We have a Kindergartener!

Dawson started school this last Wednesday. He has been waiting for this day for over a year now... possibly longer. He was up before I even had a chance to wake him up. He showered willingly, got ready, got his lunch packed, and put on his back pack. 

I should tell you that before he started school we've had lots of conversations about school. He chose to go only half day (which I was SO grateful for). They don't offer it unless you request it as a parent. Only 6 kids out of the entire grade are half day kids. I love it! I love that he will ease his way into school. 

We also had a back to school night. Before we walked into the school, Dawson said, "I hope she isn't scary looking..." I didn't know what she looked like, so I could reassure him that she wasn't scary looking. We had only heard about how wonderful Mrs. Bunn was. It's the same teacher that my nephew Carson had last year. We walked into her classroom and were welcomed with love and happiness. I filled out lots of paperwork while Dawson did things with his teacher. It was so cool. After back to school night we left and once we got home I started to cry. Just thinking of Dawson not spending all day with me hit me hard. I am excited for him to learn and grow, but it was going to be a hard transition for me. 

Here is Dawson in front of his locker at back to school night. 

Dawson asked what was wrong and I said, "I'm just really going to miss you all day."

Dawson replied, "Mom, it's going to be okay. I'm only going to be gone for HALF DAY! ..... (pause)... but then when I graduate, I'm going to go on a mission and will be gone for lots of months. Then you will really miss me. But, I will talk to my missionary president and I bet he lets me see you. So it will be okay mom. And then I will go to college and you will miss me even MORE. But I can call you." He ended it with the sweetest hug and kiss. 

My reaction.... more tears. First, what 5 year old has their life planned out??? Second, what 5 year old fixes all my fears in one message? Third, I'm just beyond proud of him and his ability to solve problems and make me feel like the bestest mom. He is such a sweet kid. He reassures me he's only gone for HALF DAY. lol! 

Back to his first day of school........

I teared up on the way to school. Then we parked and I watched him play on the playground until the bell rang. Then it happened......the bell rang. Tears came again. I took him to his teacher and he lined up. All of the sudden, they all turned and waved goodbye. It was such a bitter sweet moment. 

 Dawson was searching for me.... 

 and then he looked right at me to wave. 

At 1:00 Monty and I were waiting by the front office for Dawson. He came around the corner and gave me the biggest hug. He said he had the best day ever. They learned sounds to the letters, went to the library, he ate lunch in the cafeteria, 25 kids got stung by bees (3 in his class), saw the computer lab and music room, and played a game. 

I'm so grateful that I get to be Dawson's mom and get to help him grow and learn. I want him to stay little, but at the same time I'm excited to see him grow up. He is the sweetest and most happy little boy. He is going to do so good in school. I'm so proud of you Dawson! I love you!

Monty is 8 Months

During this 8th month of life for Monty lots has happened. He started crawling about 11 days after we got back from Utah! 3 days after that his first tooth broke through! He is changing so much and is finally getting used to being back home and sleeping better. He has had it with baby food. He only wants the food we eat. SO, we are transitioning into theses types of food and he LOVES it!

Now that's its been a couple weeks of crawling, he is wicked fast. He hears my voice and follows me wherever I go. I love it! He tries to stink bug crawl across the laminate floors though. He doesn't like his knees touching the hard floor.

He is still a terrible sleeper. He wakes up so much. However, the last couple nights we have tried a different routine and it seems to be working out a little better. He isn't wanting to eat so much in the night. Hopefully we can get him sleeping through the night soon.

He still loves his bath time. He is an expert splasher, and loves to try and drink the water. His tongue just licks the water like a dog would... it's hilarious!

He loves to be outdoors, but with all the bee's and wasps, we've spent more time indoors recently. I am terrified of bees.

He is definitely a mama's boy as of now. He loves J.D. and Dawson, but he isn't a fan of strangers. He will scream and scream until he's in mom's arms.

He has become so much better at playing on the floor with toys. He is sitting for longer and not needing me to hold him every second of the day. I love to sit and play with him and give my arms a rest.

