her she will do it right back. And she knows it's funny because she laughs while she's doing it. Also she has discovered chocolate in all it's fabulous varieties. We had to put the candy dish away because she would yell and point at it whenever she caught a glimpse. I made brownies the other night and when they were sitting on top of the stove she yelled and pounded on the oven till we gave her some brownie. At lease we know where she gets this ;)
While she still doesn't say anything but daddy she has learned to point at whatever she wants, or wherever she wants to go, so she is communicating with us pretty effectively these days.
As for Thad and I we mostly just sit and laugh at her. Thad started school today. I know he wasn't looking forward to classes today, but I woke up in the best mood because it is his last semester. I have been very cheerful all day and just keep thinking how quickly the semester will go by and how soon we might be done with Provo! Of course now that I've said it out loud the semester will drag by and he will get a job in Provo and we'll be stuck here forever, just watch.
Anyway I promised Christmas pictures so here are a few.

this might be the longest post ever.

The fun never ends with Andi. Once we got to Bako and got rid of Andi's cold she started having issues with he ears. Every time she would burp or hiccup she would scream and grab her ears. By Wednesday she had green junk draining out of the tube which of course meant infection. The whole reason we did the tubes before we went out of town was so we wouldn't have to deal with an ear infection on vacation again. But we are just lucky because she had one. We took her to the surgeon today for a re-check and he said that 65% of kids who get tubes will have 1 ear infection within a year of the surgery, and she just got hers right away.
So Andi was miserable on Christmas and went back to bed before we even finished opening present. It's a good thing she won't remember this and will be able to have happy fun Christmas memories from here on out.
Other than that we had a really great time at home. We took new family pictures with Thad's fam on Christmas eve, an event over a year in the making. We haven't had the whole family together in forever! So it was really nice to have everyone there for a few days together.
Christmas morning we got up early as usual with my family. We had Kelsie and Cameron on the web cam so they could be apart of the morning, which tweaked bobby and bradon just a little. But only because it seriously slowed down the present opening process for a little while;) Then we had waffles because we all got new jazzy waffle makers. The ones you flip over and get perfect waffles every time. We went to Thad's parent's at 9 and I made omelette's for everyone and then we did the tree with them. Oh and we also did a white elephant exchange which was hilarious.
All the boys in my family got marshmallow guns and new Nerf guns with glow in the dark darts for Christmas, so as you can imagine the next few days the house was a battle field. They even went down to the church a couple nights to run around in the dark with their glowing darts.
We also had a surprise 50th wedding anniversary party for my grandparents while we were home. A bunch of family we hadn't seen in a while came so it was really fun. And the best part is that G&G had no idea! We headed back to bako the 30th and after some lame traffic and too many hours of baby einstein in the car we made it home at 1 am. Speaking of baby einstein we watched that for 3 days straight while she was sick because it was the only thing that kept her quiet. Thankfully when we got back she discovered care bears and will watch that now too. So we can have a little variety in our movies.
Now we are just relaxing and gearing up for Thad's last semester, yay! oh I had to post these picture of Andi and Walter. . .w e took them while we were home at the weddings last month but I couldn't post them because we framed them and gave it to my parents for christmas. Sorry I don't have any christmas pictures posted, but with Andi being as sick as she was I was way too distracted and my camera didn't even make it out of my bag. So I'm waiting on the ones from our parents cameras.

The Week

Blogger is STUPID! I have been trying all week to post but first could not log on, then once I finally got to log on I couldn't write anything. Lame.
But since I am in Cali now and blogger seems to be working I thought I should post right away before Jeni sets me on fire for not posting often enough.
It has been a busy week for poor Andi. Monday I took her to the ENT, who said yes tubes ASAP. And ASAP happened to be the very next day. So 8 am tuesday morning Thad and I took Andi to the surgery center to have tubes put in. The surgery was quick but the anesthetic happens to make babies very cranky, so we took her home where she cried and yelled at us for an hour before going to sleep. The worst part is that she was not allowed to eat before the surgery and when it was over she was too mad and disoriented to eat so she woke up starving!
By the afternoon she was back to normal, but wednesday woke up with a cold, by the night it had turned into a cough, and Thursday morning we were back at the drs. We got some meds that are helping her nose and cough, but it wires her beyond belief. She seriously was running circles in the living room till 10:30 thursday night. Which means her walking skills have greatly improved in the last week, no dress required.
Anyway today we drove to Bako, made great time, and didn't have much trouble with Andi at all. But as usual we are all glad to be out of the car.

