Curious Boy

Bracken is getting so big! He's almost fifteen months old. He’s running all over the place. He loves balls, bubbles, balloons, food, books, being outside, his “dadada” and me. He’s an adventurous little guy. When I took him to the park the other day he climbed right up the stairs and tried to walk onto the slide. He loves going down the slide with someone or by himself. He’ll walk up to other little kids, put his face right next to theirs and smile a cheesy grin. He’s started talking and my favorite words that he says are “Jesus, bubble, water bottle, duck, shoes, Lucy, and ball.” He knows all sorts of animal noises and where his head, ears, nose, hair and eyes are. He loves watching “Signing Time” videos and is learning some sign language. He’s so curious and is always exploring. I love watching him growing, learning, and discovering. What a fun age!

A Bit About Us...

I’m always writing about Bracken, (and let’s face it, most of you would rather see pictures of and hear about him :), but I thought I’d post about what Brian and I have been up to.

We’re still living in Cedar. Brian has two more years of undergraduate work left before he can apply for medical school. In the mean time we’re enjoying being closer to my family and get to see them fairly often. We’ve moved every summer since we’ve been married for Brian to sell security systems (in Denver, Philadelphia and Minneapolis), but we’re staying in Cedar City this summer. Summer sales have been a good experience for us, but Brian is very ready for a break, and he needs to get patient exposure before medical school anyway.

Brian just finished his finals and maintained his 4.0 GPA! He had some difficult classes this last semester, but he studies so hard and I’m glad it paid off for him. He also just became certified as an EMT and is hoping to get a job on the ambulance or at the hospital this summer. Now that school is over, we are planning our summer garden, taking a few trips, going camping, and enjoying just spending some time together as a family. Brian has taken between 18-21 credits each semester and hasn’t had a summer break since before his mission, so he’s ready for a chance to relax a bit.

We’re actually really excited about our garden. Last year I had a little herb garden, but this will be our first time growing our own vegetable garden. So we’ve bought all our seeds and started some transplants. Brian has a part time job managing the SUU student garden over the summer and we’ve been working on getting that ready to go. There are a bunch of cows, horses and sheep out by our garden and Bracken is always pointing at the cows and “moo”-ing at them. He also gets filthy out there digging, throwing, and eating dirt…but that’s healthy for a little boy, right?

Brian and I discovered caucus meetings this year. A friend asked me to come to our precincts caucus meeting to vote for him and I found out that is where each neighborhood chooses delegates to represent them at their party’s convention. At the convention the delegates vote to choose which candidates will run to represent their party in the November election. Sorry for the explanation if you already knew that, but I didn’t until recently. Brian and I were elected to be county delegates, so we studied up on all the candidates, went to meetings to listen to them speak and ask questions, and got lots of brochures in the mail. Being a delegate and going to the county convention was a good experience, and we learned a lot.

My little sister Shaylee is going to school at SUU now and I’ve loved having her around. We go to the gym together and have started running. I just enjoy having her around, coming over to cook with me or just hanging out. Speaking of running, Shay and I had planned to run a 10K (about 6 miles) last month, and trained so hard for it. My family all came down and even the little kids ran for part of the way. Shaylee finished it, and my Dad even ran the whole way! I was so proud of them. I was bummed though because I injured my knee running and had to stop so I didn’t hurt it more. It’s healing up now though, and I’ve started running again, I just have to build my endurance back up. Brian bought me a sewing machine for Christmas (gasp! Who would’ve ever thought I’d want or use one?). I love it! I haven’t sewed any big projects with it yet, but I’ve patched a few of our older jeans so you can’t even tell, mended a whole pile of things, and made a taggie blankets with my sister Linsy. (The green one is Linsy's, the brown/blue one is mine.)
Those are a few of the things we’ve been up to. We’re loving each day of warmer weather and actually being able to see each other!

Video Overload

My handsome boys in their matching ties.


A couple of weeks ago Brian came home after his classes and said, "Let's go bowling." So we had a fun, spur of the moment family date. Neither of us got the greatest scores, but Bracken clapped for us after ever strike and gutterball.

Grandma Sue and my little brothers and sisters have been asking for videos of Bracken. Here you go! (P.S. Does anyone know a simple way to edit videos? I wanted to cut off the end of some of these videos because they got too long, but after a couple of hours of frustration, just put the long version on here.)



Grandpa Rob and Grandma Sue gave Bracken blocks for his birthday. He bangs them together, dumps them out of the little wagon they came in, and breaks the towers we build for him. I think Brian and I have as much fun playing with the blocks as Bracken does. One of Bracken's favorite words is "Wow!" He says it a lot when he knocks over our towers.

Walking and Talking:

Bracken loves his walker. He's walking (and falling) all the time now, but he still likes the support of the walker, walls, or furniture for the most part. He is a noisy kid! He is almost always "talking," roaring, making car noises, or banging things together. He even hums to himself as he falls asleep.

When Brian was little his Dad would get tired of reading the same stories to the kids over and over again, so to jazz things up a bit he'd read backwards. Brian is continuing the tradition and every once in a while I'll hear him reading backwards to Bracken.

And here's Bracken walking on his own!

Ready for Spring!

The sun is shining today! There's still snow on the ground, but I'll take what we can get right now. Is anyone else ready for spring? We seem to get a taste of sun, warmth, and melting snow...then it dumps another couple of inches of snow on us. Thankfully we live in a house with lots of windows, just having natural light makes winter better.

To get out of the house Bracken and I bundle up really well and go for walks whenever there's not too much snow on the ground. We go and get the mail and take out the garbage. We go to the library (another thing I'm especially grateful for in winter) and to the grocery store. We visit my sister Shaylee at work. In the morning Shaylee and I go to the gym or run, and once or twice a week Brian watches Bracken while I go to the institute and play the piano. At home we pop popcorn (Bracken loves watching it pop), and eat it while reading Dr. Seuss books. Actually, we usually eat all the popcorn and then read, because Bracken doesn't want to do anything but eat when there's popcorn around. With all of this, cabin fever hasn't been too bad, but I'm still ready for spring. What do you do when you have cabin fever?

Now onto the picture. Linsy and Kylie came over the other day and we spent all afternoon together frosting tiny easter sugar cookies. Linsy and I had fun together, and Bracken had fun with Kylie around. Bracken thinks it is so fun to tickle her toes while saying "tickle, tickle, tickle!" and then pull his hand away laughing. Kylie's a good sport with all his tickling and poking. I love having family close by.

Tupperware Drawer

This is designated as Bracken's drawer. It's the drawer he can attack without being told "no." He can throw everything out of it, then crawl in and out of it himself. This is how he entertains himself so I can make dinner or do dishes. I love my tupperware drawer!

(Notice the blue blanket next to him. It's become his almost constant companion. I'm not sure why he loves it so much, but he wants it by him when he plays, in the carseat, when he falls asleep, even when he eats. Silly kid!)

Baby Goats

Bracken and I went on an overnight trip to see my family last week when Brian was up to his ears in homework. Bracken loves his aunts and uncles and had a great time. We went to a friend's house early in the morning to see his baby sheep and goats. Bracken didn't notice them too much until I picked one up and it keep nuzzling his face. Then he was facinated and kept petting it.