9 months and 2 helmets later!

i'm finally getting around to it, but Kaleb has been helmet free since July 28th!!! The picture to the left is his very last moments in his helmet, and let me happily say, his LAST car ride having to wear it!!
He was 4 months old when we started the doc band treatment with Cranial Technologies, and it was quite a ride. Dealing with stinky, and i mean STANKY helmet head was probably one of the least loved moments. Car rides lasting longer than 10 mins in the AZ heat were also terrible! I carried a hand towel in the car so i could wipe down all the sweat in the helmet at each destination. I would also sometimes carry a few ice packs and leave them in the car seat while we were in the store or wherever, just so when we came back he seat wasn't so dang hot!
Luckily, Kaleb was pretty much an angel child through the whole process and it never seemed to bother him that he had to wear that thing 23 hours a day! Overall, we are very happy we decided to go with the doc band, i loved Cranial Tech, they were great (sucked that i had to drive to Phoenix Childrens Hospital ALL the time) and we are pleased with the results.
You can see his before and after pictures below, which may not seem that amazing to everyone else, but it is crazy awesome to me!!!

the $3 Boppy Slipcover

yes, you read that right, I said 3 dollars :) I love my Boppy Nursing Pillow, I used it ALL the time with Kaleb, but teh cover for it was blue on one side and rocketships on the other. Cute right, but not exactly girly, so I looked for some cute ones, found a couple that i loved, but not enough to pay $24 bucks for them! So i got crafty, and tada, here it is!
I already had the fabric for the project, so I only had to spend 3 bucks on a zipper, not bad i'd have to say! One side is the Black Damask print, and the other is a soft pink.I found a pattern online, but I didn't like the way the zipper was done, so i modified it so I could put the zipper on the outer seam. I also used an invisible zipper (see below) and I liked the way it came out much better! One more thing i can check off the list of stuff to get done before the little sweet cheeks arrives!

a Summers Update

Jared graduated from ASU in mid-May, and didn't start his new job until the beginning of June, so we took the opportunity of that rare free time and enjoyed some family vacationing!

It started off with a quick trip to the Wildlife Zoo as one of Kaleb's pre-birthday presents. Everytime he would see any type of animal on TV or dogs around town he would FREAK, so we thought he would just LOVE the zoo! It took him a while to realize what was going on, but once he did, he was in baby heaven :) He loved riding on Dad's shoulders and checking out all the animals, even the super boring birds! Mom's favorite part of the whole day-trip was the aquarium, and probably because it was all indoors and air conditoned :)We planned our vacation to go up to Colorado and visit with Jared's sister Julie and her super fun family. We never get to see them unless they come here because Loveland is pretty north in CO and made for a long drive. It was worth tho, not only did we have a blast visiting family, playing with crazy kiddos, going out to eat..alot, but the scenery was amazing!!

(Suprisingly enough when we got to the cabin it was cold AND rainy!)

Since the drive was pretty long, we decided to stop at the Tieman cabin in Parks, AZ and stay there a few nights first. We also went to Bearizona, again....we love going there! It's a pretty cool drive thru zoo in Williams. There is also a walkthrough area with smaller animals, once again, Kaleb thought the animals were pretty sweeet!(kaleb thought the rain was pretty cool too)

(super cute bear clubs climbing a tree)

When we finally left the cabin to head up to Julie's, we had a good 7+ hour drive ahead and we weren't too sure how the k-man would do, so just to be safe we booked a hotel in Telluride, which was close to halfway between the cabin and Julies house.

We also go to stop in Four Corners for a break, it was super windy though so we didn't stay long! Our drive through the mountains to Telluride was breathtaking! i couldn't stop taking silly pictures of mountains topped with snow and rivers, but seriously they were everywhere and so beautiful!! When we got to our super nice hotel, we were all starving, so we got a quick bite to eat. We hurried back to the hotel because it was FREEEZING! Literally! it snowed while we were there, which i did not expect at all, and since i was in flip flops i wasn't exactly prepared either!(one of MANY snowy mountain shots taken on the way up)

(see i told you, beautiful rivers, and snow everywhere!)

(snow starting to come down, on our hotel balcony)

We were sad to leave the beautiful little village of Telluride, but excited to finally get to our destination. Once again we drove through some amazing mountains, cool tunnels, and TONS of snow!! It got a little scary at some points, we couldn't see anything and were driving down some steep roads with big trucks whizzing by us! Luckily we made it in one piece! We seriously had so much fun in Colorado. The weather was amazing, we got to do some pretty cool touristy things, even took a day trip to Wyoming so Jared could get his precious fireworks :) Thanks again Krause family for letting us stay, we can't wait to come bug you guys again!(another georgeous mountain covered in snow!)

(jared and kaleb almost at the top of the Rockies, we couldn't drive all the way up because snow still covered the road, but it was freezing and clowdy up there!!)

MAY brought a graduation and a new job!

After 4 years, and countless study hours, he did it!!!!! Jared Tieman became an official ASU GRAD! I was so proud of him and all the hard work he put into his schooling. At the graduation ceremony one of the speaker was recognizing different key people that helped the students graduate and when he mentioned for all the spouses to stand, I jumped out of my seat and was hopping around and waving my arms like crazy...they even put me on the jumbo screen...Jared thought it was pretty funny! It really felt like forever that he was in school and it is SO nice to not have to worry about tuitions and class schedules.....now if we can only get those student loans paid off :)

Amazingly enough Jared had a job lined up before he was even graduated! Now that was an ordeal in itself...i serioulsy lost count of the places he had applied to, and with the construction industry really struggling in this economy, i have to admit we were a little worried. After a Temple trip or two, and a lot of prayer and fasting(on Jared's part), he was offered a great job with a company called Kitchell. The best part about it is that he gets to stay in one area since he is working at one of their offices right now, and they offer some amazing benefits, which we desperately needed!

So far thnigs are going great there, Jared really likes it and we are extremely blessed!!