Weekend Trip to Kansas

We took a short weekend trip to Kansas this past weekend to see Massey before he leaves for his two year mission. We left Friday evening and had a layover in Dallas,TX where the plane didn't work...we sat on the broken plane for about a hour and a half. They then took everyone off the broken plane and had us sit in the terminal till they found one that worked.... we then boarded the plan and FINALLY got to Kansas about 4 hours late... 3am (Saturday morning) It wouldn't have been so bad except for the fact that Colton was awake the entire time cause he hates sleeping on us and Reid had pulled another all nighter at work the night before.

I woke up around 9am Saturday morning with Colton. My dad and brother took Colton out sledding down the front yard hill while I made waffles and eggs for everyone. Reid then woke up later when breakfast was ready. :) We had a great day on Saturday full of eating and shopping and Kenect via X-box.

Sunday my family went to church at 9:00am... and left us sleeping. Since Colton always wakes up around 9:30am I got up with him and picked up the house and vacuumed while Colton watched cartoons. The family came home and we had a wonderful roast meal together. We then went on a nice drive together and then came home to get ready to go back to AZ.

We left Kansas Sunday at 7pm... there was a delay because of the weather and we barely made the plane in Dallas. We got to AZ at 12am Monday morning where Colton and I went to sleep and Reid then drove to work and pulled a all nighter AGAIN.

Here are some picture from the weekend.

The weekend is over!

Shoot this is my (Reid's) first time writing on the family blog.  I had to ask my wife to "turn the blog on" for me and get it started.  So here goes:

The weekend is over.  We had a long one.  On Friday we went to have breakfast out at Tumblweed Park in Chandler.  We walked by the animals and stopped at the play-barn.  Colton loved it!  After that, we took Meagan to the doctor's office for some routine testing for her pregnancy.  Then I worked the rest of the day.  In the evening we drove all the way out to El Mirage, AZ to visit some of Meagan's relatives who are in town, Kenny and Ann Sloop.  We took them out to dinner and had a great time.  They were great with Colton!  We had chicken and ice cream.  It was great to hang out with some real Kansans.  They are headed back to Kansas in just a week, so we caught them in town just in time.

On Saturday, I worked in the morning and then we went to our friends' Daniel and Dacil's son's first birthday party.  Colton loved it!  They had a HUGE pinata that really startled Colton when it finally burst open and all of the candy exploded out everywhere.

We had Stake Conference on Sunday.  There were some great talks.  We have to be good now...haha!  After conference we had lunch and then went for a drive to enjoy the rainy weather..we don't get big rain storms here very often so we have to enjoy them.  Now we have to hurry off to bed to get ready for another crazy week.

Till next time!  Reid (representing the Johnson family)

Friday night from left to right: Great Uncle Kenny Sloop, Meagan, Reid & Colton, & Great Aunt Ann Sloop

Saturday night at Ian M. 1st birthday party

Our Valentines Day

What a day we had yesterday full of ups and downs.

• I (Meagan) signed up for online classes that started yesterday. (Reid is really happy about this!)
• I started cleaning our VERY messy and dusty garage.
• Colton watched "Snoopy" valentines special on Hulu.com
• We gave our two foreign exchange students cute "Hello Kitty" boxes of chocolate
• Reid made me a giant banner that said " Happy Valentine's Day Meagan" on the kitchen wall
• I got carried away with cleaning the garage...so I was a bit late on getting dinner on the table. But dinner turned out REALLY good! (Cheeseburger Meatloaf with spiced potato wedges and salad)
• Colton didn't nap at all yesterday and wasn't feeling well. (We then found out later it was the flu)
• Colton puked all over a rug in our bedroom and in the toilet. (thank you for not puking on the white carpet!). 
• Reid and Colton opened their Valentines from me. :) 
• Reid, Colton and I went to walgreens to get something for Colton to feel better. Childrens Pepto Bismal and pedialight.
• Reid, Colton and I went to frys grocery store to get a diaper pail insert for the trash cans and got a chocolate pudding cake for our "gift from Reid".
• Colton sang himself to sleep as I'm guessing he was feeling better with the Childrens Pepto. :)
• Reid and I ate chocolate pudding cake and a glass of milk and talked about our day and then went to bed.

Not a very flattering picture of Colton and I right after we woke up on Valentines Day.

It was mostly a good Valentines day full of excitement! I love you boys so much!

Valentines Day!

This is what I woke up to this morning....

Reid had to go to work super early this morning, because they have a work deadline on Wednesday. He was sweet enough to make this giant sign for me before he went into work. :)  What a sweet guy I have.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful Valentines day!

