I AM A BAD BLOGGER

Yes, I know I am a bad blogger. I have an excuse though - I really have nothing going on in my life or in my mind that is exciting or interesting enough to blog about. If you have a problem with it then start praying for me to have a cute baby (or even a not-so-cute baby for that matter) and then I'll inundate the internet with posts about him/her to the point that you'll rue the day that you wished for me to have a baby. Until then, I'll probably remain more or less MIA in the blog world. However, I do still love to check all y'all's blogs, so keep 'em coming!

Deco

Ok so this is a little belated, but I wanted to give a little birthday shout out to Deco.
What to say about him...Deco is so incredibly unique. I'm certain that anybody who knows him would agree with me that he is completely his own person. He doesn't conform to others' opinions. He doesn't base decisions on what others think is cool - he just does what he thinks is best for him. Deco is an incredibly hard worker. When he played football in high school other players and coaches were constantly saying how he always gave 100%; even though he was not one of the big guys on the team he played as tough as the big guys. He still works that hard in life. At times in the past few years he has worked three jobs at a time (maybe more?). He works very hard to provide for his family and give them a good life. He is a very loving father and one of the most patient people I know.
Deco and I share a special bond. I think this is partly because of how close we are in age (one year and six days), and also because we served our missions at the same time, speaking the same language. We traveled to Brazil shortly after I got home and we had an awesome trip. He is really good about speaking Portuguese to me...I'm not so good about speaking it back to him. Because of him I haven't completely lost the language yet.
I hope he knows how awesome he is. Love ya D!


In this picture we're standing on the border of Brazil and Argentina and you can see Uruguay in the background...pretty cool.

I am a tired person...

So anybody who knows me very well knows that I require a pretty ridiculous amount of sleep in order to function in a normal way. I have always envied people who can consistently sleep four to six hours a night and still get things done. If I get less than six hours of sleep in a night then it takes me a good week of eight to nine hour nights to start feeling half decent again. I have learned from experience that I really need a consistent eight hours a night in order to think clearly, but even then I'm ALWAYS tired. I probably average about 7.5 hours of sleep on weeknights, which isn't ideal for me but I make it work; then on the weekends I need to sleep a ridiculous amount in order to store up a little bit for the coming week of work. My whole family (minus my mom) is notorious for being able to sleep anywhere anytime. It's not possible to live a productive life and to sleep as much as our bodies want us to sleep, so we have all come to accept the fact that we just have to be tired constantly. I have had to find the happy medium where I get enough sleep to be able to function properly, but not so much that I sleep away all the hours in the day to the point of having no time to get anything done. I have slept through more classes (especially in college) and work meetings than any respectable adult should in a lifetime. I am not even one little bit kidding when I say that I think I might have a slight case of narcolepsy or something similar. It often gets to a point where I have absolutely no control over falling asleep, regardless of the amount of caffeine or anything else that I take into my body. And that can happan at any time of day in really any situation, even if I've gotten a full good night's sleep the night before. I'm not sure why I'm putting this into a blog post, other than I want the universe to know that I'm not just lazy - I really really want to be awake more and be more productive, but my body won't let me.

My seester

First of all I wanna say happy Mother's Day to my mom, mother-in-law, grandmas and all the other moms who influence me. I have been blessed to always be surrounded with fabulous moms who are such great examples and support to me.
Besides being Mother's Day, today is also Kristi's birthday so I wanted to give her a little shout out.
When I was young I remember being taught in church or in school (can't remember for sure...probably church though) that we should pick good role models to try to model our lives after. So we made a list of people that we admired and who we thought were good examples. I don't remember anyone that was on my list except Kristi. She has always been such a fun person to be around and I don't even remember her being mean to me when I was a little annoying girl trying to follow her and her friends around.
Kristi is one of the bravest people I know. Her and Camryn are in the process of breaking Camryn's new horse (Stella) right now. The other day they were in the little round pen and something spooked Stella and she took off at a sprint going in circles. Kristi got right in her path and started waving her arms. I'll tell you what, I would have been finding a way out of that little pen...ain't no way I would step in front of a semi wild horse who was running at that speed. But not Kristi, she just stepped in the way and Stella stopped and calmed down. Kristi used to rappel a lot, which I've done a few times but it scares the crap out of me.
Kristi is a HARD worker. She is an awesome mom and devotes a ton of time to her kids' various activities. Very rarely is she doing only one thing at a time. She usually has her computer doing her coding stuff while also attending to her kids' every need, answering my coding questions and laughing at Jeremy's jokes all at the same time. I hope that someday my kids turn out half as cool as hers. I have absolutely loved living so close to Kristi and her family ever since I moved to Blanding. I'm glad she married someone who my husband can be such good friends with. We love hanging out with them.
I'm so glad to have Kristi as my sister and friend. I love her guts! Happy Birthday Kris!

It's a Boy!

