We had the joy of spending Thanksgiving in Kansas this year as we switch between families every other year. This year is Thanksgiving with the Sloop's and Christmas with the Johnson's and next year it will be reversed!

We had such a great time hanging out with everyone and visiting. We stayed for a good long time, 7 days! We flew into Kansas city instead of driving this year, it was sooooo much better. We played lots of games together and ate lot of great home cooked meals! Can you believe it or not, I'm 4 months prego and I went and played in the ward turkey bowl AND scored a touch down... my Thanksgiving could not have started off any better!



We were able to get our pictures taken while we were in town and boy did they turn our cute. Colton was crying the entire time because he wanted to run around in the grass and leafs instead of being held... but once my entire family started singing (with their teeth clinched) he was really quiet. There are 4 things that he loves in life so far... Basketball on the TV.... playing with any sort of ball outside.... shoes (couldn't imagin where he gets that from) and MUSIC.

When we were leaving Kansas to go back to Arizona I will never forget what happened... Felise Navidad (Christmas song) came on the radio and everything about that song reminded me of Arizona, it made me realize that its ok to have Christmas with palm trees and it be 80 degrees.... and the other thing that happened was when I was sitting in the airport (it was super early in the morning) and I was stairing out into space and realized it was snowing! I got to witness my favorite thing in the world.... the 1st snow of the season (for Kansas). Since then I have really been content and haven't even had the need to put the christmas lights out on the house this year. Haha.

We hope everyone enjoys this holiday season!

With love,

The Johnson's

SOOOO EXCITED!

Wow, its been too long since I have posted anything on our blog!


 To catch everyone up on our crazy lifes... her goes nothing.

We had a wonderful Halloween this year. Colton was walking just in time and really enjoyed all of his candy!
We attended the ward Halloween party that was inside the church then we all went outside to trunk or treat when the sun went down. It was still so warm outside! (Please ignore the fact that Reid has bed head in the picture, hehe)

We are expecting baby # 2 around May 8thish 2011! We are excited to have another little rug-rat running around us in circles. I will find out the sex of the baby in a couple weeks.

Thanksgiving is coming soon and we are very excited to get the chance to travel to Kansas. We will be there for a entire week! We will also be celebrating Christmas with my family while we are in town as we do Christmas in December with them every other year and the off years we do it on Thanksgiving. I think I'm mostly excited for the EGG NOGG...yummm!!!


We love this time of year that reminds us to be grateful and giving! We hope all have a wonderful holiday season!

FAMILY

The family came to town and we had lots of fun!
We swam in our pool, went to a AZ D-Backs game, we went to a water park, did lots of shopping and had two birthday parties.

Since my boy Colton and his cousin Emma are born 7 days apart we decided to celebrate their 1st birthdays while the families were in town. We had Colton's birthday on Saturday and Emma's on Sunday. Colton had a blue and white fun-fetie cake and Emma had a pink and white strawberry flavored cake.

We really enjoyed the time spent with the family. It was a great way to end the summer. :)

Colton Bolton

*Sorry about the picture qualitiy...gotta love camera phones!*

I have been getting a kick out of my sister in law who has nick named Colton, "Colton Bolton...or Bolton. Its so cute, he gets such a kick out of his Aunt Marissa!

Life has been a bit crazy to say the least recently.

We finished putting in a rock yard with the thanks of our friends from the ward Rick and Settina Beeler and the thanks to Reid's parents for letting us borrow the tools to keep Colton contained and to shovel rock. Reid sent us home late friday night around 11pm and he stayed till 3am finishing up... just in time for the new renters to move in the next morning. Needless to say... Colton and I didn't wake up till 12:30pm on saturday. Reid on the other hand went and worked all day. Yuck.

Reid's ear has taken him down again. I tell him that its the Lord trying to make him catch up on some much needed sleep. :)

Colton has learned how to stand up without holding onto anything thanks to his aunt Marissa who showed us how to teach him the ways. Colton also is teething again... he is trying to get one of his top teeth to come in. Right now he only has two on the bottom.

My family is coming in town this week!!! I'm very excited and very overwelmed. Its tough to have a teething toddler and a husband who can't be out of bed for more than 5 minutes.

I'm starting school again soon....ugh... it makes for a stressed out mother and wife, but it needs to be done. :)

Hope all is well with everyone! I will be sure to take lots of pictures of Colton's upcoming bday party!

Weekend....

We had a pretty good weekend, considering.