Monty is such a happy little boy. I love to watch him smile and laugh because he scrunches his little nose and opens his mouth so wide. His gummy smile is so sweet!

3 Weeks in Utah

On Monday, the boys and I hopped on 9 passenger plane from Glendive to Billings. It was a pretty bumpy flight; Dawson and I both got extremely nauseous. Monty did great! Once we had our feet on the ground, we were feeling so much better. It was here in Billings, we had to wait 2 hours until we could check in to our flight, and another 2 hours before we departed for Las Vegas. SO... we went and had some dinner and took are sweet time eating. This us at the restaurant in the airport. 

 Dawson was pretty ornery for some odd reason. He just wanted to get on another plane and not eat...Monty on the other hand was just pleasantly happy.

 The boys and I left a week before all the family events started so we could try and visit as many friends as possible. My mom had to work most of the week, so the first person we were able to see is the Ewells! Hunter and Dawson are only a few weeks apart in age, and they have SO much fun together. We got to see their new baby and they even caught a lizard!

 We spent every day that we possibly could swimming. I think out of 2 weeks in St. George we missed 2 days. WE LOVE SWIMMING!

 Monty LOVES the water and went hours without eating. He even fell asleep in the water while I was holding him because it was so relaxing for him.

 We headed to Cedar City one day and were able to visit the Coats'! Brynlee and Monty are 2 months apart. It was so funny to watch them interact.

 On Friday, Molly and Lucas came to St. George with their boys. Dawson loves his cousins! Tilden, Brant, and Dawson never stop when they get together.

 Brant wasn't one to stay long for lots of pics, but we got some fun ones. Dawson's arms were getting tired trying to hold Monty. :-)

 We went to the Children's Museum together in St. George. It was the COOLEST place ever! We could have spent HOURS in there. With limited time, we managed to milk a cow....

 and fly a plane....

 and then afterwards, we went out for lunch.

We ran a few errands and picked up some new PJ's that fit! Dawson will probably wear these ones out by Christmas....

 Our little man is growing so much. He slept so GOOD while on vacation. There is just something about Grandma's house that is so relaxing.

 The next week was the week of events... Jori's endowments, Jori and Danny's sealing, a baptism, and a wedding. The kids were so good with so much going on and the house being overloaded with people. Grammy got the kids lots of surprises for being good....

 Sunday, while everyone was driving to Utah, we drove to Panaca for a friend's baby blessing. We finally got to see baby Audrey; forget our friends, the baby was way more entertaining. :-) It was so fun to take a tour of the spec of a town that is somewhere near Area 51??? It was close, but I have no clue how close.

 While in Utah, Monty started these push-ups...

 I don't think I can even do this, and definitely not for as long as Monty could do it.

 Uncle Danny taught the boys how to play WAR! They played this every chance they got. It was so fun to have more cousins there to play with. Dawson was on cloud 9.

 We went to the splash pad and soaked up every drop of water we could.

 I caught a moment where Monty wasn't tearing off his hat. He could care less about getting splashed, he just wanted to soak himself.

 While in Utah we celebrated many birthdays. My brother in law Rick has the same birthday as my nephew Tilden. He is in the picture below. Brielle's birthday is the 29th, and it was her 1st! We left a surprise birthday note for J.D. since we didn't get to spend the 31st of July with him. Then Jetta's birthday is August 11th.

 Auntie Amy got lots of snuggles in with Monty.

 Wednesday was the sealing. It was the most amazing thing I have ever witnessed. It was so spiritual. Afterwards, we were talking and there were 3 people that I felt was in the temple with us. Turns out that my mom, brother, and Jori all felt those same 3 people too! Andee, Grandma Shelley, and our cousin Kim. It was pretty amazing.

We went outside to take pictures and I had left Layne in charge of Monty. He got him ready and everything! Thank you Layne!

 We had to get a picture of all the grandkids with their Uncle Matt.

 After a long day, we headed off to go swimming and found my Auntie Amy zonked out....

 We came back from swimming and found Monty and Grammy zonked out.

 and Layne soon fell asleep after.