That's right, we're the proud new owners of Elmer; he is a CUTE black shi-tzu puppy. He's the son of Ellie (my mom's dog) so we've known him since he was born. He is so sweet and so far he seems pretty laid back. There are two exceptions to his laid-backedness - He does not like it when his mom bullies him around and he fights back. They get into some pretty ferocious barking/biting matches, but he never starts the fights. Ellie is a really laid back and sweet dog too, so I think she just feels threatened by all the attention he is getting and she'll calm down once we all get used to each other. The other exception is when we leave him in his little sleeping area all alone at night. He yaps and cries like the world is ending. It is the saddest thing ever, but he is not potty-trained nearly enough to let him sleep anywhere else yet.
Camryn named Elmer when he was born and we think the name fits so we decided to keep it. Taylor tries to act like Elmer doesn't completely melt his heart but they totally love each other and he hates it when Elmer cries when we have to leave him alone at night. We love our new doggy!

Calling all foodies

I have started a new blog. If you spend any time in the kitchen, whether you like to cook or not, then check it out here What's for Dinner?. I love cooking but I usually hate deciding what to make for dinner/events, so my vision is that a bunch of us can post delicious recipes and help each other out with ideas of yummy things to make. If you would like to be a contributor to the blog and I didn't already send you an invitation, send me your email address and I'll add you.

What ever happened to grammar and punctuation?

Warning - I'm going to step onto my soapbox for a moment. I was going to give specific examples of all of the common grammatical and punctuation errors that drive me nuts that I see on blogs, emails, FB etc. (and billboards and "professional" websites for crying out loud - if you're going to pay that much money to get your name/business advertised maybe you should have someone who passed the second grade edit it before you print it). Apostrophes (possessive & contractions) seem to be the biggest culprits. Don't even get me started on the messes that happen when people start mixing plurals and possessives; and beyond that are last names that end in 's'...always a disaster. Anyway, I won't bore everybody with a full lesson because I know that nobody cares and I'm not an expert anyway. But I needed to get my opinion out into the universe that as a society we're starting to look pretty stupid if we can't even put into practice the very basic and common lessons we learned in grade school. And no, I'm not perfect and I'm sure I've got my share of errors in stuff that I write, but I hope that I do better than a lot of things I read these days.

I'm going to finish off my post with a thought from my good friend Ross, who pointed out to Rachel that y-o-u-'-r-e means "you are" and y-o-u-r means "your."

J.O. VB

When I was somewhere in my pre-teen years the Junior Olympic Volleyball program was first brought to Blanding. I played every year that I could and I absolutely loved it! Since then it has gotten bigger and more popular each year. Volleyball is huge in Blanding and they start these girls nice and young learning the fundamentals of the game. Kristi and I are coaching Camryn's team this year. They are all 4th graders who had never played any organized volleyball before and they are all learning so fast.

Camryn - our clutch server...seriously she did awesome!

We had our first tournament in Monticello last weekend and it brought back so many good memories and I really had a lot of fun with the girls. They had such good attitudes and I love their enthusiasm for the game! I wanted to get out there and play with them so badly. They didn't need me though; they did just fine on their own. Tomorrow we have a tournament here in Blanding. I think the girls are really going to come into their own on their home turf.
Enjoy some pics from last week's tourney!

How bout those socks...pretty great right?

Besides being an awesome server, Cam-bam is a really consistent passer too. She's fun to coach

Update

Ok so we've lived in Blanding for a couple of weeks now and there's not much to tell but it seems like it's time for an update. I started my job with the court immediately after moving here; it's going well, but it's overwhelming as all new jobs are.
Taylor's been able to do some random odds and ends to try to keep himself busy, but he's still looking for his dream job. Keep your fingers crossed that we find it soon! Dream jobs are not plentiful in Blanding.
We are loving the slowness and relaxedness (made up word) of living here. My parents have been awesome hosts and it's been fun spending time with them and eating my mom's delicious cooking again :)
We're looking forward to getting completely unpacked and settled in so we can start spending more time with friends.
I am coaching my niece's J.O. volleyball team with Kristi. So far it's been pretty fun - we've only had a few practices; our first tournament is this weekend...should be interesting. The girls haven't ever played before so hopefully they at least have fun with it and learn a little something. It's been really fun to get to hang out with Camryn...she's my little buddy.
So that's the rundown of our first couple of weeks in Blanding...we still think it's the best place in the world.
Oh and P.S. we're still looking for renters (or better yet, buyers) for our townhouse so if anyone knows of anyone that might be interested send them our way!

