Memorial Day, Graduation, & Sister Time

We love visiting Grandpa's house, and we were so happy when he told us he was going to let us come visit him for Memorial Day weekend. We wanted so badly to go and see him, and we've been practically quarantined for 6 months, we were ready to venture out and see the world! Seeing Grandpa and Jay brings so much joy to my heart. I remember being little enough to climb on Grandpa's lap and how safe and warm I felt. Now, Jay gets to experience that same love. I am grateful we have pictures so that he'll remember those times. 

Grandpa Great & Jay

We also decided while we were visiting, that Jay looks a lot like his momma.

On Sunday, we had a wonderful worship service together. M and Grandpa did the sacrament, and M led our Come Follow Me discussion. I love sharing church with other members of our family when possible. I made dinner for Grandpa and Uncle John and Aunt Karen. I was grateful to be able to help them, they are in a very busy time of year at the greenhouses. We also got to visit with Mikey and Mandy on their way into town, and once they left we went to the cemetery. We put the flowers out on Grandma's grave, as well as Aunt Shara's two boys, Grandpa's baby sister, and his parents. It's a special cemetery and we enjoyed our time there. We also went back on Monday to make sure everything was watered and still looking clean and fresh. 

The Crew

Grandma's Grave

Monday was a day of work for us. I dusted the house and M did all the lawn trimming. Grandpa can do most of the lawn with a riding mower in about two hours, but he struggles to do the trimming that has to happen by hand. M was happy to do it, and on such a beautiful day, I was a little jealous he was the one who got to be outside mowing! ;) We also made some yummy caramel popcorn, just like Grandma used to make. I love vising the greenhouses too, they are so beautiful this time of year! And, this year, especially empty which was amazing. They've been busy! 

M, mowing 

I also tried to teach Grandpa how to use Google Hangouts on his tablet so if his phone stops working he can have a way to call people. He's great at learning new technology. He writes down all the steps and is willing to try, which has not always been the case. I love being able to help him in small ways while we visit. 

Grandpa and I learning Google Hangouts.

The following weekend, M finally got his cap and gown and we celebrated graduation! Woohoo!! I am so proud of him, he's worked so hard and for so long. He's done with the CPA tests and all of school. I'm amazed with all he's been able to do. He also graduated Cum Laude, which is in the top 10% at BYU! Amazing! And, with a 3.96 GPA, I can't believe it wasn't higher. Master Matthew is surely a blessing to everyone and is just starting on his journey to bless the world! We had a really nice Zoom graduation with our parents. I shared photos from our time together at BYU and brought to us by BYU, M shared a few thoughts, and then our parents shared thoughts. It was so wonderful to hear from them in an intimate manner. Each of them shared their testimonies and love for us, which meant so much. We wrapped up the event with a slideshow of all the pictures submitted by every family to celebrate M. It was so sweet and I am so grateful the family participated. The surprise was a little ruined, but M was a good sport and very happy with it all! We also got to take pictures all dressed up too, which was HOT and fun! 

Graduation via Zoom!

Go Cougs!

This is when M got his diploma in the mail, he was so excited! As he should be! 

Every grad needs a yummy treat to celebrate. 

The cherry on top for our graduation weekend was a visit from Kara! She was originally going to surprise me for Jay's baby blessing, I would have been happy beyond measure! And, what a special weekend it was to have her just here on her own. We got to go for walks, sit around, shop, play, laugh, and have fun. I miss sister time so much being in Utah, it's one of the things I am looking forward to the most about moving back to Colorado! 

To get our legs moving one afternoon, we went to Ross to see if we could find Kara some maternity dresses. I have NEVER seen a Ross so empty. It was crazy! The maternity section had one shirt, the same style in like 5 sizes...one shirt per size. And other racks, just totally empty. I did find a pair of shorts for myself which was super awesome. We got Arctic Circle shakes that evening to celebrate M and Kara being with us. 

