Summer Bucket List Adventure #1: Bear World

So... it officially isn't Summer until I think June 20th... but we are getting a head start. If I had to guess, I think our baby will be born sometime in the last third of July, so I am trying to cram in all our Summer fun a little early.

Gabe is officially done with school on May 23rd, which I think is super early. I think in Wisconsin we usually got done around June 6th, but they go back to school here on like, August 23 or 24th here too. So, the boys and I have been talking about all the things they wanted to do this Summer and we decided to make a list, inspired by this movie they saw about a girl that has a "Not-Bummer Summer" list where her and her friends compete for "Thrill Points" to have the best Summer ever. If we accomplish all the things on our list, we will have ended this Summer with 1000 Thrill points... and one exhausted mom I am sure.  Here is the list:

As you can see, the first item is "Bear World." This is a place that's about 5 miles south of Rexburg and we have never even been there! It has real bears - black and grizzly - and lots of deer, elk, wolves, and more. Those bigger animals are in this drive around area where you go really slowly in your cars with the windows up and hope they don't attack you. Luckily they didn't climb on our car, but I have heard stories that they have before! Then they also had a little petting zoo with goats and deer and stuff. They even had the hugest pig I have ever seen in my life. Then they had some little rides for the kids. Gabe has been wanting to go there forever, so we put it on our list and went yesterday when it was half price admission for locals because the season official opens next weekend. It was the type of place that was fun to go once but I don't know that I'd ever need to go again. So, that was Bear World! Thrill point total for the Summer so far: 20. :)

Getting ready for Baby

I have finally gotten around to taking a picture of myself with a belly. Josh has been working so much lately - including a week-long trip to New Mexico for training - that I actually made Caleb take a picture of me.  So this was taken about a week ago, at 25 weeks. I go to the doctor again tommorow for a 26 week check-up and ultrasound. I think everything is going well, as far as I know! I can feel the baby kicking as I type this and I think we have pretty much decided on the name Avery. No middle name for sure yet though.

I have been putting together her nursery already though and I LOVE it. I painted a tree mural on the wall and have her name in wooden letters hanging from the bottom branch of the tree. I still have a couple more little projects to finish though...

This pregnancy has been pretty good compared to the others. I haven't had to do bedrest yet! (Good thing too the way Josh has been gone...) The whole dog thing is keeping me a little busier than I would like, especially while Josh was gone for a week and I had to walk it and let it out all the time, but oh well. I guess we're dog people now. Josh thinks he's applying to be a K-9 officer at the police department here in Rexburg now too, which means we may even become a 2 dog family. Joy.

I said to him, "In January, I was just so excited about expanding our family this year by just one member. Now you keep wanting to bring DOGS into our family!? Why!?!" But I guess it makes him happy. I must be the best wife in the world. First I move to Idaho, now the dogs.  :)

Anyways, that's my little pregnancy and dog rant! Here is a picture of me (25 weeks) ... and the dog (about 4-5 months old...I think).

Happy Birthday, Josh!

Last week Wednesday was Josh's 32nd birthday, so this is a little late. But I thought it was better late than never! We celebrated by going to Idaho Falls and getting some shopping done and going out to dinner at Josh's restaurant of choice.... Panda Express. (Seriously?!) Yes. He wanted to go there more than any other place. Nothing apparently says Happy Birthday like fast-food Chinese.

Anyways, then we came back and picked up our kids from Josh's mom. They had gone to a science fair in Ashton, which they LOVED. They talked about things from it for the next few days. Even last night before bed, Gabe says to me, "Would a spider web in your door make you happy?" and I was like, "No I would probably get a broom and get rid of it." And he said, "No, they said that's good at the science fair because it will keep all the other bugs out of your house." I was like, "Oh... okay."

