Memphis!

This year for Thanksgiving, we drove out to Memphis where we got to spend the weekend with Becky & Dustin! Becky was my roommate freshman & sophomore year at BYU and she lives way too far away now, but thankfully she and Dustin were willing to put up with our crazy family for 5 days :). We got there Wednesday night and spent Thursday cooking...and didn't get a single picture of the fabulous feast Becky served us...

That night Dale, Becky & Dustin went to brave WalMart and got our Christmas gift for Kimball & Cameron-a trampoline! I've been dying to just set it up, but we only have to wait 9 days until Christmas!


The next day we went to Shelby Farms which has a ton of different playgrounds...if you ever go to Memphis, this is a must-see destination for the kids!

On Saturday we went to see the march of the Peabody ducks at the Peabody Hotel where we took lots of silly pictures and admired the fanciness of the building in general.

It should be noted that the entire weekend was spent trying to cement a betrothal between one of my boys and baby Emma :)

and later to the children's museum which was neat, but a little pricey...the boys loved it and would have stayed for days had we let them...

On Sunday we went to Sacrament meeting there and headed home. It was a fabulous weekend spent with fabulous people! I'm so grateful for Becky and her friendship (I don't think I would have enjoyed BYU nearly as much had we not been roommates!). Thank you for putting up with us Becky, Dustin, & Emma!

Dallas!

My mom is from Australia, which is where all of my cousins on that side of the family live, so I don't get to see them very often. The last time we went was when I was in 6th grade and now all of the cousins are grown up and having kids!

When my cousin and his wife were flying through the US on their way back to Australia after living in England for a few years, they arranged to have a day-long layover in Dallas so we could go down and hang out with them. I'm so glad they did! It was so fun spending the day talking, reaquainting, and learning about all of the cultural differences between here, England & Australia.

We stopped by the Dallas temple...

Then we went to a park and later to the Dallas Arboretum which had more pumpkins than I've ever seen...houses made of pumpkins!

They also had Chihuly statues made of glass....

And hills to roll down...

Thanks so much Cousin!

House Tour

WE CLOSED ON OUR HOUSE...we are house owners and can't be more thrilled. It's amazing what a difference it makes in actually owning the place you live in. We love the colors and will likely never be able to live in a house with boring colored walls again!

  Here's the living room (envision it with a couch and other furniture which we are saving up for):

 Here's the kitchen and the dining room:

Here's the "craft room"/office/den/one day 3rd bedroom: 

Here's the boy's bedroom:

And our bedroom (we love the yellow walls; it always looks bright & sunny!):










Hopefully we will never have to try cramming into a little apartment again. It's amazing how differently we are able to fit into our house with an attic, garage, shed, and just more space in general :).

A Lawyer

Dale is officially a lawyer! He was sworn in on September 19th...

 To keep K entertained during the ceremony, I let him take pictures with the flash off...

 Afterwards, K expressed his surprise at how short the ceremony was, because "Daddy's graduation lasted for hours!" :)

 My boys in front of the State Capitol...

 We are so proud of Dale, and SO excited to be done with school, and the bar!

Toothless!

K recently lost his second tooth...and he wanted C in his pictures :).

PS Buy a hammock! I can't believe how much time my boys spend on that thing and K uses it to decompress after school every day.

Utah

At the end of July, right after Dale took the Bar Exam, we headed up to UT for family reunions. At the reunion on the Rex property, Kimball got to ride a horse for the first time and loved it!

 

Cameron played the part of Pig Pen quite well...

At the second reunion, we camped near Bear Lake, hiked to Bloomington Lake, spent a day at Bear Lake and loved being with Dale's siblings and their kids. All 12 siblings were in attendance!

After reunions, we spent some time with Dale's dad and his wife. One of those days, Will & Erin took us to Dinosaur Park in Ogden and my boys loved it, until Cameron saw the robot T-Rex and ran from the room screaming :0

 After shopping at the wonderstore Smith & Edwards, we made the requisite stop at Temple Square...

 Spent nights at different family friend's houses and loved spending that time with them...
Went to BYU and made our requisite stop at Kimball Tower...Kimball is a bit bigger this time around...

And in other Kimball highlights, on this trip, he realized he can climb pine trees much higher than his mother feels comfortable with, he lost his first tooth, learned how to start and keep pumping on the swing and started learning monkey bars on his own.

26!

