Aurora turns 2!

Aurora turned 2 this past weekend! Time sure flies when your having fun with your babies! She was born at St.Lukes in Boise at 12:11 pm after being in active labor for 5 hours and pushing for 15 minutes. She weighed 8lbs 15oz and was perfectly healthy! It has been so interesting watching her learn and grow!

We ended up celebrating her birthday Friday night instead of Sunday because her dad was supposed to have to work on her birthday. We had it arranged to have friends over but we were all sick and didn't want to get everyone else sick so we had a small party with just us! She didn't seem to care because she loved tearing the paper off her presents and loved eating the cake!

We are so lucky to have this smart little girl in our family!

Thanksgiving Festivities

For Thanksgiving we were invited to Tyson's brother's house in Idaho Falls. Even though the weather wasn't great we decided to go and just take the freeway instead of the shortcut through the mountains. Thank goodness we went Wednesday because it ended up taking nearly 6 hours instead of 4 but we finally arrived late at night with the girls screaming and our knuckles white.

The first night in a new bed we never sleep very well, so after not much sleep we got up to get ready for the day and help Brooke get the food and house ready for all the company. All in all there were 8 adults and 6 kids that stayed the weekend at their house (thanks Tim and Brooke for putting up with the chaos). After a full morning of preparation we enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner that included all of Tyson's side of the family (except Milo) and some delicious food! For the remainder of the day we visited, planned our day of black Friday sales, and played games. We were also lucky enough to have one of Brooke's good friends come and get pictures of all of us (which we had never had before). Getting the kids to hold still is quite the feat but well worth it!

The next morning at 2:30 am I got up (fully clothed and made-up from the previous day), fed the baby and proceeded to get the rest of the crew up. Ryan and Jared stayed home and babysat while the rest of the adults went out into the freezing temperatures in hopes of saving some green at the Black Friday sales. (I think we all ended up spending more than planned though because their were some "really good deals"). It ended up being a very long but actually very fun morning of shopping! After we all got home and napped we spent time playing games and visiting again.

Saturday was a day saved for the guys trip to Grand Targhee. They skied and snowboarded their little hearts out while the girls, kids and Jared stayed in and rested. I woke up that morning with aches and a fever that my obvious cold had something to do with so resting was just what I needed! That night we watched movies and went to bed early!

Sunday was the day we were to drive home and let me tell ya the weather wasn't on the same page with us. It had snowed several inches overnight, but we had to go anyway because Tyson had to be home for work and we were taking Chase to meet his mom and he had school the next day. Chase was a big help with the girls on the way home, and it didn't hurt that we decided to let them use their Christmas present (a double portable DVD player) early. We made it home in 5 hours and Chase reluctantly went with his mom an hour after that.

And just like that we are thrown back into real life. It was a great weekend that we wished could have lasted longer!

STAYING

So, Tyson found out we will be staying in Mountain Home for a while, at least, after he gets his new job next summer. This is great news for us, and takes a massive weight off of our shoulders!

I also wanted to share our Halloween experience with everyone. We celebrated Halloween on Saturday, the 30th. We went to our ward party which included: games, dinner, and trunk or treating. I am a BIG Halloween advocate! It was (and still is) one of my favorite Holidays. Needless to say, we all dressed up and we even decorated the trunk for the Trunk or Treat. Tyson and a friend from the ward took Aurora around to the different cars to get candy.  I stayed behind with Harper to hand out candy. Then we came home and watched a "scary" movie and ate junk food. So, of course, when it was time for Aurora to go to bed she was so hyped up from all the sugar we had to "wrestle" her into bed. All in all, it was a fun day!

We are looking forward to sharing the Holiday season with our beautiful family! Aurora will also be 2 in less than a month, so there will be some more fun posts soon enough!

The Days of our Lives

Not many exciting things are going on in our lives. We did get to go to Preston to visit our families a couple of weeks ago which was awesome! Everybody(except Chase) in Tyson's family got to hang out and get pictures one of the days. Another day we got to spend time laughing and visiting with everybody from my family that lives in the nearby area as well! Tyson got to go Elk hunting with my dad for a few days (with no luck, unfortunately). He was glad he was able to go hunting anyway because he had a great time riding horses and not having to think about work! We, on the other hand, were glad to get him back when it was over! Then after we got back to Mountain Home, Tyson had another week off that we got to spend together doing fun little things as a family!

