January to April

Wow...I'm getting really bad at updating this blog. I really have to start working on it! Well, here is a basic rundown of how things have been going for the Snavely household since January. Sorry for taking so long to update everything!

January

So, January 18th we found out we are officially having a baby boy! We will be calling him Logan Blaine Snavely, and things with the pregnancy have been going very well (I'll update more in the April paragraph). We really love the girl doing our ultrasounds, Marlene Diaz, she's a lot of fun and always willing to stretch out the appointment whenever she is able. Chad had a lot of fun once we got our shot of Logan's little boy parts, he was so proud that he'd gotten it right again according to his theory of how to get a boy/girl. I am ecstatic that we are having a boy, although I'll admit that it makes me a little nervous since I know so little about boys, my family is a family of girls! But I am really glad that we'll be having a family with one of each gender of child.

February

In February I came upon a really fun and creative idea that I'd like to make for all the kids in our family. My great-grandmother has hand-knit a Christmas stocking for everybody, and I would like to continue in having a keepsake that is made for each family member as kids are added to my extended family. I made some picture frames for Dakota and Logan, and have made one for my cousin who is also having a baby girl in June. They are super simple, and don't cost me much to do, and I really enjoy it. It will definitely keep me busy until I get all caught up (I have a lot of first cousins once removed), but I'm more than glad to make them. That way each kid has something that is just theirs, and it is something they can keep for years to come.

This month we also took Dakota to her first big show. Disney on Ice came to the Selland Arena, and we decided she was big enough that she would really enjoy the show. And boy did she ever! Chad and I had a good time too, it's been a long time since we've been able to do something like that as a family, and it was really fun to see how excited Dakota got when she saw her favorite characters. She's a big favorite of Mickey and Minnie Mouse, so she was calling out to Mickey nearly the whole time, telling him to come back. It was really cute. And I was so proud that she was able to be a big girl and sit there and watch the entire show without acting up. I really enjoyed watching all the scenes change and how they incorporated all the Disney princesses. It's something I remember my parents taking me to see when I was little, and I couldn't help thinking how much Mom would have enjoyed the show too, especially with Dakota.

March

March was pretty quiet for us. The main thing that we had was our 2-year wedding anniversary. We just celebrated by going out to dinner and relaxing. But it was nice to just spend that time together and remember the day we married our best friends. I can't believe it's only been two years, and I mean that in the very best way possible! We've had such a fantastic relationship, and I am so blessed to have the life we have together. We have our own struggles, just like any other couple, but it's all been worth it, and we've come a long way. I can't wait to continue to share my life with such a wonderful man who loves me and our kids so much.

March also kept me busy getting things put together as much as possible for baby Logan. I did my baby registries at Target and Babies R Us and starting making plans for a baby shower (yeah, I know, tacky that I'm doing my own!) on May 7th. Originally it was supposed to be a surprise, but it was kinda hard for Chad to know what I wanted to do, so he clued me in. Then, the plans for it to be thrown fell through with the girl who had wanted to do it, so I took over and now we're just planning a simple get-together with our friends and family. Much easier that way.

April

April has been a busy month for us. Our first major event was the wedding of our good friend, Dan and his new wife, Diane. It was held in the backyard of a friend of theirs, and it was just beautiful. I dressed Dakota up in a cute little dress and she actually was very well behaved. She got a little loud during the ceremony, but nothing bad overall. The weather was beautiful, which was lucky since we'd been experiencing some hard weather that week. It was a lot of fun to watch her dance with her daddy out on the dance floor. She just wanted to spin and dance with him most of the time they were doing the dancing.

Then, we did some travelling. First, Chad and I took a box of Dakota's old clothes up to my cousin Taylor in Santa Cruz. Taylor is expecting a little girl just a few days after I'm due with Logan, so we took her a large box of clothes from 0-18months. Hopefully it will come in handy for her. It was nice to visit with the family while we were there, and then we took Dakota to the Boardwalk. We were a little disappointed that most of the rides for kids her size were closed, but she did get to ride on the carousel with me. She seemed to really enjoy that.

The week afterwards, my sister Chelsea and I went up to Sacramento to visit our grandparents for four days. We had a good time and got to do a few sewing projects. I found a really cute design for some baby burpers, and so Grandma showed me how to make them and now I have 5 really cute burpers for when Logan arrives.

Then we had Easter, which was fun because we took Dakota up to Modesto and had her play with all her second cousins. She had a great time, and made out like a bandit when it came to Easter egg hunting!

