Colton's Dinosaur Birthday Bash!

I cannot believe my little boy is 3 years old!  He is so full of energy and imagination!  This year, we celebrated his birthday a month early in June.  We are always gone on vacation during his actual birthday and I felt bad not giving him a birthday party with all of his little friends- especially since he LOVES birthday parties.  Every time he sees a balloon or cake he explains, "Oh!  Birthday Party!  Friends!" 

Birthday Party Invite

Party Reminder

I feel like I was pretty creative for his party- which is saying a lot for me.  We did a Prehistoric/Dinosaur theme, since he is still obsessed with the beasts, and I think it turned out really well!  We watched Land Before Time as guests arrived.  When everyone was there, we gave each kid a pair of binoculars (homemade from green duct tape and toilet paper rolls :)  and we went to the backyard for a dinosaur egg hunt.  I had taken a bunch of easter eggs and filled them with plastic dinosaurs, dinosaur stickers, and candy and hidden them throughout the yard.  The kids loved it!  After they searched through the spoils of their hunt for a few minutes we sang "Happy Birthday" and cut the dinosaur cake.  It was no pinterest quality, but Colton loved it and it tasted pretty good, so that's all I really care about!  After cake and presents we filled up the pool (a birthday present from his Grandma & Grandpa Day) and turned on the sprinklers for the kids to play.  It was lots of fun and I really enjoyed planning it for him!  I'm excited for the next party, although I'm pretty sure with the way things are going- he's just gonna want dinosaurs again!

The roar.

Happenings Lately + Katie Turns 1!

The end of Winter lull is finally coming to an end and Spring is just around the corner!  We've finally seen some days in the 50s and the snow is melting and almost gone!  I'm an Idaho girl and I love snowy winters, but I am ready for Spring and sunshine!  My kids (and me) are going crazy being stuck inside all the time and for a girl who really likes to eat, it's not the best idea to be stuck inside for long periods of time with nothing to do!  Haha.  The kids and I have been on a couple walks outside the last couple weeks and it's been fun to get out.  It's still been a little chilly but the kids love the change of scenery so much they don't even care.

Jon & Me: Jon is still working for Deere, but he started a new job in Internal Audit at the first of March.  His first official audit doesn't start til next week and he's anxious to actually get on the job and start working.  Audit will be and interesting & exciting experience for us since he'll be traveling a lot throughout this next year but it will be a good opportunity and we're hoping he'll go somewhere cool and I can join him for a little vacation!  I don't do well with my husband gone and he's obviously going to miss me like crazy, but I'm hoping to fill up the time with lots of projects and visiting family to keep me busy!

I got released from Relief Society at the first of the year and got a new calling as a Beehive adviser.  Its been a bit of an adjustment but the girls are fun and it's nice not having so much stress from all the activity planning.  I enjoyed being a part of activities and I loved the presidency but I get my fill of party planning from baby showers, girl's nights, birthday parties, and all sorts of other random things I find excuses to throw parties for.  I also turned 26 this February and had lots of fun celebrating with friends and family!  On my actual birthday I went out to lunch at Red Robin with my friends and Jon was sweet enough to watch the kids for me.  Then we had birthday cake and ice cream that weekend with friends at our Olympic Opening Ceremonies party!  I've been working on trying to develop some talents lately and have been trying to learn more and get better at photography.  Its fun to learn more and to get some good pictures.  I was able to take some nice pictures of Katie for her 1st birthday with the help of a friend who let me use her backdrops and gave me some helpful instruction! 

We went on a fun date this weekend to a shooting range.  It was pretty fun and a little nerve racking.  Even though Jon had never shot a hand gun before, he was pretty awesome.  My own personal Jack Bauer :)  I, on the other hand, was terrible.  How do you even aim?  Gosh, I swear my eyes are messed up or something.  I mean, do you close your left eye? Your right eye?  Keep both eyes open?  I see the target differently each way!  So basically I just do a combination, aim in the general direction, and hope I hit something.  I really hope I'm never in a situation where aiming accuracy is vitally important!

I did hit the bulls-eye once!

