better blogger?...catching up

One of my resolutions is to blog more, and better! So here I go, trying....

Let me catch you up thru the holidays quickly.

Christmas was nice. Brayden was with Jason for the first half of winter break, so he returned home on Christmas day at 1 pm. Josh and I spent Christmas Eve at his parents house, had dinner and a FHE it is always nice to be around family. Christmas feel on a Sunday this year, and it is the first year I ever remember that happening! So Josh worked the morning, Brayden was gone, so I went to our 9 am sacrament meeting all by myself. Brayden got home at 1 pm, and we opened Santa and gifts from each other. This year we got a family gift - it was an ipad. Brayden gave me some scrapbook paper and he gave Josh a lot of ring pops and some WWE collector cards. He gave Keesha some nail trimmers and a food bowl.

This is the first year Brayden has had to use his own money to buy gifts for the rest of the family. He really had fun picking out gifts and spending his own money, and Josh and felt like it was a good lesson! Although we should have probably started this a while ago! :)

Here is Brayden's favorite picture of himself this Christmas! He is so funny!

New Year's Eve was fun, and low key. We were all partied out over the month of December and Josh had to work the next morning at 4:30 am....so we ordered Chinese and got in our jammies. We played Brayden's favorite games: Candyland and Trouble and watched some movies, Rango and Harry Crowne. Of course we watched the ball drop and enjoyed some apple cider and hugs together.

Our 10 year old is growing up!!!

Brayden and I were having a boys night this week and I started a conversation about girls. Now I wasn't starting THE talk. I was trying to gage if he had a crush on anyone. There is a girl in our neighborhood that I thought he had a thing for.... I started our conversation out like this. "Hey Brayden is there any boys in your class that have girlfriends?" He said, "No". Then I asked him if there is anyone in his grade that have girlfriends? He started counting. I was surprised by how many he was counting. He responded, "There is 5." (That might not be a lot to some people, I thought it was a lot.) I started asking questions about if he has a girlfriend and he said "no" and then I asked if he had a crush on anyone and he told me about two girls. One was in his class last year and one in his class this year. I asked what made him like them so much. "Cause they laugh at all my jokes!!" I started to laugh. I then asked what type of jokes he told them. "Not really jokes but, the noises I do!!" I asked what kind of noises he made. I heard the noise and I'll tell you the noise sounded a lot like in the movie "Dumb and Dumber" where Lloyd is trying share the most annoying sound in the world. IT WAS AWESOME!! I told him not to do too many weird noises so that he doesn't push theses girls away, or annoy them. I tried to tell him to just be nice and don't be mean to them. I then told him that if he ever has a girlfriend that he couldn't kiss or hold hands with them. "DAD I WOULD NEVER DO THAT!" I bet Mel wants him to stay this innocent all his life. I can't tell you how fun it is to see Brayden grow up in front of our eyes. It shocked me (in a good way) that he was so open with me. I couldn't tell my parents about the girls I liked in school...especially in elementary. I could later as I got older.

I'm really grateful that I have a good relationship with Brayden that he will talk to me about these things. One of the coolest nights I have had as a Dad.

Scout Camp!

Josh and Brayden had a fun filled day yesterday. They got to go to scout camp at Camp Keisel.

Brayden was excited because he had so much fun last year. The picture above is them leaving bright and early. They were gone all day, and Brayden had a lot of fun. He loves that his dad is his leader and gets to go with him.

When Brayden returned home I thought he would be on cloud nine, talking and telling me all about his day...he was tired! He also was disappointed. One of Brayden's favorite parts about scout camp is the store. They have all kinds of boy things...pocket knifes, arrowheads, etc.

Brayden decided to spend some of his allowance. He bought yet another pocket knife, an arrowhead necklace and a rabbit skin. He was most excited about the rabbit skin. Right after buying they sat down for lunch. Dad told Brayden several times to put his stuff in his backpack. Well, Brayden put the pocket knife in his pocket and the arrowhead necklace around his neck and he left his new found prized possession on the table to be right by him as he ate....

you got it. The treasured rabbit skin got left after lunch as they moved on to more excited things, and when Brayden realized and headed back...it was gone. Brayden was SO disappointed.

Other than that, they did have a good day and were so tired they went to bed super early.

Excited for this summer!

I am so excited for summer! I think this is the most excited I have been since 8th grade!

I can't wait to enjoy and soak up lazy summer days now that I am not working! YAY!