Reid brought me home flowers and doughnuts on Friday... I almost started crying because I seriously thought it was Thursday and I was so ready to be done with the week.

Colton has a cold and had a fever for a day. Now he just has a lingering runny nose. :)

Reid has been working so hard at our rental house trying to change the yard from grass to rock. He spent most of the Saturday working over there. He brought be lunch on Saturday and hung out with us for a little while during the hottest time of the day... while he was here he worked on putting in the lighting cove in the kitchen. When it started to cool off outside he went back over to the rental house to work on the yard till late.

Sunday: I taught my cute little primary class. I taught about the story of Samson... you know... they guy with the hair. Anyways... I have 2 girls in my primary class that are sisters and they went on and on and on and on about how buff their daddy was!!! Kids say the darnedest things! Reid stayed home with the sick baby and was glad that I made him stay home because he had another dizzy spell with his ear.... I call them "fits". :)

We are getting excited to have all my family come in town and hope we have some energy left to play with them after all this house work! Hehe. I'm glad they are coming... its pushing us to get our projects done.

Oh I forgot... I had Reid working on going through his "keep sakes boxes" and we had some fun with Colton in the process. See the picture below! 

Sunshine & Summer Time!

Above are two pictures, one of Colton and one of Emma. 7 days apart in age. 

We recently found out that my family is coming out to Arizona for Colton's early birthday party!

We are going to have a full house! The following people are coming: My mom and dad, little sister Brooklyn, my little brother Massey, my little sister Nicole with her husband Trevor and little girl Emma.

We are so excited to have everyone come out to visit. The are coming to Arizona in the hottest time of the year... Humid + 115 or higher degrees. Yuck. Can someone say MONSOON?! I hope it rains at least once while they are here so the dust in the air settles and they can get a relief from the hot weather.

Anywho... We are having Colton's birthday about 3 weeks early so that we could have Reid's little brother Cole, his wife Marissa and little girl Chayse there. They will be heading back to Lubbock for his last year of law school.


We are excited to have everyone come celebrate Colton's 1st birthday!!!

The Sloops  will celebrate Emma's birthday the day after so that we can enjoy her 1st birthday together before they go back to school again in Rexburg.

It still blows my mind how close Emma and Colton are in age...seperated by 7 days! Its too bad they don't live closer.

Sunshine and Summer time!

We have been really busy from rental house to rental house, family gatherings to family outings...and are enjoying every minute of it. We are in the process of painting our house a nice warm color and it looks like our house is sort of cameo colored. :)

Colton is loving summer time with long walks and lots of pool time.


Reid is a busy man, he works on the rental house before work every morning trying to put in a watering system for our new trees and flood lights to light up the trees at night. We just ordered rock today and it will be delivered tomorrow, so we will be working hard all night tonight and tomorrow trying to get the rock yard in.

I have decided to take another spin at the Real Estate testing this summer instead of taking summer classes at Rio Salado. Wish me luck!

Our big boy is now 9 months old. He got in two teeth a week before his well baby visit (right on track) and is in the 10th percentile for weight and 75th for height. :)

He LOVES our pool and we have had a great time playing in it while daddy is at work.

Texas & Kansas

We were fortunate enough to take a trip to Lubbock TX and Shawnee KS. We started driving on Wednesday night after Reid got off work...we drove through the night and got to Lubbock Thursday morning. We then chatted a bunch with Cole and Marissa and had them show us around Lubbock. We looked at some pretty amazing house! Who knew I would ever say I want to move to Lubbock....that day has come. While we were there we went swimming with them and I was able to go shopping at the mall with Marissa while Cole and Reid watched the kiddos. On the way to Lubbock Colton popped out his very first tooth and didn't sleep a wink all night long, can you believe it?!
Marissa and I kicked the boys out of the apartment so we could watch the season finally of Grey's Anatomy. When the show was over the guys came back and we watched Talledaga Nights... I can never get enough of that movie. I love it! We slept at Cole and Marissa's beautiful apartment Thursday night and left for Kansas Friday.

It was so good to be in Kansas, we were able to spend some good time with lots of family. Congrats again to Massey and Sammie for graduating high school. I was able to see a lot of old friends at their joint graduation party which was a lot of fun! I miss being near my family.

We drove back Monday and Tuesday without stopping, Reid and I switched off sleeping and driving. Colton's 2nd tooth decided to come in on the way home. I was able to get my little fill of a Kansas rain storm while driving away. I miss those rain storms so much!

