We are going Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow

We are going on a road trip. We are leaving Sunday the 23rd to visit Aunt Aundria in California. We made a countdown chart because Annika asked if we were leaving for Disneyland every morning. Now she can take a ring off each morning instead. We love visiting Aunt Aundria, because she takes great care of us when we stay. We are not the type who visit Disneyland 4 times in 4 days, way to many people, but Aundria knows were to go and we always have a great time.

After a few days with Aundria we are driving to Flagstaff to see Nina and Papa for the weekend. It has been a long time since we were down there and the girls are excited to ride the horses with Papa. I don't know if we are going to come back with two princesses or two cowgirls.

Picture this...

The last couple days our girls have been feeling pretty crappy. Paul left the room for a couple minutes and this is what he walked back into. I felt bad that they feel so sick, but sometimes it is nice to have it quiet.

SERIOUSLY

Annika had her dance recital last week, this year she let me put mascara on her. Seriously, look at those lashes what woman would not love to have eyelashes like that.





Paul's family was able to come in town last week, it has been awhile since we have been able to see each other. We are so blessed to have the most wonderful and supportive families. Luckily, Paul's brother and sister-in-law moved back to Salt Lake from Oregon where he finished Law school. They are expecting a baby in the fall we are so excited that they are close to be able to enjoy their family.

Lynn and Mama Jane had a little competition over the girls. To see who could spoil them with love, hugs and gifts more. They kept us laughing all weekend. Of course the girls soaked up all the attention. We enjoyed everyday we were with you and already miss you guys. I had to post the picture below of Nina and Annika. Love you!!!!

Post Op!!!

My surgery went well, my recovery has been so much quicker then my last. They realigned my knee cap on the last surgery so that is a little more invasive. I start physical therapy on Wednesday and am looking forward to getting on my bike and riding again. I doubt there will be any century rides in my future but maybe a 40 or 50 mile race would be great. The girls and Paul are glad to see me feeling better just in time for the warm weather, yeah!!!

We went to our friends Brooke and Tate house for an Easter egg hunt. The kids found enough eggs to fill up two baskets each, we have as much or more candy then Halloween. Luckily, the weather has been nice enough that then can go outside and run it off.

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For Paul's birthday I gave him tickets to the season opening game for Real Salt Lake. They beat the defending champions Columbus Crew 4-1, the last 15 min of the game it began to rain. If it rains between 7 and 10 pm on game day you can redeem your tickets for another game later in the season. I was great to go out just the two of us, dinner and a game and the girls slept at my dad's house.

The countdown begins to March Madness and my knee surgery.

We always look forward to the month of March for the basketball games, but this year we actually scheduled my knee surgery around the tournament. Who would not love to be forced to lay around and watch basketball. I went in for the pre-op appointment today, my knee is pretty messed up so there are several procedures he could preform. One of which would lead to two or three days of staying off my knee then I will begin rehabilitation or him doing a procedure called micro fracture which Peekaboo Street and Matt Harpring both have had. That is a much longer recovery time four weeks of absolutely no weight on my leg and then who knows how many months of rehab afterword. I have no cartilage left on a portion of my knee so they will drill tiny holes or fractures in my bone in an attempt to help the bone regrow some cartilage. It is not guaranteed but this is the step they take before trying to implant artificial cartilage. I am really excited and nervous to see how the surgery will go but I am definitely ready to begin feeling better. Paul has been so awesome taking care of the girls and I, cleaning the house,preparing meals and letting me take a nap when I am tired from walking around all day at work. I am pretty lucky to have a husband that is very concerned and supportive, this surgery could mean a lot more work for him in the near future but he has not complained once he would love for me to get feeling better eventually, Wish me Luck!!!

New Years Update

I am at a point where I do not check my blog everyday like I once did, I logged on the other day a when the Halloween pictures pulled up I thought that it is time to give a update of what we have been up to. The holidays were such a blast this year with the girls, Annika somewhat understood about Santa which was a lot of fun to explain to her. She loved opening everyone present's and Sydney could of cared less she just wanted to play with what was inside. Since, I have been working full time especially retail during the holidays ( I have just begun to recover) I came home and usually pass out before the girls. Paul has been so helpful taking care of all of us. It looks like I am in for some kind of knee surgery hopefully in the next month or so, I injured my knee late summer and it has continued to get worse. The last few months have gone by so quickly, which I is good I am already longing for summer again. There is not much I enjoy about winter and the girls miss being able to go play outside. I will try to update more often, Happy New Year.

Trick or Treating

We had a blast with the girls on Halloween, Annika figured out what Halloween was all about this year. CANDY CANDY CANDY and she let me put make-up on her and do her hair, that was fun for me. Our neighborhood had a trunk-or-treat, it is perfect for the girls a hour is all they can handle and they can accumulate enough candy in that amount of time.

