Tagged

So Kira tagged me and since I failed to do the last tag I thought that I better do this one so here it goes...

My 5 favorite restraunts:

*Olive Garden

*Texas Roadhouse

*Greecian Key

*Ming's Cafe

*Wingers

5 Things I did yesterday:

*Slept in (Thanks Brayden)

*Ate a yummy breakfast (Thanks Caleb)

*Picked up the house

*Went to Church

*Made yummy popcorn balls

5 Things I look forward too:

*Christmas morning (Brayden's going to be so much fun this year)

*Having our new baby

*Being a normal size again

*Paying off my student loans

*Warmer weather

5 things I love about fall:

*The crisp air

*The beautiful fall colors

*Wearing sweaters with no coat

*The sound of crunchy leaves beneath my feet

*The start of a new season

5 things on my wish list:

*A freezer

*A yard with grass and a fence

*A complete makeover

*New bedroom furniture

*A Swiffer Wet Jet

5 favorite things to do:

*Spending time with my wonderful hubby

*Being a mom

*Reading a good book

*Shopping

*Doing crafts

I tag:

Whoever wants to do this

Deck the House

Last weekend we set out to get us a nice Christmas tree. We really lucked out because when we went to Lowes to check out some other things we found that all their Christmas things were 50% off, including artifical Christmas trees. We were able to get the last one.

Okay enough about our great deal. After we bought our beautiful tree we took it home and decorated it. Brayden was a big help (NOT), but what little boy is. But he had fun stickng ornaments on the tree. Notice the pile of pinecones on the tree.

Here is the finished product. After a few adjusments from Brayden. Brayden loves the tree. Every morning he runs out into the family room and yells "ut-oh" until I turn on the lights.

Model Material

Last weekend Grandma bought Brayden a new pair of church shoes to go with his new church outfit. He was so excited to wear them that he couldn't wait until church. So he decided to sport them around the house all Sunday morning wearing nothing else but his diaper. I think that he might have a future in the modeling career :)

Thanksgiving and Arizona Trip

For Thanksgiving we took a little trip down south to Arizona to visit my brother Tyler and his family. All of my family was able to come down, except for Matt and Jen, who had to stay behind to work.

We had a blast and were able to do a lot of things. Sorry there are a lot of pictures...

Brayden and I posing in front of the Bass shop.

On Wednesday after a little trip to the doctor to get some medicine for Brayden, who had another ear affection, we were able to visit Kaden's preschool and watch his little Thanksgiving program. He did so good singing all his songs! I can't believe how big he is getting.

After Kaden got out of school we were off to the zoo. I think this was Bryaden's favorite part of the whole trip. He loved seeing all of the animals! Here is the group (minus my mom the photographer) poisng in front of a giraffe.

Brayden's most favorite part of the whole zoo was the monkeys. We got to go inside their habitat and watch as they climbed and played all around us. Brayden kept trying to talk to them, in monkey talk, and couldn't stop giggling the whole time.

Grandma posing with almost all the grandkids (Mesa was asleep in the stroller).

After visiting all the animals, Grandma and Grandpa gave all the kids a ride on the merry-go-round. Brayden loved his ride! He didn't want to get off. On Thanksgiving day the guys went golfing, while the girls prepared the big dinner.
Because we were in warm, sunny Arizona we had to take the opportunity to eat Thanksgiving dinner outside on the patio. Here are all the cousins digging into their turkey dinner while entertaining each other.

After dinner we went to a nearby park and feed the ducks their dinner of bread. This is the closest Brayden ever got to be to ducks.


On Black Friday the girls we able to escape being mommy and grandma for a few hours and go shopping in the morining. When we got back we were excited to see that they guys did a great job babysitting. Three of the four kids were asleep and they had even vacumed the house! We have some good men!
Later that night we visited the Mesa temple and watched the Christmas lights go on. It was a little croweded but fun. The Mesa temple is beautiful!

