He Did It!!!

After 3 years of Law School, 3 months of studying for the bar, 3 days of testing and 3 months of waiting for the results, Mike finally got his bar results and he passed! I was never really worried that he wouldn't pass but naturally the thought was there and we were getting very anxious. It is nice to have the test over with and I know he's glad to be done with the full days of straight studying. We celebrated by going to P.F. Changs, (yummy!!), and going to see the movie A Christmas Carol. I'm so proud of him for all is hard work. Congratulations Mike, you deserve it!

Waiting for the movie to start

Halloween 2009

I am all about going to as many Halloween activities as I can to get use out of the costumes so they don't get used just once. This year was a little different. The Halloween parties we had planned to go to, got canceled because of the snow. Kyia now thinks that snow is mean. Her preschool party was cancelled and so was the ward trunk-or-treat so we did some quick looking on the internet and found that the Bass Pro Shop had a little party. We headed over there and the girls really liked it. It didn't take Brooklyn long to catch on to what everyone was handing out. She got right into the spirit. Instead of saying "trick-or-treat", she would go up to people, put her hand out and say "candy". On Halloween morning we went to the hospital where you could trick-or-treat at the Dr.'s offices, which was also really fun. I was ambitious this year and decided to make the girls costumes. It turned out to be a nice Halloween night for trick-or-treating, and overall a fun day!

The girls and their pumpkins

Pretty Black Cat

Cute little Strawberry

Cabin Fever

Last week we got a big snow storm which amounted to about 2 feet of snow. The roads were horrible and the plows weren't out so we were stuck in our house for two days. After the second day of being stuck in the house, cabin fever set in so we thought we would venture outside. We tried to run a couple errands but most of the stores were closed so we decided to play outside in the snow, which didn't last long. Since we have lived in Nashville the past three years and the most snow we saw at one time was this, we didn't have the right snow gear and the girls got cold pretty quickly. Luckily, the sun was out shining the next day and now the snow is almost completely melted. It was fun to have one big snow storm before moving.

Pumpkin Patch

We took our two to a pumpkin patch over the weekend. We were lucky to hit the last warm day for a couple weeks but it was right after the last snow storm so most of the pumpkins were bad but the girls still loved it. There were barrel rides, pillow jumps, the biggest, creepiest inflatable thing I have ever seen and Mike and Kyia even went on a helicopter ride. Kyia loved it! She was so excited to go and Mike said she had a smile on her face the whole time. We stayed for several hours and took a lot of pictures, as usual.

The barrel ride was actually pretty fun. They had several hills and Brooklyn and Kyia would raise their hands over each one and just laugh.

She found her pumpkin

Brooklyn loved playing in the corn kernels!

Estes Park

A couple weeks ago we took a little day trip up to Estes Park. I love mountain towns and lucky for Mike, it was their Elk fest. We saw tons of elk while we were up there. Being the hunter that he is, Mike was in heaven but was wishing he could have done more than watch. We spotted one heard that was right next to the road that had about 20-25 cows. It was during the rut so it was exciting to hear them bugling and watch the bull elk herd the cows. Also in the area, was another big elk that you can tell had lost the battle. He had horn marks in his fur and the leader elk wasn't bothered by his presence. As we drove around, we saw several more big herds of elk. It was a really fun trip and we are glad we were able to go up before we move to the flat lands.

The leader in the back, the one that lost in the front

A wolf across the street, watching the elk

Wicked

Mike and I have been trying to see this play for a long time. We listen to the music and have both read the book but every time it was playing near us, something came up so we were unable to attend. We finally caught up to it a few weeks ago and loved it! We both thought the musical was better than the book, we thought it was easier to follow. The songs and voices were amazing. It's a must see and highly recommended.

The Inside

I have had a lot of questions as to where the pictures of the inside of the house are so I thought I would post a few. It's 5 bedrooms, 3.5 baths. I'm not quite sure why I didn't do it in the first place but here you go.

Front door. Dining room on right and study on left

Back to the front door right when you walk in

Kitchen

Laundry room (left) and study

Dining Room

View from Kitchen. Family room

Game room, upstairs

Master Bathroom

We'd love visitors if anyone is headed down to Houston. :)

Success!

We have had a busy week. A very busy week. We had 5 days in Houston to find and buy a house. Luckily we did most of the work on the internet before going down and had a good list of houses we wanted to see. Mike and I have similar tastes in houses so it wasn't that difficult to find something we both liked. We made an offer the second day and with some negotiation, they accepted our offer. The next few days were spent signing papers, doing walk-throughs to make sure everything was how we wanted it and since we bought an inventory home, we went to the design center to make a few changes here and there. If everything goes according to plan, we will move the end of November. We are so excited!

A few interesting bits of information, our neighbors across the street, work at the same firm as Mike. He was excited about that. Their cousins just moved from New York and were good friends with my brother and now they are in our ward. Small world. One more move to go. Hopefully this will be the last move for awhile.

On a side note, Brooklyn is walking. Before we left, she was walking a lot more but still crawled quite a bit, a few days later we come back and she isn't crawling at all anymore. She's growing too fast.

