Arizona Vacation

I feel like I'm really depriving this blog!! On June 23rd we headed south in our toyota rav. Day 1 we hit Albuquerque
 and stayed in a hotel. Day 2 we got in to Benson, AZ later in the afternoon. And yes we were already sick of driving. But this was only our 1st stop of 3 we had planned for our vacation.
My husband's sister, that he has never met, lives there. So since we were going to be in AZ already we though we would pack up a couple days early and make a stop.
Kyle has a lot of family in the Benson, Tucson area that he has never met. His biological dad that he last saw when he was 2, so of course we got to see him for a day. We met a cousin and his family in Tucson for another fun filled day. Kyles sister also has a 12mo old so Wesley had a playmate for the few days we were there.
The last day we were in Benson we headed to Tucson to meet Kyle's cousin, and family for a day at the pool. Afterward we went to dinner at an all you can eat buffet place. I forgot the name.

Sunday morning we headed north towards Sedona. A family from Phoenix had won my giveway for a free session and prints and we were going to meet in Phoenix but not having internet the entire time in Benson didn't help me get a map, and we ran into traffic because of an accident and then were totally lost trying to figure out where to go. My cellphone was acting up (it has been since I washed it), and so that was a no go. So off we went towards Sedona. We stopped @ in n out burger on the way out of phoenix, since there were a few off the highway.

The week was awesome! I couldn't of imagined a better, much less GORGEOUS place to relax. The family played tennis every morning. I did water aerobics one day, but preferred tennis the rest of the time. We swam, had lots of yummy home cooked meals, had family photos taken, lots of Euchre, a family baseball game, and of course drinks!

I wish we could have stayed a few more days, but it was on to the last part of our vacation. We drove east to visit Kyles other sister in Clovis, NM. Wesley got to play with his other cousin, Jasper, and we just relaxed.

By the end of the trip we were POOPED. We drove a total of 2650 miles and we were ready to be out of the car by the time our trip was over!!

Plus I took 749 photos and am still going through them. But for now here are a few of my favorites from the trip.

**Giveaway** The Easy accounting solution for the Photographer

One of my FAVORITE photographers Michelle Kane is having a GIVEAWAY! She is giving away a FREE copy of 

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With all small businesses its important to keep track of things, and this would be something definitely worth entering to help keep business expenses, customer info, tax info organized!!!

Michelle's Review:

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A winner will be chosen Sunday Aug 8th @ 8pm MST so enter now!

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Wesley 16mo

Wesley is now 16th months old!! (as of July 10th). He is full of life and energy. He knows so much that sometimes I don't even know what he knows. He can pick up on things instantly. Like just yesterday we taught him how to dip chips. Ok that might be minor but it was still cute! He LOVES to color. On paper or outside.

He is no longer afraid of climbing down stairs. He can do that without help.
He LOVES dogs, especially when we go tot he park to play he wants to run, pet or chase all of them! And he loves our dog Lucky who doesn't seem to be bothered by Wesley at all which is great.
He has had an ear infection, and been sick 1 time other than that.
No new words but he does know most of his body parts (eyes and toes are new) and also knows what a potty is, the lights (looks up and points), and he can turn the lights on and off too.

Hes still picky about food. Not into spaghetti. Veggies are a hit or miss. Same with meats. But he will eat ground venison, which is awesome! I've been using it for cooking since we ran out of ground beef.

He loves to push his stroller around instead of being in his stroller.
He will hand us a lot of things. If we ask him to give us what he has he will.

He wears 18-24 month clothing.
Size 6 shoes

He is a lot of fun to have around. He definitely has an attitude, throws EVERYTHING, and yells when he doesn't get his way.

Wesley 16mo

As of July 10th Wesley is not 16th months old! He had an ear infection before vacation...and it continued while we were on vacation but finally after 2x the medicine after we got home he went back to the doc and was as good as new!

Wesley's favorite thing to do: CLIMB...

Stay tuned for more updates!! Its taking some time since I got back from vacation to get things updated!

All of these Summer nights...

I'm still in the process of writing my vacation blog, but until then I'll update you on what has been going on around here since we got back from vacation.

