Start Spreading the Word...

For Thanksgiving we traveled to New York to visit my grandma. She had never met Rosalie and had been planning to visit for a while. When she realized that she probably wouldn't be able to make the journey here she was so generous and bought us tickets to come see her! She is the sweetest lady and it was wonderful to get to see her. My kids really warmed up to her and were so cute. I was worried about how they would do with this loud, old lady but she is so loving and kind that there were no problems!

One day we headed to the city and got to see so many amazing things. I am pretty sure we saw every toy store there, including FAO Schwarz. The big toys that they were advertising this season were Power Rangers. I am pretty sure that Vaughn thought he had died and gone to heaven. He also was able to meet the real live Spiderman and Iron Man. Does it get any better you ask? In fact it does, his Grandma and Grandpa caved and bought him an entire collection of overpriced Power Ranger action figures. (Rosalie got a Papa Smurf that is as big as she is!)

It poured and poured and poured rain in the city. Everyone toughed it out and made it all the way to Times Square (from the fashion district where we got to visit "Mood"). Finally I wussed out and begged everyone to eat at Bubba Gumps Shrimp Co. because I was tired and wanted to feed Rosalie. It turned out to be a fabulous decision (would you expect any less from me?). The food was wonderful. The waiters were so nice. And as you can see from the picture above, the view was the best. We got to look at Times Square the whole time we ate!!!

Rosalie turned ONE right before we left!!! We had a quick impromptu birthday party before we left and saved a bigger celebration for New York where we could get a cake from the best bakery in the world, Dortonis. Guy picked the cake which was AMAZING. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. I suggested to my mom that we buy pants a size too big before we leave and see if we could fit into them by the time we left. Seriously, the food there is so good. Bagels, cookies, cakes, pizza, BBQ, Seafood...

While there we helped my Grandma get ready to move. She is going all the way across the country to California. My uncle, her youngest son, lives there and he found a great place for her to live that is semi-assisted living. When he was trying to get her to move she was undecided until he showed her the brochure and she saw that there was a pool! That sealed the deal. My grandma is just the best little lady ever! She is a young 88 years old. It was such a moving experience to take my kids to see her and see them enjoy all that I did when I was their age. I'm not sure when we will get back to New York but these memories will last forever. (Sorry that sounded so cheesy but it's true!)

A long time coming...

Last night I opened my blog and I saw that my last post was September 1st! I couldn't believe it! I have been a terrible blogger. I get so frustrated when I want to know what is going on with someone and they haven't updated their blog. I guess that makes me a big fat hypocrite!

So much has been happening! My parents came to visit, our kitchen was renovated, Rosalie started crawling and Vaughn has been having a lot of fun!

I am having a heck of a time trying to get my photos to work today so I will just have to write and then you can look at all the pictures at the end. Sorry.

My parents had been planning a trip for a long time. It finally worked with everyone's schedule for them to come up so they could see our new house (and of course, their grandkids)! Vaughn absolutely adores them. It took Rosalie a while to warm up but once she did she only wanted them and I was pretty much useless!

Rosalie turned 11 months old and I am just praying that this next month goes by slowly because I can't imagine her being a whole year old! She is crawling and pulling herself up to stand! She tries to talk which is about the cutest this ever! She loves to sing whenever she hears music which makes the day fun and church very interesting! She and Vaughn are best friends and can play together for hours at a time. She loves Guy and refuses to be anywhere but in his arms when he is home. She loves to eat just about anything we put in front of her. She is very tall for her age and weighs a little over 20 pounds. She is very independent and curious during the day. She likes to do her own thing and explore the house which gets her into a few predicaments as the picture below shows!

We are all geared up for Halloween. Vaughn begged me to decorate so our house is full of ghosts, bats and spiders! I even put lights on the outside! Last weekend we went to buy pumpkins. Guy wanted to try to the fake carve-able pumpkins because he is always so proud of his pumpkin and he hates to throw it away. They actually turned out pretty well. The only downside is lighting them up because you can't use fire and we haven't found any lights that are bright enough!

I suppose the reason I have been so bad about blogging is because Guy's brother, Nate, died. It just feels weird to blog and not write about him but I don't really know what to say. He found out that he had leukemia and fought a good, hard fight for about five months! He was so young and had 2 young girls (one Rosalie's age) and a beautiful wife. I feel so blessed for our health and wonderful family but I also feel discouraged. The longer I live the sadder life seems. There is so much sickness and tragedy. I am fearful for what could happen to my family. I know that I shouldn't feel this way and I am sure it will pass but seriously, life is sad! He was only 33! I promise to be better about blogging because I want to record our stories and hopefully my next post will be a little more upbeat!

