I Wanna Dance With Somebody!

Last night Matt and I had the privilege to chaperone our stake youth dance. Wahoo...right?

It was definitely weird being back to a stake dance, because to be honest, it wasn't that far back for me. We had Luke with us, so the first half was chasing him around and trying to keep him away from the loud music. Half way through, he fell asleep and slept in a side room. We headed back out to the dance floor and I finally convinced Matt to dance with me.

At first we were the only adult couple dancing. Then a few more couples got on the dance floor. Matt really does not enjoy dancing, like I do. I'm trying to break him and get him to let loose!

It's surprising how much music changes over a few years. There was a lot of techno stuff and I'm telling you that there were really no slow songs. All of the "slow songs" were like some rocker screaming in the back ground.

It was fun watching all the awkwardness that was going on between the kids. Haha, it brought back some funny memories for us.

By the way, since WHEN do people do the Boot Scootin' Boogie dance to the Cotton-Eyed Joe song????! I was quite disappointed. Although, I was having a hard time holding back watching a big group doing that dance. We are definitely going country dancing when we come back to Utah (in May)!!! And Doug if you read this, you really should have dancing at your wedding!!!

It turned out to be a lot of fun for us. Even Matt will agree to that. By the end of the night we probably danced to at least 5 songs! Yay for Matt!!!

This boy cracks me up

These are just a few funny things that our boy has done lately.

Not so sure if this first one is normal.
He is obsessed with the vacuum!
I thought kids were supposed to be terrified of it.
I have a hard time vacuuming when he's around because he chases it
around and if he can't get to the actual vacuum he goes for the cord. That's the first video, but it's a pretty bad recording because the lighting is bad and there is no sound, but you get the idea.

Luke's nap schedule has been a little messed up lately and he's been fighting nap time. So by dinner time he is really drowsy when he's in his high chair. He was fighting sleep, but was happy about it.

Our wounded child...

Last night we had a bit of a traumatic experience for us new parents.
On our T.V. stand there are a few shelves that are about the height of a coffee table. It's next to our fireplace, that has marble on part of the floor. Well just before bedtime he slipped on the marble part and his head hit right into one of the shelves. It left a big gash (big for such a tiny person) above his eye, just below his eyebrow that is about a centimeter wide. His poor nose has a bruise and a little bump across the bridge of his nose where he hit too.
He cried very hard for about 40 minutes while we iced it and tried to stop the bleeding. He finally cried himself to sleep. Meanwhile, Matt was on the phone trying to call our pediatrician's office to talk to the on-call doc and he was trying to call our hospital's ped emergency hot line to talk to a nurse. Because we weren't sure if it was big enough to have stitches or if we should take him to the emergency room. We were getting so frustrated because those two phone lines were busy for like an hour!!! And our on-call-every-hour-doc A.K.A. Matt's Dad was, of course, in India. So we finally got a hold of a nurse at a different hospital who told us he probably didn't need stitches and that we could just use steri-strips, which are a lot cheaper than an ER bill.

Well we are happy to tell you that he is doing just fine. He hasn't realized the bandaid on his face or tried to pull it off yet. I had to take these pictures of him after church today, mostly because he looked so darn cute in his outfit.

He'll bounce back quickly.
Me, on the other hand, it might take a while for me to stop jumping up every time he falls or cringe when he bumps into something. Thanks to my doctor husband who is much bravier than I. Of course, I was telling Matt we had to go to the emergency room and trying not to cry or throw up (I don't do well with blood). He was very calm and had things under control. He will make a wonderful doctor someday, I mean next year!

Get well soon Lukey, we love you.

Our Goof Ball

This is the silly little man I spend my entire day with and on occasion, a long night.
Good thing he's so goofy.
He's recently discovered that he can stick out his tongue.

And he is so funny, he wears this hat all the time.

It's too big for him, but he loves putting it on and just hanging out and playing with it on.

This is what you'd see if you came to play at my house.

It goes great with his dump truck.
It's really funny because it falls in front of his eyes and he runs around the house. Luckily he hasn't gotten hurt. Silly boy.

The first video is of our boy playing in his hard hat. Sorry no sound and I took it later last night so the lighting is really bad.

The second video is from Christmas time. Luke and his cousin Lydia were playing and the very last few seconds are my favorite part. Watch for the look on Luke's face when he see's his cousin Jonah crying.

2008 Recap & 2009 Resolutions

Sorry to bore anyone, this blog is like my scrapbook/journal...which explains all the millions of pictures!

