Navajo County Fair

We live in a pretty central part of town. The elementary school, pool, library, park, and fair grounds are all a 5 minute walk away from us. It is really nice to be so close to all the community activities and I could definitely get used to it. The only down side from this is when anything is going on Macy can see it out our family room window and begs and pleads until we go do it, which is actually good for us because it gets us out of the house. When the fair comes to town we can see the lights of the ferris wheel, as clear as day. The picture below isn't from our window, but it pretty much looks like this.

 When Macy saw all the pretty lights she asked "what's goin' on over there" and I let her know that the fair was in town and maybe we'll go check it out. "Mom! What's the circle?!" "That's the ferris wheel" "I wanna go on the ferris wheel!" and that's how it started, Macy's love of the ferris wheel. Every few minutes she would ask me when we were going to go on it. Kyle and I were already planning on going to the demolition derby so we decided to bring Macy along with us and see how she did. All day long Macy kept asking if it was time to go to the fair, and all day long I let her know "you have to take a nap, eat dinner, drop London off at Grandmas, THEN we get to go to the fair"... She did awesome and patiently waited all day, when it was time for a nap she got all excited because we were that much closer to riding the ferris wheel. 

The demolition derby wasn't as good as it was last year, it had rained like crazy all day so it was extremely muddy and all the cars kept getting stuck and couldn't pick up very much speed. It was fun to watch though and be with friends. We meant Lisa there (Lorin was working) and then ran into the Wheelers too. Yay for friends!

 While we were talking into the stadium a guy from a booth handed Macy a big red balloon. She was having lots of fun playing with it until....

 Daddy accidentally poped it....

 Luckily one of the guys from the booth that she got it from was sitting next to us, and he called one of his guys from the booth and they gave her a new one. After the demolition derby Macy was pretty wiped out but FINALLY got to go on her precious ferris wheel. 

 She was so excited to go but she was so tired and it was hard for her to show all her build up emotions.

For about 2 weeks Macy would tell everyone she met about her experience; "The cars were crashed and then they got STUCK in the mud, and then we went, we went, we went on the FERRIS wheel!!" The next day Macy asked if we could go on it again, I told her it was too much money to go on it more then once. After I told her that she kept telling everyone "But we can't go on it again, it's a hundred DOLLARS" When the fair left she asked me where it went and I told her it went home. She looked at me with a pretty puzzled look on her face and said "It didn't go home. It would make a MESS in the house!"

I'm so glad we decided to take her with us, she had so much fun and it was definitely a night to remember.

Where were you when the World Trade Center fell?

Image via WikipediaAs I was reading where everyone was 10 years ago today I remembered that during this time of my life I actually kept a Journal so I looked it up. Here is my Journal entry from 9/11/2001 unedited. 


Where were you when the World Trade Center fell? I was in Lorca, Spain on exchanges with Elder Shaw in a coffee shop called Expresso watching on a big screen TV. At 4:00pm exactly the phone rang just as we were leaving. Juan Jose a member here in Lorca who works for the military called and asked "Have you seen the news?" I said, "No" he said, "I don't suggest you go in the street right now. The Twin Towers in New York and The Pentagon in Washington D.C. have just been attacked by terrorists. They hijacked planes and crashed them into the buildings. They are not sure who exactly did it but they think it was Muslims and there are as you know a lot of Muslims here." I was shocked. I didn't hardly believe it. It couldn't be, stuff like that just doesn't happen. I assured him that I would call the Mission President and figure it out. So Elder Shaw called the office and they said well President hasn't told us anything yet. So we said OK, well were going to hit the streets then. So then we left and went to the Coffee Shop where I knew there would be a TV and we watched for about a half hour. That is when we saw the second tower fall live. So then we went back to work. We taught the man from Santa Domingo and he said he thought his brother was in the building but we still taught him. Then we taught Lucas, Maria and their family the 5th Charla. Then we came back home when Elder Kallas called and said the Prophet had a message for us. We should not go to government buildings, stay out of Muslim neighborhoods, avoid contacting Muslims, and if we ever feel like we are in danger we should return to the piso. That was a great testament to me on the church. That so fast we had direct instructions from the Prophet. The Church is true. Then later Juan Jose called to give us an update on what's been going on and to find out our information. It was also good to know that the members are so concerned for us. It is definitely a day I will never forget. Where were you the 11th of September 2001 - 9-11


Soon after, I was transfered to another area that had an even higher concentration of Muslims and I remember waking through areas where all the TV's were watching the news of the events in arabic and feeling like I was behind enemy lines. My companion and I were also invited to an American Flag burning by a group of Muslim men about a week after. We didn't go :) Through it all I never felt in danger and most people actually treated us better than they ever had. Before this every time some one discovered we were americans they would tell us how much they didn't like americans. But there for a few months we didn't hear that.  

