Over A Month!

I don't think I have ever let a month go by without posting since I started blogging!  I do have lots of good excuses though.  We were having major issues with our computer and could only use it in safe mode.  We finally bit the bullet and took the computer in and they found a virus.  Then after cleaning all that out we get it home and continue to have more issues.  Well the cable cord was too lose in the hard drive.  Our computer lady was way nice and kept trying to fix the problem without making us buy a new hard drive, but alas, it never worked properly, so we were forced to buy a new hard drive :(  Anyway, we finally have a working computer, yay!

Lots has happened this past month but the most fun part was visits from family.  Paul's brother Russ has 4 boys and two of them are on a traveling baseball team.  They had a tournament out in Atlanta so Paul's parents took the opportunity to come visit us and watch the grand kids play ball!  Everyone got in late Thursday night so Friday morning we decided to go to the Georgia Aquarium.  Hayden has been 2 or 3 times now and just loves it.

 She would not turn around and look at me, the tank full of fish is way cooler than mom!  p.s.  Hayden is loving her new summer clothes!

 Hayden and Papa Steve, we warmed up to him much faster than Paul or I expected!

 Hayden with Grandma Anne and Papa Steve

 Grandma with  all the grand kids:  Hayden, Garrett, Quincy, Cooper & Jett

 Hayden and Grandma at the Dolphin Tales, Grandma had way too many yummy treats!

Quincy was so great with Hayden this trip and loved to make her happy

Hayden was so much more independent this weekend.  I think it must have been seeing all her cousins running around carefree.  Usually she wants me to be right by her on the playground and I was amazed at the fact that she would go far from me and was ok!

 Having fun with cousins

 Although ridiculous, this is also a big deal.  Hayden hasn't swung in a swing for about a year.  She would never get in these and this weekend she decided she'd give it another try and loved it.  In fact we couldn't get her out of it!  

Paul comforting Hayden at the baseball game after being ripped out of the swing

Grandma and Grandpa with Garrett, the 8 year olds ended up taking 3rd place out of a big tournament of great teams!

The next day was Paul's marathon in Atlanta.  Here we are waiting at the finish line to watch him cross.  Steve was kind enough to take Paul early in the morning and save us a spot at the finish line.  So Anne,  Hayden and I just came at the end.  Paul's dad has run 18 marathons in his life so it was great that he got to be apart of Paul's first one.  I know it meant the world to Paul to have his parents there to support him.

Paul crossing the finish line!  He was a half hour slower than he wanted, but did great considering all the knee trouble he was having (and the 4 hours of sleep he got the night before!)  I have felt so much respect, love, and adoration for Paul since he completed this marathon.  He had to give up hours each Saturday to train and lots of time during the week.  I just don't think I could have ever done this and he did!  I have so much respect for him.

 Hayden checking out the medal

Instead of going home to relax and enjoying his favorite food, we headed back to the baseball fields to watch our nephews play ball.  Paul was a real trooper.  He took a baby wipe shower, changed his clothes and we didn't get home until about 10pm that night!  That night Anne and I dropped of Paul and his dad at their car and the battery had died.  So it took them a bit longer to get home.

All the grand kids and grandparents with Coopers (7 year olds) team trophy, they ended up taking 1st place!

The next day was my emotional wall.  We had been running around like crazy and now we were about to paint Hayden's room.  Well I went to the basement to get some painting supplies and I immediately smelled something off, then I got near the storage room and my feet were wet on the carpet.  I knew it was bad and didn't want to open the door.  Our water heater was old and had seen it's last day.  Thank goodness we had big area rugs down in the storage room, they soaked up a bunch of the 40 gallons and it did only minimal damage to things in the storage room and our family room.  It's a good thing Paul's parents were here because I was an emotional wreck.  If it was just the water heater I could have handled it, but let's be honest it's been one thing after the other with this dang house and I had had it!  Paul's parents were great about taking care of everything.  We also had lots of help from our home teacher and they even found a guy in another ward who installed it for FREE!  How generous is that!

The water soaked through our family room to about where Anne is standing.  We had to pull up all the carpet, take the pads out and air them dry.

Needless to say, this set us back on painting Hayden's room!  But we did finally get around to this.  We asked Anne and Steve if they would help us paint Hayden's room since neither of us have painted.  They not only helped, they paid for all of it and did most of it themselves.  They were way too kind. But of course, the first color we bought, kind of a sage green, ended up looking like puke on the wall.  So we made another trip to Home Depot and went with a safe blue color.

