// happy fathers day //

happy fathers day to all those awesome fathers in my life..

to my dad who raised me to be the person i am today and is the best papa ever, i love you.

to my father-in-law who raised the man i love and is the best grandpa ever, i love you.

to all my brother-in-laws who treat all my favorite girls and my nieces and nephews right, i love you.

and last but definitely not least, to my husband, who is the best husband and father i could ever hope for, I LOVE YOU!

happy fathers day.

// family bbq //

saturday is the best day of the week. curtis isn't working and we have the whole day together to do whatever we want as a family. it's the best. today we hit up the dollar theater to see rio 2 which i absolutely loved. the music in that movie is so fun and so good i just wanted to dance the whole time. brooklynn did great. quinn did pretty good too, she is just so wiggly. she does not want to sit on your lap now that she can get around all on her own. but overall i'd say she did pretty good.

after that we went home for a little afternoon nap and then headed over to my brother scott and his wife brittany's house for a little bbq. we played a little bean bag toss game and talked and had some amazing burgers (thanks scott!!) it was a great time! i am so happy to be back in utah. so happy i can hang with my little bro and britt again! we love them so much! it was a pretty awesome day!

being loved by our children

i mean, lets be honest here. is there really anything better than the love we get from our children? those of you who don't have them.. well you just won't understand until you do. it is by far (in my eyes) the absolute best love you can receive. it is so pure. it is without strings. it is so completely unconditional. in other words, it's the bomb and it can make you feel amazing when you don't really feel amazing. 

tonight i wasn't feeling that great. don't know why but i just wasn't feeling myself. felt a little depressed. i put both of the girls down for bed and they both weren't having it. i was frustrated at first. they are both such good sleepers, what in the world was going on?! i took a minute and felt like maybe i should just give them a little help.. i grabbed quinn's bottle that she hadn't finished, got her out of bed and gave her the rest while i rocked her to sleep. something about watching my sweet baby girl look me in the eyes with her sweet sleepy blue eyes just melted my heart right then and there. that's all she need to be happy. was a bottle and her mama holding her tight.  what a beautiful thing. 

after quinn was tucked away sleeping her in crib i came out only to find that brooklynn was still having a hard time falling asleep. so again instead of being frustrated i got in bed with her and told her i would lay in bed with her until she fell asleep. she then proceeded to put her arms all the way around my next and said, "i love you so much mom, you're my best friend". be still my heart. i don't think it is possible to feel happier than i did at that moment. as i laid there scratching her back as she drifted off to sleep i realized that no matter what is going on in my life no matter if i'm feeling down for this reason or not.. i have these two sweet girls.. and that to them i am everything. i am their world. that's enough to get me through a life time and more. 

i love these sweet girls with my whole entire heart. 

pre-school

brooklynn started pre-school last week. this is so huge for her. i have been dreading having her go to preschool since she was about 15 months old and developed a major attachment to me. she cried hysterically every time i left her with anyone else. every. single. time. it stressed me out. what was i going to do when she had to start school? was she going to be that kid who is screaming as i leave her with her teacher? the thought killed me. stressed me out. 

but about a month ago she made a huge break through. at our church she started her sunbeam class where for 2 hours she is in a school type setting. i was so nervous for this but at least i would be just down the hall. the first sunday she was nervous but she came out a new girl. she absolutely loved it. so when we started pre-school to told her it was similar. she was pumped and so excited. she went with no fight at all. she asks every day if today she gets to go to pre-school. i am still in shock that she goes so willingly. 

i have spent so many nights praying that she would break out of her shell that she would be able to show the world the amazing, smart, funny girl i see in the walls of my home. she's a pretty amazing little girl and i am beyond proud of her!

juicing... day 5

today is day 5 of my juicing cleanse. so that means for the past 5 days i have had nothing but fresh juice that i make from my juicer and water. now let me tell you, it's been really really really hard and at the same time much easier than i thought it would be. i know that doesn't really make sense but let me explain...

it's easy in the sense that, it's black and white. every time i try and diet or eat healthy i always make exceptions for myself.. like oh i can eat just this one thing.. or just one bite of this or that (which always turns into 5-10 bites) i have no self control. so this is black and white. i can have juice and water. and nothing else. there is no room for cheating. so that is easy. also, i'm really not as hungry as i thought i would be. the night is the hardest i've been going to bed really early. ha. but i'm only hungry when i start thinking about all the food that i wish i was eating. then i feel hungry when in reality i'm not that hungry. so that makes it easy. i have been training me mind to not thinking about food all day. 