Saturday evening, we went to Aunt GayLynn and Uncle David's for a winnie roast. It stormed at our house, but we hoped it would be okay out there. It was windy windy...so windy we did part of the cookout inside. The only one who didn't mind the wind was Jay, funny kid! I tried making some homemade graham crackers and enjoyed my s'mores in the microwave because the fire died in the wind. 

Jay loves Daddy so much!

BBQ after we went back outside after the worst of the storm

Windy hair - don't care.

Book time is starting to become a regular.

We loved having Kara, and so did Jay. He got so much attention! He loved every minute of it. Jay is still working on rolling over, super Aunt Kara got him to do it a few times. He loves laughing, and has now tried green beans - it took a few tries for those to stay down and he's doing really well. Kara also taught us more about how to play with babies, so that was very helpful! 

Jay practicing reaching

Seeing Aunt Kara brought smiles to everyone. 

Sister time! So sad to see her go. 

Trying and Succeeding

The past couple of weeks we've been trying some new things, succeeding at some, and trying again. I've been reading the book "Mindset" slowly, and whenever I pick it up I realize that when you try new things you learn. You learn maybe a new skill, and you also learn a lot about yourself. You learn how to deal with failure and setbacks and you learn how to deal with success, both essential aspects of life. I don't know of anyone who really enjoys spending time with someone who deals with success poorly (we all know those winners who we hate losing to) or failure poorly. We've been really enjoying our quarantine time, we get to be home, venture out on walks and runs, have time together, and it's making us be more creative with how we spend our time.

On Wednesday's, we sometimes try to do our workouts together. One of our favorite activities recently has been spikeball. After playing a few times against each other, me losing mostly every time, we decided that playing together is much more fun. We get a better workout, and I don't leave the end of the match upset because M always wins.

Rollerblading was one of our first dates. M used Andrew's old rollerblades and about a mile or so from my house the front wheel popped off. We found the parts and tried to screw it back on, but it was only a temporary fix and M ended up running home holding his blades. It was such a funny memory, and we've now gotten M some really nice blades. We took Jay on his first rollerblading adventure last Saturday. He loved it, and we loved being outside. The path we go on is South Provo and usually has hardly anyone on it.

We had a fun Cinco de Mayo Date. M planned it all and again we had some of this trial and error stuff happening. First, we made dulce de leche. I really wanted to try it in the InstantPot, so we did. I didn't do it long enough the first time, did it again for a little longer, still not totally right, and the last time we put it in it didn't come out until like 10 at night...so, M woke up at like 2 in the morning and transferred it to the fridge. Next time, we'll be doing it just for longer under pressure and see if that works. We also decided to get nachos from Cafe Rio. We were both so excited because they just started to do them with chile con queso. We ordered at the window for that to be on them instead of regular shredded cheese. We got our order and excitedly headed home. When we got home, we pulled out the nachos and the container was corn chips with some sweet pork on top, NOTHING else. What?! We couldn't believe it, but we were too tired and hungry to go back, plus we had to do drive through, so how do you fix it...you don't. We just ate our meat and chips and split the salad we ordered. We also tried to learn a simple salsa dance that night. M and I really aren't much of the dancing type, and it showed. We tried, never fully caught on...so we wrapped up our date with an episode of Hogan's and called it a night! 

Our queso-less nachos

Jay trying Cereal

Right before everything shut down, they asked me to be the RS Activity Leader. I haven't done anything because we couldn't meet, and one day I got a call from the RS counselor and she asked me to do a FaceBook week of posts in the ward group. I hesitantly agreed, I am not even much of a user myself and no one in the ward knows me because for the past year I've been in Primary or not at church because of Jay/COVID. Every other morning, I posted some thought, then would comment on the post. For example one of them was do something physical, so I commented something like I went for a run in the morning. One person besides a member of the presidency commented on any of the four posts. So awkward, and I tried, and I need to come up with something different...especially because I think they might want to do it again. 

