Gage's 2nd Birthday!!

We were so blessed to have lots of our family over for a big Birthday Party!  Gage had so much fun and we are so happy to have him in our little family.  I can't believe he is two already.  Time flies.

 We had rootbeer and he was fascinated by the dry ice.

Gage absolutely loves the Muppets.  He will randomly sing songs from it.  "Me Party" and "Am I a Man or a Muppet"

Camping

We went camping in the beginning of June with Trav's parents and sister, Erin.  It was a lot of fun and wasn't so bad once we fixed the air mattress problem. (Not fun to be seven months pregnant and sleeping on the hard ground.)

Our Fifth Wedding Anniversary

Our anniversary was in May. We went to Olive Garden for lunch and then went up the canyon.  Unfortunately, we were all alone so Trav and I never got a picture of us together.  At least we have some of us with our favorite little man. 

Gage is addicted to Grandpa's four-wheeler.  He wants to ride it every chance he gets.

It's About Time...

I decided it was about time I added some photos to our blog.  So here are just a few that I liked.

Our new house.  We love it.  More pictures of the inside to come later because I don't want to take pictures of a dirty house.

I suspect Trav really enjoys taking care of our new yard, even though it is in rough shape and will take a few years for the grass to come back completely.  Gage likes to help too.

We've been doing quite a bit with my mom and sisters.  Here are the older cousins at the Tulip Festival.

We also went to the zoo a few weeks later.  Gage is crazy!

I love getting pics of all the kidos

I'm very proud of this picture even though Gage has a weird face.  I was grateful to have gotten this picture at all with how busy this little man is.

Hop Hop, the newest addition to our family.  It was living in my inlaw's yard/pasture area and the neighbors got tired of it eating their plants.  Trav's Dad and brother rescued it from a gruesome death and put it in our backyard while we were gone.  Gage fell in love so we kept it. Gage named it too.

He loves this bunny.

This photo is a few weeks late but here are the men hard at work taking out my parents kitchen.  It looks nothing like this anymore.  Right now there is no floor or ceiling or walls to speak of.

Mommy!

Lately, I've been struggling a lot, with a lot of different issues. The fear that something is wrong with the baby or that we might lose him/her altogether. The stress of trying to budget with a completely new set of bills. The indecision of where to put what in our new house. And the

biggest, the fear that I'm not being a good mom to Gage because I've been so stressed and sick from the pregnancy. I feel like I don't know who I am anymore.

Gage has been very sick this passed week. It's made it really hard on me because it is one more stress on top of everything else. He has been very demanding and has been crying a lot (not like

him at all). For several days when I wasn't sitting with him, he would follow me around saying "Mommy" over and over. I got to the point where I was so tired of that name.

I've been thinking a lot lately about how I really don't know who I am or what I like anymore. I've read a lot of crazy articles about how motherhood is so hard and how people who don't have kids are happier in the here and now. Maybe that is true. Mommy is all I am now. But as I've thought about that specific thought, I can find happiness.

"Mommy" is who I am.

It may be hard, stressful, worrying, and downright impossible sometimes, but then there are the moments that make it okay. The hugs and kisses from a sweet, genuine little boy who knows

that I'm not feeling well and wants to be with me anyway. The musical sound of his laughter at who knows what. That smile that can melt a hard and stressed out heart. And, yes, the repeated saying of "Mommy" over and over. I would rather have those events in my life than anything else.

It is hard being a mom. I know I'm not going to get over my feelings of stress, fatigue, etc. In fact, its going to get a lot harder with a new little one added in. But I can remember who I am. I am 'Mommy!' I mean the world to a little boy who wants/needs me all the time. And he is the most important thing in my life right now. Everything else will work out. Everything will be okay. I'm his mom and in his eyes that makes me a superhero.

Funny!

Here are a few more fun conversations from Gage.

One of my favorite things that he says right now is "Funny." If he thinks something is funny he laughs and says, "that's funny."

We gave him some Sprite for the first time last week and he kept saying how funny it was. He was laughing like crazy and loved it.

