August

I've recently made rash promises to family members to catch up on this blog - I blame the holiday spirit and too much eggnog. This is my gradual attempt to keep my word. I wonder if there will ever be a day when I'm blogging about current events and not half a year ago...

We made plans in August to go hiking with Erik's cousins family - nothing like catching up while you're too winded to actually communicate. Our plans were derailed in the parking lot of the trail head when Sam tried to keep up with Asher and Morgan and ended up falling off a high boulder. Being excellent parents, we told him to tough up and started hiking, but it didn't take long before we realized a hospital visit was in order. We left Morgan to continue the hike (another savvy parenting move) and visited one of Erik's partners at the Kids Care. Good thing the insurance kicked in at the beginning of the month! The x-rays were ambiguous, so we wrapped him up and made an appointment at Primary Children's in Salt Lake. He was looking awfully vigorous by the time we headed to Salt Lake, but we went anyway and discovered it was probably a deep bone bruise, already healing. It's like that time we paid a horrifying amount of money to find out that his brain was perfectly fine within his abnormally large head. Overcautious, that's us. Proud sponsors of America's medical community in every way.

2 years ago, we missed a Kelly Clarkson concert because of Erik's heroics playing ward ball and the resulting injury. We tried again this summer for our anniversary and had a blast. It was my first "rock concert" (I know, lame. But ask me about my Broadway experiences...) and Erik saw a whole new side of me. I may only have two dance moves but they were well used. It's so awesome to go on dates again!

We did a little more local exploring while the weather was nice - the weekend farmer's market, the train museum, boating, new parks - that probably sounds more adventurous than we actually are. We still feel a little rural, as our nearest Costco and Target are 30 min away, and a lot of fun activities are in Salt Lake or farther. But the neighborhood is stellar, and you can't beat the view.

They've been begging to go back to the farmer's market so they can ride the horse. It's gonna be a while.

Relaxing on the back porch after glorious summer food. 

We have had a lot of weddings this year - August was Erik's cousins wedding. It's been interesting to be back in Utah with a plethora of family events. We love being able to join in, but we've also become accustomed to being on our own. The adjustment will probably take a while, but it's a problem we're glad to have!

Erik had to really stoop down for this picture to work. As you can see below, I was not blessed with much height. This is Sam's trike.

At the end of the month, before we got caught up in our first year of real school, we quickly went to Yellowstone with Erik's extended family. The kids were kind of flabbergasted that such a place existed, and they only got to see a little bit of it. Sam talks very knowledgeably about "die-sers" now and they fondly remember the s'mores and the bison. 

This has actually been a good exercise for me - remembering the glories of a Utah summer makes the chilly weather and smog we're experiencing now a little more palatable.

The Final Move

Erik and I like to reassure ourselves that we will never move again - we've moved 6 times in almost 8 years of marriage, and we are pretty excited about the idea of putting down roots and getting to know our neighbors. But we've been warned: about 5 years in, we will start eyeing bigger homes and get an itch to upgrade. I sincerely hope that we restrain ourselves. Unless we can afford to hire a housekeeper, I'm not taking on any more square footage to clean! 

Here we are on move-in day! Our first house!

So it looks a little iffy on the outside... The guy we bought it from gutted and remodeled the inside, but he didn't have much skill with landscaping. That works out for us, because Erik is handy outdoors but not in. The grass is already looking greener, and we are trimming as much foliage as our limited garbage space will allow us. We are a little scared to cut back our overgrown and shady backyard - there could be skunks or dead bodies and we'd never know.

When we moved in, we heard plenty of opinions on our yard from neighbors - mostly how it needed work! We already have the little house in the neighborhood, and apparently we are known as the unkempt one as well. There's not too much we can do right away (we had to buy a lawn mover, for heaven's sake - it's not like we have yard tools or money yet) but we figured we would show our commitment to change by planting some flowers in this corner bed. It's been a lot of years since I did this sort of thing, and I did not remember it being so much work! Probably because my mother did most of it. I tried joking with Erik that I was going to emulate his mom by not doing any landscaping - that was man's work in his house growing up. He responded that he would follow his dad and not do any housework. Since he does most of the vacuuming, sweeping, and dishes, I shut up and started weeding.

The kids have been loving the freedom to run around in the yard without developing heat stroke, and so have I. I don't love discovering the back door open 12 times a day, but they are already healthier and happier for spending more time outside. Their favorite parts of our new house are all the snails and the roly-poly bugs. We've dubbed ourselves "The Mighty Snail Hunters" (we have a song and everything) and we go out in the morning to look for unwary victims. I usually have to spot them, but then the kids gleefully grab them and stick them in the jar. Or we skip the jar and smash them on the road. 