Anyways... we are back home safe and trying to get back to normal life. I have been applying for night jobs and trying to transfer to Rio Salado. Reid has been working hard at getting a watering system put into the rental house where we just planted trees.

We hope all is doing well. Colton will be going to swimming lessons soon, he loves the pool already, he kicks so hard when in the pool... with a huge smile. I love it.

Summer!

Recently Reid, Colton and I went to a ward picnic where we were able to meet a lot of new people that were more our ages. YAY for friends. Its been almost two years and I am just now making friends. There is a lot to be said about staying in one ward for more than a couple months. : )

Its warming up out side, I am really excited about summer and being able to go swimming in the back yard!

Congrats to my sister in laws: Edith and Marissa, they are preggo at the same time... again. : ) Edith is due in October and Marissa is due in December (I believe). I'm so excited for new little ones that have no strings attatched! "The baby is hungry and crying.... here you go!" Love it.

My brother Massey and cousin Samantha are graduating this May from the same school! It has been so fun to see them grow up together. Reid, Colton and I are driving up to Kansas for their graduations!!!

I'm so excited to be going back home to see the family!

This weekend my little sister Brooklyn did a lot of major changes. She got 12 inches cut off of her hair (her hair is now to her shoulders) and donated to cancer in behalf of her friend who has cancer and today she got her braces off! Watch out boys!!!

We went to Tempe Movie in the park on Friday and had a great date night. See the picture of colton with the pizza.... we took a $5.00 pizza as our dinner. : )

So.... I made this for dinner last night from my new favorite website to get recepies from.... it was heaven in my mouth! Its called Quesadilla Pie. It was super cheap to make!!! simplyrecipes.com

Homemade laundry detergent (dry)

Reid has given us a very strict "weekly family budget" so that we can get out of debt and save for the future that is to come.

He takes care of all the bills... IE. Mortgages, utilities, EST.
I take care of the food, baby stuff, and cars.

Since the budget is on the small side, (about half what a normal family would spend) I have been finding ways of how to get costs down so I can save a little to some day get a hair cut ; )

We have gone to cloth diapers which is that the most amazing thing in the world but it cuts out about 10-20 dollars per week on disposable diapers. : )

I have decided today that I'm going to start making "home made laundry detergent". Since we aren’t throwing away the diapers... they have to be cleaned right? Laundry cleaning = $$

If anyone else in interested in being frugal like me... here is the recipe:

Laundry Detergent (dry):

2 cups finely grated soap (yes body soap, a bar of it, use your cheese grater!)
1 cup Borax
1 cup Arm & Hammer washing soda (not baking soda, can be found in the cleaning or laundry isle)

Blend it up in a blender or food processer, put it in a container that has a lid and put a measuring cut next to it! You’re done!

Depending on the mess of the clothes: 1TBSP - 1/2 Cup

If you have a HE washer, no worries! This mixture does not suds up like the liquid soap so it’s fine for you washers!!!

Spring break & Easter

It has been a while since I have posted and a few exciting things have happened in the mean time!

My not so little, "little brother" came out to visit over spring break. It was also my spring break as well which worked out perfectly! We had a lot of fun!!! We went to the Kansas City Royals spring training baseball game, Massey went mountain climbing with Reid's dad and brother. We went camping up in the mountains. We attempted to climb 4 peaks mountain range but had to turn back as it was too icy at the top. We went to the  Heart attatck grill where we ate the most unhealthy food I have ever had. Every customer wore hospital gowns over there clothes and the servers wore nurse and doctor outfits. Massey ate a "quadrupal bypass burgar"... it was HUGE! My mom has since told me that he has not had a hamburger since... only chicken!!!  They then wheeled him out with a wheel chair to the car. It made me so sick that night and the following day. We also made a lot of progress on the yard here at my house. we had a "pool" fence that was held together with chains that massey and I took out. I really loved having him in town. He helped out so much and I was able to feel more motivated than I had in a long time. : )

EASTER:

We went to Grandma and Grandpa Bartletts home a lot for different easter festivities. We did a money egg hunt one day. Another day we went and did a childrens hunt with their ward and had breakfast. Then we listened to conferance on there very large (50inch?) flatscreen tv.

Easter morning we decided to combine both of Reid's and my traditions. I hid baskets of goodies around the house for Reid and Colton to find and then I also made sure there was a outdoor egg hunt. Colton was very happy to have a peep and crashed hard after he had his sugar rush. : ) Reid was happy to have candie and fruit snacks.