thankful

First of all, thank you for all of the phone calls, texts, emails and gifts.  Your kindness meant so much to us, and still does.

I'm too behind to catch up everything, so we will just go forward with Thanksgiving.  I don't know how much we will post on the blog after this post, but here's to hoping.

We went to California this year to visit my brother and his family.  My parents also flew out and it was a blast to be with them.  I love how sweet and easy going Liam is.  Just give him blankets, tell him it's time to go to sleep, and he's out.

 We walked across the Golden Gate Bridge.  I had never done that before and it was SO much fun.  Definitely will be on our list to do again.  Liam loved it to say the least.  For the hour we walked he didn't stop asking questions.  Some of his favorite questions these days are: "Mama, what's that noise?" and "Mama, where's the sun?"  We got those about a hundred times on the walk. 

 Gettin' fresh before the walk.

 

We had such a great Thanksgiving. Lots of family, food, and games.  Can't go wrong there.  My family loves to play Canasta. We were all so tired by this point except my dad. Somebody must have spiked his turkey because he couldn't stop laughing. 

 My brother with his twin boys.  Look at those faces!!!!!  I kissed on those all week.  I know what you're thinking.  Gross.  Just the twins' faces. :)

 Liam was enamored with his cousins.  They played so well together and had a blast.

My sister-in-law is an incredible photographer.  She was so kind and took our family pictures. More to come for the Christmas cards!  I love Thanksgiving.  It's a wonderful day to reflect on the true things in life that make us happy and grateful. This year we are especially grateful for what we have.  Two beautiful boys, our health, finishing the MRED soon, a great job, and family and friends who we adore.

Yesterday, Matt and I celebrated our 5th year anniversary.  5 years ago the day was filled with so much joy, love, and happiness I had never felt before.  We were surrounded by all of our loved ones who wanted nothing more than to share in our joy.  On our wedding day I thought about our future.  What would the next year be like?  How about the next 5, 10, 15 and so on?  How many children would we have?  Where would we put our roots?  All of these questions brought me so much excitement to find out the answers and more so, I would find out with Matt. 

I know the answers for the past 5 years.  It's been filled with wonderful memories, learning experiences, growing pains, and reaching many goals we had. 

Usually when we celebrate our anniversary we like to go somewhere special and take time out of the routine to make it special.  This year was different, it was special for a different reason.  This year we had a baby boy.  On Thursday I gave birth to our third child.  His name is Jacob and he was perfect.  My body just couldn't keep him anymore and he was born too early.  We had just found out the day before that we were going to have another boy.  During the ultrasound, I saw him move and suck his thumb.  I saw his little body and felt him move in me.  I wish that we could have had a life full of being together, getting to know each other, watching him play with Liam, being there for all of his milestones.  I know it isn't possible for this life, but I know it is in the next. 

We are still trying to work through all of the emotions and I know we will for a very long time.  Although we celebrated our anniversary different this year, it was still filled with a love I had never felt before for Matt and now for Jacob.

90 years strong

On June 30th, our family celebrated a very special bitter/sweet day, our grandmother's life.  If I had to sum up the day in one word it would be love.  There was so much love between all of the cousins, aunts and uncles, and most of all for our grandma.  All day we kept talking about what kind of reunion she must have had when she passed.  She had been without her husband for 11 years, her dad died when she was only 5, and she had many siblings who passed away when she was young.

When her dad died when she was 5, it was during the Great Depression and her mom lost everything.  They lived in Arizona at the time and all they had left was a tent.  They moved out into the desert and lived in that tent.  Can you even imagine?  This experience though only made her stronger.

My grandpa and her lived all over the world.  Japan, Panama, Texas, Korea, Ireland, Jordan, just to name a few.  They served missions together, were Mission Presidents in Ireland, opened the Jordan mission, and helped numerous people along the way.  Even 11 years after my grandpa's death, I'm hearing wonderful stories of how they changed people's life's for the better. 

I'm so lucky to have had such wonderful grandparents who loved me and taught me well.  Their lives were full of service and love and I hope that I can be like them.  My heart breaks that this chapter of my life is closed, but I know we will pick up right where we left off one day again.

mickey's park

This past week with the Scott family we went to Disneyland or as Liam kept calling it, "Mickey's Park."  Before we went to Mickey's Park we stopped and paid our respects to Newport beach.  It was perfect.  I think we saw a total of 10 people there, the weather was perfect and Liam couldn't get enough of it.  This kid loves the ocean.  He couldn't stop belly-laughing when the water would go over his feet.  We had to drag him out of the water because he was blue and shivering.  He just laid in my arms while we watched the waves.  It was heaven. 
(Just a preface:  He has 3 bruises on his face.  All from accidents from falling off of things just a couple of days before we left, and no, we don't beat our child.)

