The three happiest years of my life...

Yesterday, October 7th, Gabe and I celebrated our 3 year wedding anniversary. In some ways it is hard to believe it has already been three years, but in other ways it seems like we've known each other much longer. Gabe and I are each other's absolute best friend. We have a lot of similar interests, and view a lot of issues in the same way. It is so nice to have someone who I can just sit and talk to for hours. Even after 3 years of marriage, we are not at all sick of each other.

It has been a wonderful 3 years. We have been through a lot together already. Gabe is a very wonderful, supportive, and loving husband who has stood by me with all of my medical issues and also through our first pregnancy. He helped me through my first labor, holding my hand, and counting during the contractions, coaching me through, and then watched as our first baby was born by c-section, and managed to keep his face calm and cheerful, smiling and speaking words of comfort to me throughout the entire procedure. (And he still finds me attractive after having seen my actual guts!)

Gabe has always worked very hard to provide for our family, and during this last year he went back to school, and is now working full time while he goes to school part time. He is doing this so that I can be at home with Jordan. This is something that is important to him. He wants our children to be able to grow up with a mother who is at home with them. I am so grateful that he is willing to work so hard for our family.

I love that my husband's hands are strong and somewhat calloused, and often times smudged with grease or glue. I love that he is able to fix our car, our plumbing, our AC etc etc etc! I love that he can literally pick up a loveseat, and move it in and out of a truck without anyone's help. I love that he is a kid at heart. I love to watch him play with our son, and know that he is someone our son can look up to. I love the way his eyes light up when he is talking about anything with an engine. I love that he can look so handsome to me, whether it's been a while since he's shaved or not. I love that he can decide to take up biking one month, and then the next month ride 100 miles just to be my hero.

The day I married you was the happiest day of my life. Thankyou so much for giving me three wonderful years already, and many more to come! I love you sweetheart!

Happy Birthday Gabe!

So, September 29th was my wonderful husband's birthday, and I can't believe I did not have a post ready sooner for him! My only defense is that we did go away for his birthday, so because getting ready for the trip took up a lot of my thoughts and time, I totally spaced the blog post that should have been devoted to him, on his actual birthday. Sorry honey, I love you!!

So, as I am sure you can tell by the title, and the red rocks... we went camping in Moab to celebrate Gabe's birthday. We left monday morning and spent the night in an AMAZING camp ground. We got a spot that was actually inside the Arches National Park. It was a beautiful site.

This next picture was taken from our camp site.

Jordan's favorite thing to do, once Gabe got the tent up, was to run around it over and over and over again. And he would hide behind the tent and loved having us chase him.

This is another view from our campsite. Are you jealous yet?

Jordan loved hiking around all the red rocks and sand. There was one arch that was between two very large cliffs, and it was nice and cool inside, plus there was nice smooth sand the whole way through, so we got to walk around bare foot. It was great, I would highly recommend this arch to all who have kids because it is a nice short walk, and what kid doesn't like playing in the sand? Unfortunately, we didn't bring our camera in because we were afraid it would get sand in it. So no pics, but seriously, it was awesome!

Jordan loved running in and out of the tent as well. He loves it when we pretend like we don't know where he went.

This is a view that was just a very short walk away from our campsite. Jordan did not want to pose for pictures, he wanted to wander around this hill all by himself. Can you imagine why we didn't want him to?

Check this man out! So, the air pump we brought for the air mattresses ended up being one that had to be plugged in... yeah, there was no place to plug it in where we were, so my wonderful, thoughtul husband blew up two mattresses using his own lung power! And on his birthday trip too!

Jordan enjoyed all of the short little hikes we went on, and everyone we passed stopped and smiled at him, and told us how cute he was, just walking along carrying his little sippy cup.

I always like to make Gabe breakfast in bed on his birthday, but this time it just wasn't going to work. Mainly because he had to get up to help me get the stove lit. But after that, it was smooth sailing. This was actually my first time cooking on a camp stove, so I was proud of myself. My dad always used to do the cooking when we'd go camping as kids.

This was our second time camping with Jordan and the first time was a disaster, but this time it all went quite well. We all had a really good time. Moab is a great place to camp. Especially if you are terrified of bears... yes that would be me. I actually slept this time, instead of staying up all night because I thought I heard something every 5 minutes... (and keeping Gabe awake in the process...)

Yes, poor Gabe has to put up with having a wife who is very much a girly, girl. But he handles me quite well. He put up our tent, blew up our mattresses, carried Jordan and lit all the fires etc... I love how willing he always is to help me, and go the extra mile to see to my comfort. He is always opening my doors, and taking Jordan for me when I'm not feeling well, and getting up at night to figure out what the noise was, and making sure the doors are locked every night, and giving me my shots three nights a week. I could go on and on, but I think you get the idea! He is a wonderful husband, and I am so greatful to have him in my life.

Hope you had a great birthday honey! I love you so much!

Birthday part two

I wanted to include a few more pictures that were taken by Jordan's aunt Bridgett and uncle Rory. But when I had posted the birthday post, I didn't have those pictures yet. I actually got the pictures like the next day, but got too busy to post. So now, a week later I am finally getting around to it. :)

This first picture is of the cake I made. Now I know it isn't the most impressive cake you've ever seen, but it is the best one I have ever made. I usually just frost it and call it good. So here it is in all it's glory.... as you can see, the theme of the party was "Cars".

I started having Jordan practice blowing out a candle about a month or two before the party. But, at the moment of truth, he got distracted by the cars on the cake, and had no interest whatsoever in the candle!

We eventually got him to try to blow it out. His method of doing this is to put his face up to the candle and make a "puh" sound as he lowers his head. It is very cute. And it has worked for him before. But this time he just couldn't seem to muster enough breath in the "puh". So we had to call upon Jordan's older cousin, Paige to do the deed.