 Anne and Steve in front of their finished product

 Hayden in her "big girl bed"  we have been talking it up for months now and it must have worked because she transitioned great!  She just lays right down and goes to sleep each night and it has been about a week now.  She even takes better naps .  She is always so excited to go to her big girl bed.  I tuck her in and she says, "ok mom, bye..."  She even waits in bed for me to take her out in the morning.  Hayden has always been such a great sleeper, for this I am very grateful, I really believe I owe it all to the baby wise method.  I will definitely use it again!  

Anne and Steve left the next morning and just like the rest of our weekend, their flight didn't go according to plan.  It got delayed by about 7 hours and then upon arriving in SLC they lost their luggage!  I should also mention that when I got home from dropping them off at the airport my garage door started to open and then slammed shut.  That's right, the garage door (which I just had repaired last month) is officially completely broken (I cried pretty good at this point too).  We had such a great weekend with them despite how busy it was. We are so lucky to have them in our lives and hope they can make another trip out here soon.  

This NEVER happens!

I can count 3 times in the past 2 1/2 years that Hayden has fallen asleep in a spot other than her bed:

1) Found her on the kitchen floor asleep, she was burning hot with a fever after having a bad reaction to a vaccine
2) Found her asleep on the couch after her adenoid surgery
3) We now have 12:30 church so she skips her nap every Sunday.  Well she was exhausted, she was watching Kung Fu Panda and this is how we found her:

This may seem silly for some people to take a picture of their child sleeping like this, but this NEVER happens with Hayden.  We were completely shocked and had to take a picture as proof that she fell asleep!

What We've Been Up To

Getting a new job has brought Paul back to life and he is so much more motivated to start on projects.  He is running a marathon in March and has thus far ran 20 miles at one time!  This is amazing to me as I am clearly no runner.  We also started the monstrous task of cleaning out our backyard.  Paul and I still can't figure out what we were thinking when we looked at a "wooded" backyard and said, "great, we won't have to take care of a yard!"  Maybe it's because Hayden was barely walking and we didn't think how great a backyard is for a child.  Anyway, now we are stuck cleaning up this ridiculously huge backyard filled with messy trees and weeds.  Last Saturday Paul and 2 friends came with chainsaws and took down about 14 trees!

They only did the smaller ones close to our house and the bigger ones farther away. So there are still more to go, but at least we made a dent.  The following Monday Paul had off, so we hired some young men from our ward and they helped us clean up a bunch of the debris into the dumpster.  They also got to demolition the old hot tub fenced in area which they really seemed to enjoy!

So after all that work, we still have this to clean up.  We ran out of room in the dumpster, so we are thinking of building a fire pit and burning the rest...

We found piles and piles of bricks hidden under leaves, it was crazy!

We still want to take down about 6 more trees, the ones in the middle behind the pile of branches.  That would make a pretty big open area to put down sod and have a nice backyard.  This project is really hard for me.  I'm the type of person that wants to start and end a project within a few days.  Get in and get it done.  This is going to take awhile and it is so hard for me to look out my back windows and see this mess!  I am having a professional tree company come look at the other trees close to our house to get an estimate of how much it will be to take them down.  One step at a time I guess.  Hopefully by summer I'll have some awesome pictures of our new backyard!

Valentine's Day

I don't care how some people think Valentine's Day is too commercialized, I still love it.  I express my love for my family each day, but it's fun having a day to really celebrate it!  Hayden has been gearing up for several weeks. She loves seeing all the heart balloons, heart cookies, heart everything when we run errands.  She loves pointing them out wherever we go.  So I told her the night before that it was "heart day" tomorrow and that it was called Valentines.  Sure enough that morning she said, "heart day, happy valentine's!"  She couldn't wait to get downstairs and start her day!

Here is Hayden checking out her Valentine's Mailbox (I made all 3 of us these this year, I loved it and it is a cute home decoration!)  She had a card from Dad, Mom, and a Reece's Peanut Butter heart that I let her eat during breakfast!

Then at 10:30 am we had a Valentine's Day party with all her friends at Ali Mendenhall's house.  We ate lunch, made Valentine bags, exchanged cards, decorated cookies, made crafts, it was a very fun event!  Plus the moms got yummy food too!

We decided to eat at home this year (first year since we have been married that we have done this, we are getting old I guess).  I made a meal that all of us love:  Chicken Asparagus Crepes and they were delicious.  I also made a Memphis Mud Pie which was tasty.

Then we let Hayden open some gifts from Grandma Anne and Grandma Kathy.  My mom got her a Mickey Mouse Club House movie, which Hayden loved and watched about 3 times yesterday!  Grandma Anne got her all kinds of fun jewelry (which Hayden insisted on wearing to bed that night) and Valentine's candy.

