Operation Relocation

Moving day has come and gone, and our relocation is officially complete. It doesn't quite feel that way yet because of how much unpacking and organizing I still have to do. We have so many things, I'm a bit sick of looking at it all! I thought I would take a break from it all to blog about everything so here ya go! :) There are things I like about the new house - the size is nice, and there are some things I definitely don't - like that our air conditioner keeps tripping the breaker, so the heat is miserable; there is a fenced yard but it is pretty pitiful, no trees, scattered patches of grass, no privacy... But beggars can't be choosers - we are just glad to be together again! But really, I do feel very lucky to have found a decent place to live when we did. After looking for months and only finding apartments and houses that were too small and/or gross, it was beginning to look hopeless.

As for adjusting to my new surroundings, I haven't left the house much because I have had so much to do here, but so far it drives me nuts that I am forced to shop at City Market (pretty much the only grocery store in town) they are a bit more expensive, the layout doesn't make any sense, and it's been congested every time I have gone so I have decided that I'm going to do my shopping when Kasey is home so I don't have to take the girls. Also, last weekend we went downtown for some ice cream and we were going to go to Sanfords for some lunch, only to find that they had closed it down. It was the only main stream sit down restaurant here... And, we don't really like the greasy spoon or restaurant/bar types, and there are quite a few of those. But maybe we will have to give a few of them a try before I discount all of them. What are ya gonna do? Make lemonade that's what! Haha :) I will just have to use this as an opportunity to fine tune my already awesome cooking skills! ;0)

School starts August 25th and I am still looking for a preschool for Adiee. I may just work with her myself, while Isla is napping and Mikenna is at school. But that isn't ideal because I don't want her to miss out on the field trips and I feel that socializing on her last year of preschool before kindergarten is pretty important. If that's what I end up doing I will have to see about putting her in a few activities through the rec center if they offer them to solve the socializing aspect of this dilema. It will definitely be a transition... I already miss my mom and everyone else, and the amenities and conveniences of a town of at least Casper's size.

A few of our Moving Day pictures...

Kasey has always really liked Chris... What do you think, should I be suspicious? haha :)
The girls making good use of the noodles... :)

It was a little much for miss Isla... She pulled that pillow and blanket across the lawn and napped for quite a while :) Isn't she the sweetest??

Goodbye tire swing...

At the new house...As if we didn't have enough to do, Isla dumped the remaining potting soil while eating dinner. Thanks Isla. Kasey was home so he helped me. I cleaned up the peeved baby while he cleaned up the table, chair, and floor. Halfway through, he said that he thought he got the harder job but in all fairness he was the one who wanted to switch and that's why I accepted so quickly! Haha!! ;)

Finally!!

I have some GREAT news!! :) I don't have to be a single mom and Kasey doesn't have to be a bachelor anymore (when you have a wife as awesome as me, being a bachelor isn't any fun! ;) haha!) I'm so excited to be married again!! Haha! Kasey has found a place that doesn't belong in the 'Heck No!' category in houses... I haven't seen the inside and I'm not too thrilled with the poor excuse of a yard, but like I said before - I DON'T CARE!! It's 4 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms and in good condition, so it sounds fine to me!! Kasey is on-call again this weekend...go figure! But I'm going to go down this weekend and see him and the new house... I'm feeling good and optimistic, more like myself again!! Finally!! :)

Oh, and packing is exhausting when you're doing it solo! :)

Miss Isla

I haven't updated on Isla alone in quite some time, and now it's kind of hard because it's not a matter of what she can do, it's what she can't do that is the question!! :) She is now 22 months. She walks, runs, jumps, dances (complete with booty shakes and twirls! haha!!) and talks ALL the time! I can't even give a list of words because it would be too extensive! Isla gets her point across all the time, she can even tattle on her big sisters, let me know when she wants to eat, drink, or nap, and get my undivided attention (mama, mama, MAMA, and then proceeds to tap me (she will even turn my head to look at her!) until I respond and really listen! Cute, but sometimes annoying! haha) The list goes on... And it's been this way for quite some time! She has such a spitfire personality! :-) She is a total daddy's girl, he gets ALL the kisses he wants, I have to work my tush off to get just one! But when he is gone, I get his loves - probably the only perk to him being gone. I do believe that she will be fairly easy to potty-train, she doesn't like dirty diapers at all! Or dirty anything for that matter. When we move, we plan to take her crib side off and replace it with the toddler rails so that she can get in and out of bed. She is such a loveable little girl and she is getting soooo BIG!

