baby, utah trip and other happenings

lots to talk about so lets begin!
(and sorry about the formatting....I don't know if it was my computer or the website but I was having some issues getting everything to center correctly)

 

starting off, if you weren't already aware, we are expecting another baby!! Curtis and I kept the secret to ourselves at first and told our immediate family after our first doctor appointment but decided to wait until we knew the gender before we announced it to everyone else. almost 17 weeks in my doctor gave me ultrasound and as soon as the image popped up I said "that's a girl isn't it?" and after some snooping around he made a definite "it looks like a girl". a few days ago I got my mid pregnancy ultrasound and it was still a little girl and everything looks normal and healthy. we were kind of hoping for another boy but the girl thing is definitely growing on me and I am very excited :)  so baby number 3 is due November 16th but we have talked to the doctor about inducing at 39 weeks to ensure the baby wont be too big (don't need to go through another mason and doctors tend to agree my body is too little for 8 pound babies!) and in hopes that Curtis will be present when it all happens (since he has to travel 45 minutes home then another 30 minutes to the hospital). so over half way and hoping that everything continues to go well! now if only we could decide on a name.... :)

 

a few weeks ago we took our annual trip to Utah. it turned out to be perfect timing as most of our family was also in town so we filled our days with lots of catching up! I will let the pictures do the talking.

 

Curtis went mountain biking a couple of times with my family and with his brother casey.

 

my whole family

 

my parents with their 2 grandkids



 

me and my siblings...how sad that I'm the oldest AND the shortest one of the bunch :)

 

we got to see my sweet grandma! I miss her!

the one Sunday we were out there, we were able to get together with Curtis' whole Sullivan side of the family. it was great getting to see everyone and amazing that a family that big could all be together especially considering we had family from Michigan, Missouri, Florida, Texas, Colorado and Utah.

poor little Sophie was worn out so she took a nap with her grandpa :)

 

the three oldest cousins reunited!

 

me and miss talia...she stuck to me like glue!

after the Sullivan reunion, we headed up to the cabin for a few days. it was so fun watching the cousins play together and it felt like we had never moved away. we had a craft activity for the kids, went 4 wheeling, ate s'mores and just relaxed. it was SO great being in mountains and cool air again!
sophie, mason and esther on the way to the cabin.

just my little loaf

fishing with the family

craft time at the cabin

reading stories while at the cabin attracted all the kids like flies!

 

after getting back from the cabin we headed to St. George for a few days. after all, it isn't a trip to Utah without swimming at James and Michelle's :)

 

our last full day was spent at fiesta fun in St. George. Curtis' brother had some points to use up there and was generous to let us come along. the kids loved winning tickets at the arcade games and then they rode the mini go carts for a couple of laps. afterward we headed upstairs and ate some yummy pizza.

 

mason, talia, jaxton, esther, sophie and emma.

 

as usual we had a great time! the long drive is always a torture (and this time my feet got swollen on the way out which has never happened to me in my entire life!) but we always love going "home" and seeing all our friends and family.

 once we got back to Texas it seemed as if we just couldn't get a break from bad news. a few days after getting home from Utah, mason tried to pull Sophie over the arm of the couch by her arm and needless to say it didn't end well. since it was 6 pm on a Friday night and no urgent care centers in our town, I headed to the ER with Sophie screaming and mason in tow (had our neighbors been home I would have left him there). luckily Curtis was able to leave work and meet me there which was awesome because I wouldn't have been able to be with her during x-rays. they said she had nurse maids elbow which is just a fancy way of saying her elbow got pulled out of place. once Sophie was taken care of, Curtis took the kids home in my car while I stayed to fill out discharge papers (which took forever thanks to the lady in front of me!). it is now past 9 pm as I get into Curtis' car and the battery is dead. he has to come back down the hospital to jump it and the next day we had to buy a new battery. a few days later, Curtis decided to see a doctor about one of his eyes. ever since we left Utah, one of them has been blurry and he can't see very well at night which is not normal for him. he went into the nurse at work for an opinion (since she is free) and she told him that he needed to see an eye doctor. she hooked Curtis up with a good doctor in the Dallas area who accepts our medical insurance. we were thinking cataracts or something that needed surgery which was seriously the last thing we need right now. turns out Curtis' cornea is infected. after three days of doctor visits (including the doctor coming in on the 4th of july just to check curtis' eye!) Curtis is on a couple of different eye drops and it looks like the infection is clearing up. hopefully he will regain his vision soon.

so that is our crazy life right now and just a little of me complaining :) overall we are happy and glad everything is going well with baby!

blonde hair, blue eyes, birthday girl

my trouble maker is officially a terrible two year old.

some facts:

she is stubborn.

she is tough.

she loves her brother.

she doesn't like no for an answer.

she is obsessed with bugs.

she is smart.

she is giving us a run for our money.

ya know that saying that goes something like "if he/she were our first child we would have stopped at one"? yep. that's how i feel some days :)

as hard as she is she is also a lot of fun. she has quiet the personality and keeps us all laughing.

anywho, here is here birthday in pictures. please excuse how lovely i look and my messy house.