Since our move-in date coincided with a visit from Abby and the girls, we spent one busy day unpacking and then went boating. Twice. Naturally. Poor Erik got to use his vacation time to move out, drive to Utah, and move in. This boating was the only break he got between residency and his new job. Unpacking actually went pretty fast - we had a lot of helpers - but now we're in that awkward phase of frames leaning against walls, not sure where they should go yet; silverware moving drawers every other day while we figure out what makes sense; and lots of miscellaneous boxes arriving from Amazon with hose nozzles and drawer organizers and bar stools. 

We've been trying to do a better job of exploring our new environment - this is a "secret trail" right by our house that winds around with beautiful views of the valley. We feel so fortunate every day to have such lovely scenery around us. Although if there's ever an earthquake, we are toast.

 

We are also loving the summer produce. We struggled to get fresh fruits and vegetables in Phoenix, the quality just wasn't there after being shipped in. It's so amazing to drop by Nana's house for raspberries (we made freezer jam our first week here, we're nuts!), or visit one of the farmer's markets. 

This little one has discovered a passion for corn on the cob. Bordering on obsession. It matches her love of cheese, and she can go through a Costco block in a few weeks.

This is what happens when we take the corn away, after an hour of nibbling. Still not enough. 

We are so happy to have a home and job and begin this next, suddenly grown-up, stage of our lives. Every time we feel like we don't deserve to skip the teeny starter home era we remind ourselves of how long we've been on this journey with very little to our name besides debt. Now we have even more debt! But a lovely house to show for it :) We'll keep you posted on our adventures in North Ogden.

Kate the Great

In May our Katie bug turned one, and per usual we celebrated with an obscenely large and artificially colored cupcake. 

"Are you serious?! For once something this big is for me?"

"I'm just going to rest this on my chest while I try it out. Really, I just hate this bib and want to permanently stain it."

Sugar rush + Thriller

Best.Day.Ever.

Until she realized that we were all having ice cream and she had some disgusting cardboard cake. Then she was DONE.

This is one of her tricks that we love/hate: the banana phone. Adorable, right? Until you try washing banana cement out of her curls...

We sure love this little human.

I'm So Glad When Daddy Comes Home

In our family, Dad is the fun one. The one who takes the kids on outings...

is more lenient with bed times and "traumatic injuries"...

buys the kids doughnuts (and not just plain doughnut holes)...

and doesn't freak out about terrible terrible messes (that's because he isn't the one doing the laundry). 

Sometimes I'm jealous of his awesomeness. But mostly I'm just glad that one of us is fun and that we make a good team. Mostly. 

Weddings and houses

My little sister got married in the Gilbert Temple to my kids new favorite person, Uncle Travis. We realized that a crazy young uncle is a new thing for them. The rest of us are pretty irrelevant at family gatherings now - all the kids just pile on Travis. 

For April Fools Day/Crazy Hair Day at school, Morgan brought home a tempting pile of "brownies" and was very proud of her joke.

So classy.

 

This girl is so active now, I can't get her to hold still for pictures. All of them have a blurry appendage in them.

At the end of the month, we flew up to Utah to look for a place to live. It was both stressful and awesome to explore the idea of owning a home. No shared walls... a backyard... freedom to invest and put down roots...

While we were in Utah, we visited Grandma and Grandpa Merkley. 

Grandpa got a haircut he will never forget.

 

The kids loved their time with Nana and Far-Far. Although they felt pretty betrayed that the raspberries out back weren't ready to pick. When they visit Nana's house, they expect fresh raspberries and boating - instead they got shuffled between babysitters while we looked at houses. 

This is a happy crew flying home - we found a house!

March Came In Like a Lion

Not really. March is a beautiful time of year in Arizona - all those songs and phrases about seasons have no application here. Even after three years here, I struggle to remember that we play outside in January and huddle by the air conditioner in July. 

One day in March I heard a big thud and went to investigate. Turns out someone had hurled (more like launched) a big rock through the kids bedroom window with so much force that it broke the double paned windows and sliced through the blinds with precision. It was taken care of by our landlords with relatively little fuss, but it just reinforced our eagerness to move from our sketchy little neighborhood. 

I once had to take the kids with me to a church youth activity because Erik was working, and we went bowling with a bunch of teenage girls. The kids thought that was the best, and have been begging to go ever since. My cousin said years ago that if I ever found a man I would be willing to go bowling with, she would know he was "the one." And I did actually go bowling once in college - when Erik asked me to go. So here I am, sacrificing again for my children and looking like an absolute idiot. I blame it all on being left-handed and continually confused about which hand I should bowl with.

Happy Easter! I swear we don't teach Sam how to pose like this - he just does it naturally. 

 

From GQ to.... I don't know. Katy Perry maybe?

This little girl loves dolls - kind of foreign to me. I tried to play halfheartedly as a child until I learned to read, and then it was all over. She's a little nurturer already, burping them and snuggling. 

And the best picture of March: Erik signing his official contract of employment. We will be moving back to Utah, near his parents, at the end of June. Erik is going to be a pediatrician in Ogden! We are so excited to be done with school and training. We have spent the entire 8 years of our marriage in this phase - I hope we can figure out how to handle seeing more of each other. :)