Mother's Day was such a fun day. M made me breakfast, we had a wonderful Sabbath meeting at home, and then we did an outdoor brunch with Aunt GayLynn, Uncle David, Lisa and her family, and Spencer and Bekah. The weather was absolutely perfect, we all stayed outside the whole time, used hand sanitizer before going through line to serve up, and didn't give any hugs. Jay loved being outside, laying on the grass on his blanket and playing with his toys. In the afternoon we enjoyed our time together, and M gave me a defuzzer for my clothes that pill and a paper cutter. 

Sadly we didn't quite get in the photo...too many lovely people. 

Another date M planned was a fort date. We have enjoyed building forts in our living room, dragging our bed out to be the base and watching movies and spending the night in the living room. This time, we watched Cheaper by the Dozen, and we went to Brusters to get ice cream. It was such a fun evening and I love spending time with M. 

Us with our finished fort!

Yummy ice cream! 

The last date I'll mention in this post is the double date BBQ we had with Tabitha and Dan. We invited them over and we all stayed outside. We played  Kubb, M and I were ahead by a landslide, but they came back and won. We decided sometimes it's good to let people you invite over win so they want to come back and play. It's along the same lines as what Grandpa told me when I was dating M, he said, "Kitt, you're letting him win sometimes, right? Men need to win occasionally." 

Super happy Kubb buddies! I have the cutest teammates.

In other random news, M's cap and gown still haven't arrived, we've been waiting and waiting. They cancelled the order, then said they were shipping, and then said it would take 28 days, etc. It's been a ride waiting for that thing to come, hopefully it comes soon! I really want to celebrate M's big accomplishments. We also found a townhome to rent in Colorado and we're excited to move mid-July! The rent is even lower than we anticipated, it's close to my work and M can walk to the station to ride into downtown. We feel super blessed. I also got this little surprise box in the mail from my HR leadership team at work. I thought it was super thoughtful and nice. The skittles are totally gone, and the scrunchie I use, we'll see about the other things. 

Happy Box

Jay is kind of rolling, maybe. He only rolls when he really wants to, or when you can distract him by a toy. He's also started to eat rice cereal and oatmeal. It's been a journey. Probably two weeks or more of more of the cereal coming out than staying in. Also, we had one BBQ I mentioned as a double date and the weekend before that we had Nathan and Michela over for one. Both times, as soon as we stepped outside with Jay, he started screaming. I would try for a while to calm him, then M had to step in and got him to calm down. One time, he was calm and in the stroller, I decided to pick him up so he could play before we put him back in so the adults could play, and as soon as I touched him, the screaming started again. So strange, Jay is normally so mild, we don't really know what happened those days. Also, he's 5 months which is so exciting! 

Jay will just lay on his side when he falls over from sitting, as you can see here and below.

5 Month Old - Jay

Such a happy little boy!

He also loves to chew on things.

Quarantine Continues

It's hard to believe April has come and gone. I think it's the fastest month yet, however some people have called this quarantine a year. Along those lines I heard a joke...."Why was 2019 afraid of 2020? Because today they got in a fight and 2021." I recently gave the daily "happy thought" for work and I wrote a bunch of Dad Jokes as the highlight. People got a good kick out of them, so I just needed to share one here. Also, M told me that the Dad Joke book he got from Santa this past year is on the top 5 of the gifts he's ever gotten. Anyways, on to what we've been up to.

Biggest news was that we almost had graduation. I've been prepared with a few things since before the intended day of celebration, and so excited, and then so bummed when M's cap and gown didn't arrive. We're holding off on all things graduation related until we figure out when his cap and gown will get here. I don't blame him for not wanting to graduate without it.

At work, my senior manager took a role at Corporate, and with her move it opened up some new opportunities. First, she's been leading the big culture initiative for the past two years. I've been helping with different things along the way, so with her departure, she asked me if I wanted to help lead it with another leader. I was shocked, and excited. Leading a company through a massive culture change is difficult and something you don't get to participate in often. I am partnering with an awesome leader and looking forward to learning some good skills from her as we lead together through 2020 and into 2021. Second, the person I work with on almost all of my work is taking a new role on our sister team. With that, my manager is having me be an unofficial lead of two other people to help with the work Ali was doing with me. I will miss her, and again it will be a great learning opportunity and help me get a feel for some unofficial leadership.