As you can see we had a fast, fun trip. Thanks Tyler and Amy for letting us take over your house, and for Kaden and Evan for letting us sleep in your beds.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

We hope that everyone had a spootacular Halloween! We had a great Halloween Day!

It started at 6:30. When Caleb and I got up extra early to put the finishing touches on his costume. At Idaho Central (Caleb's place of employment) Halloween is a HUGE holiday. Every department dresses up and puts on a skit for the whole company. This year Caleb's department dressed as Zombies and danced to Micheal Jackson's "Thriller." Everyone in the Credit Union said that they were the best. His department won the best skit. Here is a picture of my scary zombie.

If we get a copy of his skit then I'll post it on the blog. Stay tuned...

Of coarse, we can't forget our handsome scarecrow. Brayden was a scarecrow. He looked so adorable in his Halloween costume.

Brayden riding his Uncle's snowmobile and sucking on some Halloween candy (thus the dirty face).

Brayden got to go trick-or-treating at his daddy's work. He got tons of candy! It was so fun for Brayden to visit "dadadada"s work, and for daddy to show off his little scarecrow. After trick-or-treating we went to Grandma/pa Bigelow's to show off his costume and get some dinner. Then to Abby's house (sorry Amy and Aaron it's officially known as Abby's) to see Grandma/pa Moore, Abby, Aunt Amy, Uncle Aaron, Aunt Jen and Uncle Matt.
Cowgirl Abby and Scarecrow Brayden posing for the camera.

By the time the day was over Brayden could hardly walk straight.Needless to say we had a busy Halloween, but a fun one. We hope everyone had a great and safe day too!

Our Little Artist

Brayden's new passion is coloring. He loves to color! I think he found his passion in Nursery. Now he has to color at least once a day. Since he loves to color we thought that we would see how he likes to paint. His babysitter gave us some little pumpkins from her garden. So for Family Home Evening last night we painted our tiny pumpkins...
Brayden had a blast. He was a real Van Gogh!
He concentrated on painting his pumpkin for almost a whole hour (that's a long time for a little boy).
After his pumpkin was covered in paint, as well as most of Brayden, we had to let him paint a picture until he finally decided he was finished. Caleb and I had a lot of fun watching Brayden enjoying himself. I swear we could just sit all day and watch him He is sooo fun!
Here is our finished products. They almost look professional :)

We had fun, and think we will make it a family tradition every year.

OH BOY, OH BOY...

IT'S A BOY!!!

Yesterday we went for my ultra-sound. I was so excited to prove to Caleb that it was a girl, but I was definatly wrong. We are having another boy! I really didn't care too much what we had, as long as it was healthy. Well he looks to be healthy, and is very active. He was jumping around the whole time! Caleb says he hopes it doesn't reflect his personality because we were so lucky that Brayden was such a mellow baby.

Seeing him in my belly makes it so much more real. I don't feel old enough to have two kids! My due date is still February 26. It's coming up fast! And we have a lot to do to get ready for our new addition to the family. First thing we need to do is throw out all the girl names (I was convinced it was a girl because I am carrying him so different compared to Brayden) and find him a boy's name that both Caleb and I like. As many of you know it takes us a long time to decide on a name. But I guess we still have four more months :)

Brayden is still clue-less. We keep trying to tell him that there is a baby in mommy's tummy but all he does is look at my tummy then point to his. Poor kid doesn't understand he's going to have to share mom and dad soon. I just hope and pray that he will adjust well. As soon as he does adjust and his little brother is old enough I know that they are going to have a blast together.

We are so excited for the new addition to come to our family!

First Weekend Home Improvement Activity

This past weekend we decided it was about time to clean out and organize our garage. A big job but it had to be done. So my handy man and his beautiful assistant got to work. Here is the before picture.

