Almost there!

Well, today is my last day of finals, Josh flies in this afternoon, and we're packing up our moving truck tomorrow! I can't believe we're already here at this point. I'm so excited to have my little family back together. So I just focus on that right now and not how sad I am to leave my good friends and Provo. It's all I can do to keep myself from crying. I hate goodbyes!!! :'(

Our little wrestler

So 2 weeks ago Madsen, Kristi, and I were able to go watch Jeremy wrestle at a tournament in Evanston. Madsen has watched his uncles wrestle before but not since last year, so this time around it was a whole different experience. This time we were even able to watch Jeremy from practically right next to the mat. He did amazing, against some tough competition. We were really proud to see how hard competed, even if he didn't get all the results he wanted. Well Madsen really loved watching Jeremy. He was yelling and cheering for him the whole time. The next day we were at Papa's house and Travis and Trenton were wrestling, Madsen was watching them super closely and getting kind of anxious and I thought nervous. All of a sudden he runs to the boys and pulls them apart. I thought to myself, "oh, my sweet boy got nervous about them hurting each other." But as soon as he pulled them apart he turns to Travis and says, "Travis, wrestle!" and proceeds to lunge towards Travis and start reaching for him. He was so into it that it went on for probably 10 minutes, before the kids started a movie, but Madsen was not done. He just kept following Travis around trying to get him to keep wrestling with him. So I guess its official. My sweet little baby boy is longer, instead I have a rough and tough big boy toddler. :) Well, a plus is we're good friends and going to live close to a previous State Champion wrestler, and his family of wrestlers, so I guess Madsen will have a good personal coach. :) The one bad thing is we're trying to teach him that not everybody wrestles :/

Wilderness Explorer

So for those of you who haven't seen the new Disney movie UP, I highly recommend it. I bought it mostly because I had a coupon that I could use to buy it (something that almost never happens) and quite a few people recommended it to me. Little did I know how much both Madsen and I would like it. It probably is one of his new favorites. He calls it the Kevin movie and asks for it all the time. Well, he likes it so much that as a joke we've started doing the wilderness explorer call whenever we play outside in the "wilderness". Well our new house is surrounded by quite a bit of trees and he loved exploring all of it. We let him roam around the yard while Josh and I stained the deck one day, having him check in with his wilderness call. It's so cute to hear his little voice call out, "cacaw, cacaw, roar!". Well as a true wilderness explorer would he tried to befriend all creatures whether they big great or small. He found an ant hill and tried to play with them. My poor little boy had his first run in with Tennessee red ants! I saw him standing up and pulling on his pants and thought something might be wrong, so I asked Josh to check on him. Josh hesitantly started making his way over to Madsen, when all of a sudden Madsen screams out" Daddy! Daddy, help me!" I just turned around in time to see Josh pick Madsen up and then clothes started flying in the air. He had ants up his pant legs and in his socks. My sweet boy holds no malice towards the ants, he just calls them silly ants for biting him and is more than happy to show you his bites and tell you about how Daddy saved him. I guess these are the kind of adventures you run into with little boys, especially in the wilderness :) (don't worry Josh has promised me that he will be extinguishing that ant hill this weekend so I won't have to worry about it in the future)

Madsen showing me where the ants bit him.

Ouch!

My cute boy who's more than willing to show you his battle scars. :)

Thanksgiving in Tennessee

So Madsen and I got the wonderful chance to visit Josh in Tennessee for Thanksgiving. We had an amazing time spending time together as a family along with visiting with Jeff, Jessica, and Kellen Cuthbertson who so graciously allowed us to stay at their house for the week. Jessica was out of town for the first part of the trip, so that left me to cook my first Thanksgiving dinner ever. Josh and Madsen helped me and together had a lot of fun cooking it. We decided to just take it slow throughout the day. I’m glad we did because it sure was a lot of work. But it was nice just to be together. Madsen is ALWAYS trying to help in the kitchen, so for him it was heaven. He was so excited about the turkey and brownies, it was so cute, he kept trying to get samples of the food, just like his daddy :) He was such a good helper, but he got wore out and without me even realizing it he cuddled up on the couch with a blanket and pillow. I was pretty nervous making dinner especially since we had Jeff's family over, but it turned out amazing! Of course silly me, I forgot to take pictures of the finished product. We also got to enjoy Grandmother and Leroy's farm and a later Thanksgiving dinner on the Sunday after. They had an beautiful home, Madsen was very excited about seeing the farm. He loved the beagles, and fourwheeling, and pecan picking. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera that day, so I'll have to get pictures from Jessica. For those of you who don't know, our family has had the huge blessing of finding a brand new house that we will be able to call home. So for me it was really exciting to finally see in person this beautiful house, that I will soon call home. I also got to have fun picking out paint colors, lighting fixtures, and finally seeing in person the cabinetry and flooring we've picked out. I can't believe how fast time has flown by. We have been greatly blessed to have lived in our small basement apartment for the last couple years, it has been a great home. We brought our baby Madsen home to this place, and I can think of many countless happy moments that we have had here, but I am ready and grateful for the upgrade. We are so grateful for the direction our lives are moving in. It will be sad to leave Provo and all our friends here, but we are grateful for a good job that Josh loves, Madsen is excited and grateful for a backyard to explore and daddy's green truck, and I am grateful to have a new home that we can all live in together and be one happy family again. :)

My sleepy little helper

Playing in the daddy's green truck

Our new house!

A bright, sunny, and bigger living room!

Madsen exploring around the yard.

Our own backyard.

Beautiful Harrison Bay and its close to our house!

Good friends.

My little swimmer.
Bathtub fun!

Our kitchen cabinets that got installed the day before I left.