Colton: Colton is doing great!  He's a total little boy with tons of energy!  He loves to run and have races, jump, climb on everything, wrestle, etc.   He and Katie go through spurts of loving each other and can't stand being around each other.  Colton gets really upset when Katie tries to touch his toys or books.  On the other hand, he is also very sweet and loving towards her and loves to give her kisses and gets very concerned when she is upset.  His eyes are doing good for now and he's out of eye patches.  He loves to help momma bake muffins and he's also a little treat-a-holic.  No idea where he gets that from....  He knows the whole ABC song and loves to sing that and other songs.  He also loves to read, anythings with dinosaurs, and he's getting pretty good at numbers.  He also knows all of his colors really well and is constantly impressing us with how much he knows!

Just like daddy!

Lots of snow this winter!

Katie: Katie is getting such a personality lately.  She's full of faces and loves to play games and giggle.  However, she also likes to think she deserves to be spoiled and likes scream when she doesn't get what she wants.  She has thrown some quite ridiculous fits that honestly make me laugh they are so ridiculous.  She just had her one year appointment and she's a bit of a shrimp.  19th percentile for weight and 27th for height.  She is walking really well with a walker and crawling all over the place.  She says "Mama, Dada, Hi, and Down".  She also says something super close to Colton.  She is a sweetheart and we love her hugs and giggles.  It's been such a great year, I can't believe she is 1!

Blanket fort frizz!

For her birthday I decided to just go simple.  We had some strawberry shortcake for her with the family, because she loves strawberries, and then on her birthday we had a few of her baby friends over for cupcakes and a playdate.  It was fun!  She loves other babies and is always crawling up to car seats at church and anywhere else to talk to all the babies.  She has a blanket that she absolutely LOVES and is always dragging it around and cuddling with it.  She won't go to sleep without it and its the first thing she goes for whenever we enter her bedroom.  I find this particularly adorable because I grew up with stories of how I had a blankie I loved like this as a baby that I called my "FeFe" and couldn't do without.  I guess my parents accidently lost it and I was pretty upset for awhile.  I better not lose Katie's!

Playing with her birthday princess castle.

Overall we are doing great around here!  Life is good in "The Middle" as we like to call it.  Haha, we also really like to watch that show :)  Jon is such an antisocial, stubborn Mike Heck sometimes.  He thinks I'm Sue- totally ridiculous and clueless.  Haha, well now I'm rambling but we're very happy and grateful for all of our blessings we are constantly blessed with! 

Christmas 2013

Merry Christmas 2013!  Family photo taken a few weeks before Christmas.

Christmas this year was one for the books!  Jon had almost two full weeks off of work and we were planning to spend most of that in Minnesota with Jon's family sledding, ice-skating, going to dinner, movies, playing games, two-on-two volleyball games, etc.  Needless to say, we were SUPER excited!  On top of all that, we were most excited for Colton's Christmas.  He is finally to an age where he can understand things and get excited about Santa coming and he definitely was!  He was loving all the Christmas decorations and movies and kept asking about Santa and opening presents!  We were really excited to see his excitement Christmas morning. 

We got to MN on Saturday afternoon.  Sunday morning Katie woke up with a horrible cold.  It was seriously the worst colds I remember either of my kids ever having.  She sounded awful.  We worried it was maybe whooping cough or croup but after doing some more research and googling what those coughs sound like, we ruled out whooping cough and were less convinced about croup.  Still, it was awful.  She ended up being sick the whole break and is just now getting better.  Looking back, I'm pretty convinced it must have been croup.  I've never heard a baby hack so hard!  She struggled sleeping all week and was, understandably, cranky and stuffy and just didn't feel well!  Still, it was just a cold- and at least those are manageable...

Tuesday morning (Christmas Eve) Colton was sleeping in really late so at 9:00am, I went in to wake him up.  Immediately I though, "It reeks big time in here!! What is that?"  I turned on the light and had my answer.  Colton was sleeping in a huge puddle of puke, all over his blankets, pillow, face, hair, etc.  The poor kid!  We rushed him to the bath and got him and the bed all cleaned up.  We hoped he'd just had too much sugar the day before- both of us had been out shopping a lot of the day and weren't entirely sure what all he'd eaten.  But no, we weren't just bad parents, he puked again a couple hours later and was miserable all day- puking and crying and feeling awful.  Christmas morning he woke up puke free so we hoped it was over and just a 24 hour thing.  He was lethargic and sad through most of the present opening- and just laid on the floor (not the excitement we were hoping to see!).  About an hour after presents we found out why....he puked again.  All day Christmas was filled with pukes and the runs for Colton.  He was pretty miserable.  The next day as well.  Friday he didn't puke any more but still had the runs and didn't feel the best.  Finally Saturday he was back to 80% of himself and Sunday he was back to Colton!  We left for home Monday morning.  Needless to say, we didn't have the Christmas we were hoping for.  We spent almost all week on puke watch sitting at the house. 

