Book Review

I just read Adoring Addie by Leslie Gould and it was so good. This book was a very fun light-hearted easy read. The book was set in an Amish community and was based on the story of Romeo and Juliet. 19 year-old Addie was the only daughter in a family with 6 brothers. She always did what she told, never questioning or disrespecting her parents until they want her to marry the bishops son. Everyone tells her that she would never get a better catch but doesn't love him. Then one day she meets Jonathon Mosier, a handsome carpenter from a family that she has always been forbidden to have any contact with, but Addie can't stay away. I loved the forbidden love, and the new twist on an old favorite that is contained in this story. It was a fun book that kept me up too late 2 nights in a row because I just had to see how it was going to get resolved, and then there was the heart stopping moment towards the end that you wonder if its going to end the same way as the Shakespearean tradegy. I recommend it! 

I received this book for free from Bethany House Publishing in return for an honest review. If you would like to review books follow this link: www.bethanyhouse.com/bookreviewers.

Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa

We found a new series of kid books that we absolutely love. It is called Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa. We first read a few of these books from the library but Rachel talked about them so much and loved them so much that I had to have them for our own library. There are 6 book in the series and we love every single one of them.

Rachel is always pretending to be Cowgirl Kate. In fact in church on Sunday her nursery leaders told me that she wouldn't respond to "Rachel" and that she would correct them and say, "No! I'm Cowgirl Kate and I put Cocoa in the barn!"

I love that she pretends she is Cowgirl Kate! I love how much this little girl of mine loves books and I love seeing her active imagination come out in her play. The only thing I didn't like is when she tried to "rope" Kent around his neck the other day. We had to have a talk about what things are appropriate to "rope." I love her!

Thatcher

A few weeks ago we decided to go on a little trip to Thatcher as a family. We went to the Gila Valley Temple while we were there and we had so much fun! I didn't realize how small of a temple it would be so I had planned on taking the kids to the visitors center while Jacob went into the temple, but it was such a small temple that it didn't have a visitors center. I hung out with the kids out side as long as we could just walking on the temple grounds, but it was way hot so we ended up just going back to the hotel and playing there for a while while we waited. We stayed at the Marriot! It was way exciting, and even though it was more pricey than we are used to, it was fun and I would totally give them our business again. Did you know that the Marriot is owned by Mormons? And that they put a Book of Mormon in every room? I didn't until that trip but it totally made me want to support them and give them our service next time. It was a fun little one night mini vacation. It was fun to do something out of the ordinary as a family and it was so nice to go to the temple. With two small children and living 2 hours away from the temple and with having Jacob deployed for almost 4 months, it makes it hard to get there as often as we would like, but always walking into the temple is like going home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10 Months

My Kent-boy is 10 months old! I can hardly believe it! Only two more months and he will be a year old! Time needs to slow down!
A few things about Kent at 10 months:

He weighs 25 pounds.
He is in 24 month clothes and size 5 diapers.
He has 7 teeth. 4 on top and 3 on bottom.
He is the messiest eater I ever met. It doesn't matter what he is eating, he makes a mess of it.
If Kent doesn't want the food on his tray he will drop it, or throw it on the ground it drives me absolutely crazy.
Kent is walking all over! He can't stand up in the middle of a room yet so if he falls down he has to crawl to something to stand back up, but then he is off again. He has even mastered walking in shoes, even though he hates wearing them.

I decided that Kent would die if he was left to his own devices. I just read a book (Gone by Michael Grant) where every one over the age of 14 just disappears, and if that happened Kent would die. Quickly. The other day Kent pulled the toaster off of the counter and unplugged it only part way and was trying to touch the prongs while they were still plugged in. Jacob saved him. Later he got a cord wrapped around his neck. Jacob saved him again. He managed to not only break but shatter my biggest pyrex pan. It was a HUGE mess! I was grateful Jacob was home to hold on to the kids while I cleaned it up! Those things are hard to break too! 