 We got a cute pic of Grandpa and Monty the next day. Monty wasn't even scared of anyone. He just went to whomever and whenever.

 The kids loved holding him and snuggling. I think Monty loved it more. Bressie was such a big help while I was able to get time with all the other kids.

 By the end of the week we were getting pretty tired during the days..... Dawson started to want to do and use everything Monty did. So they slept in the pack n play together.

 Of course we still found time to swim at the end of the day. Dawson and Carson kept running and jumping off the side together.

 Thursday we went to Sari's bridal shower. I'm only 5 years older than Sari, so she has always felt more like a sister than a niece.

 We did tp dresses as a game. It was so funny! our bride was Matt's gf Tender. She was such a good sport.

 We secretly snapped a pic of Matt and Monty. These two look so much alike! Their baby pictures are almost identical.

 We left Friday for Holden. Tilden was getting baptized Saturday morning. It was so cool to be able to be there for him. Dawson kept talking about baptism and had tons of questions. I loved how excited he is getting for himself to be baptized.

 All the grandkids on the Stevens side except for Lynette's 3 kids.

 After the luncheon, we headed to Kanab for my niece's reception. We also were headed to pick up J.D. at the airport in Cedar City!!! Dawson is SOOO excited. We hadn't seen J.D. for 2 weeks!

 Here he is! We are headed over Cedar Mountain and we loved the scenery! We used to go on midnight drives over the mountain and go spotlighting every fall season. We were more excited to be with J.D. again.

On Sunday we headed back to Holden for a week. One of the first things we did together was  go see Andee's headstone. It was beautiful. It was our first time seeing it.

 Here are our 3 kids!

 That night our friends, the Shakespears, were on their way back up north and stopped to see us. We got tons of pictures of these two, Monty and Baylee Rue! They were born 3 days apart.... in fact, Monty was born on her due date! She was crawling and Monty still wasn't. Monty was pretty rough and kept trying to pull her hair..... sounds like a typical boy girl relationship. :-)

 J.D. had lots of sleep to catch up on. You'd think he would have gotten lots of sleep while we were gone, but he slept worse. We both sleep better when we are all together. In fact, J.D. sleeps better with kids in the bed with us...

Monty missed his daddy.

 We visited Grandma Marjorie every day! She had so much fun holding Monty.

 Monty just loves putting things in his mouth.... I thought this toy was big enough to play with...but he still managed to get it in his mouth.

 The boys played on all the equipment around.

 We even got a day at Yuba Lake! It wasn't crowded at all and we just relaxed by the water.

 It was pretty hard with Monty because he just wanted to eat the sand....

 Dawson was exhausted..... after weeks of events, traveling, and non stop playing.... he was exhausted and even more tired of pictures.

 One day we had spend a couple hours at the park in Holden. We got back and Monty was just fighting sleep. He wouldn't calm down. SO, Grandma finally just said, "Oh give him to me." He fell asleep instantly. She LOVED it!

 We finally got to spend time with Loni! Collins couldn't get enough of Monty.

 We went to Loni's house and she took family pictures for us. Collins let J.D. hold her while she went to sleep. It was so cute!

 Grandma Stevens was loving Monty. She loved to hold him and play with him. He thought she was so much fun! I'm so glad I got a picture of them together.

 Dawson spent hours playing with Destry and he awesome toys! She had the coolest little loft place with a huge set up of toys. It was seriously the funnest set up.

 As we left Holden, we stopped to say goodbye. Dawson gave Andee a hug. It was pretty heartbreaking, but tender and sweet.

We headed back to Utah for a day and flew home Monday. We drove 3 hours home and J.D. had to get up and work the next day at 5 am.... Once we got home we couldn't seem to get back into the groove of anything. We just missed Utah and the trip put a lot of things into perspective for us. It motivated us to work hard so we can move back and continue searching for more family oriented job opportunities. We can't wait to go back to Utah. I left there saying that I understood what Brigham Young meant when he said, "This is the place" when he looked upon the Utah Valley.