November

I got to try a lot of new things in the kitchen this month.  I baked homemade wheat bread from scratch, for the first time!!! I didn't grind the wheat myself or anything, but still...Without an automatic mixer or anything. It was hard work but also very fun. I never thought I would be a person to make bread! I always thought it was way too complicated...but thanks to some lessons from friends, I realized I could do it. It's so cool to see the end result!  I also made a big batch of southern style pinto beans in the crock pot which we've been going through slowly (froze most of it).  

Most of my new kitchen creations came during weekends watching college football.  We watched a lot of games together this year, and of course rooted for the Aggies!  Grant got to sport his cool new jogging suit.

We also got to play outside a lot since it finally started cooling down.  Grant could play outside forever.  He cries whenever we have to go back inside.  It is very cute.

On Thanksgiving weekend we went to my parents' house and got to hang out with the family.  Grant really liked seeing all of his relatives and playing with all the dogs.  He kept following the dogs around everywhere.  He laid on them, petted them, chased them, and stole their toys.  It was funny to watch.

Then he wanted to play with the plants outside.  He was obsessed with these flower plants and started pulling off massive amounts of flowers.  Luckily, Nana didn't mind!

Then we headed to Bastrop.  We hadn't gotten to visit James' parents' property since the huge Texas fires affected the area.  They are very lucky that the center part of their property, where they are building a cabin and where their trailer is, did not get burned.  However, most of the trees and plants were destroyed.  Here is what it looked like.

This was really crazy.  Parts of the fire were so incredibly hot that they actually burned the roots underneath the ground...even the entire length of the branched roots.  Here are the empty holes...crazy!

 Grant was in heaven playing out there.  He loved the wide open spaces, but mostly he was obsessed with this little pebble pit.  He kept shoveling rocks into containers and dumping them out over and over again.  Amazing the things that keep kids entertained.

We also got to help saw some fallen trees.  We cut up a cedar tree into slices to make a path to the cabin.  I think it makes it look super cute.  Also Grandpa sawed another part of the cedar tree into a little chair for Grant.  In the process, Grandpa sliced his leg open but luckily he was okay. :)

 We ended the day by watching Scooby Doo in the cabin.  I love watching Grant and James hang out together.

October

We had a lot of events in October.  I love October because it is the beginning of the big holiday season with Fall Festivals and Halloween.  Too bad it was still VERY hot here (90s)...it makes it hard to believe that the seasons are changing.

We kicked off the month by watching General Conference the first weekend in October.  I love Conference.  For those who don't know what it is, this is an event held twice a year where our Church leaders give us inspired messages that give us guidance pertinent to our lives at that moment in time.  It is a great reminder of truths we already know and helps us focus on the Savior, as well.

The Conference is broadcast worldwide so we could watch it at home.  We got up early and made pancakes.  Grant REALLY liked helping me.  He seemed elated just to stand next to me on a chair watching what I was doing and occasionally dumping something in the bowl.  It's so much fun watching him interact with us more and more.

Here is my favorite quote from Conference:
‎
"This is a paradox of man: compared to God, man is nothing; yet we are everything to God. While against the backdrop of infinite creation we may appear to be nothing, we have a spark of eternal fire burning within our breast. We have the incomprehensible promise of exaltation—worlds without end—within our grasp. And it is God’s great desire to help us reach it."
~President Dieter F. Uchtdorf


One of our friends had a first birthday party so we got to attend that also, at a nearby park.  It was the perfect time to get together with friends and celebrate.  Grant loved the park.

The birthday boy!  Happy Birthday Benson!

A nearby Church held a fall festival like they do every year.  It is free and they invite the community to come and do a hayride, play games, jump in bounce houses, etc.  Grant got scared when we jumped in the bounce house together.  They also had a pumpkin patch which we visited to get our pumpkin for Halloween.

Grant had a BLAST! He enjoyed running around and tried to touch and pick up every pumpkin! Most of them were too heavy but he tried very hard. It was fun to watch. Plus we even found a tiny one for him to take home.

Here we are on the hayride!  Grant really enjoyed it.  

Finally we got to celebrate Halloween, which is one of my favorite holidays!  We had a trunk-or-treat at Church which is when the whole family dressed up in our pirate costumes.  On the evening of Halloween, we also went trick or treating in a friend's neighborhood and just hung out.  Grant had a love-hate relationship with his costume.  He kept pulling the hat off, lol.  It was HILARIOUS trying to draw the mustache on him.  Of course he kept wiggling and trying to run away, which made me laugh, which made it even harder to try to draw the mustache!  Anyway, it was a good time.

 Playing games for prizes

Fishing for prizes

A really fun end to a great month!