After picture
We built some very sturdy shelves. Got rid of some junk, and organized the rest of the stuff. When we were done we were able to park both cars in the garage (New Concept!). But we were unable to keep both cars in there for long because Caleb's brother Jon needed some place to store his new snowmobile for a couple of weeks. Talk about good timing on Jon's part :)

NURSERY WOUNDS

I'm a little late posting this... Last Sunday Brayden had his first real owee. He was in nursery, with his nursery leaders (aka mom & dad) when another little boy came over and flipped his chair over. Brayden landed face down, and bit his lip. Daddy came to the rescue and took him out. We were worried that he would need stitches because there was so much blood, but luckily he didn't. Brayden was a real tropper. Once daddy comforted him and got the bleeding to stop he was ready to get down and play again.

Amy & Mesa in Town

This past weekend Amy and Mesa came to Pocatello. Amy is starting a new business and so had to come to get trained. We didn't get to see much of them since Amy was busy being trained and we had to share them with Amy's family. But we did get to have a family dinner on Saturday night with Amy and Mesa as the guests of honor. It was so fun to see Amy and I was so excited to see Mesa, since this was our first time to meet. Mesa is such a beautiful baby!!!! Three of the cousins. Brayden, Abby and Mesa.... Sorry this is the best picture I could get with two todlers and a new born.

Uncle Matt holding little Ms. Mesa

Both sets of Grandparents came all the way from Utah just to see Amy and Mesa!
Great Grandma & Grandpa Armstrong with Mesa, Brayden and Abby

Great Grandpa & Grandma Moore with all the happy grandkids

Casanova

This past Monday my friends Kira and Sarah came over to see the house. Brayden was so excited to see them. Mainly because Kira's way cute 3 month old daughter, Mikayla, came with them. Kira and I have arranged Brayden and Mikayla to be married (when they are about 30). We figured that if we have an arranged marriage then we can ensure that we like who they marry, our grandkids will be the cutest, and we would get along with their in-laws :)

Lucky for us Brayden and Mikayla seem to already like eachother...Here is a picture of Brayden giving Mikayla loves. He is already Mr. Casavona. Caleb and I better have a talk with him about not kissing girls, only mommy and grandmas, until he is at least 25 :)
Here is a sideways picture of Mikayla. (Sorry I couldn't figure out how to make it the right side up) Isn't she the cutest baby! I think that she is one of the most beautiful babies I have ever seen. Lucky Brayden...
Brayden giving Mikayla hugs
I just thought that this picture was way too cute not to post! He is sooooo stinkin cute!!!!!
Brayden giving Grandma loves.
Brayden loves to give kisses.
He is constantly puckering up (which I have yet to catch on camera) or blowing kisses.

Lounging

A couple of weeks ago I was airing out the sleeping bag from our camping trip. Brayden pulled one down from the sofa and decided to lounge out. Of course I thought he looked so stinking cute I had to snap a picture.

VaCaTiOn

This past week we took a family vacation to Washington. It was a blast! It is the first real vacation we took since we got married (by real vacation I mean that we actually went somewhere else besides Utah). We did a lot of things, and did a lot of driving.
On Saturday we went to my cousin Linsey's wedding in Utah. From Utah we went to Hagerman (a small town in between Twin Falls and Boise) where we spent the night at Caleb's brother's house and met up with Caleb's parents. We drove up to Washington with them. It was so nice because Brayden loved driving in Grandpa's big "BRRMBRRM"/ truck, and it saved us A LOT of money in gas. It was a long drive but Brayden did awesome. He loved sitting next to Grandma and watching his animal movie over and over. We got to Sara's house (Caleb's sister) late on Sunday night. The next day we got some supplies and went to Ross Lake camping for a few days. Ross Lake is a lake Caleb's family always camped at when Caleb was younger. It is beautiful, and Caleb has always wanted to take me there.

Here is a picture of Brayden sleeping on the way down to Utah. I thought that he looked so adorable holding his tonka truck, I just had to snap a picture.

