In March, we're really into busy season madness. If M works over 10 hours in a day, he'll sometimes bring home dinner provided by KPMG. It's been nice to not have to cook some evenings, and it's really helped our food budget! Dinner often lasts from about 5:30 to 7, with starting to feed Jay through M and I finishing after he gets home. Jay is growing and eating so much, I don't even know what to feed him sometimes. When he doesn't like the food option, we often go through three or four different things before he decides which one he wants. Hence, why dinner is a 90 minute adventure most evenings.
We kicked off the month with Kylee's birthday weekend trip. She called and asked if me, Uncle M, and Jay could come. She was really insistent that Uncle M came along. She knew he would have to work, but I don't know if she realized just how much. Jason set M up with a work station, including two monitors and all the cords and charging capabilities M needed to work from there effectively. We went up Thursday evening because it was threatening snow Thursday late evening through Friday morning and we didn't want to get stuck. It was lightly pouring rain as I picked M up from his parents house. We were about 30 minutes into the drive and almost decided to turn around and come home, or pull off the road because the water was starting to pile on the road and our anxieties were rising. About that time, the traffic slowed to stop and slow-go, so we could see and all was good. Never have I been so grateful for traffic, and when we got through the stop and go, the rain had stopped and the roads were totally dry. We were blessed, and the Lord really heard our prayers. Friday was a fun day! Kylee opened her presents in the morning which brought the excitement into full swing. She got a rocket that shoots off with vinegar and baking soda, and we had a great time launching it. In the afternoon, after the kiddos woke up from naps, we went to the Rec Center to swim. Jay did great in the water, and enjoyed splashing, going down little slides, and walking around in the water. He even let Katey watch him so I could go down the big slides with the girls several times. I love water and waterslides! It makes me so excited for summer! In the evening after M finished work, we had a delicious taco dinner with chocolate crockpot cake for dessert. Yum! We finished the evening watching Descendants, a new Disney Channel movie that was really good!
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| Kylee, Tia, Jay, Kade, Abby |
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| Ready to launch the rocket! |
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| Putting in the feul. |
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| The boys loading up their truck with rocks. |
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| Dinner! |
Saturday was another day of partying. We went to the park and walked all around. Jay loves the swings and could have stayed swinging the whole time. We ventured around walking, following cousins, and enjoying the beautiful sunshine. We shot off the rocket multiple times after M finished work, and got it stuck in the tree a few times too. My day got exponentially better once M joined the fun, and we were so grateful he came on the trip with us. In the evening, we played an expansion to Castle Panic with Katey and Jason. It was a close call, but we pulled it out! We had a great time playing!
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| Everyone wanted to help Jay walk back to the car <3 |
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| Happy Jay on the swings |
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| Firefighter! |
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| Fun on the metal tractor |
We've had a few events church wise of note this month. First, we've been starting to meet with the sister missionaries every other week to participate in our Stake's Revelation Initiative. The sisters share a short spiritual thought, ask us how we want to reach out to those around us and pay attention to how God wants us to reach out and then the follow up with us on our commitments. Our meetings are short, and via zoom, and I am grateful we have the opportunity to have the missionaries "in" our home. Second, I am the counselor in the YW in charge of camp this year. We do have a camp director, phew! And, I still go to the meetings and relay information to the presidency. It will look different due to Covid, and I am excited to be able to support the planning and process to hopefully create some better experiences for camp than what I had as a youth. I think the last thing of mention is that I made an Easter wreath with the Relief Society. It was with fresh greens and so fun! My ministering sister taught the activity, and I loved my wreath. I was so sad when it froze and partially died, but we're still enjoying it on the door for as long as it hangs in there.
We also tried a few new things in March. First, I gave Jay his first haircut. He seemed a bit nervous, moved a ton, and we ended up with a pretty cute looking hair cut and no physical cuts, so it was a win!
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| The before pic, you can see his little hairs hanging over his ears. |
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| During... |
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| After |
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| And, running around in Daddy's shirt to try to distract him while Daddy was getting a haircut. |
I also made jam with Grandpa's frozen raspberries, so yummy! We were out of the jam Grandpa had made us, and it was such a blessing to have some raspberries to make more. And, I attempted to make crepes for the first time, from scratch, gluten free. I was surprised they turned out so yummy! And, they were especially good with the fresh jam, berries, etc.
