Christmas

OUR HANDSOME BOYS!!

Let it Snow!!!

So today was the first time in about 2 years that we had to shovel snow. To be honest it was pretty fun. I'm sure after we have to do it several times the fun will ware out. Landen had the blast in the snow and Porter thought it was pretty neat. This was the first time Porter has been able to play in the snow. We borrowed the neighbors sled and Ty took them on sleigh rides. They both seemed to enjoy. We got about 4inches of snow and we are expecting more. So it is looking a lot more like Christmas!!

Christmas Time!!

Yeah it's Christmas time. Landen is so excited for Christmas!! He was so excited to put the Christmas tree up and to put the candy canes on it. Porter had fun staring at the lights and watching mom and dad walk in circles around the tree. We are sad that we are not going to be coming home for Christmas, but we are excited that we are going to be able to create some of our own traditions. We decided that since we wouldn't be coming home for Christmas we would spoil ourselves and buy new Christmas decorations that matches our furniture in our home. While Ty was in Utah I dragged him to Tai Pan Trading (I love this store. Good news is we have Gordmans that has some of the same things Tai Pan has for about the same cost. YEAH!! It is my favorite store here in Nebraska. Shhh don't tell Ty he thinks my favorite store is Bass Pro Shop. Lets just say I'm trying to be a supportive wife. Well to be honest I just want to make sure he doesn't come home with everything in the store.) and we found the cutest variety of snowmen. (If you know me well you know that I love snowmen.) I was so exited I wanted to buy every single one I found. To be honest I came really close too. They were all just so cute. We haven't found a tree skirt or stockings that match yet, but we were really excited for the way the tree turned out. I thought I would post some pictures of them and show you how they turned out.

Our New House!!

So this is our new place. We absolutely love it. We have great neighbors which makes it that much better. I don't have pictures of our bathroom or the office. They haven't been decorated yet. Someday we will get around to it. The bathroom is just another bathroom with a toilet, sink, and shower so you can just imagine it. The office is going to look great as soon as we get it put together. So I'll probably put pictures on when we get that all finished. Well we are having fun here and all is well.

We could go broke!

Those of you that know me and my husband well know that we enjoy the outdoors. Well as we were driving around town we noticed a sign that said Bass Pro Shop and another that said Cabella's. Oh we are in trouble!! Since we have nothing and I mean absolutely nothing to do until Monday we decided to spend the day going to these outdoors stores. Bass Pro Shop was in Iowa and Cabella's was at the other side of Omaha in La Vista. So we just made one big circle to go to both of them. We went to Bass Pro Shop first. Landen was so excited when we walked in. He loves seeing the animal. I think his favorite part was the big fish tank and the glass elevator. We had a lot of fun at both stores. Ty is so excited that both of them are really close. He says he is going to get a part time job there so he can buy lots of new fun toys. He made quite the list of things he would love to have!

Housing Up-date!

We are no longer homeless!!! Yeah!!! I am so excited. I was starting to believe that we were all going to have to get thick flannel shirts, some walking sticks, and cans of beans. But thankful enough we won't have to! We still have to stay in our beautiful hotel room, which by the way I was going to start decorating with our things because I thought we were never going to leave. We get the keys to our house on Monday. My wonderful husband was persistent with the military housing office and in the end we get a nice 3 bedroom 2 1/2 bathroom fully renovated duplex!! With a garage! Yeah!! I am so so excited!! The outside doesn't really have anything to special, but the inside is cute and is going to be so cute with all our stuff! When we get moved in and settled I will post some pictures of it! It was pretty crazy! Yesterday we went with our realtor to look at a house that was about 25 minutes away from where Ty has to work. It was a nice house that needed a lot of TLC. So we talked about it and decided that it was going to be to much of a commute and with the gas prices here it wasn't going to be worth it. So when we got back to our hotel Ty's phone rang and it was the military housing company. She said they had a renovated one and to come look at it ASAP so we pack the kids in the car and went straight there. We looked and loved the house then went straight back and did the lease agreement. The houses here are first come first serve so we wanted to make sure we got everything done so we have a place. Anyways I am just way excited. I can't wait to start decorating it!

Winter Quarters Temple

Last night we were pretty bored and wanted to get out of our nice little hotel room so we decided to drive and see the Winter Quarters Temple in Omaha. It was only a 25 minute drive which will be so much nicer than and 2 1/2 hour drive. The directions we got off of map quest took us on a partial dirt road to get to the Temple. As we were driving on the dirt road I couldn't help but think of the Pioneers that probably crossed that same road. The Temple is so beautiful. You can't tell in the pictures, but the little round windows in the front are actually stained glass windows with different pioneer scenes. They are really beautiful! The Temple is a lot smaller than most of the Temples in Utah. In the back of the Temple there is a Pioneer Cemetery. Across from the Temple is a Pioneer Museum. It was an amazing experience to be where the pioneers were. It makes me really thankful for all the things I have including a small hotel room.

