Visiting Matthew

My birthday was last week and I turned 28.  Sure don't like being that close to 30!  However on my birthday I was able to fly out and go visit Matthew.  Matthew has been in Rhode Island the whole month of June and then will be in Virginia the whole month of July.  It was kinda funny when people on the airplane asked me where I was going and I would respond, "Oh I'm going to visit my husband."  And then I had to explain our situation.
 I should probably mention I went without kids!  My wonderful mother in law Sara and my sister in law Aubrey were so gracious and willing to watch my kids while I went.  They are so good with my kids that I was totally comfortable leaving them and knew they would have fun and be well taken care of.  I can't even explain how nice it was to travel without my sweet children!  Just little things like being able to read or sleep on an airplane instead of entertaining kids was just amazing!  Plus with a layover and about 9hrs total of travel time, it was heavenly to just worry about myself!
It was so nice to see Matthew!  This was our first trip without kids ever and we just couldn't get over how much freedom we had.  However I did feel bad for Matthew since he hasn't seen our kids in over a month now and he was really missing them.  The first two days, Matthew still had to put in 10-12 hour days at the hospital and he felt really bad that he was leaving me all alone at the hotel but really two days to myself to do whatever I want?  Yes, I will be just fine!   Both days I was able to work out and take a nap-- two things that kids make it hard to do.  One day I drove out to the Boston Temple.  It was over an hour away but I had plenty of time.  I love visiting other temples and especially when I am in an unfamiliar place by myself I loved the feeling of coming to such a place of beauty and comfort. The other day I spent some time in the Providence Mall.  It was seriously huge, like 5 levels huge, and I took my time shopping, and looking around.  So very fun!

Boston Temple

Me and the Atlantic

My view from inside the mall

Then on the weekend we made our way down to Virginia.  Oh my traffic!  We hit some really bad construction and congestion around New York City and a couple of other places along the way but I loved driving along the east coast and seeing the scenery.  And oh my toll bridges.  They were really cool to cross over but we probably spent over $40 just in tolls.
We stopped in Annapolis, MD to see my roommate Laura.  I never thought I would make it to the East Coast to visit her but this worked out perfectly. We were able to go on a date night with her and her husband and they showed us around the town and took us out for some awesome seafood and homemade ice-cream.  So fun to see her new house and cute kids too!

On our last day we were able to tour around Washington DC. I had never been there before so we decided to hit as many monuments as we could.  We first started out at the Arlington Cemetery.  It was huge and really neat but it suddenly started pouring rain on us. It was overcast but I didn't think it would pour.  We were in the middle of the cemetery with no where to take cover, no umbrella and I was wearing white pants.  We decided to just go with it since there was nothing we could do about it and I'm glad we did because we made it to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier just in time to see the changing of the guard which was really cool.

After that we rented bikes and rode all around DC looking around and taking pictures.  This was probably our favorite day of the trip since we got to be together the whole day doing fun touristy things.

Waiting for the DC metro

Martin Luther King Monument

 "Holding" the Washington Monument :)

Lincoln Monument

White House

Bikes. I was only a spaz on it a couple of times :)

This was such a fun and needed trip for both of us.  Matthew is working so hard at the hospitals and has such long, long days.  And for me it's so hard knowing that my husband is not coming home tonight, night after night.  But this trip has given us a little break from both of our daily responsibilities and real life.  Loved it!

All Moved In

We made it to Utah! Those last few days in AZ were pretty crazy trying to get everything packed and ready to go but it's done.

My "helpers" while packing.

