"House" Painting

When moving into my Mom and Pauls house it was inevitable that I was going to have to eventually paint all the walls, nooks, and crannies. That's my nature. I paint things. Especially anything that is the color of "wood". So, in our attempts to make this a fun family activity we invited the girls a long to help....buuuuut, I'm not that dumb as to just give them a brush and let them have a go at it. I found some little wood blocks and some colorful paint so they had a project too.

Riley was super meticulous and made sure each and every part of her blocks were covered. I'm sure she had some kind of great idea to do with the blocks once she was all done with them. I should have known that the other 2 itty bittys would have more paint  end up on their little bodies than anywhere that it was intended to be. Luckily for them they look so gosh darn cute with paint all over them--so out came the camera.

MoNkEyInG ArOuNd

My poor husband does not have any little boys to grow up and become world renown soccer stars. He also doesn't have any girls that will do that either (Although, Bia might turn out to be our little soccer diva).

So, it was only fate that when daddy invited us to watch a soccer game for the boys that he coaches--the girls would want to end up walking across the field to the playground.

And I HAPPENED to have my handy dandy camera with me to catch some cute girls on film...ok, ok, I know, I always have my camera on me....enjoy some pictures regardless.

Our little Pooch

We said some tearful and sad good byes to our little pooch. Sophie was hit by a car and unfortunately passed away. Luckily for her- she seemed to have been killed right away instead of suffering a long time. Her best bud Riley took it pretty hard and clung to her collar for weeks upon weeks after.
We loved our little Sophie dog. She was a good one. Grandpa Glen is probably enjoying her up in heaven as they go on nice little excursions up there.

A Decade...uh...WHAT?!

My sweet little baby girl turned 10 this year.

no, no, no, no, no...that's a typo...

10?!?!?!?!

THAT IS A DECADE

THAT IS DOUBLE DIGITS

THAT IS COMPLETLEY......depressing.

*moment of silence whilst I sob*
I will continue to try and type through the pain and agony I feel at this moment in time.

My little beauty has been nothing but a beacon of light in my life. What a lovely blessing and example she is to me every day.

We started her day off with her favorite breakfast: Scrambled eggs with peppers and onions, bacon, and strawberries with whipped cream.
Being that I'm truly that lamest mother in the whole world- I then made her go to school.

For months upon months before her birthday she kept telling me she wanted a pink stripe in her hair. Every time she asked I would simply reply "ask for your birthday" thinking surely by the time her birthday came around she would have forgotten (The girl makes thousands of birthday lists every year)

However....that was the one thing that remained on her silly little list. ugh. So sure enough--one of her gifts was to get a pink stripe (I justified it because the coming month was National Breast Cancer Awareness month).  Well-Auntie Jessiy showed up just in time for us to convince to get a pink stripe too....then Zo wanted in on the action. So everyone got a pink stripe (Besides me--I had some sense still in my itty bitty brain).

I love my quirky 10 year old. I love her "isms" and her infectious laugh. I only hope that the next 10 years go by at a snails pace instead.

 

 

 

Some New Friends

It only seems fitting that if you live on a ranch (yes, that's what I'm calling our home....you may all pretend it has cows and horses and chickens--but really it's mostly dust) that you have some of the critters that go with it.

After years, and years, and years...and more years of pleading Berns and I finally caved into letting Riley (and the little girls) get a kitty. There were just 2 conditions:

The kitty had to stay outside
The kitty had to eat the mice that would invade my home if I didn't get said kitty (country living for ya).

So being the fantastic grandma that Grandma Nisey is--she decided to ship on over not 1, but 3 kitties--because obviously we needed 1 cat for each child that resided in the house.

And being the absentminded-not-very-smart pregnant person I was, I decided to add to the mix a little Bloodhound puppy that I have always wanted...you know, cuz Sophie needed a friend.....

So on top of the following family members:
Berns
Shea
Riley
Zoie
Bia
Baby
and Sophie

we now also have:
Pickle (the puppy)
Sadie
Watermelon
Fuzzy

Oh Boy....

Now I have a farm.

Laboring Away

Labor Day 2012

Ok, if you're gonna insist I take a day off from the world and rest from my labors (which I thought that's what I did every Sunday) I SUPPOSE I'll cooperate and go on a vacation in the process.

Oh, well, ok, Labor Day isn't specifically set for me--but I can pretend. And so I did. We packed up our belongings and toddled over to my sister's house in Lehi to spend the long weekend with the cousins. Nothing fancy schmancy--just some parks, and trampolines with sprinklers--but any excuse to go visit the cousins is an excellent one to have.

Pre-K Take 1

Our lil Zozo started preschool. She could not be more thrilled. She packed her backpack up with who knows what. (and preschool kids don't need anything--except a lunch.)
Durango has a problem with not having enough daycare and preschool- So every place we tried to get Zoie into school had a wait list.
Berns was driving to Cortez everyday for work so we found a preschool for her there.
She was so excited! I can't believe this little peach is big enough to learn her 1-2-3's and A-B-C's. *silent sob*- kids growing up is just dumb.

