All Things New.

A new house.

We are loving our new living arrangements. It was a whirlwind of a move because our property manager contacted us saying that they had new tenants contingent upon our ability to move out by April 15th. The month and a half we saved on rent was great motivation, and we really wanted to help out our landlords since they are such good people. Since it was spring break and Andrew had three of those days off, we decided to pack and move it all...in three days! We are forever indebted (again) to my mom and sister for the late hours, for packing my bookshelves AGAIN, and not complaining about it one bit. And we are thankful to Jon for his painting expertise, to Josh for coming home early to help, and to our dear friends who helped us (Thanks Mel and Mike!). We might have a little less space, but everything has worked out great so far. Jackson loves his new room, and I love how close he is to us. Payton is happier living at Grandma Barbara’s…she was always asking to “go over there” anyways. We have some yard selling to do Saturday and some organizing to do, but it’s coming along very well.

A new business.

I signed up to sell Discovery Toys back in December hoping to make some extra money. While I have more than recovered my investment cost (and gotten a lot of toys myself), I’m not exactly making any supplemental income. And so, I’ve been praying and looking for other options. I reluctantly agreed to attend a Mary Kay event a couple of weeks ago, and now I’m a beauty consultant! I actually love these products (used them before and compared prices and quality recently). I love the company’s values – they get that my family comes first. AND, I get TONS of support and help from women who have been super successful in their business ventures. I’m excited about this opportunity and feel that it can give me the flexibility I’m looking for. So, if you use Mary Kay, you better call me. If you’ve never used Mary Kay, let me show you their good stuff one on one, or host a party and get up to $100 in free product! :) I’ll keep my Discovery Toys status for now…I can still get you toys…and will for my discount!!

New words.

Jackson is a chatter box lately. It’s hard to get a word in with him it seems. Here are words he can say:

• Daddy
• Mommy
• No – yeah, that’s fun
• Bobby – my Dad hates this.
• Baby
• Bye – Bye – sometimes you even get the wave!
• Hey or Hi – depending on his mood
• Catch – sounds like “atch”
• Ball
• Ty and Emre (“emme”) – two of Melanie’s kids
• What? – love how he enunciates his t’s!
• Duck – sometimes it sounds bad
• Uh – oh and Oh Wow!
• Owwwwww (especially when hitting Dad in the face)

He also loves to sing, so we’ll try to get some of that on video soon for our Missouri family to hear.  Can’t wait for you guys to see him in June!

By the way, we were overwhelmed by all of you at his first birthday party last weekend. We are blessed to have such wonderful friends and family! Thanks for sharing this special time with us!

Jackson’s still an eating machine and is army crawling all over the place. He still loves to walk though. He has shoes now and is pushing his scooter some. It won’t be long I’m sure! We’re still house-proofing, so hopefully we have some time…

I’ll post 1 year pictures and birthday party pictures soon! Forgive my delay…we have a lot going on!!