Five Years Together

On September 22, five years ago I married my eternal companion and best friend. We've been through a lot together, and a lot has changed in the last five years. Our family has grown, and we're getting settled in the Utah area.  Life is overall is looking pretty good.

Since we recently bought our home, Brandon and I decided to not do gifts for each other this year.  I still wanted to do something, so I decided to make him s'more themed foods.  I made some indoor s'more treats.

We had those the night before and throughout the day.  Since our anniversary was on a Saturday I was able to make him breakfast.  I found a recipe for s'more waffles.  They were delicious.

Brandon's parents came into town that weekend to see Amanda's BFA show (which was awesome!) so they got to spend some time with their grand-baby. That let us do some stuff around the house that needed to get done. Yay for marking more stuff off the list.  It was really great having Brandon's dad here to help him around the house.

That took up most of our afternoon, but we were able to go out to eat together.  It may not have been the most romantic anniversary, but I loved it all the same. Five years down, many many more to go.

I went looking for a picture of Brandon and I together, but couldn't find anything recent, so I decided to put in a cute picture of Kayla playing with her birthday present from her great-grandparents.  She hasn't quite figured out how to push the vacuum, but she likes the buttons!

Our House: The Project List

It has been one week since Brandon and I have become official home owners.  We signed the papers Aug 30th, the day before the deadline.  Talk about cutting it close!  Since then, we've steadily been making a long list of projects that we need/want for the house and yard.  Brandon's got the grass nearly resurrected.  Just in time for it to hibernate for the winter. :)  And I've been working on the inside of the house.  I think almost everything has its place except for a couple boxes and all the pictures.  Those, of course, go last.  I've put some up just for the sake of keeping them out of Kayla's reach.  I was doing just that to a set of orchid canvas pictures.  There were nails in the kitchen walls so I put them there.  And as I was looking I decided I really liked them there.  I really liked the colors, so I'm going to use them for the walls in the kitchen.  I'm so excited to finally figure out what I'm going to paint in there!  It's been bugging me for a while.  I don't know when we'll paint everything yet; it's on the lower end of the project list.

   

The biggest project that's happening soon is the driveway.  For those who have seen our driveway, you know it's a bit of a mess.  It's mostly gravel with some spots of random cement. We're having a friend from our old ward come in and fix it up.  By the end, we should have a nice long cement driveway with a patio.  Brandon's super excited, and I'll be glad to finally put my car in the garage.

All in all, life's staying pretty busy, but we're happy.  Brandon has a lot of projects lined up, and I'm always busy trying to keep up with Kayla.  She's loving the space in the new house.  Her favorite thing to do is to push stuff around the wood floor.  So cute! 

Here's a picture of Kayla helping Daddy put frost spray paint on the bathroom window.  She got up there ALL by herself! Silly Girl.

Brandon got a video of Kayla helping me weed the garden. She's such a big help!

By the end of the day, we were pretty tired. Kayla was happy throwing dirt and getting into everything, but she was a trooper, a dirty trooper.

So I think our yard is slowly coming together.  Hopefully by doing all this hard work now, we'll be that much more ahead next summer.

Coming Up-to-Date

I'm sorry I've been remiss in posting.  My last post was almost two months ago...I didn't realize it'd been that long.  But between family reunions, moving, vacations, and Kayla, things just get a little busy.  So I'm going to try to give a basic overview of what kind of life we've had in the last two months.  Get ready...set...Go!

July 

We started off the month with going to Clark and Lonnie's baby blessing of our new niece MaKena in Idaho Falls.  It was fun seeing them again and watching Kayla interact with her.  

I know Lonnie looks so sad in this picture, but it's only because MaKena was so sad; she was sympathizing.  This was the only picture I found from that trip.  We went out to eat on Saturday with all of the Graham family that was there.  It was a lot of fun.


Later that week we went down to St. George for the Hedquist Family Reunion to celebrate the 4th of July.  We started off swimming at Grandpa Ab's and Grandma Renee's pool.

Kayla loved being in the water and swimming with Daddy and Grandma.  She's a fish, just like her Mama.  It was nice being in the pool because I'm convinced St. George is one of the hottest places on earth.