We did have fun chatting with family and we were able to get out and do a few fun dinners and things with family.  Jon got me some good gifts and even surprised me with a Gel Nail machine!  We also had fun doing some after Christmas bargain shopping! 

When we got home we decided we'd do a second smaller Christmas for the kids, since we felt robbed of the excitement.  We had only brought about half of our gifts for each other to MN anyway and Santa felt bad Colton was sick so he decided to swing by again and bring another small gift or two for the kids.  That Christmas was a lot more fun :)  Colton was VERY excited by the giant crocodile Santa brought him to go with the giant shark, t-rex, and triceratops he'd gotten on the real Christmas.

Love our Christmas Tree!

New Years Eve Jon was feeling sick so we just rented Wolverine and stayed home.  The kids went to bed early and Jon fell asleep watching the movie just I just partied the night away by myself :)  Haha, here's to better luck with our holidays next year!!  Despite all the holiday mishaps, we had fun spending time together as a family and felt so grateful for the safety we had in our travels.  We both love the holiday season and the spirit of Christ in the air and look forward to next year!  We're both so grateful for the amazing family and friends and blessings from the Lord that made our 2013 a great year!

Catching Up: Halloween & Thanksgiving 2013

HALLOWEEN

Happy Halloween 2013

Yes, I realize this is a very belated post but life just seemed to be full to the brim the last few months of 2013 and I didn't get much blogging done!  Halloween 2013 was pretty fun!  Colton was finally old enough to grasp the concept of Trick or Treating and dressing up so that made it fun.  He was really into "doggies" and loved to bark all the time so I thought it would be just adorable for him to go as a dog.  I found an adorable dog costume at Kmart, that I even got for free with some couponing, and was so excited to get it on him.  He LOVED it in the store but the second I tried to put it on him he freaked out!  We tried for a couple weeks to get him used to the costume but in the end, sadly, he still hated the idea of putting it on and we ended up just sticking him in a buzz lightyear costume I'd bought the year before on clearance.  It was still pretty cute but we had to do some Toy Story marathons to teach him who Buzz is- cause you can't dress your kid up as something they don't even know, right? 
Halloween was on Thursday but Davenports Trick or Treat day was Wednesday and it was pouring rain.  Seriously- cats and dogs style!  We wondered if we'd even get any trick or treaters but- true to the typical candy loving kid- most braved the rain anyway and we got a good turn out!  When the rain finally died down a bit we grabbed our umbrella, threw Katie in her adorable little cow outfit, and took Colton around the neighborhood.

My adorable little trick-or-treaters :)

 It was pretty fun and adorable watching Colton trick or treat and getting to know our neighbors a little bit.   Katie was a trooper for a little while but then got tired and Daddy took her home while Colton and mommy hit a few more houses.  When Colton started barking at the doors (only cute if he would wear the doggie costume) instead of saying "trick-or-treat", I figured it was time to head home.  Friday night was the ward Trunk or Treat and Colton got to dress up again with the rest of the family and go get more candy while I, Katie, and our friend Alissa Thompson hung out in the van handing out candy.  All in all it was a fun Halloween!

Me & Alissa at Trunk or Treat

Handing out candy!

