What a difference a couple months make

Same baby in the same towel but what a difference there is. The first picture was taken when she was only weeks old. Now today Paisley is 20 months old and is not a baby anymore. She is a very curious, sweet toddler!

ARE WE THERE YET????

I know that Stef can commiserate with us. I am so TIRED of moving. Good thing we are almost ready to drive away huh?!! Somehow the unpacking always seems to be easier then the packing up. Putting your own personal touches up and making it yours right?

If I can just endure the next two days. ugh.

Birthday Thanks!

I want to say a big THANKS to everyone for the fun posts, phone calls, cards and gifts! Thanks for helping make this the best birthday yet!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Happy Birthday from me and Paisley, we love you so much!!!

This is my second attempt at posting a picture. This is the view we have from our apartment at the temple. I wanted to post a picture of President and Sister Raymond with dad the day they came to our home. But I haven't learned to figure out the jpeg numbers to get hte picture I want, I guess. If anyone out there has help for me, feel free. Anyway, I feel pretty proud of myself for getting this. Thanks, Stefanie, for the good instructions you gave me.

All Wapped Up

We finally unpacked all the boxes for the kitchen! The problem with that was they were covering up our banister that is way too wide for a toddler. Paisley loved to walk up to it and fit her whole body through with no problem. So now that the boxes are gone we have shrink wrapped the banister until we can get a new one in there. Hopefully this won't be like this for very long because I don't want anyone to come over and see it like this.

This is my first attempt at posting a picture - as you may have noticed, it didn't work. I shall try again.

Happy Birthday Shelley

Happy Birthday Shelley! Any special plans for this special birthday? We hope it is a good one!

Creations by Stefanie

My three paintings are finally finished for the guest bedroom. Now we just need to hang them on the wall. It was a ton of fun to paint them and I hope to make some more for other rooms as we decorate them.

Working Hard

Paisley is such a great helper. She loves to unpack and pack drawers and boxes. She also enjoys helping me unload the dishwasher (even if I am trying to load it). She is so cute!

Hearing from Layne

I believe a post earlier was wondering what I was up to... I must say that I have made a few comments know and then, it isn't like I haven't done anything like Martissa ;).  Lets see, last Saturday was a YSA (yes I know I am not 18 to 31) activity and it was a lot of fun.  It was a sports day for an 8 Stake region.  We played Croquet, Ultimate frisbee, and Volleyball.  My ankles are still letting me have it for playing volleyball on pot hole filled lawns, oh well it was fun.  Later that night a few people came over to watch movies which was also fun.  We started off with a comedy, Second Hand Lions, and then moved into an action with Bourne Identity. 

This upcoming weekend is filled with Service Projects and State Conference.  So now you know what is going on back East.

Me

Fun at the Circus

Last night Jason, Paisley and I went to the circus along with some of our new friends. We had a blast! The elephants performed really well. They had the worlds youngest flying trapeze artist at 6 years old. He was a 7th generation circus performer. The show lasted for about two hours so we definitely had our fill of the circus for a while. We also saw goats, camels, a zebra, and baby hippo, horses, mules, a cow, and dogs. It was a very fun night in McPherson. It looked like the whole town went out to see the circus!

Lauren's Official Graduation Proof

Pictures of Lauren and her friends who graduated with her!

These are pics of the open house we did for the 5 Mormon senior graduates.

The Guest Room

The night we moved into the house we decided to start our home improvements while we waited for the movers to arrive with our things. We were surprised to find 2 layers of wall paper on the wall we were tackling. The first layer came off without a hitch. The second layer was more stubborn.

Jason and I had to scrub and scrape to get the second layer off the wall.

We painted the room a light gray called "fired steel"

This is some of the new furniture and accessories that we have decorated the room with. We aren't completely finished in there. We still need to hang the curtains and make the bed with our new comforter set. I am also making the art we are hanging on the wall and that will be done in a few days.

The guest room is open for business to anyone who wants to come stay the night!

I love my connection!

Well the cable guy came today and here we are back up and running!! YAY! That was a LONG 10 days without the internet! As soon as I can fund the cable I need to get some pictures on the blog we will post some. We have already painted the guest bedroom and got some new furniture for it. I couldn't find any paintings or other art I liked for that room so I decided to become an artist and make my own paintings for the room. I am currently working on three canvases and having a great time. They will hopefully be done in a couple days. The circus came to town today and so we are going tonight. We are going to meet a friend and her daughter over there and have a great time watching the "greatest performing elephants under the big top!" I'm excited to share all our pictures and other stories as soon as I can and I'm very happy to be back on the blog. I was impressed that there were so many posts while I was away. We just need to find the Haralson's, Lambert's, Spencer's, and Layne Whelchel to see what is going on with them!

Stef? Where are you?

Come on Stef.....I want pictures and posting with details of your new life? I am sure you squeeze a minute or two out of your busy day to give us a Cornwall update.....please? I miss hearing from/about you.

My New Backyard

Friday we had a fence put up in our backyard. Here is the dirt view and the cement view. The kids love playing out there. Mialee loves the basketball hoop and is getting to be quite good! Notice where the motorcycle is in the dirt? It was on the cement until Nathan got on it and stepped on the gas. Before I could get to him he rode it off the cement and into the dirt. He was thrilled, Mialee was screaming. Thanks for the fence Mom and Dad. We love it!