but that's the hard part.. not thinking about all the foods that i love so much! the second it comes to mind i start to feel like i crazy person because i want that food so much! ah. i want it so much! but this is good for me.. to hopefully break that habit of just wanting food all of the time. i do miss the act of eating. it is really weird not eating. i definitely miss that. but i just have to tell myself that it's not like i'm never going to eat again. i will eat normal food again. i just have to reboot my system. 

another thing, i know i originally had said i was going to do this for 30 days.. but i'm changing it. i'm only going to do it for 15. i may be wimping out call it what you will, but i just think that is what's best for me. i think i need to learn how to eat healthy and i think this will be the kick start that i need. so, 10 more days, i can do it. i hope i can do it. i will be proud of myself for doing this for 15 days because let me tell you it is HARD! 

but it will be worth it. even just to prove to myself that i can do hard things.

a little trip to orange county

i am seriously loving living so much closer to my family. this past week i decided to take another little trip down there for a few days to spend some time at the beach and see my little brother and his wife who were also down there visiting from utah. 

brooklynn has finally broken through her shell and had the best time! more on that later. but we all had a great time! we went to the beach, hung out with family and friend, went to the movies (we saw mr peebody and it was SO funny!), hit up a bounce house place called scooters jungle. every morning papa took brooklynn to get donuts and even bought her a new bike. it was a pretty all around awesome trip and it makes me so happy that we are going to have so many more just like it! 

here a few photos from our time there last week.

park days

we have this really nice park right by our house that we have been going to almost on a daily basis. i've been trying to be more active and i want brooklynn to be active so it works out. it takes about 10-15 minutes to walk there so i walk pushing quinn in the stroller and brooklynn rides her scooter. she's getting really good at it. the weather has been really nice lately, cool but not too cold so we have been loving going to the park. it has been so nice living in california. i've got to enjoy these days before we endure a bakersfield summer. i hear it gets pretty dang hot. so for now we will be at the park. probably every day until it's too hot. brooklynn is just learning how to swing on the big kid swings. she will hop on and repeat out loud, "forward and back, forward and back" and she does it with her legs. it's pretty cute. quinn loves the baby swing. she could swing in that thing forever. i think quinn is quite enjoying being outside so much. she is 6 months old now. i can't even believe it. half way to a year. what in the world!? i love these kiddos of mine.

rainy day

i absolutely love rainy days. they are my favorite. something about hearing the rain just gets me. it's so peaceful. like the earth is being cleaned. i love it. especially here in bakersfield where the air quality is not all the great. it's nice to have the rain clear some of that out for a bit. 

today was brooklynns first real experience playing in the rain. it was so fun. she came running over to me and said, "mom! i need my boots, my hoodie, and my scarf on so i can go play in the rain!" so we did just that. except she didn't have a scarf so she ran into her room and got a pajama shirt and used it as a scarf. it was hilarious. she had so much fun! it eventually started raining so hard i had to make her come inside which she was not happy about but she still had a good time.

also, little side note:

 i have to document this because it was just so beyond funny. let me just start off saying that brooklynn was the easiest to potty train. she just wanted to do it and it was done. no accidents or anything. and then when we did it at night there were no accidents either.. not until the other night. it was the first time she ever wet the bed. i was shocked. not a huge deal though, but when i realized she wet the bed it was the middle of the night and i said to her, "brooklynn you peed your pants" and she responded, "no mom, it's ice cream on my pants from when we went to the city." i was literally crying i was laughing so hard! i have no idea where she got that from but i was dying. she is so funny!!

valentines day / / orange county

one of the many great things about moving here to bakersfield is that we are so much closer to my family. orange county is just over 2 hours away from us which means i will get to see them so much more often which i am beyond excited about. 

for valentines day the kids and i headed down there because my mom planned the most awesome valentines day. it started at jerry's dog for lunch and my mom had made the cutest valentines day pouches that looked like envelopes that were hanging on the back of every child's chair. they were to die for! ah. all the kids exchanged valentines, it was so fun for brooklynn since it was her first time really getting into valentines day. plus lunch was yummy!

then we all headed to cinepolis luxury cinemas. this place is awesome! it's a movie theater where all the seat are huge soft recliner chairs and they have servers to come and wait on you and bring you whatever you want. it was so nice for me juggling the two littles to have two huge seats to deal with. it made the whole experience so much easier. we saw the lego movie and if you haven't seen it you should. i wasn't sure how much i was going to like it but it turned out to be so good and so funny. i would definitely recommend it. 