Gettin' back to my roots

I grew up in a lovely tiny town called Blanding, Utah. I loved growing up in the middle of nowhere and I always felt like it was the best place in the world. I always thought that it would be great if I could raise my children there but I knew that would be unlikely to happen if I married a non-Blandingite. When I met Taylor and we decided to get married I figured I was sealing my fate to being stuck in the “big city.” Taylor grew up in West Jordan and his parents and sisters all live within about 20 miles of each other. Luckily I really do like SLC and I figured at least we would always be close to his family and we would likely always be close to at least some of my siblings, being that four of them live in Utah County currently. After one of our first trips to Blanding together as we were driving home Taylor said something to the effect of how much he loved Blanding and that he had a strong feeling that we should try to find a way to live there. Of course I was super happy to hear this, but I made myself stay rational by remembering that it is very difficult to find good jobs in the middle of nowhere and I also worried that Taylor might regret saying he wanted to live there. But as time passed he only became more sure of wanting to live there so we decided to start passively looking at job openings. We assumed it would take quite awhile for us to find the right job opportunity and for us to feel ready to give up city living. Well it did take awhile, but not quite as long as we had thought. A job opening came up at the court in ‘Cello late last year and multiple people told me I should apply. At first I was hesitant because this was the kind of job that I knew I would have an actual chance of getting and I didn’t want to apply if we weren’t serious about moving there this soon. After Taylor and I talked about it a lot and read through the job description a few times we decided I should apply. Well to make a long story a little less long, I ended up being offered the job last week and we have decided to take it. It took fasting, praying, temple-going and even a few tears for us to decide that this is the right thing for us. That is not to say that we are not scared out of our minds, but we know that it will all be ok and we’re super excited for this new chapter in our lives. Unfortunately we bought our townhouse at the exact wrong time and the market has only dropped since then so we don’t have much hope of selling it for close to what we paid for it right now. So we have decided to rent it out and hope that the housing market rebounds sooner than later. We are going to stay with my parents for right now; for their sake hopefully that will end up being a short-term arrangement. As scared as we are to be taking on this new endeavor, I am so so excited to get to be around my parents. They’re two of my top favorite people in the world so I’m so happy that they’re willing to let us crash their empty nest. We are really sad to be moving far away from Taylor’s family and most of my siblings; we will miss getting to see the kids as often as we do. But now we get to hang out with Kristi and Jeremy and their kids so much that they’ll probably be sick of us after a week so we’re looking forward to that! Anyway, the moral of the story is that we are moving to Blanding; we are equal parts excited, scared and sad. I think I am really going to enjoy my new job and I am going to LOVE only working 40 hours a week and not having to stop at any traffic lights or deal with traffic jams on my way to or from work. I think that Taylor and I will adapt very well to laid back Blanding life. People keep asking us what they can do to help. The two things that would be the biggest help for us right now would be for someone to find Taylor a job and for someone to want to buy an overpriced, but very cute townhouse. Since most likely you won’t be able to do either of those things then just cross your fingers for us and hope that all goes well with the move.




GIRLS NIGHT
My super fun sister Noelle hosted a very fun “girls night in” at her house last Friday. She put a lot of work into making it an awesome night for everyone, especially my cute nieces. We all had a blast; we were just sad that Kristi, Kera and Aleyah couldn’t make it. I am just going to post some cute pictures, but if you want more details of the fun evening (as I’m sure you’re all dying to know every last detail of what we did) then you can check out Heather, Marilyn or Noelle’s blogs (I assume my mom will blog about it at some point too).

CUTE CUTE McCoy was the only boy that got to crash the party

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

2009 ended very enjoyably for us. We spent a few days in Blanding for Christmas. We always love our time down there and this was no different. All of my siblings were there, except Joshy, but we did get to talk to him on Christmas day. As it always is when we're all there it was a circus, but it was a very fun circus. I am so thankful for the Christmas season that reminds us to think of the birth of our Savior and it always helps me to realize how blessed I am.


My nieces and nephews acted out a live nativity scene at our Halliday and Lyman family parties. These pictures are from the Christmas Eve nativity in our garage...those are some darn cute kids.


I included this picture because it is the best picture that I got of Paco. We surprised my dad during the nativity with his Christmas present - a donkey! For a couple of weeks before Christmas a lot of people accidentally made mention of the donkey while my dad was around, so I don't think he was very surprised that we got him a donkey, but I don't think he was expecting it on the 24th so at least that part was a surprise. Yes, you read right, we got my dad a donkey for Christmas. My dad had a donkey named Eager when he was younger that he absolutely loved and still talks about. We've joked about getting him a donkey before, but this year we decided we should just stop joking and find the right donkey to join our family. My dad named him Paco and we all absolutely love him. Seriously though, how could you not? He is one cute donkey!

Jake and Maxon played the part of the sheep and they did a very good job of it. Cohen was supposed to be a sheep with Max, but the poor little guy got very sick and spent most of the night at the hospital getting breathing treatments. Luckily, Jake was ready to step in at the last minute.

Grandpa loved Paco right from the first minute he met him.

New Year's Eve also ended up being a lot of fun for us this year. We invited a few friends over to our place at the last minute and just ended up hanging out, rocking out (Rock Band) and eating lots of junk. Happy 2010!!!

We tried a lot of combinations to get our band tour-ready. Some combinations were much better than others, but all in all we rocked out pretty well and had a lot of fun.

Krew even got to join in on the fun for a little while.

Here's the guys ringing in the new year by pulling the popping confetti things. I hope 2010 is as great for us as 2009 was!