Catch-up: summer fun in Utah

My little Mason turned 11 months today...he's growing up so fast.

Mason loves, loves, loves playing in the water. Family picture at Cherry Hill. This was the best shot out of 10 tries! We had some fun times with the Berretts at the Oakridge pool. Samuel wearing Papa Tom's hat. Samuel snuggling with grandma Suzy on the lazy river.Samuel loves making animal noises so it was so fun to take him to the zoo and watch his excitement when he saw the animals in person. You can't go to the Hogle zoo without riding the train! Mason with Joe's parents, Suzy and Tom.
The highlight of the day for Mason was the Merry Go Round. He absolutely loved it...too bad I happened to sit on the only animal that didn't move. We were too cheap to pay for another round, but luckily Mason didn't care. I think his expression in this picture is so funny.
Samuel on the other hand certainly did care. He was sitting on his favorite animal and did not want to leave. He was content to watch the Merry-go-Round, so we let him be for 30 minutes. We waited until the crowd died down before we finally braved the full-on-out tantrum.
Well we are finally on our way to Texas tommorrow, yay!!! After 6 weeks on hold in Utah, we can finally get our 'post-graduation' lives started. On Thursday, Joe and his dad flew to Milwaukee to get our stuff, and made it to Kellar,Texas by Saturday night. They had a delay due to a tire blowing out on the car trailer. Fun stuff...glad I'm responsible for flying the kids down! Many thanks to Tom and Suzy for opening your home to myself and our 2 busy, busy boys. I really appreciate your help these past weeks and I am certainly going to miss it once I'm on my own during the days again:( I will especially miss the wonderful company and watching you both interact with these babies in ways that only grandparents can. Thank you so much for everything! This move is so happy and so sad at the same time. For those of you that live by family, please always remember how truly lucky you are!! Well, hope everyone's summers are going well and I will see ya in Texas!!

Hanging out in Utah

Here's a happy Mason ready for church...spike and all! Well, so far we have been living in Bountiful, UT with Joe's parents for 5 weeks. We finally closed on our house this past Thursday and will be on our way to Dallas next weekend...hooray!! I am excited to move on to the next stage of our life, but even more excited to see my wonderful husband again. So while we've waited, in the mean time lots have been happening.

(1) Both boys took turns with a virus (we think) where they had really high fevers for a couple of days. Samuel even made it up to 104. It was pretty funny trying to guess what it was..."maybe it was the pool water?", "his gums are inflamed, it must be teething", "his stool was a little loose, it must be a cold or virus" When it was Mason's turn, we blamed the fever on a virus.

(2) I've been able to spend some time with some great friends. Below is a picture of my get-together with Kristin and Rebekah...my good friends that I grew up with in Kissimmee, FL. It's hard to believe how much has changed since our Young Women days. After chatting for a while, we decided to herd our children to a nearby park...a process that took us nearly a half hour! The great photographer that I am, the picture ended up blurry and I cut off Hallie. Sorry! This is the best shot too! Below is a picture of Sienna and Mason waiting for their burritos at Chipotle. Katie and I met for lunch and these two were so patient while we slowly ate our lunch over a 2 hour period! Thank goodness for fruit puffs and yogurt melts!
This is the aftermath of our lunch. In addition to snacks, the babies also liked to play with straws and napkins. This extended our lunch another 30 minutes.
(3) Samuel has just about discovered every nook and cranny in grandma and grandpa's house. Toys entertain him for only so long, so we've had to be creative in keeping Samuel busy to divert him away from: the toilets, toiletpaper, the bathroom in general, all the cabinets and drawers in the kitchen, the formal living room, climbing bookshelves, and again Samuel in a bathroom is very bad news. So back to being creative. One of Samuel's favorite things to do is help me with laundry. He loves putting clothes in the dryer. Once he runs out of clothes, than he'll put anything he else he can find into the dryer. Well, even that can become old news, so in the video Samuel has moved on to the next step with the dryer.

(4) Finally, some exciting news for our family, Mason has finally started to crawl!! At 10 months, I was concerned that he was never going to figure it out. The next video is for: my parents who ask me EVERY time I talk to them "Is Mason crawling yet?", my nieces Bella and Lilly who devoted a lot of time into helping Mason crawl, and my poor husband who was bummed that he missed this moment.