This next picture just makes me laugh. Poor kid's mom likes to make him look as rediculous as she can on his birthday. The hats just crack me up. You can tell by the wrinkle in his brow that he does not find it quite so amusing.

This next picture I just thought was cute, so I decided to include it. Jordan seemed to enjoy wearing this hat a bit more than the Mater one. Go figure!

Ok now I have one more picture I had to post, and then I promise I will be done with birthday pictures...

Check this out. And would you believe that this picture was absolutely (at least to my knowledge) not staged?

They are each stepping with the same foot, at the same instant the picture was being taken, plus they are each wearing stripes. And, as with all of the Lifferth grandchildren children, they are all beautiful, blonde haired, blue eyed kids. Is that an advertisement for the children's gap or what?

There were of course many more pictures I wanted to post, but I will refrain. I want to thank Bridgett and Rory for sharing their wonderful talent in photography. A think I will probably be framing a lot of the pictures they took. And maybe some of them will show up just to decorate my blog as well. Thanks again guys!

Happy Birthday Jordan!!! (Day one)

For this post, I thought I'd include a few pictures of his first birthdays to show how he's grown. So here goes!

Jordan, on his true first birthday, or shall we say, his day of birth. It was a hard day for the both of us kid, but somehow we made it through! I can remember the first time I saw him. He was crying, but it seemed that when he heard my voice, he calmed right down, and seemed content. I felt honored to already have that sort of connection with him. I remember also that he kept sticking out his little tongue, as though he was just not sure what to think of this dry air he now found himself in.

This was Jordan's first birthday party. 'Hmmm... what is this weird squishy thing you have placed before me momma?'

'Well, whatever it is, I aint touchin' it!'

And now... for Jordan's 2nd Birthday party!!!

We had the party on saturday, because his birthday actually fell on Sunday (Sept. 6th). We had originally planned to do this at a park, but in the morning when we woke up we thought it looked like rain so we decided to do it at our house. And if you ask me, I think it was funner that way, because Gabe was able to do this...

We had the party at 10:30am, so he had only been awake for an hour or two. It took poor Jordan a little while before he started to really look happy. But I don't think grandpa minded having Jordan on his lap for a while. :)

Jordan's Grandpa and Grandma Dorsey surprised him with his VERY OWN slide! Slides have always been Jordan's favorite playground activity, so you can imagine the hours of enjoyment he's already had with that thing. Seriously, we watched "Toy Story" last night with him (several hours after the party) and he was still going at it. Through out the whole movie he was either sitting on top of it, or sliding down. So cute.

This is the first time that Jordan has actually taken the initiative and actually opened his own presents. He did so great! I tried to post a video of him opening one of them, but it was kind of long and it was taking way too long to upload.

Jordan's Grandpa and Grandma Lifferth gave him a racing car, triple track tower! You should have seen his little hands shaking with excitement while he waited for his daddy to put it together!

Jordan's cousins, Max, Paige and Charlotte had fun helping Jordan play with his new toys!

And later on, after all of Jordan's party guests had left, he and daddy had a few races. I was amazed that Jordan was actually able to get all of the cars set up and ready to race, all by himself. And he knew just where to push to make them all go. He is definitely growing up!

Jordan's favorite food (besides Chocolate) is pizza. So we made sure to have that for lunch that day.

Anyway, I have more pictures I'd like to post, but I think I might have to post them on another day. It is still actually his birthday and so I will likely have even more. I am sad also, because I forgot to take a picture of Jordan's birthday cake with my own camera. Luckily, Jordan's Aunt Bridget was there with her fancy camera and snapped a few pics of it. So I'll have to post that when I get those pictures from her also.

We had a great party, and it was so nice to have everyone over at our house. We were glad that Gabe's sister Gretchen and her family could also make it, because she happened to be visiting from Washington. Thanks so much to everyone who came!

The Rodeo

Gabe's work has treated us out to the Spanish Fork Rodeo year these past couple of years, and we thought it would be fun to really get into it this year. I couldn't find a cute cowboy hat for Jordan, so he got to pose for these pictures in my hat. So the hat is a little big... but you get the idea. :)

(I don't know why blogger is now writing in blue and also underlining this paragraph... I can't get it to stop! Sorry!)



I think Jordan is a natural cowboy. He has never, to my knowledge anyhow, put his hand in his pockets before. But, he chose today to start doing it. Gabe and I thought it was great.

The rodeo was a lot of fun, we even got Jordan clapping and having fun. At least for a while... but we did have to end up leaving early, it was getting past Jordan's bed time and he had just had enough!

Ah well... maybe next year we'll be able to stay the whole time!

More summer stuff...

I came home one afternoon a few months ago (yes I am very behind on my blogging) to find this. Anyone who knows Gabe will not be at all surprised by this picture. Gabe and Jordan are now the talk of the neighborhood.

This is Gabe and Jordan on Father's Day. I felt kind of bad because he had to share his special day with me, (my birthday fell on father's day,) so I had Jordan wear a cheesy shirt. You can't see it in the picture, but it says, 'My Dad is my Hero'.

For the 4th, we went too the Provo Freedom Festival parade. This is a tradition in my family, since I grew up in Provo. The parade was great, it even rained a little bit so we didn't get too hot!

Jordan, his cousin Junior, and grandpa Dorsey. Jordan loves to sit on grandpa's lap!

After the parade we went to my aunt and uncle's house for a family barbeque. It was nice to see everyone again.

After the barbeque, my aunt and uncle put on an amazing firworks show. Jordan was a little scared at first but he eventually came around and was clapping with everyone else. Afterward, it took a little while before he dared go near the used up fireworks. Curiosity eventually won over though, of course. He is a boy afterall.