Wedding

We went to Utah over Thanksgiving week for this couple.

My little brother Clayton got married to a wonderful girl named Kara. We flew in the Friday before Thanksgiving and met her the next day for the first time. I'm sure we overwhelmed her with our loudness especially the kids. She married my brother anyways!

The wedding took place on November 27 at the Draper Utah Temple. It was a cold, windy day, but the happy couple didn't seem to mind. My sister, sister-in-law, and I all bought matching outfits for our boys.

Don't they look so reverent and handsome!

The colors were black, white, and yellow, so of course we dressed the princess Sam (the only grand daughter) in yellow so she stood out. My mom made her dress.

The boys cheering for Clayton and Kara. Apparently Sam wasn't so happy about the wedding.

My brother sang "Amazed" by Lonestar for his new wife. Don't we all wish we could be serenaded?

This is Dallin with his Aunt Lindsey who is on a mission. She sent a flat Lindsey so that she could be part of the celebration too.

Family picture at the wedding. Dallin will smile for any picture unless its a family one. So stubborn.

Drew taking care of Dallin. He is always looking out for the younger cousins. Sometimes he might get a little bossy with his role as the oldest, but most of the time, he does a great job watching over his cousins.

Honey Do Projects

Like many projects on a honey do list, they get started with good intentions of finishing within a couple of weeks, and instead a couple of months go by. Zane tries hard to get done with everything, but he is just too busy sometimes (Sometimes? Most of the time!). We had some water damage on our outside wall. Zane and my dad started working on it in September and then Zane started helping a neighbor rebuild a roof along with other men from our church. The roofing project took longer than they thought, and all of sudden it's October and our back wall project was still unfinished. I am sure most families can relate to this. I don't know where our Saturdays go, but Zane rarely worked on the project on Saturdays. Instead to get it done, he did most of the work after coming home from work during the week starting around 8:30-9:00 and working until late. By the middle of November Zane was done with everything and it looks great! He figured out what to do as he went along (with a couple of mistakes). Zane is a perfectionist, so he just keeps working until he is satisfied. Thanks Zane for all your hard work. It looks fantastic!

Grandpa and Dallin working together

Fixing the outside first

Tearing out the base boards and part of the wall

Dad's best helper

All Done!

Within three months, Zane has learned the following skills: replacing shingles on a house, replacing sheetrock, and texturing sheetrock. He also replaced the baseboards and the boards around the door.

First Girlfriend

My friend Mikkyn and I have been trading babysitting for the last few weeks. It has been great for Dallin to have friends besides his cousins and to be left without me for a little. He is really struggling in nursery and cries every time I leave him. Each time I drop him off at Mikkyn's house, the crying gets less and less. Hopefully soon he will be running into her house ready to play instead of clinging to my leg. He always has a great time and loves his new friends Ruby and Tate.

While at my house we decided to go on a wagon ride. As soon as I put Dallin in next to Ruby, he immediately put his arm around her! During the walk, he would periodically kiss her on the head. This picture though I told them to kiss. They were more then willing!

Dinosaur in one hand and a girl in the other! Should I be worried?

Fun in the Mud

During October we had a lot of rain. Whenever it wasn't raining, Dallin and I were outside getting my flower gardens winter ready. Normally I can do about 45 minutes of yard work before Dallin is done, but because of all the mud, we spent two hours outside one day. As long as Dallin could dig in the mud, he was happy. He is a great helper digging holes and pulling out weeds or dead flowers. We spent so much time though pulling things out, he had a hard time remembering not to pull out the new flowers we just put in! Although we were a mess, our hard work is paying off now as everything is growing nicely.

Part of living here is dealing with fire ants. As I was cleaning out beds, I stepped in an ant pile. I threw off my gardening shoes and socks as quick as I could. If you have ever had a fire ant bite you know how painful they are. The only other shoes I had left to wear that I was ok getting muddy were my flip flops. Luckily I stayed away from any other ants.

One of the problems with Dallin helping is his attraction to bees. My Mexican Heather (in picture below) attract bees and so Dallin pushes his way through the bushes trying to touch them. I'm constantly pulling Dallin back away from the bees. Luckily the bees like Dallin because he has never been stung. They don't seem to mind him trampling through the flowers (I do though.) Dallin now calls bees "ouchie".

Man's Best Friend

One of Dallin's favorite places to visit is the "doggy house." We have friends in our neighborhood who have three dogs, one for each of their boys. Dallin loves going over and chasing the dogs. One of the dogs just had adorable puppies and if you ask Dallin if he wants a dog, he gives a resounding yes. This is a tough one for me. I'm not the biggest dog person mostly because I like things clean and I don't liked to be licked. On the other hand, when you know how happy it will make a little boy...well you see how tough it is.

Pictures!

My friend Carla took our header picture, and all the pictures on the side (check them out.) Not only is Carla a good photographer, but she is amazing with Photoshop (thank goodness for us!) I had such a hard time narrowing down the ones I liked, so she edited a lot for us. The only problem with our picture day was trying to get all three of us to smile, look at the camera, and look good all at the same time. With a two year old, it was nearly impossible. We have plenty of pictures though of Dallin making funny faces. His faces got even funnier when food started hanging out. Carla figured out the trick to get Dallin to smile and be patient through a long photo shoot was to give him Smarties. Towards the end, he had a Smarty in his mouth for every picture. It made for cute faces though!

If your interested in using Carla for a photo shoot, email me. (This is totally free advertising. She has no idea I'm doing this.)