Close to crawling!

Rosalie is getting so close to crawling! Here is a picture of her getting up on all fours! I am not sure why she won't get on her knees but she prefers to stick her booty in the air! Vaughn is constantly by her and usually ends up blocking her rather than helping. I am not sure how I feel about her being mobile yet...

Holding On

Facebook has a new feature which tells you what your "status" was a year ago. A year ago today my status read, "Maggie is learning to let go"

I have to say that in some ways I think I have really come a long way in this. I have been able to move past things that bother me and accept many things I cannot change. I imagine when I wrote that I was doing the same thing I did tonight I put the kids to bed, without Guy. I waited for him for dinner but ended up eating Arby's by myself at 10:00 at night. I checked facebook, email and my new favorite blog Just for the Record. I used to loathe being alone at night but now I can usually embrace it. I am still not perfect at this but it's progress. Of course, I would prefer Guy to be home but this week he is on call.

Letting go isn't always necessary though. If you check that blog I linked to above, you will see the story of the sweetest little family. I didn't know them personally but have been touched by their story. Funny thing is, this week I have been trying to hold on to everything rather than let go. My days have been filled with extra hugs, kisses, stories, parks, rug time, kids shows and other things that seemed to have been looked over in the day to day shuffle. While "letting go" is a trait that has served me well for the past year, my status today will read "Maggie is holding on". I am holding on to the smell of my baby girl. I am holding on to the sound of my boy playing in his room way past his bed time. I am holding on to a husband who is working hard for our family and fills our home with love even when he is gone. I am holding on to my knowledge of eternal families. I am holding on to the peace, love and happiness I feel. And I am holding on to baby Ruby and her story so that I can be reminded every day that letting go isn't nearly as important as holding on.

God has a plan for me...

So much has changed in our lives the last 6 months. I have been amazed at how easy the transition has been. We have been in a little apartment. A new town that is busy, busy, busy with new people. A HUGE ward at church that is difficult to navigate. Few friends. No family nearby. Guy has been busy and stressed at work. Yet, it has been so peaceful for us. Life has been running rather smoothly. I keep waiting for a hiccup or set-back but nothing seems to come. Even on my hard days I am able to smile and laugh. I owe it to a lot of things, like my wonderful husband and Aspen Larsen. I couldn't have done it without my kids. I am so blessed to have them. I love being a mother. They keep me company and keep me busy and provide me with utter joy. But lately I have realized that I owe it to my Heavenly Father. He has a plan for us and I know that plan included taking us here. I know that he has comforted us whenever things got hard and lifted our burden so that we didn't feel it. Tonight I feel compelled to work harder on building a relationship with Him and work on strengthening my daily "gospel" habits. I know that life cannot always be this easy so I know that I need to have a strong support system ready for when this happens. I hope that this didn't ramble too long for any of you but I felt like I needed to share it tonight...

Goodbye June...

Hello out there!!! June was so busy for us! We got our house sold and it is officially out of our hands. It was great to have the first of July roll by and not have to pay a mortgage!!! However, I won't mind paying it next month if it means we are in our house finally! I want a yard so bad!

Our final picture at our Green River, WY house!

In June we went to close on the house and saw a couple of our favorite people from Green River. I wish that I could have brought them back with us. We also spent a lot of time with my parents and Guy's brother Nathan. Nathan is 32 years old and was diagnosed with Leukemia a couple months ago. He has been staying in Denver (away from his 2 beautiful daughters; ages 5 years and 8 months) and trying to get better. He is currently undergoing his 3rd round of Chemo and we are all praying this will be the key to him being healed! We love him and his family so much so if you would keep him in your prayers we would be so thankful!


We got to spend Father's Day with Grandpa Jack!


While in Denver we visited the Butterfly Pavilion!

Rosalie is almost 8 months old!!! Can you believe it? Time has flown by. She can now successfully roll any way she wants and sit up unassisted. She loves to eat pretty much anything and smiles constantly. At the last visit to the doctor she weighed 18.9 pounds!!! She is also very tall (although I don't have the statistics) and has long beautiful hair.


Rosalie and the flamingos at the Denver Zoo!


