Zion National Park

For our 3rd anniversary, Paul and I wanted to do something fun and wanted to get away for a bit. We had been living with my parent's then for about 3 weeks and we needed our own space, not that it was bad, it's been about 14 weeks now anyway. So, we headed down to St. George to do some relaxing and hanging out. We went shopping and swimming and went to Zion National Park. Neither of us had been there so we thought it would be a nice thing to do since we'd been down there, but never actually stopped to enjoy our beautiful surroundings.Here are a few pictures of the beautiful mountains and some of us on our trip. Enjoy...

Here's Zack on the shuttle sitting on his own bench. He thought this was the coolest thing ever

Zack on the hike to Weeping Rock. I think he was looking at a lizard.

The three of us at Weeping Rock. It was very wet up there. I think we found a little dry spot to sit and take the picture.

Just a beautiful view of our surroundings. Don't we just take advantage of what we have so close to us?

Here is a tunnel that was carved out of the mountain. It was very dark and narrow. They have two lanes, but only allow one way traffic through at once. You could see scrapes at the top and corners of bigger RV's and trucks trying to go through.
More beautiful mountains.
And More.
Cute Zack driving in the car. He had a lot of fun with us.From a distance.

Waving Hi to us.

Paul and Zack really sick of the camera getting ready for the hike.

Bridal Veil Falls

Today Paul got off early and we decided to go to Bridal Veil Falls since it was so nice outside. Zack loved it. He loved watching all the people at the falls and walking around in the water.

Here are a couple pics of Paul and Zack by the falls. I though these were so cute. The second one Zack was yawning. Way cute.

Here's Zack walking around in the water. It was like we were watching him walk for the first time again.

Zack Drives

I just wanted to share with everyone the cutest pictures of Zack. He loves to ride those little toys that cost $.25-$.50 at the stores. I had to post a couple pictures of him in some of them as well as the ones of him sitting in our drivers seat. He loves it. Enjoy.

Five Habits about Myself - Tagged

Here are the rules:
A. You have to list 5 things/habits about yourself
B. Go to 5 of your friends and leave a comment informing them that they have been tagged.
C. List at the end of your posting who you have tagged.

1. This is from Paul, he says that I take forever getting ready in the bathroom when I do my hair because I get distracted with things so easily. I just hate doing my hair so anything that comes up is better than doing my hair so it takes me that much longer to get ready.

2. I don't like football, I can't watch it on tv. I have to go to the game to even come close to enjoying myself. I am a people watcher and that's what I do at the games, that's why I can't enjoy myself sitting on the couch because the people I'm with are people I see every day and I don't need to watch them.

3. I love to spend money even when we don't have any to spend. I guess that's part of being a woman, right?

4. I love to be out doing anything rather than sitting at home doing nothing. I could have a million things to do around the house and have to leave the house because I've been there too long.

5. I hate being told I can't do something or what to do. I am a very stubborn person and have to have control over my life and situation. The only time I can have someone tell me what to do is when I'm vulnerable and down on myself.

I tag: Tara, Susan, Melissa P, Dani, & Emily

Nightmares

Wow, I think I might just die of exhaustion. I know I've been a mom now for 16 months and should be use to it by now, but Zack has always been a good sleeper until now. He goes to bed at his usual time, 9:15, and then we go to bed around 11:30. At 2:00 on the dot he wakes up screaming. I get up to see what's wrong, and he continues to scream. I change him while Paul runs upstairs to get some milk then I rock him, hoping he will fall asleep. He's calmed down a little so I put him back in his crib thinking he'll go to sleep. Boy, am I wrong. The screaming starts again the second I lay hime down and shut the door. We do the same thing with cuddling, but this time I feed him something other than milk. He thinks it's time to play, not sleep. It's as if he's just taken his nap. 6:00 rolls around and he's ready for his "nap". He is now off his usual schedule since he'll usually sleep until about 9:00 if he does this and then he wont take his real nap until later. I have to be up by 7:00 so I can shower and be upstairs ready to take calls at 7:30, so I don't get much more sleep. This has happened now about 3-4 times in the last couple weeks. I'm assuming that the reason he wakes up screaming is because he's having nightmares. I didn't think kids his age would have nightmares this often, but what do I know? Any ideas? This morning it was because he had a fever. I gave him a cool bath and gave him some tylenol, but it never really went away. Here I am trying to work and about ready to fall over with exhaustion. I am taking any advice if anyone is willing to give any on how to keep my kid who use to be a really good sleeper asleep during the WHOLE night.

