Not an actual post

Nobody get excited!! I just wanted to put this on the blog so I could pin it! hahaha

WaHOO!!

Yeah!! We FINALLY are moving into our new house this week. We have to be out of our apartment by Wednesday so we are hoping the house is ready and we get a CO. We can't wait. Pictures to come soon:)

I want a baby and I want one right now!!! Now if my body would just agree with the plan.

No new camera yet...

Somehow I managed, with the crappy camera to get some cute shots of miss Dorie.

To blog or not to blog..

I am the lamest blogger ever. I think I say that everytime I do in fact blog. But I think building your own house is a great excuse. The house is referred to as "daddy's house" because that's where he always is, if he's not at work or sleeping. We should just put a tent up in the backyard and then we could sleep there too. Dora's favorite place is right on daddy's lap when he's working with the tractor. She begs for a tractor ride every day. It's good bonding time I suppose.

Suggestions please!!!!

I think it's official that I need a new camera..I mean honestly she looked darling and these were what I came up with. I need advice. It's painfully obvious that I need a new camera. Do any of you have a camera that you love, point and shoot vs. SLR? I need help!!! For Dora's self-esteem in the coming years we need something new!!!

Does anyone want a dog?

While this dog is technically not mine to give away, he lives at my house and will soon become my responsibility as his owner is soon-to-be incarcerated. Dan has grown quite attached to this little guy, actually he's really big, but I do not want to keep him.

Come on look into his beautiful brown eyes, you know you want him for your own? By the way, he is a lot bigger now....

HOUSE UPDATE

We have a hole!!!

We have cement basement walls!!!

We even have window wells!!

We have some plumbing...from which our poop, among other things, will flow!!

We should, weather permitting have a basement floor and garage floor by the end of the week. Which means we can start framing!!! Yeah!!

Dorito

I have failed to mention anything about Dora in a while, so I will bore each of you know with the current list of the words she says. Actually she is talking so much and we can have little conversations now. She is so fun and I definitely love this stage of baby-hood. Actually, the sad thing is she's not really a baby anymore but a toddler and that is heart breaking to me....but fun and exciting in the same sentence.

Mommy
Daddy
Papa (grandpa)
Buddy-- usually said in context of Hi Buddy about 1500 times a day.
baby
No!! Don't (and usually those words together)
Kitty
Doggie
Potty
Belly
Shirt
Coat (pronounced toat)
apple
banana (nana)
watee (anything that comes in the form of liquid)
Sleepy sleepy
Nite nite.
"B"-- which stands for Binky, blanket, silk garment top or any other comfort time.
Poop
animal
book (boot)
shoes
soaks
tubby
duck
hold you me (which means hold me)
I wann (I want)
colorume (coloring)
amen
aprayer (prayer)
SHH!!!

alright this list is getting too long and I could go on. I just can't believe how much she is learning and growing. But my absolute favorite of all time she has only said once or twice...

as I was laying her down for a nap the other day, I said " I love you Dora" and she said back "i wuv ou mom." Oh my heart and the tears. What a beautiful little darling.

house planitos

So...here is the house we are embarking upon to build...I will admit that it is not my fantasy dream house, as that would be much larger and ornate overlooking the ocean in some bachelor type location, HOWEVER it is more than adequate and we are super excited to get going. We have our permits from the city, the snow has melted (most of it), and we just need to decided on which subcontractors are going to do what and we will be set to go!!! YEAH!! We should start digging, for sure, by next week but maybe even by the weekend.

Um...well actually you have to smarter than the computer and the house plans saved thereon to figure out how to get them onto a blog....which as it turns out I am not. But with that said, I will describe the house for you.... 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, an office, 3-car garage (apparently a non-negotiable item in this family), it has kitchen too. We are not finishing the basement, but it will have a 3 bedrooms, a bathroom, a kick-butt storage room (also non-negotiable), and a huge family room. The outside will be stone and Hardi-board of some undetermined color. Pictures would be better, but you have to wait til later.

IT"S OURS!!!

We closed today on our pretty little piece of land!! We are so excited and also dreading the new adventure of building our house. I will, of course, post pictures along the way.

HELP

In an attempt to up date my blog and make my sister happy by making it easier to read, I lost my list of blogs I follow, meaning my friends like you. SOOO please comment so I can have your blog address so I can redo my list at some unspecified time...TIA

Man that was a long post...

Alright...since it's been made known to me that everyone thinks something is wrong with me, like I died or gone into a deep depression) I will finally update the blog. I think I don't update because I feel guilty about always forgetting my camera and not having enough pictures of my little darlings (Dora, Dan, Dog). I need to be better, but really need a new camera, but that's a different post.