after the movie we all headed over to toys r us because my mom treats every kid to a valentines day toy. so all the kids ran around toys r us picking out their perfect toy. brooklynn had originally chosen the huge $40 bear.. this was what she wanted.. out of every single toy in that place she was set on this bright green bear. since she already has a big bear and a million other stuffed animals i was determined to get her to pick something else. and she did! we went into the art supply area and she saw a esle and she was sold! best choice ever she LOVES it!! 

so i have to say a huge thanks to mimi and papa for such a fun valentines day!

we stayed for one more day which consisted of breakfast with my girlfriend kourtney, she then cut my hair and brooklynns hair and did her hair all cute, then met my other girlfriend nicole and target with her kiddos, then i met my sister janice at the mall for lunch and shopping, and then got brooklynn's nail painted, then just hung out at my parents house for the rest of the day until we headed home that night. it was such a fun weekend! i look forward to many more just like it!

here is a little video of brooklynn dancing at the gap in the mall while we waited for janice to try some clothes on. she's such a nut.

gone girl / / book 2 of 12

okay so this book.. 

i read it because it was on a list 12 books you must read before they turn into movies this year. i love reading books and then seeing the movie.

i can't do it the other way around.. if i see a movie and i find out there was a book, it's too late i won't read it.

this book was on that list and my friend kaitlin was in the middle of reading it and she said it was so good. so i started reading it and i quickly agreed. it was so good! i was reading it so fast because it's a thriller and i just had to know what happened! 

i don't want to give anything away in case you want to read the book or if you are planning to see the movie but honestly.. don't read this book.. unless you want to stop before the last few chapters and make up your own ending.. because the ending of this book straight up sucked. i hated every single thing about how this book ended. like for real. worst. ending. of. a. book. ever. ugh i was so mad.

normally when you go see a movie of a book you read you want them to stay as close to the book as possible. but in this case i pray they change the ending...

please change the ending!!!

on a different note i'm on a great start to completing my new years resolution of reading 12 books. i'm actually half way through the 3rd already! go me!

also, i know i am supposed to weigh in at the end of january but with our move i'm not sure where our scale is and it's gonna be bad.. i did bad in january.. hopefully this month is better. i'll weigh in as soon as i find my scale!

we're moving...

we are moving to...

(drumroll please)

bakersfield, califoria

now i have to admit i at first didn't have the best attitude about moving to bakersfield... i just feel like i was born to live in big cities with lots of people and things to do... but i've come to realize that i really know nothing about this place and i need to go into this with an open mind and a good attitude. 

luckily i have a friend who grew up in bakersfield and knows all of the good areas to live in and the areas we need to stay away from so it's nice having her help while we find somewhere to live. we will be moving there literally as soon as we find a place.. it's all happening so fast.. 

i really am excited for this new adventure.. i am so happy to get out of the cold and it will be so fun to be less than 3 hours away from my family. it will be nice for brooklynn to be able to play and ride her bike outside.. and we can start going on walks again!! but it will be so sad to leave curtis' side of the family out here. it has been so nice living close to them and i love them so much that it is going to be really hard to leave them.. it will also be really hard to leave my friends that i have here.. and the ward we are in. i absolutely love it! 

and who am i going to go to dinner with and spend hours and hours talking about one direction with when i'm living so far away from kaitlin? ahhh

so as you can see this is going to be a bitter sweet transition but i am feeling optimistic.

i am ready to start this new chapter of our lives.

my thoughts on mockingjay (spoilers)

i read the hunger games and catching fire while i was pregnant with brooklynn almost 4 years ago but i never read mockingjay. i don't know why i never read it.. it could be because so many people told me it was their least favorite out of the 3 books so i didn't feel a big rush to read it. well in light of my new years resolution to read 12 books this year i figured it give it a go. i'm so glad i did. i actually really liked it despite a few things that really made me mad.

here are my thoughts and yes there will be major major spoilers so if you haven't read the book and are planning to just do not read this post.

