Friday, October 16, 2009

[..The Yard..]

When we first bought our house there was an $1800 lien on the property because the back yard had never been landscaped. The house is 3 years old and the previous tenants never finished the yard. So we made a deal with the HOA and said we will have it done by the end of August if you drop the fees. They accepted! Well August came and went a lot faster than we expected so they said we could extend our deadline until the end of September. Well we finally finished the yard...for the most part! We planted 11 trees and seeded the whole yard with grass. It probably wont be until Spring when we can use our grass, but at least its done!

Here is what the yard looked like before. Such a mess! The original owners put all of these pavers in the yard but did a terrible job. We pulled all of them out and found a small cement patio underneath!


My Father-in-law owns an excavating company so we had all sorts of tractors and dump trucks to use. Tatum loved having tractors at his house everyday. He was in Heaven.


I can't believe how much bigger our yard feels now. We don't have a very big lot, our house sits on about .16th of an acre. We are glad to have a yard, coming from a townhome, but are also glad to have a small one after realizing how much work it takes.

This tree is my favorite. It is a Bird Cherry tree which will have beautiful blossoms in the Spring. Every time I walk by my front door I look out the window and see this tree. I love it!

Friday, October 9, 2009

[..When the cat's away..]

...the mice will play! I went outside for 10 minutes and came back to see this...


Mean Aunt Elan put Tatum's hair in pigtails! I came inside and Tatum was screaming because he didn't want to look like a girl. Then we crack out the camera and he starts smiling...did I train him right or what??

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

[..I {heart} fall..]


I seriously can not believe that it is fall already! I do not love the fact that summer is over and that it is all of the sudden super cold! I do not love that we have already turned our heater on and that we live by our fireplace! And lastly I do not love that on the last day of September it totally snowed at my house!!! However, I do love the scenery, the smells and the decor that come with fall! Fall is the best time of the year because it lets me know that the holidays are just around the corner!

Today I took Tatum up the canyon to enjoy the beautiful scenery and the nice weather. I got a few good shots of the fall colors before Tatum wanted to go home.



Sunday, September 27, 2009

[..aLL gRowN uP..]




My little baby boy is finally becoming a big boy! This little man is almost all the way potty trained!! We still have some work to do, but for the most part Tatum stays in his undies ALL.DAY.LONG. One day about 2 weeks ago he watched cousin Noah go on the potty and he knew from that second on he wanted to go on the potty like a big boy.


Its crazy how well he has caught on...he can get on the potty, do his business, flushes and then gets his little stool and washes his hands all by himself. Its so stinkin' cute to me but at the same time its totally scary how grown up he is.

Tatum we are so proud of you, good work little man!


Sunday, September 20, 2009

[..Lets go fly a kite..]


One of my favorite things about my house is its location. We are nestled right up to AF canyon and the mountains are so close you could practically touch them. One of the benefits of living so close to the canyon is that every night around 6 o'clock there is nice breeze that come through our neighborhood. It is a perfect wind for flying kites. So out we went to buy some kites and headed out to our neighborhood park to fly them.



My Sister and her family moved into our basement while they are in between homes, Tatum has loved having a buddy around 24/7!!

The boys lost interest after about 2 minutes when they found these lone scooters!


Another 10 minutes after that they decided they were ready for dinner and Eric and Jason stayed out flying the kites until it was dark.

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Score... Boys:6, Girls:0

This week we added two more baby boys to the Larsen Grandchildren! We are so excited to have these two finally here and born only 2 days apart!!


[..Lake Powell..]

Lake Powell is seriously Heaven on Earth! It is our most longed for destination during the Summer. We got to spend a few days down there and loved every second of it! Sorry there are a TON of pictures, but I figure it makes up for the MONTH of not blogging :]

Here are the reasons why we LOVE it:

We love the breath taking views...


Tatum learned to love his life jacket....it took some time!


He loved reading stories with JJ and Pop-Pop...


Boxing JJ...


Searching for lizards...


Where's the lizard?


Nope, not on the ground!...


We had fun jumping off the top of the house boat...


and off the cliffs...


We enjoyed shooting water balloons, rocks and fish at the people who decided to park next to us...


We had fun tubing...


and then getting pulled over by this guy for sitting on the back of the boat...


And last but not least we love the wake boarding, skiing, knee boarding etc...


Can you see why this place is our Heaven??