We have a swimmer!

So my Mom decided for some reason the other morning to take Dylan swimming without his vest floatie thing....and he can swim!! Just like that! I told you in another post that you could take pads out of this vest one by one, and I had only taken out two of the 10. With my Mom the other day he was mostly dog paddling and treading water, but today my friend Kaley and I were swimming with him and he was swimming like 1/3 of the pool length underwater! I'm so proud of him, I really thought it would take most of the summer for him to get the hang of it. Just a month ago I tried to get him to swim a couple times without assistance and he would just go under immediatly. It's hard to say if the switch from floaties to the vest was a real help, but it did free up his arms so that he could learn to use them, and it didn't keep him up quite as well, which forced him to try a little harder. Here is a video of him with my Mom the first day. It takes him awhile to get off the steps but eventually he swims to her. Sorry, for some reason when I upload off my camera I lose the sound.

Our Anniversary

Kevin and I just celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary yesterday (June 22nd) and we had a really great time. My awesome sister volunteered to take Dylan for the night so we decided to have a fake escape and get a room at the new Agua Caliente hotel. Those rooms are awesome! The standard room is very large with a flat screen tv, comfortable bed and a great view! The bathroom has a huge tub, separate shower and even a small flat screen. If anyone is looking for a little escape, or somewhere for relatives to stay when they come visit, this is a great place! We relaxed for awhile when we got there and then had dinner at the Steakhouse, which was really good. We have only done maybe one other overnight without Dylan so this was really great for our relationship to have some alone time together. I highly recommend it! Here are a couple reasons why my husband is so awesome:

1. He works SO hard for our family so that I only have to work minimal and I get to stay home and take care of Dylan. He will never know how thankful I am for this.

2. He is the most awesome father to Dylan. He misses that kid so much while he is working it is so cute to see them together. He is a hands-on father with whatever Dylan wants to do: playing blocks and puzzles on the floor, dancing to the wiggles, coloring, singing, going down the slides together at the park, and playing silly games in the pool. He even asks me to have Dylan call him at work every night so that they can talk about his day.

3. He loves me unconditionally: and trust me, I can be a pain in the butt! Ever since we were dating he has treated me with so much love and respect, I knew right away that he was different than anyone else I had dated. Now I know that he was a gift from God because he fits me so perfectly. I just recently told him that I wanted to start to go and see more shows, and he just got me awesome seats to go see Wicked in L.A., which I have wanted to see forever. He is so great!

Here are a couple pictures from our getaway:

First thing we do when we get there: relax in bed and watch tv

Here's us right before we went down to have dinner

Our waitress took this picture at dinner

The Boys Camping Trip

As promised I am posting pictures of the Boys camping trip. They had a really good time. Kevin said it really gave them a good chance to bond a little bit, which is great because they don't get a whole lot of alone time. Dylan really liked it, but didn't want to go in the water, he thought the waves were scary. And he's not a big fan of sand getting on him so he mostly stayed on his towel, lol. Next month the three of us will be going on a camping trip with my parents to the beach so hopefully we will get him to overcome his fears on that trip because I know he would have a really good time.

Sitting on the beach (on his towel I'm sure)

Uncle Eric working with him on his scooter techniques

Warming his hands by the fire

A night time self portrait

Daddy and Dylan on the Beach

Mommy's Day off

I only saw Kevin briefly yesterday on Father's Day because he left yesterday morning to take Dylan camping with his family at the beach. I couldn't go because I had to work lunch yesterday, but I think it's actually really good for them to occasionally spend some extended alone time together (and I got a break too!). Don't get me wrong, I miss them both A LOT, but I had a really great night last night playing my dads choice of games- Boggle, and texas hold 'em. They are coming back later this afternoon and when I get pictures (he better have taken some!) I will post them on here.