The most beautiful ballerina!

Vaughn is growing every day too. He is getting bigger by the second. We are still working on potty training and I HATE it! I must admit that it would probably go faster and smoother if I was more interested and energetic about it. He wears underwear during the time we are at home and does fairly well. However, whenever we go anywhere else I put on a Pull-Up and it is all down hill from there. Oh well, I am just trying to be patient and give it time.


Vaughn's favorite animals...the penguins!

Scuba diver extraordinaire!

Can I Still Blame The Power Outage?

I wish that I could blame the power outage for my bad habits with blogging. What power outage you say?? Somehow I always live in places where the extreme weather conditions are overlooked. Maybe because it is just the usual? I wouldn't know if that was the case around here because I have only lived here 1/2 a winter! But here are the details of the fiasco this winter -- can you call it winter if it is MAY??!!??
On Saturday morning we woke up with no power or heat. We are currently living in a townhouse provided by Guy's work and it is not the most efficient living quarters. In fact, it was so cold I think we could see our breath! Luckily, our friends live in a nice house that was better at keeping heat. And even better, Adam had a power inverter in his truck so we could watch TV, have a little light and live a pretty good life. However, it wasn't powerful enough to run a heater :( They also had a grill so we could eat warm meals! We are so thankful for them inviting us into their home for such an extended period of time! Here are some pictures of us trying to entertain ourselves:


Vaughn was quite the cook with his play-doh. Spaghetti anyone?


Me and miss Rosalie. She ran out of clothes so she borrowed some of our friend's little boy's clothes! I still think she is beautiful!


When it got really cold (or when we were getting stir crazy) we would pile in the truck and drive around. It was a good excuse to get out of the house and look at all of the craziness going on around town!


This is our street. Our house is the first one on the right. Luckily we got out early enough that we could drive out but when we went back to get some things it was too snowy to drive on. Even in Guy's big truck!!! Did I mention this was in MAY??


On Sunday we were still without power and feeling pretty dirty and sick with cabin fever so we decided to drive to Minot. We got a hotel and did some grocery shopping. Rumor on the street was that we would be out of power for the rest of the week so we also bought a couple generators to help keep our food cold and our babies warm! On the way to Minot there were power lines down almost the whole way! I heard one estimate that there were 1500 down! Even after the snow melted it took a while to get the power back.


Here is our hostess with the mostess, Aspen. Notice the smile on her face even though she had us staying with her until Tuesday1 She was a trooper and stayed positive the whole time. I am so lucky to have such a great friend here in North Dakota!
Now that you have heard my sob story of living like a pioneer, here is what else is going on with us:
Vaughn is completely pee potty trained...at home! He refuses to sit on a potty anywhere else. Also, he saves his poop for when we put a diaper on him at night. Silly kid. He is a trickster. But I still feel like we have made huge progress!
Rosalie is 6 months old! She is getting so big and cute! We love her to pieces. She can roll from her back to her front but has trouble going the other way. She starts occupational therapy next week to help strengthen her arms. Poor girl has some loose joints which prevent her from using her arms to roll or prop herself up.
We sold our house in Green River! We feel so blessed that someone made an offer and we close on June 17th!!! And with our house sold we got to start house hunting here! Just this morning our offer was accepted and this is our new house (well 1/2 of it, I couldn't get the whole thing in one shot). I also feel blessed that we were able to find someplace to live here that didn't break the bank. Housing here is nearly impossible to find!


Hopefully I will be better about blogging but with the warm weather and all the moving I can't make any promises!

Star Wars, Transformers, Toy Story...

...that is the kind of cake that Vaughn wanted for his birthday. I did my best to oblige: We had many themes this year! It is so fun to have a three year old because he loves everything! No matter what we did he appreciated it and thought it was so cool. We tried to give him a little something from everything that he likes and I think it was all a hit! He absolutely loves to dress up and play pretend. (I am sure there are some more masculine terms that his dad would prefer I use to describe this.) He also loves Star Wars so the Darth Vader costume was a big hit. He has already worn it several times and so have the rest of us!

Our great friends gave him a rifle (much to my mom's dismay) and he loves it. He still can't really believe that it is his and keeps asking if he has to give "Vance's gun" back.

Here he is with all of his loot. He made out like a bandit.

