Waking and Walking Beardies

So I haven't been able to play with our bearded dragons much for the last several months because they have been hibernating since October when Bob and I got back from our honeymoon. However with the warmer weather, they have finally been coming out of their caves. This has meant lots of pictures, petting and holding and of course, TREAT TIME! Naturally I had to take pictures as well. Tweedle-Dum still looks much the same since he doesn't seem to know how to grow (he eats, just not enough I guess...) Tweedle-Dee is like a whole new lizard from the last time I posted pictures though. She has grown so fast!

Dee enjoying some treat time

Dee eating her treats

Dee eyeing the camera while deciding whether it's a treat
or not....

Dum hiding behind his rock

Close up of Dee

Dum eyeing the camera

See how tiny he still is?

Dee being too lazy to get on top of her rock

Guarding her cave.

I don't know how she still fits inside....

She was tired from all the excitement... fell asleep on her
water bowl

Treat time!

Dee in action

PS- We have now trained Dee to stand on her back legs for treats. It was sort of accidental, but we did it anyway, and here is our photographed proof!

Dee showing off her new trick

Spring Kitties

As the spring weather has finally rolled in, our cats have become overly-interested in going outside to explore. Normally Cleo is perfectly content inside watching the action from the safety of the window, and actually becomes terrified if she is outside. Jazz is a different story, she seems to like the outdoors, and begs to go out if there is another cat outside because she needs to "defend her turf". On Sunday I decided to go ahead and let the cats soak up the sun and chase the bugs. Cleo was first, I put on the harness and leash and took her outside. She was a little bit hesitant about leaving the front porch at first, but she saw that Bob, Ricky and I were with her so she began to explore. Before too long, her mom came along, and Cleo was able to have a mini family reunion. I let Cleo play with her mom for a while until her mom left and then it was Jazzy's turn. Jazzy immediately started rolling around in the dirt on the porch and wrapping herself in the leash. I took her down to the grass, and then she became a little too aggressive. I tried to pet her and she hissed at me and swatted her paw at me. She doesn't have claws, so it didn't hurt, but needless to say I marched her straight back inside and she didn't get to play outside any more!


Cleo playing in the grass

My cute Cleo cat



Cleo doing her "lion breathing" with her mouth open



Cleo checking out the bushes

Cleo walking on the leash



Spying on the neighbors

The leaves must have been cozy, she sat there
for a while.



I wonder if she remembers this used to
be her home, before we adopted her...

Cleo playing in the half decayed leaves

Cleo's mom (local feral cat, we feed her sometimes)

The reunion






Momma sharing her food with her baby

Jazzy about to get too feisty

family reunion




Pretty momma

Giving each other kisses

Cleo following her mom to the garden

momma and baby



Jazz laying on the front porch

all rolled up in her leash

Checking out the neighbor's dog

Cute little Jasmin

 

Baby Benton Weekend

This past weekend, my best friend Chelsea's husband Garrett had to go to a National Guard training that lasted all weekend. Chelsea wasn't very excited about being all alone with the baby in their house without Garrett to protect them, so she asked if Bob and I would be willing to spend the weekend. I of course jumped at the opportunity to spend some quality time with my best friend as well as cute little Benton, so we agreed! Bob and I came right over after I got off work on Friday, even though it was late. The next day Bob had to work so Chelsea and I did some shopping, talking and Zumba together all while playing with cute little Benton. He may be the most perfect baby in the world by the way. He is a great sleeper, he hardly ever cries, and has no problem eating, not too mention he is so fun to play with! When Bob finally got off, we met up with Chelsea's sister Lindsay and her husband Ian for dinner at Longhorn Steakhouse. I was so excited to eat there again, because I may be a tad bit obsessed with their mac and cheese, plus I can never turn down steak. Afterward it was back to Chelsea's house for the last night before Garrett came home. It was a great weekend and I'm so glad Chelsea and I got to sit down and really talk for probably the first time since I got married and she had Benton....

Working Toward My Goals

I made a few hefty New Year's resolutions this year, and I decided to keep them to myself since I was nervous about dropping the ball a couple weeks in like I usually do. However this year I did something a little different, I promised myself that if I dropped the ball for a few days, rather than giving up, I would jump back in like nothing had ever happened. Now it's April, and I feel like I have been doing pretty well with MOST of the goals I made so I decided it's time to share!

Goals for 2013:

1. Learn Spanish or ASL (sign language)
2. Pay off our honeymoon
3. Pay off my car
4. Get a 2nd car for Bob
5. Get to 125 lbs (the healthiest weight for my body, and the weight I felt best about myself at)
6. Either run a half marathon (13.1 miles) or a sprint triathlon (swim 500 Meters, bike 10 miles, run 3.1 miles)
7. Write a post on my blog for every week.

My rewards for accomplishing these goals:
1. I would know a 2nd language
2-4. If all of these are accomplished, Bob and I can meet with mortgage companies to get pre-approved for a house.
5-6. I will be healthy, check something off my bucket list and I will splurge on something fun to check off my bucket list like hang-gliding or para-sailing!
7. I don't have to write in a journal (LOL, okay that's more of a punishment if I don't do it...)

So far here's where I'm at with my goals:
1. Learning Spanish or ASL, I was doing decent for a couple weeks, but I didn't have the spare money to throw at a learning program and teaching myself was too time consuming. I couldn't keep up and simply haven't had the time to start back up... This one I will chalk up as a failure, at least for now...

2. Pay off our honeymoon, this one is going well. I decided to pay Bob's parents back in one lump sum, and at this rate they will be paid off by July!