The House

Those of you whom I have talked to recently know all about the housing drama that our family has been going through. We sold our mobile home in January after almost 2 years on the market. I was sure that when that was over our troubles were done and buying a home would be a positive experience. Wrong!! We decided to make an offer on a house in Villa Montego in south east Indio at the end of January. It was what they call a "short sale", which as anyone knows who has had experience with one of these, it is anything but short! They initially told us it would be 4-6 weeks to find out, and after 3 months we gave up and started looking again. The Villa Montego house was 4 bedrooms which I was really liking because I felt like it would be helpful, even if we had another baby, to still have an extra room. But when we started looking again we fell for a smaller house in west Indio in the shields ranch area. It was built in 1989, 3 bd 2ba, but 30,000 dollars cheaper then the previous house. We like the area a lot, especially since it is so much closer to La Quinta and Palm Desert. We are also seeing this house as a good investment even if we can't stay there forever, the payment is low enough that we wouldn't have trouble renting it. It is a foreclosure but not a short sale. We are in the process of buying it right now and still are struggling a little with how long the bank takes to get back on anything. But we are trusting the Lord that we are doing the right thing and that it will all be taken care of in the end. If all goes as it is supposed to we will be closing escrow on the 10th of July. Less than a month away!! For the last 5 months we have been living with my parents which has actually been a huge blessing because they have been so helpful with Dylan, and he loves them soooo much. Here are some pictures of the house, it needs a little work but nothing major.

The front of the house

The living room, it is small but we think it will work and it has a nice bay window. Another thing I like about this house is that it already has ceiling fans in every room. Very important!!



The kitchen-I don't like the white washed cabinents, we will probably paint them

The dining area- it is actually really long, good for a nice long table that I don't have yet :-)




The back patio- I like that it's covered and it has a ceiling fan and even a tv! The backyard is also big enough for a play set for Dylan- but not too big- we don't like yard work!

The Master bath- Nothing fancy but a good size and a nice sized tub :-)

Disneyland!!

We just took Dylan on his second disneyland trip yesterday and we had so much fun. We are as of April, annual passholders, so we have been trying to go as much as possible. Yesterdays trip was with our friends Kaley and Cliff. As they are big kids themselves, they had no problem whatsoever hanging with Dylan on all the under 40 inches rides. Yes, Dylan, at less than 3 is 40 inches! I think when they made these height requirements they were thinking that most kids would be about 4 when they reached 40 inches. We actually got to take him on splash mountain! He did fairly well, I think he was more afraid of the crazy dancing animals than he was of the big drop, lol. Even with the couple rides that scared him, the first words out of his mouth when we stepped off were, "More rides??", "More rides Mommy?!?". If anyone has kids who are playhouse disney fans (the morning disney channel shows), they should take their kids to see the Playhouse Disney live action show at California Adventures. It was soooooo cool! They do this whole story with puppets from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Little Einsteins, and Handy Manny. The look on Dylan's face during this show made the $3.00 bottles of water so worth it! He also really enjoyed the Play Parade which was really neat because it's been a long time since I even watched a parade there. We definitely wore him out, by about 6:30 we were walking over to attempt Pirates when we looked down and he was conked out in his umbrella stroller. This is the kid that won't fall asleep ANYWHERE but his own bed. We let him sleep for awhile and ended the day at Bubba Gumps restaurant (which is really really good and lively enough to keep you awake after a loooooong day). Here are some fun pictures from our day:

The Family on the train, I don't know what Dylan's face is all about

Dylan and my friend Kaley in Bug's Land

Dylan and Daddy on the Caterpillar ride (Dylans favorite!)

Cliff and Dylan on the golden zephyr (aka "that rocket ride")

Watching the Parade on Daddy's lap

He had just said "more rides!" then conked out, yes thats drool on his shirt

My Little Fish

Since we are currently living at my parents house while we wait for our house (a later post to cover that vast subject), we have been swimming almost everyday. Dylan loves the pool, we are hoping to get him swimming independently this summer but for now he is wearing a floatation device that wraps around his middle. He has been pretty cautious of going under or jumping off the edge or diving board until the other day when my friends Cliff and Kaley came over. Cliff was a lifeguard and he worked little by little with Dylan using different techniques and now he has no fear of jumping off the diving board or going under. In fact while we were swimming yesterday he insisted on jumping off the diving board about 20 times in a row (never once taking in water!). Here is an action shot my dad got the first day:

So I'm thinking if we continue to make progress he will be swimming in no time! And I love this floatie thing cause you can take out the pads little by little so they have less and less help. Sounds like it would work to me but I will update when it is sucessful. What are we going to do when we don't have a pool anymore??

My first blog

I've done it!! I've decided to start blogging! And we will all see within a few weeks whether this medium works out for me (aka-whether I keep up with it or not). Just in these first two sentences Dylan has come to visit me two times (here he comes again, 3 times!). In any regard the reason I decided to start blogging is because I have really enjoyed reading others blogs and keeping up with them through their daily experiences. Plus it seems like a neat way to record pictures, stories, and all the everyday yet memorable experiences that happen in the life of a family. So here it is, hopefully the first of many posts on my new blog! :-)