And finally, we get to Logan and the pregnancy! I am now 33 weeks and 2 days along, just a little over 6 1/2 weeks left until he arrives! I have put on a total of 32lbs and am glad it's not the 50+ I did with Dakota or I would be truly miserable. As it is, I feel like Logan doesn't have anywhere else to go! I've had a lot of pain in my hips and especially my right leg, but I cannot wait until he is here. I'm going nuts not being able to "nest" but we're hopefully going to be moving back into a house at the beginning of June, so the very first thing I'll be doing is getting his room all set up. I've been really leaning toward a jungle theme, even though we had originally planned for cowboy things. There's just so much cute monkey stuff out right now, I can't help myself! (Note: I just got notice that we'll be able to move into the house in the 2nd-3rd week of May! YAY! 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a pool, backyard, and we can have the dogs, house...here I come!!!) But anyway, I had an appointment this morning and the doctor says that Logan is already in the head-down position and in my pelvic bone, so now it's just a growing and waiting game. I'm rushing wanting to get everything ready, I just have a gut feeling that Logan will debut a little early, and I want to be all set up, but I am trying to be patient and trust that everything will be ready. The best part about this pregnancy has been that I switched doctors and hospitals, and I am so glad that I did. My old doctor (Dr. Lichtenstein with Fresno Community Hospital) was the one who was our doctor for Dakota, but we seriously only saw him 3 times during the entire pregnancy, and only because we asked for him directly. My new doctor is Dr. Lopez with Clovis Community Hospital, and he is wonderful. I see him at every appointment, and we get along wonderfully. Both Chad and I are so much more comfortable with him. So now I'm hoping that I deliver at a time where he's available so we can have him deliver Logan. It would be so much more relaxing to have somebody I'm familiar with there. And I love Clovis Community's birthing facility. It's so clean and quiet, I'm really looking forward to it.

Well, the next post should have the baby shower and moving featured, so we'll try to keep on top of things and have a post up before Logan arrives!

Thanks for reading so far! Take care all!

Catching Up August-January 9, 2011

Let's see...where to start...?



AUGUST

Well, August was the month after we moved into our house. Things were pretty nice once we started to get settled and comfortable. We had a few little things to fix, and the yard clean-up was ridiculous, but overall it was a lot of fun to finally be in a house! We spent a lot of time that month just getting set up and adjusting to everything. A quiet month really.



SEPTEMBER

September was a really exciting month. We'd gotten the yard cleaned and grass was planted and had started growing. Not an easy thing to do in hard-pan, by the way! It took us a lot of hard work getting grass in the yard. Chad made me a promise to have the yard looking nice by Dakota's birthday, and he kept it! We had a decent lawn (we mowed it the day before her birthday party), and Chad went and got gravel and woodchips and got the walkway and planters all set up before the party started. It looked so pretty! I was really grateful for the fantastic husband that Chad is and all the hard work he does for us.

Dakota officially turned 2, and had a lot of fun with all the family and friends around. She got a whole My Little Pony collection from Aunt Courtney and Aunt Chelsea, she loved that! She got to brush their hair, dress them up, and she even got one that she can take a bath with! I loved My Little Pony as a kid, I have to remember to find all my ponies and give them to her soon.

We also found out in September that we were pregnant! Of course, Chad knew before I did, it took me awhile to want to take a pregnancy test.



OCTOBER

Halloween was the big excitement this month! We had a busy holiday for Halloween too. We were invited to go to a birthday party on Halloween for our friends' son, and then the kids would go trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. Dakota had so much fun, and it was so cute hearing her say "Trick-or-Treat!" She got to dress up as Tinkerbell, and she was absolutely adorable. Everybody loved how cute she looked. Chad and I went to our traditional party the weekend before Halloween. It's always a lot of fun. Our friend, Debbie, has a huge party (last year 300+ people went) out at her house, with a haunted house, decorations everywhere, and good food and drinks. No worries! No alcohol for me this year, but we had a good time still. It was cold so I decided that rather than go as a fairy, I would go as a nurse and just wore my scrubs and thermals. It was so much better than freezing half the night. With my pregnant brain, I can't remember what Chad wore. :) I know we had a good time though, we always do.



NOVEMBER

I really wanted to do Thanksgiving with my family this year, so we did. We went up to my Aunt Serelle's in Modesto, and ate some of the most delicious food it's making me hungry right now just to think about it. Turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, broccoli casserole, cranberry sauce, cooked carrots, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, fresh rolls, salads, and veggie trays. Yummy! Then we had pumpkin pie, chocolate mousse pie, apple pie, and fruit/custard trifle. Oh, that was the best part. I was so full by the time I was done, but it all tasted soo good! From there, we drove up to Sacramento and stayed at my Grandparents' house. We went up with everybody to cut Christmas trees at our traditional tree farm in Placerville that weekend, and hit the market they have up there. We love their apple cider and other yummy things. Chad and I did a little wine tasting (I'm allowed!) while we were there, and it was delicious. They had a sparkling apple wine that we really liked, it was really sweet and light, something that we love in wines. It was also great to see all my cousins who had come to visit. They go to school either in Utah or Idaho, and it's closer to come see us for Thanksgiving, so it's always fun when they come.



