" get in my belly!!"

we may need to start working on table manners before thanksgiving.

update

so we just got the internet a few days ago and it's great to be reconnected with the world. as you all know, we have spent the last month fixing up our new house and we are finally in. we moved on halloween and want to thank everyone for their help in fixing up our house and also in moving us!!

it was carter's first halloween and as you can guess we were too busy with other things to think about dressing our kid up. but thanks to my friend trisha (who gave us a lion costume), carter was able to be a lion for halloween. ok, so really he was only a lion for about two seconds. he didn't care for his costume and since it was pretty big, i released him from the torture. but not before i got a few pictures.











































we weren't able to finish everything before we moved in but it's a work in progress. we still have holes in some of the walls, flooring missing and a whole list of other projects, but we are not suffering. i am almost growing fond of the cardboard flooring in the hall :) when we moved in we didn't have any appliances in the kitchen because the floor was not finished. but by the end of the first week ty finished the kitchen floor and put in all the appliances. having the kitchen completed has made all the difference! we are loving our new house and it provides us with a continuous project, i guess that is the beauty of home ownership. the following posts have a million pictures of the house so sorry. i only post them because some have asked for them and most people who read this live very far away, so here you go.



oh and one last funny story. last night tyrell and i went to a baptism. carter was with us and because i had to play the piano, it was tyrell's job to take the baby out when he was fussy. and boy was he fussy. tyrell was outside with him nearly the entire baptism, during which, you could periodically hear carter crying. but it was when tyrell took carter into the bathroom to change him that it became embarrassing. the bathroom is of course, connected to the baptismal font, so when they were in there you could hear carter crying really well (carter does NOT like his diaper changed, so by the sound of things, he was putting up a good fight).

mean while, in the service...we were singing the closing song. at this point, i was trying not to smile too much while i was playing the piano. the song ended but the crying did not. it was then time for the closing prayer (and of course the silence made the crying that much more obvious and awkward), and to conclude the prayer, the missionary prayed "and bless the baby that he will be happy.... amen" . it was pretty funny and i could feel my face turn red as i tried not to laugh out loud.

before and after

dining area




























our bathroom

































our bedroom



(which is hard to take pictures of but here is the south west corner from the doorway)
















































the kitchen




(which looked a lot bigger with out the fridge)

the front bathroom

this is what it originally looked like. the floor is white linoleum covered by stick on square linoleum which was coming up and smelled like urine.












once we got that floor up we found the mold on the OSB













so tyrell had to cut a chunk of it out and replace it












the cement board down and ready for tile
















tile in












the finished product


ready for visitors!

the front room

the continued progression of the front room

it's still a work in progress but we are liking it so far

the tile

it was always understood that when i married, it had to be to a handy man. i have five brothers and while some are more handy than others, lets just say handiness is lacking in my family. so when i met tyrell, i knew he would fit the bill.

he is handy alright, and it is really nice to have someone who can fix things (especially because i have a tendency to break things). after we bought the house and made the decision to fix it up, tyrell was sure he could do all the improvements himself. now the improvements we wanted to make, also included things he had never done before, and one of those things was tiling.

my mom was a lot of help and came up to get us started. she was here to tell us what supplies we would need and the basics of tiling. but unfortunately we had to send her back to AZ before we actually started.

so last friday we were finally in a position to lay tile. after tyrell had asked all the questions he thought he needed, he started mixing the thin set. i was not at the house when he started and when i arrived at the house he was a bit frantic. he was trying to mix the thin set in a 5 gallon bucket with an old piece of baseboard. he was stirring with all his might (because at this point the mixture was barely moist at all) and complaining that the ratio of thin-set to water on the bag was not correct. i read the instructions and asked if he has added the right amount of water. after realizing that he had only put half as much as it called for, we added the rest of the water (and a bit more) and the thin set was still pretty dry and lumpy.

(don't let the smile fool you... this was a real low point)

so as always, my mother was called ( because she is our point of reference) and we asked what consistency the thin -set should be. she told us it should be "cream of wheat-y". well this is a pretty relative reference and after talking to her we called my friend chuck. he told us it should be the consistency of peanut butter. so after we spoke to our food relating references, we took our lumpy thin- set and laid the cement board. (we were on a time crunch because you only have two hours of working time once you start mixing the thin-set)

anyway after a long process, with lots of questions, lots of... 'i don't knows', some yelling,

a few mild explitives,

and some referencing to the flooring book,

he was finally able to lay the first tile.

and after a whole days work... he was able to lay three tiles. learning is a long process.

upon my suggestion he went to the class they have at home depot the next day. he was able to ask all his questions and get a visual (non food related) idea of the correct consistency of thin set. i think that this next week laying tile should be a little easier.

thanks tyrell for being so talented!!

later: adventures in framing, drywall and electrical.

carter

so carter has been drug to the hosue everyday and had some new experiences. he has been pretty good and i am sure has enjoyed:

1. playing in the middle of the construction zone in his exersaucer, while learning about framing and dry wall.