The best part of his birthday was that Grandma and Grandpa were able to come enjoy the whole week with us! We partied down and Vaughn was in heaven playing with his grandpa all day. It was hard to get a picture that showed how much Rosalie and my mom look alike but hopefully you can get an idea. They're both so beautiful and are twins!!!

I think my dad fell in love all over again. Rosalie became very attached and flirted with him every chance she got. He could soothe her better than anyone else!

It's hard to believe my baby boy is three!!! He is so fun to have around. He is pretty good with his sister and loves playing with his dad. He can drink more than anyone else I know and always eats all of his vegetables. I hope we have as much fun in year four as we did in year three!

The CIRCUS!!!!

Yesterday, our family went to the circus. It was so fun! With Guy's new job he was actually able to be home and come with us! We were feeling pretty lucky just to have him around but the circus was a huge bonus! Vaughn was absolutely mesmerized by everything! We stuffed ourselves with nachos, hot dogs, soda, snow-cones and cotton candy! Vaughn got a light up sword (which he calls a "light saver"). They had tigers, elephants, horses, camels, a bear, jugglers and trapeze artists. I can't even tell you how cool it was to have such an eventful family outing! Williston is treating us well!

We got there extra early so Vaughn could ride the pony! He loved it and rode for like 30 minutes! Unfortunately we ran out of money so he had skip riding the elephant (it was 20 bucks!).

Rosalie is getting so big! I think she looks like a toddler in this picture. I keep telling her to stop growing up but she just won't listen! At her 4 month appointment she weighed 15 and half pounds but I forgot to ask for the rest of her stats.

Vaughn is happy as a clam. Every now and then he asks for some of his favorite friends from Green River but otherwise he just loves playing around here. He likes our little townhouse and thinks playing on the deck is so cool. He has been going to gymnastics, tyke time at the rec. center and story time at the library. It's been keeping us busy but this town is booming with new people so it is hard to meet new friends! Luckily we had some built in friends (The Larsen's) so neither of us are too worried about finding new ones.

I love this picture of my kiddos! It's from a while back but I think they are so cute! I thought it was impossible to love one person as much as I loved Vaughn but now I love them BOTH that much. Funny how motherhood makes your heart grow! While I am feeling a little homesick for Wyoming (friends, family and a HOUSE!) I feel so blessed to be here! Heavenly Father has been watching over our family and I can see His hand in so many parts of our lives right now.

Conversation with a Toddler

Me: Goodnight, Vaughn.
Vaughn: Can I sleep with you?
Me: No.
Vaughn: Why not?
Me: Where would daddy sleep if you slept with me?
Vaughn: On his side of the bed.
Me: But that is where you sleep when you sleep with me.
Vaughn: Oh. I better sleep in here mom. Goodnight.

(I loved how he acted like it was his idea to sleep in his bed)

Also, yesterday I told him we were going to gymnastics. About 5 minutes later he came up to me and asked, "When are we going to gymbreadsticks?"
So stinkin' cute!

Mostly Pictures

I haven't had much time for blogging but today I have two sick kids. One baby girl is sleeping (I don't know how she can sleep and cough but she is managing) and a little boy just wants to cuddle up next to me and watch Toy Story. So, I decided this is a good time to catch up on February...

Guy has some skills when it comes to Rosalie. He can get her to burp in record time (it takes me a good 15 minutes) and she absolutely loves to sleep on him just like this!

We got to take a week and go to Williston to see our new living quarters! We also got to see our great friends, The Larsen's, who also live there! Vaughn found a new best friend in Vance which will definitely make moving easier.

Guy came home from work and fell asleep with Rosalie on the chair.

Vaughn still loves to hold his sister!

This was our Valentines dinner. I tried to stick with the "red" theme from years past but I was a little sick so it was not my best effort.

Our family at our Valentine's Day dinner.

I think this might just be the most beautiful baby in the whole world! She is soooo sweet! We love her to bits!

One night I got Vaughn ready for his bath....but before he would go in the bathroom he decided he needed to sit in his reading nook for a while! Who doesn't love reading in the nude?

Our superman-storm trooper-hooded superhero!

And last but not least...Guy had to go to Texas so my parents came for one last visit. We live at the top of a hill and Vaughn and my dad hopped on the sled and rode the whole way down.

As you can see, we have been super busy. Vaughn has been a riot lately! He is really changing (maybe getting ready for his 3rd birthday?) and he loves to make us laugh! Both kiddos bring us tremendous joy and our little family seems to be thriving! Hopefully this momentum can continue after the move!