We are so grateful that Matthew's brother Ben was able to fly out and help pack and load the truck especially since Matthew had to work every day up until the night we packed the truck so I was grateful for the help.  Also, a huge thank you to friends who helped watch my kids while I got things done!
We now live in Cedar Hills, in the American Fork area, with Matthew's parents.  They have plenty of room for us which is so nice.  Matthew's sister Aubrey and her family live here in the basement too which has been so fun. We each have two kids and they are roughly the same ages so we have instant playmates!  However, soon after we we got here my kids got really bad colds. Like the worst they have ever had. Then I start feeling bad with a fever, chills, the worst headache ever and a sore throat.  With two miserable, sick children, I dragged myself to urgent care to find out I had strep.  Really?!  As least I could get antibiotics for it. But still we had 4 really horrible days with all of us sick out of our minds and sleepless nights of kids coughing up lungs. Worst. Days. Ever. Then the kids seemed to not be getting much better so I took them into the doctor and found out Austin had strep and Kensley had an ear infection. In one week we had 3 doctor trips, bought 4 medications and having just moved here, none of us have health insurance yet.  Did I also mention Matthew is out of town for the whole summer?  Yeah, it was a really rough week but the worse of it is over.  Not a fun way to start our year here, but things can only better now!
While we were not sick...
We went and got cupcakes for Aubrey's birthday this week. This place won the show Cupcake Wars from the Food Network and is minutes from our house!  They were so so yummy! Seriously the cutest place ever.

Kid picture: Kensley, Selina (Matthew's youngest sister), Austin, Aaron, and Declan.

First Sunday in Utah.  

Kensley at a park that is walking distance from our house

Getting some fresh, local tacos

 Found a beach in the middle of Utah.  My kids felt right at home. :)

It's funny how everyone keeps saying how hot it is here, but moving from AZ, it has felt so nice! We are loving the mild summer!

One Last Train Ride

Before we move we are trying to do all our favorite AZ things.  One of those things is going to the Scottsdale Train Park.  We met up with a bunch of friends who we won't see for a long time.  It's soo sad to be saying goodbye.  Our kids had a blast at the park and the moms had some good chats.

On the train

Waiting for the carousel 

Cooling off at the little indoor train museum

Kensley's first carousel ride.  She loved sitting on the horse for the first half of the ride but then got scared and wanted to be held.

 6 of the 11 kids we had there!  We didn't even attempt at a group picture.

 Boys! 

Sure going to miss these girls.  Good thing I will see some of them this upcoming year in Utah as they also have traveling husbands for 4th year. 

Family Camping Trip

A couple weeks ago we decided to try out camping as a family!  We are kind of rookie campers and so decided to only go for one night. We invited our friends, the Bass family to come along with us.  We drove a couple hours away to Payson, AZ and loved the campground we stayed at.  It was beautiful and had close bathrooms.
The men got the tents set up while Aubrey and I went exploring with the kids. Our boys found a tiny pond and preceded to throw rocks and pine cones into it for practically the whole trip!  They were entertained with just that!

Kensley decided to start walking full time on this trip

 3 out of the 4 kids watching as the men start the fire. Kensley was probably off walking somewhere

 Our tent! Kensley loved going in, out, in out.

While we were all getting dinner ready we hear Austin from inside the tent say "I'm ready for bed!"  We come inside and he had found his pillow, blanket and the lantern and set it all up. Very cute! I had to get a picture. If you ask him what was his favorite part of camping he will say sleeping!

Hanging out by the campfire while dinner was cooking.  Jared made us some awesome tin foil dinners. They really were so yummy.

 The tall pines at our campsite as the sun was going down.

Of course S'mores were made...

When it was time for bed we read books by the campfire and then tucked them in. For the most part they went to bed pretty good!  We were worried about that.  It was also freezing at night!  It got down to about 40ish at night. We borrowed a tent heater and left it on all night because it was so cold.  I was so worried my kids were cold that I got up a few different times in the night just to make sure they were warm and that the heater did start a fire in our tent.

Our morning started at about 5:30 with kids getting up.  We started another fire and got some breakfast going.  We mostly hung out by the fire trying to warm up. We underestimate how much firewood we would need so we were burning anything just to keep up our fire!  The kids played more and then we took them on a nature walk while the guys packed things up.

 One last group shot minus Aubrey who was taking the picture.

It was a fun, little trip and I would totally do it again!

