I thought this was Texas?!!??!!

The last few days here in Texas we have gotten a fair amount of ice and today, snow. Yes 4 inches or so here is a fair amount of snow. When you add a good amount of ice under that...it makes for some bad conditions. They do not have the equipment to handle much here, and believe me, you can tell that by how bad the roads are. They just are simply not used to it. With the super bowl coming up on sunday, Arlington(where we live) is getting a lot of grief for not cleaning it up fast enough. To the defense of the Tex Dot, it is extremely unusual for it to snow like this here. So, what do you expect? Either way, I was NOT happy to see all this crud when I woke up. Enjoy my misery.

Mandy as always is living the dream and frolicking around in the snow.

The pool and hot tub look very strange to me still open, yet all this snow is surrounding it. Strange thing for me to see.

This is a view out of our front door. Looks waaaay too much like Iowa if you ask me.

Library cards

Our library here lets children 2 and up get a library card all for them. He has his own account and everything. It even comes with a cool little zip up pouch. He LOVES the library and always has, so we though this would be perfect for him.

9mm and warm days

Today it was 76 degrees here in northern Texas. To us..that means AMAZING weather. We were outside just about all day enjoying it. One of the things we did was go to the park and feed to ducks and let Ryker play play play. We also played in the backyard and Brian and I worked on teaching Ryker how to throw a baseball. Pretty sure it likely ended up on Brians most favorite moments of being a dad, list. Just guessing by the look on his face when he was teaching him. It was a lot of fun.

Even miss Mandy had a good time.

Ok, So I am sure you reading the title and thought...9mm, isn't that a gun??? Anyone who knows me well knows that I am not really a gun person. Ever since moving to a much larger city I had to come to the reality that more crime indeed comes with a larger city. Since Brian works out of town so much, I refuse to not own a gun purely for protection reasons. I hope to never ever have to use it for that reason, but no one is gonna hurt my baby boy. With that being said, for me to own a gun, I need to be comfortable with handling and shooting it. Brian and I decided to take one of his vacation days and go to the shooting range with a couple of his fathers guns and let me try one out. It was one of the most exhilarating/scary feelings I have ever had. The amount of power a person holds when holding a gun is insane. I have always had a respect for guns and weapons in general, but I 100% respect them and what they can do. It was a good learning experience and I plan to go back in the near future to try another one out.

Pretty good shot for a first timer

Fire stations and Rock and Roll

Yesterday we were lucky enough to go on a special tour of a nearby fire department with one of my mommy groups that I am in. Ryker absolutely LOVED every second of it. Brian and I also enjoyed it too. It was fun to see all the ins and outs of it all. It was also 61 degrees yesterday here, so that always helps too. :)

This was a very cool wall of patches that were from all over the world. As you can see above, I found the Iowa one.

We also recently went exploring in downtown Dallas on New Years day, and got to see many cool things. These are a few things we visited and checked out. House of Blues and Hard Rock Cafe.

A year!!!!

Ok, So... it has been a year. I know I know. BUT, I have started my own business, Ryker has turned 2, I went back to school, moved to Texas, and have done many many other things in this last year. I will start with the business thing. Over the summer I decided to start my own photography business since so many people kept saying things like, " I hope you get paid to do these pictures". So, I thought why not take my passion in life(outside of being a mommy of course) and try and make some money from it? From that grew 1threephotography.

I have been able to capture 2 weddings, children, newborns, family, and a few other things. It has been 100% wonderful and I love every second I am taking pictures. Here are a few of my favorites.

I also went back to school August of 2010 for my entrepreneurship certificate to help run my business, and to overall better myself. I finished my first semester back to school in almost 8 years with an A and a B. I must say I was very happy about those grades. I am 2 weeks into

my second semester at this point and it is going well so far.

In October Ryker turned 2!!! He has for sure had a case of the "terrible 2s" from

time to time, but over all it is a fun and exciting age.

In August Brian had the chance to take a transfer to Texas with the railroad. I had just started school and a new business but thought, if it was gonna be any time, why not now?Since school is online it gave me the flexibility to do it any

where.

So, in October Brian went on down to Texas and November 1st, Ryker and I (and my mom)followed leaving the house up for sale(and still is). Until then we are staying with Brian's parents since owning 2 houses will not work for us. My mom, I don't know what I would have done without all her help with the move, including driving down with Ryker and I and staying a week to help unpack and all that fun stuff that comes with it. She is amazing. Love ya mom!

Moving....It was one if the hardest things I have ever done. Leaving my family and friends, especially my niece Gabby and my nephew Drake was almost impossible to do, but for my family this was to be a good chance for more job opportunity and better weather. Brian would say it provides year round sports. :) haha

Overall, we didn't want to look back in 5 years and think, what if? So, we just went for it. It has been 2 and half months at this point and we are very happy here so far. I HATE being away from everyone back home, (and by the way Iowa will ALWAYS be home) but it gets a little easier each day, and skype is a great tool.

Well..that is a update on the last year in a nutshell. I will try to be better about staying on top of this now that we are settled in a bit. Here are some photos of life since we have come to Texas.

Christmas 2010, New years Eve 2010-2011, and being Texans

ACL Fun and much more

A few things have changed around here in the last couple months. Because I am the worlds biggest clutz now. On Dec 8th 2009 I slipped and fell on the wonderful ice/snow outside of our house. I thought I really messed it up right at first due to the pain I was in. Thanks to a nice nearby neighbor I got up and got home. I was sore, but walking and fine. A few days later I realized I was NOT fine and something was wrong. After a few doctor visits and 1 VERY small and creepy MRI, they determined I had torn my ACL and minicus in my right knee. ( On the same leg as previous injury just a few months before) I ended up needing surgery because it was just extremely unstable. SO, I had my ACL repaired on Jan 26th of this year. Fun start to a year right? It has a been a long and painful Physical Therapy process...but it IS improving day by day. Thankfully I had my mom here to help me with the babies. I (and Brandon and Megan) would have been...well it wouldn't have been good for either of us. I am SO thankful for all she has done for us. It means more than she will ever know. THANKS MOM!!! Love ya!!!

Here is a wonderful picture of me the day after surgery...fun fun it was.

The reason I fell...

Onto more exciting things...Ryker is now 16 months old, and will be 17 months old in a few days. He has changed so so much over the last few months. He is SO much fun and loves to entertain us ALL day. He is a ball of energy and I LOVE it. ( 99% of the time anyway)

Here are a few recent pics of Ryker being Ryker...

Some say we look alike?

Full of smiles

We heard of place here called lollipop haircuts for kids. It was supposed to be geared to children, and you get a picture and a certificate for going. This was Rykers 10th or more haircut, BUT only the second ever in a actual "salon" place.

You decide how you think it went.....

This is the start of the cut

He screamed and cried the ENTIRE time. Poor guy.

This is the certificate he got with a lock of hair. They also took a picture for us and it turned out pretty good. After he got out of the chair and saw Elmo was on TV...he was fine.

He got to get a faux hawk. We thought it would look cute. It can be done up and look normal too..so ..why not? Turned out pretty cute I think.

Someone else growing like a weed is our beautiful niece Gabby Gab. She is doing so much now and is also....everywhere.

He likes to play Wheres Ryker behind the curtains...got a good shot from it.

We had a chance to let Ryker play the other day since the temps rose a little bit.

After a mouth full of snow....

Our little Brad Pitt....

Another good "wheres Ryker" pic

Gabby and Ryker playing and loving on Elmo...we love Elmo in this house.

The next thing on the list for this family....we are all anxiously waiting on the arrival of Brandon and Megs bundle of joy, baby boy..........????

We cant WAIT!!