Altered

This morning I was awakened out of my medicated sleep to the sound of laughter. I heard giggles and "shusshes", I heard "daddy's" and "hurry hides". I knew my little offspring was up and at it already. The sun hadn't risen yet, and to be honest, I don't think the birds were awake yet either.
I wearily pushed back the covers and walked into the living room. I saw a mass of quivering blankets in front of the fireplace. Giggles were being shushed by a daddy as my two ninjas tried to evade me. I soon found their hide out and the morning continued with bouts of hiding under blankets and tickles under chins.
I wasn't feeling to hot this morning, it fact, I was feeling lousy. I wasn't feeling too playful and I wasn't participating too much either. I quickly dismissed myself and went to make breakfast, where I managed to break an egg in the fridge. Hubby cleaned it up for me. I then dropped a plate in the sink. It shattered. Hubby cleaned it up for me. I realized I really wasn't firing on all cylinders this morning and resigned to sitting once again in front of the fireplace. At which time, my little ninja came to me again, and I was once again his hiding place and his refuge. The hubs had to leave for a docotor's appointment and I was not in the mood to say goodbye, so I gave him a sitting down hug and a not-so-enthusiastic parting.
Later, I turned on some cartoons for the ninja and found myself staring at the wall. I got to pondering as I frequently do and I realized, I was being so, well, not myself.

I wasn't being who I could be.

I had just let a fantastic morning go by completely unappreciated by, me, and most of all, I hadn't really been an active participant in my little life I am SO blessed to have.
I have been a little "woe is me" as of late. I am have been sick, alone, depressed, infertile and feeling quite sorry for myself. This morning I sat back and realized how I have been acting, and I feel like I have missed out on so much. How often do I get in these slumps and not come out of them for days? This needs to change. I need to change. I resign to change.

Tomorrow, I will play ninja and hide with my little guy. I will play tickles and speeder spiders until he tells me to stop. Tomorrow, I will be happy to be me, to have my life, my religion, my knowledge that families are forever and that this life isn't all we get. I have so much to be grateful for and so much more than I deserve. I have a wonderful life and a wonderful husband.

I have one amazing son and I need to have faith that I will have more. I need to be patient in my trials and have faith things will turn up. I need to be trusting in my Father and know that His will is what I need to seek for, and not my own. I need to have faith in Him more, and trust in his care.
I want to be an active member in my life and not just an observer. I want to be there for my son and for myself. I will stop sulking and start doing. I will stop finding fault and start finding joy. I will stop focusing on what I don't have, and start focusing on what I can do. I will stop seeing myself as a failure and start seeing myself as a daughter of God. I will stop saying negatives and start focusing on positives.
And it starts today.

Zoo with the Gma and Gpa!

So a couple of weeks ago, Joe's Mom and Dad were in town for Joe's cousin Donny's wedding. We loved having them stay with us and it was so good to see them. While they were here, we went to the Hogle Zoo. We love the Zoo. I don't know why, maybe because we are monkeys ourselves? Either way, it was fun and I got to take a lot of pictures of them with Dallin. Here are a few goodies...

Entering the Park...

Dallin loved this wolf he saw....

Me, riding in the stroller with Dallin, ummm....not really, at this very instance, my backside was throbbing from trying to fit it into that little seat...I didn't stay there for long.....

Dallin looking at the snakes with his Daddy, he loves snakes, go figure.....

This was the most hyper prairie dog I have ever seen! Dallin loved watching it.....

We had this cool little train ride with Dallin on this little train in the park. He loved it...I think...

We can never all be looking at the camera at the same time, so us.....

And this is so ME....lol

Trying to get Dallin to look at the camera was like pulling teeth, he couldn't take his eyes off the choo choo train....

again, Dallin "not" looking at the camera, but sweet pic nonetheless....

Joe and his Dad seeing if they measure up......

My two monkeys.....

Trying to show Dallin a giraffe, he was pretty freaked out by it...

Looking at the monkeys with grandma and grandpa....

Being a monkey himself....like I said, we are all monkeys in this house.....

Checking out the birds.....

I think we were looking at some turtles and birds here.....

This elephant and her baby were so fun to watch, they did a show right when we got there....

Grandpa and Dallin watching the elephants....

Grandma and Grandpa with Dallin....

Dallin on Grandpa's shoulders, so sweet :)........

The grandparentals....

Dallin and his grandpa.

It was a blast having them here. We had a lot of fun hanging out and just chatting with these two. We sure do love them, yes we do!

Dreaming of Sand Castles

Dear Joe and Dallin,

I can not wait to spend a week at the beach with you two this summer. Dallin, can you make another sand castle with me this summer? I would love that. I love you two, and we are going to have a blast. I am so excited, can you tell?