This is the best picture we got of the Ab & Renee Hedquist family (minus uncle Jason because they hadn't gotten there yet).  It was so much fun to see everyone.   

This is everyone at the Golden Corral for dinner before we went to Tuacahn to see Aladdin.  So awesome!

  

This was Kayla's first attempt at eating her own strawberry.  It was very cute, but very messy.  Uncle Kris and Aunt Cathy was sitting across from us and they thought she was so cute!  And she just hammed it up for them. That's my child... :)

One of Kayla's favorite things to do at the condo was to climb up on the glass coffee table and sit/stand on it.  It made her higher up, which in her opinion is the best place to be.  The higher the better!  Would have almost given us a heart attack if she hadn't done it to us so many times before.

The last full day we were there, we went to the camping ground where Uncle Jason's family was staying.  We ate dutch oven dinner and dessert there, so yummy!  Kayla loved playing outside.  She likes getting dirty.  At one point she was shoving her hands in the dirt and pebbles, grabbing a handful and throwing it in the air.  When I got home and changed her diaper, she brought them with her as a souvenir. Silly girl.

This was the morning we left to go back home.  Mom went with Jessica to catch her flight the next morning.  So this was her saying goodbye to her grand-baby.  Kayla's wearing the outfit that her grandma gave her.  It's so Mom!  We had so much fun!  Thanks everyone who was there to make it so!



Later in July we had another family reunion to go to.  Thankfully, it was in the area.  It was for Brandon's side of the family.  And his mom got to come down for it! 

This is a 5 generation picture. So cool!  The reunion was just one day, and we had this picnic for dinner.  There was lots of food and music.  So good!

During the day, Grandma got to have Kayla all to herself.  Brandon, Amanda, and I went to SLC to watch the musical Wicked.  Brandon and I had seen it back in 2007, but this was Amanda's first time.  She had so much fun!  I'm so happy she liked it.  It's one of my favorites.

A week or so before Brandon's mom came into town, Kayla really started walking on her own.  She'd been able to take a few steps here and there, but she didn't get it down really well until about mid-July.  Her Grandma got quite the exercise following after her.  She's so cute learning to walk on her own.  She tries so hard to be Miss Independent.  But she'll still want to hold your hand for support.  I love her so much.


August

So far, I think August has been our busiest month, and it's not over yet!  The first weekend we moved from our apartment to our new house.  Unfortunately, we still don't own it, but we're getting close.  I'll make a separate post with more details and pictures on that later.  I hate packing everything up and moving.  It's why we haven't done it in the 5 years we've been married.  I'm glad we're in the house now, but getting there was so stressful!  And now getting unpacked is pretty crazy, too. Despite that, I love our new home.  There's so much room for Kayla to run around and play in.  She's not quite running yet, but she's getting there!

For Kayla's first birthday, we decided to drive to Ft. Collins, CO to celebrate it with his family.  That week was also Brandon's graduation.  He decided not to Walk because we were traveling, but congratulations to him for finally being done!  That Sunday at Mom and Dad's house, we had a family get together to celebrate all the graduates this year: Olivia from high school, Shannon for her Associates, Brandon for his Bachelor's, Amanda for her Bachelor's, and Kayla for her 1st Birthday.  Congratulations everyone!

We ate delicious food (no surprises there), opened presents, and played Quelf.  All in all, it was a very fun evening.

Grandma bought a whale pool for Kayla.  On the last picture, you can see where the "head" is spouting out water.  Kayla very much enjoyed it.  She was in the pool more often without her swimming suit than not...so there were a lot of saggy diapers. :)

We celebrated Kayla's birthday in stages and with different people.  Everyone wanted to celebrate with us, and that made us feel so happy.

This was her first cake.  Grandpa picked it out (this one was the cutest, he said), and Daddy tried to teach her how to blow out the candle. Cute!

 

Present time!  We're still teaching her to open them up, but she's getting there!

There was a stuffed lion inside!  The first thing she wanted to do was to taste it...or kiss it, depending on how you see the picture.  Either way, I think she liked it.