3. Pay off my car, this one is also going well. I still had 2 years left on my loan and I had been paying the minimum payments. However at the rate I'm paying now I should have the car paid off by August. Maybe September, depending on interest....

4. Get 2nd car, this is another one that is going well. We don't have the car yet, however Bob has been saving his spare money, and we got a great tax return to use as a down payment. This week we should be meeting with a bank to see what kind of loan rates we can get and we should have another car, hopefully, by the end of this month! (Although that's what I said last month too, and we procrastinated.... It is only April though!

5. Get to 125 lbs. As of January 1st I was 145lbs. I'm happy to say that through exercise and healthy eating I am now down to 127.5 lbs! I'm so close to my goal, I can almost taste it, and the icing on the cake is that I did it the healthy way. I haven't used any diet supplements, no skipping meals, or exercising harder than my body could handle. I don't even restrict myself if I want to cheat here and there. If I want a cupcake, then I will have a cupcake! Most of the time it's healthy food for me though, and for the most part, I don't miss my unhealthy junk food!

6. Run a half marathon or do a sprint triathlon. So after realizing I don't have good running shoes, or clothes and I don't have a bike, both of which can be pricey, I decided to do the half marathon. I chose a Halloween half marathon in Provo this October to give myself time to train. (I will be running in a flash costume, geeky I know, but I think it's funny!) I haven't been the best at forcing myself to train, but I'm proud to say I got to almost 4 miles before my crappy shoes started hurting. Bob and I had to go splurge on some running shoes and I can officially run 4 miles. In June I'm signed up for a 10K (6.2 miles) as a test run or half way marker to make sure I'm keeping up with the training. I'm not there yet, but I haven't given up yet so I still have my fingers crossed!

Pair of new running shoes #1

Pair of new running shoes #2
(It was buy one get one half off, so...)

7. Blog weekly, I know I skipped at least one week already. I really had nothing to write about. I think I've been pretty good though, and at the end of the year, as long as I have 52 posts, I will consider this goal accomplished!

There you go. All my resolutions, and how close I am to each of them so far. with any luck I will be checking all of these off the list in the months to come and I wanted to share them with you all so that you will be able to see just what I have accomplished when I do!

My "Colorful" Easter Weekend!

So this Easter weekend also happened to be the Spanish Fork Color Festival weekend. My sisters and I had been planning to go this year, so after stopping by my cousin Britney's baby shower to congratulate her and roping my cousin Tiffany into joining us, we began our little day trip. We knew it wouldn't be a long trip since Tiffany had to be home by 5, but it was only an hour drive each way so we figured we would have a little over 2 hours to enjoy ourselves which is generally plenty of time. Getting off the freeway in Spanish Fork was a nightmare! There were so many cars trying to go to the color festival, we were literally inching along, and around an hour later we were parking our car. However we had to park nearly 2 miles away so we still had a bit of a hike to the Hindu temple where the color festival takes place. We finally made it there around 2PM. We knew we would have to make the hike back to the car and fight traffic back to the freeway, and wanting to give ourselves plenty of time to get Tiffany home before 5 so she could shower, we resolved to leave by 2:45. We quickly got our chalk and entered the crowd. Everyone had fun throwing their different chalk powders at perfect strangers, while getting pelted with all the colors from other people at the same time. It was a new experience for Tiffany, Rachel and Savannah so I don't know if they knew what to expect going in, but they all seemed pretty happy with our short amount of time there. After a quick photo shoot of our final colors, we made the hike back to our car. As expected, traffic back to the freeway was a nightmare again, and took us nearly an hour, however there was still time to get Tiffany back on time so we didn't worry. Unfortunately we hit another traffic jam on the freeway, and after about 20 minutes of hardly moving, we knew we were cutting it way too close. Tiffany made a call to her sister Jamie to let her know that she might be late, and Rachel roped my mom into going over to watch the baby until Tiffany could get there. We then decided to take the Bangerter exit to get Tiffany home since it would likely be the fastest route. Unfortunately there was an accident and we were once again trapped in hardly moving traffic for just over 20 minutes. Needless to say, Tiffany didn't make it on time, and we all felt so bad since we didn't anticipate hitting every traffic jam in the state on our drive home that day! Sorry again Tiff! Hope Jamie wasn't too mad at you!


Rachel's before picture

Tiffany's before picture



Rachel and I in our colorfest masks and protective eye gear

Savannah's before picture

Savannah and I in all our gear



Tiff and I in all our gear



Rachel's colorful pony tail

Rachel's colorful hair, she did say she wanted
purple hair....

Tiffany in all her colorful glory

Rachel attempting to take pictures of
her colorful hair



Savannah mid-colorfest











Me mid-colorfest

Savannah's final product




Rachel's final product

Close-up of Savannah's final product






Close-up of Rachel's final product



Tiffany's final product







Close-up of my final product

Close-up of Tiffany's final product



The whole colorful gang!



On Easter Sunday, Bob and I went over to my parents house for Easter dinner. My mom made ham, corn, rolls, fruit salad, potato salad, and deviled eggs. My mom's a fantastic cook, so of course dinner was delicious. It was also a lot of fun! Everyone was in a goofy, silly mood. My sisters were telling hilarious stories, in British accents, which just made it funnier. My parents were joking and teasing with everyone as well. We all laughed pretty hysterically when my dad said he saw I spider and my mom started jumping around screaming. Then we played a little Disney trivia game while eating the raspberry almond tort I brought from Marketstreet grill. Afterward, Bob and I went over to my cousin Shelby's house to catch the last episode of Walking Dead for this season. I have to say, this has been my favorite season so far, and the season finale was AMAZING! It was the perfect end to another perfect weekend!