A Quick Before and After

i've only been planning to freshen up my tv stand for a few years now...and finally came up with my plan and bought the gold paint six months ago..but i did it. i am pleasantly surprised with the results, and also learned i would probably die if i ever tried to chevron anything bigger than a tiny tv stand drawer.

please excuse the blurry after photo...not sure what was going on there.  

Tierra + Nate

My sister Tierra had a beautiful wedding last Saturday (the 9th) and everything turned out so great.  We are so happy for her and her husband Nate, and little Ryan. Nate was baptized back in October and we all can see how perfect he is for Tierra.  They are a perfect little family and we are excited for them to start this part of their lives.   

Tierra was absolutely stunning and was just glowing all day long.  She got married in the cutest little pioneer church which turned out to be perfect.  

Lola was the all time cutest little flower girl.

They had gorgeous appetizers after at the Grand Ballroom in Bountiful and then the cute babies joined us for the reception.  Look at Stella's amazing smile!

And since I forgot my camera, these are all of the pictures I got on my  phone.  Click here to see the GORGEOUS pictures her photographer got, like these two:

In the words of my cute teenage cousin, Ally, 'her fairy tale finally came true.'  I couldn't agree more.

Happy Valentines Day!

The holiday of love is fun when you're married and have a baby. Hope you all have a good one!

Thanks to my friend Nancy for setting up these cute pictures!

Time and Snow Days

I don't know how almost a month went by without a blog post.  I kept wanting to sit down and write, but every time I did the words wouldn't come.  It kinda seems like this happens every year around this time, I have lots on my mind but nothing at the same time.

Today I am so sad for a friend who is going through something so hard I can't even imagine.  And it seems that as I get older, I am reminded more and more that life sometimes is just hard.  Harder than it seems like it should be, and hard for so many of the people I love so much.   And while life is sometimes hard, even sometimes harder than we can imagine getting through, today I am reminded that life is also beautiful.  The simple things are so beautiful, and I feel so blessed to enjoy the simple things.

These pictures are older, from several weeks ago when we got a big snow storm.  It was incredible to me to go outside with Asher and watch him discover the snow for really the first time.  He was confused and amazed, excited and even frustrated.  I could see his mix of emotions as he explored and tried to figure out what all of this snow was.  It was so cute and so beautiful.

18 Months

How is my baby one and a half years old?!? 

Time continues to fly by and it is so hard to believe.  At 18 months Asher is the sweetest little thing in the world and I am lucky to be his mama.

Weight: 23 pound 8 ounces (20 percentile)

Height: 31 1/4 inches (25 percentile)

Head: 18.9 inches (65 percentile)

Asher is one content little boy.  He loves to read books, play and explore.  He is so good and so happy doing his own thing.  He is not a complaining kind of kid - he had two horrible ear infections at his appointment but I didn't even know because he still has been so content and sweet.  I thought he's just had a few colds. 

-He says his own name (Ay-yah) and pats his chest whenever he is talking about himself. It is just about the cutest thing ever.

-He is not a climber at all.  He doesn't even know how to climb up onto low couches or chairs.

-He loves all animals and loves to make the animal sounds.  He still loves his fish.

-He has learned to say "iPad" and asks for it just about every morning.  He loves watching Baby Einstein.
-He has crazy hair no matter what I do to it.  

-I think his favorite person in the whole world is his cousin Lola.  He can say her name and he is pretty much obsessed with her.  Nothing makes him happier than when they get to hang out.
-He is getting more attached to his both me and Marcus.  He loves to hold my hand and he likes to drag me around with him and always asks for me or Marcus while we're gone.
-He is getting a bit more possessive about his toys and sharing is hard!


We love our little Asher-man.

Christmas Celebrations

I did a pretty bad job at documenting our Christmas this year.  We had so much fun celebrating and watching Asher enjoy the day. I would say the highlight for me was watching him be so excited and thrilled about his new fish.  He couldn't stop talking about it, and I loved it.  At first he didn't catch on too much about the actual opening of the presents.  We had to help him open the first few, but once they were open he loved his new presents.  He was definitely spoiled by his grandparents, aunts and uncles and cousins.

We spent Christmas Eve at the Webbs and had a delicious shepherds' dinner, read the nativity, sang hymns and played lots of games.  Asher stayed up late and fell asleep talking all about "ish".  It was the first thing he talked about when he woke up too.

Christmas day we headed to my parents and were able to skype with Joe.  It was so good to see him and see that he's still our cute and goofy little brother, just working harder and being more responsible than he's ever been before.   We had a delicious dinner and had so much fun all together and exchanging gifts.

Thanks to Kate for snapping these pics.

As always we had a very, very Merry Christmas.

17 Months

Time continues to fly by.  Asher seems so old lately and seems to have turned into a little boy.  Just a few things I want to remember about him right now:

-He is taking a much longer nap lately.  He'll nap around 2 hours each afternoon and sometimes even more (while other times a little less...)

-When Asher likes things, he really likes them.  He becomes slightly obsessed and is always talking about them.  Right now he is obsessed with owls, ducks, birds, and cheese.

-He will sit and play by himself so well.  He has a really long attention span and doesn't mind playing by himself.  He loves his duplos and has learned to build tall towers and then take them apart one block at a time.  His other favorite toys are his cars and race track and balls.
-He absolutely loves to dance.  Anytime he hears music he starts stomping his feet, spinning in circles, and swinging his arms like crazy.  It is quite the sight.  I'm not sure who he gets his moves from...

-He is getting less picky again and will eat lots of things we eat.  His favorite food is cheese.  

-He says lots of words, but some are a little hard to understand.  He says: dada, mom, go, hi, cheese, fish, shoes, tree, water, juice, no, yeah.

-He loves making animal sounds.  If he doesn't know what sound it makes, he usually roars.  He knows what the owl, lion, tiger, bear, monster, dog, duck, bird, and monkey say.
-He communicates by making sounds (he says "mmm" when he's hungry, wants more food, wants to feed his fish, etc.), shaking his head (shaking his head no while saying "mmm" means he's not hungry), a few signs (all done and more), and is pretty good at getting his message across.
-He definitely keeps us on our toes but he is constantly amazing us and always making us laugh.  He is such a fun, pleasant little guy.