The Walker

We discovered yesterday that Andi actually can walk very well. She doesn't walk at home more than two or three steps at a time. We think that is because there is nothing super interesting to walk to, and if there is she knows it's faster to crawl. But yesterday at church Andi walked away from us several times, and didn't seem to have any trouble getting around. I think her motiviation at church though, is that she hates crawling in dresses. Her knees get caught in the dress and she can't move very well, so she realized at church it's easier to walk. So I think I'm just going to put her in dresses everyday untill she starts walking at home. She's still in pajamas today, but when I do get her dressed it will be a dress.

The Tree

Here are the pictures of our tree as promised. The first one is with the dimmer. . . peaceful glimmer of lights.

And this is before when we were flagging down airplanes.

Decking the Halls and side notes

I can't believe we've only been back a week! This last week Andi got her 4th ear infection. . . which means she get's tubes for her birthday, yay! I'm taking her to the ENT on the 18th for a consult so we'll see what he says, but Andi's Dr basically said 4 infections in 6 months it's almost automatic. I've had a cold all week that feels like it's turned into strep or something fun like that today, so I get to go to the Dr this week. Oh, and yesterday was the first day since we've been home that the temperature reached above 30 degrees! I hate winter!
But we did manage to find a Christmas tree this week. It's a fake one, and pre-lit, but it's really big and looks real. The only problem was that when you plug in the lights it's like having a spot light in the living room, it was so bright! So Thad spliced a dimmer into the cord so we can turn the light up and down to optimal brightness ;) And we have a bald area at the bottom of the tree where Andi kept yanking ornaments off, so we finally just took them off within her reach. Not so pretty, but when the lights are on it's nice.
We braved the cold yesterday to put our lights up outside. I wish we had more things to wrap in lights, but it was nice not to have to be in the cold that long. I'll post a pic of our lights when we get a good one. Other than that Christmas shopping is all done and projects are completes. Now Thad just has to finish papers and take finals and we are going back to Bako again ;)

Yet another Bako trip

It has been a busy couple of weeks for us. Last Thursday we headed to Bako for the wedding extravaganza and I feel like we were running the whole time. Friday we spent the day setting up for Kelsies reception and had a dinner that Night with our fam and Cameron's fam. Saturday we were up at the crack of dawn to be down at the temple and then back to bako for the reception that night. The sealing was beautiful, and the reeption was a lot of fun. Andi tore apart my bouquet, but was a good sport about being drug around otherwise. Here are a few pics of the day. My siblings.

Andi Also discovered the piano this trip.

Turkey day came and after a marathon soccer game with my brothers, we spent the day with Thads fam and feasted on Grandma Richards famous food. Thad has been excited for a Grandma Richards Thanksgiving for months.

Then it was wedding time again. Set up friday, family dinner that night. Early wedding on saturday and reception saturday night. We had to recruite baby-sitters for the temple this time though, there were so many kids and babies! And the reception was in this awesome backyard and was totally beautiful. A little cold, but very nice.

The Bridesmaids, or matrons since we are all married

Andi and her favorite baby-sitters. The giant shirt is to keep her dress clean.

