Joey - 14 Months

I saw a quote the other day that (I feel) defines parenting perfectly.

"The days are long, but the years are short."

There are some days that I feel like I have to be the most creative person in the world (which I'm not) to get through the day without a hundred toddler-sized meltdowns.  But then I look back at ultrasound pictures and pregnancy pictures, I can't believe that we found out we were pregnant almost two years ago.  I seriously don't know what we did before him.

He brings so much joy to our lives :) I thank God every night for the incredible blessing that he is to us.

- We had a play date with Lila and her mom Jocelyn.  They came to our house, and it was really interesting to watch Lila and Joey interact.  Joey has learned that his toys are "his," and so when Lila came over and started playing with his toys, he got a little protective of his toys.  He kept bringing things to me so that Lila couldn't have them.  We actually finally had to take the balloons away because of tears.  It was pretty interesting to watch.  They finally were able to share by pulling all of the diapers out of the diaper caddy.

- Joey stayed a Saturday with my parents so that Neal and I could go to the temple with the youth.

- We went up to the mountains for Memorial Day.  We met Neal's coworker and his wife and kiddo up in Estes Park and then went to a campground in the National Forest for lunch.  We then went to Jocelyn, Paul, and Lila's house for a BBQ.

- We went to Longmont for Neal's dad's choir concert.  Joey was pretty good for the majority of the concert.  He thought the music was pretty enthralling for a while, but about 30 minutes into it we were standing up with him every 5 minutes or so.

- We stayed at my parents' house the night of the choir concert, and the next day my sister and her little boy, Lucas, flew in from Utah.  We spent the day playing and then went to the races at Colorado National Speedway with my family that evening.  Joey thought the fast cars were pretty cool.

- The next day we went back down to my parents' house for a BBQ.  A lot of my family came to see Tiffany.  It was really fun to see everyone.

- Joey's first molar popped through.  It was pretty miserable for a little bit.

- It's been interesting to see how quickly Joey is learning right now.  Especially over the last few days, he has started watching us do something and then copying exactly what we did.  It's sent us into a whole new world of parenting.

- Joey and I went and played in the pouring rain before his bath one night.  He had SO much fun, and the video we took is what I will forever watch when I'm having a hard day being mom.

- He went down the slide by himself for the first time and he LOVES the slide.  We go to the park almost every day.

- We went to the park several times and played in water lots.  There were tons of cute pictures we took this month :)

4 year anniversary

My sweet husband and I have been married for 4 years now.  I really can't believe it.

Look at us :) we were just babies (ok, we still are, but not as much).

I really cannot put into words how much I cherish this man.  In four short years, we have been through a lot together - birth, death, financial hardships, financial plenty, house buying, parenting...the list goes on and on.

I'm so grateful for the love and the relationship that we have built over the last four years.

We celebrated by going to dinner and a show at the Candlelight Dinner Playhouse.  We were treated really well.  It was fun to go somewhere that we had a connection to, and celebrate with people we know and love.

I love you babe.  Here's to eternity!

Joey - 13 months old

It's graduation season, and it is seriously making me tear up.  I keep looking at him and thinking to myself "He's going to be in kindergarten, and then high school, and before I know it he's going to be graduating..." and it just goes on and on.

This last month was truly a fun one.  Here's what we did :)

- We went to Sam and Kyle's wedding.  Joey was SUCH a good boy that day even though he was passed from person to person while Neal and I ran around helping.

- We started working on our garden.

- He finally figured out that his extra pacifiers fall on the floor throughout the night, so he now spends at least ten minutes after he gets up playing with them.  

- We played outside.  A lot.  He loves being outside.  He will walk up to the door and say "wuh-si" which I'm translating to outside.  It's pretty cute.  It rained a lot, so we bundled up and headed outside when he got cranky.

- He got to try Buffalo Wild Wings for the first time ;)

- He ate with a spoon by himself for the first time.

- We built a fort.

- We worked on the garden some more.  He was a super good helper.

- He's now OBSESSED with berries.  There have been several times that we've gone grocery shopping and I've had to move him away from the berries so that he didn't open a package and start eating them.

- He figured out how to climb up on our bed.  So we play "up and down" for about 10 minutes every morning (after he plays with his pacifiers).  There was one morning that Neal left early for work and when I walked out of the bathroom, I found Joey laying in Neal's spot on the bed.  Apparently he missed the morning cuddles with Neal that morning.

- After a year, he finally realized that Sierra (our bird) exists and lives in our home.  Every morning, when we go downstairs, he rushes over to her cage to help uncover and feed her.  He also points to her and squeals at least 20 times a day.

- We went up to Estes Park for my birthday.  They were having their annual "Duck Race," so there were all kinds of activities for us to do.  At the end we watched them release all the little rubber ducks down the river.

He continues to grow and develop and excel in so many areas.  We love watching him and loving on him.  He is the sweetest little boy, whose greatest desire, already, is to help.  We feel so blessed that he is our son, and we are so excited to continue to help and watch him <3 p="">

Piano Lessons

Hi all :)

I want to start teaching 1-2 more beginner piano students every week.

I charge $12 for a half hour lesson.  You also would need to cover books.

I'd like to do them at my house because it's easier for Joey, but I am willing to travel.  I charge $.56/mile (the going mileage rate for taxes).  I am just north of Greeley.

