A Missionary and Back to BYU

April has been a busy month filled with family fun! A few weeks ago Justin's brother, Nate, returned home from serving a two year mission for our church in the Taichung, Taiwan Mission. We all went up to the airport to pick him up- minus Justin and his brother Davin who were working in Guatemala that week.

I was a pretty lame in-law and never sent him a single picture of the kids since he'd been gone so I think he was pretty surprised at how much they've grown! Ethan was 2 when he left and is now 4 and Ellie was one month old when he left and is now 2! 

 There were quite a few Smith cousins there running around the airport and a few new ones that Nate had never met so when he saw Ellie he said, "So who's is this?" We laughed and told him it was Ellie and he couldn't believe that it was her!

Nate with Mom and Dad Smith. 

 Dad totally cheated and scheduled his last leg of his flight home from China to conveniently be the same flight as Nate's. Oh and it just so happened that miraculously the seat next to Nate's happened to be Dad's! What a small world eh? :)

Last week we excitedly packed up and drove back to our alma mater for Chanda's (Justin's sister) graduation from BYU. This is really the first time that we have been back up to campus since our own graduation from there and oh how we love that place. We have such great memories there and it was so fun to drive around and reminisce about our dating, engaged, and newly married days. 

The weather was gorgeous! Spring time was always my most favorite season up there. Snow capped mountains, green hill sides, cherry blossoms blooming, and beautiful tulips planted all over campus. Please tell me why we don't live there again? Oh yes.... the winters :)

Chanda and her husband (also named Nate) live in Wymount Apartments which seems to be pretty family friendly. They had amazing green areas with park equipment, sand, and toys laying out all over the place for the kids. After being stuck in a car for 11 hours, our kids loved playing out there!

Have I ever mentioned how awesome Justin's sisters are?? They are pretty amazing aunts to our kiddos. This is Caryn...isn't she beautiful? 

It's a good thing she is since Ellie looks so much like she did when she was her age. For real, they look so similar! Funny how genes work. 

 My handsome hunk of a husband. I love that he is athletic. 

 We went to the commencement exercises where Elder Dallin H. Oaks (an apostle from our church) spoke and the next day we went to her specific college graduation.

 After, we were treated to a fabulous lunch at Tucanos. Yum!

While everyone else was in a food comatose state,  our little family drove up to Squaw Peak. Yes, all you who went to BYU know it as the infamous make-out spot but we had our kids and Justin's brother with us so don't you get all excited :) 

This spot is also known for it's gorgeous view of the valley....

 It seems as if Ethan is really into thumbs up pictures now a days. 

 Ellie was asleep in the car and the full family portrait was not worth waking her up for. She was exhausted from late nights and no naps!

Nate...he's such a great guy! He's also very single if any of you know a great girl who happens to be single too :)

 The boys had fun jumping off the "cliff". 

 If only we could have gotten Ethan up as high as Justin! Wouldn't that have been awesome?!

 We stayed with Justin's Aunt Rhonda and Uncle Art. They are SO amazing for letting all of us invade their house and eat their scrumptious food. Her house is right by  the Draper Temple which makes for an incredible view of the valley. 

This was the first time in two years that the whole Smith clan has been together. Since then we have welcomed 2 new in-laws and almost another baby into the family! What a fun bunch!

It was a short but fun trip! We just love being with family. Thanks Chanda for graduating so we could make an excuse to come back to Utah!

Our Backyard!

We've always made fun at how tiny our backyard is but surprisingly, it seems much bigger now that it is finally finished!

Note* The sod took a beating from the wheelbarrow full of rocks, it looks much better now...

Since we will either be selling or renting our house out once we move this summer, we wanted to make it look more marketable but yet still simple and easy for the next homeowner/renter to take care of. Last Saturday, Justin and his brothers Davin & Jordan worked all day long planting plants, hauling 4 tons of rock from the front of the street to the back, and putting the finishing touches on everything. 

We were so grateful for his brothers' help! They were so awesome to give up a Saturday and come help my husband do back-breaking work! As much as I think I am a pregnant super woman, I think hauling all that rock would have put me into labor so I just watched the kiddos all day :)

I love Bougainvillea and so I am excited for these to grow! We also planted some boxwoods and hibiscus plants.

Simple but classy right?!

Even though we have great parks nearby, we've been enjoying the backyard as well. The kids love to have races from one end of the yard to the other and blowing bubbles are always a hit.