Dumb vacuum.. or owner?

I love my vacuum, when it works. It sucks things right up and I love the way my carpet looks after I'm done, nice, fluffy and just plain lookin' clean. Every once in awhile my vacuum decides it's not going to work. Then we have to replace the belts- which aren't sold in stores, so I have to wait a week for them to get here. I end up borrowing Kyle's Moms vacuum because I hate dirty carpet. For the past 2 weeks my vacuum has been dead- the brushes are not spinning. I ordered the belts, two this time so that next time one goes out I'll order one when I put the 2nd one in and I'll always have one. That didn't work. Kyle looked at it a few times, and when my brother was in town a few weeks ago he looked at it. The were determined it was because of the 2nd belt, so I got the other belt... that didn't work either. I was determined that m vacuum was just dead. Whatever. I'm done with it anyway, I'll get a new one that actually works.  Then I had a thought, and looked at these buttons.

 See how that little switch says "Flooring"? Well, when it is switched to "Hard" that means the power brushes turn off... ya those brushes that kept not spinning and we thought it was because of the belts... duh- so I switched the switch to "carpet".

And walla, 2.5 weeks, a mail order, trip to the store, a husband and brother, and a switch later, it works.

Happy 1st Birthday London!

For London's first birthday we celebrated in Buckeye with some of our family. Steven was blessing his little boy the next day, so we decided while everyone was there we should do the party as well.My Grandma and Grandpa Bochat, Chris and Kati and their kids, and Steven were all able to make it out to the party. My mom spent the day making shells for dinner and then Kati and I made some cupcakes for the party.  I found the idea for the cupcakes on Pinterest, and they were SUPER cute. We looked all over and we couldn't find the sour airheads that we were supposed to use (they were striped different colors, so it looked like a rainbow) so we had to use just plain colored ones, but that's okay. We took a trip into town to go birthday shopping and the boys watched some (okay, a lot) of football.

London wasn't shy about eating the cupcake at all, in act she thoroughly enjoyed it.

The kids were so excited about eating the cupcakes. Kati and I made them about 1/2 an hour before the party started and the kids could hardly keep their pants on they were so excited to eat them.

 London has enjoyed all of her presents... sometimes we have to remind Macy whose presents they were, but they are doing good sharing and London doesn't really mind all the much.

 Grandma Bochat bough London her very own tissue box, she loves to pull them out- it was one of her favorites.

 After opening presents we went over to the neighbors house and went swimming, I'll have to add those pictures after I get them from my Mom. It was a great way to get the kids energy out.

Here is our happy baby girl that next morning. She is such a baby happy when she first wakes up in the morning, I love it.

Overall it was a fantastic weekend! We went to the Baby Jack's blessing the morning after and had a day filled of family fun. Thanks for having us Mom and Dad!

My Toddler

I just got an e-mail from Enfamil congratulating me on my toddler turning one. It immediately threw me into a defensive "She is not a toddler, she's just a baby" attitude. I started thinking about all the non-toddler things she does, and the list is getting shorter and shorter. London has been walking for about a month, and she even will stand up all by herself in the middle of the floor. She knows the word "no" and usually listens (okay so that's not so toddler like hehe) and she's learning words like "let's go" and will walk to the door when I say it. She waves bye bye when anyone says the word "bye" and now wants to drink out of a cup instead of a sippy or a bottle, even though she still drenches herself with water every time. London is such a joy to have around, she really does just light up the room when she smiles. She has a way of putting me in a good mood but I'm grumpy and reminding me of the sweet innocence of little children. She is so nice to Macy, even when Macy doesn't deserve it, and always shares her toys. Macy will run up and grab the toy London is playing with and I'll tell Macy to give it back, only to have London hand it right back to her. It's almost like she's saying "It's alright, if you really want it you can have it." She is a championship sleeper and hardly ever wakes up during the night and almost always go to sleep without fussing a bit. She loves to talk on the phone and uses anything as one, from a cup to a sock. It's such a bitter sweet feeling when you realize they are growing up, and the time she has as my Little Lou Lou is just going too fast.