Over Time

The Waiting Game Continues

I just thought I would update everyone even though there really isn't anything to update you on. As the house goes, we're still waiting to hear from the bank. They say they've ordered the appraisal and that it should take 3 weeks to recieve the appraisal and make a decision if they will accept our offer or not. What I don't understand is that it should not take 3 weeks for an appraisal if it has already been ordered. I don't think I will ever understand the way a Short Sale is done or why it is even called a Short Sale, although in the beginning it really didn't take as long as a normal sale when there weren't so many out there. Anyway, we're hoping to be in our home, if they approve our offer, for Thanksgiving. If not then, we're hoping by Christmas. We'll definitely shout it from the rooftops when we find something out.

About Zack (tag challenge)

I saw this on my friend Nancy's blog and thought I should do it since I hardly ever talk about Zack on our blog. I know, I do it a little different. Most people do it all about their kids and I just do it about life. I guess I'll mix it up a little and talk about my pride and joy.


Name and Meaning: Zackary Paul Defa
Zack - Remembrance Of The Lord, Origin: Hebrew (Zackary didn't come up)
Paul - Small, Origin: Latin
Age: 15 1/2 months
Birthday: June 7, 2007
Nicknames: Zack, Zippy, buddy, handsome
Favorite Activities: playing with any sports ball, dancing, riding my horse/tractor/airplane, being outside, playing with grandpa and grandma and cousins
Least Favorite Foods: I don't really dislike anything. I eat really well. My parents are very lucky to have me
Favorite Music: anything with a beat, but I dance much more with rap for some reason
Favorite Toys: sports balls, my riding tractor, my horses, anything that makes noise
What Makes Me Happy: playing with my grandparents, playing ball, food, food, and more food, playing outside
What Makes Me Sad: when mom tells me no, when I fall down and get hurt, when I don't get my way and my mom takes away the berries off of grandma's tree and try to eat them thinking they are peas.

Tag anyone who would like to take the time. Fun, fun!!!!

Frustrations

So many things right now that I'm frustrated with, but we'll just stick with the one that most people would like to hear about...the home in Springville.
Well, after almost 7 weeks of waiting to hear on the offer that we made on a home in Springville, we hear back that the second mortgage bank wanted $13,000 more for the home. We can't afford to pay that much more so we say no and move on our way with our hearts ripped out. We call our real estate agent and tell her to start looking again. We go to look at more homes Saturday and find another one in Springville that we want to make an offer on. It too is a Short Sale (very, very bad word to us now). It's a nicer, bigger, newer, cheaper home with a better looking outcome. We really hope it doesn't take as long to find out if the banks accept our offer or not. We just want to know as soon as possible. It gets a little frustrating when you have to wait for 7 weeks for an answer and are not able to look at other homes in the process because of the dumb contract you have to sign and then come to find out that 7 weeks are wasted waiting for a "No, give me more money". We say, if you need an amount...list the house at that amount and then we'll offer that amount. Don't list the home at one amount, get an offer for $1,000 more than that and don't accept the offer. Kinda frustrating isn't it.

Tagged by Melissa

A. attached or single? Attached.
B. best friend(s)? In no order...Paul, Mom, Angie, Kristal, Christina, Jamie, Suzie, Nancy, Melissa, Trisha, Leslie
C. cake or pie? Cake
D. day of choice? Saturday
E. essential item? Toilet
F. favorite color? Purple/Blue/Red...depends on my mood
G. gummy bears or worms? Worms.
H. hometown? Orem, UT
I. favorite indulgence? Rice Krispie Treats and Redvines
J. January or July? July
K. kids? Zackary Paul, 14 months.
L. life isn't complete without? My amazing family.
M. marriage date? August 25th, 2005...3 years on Monday!
N. number of brothers & sisters? 4 brothers and 1 sister.
O. oranges or apples? Totally depends on my mood.
P. phobias? Something bad happening to my family
Q. quotes? "Late to bed late to rise you wake and yawn with bloodshot eyes. Early to bed and early to rise your girl goes out with other guys."
R. reasons to smile? Family forever, Zack's laugh and smile.
S. season of choice? Spring or Fall.
T. tag seven peeps! Trisha, Aubrey, Nancy, Lori J, Suzie, Dynelle, Tara.
U. unknown fact about me? I'm not a very good sleeper anymore.
V. vegetable? Green Beans.
W. worst habits? Shaking my leg, it drives my husband crazy.
X. x-ray or ultrasound? Both quite often, not that I'm proud of the x-ray thing but you all know me well enough to know that I'm a klutz.
Y. your favorite food? Oh the choices... Italian & Chinese.
Z. zodiac sign? Leo.

