City Creek Center

Last week Andrew had the week of for his break. We spent the week getting settled in and doing a few fun things as a family. One day we had to run downtown for something and so we decided to go and see City Creek (the new mall the church built). It has a lot of high end stores and it is really nice. It is an indoor/outdoor mall with retractable roofs. There is a creek running through it and is set up really nice. We walked around and got some lunch in the food court. Then we went over to the Disney store where Ella was in love. She kept running all over and grabbing things. They have a magic mirror and a projector playing Disney movie clips. You can choose which clips so we chose a Tangled one and a couple Little Mermaid ones. The next couple of pictures were her reactions to the movies. She was in Heaven. Also while we were down there Andrew was told to expect his board scores by two that afternoon and so he spent the day checking his phone for that email and refreshing the website with the scores. They were posted finally while we were in the Disney store and he PASSED! It was such a relief for him. He has two more parts to take but this was by far the hardest and the one with the most need for studying. I am so Proud of him I knew he could do it!

 We then walked across the bridge over the street and stopped for a picture with the Temple in the background.

 After we walked over to Temple Square and walked around and sat for a little while enjoying the scenery. It was such a nice day and so fun to spend it together as a family!

Dance

Less than an hour after we made it to Utah we found ourselves sitting at my little sisters Dance Company recital. She was in a quite a few dances and helped coreograph a few others and her and a friend did a clogging duet. She is really talented and Ella loves watching her dance. Ella was mesmerized with the whole thing.

 After she danced we went to Leatherbys with my family and then we went home and crashed we were so exhausted!

Moving

We left Mississippi almost two weeks ago. When it came time to decide our externships a year ago we knew that there was going to be a lot of things happening in Utah this summer that we needed to/ would like to be here for so we decided to do our first of three rotations in Salt Lake which means moving home to Utah then back to Memphis for the fall then back to Salt Lake next Spring for his final rotation. It isn't exactly the easiest way to do things but now that we are here we are excited. We didn't quite know what to do with our house but quickly realized we needed to move out so that we could save some money. We have lived in it for almost two years. It was the house we brought Easton home to and the house both kids learned how to walk in. It wasn't the greatest and has its problems but we have so many memories in it. We really lucked out finding it when we did since houses in our neighborhood are rented out so quickly. Our sign was up less than 48 hrs before it was rented. We started packing up way early and it really payed off in the end to not be so stressed and really not have anything to do the day we moved. On Tuesday May 1st we moved all our furniture into our storage unit and slept on an air mattress that night. The next morning we finished moving a few things and packing up the cars while Andrew was taking his last final EVER!!! It was such a weird day with moving and leaving Mississippi to Andrew reaching such a milestone in his education. And a big thanks to my friend Heather for taking Ella for a little while why we finished cleaning up and packing up it really did help and it was good to play with Garrett one last time. We had hoped to leave for the day around 9 that morning but finally made it out at noon and after I cried a few times.

We got one last picture in front of our house before we left!

Our poor kids have been such troopers through it all. Moving is so hard on kids and as hard as it was they did awesome. Many tears were shed by both of them and there was lots of confusion. We took down our kitchen table a few days before we moved and Ella woke up the next morning and asked where it went and continued to for a couple days and the next day it was the couch and the next day the TV. She kept saying "mom where did the couch go, or where did the TV go?" It really was heart breaking. She asked me a few times to open her closet to get the toys out only to discover each time that they were gone She has asked a few times if we can go home. The day we left we stopped at Chic Fil A to get lunch and once they handed me our food she said ok mom now let's go home and eat, made me cry. It is going to be a hard year on them with so much moving and back and forth but hopefully in a year we can start to get more settled once we find a job and know what we are doing.

Before we left Ella wanted to go see her room one last time. She kept saying it's all gone mom!

The first day we drove and stopped for the night in Kansas City, Missouri. The second day we drove through Nebraska and stopped for the night in Sydney, Nebraska. On our second day we stopped and got a pizza in Lincoln, Nebraska and played at a park for about an hour. It was good for the kids to get out of the car for a while and play.

I think this is from our first day we hadn't even gotten ten miles and she was out.

A couple days before we moved I ran to the store to grab something and came back to Easton and Grandpa Brown both asleep on the couch. Poor Easton fell asleep for two days in a row in someones arms he hasn't done that in months!

After we left the park in Lincoln they were both asleep before we hit the highway

Somehow the pictures all got mixed up

The night in Sydney we got the swimsuits out and went swimming! Ella is still terrified but is getting better in the water. They both had a lot of fun splashing and kicking in the water and Ella keeps asking to go back to the pool.

It was nice to have the pool all to ourselves!

Over 1600 miles later and lots of movies and singing songs later we made it to Utah at about 5 in the afternoon on the third day!