This is my employee appreciation gift this year, so stoked! A pink LM branded chair. 

We always FaceTime for our staff meetings, and my co-worker and I sometimes have our kiddos, which is so fun! 

We've started choosing different areas in our house to start sorting through. One of the hardest things about packing is having to sort all at the same time, so we're working through area by area to get rid of stuff. We started with my office closet, then moved to our nightstands, then the bathroom, etc. slowly working our way through the house. M really likes the Divergent series, so Friday night we watched the first movie, then Saturday we were sorting so we watched the other two as we did it. We hardly ever watch movies, so this was out of the ordinary and M loved it. He enjoys movie nights, plus we made caramel popcorn which was yummy!

One great perk of everyone being quarantined is that people are open to doing things virtually. One of these things is virtual game nights, which we've participated in two so far with the Blaylocks and one with the Bryce's. Saturday night with the Blaylock's was great, we played games on Jackbox which was very fun and we had a great time seeing everyone. We always get some good laughs. Then, on May 1st, the day before Katey's birthday, she threw herself a game night birthday party. We all joined and had a great time. We played ImagineIf..., Wits and Wagers, and then Matthew and I made our own version of Quiplash which we learned from the Blaylock game night. We had a blast, and it was fun to be able to celebrate Katey's birthday together. I am so grateful technology allows us to connect in unique ways when we can't see each other in person!

Can't you tell what this is? Obviously "King of the Internet" (From Drawful that we played at the Blaylock game night)

Sunday afternoon walks continue to be one of our favorite Sabbath activities. This past Sunday, Nathan and Michela came to find us to drop off some gifts for M's graduation. My mug was pretty sweet, and M got a nice BYU polo. We love living close to Nathan and Michela, they are the people who have definitely seen Jay the most.

The mug for me

Each week the weather gets a little warmer and we are loving it! M plays basketball two times a week at the church and mixes in other workouts to hopefully be able to dunk by the end of the summer, and I typically go on runs or do some exercises with him. Getting out and being active keeps us sane, and we're so grateful for our bodies that allow us to get moving. And, if you read my previous post about failing at making cinnamon rolls, you should know I attempted again with a recipe shared by Jack and it turned out muchhhhhhh better! Plus, it makes just 6 little muffin sized, perfect for two.

I would also be remiss if I didn't include some pictures of Jay and how much he's growing. He laughs and smiles so much more these days, and we're soaking up every minute we can! He's big enough for the little outfit we got to announce gender, and he's loving playing with toys and sticking anything he can in his mouth...or trying to, even if not very accurate.

April Full of Happy Things

This is a unique and special time in life, we're quarantined with each other, we get to work from home, we get to do school from home, and it's springtime with summer coming. And, because of COVID-19, we fill our days with many less things outside the home and much more inside or close to home with as little errands as possible. I've thought about those who are single, living with roommates, and oh, how grateful I am that I am married to my best friend and I get to be quarantined with him!

To start April, we celebrated my birthday. It was so much fun! M made me a sign that he put up in the morning, which is a long standing family tradition that he's willing to carry on and I appreciate it! We had dinner from Domino's courtesy of Lockheed Martin supporting local business and giving gift cards to employees to use at this time. M made me waffles for breakfast, and a delicious chocolate cake for dessert that night. We did presents while Jay was awake and then cake and the rest of celebrations after we put him to bed. I got a huge tupperware bowl, Kingdomino, Pass the Pigs, nail polish, pants to wear when working from home - soft and comfy and look fairly classy, a couple nice work shirts with some gift money, markers, and some Cadbury eggs. I also got to talk to many of the people I love on the phone throughout the day and evening which was a wonderful treat as well! And, I didn't have work on Friday so the celebrations continued through the weekend including General Conference.

