{ contest }

My favorite photographer, Julie Parker, is giving away a free seat to her group mentoring session in March! But the thing is people have to vote on who gets it! So I'm up for the running! This would be such a great opportunity for me, and I've been wanting to do it since I found out she did these mentoring sessions, but with everything going on it just isn't in our budget. I would so appreciate it if anyone voted for me! Just click on the link and vote!

http://julieparkerphotography.blogspot.com/

The voting ends February 5th at 9am, so there is lots of time to vote and even tell your friends and family! Thanks so much! I will let everyone know how it turns out!!! Loves!

{ happy new year }

2011 is here! Wow...that was fast. In less than 2 weeks our beautiful baby girl (more accurately should I say...beautiful toddler of a girl) is going to be 2! Yes, you read correctly...she is going to be 2! Are you as surprised as I am? Are you as excited for her party as I am? No, didn't think so.

So anyway...the new year. I'm not a big fan of new year resolutions...mainly because I never stick to them, and they are always the same as the year before...like exercise more, lose weight, blah, blahblah, blah, blah. Matt has finished his first semester of graduate school...way to go babe!!! He is very excited about this upcoming semester because he gets his very first client! Let the therapy begin!! And this summer he will be doing an internship somewhere, but it is yet to be determined where. I'm still working at a Residential Treatment Center, which I LOVE! And I'm still doing photography part-time, which has been amazing!

Berkley is as busy as can be. She is saying SO many words and putting them together now, which is very cool. She is very into pretending and that is lots of fun. She likes to build houses and doggie houses with her blocks, and then jump right into cooking with them. Her favorite flicks as of late are Buzz (Toy Story 3), Nemo (Finding Nemo) AND...that's pretty much it for now. So I'm sure you can imagine what lines I have stuck in my head all day...a personal fave, "There's a snake in my boots!". I just can't get rid of that line. Oh, well. Here are a few pics from the last couple weeks.

{ 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!