 

the big girl herself.

 

 mason was a great helper as usual.

spring is the worst time of year in texas....it means tornado season. i hate tornado's. they used to fascinate me growing up but when you move to their territory, your husband works 45 minutes away, you don't have a basement (no basements here of all places!) and you have 2 small kiddos, they are not cool. last year we only had one big scare and it was the first week in april. this year they decided to wait until the middle of may to start hitting. we have had numerous tornado watches and warnings and i have had our bathroom ready to go on several occasions. all of you who have lived in tornado areas before are probably laughing at me, but seriously these days scare the crap out of me!! anyway, the rainstorms that don't include swirling clouds of fury are awesome. the day we celebrated sophies birthday we had a small shower hit and the kiddies took to playing in the puddles. 

mason's best bud lives across the street and came to join the fun.

don't know what this pose is but mason was soaked by they time they were finished.

 

that's it for now! watch for more soon ;)



my 4 year old!!

i love my sweet boy :) here is his 4th birthday!!

 

this mama has not been feeling so hot lately so poor mason got a low key party. mason chose to invite his closest buddies, preschool pals, and sunbeam sidekicks...7 kids total. when i asked mason what kind of party he wanted, he insisted on lightning mcqueen....completely caught me off guard. i mean....he likes cars but he likes other things better. i was expecting scooby doo or jake and the neverland pirates but it looked like cars was the choice this year. for his cake i did a  race track with some little cars on it (that went along with one of his presents)...just don't make fun of my cake decorating abilities. i was hoping for a better looking cake (i am a perfectionist after all) but mason was satisfied so that worked for me! for games, i painted some cardboard boxes with numbers and stripes like race cars and let the kids do a couple of races and we also played pin the sticker on the birthday boy :) then we let them eat cake, open presents and get all their energy out with balloons!

after the party we let mason open all his presents from family members (one spoiled kid! thanks to all who sent cards, presents, etc!) and he picked hamburger and fries for his birthday dinner. i think he had a good day (even though it took a huge toll on his mom :) and i'm glad he has good friends to celebrate with!!

my weekend of bliss

have i ever mentioned how awesome my husband is? :) the two of us haven't gotten away from the kiddies for longer than a few hours in a very long time. i think the last time we went on a trip without our entourage was when mason was really little. so, curtis talked to his buddies at work and planned a whole surprise weekend for our anniversary all by himself! his parents came down to watch the kiddies and the two of us went to san antonio for 3 wonderful days. our hotel was right down town, walking distance to the alamo, the mall, and the riverwalk. i have always wanted to go to italy and i jokingly told curtis "you can't afford to take me to italy so you brought me to san antonio instead". i loved walking along the river with shops and restaurants lining the sidewalk. it was just like i imagine italy to be. we had wanted to take the kids to sea world down there last fall and visit these other places as well but i'm so glad we did this just as the two of us. it was very romantic and relaxing! on saturday we spent the afternoon visiting some of the historic missions around town. i loved it :)

 

dinner on the river walk...i had ducks right behind my chair quacking and begging for food like little puppies

one of the missions we visited. they were very cool inside but pictures cannot do those high ceilings any justice!

the alamo

 

so yes, my weekend was fantastic! i had a hard time facing the fact that i had to come back and work on my singing time lesson for next week, stress about our new song for choir, and come up with 2 preschool lessons for the week....oh and no more sleeping until 9 am :) i cannot thank tony and stephanie enough for watching the kids for us and for everything they did around the house while we were gone. i am so blessed to have in laws that treat me just like a daughter, taught my husband how to be the great person he is and are amazing grandparents to my children. thanks you guys!!