The past year has been an eventful one at the Clark house. To start off the year of 2008 I spent the first weeks well..HUGE. Isn't it strange to look back at pregnancy pictures and deny that you could possibly be so big!
(Man I was HUGE!! It blows my mind to look at this picture!)

This was the most recent picture before I had Luke. Probably the week I was due.
My water broke about 11:45p.m. the night before Luke's due date (Jan. 31st) after what seemed like a long 8 hours of labor, mostly without an epidural (I got it when I was dilated to an 8, barely in time) and about 30 minutes of pushing we welcomed our bundle of joy into this world! Might I add, he was right on time.

A new daddy.Matt studied six weeks for the boards with a newborn.

A new mommy.

My mom and mother-in-law, Anne, thankfully came to Cleveland to help us out the first two weeks after Luke arrived. Thanks!! Moms are the best!!! We love you both!
While my ma was here we took her to Kirtland, it was 7 degrees that day. Burr! But boy was it beautiful (a rare occurrence in Cleveland).

Photo shoot of our beautiful, healthy, smiley, baby boy.

In March we celebrated our 1 year wedding anniversary traveling in an insane blizzard to the airport...and back to our apartment. We planned to fly home to bless Luke, but we had to delay our travel plans for a day. It was not easy trudging through two+ feet of snow with two suit cases, two carry-ons and a 6 week old baby in a car seat. We're lucky he didn't get sick.

We eventually made it home and Luke met all of his cousins, aunts and uncles.
Keegan really liked Luke.

Matt turned 26 in April. We had some awesome homemade pizza.

We spent a lot of time outdoors in the Spring and Summer.
Luke loved stroller rides to the park.

In June the Clark family came to Cleveland to visit.

Me and Luke ventured on with them to NY, PA & D.C.
It was such a fun trip!

In July we flew home and spent time at Bear Lake with the Clarks.

Had a family reunion with the Johnsons in Heber and I stayed an extra
week to spend time in the sun with my family.

We visited many farms to pick strawberries, raspberries, peaches and apples. While we were out at one we stopped to "hike" through Nelson-Kennedy Ledges.

Luke attended his very first (& it won't be his last) Cleveland Indian's MLB game.The Cleveland Rock'n Roll Hall of Fame.


In September my mom & dad came to Cleveland to visit. They were kind enough to take us with them on a short road trip through the church sites in NY and up to the 1000 Islands region, which was beautiful and so fun!Thanks mom & dad. You two are the greatest. We are thankful for all you do.
We love & miss you dearly!This was Luke's 2nd time to Niagara Falls, NY.

Luke's first Halloween. Our super baby.

We spent Thanksgiving with the Egberts & Meg & Dave, in VA.

And had a very Merry Christmas in Utah with both of our wonderful families.

Happy New Year!!!

We've been anticipating this new year to get a start on our resolutions.
My major goal this year is to build some muscles!! And fill my stomach with good food, such as veggies (which I'm not a huge fan of). Sounds silly, but I'm excited about it. I am all prepared. For Christmas I got a set of weights, a yoga mat & lots of work out clothes. So far (what 8 days?) I've been doing pretty good.
As for me and Matt we are going to read the Book of Mormon & the Doctrine & Covenants. (We've been meaning to have a little family meeting to make more new year's goals, but Matt has been so busy we barely have time to say good night).

What we have to look forward to in 2009:

• Matt entering his 4th & final year of med school. Wahoo!
  
• Making that final decision on what kind of doctor he chooses to be.
• Applying & interviewing at different residency programs across the U.S.
• Luke turns One!
• I continue my long journey of school work.
• Trips back home to Utah, at least two!
• Luke getting a littler sister? HAHA JUST KIDDING!

Happy 2009!

Oh the Holidays!

Warning:

This is a very long post and contains many, many pictures!

Christmas break this year was a blast! We were very sad to leave. I always get sad after the good byes, like on the plane or once we get home and Matt's back to school/work and me and Luke are lonesome buddies.

After uploading these pictures I was surprised and a little sad that I didn't take more pictures, since we did soo many things! (Matt told me we already had enough...men).

Before leaving we were able to go to our ward's Christmas program. We sang in it (thanks to the Jeppson's for watching Luke!) and it was a lot of fun and a great program. Our good friends directed it and they did an awesome job. Later Sunday (21st) afternoon we ventured home to Utah.

We stayed at Matt's house the whole two weeks, besides one night we had a sleepover at my mom's. The first week we spent a little more time with the Clark's since Anne (Matt's mom) was flying out to Texas to be with Emily for the second week. Congrats to Doug and Em by the way they had their sixth child, little Logan, who is so darn cute!!!

