Our House

Here are some pictures of our house before anything was in it. Unfortunately, we're only renting it, but we hope to own one like it in the next year or two.

The family room. (Where our TV is.)

The formal living room. (Looking into the family room.)

The kitchen and dining room.

The loft. We're using it as a playroom.

The garden tub in the master bath.

One of my favorite things, a HUGE closet in the master bedroom. 3 of the 4 rooms have large walk in closets as well. They're all pretty empty, but I'm sure they'll fill up with junk fast.

Our backyard. There's rock in the back now. No one around here has grass.

We pretty much finished unpacking now. I just need to hang pictures. I'm also having trouble arranging my family room because it's kind of an odd shape and it doesn't help that we have all of our old college furniture. Hopefully we'll get some new stuff after we get our tax return! I'll post some of our pictures from Christmas within the next day or two.

We're back!

I'm finally updating my blog! I haven't gotten a chance to post anything for a while because we were gone for Thanksgiving, then I was busy packing and moving, and then we were in Farmington until Thursday. We just had our Internet and phone set up so now I don't have any more excuses. I don't have any pictures to post though because I'm waiting to download them to our other computer. Anyway...
It's been a very busy month for us. After Thanksgiving we left the girls in Farmington with my mom so that I could get our apartment in Socorro packed and cleaned. We moved into a house in Albuquerque on December 1st. I love this house! It's a 2-story, 4-bedroom, 2.5 bath. I'm have so much space! It feels so empty compared to our small 2-bed apartment. I'm sure I'll fill it with junk soon enough though. There's two living spaces down stairs plus a loft upstairs that we're using as a playroom. We're also living right across the street from a huge park. I'll post pictures of it later.
On December 14th Joe graduated from NMT! It's been a long haul and I'm so proud of him for working so hard. He'll start his new job at Lockheed Martin on January 7th. I'm keeping him busy until then with getting our house all put together and settled.
On December 22 we went up to Durango and rode the Polar Express. We went with almost all of my family and had a really good time. It was freezing cold, but we had fun anyway. Surprisingly, Aly stayed awake through the whole thing and she wasn't crying the whole time. (She's getting all four of her I-teeth, so she hasn't been too happy.)
Christmas was fun. We did the family thing with both sides.
Our 5th Anniversary was on the 27th, but we drove back to Albuquerque that day so we celebrated the day before.
Now we're home and trying to get settled. I've got most of the big stuff taken care of, but there's still random boxes around. The hardest part for me is trying to figure out where I want to put decorations an pictures. We're also trying to make-do with our old furniture for a while.
That's about all of our excitement for now. I'll post some of the pictures from the last month soon, so keep checking back!

Twilight - The Movie!!!!

Finally someone is getting to work on the Twilight movie! It's supposed to start production in February 2008. They have cast the role of Bella to Kristen Stewart. The only movie I've seen her in is Zathura, but she's been in a lot of other movies. She looks like she fits Bella's description though. Anyway... This week has kind of stunk for us. Monday and Tuesday Aly had the flu. Then Tuesday and Wednesday Kayla had the flu. Wednesday Joe had it and Thursday I had it. I'm actually glad everyone else was better before I got it because I didn't have to worry about taking care of them while I was feeling miserable too. On Monday we found out that Joe officially starts at Lockheed on January 7. We're are going to go ahead and get our house and move up there on December 1st and then me and the girls will stay in Farmington while Joe finishes up school and then he'll meet us up there and we'll stay through the holidays. I've got a head start on packing so I'm not too worried. Plus, my mom and sister are going to watch the girls for me the week after Thanksgiving so I can get all the packing and cleaning done. I'm having to do almost all of it myself because Joe's so busy with school and work. Packing everything is making me realize how much junk we actually have and that the girls have way more toys then they need. Looks like I'll be having a yard sale once we move!!!!

Happy 4th Birthday Jaylee!!!!!