At Ross Lake it was pretty chilly and raining off and on so we weren't able to play in the water. Except Caleb and Sara did get brave and jumped in to wash their hair and get a little clean. But they didn't stay in too long. BRRRRR! The weather didn't stop our fun though. We went for a hike, drove around in the boat, and played on the beach.

We also had a little adventure while driving around in the boat on our last day there. We were in the middle of the lake heading towards a a water fall when all of the sudden Sara and Caleb's mom could smell something hot. Caleb immediatly stopped the boat (in the middle of the lake) and we heard poping sounds coming from the engine. When he went to investigate we could see smoke coming from the engine. Not a good sign! The engine had seized up on us, and we were in the middle of this huge, remote lake with nobody else around. After a couple of minutes of Caleb and Sara trying to paddle us to shore and us not getting anywhere. We were all getting a little worried when Caleb's mom decided to say a prayer. Right after the prayer Caleb's dad had a great idea. He made a sail from an extra blanket we took in case it got cold and the oars. The sail worked great. It only took us an hour to get almost to our camp sight. When we were just about to camp, our neighbor, a really nice guy who was camping close by saw us and came out to pull us back into shore with his boat. And because you have to boat into your camp sight, he also spent the rest of the day pulling our boat with all of our gear and taking us to the launch sight so we could go home. It's kind of funny now but at the time I don't think I've been that scared in a long time. Here we were stuck in the middle of a huge lake, with no one around, and no extra supplies like food, and diapers. Thank goodness for the gift of prayer! Becuase of that prayer everything worked out, and we were just fine.

Here is a picture of Ross Lake from our camp sight. It is such a beautiful lake!

Caleb and Brayden are finding good rocks to throw into the water. Brayden loved camping! He got to be outside almost 24 hours straight. Definalty a little boy's dream come true.

I don't have anymore pictures because our camera was acting up. I have to get copies from Caleb's mom, but I can still tell about the rest of the trip...

On Friday we went crabbing. I think that this was my favorite part of the whole trip. It was sfun to be out on the ocean in Caleb's dad's fishing boat and getting to watch Dan (our brother-in-law) pull up the baskets full of crab. It was even fun after getting to eat our yummy catch!

Saturday we went shopping at a huge outlet mall! I told Caleb that it is a good thing that we don't live any where near a shopping center like that one or we would be in trouble. Then Alex (our nephew) got baptized on Saturday night. We were so happy that we were able to be their Alex's special day.

On Sunday we went to church with Sara and Dan, and got to see Alex recieve the Holy Ghost. It was kind of fun too because a lot of people knew Caleb from when he was a little boy, and Caleb was able to show off Brayden to some old family friends.
We came home Monday...

As you can see we had an amazing trip! It was so nice to get away and was fun to see Sara and her family.

New Favorite Thing

Brayden's new favorite lately is to watch his Baby Einstein movie, Neighborhood Animals. He loves this movie! I think that he likes it because it shows all of his favorite animals. It is so cute to watch him watch it because he giggles at certain parts and will say the animal names/sounds as he sees them. If we put any other movie in he gets mad! He only wants to watch his movie.

Here he is glued to the tv. It's kind of nice for me because now I have something to distract him while I shower in peace :)

I'm going behind bars

Recently I have been nominated to raise money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA). They are coming to arrest me, and the money I raise will be my bail money. I need to raise about $1,300. A lot of money but if I could get a small donation from a lot of people then I know it can be done. The money will go to helping local kids attend camp, help MDA continue research for causes and cures of 43 neuromuscular diseases, provide wheelchairs and leg braces, fund clinic visits, and run support group sessions. As you can see it's for a good cause, and I am excited to help.
If you would like to help me post my "bail" please go to this website https://www.joinmda.org/MyLockup/MyHomepage/tabid/18593/Default.aspx

Thanks and I love you all!