Now we are back to the normal schedule...........work and taking care of the house & kids. Don't get me wrong we appreciate our lives but now Tyson's job isn't so flexible and Aurora is going through the hardest stage yet. Needless to say, we have both been more stressed out than normal!

We still haven't heard as to whether or not we will have to move next summer, so that is still up in the air. We are truly hoping to stay here because we have gotten comfortable in our home and have a lot of great friends here. Plus we would have a hard time selling our house for what we would need to break even.

Harper is almost 5 months old already and Aurora just loves her little sister. She is always hugging and kissing her. When Harper cries Aurora says, "Okay? hmmm?" Aurora loves having a little playmate and Harper smiles whenever Aurora talks to her. We truly are lucky for our beautiful angels!

Until next time............................

Keeping up with the Andersen's

So I guess I am not very good at keeping up with a journal...never have been. That is besides the fact that being a mother of 2 under 2 can be very busy at times! Alot is going on with Tyson's job right now that we dont have any for sure news on yet, but in a nut-shell we could be moving, YIKES! Right now would  be horrible timing because we would probably be upside-down on our house. Anyway, we will let you all know more when we do.

Aurora and Harper are growing like weeds. The past couple of weeks Aurora has been learning to talk a lot better. All of a sudden she woke up one day saying "Train, Choo-Choo" and ever since then she is saying something new everyday, and she is stringing words together.  She now also loves to go to "chuch" (church). Whenever you say "church" she wants to get her shoes on and in nursery they must be teaching her that she needs to be nice because she associates "nice" with "church". We are also trying to slowly introduce her to the "potty" I would like to get her potty trained around the time she turns 2. It is so exciting to see her learning new things. Harper is starting to coo alot more and will probably be laughing soon. We already started putting her in the Johnny-Jump up even though it says 6mo+ because she a really strong neck and strong legs. She doesnt bounce yet but just kinda hangs around so to speak. Harper is a really laid back girl, as long as she is on her acid reflux medicine she sleeps well and is happy most of the time. They are both such cute girls and we love them so much!

Tyson has been working swing shift for the past couple of weeks which is a curse and a blessing. Some nights he has been home late but some nights he has only had to work for a couple of hours. It almost seems like we get to spend more time together and having him there in the morning can be very helpful. If he is gone when its the kids' bedtime that is hard though because they are usually tired and grouchy and hard to deal with. Because he is there in the morning he has been able to watch the kids while I workout or run so I have been able to have that time to work on myself and that has been good!

Tyson and I have been trying to get healthy. We are trying to eat smaller portions and we have started running in the morning. Tyson runs 3 miles every other morning and I (being a very routine person) run 2 miles every day except Sunday. I have never been a runner so the first few times were really hard but I am getting in the swing of it now and I actually enjoy it! Tyson has always had to run for PT so he is pretty good at it and he can do it much quicker than me (which is one reason we dont go together). Both of us have lost a few pounds and are feeling better about ourselves!

Well, I hope this updates you a little on what we have been up to. Thanks for wanting to know more about us!

Until next time.................

Awwww Sunday

So Sunday mornings are always a little hectic at our house trying to get all of us ready and  to church by 11:00. Tyson always has meetings at 8:00 and usually has to make phone calls after his meeting so he isnt available to help us get ready a lot of times. When we finally get to church it is always hard for us to keep our 2 under 2 quiet during sacrament meeting. The baby always cries about half way through because she thinks she is hungry or something. Despite several poopie diapers and trips to the mothers lounge we were able to stay through all three meetings. We came home to make an early dinner and then take a late nap. After all of that Tyson had to leave us to do visits with the Elders Quorum  presidency, we weren't able to go for our daily because  the wind was too strong. It was a satisfactory Sunday! Tah tah

We just love our weekends together!

Today started out with Tyson mowing the lawn while I did my Jillian Michaels workout video. Aurora loves to watch me workout and she tries to do some of the moves too (such a cutie).
Then we decided to go yard-saling, (we love to do this together on Saturdays)
After spending too much money on baby clothes and hunting stuff we came home, ate lunch and laid down for a  nap. Every time I am just about asleep the baby decides she is no longer tired so we always end up sleeping next to eachother cause she sleeps better that way.
When we woke up we got ready and went to the gun range. Tyson has been trying to get me to go with him to site in his new 9mm handgun for a few weeks now. Of course he wants me to shoot it to get used to using it and so I did. It wasn't too bad considering I am afraid to even hold a bullet by itself.
Then we went to the furniture store to look at king-size bedroom sets (we have definitely out-grown our queen size bed now that we have two kids). We must have looked really ghetto after being at the shooting range cause not one of the sales reps even came up to us which was nice and unusual. We just wanted to price some mattresses and such, so we did come home empty handed which is also unusual.
We decided to go get a papa murphys take and bake pizza for dinner.
When we were done with dinner we decided to go for our usual walk but ended up walking to McDonalds and got McFlurry's (so much for our walk and for our diets).
After we got home from our "walk" we got the kids to sleep and watched a movie. Then off to bed for us.
All in all it was a really fun day spent together as a cute little family! Hope yours was nice as well!

