Poor Benjamin
Benjamin hasn’t had the best of luck with cavities. On his last visit, we discovered that he had 14 CAVITIES!! Can you believe?? Poor little guy! We had to take him to a surgical center and completely put him out to perform all the fillings. Here is a picture of him before they took him back. He got a new shirt and played in a wagon.

He's still a good lookin' kid though. This picture always brings a smile to my face.


As of now, I am training at my gym for my last triathlon of the year. This will be my 4th one to do. After this, I think I’m going to take a break from the gym and pursue working out on my own. That will sure bring some extra savings in our pockets instead of paying my trainer. Hopefully, I can keep up my workouts and use my treadmill a lot this winter.

Fun in the apartment!
Since we live here now with the in-laws, Ryan and Benjamin are having a blast spending time with their grandpa! They’ve been having fun helping him rake the leaves in the backyard. Andy gets his tractor out and puts his trailer on the back. He loads all the leaves in the back and throws the boys in there. They love it.


One Sunday, my brother-in-law Cody brought over his big semi-truck. The boys were ecstatic!! Here are some pictures of them playing around!

Recently, I had to bring Ben with me to get some samples of carpet and wood for our home. (Ryan was in school at the time.) There was a nice little area with ducks and a pond. Ben begged me to stop so he could take a closer look.

Halloween!
Halloween crept (in a scary Halloween way) up on us! We had a great time out this year. In addition to Halloween night, the boys were able to wear their costumes to school and to our annual Ward Halloween Carnival. It was really fun for them.

Obviously, Ryan was a bumble bee and Benjamin was Sheriff Woody.

New Home
In September, we finally sold our house!! Yay! We were so thrilled that we were able to move forward with building our home. I was sad to see our home go because we’ve lived there for almost 8 years and also the fact that I brought my babies home there. Our home felt really weird when we moved the last piece of furniture out. It felt so empty and just “not ours” anymore. Sad huh?

As of now, we are living with Troy’s parents while our home is being built. They have a 1 bedroom apartment attached to their house. It’s a bit of a squeeze for us but we’re happy and grateful to be here instead of renting an apartment somewhere else. Just recently, we decided to move from our home ward to Troy’s parent’s ward. I’m happy with the decision because I just felt that staying in our old ward wasn’t right. I didn’t feel at home anymore and I felt that we needed to move forward.

As of right now, we will be breaking ground for our new home next week. The construction time will take 90 days. We are excited to create a home that we already love and to make more memories. We get to choose everything… carpet and tile, to doorknobs and countertops. So far, I’m doing great with the stress level. I think I have a handle on things. I just take one thing at a time. I’m not saying that the process so far hasn’t created tension between Troy and I, because it has. We’ve had some fights here and there but we’re working through it. It’s great… our marriage will strengthen because of this experience.

Time to Update!
I guess the last time I blogged was in July! Wow… I sure did take a long break from blogging didn’t I? I figure that it’s time for me to keep it up to date more often. I do that. Blog, blog, blog… then stop for a long time.

Well, since July, here’s what is going on with us…

In August, Ryan started back to school. My little Kindergardner!! I was long awaiting the first day of school!


Yay!! He sure does look so happy in these pictures!

I also thought it was a good idea to get Benjamin in a preschool. I was really excited to hear about a preschool that a woman was teaching out of her own home. Her price was really good so we went for it. Benjamin is having a blast! They do lots of crafts, sing songs, tell stories, and go on fun field trips.


In the fire station pictures, you’ll notice that Ben has band-aids on his chin. Yet again, he fell and busted is little chin open. Luckily this time, knock on wood, he only needed glue to keep it shut. No stitches.

Here is when they went to a fun place called Pumpkin Land.

Swim Lessons and Troy's Birthday Presents

The boys started a 2 week swimming lessons. They are both having fun going to the pool everyday to learn and have fun with their teacher.


They are both still having a hard time putting their heads under water but while Ryan was in the bath tub last night, we did it! I'm excited to tell his teacher next week so he can start having more fun!

Now..... Here are the 2 toys Troy got for his birthday! (Spoiled little brat!)

Troy's first present... The Ipad. He loves to use it for his new job. He needs to take lots of notes at work and take it to all of his meetings. He can also jump on the internet with it wherever he needs to pull it up. It's a really handy little notebook.


The boys are having fun with it too. We've added the Toy Story 3 app on it. It's a storytelling app that also has games during the story. The boys are in heaven!