Sean and Ashley came to hang out with us while we took pictures. It was so good to see you guys, we miss you!

it's always something

Here's what I don't understand. Andi's teeth seem to only grow at night. She is totally normal and happy all day, but once she's asleep it's like the teething kicks in to overdrive and she wakes up screaming and is up for hours. Why can't her teeth bother her during the day so we could all sleep well. And why can't ALL of the teeth come in at once so we have one horrible week instead of stretching this trauma out little by little over 2 years. I just don't get it.
Anyway, besides that fun, I am cleaning and doing laundry and packing so we can go to wedding central (bako) for 10 days. And today I am grateful for baby einstein dvd's. We've tried all kinds of disney movies, but the only thing that keeps her attention is baby einstein. So I pop in one of those and I have a 20-30 minute window to get things done and she literally will not move. It's great.

Andi's new tricks

Well the last week or so Andi has learned all kinds of new tricks, like turning on the dishwasher, turning off and on the computer, climbing on the coffee table, turning all the way around in her high chair and standing up, and emptying out dresser drawers.
Her new favorite foods are cheeses-its, halloween candy, and honeycomb cereal. . . all compliments of Thad of course. I feed her dried fruit and cheerios, but find her sitting in Thads lap with her arm in the cheese-it bag.
She also loves making forts with Thad. For some reason the forts make her super hyper and she crawls around in circles in it.

long week

This is what happens when Thad is on Andi duty.


Andi has actually been sick this last week. Another ear infection! If she gets one more before the end of the year we have to do tubes. I don't look forward to that at all, but I have a feeling it will happen. If she picks up even the smallest little cold within a day or so it turns into an ear infection.
So, I have been looking forward to the whole daylight savings extra hour of sleep for quite some time now. We kept Andi up an hour later than usual in an attempt to help her adjust to the change so she'd still wake up at 7 after the time change. But our attempt failed and we did not get that extra hour. Andi was up at 6 ready to go and there was no explaining daylight savings to her. And now we have to wait an entire year to get that extra hour of sleep.

off and running

This has been an eventful few days for Andi. She started standing by herself a little bit at a time a few days ago, and last night took her very first step. She was walking along my leg and when she ran out she just stepped away trying to get to Thad. She fell on her behind of course, but she tried without any coaxing.
Look, No Hands!

As most of you know Andi is a puke machine and has been since day one. I can't count the number of time she's spit up all over me, in my hair etc. There have been several times when I just think to myself, one of these days i'll get you back for this. Well last night Andi got what was coming to her!
We were up in Draper at Thad's Aunt & Uncles and all the cousins were there. Heather(cousin) has a little boy who is a month younger than Andi. Luke and Andi were playing , crawling after each other, fighting over toys and what not. Anyway, Luke was, I think, trying to give Andi "loves". He wraped his arms around her head, opened his mouth and slobbered all over her head, wiping his snotty nose in her hair! I know I should have been grossed out or worried that she would catch his cold, but all I did was laugh! Finally, she got paybacks for pukeing on everyone! Yay for Luke!

Feelin the Burn and stuff

So Monday was my first day at the gym in . . . well. . . ever! It has been over 5 years since I've had any regular exercise program and let me just say that an hour of Turbo kickboxing was probably not the best way to jump back in to things. I am so sore! I can hardly pick Andi up this morning(it's always worse the 2nd day). So I think I'll try pilates instead of Turbo for a while and work my way up to that.
I had enrichment last night. My first as a committee member and it went really well. We had a dinner and I was running around getting stuff together, so when I finally came in to sit down at a table I noticed something interesting. Everyone was sitting by age groups. All the really old ladies at one table, the middle agers at one, luckily there was a seat left at the young moms table or I would have been lost! I guess we just gravitate to people we have the most in common with. Anyway then there was a program and all in all it was a nice night.
oh, and I just realized I hadn't posted any pics of Andi's teeth, so here ya go ;) She's not exactly happy to be having this picture taken because Thad wouldn't pick her up, but you can see her two bottom teeth pretty well.