Can't Wait for the Olympics to be Over

I love the Olympics, but I just have to say that I am looking forward for them to be over. I don't think I've been this tired in a long time and that is due to the fact that we have to stay up until the last of the events are done for the day. That has been about midnight lately. Since I have to be up for work early I don't get too much sleep. I know I get about 7 hours, but for some reason I am still so exhausted. I think my whole family, or the one's I live with right now, feel the same. We all passed out on the couches watching the coverage this afternoon. We all had about a 3 hour nap. It was so nice. Maybe once the olympics are over I will get the rest I need to not have to take a nap while Zack is down. Hope all of you are not as addicted to the games as we are. I guess it's not too bad to only be this way for 2 weeks every 2 years.

How much stuff can 3 people accumulate?

Wow, I cannot believe how much stuff we have accumulated in 3 years. I moved into our Evanston apartment in July 2005 and then Paul moves in once we were married in August 2005. Zack joins us in June 2007, but seriously, how much stuff do you think can fit in a 3 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment? We rented a 10 x 25 storage unit and it's almost full and we are still not done moving everything in. I know we were cramped in that apartment, but seriously. I had no idea how cramped until we started to make our way up and down those three flights of stairs about a million and a half times. We still have stuff in the front room, Zack's crib, our bed frame, our mattress, washer & dryer, other stuff in the laundry room, and our whole kitchen. I honestly don't know how much more I can do? I think we have been packing for the last month and it seems as though nothing has gotten done. We get to go back right after Paul gets off work on Friday and pack some more and clean and still try to get everything done by Sunday so we can drive back to Orem and go back to work Monday morning. I hate moving and we're not even done yet. We're still waiting on the bank to accept our offer on the home in Springville, so until then we're staying with my parents. We have thrown away so much stuff and given to DI so many things that I don't know how we still have stuff to move. I just really hope we can get into this home soon so we can be done within the next little while and stay there forever and never move again. Maybe we should just throw everything away and not have anything to pack in case we move again? It would be so much easier, don't you think? Well, the move has been awful, but we're glad to be in Utah. Change is good and when you know it's the right thing for you to do, change is really good.

Here is outside our front and side door with all our cleaning supplies.

Here's our guest bathroom all clean and ready to go.
Zack's small bedroom all done.
The front room fresh and clean.
Zack wondering what's going on.
Downtown Storage Unit 144
Full with most of our stuff.
Full, full, full
Top to bottom, FULL!
FULL!

UPDATE!!!

We went back there this weekend, 10/18, to try to get to the filing cabinet where we had our checks. We opened the door and Paul's parent's had added more of our stuff in there and we couldn't even stop foot in there. I don't know how they added more, but there's more. We don't have any more checks so I hope we hear soon on the house so we can get to the filing cabinet soon to pay our bills that need to be paid by check.

Stresses of Training

I would really like to name this one Word to the Wise as well, but I wont. I just have to say that I really hate training people who will be taking my position.
The story begins with me giving my two weeks notice (note that my last day of work at Union Tank is this Thursday). My boss, Gilbert, goes through SOS Staffing to hire new employees until they can bring them on fulltime. Gilbert takes the first person SOS sends over and I don't think he even interviewed her. Anyway, Tuesday she, will call her Crazy, comes in to my office and I start to ask her questions about what we do at our shop. Wow, she blew me away. I thought I was asking Gilbert what we did here. I don't think I ever heard it explained so well before. I knew right then that she was going to work out. I start to train her and get pretty far, she seems like she's understanding it. Wednesday, same thing. Thursday she starts to do everything by herself and explains what she's doing to me and why she's doing it. SHE IS TOTALL MIXED UP! I start to explain to her that she's mixing everything up and start to explain it again. Misty, the girl I originally trained before I left Union Tank the first time is in my office as well listening in. Crazy begins arguing with me and is basically telling me that I don't know what I'm doing and she knows what she's doing. I then tell Misty I'm going to walk away for a minute to calm down and asked if she would try to explain it better for her to understand. I don't think I have ever felt my blood pressure rise before now. I feel as though I am one of the thermometers in cartoons where the red is rising and going up to the bubble at the top and pulsating right before it is going to burst.
I calm down and come back and just sit in on Misty trying to explain it more. It's 5:00 and Crazy leaves. Misty and I talk and decide that she would tell Gilbert what happened since I don't work Friday's. Well, Gilbert wants to see how she does Friday so Misty gets to have her all day in her office while she works on her stuff. Not much of my work got done Friday so she got to come back in Monday.
Well, Monday I went in at 10:00 and planned to work until 3:00. It was the worst of the days...I find out that she can't even file right. How hard is it to tell the difference between a 5 and 6 digit number? My goodness. I thought I might scream. She also told me more than once that she didn't know if she were ever going to figure that part out. Anyway, I let that slide for a minute and start to do what we were doing on Thursday. Misty was back in my office listening in. Here we go again...She thinks I don't know my job and starts arguing with me AGAIN. I had had it. Misty sat down and told me to go to her office and finish what she was working on and see if she could do better to make Crazy realize what she was doing was wrong. I had not been able to do any work yet that day so I still had a whole days worth of work at 1:30. I tell this girl that since the day is almost over I'm going to do it and she can watch. 4:00 comes and Crazy leaves. Gilbert comes in and starts to talk to Misty and me. We tell him what happened and he says that if she's thinking she knows more than we do then that wont work. She's done.
Gilbert calls someone that brought her resume' in the day we started training Crazy lady. She comes in today at noon and tells us that she can only work until 2:00 and wont be in the rest of the week. Again note, my last day is Thursday. I start to train her the best I can with the little time that I have. She leaves at 1:45 so she can be to her destination by 2:00. I don't have anyone to train anymore. I just get to do my job the rest of the week and now poor Misty gets to train someone for my job and do her own at the same time. I feel so awful, but I don't know what else to do.
I guess these are the joys of training a new employee that thinks they know everything about everything. Now I guess the crazy girl knows that it doesn't cut it to think you know more than the person that is training you.