As some of you may know, we are expecting baby #2. I'm not super far along only about 11 weeks. But Trav asked Gage if we are having a boy or girl. Gage very seriously looked at us and said, "boy." So we asked him what his name is, and he said "Tate" which is actually a name I love but Trav still needs some convincing. We asked these questions several times and he is adamant that we are having a boy and his name will be Tate.

Funny!

New Phrases brought to you by Gage!

Gage is talking up a storm lately so I decided to post some of our favorite conversations.

Daddy: Gage are you ready to go night night?

Gage: No!

Daddy: Why not?

Gage: Cuz!

(I don't know where he got that one because I don't think either of us say that.)

Gage: I wanna watchit!

Mom: what do you want to watch?

Gage: Yeah!

Mom: what do you want to watch?

Gage: Woody! (toy story)

Mom: you want to watch Woody?

Gage: Yeah!

Mom: Are you sure you want to watch Woody? (we watch it ALL the time)

Gage: Po! (Kung fu panda)

Mom: You want to watch Po or Woody?

Gage: Woody!

Mom gets Toy story out to put in the dvd player. Gage, of course, sees other movies he likes.

Gage: Hammy! (Over the Hedge)

Mom: you wanted to watch Woody.

Gage: No, Hammy!

Mom: You want Hammy not Woody?

Gage: Woody!

You can understand where the conversation goes from there. Eventually, I just put Toy Story in because I was tired of getting the run around.

At the moment I can't think of any other funny conversations we have. He says a lot of sentences too, but my mind is drawing a blank. I'll post more when I remember them.

Crazy Life...

Our lives have been so crazy lately, and not just because of the holidays. Today we are waiting to hear whether or not the house that we want to buy will appraise the way we need it to. It has been a long hard road but if everything works out today then we may be able to close next week. So in order to distract myself I decided to spend some time uploading our Christmas photos. Here they are in no particular order whatsoever:

This is my family. Both of my brothers and their families came for Christmas this year. It was the first time we've been all together since my parents came home from Argentina two and a half years ago.

This is Gage opening a present at Grandma and Grandpa's house. He loved opening gifts.

Trav's brother Brent and his beautiful wife Stefenee

Gage loved opening presents on Christmas morning. He slept really late so we had to hurry him along so we wouldn't be late for church.

Checking out the stockings. We gave Gage a stuffed Elmo toy and he wouldn't put it down.

My two cute boys.

Christmas Eve Nativity (Gage knelt down to kiss baby Jesus)

The angel (beautiful Addie Rae) comes to the Shepherd (my bro Dan) and his cute sheep (little Jack)

Jack made such a cute sheep

Here's the cute gang looking to Opa for what they're supposed to do next

My Gorgeous Sister Jenni and beautiful Angel Addie Rae

Mary and Joseph (Claire and Eric) Eric took his part very serious

Gage was getting really tired

Oma and Opa with ALL the grand kids. This was the best picture we could get. And we have Jenni in there as a bonus.

We hope everyone else had a wonderful holiday too. We'll let you know how the house business goes as soon as we know something.

For Our Idaho Friends

Here are just a bunch of picts of Gage for our friends in Idaho who wanted more.

For Halloween, Gage was a Construction worker. We drew a goatee on his face like his daddy.

A few Pics for your Amusement

Sorry it has taken so long for me to post. I've tried several times to post pictures from our new camera and have finally figured it out. I have to do smaller uploads because the files are so huge. Anyway, rather than try to upload pics from everything this past summer and fall, I'm just going to do a few and try to start updating more often from here on out.

Next to Grandma and Grandpa's house there are some horses which Gage loves. He calls them "Nays"

I love this kid. He is absolutely hilarious.

Gage love tools and plays with his toy drill all the time.

Gage has a stuffed dog called"Puppy" that he has to sleep with now. He LOVES Dogs. At the store yesterday, a lady had a small min pin and Gage cried when we had to leave because he wanted the "puppy!"

I had to throw this one in because I am crazy about birds right now. I love pictures and statues etc. of them. We went up to the foothills and took some pretty fall pictures and Trav got this pretty one from the car.

Chasing Gage is my life right now. He is the funniest most active little boy ever. I love him like crazy.