I think we did a pretty good job at splitting up the time between families. It's nice that they live so close, but can be hectic at times going back and forth.

Monday night my family had their big Christmas party. The fam has gotten so big we have to have our parties at the church cultural hall! But it's nice to have space for the kids to run around.

The pinata that was actually made with cardboard. No wonder no one could get it open.

Good thing Grandpa J had his handy pocket knife.

Burk and Me.
Jonah and Me.
My silly nephews.

Lydia is so darn cute. She is always saying "Hi" in the sweetest girliest voice and the next thing you know she's screaming at the top of her lungs. But it's only for a second and it's really funny. She always does this head tilt thing, cute.

Some of the fam.

My boys.
We had so much fun eating good food and desserts, opening fun presents, playing games and visiting.

While we were there we got quite a bit of snow.
On Christmas Eve and Christmas day I think we got about a foot in addition to the foot they already had. So everyone had to go out and play!

Matt, Rob, Adrienne vs. Rachel, Charlie & Sarah
They had great forts.
Lucky for me I was the photographer...from inside the house.

Burrr.

One thing Matt loves to do when we're home is play racket ball with his Dad and bro/sis. They played three or four times I think.
We also went and played walleyball. It was a lot of fun!

Luke and McKay didn't have the most fun. They were a little ticked that they were stuck in the play pin.

Charlie in action.

Oh the babies!
It was a lot of fun but quite a handful to get the three babies together.
Jakson and Lydia were born on the same day, five weeks after Luke.

For the most part they "parallel played."

Christmas Eve Day was spent sledding at Peteetneet and we were the only adults there without children. And it was SO fun!
Me, Matt, Rachel, Charlie, Sarah, Adrienne & Rob (Matt's dad) went.
Thanks Anne for watching the babies!
That night we had (cheese) fondue for dinner. Before we got to the nativity and A Muppets Christmas Carol I was in bed with a pounding headache and a sick stomach. That night Matt threw up a few times and on Christmas morning....bummer.

Luke & Sarah on Christmas morning.

Pale Matt wearing his favorite surprise Christmas present.
For those of you who don't know, Matt LOVES John Denver.

Matt and the babies. And happy little McKay.

Our last Monday there all of us sisters (except for Angi) and my mama had a major girls day out. It was SOOO Great. We shopped ALL day, starting at 8 am and had a delicious lunch at Red Robbin (soo good!!!). It was so fun and I was so happy to be there. I miss shopping and hanging out with the girlies in the family. I love and miss you all!
Above: Susie, Jenny & Holly
Below: Mom, Me & Mandy
We also had the chance to go to the temple while we were in town. Provo was closed for cleaning so we headed over to Timp and we had never been to a session there before and it was huge and gorgeous! We're used to our beautiful, little mini temple in Columbus. It was also great because we went with one of my best friend Dani and her husband Tyler.I know I look pregnant in these pictures, but I can assure you that I am not.

One night me and my girls got together for some good Mexican food, as always and time to chat and visit. It is always so much fun to see them and catch up. I love them all dearly!

Dani, Me, Jamie & Liz (sadly we were missing Jess & Andrea)

Mandy, Jonah and Lyd stayed at my mom's for the two weeks. Jo got this marble thing and I think Matt liked it just as much as Jonah.

I celebrated my 21st birthday with lots of goodies!!!!
I can always count on my family for delicous desserts.

My mom made the pies.
My sister made the cake.
Other sister made the homemade Oreo's.
Gesh!
Thanks ladies!

Our cute little family.
My birthday started off perfectly, we went to the Mt. Timpanogos temple with my good friend Dani & her hubby Tyler. We had an early afternoonish party at my mom's with most of my family. That was so fun seeing everyone! Later that night we had a New Year's Eve party at Matt's house. We had some good food, played around the world ping pong, some foosball and watched Eagle Eye with some good friends. It was a great birthday.
Thanks everyone!

Other fun things that we did while we were home:
Bowling with the Clarks (our team totally won, twice)
Saw the movie Bedtime Stories (it was okay)
Played lots of fun games
Watched a lot of Monk with both families (we love that show)
Ate at P.F. Changs....oh so good, thanks Mom and Dad!
Matt went to the shooting range with the men in my fam
Visited with friends
Went to Farmington to visit Grandpa Hess and other Hess cousins
My sis-in-law Angi did my hair, I needed it badly!

We had so much fun with both of our families and all of our friends. We're sorry to those we missed! And so thankful to our parents for the hard work and sacrafices they make for us, to help and support us. Thank you to our grandparents and their generous gifts. And thank you to our siblings, friends and everyone for all the memories!
We love and miss you all!!