{ merry Christmas }

Hello, wonderful friends and family! It's a couple days before Christmas and we are enjoying our wonderful family. My cousin Sarah got married on Tuesday and we have lots and lots of family from out of state here visiting. We are up at Dianne and Eric's right now and will be making our rounds of visiting family on Christmas Eve. We are excited to be here in Pleasant View on Christmas morning. Berkley is definitely figuring out opening presents, and that is pretty fun to watch.

We just wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! We love you all very much and pray that you will  be safe and protected this Holiday Season.

{ catching up }

It's December and finals are done for Matt!!! Whoop! It has been such a busy semester. And it's over! I'm working 2 jobs and Matt is doing full time school and Berkley is being a full time pain in our...just kidding...she's being amazing! She is talking so much more now. She is all about "Hanta" (Santa) and doggies and candy....really what kid isn't into candy? Really? 

We are looking forward to having Christmas in Utah with lots of family and friends. My cousin Sarah is getting married on Tuesday in the Salt Lake Temple and we are so excited for them! 

I've been trying to take more everyday pictures of Berkley and here are some that I've taken up till now this month. Enjoy!

 me and my new bestie, amera

 first big snow of the season

 yogurt...

 more yogurt...

{ ahhhh! }

There seems to be a common theme in the last few blog posts...it's called procrastination. I really need to make a better effort.

Our life is pretty busy at the moment. Berkley is growing up too fast. Matt's finishing up his first semester at Graduate School. I'm working at a Residential Treatment Center for girls and we are just getting ready for the busy, but fun holiday season coming up.

Berkley is talking SO much and she seems to be acting more and more like a grown up each day! She loves her babies, yogurt, otter pops and Netflix (mainly Monsters Inc. and Annie at the moment).

{ the new house and of course, the berk }

Well we have been in our new house for about a month and a half now. And it's wonderful! Love the house, love the neighbors, love my CLOSET! It's huge!!! Matt is doing great at school. He is liking his classmates, professors and only having to go to school 3 days a week. But he is definitely working hard! Berkley is loving our new place as well. She has lots of stairs to climb, which she can do all by herself with no supervision now. Still a bit nerve racking for me, but she is a PRO! She is seriously saying so much now!!! And the great thing is she is repeating things that we say and it's ADORABLE! Her favorite words are Mommy, Daddy, bubbles, doggy, and babies. She is also developing awesome manners. PEEZ (please), ANK U (thank you). Oh I could just melt from the cuteness! She also likes to give lots of kisses now. But only if you get an owee. If she bonks me accidently and I say OW! She will kiss me wherever she bonked me...seriously the best! She is just growing up too fast...Matt and I are just soaking up every second with her! Here are some recent pictures of the Berk...just for all of you!!!

{ moving }

S-U-C-K-S!

Excuse the language...but it does. Don't get me wrong...I like the feeling of something new that lies ahead and the new adventures that are awaiting us...but can't I have all that without having to pack, clean, move, unpack, and clean some more? WHY??

Well, I guess that is just life and I'm going to have to deal with it. On a positive note, my dad is flying out here next week to help us move and that is going to be AWESOME!!! (Dad, I know you are going to read this, and just be prepared...I have no reservations about putting you to work when you get here!!! HAHAHA!!! Payback for all the work I had to do when I was a kid!!! HAHA!)

Oh, and for those of you who don't know...or just don't read our blog very often...Matt got into BYU's Social Work Graduate School, so we are moving to the Provo area in exactly 9 days! We are actually going to be living in my friend's home for about a year while her husband is in Iraq. She's moving in with her parents while he is gone and we are going to take care of their house!

So if anyone is going to be in the Spanish Fork area the 14th of August, feel free to come help us move in!!!

{18 month update }

Seriously...where does all the time go? It can't have POSSIBLY been 18 months ago that I was pushing our little Berkley into this world. :) Sorry if that is too much...but seriously people...come on. She is and has been a toddler, in my mind at least, for a while now. And doing all sorts of toddler stuff. She tries to do somersaults which is pretty funny. I've seen her do one "real" one unassisted. I think she could do it better if she practiced more, but doing somersaults all day doesn't seem to interest her much. One thing that does interest her though are babies, babies and more babies. Whenever she sees a car seat she wants to look in it and see if the baby is there. We were able to spend a weekend with a friend who happened to have a 2 week old, and Berkley wanted to hold the baby several times, and she did with our assistance. It was pretty darn cute. And of course she loves babies that aren't real too. It is amazing to me that little girls just know what to do with a baby doll. They know how to rock it, feed it, take it for walks in the stroller...all the maternal stuff. And just when I don't think I could possibly be more amazed...she throws the baby on the floor and goes and does something else. Hmmmmm...we might have to work on that before baby #2 comes home with us. One recent development that Matt and I are both happy about is Berkley's amazing ability to sleep in. Except for very rare occurrences, (maybe twice) Berkley hasn't got up before 8 in the last 3 or 4 weeks. She has slept till 10 a couple of times and we couldn't have been more happy to get out of bed on those days. One last thing to note is Berkley's amazing arm. She is getting SO good at throwing! (that's my little softball player!) She throws just about everything...her favorite thing to throw is food, then balls, today she threw a bottle of ib profen and tums at me...and anything else she thinks would be funny to throw at Mom. (If you have an idea of when this phase might stop, please inform me so that I can be ready to throw a party in celebration of this stopping.)

Berkley is growing up so fast and I'm so grateful that I have something like a blog to help me write down and remember all the things that are going on. She is such an amazing little person, and we are so proud to be her parents. Happy 18 Months Berkley!!!!