Dinner Group

When we started school almost 3 years ago one of my friends Kate started a dinner group. She had gotten this idea from someone she knew and decided to start it up with our class. The idea was each person was in charge of a portion of the meal weather it be a salad or main dish and then one family was in charge of giving an FHE Lesson and game. The idea was to fix something that you had never made. It has been a lot of fun to try new recipes and enjoy new foods. When we first started we were having it at people's houses but after the first year we just grew to big and so we started having it at the church. We would get together one Sunday a month and I really enjoyed it since Sundays are sometimes so long! Since we started we have had over 10 babies born amongst us with at least 4 more to be born by the end of the year. My friend Kate is so nice and has put together the recipes each month with a picture of each of us with our food and has sent them out to us each month and now she is going to put together a book for us to each buy when we graduate. Our last dinner group as a whole was the Sunday before we left. We had the bishop come and give us some words of advice and we played a game of family feud while some youth from the ward watched all the kids. After we took a picture but sadly we were missing about 5 families a few that couldn't make it and a few that had already left. We had all LDS families in the class of 2013 come plus a girl in their class and her husband who lived by all of us would come. It was fun this night to think about the last three years and how far we have all come. Andrew and I went to the first 3 without kids, it is still weird to think we moved there kid less. This was the last dinner group as a whole since a couple of us have moved away and by the end of the summer a few more will be moving but we hope to continue to go when we move back for a few months. We really all enjoyed each other each month and felt like this really drew our class close and it was nice that we all got along so well!

 I was in charge of rolls/pastries this month and since we were two days away from moving there was no way I was baking anything so Sister Shupert and I got together and made these yummy hot rolls (Sister Shupert is a frozen already baked brand in Mississippi). I went against the rules of making something new but that was the best I could do without a kitchen to work in!

BBQ at Conger Park

The Saturday before we moved we went down to Conger Park in Hernando for a BBQ with our friends. We all brought our own meat to grill and a side dish to share with each other. We really enjoyed ourselves and the weather was a little warm but not to hot yet. We had a fun time laughing once again. It was fun to spend two nights in a row with our friends. I had a really good time and we were happy to be able to enjoy ourselves with our friends one last time! The husbands were nice enough to go and chat while watching the kids while we hung out and chatted ourselves.

A couple of the families had already left when we took this picture but here is who was left!

Front Row: Jenn, Heather, Monica, and Larysa

Back row: Lauren, Ashley, and Me

 The Heather's! We have lived in the same neighborhood together the last two years. We have enjoyed many morning walks and many enjoyable days at the neighborhood park. They are moving in a couple weeks as well to St. Louis to start a job and I am sad they won't be around when we get back but we are hoping to stop on our way home at the end of the summer to spend a day with them.

 My friend Monica text this picture to me the other day and I had totally forgot about it. I think we were laughing about something from our girls night the night before. I love it!

 My friend Larysa and I and her cute little baby Zachary, I think he was almost 4 weeks old. They are moving to South Carolina at the end of the summer so we won't see them until Graduation next May! I know I got pictures of me with more people but I don't have them so if anybody does send them my way!

 I got a couple pictures of Ella on the playground but Easton was already on his way to the car he had a fever which turned into 5 teeth coming in!

 Once we got home from the park we knew Grandma and Grandpa were on their way over since they had just got to town so we went and grabbed our Popsicles and sat on the driveway and ate them and waited for them to come!

This picture is dark but I love Ella's raised eyebrow in it!

 Easton loved his Popsicle with all his teeth coming in I am sure it felt really good!

Girls Night Out

The Friday before we moved we had one last girls night. Since 6 of the 8 of us will be moving in the next few months it was kind of bittersweet. We decided on Panera Bread. I had only been there once maybe twice. I was excited to go. The food I got was really good! We talked and laughed for a couple hours until they were closing. I am so sad that we are all going separate ways but we have so many ways to keep in touch these that I have no doubt we will all keep in touch. We laughed at old stories and made some fun memories. After we ate and when they were closing down we decided it was to soon to go home so we headed and got some frozen yogurt. It seems as though self serve yogurt places are all over the place these days. We ate our yogurt and talked some more before heading home. It was a perfect night and much needed. I enjoyed myself so much! Thank you ladies for such a great and fun night!

L to R: Jenn, Luna, Monica, Me, Heather, Elise, Ashley, and Larysa

This picture has a funny story but it was kind of a got to be there type moment. It was like they didn't want me in their picture and I just jumped in. Then someone said lets take another picture and include Heather since we are friends! It was funny, had to be there!

Paint the Patio

A couple weeks ago we went up to Andrew's school for a little event. They are going to be added onto the school and remodeling it to be able to accommodate more students. The back patio is going to be built over and so they wanted everyone to come and paint it since they are just building on top and not tearing it up. It was fun (a little stressful giving paint brushes to toddlers) but really windy that day. Easton managed to get paint all over his clothes which I was able to get most of it out but not all of it. It was a nice way to get out of the house and away from packing for a couple hours.

 Ella was in heaven she loves to paint

The school even had some Corky's BBQ catered. Corkys is one of our favorites, Andrew was excited.

 Ella loves baked beans and ate all of hers and Eastons and some of mine! It was so windy a few minutes after I took this he plate went flying throwing food through the air and all over the table!

 The President of the school. He wrote something about all the beer that has been consumed on the patio, typical SCO everything always comes back to drinking

 Easton had a hay day with the paint brush but was never happy because he wanted to hold two of them!

This picture I found on SCO's facebook page, I love it!