California Day 1

Jake had an FOP (Fraternal Order of Police) Convention down in California, so we took the opportunity for an almost free trip and joined him. It is in Long Beach right off the beach. The first day we walked around Pike's Pier. We went to the Aquarium of the Pacific. It was fun, but super super crowded. We went to California Pizza Kitchen and walked to McDonald's. To get to McDonald's we had to walk through Gangster Paradise, a bit scary, but we made it with out any harm. We wanted to get Marshall some water wings for the pool, we had to go to about 7 stores before we found them, and let me tell you, walking store to store in this area made me fear for my life :0). We have decided we would not like to live in California, it is crazy. People are inconsiderate, tons of gangsters, crazy drivers, confusing freeways, and much much more!!

This is eating our pizza. It was so yummy. Jake really enjoyed his water.
Like father like son

Kambria likes the high chair. She is getting so big!!

This is at the Aquarium ... look how huge his teeth are.

I love this shark.

The Sting Rays feel cool to touch, marshall was a bit to nervous to touch, But Jake and I did!

It was cool to see the Eel.

Jake and Marshall by a little pond with fish in it.

Marshall had to go to the Bathroom so bad, he couldn't hold it any longer :0)

After Jake watched Marshall, he just couldn't hold it either ......

Our Kids

Here are some pictures I took of the kids! Kambria is almost 8 months. Her newest thing is she can go from back or belly to the sit position :0)

Here is Marshall, he is getting so big, He is 4 1/2 years old. He is such a delight to have in our family!

I know I post a lot, but it is more for me then anything. I take my blog and have them printed each year into a bound Journal Scrapbook. So I like to capture all I can so we have them for memories for years to come.

Kambria 7 1/2 Months Old - Marshall 4 1/2 Years Old

Kambria is getting to be so animated. She has started shaking her head no, but really fast ... It is so funny, when we laugh she does it faster. I really need to get it on video. She has now started waving as well. She looks at you and waves by folding her fingers down and up, and then she will stare and her hand and do it some more. She loves to take her fingers and rub them against her lips to make noise, its cute, but oh so loud!! She is army scooting all over the place, she starts in one spot and ends the other side of the room. Same in her walker, she is all over the place, the only bad thing with the walker is she loves to go fish out garbage, NASTY!!! She is so close to crawling. She goes from sitting to crawl position, but then she just goes down to her tummy. I am sure within 1 month she will be there. Kambria is such a daddy's girl, she loves her daddy. Jake will do something to her and she will do something back, it goes on and on forever. Its cute, but it makes Kambria so loud. Kambria's new found love is Maverick. If she can see him, she scoots to him and grabs his hair, and just sits by him and laughs, she loves him, and Maverick is so good to her, he just takes the hair pull. Her and Marshall are best buds, they could laugh all day together. Marshall is such a good big brother, she will always look up to him I am sure!! Kambria is always happy, unless she is sick. The week she was sick with the Cellulitis was so hard, because my Kambria isn't sad and crying like that, she is always happy. She has started to have the separation anxiety, where if you leave the room she will get sad until you are in her sight again. Its a bit annoying, but she will grow out of it. I just love my kids, I love being home with them, I loves seeing every change that comes, I love it so much, even though some days are hard, and sometimes I complain, I am so happy!!! Just when I think 2 kids is enough, I know that really 3 will be great one day. I am glad that Jake is such a good dad and provides for us, and that when he comes home the kids are so excited and Jake plays with them, talks to them and has so much fun with them!! Life is great :0)

Did I mention how much I love Kambria's laugh. It is so cute, it is contagious and makes us all laugh. I love hearing her and marshall laugh together.

Marshall is a little character right now, he is a bit too smart for his own good. I have started to have to live up to my threats and use time out more then not. He learned just how far he could push me until he was really in trouble and I decided that had to stop. Since I have been doing what I say he has been such a better kid. He will say the funniest things still, and man it just cracks me up and still makes me wonder where he gets it from. Marshall is doing really well. He has been able to write his name now for over 6 months, he can recognize 2/3rds of the alphabet, we are working hard on that right now, he almost has them all. He can count to 40. He is very creative, and loves to make up games. His current obsession is Webkinz, that is a great thing for me to threaten him with, because he immediately starts being good. He is super smart on the computer. He knows how to pull up a new window, pull up webkinz and type in the username, just not the password. He knows where everything is in webkinz and can play on his own. He loves preschool and keeps asking when he gets to play soccer again, so maybe we will have to put him in an indoor soccer league. Well that's all for now.

Awesome Blog

I came across this blog on a friends and thought I would share.

It is called 365 days of Slow Cooking : http://365daysofcrockpot.blogspot.com/

There are some delicious receipes on this site!! I have tried several and have loved them all. I love using my crockpot and this made it so much easier to come up with ideas.
This is the latest one I used, I did the rolls and all, it was super yummy!!


http://365daysofcrockpot.blogspot.com/2009/07/day-179-french-dip.html


Hope some of you will enjoy this site as I have!!