We made a cute summer 'to do' list:

The list isn't all the way done. I found the idea on this site:

http://thecraftingchicks.com/2011/05/summer-fun-chart-and-photo-journal.html

Brayden was looking at it today and has already picked out the top three things on his list.

Visit Vernal - Uncle Chick's Farm, and 4 wheeler :)

Sleep out on the tramp - always my favorite!

Family date night - yet to be decided if it is basement or theater.

Bring on the fun summer!

Keesha's treat

I came home from a family dinner to this....

GUILTY!

Luckily there were only maybe 4 eggs left in there, I don't even know how she got them down. They were up on a shelf downstairs.

Hopefully a little chocolate won't be too bad for her, and at least she picked the very best kind!

1st week off!

It was so nice! I think it was nice because Brayden was out of school for spring break. So it felt like a mini vacation. Sleeping in, going and doing what we wanted, playing with friends, etc.

So, maybe next week I will start a routine I can feel good about.

We had some of our neices and nephews over during spring break to have a late night!

It was fun! We recently bought 'just dance 2' so after dinner...we played for the rest of the night.

I think Josh and I had just as much fun as the kids!

Then one of my first things on the 'to-do' list was to organize the pantry, cause it was bad!

Before:

Sorry it is a little blury...but just know it was a mess and everything was lost in there!

After:

Tada!

I moved quite a bit around, to make it more accessible.

Also, added a lazy susan - ($5 at Walmart).

Labeled what I could.

Added some organization to the door to free up some more space!

Added some vinyl! Thanks Jill! (utahvinyl.com)

So much better to have less in there and more organized so now we can find what I just went to the grocery store and put in there!

Mindy Gledhill - Whole Wide World (Official Music Video)

So...I love this! This is kinda my theme song as of late.

Today is my last day of State employment.
Some think I am crazy...and I might be.
But let me tell you it is the most freeing feeling feeling to walk away from something that is sucking the life out of you and imagine something else...
Scarey? ABSOLUTELY! But also so peaceful to put your faith in something higher and go with it!

Freedom came early!

YAHOO!
I put my 2 week notice in today at work!
My last day of work is 3/31/11.

Bring on spring, rejuvenation, cleaning, LOVE, cooking, enjoying, less money, learning to RELAX, projects, volunteering, more time, sleep, happiness!

I am so excited.
Thanks to the most amazing, supporting husband. I love you Josh! Wouldn't want to do it with out you honey!

I am pushing through the fear and going with our answer to our prayers.

quitting...part 1

This is going to be a long post...heads up. But I think it is worth it.



I am sure several of you have heard me complain about my job.
(sorry about that! Thanks for listening)
So, Josh and I have been talking about me being able to quit for some time. Ever since my boss transferred me out to West Valley it has been on our mind. (Which was 18 months and 6 days ago...but who's counting?!)

I can't even begin to tell you how much my job has changed over the past 18 months!
I know why, cause I have new management...hence the change. Fine, people choose to retire!
I get it... it is just so frustrating when those that take their places are not as gutsy, and hard working. They choose just to let everything fall to pieces and someone else (not management - why should they get their hands dirty!), eventually will take care of it right?! Meanwhile all their little worker bees under them are carrying this giant load of....CRAP. The crap that has slid off their desk, cause they refuse to deal with it. whatever.
So, that is enough said right? (Well I could go on and on but my blood pressure is rising and I need to get back to the point!)

We started talking about me quitting pretty seriously after we were approved for adoption and our case worker made several comments that birthmoms want to place babies in homes where there is a stay at home mom. At the time she said that, I knew she was right. But I have ALWAYS worked. I have been a hard worker all my life. I got my first real job at the age of 14 over at Lagoon and since then - that is all I have known. And of course by some of my decisions I had to work harder than others. When my caseworker said that about stay at home moms, I had to work through some personal things.... which I will save for another time. But one of them is a paycheck. I have always had a paycheck....always. I have been blessed with awesome jobs and a supportive husband. We have always been able to buy what we needed/wanted. And somehow my life has become attached to a dollar amount that is gone too quickly and is not compensating me as much as I feel it should.
So - how to get away from me being attached to this $ amount...? How am I going to do it?

The original goal to quit was December of 2012...also when the world is suppose to end according to Mayan calendar. My quit date had nothing to do with that- I promise! It just happened to work out that we would have all our 'ducks in a row' and that was the month before my HUGE 3-0 birthday!