Caleb is excited now because his birthday is next. We started with Gabe's in March and we said then it's dad's, then yours, then mine (or possibly the baby's I guess even before mine if it's a few weeks early!) We already had to get Caleb a new bike recently because the one yellow Tonka one that I bought back in probably... 2009 from a garage sale in Wisconsin for $10 (that Gabe went through training wheels and learned to ride 2 wheels on, then got passed to Caleb for the past year or so...) finally bit the big one. One of the tires got so wore out that it has a hole in it and a new tire would probably cost more than the bike itself.. plus it was getting too small. So! Josh and I debated and I was like, "Well.. technically the practical thing to do would be to buy Gabe a new one because he could probably use the next size up (he got a new one for his bday last year but it still is in good shape) and then just give Caleb Gab'es hand-me-down again." But then we thought that would be really mean because Caleb really deserved one and never gets anything new. So we went ahead and bought him the exact bike he wanted (because he saw our neighbor boy just got it) and he was pretty excited about it. When we brought it home he wanted to knock on everyone's door in our neighborhood that had a small child and show them his new bike. The thing that makes him the most excited about it is that on the handle bars it has this motorcycle type revver thing that makes him feel super-fast. :)

So, the other big news is that we got our backyard in! It has been a pile of mud and snow all winter. I asked Josh what he wanted for his birthday and he said, "Grass." (Again.... nothing says Birthday like grass.) So, we ordered the sod and even a few trees and now the playhouse is practically done except for a few pieces of trim inside and my flower boxes, the the yard is looking pretty good. Josh even got a BBQ grill from me and my mom for his birthday. I will have to definitely post some pictures when I get another second.

But I wanted to post the top five reasons that Josh is the best husband in the world in honor of his birthday. :) (In ascending order of importance)

5) He has ability to fix anything in or around the house. And if he doesn't currently possess the ability, he watches a video on YouTube and figures it out. My friend was over the other day looking at the playhouse and said, "How much did this cost you to buy???" and I said, "Most of it was made from scrap they had in the dumpsters from building the houses around our neighborhood." And she said, "And Josh just like... put this together... from his head???" and I said, "Yup." She replied, "What a stud!" I know.

4) He can lift anything in our house when we are moving or rearranging furniture. I couldn't live with a skinny girly man for a husband. :)

3) He works at a job and supports our family - very important. Even though now he is telling me he is applying for a K-9 position at the department which brings the potential of dog #2 for our family.... more to come on that later.

2) He helps with the kids more than a lot of other dads I know, and he actually seems to enjoy it most of the time too. He doesn't ever refer to it as, "Babysitting the kids," which I have heard other dads say.

1) He loves me! Which pretty much makes him a very smart person as well. :) Happy Birthday Josh!

Family Visit and Easter

It's been a busy past 2 weeks! My mom and my niece, Jasmine had planned to come visit for the past few months, but at the last minute, my sister, Rachel, came too. They were here from Thursday, March 29th to the following Monday, so not too long. But it was still fun. Then my brother and his family also drove down from Montana and spent Saturday night here and left Sunday. We did some shopping, ate some Cocoa Bean cupcakes, played outside with the kids, and had an Easter Egg hunt. The weather could have been a little better. It was pretty cloudy and windy most of the time. At least they didn't have snow! That came about three days after they left! Luckily it melted within a day but that is why you see snow on the ground at the church Easter egg hunt!

The next week was Easter and Gabe was off of school from Thursday to the following Tuesday. The weather this past week has been beautiful! It was in the 70s for a few days in a row, starting on Easter Sunday. But of course now today it is windy and cold again. :( Please can it just be Summer!?

For Easter, the kids seriously had like, 4 or 5 Easter egg hunts. One was at church, one with their visiting cousins, then one with their Idaho cousin's at Josh's parents' house, then TWO with the neighborhood kids. It was kind of funny. There were some kids that didn't come out in time so we quick set it back up and did another one. We are pretty sick of Easter egg hunts now! Or at least I am! Then the bunny came on Easter morning of course. He did a little scavenger hunt with clues saying, "First I needed to use your bathroom..." where they'd go and find a handful of jelly beans and another clue like, "Then I decided to go check out your toy trains...." etc. There were about five stops before they found their baskets in the coat closet at the end. It was funny. Their baskets contained some healthier options like mini-muffins and juice boxes, partly because they had already gotten tons of candy from Easter egg hunts and partly because when I went to Walmart the day before the candy isle was seriously picked over! They also got some kites, some bubbles, and other little toys.