Harvest Days

Yesterday was Midvale Harvest Days and Jake planned an FOP booth. He did so much work. They had a dunk machine, and had a sign labeled, "Dunk A Cop", man did they make some good money. They also had a spinning wheel where you could win soda, water, candy or a toy. It was a good time. I forgot my camera, and man does that make me mad. There were 6 different Officers that sat on the dunk tank. They all had there peeps that wanted to dunk them. Those that they gave tickets to, arrested and some Dare Students!! I probably shouldn't write this, but man it was funny. This girl, probably 17ish wanted to dunk Huntington so bad, she was so antsy about it, finally Detective Huntington got up and she paid for 3 balls, she threw them all and missed so she ran up to push the button and an officer tried to stop her, it must have scared her because she peed her pants. It was so funny to me. She was so ready for revenge and really she only got herself wet :0) When it was Jake up, Marshall dunked him, Yes I threw a ball and dunked him, and several other people. The weather wasn't the greatest so the poor guys were so cold, but such good sports. It was a lot of fun, and drew a lot of good attention for the officers!! Everything went well, and they earned a decent amount of money for the Midvale Lodge FOP. Each year Jake brings our trailer over so that they have a place to rest and cook up some food. I think it was great. Jake is a trooper, he was up at 6am, and over to set up and didn't get home until 11pm. part was volunteer for the booth and 8 hrs was work. What a good man!! Well we are soon off to California, and I will remember my camera this time.


Also I did the Cry It Out method with Kam and it worked wonderous, she is a better sleeper and life is better. Marshall started Pre-K and really enjoyed his first day, he came home and said It was so awesome MOM!!

My Niece Kayla

My Niece Kayla has diabetes and it sucks. She has to get insulin often and poke her finger all the time. It is a sad disease and we hope they will find a cure.
Makayla was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when she was 4 years old. She is a brave girl. It would be very hard, she can't just eat whenever she wants to like we all can, when she goes to a birthday party she can't indulge in all the junk food, its not easy to have sleep overs, and you have to count your carbs each meal. Plus at school, she can't just follow her class to lunch, she has to go to the school nurse and have her sugar levels checked, get a shot and then join everyone for lunch. Poor Kayla. I have given her a few shots, and let me tell you ... she is one strong girl. We figure since she was diagnosed up to now she has had to have over 4800 shots of insulin. That is insane!!!! Plus several times a day I would say at least 6 minimum she has to poke her finger to check her blood sugar level. Lets pray that they find a cure and find a cure soon. Diabetes is scary, and not fun for anyone, but especially a child. Sorry for my sob story, But this is something I support 100%,l we truly need to find a cure!!

Here is Kayla's message!




Friends and Family,

I am doing the walk to cure diabetes in a few weeks. I am trying to raise money to find a cure so I don't have to have 4 shots a day plus 4-8 finger pricks a day. If you can donate any money I would appreciate it. Any amount will help, $1, $5, $10, $20, every dollar helps us get closer to a cure.
If you can donate go to http://www.walk.jdrf.org/ on the left side where it says donate a walker put my moms name in Aryanne Allred.

Thank you for your help.

Makayla Allred

Midway/Park City

For our Anniversary Getaway Jake and I stayed the night up in Midway. We stayed at the Inn on the Creek. It was very pretty. Very green and it sat right on the golf course. We saw a few deer and some little animals. We spent a lot of time in Park City. The first day we went shopping at the factory stores, it was crowded but there were a lot of good deals. That night we went to downtown Park City ... it was the Arts Festival, we didn't know that, but it made it crowded and gave us a lot of stuff to look at. We ate dinner at the Pizza Parlor on main street, it was yummy!! Our final day we went to Park City Mountain Resort and did an all day pass. We went on the Zip Line several times, the Alpine Coaster lots of times .... this was the best, it was so fast and so fun, I could have went on it all day long, and of course we went on the Alpine Slide, I was a bit slower on this one cause I was scared of falling of the trail. We also did the little mini golf course, and it is mini for sure! It was so much fun. Being the dork I am, I didn't think about anything but a night away and forgot to bring/put on sunscreen. I am a lobster, my legs, arms, chest and nose are soooo red! I will be surprised if I don't blister. Stupid of me for sure, but who would of thought, not me obviously. It was a fun time to be away and just relax. Thank you Jeannine for watching the kids, we so appreciate you! With our luck, every time we go out of town something bad happens, well thankfully no one got hurt, however we did come home to house of 84 degree's and our AC unit is toast. So we get to invest in a new one, I am not excited, we have NO money, but we will figure it out!! We didn't get a lot of pictures because we would go together, so oh well. I'll post some pics later.