The Fair

Yesterday, Brynt came up with the fun idea of going to the fair. It has been several years since I have been to a fair, and I have never been to a fair in Idaho so I was excited. And I am happy to report that my excitement was not in vain, The East Idaho State Fair is pretty awesome!
So many great exhibits, there A LOT of talented people in Idaho. The art work was beautiful and inspiring, the cake decorating was incredible, the quilting was was impressive and the antiques were impeccable, (and I just realized that I subconsciously made all those words start with I... interesting).
Camberlyn's favorite by far was the animal exhibits. Now, we already know that Cam is a farm baby because of all the many baby Einstein videos there are, the only she really enjoys is baby McDonald.  But the fair gave us a stronger idea of just how much she loves live stock. She sat and watched 30 minutes or more of the dairy cow competition... please keep in mind that she is 7 months old. At least we know what kind of toys to get her for Christmas.
To complete our fair experiance we had a smoked turkey leg and some yummy fries, because what is a day at the fair without food that is sure to get you 75% closer to a heart attack?
 It was a great day and the perfect way to start our Fall season!

August, a month of travel and exploration.

August was a great month, and I say that having had many great months in my life.
 For Cam, life has really opened up. July was a little frustrating for her because she knew she wanted to crawl and couldn't. She knew she wanted to climb and couldn't. She knew she wanted to be able to pick things up while on her hands and knees and, well, she couldn't... Needless to say, July was a good month but a frustrating one. Then came August and boy did the winds of change start blowing. It all started with what I like to call baby yoga. Camberlyn would get up on her hands and knees and them from there she would stand on her toes and stick her cute little baby bum up in the air, if you have ever taken yoga it was a perfect downward facing dog. Hilarious to say the least. Then she learned to do the worm, that is the best way to describe it. She would get up on her hands and knees, rock and then fall forward and then push herself back on to her hands and knees and start the whole thing over again. This was her mode of transportation for about 3 weeks and she loved it, her dreams had been realized, she could see something she wanted and go get it. I was actually starting to think that she wasn't going to really crawl because she seemed pretty darn content doing the worm everywhere. But then on the 26th of August while we were in Arizona (more on that later), she did it! My best friend Baylee and I were talking at Brynt's parents house, Cam had been sitting with us and then got squirmy so I put her down, and right then and there she took off crawling! That opened a whole new world of possibilities, because by the next morning she was starting to climb and pull up on things, an explorer was born. She is now into EVERYTHING, nothing escapes her curiosity. Cupboards, plants, purses, boxes, baskets, cords, books... they are all prey to Camberlyn now. I will openly admit that it has gotten a lot more challenging to keep her out of stuff, but I love it. There is honestly nothing in the world like watching a baby explore their surroundings, it is a beautiful and wonderful stage.
Also, on the 14th and 15th of August she cut her first two teeth! I honestly can't say it was all that bad because it happened really fast, she got a little fussy and then there they were there. They are so cute, and they make her little smile even more adorable.
Now about Arizona. The main purpose of our trip was to be there for Brynt's sister Dusti on her wedding day. We got there on Friday and spent the day with our family (his and then mine). We have amazing family, I love them all. Saturday was the wedding, so in the morning we left Cam with my mom and Dad and went to help decorate for the reception. decorating went well into the afternoon and we hardly had time to get ready for the wedding, but we managed to get it all done and get ready in time. It was a beautiful day for Matt and Dusti and I am so happy for them both. Sunday we spent with Brynt's family and then my parents came over for dinner, which was a lot of fun. Monday we ran around a lot, we saw Grandma May, then went to lunch with my mom and Aunt Karen, saw Dusti's new horse, then went to Bagdad to see my cousin Sunny, Aunt Lisa, Cousin Kaitlyn, Uncle Lloyd and my Dad. It was so fun to see everyone!
Tuesday was our last day and it was great. Lunch with Brynt's parents, a visit with Grandma Kruger and then to see Grandma and Grandad Watson for dinner.
Dinner was amazing and oh my do the just love Camberlyn. She is their first great-grandbaby, and it shows! The whole evening they were amazed and awed at everything she did and just loved her to bits. It made me wish that some how Arizona and Idaho could be closer so we could see them more. 
I love spending time with our family, mainly because they are all incredible, wonderful, funny, amazing people. Our time in the desert seemed to short, as it always does, but it was great!