I am free most days since I am a stay at home momma :)

Feel free to email me/text me/call me if you have questions.

Easter and Joey's actual birthday

Easter's are always kind of interesting at our house.  For the last few years, one of the big churches in Greeley has had their Easter service at the UCCC, so Neal has worked Easter morning for the last few years.  

The Easter Bunny brought us a family basket with a scripture book and some bubbles for Joey, and then some treats for Neal and I.  While Neal was at work, Joey and I spent the morning watching General Conference, and then in the early afternoon we headed down to UCCC to pick up Neal and go to Easter dinner.

We headed down to my Aunt Sonja's house for dinner with my family.  I love it because I get to see members of my family that I don't see any other time of the year.  We had a yummy dinner and sat around and talked.  The kids did an Easter egg hunt (which Joey missed because he fell asleep way later than he normally does), and then we headed to my parents' house.  My sister, Tiffany, and her husband, Chase, and their little boy, Lucas were visiting, and we wanted to spend more time with them.

We took a bunch of family pictures, and then played with the ball and bat that Joey got for his birthday.  Joey loves hitting the balls with the bat, and it will entertain him for quite a while.

It was a very relaxing, enjoyable day.  I'm so grateful for the resurrection of my Savior, and for the opportunity that we get to celebrate it every year! 

We still exist, too :)

I post on here pretty often about Joey, but now that he's a year old and I feel like I'm a little more caught up on our life, I'm going to try and post more than just my monthly updates on Joey.

So, here's a little bit about Neal and I right now.

At our church, I teach and help with the 16 and 17 year old girls, and I am loving it.  I'm super excited to go to girl's camp with them this year.  I went to every year of girl's camp that I could when I was a young woman, and I loved it.  Our theme for the camp this year is "Anchored."  I think it's going to be an incredible year, that's for sure.

Neal and I are working super hard at getting (and staying) completely out of debt.  A few months after we bought our house, we had over $4000 in car repairs come up that we just flat out didn't have.  We were pretty stressed out about it.  For our wedding, someone gave us a copy of Dave Ramsey's "Total Money Makeover."  Our friend's had used it to get out of debt, but we had kind of ignored it because we hadn't been in debt our entire marriage.  When we had to put the car repairs on credit cards though, I picked up that book and started reading.  Fast forward a few months, and we are now taking Dave Ramsey's class "Financial Peace University" (thanks to our friends that I mentioned earlier).  We are learning SO much.  I think one of the coolest things is that it lines up with the counsel our prophets and apostles have given about debt and finances.  We are really excited about this, and look forward to when we are done with paying off our debts.

After over a year, Joey finally slept a long time last night.  He went from 7:30 pm to 4:30 am.  Hallelujah.

Even with the sleep issues we've been having (which I've finally accepted are mostly my doing), I'm seriously baby hungry again.  We have a plan, and I keep telling myself that, but it doesn't stop my ovaries from jumping every time I see or hold someone's new baby.  It's interesting this time around.  When we first talked about trying to get pregnant with Joey, he really struggled with the idea - he was pretty slow to agree it was time.  This time around, he seems pretty excited about it.  I think he truly enjoys being a dad, and after seeing all of the joy Joey brings to our family, I think he's looking forward to adding to that joy.

Neal's job is going very well.  He has received many compliments from tenants and from supervisors about the work he is doing.  I'm grateful for his assistant technical director, who has made his job much easier to do because he can focus on his job instead of having to worry about his ATD.

We love our house.  We are currently working on starting a garden in our back yard.  We're moving a section of rock in our back yard every year - we have three sections total.  We moved one this year, and we're planning on moving one more each year until we are done.  After that, we are going to replace the other half of the rock along the back fence with a play area for Joey and any future kids.

Life is going really well for us right now, and I'm incredible grateful to Heavenly Father for that.  While we do work very hard, Heavenly Father has sent an amazing amount of blessings our way!

Joey - 1 year old

Joey is 1 year old!  Woo hoo!  Here's all about our last month:

- The day he turned 11 months old, we went outside in his snow suit to play.  We were both so tired of being cooped up inside that we braved the cold.  We had quite a bit of fun.

- He started the worst round of teething that we've had so far.  Two have come in so far, and we're still waiting on the other two.  He's been a drool monster for the last month.

- We went to the Family FunPlex in Greeley.  They have an awesome pool that's pirate themed.  It's freaked Joey out before, but he really seemed to like it this time.

- Joey has started figuring out how to maneuver balls, so he and Neal went outside to play soccer while I made dinner.

- We celebrated St. Patrick's Day by having corned beef and cabbage with potatoes.

- We went to the zoo with Neal's brother's wife, Robin, and their kiddos.  It was really fun!  Joey got to meet bears.  We also got to meet a possum named Walker.  (I was probably more excited than Joey was about that one).

- Great-Grandma Psuik and Papa Joe came out for lunch and brought him a fire truck.

- We discovered rocks.  They are now his favorite thing to discover outside.

- We went to the park.  A lot.  I'm pretty sure that's Joey's favorite place right now.  Actually, he pretty much just wants to be outside, constantly.

- We had his birthday party!  Read about that here.

 - He's gotten so big.  I can't believe it.    Here's a great picture that shows it.

It's so wonderful and amazing that we've been parents for a year.  It's been one of the most rewarding a joyful experiences of our life!