Family Pictures Spring 2012

 Our niece, Mateah, took these awesome family pictures. Love how they turned out!

 Jensen, Maxwell, Alicia and Kaleb

 Alicia and Kaleb

 Maxwell

 Maxwell and Jensen

 Jensen

 Kaleb and the boys

 My manly men!

 Typical Maxwell face

 Cute Jensen

 Water and rocks....so hard to resist throwing rocks

 Love these pictures

 Momma and the boys

Love these family pictures.

Too bad I went and cut my hair a couple months after we took these pictures, so now I look a lot different. Oh well, my smile is still the same :)

Happy Anniversay Dinner

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"Appetizer from our anniversary dinner at the Beehive Grill. Super yummy and spicy hummus!"

Look What I Made!!

My blogging has been suffering lately...actually since I started on FB and using the laptop. All of my pictures are on the other computer and blogs with pictures are just so much better! So along with that I've fallen behind in reading and keeping up with my friends blogs. But even FB can only keep your attention for so long!

While reading blogs earlier this week I saw this super cute earring frame and totally wanted to make one! And of course with my crafty mind I found a way to do it for only $2.13. First I took an old frame that wasn't being used. Rummaged through my craft and jewelry boxes and found a chain that I had bought from Michael's and was no longer using. Then I went to the hardware store and bought a small package of teeny tiny screw eyes. Measured, marked and screwed the screw eyes into the inner back of the frame. Then attached lengths of chain between two screw hooks and put a picture hanger on the back and hung it on the wall (All with the help of my super husband, I could have done it all myself but extra muscles are always nice.) Then hung my few earrings on and TADA!! Now I just need to work on having a few more earrings to accessorize my cute frame.

You Get the Good with the Bad

The Good:

• Grandma Debbie is coming to stay with us for 4 days.


• Grandma Dille is coming to stay with us for a week.


• Both Grandmas will get to take the boys to Orchestra practice and hear them play

The Bad:

• On April 12th I am having a hysterectomy


• I'm not a candidate for the less invasive way because I had c-sections


• I won't be able to go to orchestra and play the cello for a while and won't be up to playing in the concert with my boys

The Good:

• The Dr can fix my bladder leakage during the same surgery


• They don't have to take out my ovaries


• We've already met our insurance deductible for the plan year


• My older sister is making us some freezer meals for the days after help is gone


• We live in a great ward that is willing to help with whatever we need

The goods definitely out weight the bad today!! :)

It's Almost Time!!!

Graduation is only 3 weeks away!! We are sooooooooo super excited to be done!!! (Really I am already done and my diploma is hanging on the way in a super cool frame that my in-laws gave me, but I haven't done the whole walking thing yet.) So we decided to order announcements that had both of our names on there, since we get to walk together. And we decided to have a Graduation Lunch. And of course we needed to take a picture to include with that and our awesome upstairs photographer neighbor even agreed to take some one evening for us.
The only problem is that the weather has been so up and down that we couldn't really schedule a day. So one day it was kinda warm and not cloudy, so as soon as Kaleb got home from work I made him, yes I made him, shower and change so we could go take pictures. One of the electives in Cub Scouts is photography, so I thought Maxwell could try taking some pictures and he did pretty good for his first photo shoot. With digital pics we could take them and look and teach him how to make them better and always just erase the ones that didn't work. And if all else failed we could use the little tripod and the timer.


In front of Old Main...an okay picture but we were squinting a little and I don't really like the open door in the background.


A fun spot to take pictures, but the lighting just wasn't right and neither were the looks on our faces!!!

Jensen wanted a picture with Mommy! The sun was just right in my eyes, hence the wonderful look on my face.

This is Old Main, a famous old building on the USU campus. At night the A's on the top are lit with white lights. Then when the Aggies win a game they turn on blue lights!

This was a pretty good picture, just the sun was in our eyes and made it hard to get good facial expressions!!

Tradition on campus is that you aren't a "True Aggie" until you've kissed another "true aggie" on top of the A on the night of a full-moon. However, since we were already married when we started going to USU we decided we really didn't want to kiss some stranger on top of the A. So we decided this worked for us and we are "True Aggies". We've put enough time and money into this that I think we get to decide that!

However, the boys are both at the age that they said "EWWWWW!" when we kissed!

Since we were all there we tried a family picture on the A. I think we will go back another day when the light is a little better and it is a little warmer and see if we can't get a better picture.

The winning picture! We ended up using the tripod and the camera. The boys got tired of taking pictures and it was getting cold.

Sorry if you didn't get an announcement in the mail, being poor college students we could only afford so many. Here is a scanned in one. If you are in the area that day we would love for you to come to the lunch!!! (Let me know and I will send you the info, cause I didn't want to post it all on our blog.)

WOOOOHOOOOO!!!!!

It's official!!! I got my USU dipolma in the mail today!! I am officially a graduate with a BA degree in Liberal Arts and I graduated Cum Laude.....hey wait where is my minor? great I guess I will be calling the university on Monday to see why my minor isn't showing up on my diploma! I didn't do all that work for it not to be there!

34 Things

I turned 34 a couple of days ago and decided I would make a list of 34 things that have happened in my life since my last birthday.

1. Went back to school at USU.

2. Fell asleep while studying for classes.

3. Got new neighbors.

4. Called to be a Cub Scout Bear Den leader with Kaleb and went to our first Cub Scout Day Camp with Maxwell.

5. Joined a new card exchange group.

6. Passed my ASL 4 class, after a break of almost 9 years since my ASL 3 class.

7. Burned fabrics on campus and enjoyed a textile science class.

8. Watched a family loose their little boy in a car accident and missed him in our primary class.

9. Best friend and her family moved to Wyoming. :(

10. Four day camping trip with in-laws.

11. Maxwell had his tonsils out.

12. Jensen had feet surgery.

13. Made a fish cupcake birthday cake and a Lego guy birthday cake.

14. Visited best friend and her family in Wyoming. :)

15. Met some new friends.

16. Tried to teach Jensen to ride a bike.

17. Finally took a pottery class and made some cool stuff.

18. Learned that a stress management class can cause a lot of stress!

19. Maxwell started learning the cello and played awesome at the Christmas concert.

20. Made a bat costume and a Phantom of the Opera costume.

21. Went on a tour of Aggie Ice Cream with Jensen and his class.

22. Started paperwork for adoption.

23. Went to Hardware Ranch to see the elk.

24. Round two for feet surgery for Jensen.

25. Grew a garden and then canned salsa, tomato soup, and chicken.

26. Froze the rest of the onions from our garden. We cried a lot that day!

27. Went to Antelope Island and played in the Great Salt Lake with my sister and her family.

28. Saw a man walking a camel in my in-laws backyard. The boys touched the camel.

29. Created the most yummy Garlic Shrimp Pasta. A new family favorite!

30. Started the fibromyalgia study.

31. Went home to New Mexico for a week for Christmas.

32. Went to my grandma's 80th birthday party.

33. Graduated from USU with my BA in Liberal Arts and a minor in Art.

34. Loved spending another year with my wonderful husband and two awesome boys!

Thank You for not Raining!!

Last Wednesday was Cub Scout day camp and since Kaleb and I are Bear Den leaders, we got to go along with Maxwell for the camp. We were a little worried because it had rained all night and all morning. But when it came time for camp at 3pm it had stopped. We got sprinkled on a little, but finally made it home at 10Pm (an hour late!) and still dry. The boys had a great time!

Maxwell on the zip line


Learning about telescopes. Maxwell is in the middle with his arms crossed.

On the climbing wall

Eating almonds, Kaleb always gets the most beautiful pictures of me :(