4th of July... late

So I just realized I have these pictures of us doing fireworks on 4th of July. We celebrated with our sis.-in-law's family and Jared's sister and her family. We had a blast. Buddy did surprising well too... as long as he was by his "momma" :0)

Buddy getting comforted by Jared... most of the time it was me, but I guess I was too into the fireworks in this picture

Michelle (our sis.-in-law) lighting fireworks with her dad

Our cute little niece, Chelsea

Brian, our nephew, having fun with sparklers

Brian ready for the excitement to begin

Girls camp

These last few days we had the opportunity to go to girls camp with the 12-18 year old girls in our church. It was a blast!! Yes, we both went. I was there more than Jared, but he did come up as our priesthood leader for two days or so. It was so fun getting to know the girls and seeing how incredible of young women they are. I loved every minute of it. When they asked me to go as medical advisor I was so excited. I love girls camp and I don't see that changing any time soon!

3 of our cute 12 year old girls leading camp songs.

Some of our camp group... I think there was like 8 or 9 wards.

Some of the girls playing "Scum". So fun! Yes, we are in a lodge. The weather got so incredibly bad for two of the nights, so some of the girls slept in the lodge.

Our girls performing at skit night for the whole camp. They did an amazing job.

Playing twister with another ward. They did great! More importantly, they had fun.

Pictures

Pictures are up!! Take a look. Let me know what you all think!

redesigning the blog

Please bare with us as we trying to make our blog more user friendly for our perspective birth families. If we haven't included info. you think we should, please let us know! Let us know if you have any suggestions for changes too. We value others opinions. Thanks!

Nothing too exciting

So~ life is pretty good here. Nothing exciting has really happened. Hence why I haven't updated. Jared is still busy, busy at work. He's just finished the fishing merit badge with his boy scouts. He's got a camp out or two coming up too.

I have to admit, I am loving unemployment life! I thought it'd be so hard, but to be honest I have not missed work one bit. I have been busy with school, cub scouts, and getting things done around the house that I haven't been able to do. I feel like I'm finally getting caught up on life.

Buddy is growing so fast. He's four months old... weighing about 21 pounds. It's awesome. He's so much fun. We watched our friends doxin for a couple of weeks. Buddy was in heaven! He loved having a friend 24/7. I don't know that he'll get a permanent friend any time soon though.

Anyway~ that's about it for us. Hope all's going well for all of you!

Past 6 months

Here's a family letter that I wrote for my side, summing up our last six months. If you want to read it, great! Don't feel obligated to in any way though! Just thought it'd be fun to post...

Wow, has the time flown. I can't believe we are already half-way through 2010. So far, this year has been great to us. Few changes in our little family, but they're great changes.

Jared is still busy working at Symantec. He's loving it and is good at it, so hey... why change? He is now serving as scout master (over the 12 and 13 year old boys) in our ward. He is loving every minute of it! This has been one of the perfect callings for him I think. It has definitely kept him busy with weekly activities, camp outs, and merit badges. It's been a wonderful experience for him though. Other than that, Jared is staying busy keeping me sane and he's loving life!

I have now completed first year of nursing school. I'm still on track to graduate May 2011. YAY! I can't wait. I am currently in the process of taking the last class so I can get my L.P.N. I should be able to sit for the state board at the end of Aug.-ish. I am serving as cub scout committee chair (so I am in charge of all the boys 8-10 and their leaders). This calling has been a challenging one, but I love it. I think/hope I'm getting the hang out it, but we'll see. I am also primary pianist. I think this has been one of my favorite callings by far. Get the best of two worlds, kids and the piano! As far as work goes for me, we have recently decided that it is time for me to leave the working world and focus more on my studies, the house, and scouts. I had my last day on July 3. It still hasn't hit me though, since we had a busy 4^th of July, I have clinicals for school for the next couple of weeks, and still busy maintaining life. Oh! Towards the beginning of March, I broke my pinkie finger. I had to have a day-surgery for the doctor to put pins in to help it heal properly. I had the pins in for about 4 weeks. I had about 4 or 5 weeks of PT, out of work for about 5 weeks, and off the piano for about 4 weeks. We made it though! I have total use of the pinkie, total strength, and life is good again!

As a couple... hmm... we bought a house and closed mid-Feb. I might have mentioned it in the last letter because we were in the process then. We moved at the end of Feb. We have also gotten a puppy! He's a joy, and a lot of work. His name is Buddy. He is a cockapoo (poodle, cocker spanial mix). He was born mid-March, so he's 3 ½ months right now. He's definitely your average puppy... playful, loves to chew (mainly on Jared's shoes and socks- I'm hoping this will help Jared remember to keep them picked up ;0) ), and he loves to run. He's already house broken but we're still working on the no jumping and no running after little kids. As far as our adoption process, we're still in a waiting game. We have updated our online profile, so hopefully that'll help us hear something. We'll see though. One of the things I hope to do, now that I'm not working, is maybe be a bit better at the publicity side and get our name out there more.

Anyway~ that about sums us up in a nut shell. Hope this finds everyone well, happy, and loving life!

Time for an update...

So... life has been fun, but crazy around here. Fourth of July weekend was busy. It all started Sat. Let's start with the shorter of the stories. Sat. I had my last shift at the hospital. Yes, I am no longer a workin' woman. I don't think it's quite hit me because of how busy things have been. We decided that it was time for me to focus more on school, scouts, and getting things done around the house. Main one being school. SO Sat. was a bitter/sweet day. I'm excited to no longer be working, but I'm sad too. I love working, but I know it's not right for me to be working outside the home right now. I think I've been in a bit of denial and that's why I haven't publicly announced quitting until now.

Next story!

Sat. when I got home we had a house full! Jared's mom came in from TX, his sis. and her family came down from northern UT, Jason & Michelle were here with good hunk of her immediate family. We hung out here for a bit then went to Jared's uncle's to swim. We had a little birthday celebration for Jared and one of Michelle's sisters.

Sun. was the main event everyone was here for. We went to Jason and Michelle's church and their little boy was blessed. For those who don't understand what that means, Carter will now be known on the records of the church and at the same time, Jason (who performed the blessing) gave Carter advice and things to help Carter throughout his life. This advice and blessing come from our Heavenly Father specifically for Carter. Hope that makes sense. After church, we all went to a park and had a little picnic and then later that night had dinner at our place.

Mon. was a great day! It was my Jared's birthday!!!! I am so blessed and grateful to have him in my life. He's an incredible husband. Much more than I could ever hope or ask for. Anyway (moving on from the mushiness), we just hung out and had homemade cherry ice cream. Michelle's family left in the morning, Jared's sis. left that night, and Jared's mom went to go stay with Jason and Michelle for the week.

Other than that, life is same ol', same ol'. Sorry there's no pics. of all these exciting events. There were issues and so the camera could not be used. I promise pictures next time!