Dinner for 2 for 2 meals - score!

The sign

Presents!

Look at that cake, so yummy!

Two sillies

Have you ever roasted a mallow over your birthday cake candles? Why not? 

I also was referred to a specialist chiropractor who adjusts using a sound wave machine, no twisting and turning. I wasn't making good progress at my last chiropractor so he referred me to this specialist. After seeing the x-rays of my neck and lower back, I could tell that I needed help. The chiropractor seems hopeful, so I am hopeful I can find some relief to pain I feel almost all the time. The interesting thing is, after he adjusts the atlas (the top vertebrae) with the machine, you have to wear a little neck brace for a few hours to remind yourself to have good posture and not move. I've been going for a couple weeks now and I am starting to see some improvement.

Jay doing his morning workout with Daddy

Sporting the neckbrace.

We were so bummed that we didn't get to go to Grandpa Great's for conference, but we made the most of it here in Provo. We made English toffee and puppy chow for our treats to enjoy during the sessions. Michela and Nathan joined us Saturday afternoon, and then we finished the day with playing Kubb before they headed off to Ogden. It was special watching at home with Jay, and enjoying our time here as a family. Conference was amazing! M got to participate in the Hosanna shout for the first time, and how cool it was to do in our home. Sunday we went for a long walk after conference concluded, and talked and reflected on what a spiritual boost the weekend was. A temple in China, a new proclamation about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and so many words of hope from the leaders of the Church in a time where there is so much unknown.

Kingdomino

Conference Sunday stroll

Jay and Daddy playing

We've had our evenings of fun mixed in with work and school. Mostly playing games like Kingdomino, Pass the Pigs, Rivals of Catan, or Pandemic, but sometimes we do things out of the ordinary like creating funny photos...some worked and others didn't, as you can tell.

Easter weekend was definitely a big highlight for us this month. Saturday was a beautiful day so we played badminton, spikeball, and ladder ball. We would take Jay out and put him in the stroller so he could have some shade while we played. He was a champ. On Easter, the Easter bunny came and created a very intense Easter egg hunt which was very fun. We also had a wonderful Easter morning with the Sacrament and a discussion about the wonderful gift from our Savior that we can live again with those with love and with our Father in Heaven! We took family photos with a makeshift tripod and self-timer, and by the end Jay was totally out. The day concluded with another Sunday walk.

I love our tulips! They grow every year, no watering required.

Jay smiles when Jay wants to smile, we're learning. 

One of the best shots we got by the end of trying. 

Jay turned 4 months this past week and he's cuter than ever. We took his 4 month photos and also took him to the doctor. He's now 15.5 pounds (40th percentile), 26 inches (75th percentile), and 90th percentile for head. The doctor was very pleased with Jay's growth, which made us very relieved! Jay had to get his 4 month shots and immunizations, which is so sad to watch and he's always so tired at the end of a visit he's extra grumpy.

He's recently discovered his tongue and how to stick it out when you stick your's out.

4 months! 

We wore our masks to the doctors office, they checked our temps before we could take Jay in.

M continued online classes and even wrapped up his final presentation via zoom. He crushed it with the outfit. And, he just wrapped up all his finals this week and he's so excited to have a week of freedom! He doesn't need to cram study for the CPA right now because the testing centers are closed, and thankfully they are extending his initial deadline. Such a blessing! The feeling of finishing the last final of your last class in college is one of the best feelings ever, and now M is feeling free! To celebrate we had Nathan and Michela over for grilling and games. We played ladder ball and Up and Down the River.

Outfit of champions, right here.

As I started the post, we have so much to be grateful for right now. April has already been a month filled with fun and happy things and I am sure it will continue to be. We're looking forward to celebrating M being done with school, and a week free from studying. We go on runs when the weather is nice and we workout inside when the weather isn't. We try to capture every moment with Jay's giggles and soak up all the cuddles he offers.

Candid photo of us both journaling/blogging while keeping Jay awake for a few more mins before bed.