2. being strapped to a folding chair for lunch

3. playing in his pack and play with a paint stirring stick

4. and i think his all time favorite.... playing on a card board box with the new wood flooring.

even though he has had to endure working on the new house, (don't call CPS yet -well if you hadn't already due to the broken leg) we are still finding time to:

1. eat delicious meals at home. (and flash the new teeth) he loves feeding himself and is getting really good at it.

2. enjoy taking baths

3. play before bed

4. and hang out with dad (look at those cheesy smiles)

he got his cast off on the 9th of october! free at last.

the house

so that house we put a bid on a few posts ago, is now ours! well it has been for several weeks, and has been consuming our lives. we are remodeling a little, painting everything, and replacing all the flooring. so here are some pictures of the progression of the front room.

i think we are really going to like it when we are finished!

in here we painted, tore out the closet and added a half wall

couple quiz

♥ What are your middle names? wayne (my grandpas name.. wayne smith) and mine is now lee
♥ How long have you been together? 22 months
♥ How long did you know each other before you started dating? well we met when we were 15ish in st. johns over the 24th, and then never saw each other until he asked me out in 2007. so if you count that, we could say about 11 years. if you don't, then it was sort of a blind date deal.
♥ Who asked who out? He asked me upon encouragement from my cousin (his sister-in-law). i was just another tally mark on his goal to go out with 100 girls. he claims he was doing this to follow the counsel of an apostle (you know create a dating pool). i personally think this may have been a bit excessive, and i think my number was somewhere in the 50's. once we decided we were 'together' he was glad he didn't have to add another 50 to his list.
♥ Who made the first move? He did but it took a long time. we were dating for a while (traveling back and forth from az to ca) and my dad asked me if he had kissed me yet. when i told him that he had not my dad asked, 'what is he... gay?". not your normal fatherly reaction perhaps, but apparently my dad thought it took too long.
♥ Did you go to the same school? Nope i was an ASU sun devil and he was a EA gilla monster/CSU-P thunder wolf
♥ Are you from the same home town? no, i am from st. johns and he is from pima
♥ Who is the smartest? i would say that it depends on the area of knowledge...
♥ Who majored in what? i majored in nursing and tyrell majored in automotive industry management
♥ Who is the most sensitive? depends on the time of the month (this is tyrell's answer)
♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple? we don't go out to eat much but we like johnny carinos.
♥ Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple? from michigan to ithaca to palmyra, to kirtland, to colorado, to arizona. that was a really long drive but we also went to cancun last summer. it was great.
♥ Who has the worst temper? I do hands down. i have yet to see tyrell loose his.
♥ How many children do you want? four to five.
♥ Who does the cooking? If there is anything cooked in this house it is because i made it. tyrell hates to cook. a reality he did not reveal until after we were married.
♥ Who is more social? i would say we are tied.
♥ Who is the neat-freak? tyrell is a neater freak than i (although i would consider myself neat). he loves buying organizers and is still trying to teach me that everything has it's place. i'm not buying it :)
♥ Who is the most stubborn? again that would be me.
♥ Who wakes up earlier? tyrell i am not a morning person at all.
♥ Where was your first date? we climbed the locked fence to play raquetball in the outdoor racquetball courts. and don't worry i beat him :)
♥ Who has the bigger family? Me, his family has 5 kids and mine has 6.
♥ Do you get flowers often? i wouldn't say often, but i do for special occasions, anniversary or birthday.
♥ How do you spend the holidays? Well, we have been married for two christmas's and i have worked both of them. but not this year... from here on out we are spending holidays with our families!
♥ Who is more jealous? We aren't the jealous type
♥ How long did it take to get serious? 3 months i think
♥ Who eats more? i think i do
♥ What do you do for a living? tyrell teaches at the university and i am a stay at home mom taking a break from nursing (at the hospital not the feeding your baby kind)
♥ Who does/did the laundry? i do most of the laundry but tyrell helps out every now and again
♥ Who’s better with the computer? ty
♥ Who drives when you are together? ty
♥ What is "your" song? we don't have one.