SLEEP UPDATE: Vacation totally messed up Berkley's sleep schedule.

Here are some pictures of Berkley on our vacation to Lake Tahoe...she is getting so big!!!

{ my first wedding }

I've been doing photography now for the last 6 or 7 months, and I'm absolutely LOVING IT! I've been mostly photographing families and couples, but this weekend I shot my first WEDDING!!! I can't even describe the amount of nervousness I had running through my body from the time I got off the plane in Seattle until I took those first few shots. Once I got going, I was a lot more relaxed, but I ran on adrenaline ALL DAY. I don't even think I ate anything for 8 or 9 hours straight....I was just going, going, going. But I had a blast! I was able to see my Mom, which is always a treat, and her and her friend, Patty, helped me a TON! I was so grateful that they were there. Note to self: never do a wedding all by myself...always have someone to help me. Anyway, I figured I would post a couple for you to see!

{ june fun }

It's the end of June, and it's been a while since I blogged. We have done a lot this month! And next month is going to be twice as busy. The beginning of the month we celebrated my birthday and our anniversary by going away for 2 nights...without the Berk. It was the first time that she was without at least one of us for a night, let alone two...but Grandma had everything covered while we were gone. We've went rock climbing a couple of times, which is a seriously good time. And since the weather has been nice, we've spent a lot more time outside. Which just happens to be one of Berkley's favorite places...outside anywhere. Yesterday we finally got some new pictures taken! It originally was going to be a photo shoot of just Berkley, but then I figured we should just do a family one, since we will all be there, and we haven't had family pictures for a while. (Grandma once again came to the rescue and took pictures of us). WELL...it ended up mainly being a Matt and Val photo shoot. We got some cute ones of Berkley, but after about 5 minutes she was done with it, and then we tried family pics...that was over in about 1 minute...so then it was just Matt and I. Berkley walked around for a few minutes, but then we remembered the otter pops we brought. The 2 we brought kept her occupied the rest of the time. It was so fun to just take pictures with Matt! We hadn't done that for a while.
At the moment I can't remember anything else we have done that would be of interest to my fellow bloggers. But hopefully there will be another post soon, about our wonderfully crazy and fun life!

{ french braids and amen }

Today was such a fun day with the Berk. She is starting to become so animated and spunky! She has now started demanding (yes, DEMANDING) breakfast immediately after she gets out of bed. Well, I wake up when she wakes up and I'm still not adjusted to cooking 2 minutes after I wake up. But that's what I did today. So, while I'm cooking her eggs (probably her favorite food, at the moment) I gave her some cheerios to keep her happy. She knows when her eggs are done and right when she sees me putting them on a plate she starts yelling for them. Like usual, I said, "Ok, time to say a prayer." And that didn't make her very happy. She started becoming more vocal that she wasn't getting her eggs immediately. But I just folded my arms, closed my eyes and said a quick prayer. About half way through she stopped talking, and when I said Amen and opened my eyes she had her arms folded and said, "AMA". IT WAS THE CUTEST! So I ran over to her and gave her a big hug and kiss and she seemed pretty pleased with herself.

Later in the morning I decided that I would try and french braid her hair for the first time. I had never attempted it before because 1. Her hair wasn't long enough and 2. because I thought I was just pushing my luck assuming that a 1 year old would sit still long enough for me to braid both sides. She is used to getting her hair done everyday, but it doesn't take that long. So I did it, and it wasn't perfect, but it sure looked cute!

We spent the rest of the day cleaning, playing, went on a walk, and even went over to the local fish hatchery and fed some fish. :)

{ oregon trip }

Well, last weekend Berkley and I went to OREGON! It was busy, fun, exhausting...you know all the feelings that come with going on vacation and working at the same time. We had so much fun though! Saw so many friends I haven't seen in a really long time, and that was amazing. My brother and his cute little family came up from California and that was SO fun! Berkley LOVES Lila and she pretty much just followed her around everywhere. Super Cute! I did some photo shoots while I was there too, which was a blast! As usual! You can see the pictures on my FB page or here: http:valoryjeanphotography.blogspot.com
I just have one shoot up on my blog from Oregon, but the rest will be up soon!

Here are a few pics from the trip: Mainly of Berkley and Lila. :) (GRRRR! Photobucket won't resize my pics right, so there aren't as many here! Sorry

Silly girl!

{ new diet }

SOOOOOOO...I have been having trouble losing my last 10 lbs, from the close to 40 lbs that I gained when I was pregnant with Berkley. I've exercised on and off...watched what I ate on and off...and just haven't really committed to anything for more than 2-4 weeks...If I did, I cheated a little bit in there sometime. I just seem to ALWAYS make exceptions. "Oh, it's so and so's birthday...I'll have a little cake." or "I hardly ever eat this, and I probably won't have it for a long time, I think I'll have seconds or thirds of it." It just always seems that I'm not totally committed and my will power has gone out the window. So now I'm trying a specific diet which is something I've never really done before. The nice thing is that it is all laid out for me and I know what I can and can't eat and the most important thing is that I have committed to do it. This is a little embarrassing, but I feel like I need to write it so that I'm responsible for the results and so that I can share it with everyone when I've finally reached my goal weight. Tonight, on my neighbor's scale, I was 142.4 lbs. And I'm hoping to loose another 10-15 lbs when I start trying to maintain and not lose anymore.

So...here I go.

I CAN'T STOP...

Ok, so I'm a little obsessed with scrapbook kits now! They are SO much fun! So I finished making my blog background today and here is the 2nd one that I made today! I think I am going to have to stop for a few days...:)

AHHHH...PICTURES...

Here are some pictures from April...mostly of Berkley, but we got in there once... :)