THANKSGIVING

For Thanksgiving this year (2013), we decided to stay home again and have some friends over.  We had a lot of fun with it last year and liked the idea of not having to travel for all of our holidays.  We had our friends Aly & Taylor Larsen, Stefani & Colin Cragun, and Sarah & Jared Haslam over for dinner.  I made the turkey, yams (with lots of gooey marshmallows of course!),  and a fruit salad and everyone else brought yummy food to complete the meal!  I have to say, Sarah makes some awesome mashed potatoes!  I made the dumb mistake of not buying a Turkey with one of those "done" poppers in it, so I had to use an actual meat thermometer.  I felt both annoyed and very culinary at the same time :) 

That night Jon sent me out to the crowds to try and snag him a 70 inch tv on Black Friday sales.  I was happy to do it for him until I got to the store and realized they were making us wait in line outside and it was FREEZING cold! I didn't even have a coat because last year they let us all inside and I was super hot and didn't have anywhere to put my coat!  I was outside about 45 minutes and when I finally got inside they told me the tv's were all gone.  It was only 6:30 and they weren't going on sale until 8 but APPARENTLY they handed out wrist bands for them at 6- and you couldn't buy a tv without one.  Pretty dumb.  What's the point of not letting you actually buying something til 8 but giving out the "coupons" to buy them at 6?  Again I say, pretty dumb.  I found a couple toys and movies for the kids and then headed to 3 other stores to be my ridiculous self.  I waited in line at Von Maur for an hour to spend a free $10 coupon they'd sent me on a $10 toy for Katie.  When I checked out with just one small toy and spent only a few cents in tax, a lady behind me commented, "You seriously waited in line just for that?"  It wasn't rude, she was just amazed.  What can I say?  I love a good deal!  I then proceeded to do the same thing at two other stores.  In the end, was it worth it?  At the end of the night, and even the next day I'd probably say,  "No chance."  However, once I get beyond the crappiness of waiting in lines for about 3 hours for just a couple small toys I'd say "Yeah".  I mean, I only spent like $7 dollars that night combined at all three stores and got like $50 dollars worth of stuff!  Gotta love a good deal!

Playing over Thanksgiving break!

These two: A long awaited update.

I am constantly amazed at how blessed I am to have been given these two sweet spirits.  I love them so much!  They are so fun, funny, cute, ridiculous, and full of their own unique personalities.  It's so fun to watch them grow and learn new things.  It's been awhile since I've given any updates on them and I'm sure I'll forget stuff but I'll do my best!

Colton:  Colton is a man's man...in little boy size.  He loves anything cars, trucks, & dinosaurs.  He loves to climb, wrestle, jump, run, and a lot of things that make no sense (a total man quality).  Recently, he  loves to impersonate animals- especially dogs, lions, and dinosaurs.  Of course, he loves the loudest ones.  I often feel ridiculous when I go out shopping because Colton will just bark in the cart, as loud as he can, pretty much the whole time.  I've even had a friend comment that she immediately knew we were there when she walked into a ward function because she could hear Colton's growl.  Yes, it's a bit ridiculous and sometimes embarrassing, but I love his imagination and determination.  He will bark all day long at you until you confirm that he is being a little dog and he has a great bark!
He is learning so much lately!  He knows lots of new words and can identify almost every animal he sees a picture of (even walrus's and camels!)  He can now count to 8 all by himself, and he knows his colors and shapes pretty well.  His favorite games are telling mommy what animal to draw and then what color to color it.  Unfortunately, mommy is a TERRIBLE artist.  A friend thought my drawings were Colton's.....yeah, it's that bad, and "Get you" where he runs and I come "get him".  He loves his baby sister!  He would smother her with his love if he let him!  He gets really distraught whenever Katie is crying and will say, "Oh no, baby crying.  Baby sad."  And then it often leads to him crying as well.
 He ended up needing glasses.  He has really bad eye sight in his left eye and normal in his right so his brain was started to compensate and only use his right eye- making his left go lazy.  Thankfully, he has adjusted to his glasses really well!  I'm so proud of how well he's doing!  If I forget to put them on after a nap, he'll tell me, "Oh no!  Glasses!"  He always brings them to me if they fall off and he rarely takes them off himself.  He is only at half his prescription right now, but there is already a noticeable difference in what he is able to see.  He has an appointment next week where the will be upping the scrip.  It'll take a couple more times til he's all the way to his prescription!
He's still a SUPER picky eater but I guess maybe it's getting a little better.  Now that Halloween happened and we can bribe him with "Trick-or-treats" to eat his food.  