I haven't been updating because I have been busy dang it. I have been working on some classes to do medical transcription from home, so that takes up the majority of my time when Dora is sleeping. And lets be honest, no computer time when she's awake, unless I want the screen drawn on, printer paper all of the house, or a number of other things she does to let me know that she is not happy that she does not have my full and complete attention. I am almost done with the class though (I have been saying that for months) and then should be able to work a few nights from home to make some lavish amount of money to buy clothes, vacations, and other things that Dan gets mad at if I go over budget:) Just kidding he pretty much lets me rule the roost most of the time.....

Then for the past 3 weeks I have pretty much been on the phone non-stop talking to relator's, sellers of houses, lots and banks, and mortgage officers and home depot and you know name it, I've talked to them. Here's the saga.

We waited 4 months to find out if we could buy this: It's a short sale, therefore a killer deal..um nope, after 4 months of waiting, the bank decided to take it to auction and we lost it.

In the mean time we put an offer in on this:

Didn't get this one either..oh well. needed lots of work, but a killer deal.

Then we were under contract to buy this:

But at the last minute, we backed out...just didn't feel good about the one we actually got. It still needed to be finished inside and was just more house then we could handle.

NOW we are waiting to see if the bank and the sellers accept our offer for this:

A beautiful piece of land in little old Heber City, where we will build something like this:

I love this house and want it, Dan not so much so we'll see. But we are getting a great deal on the land (we should know in about an hour if they accepted our offer). Then we gotta get going on a house and we will start building by February!! Yeah...lots have really dropped in price up here, so has the cost of lumbar, and I am married to the greatest house builder of all times!!! So it's all shaping up to be a beautiful little house for us. Can't wait. Hopefully we stay married through the process and get exactly what we want.

Moral of this whole story, sometimes what we think we want isn't always what we need/get. But Heavenly Father knows us and he will rewards us for our patience. Amen.

Holidays in Review....

I am the lamest blogger ever, but I do have good excuses. I promise. Someday I will explain.

For now, here's our Holidays starting way back in October with the cutest little lion that you've ever seen.

Oh we can't forget poor little BudderBones who got to dress up like a little girl for Halloween. We had a great time taking Dora, her 3 cousins, and 2 dogs trick-or-treating. She took a little while to catch on, but as soon as someone let her pick her own candy she was grabbing handfuls as quick as her little hand could go.

Now on to Thanksgiving. While I realize that am 25 or 26 years old (can't really remember right now), am married, have a dog, and have a child, there are still days when I think to myself, "Self: You aren't an adult, you don't have responsibilities, you still weight 100 or even 110 pounds (ya right!!)," however Thanksgiving this year made me realize that I am in fact an adult and there is no getting around it. How you say can Thanksgiving do that to a person? Well I'll tell you--I cooked the entire meal by myself and hosted Dan's family. Not his entire family, but still. I cooked the turkey, potatoes, sweet potatoes, pies, stuffing, etc...all of it. I am freaking amazing by the way. We had more food than I ever thought possible. Some of you probably cook for as many people were there (6) on a daily basis, but I am still proud. We did miss Dan's youngest brother this year as he was locked up in the Heber City Jail (interestingly enough he was there on Thanksgiving last year too), but other than that we had a good feast, good family and fun. Later that night we drove to Layton to be with my family and then I got up at the crack of dawn to stand in line at Toys 'r Us and Target. Unfortunately no one else would get out of bed with me and I stood in the freezing rain by myself. But I got the goods and that's all that matters. Oh yes, and I am very grateful for many things.

Christmas was rocking this year because it just doesn't get more fun then showing new things to your children and seeing the excitement in their eyes. We had a fun holiday season, even though Dan is a Scrooge when it comes to Christmas. We spent Christmas eve day with Dan's family. We went sledding in an old cemetery--which I forgot the camera for--but still worth mentioning. Had a feast at Carrie's house, played games, and opened gifts. Then we were at my parents for Christmas Eve night and Christmas morning. Dora loved her presents and the highlights were here 4-wheeler, Dollie, FurReal Kitty, and play dough. Dan's highlights including some new clothes, stuff for the garage, and a brand new chop saw that I had convinced him we would never be able to afford. He was shocked and it was lots of fun. I got some new boots and a facial treatment day at the spa. The real shock of the year was that my parent spoiled all of us and we all got a Wii and tons of games. So the real reason for me not posting is I am too busy perfecting the drums on World Tour and beating Dan in tennis (I wish). I guess I was caught up in the moment because these are the only pics I have. Ever year I have gotten Dan the ugliest PJ's ever and then he sports them on Christmas morning and makes everyone laugh. I am running out of ideas for ugly PJ's so if you have any let me know.