Catching Up

I haven't posted anything lately because it has been kind of crazy around here. Nothing too exciting has been going on, Just busy. The most exciting thing that just happened today is that Kelly (Caleb's little brother) left for his mission to Brazil. He flew out today. We are so excited for him. He was so ready! We know that he will be a great missionary.
Some other news... I decided to quit my job at Sylvan. I wasn't getting the hours I needed. I am still not quite sure what I am going to do yet. I am thinking of either substitute teaching (not a fun job but good money), working at Convergyce from home (againg not a fun job but I get to stay home and pretty good money), babysitting (not the funnest idea but at least I get to be with Brayden), or working at the daycare center at Gold's Gym (not a lot of money but I get to be with Brayden). It is kind of frusterating becuase all I really want to do is be a full time mom to my adorable little boy, but hey somebody has to pay off my student loans. I'll keep you updated on what I decide to do.
Anyways that is about all that is going on around here...I'll post more later. Love ya' all and hope all is well.

SURPRISE!

This past June I had not been feeling completely like myself. I was tired, and a little quesy. I also noticed that everything smelt a lot more stronger. So I decided to take a pregnancy test... Just in case. Well the first test that I took came out positive, and the second test... Yep, it was postive (The second line is really faint, but it was still there).

After the third test I finally came to the conclusion that I am pregnant. So surprise!

I am now about eleven weeks along. Yesterday I finally came to fully believe that I am pregnant after I went to the doctor and got to hear the heart beat. I knew all along that I was pregnant. I guess that I have just been in a state of shock because it was such a surprise for us. It took us so long to get Brayden that I just figured we would be in the same boat for the rest of our kids. But I guess the Lord thought that Brayden needed a little sibling before he gets any more spoiled. The baby is due sometime in February.

We all love icecream

On Saturday all the Bigelow clan went to Bamboo Garden for dinner. One of the best parts about Bamboo's is the ice cream after even when you are stuffed. Like my Grandma Moore used to say..."You always have room for icecream because it slithers down the cracks." Even though Brayden was stuffed from pork fried rice, and sweet and sour chicken he found room for icecream "in between the cracks", and throughly enjoyed sharing dad's ice cream.

Yummy Yummy

Got milk?!?!?

HAPPY 4TH OF JULY

I hope that everyone had a great 4th of July! We had a great one. It started off with us going to the parade. Brayden didn't really understand what was going on at first, but he soon got into it. He had a blast! He especially loved seeing the horses, and now can say "neigh." After the parade we went home so Brayden could have his nap. Later that afternoon we went to Caleb's mom's house and had a BBQ with all of Caleb's brothers and sister. After eating way to much the kids played together until it was time to light a few fireworks. We then went down by the fairgrounds and watched the fireworks with Sara, Caleb's sister, and her family. Brayden loved the fireworks! He kept saying "Wow," "Ohhh," and "Heehee." All in all it was a great and fun filled day!

Us waiting for the parade to start. Dan, me, Caleb, Brooke, Sara, Brayden and Ashley.
Taking time out of watching the parade to pose for the camera.

Brayden lounging and trying to snatch his cousins hamburger during the BBQ at Grandma's. Let me just say that Jerri is the best cook. We were all stuffed!

Brayden with all of his cousins (except for baby Brynn who was out of town). Jerri bought them all matching 4th of July t-shirts. They all looked adorable! Thanks Grandma.

This isn't the best picture but you try to take a decent shot with seven squirmy kids :) If I had a video tape of us trying to get all of their attention I would have posted it becuase it was pretty entertaining.

Brayden watching the fireworks in the back of Uncle Dan's truck.

Caught Red Handed

Brayden has a favorite secret place in our new house. We have a space between the front window and the couch. Brayden loves to play with his toys back there. Today after church he got into the pantry, took the box of cereal, and disappeared. When I went to investigate I caught him in his secret place scarfing down a handful of frosted flakes.