We're HERE!

We Made it! YAY! We are now officially residents of Dallas, TX! So far we LOVE it! We love our place...its small, but its nice. Brandon is ofiicially done with training and today is his first "real" day of work. Lets hope he likes it..haha! I still have a TON to do...but we are slowly getting unpacked and settled in. I think tomorrow we will venture out and go explore our new surroundings and have some fun! But like the last three days, today we will be sequestered in our apartment  trying to get things unpacked and back to normal! Wait...I have two crazy kids...this might take longer than a day........

NEVER.........

in a million years would I have EVER believed that I would actually LIKE to work out.....NEVER!.....BUT ever since Brandon signed us up for a gym membership I have forced myself to go since we are PAYING for it...and I didn't want to waste the money. AND I have never stuck with working out long enough to actually start SEEING results..........YET....here I am about a month later....and I LOOK FORWARD to when I get to workout...the kids LOVE the Kid's club......and I am seriously SEEING my body change for the better! I feel like once I started seeing the results I have been addicted! Its amazing to me that once you start working out on a regular basis no matter what you might actually look like you start  to feel SO MUCH BETTER about yourself and the way you look! Many of you probably are already know this, but since I have never stuck with it long enough to start enjoying it I have never felt this way... the light bulb has FINALLY turned on for me and I am loving it!

Here we GO again....

Brandon has accepted a job with Culligan Water and we are moving to..........DALLAS!!! We are so grateful for this WONDERFUL opportunity! It is a great position and we are  looking forward to a little stability in our lives! We will be moving the  second weekend in October....and STILL have no clue WHERE in Dallas we will be living! I am hoping we can figure that out in the next couple of weeks! We were laughing the other day because I was telling Brandon that I was lookig forward to moving.....and he was like "ya...we have stayed put for WAAAAY too long...." haha....I guess we have just become accustomed to moving every 6-8 months that it has been kind of weird being in ONE place for a year. But I think we are finally ready to put some roots down somewhere. The not so fun part?......the packing.......the cleaning.....pretty much ALL BY MYSELF....with two kids. Brandon is traveling to train Monday through Friday from now until we move! Its gonna be a busy...lonely month! AND so it begins....

Cooper Steven is Our little Blessing

We FINALLY blessed Cooper on Sunday. We kept putting it off this summer thinking some of Brandon's family would be here for it, but they didn't end of making it down, so we went ahead and did it Sunday. The blessing was really sweet, and of course he looked very handsome. I think there is just something so special about your baby all dressed in white looking so pure and innocent as of course they are. It is such a beautiful occasion. It also reminds me of how grateful I am that Brandon is a worthy Priesthood Holder and has the abiltiy to bless our children. Later we made a yummy dinner to share with our friends and celebrate having little Cooper in our life! It was a good day!

POP-POP came to VISIT!!!

Brandon's Dad came to visit us in June and we had a GREAT time with him, Tessa just soaked it all up! We don't live near any family...so when Pop-Pop came to visit she coldn't get enough of him! She had lots of fun playing with him and gettng lots of extra attention and it was really nice to have an extra set of hands around here to help too!  We had a busy weekend while he was here; Brandon and him worked on his Mustang and got it running really good, he took us shopping, went out to eat, he made us lots of yummy food, and Brandon and him did their FAVORITE thing EVER.....FISHING. We played  and played and played! When he left we felt sad that we don't live close to  grandparents or aunts and uncles. She enjoys it so much when they visit! Hopefully we can SOMEDAY!!!

Tessa Opening her gift from Pop-Pop!

Its was a manget Puzzle...She played with that thing for DAYS!

           Just our little Coop man stretching waking up from his nap to meet his Pop-Pop!

 

   Getting ready to go to the Park with Pop-Pop! She is just too excited!

  Playing with Pop-Pop at the park! Swinging is one of her FAVORITES!

    MMM...ice cream!

She just LOVES her baby!

Sidewalk chalk with Daddy!

She pretty much had a smiled planted on her face ALL weekend!

