We are all in love with our sweet little Sam!!

Truth be told

Well now we live in Oklahoma. There's not much to say yet, it certainly hasn't won over any of my heart with this horrible weather, humid and 105-110 degrees everyday. We thought we were leaving the hot hot heat in Arizona, but we were wrong, very wrong. I am hoping that something will redeem this place, so I can bear living here for the next 3 years. But so far, it's been rough. I don't mean to complain, but the last couple of months have been the hardest of my life. I have cried more in the first few weeks here than any other time in my life. Thankfully Tyler's parents flew to AZ and made the 16 hour drive with us to OK and spent a few days here to help us clean and set up. We were so sad to see them go, they were here at a critical time for us. And oh so thankfully my parents came out a couple of weeks later, driving 18 hours each way within one week - talk about love! - to bring us some of our things we had in storage and help us with some home improvements. Oh how I cried, like a little baby, when they pulled out of my driveway to go home. My parents and Tyler's parents have no idea how much they helped us while they were here, I can't even express in words how much their sacrifices of time, money and labor meant to us, but ever so much more just their presence and love, I am crying now just thinking of it. I honestly don't know how we would have survived this first month here without their love and support. AZ was a different story, it was fun to have a little adventure there, and we knew it was only for 1 year, so we knew any issue we didn't love there was so very short and temporary. But here we are now in OK, one month down 35 to go, and it seems so overwhelming. We are so unfamiliar with everything, so lonely and Tyler's program is so hard and grueling. I know it just takes time to make friends and get settled; we saw that in AZ and certainly experienced a similar rough patch in the beginning of both our missions. So we know there is hope and we know it will get better, but we just can't wait to get there.

Anyway, on a more upbeat note: We finally have a garage and a yard, Hooray! We are still trying to figure out where everything goes in this new little house and don't have any pictures yet, but will soon.

Ben is doing pretty good, he is starting to feel at home here and has stopped saying "no new house, other house" - requesting to go back to AZ - which is good. He is so darn cute, the other night he sang his favorite song "families can be together forever" all by himself and then prayed his whole prayer by himself, and it made my day. Thankfully I have such a sweet little guy and dear husband to brighten my life even when it's hard.

Another project

My friend was getting rid of this little kitchen so I snagged it from her with thoughts of making it a little more gender neutral. The top was a little tricky as were all the flowers molded into the plastic, I couldn't cover them all up, but I think it turned out good enough.

Before:

After:

Busy

A while ago I saw these darling maps from qadesigns promoted over at Made, but qadesigns is on hiatus, so I made my own version.

I love the way they turned out. I love the colors and the clean simple look it gives our front room. I happened to have the green striped fabric from IKEA on hand and just used felt for the rest. Luckily I still have some of both fabrics left for our next state, Oklahoma, but the real problem is that OK happens to be a short and wide state unlike Utah and Arizona. So... I'm not sure how thats going to work out, I guess I'll figure it out when we get there.

More visits and Ben's #2

My parents came to visit us in March and we had such a fun time together. Ben loved having them here and kept them very busy with tours and museums and lots and lots of playing and reading.

We were so happy that they came just before Ben's birthday and were excited to have a little birthday celebration with them. Ben loved his Mickey cake and all the fun new toys he got.

A couple of days after my parents left we drove up to St. George to spend the weekend and Ben's birthday with Tyler's parents and sister Lori and her little family. We loved spending the time together and Ben especially loved playing with his cousins.

Ben was so lucky to have 2 birthday parties for his #2 birthday.

He is my best little buddy. He makes me smile and laugh out loud every day. I am so grateful for him. It amazes me how fast he grows and how he changes right before my eyes.

I love you to the moon and back Ben.

Rachel's House

On a Tuesday in late February Tyler came home from work and said he had the rest of the week off due to a medical conference that all the doctors would be at so there would be no clinics. We had to take advantage of such a lucky break, so we hopped in the car and headed out to San Diego to visit my sister and my brother and his wife. My in-laws just happened to be there too so we got a wonderful family filled week. It was a perfect get away, my sister lives right by the beach and we soaked in all the sounds and smells of the ocean. Ben absolutely loved the beach, and so did we. It was fabulous to spend some time with my siblings, going to the aquarium, beach, La Jolla, out to eat and just hanging out together. Ben loved my sister's apartment, especially the elevator and still talks about Rachel's house every time we read our book with "dinosaurs crammed in an elevator."

E

We went from July to November without seeing anyone from our families, but have been so fortunate to see so many people the last few months.

My sweet sister E dropped everything to come visit just after my miscarriage to keep me company. We had a great and relaxing time together and Ben loved pointing out all his favorite animals at the zoo, seeing the ducks at the park, and playing cars with her. A big thanks to her and all my and Tyler's family for all their love and support.