Ramblings and such

I know, I know we need a new family picture. I am working on it. hopefully in the next couple of weeks we will be able to get one. Anyways...
Sorry it has been so long since I have posted. I didn't realize Thanksgiving break was going to mess my routine up for so long. Between sickness, tiredness, and trying to get the house back together I have been all over the place. But now things are starting to calm down again. Oh and do you want to know what the best news is...Mackay finished classes today!!!!!!!!! (I don't think there is enough room for me to put the amount of exclamation points that statement deserves.) He still has finals next week but we are that much closer to Christmas Break!
Henry and I have colds right now but it has been nice because we have been forced to stay home and spend one on one time with each other. So we have been having fun together despite the sickness.
Oh did I mention that we are moving into a different apartment that is nicer, newer, and has washer, dryer hookups? Oh and my parents are buying us a washer and dryer for Christmas!!! I am super, super excited! This will be my first time having a washer and dryer of my own since moving away from home 4 years ago. Yay!
This post is a lot of rambling so sorry! I just needed to get back into the swing of posting and then I will get some more cute pictures of Henry up soon :)

So many things to be thankful for :)

Lately I have seen lots of my friends posting about the things they are thankful for. I guess the spirit of gratitude has finally caught up with me. Sorry if this post seems sappy, just know that it is sincere and from the bottom of my heart.

• My Savior Jesus Christ.
• Jesus walks with me everyday and carries me when I cannot keep going. Without Him I would not be making it through the trials I have in my life right now. I know that through His atonement He can and will heal every wound we have, whether caused by ourselves or by another. I love Him.
• My wonderful husband Mackay.
• Where do I find the words to express my love and gratitude for Mackay. He is my everything. Thanks for the smiles, the patience, the counsel, the nerdiness, and thanks for loving me with all your heart and soul!
• Henry
• What a joy. Yesterday I really realized how much this little person looks up to and learns from me. I am just overflowing with gratitude that I get to be his mom!
• My mother.
• She gave me life. And more than that she fills that life with joy. I love talking with you mom it always brightens my day. Thanks for listening to me and always helping me to see the good things I have in my life. (Oh and thanks again for putting up with me when I was a teenager!)
• Dad.
• Thank you for being such a wonderful example to me or enduring well. Life brings challenges and you are still holding on strong despite all of them. I love you!
• My Mother and Father in-law.
• Thank you guys for loving me so much. I have felt like one of your own children since Mackay and I got engaged. Some of my fondest memories are with you Mom when you guys came out to buy quilt stuff for our wedding. Thank you for your examples of dedicated service to the Lord no matter what happens. And thank you so much for raising Mackay and letting me have him!
• All of my siblings (this includes my in-laws, you are my siblings!)
• I love you all. Each of you have taught me wonderful lessons. Each of you are my friends and oh how I wish we could all live close and spend more time together.
• Christie.
• I send a special thanks to Christie for all the countless hours you watched and nurtured my son so I could finish my degree. I cannot thank you enough!
• Those who have provided clothes and toys for Henry.
• Thank you to all of you who have bought so many cloths and toys for Henry. Mackay and I could never have afforded such nice things for our son and I thank you all for being so kind to us and to him.
• My wonderful family of friends.
• I have been blessed with many friends who are wonderful and who help me through the trials I am facing right now. Thank you for being so understanding and never tiring of listening to me. 

There are many other things that I have to be thankful for. These ones are on the forefront of my mind though right now. Life is wonderful! Thank you all so much!

Some fun pictures

Chocolate chip cookie + Henry

Going for a stroll :)

"posing" for the camera :)

I sure love being Henry's mom!!!!!!!

My son is a genius!

Doesn't his smile just melt your heart!