And here is what she likes to do in the car now. . . weirdo!

on line shopping

So I've never been a big fan of the "stab you in the shins" pointy shoes everyone wears these days. But in looking for shoes for the bridesmaid dresses I went out on a limb and ordered these. I was actually really afraid when I opened the box because they are a whole lot pointier in person than in the picture. . . and they are going to be bright pink. But I put them on, and suprisingly they don't make my feet look like boats. This has broadened my perspective a bit on shopping. . . all those things I thought I could never pull off might actually work. Thad totally hates the shoes though. . . especially since they are going to be pink ;)

Home on the Range

So today Thad went to the Engineering and Technology school career fair on campus. He has a few info sessions and interviews lined up with some companies he's kinda interested in. But get this, the one he's really stoked about is a Co called Union Wireless. Basically they build and maintain towers for cell phones companies. They offer some really great benefits, a Co truck, good pay, and they are not all over so we wouldn't have to move around. The Guy at the booth wanted to hire him on the spot and he'd be put in charge of all the construction operations. Oh wait, did I say that it is in Mountain View WY!?!?!?!? In the brochure about the company it calls mountain view a "fontier comunity" . . . nice way of saying in the middle of nowhere! closest big city is SLC 2 hrs away. It get's better. . . population 1,600!!! It took me a while to figure out why Thad was so excited about this company and then He said that the guy he was talking to told him about all kinds of great fly fishing spots. So Thad want's us to move to nowhere WY so he can be close to good fly fishing. I know there is more to his excitment than that, but it really makes this whole issues suspicious. WY! I'm crossing my fingers that before April he gets excited about a different Co. Because I'm just not sure I'm cut out to be a country girl.

whirlwind

What a weekend! Both my parents and Thads parents along with our sibs came to Provo this weekend. They got here friday afternoon and left sunday morning, so really they were here not even 2 full days but we were busy! Tenille found her wedding dress and veil, and ordered bridesmaid dresses, and Mom B found a "mother of the bride" dress. I shopped with my mom for 3.5 hours on saturday and we managed to narrow down shoe options and find nothing for her to wear for Kelsies wedding, but we did find a dress for Lexi to wear as a flower girl, and bought material to make Andi and Cuatro wedding attire.
Thankfully the weather was very nice so we weren't running from mall to mall in the rain, and the boys had stuff to do outside while the girls shopped. With two weddings coming up within a week of each other it seems like wedding talk/business never ends! But I do get two cute new dresses ;)

Winter Wonderland

I've been so distracted by our house drama that I forgot to complain about the weather. I know, I do it all winter long, but this is bad. There has been snow on Timp for over a week, and I'm not just talking a dusting of snow, I mean like a foot. The high yesterday. . . 50 degrees. Hello, it's September! I don't know what's going on here, but I am definitly dreading the next 6 months. Winter is going to be forever this year! So far we only have rain in the valley, but it's been raining for weeks now. I feel like we are back in Vancouver. Last night was kinda cool though, the thunder was so loud that it shook the windows and woke me up at midnight. At least I'm not walking in snow yet. . . I guess that's one thing to be happy about.
oh! and speaking of house drama, our landlord finally called us back. He's assured us at the earliest the house would be coming down in 6 months, but probably not that soon, and he'd give us 2 months notice when it happens. So we should be done with school and out of here by the time they tear it down. Kinda sad, but at least we don't have to move!

Surprise!

So I've told you all before how our house was bought by a land developer who doesn't charge us rent. He told us months ago that our house would not be part of his new development because of zoning restrictions. Well, yesterday I came home from running errands to find this.

That giant whole would be my driveway. Apparently our house is going to be part of the new development and they needed to lay new sewer pipes. And by part of the new development I mean they are going to level our house and build a new one. The best part is that we still can't get our landlord to call us back and let us know exactly when our house is being demolished.

So now i'm thinking that me getting a job handed to me was not so much to bring in a little play money as much as it was a hint from Heavenly Father saying "your gonna need this". I hope not, and I hope we will get to stay in the house till April but with that hole, and lovely peice of machinery sitting right outside the living room window i'm getting very nervous.