1) Kyle and I have both joined a co-ed softball team. We've had 1 practice and games start next Monday. I'm SUPER excited to be doing this. It was one of my goals to be part of a co-ed team this summer, and have fulfilled that!

2) While on vacation we played a TON of tennis, and so I told myself I wanted to keep playing when I got back. I signed up for tennis clinics twice a week and tomorrow is the last day of the clinic until the next session. I have made some new friends from the clinic and hope to get some numbers so we can start playing together!

3) The week we got home we enjoyed Jubilee days festivities. The carnival was in town, and we walked around there, have been going to the farmers market on fridays, enjoyed the chili cook off, parade, and street dances!

4) My birthday was on Sun July 25th, and Kyle and I went to see brooks & dunn in concert for frontier days the night before. We had a blast, even though we didn't get home until 2am!

5) We got a new dog, Lucky, the St Bernard, and hes been a wonderful pal for Wesley!

6) I've been meeting my friend 3 days a week @ the park for evening walks. Its a nice time to get out of the house and have some adult time.

Wesley playing in the ice cold pool on a warm day in Wyoming...

Thats all the new updates for now in the last 3 weeks since we've been home. This next week is the Albany County Fair, and we plan to go a few times and have fun!

15 months old

Wesley turned 15 months last Thursday. His vocabulary has improved and he knows so much!

• He LOVES fruit still, especially cantaloupe.
• Certain veggies he spits out, but eats most of them such as mixed veggies, green beans, carrots, corn, tomatoes, peas.
• Words he says are: this ("dis"), cookie ("coouk"), mom ("mum"), shoes ("shus"), hot ("dott") and still signs milk, please, more, and all done. Most of the time he points to things when he wants something.
• He knows what a ball is, binky, books (he can turn the pages when asked), outside (he runs to the door), elmo, cookie monster, juice.
• Just recently he started to love coloring on paper and outside with sidewalk chalk. I know hes going to LOVE vacation in a few days and spending the majority of the time outside @ the park, swimming, or coloring.
• Bed and naptime are wonderful. He goes down without a fight and still is on a schedule. He naps in the afternoon after lunch until about 3 or 4.
• He knows a few of his body parts such as nose, ears, tongue, belly button, and hair.
• Hes mastered using a straw.
• He doesn't just walk, he RUNS, and walks backwards too.
• We don't have a lot of stairs in the house but he can climb the stairs we do have but is still afraid of climbing down. He always wants one of us to hold his hand so he can walk down it.
• He has all 16 teeth.
• He is 32" tall, and 25lbs. 

He loves to be outside. We spend a lot of our time out there running around, coloring with sidewalk chalk, bike rides, swinging @ the park and just enjoying the weather. Since our summer is so short here in wyoming we really have to take advantage every single day!!

Here is a beautiful photo of Wesley showing me his watermelon =)

Flooding in Laramie!

Some of the flooding around town.
Here is a link to the photos I took the other day. FYI its now twice as much as it was before!!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=235842&id=650370096&l=065361aeff

Memorial Weekend

I know I'm wayyyyy behind on blogging but I wanted to catch you all up a little bit.

We had a FANTASTIC memorial weekend!

Saturday was pretty relaxing. Was in and out most of the day. Kyle installed our new clothes line, and worked on fixing the siding of our house. I just did laundry and played with Wesley outside. Nothing special but just a fun day at home.

Sunday was our anniversary. Kyle surprised me with some beautiful yellow roses (which didn't last long), and I made Kyle a video and surprised with with Brooks & Dunn tickets!

 We took a lunchtime bike ride to subway and back, Wesley went down for a nap and I did laundry and hung clothes on the new line. I did a workout while Wesley was napping also, and then we all went on another bike ride to the park after Wesley was up from his nap. We wanted to take him to see the ducks and feed them but the seagulls wanted the bread instead.
Instead of cooking we ordered togo from one of our favorite pubs in town. The Library. They have amazing sweet potato fries, and I had a breakfast sandwich, and kyle had Philly steak sandwich.
We relaxed and watched Avatar.

The next day we headed down to Fort Collins to visit my Dad. Grandma was in town visiting  and we wanted to see her before she went back to Illinois.

It was a gorgeous day down in CO. We had some grilled chicken for lunch with a bunch of fruit and veggies.
Since my Dad lives right on a lake and it was warm enough and we brought our suits, we took a little swim in the water!