Ok so this evening Henry wanted Mackay or I to blow some bubbles for him. So Mackay and I got it in our heads that we were going to get Henry to say "bubbles" before we would do it for him. So Mackay and I are sitting there asking Henry "can you say bubble?" and Henry keeps saying "yeah". So we were getting frustrated and then the thought came to me and I asked him a different question "Henry what do you want?" With perfect pronunciation Henry replies "bubbles". So we congratulated him and blew him some bubbles and he was happy. When Mackay and I were talking about it afterwards, we realized that Henry had been answering our questions the whole time and we didn't even realize it. We asked if he could say bubbles and since he could he told us so. He understands a lot more than I realized and I am figuring out that I have to think outside the box with this little guy. But I don't mind I love everything about that kid :)

I think I have lost my brain but it is fun :)

So my newest crazy goal is to run a half marathon in May! I was talking with Meagan, my sister in-law, today and she inspired me to start working towards something in my exercising. She will be running a half marathon next week. So I started looking up 5Ks in my area and realized that none of them are until next spring...much longer than I need to train for one (haha at least that is what I think :) ) so then I started looking at half marathons and realized that I have the perfect amount of time to prep for one that happens in May! I am so excited! If there are any of you out there who read my blog that would like to train with me, let me know and we can talk! I start training next week and am itching to start :) Wish me luck!!!

Halloween

Ok this is random but Henry was playing with his cereal bowl yesterday and this is what he made :) My son is an artist and he doesn't even have to try!

Our little lumberjack! This is the outfit he wore on Halloween when we took him trick-or-treating :)

Mackay and I were so proud of the ax we made for Henry...too bad he would not old it longer than for pictures haha.

Golfer

This was Henry's original costume that he wore to our ward trunk-or-treat but he got it messy. He was sitting on my lap while we were eating soup at the party and he pulled my whole bowl of corn chowder on us haha. Needless to say he and I were a mess. Since I didn't have time to get it cleaned before Halloween we came up with the lumberjack outfit :)

We had a great time taking him trick-or-treating and he thoroughly enjoyed eating his sucker. And you should have seen his face when he made it to the tootsie roll part of the tootsie pop. Lets just say he was very excited :)

Hear Ye, Hear Ye...

So I am pretty sure that all of you already know this but I figured I should make the announcement anyways. (And no I am not pregnant.) Mackay has changed his future career path. He is no longer pursuing a medical degree. Rather we are going to graduate school in applied mathematics. Sounds cool huh?!?! Well I don't understand it either but it sure makes Mackay happy :) We will be sticking around here for awhile longer (time unknown) so Mackay can take some extra math classes in preparation for graduate school. We are really happy with our choice and are so excited to see where the Lord takes us from here. Thank you all for your love and support!

P.S. Pictures will be coming soon of Henry in his Halloween costume!

Books, books, books!

So to pass the time while Mackay studies at night and during the day when I need a break from watching Henry play I have started reading again. I am out of new book ideas. So I would love to hear the books that you guys love and I can give them a try :) Just post them as a comment or send me an email or something. Thanks!

Two weekends full of family and fun:)

Mackay was out visiting his family the 8th through through 11th and so Henry and I made a visit to Grandma Stromberg's house. Hailey suprised Mackay and I the day before he left by coming up with her friends to visit us. So she joined Henry and I at Grandma's house. We had so much fun. We ate tons of food, played lots of games, and just had a good relaxing trip. Here are a few pictures from our stay.

Ebelskivers..."YUMMMM"

Henry scarfing down the ebelskivers.

So Henry ate so many that I could tell his stomach was hurting, because he was moaning, but he just wanted to keep eating them. It was pretty funny.

A little blurry but too cute to leave out :)

Thanks for having us Grandma!

Jordan and Mackay drove back to our house from Mom and Dad's and Jordan, Hailey, Mackay, and I got to spend the week together. (Well Mackay was doing homework not so much time with Mackay.) We had an enjoyable time together and miss having them. Here are some pictures of a hike we did Friday night while Henry was at the babysitters.

The siblings

My sweetheart and I!

We made it to the top!

We love you guys!

Thanks for coming to visit us Jordan and Hailey!

Here is a quote that I loved from Conference last weekend.

"...no matter how humble your circumstances, how meager your employment, how limited your abilities, how ordinary your appearance...you are not invisible to your Heavenly Father. He loves you."
-President Dieter F. Uchtdorf, You Matter to Him.