• um so peeta is crazy? i really don't like that he is all messed up for most of the book because i always loved how peeta loves katniss and would do anything for her that i hate that he's so mean to her for the majority of the book. on a different note it was nice to see katniss fight for peeta.
• i don't like that katniss is so cold towards gale. ok, now here's the thing. when i read the hunger games and catching fire i was so team peeta so i would not have cared had i read this before the movies came out... but i'm all confused now because they casted liam hemsworth as gale and he is just so much hotter than josh hutcherson who plays peeta that it made me conflicted.. dang movies.
• i liked that finnick and annie got married. that made me happy.
• i liked that katniss and johanna kind of helped each other out, it was nice to see them become sort of friends. but i was sad that she lost her mind again during the test and wasn't able to go into combat although it probably saved her life.
• speaking of that... why on earth did finnick have to die.. i really grew to love hims and it made me so sad that he left annie behind! boo
• i'm glad katniss didn't shoot gale when he mouthed it to her.. that would have been lame.
• I AM BEYOND UPSET THAT THEY KILLED PRIM! i mean hello, remember at the beginning of the series that katniss volunteered to take her place in the games so that she could live???? i mean, yeah katniss sparked the revolution and it all kind of worked out even though a lot of people died but come on.. not prim.
• i was actually kind of disappointed that most of the remaining victors chose to have the kids of those in power in the capitol to be in a hunger games.. really? like what did president snows granddaughter have to do with anything? that kind of bugged me.
• when katniss shot president coin... whoa, did not see that coming... 
• i was sad that haymitch just went back to drinking.. though i don't blame him
• i wanted more interacted with katniss and peeta... i feel like it ended and they were like yeah we like each other?? what?? i need more.
• and what about gale.. so she gets taken to district 12 to live after the whole thing goes down and doesn't say bye to gale.. doesn't talk to gale.. doesn't know anything about what he's doing after everything that he did for her and her family! yeah i know she's made because he helped build the bomb that killed prim but he didn't send the bomb to kill her! i don't know it just makes me mad that after everything they went through they didn't even say bye to each other. i don't like that at all.

okay, i know most of those things are things that i didn't like about the book but i just had to get it off my chest. i really did like the book overall and i'm interested to see how they make the movie. wish it wasn't going to be in two parts..

anyway, anyone else read this book? thoughts?

changes

there are going to be a lot of changes around here pretty soon. good changes. stressful but good changes. curtis got a new job working for vivint solar and we will be moving in about 3-4 weeks.. we actually don't know exactly where we will be moving.. somewhere in either southern california for arizona. we will find out where sometime in the next 3-4 weeks and then we will immediately move. but for now curtis is working in orange county and i'm staying here with the kids getting everything packed up and ready to go so when we get the word we can go asap. it's a pretty stressful time and it's not going to be fun being here without curtis. i have a hard time sleeping when he's gone because i get mega paranoid and every little noise is magnified and i freak out and start thinking crazy stories in my head and i usually end up staying up really late which isn't good when you have littles who like to be up bright and early! or should i say dark and early since a lot of the time the sun isn't even up yet. 

i must admit, i am getting really excited about moving somewhere much warmer than here but i am also going to miss utah a bit.. i will miss our family and friends out here the most. and it really is beautiful here but as a california girl i am most definitely not going to miss the winter here. not at all. hopefully we will find out where we will be going soon.. i just need to make it through these next couple of weeks and then everything is going to fall into place. crazy that we are actually moving. i will definitely let you know as soon as i know! ah

bowling / / weighing in

today we headed down to the provo beach resort for some bowling and games. it was brooklynns first time bowling and she absolutely loved it. we picked up grandma on the way and made her come with us. it was so much fun having her with us today! it had been 3 years since i'd been bowling and i don't know why we haven't been going more. it's so much fun! you'll notice in the photos that i smoked everyone! also, playing all of the arcade games. i felt like a little kid in there having so much fun playing. it was a great day! 

^^ notice, i smoked everyone! curtis didn't have a great game today.. brooklynn beat him too! haha :) ^^

on a different note:

i had said in my new years resolutions i was going to weigh in at the end of each month to track my progress but i of course need to post a starting weight which i really don't want to do but i must...

165 is the current weight.

end goal: 115

it. will. happen.

happy new year

i can't believe 2014 is already here. 2013 was a great year. lots of great things happened. we moved. we had a baby. curtis graduated with his masters. and so much more. 

i really love new years because it makes me fee like i can start fresh. a new beginning. i love that. normally i make a huge list of resolutions that never get accomplished and i'm not going to do that this time around… this year i am only making two.

the first one is that i want to read 12 books. it doesn't have to be one a month or anything specific like that. just 12 books this year. 

the second one is that i want to lose 50 pounds. i've really lost myself after having two kids and i am officially ready to get it back. by the end of this year i want to be back at my pre baby weight and i know it can do it. i will post my starting weight tomorrow and at the end of each month i will post my weight. i've tried doing all sorts of things here on my blog about weight loss and i'm just not going to make huge commitments for logging things here because i never follow through. this is simple enough. the last day of every month i will post my new weight and hopefully it's less and less each time until i hit my goal. it. will. happen.

here's to a great new year. a year of positive changes. 2013 you've been great but 2014 you will be the best one yet!