And as much as we love our cute, small town and the people and friends in it, we are also excited to be moving in a few months. Here is a little sneak peak at what the home we are building will look like:

Even though the house is beautiful (and the backyard a bit bigger),  it's more the neighborhood that we are excited about. White picket fences, our very own mailbox, gorgeous parks, a lake, and the whole area is 95% turf- unheard of in the Phoenix Valley!! I'll be sure to update more about it as time goes on!

Happy Easter!!

Warning: Picture Overload!

I actually made the effort to take some pictures and there were so many cute ones of the kids that I just couldn't narrow them down!

We had a fabulous Easter and started it off with seeing the Mesa Easter Pageant on Saturday night. For those of you who don't know what this is, it is this huge production of Jesus's life and ministry held on the Mesa Temple grounds. It is put on by our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints) and they do it every year in the weeks preceding Easter. It is very well done and there are people there from all different religions. Ethan was captivated by it. 

Sunday morning we all woke up late from the late night before and the kids found their Easter baskets. With all the billions of March birthdays in the family, I felt like our kids have had plenty of sugar lately so they received coloring books, bubble stuff, and Ellie got a little toy pony. I just love the Dollar Tree!

 The kids then went on their Easter egg hunt around the house. I was super lazy and didn't fill any eggs with candy but the kids didn't seem to mind.

 We have 1pm church so it was nice to just be lazy and spend time together as a family. Here are the kids all dressed in their Sunday best!

 After church we headed over to the Smith's house for dinner with Grandma and Grandpa Chapman. After a scrumptious dinner, we enjoyed the beautiful evening weather outside. AZ evenings and mornings are beautiful this time of year. Unfortunately, it is already starting to get hot during the day :( 

Have I mentioned just how much Ellie loves animals? She loves Kooter, the Smith's dog. 

 She is so sweet giving him kisses and I just try not to think about how dirty the dog is while she is loving on him. I really hope Justin's family will always supply our children with their animal fix since neither of us have any desire to get an animal any time soon!

Ellie LOVES her daddy!

And she is a jumping machine on the trampoline!

The static makes for some pretty awesome hair do's!

By the way, any ideas of how to tame a natural bowl cut/mullet? Gel works for a little while and then it just gets crazy!  :)

 Miss Ellie is so sweet and happy! Especially when she is outside!

I think she was meant to be raised on an acre or more of land. The first thing she does when she goes outside is throw off her shoes and run around like crazy! She will put up quite a fuss if you try to make her put her shoes back on. I say you gotta pick and choose your battles and she wins on this one :)

 Oh yes.. Hi Ethan. 

 Don't worry, I didn't forget that I had a son. 

 I just think he is such a little stud. He always has so much fun playing with all his aunts and uncles. They are so good to him and always make time to play and spend time with him. He is one lucky boy to have so many people love and adore him!

Justin's mom had cute Easter baskets for the kiddos filled with lots of goodies. The bubbles were a big hit!

And this is probably my new favorite picture. 

 Mostly because of this shot right here...

 Haha. It still makes me laugh every time I see it!

Jordan, Chay and Caryn wanted to do an Easter egg hunt for the kiddos and they were so kind to go out and hide all the eggs for the kids to find. 

After the hunt had commenced, there was some serious egg wars that took place. It started out just trying to crack each others ends to a full blown egg war with eggs being chucked at one another and smashed in the face. My husband may or may not have been the ring leader in it all :)

 And last but not least, there was a beautiful Arizona sunset which was the perfect way to end the night!

 Despite all the fun festivities, we know what the Easter season is really about and we thoroughly enjoy teaching our children about our Savior and His precious gift to us. Happy Easter everyone! 

All Over the Place

This post will most likely be all over the place. I feel like I have some catching up to do and since it is 3:00 in the blessed AM, I promise nothing when it comes to this making a whole lot of sense :)

To start things off, can I complain? Is that allowed? Well, I'm going to anyways...I am miserable! I have had a cold for a few weeks that has now turned into a full blown sinus infection. I can't sleep (hence the 3AM blog post), I can't breathe, I have a nasty cough, I haven't been able to taste food for days, I'm nauseated from all the drainage, and to top it off, it feels like someone has punched me on both sides of my entire face. I can't sleep on my favorite side because the pressure hurts too bad on my face and sleeping on your back is not an option with a big baby in my tummy. I'm also exhausted during the day from not sleeping well (or at all) at night. I know, I know, it's just a sinus infection but I think I'd rather have food poisoning than have this. At least that way it's over and done with instead of dragging out the misery for weeks. I've been lathering myself with essential oils hoping it will help but honestly, I'm not seeing any improvement. You know it's bad when you put oregano right up to your nose and can't smell a darn thing :) I typically don't like taking any medications while pregnant but I think I'm pretty close to just caving in and getting some antibiotics. Yes, I am getting that desperate. It's not getting any better, only worse!