Ward Halloween Party

Our pumpkins. Joe's is on the left, mine is on the right.

Here's Aly playing a bone-tossing game at the party. The primary presidency was in charge, and no one else was there, so we let her do it over and over again. She would have done it all night if I let her.

Our Sleeping Beauty.

McKay (the boy I watch everyday) was a bumble bee.

Here is Kayla with her friend Bryce.

On Friday night we carved pumpkins so that we could use them for trunk-or-treating. I did a scary one and Joe did a funny one. Saturday night we had our ward Halloween party. Kayla dressed up as Sleeping Beauty and Aly was a witch. Aly didn't have a witch hat on though because she screamed when we tried to put it on her. We had to make do with orange barrettes to complete her look. Joe and I were party poopers and we didn't dress up. Aly actually said, 'Trick-or-treat' and 'thank you' when we were doing the trunk-or-treating. It was pretty funny and I wish I would have gotten it on video. Anyway... here are some pictures. Some of them aren't the best quality because we didn't realize that the camera was set to a low resolution until after we took a bunch.

So long Socorro!

It's official.... Joe has accepted a job at Lockheed Martin at Kirtland Air Force base in Albuquerque, New Mexico. We will be moving on December 1st. We never thought we'd be moving back to Albuquerque, but we're are excited about it. Kayla's excited too. She says we're moving to Albucookie to live in a big big house. So now comes the fun part where I get to start packing up all of our junk. I've been so anxious to move and now I feel like I don't have enough time to get everything done that I need to. Oh well! Where would the fun be if I wasn't stressed? At least our move is only an hour away rather than across the country. Oh yeah... my blog is back to being boring again. I had some problems with the HTML that I put in and I haven't had time to redo it.

Aly's ABC's

I've been working with Kayla on her ABC's a lot lately and Aly has picked up on them. She walks around the house singing them over and over. Of course she's not really saying them, but she sure thinks she is and it makes me laugh every time. She's also started to walk around on her tiptoes just like her sister does. I've got two little ballerinas!

Happy Anniversary!

Today is my parents 35th wedding anniversary. Happy anniversary! We love you!!!

Birthdays!!!

Happy birthday to Naomi (my niece), Deena, & Dana (my sister-in-laws)!!!!!!!
Hope you all have a great day!!!

Dana and Hannah

Deena and Josh

Naomi is 1 today!!!!

The many faces of Joe!

Before

We call this one 'White Trash'

We call this, 'Uncle Kim.'
Joe's Uncle Kim has a mustache and everyone says he looks like
him.

'Hitler'

All smooth. Can you tell he wasn't too excited about shaving it?
The things we'll do for a job!

Joe has an interview in Dallas tomorrow and one in Albuquerque next Thrusday, so taking the advice of everyone, last night he decided to shave his goatee. Actually, he let me do it and we took pictures along the way.

Today is your birthday....

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

MOMMA!!!!
Hope you have a
great day!
We love you!!!

Finally updating!

I've had more than one person tell me I need to update my blog, so here it is! We're finally settled from our crazy summer and now officially into Joe's last semester of school!!!! I know I've complained a lot about sitting around here waiting for him to finish, but time really has flown by. We still don't know where we'll end up at the end of the year, but we're getting there. He just had one interview and is in the process of setting another one up. Keep your fingers crossed for us. I've been keeping myself busier this semester. I'm watching our friends little boy, McKay, everyday. His mom is a second grade teacher and his dad's a full time student, so I have him most of the day. He's a great kid and it's fun to have someone play with Kayla. I've also been working with Kayla a lot. I figured since I have my Early Childhood Education degree, I might as well use it. Plus, I've taught a class of 30 four-year-olds, why not my own daughter? It's going pretty good. Her latest accomplishment is drawing a picture of something that's actually recognizable. It may not seem like a big deal, but that's actually a very big developmental step. Plus, she said the picture was me, so I feel special. :-) Alyssa's growing up so fast too! Since McKay's been around she seems to be picking up more words. Right now we're trying to get her off of bottles, but it's not going so well. She screams at us when we try to take it from her. Well, that's what we've been up to. Things are starting to get more exciting for us though, so I'll try to keep our page update with news. Here are some recent pictures of the girls. Kayla's in her little leotard Grandma Churchill got her. She was dancing around saying, "I'm a princess ballerina!" The one of Aly is showing I can finally put her hair in little piggies, even if they do look like horns. The video pretty much explains itself.