it's broken?

well it has already begun. carter at the age of seven months has broken his first bone. he was a victim of neglect, as his mother left him on the bed unattended, from which he fell off and broke his femur. and his parents, being the caring and loving parents that they are, didn't even take him to the doctor until 5 days later. in our defense, he didn't cry enough to evoke panic or serious concern in either of us or his maternal grandmother (she was here when it happened). he cried the first day (but not a 'i broke my leg' cry) and we discovered that he would not put weight on his left leg when held in the standing position. but as the day progressed he seemed to be doing much better and we decided to wait and see how he felt the next day. there was no redness, bruising, swelling, deformity, he could move his leg and all his joints, and i was not able to locate a particular point of pain as i squeezed up and down his leg. so we waited. his behavior was mostly normal (note that he was also teething and had a diaper rash at this time) but still no weight on the leg. so when the flamingo stance thing didn't go away, we went to the doctor. after an xray, the doctor came in and told me his femur was broken.... after i realized that he wasn't joking, i felt terrible. poor kid, we had been squeezing and moving that poor leg around for days trying to diagnose what was wrong. i know i am possibly the worst mother i know. i saw the xrays and it was a break all the way across his femur right above his knee. thank heaven it was above the growth plate and the doctors say he should heal normally and will have no future problems. the next day we went to an orthopedic doctor (who told us he had a bi-cortical buckle fracture) and they casted his poor chubby leg. he held perfectly still and just like before he didn't even cry.



so this is carter while his leg was broken, but before we knew. he was still moving all around on it when it was broken (another reason i thought that for sure it wasn't broken).














this is carter at lake powell the day after he got his cast. he was a great baby the whole time and he didn't seem to mind hanging out in the pack and play.









and this is carter after he wiggled out of his cast. thankfully it was the day we already had an appointment.













and this is carter with his new removable splint. after we went to the doctor they said it was healing great and he was already making new bone. his skin was really red behind his knee so they decided to put the splint on so i can take it off, bathe him, and put cream on his poor skin. i think he likes his few moments of freedom.












the cast has not slowed him down; he scoots, and rolls, and sits, gets on his hands and knees and shimmies all over the place. the cast doesn't seem to bother him and for that i am grateful. hopefully he will only need it for a few more weeks. we love you carter

arizona

so right after we found a place to live in colorado, we threw our stuff in the rental and headed to az. i'll give you the abbreviated version.

we went to st. johns for the 24th of july celebration. it was tons of fun and we got to see a lot of family and friends. we stayed the following week also and even got to take a trip to lyman lake. it was cloudy and windy the whole time and we had 6 children under the age of 5 but we had a great time and no one drowned. so i would say it was a success.

then it was off to the valley for lake fun, visiting and shopping.
lyman was carters first lake experience. he did well and his second was at lake saguaro. it was also fun and tyrell even took carter for his first lake swim.

while we were in the valley i was able to find carter an adorable blessing outfit (it was a three piece suite). great grandma and grandpa smith were the first to see it.

then it was on to pima for a week and carter's baby blessing. we had lots of family and friends in town and it was a beautiful blessing. but because carter fell asleep, and it was REALLY hot, and everyone was getting ready to go home right after sacrament meeting, we only managed to get two pictures of the occasion. and then we lost our camera which is why the rest of the trip was not documented. (but don't worry it was later discovered at ty's parents in one of the chair cushions.)

and the big scrape on carters head was a mysterious cousin/chair accident from the day before.

we had fun in pima and from there went to lake powell. and of course that was a great time. carter did get a little chaffed, which caused some pain and crying but it was minimal and he didn't seem to mind staying under the canape the next day.

so we are now in pueblo, most of our things are out of boxes, and we are getting adjusted. it has been pretty easy since we have been here before and already know people.

our friends have taken us out on their boat several times and during one of those trips carter got his first sun burn. he didn't seem to mind too much.

we put a bid on a home here in pueblo and are waiting to hear if we got it or not. here's hoping. ty's job is proving more time consuming than he originally thought. mainly because there was not any material for him to work with. so he is basically starting from scratch the first week of school. he is keeping his head above water and thankfully he has said, even though it is horribly busy right now, he thinks he is really going to like this job. he is getting paid to learn. hopefully he will have things a little more together before he starts school himself in a few weeks. things are crazy around here but we are hanging in there. wish us luck!