So then after all the Easter stuff ended and I got my house back in order from the visiors, it's been time for some Spring cleaning and organization. I have been trying to piece together things for the little girl's nursery. I ordered my crib online and found a changing table that was EXACTLY what I was looking for on craigslist for $40. Score! I was so happy. I already had the bedding from when I was pregnant with Caleb and bought it - hoping for a girl. I guess you could say I am pretty excited! I also have been doing some little girl clothes shopping. :) I even bought this soooo cute swimsuit from Target that she will probably wear twice before it is too small but I couldn't stop myself.

We are also getting our backyard ready for sod. Josh said yesterday (as I was talking about how he should build a toybox) "I have so many projects started right now I don't even know which one to finish..." It is true. I keep him busy. :) He is trying to finish the playhouse still - it just needs trim basically. Then he's been raking out the backyard and leveling it out, checking the sprinklers to make sure they work, getting some paver stones in place for a sandbox, pouring extra concrete for a dog kennel to be in the backyard.... just getting everything mapped out before the final step... grass! I am so excited to have grass and not little puppy paw mud prints on my kitchen floor every day.

So, this is a long post! As you can tell, we keep busy! Here's some pictures!

It's a GIRL!

What a great past few days we have had. It all started on last Thursday. Josh took off that day from work so that he and I could go to Idaho Falls together for the big ultrasound - the one I had been waiting for since I first found out I was pregnant. We decided to leave the boys at home because they both had school and then could be babysat for an hour or two afterwards by a friend of ours (Shout out for Stacey! :)

So we dropped them off at school around noon and headed to Idaho Falls. I was so nervous... my stomach was not happy. But as soon as we got there we went in for the ultrasound and the lady was like, "This is the 20 week one right? Do you want to find out the sex?" and I was like, "Uh YEAH!!!" (Who wouldn't!?!? Crazy people.) So she started the ultrasound and within about 2 minutes got the between the legs shot and said, "Oh... what do you have so far?" and I was like, "2 Boys..." and she smiles and is like, "Do you know what it is?" and I'm like, "Well... it doesn't look like my boys' ultrasound did... there's no turtle..." and she's like, "I'm gonna say it's a girl!" but then she kept looking to make sure and it became positive it was a girl. :) Then she spent the next hour checking every little thing from two kidneys to cleft lip (all good) and I was just thinking, "Let me leave so I can go shopping!!!" But then when she was done we ended up just getting my weekly progesterone shot and heading out because my doctor had to go deliver a baby and they were sooo behind. I was like, "I just saw the baby's entire anatomy... I can come back a different day, we're fine."

So, of course then I texted everyone who had been anxiously waiting to hear the news and everyone was so excited, as am I. My babysitters had made cupcakes for us when we got home and a different friend stopped over with a "It's a girl!" balloon and some baby clothes. (You'd think this baby was born already from all the hoopla!)

I was pretty much expecting that it was a girl the whole time but I wasn't sure if it was just that I really wanted one or that it was an accurate hunch. I did have a dream the night before that I had the ultrasound and it was a boy and I woke up like, shocked... and relieved it was just a dream. :)

The next day was Friday and it was Gabe's official Birthday! He took cupcakes to school for a birthday treat and he had a special poster that we made about him for his "spotlight day." The weather was a little cloudy and windy that day so we didn't spend a ton of time outside, but we did go to play at a park after school and then got a cheese pizza (Gabe's favorite) and a movie to watch.

Saturday was GORGEOUS! We had planned to meet some friends of ours out at the sand dunes (don't ask me why there are sand dunes 15 minutes outside of Rexburg but there are) and we built a fire and roasted hot dogs for lunch and let the kids ride on the four-wheelers with the dads. Our friends, Lynn and Erin, have 4 kids, ages 7, 5, 3, and baby, so the boys had lots of fun running up and down the sand dunes with them. It was hard work getting up to the top! I about died. Going up once was a enough for me. But the weather could not have been better. It was in the high 70s I bet and sunny. I even got a little sun tan. Then at about 4 I had to get home to go to the young women's broadcast at church. Josh and the boys stayed outside all evening and worked on the playhouse, which is really close to being done. A little bit of paint, trim and flooring and it'll be done. The goal was to have it done by the time mom and Jasmine come out to visit so it'll be close!