Friday

Today wasn't anything especially exciting, but I will make a post anyway for the grandparents......

It started out with Tyson getting home from work at 9:30 am which was exciting and unexpected. After he got home we got to spend time as a family hanging out and eating lunch together. Then after Aurora and Harper went down for a nap I went to my doctors appointment while Tyson stayed with the girls. I painfully and successfully got my IUD placed and then came home. After which, my babies and myself went to our neighbor friends' house for a play date, when we got home from that we all went out to eat at a, not very satisfying, Mexican restaurant in town. After going for a walk we came home and grudgingly got Aurora to bed. Before we went to bed we watched the movie  "Date Night" that we had rented (which was incredibly funny and I would recommend it to anyone in need of a laugh). Like I said, Just another normal day in the life the Andersen'S. Hope you all got some entertainment out of our boring but Happy day!

Harper is over 2 months now.......where does the time go?

Today we went to the dr. for Harper's two month check up and to our surprise she weighs 13.01 lbs now and is in the 84 percentile. "Growing like a weed" they say. For height she is in the 78% and for Head she is in the 26%. When he was checking to see if her hips pop out it took him longer than normal because in his words "she has really strong legs". I already new this, however, because when I was pregnant with her I swore she was gonna break my ribs. Unfortunately, during this appointment she had to get her first set of vaccines and I couldn't even watch and her cries were heartbreaking, but I know it is for the better! He also checked her herniated belly-button and told us it is a very large hernia but that most surgeons wont do anything until the age of 3 because the risks of the surgery are greater than the hernia itself. He also looked at her skin, which they told me last time had eczema, but he said it wasn't very bad and that it was probably just dry skin. He did order us some Eucerine to use on it though.
While we were there we asked the Doctor check Aurora's ears because she had been tugging at them lately and waking in the night screaming but he said her ears look great.......Thank goodness no antibiotics(being that she is allergic to penicillin it makes it more difficult). Now the question is why is she waking up so unhappy every night, could be nightmares/scared of the dark, or she may be getting her canine teeth which haven't reared their ugly heads yet. I am gonna go buy her a nightlight to see if that may solve the problem. Anyhow, we have happy healthy kids and we are so blessed!
 Also while we were at the clinic I had to get a blood pregnancy test done because tomorrow I am having an IUD placed and the 24 hour before pregnancy test is standard. Fun fun we get to spend time at the clinic again tomorrow.

Fortunately, I have a very helpful husband who took time out of his busy work schedule to come to the clinic and help me with the kids.......two under two can be very difficult in public (or anywhere for that matter). Thanks, honey!

So far our day hasn't brought any other events worth mentioning, so we will be on to let you know what our day brings tomorrow! See you soon!

Introduction to the fam!

We are an LDS, military family of four and we also have a daughter waiting to greet us in heaven. Tyson and I (both 26) are high-school sweethearts and have been married for 8 years. We were both 20 when we lost our first daughter, Piper, at 30 weeks gestation. Our daughter Aurora is almost 21 months and baby Harper is 2 and 1/2 months. We are stationed at Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho and being from Preston, Idaho are not far from home. We love to spend time together as a family camping, going for walks, eating, playing in the yard, and enjoying the company of family and friends. Tyson just made Tech. Sgt. in the AirForce and is a dedicated provider. "Daddy" enjoys playing video games, hunting, woodworking and fishing! I, Jamie, am a stay-at-home mom and homemaker who enjoys scrapbooking, cooking, reading and doing crafts. Aurora loves to look at books, play with dolls, play with other children and she loves to kiss her sister Harper. Harper loves to be held, loves her bath and will coo when you talk to her. For the most part we are a Happy, Eternal family with the goal of inviting more children into our family and starting/completing a higher education. All are welcome to join in our fun!