The Browns VS The Yard

So when we bought our old house 4 years ago we had to do all the landscaping, which we did. It wasn't easy, fun, or cheap! So afterwards Ben promised me that if we ever moved (because he told me that we were going to be in the last house for at least 10 years, and we weren't even in it 4) and the landscaping had to be done that we were going to pay to have it ALL done. Well he lied! This is a picture of what we had to deal with. The dirt was pushed back the legal amount from the house and we had to do the rest. We were told we would need a 7 foot retaining wall! If my kids were to fall off of that they would seriously injure themselves. We weren't told about our landscaping issues until the house was well underway so all we could do was deal with it!


In March my brother Todd came down with a semi hauling a loader to move dirt around to see what he could do for us. Thank heavens for Todd and that he loves my kids. He wasn't happy with the landscaping issue and knew that it wasn't kid friendly. He spent two days leveling and moving dirt and when he was done we only had to have a 3 foot retaining wall! He saved us a ton of money and I'm sure several trips to the ER.


So since we moved in, at the begining of May, we have been dealing with a LOT of dirt! We have worked with landscape people designing plans for sprinkler systems, curbing, fences, top soil, sod, and everything else that goes with a yard. For Memorial day we had some of Ben's family here helping to install the sprinkler system, which we later learned had been designed wrong! The guy had measured the yard wrong which totally screwed up everything! He admitted he had done it wrong, but said he didn't have time to fix it and we were basically on our own!


Ben worked on the yard constanly! We had a ton of help from our neighbors, especially Tyler. Tyler helped Ben in our yard every night even nights when Ben worked late Tyler came over and worked with out Ben even being here! We really appreciate Tyler paying a landscape company to do ALL of his yard so he could help us with ours!


So two weekends ago we were finally to the point of laying sod! Yea for us! So we called all of our family and anyone who was silly enough to say that they would help us. Ben had his older brother Daniel here with two of his boys, his brother Jacob, sister Suzy, and his sister Kat, to watch our girls. Ben learned from Tyler's landscape guy that we would need to install a pump to boost our water pressue that would cost us over $1000! So we bought one here and had Jacob install it and saved us a ton of money. Thanks Jacob. Jacob also worked on the sprinklers to make sure that all the grass would get water and so by the time we were done he was soaking wet!


I called my nephew Jason, who offered to help. He ended up coming from Sandy with my sister Wendy, her husband, Jason's wife, my nephew Logan, and my neice Lexie, who also helped watch the girls. It was a party! We laid over 13 thousand square feet of sod and were done before noon. We were a little short so we ordered some more and finished the sod last week.

A huge thank you to everyone! We couldn't have done it with out all of your help. I thought the sod would take us all day. Thanks again it took almost 3 months but we finally won the war against the yard!

And we're back!

It has been a busy two months. We moved into scary house and I HATED it. A big thanks to everyone who helped us move though.


We were only in scary house a few weeks when Hinkley was born. She arrived as scheduled, the only thing not planned was her size, she was 8lbs 1oz and 19 inches long! My dad's comment was "No wonder Alisa was so big!" She has more hair than Bailey did and her skin is a little darker. She is definitely her own little person. Neither Ben nor I think she looks at all like Bailey did. Thanks to all the family and friends who came, called, emailed, sent text messages, etc. We appreciate your thoughtfulness. I was in the hospital for 4 days and was happy to get released.

Bailey was so cute with Hinkley when they first brought her into to see Hinkley and I. She sat on the bed with me and she and I both had to be holding Hinkley. Whenever anyone, even Ben or Grandparents, tried to take or touch Hinkley Bailey just cried and cried. She has done great with her and is such a little helper. Actually Bailey has done amazing with all of the changes in her life since March. Three houses, tax season, and a new little sister.


Two weeks after Hinkley was born we moved into our new house. I don't have a picture of the finished product, sorry. This picture was taken a month before it was done. Thanks once again to everyone who helped us move. Especially those who helped us move all THREE TIMES! We were in three house in three months something I don't advise. We are loving our new home, we are still not settled in, but with a new born and still recovering from surgery it's as good as it can be.

