A Little Catch-up Before Christmas

Time sure flies during this time of year. Since my last post we celebrated two holidays, went on two trips, cut four more teeth (James), learned to cruise all over the house (also James), had a wedding and a baptism and all the little stuff in between...its been a busy few weeks.

Halloween 2010

We are lawn ornaments. James and Dave are Garden Gnomes and I am supposed to be a pink flamingo...okay so James' costume has been ready for over a year Dave and I threw ours together the night of our first Halloween party.


Our cute Garden Gnome.

Thanksgiving 2010

I feel like all I do is take pictures of this cute little guy and yet I don't have ANY pictures from any of our Thanksgiving dinners. But here he is the night of Thanksgiving getting ready to go for a walk to see the neighbors' Christmas lights. As you can see he is SUPER excited!
We had three Thanksgiving dinners this year. The week before Thanksgiving we traveled to San Diego to see Dave's niece Jessie get baptized and had an early Thanksgiving dinner with the Freestones. On Thanksgiving Day Dave's sweet Aunt Pat and Uncle Chris had us over with some of their family. The following Sunday my parents flew in from Salt Lake and we had a small Thanksgiving dinner with the five of us. Needless to say we have already put on our extra holiday weight.

Utah v. BYU 2010
James cheering on his Utes. It was a GREAT game!!

Getting Ready for Christmas
James wearing his new Jammies from his Lady. She actually got all three of us matching ones...we will get a picture of that eventually.


Utah December 2, 2010
Our little snow angel. James loved playing in the snow...for about 5 minutes.

Justin & Mariah's Wedding December 2, 2010We went to Utah last week for my brother's wedding. He has found a fantastic girl. We are so happy for them.


Someone is ready for Christmas.
James is good to leave the tree alone but he does love to play with the wrapping and bows on his gifts under the tree. We got him just a couple small gifts but I think he would be fine if I had just wrapped some empty boxes.

Only 19 days till Christmas!!!

Ooooooklahoma!!

For the past four weeks Dave has been doing a pediatric rotation at The Children's Hospital of St. Francis in Tulsa Oklahoma. James and I were able to join him for his last week. We loved Oklahoma. It had beautiful fall weather with the leaves just starting to turn. We were able to see many beautiful parks, visit the new city library, see the cute children's hospital where Dave worked, walked along the Arkansas river...basically it was a great trip! But best of all we got to be with Daddy again!!!!!
On our way home from Tulsa James and I had a layover in Salt Lake City. My Dad extended the layover a day so that we could spend time with family. It was a busy few hours in Salt Lake we saw all of James' cousins on my side, his four great-grandparents on my side and all my brothers and sisters. Our flight home that night ended up getting canceled so we were stuck in Salt Lake an extra night, it was a little stressful, especially since I was supposed to work the next day...but in the end it was okay and we got to spend a little more time with Grandpa!

Happy Fall everyone!!!

Six month pictures

Our little baby is six months old!! I really wanted to get some pictures of him at this fun stage of life, but as poor students we really don't have extra income for things like that anymore. So I solicited the help of my father-in-law (Phil) and mother-in-law (Liz) and with their help we were able to get some cute pictures (if I do say so myself) of our sweet baby James.

Our drooly boy cut his first tooth about a week ago.

He doesn't "pout" much so I am excited we caught this on film.

Yes James is crawling!! He started to army crawl when he was just five months old but he is working hard at getting the on-all-fours down.

Our little man.

James was pulling himself up to stand in the basket through most of the shoot. I know I am biased but he really is a strong little guy.
So there you have it. Our Sweet Baby James at 6 months old!!
Thanks to Phil for letting me use his camera and Liz for all your help and Baby James for being so darn cute!!!

Visitors, road trip and much more

The past three weekends we have been filled with family, friends and lots of firsts for James.

First we had a visit from Uncle Justin, his friend Mariah and her son Bronson. They watched James for us so we could celebrate our fifth anniversary. On Saturday we took the boys to the Peoria splash pad and had a picnic (both firsts for James).James & Daddy cooling off.

Bronson "not" feeding the ducks.


James enjoying his first picnic.

While Justin was in town we also had a quick visit from the Moore's (Dave's sister's family). Here is James with his cousin Thomas. It was so good getting to see them even if it was for just a little while.

The weekend after Justin's visit my mom, also known as Lady, came to see us. It was so much fun getting to see her. She left just a couple of days before her birthday so we had an early celebration. Here is James helping Lady blow out her birthday candle.
Happy Birthday Lady!!!! We love you and miss you!!!

