Life is great!

Maelie's Baby Doll from Nana, her FAVORITE toy!

So I know it's been awhile, but I have a good excuse, my computer seriously did crash so now I'm borrowing my Mother-in-love's. Plus we've been incredibly busy with my family visiting for a week and a half, camping, job hunting, finding a job, sicky Maelie, etc.... Anyway, I have a lot of videos and pics this time. My camera memory is full cause I can't download my pics anywhere to be able to erase them off the camera, so this is all I have plus some my mother-in-love has.

Poor Maelie has been teething off and on and I believe is "on" right now since she didn't sleep hardly AT ALL last night and refuses to sleep in her crib or anywhere without me. It was a bit of a long night...a few weeks ago we thought she was teething, but since she had an awful fever and no teeth came through, I guess it was just some bug. She's doing well though and just about ready to start running! I say running cause this little busy body does NOT stop moving! She is sooo fast at crawling and has been practically running along the couch and now even walking along the wall without really holding onto anything. She can stand all by herself and does it all the time for minutes at a time. She figured out the stairs recently so now we REALLy have to keep an eye on her at ALL times. She loves 'banging' the piano and just learned to dance. The cutest thing she's learned to do is when she laughs she throws her head back. She is hilarious to watch and has a gazillion different expressions, which EVERYone loves to comment on and laugh at. She really is so fun and I love her to pieces, even when she keeps me up all night and hit my faces while laughing to wake me up nice and early every morning. (If she's awake, everyone in the room also has to get up) :)

See Maelie's tooth...she now has two and I think the top two on the way.

A few weeks ago I got to visit with my family for a whole week and a half! It was soooo great to see them and Maelie LOVED getting to know Nana, Grandpa, Uncle Tyson, Aunt Alexa, and Aunt Tiffy all over again. We got to see a lot of family with them and even got to have a party with the Rowley's for Jared's b-day! We learned that Maelie HATES loud noices especially when there are a lot of people in one place being noisy...she was FREAKING out and would just scream back at first, then started crying everytime one of the kids would yell or be noisy. It was sad....my poor tender hearted little girl. She did get to go swimming with Daddy and Tyson and Alexa and really loved that. It was just nice playing the bean game and rook and just relaxing with my family. We were sad not to see Chelsea, who is serving a mission in Tampa, Florida, and Shayla, who is working and saving every penny she can before she leaves this fall for BYU-Hawaii! I still think that is soooo awesome and would LOVE to go visit her, espeically since that is were Kyle served his mission!

Well after they all left we had a fun ward campout up by Strawberry, Arizona. It was so nice to be up there and watching Maelie having fun. She loved walking around in the tent and was DYING to be able to crawl around in the dirt, but I wasn't about to let her get that filthy....I know what a mean mom! :) It was a fun break from the heat and I really love camping!

Well, when we got back from camping we were still job hunting, but thanks VERY VERY much to Uncle Brian, we FINALLY got a job! Brian has been talking to everyone he knows asking around for us and talked to his neighbor who owns a moving trailer home construction place. The guy, Gary, told him to send Kyle on down and ended up hooking us up with a job. Now Kyle is there new frieght guy...he gets to use the fork lift unloading the trucks and gets to work hard in this wonderful Arizona heat lifting boxes, unloading crates and resupplying all the stock for the production lines. He was a little nervous about working there when he met the crew and found out the probably half of the 150 people were all ex-convics and about 90% of them all speak Spanish, but he is happy with were they put him to work. He REALLY LOVES having a job and a place to go to work everyday! And I have to say, we both LOVE having an income again!

Layla tries so hard to play with Maelie, but we're still working on sharing...Maelie's just a bit too independent and needs to learn to play nicely with other kids still :)

As hard as life has been lately, I have come to KNOW that Heavenly Father REALLY does want us here and really is taking care of us. Maybe not as fast as we would have wanted, but I have learned many reasons why he has waited as long as he has. Not only has mine and Kyle's relationship grown soooo much, by allowing me to see how he was raised and being able to better understand him and where he comes from, but also He has answered a prayer of mine. When I met Kyle and his wonderful family, I had been asking Heavenly Father ever since to allow me to get to know them and love them as much as my own family; that I would feel as comfortable with them as I do with my own family. As much as I would have rather not had to go through the no job thing and all the stress that goes with it, I know that it definatelyhas been worth it to get to know Kyle's family so well and Kyle! Another blessing is just having them all here to help me with Maelie and to help me not be so lonely especially since I'm no longer living right by my parents. We truely have been blessed and I am sooo grateful I have a knowledge of my Heavenly Father and that I have learned to just trust him. I know He really will take care of everything and knows exactly what we need and when we need it! Thank you everyone who has been so helpful and supportive! We love you all!

The girls learned they could climb the tv! :)

For the 4th of July we got to spend the morning having an AWESOME breakfast at Shannon and Aaron Hallstroms (they are expecting there first baby boy in a few months!!) We also got to visit with Grandma and Grandfather and watch fireworks with the Cranes and BBQ and play games. What an awesome 4th!

Maelie LOVES playing on the outside of this when her cousin Layla is in it...she's not very fond of being on the inside and unable to walk. She's just too grown up for such a baby toy :) Cousin just learned to crawl though and LOVES LOVES LOVES to follow Maelie around...she's a bit slower, but tries so hard to keep up and do everything Maelie does...we're going to be in big trouble when they're both walking!

I also was honored to be invited to the birth of Jared and Cheyenne's little Gunner Joseph Rowley. It really was amazing and different being on the other end of the birth...MUCH more comfortable! I did learn that maybe I'm not quite ready to be pregnant again yet :)