A Word to the Wise

Yesterday was a very busy and stressful day. Not including the packing half our apartment and moving it all to the storage unit, Paul received a call at about 3:30 from his co-worker, Aaron, that was working this weekend. In the conversation we learned that Dennis, Paul's other co-worker, a 56 year old man was last seen at 8:10 that morning when they all got off work.His wife, Andrea, got worried at about 1:00 and went down to the maintenance shop where they all work. The gate, which is usually locked, was wide open. Dennis' car was there with the keys in it. The doors to the shop were locked. She then called Aaron to find out what was up. He said he hadn't seen Dennis since that morning and that he would meet Andrea at the shop to go through it to see if Dennis were there. They find Dennis' office unlocked with his wallet and keys to the shop on his desk. The police were then called.They came out and then all the rest of the employees show up including us. We stayed there with Andrea and her kids for about 2-3 hours. They had cops going around the native, tall grass, at the golf course with a fourwheeler and horses to make sure his body wasn't there.We went home to shower and feed Zack. We go right back and no one is there. Aparently they sent everyone home to wait. We ran into the local Dective and let him back in the shop to look around some more and to check out his wallet to see if there were any notes or if it looked as though anything were missing. Nothing, so we went back home. He also told us that Andrea told them that Dennis had once before gotten disoriented and couldn't find his way home. We said a family prayer for Dennis and went to bed.This morning at 8:30 Paul got another phone call from his boss, Jim. Jim informed him that they found Dennis in Wendover, of all places. We are assuming that he got disoriented and walked over to the Flying J behind the golf course and hitched a ride with a truck driver. This is what we are hoping for because if it isn't the case he will be dead anyway from his wife and kids killing him.I could never imagine, nor do I ever want to know what Andrea was going through.Now the word to the wise, never ever do this to your family. If something like this does happen and you get lost. Go to a psychologist and find out what is triggering it. It will save your life with your family.I guess this word to the wise is more for Paul than anyone, but I just thought I would warn anyone that would even think about it. Never leave without telling anyone where you are going.

With Life, Comes Change

We thought you might like to know if you don't already...our family is packing up and moving to Utah next weekend. We will be working for my brother, Jeff, in his new business. Paul will be working the warehouse and I will be working from home (so I can be home with Zack and wont have to pay for daycare)I'll be working in the call center making calls to current customers. I am so excited and can't wait for this new adventure. We also made an offer on a home in Springville and since it's a Short Sale (nothing like it sounds), it could take forever for the bank to accept our offer. Still just waiting to hear from them. In the meantime, we will be staying with my parent's in Orem. I'm sure they are just thrilled to have their guest room filled again with their children (wink, wink). So, if you need to get a hold of one of us we will still have the same phone numbers, but we will no longer be living in Evanston, Wyoming after July 31st. Can't wait to be closer to those in Utah, but sad that we will be leaving those in Wyoming. Wish us luck in our future endeavors. We'll keep you posted on our house situation.