First Job

I knew my baby boy was growing up, but now I know it is too fast! Yesterday at the rip old age of 17 months Carson got his first job working for the movie theaters, j/k, but he was wearing their apron. He decided he wanted to pull out the apron that we purchased at the DI yesterday and then proceeded to want me to put him in it, so of course we had to take pictures of his first day on the job! Enjoy!

Who is Going to be a Big Brother?

If you answered Robert, you would be wrong Mama Dickens is not having any more children, LOL. But really who is going to be a big Brother, why Carson of course! Yes we are excited to be bringing another baby to our family, and in fact Carson and this baby's due date could not really be much closer. This baby could make it depute on June 27th or maybe on Carson's 2nd birthday June 28th, we will just have to wait and see! It was fun to see that the due date of this baby is  2 years to the date of Carson's induction date, kind of cool, still not sure how I feel about 2 kids possibly having the same birthday, but we will cross the bridge if we come to it. Another interesting thing about this baby and Carson was that they both were conceived the following month after a miscarriage, not saying that I like it this way, but an interesting fact no less. We are not leaning to wanting a girl or a boy, either would be wonderful, we will have to wait though not quite long enough to know at this point, but we look forward to knowing. To announce this pregnancy to some of our family members and to my Zumba ladies we made a T-Shirt for Carson stating " Only Child Status Expires June 2013" We then proceeded to let him walk around and let people read his shirt as he played. Last Monday at Zumba it was fun to watch people read it, then run after Carson to read it again to make sure they really saw what they saw. For Thanksgiving as a family we go around and say what we were thankful for, and we pulled Carson's arms away and revealed his T-Shirt, so fun. For my Dad's side as we did not see them to announce we took a picture with Carson and sent a Christmas Card from Carson reading. "Study my picture, and you will know what I mean." Hope they got it, not saying it was hard. Additionally a few weeks ago we were able to have an early ultrasound at 8 weeks and a great relief was lifted when we saw a healthy heartbeat, ever since, if we ask Carson where the baby is his points to the ultrasound picture on the fridge, we are trying to get him to realize that the baby is inside Mommy, in time that will come as well. Needless to say we are excited and were excited to use Carson this time in introducing his new baby brother or sister!

Baby # 2 Due June 27 2013

Christmas Time

For FHE yesterday we set up our Christmas tree and made our house feel more like Christmas. It was quite a different experience then we had the last few years as a married couple. We now know that we have a toddler if we didn't think so before. Multiple times I had to make distractions so Robert was able to finish up with the Christmas tree, not to mention I have a feeling in order to keep our sanity the ornaments will continue to rise until they are half way up the tree, those with kids know what I mean. Despite the bit of difficulty it was a fun time we got to spend as a family, Carson especially loved Mommy's trains and gave us big crocodile tears when Mommy put it on the shelf, but he loves to point and look at it now. To finish off the night we pulled out Polar Express, I was quite surprised Carson watched the entire movie, at times I was not sure if he was scared or excited, none the less I think he liked it overall. This morning Carson and I went to Walmart and purchased his very own Nativity scene that he can play without having to play with Mommy's decorations, even though I know it will still happen. He loves to push the button and make the stable sing Away in a Manager, pictures to follow of this toy. We look forward to making many more family traditions and years go by and more children join our family.  Here's to a wonderful winter Season and a Merry Christmas.   

Our Christmas Tree Day & Night

My New Nativity Set

 Carson's Little People Nativity Set

Thanksgiving 2012

This year Thanksgiving was filled with lots of fun, love, and laughter to last a lifetime. We traveled to my grandparents house for Thanksgiving on Wednesday and left on Sunday, so a very fun filled weekend. I always love being with family, where would we all be without family, I can't say I would like to know the answer to that question, but I can never get enough of my family, love them all so much. There is so much to be thankful this season, but to name a few: Thanks to a loving husband who provides and protects his family, love you honey! Thanks to the most wonderful son that anyone could ask for, thanks for bringing more joy into my life, Love you Carson! Thanks to my parents who have raised me in the gospel and have taught me most of the things I have learned in this life, and thanks for loving me when I may have not deserved your  love, love you Mom and Dad! I am grateful for my siblings who are always there to tease and to love, love all 4 of you! Thanks to all my extended family including Robert's extended family, love you all and love the support and love you give our family. I am also grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who sent down his son to atone for my faults and sins that I able to return back to him, I am grateful for the knowledge I have within the gospel, it has made many struggles and trials more bearable. I am finally thankful for my physical ability to be able to better my health these last few months, not to mention it is always great to get compliments on how well you look! This list could go on and on, but these are some of the key things I am thankful for. Hope all had as wonderful of  a Thanksgiving as I did!