The neighbors dog Cody decided to come take a swim with us too!

Wesley played on the porch for awhile to dry off.

Wesley was such a trooper. He didn't take his usual afternoon nap, but sure did take a great nap on the drive home and went to bed a bit early.

What a wonderful weekend we had!

Our anniversary is tomorrow. We have nothing special planned. No babysitter. Notta. Kinda sucks. I guess thats what happens when we have no friends or family around. 

My grandma is visiting from Illinois and staying down at dads an hour away. I don't even want to drive down there because I'm a little irritated with the situation. 

So this is going to be a pretty boring weekend. Its a little chilly and windy out today so probably won't be taking a bike ride. I have nothing else to do today besides clean. 

Well happy 1st anniversary to us I guess.

Menu Plan Monday [May 17th]

I can't believe Monday is already gone. And as far as meal planning I put it off until last night and I still haven't completely figured out lunches yet either.

Still on the health kick and wanted easy, yummy meals that I didn't have to put too much thought into. 

So for this week I just looked around on Tasty Kitchen for recipes and saved them in my box. I also added a couple of my own recipes as well! 

Monday

Breakfast: Multi grain cheerios w/banana

Lunch: Ham sandwich and string cheese

Dinner: Salmon, brown rice and green beans

Tuesday

Breakfast: Broiled Grapefruit

Lunch: HG Tuna Salad

Dinner: Korean Tacos

Wednesday

Breakfast: Breakfast Burrito

Lunch: Don't know yet

Dinner: Spinach Lasagna Rollups

Thursday

Breakfast: Tropical Avocado Smoothie

Lunch: Don't know yet

Dinner: Homemade pizza (dont know what toppings yet)

Friday

Breakfast: Strawberry Lime Shake

Lunch: Don't know yet

Dinner: Venison & Black Bean Stew

Saturday

Breakfast: Faux Egg McMuffin

Lunch: leftovers

Dinner: cook on the grill or leftovers

Sunday

Breakfast: Haven't decided but maybe pancakes or waffles

Lunch: leftovers

Dinner: leftovers

Enjoy!!

Five Question Friday [May 14]

Its friday yay!! Its been one busy week for me. I'm loving my new weight-loss program..well I wouldn't call it a program just calculating calories and exercising, its great! Now I just need to work up to longer and more intense workouts. Next week is the start of my photography class and I'm going to start going to the gym then as well! Blogging is now my 5th priority...Wesley, photo class, exercising, and counting calories comes first! So I'll try to update as much as I can when I get time. Hopefully I can get all my workouts and projects done during the day and leave blogging to night time.

1. Take your pick...date night, girls night out, or night out alone?

Definitely a girls night! Not that I don't love my husband but I hardly ever get to go out with girls and I really miss it and want to. 

2. Can you touch your nose with your tongue?

Nope

3. What is your favorite flower and why?

Tulips. Tulip time in Iowa is the best! They are just gorgeous flowers.

4. If you could go back in time, what advice would you give yourself?

5. If you won the lottery, what is the very first thing you would do?

Pay off debt!!! and then buy a house...and then a personal trainer.

Happy Friday!!

Tuesday Tag Along [May 10th]

Today my little man is 14mo! Really? Already?

Another wonderful week has come and gone. 

And boy am I tired.

If I plan to get up in the morning to take a nice long walk with Wesley then I better get some rest.

I look forward to meeting you! 

Just leave me a comment and I'll surely follow you back.

Enjoy my blog!

Meal Plan Monday - Heathly Eating [May 10]

I spent a lot of time working on my menu this week. Probably longer than I wanted to but it was well worth it. 

Since today was my official start date for my weight-loss journey I wanted to make the meals extra healthy.

I even planned out my breakfast and lunch meals as well.