In other news Andi's first tooth has made it's apperance. It's not all the way in, but just poking out enough to see and feel when she puts my finger in her mouth.

more changes

Well, now that we are all unpacked and settled in I've got time to tell you about all the little changes that have happened this last week.
First off Thad and I both got new callings. He is now the 1st councilor in the Elders Quorum and I am on the Enrichment board. I have to say I threw a bit of a stompy fit when I found I was getting released from Young Womens, and I'm still a little bitter about that. But I guess it's time I learned to appreciate Relief Society and enrichment. We'll see how that goes.
Also I got a job, well Thad kinda got me a job. Anyway Thad works for a guy who ownes a bunch of houses in Provo and Thad takes care of them. Their manager lady just quit so I'm going to be doing the management part of it. Dealing with tenants and contracts and rent and all that. It's only a few hours a week and the owners are really nice so that will be fun.
My sister got engaged a couple weeks ago and since then we've been wedding planning like crazy. I took her to Alyssa's and found her "the dress" in an hour. We found bridesmaid dresses on-line, which I have to order today, and she picked out flowers, cake and invites in Bako. So the bulk of it is done, which is good cos she's in Jersey till mid october and getting married Nov 18.
That's what i've been up to.

I'm Back!

Well It's been an action packed, fun filled, long yet short month. We headed to Bako the 2nd week in August and spent a week at my parents house before we left for the beach. We discovered that Andi LOVES the pool and has no fear of the water. She kept sticking her face in it, trying to drink it I think, and though she choked and sputtered would stick her face right back in it.
Saturday Kelsie and her "friend" (now fiance) Cameron arrived and we went to Rosemary's. For those of you who don't know, Rosemary's is by far the best ice cream place in the world and if you are ever near Bako you need to stop and eat there. Sunday my brother blessed his baby boy and we had a big family dinner where everyone had an opportunity to size up Cameron. He handled it well.
Monday we headed to Pismo and stayed in this awesome beach house. The 12 of us actually had plenty of room and it was right on a cliff over looking the ocean. We also had wet suits with us this summer which I decided is really the only way to go boogie boarding. I wasn't cold at all! It was awesome. Here are a couple of pics we took as a fam.

The whole crew

Kelsie and her now fiance Cameron

We got back from the beach Thursday afternoon in time to do some laundry and gt re-packed to go camping with Thads family. Friday afternoon we went to Wishon and Thad of course went fishing. He'd been talking about it for weeks. I always think that a few good fishing days will get it out of his system for a while, but that is never the case ;) We had a great time and Andi saw her first bonfire and trout.

The whole gang (yes Tara is holding her 1 month old and they camped in a tent trailer!)

Thad showing the kids how to gut a fish.

As you can tell they were almost as grossed out as me.

After camping we still had 4 days to just hang out. Unfortunately Andi got a double ear infection and couldn't go swimming anymore. We had a b-day BBQ for Thad at his parents Thursday with all the fam. And then drove back to Provo early Friday morning. And this is Andi boxed in by all our stuff in the back seat. Poor thing hates the car again.

We had a great 3 week vaca, and I know we'll never get to do that again. But we are glad to be back home and start getting un-packed from our WA move.

I'm not in right now

Well, we are getting all packed up this weekend and will be driving to Provo on Tuesday. Yay! I know you will all be sad, but I will be out of blog contact for almost a month as we will not have internet conection in Provo before we leave for California. I should be able to check on your blogs at some point on our trip, so keep them updated!
I will return in September.

The Wrestling Match

I've known since day one that Andi is a big fan of being naked. She doesn't get the chance often to be so, that is until she figured out how to crawl. She will sit still during the diaper change until the diaper is off, and then she's off. It doesn't matter if I'm holding both her legs, she flips over and wriggles free and starts scooting away! This morning's wrestling match was pretty rough, I finally had to put my leg across her stomcah and chest so she could not flip over, and try to put the diaper on working around my own leg. I think i'm going to find a way to strap her down from now on.