Saying Bye-Bye to Pop-Pop the morning he left!

Come back SOON!

Tessa turned 2!!!!

Her birthday was May14th. I know it was a long time ago...but I got a lot of catching up to do. We didn't have a big party planned...but I wanted to make it special for her. So Brandon took off a day of work and we spent it doing things that Tessa would LOVE. She is really into farm animals...So we took her to a neat place called Oil Ranch. It has farm animals, a train you can ride, and bouncy houses. She had a BLAST!! She got to ride her first PONY, and couldn't get enough of the chickens. She especially loved feeding the Horsies and kept hugging their noses and would say, "oooh...I Love you".

Then we came home and ordered her a pizza(her fav) and let her enjoy a couple cupcakes. This girl LOVES her sweets...So she pretty much thought she died and went to Heaven. She opened up her presents..and played with her new toys the rest of the day. It was a pretty low-key birthday, which was nice considering I had just had a baby 10 days before. But I think we made it a special day ALL about HER!

A couple days later we had some friends over for cake and ice cream and sang her Happy Birthday... By this time she was getting a hang of the whole blowing out the candles thing...and blew out her candles in ONE breath. All in all I think Tessa enjoyed turning 2...and can't wait to have a birthday again!

After Baby......

I know that I am a HORRIBLE blogger...I want to be better...but I can't promise I will be:) SO lets get on with the update....

Let me preface by saying that I feel really guilty that I haven't taken as many pics of Cooper as I did with Tessa the first couple months of life...I need to repent and do better. Sitting down to do this update has made me realize this fact...so I HOPE the guilt and pressure  of this fact will improve my picturing taking skills!

I have a few pics of when Cooper was FIRST brought home...but in EVERY pic I look like a WHALE... SO I am not going to post too many of those.

I will go in order of the events that I have ACTUALLY captured on camera....First being Tessa meeting Cooper for the first time

Tessa was very needy and cuddly when she first came in the room so it took her sec to actually notice the baby. But when she did she was VERY interested! 

   

We were able to capture the look on her face when she first saw him...priceless. Its been a LOVE affair ever since!

She sure LOVES him to pieces, She has the typical sibling relationship with Cooper. She LOVES LOVES LOVES him and asks for him every morning and is always saying, "Hewo Bwatha...How are you?" and "Ooooooh...I WUV you Bwatha" He gets LOTS of slobbery kisses and smothering hugs. She likes to help feed him is bottle and play with him on his play mat...and loves to give him his binky(even if that means she has to take it out of his mouth first...So SHE can give it to him.haha) BUT...she also LOVES to pick on him. I think she does that more to push MY buttons! She is my little sassy stinker I shouldn't expect ANYTHING less:)                                                                                                                                                                            

It was nice to spend some one and one time with little Cooper in the hospital.  I will cherish those moments when it was JUST him and I and daddy.

Here we are taking our little man home....this is when the REAL fun ALL begins..haha

This is Cooper's first sponge bath at home...As you can see Tessa loved to take care of "her" baby as I took care of "mine".

Our first few weeks were kind of rough for me. I had a great delivery but due to some side effects of my fast delivery...I had a REALLY rough recovery. So unfortunatly not a lot of pics were taken. I was just trying to feel better so I could take care of my new baby and hyper toddler. I think I also had a case of the baby blues the first month. But FINALLY after about six weeks things started going great...we got into a routine...Cooper was sleeping better...Tessa was adjusted...I was feeling good.....and life started feeling really sweet. I have LOVED having Cooper in our family...and have so enjoyed watching how he has brought so much love and sweetness to all of us...especially getting to watch Tessa be a loving big sis and see how much fun she has with him. Before you have two kids it just doesn't seem possible to love anyone as much as you love your first child....But then the second baby comes and you see the miracle of how your heart just expands and you realize you have even more love to give. The last few months have  really been a special time in my life full of struggles, learning, adventures, stress, peace, and the PUREST joy. I Can't wait for what is to come.

Next up....Tessa's 2ND Birthday!!!!!!