DECEMBER

Last month was extremely hectic. We did a lot. We had been doing a lot of fighting with our landlord, the original agreement had been that we were going to do a rent-to-own deal. He was going to carry the deed for us for 5 years, so we could save up and get our credit in a better place, then we would buy the house from him for $225,000. He'd had an appraiser out, and that's what they had told him the house was worth. Problem was, we'd never been able to get him to put it on paper. He always said, "We'll take care of that when the time comes." We really should have pushed for it. We had also agreed that we'd be working with him and doing work around the house/property to work off some of our $1300 rent each month. We were never able to get that in writing either. Long story short, we ended up moving overnight on December 15th. The stress of everything was just getting to be too much on us (especially me) and so we decided it was best to move out before we lost the baby due to all the stress. We got all moved in and mostly settled though just in time for Christmas. That was my one condition, I wanted things to be comfortable for Christmas. But we got our tree all set up, decorated, stockings out, and gifts wrapped, just in time. It was rushed and everything, but we had a good Christmas anyway.



JANUARY
This month has so far been very nice. We love our apartment, and plan on being here until the baby is born in June. We don't have the dogs here, but they are doing very well at my father-in-law's house. Lucy is gorgeous and sweet as ever, and Sierra is growing so much it's amazing. She's going to be a truly beautiful dog, and once I'm done with her training, she'll be a great dog, just like her mommy. She's my girl, and I love it!
My birthday was ok. We went to a New Year's Eve party and had a quiet and relaxing time. It was actually kinda nice, not too big and crazy. I got pretty tired soon after midnight, so it was really nice to be able to just come home and fall asleep. Then, my dad took us out for dinner at The Cheesecake Factory on my birthday. It was really yummy. I had the tiramisu for dessert, and it was delicious. We ate so much, it hurt by the time we were ready to get up and leave.
Right now we're just waiting until the 18th, when we can find out what the sex of our baby is. We're pretty sure we're having a boy, so I'm going to laugh really hard if this baby is a girl too. I have to admit though, I'm gonna be really disappointed if it's a girl. I really want this baby to be a boy. I've always wanted a boy, and since this is going to be our last...it'd be really great if I got my boy. We haven't been able to settle on a name yet, which is a little frustrating. I thought we'd agreed on Logan Blaine, but Chad doesn't want to use it now because it brings up bad memories of a girl he can't stand. Her son is named Logan. It's just been a lot harder to come up with a boy's name. For a girl we like Kenna Marie/Nicole, or I also like Mikayla Nicole, Chad really wants Nicole for a middle name. He wants to honor me in some way I guess. So, now I'm 16 weeks and 5 days along, and just trying to hang in there. I hurt everywhere, the cold is getting to me really bad. Tylenol isn't helping either, but I try my best to just stay warm and be patient until it starts to warm up again. I cannot wait though to have this next ultrasound. I want to know so badly what we're having.

Anyway, that's about all we're up to right now. Until next time! I'm gonna go eat! :)

Update

Well, just a quick one: apparently we're not pregnant this month. I'm ok with that though, because if next month works out, then I have a better chance at delivering around/on my mom's birthday (June 20th). My aunt's is the 21st, and my great-grandmother's is the 22nd, so anytime around then is great. I don't mind. I can wait!

New House. New Adventures

I love my new house! It's nothing big and fancy, but it works well for us. We're in a 3 car garage, 3 bedroom, 2.5 bathroom, 1260sqft house on 2.5 acres with horse pasture. Not bad if I do say so myself! We're discovering all the little things that need to be fixed, but we're slowly getting it all worked out. I think Dakota is enjoying all the freedom though, she can go anywhere she wants now instead of being cooped up in our bedroom at my father-in-law's. I like it too, I can finally relax and just enjoy myself. We got cable hooked up this week, and I got my mom's piano delivered yesterday (yay!). We're finally seeing grass in our front yard, which I am glad to have, although we're still working on it. We still have a lot of bare spots, but we'll just keep throwing seed and eventually it'll fill in, then we'll have a beautiful green lawn for Dakota to play on! The hard part has been that we have mostly hardpan out here, not much good soil for the grass to grow in. Dakota's birthday is coming up next month, and I have been wanting to get her a play set to climb on, so I'm going to be kicking butt trying to get the yard set up so she has a good area to play in. I know that she'd love to be able to go outside and play and climb and run.