Until next time... ;)

I NEED TO MOVE!

I can't wait to move so that Kasey and I can be together again! I miss him so much, it seems he isn't ever able to come home because he is on-call constantly. I know he misses us too, he hasn't been able to be a part of things he always is... Recitals, Mikenna's party, 4th of July (I bawled my eyes out, I just felt so bad that he was all alone), and the camping trip with his brothers (they changed the location so he could come when he wasn't working, but there was no cell phone reception so he couldn't! Grr!) Everything is just hard right now and the phone calls and e-mails aren't cutting it... The girls and I are so lonely for him it's not even funny. One morning when I was letting the dogs into the backyard, Isla (21 months) heard a lawn mower and she pushed the door open and yelled, "DADDY!" It was so cute, but a little sad. Another morning, right after a weekend that he was home, I was cooking pancakes and Adiee said, "I will go wake daddy up!" while running to our room. And Mikenna is always asking, "When is dad coming home?" :( Not fun!

Hopefully soon something will come up, everything we have seen has been too small or too dumpy - I'm not even that picky anymore. I can always scrub it clean, or even something to get us down there initially. Also, I'm stressing about Mikenna being in school limbo. Fort Caspar Academy is no longer holding her place and we can't register her at her new school until we actually live there - school starts August 25th, still a ways away but that kind of thing always seems to creep up on ya. I also need to check out preschools, I really don't like having such limited choices. Adiee's teacher gave me the names of the two she knows of, and one of their names are 'Project Reach', now that is definitely not my first choice purely because of the name! It sounds to me like an organization for neglected kiddos or something. :(

I don't know... Maybe I'm just being too judgemental... I'm stressed, StReSsEd, STRESSED!! :-/

Party Time!

Planning Mikenna's Birthday is always hard because it's summer, and everyone gets super busy or leaves town - we always are! Well it's that time again this year and time was slipping away yet again, and we are right in the middle of relocating, 4th of July, camping with Kasey's brothers, and Kasey has been working a ton... So we had to just pick a date and hope that some of her friends would be able to make it; that day was July 2nd - the Friday before the 4th... Not a very smart idea but the plan was for Kasey to be able to make it, and it not be too long after her actual birthDAY. I was really wanting to throw the party myself, but time was just running out and we went to a going away party for her friend Brooklynn and she had a blast; Mikenna also leaned over to me when we were there and said, "This is where I want to have my party so I can sit in that princess chair!" Haha :)

We sent out about 20 invites in hopes that we could get a few kiddos to come! :(

Sending the invitations...

Out of all the friends we invited, there were 6 at the party (including Mikenna and Adiee) Disappointing, but it was expected. And to boot, Kasey ended up being on-call so he couldn't come home at all that weekend! :( So I dropped Isla off at Noni's house, that's an expensive store to put a baby down in...haha!

They painted their own tiles which I have to go pick them up and deliver them along with Thank You notes.

After they were done painting, it was time to open presents! She got all sorts of goodies! The buckets were the kids' "treat bags", I didn't know exactly how many were coming so I made extra... and then went home with extra... Yipee! haha :-/

She picked out a Hanna Montana cake and she LOVED being sung to...again!

All in all, she had a great party! Thank you to everyone that came to make Mikenna's 6th birthday extra special! :)

Look! No Training Wheels!

Kasey was home this weekend and took Mikenna's training wheels off her Barbie bike. She tried and mastered the art of balancing on your bicycle in about 5 minutes... She was definitely ready. They went on a bike ride together and she kept up with him the whole time - zipping down the hill, up the hill, in circles... She's a natural! :)

No More Thumb!!