Cam and Papa John

Grandpa Terry

Where'd the baby go?

First time riding a horse!

Great Grandma May

Bagdad Family

Lunch with Grandma and Grandpa

The ADORABLE chair that Grandad Watson made for her :)

6 months!

You know the old saying "time flies"? Well, I think when you have children, time hits light speed. Its incredible how fast the last 6 months have gone! Whats even more amazing is all the ways Camberlyn has grown and changed in that time.

From day one she has been a happy baby, and a social baby. Cam loves people, she will give just about anyone a huge smile and giggle ( which I will admit as a mother is a little nerve racking, I would like her to have SOME reservations lol). She can sit, well sort of... I think she can actually sit pretty well but she is always going after this or that so I can't ever get her to sit for very long :) . She gets up on her hands and knees now and can ALMOST crawl, I seriously think we are days away from that. I think she would like to be a farmer when she grows up, I say this simply because of all the Baby Eisenstein videos we have let her watch, baby McDonald is by far her favorite. Camberlyn has wicked good fine motor skills for her age, yes , I know all parents think their kids are incredible, but Cam can pick thinks up with just her thumb and for finger as well as being able to pass toys back and forth between her hands ( I looked that one up in one of my child development books, generally babies can do that around 9 months). She thinks its funny to squawk, its a high pitch short scream that she does in 3 second intervals. Her favorite song is "You are my Sunshine",  she will start beaming if you sing that to her, I love it. She also loves "Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam".  One thing I really enjoy is when I feed her she will softly touch my face and look up at me, it melts my heart every time!


She has stolen our hearts completely, the past 6 months have been such an incredible and wonderful time, what a blessing our little Camberlyn Elizabeth is!

Sewing time!

So I have been on a sewing steak lately, and yesterday I made this little number for Camberlyn.

 

Talk about easy and fun! I took a toddler t-shirt some one had given us, took the sleeves off, took it on on the sides, finished off the edges of the new sleeves and added a flower detail from the scraps and ta da! Now she has a cute little summer dress to enjoy   :)

Money Matters

So Brynt and I are working hard to pay off all of our debt. We don't have that much, but we don't want ANY. Quite a bit of it is the baby bill. Babies are expensive, babies are especially expensive if your student insurance has crazy high premiums and pays for basically nothing. Grrr, what a rip off but oh well, we are dealing with it.
Last month we payed of the credit card. This week we have payed off  the hospital bill (YAY) and a few other smaller medical bills. It was a lot of money, and I am so glad we don't have to worry about it any more. It gives me so much motivation to keep going and do better with money.

We want to have everything payed off, and then go on a vacation. After the vacation, time to save for a house!  obviously we will have to take out a mortgage  for a house but we want to have a BIG down payment. And then work hard to pay off the house too!

This "pay it off now" attitude takes some life style adjustments, but its worth it. Brynt and I are 23, if we can train ourselves to make wise money choices now, and start working towards our financial goals early, there is a bright future ahead.

Mostly this is for me, and also about Mesa Falls

I have to get some of the things Cam does written down so I don't forget! That's why this is "mostly for me". And then I will write about Mesa Falls in the same post because I am to lazy to start another one (how sad is that?).

So about Cam:
Quick story from last Saturday:
Brynt and I were sitting on the couch and I layed  Camberlyn on her back in between us. Brynt was sitting kind of on the edge of the couch so there was a gap between him and the and the back cushion; well as soon as I put her down Cam starts wiggling herself around so that she is laying between Brynt and the back of the couch. But she didn't stop there! She then proceeded to continue wiggling until she had gotten all the way around to the other side of Brynt. It was so funny, and she was so pleased with herself lol.

Cam is officially 5 months old now, and this is the stuff she does:
~Sucks her thumb. I tried and failed to prevent that one,oh well I guess.