Speaking of birthdays, I cannot believe that Dakota is almost 2. She is growing so quickly it's almost as if I see a change daily. She's even speaking more clearly! She's now using short phrases, and we can understand what she's wanting. Last night we went to visit a friend, and while we were sitting out on the patio Dakota got up and one of the dogs jumped into her seat. When she came back to her chair and saw the dog in it, she turned to Chad and said "Doggie took my seat." We were shocked, we've never taught her about that kind of thing, but she let us know very clearly what had happened. I'm very proud of her. She's a good kid who really loves her mommy, and most of the time she's happiest to cuddle and play with mom. I'm curious to see how she does as she really enters the "terrible two's" and if she's going to cause any big problems for me in the next year.

I'm extremely excited for Chad and I right now too. Last week we started a new business that has really taken off. It's called Uni-Rack, and it's making universal horse saddle racks and other equine/tack supplies. We're getting in touch will all the local feed/tack stores and businesses and working with them to sell our products. In just the last week we've done so well that we can't keep up with the demand, everybody that Chad has talked to has bought something, he's never been turned down! We're even going to the horse shows/roping competitions/rodeos, so I'm in heaven. I love getting to see all the horses! It's great. We're working on going national, if we can get an account with Tractor Supply Hardware, we'll be set. They have 1000 stores that sell tack supplies, and they'd stock each one with our stuff, so we're really excited. All we're working on are prices with them right now, so we're pretty sure that once we work them out we'll have them as one of our business accounts. Yay!!! Then we'll buy some property and build a house and set it up exactly as we'd like, with everything that we need and/or want.

I'm also getting ready to go back to Fresno City and finish my Associates Degree, I just have this one PE class to take, and then I'll be finished. I have to see if I can be added to this class that I want to take (it's by instructor's permission only), but if I can, then it's just 1 hour a week starting August 17th until December 14th. I'm excited to be getting so close, then I can say that I have my degree. I just hope that the instructor will let me join the class. It's called Adapted Fit and Flex, and it's supposedly like a yoga class, but it's taught by one of the dance instructors. I wanted something easy and relaxing that I could just do once or twice a week, and finish up what I need to all at once. If I can find a steady babysitter for the time that I'm at school, then I'll be so glad to finally do what I would like to and finish what has kinda been on hold for about four years now.

I'm really super excited about this bit of news: Chad and I are trying to have another baby! With the business doing so well, we decided now was a good time to start trying. He thinks I'm already pregnant, but I won't know for another two or three weeks. I can suspect by the third week, and know for sure by the fourth, so we have a few more to find out. I can't wait, I loved my pregnancy with Dakota, and I would love to have another chance to experience everything. Yes, even the morning sickness. It's not enjoyable at the time, but it's part of the experience, and it's so worth it in the end. I'm hoping I am already, it would put me due in...May or June, and both are great months for our family as far as birthdays go. My sisters are May 9th, and my mom is June 20th, my aunt is June 21st, and my great-grandmother is June 22nd. But I should know by the 20th of this month whether or not we're expecting, so stay tuned to know for sure!

Immature Mother in Law

Today has been funny. This past Sunday, we got a call from Chad's cousin, Robbie, who is living next door with Grandma Snavely. He was letting us know that my dog had been let out of the yard by Clovis Sheriff's Department. Robbie's girlfriend/wife (we're not entirely sure) apparently had a warrant out for her, and so they'd come looking around. Well, when they went in the backyard, they left the gate open, and my dog got out. So she took off down the street, and I finally got her back home. Anyway, the Sheriff's Department denied being in the backyard, but Robbie saw them out there, and there was no other way for the dog to get out unless the gate had been opened (we have hot wires everywhere!). So then the mystery was: who had called them to come out? Well, yesterday Chad called Verizon to check his mom's phone to see if she had called them. There has been a lot of stress between her and us, her and Robbie/Crysta, her and Grandma, her and everyone basically. Well, as it turned out, the number for the Sheriff was right there, plain to see on the call history list. So when Blaine, my father in law, confronted her about it, she had no way to prove it wasn't her. But, being her, she denied it anyway and is now throwing a hissy fit. She brought her box in for Dish Network today, and set it on Blaine's coffee table with a note that said "I have $100 to my name. I will return the phone (her cell phone) when I buy a pay phone. I'm fed up with all the BS." I just had to laugh! She causes all this controversy, and this is how she reacts?! Well, my first thought was "Well, if she hadn't done anything, why get rid of her phone?" My second thought was "There's less money for Blaine to have to spend on her." He supports her 100% after being divorced for over 30 years. When she lost her house 4 years ago, he told her she could put a trailer out back and live here for a few months until she got back on her feet. Needless to say, she never got back on her feet and is still here. So now she's throwing a hissy fit for being caught red handed! LOL!!!

September to November

I've gotten behind again the last three months. Now time to try and remember what we've had happen since the last time.