(5) We have been going non-stop since we've been here and luckily time has gone fast, since I am beginning to miss Joe. Ha, Ha, just kidding...I've missed you the whole time and I can't wait to see you. I was planning on posting more pictures, but I am way too tired. Stay tuned for pictures at Cherry Hill...the greatest funspot you'll ever know.

How do you like our new house?

Here are some pictures of our "possible" new house. I say that because although we are in contract, you never know what is going to happen until the final closing day. I have had a few requests to post pictures on our blog, so here it is. I am a huge fan of the cape cod look with a little porch in front, so this house fits me exactly. We got a killer deal as well, so that was a bonus...gotta love inexpensive Texan living!

I love porches in the front!

Front entry way...it is not nearly as wide as this picture makes it look. The formal dining room is to the right

The living area. The lemon yellow will have to go (what were they thinking?) but my favorite part about the whole house is the sunroom which is through those double doors on the left of the fireplace. It's supposed to be a study, but I'll make it a playroom...my goal would be to keep the toys in that designated area and then shut the doors when I get tired of looking at them! Joe tells me good luck on ever keeping the toys contained. It's worth a try!

Another look of the living room. Below is the kitchen. This is by far the most counterspace I've ever had...goodbye tiny aparments!

There's 4 bedrooms altogether, a formal dining room, a gameroom on the top floor, and a big backyard. The best part about this house is the community center...a waterpark area, lap pools, spray parks, and so forth. I look forward to taking our kids swimming on the the many hot Texas days! Well that's the house. Joe just barely got to take a look at it while in Texas and he gives me two thumbs up on my choice. Thank goodness! It was not easy house hunting alone...talk about pressure!

Catch-up: our 4th of July

I love our 4th of July get-togethers with Joe's family and extended family. It's usually one of the few times we are in town (Utah) and we get to see all of the Berretts . Below is Mason playing with Sienna...he is not too sure about sharing his toys. At our last 4th of July party, Katie and I were really big (more-so me) and pregnant and sweaty with these two sweethearts. I remember inhaling about 10 chocolate chip cookies that Katie made as I complained about how much weight I was gaining inbetween bites. I'm still working those off plus the 10 sugar cookies I ate this time around.

Some of the cousins and second cousins eating and playing with bubbles. Look about Mason's face, he's now struggling with the idea of sharing his toys with even more cousins. Bryan, Joe's brother, playing with Samuel while we get a bite to eat. As you can tell its getting late and my camera was having some trouble with the flash. But left to right, here's a picture of Monica, Katie, me, and Brooke.

So we are still in Utah having a blast, thanks to Joe's parents Tom and Suzy. Joe will start work on Monday while I again live without a husband for another two weeks...or who knows how long! We did find a house...I flew to Texas for 1 day, looked at 14 houses, and picked one...no diddle daddlying there. Our offer was accepted, but who knows how long it can take to close. We found that it could take up to 6 weeks...ahhh! Very frustrating. Do these mortgage lenders and title companies and whoever else is involved, realize that I am in Utah without all my "mom gear" (I know you moms know what I mean by this)! Of course not. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't care even if they did know. Plus I don't like being in transition for too long. Anyways, enough complaining. I will post pictures of the house once our inspection clears. We really hope buying will pan out for us and will be worth it in the end!

We're movin' to Texas y'all!

Yay! Joe has found a wonderful opportunity in Dallas, Texas. It was the first interview he went on and we ended up cancelling his other interviews because we both felt so good about this opportunity. It met our criteria of warmer winters, great job opportunity, and being in an area where we could possibly stay if we like it well enough. We will be there for at least 3 years and we are very excited about this new adventure. Now comes the next hurdle...since we had to make last minute plans, we were not able to find housing quick enough. So now we are nomads. We will move our stuff into storage here, move in with our parents, and then come back and move our stuff to Texas when we have a place to live. It makes me tired just thinking about it all! We are considering buying a house since housing is pretty inexpensive there, but that means more time living as nomads. It is a pain, but I actually feel more sorry for our parents than us! Well, I know everything will work out in the end...I've learned that it just takes patience and a lot of prayers. Thanks everyone for all of your kind words and support!