Jonathan's Ordination

Jonathan will be ordained to the office of a Teacher next Sunday. Lewis and I will also be speaking in Sacrament. I guess it will be quite the day for our family. I can't believe he is going to be 14. Seems like just yesterday I was giving birth to him. Time flies........I remember Tevya singing about sunrise and sunset. I can so relate.

Senior Awards Night

Lauren was honored tonight by CSF (California Scholastic Federation) for her academica achievement and she also received a $600 scholarship from the Teachers Association due to her academics and desire to become an elementary music teacher.

Had to toot her horn!!

MMMMMMM, Good!

After eating his ice cream sandwich!He thoroughly enjoyed every bite. Straight from the high chair to the bathtub and cleaning up is not that bad.

This past week....

Bubble Time! Nathan gets an empty medicine bottle and a cleaned off bubble blower and he is as happy as can be blowing bubbles without any mess. :)
Mialee graduated from her preschool class....not really though because she will be back in September, but all the children participated and received a diploma.

Group photo. Her preschool is at the High School and the students run it for child development credits with a head teacher that over sees it.
Swim lessons start for Mialee in a week! She went shopping with some birthday money and got herself some pretty cute swimwear.

Wonderful Day

Yesterday dad and I had the honor of entertaining our former mission president and his wife, President and Sister Raymond. They e-mailed us a few weeks ago to ask if they could come up to see us. We, of course, said yes.

We had lunch together and visited about 90 miles a minute. Then we took a ride - President had been in Palmdale 40 years ago and wanted to see it again. We passed a place where new homes are being built and are advertised as being available from the "low $600,00's". President was driving and he said he wanted to see what a $600,000 house looks like so he pulled into the tract and we went through a couple of the models.

After that we came back to our house and played Rummy Kub until they had to leave. It was so fun to be with them again. We will be attending their farewell party on June 23.

Hope all of you have a happy and reverent Sunday. We love you all!!!!!
Dad and Mom :)

Relaxin' at HOME

Our Cute Basement

Hidden Treasures in the House

Today we started moving things into the house. The carpets were dry so we could put things where they needed to go. The first two pictures are me and Paisley relaxing on our cute new basement furniture. While we were looking in one of the storage rooms downstairs we found an awesome sword. This is Jason's new favorite thing and he plans on using it as a prop in a future movie. Oh the fun hidden treasures you can find in a new house!! Tonight is our last night in the hotel and we are celebrating with ice cream. Tomorrow we start our new life as homeowners actually living in our home!! We are very excited!

Holy Cow!!

I have been getting ready to switch such things as our insurance and utilities. I am SHOCKED by the difference in the charges between California and Utah!! How can California get away with ripping us off so much? What allows them to get away with it? Our insurance is dropping by HALF!! We had a high electric bill last year while using the air conditioner that cost us $743, I went to So Cal Ed and got the usage information for that month, then went to DixiePower who also lists their power prices on their website and figured out that same usage that month in Utah would have cost us $153.46. HOLY COW!!

Officially Homeowners!!

Well we moved up the day of closing on our house to today and so we are officially the owners!!! In this picture we are holding up the keys to our home and our first piece of mail that was waiting for us in the mailbox today! We can't believe that this day has finally arrived after years of dreaming, planning and saving money. There are many more pictures to come and hopefully a virtual tour of the house, but for now we wanted to share this fun news.

Do you remember this?

Here is the house most of you lived in. The new owners have closed in the front porch and the door is where we used to step up on the porch. They took out the rockery and put in the cement walls. The picture doesn't show, but they may be extending the kitchen out over the driveway. We couldn't tell what was going on for sure. The neighborhood is still great and we were filled with the many happy memories of you growing up there.

We splurged and ate dinner at the Space Needle. It was delicious, which is good considering it cost and arm and a leg.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LAYNE

We love you, Layne! Hope today is great for you!

Home Again

Well, an hour ago dad and I returned from our latest trip. We visited the Cornwall's in Kansas, the Spencer's in Colorado, and the Lambert's in St. George. After spending less than 24 hours at home we took off again and spent 6 days in Seattle with Layne.

Before they moved, Stefanie gave me directions for posting pictures on the blog. Maybe I will have more energy in the morning and give it a try. We have many pictures from Seattle, including our home on Barrett Street, that most of you would probably enjoy. Keep your fingers crossed and give me your good thoughts in the morning as I try to post pictures.

Tracy, we love your new home. We are very happy for you. I don't want to upstage Stefanie, but she has some very exciting news which I am sure she will share soon. I'm really happy we have this blog. Just wish that Martissa would get her computer fixed and that Shelley could remember how to log on. Stefanie, she may need a new invitation - I don't think she has posted since we went to gmail.

Dad and I love each of you more than we have words to express. We are proud of you and very grateful for you. Keep the posts coming!!

Pics of our new house!!

Mialee's birthday continues

Mialee's party was on Friday. We painted pottery at Red Hot Pottery.....
Here are some of our masterpieces
Then home for pizza and presents....the bike being the big finale
She wanted a white cake painted like a rainbow.