September: We finished off the month celebrating Dakota's 1st birthday. It was so much fun to set things up and have a party for her. Slightly stressful, but very fun. Now that she is over the one year mark, it's amazing to look back and see how much she's grown and how much we've done as a family. Her birthday party was carebear themed with streamers and balloons and bright colors everywhere. My sisters came over and helped me set up and get food ready, which I really appreciated, I needed the help. What was super exciting was that Dakota stood up for the first time on her own right in the middle of everybody. She was out on her blanket in the middle of the lawn, and decided she was going to stand, so she did! I was so proud of her. And Dakota REALLY enjoyed her birthday cake. SaveMart had a special going on, so when we ordered a 1/4 sheet cake, we got a free 8-inch cake for baby's first birthday that matched the sheet cake. She was so dainty at first, Chad had to shove her hands down into the cake before she started enjoying it herself. Dakota had such a sugar rush; she didn't crash until 11 o'clock that night! But she had fun, and that's all that mattered to us.

October: Dakota worked on standing on her own some more, and we kept watching for her to take those first important and exciting steps. She still wasn't that brave though, so we continued to work with her, and wait. As Halloween neared, we started deciding what we wanted to do for costumes and which parties we were going to go to. Every year, our friend Debbie has a party the weekend before Halloween. It's always a lot of fun, and it's huge. So Chad and I knew we'd be going to her party. I dressed up as a swedish barmaid, and Chad went as a breathalyzer test with a twist. He was a big hit to say the least. It was hard to find a costume for him this year, there really wasn't much that was interesting to him, but we made things work. The hard part this year was that I got tired early, and we went home around 11pm. As it turns out, I'm pretty thankful that we left early. Not long afterwards, there were a few fights and the police were called out. When we left there was a policeman in the driveway who had been called out for a noise complaint by the neighbor, and when we returned the next morning to help clean up, there was another taking statements by those involved in the fights. Hopefully, Debbie has another party next year, but I wouldn't blame her if she decides to take a year off after all that happened this year. The plan as far as I know is to make sure that everybody is limited on how many drinks they can have, and to make sure that everybody is the proper age, apparently we had a lot of underage people sneak in this year.

On Halloween, we went to our friend Larry's. He always does a haunted walkway for the trick-or-treaters that everybody in the area comes to check out. This year Chad and I took Dakota trick-or-treating, which was a lot of fun. I dressed up as a cowgirl, and Dakota went as a baby leopard. She was so cute!!! We figured it would be fun to take her out and get her used to the holiday and all that comes with it. Next year she'll understand it more, but it was fun to take her out anyway. She got to grab our hands and do some walking that way, which she is getting really good at, if we're not ready she'll take off faster than we expect and end up pulling herself backwards. But she had a lot of fun walking with Carissa (age 4) for a little while on Halloween.

November: So far this month has been amazing. On the first day of the month Dakota decided to take her first steps for her dad and Grandpa Blaine while I was getting her bath ready (so I missed them!). It took a few days to get her to do it again, but I finally got to see her walk. I am thrilled. I can't wait to have her really walking and starting to run. I know everybody tells me that I won't be saying that when she is, but I don't care, I honestly can't wait to see her achieve the next stage of her abilities. I am so proud of her every time she learns something new. Then, on the 6th Chad and I went to Pismo so I could finally get my birthday present. Back in January, Chad's gift to me was a new tattoo. And I absolutely love it! I still have color to get done on it, but I love it. Now, before it becomes an issue, it's already done, and it's not going away. You don't have to like it, but it's there. I won't be pressuring anybody in any way about it, so please do not lecture me about it. I will be respectful of you and keep it covered if I know you don't approve, please just respect my choice to get it. Anyway, if you'd like to see pictures, let me know by e-mail (kitten32669@yahoo.com) and I'll send them to you, but otherwise I won't be putting it on display for everybody to see.

I'm excited for Thanksgiving this year. Chad and I will be joining my family in Modesto for dinner, and I'll get to see many of my cousins from the east coast who will be visiting: BJ and his new wife, Ally, Brienne, Connor, Michelle, and some of their friends. I can't wait to see them all, it's been 6 years since I've seen many of them, and I've never had the chance to meet Ally, so I'm looking forward to getting to know her and introduce them all to my little family.

Future Plans for the Snavely Family: Next month Chad and I are going to be going on a cruise to Ensenada. It's a 3-day cruise just to Ensenada and back, but I'm looking forward to it anyway. I bought a stunning dress to wear for the formal captain's dinner, and I can't wait to have Chad see me in it. We'll leave December 4th and return on the 7th. I can't wait! I'm also really excited since Chad and I have decided to start trying to add another little miracle to our family in the near future, so wish us luck!

Catching Up

I've gotten behind on my blogs. The last few months have been crazy for us, and I've been too preoccupied to type up much. But today I'm attempting to fix that.