Alaska Cruise

We have been home a month now and I am just now posting about our trip. We had a great time! We were gone for two weeks which was a nice break but we really started to miss the girls. At least we got to talk to them almost every day. This was one of the best vacations I have ever been on and we miss it already. *Warning: This is a long post with a lot of pictures*

The first couple days were spent in Anchorage and surrounding cities. We had a salmon fishing trip planned but out of the 15 days we were gone, this was the only day it rained so our trip was cancelled. Yes, we went to Alaska but didn't fish. It gives us a reason to go back. We went to Homer, Seward, Whittier, and spent a couple days in the Kenai. It was such a beautiful area! We really wanted to see some bears but all the bear tours were $300 and up. A lot more than we wanted to pay. So we decided we would go off the main roads and take a 2.5 mile hike into bear country. It didn't get dark until around 11:30 p.m. there so we went up at night which is a better time to see bears. We didn't pay much attention to the "bear repellant or gun highly recommend" signs, just made a lot of noise going up. It didn't seem so dumb at the time but looking back, we were a little crazy. We did see two bear up at the russian river, a brown bear and a black bear, and several fisherman had bear encounters where the bear were stealing their fish. We were able to see the bear catching the salmon jumping up the river which was something I really wanted to see. The river was covered with hundreds of salmon! You might be able to see them at the bottom of some of the pictures but they were everywhere. We also went on a 14 mile float trip down the Kenai river. It got a little long but it was really fun! We had a great time in the Kenai! We also saw several bald eagles and moose pretty close. We were probably a little too close to this Moose and her two babies but they seemed more interested in eating.

(Top Left: Homer, AK, Bottom Left: Russian River, Top Right: Mt. Redoubt)

For the first few days of our cruise, we went to College Fjord and Glacier Bay. We saw a lot of Glaciers, killer whales, humpback whales, otters, and dolphins. We were amazed and how big these glaciers really are.
Our next stop was Skagway, AK. One of my favorite stops. It was a small town, like all towns in Alaska. We looked around the shops and then rented a car and drove up into Yukon, Canada. This was a beautiful drive. We drove up to Emerald Lake and saw the World's Smallest Desert along the way. Before going back on our boat, we decided we'd go looking for more bears and ended up finding two grizzlies. These were huge bears!

(Left: Train on White Pass Trial, Middle Right: Worlds Smallest Desert, Bottom Right: Grizzlies)

After Skagway, we stopped in Juneau, the capital of Alaska. Not our favorite stop. We could have done without this one. We didn't get many pictures from here.

Then it was off to Ketchikan. The seaplane capital of the world. Another one of my favorite ports. We went to Creek Street where the river was covered from side to side with salmon. You couldn't even see the bottom. As the fish were "waiting for their turn" to go up the river, they were jumping all over the place. Several at a time. We sat there watching the fish for awhile. It was quite the sight. We also went to a totum pole park which was really neat.

(Top Left: Creek Street, Top Right: Totem pole park)

The last stop of our cruise was Vancouver, Canada. We spent a day here and went to the suspension bridge.

We're not done yet. We then drove down to Seattle, WA and spent a few days there. What do I say about our time in Seattle? It was....interesting. We saw just about everything there including a different kind of bare. We went on the "Ride the Duck" tour, the craziest tour I have ever been on, but it was fun. For those of you who have never been on one, you should give it a try. We also went to the famous Pike's Place Market.

We had a great time on our much needed vacation but we were also excited to get home to our girls. If you've made it to the end of this record long (which is also my 100th) post, I'm impressed. Next time I won't wait so long to post. :)

A Month of Birthdays

This past month has been a busy one so I am a little behind in my blogging. With 3 birthdays, 3 parties, a two week trip to Alaska (which I still haven't posted about, pictures are on the way), and a move, my blog has been pushed aside so now I am trying to play catch-up.

Brooklyn had her 1st birthday on August 22. We had a small party on her birthday and a family party a few days later for both her and Kyia. Kyia really wanted a pinata for her birthday this year so we got her one. Did you know they make the pinatas out of cardboard now? We had to get Mike and his brother to break the thing. Next time I will get one with the strings you pull. That will be much easier but she loved it. Kyia decided she wanted a butterfly cake for her party so I tried to make her one. At least she could tell what it was.

She found the candy and had a death grip on it after that

The Butterfly cake

We got to Denver and had a pool party on Kyia's birthday which was on September 5. Everyone had a great time. She asked for a purse cake for this party. She really tested my creativeness. I think it turned out alright. We got her a power wheel for her birthday which we can't get her out of now. She puts on her sunglasses, turns on the radio and dances as she goes down the road. It is really funny to watch her. Brooklyn is usually the passenger and she seems to love it as much as Kyia (video coming soon).

The purse cake with a little purse for Brooklyn

Kyia loves Cinderella and has been asking for this for a looong time, complete with glass slippers and crown.

Kyia with cousin Adam

Mike's birthday is in 6 days and after that, we have a couple months break before another one. I think I've used all my creativeness up this month.