For Labor Day weekend Dave and I decided we would take a quick road trip to L.A. and see my friend Stacy. Stacy and I have been best friends since elementary school. She had her first baby just a few weeks before James. She and her husband Nick live in Sherman Oaks now and were nice enough to let Dave and I come stay with them.

Stacy and I with the babies. Dave took about 5 or 6 of these pictures and little Amelia is staring and touching James in each one. These two were so cute with each other!

We went sightseeing on Hollywood Blvd. Here we are at the Chinese Theater.

James and Shrek just outside the wax museum.
Dave and I love the beach were so-o excited to take James. Nick and Stacy took us to a Beautiful beach in Malibu. Even the drive there was stunning. We were a little worried it would be crowded because of the holiday, but we got there at the perfect time and it wasn't crowded at all.
James!!
He LOVED the beach...not so much the ocean though. It was a little chilly.

James and Daddy checking out the waves.

We finally took James to the park. He has been before in his stroller. But now he is strong enough to go in the swings. And as you can see he LOVED it!
This has been an amazing summer with our sweet little baby!!!

5 years ago....

August 20th five years ago Dave and I began our lives together.
These past five years have been filled with many major milestones and incredible memories. We feel truly blessed to have one another and to have been able to experience all we have with each other at our side. The day we were married I truly felt like the luckiest girl in the world...and I was.

Our engagement picture.
Dave and I met in Physiology class at Weber State University. After a wonderful year of dating Dave proposed in June of 2005 (I said yes).

August 20, 2005
Our Wedding day was more than I could have ever hoped for. We were surrounded by our amazing families and friends. The love and support we had was incredible. The sealing was sweet and beautiful. The weather was perfect. I could not stop smiling all day.

December 2005
Our First Christmas together in our first apartment in Washington Terrace.



Nursing School Graduation, June 2006

August 20, 2006
Our first Anniversary Walt Disney World Florida. We were able to celebrate with my parents, sister and her sweet family. So much fun!!!

Thanksgiving 2006

Christmas 2006
Puebla, Mexico. Dave's dad and mom served as mission presidents in Mexico our first three years of marriage. We were able to go visit them every year at Christmas time.


Summer 2007
Going through our pictures I realized Dave and I have dressed up ALOT the past five years. This was for my nephew Jack's superhero birthday party. We made these costumes ourselves!

The Amazon River, Peru, May, 2007
Our first medical mission. In the Spring of 2007 Dave and I were able to travel through parts of the northern Amazon Basin with a group from our University and provide medical aide to the people there. It was an amazing experience and we are so grateful we were able to share it together.

Machu Pichu, Peru July 2008
The following year my parents surprised us and my siblings with an opportunity to go on a service mission together. This time we traveled through the Andes serving people in very remote villages high in the mountains. It was spectacular.

December 2008
Dave graduated Weber State University in the Spring of 2008 with a degree in microbiology. That summer we moved to Arizona so he could begin medical school at Midwestern University. Here we are at his White Coat Ceremony during his first year. Now he is in his third year busy doing rotations. I am so grateful to have such a hardworking and dedicated husband!

Fall 2008
Kayaking in Southern California.

August 2009
For our fourth anniversary Dave and I traveled to Italy. My parents joined us (they were celebrating their 25th anniversary!!). It was a blast!!! Dave served his mission in Rome. He had always said that he would take me there one day. We are so grateful we were able to go on this amazing trip!!

March 2010
Just two days before our lives would change forever!!! We just bought this car the day before. We were so excited and anxious for our little guy to come. Dave was so great to me throughout my pregnancy. Foot rubs, back rubs, not complaining about having cereal just about every night (my only craving). My pregnancy made me love and appreciate Dave even more!

March 17, 2010
Our greatest adventure/accomplishment/joy of all. Sweet baby James!!

We have LOVED being parents. Doing it together makes it even better. Dave is an amazing daddy. I feel even more blessed and lucky to have him now that we have James.

Thank you for 5 wonderful years!! I look forward to the many more ahead!!



And just because we haven't posted in a while here are some pictures of James...

Our little cowboy. All dressed up for the 24th of July pioneer party at church.

James is one of the happiest babies I have ever known!!

Our Big Guy is sitting up really well rolling across the room and pushing himself around in circles. It is always a surprise to see where he ends up in the crib when we go to pick him up in the morning or after a nap.