Adventure Wall

For the past few weeks I've been working on an Adventure Wall. What is an Adventure Wall? Well it's a grouping of pictures - each one from a different vacation (adventure) we've been on. I bought a bunch of different frames from different thrift stores then painted them black. I decided I liked having a couple of picture frames different colors (one is red and one is blue) as accent colors. I even cut out and painted the letters myself! It's been a fun project and a long time coming!

**UPDATE** I needed a new picture frame for our Saint Louis adventure, so I went to the thrift store. While I was looking at the picture frames, I found a few that I liked. I grab the ones that looked good to me, even though I don't yet have an adventure for that frame! I decided to get the extra frames all ready for the next adventure we go on, including hanging the picture. But I've added a little note inside those frames "Awaiting Future Adventure." This way, I'm all set for our next adventure!

My First Mother's Day

My Mother's Day weekend celebration was amazing! I must start by saying what an amazing husband I have and how I am so lucky to have him in my life! I love Ammon so much! More every day! Also, all of my family who helped me to have a wonderful first Mother's Day.

Our celebration started off with a campout to Spring Lake with the Powells! We had such a blast!




Saturday morning we went fishing before driving home. Because the adults didn't have fishing licenses, just Powell kids fished. Unfortunately, no fish were biting.

When Ammon and I got home, we cleaned up then Ammon took me out to a late lunch to Flat Top Grill - one of our favorite restaurants! It's a stir fry restaurant. Ammon gave me a beautiful necklace.




That evening we worked in the garden. Ammon tilled the whole garden, then together we marked off all of the walking paths. We were going to transplant our broccoli and cabbage, but ran out of day light.




Sunday, after church, Ammon made me very delicious fajitas for lunch. Then we went over to the Powell's house for dinner where Kendall and Ammon cooked us all dinner. We had a fun time! After dinner, Ammon surprised me with a peach pie from a local bakery. A couple of weeks ago, I told Ammon that it's too bad peaches aren't in season because I'd love a homemade peach pie for Mother's Day. Ammon remembered that and searched for a fresh peach pie, which he said was hard to find! Mmmmm Mmmm. It was so good! And what a sweet man to remember and find me a peach pie! I love you Ammon!

Melissa and the Powell family gave me a beautiful framed collage picture of what makes me a mother. It has a picture of our family of 4, Carter's footprints, Tanner's footprints and a quote on infant death by Joseph Smith. It was so sweet of her, I love it!

To top it all off, Ammon gave me a very sweet card. I also received cards in the mail from my family and phone calls! This weekend was full of so much family and love. Thank you everyone, especially my dear husband, love of my life, Ammon.

In Memory of Quiet Books

In February I decided to make a Quiet Book for Elise's adorable children, JD and Maia. I figured if I'm making one, I ought to make a second one for my own kids! So I found ideas online and tweaked them to my own liking and got busy making them. I had the books about half done when everything happened. Despite it all I still wanted to finish these books. My parent's suggested that my family's quiet book could be a gift from Carter and Tanner to their future siblings. I liked this idea and took it one step further by adding the dedication in the back of the book.



If you are interested in making a quiet book and have any questions as to how I did it, I would be more than happy to share the knowledge I learned while making it!

Spy Training School

This weekend we had a Spy Training School Sleepover Party with our nieces and nephews here in Illinois. The fun started a week earlier when we gave them special invitations.

When they arrived at our house, they each got to choose a spy name. Then we learned how to be spies! We had a balance beam, bombs, lasers, observation and a final test. The final test was a set of clues that guided the spies back through all of the fun things we had already done. At the end of the test, they became agents.

Next we watched Spy Kids and ate spy candy. Then it was lights out! The next morning we ate waffles for breakfast then watched Spy Kids 2. It was a fun party!


I must give credit to the internet. It gave me ideas and I adapted them to fit our party.

Twice the News!

We are very excited to announce that we're pregnant!!

From 2012-02-05 Pregnancy Announcement

With TWINS!!!

The twins are currently 14 weeks old and are due on August 2, 2013. We are officially 1/3 of the way through the pregnancy! Because we're having twins, the pregnancy is considered high-risk, meaning that the doctor keeps a closer eye on us. For us, that means monthly ultrasounds! Here's a few of them:

7 weeks

From 2012-12-17

10 weeks

From 2013-01-07

14 weeks
This ultrasound was particularly fun because the babies were moving around. They're positioned side by side with their heads next to each other. They must already be having a good time!


Our 14 week ultrasound was a little early to be able to tell genders. We'll have to wait until our next appointment at the beginning of March. We are so very excited and feel so blessed to be growing our family and become parents!

California to Illinois

Oh Man! It's been a long time! Since the Air Show at Miramar, we had a wonderful Christmas with the Eggett Family. Dad, Mom and Kimberly drove down from Utah, and we all met at the Johnson's house. It was SO much fun watching Elise's kids play with all of their new toys!

From 2012-12-25 Christmas

Just days after Christmas, we had movers at our house packing up all of our belongings and both cars - starting our yearly move. This time, to Illinois. We had such a wonderful year in San Diego! We miss our friends, the weather and all the fun things (definitely including the beach) to do there!

Although we were very sad to leave beautiful San Diego, we were/are excited for our next adventure. It's true, the weather here does NOT compare to California at all, but we are lucky to be living close to a lot of family! It has taken us some time to get settled in and unpack all of our boxes, but we're finally ready for the debut of our new home! Enjoy the slide show!

San Diego Scene 8

This past weekend we got to experience a really awesome Air Show. It is the largest air show in the USA, and it's here in San Diego! The Miramar Base puts it on, and it is amazing! We planned on taking our own chairs and sitting in the free section for the afternoon and evening shows. But it didn't take long in the afternoon show for us to realize that we were missing out on a lot because we couldn't see the "main stage." So we purchased tickets for a seat in the stadium for the evening show. The night show ended with fireworks and the wall of fire. They did a wonderful job on the fireworks, it was a very good show! Much better than the firework shows that San Diego City put on for the 4th of July!!!