We got her a heart-shaped chalk board, new purse, and I made her some quiet activity folders for church.  Hayden loved Valentine's and all the excitement it brought to her day!

Silly Hayden

Hayden is developing quite a personality and she always keeps us laughing.  Hayden HATES winter clothes.  Every morning she begs to wear a dress with short sleeves or anything sleeveless.  When I do manage to get a long sleeve shirt on her, she immediately has to have the sleeves rolled up!  And I mean immediately!  As soon as the shirt is on she says, "uh oh, uh, oh" until we get the sleeves in place.  I can forget about coats and jackets.  She gets hot so fast, it's a good thing we live in Georgia since it doesn't usually get to cold.

This is how I find Hayden every morning:

I have no idea why, but this is how she likes to sleep!  Sometimes she'll do this with her shirts too and if it is lose enough she'll make her shirt into a tube top.

Hayden's love for music continues to grow.  She knows the lyrics to songs by The Band, James Taylor, The Killers, Regina Spektor, Mumford & Sons, better than I do half the time!  When she hears a song she really likes she says, "again" and "one more time" over and over again.  She is also really good at memorizing words in her favorite books.  So as I read I omit words and she fills them in with the right words.

Hayden is good at repeating everything I say, but is just now starting to independently make up her own phrases.  Right now she likes to ask and answer her own questions.  For example, "Where's daddy...At work."  It's really cute.

Hayden is also so observant.  Anytime I wear anything new or do something different to my hair she immediately notices and comments on it!

Something Hayden is doing that drives me crazy is that when she doesn't get her way, or someone looks at her that she does not know, she slaps herself across the face.  Seriously, this makes me feel like a terrible parent every time it happens.  Should I just be grateful she is hitting herself and not others???  She is also turning into a super picky eater.  We sat at the dinner table for about an hour a couple of nights ago while I tried to bargain with her to eat her dinner.  She is stubborn to say the least.  After the horrible event I could hear her saying to herself, "Hayden, just try it..."  yep that's what I kept telling her.

Here are a few pictures of her playing in the monstrous bag my birthday pie came in.  She had so much fun until it broke!

Philips Healthcare

Paul officially started his new job today at Philips Healthcare.  The job is still in the Atlanta area but they have offices all over the west.  So it holds the possibility of someday returning closer to home. I am really proud of Paul for looking to improve his job.  It has been a rough year for him because he basically worked alone for over a year.  Instead of staying in an unhappy position any longer he started applying for some jobs to see what was out there and found this job which fits his personality and skill set perfectly.  Not only does the job come with a raise, but much better health insurance!!!  I am so excited for him to be able to work with people each day and build new friendships as he learns this new job. 

Congrats Paul!!!

Age Is Just A State of Mind!

"Age is something that doesn't matter unless you are cheese...It's all in the attitude"  -Billie Burke 

This quote is on my birthday card from my sister Michelle and it is going to be my mantra for life.  Birthdays have never really made me reflect on my attitude ever, but this whole turning 30 thing has really made me think.  By nature I believe I am a negative thinker.  It's way easier for me to dwell on the negative and be a bit of a complainer.  This is going to age me beyond any other factor in my opinion and just because I am now 30 years old does not mean I have to start "aging."  I'll still blog about and voice my frustrations, but I need to balance them with the joys that are all around me!

My birthday really was a great day despite being on Friday the 13th!  (although a plate fell off my wall, put a whole in my wood floor and broke :( see I do have to add the frustrations still!) I woke up feeling a bit like my birthday was anticlimactic as I went about my normal morning routine with Hayden who had no idea it is my birthday, let alone my 30th!  But then I went to meet my friend Ali Mendenhall at her house for lunch and she had planned a whole surprise luncheon.  I was totally caught off guard and floored by their love and support.  All the moms parked far away so I wouldn't see their cars, so when I saw them all I was so shocked!  The food, cake, and company were amazing and made me feel so appreciated and special.  Then the emails, facebook messages, texts, and phone calls made me again feel valued and important!

That night my friend Stephanie and her daughter Lizzie watched Hayden for us while Paul and I went to Maggiano's.  It was delicious and they have the best deal there:  an appetizer, two entrees, dessert, and wait for it....two more entrees to take home for $40!  Isn't that amazing???  It was a nice restaurant and a fun way to celebrate my 30th birthday.

I am truly blessed to have such wonderful friends who take the place of my family while we are far from home.  And I am also truly blessed to maintain relationships with family and friends all over the country.

I didn't take any pictures until the very end of the night dang it!

We probably took 8 pictures trying to get Hayden to look at the camera, but she was much more interested in holding onto the gift bags!