My little brother's married!

Congrats Jordan & Jaymie!!!!
My hand is still sore from my surgery so Im not going to put all the details yet but I will soon  I promise!

An opportunity to help another.

I have been following this blog The Sullengers ever since their Little girls accident. It grabbed my attention because Quinton had gone to school with part of their families. They are such an inspirational couple. Their Faith is so strong. Well on their blog they posted a link to another blog about a couple they have gotten to know who also lost a little girl. This family, the Websters are hoping to adopt in order to have the opportunity to be parents again. They are putting together a recipe book to sell to make some of the money they will need. They are looking for recipes from all over to include in this book. Its easy and only takes a few minutes. What an easy way to help another in need. Just go to their blog, The Websters and follow Kendras instructions. You can also read their story. I'm looking forward to the chance to purchase this recipe book!

Birthday girl!

Happy Birthday to our little Princess!!!

I can't believe it has been a year. It went by way too fast! She has been in such a hurry to grow up. Crawling at 5 months

 and walking since 7 months.

Sometimes Im afraid to blink. When I opened my eyes she might be a teenager!

The last year has been so much fun. Reagan is so full of energy its hard to keep up with her. Lets just say that Mt. Dew is a daily requirement!

When Reagan isn't causing mischeif she is trying on or changing her shoes, or being a great "mommy to her baby dolls,

We love her so much and feel so blessed to have her in our life

XOXOXOX

A nice reminder.

So I have seen this saying a few different places in the last couple of days,

 

"And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less."
- Anna Quindlen, Loud and Clear

Seeing how my baby girl will be turning one on September 2nd it kinda hit a soft spot.

It goes by all too quickly. It seems like she just came into our lives just days ago. Im having a hard time believing its almost been a year. We knew she would be our last baby but Im still having a hard time accepting that we are experiencing all these "firsts" for the last time. Anyone who knows me really well knows that Im a bit OCD about my house. If its a mess so am I, but this quote makes me wish that I had let things slide a bit & enjoyed it more. Before you know it they go from this:

To this:

in no time at all. It leaves you wondering where it all went, and thinking about how much of it was wasted on things  that didn't matter. As much as I would love to keep her little forever I do look forward to watching her grow up. She is definately destined for great things!

 

A Much needed break....FRIDAY!

After some very nice date nights we were ready to see all the things we had heard about in Seattle. Quinton got done with class at 12:30 so we had all afternoon to play! We rushed off to downtown to start our day off with a Harbour Tour . Let me add that before we left I printed off  directions on how to get to each location we were going to ( yes I am that OCD)  but in the end it was pointless. Every single time we ran into a road closed for construction. Well apparently there they don't believe in detours. We were left to figure out how to get around the construcion and still end up oin the right vicinity. I hadn't planned on the extra drive time so we finally found a parking garage, about 4 blocks away from where we were supposed to be, with only 10 minutes untill we were scheduled to board our boat! about 1 1/2 miles & only 10 minutes.... needless to say that that was the farthest & fastest I have ran in a long time. But we made it!

After our tour we headed for Pikes Market. So much to see there! It was very neat. Of course we had to go find the famous "flying fish". Which we did indeed find , but were too cheap to fork out the money to buy. After checking out hundreds of booths we found the Gum Wall. Unfortunately I'm not going to put up the pics of that. We thought we would be brave & add our gum to the wall but all the pictures showed just how disgusting it was! 

After the market and Dinner at Ivars came the part of the trip we were looking forward to all week long ( months actually!)

The Seattle Mariners Game!!!! Section 136 Row 8 . Really Great seats! neither of us had ever been to a MLB game but we decided that its something we will definately have to do again. But next time we want to take the kids with us. They would have been in awe. Something that every child should experience. Though after paying for the tickets and all the Mariners stuff that the boys requested ( My biggest "boy" was just as bad!) We may never be able to afford to go again! Its bad enough that Kale now has a goal to have as many team T-shirts as he possibly can. I tried to explain that your supposed to pick a favorite team and then you just need one.... didnt work. But he did decide that where his Mariners shirt & hat had Ichiro on them that he was his Favorite player, for now.

The mariners had a great game and won! after the game we took a slight detour of our own to Alki Beach to take a look at the City at night from across the Sound. Breathtaking!!!!

We had to leave early Saturday morning for the long drive home.  At this point we were ready to get back to the kids ( & we were out of money anyway!) We decided that someday we would take the kids with us and head back to experience some of the childrens museums and the zoo and Im sure another ball game. But Somebody please remind me ...... NEXT TIME WE GO BY AIRPLANE!!!!

A much needed break!

For the first time since having kids ( almost 9 years!) Me & my handsome hubby got the chance to go on vacation alone. So ok it wasn't really a vacation. It was a business trip but hey, close enough right????  Quinton was headed for Seattle to attend a Forensic Interview School & I decided to tag along. Neither of us had ever been there so we were very excited. And of course the fact that the City of pocatello was paying for the Hotel, rental, and a nice daily Per Diem made it that much better!  My cousins came up from Utah and Florida  to stay with the kids .They did such a good job that the boys didn't even want to talk to us on the phone & when we came home Reagan didn't even want to come to us . Kale cried because he was going to miss them. Now that's a sign of the perfect babysitter! It was so nice to not to have to worry about the kids. They were in very good hands.
The Very long 12 hour drive to Seattle was just that, LONG!!! Next time we are flying. But once we got close to Portland it was beautiful. Everything was so green & lush that you couldn't even see Portland! All you could see were the exits that seemed to dissapear into more trees. It was such a relief to finally arrive at our hotel. 
Quinton had to be in class untill 5:30 monday-thursday so I had to find ways to entertain myself. My days went mostly as follows; Breakfast, nap, a run , a good read and maybe even another nap ( yep I really am that lazy!)  I did venture out one day to the mall & some shopping centers. but mostly the lake by our hotel was the perfect spot to veg out , read & people watch.

Monday night we went to the Space Needle. We even decided to enjoy dinner at the Sky City Resteraunt. Neat experience! We took in the whole city while eating a nice (aka expensive!) meal while our floor rotated.

We then went to the upper deck to get some pics...

After dinner we still had a while until we had to get the car from the Valet so we walked down to the pier for our first chance to see the water. Downtown Seattle was my first experience in a very large city so I took everything in. So Many apartments, condos & penthouses! & here I was thinking that our house was too close to our neighbors.
Gorgeous sunset on the Pier....

Most evenings were spent just enjoying each others company. A Nice dinner ( without kid menus and highchairs!) and  checking out a few of the local beaches & Marinas.

After some relaxing easy paced days we were ready for FRIDAY!!!!!

Ughh....SO NOW IT WORKS!!!!!!

Apparently it works now that Ive lost all my loooong post & have to redo them. Sorry!  Just ranting.
New fun posts coming soon!!!! ( hopefully)