Good News and Fun Times

Teacher of the Year!

On Josey's last day of school, he was awarded for being Kemmerer High School's Teacher of the Year. I was very proud of him. Good job! (This was a forced picture taken as soon as Josey got out of bed this morning.)

Four-Wheeling with Grandma

Whenever we go visit my parents now, Jordan wants a ride on their 4-wheeler. I guess it's pretty exciting for a 3-year-old to ride around the block with grandma going about 5 mph!

Let's Get Moving!

We decided to break out our rollerblades tonight and take the boys on a little ride. Kemmerer has a little walking/biking trail that goes along the river by the golf course. We took them for their ride and then they had to get out and throw rocks in the water, which is their favorite thing to do. Whenever I take them jogging, the deal is that I have to let them throw rocks in the water when I'm done. With this promise, they are always good boys for me in the stroller.

Outdoor Heater

Josey was figuring out how to install our timed lawn-watering system (needed because I will be gone a lot this month visiting family since Josey will be gone.) It wasn't very warm outside, but of course when Jordan heard the word "sprinkler" he had to get his swimming suit on. Luckily, he found that our dryer vent was blowing warm air and he thought this was a great heater for his belly.

Yummy! Jarrett must have thought this marker tasted really good because he ate the whole thing!

Happenings with the Allen Fam

There hasn't been too much going on here so I haven't posted for awhile. Last weekend I took the boys to Casper to watch the state track tournament. It's a 5-hour drive to Casper, but the boys did great in the car (Josey had gone over a day before with the track team.) I thought it would be fun for the boys to stay in a hotel, go swimming, and just relax a little. Friday turned out to be quite the disaster, with Jarrett being sick and Jordan being just plain miserable. Luckily, after getting some rest, the boys were much happier on Saturday and the weather was the best we've seen all year. Jordan especially loved riding around in the bus with Josey and the track team, and he was the center of attention with all of the kids. Kemmerer's track team did not do very well, but that's okay. I've never been interested in track at all until being married to Josey. I'm still not that interested, but I like watching some of the races.

Tomorrow is Josey's last day of school. Then we get a few days to spend together until he goes to Mississippi for a month for something called Industry-Education Partnerships. We will miss him!!

My biggest headache as of lately is Jordan's nighttime behavior. Jordan was the BEST sleeper ever until I had Jarrett. For the last year and a half, it's been a struggle to have a consistent night's sleep for him. Jarrett is a wonderful sleeper, thank goodness, and I'm hoping to soon get Jordan back to sleeping in his own room and his own bed for the entire night. When Jarrett was a few months old and we moved him into Jordan's room, his nighttime wakings would wake Jordan up and then I had to get both of them back to sleep. Soon Jordan got into the habit of coming into our room when he woke up in the middle of the night or going onto the couch. This didn't really bother me, because it was only occasionally. Well it has become a regular thing and it is bothering me now! (Mostly because I rarely get to sleep in past 6:00 a.m. because Jordan is a very light sleeper in the morning and he gets up when Josey does. Sometimes I don't mind getting up at 6:00 a.m. because that's when I exercise, but I would like to get up by myself, not with kids.) Anyways, when he has been coming into our room, I make him sleep on the floor. I just can't really sleep with him in the bed. He doesn't mind sleeping on the floor and usually he'll just stay there until morning, but sometimes he keeps waking up and trying to get in our bed and whining and I'm not very patient with him. Our bedroom door does not lock; it doesn't even shut all the way because it's broken. So a few weeks ago Josey got the brilliant idea to wedge his shoe under the door to lock it. It worked, and Jordan laid outside the door bawling and throwing a tantrum (banging on the door, yelling ridiculous things) for at least an hour. He does not give up easily. I was laughing really hard at the things he was yelling at us, but at the same time my heart was kind of breaking because he was so sad. Needless to say, this was a failure. He eventually fell asleep in the hallway, but the next night I just couldn't bring myself to do it again. I think at that point I should have not let it go so far, and I should have just taken him back to his bed and he would have calmed down and fell asleep. If I did this consistently, I think he would eventually get the point. The problem is I'm tired and I don't want to spend half the night taking him back to his bed so I just give in and let him sleep on our floor. So stupid us, last night we did the same thing (locked the door) and went through the same thing (huge tantrum for over an hour). Only this time he woke Jarrett up. Tonight we're not locking the door, but if he gets up I will just have to get my lazy bum out of bed and take him back to his room, I guess however long it takes. This is not fun, and I'm mad that he's such a bad sleeper when I had him trained so well! Sorry this is so long, and probably really boring, but if any of you have any suggestions, please let me know!

Silly Boys

Jarrett has been feeling pretty sick for the past couple of days. He has been really whiny and unhappy. It's been hard to even get him to smile. Poor little guy. But tonight at dinner, Jordan was being a silly boy hitting his candy on his head and Jarrett thought it was the funniest thing ever. It was fun to hear him laughing so I thought I'd get it on video, especially for grandma & grandpa who probably miss his giggles. (This time it's my mess in the background, so please ignore it! I usually don't do my final round of cleanup until Jarrett's in bed if Josey's not coming home, which he's not, because he's gone to state track.)

A Sweet Husband

I haven't posted anything in awhile because there hasn't been a whole lot going on. The biggest news in my life right now is that I have a really sweet husband who let me buy a treadmill with some of our tax stimulus. I've been running for awhile and I really love it now. I've been going to the Rec Center, but it will be so much easier now. I'll mostly run outside this summer, but I couldn't turn this deal down when I saw it online, and I know I will get a lot of use out of it. I was trying to figure out a way to get it because the man selling it lived in Salt Lake (about 2 hours away or 3 hours driving our truck - a sweet, but old '84 Dodge.) Luckily, I made a deal and things worked out so perfectly because Josey's track meet was cancelled the next day and he got to ride down with me to get it. (I was really worried about driving that truck down there by myself, let alone figuring out a way to help the man get it in our truck.) So far, I've used it every day this week and I love it. It's very stable and great for running. Today was the first time I reached my goal of running 4 miles in 30 minutes (7:30 per mile). Now I have to come up with a new goal, and I think it will take me awhile to get there. So, Josey, if you happen to read this, I LOVE YOU and thanks for thinking of me!!


Here's a picture of the treadmill I got, and for those of you who haven't seen it, our sweet truck when we got it last summer in Montana.

I've been trying to take lots of pictures, but sometimes when a cute moment comes I've forgotten my camera or it's run out of batteries again. I got some cute ones of Jarrett the other night eating his dinner. He was making the funniest faces (I think either trying to smile for the camera or getting his eyes ready for the flash). I love my messy eater, but my least favorite job of all is probably cleaning the high chair 3 or 4 times a day.