Adiee's thumb sucking has come to an end... We have FINALLY won a 2 year battle and the good news, her thumbs are starting to look normal again!! :-)

We started trying to wean her off of her thumb when she was 2 and for a while she would just suck her thumb when she was in bed and when she was sleepy. We tried everything and what worked for her? We got some knit gloves to put on her hands at night and nap time. We called them her 'princess gloves'. We caught her a couple times with a thumb pulled out of a glove, so Kasey put some string through the hem of the glove and we would tie them in a bow with a double knot so that she couldn't take them off. It took a couple months to be sure that she had broke her bad habit... and she did!! :)

Go Ahead and LAUGH!!

Well Father's Day was interesting this year that's for sure! Kasey had to work all weekend long; wanting to spend time with him, the kids and I packed up to go camping - we left later on Saturday so that we would get there when he was getting off work. We set up camp at Seminoe State Park, it was fairly busy so we put Isla in the car to play in a safe confined space while we were putting up the tents. When we were done I went to get her and realized that it wasn't as kid-proof as I thought because she found a blue pen and had scribbled all over the driver's side leather seat. Yeah, that was a great idea... worst part is that it will not come out. So, at this time Kasey and I are a little peeved and I was getting things ready for dinner and realized I had forgot firewood; the firewood!! Are you kidding me, how does that even happen?? It wouldn't have been that big of deal if we were camping in the mountains but we weren't, so Kasey had to go find something to burn so we could cook dinner. It took about a half an hour to find some scraps of wood - and they burned out about 10:30 p.m. so we went to bed.

Okay, now it's Sunday and Kasey had to get up for work and left at 6:20 a.m. Of course, the girls hear his truck start up so my day started at 6:20 A.M. as well. I'm all for getting up early when camping, but not that early! haha :) It was really cold and windy in the morning and got really hot around lunch time. The girls played in the lake so they were just fine. There wasn't any sand, just gravel and mud but we made it work. :) After their nap, we played in the water yet again... I was sitting in my chair watching the girls and a stray dog came and stirred up mine (who were both tied up), his owner came to get the stranger dog and Sara - who is protective of our family - showed agression to the guy and his dog... Scared me to death!


Anyway, when I decided to go camping to see Kasey over this weekend, I fully expected to spend some time by myself while waiting for him. I figured it would be like 4 hours or so, maybe even from 6 to noon. But I spent 11 hours of misery by myself, looking at all the cars driving by hoping it was Kasey. Even something as simple as going to the bathroom had turned into a field trip - 3 kids and 2 dogs that you can't leave by themselves... Irritating! So it's like 5:30 p.m. and Kasey bought firewood when he was in town, but he forgot to get cash back for the camp fee for the second night! We had to pack up camp, drive to another location, re-set up camp, built a firepit, and started dinner at about 7:30.

So now we are sitting around the fire enjoying our dinner amongst the millions of mosquitoes, when Pete goes in for the kill on a tiny piece of hot dog that one of the girls dropped and jams his head in the in the small folding chair. When he realized that he couldn't get it out, he panicked and whipped it right out from under Mikenna, swung it around and hit her in the shoulder and cheek (and we are close to the fire, by the way), she wasn't hurt or anything thank goodness. Kasey had to grab him and took a couple hits himself, while I had to sit on him while Kasey cut his head out of this chair with a hack saw. As you can imagine, it wasn't easy going to bed after all this excitement, but we had to get to sleep early because we had to wake up at 4:30 a.m. to break down camp because Kasey had to work and I was heading back home. We said our goodbyes at 7, how depressing... :(

It's funny now, but wasn't so much then! Haha :) I think it's safe to say that this was the worst camping trip both of us have ever had. Even though the kids and I only saw him for probably 10 hours combined, it was well worth it because he won't be home for another week. But you know, this will be a memory that we will look back on and say "remember when...." and then laugh for hours. Oh, wait we already do! ;-)

Happy Daddy Day to all the men who take great care of their families, because any guy can be a father but it takes a special man to be a daddy! :) Kasey - you are the best dad, husband, and man I have ever known. Our girls wouldn't be the same without you, I wouldn't be the same without you. We love you tons!