Hinkley is doing great and growing WAY to fast! Sometimes I can't believe she is here and she is already a month old! She does amazing at night only wakes up once or twice. She LOVES to cuddle and its so hard not to cuddle with her constantly, which may explain why there are still boxes all over the house! I love her little smiles and she is a mommas girl which I love too!

To all who didn't know my parents got their mission call to Frankfurt Germany. I'm trying to be happy about it. Just hard to think of them gone for so long and so far away. And Congratulations to Scott and Sommers on thier new baby boy!

Hope to catch up some more but Hinkley is paging me

Moving!

Well this last weekend we moved out of our first house! Kind of emotional, but I am also 9 months pregnant, we had shipped Bailey and Obi to Idaho with my parents so it could have been a lot of different things. Ben's mom Ann came up with two of his little brothers and little sister. I can't tell you how much help that they were we couldn't have done it without them! Ben has an amazing mom who always helps us, I feel bad because she doesn't come to visit often, but when we need help she is always there for us. We also had some awesome friends who showed up to help. Tyler, Jake, and Patrick all guys who Ben works with. Thanks for taking time off from work to help.


So our old house is sold, we closed on Friday, moved on Saturday and the funding went through on Monday so here we are renting again. I also realized Wednesday night that the drawer under the oven/stove still had pans in it! So we called the realtor and made arrangements for the guy who owns our house now to just leave my pans outside on the door step. That was a little weird picking up my pans from my old front step!

We are in Scary house and I'm still not happy about it, but I'm just trying to accept the things I can't change and that is about the best I can do and try to keep Bailey in a clean little bubble until we move!


Our new house is moving along, it just will never be fast enough. But they are texturing and mudding the walls, dry wall is hung, wiring is done, and they have started to hang siding. I am way excited for the house to be done, not just because I will get to leave scary house, but we won't have to move for a very long time, its nice to be able to have some say as to the lay out of your house, and it will be perfect for us in so many ways.


As for me and the baby we are doing well, besides living in scary house, I have started to dilate and efface, but I'm not holding my breath it will be a lot less stressing if she can stay put until after tax season. This is one of the only pictures of my pregnancy with #2 I think including this one there are 3 all together. I am HUGE!

To all my fellow tax season wives -Cara and Tiffany- we have almost made it! Only 13 days left! Yea for us now after the 15th we can have husbands and our children will have fathers!

We're alive, but we're dead!

Ok, so here we go playing catch up for the last month.

My sister in law (Lyndsie's) mom came to visit for a weekend. We had a great time! The girls went shopping, out to eat, watched movies, hung out, laughed, talked, and spoiled Bailey. Brenda and Lyndsie don't ever tell her no! And Ben worked - Love tax season!


The week after that Bailey came down with a cold. She started coughing Tuesday night and by Wednesday morning it sounded like croup. By Thursday I had caught her cold and by that weekend so had Ben. That Wednesday Ben's little brother Nathan came home from his mission. We headed to Idaho Saturday spent very little time with his family because we were all sick and Bailey was getting worse. We didn't spend a lot of time with my parents because they were watching my brothers 3 kids and no one wanted to get them sick. So we stayed at my brother Todd's. Saturday night Bailey had stopped eating and had a fever. By Sunday morning she was worse! Her cough was bad, her fever was higher and she would wake up for only about an hour and want to go back to sleep. We left her with Brenda while we went to Nathan's homecoming and took off for home after that.


I got her into the Dr's office Monday morning and they told me she had her 1st ear infection. Poor little monkey, so we got her some medicine and did a lot of cuddling and moving watching. On Wednesday I was having enough problems breathing from the cold and being pregnant that they wanted to have my lungs checked so I went back to the Dr's. Thank goodness for Lyndsie who came to watch Bailey. By Friday Bailey was starting to improve still not eating normally and clingy. But things got worse. I woke up Friday morning at 2:30am with a horrible ear infection. I was done getting sleep that night! I called my mom in tears and she headed down and Ben came home while I went to the Dr. again and got medicine for my ear. Mom stayed until Sunday and took Bailey home with her. I had a pregnancy appointment Monday morning and took off that afternoon to Idaho. So in the words of Dash from the Incredibles "we're alive, but we're dead."