I know that Heavenly Father loves me because I am His daughter.

General Conference!

The General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints starts tomorrow and I am very excited about it. Conference has always been a thing that I look forward to. Getting to here Prophets and Apostles speak just like those in the Bible and Book of Mormon is such a great blessing and I always feel God's love for me even stronger! For those of you who would like to watch or listen to Conference just click on the Mormon Radio button on my right side panel. I hope you all enjoy!

Go BYU!!!

In honor of BYU's win tonight!

He looks like a little boy now and it makes me happy and sad all at once...

Just some fun pictures :)

Look at those blue, blue eyes! 

We tied him up in one of my scarves :)

Haircut #2

And yes he is in a hiking backpack.

I can't believe how long his hair was.

He is a little boy now...

After the ward carnival!

We love you all!!!

Recent Happenings

I have a new goal and boy is it a lofty one...but I think I can do it! My goal is...to write on my blog once a week. All this junk about me not having enough time is just that...junk. I have my evenings to myself most of the time now with Mackay working on homework so it is a perfect time to keep my blog updated. Anyways, here are our most recent happenings :)

Mackay started school! Exciting and sad all at once. Exciting because: He loves all of his classes, it is his second to last semester,and we are that much closer to being done with undergraduate education! Sad because: Henry and I miss Mackay! Between classes and work Mackay is gone a lot but thanks to wonderful friends and family Henry and I are not as lonely as we thought we would be. I have one great friend who says she will stand in as my pseudo sister-in-law since Christ and Josh moved and we get together weekly which I always look forward to :) I also have the best visiting teacher ever! She is so sweet and loving and has become my friend. She comes to visit Henry and I often and we always enjoy their visits. Between visits with friends and texting and calling family members I don't feel too lonely. Mackay is doing well in his classes and loving the things he gets to learn! For those of you who don't know already he has gotten one interview invite which is great and we are just waiting to hear from other schools!
Henry is just a bundle of joy! He is big enough now to climb on everything...nothing is safe anymore :) I think it is so fun to see how big he is getting and all the things he is learning! He says "da ou" (thank you), "goggy" (doggy), "ya", "mommy" (to whine).  I'm sure there are other things that he says that I can't think of right now but those are the most common. We go on walks daily and I let him walk now! He will hold my hand while he crosses the street if I remind him but hates to hold my hand any other time. We have story time which consists of me reading while he walks around because he does not want to sit there for that long but as soon as the book is over he will run and get me a new one so I assume he is listening. He still takes naps which is a blessing because otherwise I would never shower. He is a fairly picky eater still, unless we are at Nanna Merrill's house and then he eats like an angel. I love my little boy and would not have him any other way!!!

So as you can see things are going great for us! We have our ups and our downs like everyone else but overall we are pretty darn happy :)

Day Trip

Before school started we decided to go on a day trip and it was great! Here are my favorite pictures and a video from our outing :)

He was so excited about all the water around him :)

Our happy family!

This is the spot where the water surfaces after traveling underground.

Playing with Daddy :)

My little boy :)

Checking out the scenery with Dad.

I still cant believe how clear the water is.

Pictures, Pictures, and.....More Pictures

What a Ham!

I just can't get over how cute this little guy is! O.K. so Henry's new favorite pass time is running through the sprinklers. Every single time we go outside he grabs the metal rod to turn on the sprinklers. A few times a week I end up giving in and letting him play. I got these pictures from one of the many sprinkler runs!

"O.K. I'm ready Mom. Bring it on!"

Testing the water.

Just a beautiful shot!

"It's COLD!"

"You're turn Mom."

Escaping to the stairs.

Just too cute!

I don't know what he was doing in this shot :)

Nice and wet.

Pushing the sprinklers back down.

Henry also loves working with his daddy! I got a few shots of the boys working on a table for me! What wonderful boys I have :)

"Mom, look what I can do!"

"Now you see son, it works like this..."

One happy daddy!