Final Destination.... Tucson Arizona!!!

The count down is on! Five months left until we move. Nick joined a group practice in Tucson Arizona. It took me a while to warm up to the idea of Arizona but after living in Memphis for nearly 4 years, anywhere was starting to look good! After a few visits to Arizona over the past couple years, I really started feeling like this was somewhere I could live. To be honest I have never been there during summer. Each time I have been there has happened to be in October. So of course the weather was perfect and sunny as opposed to scorching hot. Memphis summers are pretty miserable too though, especially with the humidity down here in the south. People tell me the dry heat is much better. I will let you know when we move in June! There is a natural beauty down there that surprised me. While phoenix is very flat and artificially landscaped, Tucson is surrounded by mountains and is covered with desert plant life. I wouldn't mind a little artificial landscaping though, especially for neighborhoods and shopping centers etc.. If only they had a good balance of both it would be perfect! It is always around ten degrees cooler than Phoenix so I am excited about that. I was surprised to know they have a mountain called Mt. Lemmon that gets snow and you can ski in the winter. I have talked to a few people who have lived there or knew people who had lived there and the reviews have been very positive. I am a little nervous to move to a brand new area and know we will be there for the long run. This was a great opportunity and I am relieved he won't be starting up his own practice though... I am ready to have a husband that is actually around and earning some more money as opposed to getting in more debt sounds nice too! Last time I blogged I said I would blog more regularly and I am really committing to that now. There are going to be so many changes in our lives, I need to get better at documenting it all!

Since there is no way I can catch up to a year of no blogging... Here is an update!

Halle in September (almost 6 months)

Family picture taken at Gulf Shores AL Sept 2010

The 3 kiddos October 2010

Halle in her pumpkin jammies

I don't know why I haven't blogged in a year. Probably a combination of laziness and using facebook much more often. Actually I am pretty sure that nobody reads my blog anymore so I will most likely be starting from scratch! I have decided I should at least blog for journal purposes and I miss reading other people's blogs as well. I also don't know how to arrange my pictures in cute ways or do anything fancy with my blog (like many of my friends do) so that has had me in an unmotivated state! Maybe someone can teach me :) As I stated above I will just provide a quick update of where we are in our lives as of right now. I also still need to upload some more current pictures, so these are just some cute ones taken in the past few months.

We are in our third year of oral surgery residency! Only about a year and a half left and it will be time for real life. I must say, I have gotten rather used to living the student life and moving around. I don't know what it will be like to settle in a final location and actually have a husband that has a REAL job and a REAL salary. So far we do not know where we are going for sure yet. Nick has really been focusing on Arizona and I am just starting to get used to the idea. I just don't know about living somewhere with extremely hot summers and not having the normal 4 seasons. I do like snow sometimes and I am having a hard time thinking I will spend the rest of my life living in the desert. But... So many people love Arizona so maybe there is something too it! Still, nothing is for sure. Nick still has to visit places and explore other options before the decision is made!

Ok Now about me. I am still just staying home and feeling rather busy with 3 kids. I just got a gym membership to Lifetime Fitness which I love. Seriously it is the best gym ever. I just hope I can find one when we move! I needed this membership so I can get back in shape. I have never had too much of a problem losing the baby weight, but I have problems with postpartum flab and feeling tired a lot. I think hoping for a bikini body is beyond my capabilities but if I can look good in my clothes I will take it! Besides that I have been participating in card club which is fun and reminds me of card club from Omaha! Oh and I also have a sewing machine that I need to use more often! I still barely know how to work it, but with the help of friends I have made some amazing projects. I need to get better at organizing my life so I have time to do fun things and not just things I have to do.

Dylan is in the first grade and attending a new school this year. They finished building it this summer so it is very nice. He is also in an optional program they offer which focuses on science/the environment. He really likes it and I am impressed with how much he has learned. My only complaint is that school starts at 7:15 am. The bus comes at six something every morning and it has been so hard on us both! Dylan is not an early riser. He must take after his mother and father! The nice thing is that the school provided breakfast free of charge, so I don't have to worry about that. I really feel like elementary students should not have to go to school so early, and hopefully when we move we will not encounter this problem again!

Jaxson turned 3 years old in December. He will be starting preschool next year and I can't wait! We started potty training a couple weeks ago and he has been so much easier than Dylan. Pretty much had it down in a week and he has had a couple random accidents but he is doing very well. Those couple accidents have been with #2 which seems to be harder for my boys to get the hang of. I really don't get it, but changing a couple messes is so much better than changing daily dirty diapers. Jaxson loves pretty much all things Dylan loves so there has been a little fighting. He also adores Halle but now that she is mobile and goes after his stuff he gets mad at her. Ahhh the middle child syndrome...