Mikenna is 6!

Mikenna is growing like a weed... Just look at her, she has transformed into a "big" kid!! Her attitude has also made a flying leap in that direction too! Still a sweetheart but definitely with a twist of spunk.

On her actual birthday, Kasey was out of town working and was really sad to be missing his first born's birthday and Mikenna was understanding but bummed. I couldn't just let something as small as a 2 hour drive come between them so we decided to surprise him. He called that morning and Mikenna played along perfectly, telling him all about making cakes in the easy bake oven, the cupcakes, and how she wished he could be here, etc...

My goal was to leave at about noon, which never happens... At the last stoplight, I had to slow down quickly and my purse fell off the passenger seat and right on top of the cupcakes that we had decorated... Talk about irritation! And to boot were already an hour behind schedule... We still got there on time and when we did, we played at a park across from Kasey's station and waited for him to get off work. I called him because we had been waiting for about an hour and I asked him what he was doing. He said that he was working late and waiting for his supervisor to get there so he could do his operator qualifications, then asked me what I was doing. I told him we were at a park and I asked him how late he would be, he didn't know. I said, "That stinks because we are right across the street." He was so excited!! :) We went and looked at his office and then waited for him to get off.

We all went to dinner at Sanford's, then drove out to the sand dunes and played in the sand until the mosquitos came out and started munching on us all. Last stop was a park where we lit candles and sang happy birthday before we headed home.

We will be having her actual birthday party with friends at a later date...

Happy Anniversary

Six years... Wow, 6 years ago today is one of my happiest memories. Back when I started my blog last year I wrote about this momentous occasion as one of my first posts and the event leading up to it... our engagement.

Since our anniversary landed on a Monday, it was back to work for Kasey. So I got to see him for a few minutes at 5 in the morning before his drive today. Kasey sure put his heart out there on Facebook today, I just had to share what he had to say because it made me cry. Every woman deserves a man that treats them the way that Kasey does me. He is such an amazing husband and daddy.

"6 years ago today I married the woman of my dreams! 6 years ago today, I married the woman that would help me learn what life is really about, how much fun life can be, and how much I can really love someone through and through. 6 years ago today I married Krista Ann Oakland and it was the one of the best days of my life!"

Then went on to say...

"I love you Krista Brown and not a day goes by that I don't think about how lucky I am to have such a loving wife like you, you are my rock, my everything and I am so thankful that I have you by my side for the rest of my life there isn't any one else that I could ever love like I love you!! Happy anniversary Krista, 6 years down and a lifetime to look forward to!!"

Okay, definitely feeling the love here... :)

Thank you Kasey for the love and the life you have given me. You are incredible.

Poodles in Paris

She did great and looked beautiful! They did the major parts of their dance, but I think the lights and the dark, people filled audience was kind of intimidating for all of them; it was different than rehearsal because the lights were on and there weren't as many people... But I screamed at the top of my lungs and I cheered my lovely little Adiee on!! Great job Baby, We love you!! :)

Memorial Day

We went on a mini vacation for Memorial Day: A day trip to Rapid City. Our first stop was Mount Rushmore... When we saw it from the road the girls were super excited to get out and walk around! They loved it! :-)
I dressed the girls the same on purpose obviously but when we were driving back home that night, I noticed that we were ALL in stripes! Funny :)

Next stop was The Cosmos... Now that was FUN!!!
It was such a neat place! You could feel the pull when you entered the mystery house, everyone was standing at a slant... The girls thought it was a blast!!

Here, Mikenna and Adiee are standing across from each other, and they had a level there to show that that the two platforms were straight. In this first photo, of course Mikenna is taller than Adiee...
But when they switch, Adiee now is the same height as Mikenna even though the platforms are level!! How cool is that?!? They sure thought it was!

