what we've been up to

Yes, it has been forever since I have blogged. I just don't find it a priority but since Kate is growing up so fast, I really want to capture these memories to last forever, because we all know my memory is shot. So I'll try my best to remember what we have done for the past 10 months.

December- I celebrated my 23 birthday. I am getting old (ha!) We also had a fabulous Christmas in Denver with my family minus the fact that my entire family woke up with the flu Christmas morning. Kate had a blast playing in all the snow we got in Kansas. We actually got a lot of snow this winter which was a fun change from Vegas but I think I had my fix and would be just fine if it didn't snow this winter.

kate stuck in the snow

January- I can't really remember what happened this month. Phil started up school again. We are so proud of his hard work in law school. He is really enjoying it.

February- Phil turned 25!

kate decorated the cake!

March- school, school, more school

April- I went home to Denver with Kate while Phil studied and took his finals. While I was there my dad got released from being Bishop and it happened that all my siblings were in town that weekend too. What a tender mercy. We got to see my brother Jeff rock it in his school play while we were there. Kate really loved watching Jeff on stage. And Phil rocked his finals. We also had a fun time going to the Children's museum with Angie and Ethan while we were there.

at the children's muesum

May- Phil started taking classes again for the first half of the summer..

June- We had a great time going to a Royals game with our friends. It was really hot but we had a great time. Phil finished up his classes.

kate and her friend lily riding the carousel at the ballpark

July- July was a busy month for us. We moved to a new house. It is bigger and has the best backyard. We love it. 2 days later we moved to Denver for 7 weeks because Phil got an internship there for the second half of the summer. We lived with my parents. It was such a fun summer. More on that later. Kate turned 3 while we were there! How did that happen? Phil's family came to Denver that week so we celebrated Kate's birthday by going to a Rockies game and having a little birthday party in the parking lot before the game started.

old house

new house (ours is on the left)

August- We returned home from Denver and Phil started school up again. I also quit my job at jcpenney. It has made this semester so much easier and a lot less stressful.

September- Kate started preschool. She has the best teachers and really loves getting to interact with other kids. She has already learned to spell her name!

too bright mom!

that's better! (kind of)

Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving my mom, dad and Jeff came to Kansas! It was such a blast. It was a quick trip but am so glad that we actually had visitors here. We probably won't be having to many of those the next 3 years. We didn't do a whole lot while they were here. On Thanksgiving we just cooked and ate all day. That night we went to go see Tangled. It was really cute movie. Kate loved it. It was the first movie she has sat all the way through. Phil's Grandpa unfortunately passed away on the Monday before Thanksgiving. The funeral was held in Rockford, IL where we was from. Because it was thanksgiving weekend plane tickets were super expensive and Phil didn't want to drive to Chicago with Kate by himself (I unfortunately had to work or else I would have gone.) So they decided to take the train! They even had their own Harry Potter room. Kate absolutely loved riding the train. She still talks about it. They even had a train stop in Naperville. How is it that Kate and Phil got to go back there before me? They had to be at the train at 5am the day after Thanksgiving. I dropped them off and then went black friday shopping with my family. We went to walmart, target, kohls, gap, and jcpenney. That afternoon my parents left and I had to go to work from 1-11:30. It was a super long day. But Phil and Kate made it safely to Chicago and had a beautiful funeral service for his Grandpa. He will be missed but is definitely in a better place.
Here are a few pics from the train.