Plans

As of Monday, Matthew is now considered a 4th year medical student.  Woohoo! I am so proud of him and all the hard work he has done to get here.  The end is in sight! He will be graduating in exactly one year from now. He has just started a month long rotation at a hospital in Phoenix and it has already been pretty intense with long hours. However this is the only AZ rotation for this whole next year. Months ago, we applied for all of our 4th year rotations and the ones we got accepted to are scattered across the nation. This means we are sadly moving!  We have loved our time here in AZ, the many friendship we have made, and watching our kids grow up here.  I am not ready to leave it all behind! But my choices are to either stay here by myself for the entire next year or go move-in with family.
At the end of the month I will be moving to Utah to live with Matthew's parents and Matthew will go to the east coast to start his abroad rotations.  It's going to be a rough summer with Matthew being away for the first 3 months straight.  He will be in Rhode Island, Virginia and Indiana. Then he will join us for a few months in Utah.  Then more craziness and travel, etc... I am very excited though to be spending a lot of time with family this coming year.  Sometimes I get overwhelmed at the thought of being basically homeless and traveling this whole next year but then sometimes I feel like this will be a fun adventure.  Medical schools definitely don't take into account family life when they set up rotation schedules! Our days have been spent purging, packing and trying to do as many fun AZ things as we can.

I can't make a post without pictures of my kids right?   These were taken today.  

Kensley is a full on walker now! At 15 months she has now preferred to walk rather than crawl.  

 Austin is really into building with his legos. He played with these all day today and made something for everyone in the family to play with. 

Phoenix Botanical Gardens

We did this awhile ago, when it wasn't quite as hot as it is now but I have been forgetting to post it.  We went with some good friends who had some passes to the Botanical Gardens.  It wasn't as much garden as it was cactus.  But that's what you can expect living in Arizona.  We all liked the little nature hikes we went on and the cool plants we saw.

The kids standing in front of a huge Saguaro 

 Looking at the wildflowers.

 Kensley and I hanging out with the catcus

 More catcus...

 They also had a butterfly exhibit which was the best part.  We went into a greenhouse where butterflies were everywhere.  They would fly all around us and sometimes even land on us.  This was the favorite part of the day. The kids just loved it!  We went through twice. Too bad I didn't capture much of it.  

Sahuaro Ranch Park

A year ago my friend Aubrey and I took our kids to Sahuaro Ranch park.  Such a fun park with tons of space to explore, a few different playgrounds, cool settings for pictures and peacocks roam around! We took these pictures:

Then a couple of weeks ago, (almost exactly a year later) we went to the same park and took the same pictures!  We didn't even realize it until we were there taking pictures again!  How fun to see the difference a year can make.

 And now the younger siblings are in it too!

Easter

For the first time, we actually tried to teach Austin the true meaning of Easter.  It was pretty funny hearing him try to say "resurrected."  I'm not sure he really understood all of it but he was sure worried that Jesus died and was glad to know that he came back.  I didn't get any pictures of Easter Sunday (but sadly I didn't have anything matchy and new for them to wear anyway...) But I did get some pictures of the Easter Egg hunt we did at Matthew's school.   

 Don't be fooled by Kensley.  She is not quite walking yet, but she is sure close!  This was her standing for a minute.

Going through the goodies.  Kensley loves ducks and when Austin found one in one of his eggs, he gave it right to her. :)

Picture with the Easter bunny

For the first time since we have lived in AZ we went to the Mesa Temple Pageant.  We swapped with another couple to watch kids and made it a date night.  We picked up Cafe Rio on the way and ate on the lawn while it was waiting to start.  It was a great pageant and told of the life of Christ. It was a great presentation.

This was another egg hunt we went to.  I think we actually went to 3 this year!  Austin totally ran and searched for eggs but Kensley was content to pick up one egg, put it in her basket, pick it back out, open it and play with the candy inside.

I think in every single pictures my kids are majorly squinting.  Darn that bright AZ sun!  But as least we had a very nice and warm Easter weekend.

Playing Together

I love it when my kids play together.  It doesn't happen very often so I try to capture it when it does.  Usually Kensley just destroys whatever Austin is building/making/playing with and he gets really frustrated about it.  It's also hard right now to play with both of my kids at the same time.  They have such different needs right now when it comes to playing so it's so fun when we can all do something together that they both enjoy.  It's the littliest things that count right?

Playing with their blankets! They were giggling with each other. So cute

Playing with chairs and making faces

Playing with water.  We all got soaked but spent a good hour here playing!

I