So for FHE one night Josh suggested we make a freedom chain. (He is so adorable!) To explain the freedom chain it is a paper chain made of links. The original plan was to take a link off each week. Links of freedom colors, red, white and blue. We calculated the chain and needed to have 227 links, got busy cutting and stapling. Brayden was so excited to label each link from 227-1. We decided that it would hang in the most convienient place for us all to see (we are working on a goal together) the pantry door. So each Friday Brayden and I would be so excited and rip off a link and throw it away...because we made it through another week! A week of mom gone from 7 am-7 pm Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. A week of eating out and breakfasts for dinner and my sweet husband cooking 1 meal a week. A week of me spending long hours with people that aren't living up to their potential (myself included). A week of anger and frustration for me as there is not enough time in the day. A week of not spending enough time with those that are most precious to me...and asking them to put up with a crazy, stressed out woman/mom. This job is sucking the LIFE out of me! and the question is .... is it worth it?

More and more I can feel like someone is strongly pushing me to quit and not work. Which is so weird for me, yea I hate my job, but I have always wanted to work. Lately this feeling is so strong...and I can't even explain it. I know it sounds so weird but I can feel this happening to me. In the beginning I thought it was just my head playing games, and me going crazy...but I can't deny this feeling of someone putting their hands on me and shoving me!

Why can't it be easy for me to live by faith?! I want to be one of those persons, that just can trust and be at peace.

How the Grinch Stole Christmas

I came down stairs the other night and Brayden was watching "How the Grinch Stole Christmas"(the Jim Carry version). I was wondering why he would be watching this show. Its not even Christmas season and he has been watching this show like 2 times a day for four days now. I kinda got a little irritated and said "Why do you keep watching this show"? After the second time its like HOLY CRAP kid come on now!! Some kids have the ability to says things back that puts you in your place. Brayden's response was, "I Like show that there is a CHANGE OF HEART in it" Me after that I just looked at him and stared and couldn't think of a thing to say. Man he right. Those are great movies!!

Happy Valentines Day!

For a FHE in January we each wrote each other 7 love notes.
Then on each day of the first 14 of february we each had a Valentine to open.
It was fun, and Brayden really enjoyed it!
Some were cute, some where coupons for different activity, some were funny.
This is by far the cutest one:

(This one is to Josh, from Brayden. It says:
Free Helper, Me and a cute stick figure.
Good for many times)

Then on each day for the first 14 days, cupid left love notes with different things for Brayden.
This was his favorite:

(One of Brayden's favorite treats - sparkling cider)
He was excited!

thinking out loud....

We have our adoption blog that you can access here:

jandmadoption.blogspot.com

I had an idea...what do you think of this? Please post and tell me what you think.
I was letting my mind zone out the other day and I was thinking about the adoption blog. And how I can feel someone pushing me to work on it more and more.
I also feel someone pushing me to not work - I know it sounds weird and it is bizzare to me, cause I have worked fulltime for 12 years. I have always worked!
Anyway, my idea came to me about the adoption blog...
Josh and I were thinking we should write it and compose it like we have someone in mind...you know? What do you think?

It's my Birthday!!

Happy Birthday to ME! I was too busy yesterday to post on my actual birthday...but here is how my day went:

Josh and Brayden woke up early and suprised me with breakfast in bed!

Handsome husband

Excited Brayden!

Birthday girl!
Good morning sunshine!
Isn't this the best picture of me you have seen! Wow...yes I did just roll out of bed.

The eggs and toast were yummy! I love starting the day out with breakfast in bed!

Thank you to my cute boys who suprised me!

Brayden went to school and Josh and I did our normal birthday celebrating...

Movie and the mall.

We went and saw 'The Fighter' - Awesome show! I thought it was a great show, great actors and it was inspiring of course! I loved it and could have cried at any moment, it is a great show about being victorious with our personal battles. Go see it!

We came home and ran errands and picked up Brayden from school.

Brayden showed us some awesome tricks on his new Wii game Santa brought - Tony Hawk skateboard game and yes...that is my big toe sticking out in the pic...oops.


Then we went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Texas Roadhouse - Yum!
Then we came home for some homemade birthday cake. Yes, I made my own cake, usually I buy them...but this year I wanted a perfect mint chocolate cake.
This was not the perfect cake....I don't know that I will make my own again. But it was delicious for homemade!


Do I feel older?...just a little.
Thanks for all the fun birthday wishes! I am getting use to facebook.
Thanks to my cute boys for making my day so fun! I love you both very much! xoxo

~Mel

Family Pictures

We had a family picture taken down at Wheeler Farm. Our friend Justin did such a great job! I am excited for the proof cd to get them printed out...and don't worry, you will probably have a copy of your own - these might be our Christmas cards this year! You can get a hold of Justin by going through our facebook, or contact him directly at: Phone - 801-810-6760
http://jsmithdigital.wordpress.com/
He is a great guy, super easy to work with, and should be charging more! Can't recommend him enough!