Random pics

Here are a few random pics I don't think I've posted on here before. Grant is a funny boy. I wonder where he gets a lot of his ideas.

He loves to play/help with the dishes. One day before I knew it, he was sitting on the door to the dishwasher. He likes to take things in and out of the racks, which makes actually doing the dishes very difficult. But it is cute.

Falling asleep in his carseat, of course holding one of his favorite things-a toy car! On road trips, he will point out the window to EVERY single car he sees, and say "ca! ca! ca!" He LOVES cars.

A few weekends ago, we were in Houston looking at houses. Grant got to play with his cousin Eli! Grant was of course trying to steal all of his toys. Poor Eli. It's pretty adorable seeing them interact now that they are able to do similar things. :)

Grant loves to Swiffer, either with the sweeper or the duster! He sees it and runs over to grad it and will carry it around with him, and sort of try to mimic us using it.

We are getting further into the tantrum stage. When we tell him no or when he doesn't get his way, he will plop on the floor or throw himself down and make a pouty face and cry. The littlest things can do this so you really never know what you are in for day by day.

Grant is also an expert at knowing what women's fashions look good on him! haha. He cannot leave stacks of clean laundry alone for the life of him.

Well that's a peek into some random stuff around our house lately. :)

Starting a new chapter

It's interesting how life can change so much from one small event. A few months ago, we had no idea what life had in store for us. We knew that James would be graduating with his Master's of Accountancy in December but beyond that was anyone's guess. James decided that he would like to work at one of the Big 4 accounting firms to gain experience as an auditor. He really wanted to learn from the experts and start his career strong. But it is not easy to find a great job in this economy so I was very worried about what would happen (obviously, since I worry about everything).

But around late July/early August, we talked with some friends of ours that worked at one of the firms and they offered to pass along his resume. From there, James had a phone interview which was actually pretty short. We waited several days to find out if he would be formally interviewed. We found out that he would be going up with a small group of students (mostly wanting to be interns) to be interviewed at the firm office in Houston. It went really well and James learned a lot about the company and really liked it. A few days later James heard that he was being offered a position beginning in January! It was exceptional news and we were elated.

I want to express how grateful we are for this opportunity. I hope what I say next makes some sort of sense. We really feel that it is a tremendous blessing in our lives and we feel like the hand of the Lord was definitely in this process. From being able to register for the appropriate courses and getting certain transfer classes accepted, to placing someone in our path who could help us get a foot in the door, and simply the availability of the position (most people don't start this job in January, usually it is in August). It just seemed like everything really fell into place and it was a great reminder for me on how merciful the Lord really is. It happened too perfectly to be the result of our own doing. Yes, we worked hard to get James through school and made a lot of sacrafcies to do it in the way that we did. Yes, he did well in his classes. Yes, he is capable and has a variety of work experience. And just like with anything in life--the Lord does bless us for our hard work and obedience and in some small way we "deserve" it.

But then there is the other side, where essentially we are all indebted to the Lord for the amazing gifts He has given us and some of the amazing things that happen in life are just plain above and beyond what we REALLY deserve. And He does it because He loves us. Sometimes He witholds opportunitites and blessings for the RIGHT time so that we can fully appreciate them (so that means sometimes we are living righteously and are good people but that doesn't always mean we get what we want). I believe that is the case with us. We have waited for this moment for James to find something he loves and to really begin his career and now that we are finally done with school I honestly do feel like we appreciate this job offer more than we would have if we had taken a different journey.

We realize how important and what a blessing it is to have a job that you enjoy, in a promising field, that can provide and support your family, especially in the current state of the economy. So we truly are grateful. This is more than we could have hoped for and is exactly perfect for our family. So we are approaching our upcoming move to Houston with a lot of excitement and joy. That's not to say that we won't miss our family and friends here in Corpus. We really will. This is the only place we have lived during our married lives, where I earned my Master's, where I had my REAL first job and learned so much, the only Church ward we have attended as a married couple and learned a ton serving others in various capacities, the place where our first child was born, where he learned to do so many things, with amazing people that have been by our side through all of these exciting events. Change is difficult for me and now is no exception. But I can honestly say that I am a person that likes and wants to keep in touch with people. So take me up on that! Call me! Email me! Invite yourself to our house for a visit! We would LOVE to have you (unless you are some freaky stranger reading this, haha)! We really won't be that far. :)