Ok, ok, I'll stop. I'm sure I'll look back on this tomorrow when my head is clearer and be embarrassed on how ungrateful I sound but for now, it's how I feel :) Speaking of feel, this little boy inside of me is an acrobat! There isn't a lot of room in there and he is definitely taking his half out of the middle! :) I went to the doctor today for a check up and everything looks great. He prefers my left side which means my stomach is being squished and I get full so much faster. It's ok, right now I can't taste the food anyways. But miraculously, I don't get any heartburn! 

I stopped teaching Turbo Kick and our city league volleyball season has just ended. I miss both already but I know that since I'm not very good at taking it easy at either, it's probably a good thing. After teaching Turbo, I was waking up in the morning feeling like I was hit by a semi so my hubby convinced me that it was time to stop. I'm still hitting the gym though and feeling great. I've noticed that contractions have started much earlier this time around than with my other two pregnancies. Mom and Dad, don't worry...I am smart with my body :)

Speaking of body, I saw this article on pintrest and I love it. So for all you non-pinners out there, here ya go! I love what she has to say about pregnancy and weight gain. I get told a lot just how lucky I am to not gain a lot of extra weight in pregnancy and how quickly it comes off (or has in the past) but really, I don't think it's luck. I think it's the conscious decision and effort I make everyday to live a healthy lifestyle whether I am pregnant or not. Now I don't go to extremes and don't get me wrong, I enjoy a good desert every once in a while but I really do believe that a healthy diet and exercise are the keys to everything. Everything. It's the key to good health, to good self-esteem, to better spirituality, and even a better marriage. I could go on and on but I think she says it better than I could in the article. That being said, I do know that there are always exceptions to this point and I know that I am lucky that my body allows me to be physically active during pregnancy. I know not everyone's body allows them to do that and I am grateful that I can. 

Ok, ok enough chit chat. Here are some photos of some different activities that we have been doing lately.

I found these pictures on Justin's camera from back in January. I wasn't there, I don't remember why, but it looks like Justin took the kids with his family hiking one day. I have no idea where they went but it looks like they had fun!

 Ellie fell asleep in the car one day and after I took her out of her car seat, I laid her on the couch in the living room. When I went back in to check on her, she had thrown the pillows off  and had her head hanging off the couch. She must have been tired :)

 The Roots & Boots Rodeo came to town and so we took the kids one night and met our friends the Vilt's there. Ethan loved riding all the rides and Ellie was super happy when she was able to go on some too. Although it was fun, they gouge you big time for anything you want to do there! $5 for parking, $20 for just a handful of tickets, and $10 per person if you wanted to see the rodeo. Ridiculous! We skipped the rodeo and luckily the kids were happy to see the horses in the warm up ring. 

 I've been loving getting so many good ideas from Pintrest on fun activities to do with the kids in the afternoons! This particular day, we read The Kissing Hand and then made and decorated our very own raccoon masks. I even had some heart stickers laying around that we put in the palms of our hands, just like Chester. 

 We love decorating our back porch with sidewalk paint! Ellie made a mess and had fun doing it and Ethan was so cute using his artistic skills to paint the porch beautifully :)

 The paint is super easy to make. 1 cup cornstarch to 1 cup water. Mix, pour in muffin tins, and add food coloring. Easy peasy and oh so fun!

Oh and speaking of projects, see the grass?? We are excited and it makes our pitiful excuse for a backyard actually seem bigger! Tomorrow's project is to spread rock in the dirt areas and plant some pretty bushes. Yeah, it only took us almost 3 years to do the backyard and just in time for us to move. Have I mentioned we are moving?? We are building a house in Gilbert and are SO excited! It should be done late June/July but more on that later. I think I need to try to go back to sleep. Wish me luck!