My Little Popeye..

You gotta watch this... I love it!

"I Wanna Be A Fire Fighter Mom!"

This last Monday for FHE we had the opportunity to go tour the local fire station. It was so awesome! Our friend here in our ward, Steve, is a fireman. Cool huh? So he and his wife Ruth offered to take us on a tour. It really was so fun! We met the Chief and few of the other firemen (and one fire women :) ). We received a tour of the building, complete with commentary from Steve, and we got to see the Trucks. (The COOLEST part). We got to sit up in the truck and little T-man even got to drive! The things that these guys do, and all the stuff that they have to know is incredible! I can't imagine being able to run into burning buildings like they do. So I am very grateful that we have these brave men AND women who spend their time and risk their lives to help keep us all safe. Thanks Steve and Ruth for the awesome experience. Thanks for the tour and putting up with our millions of questions. We absolutely loved it!

Steve and Ruth

Tray With Fire Fighter Steve

Tray with Chief Gatti

Tray and Darren with Steve in the Fire truck

Tray driving the fire truck

Tray getting his gear on

Fire Fighter Tray!

Us standing in front of the fire truck. We learned that different counties get to pick the color of their trucks. Steve and Ruth said there was a bright green one where they used to live!

Another truck I thought was really cool

Messy Messy Boy

This last week has been an especially messy one for little Tray-Tray. In the first pics he decided his food was better worn than eaten. Surprisingly he managed to make that big of a mess in just one swipe of one spoonful of food. Now THAT'S talent! :) And then the poor guy had a super bad nose bleed. Oh I felt awful! That was his second nose bleed in the past couple weeks. The first time he and I were taking a nap in my bed after Darren left for work and I woke up cause I heard Tray struggling to breathe through his nose which sounded super clogged and it was frustrating him. So I looked over and saw that my arm had blood all over it.. so I started freaking out cause it was on my arm, my hands, my chest, my clothes.. I couldn't figure out where it came from. Then I look over at Tray and see his face and jammies covered in blood. So I flipped out, jumped up, grabbed Tray, ran to the bathroom, turned on the light and looked him over head to toe trying figure out the source of the problem. Come to find it was his nose..? I guess I didn't realized babies got bloody noses like that? A few other people have complained about nosebleeds lately too, cause of the weather changes. So that explains it, it just seemed weird. Then the other night Tray was having a hard time breathing through his nose again and he kept rubbing it and trying to blow it, so I decided to use the sucker and relieve his little nosey, then after ONE suck (not even a well placed one) it was like I had let down a valve. His nose started gushing! From both sides! I was on the verge of tears I felt sooo bad! But a few minutes and 3 bloody shirts later (Trays, mine, & Darren's) it finally stopped.

Like the toilet paper shoved up his nose? Ha ha I didn't know what else to do.

Lucky 21!