We're coming up quickly on Dakota's first birthday. Plans are all set for her birthday party a week from today. It's going to be simple: balloons, streamers, BBQ, and swimming. But it should be fun anyway. We're excited about it anyway. Trying to believe it's been a year...that's a whole different thing! I cannot believe that I've had an entire year with this precious girl already. She's grown so much and is quickly becoming a beautiful toddler. She isn't walking quite yet, but she's working on standing up on her own in the middle of the floor. She'll push away from you if she's standing on the bed and stand for a few seconds. We're thinking she'll be walking within the next month. Then the real fun will begin (and I'll really start losing weight!)!

We made a move this month from our apartment out to the country. We're currently living with my father-in-law. It's nice, we've got our own little portion of the house, and we're going to be building on a temporary room for Dakota. It'll be added on to the garage, so it shouldn't be difficult. All we do for now is have her sleep in the back office in the playpen. She's done well, she's stuck to her schedule and not been disturbed by the change. I just can't wait to get her back into her crib and more settled. Blaine's place is nice, we're all adjusting pretty well to living so close. All we do right now is share the bathroom and the kitchen. Otherwise we have our own space and pretty much keep to it.

The Month of June

Dakota is 9 months old. It seems impossible that time has gone so quickly. In just three short months, she'll be a full year old. She now crawls everywhere (yay! finally!), and has three and a half teeth. She's got three on the bottom, and one is cutting through up top. Lucky for me, she hardly notices now that teeth are coming in, I just wonder how she'll handle having her molars come in when they decide to make an appearance. Dakota is just a happy, beautiful child who brightens my day every day. She's just starting to pull up on the furniture, but luckily hasn't found much that she can reach to pull up on yet. What we really enjoy now is that she finally gets to sit in a high-chair when we go out to eat. She's getting to eat rice puffs and learning how to mash them up and "chew" them. She absolutely loves them too! Before I know it she'll be walking, then running, and able to eat almost whatever she wants. We're working on teaching her how to open her mouth so we can brush her teeth, but so far I think she likes the taste of the tooth and gum cleaner (it's berry!) too much, and she just sucks or chews on the toothbrush. At least we're trying to start her on good habits though! Summer is fun for us, trying to keep her cool enough is a bit of a challenge, but we're doing well. Luckily, she loves water and will gladly go swimming or sit in a cool bath when it's really hot. But I love my daughter, she's just a joy I couldn't imagine not having in my life.

We had the second of our four-wheel drive trips this past weekend. We didn't take Dakota with us for Moonlight Madness though. The drive is done at night, and many of the obstacles are just too rough for her to go on this year. Chad and I had a really good time though. We drove up Saturday morning, went on the day-time run, came back to kabobs for dinner (super yummy, thanks Debbie!), and packed up and went on the night-run. The trail was particularly rough this year, so we're glad we had Dakota stay at Grandpa David's while we were gone. The day was hot, and the night got pretty cold. I came back needing to stand by the fire to warm up!

How Fast They Grow!

It is amazing to watch my daughter grow. I am just so proud of her. It was just Thursday that my sister and I walked into Target, and I was telling my best friend, Stephanie, that Dakota was working on sitting up by herself. Then, not five minutes after we got home, Dakota sits up all by herself! Chad and I were just watching TV, and he looked over at her, and she was just pulling herself up into a sitting position! Now we cheer her on and encourage her every time she does it. It's just amazing to see how fast she can do it now, and how quickly she learned how to do it. Now if only she would crawl! She still insists on rolling everywhere, so she'll probably be one of those kids who walks before she crawls. It's especially funny to see her sit though, because she's really doing the splits, I understand that's how it starts out, but it's just interesting to see. I am just so proud of her every time she figures out something new. Her ability to learn new things is fascinating, she's so smart already. It means so much to me, like I've done something absolutely right, and that I don't have to feel bad for any of the things I think I've messed up on because she still manages to do the right things. She still improves by leaps and bounds. Before I know it, she's going to be walking, running, jumping...and I'm not going to believe how quickly she's learning so much right in front of my eyes.

Last week Dakota went swimming for the first time, wearing my old baby swimsuit. She was a little scared at first, she hadn't gotten the sitting thing down yet, so she still managed to get a little water on her face. Now I don't think I'd get her out of the water if she had a choice. She loves playing more in the bathtub; she splashes and plays now, and knows what it means when I put her in her new swimsuits. It reminds me of what everybody says about me being a fish when I was a baby and a kid. I still love swimming, and it's exciting to get to swim with her now. Even if it's just that she gets dipped in her baby pool or carried in the bigger pool, it's fun because she enjoys it so much, she gets so excited. She gets into her suit, gets all greased up with sunscreen, and is ready to go. She's laughing and giggling the entire time we're in the water, and when we decide it's time to get out, she doesn't want to. Sad thing is, I think she has more of a tan than I do. She must have gotten some of Chad's Cherokee coloring, because she's already darker than me. As you can see, I desperately need a tan, I am white, white, white. Except for my shoulders now. When we went on our 4-wheel drive run last weekend, my right arm got a little toasted, so it has some color, but now I'm all lop-sided, I need to even out. Luckily, we have some time at the beach coming up, and another 4-wheel trip next month, so I'll have some time to tan a bit. That's the plan anyway. If I have a good few days in Pismo, I can get myself some good color and hopefully be my usual beautiful summer bronze for the first time in a few years. That's my goal, get in shape and look more like my slender self by Christmas, complete with a good summer tan.

