This is how we do photos....

First off, we don't pay for a photographer.  We are much to cheap for that kind of professionalism. A tripod and remote control cost less than 1/2 the price of a photographer. Secondly, we don't do it on a sunny day. No.  We wait until it is fall and cold and our cheeks are rosy.   And in a studio...that would be much to easy.  Thirdly, we don't chose a location like the park or somewhere we can easily drive to.  Not us.  We pile all our crap into the trailer and ride our bikes, praying we don't get rained on. 

As you can see, I make this all much harder than it needs to be, so we don't do family pictures often.  So you will probably see these on Christmas cards for the next 3 years.

Birthday Week!

The last week of September is Birthday week around here.  On the 26th, Chad hit 27 years.  We celebrated by going to Dave and Buster's without Jordyn!  Our first date alone since we moved to Colorado over a year ago.  We weren't going to go out because Chad was having a crazy busy week at work.  But I just felt like it was time to be a big girl and get a baby sitter.  It is not that I don't want to leave Jordyn (trust me, there are some days that is exactly what I want) and it is not that I don't trust anyone with my daughter.  It has just been that I don't know the youth here very well, and I don't want to burden any of our friends.  But my visiting teachers came to the rescue and offered to watch her for us.  So, Happy Birthday Chad, you got a meal in peace and quiet and rock the arcades.  But for the record, I won ski ball.  Let it be known.

Later in the week, we took Jordyn to the aquarium in Denver. It was such a cute aquarium! It was like the Disneyland of aquariums. Everything was decked out, decorated, and the atmosphere was so fun. A few years ago, the aquarium was bought by Landry's Restaurant chain, so they have a fancy sea food restaurant inside the aquarium. You get to eat fish, while surrounded by fish. A little ironic, but fun still. Jordyn was so excited about the fish! She just ran from tank to tank and pressed her little nose to the glass. She would point to all the fish in the tank and count "One, two, three, ten nine!" It was fun to see her so exited about it!

She called the jellyfish "bubbles".

 

On Sunday, her actual birthday, I made her wear her new birthday dress to church.  She was ticked cause she wanted to wear pants.  And thus, these pics are not the best. Yay for 2!

Sunday evening, we opened gifts, ate cake, and skyped with grandparents.  She was spoiled by her grandparents.  We got clothes and a trampoline for our little jumping Jordaroo.  She was equally excited about both. but mostly excited about balloons.

TOFW

Time Out For Women.  Who knew?!  It is one of those little gold nuggets in life that I discovered this weekend.  A friend told me about the Denver event and organized a group of women who wanted to go.  We went on Friday and heard from Sheri Dew, Virginia Pearce, and Jenny Oaks Baker.  It was a great night!  We went out to eat, spent the night in a fancy hotel downtown.  Ate lots of snacks.  Chatted and laughed a LOT!  Saturday, we heard more great messages from more great speakers.  We ate Indian food (my first time) and tried our best to keep our eyes open after our late night!  Thanks for the fun weeked girls!

 

PS...This event travels all around the country.  If you are looking for a fun girls weekend, look it up!

Another Zoo Day

There are some holidays when I get more homesick than others.  It is always the little holidays, like Labor Day.  As always, I give Chad a fair warning and tell him we need to do something fun or I will probably cry.  He listens well!

We wen to the Cheyenne Mtn. Zoo in CO Springs on Labor Day.  We love a good zoo.  Jordyn loves the animals.  We like this zoo because it is a little more intimate than the Denver zoo.  They have a little petting zoo section and fun playgrounds.  There are a lot of animals you can feed too.  Of course because it was Labor Day it was pretty crowded so we did not stand in any food lines to feed anyone but ourselves.

I love Jordyn's face in this picture!  So excited about the giraffes!

Made friends with the goat.

Utah Vacation!

Before you read this post, take a deep breath, cause it is long.  We were in Utah for almost 3 weeks and there was not a day that we sat still.....

We drove to Utah on Aug. 9th and made our first quick stop in Gunnison, to pick up a second car.  Then we had dinner with some of our favorite Utah friends, Nikki, Jody, and Meggan, and their little families.  I am so grateful I still keep in touch with these friends.  It is so nice to know that even though we are far away, we still have friends in Utah and we always look forward to seeing them.  Nikki was such a good host and allowed the kids to play in the water.  Jordyn had been in the car literally all day and was exstatic to play!  That night, we drove to SLC and stayed with Chad's grandparents.  As always it was great to see them, even though it was brief.

The next day, Chad went golfing with his brother and Tarrin was nice enough to let me chill with her and the kids.  And I finally got to meet the twins!  So adorable!  That afternoon I met my little bro at the airport returning from his mission!  Welcome home Connor!  He got to meet Jordyn for the first time.  She was mostly concerned about showing him her bunny.

We left the airport and drove to Bear Lake.  I had never been there, and I tell you...GORGEOUS!  Chad's parents rented this awesome house.  We spent a day at the beach playing in the sand and riding wave runners.  Jordyn was in heaven!  Unfortunately, I had to leave Bear Lake early to go to my brother's homecoming (which is why we needed the second car and wich is why I only took 100 pictures instead of 1,000!). I know that Chad had a blast sharing Jordyn with his family as they toured caves, played games at the house, and enjoyed  Bear Lake and Logan. Thanks Rod and Lisa for providing such a great get-away for the family!

Do you love how her fat cheeks just roll out of her life jacket?! She was great not to whine about it and wear her life jacket whenever we asked.

When the Bear Lake portion of the vacation was over, Chad and Jordyn joined me in Gunnison to go to Lake Powell.  Oh, how I love Lake Powell!  It was different for me this year.  I realized it is much less of a relaxing vacation now that I have a child to watch.  Less relaxing, but more entertaining.