21 baby! Twenty One! Last Thursday marked my 21st birthday! All I've got to say is.. its about time! I know I am young, but turning 21 seemed like a big step for me. I was feeling very good and very grown up until all my wonderful friends let me know that I am still the baby. I guess I just feel older being married with a baby who'll be one soon BUT at least now I will hear no more cracks about not being able to get into bars and clubs or having to be left home cause I'm not old enough. Ha! I'm old enough now! Bring on the booze! :) There's nothing I cant do now! Except maybe get better rates on my car insurance. Stupid system.. apparently you have to be 25 to get the cool discounts. But anyways my birthday was really great this year. It is every year, but this year it was particularly great. My friend Ali decided to throw me a surprise birthday party. She said she was going to take me out to lunch but didn't mention the part that she had invited all our friends. It was so awesome! Crazy Ali... Ha ha thanks so much hun! Thanks to everyone else for coming. :) I was super bummed earlier cause Darren had to go to work and Tray was having a very ornery day so I thought my birthday was a bust. But it really picked up. Later when Darren got home he surprised me with our favorite Chinese food..it was soo good! He told me that he was going to be in charge of dinner and when I got home I asked him what was for dinner cause I didn't see anything.. he said he was heating up some left overs (which really concerned me cause I was pretty sure there was nothing edible in my fridge) so I opened the microwave and found our Chinese food.. the little sneak :) Then he made me a cake and just in time too, right after he took it out of the oven the power went out! We were planning on having friends over for cake and ice cream and I thought the power out would've put a damper on the night but we still had a great time. After stuffing our faces with all sorts of junk we played catch phrase by candle light... very romantic ;) All in all it was a great day. And Tray-Tray even got me a present! The gift of mobility! Ha ha he decided to crawl! Awesome huh?! Now he is just getting better and faster and getting into everything.. I love it! My brother and sister in law came up to visit for the weekend too. We loved having them here, it was so much fun! On Friday we went out to dinner, then got a group together for some mad volleyball, which was so fun! Then Saturday was fight-night! Now that was fun! And right before it was supposed to start the power went out again! (Stupid Rock Springs!) But luckily My friends husband who was hosting the shin-dig had a generator! (nice right?!) So they hooked up the TV and ordered the fight. It was probably the only house in the neighborhood with power it was so awesome. The fights were really cool and the food was super yummy! Thanks for the invite Jen! Then Sunday was my friend Ali's birthday so we went over there for some MORE cake and ice cream. I swear I gained 20 lbs over the weekend. ha ha after eating we got together a giant game of signs which was hilarious! We definitely came home a crashed after all that.. What a great weekend!

Tray Learning to Crawl.. This was the morning after he learned, so he's slow. He's much faster now and getting into everything!

Trays Aunt Christie got to him and did his hair all crazy for fight-night.

Tray With uncle Stu

Tray with Auntie Christie and her super cute baby-belly :)

Me and Christie

This is my birthday present from my mom.. Incredible huh? She's amazing.

Oh George...

For a few months now we have been awaiting Darren's company party. I've been pretty excited for it, but nothing like my cute husband, he couldn't wait! We had the opportunity to go to the George Strait concert in Cheyenne and it was a lot of fun. The weekend started off with us driving all the way to Salt Lake to drop off Tray-Tray at Grandma Young's. He got to spend the whole weekend with her and loved it. (Although I missed him like crazy the minute I left my mom's! First time ever spending the night away from him. Rachel and I were whining the whole weekend about how we missed our babies and ended up getting our phone confiscated by our husbands as punishment for obsessing.) At least Tray had fun though, he can't get enough of my family. Probably because they re all so entertaining.. :) After driving back Friday night, we got a few hours of sleep and were off the next morning to Cheyenne. We car pooled with Devin and Rachel and had quite the time listening to the few C.D.s we thought to bring over and over.. ha ha. We met up with Darren's parents and brother and sister in law at our hotel in Laramie and got settled in. Then we were off to Applesbees for dinner before the concert. It was sooo yummy! Then we got in the car and headed for what we thought was our finally destination. But we actually got corralled into a field to park the car then got on buses that ship us all up the fair grounds. After wasting forever trying to find out where to go we actually found our gate. The actual seats for the show were sold out in the first half hour of going on sale back in October of last year.. so we got tickets to the "Party-zone" which roughly translates into "Stuff-as-many-people-as-we-possibly-can-to-stand-in-front-of-the-stage" We pushed and shoved our way as far in as we possibly could and got about 30 yards from the stage which would have been great if not for the tree of a man who stood right in front of me. Not kidding he was close to seven foot tall! ha ha so it was kind of hard to see the stage, but every now and again the heads would part and I would get a peak if Darren picked me up. Julianne Hough opened for George and she was really great. We liked her a lot. Then finally after waiting for what seemed like forever Mr. Strait himself came on. He was really great! Sounded awesome! (I'm sure he looked awesome to... to those who could see him) Actually they had some giant screens on either side of the stage so I did get to watch... just not HIM. Darren was able to raise his arms up and get some pics of him. He got a video too, but its super shaky. I didn't know that Darren was recording him so I was just tugging on his arms and bumping him like a dork. So the visual quality is not the best, but you can hear him singing! ha ha After the concert we got back on the buses headed back to our car, drove back to the hotel and crashed. It was a long day! Then we drove back to Rock Spring to shower and eat and headed back to Salt Lake to get Tray... Lots of driving! Poor Darren never gets a break! He drives 400+ miles a day for work then get to drive even more on his vacations ha ha I don't know how he does it. He's amazing!

