Congrats to Trevor!

My wonderful Hubby just graduated Nursing school and was hired on as a new grad in the ICU.  I am so so proud of him.  I thank Heavenly Father everyday for letting me find Trevor.  He is my perfect opposite in every way.  What I love most about him is that he makes me laugh.  Even when I don't want to laugh.  Even when I am trying to be angry at him.  His lighthearted, easy going ways will probably add years to my life.  Of course we fight.  We are both very stubborn.  But I know he always has my back.  And he continues to challenge me and make me want to try new things and reach new goals.  What a lucky girl I am.  Also lucky he doesn't read this blog so I can share these funny pictures.

Fell asleep playing with Kirra.  He works hard and plays hard.

Best dad in the world

He secretly wants to be a redneck.  

Did not want me to share this one but look how good he did with my foils

When he was little his mom said he was so scared of the car wash that they had to put his brother chad's diaper on his head as they went through so he wouldn't have to see anything.  He was so sweet to recreate that one for me.

Asked him to dust the fans and the walls for me.  He managed this whole room while never getting out of bed.  I believe this one perfectly explains our relationship 

Love him more than he will ever know

Knox

So Knox is growing up so fast and there are a few things I never want to forget about him at this age.

1. He loves eating and I feel like he is constantly eating.  I know this is a lot of kids but Knox is so funny about food.  Like if he sees someone at church with food he is determined to take it from them and eat it.  And when we go to the grocery store he cries in the cart every time I put something in because he wants to open it right now.  Once I let him hold a box of cheezits while we were shopping and when the cashier took it from him to ring it up he broke down in a screaming fit.  If we ever have fruit snacks he gets out of control.  He freaks out until I open them and then cries and cries and cries when they are all gone and then feels like everyone around him that still have fruit snacks should now give him their fruit snacks.  I have never seen food emotionally affect a little person in such a way.  At least we know the way to his heart!

2.  He just started saying Kirra.  It sounds more like Tia.  He walks around chanting her name proudly and then we went to the park while Kirra was at preschool the other day and he just kept looking at me with and saying, "Tia?"  He loves her to death and she loves him.  Of course they still fight.  He can't stand to see her sitting on my lap.  He will throw a tantrum until she gets down even if I am holding him too.  As soon as she is no longer touching me he is completely fine.  But for the most part I get to enjoy watching them chase each other around the house laughing and playing.

3.  He loves bath time/shower time.  He thinks that if there is a shower on in the house, he should be in that shower.  It doesn't matter if he just had a bath.  He will come in and start motioning to take off his shirt for him.  Then he will try to bring every thing he owns into the shower.  His blanket.  His toys.  The hairdryer.  A pillow.   And sometimes I try to trick him into doing something else while I shower and ever if he is on the opposite end of the house, he still knows..

4.  When he is quiet you can be assured he is doing something naughty.  I always find him taking everything out of my kitchen cabinets, or eating out of the garbage, or taking everything out of his drawers, or dipping his binki in the toilet, or eating an entire chapstick.  Nothing is safe.

5.  He tries harder than I have ever seen anyone to communicate without talking.  He will grab my hand and take me into a room like I am supposed to know what he wants in that room.  And when he wants his diaper changed he will just come lay down in front of me and stick his legs up.  And when he wants me to stop looking at my phone and talk to him he will just take it and throw it.  This kid is seriously keeping me on my toes.  There is just something about his sweet face that has me totally wrapped around his finger.  I can't imagine our family without him.

Polar Express

My parents and two younger brothers came for Christmas.  I planned in advance to drive up towards flag staff and ride the polar express.  It was a long drive but totally worth it to see Kirra's reaction.  She loved the whole experience.  I will let the pictures tell the rest of the story

They had hot chocolate and cookies

They did a reading of the book including all the songs from the movie

Santa came on the train and gave every kid a bell

There was also singing and dancing the whole way which we have on video but will not be shared ever because of how incredibly silly I look 

Perfect Christmas picture

Overall my evaluation of the ride was that it was way overpriced and the "North Pole" was super cheesy.  Had I known more I would have chosen the night ride because I think the lights would have made it better.  But Kirra believed every bit of it.  She loved it so much and kept asking to go again.  And this smile...can't put a price tag on that!

DIY Shelves

Before my family came for Christmas I went into serious organizing/decluttering mode.  Part of that process involved getting rid of our T.V. stand so we would have more floor space.  In order to have a christmas tree this year we had to rearrange our entire living room.  The set up before was very open so I thought I would hate the new set up but I loved it.  It gave us a lot more options for our walls and ended up making our living room feel bigger.  We also had a giant wall to hang our T.V. on!  Then the problem of where all our T.V. accessories would go came up.  Trevor wanted to leave the tv stand for them and I was completely against that for obvious decorating reasons.  Unfortunately all this was happening during a financial drought.  It turns out that graduation is not cheap and when you have Christmas in the same month and scholarship money stops coming in, well it was bad. So we didn't have many options.  Then Trevor started doing some sketching and online shopping and some sort of wizard math and figured out we could make some shelves to hold everything for about 40 bucks!  We had some graduation gift cards so of course I was on board.  And my wonderful neighbor and visiting teaching companion let us borrow their electric saw.  The project took us about a day and a half and there are some things that could have been better had we waited until we had more money but overall I love the way these shelves turned out and with all the extra wood I am having fun making things to hang on our wall!

                                               

When I imagined this project in my head I thought it would be so easy.  It was not at all.  Trevor sketched everything out with measurements and then made paper sized cut outs of our T.V. and shelves to see where we wanted everything to go.

I know it looks like he did all the work but I was helping and I did the staining :)

Knox loved this process and we found him a few times with the hammer trying to help.  

We had the grey rug (above) for just under a year but it was already coming apart.  One day I headed over to Costco while Trevor was sleeping to see if they would exchange it and they did!  I decided to try a white rug which I know is a terrible idea but I love the way it all turned out.  And guess who put the first stain on the carpet!  ME!  Dropped a whole slice of pizza sauce side down.  So now it is officially broken in.

Im trying to catch up on my blogging since I'm a month behind and this makes me miss my christmas decorations.  It looks  bare now.