Kent loves to be teased and chased. You can get him from a grumpy mood to a happy one in seconds if he thinks you are going to chase him or tease him. If Daddy chases him he runs to Mommy as fast as he can. If Mommy chases him, he runs to mommy as fast as he can. He likes to run to Mommy. :)

Kent loves to play peek-a-boo and will play it all by himself sometimes. If he doesn't want to get his diaper changed, I can put his pants or something over his face and say peek-a-boo and he will lay there and let me change him while he puts the cloth back over his face and plays peek-a-boo.

He loves his mama! 

Kent loves to play in the hose. If we are outside he thinks it is his own personal toy and that no one else can play with it. (Don't look at our extremely dead grass in this picture. Its hot here.)

Kent loves to unroll the toilet paper. We try to keep the bathroom doors open but I have a two year old who sometimes forgets and he notices every single time she does.

Kent loves to read books and it makes me so happy. He is always getting into the books. I think it is the sweetest thing ever when he gets a book off the shelf and brings it to me. He likes it when I read to him more than when Jacob does (probably because I do it more.) The other day Jacob read him a book and Kent climbed off his lap grabbed the book and said "Mama" and came and found me. 

Kent can take the lids off of sippy cups and dump out the water. He does it constantly. I've had to change which sippy cups I give him and tell Rachel to keep the other ones out of his reach because other wise there are big wet water puddles all over the house.

Kent loves Rachel. He wants to do whatever she is doing ALL of the time! He is always following her around and I love it!

Kent likes to make things make noise. For example he loves playing the piano. He also loves music and has the cutest little singing voice. It makes me so happy when he sings.

He climbs into the bathtub by himself to play with the toys in it.

Kent is very very active. Into everything and always wiggling.

Kent is incredibly persistent and determined. Once he sets his mind to something, he can not be swayed. The other day he decided he was going to take his shirt off and it took him a good solid 5 minutes to figure out, but he did it. 

I love how happy he looks after he got it off. 

He still doesn't sleep through the night. We are working on not nursing during the night. It makes me sad and makes us all tired.

Kent says mama, dada, more, Jesus, please and he signs more, all done, please and milk.

I love this little wiggly wild boy of mine. He is so fun and wild and happy and he is always cracking us up. Our family wouldn't be complete with out him!

He's Home

Jacob's been home a month now and I haven't taken the time to blog even once since. slacker, I know. It has been so nice having him home! We haven't wanted to do anything except just spend time with each other. He had a little time off from work. It was just long enough for us to get used to having him home all of the time and then about a week ago we had to start getting used to a new routine of having him go back to work all day again. It has been quite the adjustment. I've been used to doing absolutely everything on my own for almost 4 months so its been kinda tricky letting go of some things and letting Jacob step in and help.

Rachel has absolutely loved having Daddy home. She thinks he is her play thing that can throw her in the air and chase her and read to her and never get tired. The first quite a few times Jacob had to leave the house with out us Rachel would get really sad. She thought he had gone back to Afghanistan and she didn't trust that he was coming back. I think its starting to sink in though that Jacob is here to stay.

Kent warmed up pretty quickly to Jacob. He is still a mama's boy, but he loves playing with his Daddy. At first though he would scream and scream when Jacob would try to get him dressed or change his diaper or anything like that. I'm glad he's stopped doing that! Jacob was content to let me keep diaper duty forever. 

 

It was a hard 3 1/2 months but I know I grew a lot during it. We adjusted well and we did it! I feel stronger and I know I had a lot of help from our Heavenly Father.

We are in heaven now that we are together again! 

Up next for our family, Jacob is starting a 5 week class this week and as soon as he graduates we are MOVING!!! We will be off to Monterey, California! I am so excited to be going back there! I've loved being here in Tucson, but I am super excited to be so close to the beach again. Jacob can't wait to get out of the hot Tucson weather. Personally I don't mind the heat here, but it will be nice to be able to go outside and not worry about the kids getting too hot! We will be starting a new adventure! I love my life.