Manassa

Here is a video of the train derailment. Joe dropped the camera at the end thinking he'd have to jump over to get Kayla. The joys of carnival rides!



The Pioneer Day parade is taken very seriously in Manassa. Here is the Shrek float that someone made.


Kayla playing 'Duck, Duck, Goose' with her cousins.


Kayla and Brayden playing soccer.


Kayla on the swing with Brayden. She spent most of the weekend on that thing.


On the Merry-Go-Round with mom.


On the Merry-Go-Round again, with dad.


All of the babies that were there this weekend. These are Grandma Sowards' Great-Grand babies. (These are only the ones born within the last year. Of course there are a lot more!)


Joe, Kayla, and Aly with Grandma Sowards. We didn't get to see Grandpa because he fell last week and broke his leg and was in the hospital in Denver.


Here are some pictures from our trip to Manassa Colorado. We had a pretty good time. We went to a parade and a carnival. Most the time we just hung out at Grandma Sowards house. Kayla and Aly had fun playing with all of their cousins, and there were a lot of them there to play with! Kayla had a blast at the carnival. She went on the merry-go-round twice, the airplane ride, a train (which got derailed while she was on it) and a flying fish ride. We also watched fireworks on Saturday night.

Another trip...

Kayla watched fireworks that Uncle Jared, Uncle David, and Grandpa Stradling did. She also got to play with sparklers.


Aly in her swim gear.


Aly playing with her cousin Naomi.

We just got back from another trip. My dad came and picked me and the girls up and took us up to Farmington. I helped my mom get some stuff done for my brother's wedding open house. We were there over the 4th of July and the girls had a blast swimming and playing with their cousins. Now we're home and settled until next week, when we leave to go to the Sowards family reunion in Manassa Colorado. We just can't sit still this summer!

Our Vacation & Alyssa's Birthday

We've had a very busy week! We went on vacation to Mesa (for Jeff's wedding) and Tucson. Even though it was a lot of driving, we had a good time. The wedding and the reception were very beautiful. Kayla had a blast at the reception, dancing and running around with her cousin Jaylee. Alyssa slept through half of it. In Tucson we went to the Zoo, to a movie (Meet The Robinsons, very cute! Alyssa slept through that too!), the mall, and swimming at the hotel. We also drove around A LOT!!!! We're looking into moving down there and we wanted to make sure that we liked it first. Today was Alyssa's 1st birthday. Unfortunately, we were in the car the whole day, but when we got home she got a cake and presents. She made a huge mess with the cake, as you can see in the pictures, but it was worth it. I can't believe she's already 1! Now it's back to the old routine, until next week anyway. The girls and I will be leaving to go up to Farmington for a while.

She's On The Move!!!

This is a really cute dress Aunt Deena sent to Alyssa when she was born. She can finally fit in it! She only kept the hat on for the picture though.


Here's Alyssa up on the coffee table with her Elmo book.

She did it! Alyssa is walking and she did it before her first birthday! She's not a pro yet, but she can go about 7-10 steps before she falls down. She's also learned to climb up on things. I was cooking dinner the other night and looked over and she was on our coffee table reading an Elmo book. I've really got my hands full now! :-) Her and Kayla are starting to play together a lot more. It's really cute. We're getting ready to take off to Arizona at the end of the week for Jeff's wedding and then to Tucson for a couple days so we should have a lot of fun pictures to post later!