Monday

Breakfast: HG Chocolate Banana Smoothie

Lunch: OL BLT Salad 

Dinner: FF Strawberry Orange Pasta Salad, corn on the cob

Tuesday

Breakfast: OL Breakfast Smoothie

Lunch: HG Chinese Salad

Dinner: OL Minestrone Soup

Wednesday

Breakfast: Bowl of frosted mini wheats cereal, 1 slice of whole wheat toast

Lunch: OL Apple Broccoli Salad

Dinner: HG Goo-lash, green beans, caesar salad

Thursday

Breakfast: FF Breakfast Burrito

Lunch: HG Spicy Taco Tuna Salad

Dinner: FF Homemade Pizza (Veggie)

Friday

Breakfast: HG Berry Smoothie

Lunch: HG Chick'n Salad

Dinner: HG Tomato Basil Chicken, baked potato, brown rice

Saturday

Breakfast: HG Taco Scramble

Lunch: Left overs

Dinner: HG lo mein

Sunday

Breakfast: FF French Toast

Lunch: Left overs

Dinner: Left overs

Key

HG hungry girl cookbook

OL online recipe

FF family favorite

OC other cookbooks

Interested in calorie info or weight watchers points info??

Or want one of the hungry girl recipes from the book??

Then head on over to my weight-loss blog!!! 

Each day I will post my food log and that days worth of recipes, calories and weight watchers points!!!

http://jencanloseit.blogspot.com

The weekends sure do fly by....

Mother's Day wasn't bad. I did absolutely nothing kept myself super busy! I slept in until 1030a maybe. I love sleeping in. But unfortunately I didn't really sleep in because Wesley wanted to wake me up and I'm definitely not a deep sleeper anymore. 

We were originally going to go out to brunch because I've really wanted eggs benedict! But that didn't happen. So I asked kyle if he wanted to make eggs benedict with me. He wanted to bbq. I wanted eggs benedict and it was my day so I told him he could bbq for dinner. We never ended up making eggs benedict. He went to bed (at 1p) after doing dishes and I just worked on my menu for the week.

*note to self - start menu planning fri night and decide what I want for the week. Sat figure out coupons, and ww points amount. Sunday after breakfast grocery shop.*

I ended up making eggs benedict for dinner. Wesley really liked it and this was my first time making it and it was wonderful!!!

If you've never made eggs benedict or if you've always wantef to, check out the super simple recipe from The Pioneer Woman.

Click the photo for the full recipe

Tomorrow starts my journey to weight loss. 

I will be posting all of my progress, recipes, food log, exercise I did, weigh ins, etc over at the blog so go check it out please and follow along

http://jencanloseit.blogspot.com

Plus starting May 15th myself and 4 other ladies are taking part of a weight loss challenge for a chance to win $10,000! Check out the blog for more info on the contest.

Well thats all the news for today!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Mothers Day!

And sorry for not posting the Swingin' to the sound Sunday post. I'm exhausted this week but will have it posted next Sunday!

Happy Mothers Day!!

Happy Mothers Day to all the wonderful Mommys in the world!!

We plan on going out to brunch...and I'm probably just going to grocery shop for next weeks meals, and clean since the hubs works nights and will probably be going to bed after brunch. But I want eggs benedict! Mmm... 

I'm still in the middle of deciding what I want to make this week because Monday is the day I start my diet lifestyle change. 

One thing that is going to help me is this new awesome cookbook I just got in the mail a few days ago.

Now I'm not always going to have every single ingredient they mention, but I'll sure try because it makes it super easy for me to not have to look up every single ingredient for recipes and figure that out. 

Oh and stay tuned!!! I'm going to have an awesome giveaway coming up VERY SOON!!!

And I've also recently become obsessed with BIG LOVE. 

Ever since my religion class, and having to write a 10 page paper on polygamy, I've been hooked. If you haven't even seen the show it really is dramatic. And utah is gorgeous too!! 

If you've seen the show tell me what you think about it?!

Time to get some sleep.

Five Question Friday [May 7]

Friday WOOT WOOT.

1. What is your worst memory of your siblings?

To be honest..I don't have any. I never lived with my sister (only for visits) and I lived with my brother from age newborn-3 and then ages 6-9 and he was a pretty awesome kid then and is now...besides being kind of a goof sometimes.

2. What was YOUR naughtiest childhood memory? (Must be something YOU did, no pawning it off on someone else!)

Naughty...hmmm. I should ask my parents this one. I can only think of the times I got into trouble (which was A LOT) and lets say that they aren't anything I'm proud of and I'd rather not say LOL. I was the rebel of the family definitely. I loved boys. And I loved my friends. And I hated being around my parents..