Tray eating a pretzel at Grandma's

Tray and Uncle Stu

Tray and Auntie Christie

Me and Darren in the car on our way to Cheyenne

Devin and Rachel on the Bus

Miss Julianne Hough

George fixing his guitar

George singing...

George singing...

Pic of George on the big screen... What I actually watched.

Remember.. I'm a klutz and its shaky...

Happy Birthday America!

Such and incredible holiday! An incredible chance to marvel on just how blessed we are to live in this wonderful land. And to celebrate our Freedom an Independence. I Love love LOVE the fourth of July. I love the fireworks and carnivals. Our Fourth of July was great! We had a lot of fun. The weekend started with a trip to the lake with Darren's family. I learned to water ski again after 2 years of sitting it out. I actually learned to go OUT of the wake for the first time. oh ya! That was a lot of fun. Darren, of course is a pro on his wake board, and practiced CLEARING the wake. Tray took his first boat ride and fell asleep ha ha. He then got sun screen in his eyes and was miserable the rest of the afternoon until we were able to drive into Darren's parents house and get tray in the shower. We then went to watch fireworks up at Utah State University. We were afraid that Tray would be scared and scream and we would have to leave but he actually loved it! They shot off the fire works the night of the 3rd instead of the 4th because of the Cruise-In the comes into town every year. Its a huge car show that lasts all weekend and then at the end all the cars cruise down main street. All in all it was a great weekend. :)

Darren Wake Boarding

Darren and Tray waiting for fireworks

Me and Tray waiting for fireworks

Me and Darren

Tray and Uncle Devin

Tray and Auntie Rachel

Tray and Emry both entranced by the fireworks :)

Me and Tray at the Car Show

Emry at the Car Show

Tray and Emry with Grandpa Anderson

A few of the hundreds of cars at the show

Almost Mobile!

Life in good ol' baron Wyoming is actually pretty great right now! We really are enjoying it here, despite the constant June rain. Things finally seem to be settling down for out little family and it is sooo nice. We love having a place to call home! Usually we would still be going back and forth to Utah every weekend to visit family but our ward here seems to have a different idea for us. Darren and I were both given callings. Darren was actually given two! They seem very adamant to keep us in town :) We have had the opportunity to make some new friends in our ward and it has been really fun getting to know them. Last Saturday we had a couples night that was so much fun! It has been a long time since we've been able to get out with some friends and relax! Although relax may not be the right word to use.. we played some super silly games that had all ten adults jumping around like giant goofballs. Ha ha Thanks for inviting us Jen!



Our little Tray bug has become quite the wiggly worm! Although he'll definitely sit and play with toys for a good amount of time he REALLY loves moving around. Whether it be jumping, walking, or attempting to crawl. Actually to be honest, he hates the latter. Tray has always hated being on his tummy. So for those of you who know Tray, you know what a HUGE step this is for him. We are so excited for him to learn to crawl! I have a feeling we'll feel differently when he is actually crawling though. Babies are much harder to control once they're mobile! :)



Everyday has been a new adventure for us. Some days are harder than others, but we are really enjoying the ride!

Tray learing to walk! So fun!

Tray in his Jumperoo.. So funny huh!?

Some of Trays first attempts to crawl... It may not look like much, but this really is such a big deal for him!