My Sammy

With a chill in the air.. Sam and I finally said goodbye to summer tonight.

This post is all about my Sammy. I expected so many changes from Jadey this year and I honestly had no idea how many changes my little buddy would go through. In the past 3 months he has built quite the vocabulary (with full on sentences), he has a creative imagination and hilarious comebacks, has learned to ride his bike, scooter and ride a four-wheeler, has made several friends, started preschool, and is seriously grown up to be a little boy.

Maybe I'm a little weird, but sometimes I'll walk by our house and envision we've upgraded to a new house and our house is just a memory. In that memory I feel incredibly sad because I think of all the amazing memories we built in this house and watching my little guy grow up here and play in the yard. I guess I'm feeling a little sad because time has flown by me so fast and I don't know how my Sammy went from being a baby to a toddler to a little boy.

Sam just celebrated his 3rd birthday and he wanted a lightning mcqueen birthday party. My sister did an amazing job and made him this cake! He was so protective over his cake and did NOT like my grandpa teasing him that it was grandpa's cake. :)

He found this buzz lightyear at the store 6 months ago and has been telling us he wanted it for his birthday.

This year Sam had a party with all his friends and cousins. They painted at Color Me Mine and then finished the cars party at our house. He had the best day!!

And of course, the 1st day of preschool

I told Sam to stop growing up and he yelled at me, "Nooooo Mom!" So acted like I was sad and he said, "Okay mom, I'll stop growing." I seriously love this little guy and I'm so glad I get to stay home with him and Jadeyn during these precious years! Happy Birthday little buddy! I'm so glad I get to be your mom!

A new beginning

August 2011 is the month we've been dreaming about for almost 3 years now!!!

What does it mean?

Matt is DONE with his Bachelor's in Respiratory Therapy!!! I am excited to report that he passed his SAE (which determines if he can sit for the state board and that he can receive his degree). Now some of you may think.. big deal... so he got a B.S. Let me just tell you how BIG of a deal this was for us.

In 2008, we had our little Sammy and my dream was for Matt to work and for me to stay home. But life turned us into another direction and we took a HUMONGOUS leap of faith for Matt to go this direction with his career. I was working full-time to support Matt through school and we seriously had no idea if he'd even enjoy this field, let alone if he would pass all the pre-reqs (where a lot of people are weeded out). We were on pins-and-needles to see if he'd be accepted into the program. And as of recently, we've been praying he'd pass his final exams and get a job upon graduation. All of these steps could have resulted in failure if one thing went wrong.

Our life has been on hold from having fun, spending time together and just being a normal family. Instead of spending nights together playing in the yard, going out or even watching TV, Matt would study study study. He has been gone probably on average of 60 hours per week + any extra hours not sleeping-- spent studying. Being a "single mom" has been the most challenging thing I have ever done in my life. I have ended so many days in tears from being overwhelmed and I don't think I could have done the past 3 years without my little Sam.

I am so proud of my Matty and all that he has accomplished! He is such a hard worker and has dedicated so much so we could have this new beginning to look forward to! I am such a big believer that if you follow your dreams and work really hard to get there.. you will be blessed to make it through.

It does my heart good to see my kids playing with their dad!!

Lil' munchkin is already 3.5 months

When you have your 2nd, time just flies!!! Jadey is on a roll and is definitely trying to catch up to her brother!
She has already laughed out loud and rolled over from her stomach to back. (way sooner than Sam did) Her head and legs are SO strong and she always wants to stand up! She's getting some seriously cute chub and we just LOVE this lil' munchkin to death! Here's some pics I took of her today. She's so stinkin' cute if I do say so myself :)

2 month stats

Our little Jadey went from 7 lb 5 oz to 12 lb 5 oz at her 2 month check up. She's in the 80th percentile and I'm thinking she's trying to keep up with her brother. :) She is smiling up a storm and has bright blue eyes just like her brother. She's already sleeping 7-8 hours at night (thank you babywise) and is such a little sweethart! Here's the most recent pic of her:

So the other day I was trying to figure out who she looks like because I didn't really think she looked like me. But after pulling out my baby book, I can see a pretty strong resemblance. (minus my crazy hair)

Here's me and my momma!!

If time keeps going by as fast as it is.. I'm going to be looking at this pic with Jadeyn and her child thinking.. man that seemed like just yesterday.

and here's me and my little Sammy when he was 2 months. There are definently some similarities there too!

right before bed...

The other day I laid Jadeyn down by Sam for his nap and told him that baby sis was gonna take a nap with him. He looked pretty confused... especially when I shut the door and pretended to leave him there alone with his sister.

But he warmed up to the idea and even got mad when I took her away.

BTW - I just realized his reeses are in these pics. I know it's bad to give him a reeses for his nap, but he's so much more willing to go to bed. Matt's afraid he's gonna turn into a chubby 13 year old that won't go to bed without his chocolate.

At 11:30p I went to give Sam a kiss goodnite --thinking he was sound asleep. Well, I walked in to find him wide awake with this on the floor... (side note: I put him to bed at 8:30p so that means he was in his room, quiet for 3 hours. He really does not like messes and is kinda compulsive about it.. so this must have kept him up for a while.)

Here he is explaining to dad that "we hafta go to the store to get a new book." He talked all about the chicken and the eggs and who knows what else. I can't figure out if he despised this little farm book or if he was just really bored.

bragging moment

I have to take a minute to brag about my Matty. He is seriously freaking amazing! Being in this program is pretty rigorous and requires a ton of dedication. He has been going to school 18 credit hours each semester and working 24 hours a week + some of his clinicals are 24 hours a week. On top of that, he is in the top 10% of his class. I am so dang proud of him! Take a look at these grades.

P.S. -- He was offered a Respiratory Therapist position at Intermountain Medical Center and starts on Monday!!! YEAH!!! He will officially be graduated with his Bachelors in August. We are so excited to have our life back!!!

Hold on time...

Hold on time... you're going by way too fast! I can't believe it's already been a month! It's been a busy one! I really wasn't looking forward to the first month because I knew that Jadeyn was going to be born right during Matt's finals and a 2-day Respiratory conference. So I was a single mom with a brand new baby and a jealous toddler. The first two days home was really really hard, but once Sammy got used to his new sister he really stepped into the big brother role and it's crazy how much he has grown up! This month we survived nasty colds (poor Jadey got it at only 1 week old) and then I got mastitis (wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy). I started training for my new job and it worked out that I will start teaching in late July instead of this month. So now that we are all feeling back to ourselves, I'm soooo looking forward to enjoying the warm weather and maybe sleeping longer than 3 hours at a time ;)

Announcing...

1 week old

2 weeks

Big brother Sam--- I really didn't know how Sam would react to his sis, but you can see everyday that he just loves her. He always wants to be near her and he is so soft with her. He probably gives her about 40 kisses a day ;)

playin with the cousins

Easter Egg Hunt


Easter bunny brought Sammy a basketball hoop!

3 weeks -- I always look at this sweet little face and can't believe that she's my daughter.

My little sweetie-pies

Blessing Day = Beautiful Day

the dress

Matt gave the most amazing blessing to his little girl.