A Happy Birthday to the Cutest Little Boy in the Entire Universe

Well, last week was Kale's 

FIRST birthday!!

I realize it has taken me a week

and a half to post pictures.

Just listen, I have a perfectly 

reasonable explanation...

but it's really long and complicated

so I'll just skip it and get

straight to the cute

little guy :)

We had a super fun day with Kale.

I tried to document as much as

possible so that I could

put lots of pictures up

so that the audience 

might be better able to imagine 

they were there too.

And so, before posting the pictures, 

I simply warn you that there 

are MANY. 

Enjoy:

So we started the day with presents from Mom and Dad.
Tyler gave him this adorable monkey bean-bag chair.
Kale loved it immediately.
Mom gave Kale a few Hot Wheels cars and
another toy I'm not quite sure
how to put into words without sounding
idiotic, so I'll just say it's a learning toy :)

Look at all those presents!!!!
(that blue and green box is the toy I gave him)

The camera was distracting him from the task at hand.

Kale is thinking, "Sheesh Grandma Pam! You gave
me a ton of great presents!"
That's verbatim. I swear.

Kale loves those little cars :)

 

If Kale could, he would probably read those books all day.
I know the expression on his face in this
picture would persuade you
to believe otherwise, but
pictures can be deceiving.
That's why you shouldn't believe tabloids.
You should believe me.

We had a very "efficient" way of opening the presents.
Kale and I make a good team.

Snazzy shoes "from" Uncle Dain! ;)

After opening presents we went out
onto our sad little patio area
to blow some bubbles.
Kale was more interested in the
bubble wand than the bubbles themselves.

Birthday pictures with the 'rents!
(yes mom, I do realize that the shirt I'm wearing has
flowers on it. As Rocketman sort of once said, I'm 24 years old, I'm
almost a full-grown woman!)

Kale trusts his daddy 100%

While daddy was at work, we went to the park,
and I watched Kale climb on everything.

Playing with his new toys!
Look, at that mischievous face!

Birthday cakes I slaved over :)

Kale didn't really eat the cake,
he mostly just played with the frosting.

And that was his birthday!
It was really wonderful.
And it was made that way because of how loved he is
by everyone in our family.
A special thanks to Grandma Pam, Grandpa Pat, Aunt Laura, Uncle Clint, Addison, Kolbi, Aunt Janie, Uncle Mark, Josh, Rubie, Gracie, Uncle Shane, Aunt Realyn, Sadie, Great-grandma Estes, Nana, Poppee, Uncle Jake, Uncle Kyle and Uncle Dain. (Phew!)
We really appreciate the presents you sent, the cards you sent, and the phone calls.
We missed you all so much that day,
we wanted so badly to share it with you all.

The following pictures aren't from his birthday
but they involve birthday presents.

Go Iowa!!

This is the coat we got him from
Grandpa Pat!

September Rocks!

Happy September! 

It's the best month in the whole year, 

and I say that because the weather 

in September is the best.

Especially here in Ellensburg.

It's been GORGEOUS!

It's so great to have the windows open and

to next to never run the air.

Not too much has happened. 

Tyler has been working at the high school like mad

and had to go to his first away football game

on Friday, all the way to freakin Spokane!

Ellensburg hosts the Kittitas County Fair

and it is a huge deal around here.

They don't start school until after Labor Day

because of this Fair.

We haven't gone because it costs money

and we aren't really Fair people.

After we'd been here a week there was a huge

fire just north of Ellensburg.

We didn't know about it because

we don't have TV,

but we saw the ginormous cloud

of smoke and then looked online to find out 

what was going on.

It was a really bad fire and it got within about 10 miles

of us, which freaked me out.

It was raging out of control when we were heading 

for bed and we just had no idea if it was going

to make it to our house.

So, we decided to pack a bag and put it by the 

door, just in case a policeman banged on 

our door in the middle of the night

and told us to get out.

Here's what we packed:

1. Two days worth of clothes

2. Some food

3. Laptop

4. Ipods

5. Kindle/Nook

6. Camera

7. Video camera

8. A folder containing all our legal documents

9. Kale's diaper bag stuff

10. Scriptures

That was it.

It was really strange to actually say,

Ok, our house might burn down, 

so we literally have to choose what 

we'd take, right now.

Luckily we did not have to evacuate :)

Anywho, other than that, we've just been 

hanging out and enjoying

the beautiful weather.

Kale is still adjusting to a new place

His sleeping habits are...deplorable!

But he's still adorable, so 

I forgive him :)

Here are some pics!

  Isn't he so handsome! The flash kept making
                him blink :)

Go Cougars!!

I love it when he holds our hands.

He was so frustrated that he couldn't

crawl up the slide. 

It was hilarious.

Kale! Stop eating the rocks! 

(This is what you would constantly hear me saying if you were at the park with us.) 

Kale LOVES puppies.

                  

Footy pajamas are the best :)

My boys doing some reading together :)

Say Cheese!

A few weeks before we left Utah we took

some family pictures.

And now that we are all situated 

here in Washington,

I can share them with all of you!

          

I really want to make this one black and white but keep his eyes blue, but the 

program on my computer can't do that :( 

                 

         

It's Old, But It's New To Us!

Greetings from Ellensburg, WA!!!

We got here safe and sound at about 5:00 on Monday.

What a drive that was. Kale was a champion!

We made a few stops so he could get his wiggles out but it only

ended up adding on about 20 minutes to the trip overall.

The wonderful Shane and Doug Patterson were

kind enough to drive our moving truck up

which was the BIGGEST help.

When we got here we were able to get in contact

with the Elders Quorum President for 

some extra hands to unload. 

We made quick work of it and tried not to

think about how we had to

UNPACK everything now.

Sidenote: I think I'd rather pack everything up than unpack it.

But now everything is unpacked and we

are really enjoying our new place.

It's WAY better than our old one :)

Here are some pictures of it:

 

So this is our master bedroom. 

It is much roomier than our last one and the window brings in a lot of light which is great.

       

We have TWO closets in our master!

One of which is a walk-in; I can barely believe it myself.

And it's got super rad green shag carpet in it :)   

           Here is Kale's room. His closet is so big   that we've decided to put
      everything in it so that he can have the whole room to play in. I think he likes
       it a lot, only time will tell, right?

That was the upstairs....let's head on down and 

check out the rest. 

(Can you tell that I'm super pumped that I have an upstairs and a downstairs now?)

Here is our lovely living room with my boys ;)

Right next to the living room is our dining room

and then out that door is where we have 

covered parking for our car.

Score!

Say hi to Kale. He always

knows when he's on camera.

And here's the kitchen. I think pictures

make it look a lot smaller than it is.

I think that the cupboard

space is more than what we had at

our previous apartment and because of that

we can have a lot more counter space cleared. 

Also notice the amazing contraption known to us as a dishwasher.

I never want to be without one again.

A few days before we left for Washington my awesome niece, Addison, was

baptized. She asked me to speak on the Holy Ghost,

which I was really nervous for, but I'm 

really glad she did. The whole baptism was

a wonderful and special experience and I'm 

glad we got to participate before leaving. 

Well that about sums it all up.

We met our ward today and everyone seems

very friendly. 

I'm excited to get involved and make 

the most of being here in Ellensburg.

It's a really interesting little town.

There are plenty of places to go and things to 

do but it's still a small community

which feels safe to me. 

Thank you to all who have

helped us on our journey up here wether

it was with your physical efforts

or simply your prayers.

              

Another post will be coming soon. 

I promise!