Sunday was nice weather again and we went to church, came home, relaxed. Josh and the boys played a little baseball in the front yard and I sorted through the baby girl clothes I have been collecting over the past few years. Some stuff I was like, "WHY did I ever think this was cute?!" and some stuff I was like, "I can not wait for her to wear this!" But I still have a LOT of shopping to do. :)

So that was our fun weekend! Today is Monday and Josh had to go back to work today. It was quite the good past few days though! Now we have a few more days and then a little visit from the family to look forward to! Gabe and Caleb are so excited. Caleb already started setting up pillows and blankets in the playroom where all the kids are going to sleep. :)

Here's some pics!

Gabe's 6th Birthday Party

Well, I survived Gabe's 6th birthday party today... barely. He wanted a Dinosaur themed party and I had it here at our house from 11:00 to 1:00. I was wondering beforehand if that would be enough time to do all of the amazingly fun activities I had planned out in detail for Gabe and 7 of his closest friends. I looked at the clock in exhaustion after the little tazmanian devils had whirled through lunch, a "Pin the Horn on the triceratops" game, a Dino-Egg hunt, and a pinata...... It was 12:05. And I was ready for a nap.

I think that next year I am going to just fork out the money to rent some place and let them go crazy there. They seemed to be having fun though.

For lunch they had ham sandwiches shaped like dinosaurs (used a cookie cutter), grapes, dinosaur claws (Bugles), and some fossils (jello with little dinosaurs stuck inside them.) His cake was a "volcano" (a Bundt cake with some orange frosting coming out of it) and then I took cupcakes and put them all around it to look like a little dinosaur gathering. It was not professional like some of my more talented cake-making friends (Ms. Jamie I mean you....) but the 5 and 6 year old boys liked it. :)

Gabe got an aircraft carrier from us (he had specifically asked for that because he has a million little airplanes), some walkie talkies, a helicopter, a backhoe toy, and lots of other fun stuff. I have to say, he was pretty good about sharing after he opened his presents and each kid instantly wanted to play with the toy that he had brought (or those that others had brought). I learned that with 6 year old boys, you really shouldn't plan out detailed dino-egg hunt game with checklists because they really just want to run around crazy and play. I also learned that 2 hours is plenty for a birthday party. Maybe even an hour and a half....

Here are Gabe's stats for being 6 (well officially next week!)

Height: 47 inches
Weight: 50 pounds
Clothing size: 7
Favorite toys: anything animal related, the Wii, airplanes, cars, trucks, his new puppy! He goes for a walk with her every morning at 7:00 am with Josh! Even when it's cold and dark!
Favorite part of school: "Recess" (his own answer...)
Favorite color: Blue
Best friends: Alex and Andrew from school, neighbor kids - Noah, Michael
Mom's description: Gabe is still my little snuggler. Ever since he was little he liked to be close to me. He still sneaks into my bed some early mornings, especially when Josh is at work, and likes to snuggle. He likes to do things that make me happy and often says, "Mom, you the best mom any kid could ever have!" Sometimes, things still get his temper riled up - usually it is Caleb. But he is a good big brother and a good helper to me. He is working hard in school on reading, and still goes to speech therapy about twice a week during school time. We can tell he is improving with his words all the time. All of his teachers say he is so fun to work with and very cooperative. He still gets mad when we suggest he has a girlfriend at school. :)

Happy 6th Birthday Gabe! We love you!

Funny Random Conversations

Here's a couple funny moments with the boys lately:

CALEB

So Caleb was in his room for a nap (which he really needed that day so I basically put him in his bed and closed his door and told him not to come out...) but I was standing outside his door listening because he sounded like he was talking to someone. I could kind of make out the words and it sounded something like this:

"Hey.... why can't you be bigger? I wish... I wish dat you were bigger so you could turn on dat light...can you? Can you..... Mr.???"

(new, higher-pitched voice) "No! I just a stuffed animal!!!"

Also...
Caleb woke up from his nap and groggily walked downstairs. He sat down next to me and I said, "Hey Caleb! How was your nap?" He looks at me, still tired, and says, "When I was a asleep I was dreaming about Chick Fil A." Awesome.

GABE

Gabe and I were discussing how next year he would be in first grade, which means he will go to school from 8 am to 3 pm and not just in the afternoon. He started whining that he wouldn't have any time to play at home during the daytime and how he didn't want to go to school all day long. So then I said to him, "You know, when I was in high school, I would get up and leave my house at 6 in the morning when it was still dark out and go to a church class before school everyday. Then I would go to school all day and after school I would stay for dance team or yearbook or musical practice. And alot of times when I got home, it would be dark out again and I would just eat dinner, do my homework, and go to bed. Then I would do it all over again every day. What do you think about that?"