Life in TLF

We've made it to Nebraska and well it has been a little well lets be honest pretty crazy! Before we came we had talked to housing and they told us there was not wait for base housing. So we packed everything up in our Penske truck (this time we got a 26' truck instead of a 16' truck and we didn't have to leave anything behind) and made the 15 hours journey. (FYI if you get a 26' truck from Penske they will only go 70 mph even when the speed limit is 75 mph. On mapquest it was only supposed to be almost 13 hours, but we putted right along and made it in 15.) Oh yes we left on Saturday spent the night in Sidney NE, then drove the rest of the way to Omaha. (We actually are in city called Bellevue.) So we are all excited to be here and get our house on Monday. So Monday we go to housing and they tell us they only have one house and it is not a renovated house. In fact they are planning the destroy it in a year or so. So we walk into this house and kid you not it was 10 times worse then the old houses in Monterey. There was tan linoleum throughout the house probably the original stuff from when the built it. There was some of the pieces replaced with white linoleum. The appliances where also probably from the 1960's. Oh it was bad. I told the lady that this was not acceptable. We have 2 boys. One of which is going to start crawling soon and I really wanted a house with carpet. She told us if we wanted a renovated home that we would have to wait for weeks. We told her that we were going to look at other options. Well since that initial visit on Monday, Ty has gone in every day to see what is available with them. So hopefully something will work out. We have also been talking to a realtor and looking at houses. Houses here are really cheap the only problem is there property taxes are crazy!!! Our realtor has informed us that they are number 6 in the country for the highest property tax. So anyways while all this has gone on our Penske truck is sitting in the parking and we are staying in Temporary lodging. Oh the joys of being a military family!

Happy Halloween!!

Yes I know Halloween was a week ago, but life around here has been a little crazy!! So I just wanted to post some cute pictures of my cute little boys!! Landen was a cowboy on a horse and Porter was a little spider. We went to a ward Trunk-or-Treat and they both won prizes for their costumes!! I was such a proud mom!! We also had a family Halloween party so Ty and I dressed up. Ty was a priest and I was a pregnant nun. (This is not an announcement by any means!! Porter is only 5 months old and well we just thought

the costumes would be really funny!)

Girls Night Out!

Yesterday was so much fun. We had a girls night out! It is so fun to get with everyone and hear what is going on in there lives. Thanks so much for everyone that came! It is so fun to get with girls that are the same age and going through some of the same things in life! We missed all of you that couldn't make it, but we are going to get together again sometime before I leave so make sure you keep your calendars clear and come and play!

Much needed break!

So for those of you that don't know Ty has came back from Texas. (YEAH!!!) He is done with all of his training there and is ready to move on to other things. Well we didn't know whether he was going to be able to come back to Utah for a little vacation or not until Wednesday. (FYI he had already bought a plane ticket to leave Texas first thing Thursday morning) So have I confused anyone yet?? Well being in the military we have learned not to make plans because for some reason they always change. When Ty arrived in Texas he was told that his next training after Texas was about 6 months out so they had told him to make plans to move us to Omaha and while we were in Omaha he would have to leave and go to his training in Washington. So we had made all the arrangments to move to Omaha on the 9th of October. Well the Tuesday before Ty was supposed to come home and start getting ready to move they recieved his SERE dates and they were from the 1st of October. So they didn't really know what to do and whether they were going to let him come to Utah for a break or stay in Texas and do casuals, but everything turned out okay and he was able to come back to Utah for a little break. The way to whole thing has turned out is going to be much easier on us. While Ty is in Washington doing his SERE training we will just stay in Utah. He gets done on the 19th of October, so he will fly back in on the 20th and they be a recruiters assistant for 2 weeks then we will pack up and drive to Omaha sometime around the first of November.

Since Ty was coming back we planned a weekend get-away to Logan. It was so fun and nice to just have some time to ourselves. It has been so nice to have him back home. I have sured missed him a lot and he is so helpful with the boys. They are also so excited to have him back.

Dinosaur Park again

Isn't this the cutest caveman you have ever seen!!


Yes I do believe that some of the individuals in this picture are the most dangerous creatures, but I'm not going to say who. We had such a fun time together. It is so great to have Ty back!


(This is Landen and Kenzi in the picture.)

Landen had so much fun at Dinosaur Park on his birthday that he just had to take his dad when he got here. So Ty flew in Thursday night and first thing Friday morning we were at Dinosaur Park again.

Landen is 3!!!

