Our Hometown Heros from San Miguel Fire Department

Here is the newspaper article written about our Brother in Law, Gilbert and Micah's father Ken.

Gilbert received an award for an accident we came along while traveling to work one morning in December and helped saved the life of one of the victims. 

Ken received a promotion to Engineer and Firefighter of the Year for the San Miguel Fire Department. 

By the way guys, does this mean you owe more ice cream to the station now - oh don't worry I don't  mind sending them a link to this website :)

Welcome Our Newest Addition, Boozer

 

 I have been BEGGING Micah to have a dog since before we were even married . . .  Since we lived in an apartment and then we moved the timing was never right.  So by the time we moved into our house I thought for sure I would get a dog someday!?!?  Yea well five years came and went . . . NO DOG!

The reasoning was we had no fence, we were to busy and never home to let a dog out and it was a lot of work for two people never home.  Ok that makes sense, but I still wanted a dog.  

So after not working for over a year I reminded Micah I still wanted a dog  . . .   the dog I wanted was too much money and we could never aggree on a dog we found that was free.  So after months of browing KSL.com free ads I checked once more for the vening before I settled down with Micah, Sam and Jon for the evening . . . and GUESS WHAT there he was . . .  

A lady in Herber  had posted an ad looking for a home for her dascuhund Ozzie.  Not only was she over an hour away it was 7:30 at night . . .  after begging and pleding with Micah I won the 'dog war' I aggreeed to take full responsability for the little guy and off we went.

He has been the best addition to our little family; he loves to play fetch, loves to cuddle, and is over all a great little dog.  He has 'issues' and we are working on potty training, but he is just sooo darm cute!!

Pretty Flower, Sammy!

Not to sure what he was thinking, but it was rather funny watching him walk around with a flower behind his ear.  And the best part of all of it - I have pictures to PROVE it.

What a Wonderful Saturday Surprise from Sam and Micah

I have been struggling with all the changes the last few weeks 

and what a wonderful surprise I came into this morning after taking Jonathan for a haircut . . .

Micah and Sam went to get me flowers and cards!  

I got the tradition I Love You card from Micah, but the one from Sam not only made me smile but touched my hear so much that I can;t express how grateful I am for this young man in my life.

The card read " Sing and Dance, Whirl and Twril you're the best, Foster Mom!"
Tanya, you're the best!  Sing and laugh, dance and prance!  Cuz you're the Best Foster Mom!  Thank you for being there for me when I had no where to go!  Love Sammy

Welcome Jonathan!

Today Micah, Sam and I welcomed Jonathan into our home!

• Birth Date: February 17th
• Age: 15 years old (16 in February)
• Sophomore at Syracuse High School
• Hometown: Price, Utah
• Favorite Sport:Football
• Favorite Color: Blue and Red
• Favorite Movie:Hercules
• Favorite Book: The Lighting Thief
• Hobbies: Reading, Writing Poetry
• Favorite Food: Mac and Cheese with Mashed Taters
• Favorite Holiday: His Birthday
• Least Favorite food: Healthy Foods
• Favorite Season: Summer
• Favorite Subject in School: Cooking and Football Conditioning
• Favorite TV Channel: Music Channel
• Favorite TV Show: 

Happy 10th Birthday Kayla

Wishing Kayla a very Happy Birthday, Hope it was a great one!

It was awesome while I was in California I got to help Kayla make her Birthday Party Invitations.

We left California home bound for Utah at 5:30 this morning, but before we could make it out of town we had to make one last stop and pick these two cuties up . . . They are coming back to Utah with us for five days to get a little R & R from California.

Returning Home to Utah

Here are a couple of snapshots of our Home Away from Home while we were in California.

Thanks to a family friend we had our own space while visiting for ten days  - As you can see from the Decor it was not the St Regis, but it was a nicely kept Motor Home parked outside of the Celedon home.

Painting Project in California

While we were visiting in California My Sister-In-Law thought it would be a great idea to get some input on painting her house.  Afterall after living there for over five years it is due for some changes; never mind the fact while she was gone at work one day I deceded to take all her framed photos down and rehang them around the living room.

Off Sara and I went to find paint samples to intise Gilbert . . .  You should know his favorite color is any shade of blue and the only color blue . . .  We found a few colors that would work nicely in their home and Sara really wanted to have a blue/brown themed living room.  Needless to say Gilbert did not like any of the colors we choice so off he went to find his own.  After serious debate as to wether it was to dark, too bright, matching and not matching we found the right shade.  Thanks to Lowes (and our friend Nick the Valspar Rep. in Utah) they choice China Blue for the main wall in their living room.

I would like to note that I LOVE textured walls, but I never had any idea how difficult they are to paint when you are only going to paint one wall!  My goal this year to to figure out a nice way to have that perfectly cut in line without it bleeding around the edges.

Paintballing Adventures

Micah and Sam went with a bunch of friends th  at Micah grew up with to go paintballing New Years Day.  

This is the text message photo I received from Micah that afternoon.

Afternoon Out Shooting in California

 This afternoon while we were in California we spent some quality time with the Celedon family.  Sam had a great time seeing where Gilbert worked and learning about what Gilbert's company did and built.

Sam really enjoyed spending the afternoon with Gilbert; they liked the same kind of music and just seemed to hit it off.

It was awesome!  Thanks Gilbert for spending some time with Sam while Micah and I were off helping at the 'Family Storage Unit'.

As you can see Hailey and Rebecka got to learn how to shoot for the first time and seem to be doing a pretty good job.  Shortly after, Sara, Kayla, Debbie and I headed home.  It was pretty windy and none of us were interested in shooting.

Besides Sara and I had a project at her house that needed to get finished up before I headed back to California in a few days

Random Pictures from Our Day Out Shooting . . .

'Smith' Family Storage Unit

Only I would have a good time 'blogging' about this kind of thing . . . 

I married into a family that loves to save things; 

old, new, gift, hand me down, inherited, or just something they have gathered along the way. 

While Micah and I were in California visting for the Christmas holiday the family deceided it was a good time to through the Smith Family Storage unit and do some housekeeping!!  

Never in my wildest dreams did I expect to see some of the things I saw! 

My In-Laws are the most amazing people - 

They have saved their wedding gifts from 30+ years ago  (still in the original package might I add). . .  

My Father-In-Law saved every Boy Scout, Church, Hunting,Tool Manual from the day he acquired it.  

My Mother-In-Law has saved EVERY drawing, colored picture, and school award for every one of her childern. 

In prepartion for the future; Mom, Dad and the three kids got together to help manage and clean the storage unit.  With that being said - in the future if it is ever questioned I wanted to document that everyone was present and accounted for and make special note that Debbie said she would go through those wedding gifts and find them all a new home and that Ken in fact donate his reading materials to a good cause!