i am so grateful to have such a wonderful man to take care of me. our life together has been so full of challenges and twists and i know i couldn't do it without him by my side. i love that he still makes me blush and laugh and tells me how beautiful i am even though i look like a mess. he works so hard to support our family and makes sure we are all taken care of. i love him!! so, 6 years down...eternity to go :)

family life

just a little update on my growing-too-fast family :)

sophie is almost 2! at her 18 month check up we were a little worried because the only 2 words she was really saying at that point were "mama" and "daddy". we may have just been used to mason who was speaking full on sentences at that point and the doctor said give it til her 2 year check up and then we can start worrying. sure enough this girls vocab has taken off!! she is starting to string words together and even though they aren't all clear as a bell, you can definitely tell what shes saying (this morning she was looking out mason's window and said "i see a bird" and sure enough there was a bird in the tree!). her current favorites are "why" and "what". whenever i say something like "sophie get down please" her response is "why?". she cracks us up!

mason is still the smartest cookie on the block :) we have started working on sight words and reading chapter books together. he has a great imagination and loves to put it down on paper. he just started soccer and loves it (so far :). he is on the same team as a boy in his primary class who's dad is also the coach. its nice for him to have a friend to tag along with and for me to have someone to chat with on the sidelines. he is such a great help and i'm so glad he is my oldest child!

curtis is still kicking butt at work! he is always being told how great of job he is doing and impressing his bosses. he was recently offered a job in houston that had great potential but we didn't feel like it was the right thing to do so we are staying in dallas. he is such a great help at home and usually spends all his free time with a needy wife and kids :)

as for me i continue to be a soccer mom, a teacher, participant in a car pool, ward choir director, and my latest challenge is the primary chorister (which i love) all along with my daily household responsibilities and other activities during the week...my life is getting so busy and i don't see any end in sight!  i am excited for all the summer activities and cant wait to get to work on my yard and garden (and possibly painting the house!). i have also been making a ton of busy bag activities for the kids that range from bottle cap patterns (all the free bottle caps i want! thank you pepsi :), to clothes pin number wheels to super cute lds quiet books (i get the templates online then upload my own pictures).

one fun activity we did a few weeks ago was seeing sesame street live! they have ticket drawings at pepsi for various events around the dallas area, curtis thought the kids would like this and low and behold he got the tickets. i thought it was cool but as usual our kids were the least bit interested (this is why we never waste our money or time taking the kids to anything). sophie lasted about 10 minutes. curtis took her out and let her play with the different booths they had set up. just after the intermission, mason decided he was done too. it didn't cost us a penny (they even paid for our vip parking) so we didn't see the harm in leaving early. these are the pictures we got!

looking back...

i can't believe 2012 is already gone. it seems like when we look forward to something in the future, it can't come fast enough, but when you look back you don't understand how time passed so quickly. curtis and i will have been married for 6 years this march. we have been in texas for a year and a half. sophie just entered nursery and mason will attend primary for the first time this sunday. where oh where did my little babies go?! the past few years have been huge for us and this past year was no different. we continue to see how heavenly father has such a huge hand in our lives and it is usually for the better. curtis continues to excel at work and although moving to pepsi was a big change for him, it has given him great growing space. he loves what he does and there was never a better person to be in his position. most people are shocked to hear he hasn't even been out of school for 2 years yet. it makes my heart burst with pride :) he is such an amazing man. he works so hard for our family so that i can stay home with our kids. when he is home, he helps out with housework and with the kids and is so willing to step up when i have other responsibilities outside the home to take care of. he loves me when i haven't showered for two days, when the dishes are piled in the sink and the floor is sticky, and he even loves me when i get upset over petty things. i love him so much it makes my heart hurt sometimes :) my children are another source of great happiness (and grief :). mason is so smart. he is so excited and ready to attend primary, he loves going to preschool and he loves walking across the street to his friends house. mason is just like his dad. not only do they look alike, but mason is also not one to keep his affection to himself. he just can't resist cuddles, kisses and hugs. sophie is a handful but a cute one at that. she is learning so much right now and her vocabulary is finally picking up steam. i love having a girl to try hair do's on and dress in pretty clothes! i was just thinking today how much i enjoy hearing their laughter and giggles. as for me, i continue to grow and experience life out of my comfort zone. if it were up to me, i would still be in utah living the same life i always did. i miss grocery shopping at lin's, i miss our doctors, knowing what school to have our kids attend, where everything is located, knowing the people who announce births or deaths in the paper, sunday dinners with my family and last minute trips up the mountain. as much as i want that old life back, i know that we needed this move to grow. i feel like i have changed and grown up so much! now our gps is my best friend and i have learned how to make friends and a yummy sunday dinner all by myself. i went through every woman's worst nightmare and learned how to say goodbye to someone you love so much even though you haven't physically met them yet. thanks to lots of help, i learned (and still am learning) how to lead a choir, take charge and do something i never imagined doing in my life. i learned that your ward members become your family and everyone watches out for one another. i learned that cute little field rabbits are not so cute when your back yard becomes their breeding ground.  i learned that 40 degree winters are much better than 15 degree winters and that when the sky gets thick, dark storm clouds, you turn on the news and listen for the tornado sirens. i know we won't be in texas for the rest of our lives and although i hate the thought of moving again, i know i will get through it and start growing all over again. 2012 was had some really, really  crappy moments and i'm sure 2013 will too, but overall i'm super happy with life and know that if we live how heavenly father would want us to, everything works out in the end!