Presents from my mom.  Love the hat!  She also got a little purse and a tiger that wraps around her arm like it's hugging her.  She also got tons and tons of clothes, and most of those were dresses. Loved them!  I think dresses work the best for her because she can't really wear pants.  They're so big on her! And when they finally fit around the waist, they're too short! So, it doesn't really work for her.  Shorts, skirts, and dresses are the best!

I think the best part about the trip was that Kayla got to play with her grandparents.  She's their only grand-baby so far, so she gets all their attention, and she loves it.  Grandpa's such a tease!  It took her a while to warm up to him, but by the end she was smiling her cutest smile at him, and I think he just loved it. 

The trip was way too short, but we must go back to work.  And there was still a house for me to clean and prepare for the next party!  This time it was a joint party with Katherine and Phil's little girl, Amy.  Her and Kayla's birthdays are about a week apart, so we wanted to do one together.  We're hoping to make a tradition out of this while we're both still in the area.  So we invited our families over to celebrate with us.

And there are the little birthday girls! Kayla's wearing one of her birthday dresses, and being as cute as ever.  Amy was so quiet compared to the mayhem of the other children, it was really fun to watch her, too.

My old boss, Brad's, wife makes cakes as a small business at home.  She made this one for us.  I love it!  It was carrot with buttercream frosting.  She did an amazing job!  She was excited to try making it in the shape of a butterfly, and it turned out fantastic!  And yummy too!

The whole time they were eating, Amy kept trying to steal Kayla's cake! It was one of the funniest things I've seen!  But Kayla's didn't fuss about it too much.  She's a sharing girl.

Surprisingly, she didn't get too messy eating.  The frosting wasn't smeary enough for other people's tastes, but I liked it just fine.  She can still look cute and messy without being a complete disaster.  I like smaller messes to clean up.

So I know this has been a REALLY long post, but I wanted to share it all.  I had a hard time selecting the best-of-the-best pictures because there were so many cute ones!  So that's been our life the last couple months.  There's still lots to do and friends to play with.  Brandon's been busy making movies and resurrecting our yard.  We'll get there eventually. 

Thanks everyone for your love and presents to Kayla.  We love them all!  We love y'all!

House Hunt Part 2

Homes visited: 9
Interested: 2
Offers made:1
Offer status: Under contract!

 We saw a bunch of homes last Friday and found one that we fell in love with.  As we thought about it over the weekend, we liked it more and more.  So we went and visited the house again on Monday to make sure all of our stuff can fit because we have BIG furniture.  I don't know how we fit it into our small apartment, but one of our biggest problems has been finding places that are big enough to have our stuff and not feel cramped.  So we were stoked that everything fit. I found this kind of surprising because it's only about 780sq.ft. on both floors (there's a basement!), so it looks really small.  Looking at it from the outside, I still think it looks small, but when you walk it, it's all open and spacious.  Amazing!

It's got a big backyard for Kayla to play in with her future puppy.  It's got a separate 2 car garage that's big enough to store everything we need.  There aren't any major projects we need to do before we can move in (like a new water heater, roof, carpet, etc.) which is amazing.  We've seen some bad houses...but this one we can see ourselves living in.  It's in Orem, so a good location between our jobs.  And it has AC! No swamp cooler! Yay!  We can finally be cool in the summertime.

All in all, we're way excited about this house.  So we made an offer on Monday, they countered on Tuesday, and now we are officially under contract!  So if everything runs smoothly, we should be moved in by the end of July.

We've been so fortunate to find a house so quickly and one that fits our needs so perfectly.  I'm guessing some Divine Direction has been used, and I'm grateful for it.  I believe we're moving in the right direction.  Deciding to not go to California was a big deal for us, but we couldn't really see it working with the situation we're in.  Brandon can't be a intern, working 60-hour weeks with no pay for 6 months and no guarantee of a job offer afterward.  That just doesn't work for a family man.  Not to mention the cost of living there is practically triple compared to Utah.  All signs were pointing to staying in Utah, and especially now with a house, we'll be sticking around for the next little while.  I think it's a good thing. We're still close to friends and family.  And for right now, this is a good place to raise Kayla.  