Halle is ten months old. She has been crawling all over the place. She loves to put everything and anything in her mouth and it is a little scary. Not to mention she doesn't spit stuff out she really tries to eat whatever she gets her hands on. She has been teething the past couple weeks which has not been fun. She got her lower teeth 2 months ago and has been trying to cut the top teeth which is taking forever. She hasn't been loving her bottles lately but will at least eat her baby food and loves real food too. Despite the teething she usually sleeps through the night. She was such a hard baby up to six months that the fact that she will now take decent naps and sleep at night amazes me. I thought we would never get there! She is a happy girl but can definitely throw a tantrum if she is really upset. Usually she reserves her screaming fits for times she wakes up at night and don't get her fast enough, or wakes up but is so tired and cranky she just doesn't know what to do with herself. This behavior has been new to me since my boys were a little more easy going. I can't complain to0 much she really does sleep well and likes to sleep in or just hang out in her crib for a long time each morning.

This concludes my update and hopefully a year won't go by before I post again. I am actually going to make it a priority to blog regularly from now on so that won't happen again! More current pictures will be coming soon!

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Happy 2nd birthday Jaxson!!!

Thomas the train cake

Not sure what is going on with all of us singing happy birthday to him!

Excited now to try and blow out his candles!

examining his presents!

We threw a birthday party for Jaxson on Sunday December 14th even though his real birthday is December 20th. Since we will be out of town for the holidays this was the best time to do it. I didn't get to do a real party for his 1st birthday since Nick was really busy during residency and I felt kind of bad about that. Dylan has had a party every single year. We decided to invite our friends over that have little ones close to Jaxson's age and who Jaxson spends a lot of time with. He likes to give my friends hugs and kisses and they are kind of like his second family so I am glad we had them to help us celebrate! We had pizza for the kids and Nick and I made chinese burritos for the adults. We also had some sides people brought to make for a delicious meal! Jaxson loves having kids over and was really happy the whole time. When he saw his cake he kept trying to grab the train off. He has gotten really into Thomas the train lately so I just had to get that cake! Dylan was really excited for Jaxson's party. He took it upon himself to open all of Jaxson's presents for him. I barely even got a chance to get pictures because I didn't know Dylan had started opening gifts! It was so funny to see Jaxson sitting on the couch surrounded by kids and having all the presents dumped on his lap! We also had balloons and treat bags for the kids, but half the balloons popped thanks to my popcorn ceilings! I don't think they cared too much most of the time they were all just running around being crazy. I am so glad we did this party for him and everything went smoothly! I am now wondering what I am going to do for Dylan when he has his birthday in February!

Happy Halloween!!!

Before Halloween a few friends and I got together and spray painted pumpkins. My friend and I got this idea from a magazine and it turned out to be pretty cute!

The girls. From left to right: Melanie, Angel, Jodi, me, Kara, and Erin

The guys. From left to right Greg, Nick, James, Zack, and Eric

Dylan showing off his ninja skills

My little pumpkin

Excited to go trick or treating!

Nick and some friends took the kids trick or treating in our neighborhood

Jaxson taking a little break to see what he got. He walked the entire time without being carried!

Some of our delicious treats for the party

We had a chance to have a little Halloween get together at our house this year. We had been planning on going to the big Halloween carnival at the Baptist church down the street but unfortunately it was canceled! We had originally planned to meet at my house since I live closest to the church, but since it wasn't happening anymore we decided the party must go on! The kids got a lot of candy going around the neighborhood, and we had a fun time hanging out and eating what everyone made! A lot of the food came from the same magazine as the pumpkin idea. We had a meeting before Halloween to decide what everyone was making. I made "the cheese ball" which was actually more of a dessert served with ginger snaps. Of course it wouldn't have been complete without the googly eyes you put all over it! I wish I had a close up picture since it was a fun thing to make for Halloween. Everything was really good and our friends brought stuff to make italian sodas which are always good! Our kids loved getting to dress up and even Jaxson got the hang of things pretty quickly. He loved getting candy and that was all he wanted to eat after Halloween. I put his basket on top of our fridge so he couldn't grab the candy out but every morning he would point to it and beg me for candy. He loves chocolate especially. He would seriously only eat candy all day if I let him! I wonder where he got his sweet tooth from? :)

An update.. FInally!

Dylan's last day of preschool

T-ball game

Trying to play tennis after swimming

Jaxson loves swimming!

Gulf shores Alabama

Playing in the sand

Dylan like to use his spider-man goggles and flippers at Lake powell

Jaxson on the boat

Nick showing off his skills

Dylan and his cousin loved tubing

First day of kindergarten!