The Busy Month of May!

Wow! What a busy month for us. We've got 5 birthdays, 2 races, Mother's Day, 1 camping trip, helping a friend move back from Lancaster, and a wedding this month. We are busy, busy, busy. I don't think Chad feels like he's stopped moving and running around trying to get things done for awhile now. He's exhausted. I'm tired, but it's just from trying to stay on top of things and take care of Dakota at the same time. She's got so much energy! She still isn't crawling; she prefers to roll everywhere she wants to go. She still manages to get around fast enough though, if I don't watch her, I lose track of her quickly! She's 8 months old on the 30th of this month and every month we're closer to a year, I believe it less and less. Dakota can stand on her own for a few seconds, she's got very strong legs. Chad and I are starting to think she'll seriously walk before she decides to crawl. What I love is that she reaches out for me now when I go to pick her up or take her from somebody else. She doesn't do it that often for Chad, and she absolutely refuses to do it for anybody else. Mommy is special in that regard. Her hair still grows just in the strip down the middle of her head, so I tend to give her a bath-time mohawk (It's so cute!). She is just such a happy, easy baby it makes me wonder if a second baby is a good idea. There's no way we could get lucky and have another super easy and well behaved child. Dakota is such an independent kid, she takes care of herself for entertainment, the only thing she asks for is some cuddle time in the afternoon, and playing on the floor with the rest of her toys. All I have to do is watch for her signs of needing a bottle, diaper change, or a nap. They're all pretty easy, so I don't have much to do for her otherwise. I love having such an easy baby, hopefully the next will be the same way.

I'm excited for Chad right now as well. He's starting up a second business to help earn some extra money called Poor Boy Chassis. He'll be putting together sand rail and rock buggy frames for his customers. We're just finishing up our second rail right now. We built one smaller rail for Chad's dad (to the right) and this week we sent our V8 rail in to get powder-coated. It's a beautiful red-orange with a pearl finish. It's really very pretty, almost coral in the sunlight. To offset the orange, certain parts are black satin, and it's stunning. It's our racing rail, unlike his dad's, which is our jumping/wheelie/play-time rail. Blaine's is nowhere near as fast, but we play a little harder in it (clearly). It's a lot of fun to have these to play in out at Pismo Beach. We wanted something we could both be in together, and when she's a little older, that Dakota can be in too. Blaine's rail is just a 2-seater, but ours is currently a 4-seater and will eventually become a 5-seater. Once we get finished pictures of it (later today) I'll post a few and give more details about it. The one picture I have is in it's unfinished stage, and it looks a little like Mater from Cars. Besides, I'll have more details from the races; speed, times, that kind of thing. It should be a lot of fun. We certainly enjoy them anyway.

We finally have Lucy, our boxer pup (although she's hardly a puppy anymore!), back at home. She's 11 months old now, and although I think she's already huge, she still has some growing to do. She's going to be a very big girl. And, typical of big dogs, she still thinks she's a lap dog, of course. She loves to sit in my lap every chance she gets. She's in heat right now, but normally I let her sit for a little while and then wrestle my way up. We're going camping in Jose Basin next weekend, and she'll be coming with us. She's so well behaved, we know we don't have to worry about her a bit. I'm just a little worried about the rattlesnakes. It's been really hot up there, but when we went to drop off a few of our friends' trailers and rope off our camp site, we saw a lot of jack rabbits, so I'm hoping that means their (the snakes, that is!)numbers are down. If we don't see a single one the entire time that we're camping, I'll be very pleased. The two last things I'd want to ever see is my daughter or my dog get even within strike range of a rattler. I've already seen Chad there, and I don't like it either. Lucky for us, we had a shovel with us and he killed it. No more poisonous snakes! Eventually the plan is to breed Lucy. Now, I more than anybody can respect that animal populations are high and the thing we're encouraged to do is spay and neuter our pets, but this is something we have discussed and decided to do. We'll wait until after a few more heat cycles have gone by and she's a little older, but we are going to breed her once we feel she's ready. I'm excited for that, I loved having the puppies from my last dogs, and I know that if I'd had the chance (in other words, the time) I'd have found them all wonderful homes. But at the time, that wasn't an option. I was being kicked out of the place I was renting to make room for her son on three days notice, I was 7 weeks pregnant, and was not working because of the pregnancy [I miscarried anyway due to all the stress]. I barely had a chance to keep the puppies until they could be separated from their moms as it was. I had to beg for that amount of time. But we're excited to eventually get to do something we love with such a wonderful pet. No worries, we won't go overboard and breed her too many times too close together, we love Lucy and would never do anything to hurt her or not take care of her properly.