~Laughs at jokes. This sounds ridiculous, but in the last week she has started to be able to tell when things are funny. We let her watch Baby Einstein movies and there are certain parts where the puppets come out and do something funny (ie. pigs getting muddy and so on), and she thinks its way funny! I absolutely love hearing her little baby giggles :)

~Puts herself to sleep. This is one of my favorites. We put her to bed in her own room and she puts herself to sleep... and then proceeds to sleep 12 hours or better. I love this so much.

~ Wakes up with a smile. My favorite part of the morning is when I walk in to Camberlyn's room to get her up, and she is peaking through the bars of her crib just beaming at me. She always wakes up like this, and it just melts my heart every time.

~Roles everywhere. EVERYWHERE.

~ Squeal/scream/yells. This one is funny, and loud. She started this a few months ago, but has really honed in on her talent for it in recent weeks. She will get excited about something, and then it starts. she squeals as loud as her little voice can, for as long as she can ha ha! Its really funny, except for some occasions like during the baby blessing at Church on Sunday... who am I kidding, it was funny then too :)

~Feeding herself. When I say feeding herself I mean it in the loosest definition of the term. Little miss independent likes to steal the spoon from me and put it in her mouth all by herself. She's pretty good at it, but it gets very very messy, so she eats with her shirt off these days ha ha.

~She loves to be outside more than anything, she just smiles the whole time. She fits in well with Brynt and I ;)


Its kind of incredible to watch someone grow and change day by day, I feel so blessed that I get to witness everything that she does.

And now about Mesa Falls-

At the beginning of  the summer Brynt and I decided that we would try to spend as much time as we could outside on the weekends.  So far we have done pretty well.
We've Gone Camping:

 We've Gone to Jackson Hole:

 We Went Home to AZ (although it was to hot to be outside the whole time):

And most recently we went to Mesa Falls:

It was Really awesome! We first went to the Lower Falls.

They were beautiful! The only bummer was that we couldn't get very close to them.  But Cam still liked it :)

Then we went up the road a mile or so to the Upper Falls, We were able to get REALLY close to them which made my day!

Everything about it was gorgeous, the sight, the smells, the sounds... I was in heaven. The canyon that the river flows through is so green and rich with wildflowers, its wonderful just to see how full of life it is. While we were enjoying it, Camberlyn took it upon herself to try to yell louder than the sound of the water fall. SOOO funny! As pictured bellow :)

After we soaked up how beautiful the Falls were, we hit the road again and found ourselves somewhere in Island park on a little trail. We love a little hike and this one (although short) was a lot of fun. Side note, we think we found pot growing a long the path, or at least a member of the hemp family LOL. It was great to see some of the great places that are around our area. The world is a beautiful place, and we try to get out and see as much of it as we can :)

Happiness...

Warning: this will be pretty mushy.

I love my life. Is it perfect? No, but it is very very good. My husband is wonderful, he's my best friend. We are goofy and weird, but we laugh a lot and we talk about everything. We talk about stupid stuff and serious stuff and everything that falls between stupid and serious. Some people have told me that we are still in the honeymoon stage, and that is why we get along so well. Maybe they are right, but I don't think so. Why can't two people just really love and enjoy being with each other? Is that really that far fetched?  I love my husband more because of the things we have been through, the tough stuff has brought us closer.

And then there is Camberlyn. She's pretty awesome. I know everyone thinks their kids are great, but I just can't get over how much I love this little girl. She has developed such a personality; She loves to be outside, she's super social, very very active and stubborn (Brynt says she gets the stubbornness from me, I have no idea what he talking about. ha ha). She has mastered rolling now, in fact she tends to show off now. She rolls everywhere, and if she cant roll to get where she wants to go she does this funny wiggle/army crawl thing... once this kid can crawl for real, I am in big trouble. She's a handful and a half, but she's so fun and funny. 

This little family of mine is great. Some days Cam is cranky, some days I am over whelmed, and some days Brynt is worn out, But we are here to help and uplift each other when one of us needs it. I love them, and I love this life that I am so privileged to live.

Happiness is not in things, it is in us.