Backyard Rennovation

Since our house had been vacant for awhile before we bought it, the backyard was a jungle of weeds. Thanks to a little weed-b-gone though, we turned that jungle of weeds into a pile of dead grass and dirt. After living in Okinawa with green grass for so long, we just couldn't stand looking at the dirt any longer and had the backyard landscaped. We extended the patio, added a few bushes and a tangerine tree and most importantly...grass. Wayne & I are just in awe at how beautiful the yard turned out.


Before...





After...

2nd Family Day

We celebrated our 2nd Family Day today. It's hard to believe that 2 years have already flown by. What an amazing little boy we have. He changes so much that it's hard to keep up with him. He is now potty trained (with the exception of bedtime), sleeps in a big boy bed, can count to 12 in English and to our surprise, can count to 5 in Spanish, and talks up a storm with his favorite phrase now being "What's that mommy?". He is all boy and has already torn his first hole in the knees of his pants, loves playing and watching baseball, and is excited to go to the ASU Spring Football game to watch the Sparky (team mascot) football team. We can't imagine what our lives would have been like these past 2 years without him...

Update from Sunny AZ

Wow, it's been a long time since I've posted on our blog.... Here's a brief update on what all we've been up to these past couple months. We closed on our house the 15 of January and slowly moved in taking a few boxes over at a time and doing a few minor repairs. We moved all of our big furniture over the beginning of February and then grandma & grandpa came to help unpack boxes and do handyman work around the house. (A BIG thanks to grandpa & grandma for all of their help!) While they were here, Bryce came down with a mild case of the chicken pox. Thank heavens everyone in our house had already had them. Now that we're all settled in (for the most part), we're looking forward to Spring Training at the Royals stadium. K-State is coming here in the middle of March to play ASU so we're really looking forward to that. And while everyone in Kansas was enjoying 1-2 inches of snow today, Bryce and I enjoyed what he called "a nice day" out at the Surprise Stadium watching the Royals play the San Diego Padres. (Dad just so happens to be in San Diego this weekend.)

Our house...

Unpacking boxes...

Spring Training Fan Fest...

Royals vs. Padres game...

Sledding in Arizona

We loaded up the car Friday morning and headed north to Flagstaff to play in the snow. There is an area that is strictly for sledding with small, medium, and large hills, a place selling hot drinks and BBQ, a campfire burning, and an area to build snowmen. The snow was beautiful and Bryce had fun playing in it. His favorite thing to do was fall down and roll around in the snow. Wayne was a daredevil and sledded down the big hill and after taking a few hard crashes, will be paying for it today. Afterwards, we headed back down here to the valley and to our nice 60 degree weather.

Getting geared up...

Heading up the hill to sled...

Sledding...

Playing in the snow...

Wayne sledding down the big hill...

Beautiful view of the mountains...
Trying to make a snow angel...

Building Frosty the Snowman...

Who knew a plastic spoon could make such a great shovel?

Enjoying a cup of hot cocoa...

Rock Chalk Jayhawk

You read correctly. We cheered on the KU Jayhawks at the Insight Bowl on New Years Eve. (Please note, both Bryce & Wayne wore their purple K-State hats.)

It was neat to see so many Kansas license plates


Trying to keep the sun off his face. It was a toasty 73 degrees at the start of the game. Bryce is working on polishing off a bag of kettle corn.

Beautiful Arizona evening

Wearing our KU blue (but we still bleed purple)

Xmas House

This is a house in our neighborhood with the coolest lights we've ever seen...

Christmas in Surprise

We went out to our town's Christmas party this weekend and enjoyed seeing the Hot Air Balloon's, riding the ponies, and petting man eating...

and then the non man-eating animals....

Giddy-up horsey

Carousel ride