Hoping to Adopt!

We have been approved for adoption through LDS Family Services. We are extremely excited! We have been working towards this since March, we hope to be picked soon...but we have our faith in the Lord cause he knows what is best for us.
We wanted to let everyone know - so please feel free to spread the news!

This can be a very sensitive subject, we are telling everyone to refer birthmom's into LDS Family Services for the counseling, so they can be fully educated and make the best decision for themselves. Through LDS Family Services birth parents get counselling, and support from other birth parents who have placed their children.
Our caseworker has told us that the more people know of our plans to adopt the better our chances are. They say it two steps away from us, meaning someone knows of someone that might be thinking of adoption.
We can't wait to meet our birth parents and develop a relationship with them! Open adoptions seem much more healthy and better for everyone - with the right boundries of course!

This has been an awesome experience for our family so far! We can't begin to imagine what is in store for us!
So how can you help? ... Keep us in your prayers, but more importantly we ask you to pray for our birthparents. Pray for us to come into contact with each other. Pray for their health and safety, and for the great arrival that is coming!
Here is our web page: https://www.itsaboutlove.org/ial/profiles/24605330/ourMessage.jsf

Love to you all!
Josh & Mel

Lava Hot Springs

Mel and I decided we needed to have some fun with Brayden. We wanted to go somewhere that he hasn't spent a whole lot of time. Some place that isn't that expensive either. We chose Lava Hot Springs. I have been there only twice before. Once at a church deal and once with Melanie's family. So we invited one of Brayden's best friend to come and we left. Took 2 hours to get there and we unpacked and we were off. One of the first things we did was jumped into the indoor pool there and watch the two buddies jump off the diving board. Then we went to the slides. They have a few there. I tried to get them all to go on the BIG slides but they were all to scared. Then all the diving started. Brayden and Bryson went to the tiny ones to warmed up for the Platforms. The rest of the day all my efforts went to coaxing Brayden. Trying to get him to go off the Platform. Not only did he go off, he went off the 2nd platform. Mel caught the best picture of him. That was the last hour we were there. It was one of the best days.

Mercy River

My mom and I went to Cherry Hill Friday night to enjoy Mercy River.
Mercy River is one of my favorite groups! They are so cute, the picture is of them singing to their cute husbands.
Thanks for going with me Mom!

Happy Anniversary!

I am late posting, but our 5th Wedding Anniversary was yesterday (6/22/10).
We spent the day together, we went to the Bountiful Temple where we did sealings.
I love doing sealings!! Cute old man as the sealer.
We then ate lunch at the temple, which I have never done. It was yummy!
For a gift we got a memory foam mattress pad - heaven!
So, of coarse I had to take a nap! Day off = nap!
The new memory foam just sucked me in - I told Josh to wake me up in an hour...3 hours later I was able to get my bones up.
We got dressed up, dropped of cute Brayden boy to Grandma Julies, where he had fun with his cousin LG, Aunt Leslie and Grandma at the pool.
We headed to The Roof Restaurant.
Here are a few picks....
Our view!


Us at the table, there is a lot of back light - sorry it is hard to see our faces.

Us together, there is a lot of back light - sorry it is hard to see our faces.

Sexy husband!




Josh - I love you!! These past five years have flown by. I am so blessed to have you as my husband. You truly are the sweetest man alive. I can't wait for the rest of our lives, cause with you by my side I can really do anything. You are the best honey!
Much love,
Mel XO

Summer is here!

Brayden loves to jump on the tramp with the sprinkler underneath.
He invited his best friend over to play and here they are soaking up some sun after jumping on the tramp!

Parenting Fun

What to do when your son comes to you and tells you that he has a book report due tomorrow. First you kinda get on his case for playing outside and not doing his homework. Then you see his face, which make you hate yourself for getting on his case. Never the less, Brayden and Mel got on it.If you know Mel she just goes full blown. This book report was done in 45 minutes. Its funny what your kids can do when you tell them they have only 30 minutes of your help and then their on their own. I never seen Brayden work so hard on his homework as he was for those 45 minutes.

Weekend in Denver

Jeff and Josh found tickets to game 1 of the Denver/Jazz game in Denver. So Friday night we decided to fly out on Saturday and go to the game. It worked really well cause Grandpa Guy is out in Denver and we have great friends living out there.