 Day 1 of Dland was so great.  I think the best part is when you walk through the gates and hit Main Street.  All the sights, sounds and smells are spectacular.  Liam was pretty tired on this day because he didn't get much sleep the day before, and then we woke him up early so we could get to the park.  Every ride we went on he would cry all through it and then clap at the end and say "again." What?!  At least he liked it though.  Well, minus the Pirates ride where I think we permanently damaged him.  Bad parent move.  Matt and I wanted him to go on every ride that he could.  Try going on that ride seeing it through a 2 year old's eyes.  YIKES.

 Em, this one is for you.  Thanks for the shirt.  It's still his favorite.  He wouldn't look at me for this picture.  I think he was playing little-blind-boy again.

 Cole calming him down on the very scary Storybook ride. 

 All day long he wanted to go on the Rockets.  As soon as we got on the mother or all meltdowns happened.  But true to his form he clapped afterwards and asked for it again.

This is on "It's A Small World."  He was fascinated to say the least.

 Day 2 was much better.  He got a good night sleep and we hit the park right when it opened.  For the 2 weeks before we left I prepped him all about Mickey Mouse and everything Disney.  Everyday he would ask for Mickey so I think when he finally saw him in real person he was a little shocked.  He needed to be in view of Mickey but don't make me touch him or get him out of my vision.  :)

Grandma Sandi and Papa D got him a bubble gun.  Needless to say, it was a huge hit and he wouldn't part with it.  He had so much fun getting spoiled by everyone.  I think the picture below is one of my all-time favorites.  The pure joy on his face.

This is how he watched the Parade.  Love it.  We are so ready for another Disneyland trip.  It's so much more fun now with Liam.

#2 for Liam

 

Today our little boy turned 2.  This means he isn't a baby now, he's a full-blown toddler.  I'm loving each stage more than the last, but it's still hard to realize those days with my baby are gone.  We woke up this morning and celebrated "A day of Liam's favorite things!"  It started off right with waffles, balloons, and apple juice.

We opened presents and Liam got spoiled by his grandparents and autns and uncles. 

I am one lucky momma to have gotten this boy 2 years ago.

We went to Thanksgiving Point to pet the animals (Ah-mhals as Liam calls them) and let him run wild at the Tulip Festival.  We thought he would love a pony ride.  What little boy doesn't want a pony ride on their birthday?  Ours, he lasted about 4.5 seconds.

Poor guy has no bum to keep his pants on.  I think they fell off about 20 times today.

After a fun day out we came home and had his favorite dinner, pizza, followed by chocolate cake.  I made a doggie cake since Liam loves his doggies.  Let's just say Ace of Cakes won't be calling me to decorate any of their cakes.

Happy 2nd birthday Liam! Thank you for making these past 2 years happier than we could have imagined.

little liam

This post is all about Liam's life lately (how's that for an alliteration?!) Nothing shows life's events better than a picture...so, here we go!

A couple of weeks ago Liam had the flu and fell asleep in our bed. This hasn't happened since he was about 6 months old. All he wanted was to be held and so that's exactly what we did. Is it bad that I was loving every second of it even though he was sick?!

As I've mentioned before, Liam is a very picky eater. I made my Grandma's famous spaghetti one night and the bowl was literally licked clean by the Mr. Liam.Nothing better than ice cream in the bathtub. Here's looking at you kid!We cut Liam's hair one night and he was so giddy he couldn't stop smiling and laughing.
We do a fantastic Mommy-and-Me reading group together with some friends at the library. He can't get enough of the stories, songs and activities especially when it includes putting masks on.We headed up to SLC one night to see the new City Creek center and it did not disappoint. Liam was enthralled with all the water features and we had to pull him away from them. I love this picture of Matt and Liam. They are best buds and love playing with each other....and the pulling away...We had a great Easter weekend. The weather was perfect and we soaked up every minute. We went to an Easter-egg hunt with the Millers and although the hunt was lame we never not have a good time together. This was supposed to be the train ride but I don't think you can classify it as one when you have a 4-wheeler pulling a bunch of metal pigs around. Plus Liam was screaming for "DADDDDYYYYYY" most of the time. Awesome.For a few months Liam has been taking a gymnastic's class. He has loved it and we've already noticed an improvement in his coordination. Sometimes Liam likes to play what we call little-blind-boy. He likes to close his eyes and try and walk around by feel. He decided to do this during a class a couple of weeks ago. It was funny for the first mintute but 15 minutes later, not so much. He would not open his eyes!!!This is my favorite face of late. This is the "OH! Mama! Was dat?!" And it's usually always said in an intense whisper.
Life has been so fun lately with Liam. His vocabulary is expanding every day and we are loving the things that come out of his mouth. Well, except when he says "GAS" really loud during church.