And Gabe looks at me with a totally straight face and says, "You're going to give me nightmares."

Pretty scary for a kid I guess!

Dino Museum Field Trip

Gabe had off from school on Monday and Caleb's preschool had a fieldtrip planned to the Dinosaur exibit in Idaho Falls, so I decided to go along and take the two boys together. We met there at about 10:00 and there was about a billion little preschoolers there waiting in the lobby! I think the old ladies that work at the museum were about to have a heart attack. But the good news was, it was way cheaper than usual because of the group rate for the kids, so I just had to pay for myself to get in - which was $8.00. Any other day it would've also been $6.00 per child so I was pretty happy.

We spent about two hours there, exploring all the dinosuar fossils and even talking to a guy who was working on piecing together some bones that were found recently in Wyoming. I didn't realize that they usually find like - hundreds of pieces that need to go together just to have ONE bone. It's not like, "Here is a femur!" It's like, "Here are 300 pieces that we need to put together to make the femur!" Crazy.

The boys were too young to appreciate a lot of the info at each exhibit but they still had fun seeing it all I think. Caleb had one little melt-down (I'll post a picture...) but otherwise it went smoothly. We just saw everything a LOT faster than adults probably would! :) Anyways, it was a fun little trip and it was a good warm-up for Gabe's Dinosaur party coming up on March 17th for his 6th birthday! We are celebrating a week early because one of his best friends is going to be gone the weekend of the 23rd. I am going to try to do the whole party myself at home - even making the cake.... it should be interesting!

The Fam is Growing!

Lots of news!

A) I realized that I never officially announced that baby #3 is on the way. Oops. I guess once it's baby number three it's kind of like, "just another kid..." :) Right now I am about 17 weeks and I wish I knew if it was a boy or a girl by now but I don't. My ultrasound tech seems to be the only one in Idaho that insists on waiting until 20 weeks to even try to see what it is! I know two girls that found out at 16 weeks what they were having! (Both also having girls... no fair.) Of course I am hoping for a girl again, just like I was the first and second time. So I guess I shouldn't get my hopes up too much! The mom thing to say is, "I will be happy no matter what it is!" But whatever, I want a girl. I have done my time! If this one is still a boy I might just be throwing in the towel.

B) BUT, in other news... we did recently add a girl to the family... in dog form. Josh has always been an animal-lover and has wanted to get a dog since the day we got married. Luckily, we were living in apartments for a while and couldn't have one. Then we moved to Wisconsin and had a house and tried out a little tiny dog. We had it for about 3 months but it was just too much. The kids were still really young and it seemed like it just chased them around and bit them all day. So, now we have our house here in Idaho and Josh has been asking about getting a dog again since last August. I kept putting it off for various reasons, but then this kid we know said that his cousin was moving and needed to find a home for her newly adopted golden retriever puppy and she was willing to just give it away to a good home. We had talked about how a golden retriever was the kind of dog we wanted to eventually get and if you have to buy them they are usually about $400 out here to buy as puppies, so Josh appealed to my sense of bargain hunting by saying, "Tiffany, this is a FREE dog! Why wait until next year and pay $400 when this one is FREE and it's exactly what we want!" Oh boy. He was laying it on thick. I actually think he was surprised when I agreed to even go look at it. But when we did, he was ready to take it home with us that second. I made him wait four days until he had his 3-day weekend and so we could get the house dog-proof. But then we officially went and got her last Monday.

So it's been a week now and she has become a member of the family. She has her moments of puppyness where I am like, "Arg! Stop biting everything!" but overall it has been easier than I thought it would be. She seems to be worlds smarter than the other little dog we had. She goes to the door to go potty and Josh already taught her to sit and stay. I think that's pretty good for an 8 week old puppy. Oh and we named her Zoe. She's pretty cute and the boys seem to like her. Gabe got up early this morning and got himself dressed just to go with Josh to walk her in the cold. My hope is that she can just be mostly trained by the time baby #3 is here!

That's the news for now!