Last year

I quietly sobbed a little inside. This is my little girl...who started 5th grade. yup, 5th grade. The last year of elementary school.
The last year of recess.
Last year of field day.
Last year of one classroom, one teacher.
Last year of cute classroom decorations.
THE LAST YEAR.

She's thrilled. I silently sobbed.

But here she is. My little tweenager. And she's growing up. And. I. Hate. It.

Architect

I have dreams of building my dream home--a rambler--with a basement. 5 bedrooms. A library. A seriously sweet craft room. Oh, and a room made out of trampolines.
And a built in diet coke fountain.....ok...maybe not- but definitely a fridge that spits out niblet ice.

And I found my contractors. These two:

My house is gonna be epic.

Not Ok

This little peanut turned 2. TWO! T-W-O! Seriously?! It’s down right mean how fast my little nugget is growing. But she is perfect in every way—a little onery, but perfect.

About this nugget:

           Beezer loves Mickey Mouse and his friends. Loves them. Would probably prefer living with them over me.

2.      The little peach doesn’t like anything that is semi healthy for her. She wants nothing but sweets (don’t worry, we are working on that one!)

3.       Little miss is EXTREMELY opinionated. She will definitely let you know if something is happening that she does not agree with.

4.       She loves strawberries. A lot. Almost so much that an intervention might need to take place.

5.       She’s a momma’s girl. Hands down.

We love our little Bia Bird, Beezer, Bia Tortilla—she makes me smile every day.  I’m so glad she is ours and we get to snuggle her and squeeze her any time we please. Happy Birthday little miss. Youre the bees knees.

Durango Livin'

My favorite time of the year in Durango is its summers. Well, maybe, I kinda love late spring and fall too. HATE winter…but can tolerate it knowing that the other lovely seasons will soon follow.

We moved to Durango during my favorite time (which is a good thing, because if we would have moved in the dead of winter I would have told Berns “No way, we are going back to the desert”.

Berns’ brother Felipe and wife Mariana came for a visit and we decided to take a stroll down by the railroad tracks and enjoy the beauty that Durango is. Up until now we had been so busy with summer camps (me teaching them) and trying to adjust that we never really took time to “smell the roses”.

It was time. By golly! It had been almost 2 months and I had yet to take the girls exploring. We wandered over to Gazebo Park (I have no idea the real name) and the girls enjoyed looking for snakes and walking along the river. Everything was so lush and green and deliciously beautiful!

I love Durango. End of story. It might be one of the happiest places on earth—someone should tell Mr. Walt. 

Bia Bird

This girl. Love her to bits. The End.

Glory Days

Once a year Berns gets to relive his college glory days and go back to him home field and attempt to outplay the current team. And now that we live back in Durango it was easy for him to make it to this years' Alum game!

My ever so lucky husband has the most ridiculous annoying metabolism ever. EVER. The kind that makes you want to punch him. So, it's easy to be fooled when you look at him and think he's in just as good as shape as he used to be.

He's not. (love you honey).

He still looks the same...but can't play the same. And he knows this--So he told everyone his goal was to last 5 minutes on the field.

But because my husband is also a rock star he lasted an entire half! *clap clap clap, whoop, hollar, yahoo*

The girls had a good time watching their daddy kick a ball around. I enjoyed watching him run around in his white uniform (my favorite. lovely. soccer players in white.)-- and he enjoyed getting SCHOOLED by the new team. I don't recall what the final score was--but I think along the lines of Alum:1  Fort Lewis Men's Soccer 2012: Eleventy

The Kessley

Riley Aspen-- have you heard of her? The cute lil lady that is 9 years old? You know, the one that looks like me? --This little lady has had a wild and crazy imagination since she came screaming into this world.  Her thoughts and stories are constantly flowing--I can't even keep up.

When we moved to Durango she was excited because her 2 best friends lived there! Little Miss Jessica Harris and Kiersten Landford. Once we got there, Riley's little gadgets in her mind starting turning. She got together with her little buds and decided they wanted to put together a restaurant. They were going to be the servers AND the entertainers--and good ol Grandma Nisey got to be the cook.

The girls spent a couple weeks planning what they wanted the menu to be and passed it on to the chef (Good ol Grandma Nisey is always the greatest for always doing things like this for them! Especially in a HOT kitchen in the dead of summer!).

The morning of the restaurant Riley went to work making the sign--they called it the "Kessley"--apparently that is part of all 3 of the girls names (Kirsten, Jess, and Riley). 

When it came time to serve, Zoie was feeling a little left out and decided to dress up and enjoy the "fun" of waiting on people.

It was such a cute fun evening. I love my little imaginative Roo and the little wonders she brings to our every day lives!

 Work it girl

 Our servers. Arent they all just FABULOUS!?

 The Kessley--If youre lucky maybe it will show up again some day.

 This little peanut walked around greeting people

The crew and the tired, hot, didnt-get-to-eat-the-yummy-food chef