7 Years

Happy Anniversary Jared!

I love you so much more today than I ever thought possible! You are such an amazing husband, friend, and father that I sometimes sit back, look at my life and wonder what I did to deserve all that I have. Thank you for supporting me and loving me always! You have always been the one...ever since 1st grade

I LOVE YOU!!

Chase's 1st Birthday Parties

I cannot believe that my baby is already a 1 year old! It seriously makes me so sad and happy all at the same time!

We had two parties for him: one on the actual night of his birthday with just us and my mom and sisters, and then one the following Saturday with Great Grandma, Grandma, Mimi, Pops, Aunts, Uncles, Cousins and friends. About 20 people in all!

Everyone had lots of fun celebrating Chase's first year!

I had to work the day of Chase's birthday but before I picked him up, I went home and blew up a bunch of balloons for him to play with! I think he had fun being surrounded and walking through all of the balloons!

That night, Brody helped him open presents!

He got a toy train and an inflatable bus with those plastic balls to throw all over the house!

Then it was time to sing Happy Birthday and eat cake! He was so sweet trying to blow out the candle!

And the fun mess begins!

So nice of him to share with Daddy!

Now he's really getting into it! I loved how he just went for it!

The aftermath! Chase was in heaven...we had to pry the cake away from him!

Straight into the sink to get cleaned up!

This was at his Saturday party. We did a monster theme since we call him monster. So that's the crazy balloon looming above him :)

We went with white cake this time...chocolate doesn't look quite as appetizing when it's smeared everywhere!

Then it was time to open more presents!

Chase did a pretty good job all by himself!

He didn't want to wait for me to get his little scooter out of the box, he was ready to ride!

Chase at 1 year:

• weighs 23 pounds
• is 30.5 inches long
• started walking well at about 1 week before his birthday
• has two bottom teeth and a top one is trying to poke through
• says momma, dadda, bubba (Brody), hi, bye, more, bite, tickle, look it (points to everything and is so curious)
• makes truck, dirt bike, and airplane noises
• loves to play Patty-Cake
• blows kisses (so super sweet)
• loves to cuddle and give hugs and kisses
• absolutely loves playing with Brody...it's one of my favorite things to watch
• loves singing and dancing to music
• eats anything and everything
• loves being the center of attention
• when wiping his face or brushing his teeth, he gives hugs to avoid doing it...total pain in the butt, but it's hilarious!
• loves to do things to make people laugh

Chase is just such a loving little guy. His personality is really growing and we are so grateful that he is in our lives! He is a true blessing and we love watching him become such an incredible little man everyday! WE LOVE YOU CHASE!!

Happy 1st Birthday Chase!!

Chase's birthday was yesterday, the 9th, and I feel guilty that I didn't get a post up the day of. So here is a quick teaser picture of our fun night! More to come soon!!

We love you Sugar Bear!!!

I'm In Trouble...

with this second son of mine! Chase is at the wonderful age of testing out his limits and he does more than his fair share right now. He knows exactly what he shouldn't do and then does it and just looks at me to see what I'm going to do about it. So today, I caught his reaction to me saying a very firm and frowny-faced "NO!"

I mean, really, how can I possibly say no to that face?!?!?!?! So like I said...I'm in trouble with this one!

Our Winter Weekend Getaway

Last Sunday we drove up to Mt. Charleston to play in the snow. It was so much fun that I think we are going to go up every weekend!! It's only an hour out of town but it feels like you are so much further from Vegas, it's great!

Getting Chase ready for the snow :)

Brody all decked out and ready to go!

Yeah, it looked a little strange with the stroller in the middle of the snow, but it worked!

I love pictures of Jared with the boys taken from being behind them. There's just something so special to see him holding hands with his son!

Getting ready to zoom down the hill!

Brody's expression is priceless!! So much fun!

Brody wanted so badly to ride with Chase all by himself...maybe next year :)

I LOVE this picture!!

My sweet sweet Sugar Bear

Me and my snow boys!

We love Mt. Charleston!!

Christmas 2008

Christmas was so much fun this year with our two boys! Jared and I were up until about 2 am getting everything ready for Christmas morning so we were pretty tired. But once I was in bed, I couldn't go to sleep because I was too excited!

Jared and I woke up at 7:30, before the boys, and once again, were too excited to sleep! We waited about 30 minutes and then had to go wake up Brody and Chase! We had such a great Christmas with our family!

This is Jared and I waking up Brody! Isn't it supposed to be the other way around?!

The first words that groggy Brody said were, "Did Santa come yet?"

Coming down the stairs and getting the first glimpse of all the presents!

Of course Brody went for the biggest present first :)

I'd say Brody is pretty excited about his doctor kit from Santa!

Chase was sooo tired all morning...we probably shouldn't have woken him up so early!

Brody helping Chase unwrap his presents. He was so excited for Chase to unwrap the gift he picked out for him!

Chase LOVES music so he got little drums and a piano

Here's Brody on his Smart Cycle and Chase trying to hitch a ride!