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| Crepes in the making... |
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| SO good! Even M liked them! |
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| Yummy, jam! |
We got a big snow storm in March, a snow storm that cleared out the grocery stores and caused panic. Potatoes and onions are normally here, all gone...all the salad, gone. Basically everything produce was gone and many other items, but luckily I was able to get most of what was on the list. Church was cancelled as the storm picked up Sunday morning. We did get a lot of snow, probably close to two feet by Monday when it stopped. Our nanny couldn't get out of her neighborhood, so we had to pass Jay between us for the day, which made things a little crazy. Of course, we also had to take advantage of the snow and the time off work and built a snowman on our porch.
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| Very fun, snowball snow. |
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| Snowman! |
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| Feeling the snow, being buried in it. |
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| I just stuck him straight into the untouched snow on our porch, and he couldn't move. |
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| Me and Jay |
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| Enjoying his wet gloves and his new hat - end of season wins at Walmart! |
My co-worker from a past team decided she was going to leave LM and move her family to Texas. They sold their home in this extremely hot market, got almost 100k over ask, and left town. We had a little going away party at our house one Friday afternoon. It was so fun to see the old Leadership Development team. We had a great time catching up, and the team brought their little kiddos. Jay was all over the place, and loved hanging with the adults. He got his hand in my old boss's water, stole treats from the little girl, and emptied purses or anything else he could get his hands on. Such a funny kid!
We've had our share of fun as a family this month too. In addition to the snow, we had some great weather days! One of those Saturdays, we convinced M to take a lunch break from work, and headed to the park. The sun was shining and it was so nice to be outside together! I also made a cute Easter garland with fabric from Grandma Blaylock. She is so kind to let me use some of her fabric, it's been a blast! We also celebrated Easter a little early with the last Sunday before Conference, and got in our matching outfits and took pics. Jay and M mimicked a picture they took 1 year ago on Easter, so cool to see how much Jay has grown in a year!
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| Soaring Jay! |
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| Sunny family photos! |
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| This is about the best photo we got. |
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| Jay loved the stroller and things inside the basket. |
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| The garland |
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| I need to get this photo next to the photo from last year! |
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| The fam-bam. |
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| Jay in his new digs. |
To wrap up the month, we got to spend an evening celebrating Grandpa Blaylock's birthday at Mike and Jenna's! It was the first time we'd seen there house, and it is beautiful. We had a great time visiting, and Jay got more and more comfortable with his cousins. I am unsure how comfortable they felt with him, but they were good sports.
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| Watching basketball and chatting. |
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| Cambrie was so sweet with Jay! He loved it. |
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| Jay wanted Tanner to put his blocks together over and over. |
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| Cowboy Jay's first ride on a horse! |
Jay had his 15 month appointment as well. He still only has his 4 teeth, two top and two bottom. He's jabbering a lot, but no real words other than Dadda. He discovered his personal love for looking at books, which sometimes leads to book destruction. And, he loves sour cream, almost as much as Papa...or maybe more, because he just can't get enough!
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| The wild man woke up and pulled his arm out of his shirt. |
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| He picked me some flowers, so cute :) |
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| Jay's been loving on this new teddy that my friend Rachel gave him. |
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| Books! |
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| Daddy fun |
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| Static-hair was my life as a kid, and it will be Jay's too. |
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| Just need some more sour cream here, please! |
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| 15 month appointment cuddles, so nice, and so sad. |
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| Don't you just love sleeping babies. He is cuddling his teddy, Beary. |
Busy season is mostly over and we have been so blessed! It's been a great month, with lots of fun. The last thing I'll mention is I started my coaching certification this month. It was three 10-hour days, fully interactive, and intense training. The self-reflection that happened during that module, was incredible. I learned of some "rules" in my life that I'd been carrying for a long time. The one I'll mention here is the rule that I believed if I succeeded it meant someone else failed. That belief stemmed from moving to a small town and literally taking the top seat in the class from someone, taking a friend from someone, taking a trophy from someone, taking a state title from someone, etc. It was a thread that was very real in my life, a thread that caused me to often not share my successes with people due to the belief that it meant someone else was failing. This realization has brought so much light into my life, as I have worked to start sharing more of my successes and happy times with people without feeling guilty. I want to celebrate the wins of those I love, and in turn I am sure they want to celebrate my wins and they can't do that if I don't share. We should all support each other more, because we all win! We win at different things every single day, and those wins deserve celebration. They are only big or small if we define them that way.