What about news years you say? Um.... LAME. We were supposed to chaperon at a quad stake youth dance, but at the last minute they didn't need us so Dora went to sleep at 7:00pm (after a very emotional moment of burning her hand on the rice cooker), Dan followed at about 7:34 pm, and I stayed up 'til about 10:30, figured how lamo by myself, and went to bed. Hardly worth mentioning, but I am learning to deal with an early to bed'er that best I can.

New favorite pictures of Dorie

OK here's the real favorite pictures of Dorie....however they are about 5 months old now. She just keeps getting bigger and I really need to go get new pictures taken of her. These were some shots that my sister took of here when we stayed in Logan for a few weeks, last fall. I love these pictures because they show her personality at that time, like the "what's that pose," and it shows her beautiful red hair (for all of those non-believers, it is red and it will stay red dang-it)!! They other ity-bity is India. They are kissing cousins, or at least someday will be and will really like each other, but as for this stage, Dora mostly likes to take whatever India happens to have, sit on whomever's lap India is on, and mostly terrorizes the poor thing--but that's what I get for having a red-head. PS I took the liberty of editing these pictures...don't' know if I like them or not, but that's how they turned out.

Family Hike

Last Friday I woke up to a phone call from my sister-in-law saying that everyone was going on a hike up Stewart Falls, which is above Sundance and Aspen Grove, so I quickly got ready, found a pack I could use for the baby from a neighbor and off we went. I was so not ready for what was in store... I realize that my baby is 15 months old so I certainly cannot use her as an excuse for being out of shape anymore, but then I realized that I wasn't in shape when I got pregnant either so basically I'm just lazy when it comes to exercising these days. The hike that we thought we take no more than a 2 hours, took 4 but it was fun and well worth it.

We had a really fun hike (most of the way) there were a few parts that were really hard and I thought I was going to be sore for a few days, which suprisingly I wasn't. Adora loved her ride on my back, I borrowed the cadilac of packs and she could see everything. The best part was when we finally got to the falls, she had so much fun playing in the water and splashing around. I can't tell you how cold the water was and she refused to get out. I could barely stand to be in it...her feet were like ice cubes by the time we got out. She fell asleep on the way back out.

I love this picture of Adora...she was so excited.

I also had a flash back to high school while we were there. When we came around a bend and I got my first view of the falls, I realized that I had done the hike before but had gone a on a different trail. In high school I went on a double date there with Tyler and Melanie. It brought back the greatest memories of Scott Bell. It made me laugh right out loud. I can hardly believe that was 7 years ago...time flies.

Housing Woes...

This last week we found a house that we love--it needs some work and some major TLC but it really has some great potential. I found it online, we went and saw it that same night and then the next day we put an offer in on it. The problem is that it's a short sell and the bank has to approve the offer which could take weeks or even months. So for now we are just sitting around waiting and praying that we get it. It would be perfect for us. It's really big and has a huge yard plus is has an apartment in the basement which we could rent out. I don't love the exterior but when you have Dan as a husband you know that anything can be changed to look just like you would like it. We have so many fun ideas for renovating it, if we can just get it. Here's a few pics..but remember it really needs some work.

Congrats to the Newlyweds!!!!

We had a great trip two weekends ago to Cedar City!! We went for Jack's (Dan's dad) wedding. We left Friday night and stayed in a hotel and then they got married Saturday morning. I was a little worried about the drive down there because Dora hasn't been on that long of a trip since she was little, but she did great and luckily we had Dan sister, Amy, in the car with us to help entertain her. I also got to see one of my dearest companion, Morgan Niemann. I hadn't seen her since the day I left the mission so it was so awesome to get to spend some time with her reminiscing about the mish.This is Dan and all of his siblings: Emily, Andrew, Amy, Dan, Jack, Kerrie, Carrie, John, JulieDaddy's little girl...of the girls had matching hair things...they all looked really cute

This is Dora's girl cousins, except her favorite Lucy.

Olivia, Kylee, Hattie, Anna, Katie, and Layrn. Dora was too busy to take pictures.

Adora was so tired by the time the day was through that she feel asleep before we could even get the car seat buckled and she didn't wake up until we got home. What a trooper. We are so excited for Adora to have another grandma and for Jack to have found someone to share the rest of his life with.