With that said...we are going to build a house! We've done a ton of research on home buying in the Houston area and the benefits and disadvantages of all of the options available to us, and we got a really good feeling about this particular neighborhood we visited. After all of our searching we just kept going back to it. We prayed about everything and felt that we would be very happy in this area and it would be okay to go forward with it. Buying and building a house is a HUGE and scary commitment! I still wonder if we are crazy but we signed the contract yesterday to build the house. We picked out our floorplan and the lot. I LOVE the lot! It is one of the reasons we fell in love with the neighborhood. A lot of the new developments in the area don't have too many trees because obviously they cut them down to build houses. But this neighborhood has a wooded area that is designated to NOT be built on. Originally there were not any lots open by the trees, but when we visited yesterday, some had become available so we were able to snag one! The trees are technically not on our property but it means that we will have privacy and NEVER have neighbors behind us. Here is what our lot looks like:

Yay for trees! And here is the floorplan we have picked out! James and I had a few different ideas on what we wanted and thought would be best for our long-term plans and we finally agreed on this:

We will get to pick out everything in the next few weeks...the floors, cabinets, colors...everything! THAT is the part I am VERY excited about! We will post more pics as things come along. :)

We have a toddler!

I haven't updated in a while about Grant, his milestones, and things that he likes to do these days.  Our little boy is growing up right before our eyes.  He'll always be my baby but it's crazy to also say he is a toddler now!

He is now 20 months old and I swear that he gets cuter (at least in my eyes) every day.  It seems like there is constantly something new he is doing or learning that adds another dimension to his personality and unique quirks.  We love anticipating what he will do next and it just seems like things get more and more fun the more interactive he gets.  He is at such a fun age. 

Here are some of the highlights:

Talking/Communicating

• His vocabulary has been slowly growing the past 10 months.  Recently, he has really started picking up on more words.  dog (da), duck (du), ball (baw), baba, baby (gi-gi...no clue why, but that's how he says it!), car (caw), book, go, no, good job (gu-ja), Grant (gan), cow, pig (pi), hippo (po), O's (cheerios), panda (anda, or, da), cheese, and finally, today, he sad MAMA several times!  He has had trouble with the M sound until now, it suddenly has clicked!  It is so heartwarming to finally hear him say mama!
• He is VERY good at pointing to what he wants, and he will usually say "Ah ah ah" when he wants something.  He will go stand by the fridge if he wants milk.
• He shakes his head yes and no ("yes" headshake is new, about a week ago he started doing it when we asked him if he wanted ice cream!)
• He had learned several animal sounds.  He knows monkey (m-m-m), dog (he pants---hehe), cow (mmmmm), and elephant (he makes a really high pitched eeeeeeeeee sound).  He also likes to line them up.

• He will try to have a conversation with you (in his own words)
• Can point to several body parts (head, hair, eye, nose (he likes to stick his finger up his nose, LOL), mouth, ear, hand, foot, and belly button)
• Will give kisses (opens his mouth and leans forward on your cheek, too cute).
• Loves to laugh.  Will mimic laughing of others, even the TV, and he will laugh when people dance!

Moving/Running

• He practically runs everywhere, he is very fast!
• He is a pro at climbing up the stairs (but is too scared to go down)
• Learned how to climb out of the bathtub (James was surprised when he was getting ready one morning to see a naked baby running up to him!  haha)
• He LOVES to be chased.  He thinks it's so funny and could do it for hours.

Activities

• LOVES to wear shoes.  He will bring them to us when he sees them so we can put them on.
• Sometimes he tries to put on other people's shoes

• Likes to play with pots and pans.  He will get ALL of them out.

• Has learned to color within the past month.  He likes to take the crayons out of the box and then put them back in, over and over.  And makes cute little scribbles.
• He LOVES baby Einstein movies and knows how to turn on the iPad and TV (scary, lol)
• Still enjoys pulling all of the laundry out of the baskets and putting it on his head

• LOVES CARS!!!  He holds them, carries them around, pushes them everywhere, lines them up, makes a vroom sound when they "go," and even likes to hold one in his hand while he goes to sleep.

• Will sometimes hide under blankets
• Loves to close doors.  It's almost like an obsession.
• Loves to take baths.  He will run over to the bathtub and stand next to it and point inside to tell us he wants to take a bath.  Sometimes he will try to climb in!

• Loves to run around and play in water

• Likes to play with hangers
• Likes to throw things (including food)
• Likes to sit/stand ON TOP of things

Preferences/Quirks

• Throws tantrums when he doesn't get what he wants
• He has become a VERY finicky eater.  It is very difficult to get him to eat a variety of foods.  He absolutely loves french fries (and has learned to dip them in ketchup), ice cream, and pizza (just like his mommy!)
• When he gets tired, he will get destructive and try to grab everything he knows he's not supposed to
• Still won't go to sleep on his own, we have to put him in the crib and he cries himself to sleep.  It usually only takes a few minutes, and he mostly sleeps through the night.
• Wakes up grumpy, but is usually happy the rest of the time.
• Likes to put things on his head

Other Cuteness:

 

We love our little boy!