fireflies

All my life I have wanted to see fireflies.  I remember two summers ago, I was so excited to go to see Heather my sister in up state New York because they have fireflies up there. But for some reason they weren't there when I visited.   Now that we have moved to Omaha I have seen them every night.  They are very magical and enchanting.

One evening after I had put Sawyer down for the night, Jake and I when outside to throw a football around.  I remember missing one of Jake's throws and having to walk aways to retrieve it.  As I was bending down to get the football, I saw a flash of light, almost like a spark 12 feet in front of me.   I froze and realized I had just seen a fireflies!   I started to yell and scream the words to Jake " I JUST SAW A FIREFLY!  I was so happy and excited! The rest of the evening we watched and waited to see if we could see anymore, but we didn't. Now however, I seen them every night. They are very magical and enchanting bug.

Happy Birthday Jake

I love this man of mine for many reasons! He just turn 27 year, and is handsomer than ever!
Jake I love how you preform your best at whatever you are doing.
I love how you are always trying to be better.
I love how you love to learn.
I know you love your Sawyer and me.
You are the most amazing man I know. I love you.
yours only, Alisha

I have loved this age Sawyer is in right now (almost 19 months). His facial expressions have been hilarious.  He is saying new words almost everyday and surprising me with what his little body can do. We have had so much fun playing outside. Outside is were Sawyer wants to be all the time.  There are a lot of little playgrounds at Village Green and everyday we are at one of them.  

Sawyer also has an obsession with cars and trucks right now.  In the morning and through out the day, he says to me "KEYS KEYS" grabs my hand and says "COME MOMMA" and directs me to where the keys are hangs.   If I cant distract him with something else, we end up sitting in the car playing for a hour.  

Sawyer

Sawyer! You have grown up so fast. You are 18 months old! I have loved watching you grow.  I love watching you dance in your room to silly songs. I love how you smile with a mouth full of teeth. I love when you say PLEASE and THANK YOU.  I love that you are a good eater. I love that you love to learn. I love when our eyes meet and we both laugh. I love that you tell your dad goodbye every morning with a BYE DAD! You make me so happy. You are my Joy Sawyer! I love you so much.

Love Mom

Eddy you are my bud,

You make me laugh everyday which has blessed me so much, thank you.  School can be stressful and incredibly time consuming sometimes, but I rearranged my schedule so that I can always see you and play with you everyday.  That is important to Mom and I.  I want you to know that everytime I study at home in the basement, I just want to stop studying and head upstairs to see you.  I really like being around you.  I love you bud. 

Love Dad

  Since there has been major flooding on the Missouri river; our family and some of our friends wanted to see how close the flooded river was to the levees. We went to the pedestrian bridge, where the Missouri river divides Omaha from Iowa.  The bridge is very long and large. It was breathtaking to walk across it at night when it was lite up.  If you look at the top left corner of this birds eye view picture of the bridge, you will see the end of the bridge. The flooding has gone all the way out there to the end of the pictures.   The levees are very close to the end of the bridge. It was amazing to see where the river would naturally be vs. where the river is now.  I was very uneasy while we were on the bridge, because you could see how powerful and destructive the river was.
Our ward in Council Bluff has ask members to prepare for the worst, but hope for the best. They wanted us to have our 72 hour kits ready to go. Since Village Green is on a hill, we are safe from flooding if the levees brake. However our water supply and sewage might be affected. Some members in our ward and stake will be in the flood zone. The bishop and stake president has ask members to open up their homes to members that could be affected by the flooding.   I am so happy we have a basement room  that is finish so we could help if we needed to.

Our little family has moved!  We have started a new chapter in our life, and it has started in Omaha Nebraska.  Jake and I anticipated the move for over a year and it finally came. I want to write some of the  tender mercies that happen along the way to Omaha.

Wayne and Melayne helped us drive out to Omaha in a timely fashion.

My parents watched sawyer while Jake and I packed and cleaned our old apt. Our neighbor in Salt Lake come helped us pack our moving truck.Jake so happened to find a bank that approved Village Green for financing two week before we were going to be moving to Omaha.

My parents bought sawyer some toys for the long drive.

Aunt Merlyn, for her love and her thoughtfulness.Jake stayed calm, faithful, efficient, and on top of the loan process.

I remember being so nervous for the drive from Utah to Nebraska. I didn't know how Sawyer would be able to sit in his car seat for 15 hour.  Sawyer was an amazing passenger- he did so well.

The drive went by so fast for me!

Sawyer only pooped one inconvenient time along the way.

I was able to have energy for the length of time I needed it.

Our prayers were answered when the office manager at VG transformed from being no help in the application process to having her heart soften and helping us in the application process.

Technology-  computers, cellphones, Internet, faxing, FedEx overnight.

Brenda the loan lady. She was on maternity leave and still worked on our loan. We are so grateful for her speedy skills to make the loan go through in a weeks.

Sam and Shauna dropped moving into there home to copy and FedEx contract documents to us.

Todd and Katy took time out of remodeling there home to looked at all the homes available at VG and give us their input and which one they recommended.

Moved into our home the day we got to Omaha. We were not planning on that!

The Batman's, for being willing to let us stay at their home while we tried to find a place to live. 

A whole herd of people came immediately after we got to Village Green to help us move into our home in less then an hour! WOW it took Jake and I a whole day to pack our truck.

We had saved enough money for the down payment of our townhouse that we didn't know we would get. 

We got an incredible deal on the town home.

Our home has lots of windows

We live next to the forest

Finished basement so family can stay with us.

I know Heavenly Father knew we needed to live in Village Green and he helped us make it happen.