I have been trying to think of a craft to do as I have realized I need to pick up a hobby again... my day to day activities just are about as boring as a pile of rocks. Here is what I'm thinking... RAG RUGS. So if you receive one for your birthday ect, now you know why. :) I'm hoping to use sheets instead of rags as I have read they hold up much better and clean up better too... so if anyone has old solid colored sheets that they are willing to give to my crafting hobby... please don't hesitate to send them. :)

The day when Colton and I got to use the car....

Reid and I share a car, and being that I'm a stay at home mom I'm ok with Reid taking the car to work everyday. We decided that Fridays Reid will ride my bike to work so that I could get things done, IE. grocery shopping.

Since today was Friday, Colton and I got the car! Yay. My bff came over in the morning as I had a check up appointment for baby #2. Colton and Settina watched some good ol' Bob the Builder after breakfast and it was finished by the time I got home. Settina then went home and I put Colton down for a morning nap since he was rubbing his face and couldn't hardly walk straight. On my way to the OB/GYN I realized that the car has become very messy and I decided while Colton was napping that I would pull things out and clean, I vacuumed the floors and seats ect, I then oiled up the door hinges as it was driving me nuts how loud and hard it was to open the doors all the way. After I was done it was about 12:15pm, I then called Grandma Bartlett (Colton's Great Grandma) and told her that we would be a little late for lunch as Colton was still napping. She said "no rush". Once Colton woke up we jumped in the clean car and headed to the gas station (Since Reid left the car empty for the "gas fairy" (As his sister Edith calls it) to fix.). Since I was getting gas and the inside of the car was so clean I decided to run the car through the car wash. Its such a nice feeling to have a clean car. We then headed to Great grandma & Great grandpa Bartlett's farm where we enjoyed a nice lunch of "throw everything into a pot and add some cheese". Grandma was amazed that Colton could drink out of a regular cup and eat successfully from a regular form and plate on his own. (Thank goodness I have been working on that with him!) Great grandma Bartlett, Colton and I then went out back to the farm and fed the chickens, rooster, and sheep. Colton LOVED being out there near the animals and tried to imitate the animal noises. He also almost fed a chicken right from his hand... then last second as the hen was really close... he threw it at her (what a boy right?!). We then went inside and got the napping Great grandpa and he helped us pick oranges to take home. Colton really enjoyed getting oranges. Colton also got to hear the hens when they made their noise that they had laid eggs and got to see where eggs come from.  (I'm sad I didn't have my phone with me or a camera... Colton was so cute!!!)

We just got home from our big day on the farm and Colton was acting very tired, orange in one hand and rubbing his eyes with the other. He is down for nap #2... and I couldn't be more happy about it as I'm very tired and I still need to make the grocery list and go grocery shopping... oops! :)

All in all I would say we had a very eventful day with the car. Till we meet again next Friday Mr Camry!

BREAD

We seem to go through sandwich bread REALLY fast around here now that we have a extra student living with us. I was looking through blogs and websites last night trying to look at different ideas of how to cook with a stick food budget. One of the blogs had a wonderful idea of making your own bread to get costs down on the food bill. So I decided that I would try it. I found a couple recipes for making bread from scratch without a bread machine. I'm going to try them out to see if we like any of them. One of the recipes is titles "$.11 cent loaf of Bread". The other thing I'm excited about is the fact that it will be healthier than getting the $.89 bread at the store that has hardly any nutritional value (IE. enriched flower...ect). Since I'm at home all the time, I figure its worth a try right?!

Reid had to work all night last night at the office instead of from home in the home office. He got home just before 9am this morning and slept till about 1:15pm. (He also went to work yesterday at 3am!) When he woke up this afternoon we went and took Colton to the park by our house. Colton seemed to enjoy himself there and didn't want to leave. We then put Colton to bed and had a late lunch, while lunch was cooking Reid put together one of the 4 toddler chairs from IKEA that we got a while back. I had put the table together but didn't have the time or patience to put the chairs together. I'm like that IKEA picture in the instructions with a question mark over my head. Haha. Anyways, Colton woke up to his new chair to go with the table he has been using...and he loves it. :)

DATE NIGHT

Chocolate Affaire Filled With Fabulous Entertainment, Decadent Delicacies & More!


Sounds like my kind of entertainment!!! 

Reid is out with the scouts this morning doing "food for scouts" (food donations). After that we he has a conference call then we are driving out to Glendale, AZ to enjoy the Chocolate Festival! I'm so excited I can't hardly contain myself!!!