Josh called Mark and Kandice and they were so gracious and invited us to stay there and also offered to pick us up at the airport. THANK YOU MARK & KANDICE!! We just felt bad we couldn't stay longer.

We spent some time at Fat Cats, bowled and ate pizza - then we headed to the game.
It was fun the Jazz hung in there - until the last 6 minutes of the 4th quarter.


In the arena, the fans weren't too bad, the usual comments. We had a good time.
Then we walked out on the streets to find our car.... it was HORRIBLE! We couldn't believe how inhuman the Denver fans were acting. They were saying all kinds of things about Utah, our religion, and lets face it we were 6 of the maybe 18 Jazz fans there among the 18,000 Denver fans.
On top of all of it, we couldn't remember which way we parked so we are walking around like idiots! With all the traffic congestion, people were walking by us saying things, rolling down their windows scream obcinities at us - which is fine, but I have an 8 year old boy with me. Truthfully I know Brayden has heard the F*** word out of my mouth a few times. So it isn't like he hasn't heard it, but what grown man laughs and jumps around us screaming it to an 8 year old boys face! So after what felt like an eternity of being persecuted we find Grandpa and his truck. PHEW!

We headed to our car, which luckily Grandpa remembered where it was.
We drove home to Mark and Kandice's cute apartment and talked and went to bed.
Mark & Kandice - that guest bed was the most comfortable bed Josh and I have ever slept on! I don't know if it was just that it was 2 am and we were exhausted, but that bed was heaven! Thank you sooo much!!

We needed to catch a flight at 10:45 am, so we got up around 7 ish and began getting ready. Mark and Kandice were already up and making breakfast! Kandice thank you so much for the yummy breakfast and for your sweet hospitality! Such a perfect hostess!
Love you guys!

BYU vs OU

Its here the start of the College football season. My favorite time of year is here. With the Football season here so is the Beynon annual trip to a non-conference BYU game. This year is one of the most anticipated games. BYU vs Oklahoma.
We flew to Dallas where the game was being played. In one of the biggest, newest, staduim in the country. The new Dallas Cowboy Stadium. I couldn't wait. The different thing this year was how we had to get to Dallas. We fly Standby so we have to check flights all the time to see how full it the flights are. I checked the flights and they didn't look good directly there. We had to go with plan B. Which was Salt Lake City to Atlanta to Dallas. Kinda scary. Atlanta is the busiest airport in the world with a plane leaving once every 60 seconds. I wanted to make sure we got there ok so I decided to put us on the 12:50 AM flight to ATL. The problem was 2 hours before the flight some stupid people decided to go to ATL and book up the flight. So Mel, Brayden and I didn't get on. We were the next people to get on if people didn't make the flight. The next flight was at 7:00 AM. I didn't want to drive home and come back in 3 hours and have to be back to get check in. I told Mel that we should go sleep in the truck in the Employee lot. We went out there and slept in the truck for the next 3 hours and check in at 6 am to get on the flight. We made this flight. So did my father and mother. Cort and Jaren not so lucky. They had to fly to Phoenix to Atlanta then sleep overnight there and then on to Dallas. Isn't Standby great!!
Any way we got there Friday night and got to the Hotel. We booked the room through Holiday Inn. Now Melanie new favorite place to stay.(Holiday Inn is a very nice hotel, just so you know). Then went to Dinner at the Outback. Then we went back to the Hotel and Slept and Slept and Slept some more.
Saturday Morning we went to the JFK museum.



Dallas is where he got Assassinated. Me being a history buff, loved every minute!! We went to the 6th floor of the building next to the road where JFK got shot and went through an hour long exhibit on his life and death.






Man it was awesome!! If you guys go to Dallas this is the place to go. Well to be really honest. This is the only thing to do in Dallas besides sports venues and Six Flags. In all seriousness the museum was amazing. I learn a lot.



After this we went straight to the Stadium and hung out there until they opened the doors at 4 pm. This place is huge!!








I can't believe it. You can see this thing from miles away its so big. We get up there and Im in awe. Just so you get this. This Stadium cost 1.3 Billion dollars to build. There are beams in the stadium that are 1/4 mile long. Trust me this thing is BIG!! Our seats were awesome. The Scoreboard was awesome, the GAME was awesome. BYU won 14-13.



I'm still smiling over it. Its still the first game so will see how the rest of the season goes but BYU look really good. Im really sorry about how long this blog was but as you can tell this is our favorite trip so far.