A Funny and a Sweet Moment from Colton lately....
1.  We had just returned from a trip to MN and we left him buckled in his seat while Jon and I were unloading the car.  We brought a load into the house and as I headed back to the van I heard him yelling.  When I got to the car, I very distinctly heard him yelling, "Ayuda-me Ayuda-me"  ....Thanks Dora.
2.  I was headed out to the store Saturday morning with no kids.  I went to Colton and told him that I was going to the store and that he needed to stay home with daddy and be a good boy.
Colton says: "Ok.  Hugs!"
Hugs given.
Colton: "Do you have your keys?"
Me: "Yes, I have my keys."
Colton: "Your phone?"
Me: "Yes, I have my phone."
Colton: "Ok.  Love you!"
And then he blew me a kiss!  So SWEET!  It seriously melted my heart!

New Glasses!

Playing with his favorite friend, Tate, at the Park.

Colton and Tate.

First time the kids could swing together!  This is they day after Katie got her harness off!

Katie: Katie is still the sweetest little girl ever!  She is so funny!  She loves to play games and purposely tries to get you to play games with her.  She loves the yelling game of yelling loud until we do it with her, stopping, starting, stopping starting, etc.  She also loves the head shake game.  She'll shake her head back and forth, over and over, with big smiles trying to get you to do it with her.  She can roll both directions now and is getting really good at sitting up!  Her legs are still pretty weak for her age but she's making progress and getting stronger!  She loves the jumper and daddy's little homemade physical therapy treatments.  She has an appointment in December to check if her hips start regressing but we're told it's very unlikely.  She has two teeth in the bottom front and her eyes are almost all the way brown!  She loves to be loud and make noises.  She also loves playing with Colton, until he gets too rough.  She is turning into a little daddy's girl and starting to wrap him around her finger as well.  She turns to all smiles and cackles (a pretty fitting description for her laugh) whenever he walks in a room. She is struggling with solid's.  She either won't eat it, or she violently throws it- and everything else she's eaten all day- up.  This has happened a few times with pears, bananas, and oatmeal.  She won't eat carrots, sweet potatoes, or apples.  The ONLY thing she likes to eat and can keep down is green beans.  Weird little girl :)

...I'm telling you, she's got personality!

Best friends! They always get each other's best laughs :)

Jon and I are doing well!  Things are great here in Iowa and we finally upgraded ourselves to a King Size bed so life couldn't be better!  Haha, ok, maybe it's not all bliss and roses but we're happy and we love our kids and we're so thankful for the blessing we have to raise them!

Why it's GREAT to be SIZE 8!

Hi.  My name is Emmalee, and I am a 25-year-old mother of two.  I currently weigh 137 pounds and I am a glorious size 8.  I am the smallest I've ever been in my adult life and I can honestly say I don't want to be any smaller.  Now before you start thinking I am writing this post to brag, pause, and let me assure you- I am not.   I've actually put off the prompting to write this post for a couple months now because I don't like putting myself "out there" this much and worried about negative responses.  I finally realized that the whole point of this post was not worrying what others think, and I should just get over myself and spill all my secrets in the hope that it will help someone else.  So here goes...

I first started thinking about several months ago when I was out shopping with a couple of friends.  As they perused through the size 2's, 4's, small's, and extra smalls, I jokingly excused myself to go take a look at the "big girls" section.  At this, they both laughed and responded with phrases such as, "Whatever!"  and "Shut up, you're skinny!"  I thanked them for the compliments but excused myself to go as I did, in fact, need to go look at the bigger sizes if I was going to find anything for myself on this shopping adventure.  It still took a minute for them to believe that I wasn't just dissing myself and actually telling the truth.  They were both very surprised, if not shocked, to learn that I was a size 8/L.  Fast forward to today.  Since that experience, I have had several similar responses from girlfriends when they find out what size I am.  I can't deny I'm flattered that I apparently look smaller that I am, but the nagging question I can't get past is, "Since when is size 8 big?"