Las Vegas Marathon

On December 7th, Jared ran in the Las Vegas Marathon which is 26.2 miles and the half is 13.1 miles. Jared ran the half and did awesome!! He decided only 4 weeks before that he was going to do it and most people train for months before running it. The furthest he had ran prior to the marathon was 7 miles. Jared was thinking that best-case scenario, he would finish in 2 1/2 hours, worst-case scenario would be that he would get pushed to the sidewalk because they open the strip back up after a certain amount of time.

Jared, Brody and I stayed at the Excalibur on the strip the night before so that he would be right there in the morning and so that Brody and I could hopefully meet him at the finish. The marathon started at 6 am at Mandalay Bay, went all the way down the strip, downtown into the ghetto and all the way back! You get a chip that tracks your time because with 9,000 people running all at once, you don't get moving very quickly until further along. Jared said that it took him about 10 minutes to actually get to the start line after the time had begun!

Brody and I headed to Mandalay Bay around 8 am. We found a spot right at the finish line and kept an eye out for him. I was thinking that he was either going to finish with a really good time or finish at the very end! I knew he would finish no matter what, though. As Brody and I are watching people finish, I started to get worried. People were crossing the line with the most awful, painful expressions on their faces, like they had barely made it and were about to pass out! I was nervous only because Jared hadn't really trained for 13.1 miles of running!

All of a sudden, here comes Jared blazing across the finish line!!! We were in the perfect spot and I was able to yell his name and he saw us right away! It was seriously one of the coolest things I have ever seen and I was so proud of him!! Jared made his way through all the people and gave us big, sweaty hugs! The first words out of his mouth were, "That sucked! That was the stupidest thing I've ever done!" But then after about 10 minutes, he was already talking about the next marathon that he wanted to run! Jared's official marathon time was 2 hours and 33 minutes!! He did so awesome!! He ran the first 8 miles without stopping or walking once and then just kept pushing himself to finish! I knew that he would finish, but I didn't know that he would do it in such a good time! Jared ran his very first marathon within his best-case scenario time!

Waiting for the marathon to start

Fireworks before the marathon

The start/finish line

I think he found every camera along the course

Look at him go!

Yay Jared!!!!

Where Are We?!

This is the question I was asking myself the whole time I was driving home Thursday morning, December 18th, after being stranded at my mom's house in Boulder City the night before due to a snow storm!! There was snow EVERYWHERE and semi trucks lined up along the roads from my mom's house to our house in Henderson! They had to pull over the night before because roads were shut down! It was seriously like what I have seen on the news about the towns back east that get hit with horrible storms and there are vehicles just abandoned everywhere. I couldn't believe that this was Southern Nevada!

Here's our snow story:

I left work 30 minutes early, at 1:30, on Wednesday, December 17th because it had started to snow and I knew the roads and traffic would be crazy. Never did I think they would be as crazy as they ended up being!! I made it to my cousin's house by 2:15 and thank goodness I left work when I did! If I wouldn't have left early, I don't think I would have made it to Boulder to get my kids and then I would have really been freaking out! By the time I got the kids loaded up and ready to leave, the snow was coming down like crazy! I had just left my cousin's house when she called to tell me that she heard Railroad Pass was closed. I was already very leary about driving home because my truck was almost impossible to drive in the snow. I turned around and was going to head back to my cousin's house but I thought I would try to call Jared to see how to make my truck drive better. It's not 4-wheel drive and needs new tires but I thought maybe I could put it in a different gear or something and that would help. He told me to put the rear-differential lock (whatever that is) on and try that. But the only snag with that is that it makes the truck harder to turn!! So now I am slipping all over the road AND unable to turn!! What the??!! I was going to try to make it home until I had turned (well, tried to turn) down a street and totally would have taken out cars if there had been any there. I was on the otherside of the road, up against the curb! Now I was pissed and scared and decided that I had to just go back to my cousin's and wait for the snow to stop. The snow never stopped.

After being at my cousin's for about an hour, I called my mom to come pick us up so we could go to her house and wait it out. I wasn't even going to attempt to drive my truck the short couple of blocks to her house. So for the rest of the night, we were watching the news, hoping that we would be able to go home. Meanwhile, Jared was driving home from Moapa! So on top of stressing about not being able to get home, I was terrified that Jared was out on the snowy roads. He actually made it home in about 2 1/2 hours but I was still stuck in BC with the boys. We ended up just staying the night because my mom kept in touch with her neighbor that was trying to get home. The neighbor had left work, which was at the Venitian on the strip, at 3:30 and didn't get home until 10:15! It took her 6 hours and 45 minutes to get home!! I guess it was good that we didn't attempt to get back to Henderson.

So we woke up the next morning and finally made it home. Jared had driven out to Boulder just to make sure that everything was open and safe and took us to get our truck. He saved us! After getting home, we could finally enjoy the snow so Brody and I played in it while Chase watched from the garage. It was lots of fun, I just wish I could have enjoyed it all from the comforts of my own home. Thank goodness everyone was safe on that crazy night!!