Now here are some pictures of us at a park. Samuel does not like to be cooped up in our tiny apartment so we seriously go twice a day if it's decent weather. We usually go to a park with a basketball court because Samuel loves to run around Joe and shoot at the hoops even though his ball goes no higher than his head. It gets a little tricky when other people are playing on the court though because he wants their ball even though his looks exactly the same. Luckily, people think he's cute enough and are happy to switch balls.

Meanwhile, as Samuel is running around and claiming every basketball as his, Mason is usually content to sit on his blanket for an hour and play with the grass. Here he is pretending he is going to crawl.

For the grandparents, here is a video of Mason enjoying the park:

Sienna tags Mason: 11 facts about Mason

1. Like Sienna, we consider Mason our miracle baby. Aside from the tremendous odds I faced on ever getting pregnant, Joe and I are honestly stumped on when Mason was conceived! My OB of course narrowed down the days that it should've happened, but we swear it didn't! Hmm...still stumped. Well, we were so swept up in the adoption thing that the month of December was a blur anyways.
2. Although I love Mason dearly, he was the hardest newborn EVER! Unfortunately, I didn't know about reflux so our household suffered ALOT of constant crying for several weeks. He became happy as a clam once we introduced him to Zantac which he is still currently on.
3. For his first 5 months, Mason was a horrible sleeper. On average, he woke up 2 to 3 times a night. Finally I let him cry it out one night and now he is an excellent sleeper!
4. Mason is our serious baby. You definitely have to earn his smiles, especially if he doesn't know you.
5. Mason loves Samuel more than Joe or I. I've finally come to terms with that!
6. At this moment, Mason feels no motivation to move. He is perfectly content to sit in the same spot for an hour and play with his toys or look at books.
7. Mason is the most low maintenance, laidback child. If he is fussy and he's not hungry or tired, than I take him to the doctor because I know something is wrong (and there usually is!) Once he started sleeping better, he has been such an easy baby which is what I needed to be able to keep up with Samuel.
8. He loves being outdoors. I'll take the boys to the park and all I have to do is park Mason in a stroller and he'll just relax and enjoy the weather while I chase Samuel around.
9. Mason loves to give me kisses. Once he starts, he doesn't want to stop! My face will be covered with his saliva by the time he's done!
10. Mason is terrified of Tickle Me Elmo, dogs, and being in the bathtub with Samuel (I don't blame him, Samuel is a wild man!)
11. Mason is very sweet and sensitive. The other day he was knawing on my shoulder and actually bit me pretty good. He didn't mean to, but I responded out of pain and said "Ouch, no, no Mason!" He puckered out that bottom lip and it started to quiver, and then he started to cry. So sad! It was the first time I was stern with him and I actually started to tear up. I didn't think he'd get so sad about it!

How I love this sweet baby boy...such a blessing!

Mason tags Ella, Braxton, Sadie, Austin

Florida...maybe another time.

Well, Florida is not meant to be for our family at this time. Joe gave his best efforts on the boards and scored almost perfectly on everything...except the biggest portion of the boards. Due to an unfortunate event, which involves a badly decayed tooth and the patient biting down on his hand at the worst moment, he received an automatic failure for that part. He nearly passed despite missing 30% of the grade, so he can retake that one procedure again. But that will not be until November. Although I am very confident that Joe can pass, we have decided not to put everything on the line again to see if he passes. It's too much of a risk and far too much pressure on my poor husband. While he was in Gainesville, he was teased endlessly about how much pressure he had...with a job, house, and my family all waiting for him to pass even though he hadn't touched a drill for 2 years. I am touched at how he went through all of that torture just to please me and my need to be by family. What a husband!
So our plans for right now? Uh, we are back to square 1. Although I was very disappointed at first, I am now pretty excited about a new adventure. Since we now are in a hurry (we will be homeless at the end of this month) Joe is looking for an associateship for a couple of years which will give us a little more time to figure out where we should settle down permanently...who knows, maybe it will be Florida in the future. We are looking everywhere and he already has a few interviews set up. Wish us luck!