3. Where do you like to go to relax?

I relax in front of the computer blogging. Literally..No screaming child and I can get everything out of my head that I'm thinking about.

Other than the computer, our cozy king bed is heaven. 

Now we need a jetted tub and I'll be all set!

4. What was the last thing you won?

Hmmmmmmmmm.....Oh yes..My senior year in high school (7 years ago) I won a free haircut/hi-light, and a $500 scholarship for books for the University.

You want to know whats crap?? I decided to wait and not use them right away (no expiration) and I can't use them!!! BS I say. I tried to use them in 2007 (4 years later) and the company who awarded the 500 scholarship said it was too late. Isn't there something I can do because they don't expire???? Cuz I sure want to get a haircut/hi-light and get money for college books.

Tips please???

5. If you could be on a game show, which would you choose?

I'm not sure if this counts as a "game show" but BIGGEST LOSER no question. Technically its a reality show, but they are winning for 250k so YA i'd say its a game!!

Which BTW I am going to participate in a contest & try to lose 100lbs so if anyone wants to follow along my journey here is the blog

http://jencanloseit.blogspot.com

Molars are no fun

UGHHHHHHHHH have you ever typed up an entire post for it not to publish and blogger didn't save it!!!! Well it just happened.

Damn f**king blogger.

Wesley now has 11 molars @ 13 months. Crazy. And his molars have taken a toll on him big time. So today we took a little trip to Saratoga (about 90 miles) and he literally screamed bloody murder the entire time. Nothing helped...

So we get there and low and behold its a poopy diaper. We change the poops, give him a snack and drink and figure were good to go. And while we were there we saw the ducks (wesleys favorite animal).

The car ride home was a disaster. Normally he naps from about 1-3 or 4 but since we were out of town I thought he would sleep there and then back. WRONG. He slept 20 min there. And 0 minutes back. He screamed and cried the entire time. So I climbed in the back seat (and no I wasn't driving :P) and tried to rub his head, give him more of a snack and drink and keep his binky in, play with his learning book...NOTTA. I knew he was exhausted. And during one of his crying spells I noticed the 3rd molar that had come in on the bottom.

Well there is the problem. I knew the molars were painful. Poor kiddo.

So we get home just after 5p..Laid him down for a short nap (I figured he would sleep about an hour or so, then get up for dinner )...WRONG AGAIN. He is still sleeping...So many times I just wanted to go in there, and wake him to eat. I feel so bad but I don't want to wake him because that would just be a disaster ever more..
I would have given him teething tablets in the car to help or some medicine for the headache I'm sure he had...but I had nothing...PLUS all the medicine is recalled so I have to return it.

Sometimes there isn't anything I can do...and yes many times I just wanted to get out of the car and walk the 90 miles back home so I wouldn't have to listen to it....but I'm so glad hes in bed now so I can relax.

But I better set my alarm for 7am because I can guarantee he will be up STARVING.

Friday Follow [May 7]

I've been a little slow getting posts up.....because its hard to manage 5 blogs!

Sponsored By:

I have so much going on this weekend! I'm in the middle of trying to open up my ETSY STORE which I'm TOTALLY stoked about.

I'm a photographer. (in the making) And I'll be selling my one of a kind art prints. Woooot!

Plus I'm a painter.

So I'll be selling custom painted wooden letters, and door signs, lightswitch covers and more!

AND

I am a graphic designer too! Self taught mostly but I have taken a ton of classes at the University! and I'll be selling custom designed invitations, name/wall art, logo design, and more!!

SOOO I'm trying to get organized and get things together to get the store open!!!

If you want to see some of my work check out my photography + design blog OR my portfolio, which is also in the works as well.

I have lots of other stuff on my blog too. So look around and I look forward to meeting you!!!!

Tuesday Tag Along [May 4th]

If I don't already participate in a million things, here another one. I'm sooooooo trying to increase the readers on my blog. Because I have lots of things I want to do in the near future and I love to help people out if they need it so please help me.

So I have lots of blogs for you to follow.

Well ok this one and 3 others.

Color My World Photography + Design

Business Portfolio

All About Wesley

Happy Tuesday. 

And please leave me a comment and I'll be happy to follow you back!