In this picture, Kasey is in the mystery house re-enacting a scene from the matrix... Sorry Keanu, you've got nothing on Kasey!! ;-) Isla's face is funny too - she was saying "whoa", obviously very impressed with daddy's skills!! Haha :)

After we were done with our Cosmos tour, we drove on... We stopped in Keystone to get some lunch, a beautiful little town where you can spend 40 dollars on grilled cheese sandwiches. Haha :)

After lunch we went to Storybook Island, we were there for quite a while! We had so many pictures it was hard to choose just a few!

Cinderella's set... Note Adiee looking deep into prince charming's eyes! Haha :) So precious!

Now it's Mikenna who's giving Aladdin some love... Haha :) Those girls!

Isla forgave Tigger and gave him a hug even though he BIT her... This was the funniest thing! She put her hand/arm in his mouth and started screaming "Ow, Ow, OOOOWWW!!!" and would run away crying! She did it probably 4 or 5 times and I got a little video clip of her doing it! HILARIOUS! :) Everyone around got a kick out of that!

Sweet Adiee riding a "real" unicorn...

Mikenna loved this tree!

Kasey and Krista as Raggity Ann and Andy. Mikenna took the picture right as Kasey was grabbing for Isla... Look at that face! Haha :) I love you!!

The girls rode the Storybook Line, I thought Isla was going to possibly freak out once they started moving but she didn't! She absolutely loved it and didn't want to get out! This picture was taken when they were finishing up their ride.
Mikenna was reading the words on the wall, Adiee was being adorable and sitting in the Cat in the Hat's lap, and Isla's face is something else! I love my kids! :)

Last stop - Chuck E Cheese!! Something they have been waiting for all day!

Mikenna after she and dad won the race! Which was quite obviously a win! Haha
Adiee riding the carousel... She is such a happy little girl!
Isla was a hungry baby! Smiling with food in her mouth... I thought I had taught her better than that! Haha, just kidding :)

Last Day of Kindergarten

The last time I will drop her off for kindergarten... Sad :( And the last time we will be at Fort Caspar Academy since we are moving to a new town this summer.

Mikenna is officially not a kindergartener anymore!! She also had so much stuff in her desk that she had to have another bag for all of her papers! :) Wow... now she's a first grader!!

Today has another special meaning for me... Saying no to a door-to-door salesman!! I know that most of you will think this is pathetic, but I am awful, I usually give in because I can't say no and especially after they do their sales pitch and their dumb demonstration I feel bad saying no. BUT NOT TODAY!!! haha :) He asked me to write on my shirt with the sharpie he had. Ummm, No... Are you kidding, I don't want to do that. So after he did his thing - cleaned sharpie off his rag, and scrubbed my sidewalk (? don't ask me, it was supposed to compare to my oven?), I said no thank you, and he said that he would just leave this bottle of super duper cleaner with me and I wouldn't even have to pay for it for 20 days! 20 days can you believe it?!? hahaha! I just said no thank you again and that I just wasn't interested. I felt bad right after, but then when he scoffed with a well that's fine, I make $16 an hour just to walk around in this sunshine...yada yada yada... I felt a feeling of such empowerment!! :) I think I love saying no!! haha ;) Good day!

Our New Car

We bought a new car last night!
It's a beautiful Chevrolet Z71 Tahoe and I LOVE it!!

Last Days as a Kindergartener

Hero Days...
Mikenna was to pick a person from history for a social studies project. She had to dress up like them and memorize four facts about them. I gave her a few people to choose from and she picked Neil Armstrong because she "likes space". I was having a heck of a time trying to find items to make a space suit and the plan I did have turned out to just look dumb. So I was scrambling to figure out what I was going to do, I ended up making a rocket ship with a box and she wrote on the side "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." and "Apollo 11". On the top she also wrote, "To the moon or bust!" While I drew NASA logos and flags on it. It turned out to be super cute, we got so many compliments on it! Apparently I do my best work when the pressure's on! haha :) At school, they mixed up the kids from different grades and classes to put on a presentation of the person they were portraying.

Last Blast Picnic...