This is why I coupon

Anyone who knows me probably knows of my love of couponing. It is a fun hobby for me. It isn't even about saving the money (which is an awesome part too since we don't have any being in law school and still having our house in Vegas) but it also gives me something to do and it is so exciting walking into a store and seeing what awesome deals I can get. But when I tell most people that I coupon, they usually just laugh at me. Well I got everything in the picture below for .94 (I only had to pay tax) So who should be the one laughing? I also threw in a picture of Kate because she is just great and was so excited to help take the pictures. Oh and totally ignore the messy table in the background. It's my catch all in the house (we all to have one of those right? I'll just keep telling myself that)

Governor Kate Pemberton

Phil and I are trying to get out and see this state we just moved to so this past week our family took a trip to Topeka, about 20 minutes away, to visit the Capitol Building. They were in the process of renovating the building and because of the construction we were able to visit all of the rooms including the Senate Chamber, the House of Representatives Chamber and the Governor's Office. Our favorite room was the Senate Chamber because it had marble everywhere as well as a beautiful dome ceiling. It was funny to see all of the different representatives show their school spirit. Different desks in the Chamber had cardboard stand-ups of the different schools throughout the area (KU, Wichita State, Kansas State). Kate has learned how to say not only "Jayhawk" but the Rock Chalk Chant that is famous around here so whenever she sees a Jayhawk she yells it out except she combines some words and ends up saying "Jaychalk." Kate loved the Governor's Office and even got to sit in his chair! Hopefully she didn't break anything... We are still loving Kansas as we get to look around at the surrounding cities and are excited to spend the next few years here.

Birthday Girl

Kate turned 2 on Thursday. I really cannot believe I have a 2 year old. We had such a fun day!! She loved every second of it. She woke up to a birthday rope (it's a tradition in my family to have a rope go all through out the house with fun little toys and stuff on it) then she had pancakes with bacon and orange juice. It was like Christmas at our house with the amount of stuff she got. I don't feel too bad about it though because she has no age appropriate toys at all and most all day she just wants to watch tv. Well the day of her birthday she had so much fun stuff to play with she didn't ask to watch a "show" (as she calls it) once! That is a big deal if you know how much Kate loves movies and tv. We then took her to her favorite restaurant for lunch, McDonalds. She had a blast playing there. In the afternoon we took her to see Despicable Me. It was a really cute movie except Kate and I didn't get to see the last half because she thought it was more fun to play with the arcade games in the lobby then watch the movie but Phil said the last half was really good. I don't think we will be taking her to see another movie for a while. That night she opened some more presents and we had yummy cake. It was a day all about Kate and we loved every minute of it. Kate is such a cute and fun girl. We love having her here and can't wait to see what she will show us this year. Happy Birthday Kate!

got rain?

Kansas has definitely welcomed us with A LOT of rain. Right now we are having probably the worst storm yet and our yard is flooding. Some people in our ward that lived on our street just moved and gave Kate this awesome little tikes slide. She loves it. It entertains her for hours. Well here is stuck in our yard.

We have this window seat in our house and it must be the cool hangout spot because Kate loves to sit up there and read books. She isn't afraid of the lighting or thunder at all going off every minute right outside the window. I love my tough little girl.

Tozzle, Lawrence and Kate

One of Kate's best talents is to use the Iphone. (what does this say about my parenting skills?) Phil has a number of apps to get her through various outings, one of which is Tozzle. Basically it is a puzzle game geared towards toddlers. The other day we were sitting in bed and Kate was playing the game and all of the sudden this clapping sound came on, SHE BEAT THE GAME BY HERSELF! She knows how to move from app to app, go and start movies, play different games such as Frogger although she can never make it across the logs, she surprisingly usually makes it through traffic. She is too smart for her own good.



As for Lawrence, we are loving it. The humidity does wonders with my hair, but it is fun to be in a college town. Lawrence is all about the Jayhawks, there are even little Jayhawk statues all over town. Kate already loves the mascot, whenever we go to a place where the mascot is on a flag or there is a physical Jayhawk, Kate stops, points and says "OH, WOW!." I am so excited to live the college life we never got to experience together. Phil is loving law school. For the summer he only has class from 9-12, although his books are huge and he in constantly reading, we are getting to spend more time together. By a miracle, we found a place to live. It's a cute 2 bedroom duplex. I will post pictures when it's actually clean. Life is good and we feel so blessed!