a white christmas in texas!!

we have had a fun week! heres the how our christmas went!

last wednesday morning curtis went to work with a bad sore throat. they have a free nurse practicioner there for employees, so he stopped in at her office before his shift. strep throat!! go home til at least friday, and you probably wont even want to come back that day either! so with the christmas holiday curtis got a 6 day weekend. it was awesome! even if he is sick, it's great to have dad home whenever we can :) he was feeling better by friday and even went to "the hobbit" with our neighbor that night. i figured i owed it to him since i made him watch the kids that  morning so i could go visiting teaching :)  saturday morning i headed to my last choir practice before our big christmas performance. i think most of you know i am the choir director in our ward. it has been such a challenge but i feel like i have learned a ton of things! anyway, i have been stressed beyond belief since i found out i was in charge of the sacrament meeting christmas program. we have been working super hard since october, i had to make a few last minute changes,  and i just wasn't feeling like we were prepared. i went to practice on saturday feeling sick to my stomach. after our practice i felt much better (although still scared out of my mind! i hate being in front of people, add to that the fact it was THE WARD CHRISTMAS PROGRAM!!). afterward, i got home and prepared for a temple trip with curtis. we are terrible at getting to the temple. we actually haven't gone since before we had sophie. it didn't help that sophie breastfed for a whole year and never took a bottle which meant we could never be gone for longer than a few hours. now that we don't have that issue and we have someone we trust to leave our kids with we decided to make it a date. not only was this our first time at the dallas temple, it was the first time we have gone to a temple outside of utah. wow. huge shocker. they organized things a little differently and there were only 8 people in our session including us. 8!! i was the only woman and we were the only couple there until the last second so those of you who go to the temple probably know what we were asked to do. it was our first time and i was super nervous but it ended up being a really cool experience :) the best part was my nerves about the next day had calmed down tremendously! luckily we only ran into a little traffic there and back so we were only gone for about 4 hours, home just in time to get the kids ready for bed.

we had to be at the church early for choir the next morning. we had to warm up and since it was joseph smith's birthday the bishop had asked us to sing praise to the man for prelude music.  i looked at my choir and said "here we go!". the time passed quickly and before i knew it sacrament meeting was over! we did it :) i felt like i had just hiked to the top of mount Everest and kicked its butt! it was a great feeling of accomplishment for me. glad to have that over, we went through the rest our meetings then tithing settlement afterward and i finally got to relax and focus on christmas and my family :)
we went to the park on christmas eve then spent the evening just hanging out and had a nice dinner of ham, potatoes, broccoli, rolls and pumpkin pie. the kids opened up their christmas eve pajamas and we watched the grinch before sending them to bed. then the fun began for us :) it actually wasnt as bad as we thought it would and got to bed at a decent hour. unfortunately we had thunderstorms roll in around 4 am which woke mason up and due to the on going thunder and lightning, he took a while to fall back asleep...we were a tired family the next day! anyway here is our christmas in pictures!

mason did a great job decorating the tree :)

 

our friends had several of the neighbors over for a gingerbread house making party. it was a lot of fun and we got to know the people in our neighborhood a little better.

opening up our christmas eve jams!

mason suddenly turned into a model :)

sophie loves playing with kitchens and now she has her own!

 mason wanted a blue bicycle more than anything in the world! santa is awesome :)

check out this dork :)

curtis is the most thoughtful person ever :) he got this desk for our computer stuff and for me to use as my scrapbooking station.

 

we had thunderstorms all morning (opening presents while lightning flashes and the ice cream truck making rounds on christmas eve...will i ever get used to this weather? :) but later that afternoon the rain turned to snow. just enough to make the ground white. now that's the kind of snow i enjoy :)

 

so that was our christmas! although we miss our family i love having just my own cute little family to myself for the day :) hope everyone else had and continues to have a wonderful holiday season!