My Little Firefighter

Recently, the Florence library had a special story time. They invited the local fire department to come and talk to the kids. They learned about firesafety. They got to see a firefighter dressed up in all his gear. They gave all the kids their own fire hat.


And the best part for the kids, they got to tour a real live fire truck. Andrew had such a fantastic time and it has inspired him to be a firefighter for Halloween.

For a little boy, this was a dream come true!

Update

Man, it seems like time just flies sometimes. I keep meaning to post something and then life gets in the way. So for a quick recap of what's been going on around our neck of the woods:

Luke is growing like a weed. He's 9 months old and crawling and cruising the furniture like a mad man. He's got two teeth and loves to eat anything he can feed himself. He adores his big brother, sometimes to the dismay of his mommy and daddy... This adoration usually leads to mimicking of Andrew's temper tantrums.

Andrew is loving preschool, but really struggling with the concept of rules. He often refuses to help clean up and school and his new favorite phrase is, "I don't want to!" This has led to a lot of time in time out and on more than a few occasions lost privileges. But we love the little stinker, nonetheless.

Clayton and I have decided to finally get our rears in gear and lose the extra weight we've been carrying around for far too long. We started a health challenge and I've been using SparkPeople.com to help me keep track of what I eat. I'm not sure how much weight Clayton has lost, but he's now exercising 5-6 days a week and has cut out the soda. I'm down 9 lbs so far and we're just finishing up week four of our challenge. We've also been working on making our home a place where the Spirit resides instead of occasionally visits. We've been trying really hard to not yell at the kids and to focus more on teaching the gospel. We have some days that are better than others, but it's definitely a marked improvement over a month ago...especially for me.

So there's been a lot going on. I'm hoping to get back on the bandwagon. I still need to get pictures of the kids off of Clayton's computer so I can post them.

The End of My Journey as a Single Woman!

So, Clayton and I went out for Valentine's Day. He thought it would be fun to dress up. SO I just knew that he was going to propose. The evening was great, but not what I had expected. The next night, Clayton came over and we were just hanging out talking. He turns to me and says, "So, hypothetically speaking, would May be too soon?" "Too soon?" "Yeah, too soon." "For what?" "To get married?" "Uh, no..." The discussion continued and ended with us having set May 28 as our wedding date. Still no ring. Still no official proposal. Because it was a holiday weekend that we had chosen, we decided we had better call the temple ASAP.

In the mean time, I was on my way home from work one night and called Clayton like I usually did. We chatted with some "Hang on a seconds" on his end. He asked me where I was and I told him just a couple of miles from home. I heard a bit of panic in his voice, but couldn't figure out why. When I turned the corner to get home, I saw his car parked in its usual spot. I opened the garage door, but my mom's car was gone. Curious. Just moments later, my mom's car turned the corner and I saw her and Clayton in the car. I wonder what THEY could have been up to. Clayton was acting all weird and when we decided to all go out to dinner together, he wouldn't let me sit in the front seat with my mom. So she chauffered us all over town. Very odd. But I knew deep down what was going on.

On March 1, I called the temple and scheduled our sealing, still with no ring or proposal. Clayton wanted to go out on the 4th, but wasn't feeling good. He called the next day and we planned to go out to dinner. He thought it would be fun to dress up "since we hadn't done that in a while." I knew what was coming...FINALLY! So he picked me up and we went out to Pei Wei for dinner. We were then planning to head up to the Fountain Hills/Scottsdale area to a lookout. But when we left dinner, Clayton headed the wrong direction. We pulled up to the Mesa Temple and he told me we should walk around for a while. He walked me over to the east side of the temple on the walkway and stopped. He got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. He had barely gotten out the question before I jumped on him and said "YES!" I couldn't believe it! I was finally, at 27 (and nearing 28) going to get married!

The next few months were filled with planning and getting everything together.

And on May 28, 2005 at 10:43am at the Mesa, AZ Temple, we were pronounced husband and wife. It's been an awesome and sometimes frustrating journey, but I love Clayton with all my heart and can't imagine spending the rest of my life with anyone else! I love you so so so so so much, Honey! Thanks for putting up with me!

MIA

Sorry about not posting anything for a while. We went to Idaho for a couple of weeks on vacation and just got back. I'll be posting pics from our trip as well as finishing off Clayton's and my story soon. So check back soon for updates!

Bowling, Our First Date, and Courtship

The first weekend of every month, a group of us would go bowling so I invited Clayton to come to our outing in October. He agreed. Usually a couple of us would go over early to get our names on the list for open bowling as soon as we could. Since I had offered Clayton a ride and it was my and Bridgette's turn to reserve the lanes, we were going to head out a little early. The Thursday night before bowling, he asked if Bridgette and I were going to get something to eat. Nope. Did I want to grab something before going. Sure. (WOOHOO) Did I want to invite Bridgette. NO! Bridgette is my bestest friend, but I wanted some alone time with Clayton. And she was not offended when I told her the plan.

The night of bowling came and Clayton took me to dinner at Charleston's. I was so stinking nervous. Clayton was super cute and really nice. It didn't help that his plate came with half the food mine did. Talk about making me look like a..well...You know. We laughed about it and still do sometimes. We picked up Bridgette and went to the bowling alley. After everyone got there and we started bowling, I made the mother of all foot-in-mouth statements. Clayton was wearing a pair of cargo shorts. The pockets had zippers and velcro. I went to flip the velcro open, but it was stuck and wouldn't pull easily. I innocently said, "I guess I should have gone for your zipper." I immediately realize what I'd said and turned purple with embarassment and started laughing. Clayton didn't get what was so funny...until later. As he was preparing to bowl a frame, it occurred to him what I had said. I just knew after that incident, I'd scared him off for good.

But to my delight, I was wrong. He asked me out to dinner the next Wednesday, three days before I was leaving for Idaho for a week. We went to Carrabba's and had a nice dinner. Then we got back to my house and sat in the car talking. He got brave and reached for my hand. We decided to go inside and chat and after a while... our first kiss.

It was hard for me to leave for Idaho. I wanted to do something nice for Clayton since I was leaving over midterms. I made him up a little goodie bag and left it on his door. We talked over the week and were so glad to see each other. Things quickly got serious between us. I think we both somewhere deep down realize that what we had wasn't run of the mill romance. It was hard for me because he was finishing his last semester at ASU so was often busy with school projects and studying. I took whatever time he could make for me. Meeting his family was a little intimidating, but they were all nice and seemed to accept me right away. I knew by the beginning of November that Clayton was the man I wanted to marry. It took him a little longer to decide. He told his mom right around graduation from ASU in December that I was the one. Now came the longest wait of my life....