Waterboy!

Luke was having so much fun playing with the hose with Mark. He was having fun in the water but he also loves to do this funny fake laugh! I guess he enjoys it so much because we get such a kick out of it and laugh so hard at it!

Mark and Luke swimming in the lake!

Luke showing us how he can kick his feet in the water. I obviously don't know how to turn the picture (I thought I'd turned it and did not!)

Mark's chess set from Russia that he got for his birthday

Happy Birthday! Luke is fascinated with both the candles and the flashlight he found!

spring time fun!

I'm obviously really bad at this blogging thing considering it took me how many years to start doing and it and I've made only a few posts! I will get better! Things are going great here in South Carolina with our family. Luke is getting so big it's hard to believe sometimes just how fast time goes. He just turned 19 months and is such a smart cute little boy. He's starting to talk, which is fun, although sometimes I still can't understand half of what he says! He tries to sing the ABC song but instead of saying the correct letters at the right time it's more like e or some other vowel said over and over. He recognizes when he sees a letter but isn't quite to the point where he will say the correct letter, but that will come soon as he is obsessed with letters! Of course the letter he has the hardest time with is L which makes him trying to say his own name quite interesting! I guess we should have thought of that before we named him Luke!
Mark graduates this month from school and is officially done with his masters! I am so proud of him for doing it and working his full time job during the last year of it. He, unlike many people in his program, has a wonderful job that keeps him super busy (sometimes too busy). But he loves what he does, even though it has caused him to get a few grey hairs. He doesn't mind the grey hairs though, he's waiting for the salt and pepper look. But we are very lucky and feel so blessed for him to have the job he has especially in this economy. The Lord has really watched after us and blessed us more then ever. When we look back at the decision to move to South Carolina and how that one decision has brought about so many wonderful things in our lives.
Well, we are getting ready to take a trip back to Utah for a little bit this summer. My parents have been called as mission presidents in the Yekaterinburg Russia mission. It's only a two year mission instead of three because of its difficulties. I guess I am happy that it's only two years but I'm not sure how excited my Mom is that it's going to be so difficult! Oh well, they'll be watched and protected by the Lord. But we are excited for them and get to spend some family time with them before they go. It's always fun to visit Utah and see all of our friends and family from there. All of you in Utah I hope I get to see you in June!

Family

We got back Sunday night from a short but great trip to Utah. We only got a few days in Utah because Mark doesn't have any vacation days left, but very grateful we were able to go at all. It was so much fun to see Luke interact with cousins, aunts, uncles, grandma and grandpa that he doesn't get to see very often. It made me really wish we closer to more family just for that reason. I guess more trips will have to be in the future! It was so funny though because Luke's cousin Cody is 6 months older then him and the two played together most of the time without actually playing together. They were always near each other and would follow each other around, but never really played together. However, they were famous for the screaming contests. It was actually kind of amusing, although hard on the ears! But they were very cute together. It was a joy to watch the two have fun together.
Funny thing, Monday evening Luke was running a fever and was just so tired and wanted to do nothing but lay all over you, it was so nice but sad. When I took his temperature and told it to Mark, 101.5, his response was priceless! He said, "What do we do, take him to the hospital?" My dear husband, I reassured him that he was ok and it was fine for him to run a fever and that there would probably be more fevers ahead of us. Mark sure does love Luke and wants to make sure we are always doing what's best for him. I love it, and I love the entertainment his lack of knowledge with anything medical gives me!
I felt like I had too much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving. Maybe I just took more time to ponder about all that I have then I use to, but I feel like I am more blessed now then ever. I look at my little family daily and wonder what I did that allowed me to be worthy of such a wonderful husband and baby boy that I get to be with forever. It amazes me daily. The rest of my family is wonderful as well. My parents have been called as mission presidents and what an example they are to me. I will miss them dearly but I know they will be awesome! For those of you in Utah, I will be back in June so we'll have to get together! I also have the best friends ever, all over the world. I could go on and on, but I must stop somewhere I suppose! Thank you to all of you for whatever part of my life you are. In some way you have impacted my life and helped me become the person I am today. Thank you.

Giving in!

After forever I've finally decided to get into the blogging thing. The funny part about it, is that I was going to do it at the beginning of 2010 and here it is almost 2011 and I'm just now getting it up and running. I still haven't figured this all out, but maybe eventually I'll get there. Luke had his first birthday party on the 28th and I had to throw a party for him! Mark was making fun of me, but I decided that my first child only has his first birthday once so I was going to make a fuss about it. We had some friends over for dinner and a little party. I made a Mickey Mouse cake and Luke got an ear as his little cake. When I gave him the cake he looked at not sure what to do since it was so big, but Mark just shoved his hands in it. It didn't take much after that for Luke to smash it to pieces and to start eating it. He already loves to play with his foods so it didn't take much to get him into the cake thing. We have such great friends here that all have little kids that Luke adores so we had quite a good time.

We recently took a trip to Germany and Russia. Mark had a trade show in Germany and then we decided that since we were already in that direction we'd go visit my parents in Moscow. Germany was amazing and made me want to spend a lot of time visiting Europe. My mom was the best tour guide in Moscow and made it possible for us to see so many things while we were in Moscow as well. This trip made me realize just how much I love to travel and want to do more of it. We had a lot of fun, but poor little Luke did not enjoy the limited space on the airplanes. He is walking all over and therefore he wanted to walk up and down the isles touching EVERYONE! He was as good as can be expected for an 11 month old I suppose.

As I figure this blogging thing out more, I'll get some pictures posted of my cute little boys birthday party! I have so much fun with him every day. I am so happy that I get to stay at home with him and see how much he is learning and growing! We just had his 12 month well visit and he is still off the chart for height and 80th percentiles for weight and head. He's over 33 inches tall...this kid is bound to be tall! Me and Mark are very happy in South Carolina and feel so blessed to have not only each other but a healthy and adorable little boy!