We stayed with my parents until Thursday and came back to a house full of Boys! There was a USU game on and Ben had invited a few friends over. We also had some old friends from Burley staying at our house that week, but they left on Friday.


On Saturday Todd and Brenda came up. We have had some serious issues with landscaping at the house we are building. So my amazing big brother drove down with one of our farms semi's hauling a loader and spent 2 days moving dirt around. It is so much better than it was and it looks great. I can never thank Todd enough. We also had Ben's little brother Jacob come down for the night, he needed Ben's help. We had a fun, but busy weekend!


This last week we are all healthier and doing well. We have had a lot of stress finding a decent place that would rent to us for 2 to 3 months! So we are renting a scary house in Smithfield and are planning on closing on our old house this Friday and moving out this weekend. Brenda brought Lyndsie back yesterday after USU's spring break. I'm so happy to have her back because if the baby decided to come in the middle of the night Lyndsie is on call to stay with Bailey so it always makes me nervous of what we would do when Lyndsie is out of town.


The baby and I are fine, I have started falling about once a week! Not really sure how I manage it, Ben says he's sorry I'm a clutz! Bailey keeps us busy and laughing! Ben is working hard at Tax season. Yea tax season! We are just praying that the baby will stay put till after the move and than until tax season is over. The new house is moving along, it is framed and mostly wired and they are hoping to start dry walling this week.

House Update

Day 1: February 2nd Sign goes up

Day 11: First showing

Day 17: Received offer on the house

Day 18: Submitted counter offer

Day 19: Counter offer accepted!

Now if everything can just go great we can close and have our house sold!!

Where did February go?

So we have been so focused on getting the house ready to put up for sale that I haven't really been a good mom, wife, friend, or blogger!

The first week in February we were really just finishing up all the little details of cleaning and getting the house ready. We finally got every thing worked out with the realtors and got a for sale sign up and that was stressful!


The second week Bailey and I took off for five days to Idaho. Ben gets to put in all the hours that he needs to for work and not feel guilty about never coming home. Yea tax season. We had fun in Idaho and of course I forgot my camera there, which is another reason that I haven't blogged.

This last week we have been dealing with house crap. Lyndsie (my niece) watched Bailey a lot for me while I got the house ready to sale and now all I have to do is just maintain the house and keep it clean. So I feel like I have been a little better of a mom lately. Bailey has been AMAZING with this whole thing and I hope I can make it up to her.

Ben did a lot of work on the house every night after putting in a long day at the office and has been amazing too. Now if we can just sale our house!!

House Stress

Last week we had some of Ben's family come into town. They were coming to discuss some investment options and of course since they were here we put them to work! I love Ben's family, they have always been so good to help us with whatever we need and they seem not to mind always bailing us out.


We had Jacob, Breawna and Ben's sister Misti, her husband Cannon, and their son Corbyn. They all came into town on Friday night, we had dinner, talked, had our investment meeting, and let Corbyn and Bailey play. We all stayed up WAY to late!! On Saturday we got up had breakfast and than put everyone to work.

I had a pregnancy scare a couple of weeks ago and have been told to try and take it easy! Right...low stress, no heavy lifting, and try to get enough rest! Ok well in reality I have a two year old, a husband, house preparations, and I'm not sleeping well at night.

Anyway we are getting ready to put our house up for sale and we decided to move a lot of stuff to storage just to get it out of the way and hey less to keep clean! So we had Jacob and Ben making storage unit runs, Cannon hanging closet doors in our new 4th bedroom, Misit helping the guys, me helping Ben, directing traffic and keeping track of Bailey and Breawna helping keep track of Bailey and Corbyn.

We had a lot of fun with everyone, a lot of late night Wii playing, and Ben and I are so grateful for all of the help, we couldn't have done it without you.

And a HUGE thanks to Jacob, our wonderful mechanic, who fixed Ben's pickup and brought it back down to us!!

New Couches

Well after almost 6 years of marriage, lots of SAVING money, tears (ok not so many tears), gnashing of teeth, and tons of begging I finally got some new couches and here they are! I am so excited and any one who knows that I have this blog are all invited over to sit on my new couches -I know how exciting! I would also like to thank everyone who donated couches to the Brown family.