The second present... A new car!! It's a 2010 Jetta TDI. I don't know alot about cars so go Google it and find out all the specs. All I know... it runs on diesel fuel and gets about 50 miles to the gallon. That's pretty great! The reason we bought it was to replace our 2001 Passat. We spent a fortune last year on getting the car fixed and it ran smooth! All of a sudden, it started making more sounds and that was the last straw for Troy. He really needed a dependable car to commute all the way up to Salt Lake and back. Here it is!

All I have to say is that Christmas better be great for me! I better get something good!

Up to date news...

We've now had our house up for sale for 6 months now. There have been some people that have been interested but either their loan didn't go through or they needed to still sell their home they are in. I'm really trying to be patient but it's getting pretty exhausting waiting and keeping the house clean.

At the beginning of June, Troy was presented with an opportunity for another job that was better paying and that is a different career. He would be working with a sales company called ASG that sells computer equipment. Troy would basically be explaining to his clients the technical side of the sale. He will help them build their systems that would best fit their needs and help them handle any technical issues they might have in the future after purchasing it. Troy was pretty excited for this potential job since he would be moving away from the operational side of computers. No more being on call and no more dealing with keeping computers and servers up and running. He thought this would be a fun change. I have no idea what Troy knows about computers. I think he’s a computer genius. All I care about is the fact that we get more money! Wahoo! More shopping for me!! Things moved fast for this job and the official offer came in the middle of June.

So, since I got my boot off and I can now start exercising, something else happened to me! A couple of weeks ago, on Thursday, July 15th, I fell and sprained my ankle pretty bad. I have to wear a brace for another week!! With the luck I’m having, maybe next week I’ll fall and break my arm. I am still going to the gym every day and I’m training for 3 triathlons that my gym hosts in the winter. The first one is in November so hopefully I’ll be ready by then. I’m crossing my fingers. As for my weight situation, my sister Anne helped me start Weight Watchers and I’ve already lost about 7 pounds!! I’m excited to lose weight and get back into shape! Pray for me!!

Bales Family Reunion
Houston, June 2010

I am finally posting again! I am waaaaaay behind. So much has happened in the last month! Last month in June, we drove all the way down to Houston, Texas for a Bales Family Reunion. It was a very welcomed break!!

We all started down in Galveston. We rented a beach house and had fun going back and forth to the beach. Here are some pictures of the boys at the beach the first night we got there.

We all had fun playing the Wii and, thanks to my mom for getting a fun dance game. All the grandkids had a blast playing the same songs over and over again. Since then, I've had "The Eye of the Tiger" in my head!

We also had fun making shirts for all the grandkids. Everyone painted their hands and put their hand prints on every shirt. Ryan didn't do very well with this part. he wasn't use to this and he had a huge meltdown while we forced paint on his hands.

Benjamin didn't do too bad. He just didn't understand why we kept getting him dirty with all the paint.

We also had to get the grandkids together for the grandkid picture. My mom made all the girls WAY CUTE pillow case dresses! We pilled all the kids on the stairs and started shooting.

Another reason I love being there was when things settled down at the end of the day and all the siblings with my mom and dad sat on the deck and talked. It was great.

After leaving Galveston, some of us went to the Rainforest Cafe. It was really cool inside.

But, Ryan didn't do very well inside. He was paralyzed with terror. Every 20 minutes or so, the lights would fade and it would start "thundering and lightening." He really struggled with that. Poor Ryan.We also went to a really cool store called Murdocks. It is a huge souvenir shop that has everything you can think of. I got some cool wind chimes, some t-shirts that say Galveston Island on them, and a sundress. Really cool stuff!

After the fun of Galveston, we headed back to Humble and chilled for the rest of the week. We had fun going to the movies to see the new Toy Story 3 in 3D.

This was Ryan and Benjamin's first time going to a movie! They both did really good. At the end of the movie, Ryan fell asleep because we've been keeping him up at nights. Ben was pretty restless and I had to go out a couple times with him. I didn't see the last of the movie so we'll have to get it when it comes out.

We also took the wonderful opportunity to eat wonderful BBQ!! While we ate there, they had karaoke set up and the kids got up to sing "Sweet Home Alabama." We also sang happy birthday to my nephew Kaleb. He's 12 now!! He's getting so old!!

One of the most important things we did, we ate Blue Bell ice cream!

Lastly, we just had to get some family pictures done. (Please excuse how I look. I know I'm really big. I'm working on it!)