I've had body image issues basically my whole life.  Let's be honest, I think most girls do.  I grew up in a small town, went to a small high-school, and was surrounded by tiny girls.  I wore the biggest pant size of all my friends.  I had less dates than all my friends.  I knew why.  Obviously, it was because I was fat.  I remember one specific time when a good friend of mine- probably size 2 at the most- was complaining about her belly.  I asked her if she'd rather have mine and she told me "no", and then gave some excuse that it was because she really like her belly button...  Yeah.  That pretty much cemented my belief that I was huge.  I had some amazing friends in high school whose influence kept me from doing anything TOO stupid or dangerous to lose weight.  We clung to each other through our four years of splendid high school glory and I'm pretty sure we all saved each other from a lot of things.  That being said, I still felt fat. 

It wasn't until I got to college that I first started to realize that maybe my perception was off.  That first year at BYU-Idaho I really had a turn-around.  I started to realize that not only was I not "fat" in comparison with the average person, but maybe even on the "thin" side.  This blew my mind.  Still, it's taken years of time and a lot of education to get to where I am today.

I spent five years at BYU-I and BYU in Provo studying to be a Health Teacher, Coach, and Physical Fitness Instructor.  The more I have learned, the more passionate I've become that weight and size mean nothing.  Fitness and health are the only important indicators.   THERE IS NO PERFECT SIZE!  We're all different and my healthy size is going to be different than Jane's healthy size, and so on.  The media has warped our minds into believing that in order to be worthy, we need to be "skinny".  We all obsess about losing weight, and the focus on actual health is getting lost.  Let me blow your minds.  Just because Jane is size 2, it does not mean she is healthy.  In fact if size 2 Jane isn't exercising, she is indeed LESS healthy, and more likely to have heart disease, than size 14 Sally who exercises regularly. 

Don't mistake me.  I'm not saying that being overweight or obese are suitable lifestyles.  It's a very unhealthy and risky way to live your life.  Do these people need to lose weight?  Yes, absolutely.  The quality and longevity of their lives will be greatly improved if they do.  However, I feel that focusing on a ideal weight or pant size goal is also unhealthy.  We should make fitness and healthy eating goals instead of weight goals.  By focusing on eating healthy and becoming more fit, the weight will come off and it will happen in a way that's healthy for your body.  You can't be fit and severely overweight.  It just won't happen.  

To give the example of Jane (because I have had friends like this), if she is eating healthy and exercising regularly at size 2, she should stop trying to be a size 0.  It's probably not a healthy size for her.  For Sally's example (I've also had several friends like this), if she is eating healthy and exercising regularly at size 14 and not losing weight- she is probably at good size for her body and she should not be concerned about being "fat",based on her pant size.  I can tell you this.  I will never, ever be a size 2.  I'd probably have to be dead.  I will never, ever weigh 120 pounds... unless I had a severe eating disorder...or had a limb amputated. 

Finally, after years of feeling horrible about myself and obsessing about weights and pant-sizes, I feel like I can be confident in who I am and what I look like.  I exercise 3-5 times a week for about 45 min (my goal is to shoot for 5 times a week of at least 30 min continuous exercise), I eat lots of fruits and vegetables, make most of my grains whole grains, eat lean meats sparingly, and try to overall just eat a balanced diet.  I still eat pizza, burgers, and treats- but try to keep it under control and make it an occasional food rather than my regular habit.  I can honestly say that I feel like I'm pretty healthy. 

Do I still have moments when I feel fat?  Yes.  Especially when I'm trying to lose the baby weight!  Can you blame me when I'm constantly assaulted by media messages that tell me to lose weight and get skinny so I can be beautiful?  I just hope that we can move away from our culture's obsession with numbers on the scale and in department stores and start focusing on getting healthy!  Who cares what size you are!  As I said earlier, I am a size 8 and it feels GREAT!  Why does it feel so great?  Because I am healthy at this size, and healthy is all that really matters.  So whether you're size 5 or 50, I just hope that maybe this post will help someone else out there realize that sizes are just numbers and you probably care about it more than anyone else.  Try to get healthy, whatever size you are.  Tell yourself it's all that matters ,(because it really is!!), and I promise you that you will be a happier person!  You'll feel better, have more confidence, and live a longer life!

For those interested:  The current reccomendations for adult exercise (ages 18-64) is 2 hrs 30 min (150 min) weekly of moderate-intensity aerobic activity with muscle strengthening activities on 2 or more days of the week.  For more information and tips to get started click here!

http://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/everyone/guidelines/adults.html