Adiee, Isla and I packed up the picnic basket and headed to Mikenna's school for their last blast picnic. We ate lunch, played on the playground, did a bean bag toss, donuts on a string, got ice cream, and watched Mrs. Geise get dunked in the water over and over and over again! What a great sport, she just kept getting on that thing - it looked exhausting! All three girls fell asleep before we had left the parking lot... They had a great time!

Daddy's HOME!!!

Kasey has been gone for 2 weeks in Salt Lake City doing all kinds of paperwork, safety training, and testing for his new job with ConocoPhillips. On the first day he drove to Rawlins to pick up his work truck, the next day he went to Rock Springs to attend a safety meeting, the company also paid for new fire-rated clothing and dropped 2 grand on that alone! And then he drove to Salt Lake where he got his work laptop, cell phone, etc.. and did all of his hiring paperwork and started the training process where he had to do hours and hours of testing.

I am so happy for him, because this job is what he has been after since he started his schooling and training, and for him to finally have achieved his goal is just amazing!! He is the newest Instrumentation and Electrician Technician (that's a lot of ician's!! haha) For short, his job title is I&E Technician. We aren't really looking forward to moving to Rawlins, but it will be a great way to gain experience, job stability and we will be able to transfer in a few years so for the time being we are going to look at it with our glasses half full - it's a new adventure...

I can't tell you how much I missed him! And I guess I didn't really know how much I missed him until he rolled up in front of the house!! I had the front door open and when I saw him pull up I yelled "Girls! Daddy's HOME!!" I picked up Isla and busted out the front door and when I saw him get out of his truck I just started bawling!!! I couldn't control myself!! Haha :-) We have never been apart for this long before!!

This is Kasey and his new work truck...pretty nice!! :) And he came bearing gifts... He brought Mikenna and Adiee this really pretty handmade glass heart for each of them - they really love little trinkets like this and are constantly toting them around. For Isla, he got this rubber bouncy horse that their tumbling studio has - something that they can all share. That thing is crazy, it can support up to like 400 pounds, so it is durable and that's always a plus with our crazy kiddos!! haha :) And for me, he went to Williams Sonoma and he got be this really pretty pink apron with the logo on it and some potato and veggie gloves - he is such a wonderful husband, I have been wanting an apron for a while and the gloves are pretty cool too! He knows what I like!! ;)

I'm really sad though, because he has to leave again on Monday to Billings, MT. But it isn't for as long so it's okay, plus he is going to meet up with an old friend and go to dinner while he's there. I'm excited for the girls' school and after school activities to wrap up so we can go on some of these trips with him!! :)

Adiee's Last Preschool Program

Adiee's last preschool program, at least for this year. I think she was looking for us in this picture... Since Kasey was out of town, I had to take all 3 kiddos and try to take pictures and video all by myself. Thankfully Noni came with us, so she sat with Mikenna and Isla while I tried to take pictures and video of miss Adiee. This was a fairly irritating night... I couldn't see Adiee at all, so video was not the greatest, I mostly have some guys bald head on the screen and I had to give that up because Isla for some reason was acting up. She cried the ENTIRE time, I had to leave the room to get her under control. What makes me mad is that Isla never cries like that... So not only did I not get to see her sing, I couldn't even hear her. Total bummer...

R.I.P. Chloiee

Chloiee Madison Black

1999 - 5/18/2010

Chloiee was an AKC registered parti cocker spaniel. She was a great dog for the time that we had her and she will be missed dearly. She was in pain for a while before she was put down so I know that she is at peace now. We love you Chloiee!

Recital Pictures

There are a lot of pictures in this one... I tried so hard to pick my favorites, but they are ALL my favorites!!! I have never had such an easy time taking pictures! I didn't need to coach them at all and EVERY single one of them turned out fantastic!! :) Made for one ecstatic momma that's for sure! haha!

What pretty little ladies!! I promise I tried to limit myself... haha :)
I just can't stop... haha ;-)
They are GORGEOUS!!

Her 50's ponytail... Super cute! She looks so grown up...too grown up!
Adiee's hair has grown quite a bit! Look at her curls!
So sweet!! :-)
Perfect little angels!