Shortly after we moved into our new house I celebrated my 26th birthday! Dale came home from work and made me crepes to fill with strawberries and powdered sugar for dinner and then he made me a cheesecake with pretzel crust and chocolate mousse...sorry you missed out because it was amazing:

Moved

We are on to our next stage in life...we have left apartment dwelling behind and have moved into a house! We moved last week and are VERY grateful for all the help we received. When we got to our house, the boys thought the best use of the moving truck was as a ramp for their own vehicles...so much boy-ness in my house :)

 

We are probably 75% unpacked and I don't remember my feet ever being so tired. The floors in our house are all wood, wood laminate, etc and my feet were missing the carpets, though I think they're adjusting. Somehow, C was still able to fall asleep on the floor today though...

We are adjusting to our new home and surroundings and it should be quite the adventure for us! We have a garage, a fenced in backyard, a kitchen with enough room to store everything, a quiet neighborhood and two little boys who seem to be adjusting quite well.

Muddy Monster at Lake Thunderbird

We found a bunch of wood behind our apartment and told Kimball we would have to go camping and burn it. This last weekend was our last chance to go camping before we move so we went out to Thunderbird Lake close to Norman.

We got there at 8:00 and set up camp just in time for it to get dark. It was a late night for everyone but we enjoyed sitting by the fireside, and later Dale and I were astonished at the raccoon that just waltzed right up to our table with us sitting near it.

The next morning we finished burning all the wood we took and then we went swimming at the lake. The beach is a clay type of mud and looked less than desirable but even still we all had a great time swimming, digging and burying each other...video of buried muddy monster Kimball below.

The most amazing thing of it all is that Dale is the only one who got sunburned...seriously bizarre since I usually fry and Dale never burns.

Through the Years

Katie and Justin Ferrell are those friends that last forever...after being neighbors in 2 different places and playing countless board games together, there's a relationship there that only grows stronger every time we see each other. We're so grateful for their friendship throughout our married life and look forward to many game nights to come :)

Last Day of School

K and Dale celebrated their last days of school recently and it's hard to believe we've already finished an entire school year, let alone Dale's law school career! It has been so fun to watch K in pre-K and see how much he has learned, hear about his school friends and just see how much he has grown.

They Came

Our favorite Katie and Justin Ferrell came to visit us at the end of May and we had a packed week of fun (minus the Justin trying to make us sick part!).

The Rolly Pollies C caught while we played

He winds up and...

C utterly exhausted got a lift

Kings of the hill

We filled our time with game nights, house hunting (an entire day going through 13 houses...exhausting, and still no house), disc golf, touring the 45th Infantry Museum and the OKC Memorial, a mani/pedi for us girls (THANK YOU KATIE!), and laughing/teasing/joking, etc.

We miss you already and can't wait to see you in a couple months!

Graduation!

We survived! We survived law school...Dale graduated on May 12th and it's hard to believe that law school is over. Family came from NM and UT to celebrate with us and the big day was wonderful. I'm so proud of my husband and all that he has achieved in the last 3 years. I'm also incredibly grateful that it's done :). 

The poster Dale's brother's fam made for him.

All of the fam that came to support Dale.

Dale in his hooded robe glory.

The fountain at the law school.

Now we just have to get past that pesky bar (which Dale takes in July)!

K turns 5!

Um, almost a month ago we celebrated Kimball's birthday. The week before his birthday we had a birthday party for him...the first since he was 2 and I think it turned out well. We just didn't really get any pictures of it :(. We were supposed to have the party at a park but the weather was less than favorable so we had about 8 extra kids and their parents packed into our little apartment, but the kids got along well and I think the parents enjoyed talking! The theme was dinosaurs.

K's winking face ;)

 The night before Kimball's birthday we had a tornado come through town and were supposed to get more tornadoes on his birthday so we celebrated as a family in the morning to prevent being interrupted by any tornadoes. Thankfully no more came through town and Kimball was so excited about his new big boy bike (which I have no pictures of!). We just made cupcakes for his birthday and each iced our own and unwrapped presents so it was pretty low-key.

Cam turns 3

Cameron turned 3...our little boy turned 3! Before his birthday if we asked him how old he was, he had no clue or just wouldn't respond, but this boy knows his age now.

This little boy keeps us laughing every day. He is all boy with an obsession with dirt, vehicles and animals. This boy still moans when he is most content in life and that's usually how we locate him if we're looking for him...listening for a low, miserable sounding moan. He's still my cuddler, though I can feel him growing out of it sadly.

In probably the last 6 months has been where both boys have really started playing together because they understand each other more and I love listening to Cam play with K. I love when Cam gets so proud of something he does and has to run to his big brother to tell him what happened. Those are the moments that make raising two active, crazy boys totally worth it.

Happy Birthday C!