Hand Me Down

About 3 weeks ago I was at work when Kevin called me. I took a break to take his call, and he informed me that he got a crib. As most women can imagine, as nice as a gesture as this is, what would possess a man to get a crib without his wife's imput sounds pretty crazy. Our conversation went like this:

K: "I got us a crib today."
S: " You what? From where? What color is it?"

K: "Don't worry I got it for free, it is white."

At this point I am thinking in my head, "where did he get this, off the street somewhere?" and also "well white is not my first choice, but I could live with it, depending on where it came from."

S: "You got it for free, from where?"

K: "Well, Mike was working at Mehmet's house and he was getting rid of it and asked if he knew anyone who needed a crib. Mike told him we were expecting and he said we could have it!"

Kevin's company does work on multi million dollar homes and some of the people they work for are Jazz players. Mike is Kevin's boss and he was doing work on Mehmet Okur's house, you may have heard of him, he plays for the Jazz. Needless to say it is a very nice crib, and we feel very blessed to have been on the receiving end of such generosity. Heavenly Father continues to bless us in so many ways and we are very grateful.

Emotion overload

I have been contemplating this post for awhile now, I just haven't known how to even start. There are a few reasons I didn't want to make this announcement I guess, first of all fear, and second I know how if feels to read post after post of your friends having babies when it is not happening for you. We are expecting a baby around May 3, 2010. First, the fear, I just couldn't do it until I was sure things were going to be OK, this isn't my first pregnancy, and it has been a longer journey than I would've liked, so I wanted to be sure before we announced anything. Second, I know it is not easy to get pregnant and how it hurts when all you want is to be a Mother. I know what it is like to read a blog of someone announcing their pregnant and you're not and have been trying so hard. It breaks your heart as happy as you are for that person. Kevin and I cannot express in words the gratitude we feel to be blessed with this little person growing inside me. I am truly grateful to my Heavenly Father for this opportunity and will do my best to be a great Mother and raise our child in the gospel. I am THANKFUL for this nausea, the acne, the weight gain, that my digestive system is broken, that I want to eat all the time, and for every other discomfort that can be a pain. I am so EXCITED that I cannot even put it into words!! We went to the doctor today and at 15 weeks, I am going to be very outnumbered. Between Kevin, Nixon and the fact that IT'S A BOY! I am in trouble. I am so excited to be having a boy, Milo Ryan Taylor will be unbelievably and unconditionally loved. Thanks for all your support, We love you all!

Dead Man's Party

Last night we attended the 2nd annual Dead Man's Party. As you can see I was Evil Alice and Kevin was Johnny Depps portrayl of The Mad Hatter. We had a lot of fun, it is an event we look forward to every year. We put a lot of time into our awesome costumes and so did many other people. Thanks again to Brady and Amy for throwing such a great party!

Boring..

I feel that Kevin and I have boring lives right now, so I have been a blog slacker. Kev is doing full time work and full time school, so that keeps him quite busy. I am actually making a HUGE change at work starting November 1st. What is the change? I will be stepping down as a manager at IKEA and moving to Loss Prevention. Don't worry too much when you read that, it is NOT like Loss Prevention at Wal-Mart, no tackling, ect. It has been a decision that we made months ago because I am just not happy at work. I don't love being stressed to the max all the time. It will be a big change going from a 40 hour work week to 25 hours, I may even have to pick up a job during the Holidays so that I won't be bored. It will also be quite a large adjustment financially, but we have been trying to prepare, paying off my car and reducing in every way possible. I know that if we pay our tithing and do our best to live within our means we can do it. Kevin will be glad to have a happy wife and I will be glad to be happy at work. I was talking with a girl in another department the other day and she was asking me if I was excited for my change. I said "Yes, I don't know if that will change when I get my first pay check though..:)", then she said something that I totally loved. She was telling me that when she first came home from her mission she met with her Bishop and was discussing her major. He then asked her this question "Do you want to be rich, or do you want to be happy." I totally thought that was awesome. I know that financial stress can be hard, but so can the stress of working at a job you don't enjoy, but it pays well. We are putting our faith out there and I really think we both feel good about this decision. What are your opinions, am I totally crazy!?

5 days of celebration!

Two years ago I married my best friend for time and all eternity in the Salt Lake Temple. It was by far the best day of my life and I am so thankful for my amazing husband! We really wanted to go on a vacation, but thought financially speaking it would be better if we did a staycation instead. We began celebrating on Friday, we decided to go camping with our friends the Christophersons and Vanriji's and we ended up going to Big Cottonwood Canyon and camping on Kevin's sisters in laws property. They have a cabin up by the Spruces campground, and it was tons of fun! We all realized we should have started camping at the beginning of the summer instead of the end because we had so much fun! We just stayed one night and then Saturday night Kevin and I went to the Bee's game. It was a really fun game, lots of suspense, it made me remember how much I like baseball. Sunday afternoon we headed up to the Anniversary Inn in Logan and stayed in the African safari room. Monday we returned back to the valley and hung out with the Taylor family to celebrate the holiday. We BBQ'd and had a fun time hanging out with the family. Our actual anniversary was yesterday, September 8th, so we exchanged gifts, went to dinner at Rusted Sun Pizzeria, and went to the movie 500 Days of Summer. It was a really fun few days and really nice to be able to spend some time together. Kevin is back in school, so his days are at work, and nights are at school, which makes it hard to see each other sometimes. I can't believe it has already been two years, the time has flown, and we are excited to see what this next year will bring!

Staci's Wedding

Kevin's little sister Staci got married a couple weeks ago to her longtime sweetheart, Blake. They were married in the Salt Lake Temple on August 20, 2009. The reception was held at the Wood's reception center in Murray. Congrats to the new couple, Mr. & Mrs. Rowley!

Ryan Bennett Memorial Golf Tournament

On Monday I had the opportunity to fly out to Ontario, California with my sister in law Tonya and Niece Ashley to attend the First Annual Ryan Bennett Memorial Golf Tournament. As many of you know my brother was killed in a car accident on May 31, 2006. He was a sports broadcaster with a particular specialty in Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) which most recognizable organization is the UFC. MMA is a sport Ryan always believed in and he got into being a ring announcer before really anyone new what it was. He worked for several different organizations, the UFC being one. He had friendships with lots of different people in the business, fighters, announcers, promoters, clothing lines, agents and several others. He founded one of the sports now most popular websites, mmaweekly.com. There are so many people in the sport that Ryan influenced that one particular group, MMAagents, which are agents who represent fighters in various organizations, put together this golf tournament to raise money for Tonya and the kids. Ken Pavia who is the founder of MMAagents knew Ryan and wanted to put this together to honor his memory. It was a great turn out with 25 fighters who came out in support. Chuck Liddell was one of the first fighters to commit, but was unable to attend due to a scheduling conflict. Each fighter was put into a group of 4 to 5 people who paid to play and it was a lot of fun to watch some of them golf! The tournament was held at the Sierra Lakes Golf Club in Fontana, CA. There was a silent auction and a raffle, and the day concluded with a dinner and the tribute video Randall had put together. Ken had thought it was a video put together by the Fight Network, but we quickly corrected him and let him know that was Randall's excellent work. It was a very emotional, very good day, it is nice to see that Ryan's memory lives on and there are so many people who love and respect him. He touched the lives of so many people and would be so proud to see where the sport is today. We are so thankful we had the opportunity to be a part of such a fun event, and are very grateful to all those involved in putting it together. There are more photos on my facebook page, there were too many for a blog.