Dear July,

Please hurry up and get here soon. I want to play in the sun at the beach....like come soon please, very soon???


Dear Utah Weather,

Please be sunny! My skin is still so pasty white and it will be June soon. Yikes~

Mother's Day this year was awesome! I got the coolest gift and it was so me. You can see me in the above picture with my rad bike Joe got me. It is pretty much the essence of me. I love it. You can't see in the picture, but it has this awesome bell that is pink and purple and orange. I love everything about this bike. I got a bike for my birthday a couple years ago, but it didn't have built in gears and so Joe always smoked me when we went for a ride. I got him a beach cruiser a couple years back, but his has gears and so he can sure change his speed much better than I. So for Mother's Day Joe decided to surprise me with this beauty! I was so excited you have no idea.

Joe surprised me Saturday morning before Mother's day, with breakfast from Kneaders. He let me sleep in and when I woke up, Dallin was in my room saying, "mommy, breakfast". I was so hungry, I got up and found my sweetie had bought me my favorite breakfast!

Then Joe let me play tennis for a couple hours with my brother Caleb. It felt so good to get out and just smash that ball. Now that I can play, it is so much fun.

Joe picked me up from the tennis courts and drove me home. When we arrived, he got out of the car with such speed I was like whoa, where is the fire!? He quickly got Dallin out of the car and in the house. I was taking my time, because I just played 2 hours of tennis. As I went up the steps, I saw the door was open, and the two of them were peeking around the corner of the door. As I pushed it open wider, they both yelled surprise. Sitting in the middle of the living room was my new bike! Oh it is such a beauty! I love it!

I had fun riding it around the block and back and trying the new bell. I am so excited for this summer. We are going on lots of bike rides. Later on that night, Joe took me to see Thor! It was awesome. I love going to movies with my sweetheart. I love to cuddle him and pretend we are dating again. So fun!

We got Bajio to go and picked up our little man from the sitters.
I got to put him to bed and sing to him. I love this about the night time. I get to be with my son and have such fun moments together as we giggle and laugh about songs and stories.

Sunday, Joe made me rolli-ups for breakfast and even taught my lesson for me in Gospel Doctrine. I love teaching, but love having a break too.

Then we headed to my mom's. My sisters and I cooked her a nice dinner, and had yummy cheescake afterward. I had a long chat with my sister, played with my son and laughed with my hubby. It was a great way to end a great weekend celebrating my opportunity and blessing to be a mother. I felt so loved and I am so thankful for all of it:)

Cinco de Mayo

Yesterday was Cinco De Mayo! I thought it would be fun to have some mexican food and a pinata for the kiddos. It turned out to be way fun. I made fajitas with homemade guacamole, torillas and all the trimmings. We had chips and salsa from Los Hermanos, the best in the west I say. It was all delicious. We had my parents, and Caleb and Stephanie over for dinner, it was great to have them all over. I was babysittying Calvin and Camden last night, so I also thought it would be a blast to have a pinata. I found one at a Mexican market here in town. It was a finding Nemo pinata. Dallin screamed with joy when he saw it. Nemo! Nemo! He kept saying. It was pretty cute.

Gwen and Gerritt and their kids, Xander, Axel and Lacy came over for the pinata busting. Each child took a turn taking a swing. The younger ones, didn't quite get it at first, and Dallin ended up just jabbing it. LOL. But in the end Xander gave it a good bashing and the candy went a flyin!

Lacy bug taking a swing

Calvin giving it a go, he didn't like it much....grandpa gave him a good push along.

Axel swinging away.

Dallin giving a a good swing also, but in the end just started stabbing it.

Xander giving it a good bashing, you can see in the picture below, he gets some good air!

Children getting their spoils.

Dallin enjoying his sucker, it was his favorite part.

Our little family.

It was a fun night and we enjoyed having our family over, what a treat! Lucky me I have leftover for lunch today! Hooray!

The Many Faces of Dallin

Dallin is a pretty expressive little guy. He inherited that from me. I can't count the number of pictures I have of myself in the background at some event or some party making some hideous face, and lucky me the camera caught my contorted face just in the nic of time. I am a woman of many faces, what can I say, I love to be expressive. I know I am extremely expressive with my face when I talk, Joe is always teasing me that I must have a few extra muscles in my face. I won't post any of those pictures, but I do want to post some of my beautiful progeny.

Dallin has been watching this cute cartoon lately called, "Kipper". He just loves it. He can sit and watch it forever if I let him. He has so many emotions while he watches it, and you can see it all on his little face. I love it. It goes from confusion, to excited, to happy, to sad, to confused again. If Dallin was to play poker, he would loose every time. You can tell what he is feeling just from his face and so here are the many faces of Dallin.....

I just love him.