Pumpkin Head

We have a fun little pumpkin patch in West Haven that we have gone to get our pumpkins the last couple of years. The gentleman who owns the pumpkin patch wears a pumpkin head while his is working at the patch. The kids either love him or are terrified of him. The girls didn't want to take a picture with him, so Paul tried it on to see if they would take a picture with the pumpkin on his head. As you can see from the last picture Sydney just ducked her head into his chest and wouldn't look at him until his took it off.
I know it has been a few week since I posted last, since then I have begun working at Kohl's as the Supervisor over the Men's department. I am enjoying it, for you that have worked retail before you know this is probably the worst time of year to start working we have been putting out merchandise pretty much none stop since I started three weeks ago. Kohl's is a much larger company then Hallmark so it is interesting to see how they run a store on a much larger scale. I have never been tempted to buy much from the companies I have worked for but everyday we are putting out new merchandise like sweaters, slacks, Levi's, jackets, workout clothes, skirts, shoes and that is just for don't get me started on clothes for the girls. I have to restrain myself from my urges to go on a binge shopping spree. I did get a king size comforter for seven dollars yesterday, that I don't feel any regret for buying.
We have had a about ten families come through our house, no word yet of an offer but we feel grateful that we are getting traffic in this lagging economy. We (mostly Paul since I have been working) have been cleaning our house constantly in an effort to have the house in good order to show. So we are staying busy to say the least, but always having fun with the girls they make us laugh everyday.
Also, we were so happy to have Paul's sister come and visit a couple weeks ago. She came up a few days after Annika's birthday so we of course extended the celebration to have her celebrate with us. She has been very busy working and going to school herself so we are grateful to be able to see her when we can. Thanks, Aundria....

Fun with paint....

Annika always enjoys helping me with projects around the house one of her favorite things is to paint with mom. So I decided to let the two of them go crazy with painting whatever they wanted. I covered an area as well as I could with plastic and poured the paint for them. They started out using brushes but ultimatley the bests way to paint is with your hands, right. Atleast for a three and one year old.

Even more....

Here are some pictures of our new and fabulous carpet it complements the wood trimming very well. The gentleman that owned the house before us put some out of date grey carpet in, not quite sure what was going through his mind when he ordered it? And last the bathroom remodel which you have seen before but I love to see before and after pictures. We have more to complete so I will end this series of posts and continue with more fun house projects.

More house pictures....

For you Friends and family that have visited our house you have probably noticed our very attractive staircase, which was a project the dogs decided to do while we were away one day, they somehow tore all the carpet off the stairs. I am not saying it was the most attractive carpet but it was something. So we were so excited to have carpet on them once again. The next set of picture was our large sandbox we had for the girls he he Paul, his friend Tate and my dad all helped with laying the sod. Then we went yesterday and picked up the compost to fill around the basketball court. It turned out so beautiful and the girls love running around on the grass, well Annika does Sydney still find a pile of dirt and digs in. I have come up with new nick=names for my girls, Annika is "sticky" because she is seems to always be eating or playing with something sticky. Sydney is "dirty" she is our little digger she love to grab handfuls of dirt, food, flowers and toys and spread it EVERYWHERE. Anyways, back to the house renovation we are thrilled with how things are coming, we still have a lot of work to do but it WILL be finished by Friday.

Update...

We have been crazy busy the last few weeks I wanted to update you all on the progress. I also have some before and after pics of our projects. Today has been difficult we had to say goodbye to one of our babies, our dog Duke, unfortunately we will not be taking her with us to my dad's house and have found her a excellent woman to live with until they can find a home that is perfect for her.





These first pictures are of Annika's old room, we tore up the carpet and finished they wood floor and transferred Sydney's furniture over.

We are on the move

So we have decided it was time to move on. Paul and I are both going to go back to school and finish getting our degrees. Paul is going to get his master's in counseling and I have chosen to get my nursing degree. We want to be able to pursue our education with the least stress possible so we will be putting our house on the market and moving in with family to achieve our goals as quickly as possible.
We have been doing some project that need to be finished to sell the house. We had our agent over and she asked is we had wood floors underneath the carpet, to our surprise there was. Who would cover them up especially with dated, grey carpet? So my mom took the girls last night so we could pull up the carpet and we found wood floors in fairly good condition. To bad we didn't realize this when we moved in. It is funny I was thinking when we moved in to the house we repainted everything and now that we are moving out after two children and two dogs we are replacing the flooring. I will keep you updated with the progress and we are happy to be able to finish our education and continue on with life.

Out and about............

I don't know if you can tell how enormous this cow is, it is twice the size of a normal cow.
It was pretty much the only animal worth seeing that was left at the fair, I guess that is what we get for going on the last day.

Here is me and the little ladies on the merry-go-round.

Mama Jane wanted us to get a bike for Annika on her birthday, we thought this one would be good.

Our little cutie hanging out at Paul's baseball game.


I know it has been a few weeks since I last posted, last Sunday we met up with Nicole and Brent at the State Fair. They had just come home from a all niter at Wendover, they always are out living it up. We went on the last day of the fair, one reason for that was to go to the demolition derby but when we walked up to the gate there was a sign that it was all sold out. Nice, it didn't say anything about purchasing tickets on the Internet, oh well. We bought a funnel cake to make up for the disappointment, there was a cute little exhibit for kids call Little hands on the farm. It helps children understand the process of harvesting their own goods and the steps it takes to be able to sell them for a profit at our local stores. The girls wanted to hit the rides, carnival rides always give me the creeps but I guess it not the adult they make the money from, kids do not know any better. Paul has started his fall baseball league so we have been dousing ourselves with bug spray and love still being able to get and watch him play, his is pretty awesome at short stop.