I'm not sure if anyone still reads my blog anymore since I fell off the face of the earth for five months, but I decided to update anyways! I will try and sum up the past few months without making this post too long. We had a great summer and it went by really fast. Dylan went to a couple of bible camps, sports camp, basketball camp, and got a chance to play T-ball for the first time. He also went to an all day karate camp. Needless to say I was trying to keep him busy when preschool was over! Jaxson loves the water and has no fear when it comes to jumping in a pool (a little scary)... Nick had a great schedule since he was on an a nice rotation. He was done early every day, off on weekends, and took no call! It has been really nice. I went and bought a sewing machine this summer and made a couple projects. Never thought I would take up sewing but it I had to keep up with all the girls around here that sew for fun! We took a trip to gulf shores in August and we all loved the beach! There was white sand and the water was great! We hope to make some more beach trips while we are out here! We also flew out to Utah and made a trip to Lake powell for a few days. Dylan impressed us all by water skiing behind the jet ski like a pro! I was able to get up on the wake board even though it had been a long time since trying it. Dylan is also in kindergarten this year! He had been doing really well and enjoys it even though it is a long day for him. He leaves at 8:30 and comes home at 4:30 so it is a long day for him. The only other update I have is that I am pregnant! I am fourteen weeks along right now and it started off as a great pregnancy but then the morning sickness hit me strong when I was almost 11 weeks. I hope it all goes away soon! Besides that my only other complaint would be the extreme fatigue which has let up this past week. I am hoping this last baby is a girl but if not, I will just have to adjust to the idea of having three boys. I need to also adjust to the idea that Jaxson and this baby will be a little under 2 1/2 years apart yikes!!!

Nashville, Easter, check ups, and soccer!

Us at the museum of country music

A really pretty park our tour bus stopped at

monument

A picture of the capital

Grandpa and the boys

Cool bar

Us at the grand ole opry

Graceland

When we got back to Memphis we saw Graceland

Nick's parents came out for a visit so we headed down to Nashville for the weekend. It was really fun and I thought it was a nice city and really pretty. We did a lot while we were there and I hope we can go back more often just for a change of scenery. When we got back we went to Graceland which I really liked. There was a lot of Elvis history there and surprisingly Dylan was really into it too. Everyone always asks us if we have been there when we travel and people know we are living in Memphis. Now we can say we have been!

Easter Sunday

Easter was pretty good this year. After Church I wanted to get some pictures but Jaxson fell asleep on the way home. He didn't even wake up when I put him on the coach for a picture! Unfortunately after Jaxson's nap I didn't get any nice pictures since it started pouring rain outside. My friend Starla invited us over as well as a few other families for easter dinner. It was fun spending easter with all of our friends and playing games afterwards!

Easter Egg hunt at Dylan's preschool

Ready to collect some eggs!

Jaxson figures out what to do pretty fast

Jaxson was scared of the easter bunny but Dylan was willing to let me get a picture!

Easter Egg Decorating

Dylan showing off his finished Easter eggs!

Dylan had fun coloring Easter eggs. Unfortunately I thought it might be a dangerous idea for Jaxson to participate. I actually got some dye on myself trying to help Dylan. Maybe Jaxson can get his chance next year!

Doctor check up and shots!

Hiding from the doctor

Playing around

Happy to get some stickers and a pencil after the dreaded shots!

Bowling that evening as promised for cooperating at the doctor!

Dylan and Jaxson were both due for check ups and immunizations. I was really nervous for this visit. The last time Dylan needed a flu shot we had to hold him down and he freaked out big time. I mean he was screaming like the nurse was cutting off his leg. So I knew this time he needed like four or five shots and I didn't know how to get him to be good. I heard a couple horror stories from friends which made me even more nervous. One friend had her little girl try to grab the needle which cause the needle to slice her and she needed stitches. Another friend's daughter actually kicked the nurse in the stomach! I decided to warn Dylan this day was coming a couple months in advance. I told him if he was good which meant we didn't have to hold him down and if he didn't start screaming we would take him bowling that evening. We talked about this a lot and he was excited for his shots until it was time of course. I reminded him he was allowed to cry but that was all. To my surprise he sat still and allowed the nurse to give him his shots and he was upset of course but I didn't have to restrain him or make him or worry about screaming. Jaxson did really good too. The funny thing is in addition to the shots he needed a finger prick which he was not prepared for. I had to sweeten the deal by throwing in a milk shake after the visit. I guess bribery is necessary sometimes! I plan on doing this next time he needs shots!

Go Hawks!!!

Dylan excited to play

Jaxson on his "leash" is the only way to get through a game

Dylan and his buddy insisted I get a picture of the back of their shirts!

Spring soccer has been going on since March and Dylan's team is called "The Hawks" I love their uniforms and we actually had to buy Dylan new cleets cause his feet grew a couple sizes since last year! The problem with spring soccer is nearly every game gets rained out! Practices have been rained out too! I guess that just goes with spring time. At least there are make up games!

PS: I can't believe I slacked on my blog so bad. I mean my last post was two months ago! I felt like we have had a pretty busy past couple months so that will be my excuse! I now need to check everyone elses blogs and see what I have missed. I can't believe we have been here a year already it has gone by so fast!