Thanksgiving Preparations

Thanksgiving Dinner

Thanksgiving Weekend Festivities

Carson and Savannah playing

 Watching Brave

 Carson so much wanted to be a big kid, he got off my lap and went in front to sit next to his 7 year old Aunt Rachel and almost 5 year old cousin, so cute!

After the drive home

Upon arriving at home Carson immediately went into our bed and requested his remote controls so he could watch TV in our room.

Cold Turkey Run

Over the weekend my sister-in-law Lisa and I ran a 5K, which was a lot of fun. In fact I did better than I thought I would, I came in with a time of 36:45, I am sure I could have done better if I trained for it, but despite not training for it I had about a 12 min mile, not bad I say. It was started raining towards the end, but that is great weather for a run. Lisa and I were captured in a few pictures posted on the county website, so enjoy our run. 

Beginning of the Race

Starting off strong!

Finishing Strong!

No Smoking!

Saying Goodbye to One and Hello to Another

To be honest I didn't think I would be posting about this experience until much later this month or even months to years down the road, but I am not. We have been thinking ever since we lost our last baby in September, that we should think about getting a vehicle that would allow us to expand our family more comfortably.  We then got to thinking how about November? My car would be up for registration and it seemed like it might be the perfect time to make the switch. We went back and forth on the issue of buying a new vehicle as we have loved not having a car payment and the fact that we knew we would be spending quite a bit more than either of us have ever bought a vehicle for, but we decided to go test drive a few options of vans anyway. We had intended on test driving a Honda Odyssey  Toyota Sienna, and then finally the Dodge Caravan, so we headed out to Low Book Sales to see what they had on their lot to test drive. They didn't have much in terms of the vans we wanted to test drive, but we did test out a 2006 Caravan and a 2012 Caravan to compare the old and the new model, needless to say we loved the 2012 way more than the 2006, just felt more right. As we both are not spare of the moment people when it comes to large purchases we decided to take the 2012 Caravan for the remainder of the day to be able to check out our finances as well as get a better feel for the car, we already really loved the car. Throughout the rest of the day we ran our errands driving the van to get a better feel for the van itself, and we loved it even more. It was a 2012, which we never thought we would be considering in 2012, and it was relatively low miles, which we wanted, the interior was black which is a plus with the idea of having many kids in the future, let's just say we were falling in love with the van, not the payments of course. Low Book Sales closed at 9 pm so we finally decided to bring the car back, but before we decided on purchasing it we needed to ask some hard questions in which we did, to make this long story shorter we then decided to purchase the car that night and drive it home. This next part of the experience I can say I did not expect the emotion that came with leaving my college car at the car dealership. Almost immediately when I knew we were going to be trading it in to them, I started crying. I began to remember all the fun times I truly did have with the car, it had been in our lives our entire marriage and had been a wonderful car. I was able to get myself composed enough I thought to empty the last remaining contents out of my Alero, but once again the flood of emotion came over me as I locked the car for the very last time. It broke my heart I felt like I was leaving a part of myself behind or maybe a child. Even as I relate this experience I can't help but cry for my Alero and the many experiences, joys, and downs that it gave me in the 6 years I had it as my car. Despite the difficult time I had with saying goodbye to a good car, I have stepped into a new phase a life, which will be just as great. With this van I feel more like a parent, like I was missing my soccer mom van (Not anymore) In the last few days we have been playing around with all the new gadgets and finding new things we didn't know about the van, so exciting, however, we still can't figure out how to get the lights to turn on automatically when the car doors are opened, if you know comment please. We truly are blessed to be able to make such a purchase and feel comfortable about the payments even though they are higher than we have ever made, but it is reassuring to know that we are okay and our family will not suffer because of this decision. Here is to a wonderful new beginning and a wonderful life with our new van. Enjoy the pictures of the old car and the new van.

I realized this is the only picture of my Alero-December 2006

Last remaining part of my Alero

Home Sweet Home

New Experiences

Yesterday November 10th, the winter season was unofficially opened in Springville with a bang! It snowed, and snowed, and snowed. Compared to last year we hit the jackpot! This year it seemed that I was wishing and praying for snow while most people was hoping it would not come. I wanted to have Carson experience snow for the first time, and let me say, it was a big hit!Carson and Mom played out in the snow for about 45 minutes during the day, and then Carson and Dad played outside again at night for about another 45 minutes while Mom was working out. All in all we received probably a good 10 inches between yesterday and today, and we're loving every bit of it at our household. 

 

This little guy just had to get in on the action. Unfortunately Mom did not have snow pants or mittens for him, but he could have cared less. As you can see he picked up the snow anyway after a few moments of coaching from mom, what you do with a ball of snow, hehehe. The next adventure for this little guy was finding an abandoned sled which Mom, happily pulled him around the common grounds, love his smile in the sled pictures. 

Final adventure is good old playing in the snow itself! 

 

 WE LOVE SNOW!