We feel good about this decision.  And I'm so relieved we're no longer renting.  No more sharing walls with neighbors and having cold showers.  No more walking to the shack behind our place to do hopefully do laundry if no one else is using it.  No more having a parking lot for a backyard and heavy, loud traffic in the front.  We will have a place of our own.  Yes, there will be more work we'll have to do and more bills to pay, but they are ours.  We can make our own decisions about changing things in the house without asking permission.  We can buy the puppy I've wanted for years now.  We can.

So I guess to sum it all up, I'll just have to show a picture.

Yeah, we're pretty happy.  Yay for home-ownership!

More news to follow...

Animal Instincts vs. Civilized Society

For the next little while I'll be posting up updates about our house hunt, but not dedicate a whole blog post to it.
Homes visited: 3
Offers made: 0


Sometimes Kayla can be a real menace.  I think she's just got so much energy, she needs some sort of outlet.  Here are some ways in which she does that:

This is Kayla trying to help Brandon clean up the family room...

Doing laundry...

And cleaning up messes.


Sometimes, though, she can act like a real lady.  Don't believe me?

Just look at that pose! So cute! Or...

Pinky's up!  


But if that still doesn't prove it, here's one to illustrate that she really is meant to be in today's world:

But today's post isn't just about Kayla.  Today is Father's Day, so I want to talk a little about Brandon.  He just finished up his last class for school, so he is officially done!  He decided he won't be Walking in August, so we should be getting his diploma in the mail soonish.


It was also Brandon's first Father's Day, and I gotta say that he's one proud daddy.  He's such a good father.  He watches Kayla every morning so I can go to work.  He loves to play with her and make her laugh.  I fully believe she is a Daddy's Girl, and I think she will always be one.  Who wouldn't be with the kind of father she has?  He's amazing!


I was a Daddy's Girl, too.  My dad's been gone for 6 years now, but I still remember the good times we had together, all the precious moments I'll never forget.  I will miss him till the day I die.  I'm sad that Kayla won't get the chance to know him as she grows up, but she has another awesome grandfather that will dote on her, I'm sure.  We have an amazing family, and I don't want Kayla to miss out on any of it.


So Happy Father's Day to all those Daddies out there.  You're awesome!

Our Little Monkey

Kayla was born last year, the Chinese year of the Rabbit.  However, right now she's acting more like she's a Monkey.  Here are a few pictures to illustrate:

It started out innocent enough.  She wanted a little extra stability for her bottle.  So she's got a bit of Monkey feet.  And then...

She has a very strong grip, and she just wouldn't let go.  Believe me...Brandon tried.

This is one of her favorite spots in the apartment (the others being by the screen door and climbing the rocking chair).  Today she even got onto the ledge because that was higher than any other spot there.  If she sees something she could possibly get to, she'll go for it.  That girl is fearless.

And now she just gets into everything.  We can't contain her.  She is a free spirit, and she's got to climb higher and higher.  We love our little monkey.

The Hunt

So Brandon and I have finally decided to begin the journey that every responsible adult has to one day.  It's a graduation of sorts.  We thought we were doing pretty good when we got married and then when we had Kayla.  

But this is a completely different ballgame.  With the score set back to zero, and the players are people we haven't even seen but we know are real competition.  We have a fantastic team that will help us as best they can, but the final decision will ultimately be ours.

It's the biggest thing that will tie us down in Utah.  It's definitely the biggest thing we'll have purchased.  The biggest responsibility we'll have and the biggest risk if we can't make it.  It will be our biggest adventure yet.

Yes, my friends, we have decided to buy a house.  

We went down this road a few years ago, but things fell through when I lost my job.  It's all for the better now.  I have a great job with awesome people.  Brandon's done with school and is working on building his filming reputation.  I believe he's in a good spot to do that here.  Kayla's the joy of our lives and we want to find a home that will be best for her grow up in (for a while anyway).  And the housing market is better now than it was.  It's a great time to find a good deal.


We still have the same realtor that we used before.  He's great, and we know he'll find something great for us preferably out of Provo.  I've lived in Provo for 8 years now, and I feel a move is a bit overdue. 

We'll find a home with a yard so I can finally get a puppy that I've always wanted:

 A cute sheltie puppy that will one day turn into:







For something that will keep us in Utah for the foreseeable future, I feel like we're finally moving forward.  I can't wait to get started.

And so The Hunt begins again...


Wish us luck!