What is it about digging holes in the sand that is just so satisfying?



More sand.  More water.  Jordyn LOVES the water.



We went for a short boat ride to the huge over-hang you see in the top left picture.  Chad also showed us all up by jumping a huge cliff.  You can see in the bottom left picture where the arrow is how high he was.  Crazy man. 



Skiing, skiing, and more skiing.  Chad again showed us up by getting up on one after only like 3 tries.  To make sure we all know how awesome he is, he crossed the wake the first time he was up.  Pictures are of .....
Top left: My dad.  He is 58 and still skiing like a pro.
Top middle:  Cody
Top right: Canyen
Bottom left: Chad
Bottom right: Casey
I spent a lot of time on the boat this trip because it seemed to be the only way to get Jordyn to sleep.  And the poor girl needed some sleep!

Jordyn learned lots of new words at Lake Powell.  She became obsessed with stars, and, and water.  After we left, I was putting her to bed at my mom's house and she laid there saying, "Oh, water. Oh, boat.  Oh, stars.  Oh, swimming.  Oh, sand..."  On and on, repeating all the things she loved about Lake Powell.

Chad and I split ways at Lake Powell.  He had to be back in Denver for a performance review so he drove home, and I went back to Gunnison with my parents.  Jordyn was pretty confused about the whole thing.  Anytime I asked "Where's daddy?" her reply was "Bye-bye, at the water".  I stayed in Gunnison for a whole week. I got to meet another new nephew, baby Kelton.  My mom started work and it was a really busy week for her.  I was glad to help out with all the kids staying at the house right now.  There were times when it got crazy, but honestly, it was mostly caused by Sam and I!  We wanted to have fun, but that meant taking three 1 year olds and and 3 year old every where we went.  We went shopping, and the park, the derby, El Mex (of course) and at trip up the mountain to roast hot dogs.

I love these mountains!

 

Being with family is great.  And Chad and I are so blessed to have great families who have so much fun together.  Jordyn and I flew back on Aug. 25.  That makes almost 3 weeks.  I was glad to be home with Chad, and Jordyn was glad to be in her own bed.  Bedtime on vacation is no fun for anyone!  Especially 3 weeks worth of bedtime.  I am glad to be in my quiet home.  After being in Colorado for a year now, I am so grateful we are here.  We definately made the right choice.  We have learned so much and become a different family than we were in Utah.  We are different church members here.  We are just different than we were.  Sometimes when I go back, I miss who we used to be.  But then I come home to Colorado and remember that this is a good life!

Monkey Girl

I don't know what has happened, but all of a sudden Jordyn has realized she can climb.  She is always up on our tall chairs and table.  The other day she climbed the railing overlooking our family room, just the way a money climbs a tree.  I have been watching her try to climb out of bed for a while now, but figured she was far from succeeding.  She succeeded.  She ran into our room this morning and woke us up.  My first thought was that someone was in our house and got her out.  Then my more rational brain woke up and I realized she did it.  She broke free.  I put her back in her crib and watched her climb out again.  We put her down for nap, and the same thing.  She climbed right out.  It is scary to watch cause she is just so little, and she just drops.

We bit the bullet and put up the toddler bed.  I really didn't want to.  I know naps and bedtime are going to be hard.  But she is not just going stop climbing out.  So I figured we might as well try to prevent injury and set up the toddler railing. 

I am not going to lie, a little part of me died taking down the crib.  The part of me that never wants her to grow up.  I looked at Jordyn and asked her why she could not just stay my baby forever.  She said "baby" and ran and got me her baby doll.  Then there is the part of me that so cherishes naptime! Oh naptime!  What will I do when it ends!  Jordyn on the other hand was exstatic about the whole thing.  Which is obvious!

What's New

There is really not much new in the Barton house.  Same old, same old.  Just living life day by day.  And in case you are wondering, here is what that is like...

Jordyn:
She is a sweetheart, but she is definitely coming on to two.  The fits are becoming louder and more frequent.   We are figuring out how to discipline, and it sucks!  We suck!  But with all the practice we are getting, I am sure we will get the hang of it.  Jordyn is talking all over the place.  New phrases come along every day.  My favorite lately is when she comes to me with her fake cry and holds up a finger or points to her toes and lets out a pathetic little "owie".  I give it a quick kiss and she shrugs her shoulders and says "all better"!  It makes me giggle every time.

Here are some 4th of July pics...  On a side note, Chad bought her this little golf caddy.  She is obsessed!  I know when to pick my battles, and I did not want a crying picture so I just let her hold on to the caddy.

This is her "cheese" face.

Chad:
Chad is really liking his job.  It is weird to think he has now been working for Microsoft for a year.  He has 5 accounts now.  He has one global account, which means he has conversations with people in New Zealand and UK quite a bit.  It is just kind of funny when he has a call with them on Thursday at 2 pm here, and it is already something like 8 am Friday there. But as much as he likes his job, he likes to golf even more.  He tries to go about once a week.  There were a couple weeks there he had to skip cause he broke a window of a nearby house.  Unfortunately he had to pay to have it replaced, so he took a couple weeks off.  Not his best game!

Mandi:
Staying at home has been a lot better for me the past few months.  I am doing some reading groups with kids in the ward and neighborhood and I love it!  When I started the process, I told myself I would be satisfied if I had 12 students.  I ended up having 14 students in June and 9 in July.  I have had some parents ask me if I will continue during the school year, so I am trying to figure that out and just how I want to run things for an after-school program.  I am also really enjoying Junebug Jane.  I average about one sale a week, which is just enough to keep my hands busy.  I don't make a ton of money, but enough for us to play with a little bit. 

That's all I have to report.  I hope everyone is enjoying summer, cause it is flying by!