I'm especially excited for Cara and Matt's wedding on the 29th. My great grandmother and great uncle are coming from Idaho, and my aunt, Pam, and uncle, Shawn, are coming from North Carolina to be there. I'm so excited for them to get to meet my family and to see them again. It's been close to six years since I've seen my aunt and uncle, and I've been trying to figure out a way for my great grandmother to meet Chad and Dakota. We were trying to plan a trip to Idaho this summer, but I don't think we would have been able to go, so I'm so excited they're coming here! I'm also glad that Cara and Matt are finally getting married. As a kid, I remember my mom saying that Matt would probably end up marrying either Cara or Mandy, but it was kinda inevitable that he'd become part of the family. Cara's bridesmaids dresses sound absolutely beautiful too, I keep hearing descriptions from Grandma Meadows, and they sound really pretty. Plus, who wouldn't love a picnic reception? It's planned for later in the evening, so the weather should be fairly nice. I'm excited to get to go and see all the family again. I haven't seen many of them since my wedding, some of them I haven't seen since November. After Cara, we'll just have Laura and Amanda to get married, and so I don't know how soon we'll have the family again together, especially not with great-grandma here. It'll be fun!

Speaking of marriage, I am so happy now that Chad and I are married. I know I said in my previous post that things really haven't changed, and for us they really haven't. But for me, it's very different in many, many ways. My first marriage never felt this secure, this fulfilling. The relationship that Chad and I have is so much more than I could have hoped for. We still don't fight or argue, we talk about anything and everything, and we work together on everything to make it easier for the other. But I have no worries about his loyalty or security in our marriage like I did in my first marriage. I know that Chad is dedicated to me, and that he isn't going anywhere, that he is always there to support me when I need him, and is always going to love me more than any other woman he knows. I never had those feelings before, and it makes me feel so much better than I have in years. I have no reason to doubt myself or the direction of my life, so my self confidence is much higher than it's ever been. Chad and Dakota hold me up and keep me from ever feeling depressed. We all love and cherish one another, and we truly are a family. Chad and I still do many things together, and try to spend quality time together as much as possible after Dakota goes to bed at night. That's why we're both so glad that she knows bedtime is between eight and eight-thirty. It makes it so easy for us to spend time together at night. With Chad working so hard, it's nice when we do get time to spend together before going to bed.

When we travel, unless it's a situation where it's too loud or if it would be easiest to leave her with a babysitter, we take Dakota with us. We've got a 4-wheel drive run next weekend in Jose Basin and she's coming with us. She'll be strapped in tight in her carseat, riding on the run with us. We're trying to get the "Youngest On the Trail" award this year. We'd have gotten it last year if they'd counted her age at -4months. I was six and a half months along, but it didn't count, the child actually had to be born. Go figure! Hopefully, at almost eight months she'll be the youngest this year. We'll find out! I'm excited that it's finally time to go again though. It was this same run last year where Chad proposed, and that makes it extra special for us. We were just sitting around the campfire and Chad said "Hey, I forgot, did I tell you guys that as of today Ash and I are officially engaged?" I just about fell out of my chair. I gave him the most shocked look, to which he responded with "Oh, I guess I forgot to tell you. I think you'll be needing this." Which is when he pulled out my ring, got down on one knee, and officially asked me to marry him. Granted, this picture is from Bald Mountain, but it's the same basic idea. This is our Toyota 4 Runner that we use for all our four wheel drive excursions. We've been in the desert, in the snow, and in the rocks with this thing. It's definitely one tough truck! We have a lot of fun, and I'm hoping Dakota enjoys going with us too. She enjoyed the monster truck rally last month (picture to the left [I look really creepy]), she loves the drag races, so she'll probably love the run just like everything else. She was waving her arms and laughing the entire time, so we'll hope it's easy to keep her entertained on the run, I just wish we could turn her around so she could see everything going on. The view of the back of the seats can't be that exciting, I'm sure it'll get boring fast. And I really hope that the weather isn't too hot. It's so hot this weekend, I don't really know what to expect for next weekend. Pray for cooler weather! Besides, cooler weather means less chance of snakes (again, no rattlesnakes for me = good weekend!).

In the meantime we're not up to much. Just taking as much time to relax as we possibly can when we can. With so much going on, not easy, but busy months are always exciting. Dakota and I are heading out to Grandpa Blaine's, we're going to go swimming for the first time! How exciting for Dakota! Pictures will come soon!