Reid and I sat down and decided with him having such a busy schedule that we need date night once a week. So starting tonight will be our first of many date nights. Since we just decided that we REALLY need to do date nights last night.... Colton will be joining us on this date. We decided that we are going to take turns planning date nights (every other week). Since I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted to go to the chocolate festival in Glendale we decided this will be our date night (and since the festival is kid friendly with crafts...Colton probably wont get too bored and make it a crazy night). Colton better enjoy it while he can because this is the first and last date night he will be going on.... (Good luck youth baby sitters from the ward!)


Don't you just love living in the big city and having free events to go to all the time! CHOCOLATE!

EXAMS

ITS OFFICIAL.... I was able to get Reid to commit to going to a class for his Structures exam to become a licensed architect. This is basically a study class for a few weeks that teaches him things about the Structures exam that he needs to take (along with a bunch of other architecture exams, in order to get licensed). It started last night and he seems positive about it. The down side of it is that it takes up yet 2 more nights a week of his already crammed schedule. I'm not joking, let me prove how busy that guy is:

• Monday nights: Works all night long for his full time job in order to get renderings done in time for the Tuesday morning meetings. (We see him for dinner and then he locks himself in the office and remotes into work)
• Tuesday nights: He gets off work and goes to his structures exam class and then from their goes back to ASU and teaches his Auto CAD course. By the time he is home... I'm crawling into bed. He gets left overs and a kiss goodnight from me. 
• Wednesday nights: Scouts (ugh)... they are killing me! They have been starting super early every week (6pm) and then he comes home from it at 9pm. By the time he is home... I'm crawling into bed. He gets left overs and a kiss goodnight from me. 
• Thursday nights: Reid works all day and then goes to his structures exam class and gets home at 9pm. Again... by the time he is home... I'm crawling into bed. He gets left overs and a kiss goodnight from me.
• Friday nights: He doesn't have anything planned (unless there is a scout camp out)... So Colton and I take advantage of every second he is home. 
• Saturdays: You guessed it.... he has been doing scouts on Saturdays.
• (What ever happened to making the kids earn their own scout money and going door to door?! They seriously need to learn some responsibility... if they don't go out and sell flags... then they don't go to scout camp. Easy lesson to teach and learn don't you think?!) 
• Sundays: Reid remotes into work from home and works all day after teaching the boys at church. 

I have one busy husband!  I don't think I want to have any more kids if they don't ever see their dad.

On the brighter side... maybe that class for one of his exams will pay off and he can do his own thing. (Not that, that will let us see him more...probably less... but at least I know he will be happy.)

I'm also grateful to have some foreign exchange students living with us so that I'm not alone all the time! 

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Colton Johnson

Nesting: "Around the fifth month of pregnancy, the "nesting" instinct can set in. This is an uncontrollable urge to clean one's house brought on by a desire to prepare a nest for the new baby, to tie up loose ends of old projects and to organize your world."

Uncontrollable urge is right! You would not believe the things I have been doing. I have raked the entire front yard, trimmed a overgrown tree, re-arranged and deep cleaned one of my foreign exchange students room, laundry every second of every day, dishes two times per day, cleaned out my fridge, swept, moped, vacuumed any floor surface I have come across, cleaned toilets and showers. If I didn't have a husband, a 1 1/2 year old son and two foreign exchange students... I think I would run out of things to clean!

At least I'm able to sleep most of the night because I'm so worn out. :)


When we went and got the sonogram done at almost 26 weeks pregnant we also found out that our baby is measuring out at 2 1/2 lbs already! Can you believe it?! Either this baby is going to come early like Colton did or its going to be mighty large. I find it funny that from time to time when Colton wants to be held that the baby kicks and hits him already (probably because Colton is sitting on her!) She is going to come out with her boxing gloves on ready to take on Colton.


This week in weather, the Midwest got a intense blizzard. I have been getting text messages from people in Kansas saying things like, "I have lived in Utah most of my life, but I have never seen it this bad!", or "I grew up in Minnesota, this puts those winters to shame!". They first got sleet (freezing rain) which then turned to ice on the roads and plants ect. Then hours later they got dumped on by a couple feet of snow. I talked to my family on the phone last night and they said it stopped snowing but even though the sun is out it still wont melt anything because its only 5 degrees outside. It made me want to get a big cup of hot coco and sit by a fireplace just listening to stories about the storm. I miss it. I'm hopeful that there will be one last snow storm when I'm in Kansas in a couple weeks.

Well, my brain is going about a thousand miles a minute in different directions (due to pregnancy and my horrible cold) as I'm sure you can tell by my posts lately... I think I will go clean. :)