Our Atlanta Trip

Well, we made it back to Tucson in one piece! The trip out there was great. We left Thursday mid day to head up to Phoenix. We decided to go up a day earlier than our flight to have some extra time together. We saw Batman at the IMAX theater, ate at Cafe Rio', and spent the night in a motel room (not my favorite part.) We stayed in a super 8 to save money and as soon as we saw the room I wished I had just spent the money for a nice hotel room. But it was just one night and we were up at 7:00 and out the door by 8:00 am to catch our 10:45 flight to Atlanta. It was a direct flight, which was so nice and we arrived in Atlanta at 5:45 pm (there is a three hour time difference.) We met Matthew's clients at the airport and headed back to our hotel to freshen up. We stayed at the Glenn hotel, a very swanky place, and I was SO happy with the room. A great improvement over the Super 8! We had dinner at a great Italian Restaurant and spent about three hours there talking with Matthew's clients and getting to know one another. Most of the weekend was spent working and eating and hanging out with Robin and Meaghan (the clients) and on Saturday Matthew and I took a break and went to the Georgia Aquarium. It was really cool. We were sad when Sunday came and we had to go home. I didn't think I would, but I fell in love with Georgia and didn't want to go. Our flight home was quite and adventure. We got there an hour before our flight, only to find out we had a FOUR delay and didn't even get on the plane til 10:45 pm! We got back to Phoenix and had another TWO hour drive back to Tucson. We finally got in bed at 3:00 am...but with the time change we had been up all night. Needless to say, we were dragging on Monday! Here are some pictures from our trip!

The Boluga Whale. They are all white and very beautiful. They look a lot like dolphins.
Not the best picture of me, but we were in the room where the ceiling is glass and fish and SHARKS swim overhead!
Me and Matthew in front of the GIANT glass at the end of the Aquarium that shows all sorts of fish and sharks and sting rays, ect. swimming around. It was really spectacular.
Aren't these beautiful? They were even more impressive in person.
Matthew watching TV in our hotel room. It was a HUGE plasma TV, and our bed was a California king with fancy sheets and down comforters...THANKS Robin and Meaghan, we LOVED our hotel room!

Georgia on my mind...

We are heading to Atlanta for the weekend. Matthew has a business trip and I am tagging along...with out the kids :) It's not for Raytheon, but for our web design business that Matthew started about three years ago. It's grown steadily over the years and Matthew has gained some loyal clients, one of which is flying us out to discuss an upcoming design project. It will be a nice break for us, seeing as this is our FIRST trip together since being married WITHOUT kids! And seeing as we will have three children by Christmas, a weekend away together is much needed. Granted he will be in meetings most of the weekend, but any free time to myself is going to be enjoyed. We are going up to Phoenix today and spending the night and leaving for Atlanta early Friday morning. We are going to see Batman at the IMAX this afternoon and have dinner at Cafe Rio afterwards...that's right, Cafe Rio! We have one in Arizona now, and I am SO SO SO happy. It was my favorite restaurant in Utah. There is only one in Mesa, so we make it a point to eat there after visiting the temple. It's wonderful. I will post pictures of our trip when we get back.

Poll Anwser

Backyard fun

Three days in a row of blog posts, this is a personal record for me! I almost wasn't going to post these pictures because of how embarrassed I am of our backyard. You see, here in Tucson if you want a "normal" backyard with grass and trees--you know the stuff that just naturally grows everywhere else, you have to PAY for it. That's right, I said PAY for grass and trees. It is one of the reason I always complain about living in the desert and my biggest pet peeves! I won't even tell you the ridiculous amount of money it is going to cost us to landscape our backyard...but we are planning on having it done by April of 2009, now that most of the inside renovations are completed. Until then, any backyard pictures will show off our lovely gravel and weeds.

Last night after a dinner of McDonald's (it was late when I got back from the doctors so I ran through the drive threw on my way home) I decided that it had cooled down enough for the kids to go outside while Matthew swept the patio and cleaned up after Sadie (our doggie). Aidan bugs me ALL day long to go outside and I usually have to say no until after 7:00 pm, which works because he goes out and gets filthy and comes in just in time for his bath and getting ready for bed. And last night was special because we let Emma go outside too. That is, she got to go outside with shoes on and walk and play around by herself. Up until now one of us would have to hold her because she couldn't walk well enough...she had so much fun and we had so much fun watching her!


Emma and our dog Saddie. Emma just loved that spoon and didn't put it down the whole time.
This is what Emma looks like when you say "smile." She scrunches up her face and squints.
A cute moment alone with no dog or brother bothering her.
Aidan loves his radio flyer wagon and took his sister for ride...notice she STILL has the spoon.
Aidan sitting on his "potty steps" drinking some water after being outside. He was very thirsty when he came in and he likes to go in his bathroom and "be alone." It's very cute.

Outing To The Park

We braved the heat (it was 105 degrees) to take the kids to the park on Saturday. They love getting out of the house, since we stay in most of the time during the summer. I try and take them to the library, where it's air conditioned, for story time and to my in laws to swim as much as I can, but they still just love being outside. I have a hard time watching them both by myself at the park, so we had to wait until Saturday when Daddy was home. They had a blast, especially Aidan. He was able to get out lots of his pent up energy. He just loves to run and jump and climb and swing...typical boy that he is. Emma had fun too. We only stayed for a half an hour because we were all hot, sweaty, and tired from the sun.

Aidan and Emma on the swings...weeeeee!
Aidan is really good about smiling for the camera.
My two little cuties...
Emma about to go down the slide.
Can you say static electricity?
What a strong boy!


Today is my ultrasound. We had one at 8 weeks for viability, one at 13 weeks to do a screening for down syndrome (my test came back 1 in 10,000 and is considered a negative result) and today is my anatomy exam...and also to see if we can determine the sex of the baby. Any guesses?

Another month that got away from me!

I can' t believe that my baby girl is now a one year old! She turned one on June 27th (I turned 31 a week later, but I don't want to talk about that :) It was a very low key day. When Aidan turned one, because he was our first and the first grandchild, we had a big family party with a house full of people and lots of cake and ice cream. We also did that for his second birthday and I wanted something smaller and a little more intimate for Emma, and us. Matthew had that Friday off from work, so we took the kids to the library for story time and then went to Matthew's parents house to swim. After that we all went home for naps...that was so nice, and then just had dinner the four of us. I bought ice cream cupcakes at Costco, but as you'll see below they weren't a big hit with the birthday girl!


Emma opening her presents
Sitting in her new chair!
Ice Cream Cupcakes...they were yummy!
Emma cautiously taking a bite...
...and making her "this is really, really cold" face.

Since my birthday falls on the Fourth of July, we took advantage of my mother-in-law and had her babysit the kids while we went to a movie and lunch. We went to see Hancock, which is good if you don't mind a lot of swearing, and then had lunch at olive garden...I was really in the mood for bread sticks! After that we went back the the Carpenters for the rest of their Fourth of July party and topped off the day with fireworks, which we got to see perfectly from the corner of our street! We live across the street from Tucson's air force base, and they do a fireworks show every year, so we have the perfect location. Aidan loved them and has been asking every so often since, if we can watch fireworks again. He doesn't quite get that they are only once a year. It will be nice next year not to be pregnant, or just home from the hospital on my birthday!