It is so crazy to think that we have a 3 year old, but I guess that's what happens when time flies on by. On his birthday we had a birthday party at Dinosaur Park. He had a blast! He had so much fun meeting new friends and playing with them so thanks to everyone that came! He has been pretty desperate for new kids to play with since we had to leave all his old friends in California ( He really misses his old friends and is constantly asking if we can go home). On Sunday we went to Grandpa and Grandma Loveless' for another birthday party where he was completely spoiled, but he loved every second of it. He was so funny he would open a present, put it done, then ask for another one. He really didn't care about what the present was he just wanted to open them. This morning he was finally interested in what was inside all those boxes he opened. In fact he woke up at 6:45 a.m and wanted his presents out of the care. It has been so fun watching him be so excited about his birthday.

Family Vacation

Our whole family came to visit us in California for Porter's baby blessing. I thought it would be fun to update everyone on what is going on with the Barker/Stanger/Loveless/Smith family. Steve and BreeAnne still live in Chicago. Bree is an ICU nurse and is working on receiving her bachelors. Steve is working for Blue Cross Blue Shield and is also working on his Masters. They still have their dog Guss and their cat Mino and they have added a new addition another cat named Newt. Bronson and Megan got married in March. Bronson works for my dad and Megan does home health care. They are living in the house that Ty and I use to live in. Cortney, Brooke, and Kenzi are all doing well. Cortney works for the city and Brooke works for Wells Cargo. Kenzi will be 2 in just 2 months. Brigette is going to be in Jr. High this year and Braxton will be in 3rd grade. My parents are very busy people. My dad is still building houses and my mom is still doing hair. So that is just a brief update on everyone.

Gilroy Gardens

On Saturday we went to Gilroy Gardens. It is an amusement park that also has some gardens and it is in Gilroy. Thus the reason its called Gilroy Gardens. Most of the rides are made for little kids, so Landen had a blast there. To be honest we all had a blast there. We went with our friends that also have 2 boys that are the same age as our 2 boys. I think Landens favorite thing to do their was driving the cars around. He took Ty on a ride then he came back and took Brigette and me on a ride. While he was driving Brigette and I around their was another kid driving a car coming for us and Landen looked at me and said those are crazy drivers. It was so funny! Gilroy was really hot compared to Monterey. When we left Monterey the fog was still in and it was probably only 60 degrees. Once we got out of the fog and into Gilroy it was 75 degrees. By the end of the day it had hit 90 degrees. (I know we shouldn't complain about that weather compared to what the weather has been like in Utah, but it was so hot compared to what we are use to.) To cool down we went and splashed around in their water park area. It was really just an area the size of a church gym with a slide, (not a water slide, just a plain old slide) some water guns that were attached to a fence, some buckets that when they filled up with water tipped over, and some water that shot out of the ground. We all had a lot of fun there!

Landen and his friends

Yesterday we had both of Landens friends over. They had a lot of fun together. He is really going to miss them. In the picture it goes Landen, Christian, then Kaeson. The other picture is of Aiden and Porter. Aiden is Christians new baby brother who is 6 weeks old. Landen gets really excited when Aiden comes over. He tells Porter that Aiden came over to play.

Jake, Lindsey, and Katelynn Came to Play

Jake, Lindsey, and Katelynn just left this morning. They came out to California to visit us for the weekend we had so much fun with them here.
On Thursday we spent the afternoon at the beach playing in the freezing cold water. Ty and Jake went completly in and went swimming. Landen, Katelynn, and I got in about waist deep and looked for seashells. Lindsey and Porter made sure our stuff didn't blow away. (FYI: Lindsey is 5 months pregnant with a little boy.)


On Friday after Ty got home from school we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. the kids loved to look at the fish and play in the kids area, but I think their favorite part was stamping in their Wild about Otters book. Landen got bored with stamping in the book, so he decided his arm wasn't colorful enough and stamped it.
On Saturday they guys had made plans to go out ocean fishing. Lindsey and I were going to take the kids out whale watching. We thought that they would have so much fun, but they were to small to go on the big boat. So we took them out on the glass bottom boat that went just around the harbor. You really couldn't see anything through the glass except the dirty water and some kelp. The kids had a lot of fun on the boat. If you ask Landen about his boat ride he gets so excited and will tell you all about it. We got to see the Sea Lions and Harbor seals up close, but that was all the wildlife we saw besides the people on the warf the kids loved to wave at. Porter went to, but he enjoyed his afternoon nap on the boat. Sunday we went to church then had a fish fry with the fish Ty and Jake had caught. After that we went to Lovers Point and let the kids play in the sand and water. (By kids we mean Ty, Jake, and Brigette.)

Our new addition to the family

Porter was born on May 25, 2007 in Monterey, California. He was born at 9:39 a.m. He weighed 7 lbs 13 oz and was 20 inches long. He is a keeper!

Landen is trying to get use to the idea of being a big brother. He just wants Porter to get big so they can play. He is getting a lot better at being soft with him. We sure love that our family is growing. We are having such a fun time with our boys. Life just keeps getting better and busier with each one.