Birthday Boy

Okay, I know I stink at being consistent on blogging, but here I am again! 

My sweet son turned two on Sunday you guys. What?!? How can this even be possible!? So a few days before Owen's birthday I was contemplating on how elaborate I should make it. We planned on having our aunts and uncles that live here in KY over for dinner and dessert, but I didn't know if I wanted to make a themed birthday or what for Owen. So, I regrettably went on Pinterest and was bombarded by all these AMAZING, completely detailed ideas for little boy birthday parties. I mean, these mom's went WAY out! So, of course I felt like a terrible mother for not having tons of little kids over for a party. I hadn't made homemade decorations with place-cards to match. There were no plans to spend money on buying favors, let alone making them. Wow, I was so overwhelmed by guilt I decided to put a little extra effort into at least making it extra special and fun for Owen. I may not be a supermom, but I feel like I try to be a pretty dang good one;)

If you know Owen, you know he loves trains. Our cute little town has a train that goes right through it, so we see it regularly. Every time we drive across the train tracks (usually daily), he yells "train tracks"! We also go to the library twice a week, where he could spend hours at the train table. He just loves it. He's also a huge fan of Thomas the Train. So, I had been wanting to find him his own train set and table, but they are just so expensive! After looking for several months, I told myself it just wasn't going to work out for his birthday. Maybe we could save up for Christmas to get him one. BUT then my sweet friend from our ward, and one of Owen's babysitters, offered to sell theirs to us because her kids just weren't playing with it. YAY! I think I was more excited than Owen! We got it from them just in time for Owen's birthday.

Owen's birthday was on Stake Conference Sunday, so we enjoyed a great Sabbath morning at church, and then came home to party. While Owen napped Riley set up his train table and arranged all the pieces so cute. I did in fact put my creative skills to use, and made some cute little rail road signs to make Owen's birthday a somewhat "themed" party. HE LOVED IT. When he woke up from his nap and spotted his new train table, he got a huge smile on his face and said, "WHOA" as he ran toward it. Made our day as parents.

Our own choo-choo tracks

Riley also got him his very own skateboard, since he is constantly begging to go "board" with daddy.

Aunt Lisa and Uncle Ray were so sweet to give Owen a couple new books, which he loves!

And he also got spoiled by Aunt Julie and Uncle Bob!

He loved being the center of attention, opening up presents, and attempting to hold up only two fingers when asked how old he was now. It really is the funniest thing ever.

So excited for chocolate cake!

Owen had a great birthday, at least I'm pretty sure he did. We are so grateful to our aunts and uncles for coming over to help make Owen's day special. We are so blessed to have them here so close, since we are away from immediate family at this time. I know that Owen also loved getting the phone calls, FaceTime calls, Skype, cards, etc. from all the other family. What a tremendous blessing for him to have so many people who love him! 

I mean, how could you not love this face?!

Happy Second Birthday My Sweet Son!

Another attempt

Well, here's another attempt to get the "blog ball" rolling. I am very impressed by all ya'll that post regularly.  So much has happened since I posted last.

If you can believe it, I am sitting in Barcelona, Spain right now creating this post. Riley's MBA program does an international trip each year, so I decided to come along for the fun. We've only been here two days, and we've seen so much! All the students are in a business meeting right now, so instead of wandering the streets alone, blogging might be a safer decision:) Actually, the city of Barcelona is considered pretty safe. Our guide mentioned that other than the pick-pocketing and theft, the crime rate is fairly low. Which is good. I'm not sure about Morocco though (that's our second destination of the trip). We will see. I must say that I am so glad that Riley and I are where we are in our lives right now. I look at some of these other MBA students and just find myself grateful. Already, 2 students have lost their debit cards and one actually got his passport stolen due to the fact that they were drunk. I know it's wrong to judge right, but really??? #1-I think getting drunk is stupid (not just because of my religion, but many other reasons). #2- I think getting drunk in a foreign country is even more stupid. #3-well...ok I could go on and on about how stupid this situation is, but I think you get it. Right? 

Anyway, we are having a blast visiting, vacationing, and meeting new people. More to come on our trip later. Who knows how much later, since I haven't been to consistent on the blogging thing:) 

So, we are getting settled into our new house! We have been in more a few months now. I still can't believe that it's ours. I still feel like a little baby. How is it that I'm married, have a 20-month old son, and a new house? Oftentimes I realize how short our time on this Earth really is. Why do I get so stressed out over something that when looked at compared to eternity is nothing. The other day I found myself getting embarrassed by asking so many questions at work one day. If you know me well, you know how easily I get embarrassed. My face turns bright red, my voice shakes; hiding it is impossible. Later that day I was looking back, and I thought..Why? Why do I put myself through so much misery when that little moment of being embarrassed was but one small moment of eternity. It didn't matter. Who cares that I asked a lot of questions, who cares if I have to face another trial, who cares if things aren't working out the way I wanted. Because I know it will change. I know that these moments of despair or discomfort are nothing when compared to an eternity of experience. I hope that all makes sense. I'm not trying to make anyone else's trials smaller than they really are, because I do know how hard it can be to be deep in an exhausting battle of striving to be positive and happy when all you want to do is curl up and cry. I do want to remind all of us that our "afflictions shall be but a small moment."

Wow, ok, back to our new house. We love it! Of course this is our first home, so there are a few things that we wished we would've done a little differently, but overall we are so pleased with it. We are learning:) Here are a few pics before we moved anything in.

Love, love, love that we upgraded to granite countertops. Not cheap! But totally worth it!

Our cute little fireplace. We now have TV hanging above the mantle thanks to Uncle Bob's help. 

Master bath. Who would've thought having two sinks would make getting ready for bed so much more pleasant.

Our builders put in our front yard for us, and seeded the back. The front looks great, thanks to all this Kentucky rain. However, the rain has also helped move the seed all around in the back creating cute little patches everywhere. We're not sure if we'll end up just sodding it or adding more seed. That's something to think about after the trip. The mud has provided Owen with plenty of fun though!

Look at those muddy boots!

This boy begs to brush his teeth.

Cute Easter Outfit from Grandma and Grandpa Matthews

We also have a park right across the street from us. Every time we go outside Owen points to the park and says "pawk" or "wides" (for slides)

Can't get enough of this sweet boy.

Guess who's here? We love grandma!!!

Happy Monday Everyone!!

I started a blog? Wait what? Oops!

So, yeah, it may take me awhile to get into this blog thing. I just love reading others' blogs, so I really want to dedicate some of my time to my own. Although I've missed blogging about all the holiday madness, I'll just start with the here and now. Most exciting in our lives right now is this...

You guys, I cannot tell you how extremely excited I am to get into our house! We have been blessed beyond measure to save money by living with others for the past two years. I will never take that for granted, but WOW.... it is time. Time for us to have a place of our own to call home. A place we can learn, grow, and play together as a family. Lets face it, I am my mother's daughter. I really am most excited DECORATE and to also get in that KITCHEN!!! I pray that we will love it's location, and that for however long we stay there, we will make happy memories. We should be closing in exactly one week!

And here's a pic of the little one just for fun!