breakin in the baby

I don't know where the time has gone but time flies. I planned on doing this post a while ago but I guess I just got ahead of myself. Last weekend and also the weekend before we had the opportunity (finally!) to take out the rzr. the first time we went to bountiful and man did we get in some scary spots! I even had to get out and walk. (For those who don't know I have a fear of heights.. and spiders..) This last weekend we took the rzr up to strawberry. Bountiful was cold and I found myself day dreaming of a bubble bath. Strawberry was fairly warm when the sun was out but kudos to mother nature because she didn't drop any surprise showers on us. There isn't much to say but the fact was we had a good time. We have a few more trip planned even though school starts on Wednesday for me. I am a huge fan of pictures so here are a bunch that we took. Enjoy

p.s does anyone need/want some tomatoes???? I think our tomato plant are on steroids or something because I am pulling 2 large bucket full every other day from our garden and we are just taking them to our work so people can have them. We have more than enough if anyone wants some.. PLEASE let me know if you want some!

A dragonfly


The great view


Nikki and Julian


Bryce cruisin' around while I take pictures


Me and Bryce


Bryce and me

Now these last few picture you will have to enlarge. I did some multi shots on my camera and they are funny


Notice Nikki's face. semi open mouth..


Now the hand braces, and the mouth drops more.


I think she may have a wet spot on her seat.

Stuck

For the last 8 year of my life I have been stuck between a rock and a hard spot. For the last 6 years it has been more pronounced than before. The last 4 has been the most difficult and the last 2 I have been able to adjust and not let it effect my life near as much. I am talking about my family.


I realize I have not had very much good or anything at all to say about some of my family on my blog but the truth is.. its ugly and it is reality. I am not going to sugar coat things. We all have our problems and I hate it when pretty pictures are painted of our lives and then reality hits and we ask 'where did this come from?' 'How long has it been going on?' and the ever most popular 'How did this happen?' so excuse me for a just a minute while I paint another picture of my life for you.


This last past weekend our camping trip camping to a grinding halt when the weather decided not to cooperate. I can take cold weather any day but mix that with wet and it is flat out miserable. Now let me jump back to the week prior, as you can see I attended my dad's family reunion. I went because I needed to be there, I did not go because of my family. My expectations of them are not very high but let me tell you it was one of the most enjoyable weekends I have had with them in a very very long time. Even my oldest sister was nice and nice is not in her dictionary. I was amazed, and besides my tire being broken, the weekend was a huge success! I had no intentions of being with them but it ended up that way. I feel like my mom was trying. On Tuesday I went to her house to pick up some things that they had hauled for us. My sister just older than me was also nice! Could this be a dream come true or a slap in the face with reality that was coming my way? For the first time in my niece's life I received even a picture of her from my sister and to top it off I received an invite to her graduation and to lunch this coming up weekend. Wow!


Now back to this weekend.. since our plans crashed I decided to head up to the U to attend my sisters graduation and leave this following weekend available for whatever may come our way. I am proud of my sister and with this new found niceness that I was experiencing I found myself longing for my sister in my life. I wanted to hug her, cry with her, tell her everything that is going on in my life. I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs for her as she walked across the stage to receive and award she has been working for, for years. That is my sister and I am proud of her! After the ceremony I felt anything but that. There was a snide little comment from another that made all that niceness disappear and my hopes come crashing down that there may have been a change in some of my family members.


The point is not that is matters who said it or what was said but that it made me doubt myself. I doubt my life, I doubt what I am doing is the right thing for me, I doubt my schooling, and I doubt that I will ever be good enough for anyone (friends, family, boys, children). I have spent my entire life trying to be just as great as my sister and the reality is that I wont. She has exceeded everything in life and that is hard to follow.


My hope is having my family back came crashing down once again and I found myself in the same position as I have always been in, having high hope to have them stubble down upon me. I cannot expect much from my family and I knew this. Knowing this I set myself up once again for complete failure and risking my emotions for it all.


After time and time again of blubbering this to Bryce (bawling and mumbling) I have come to conclusion that I am doing the best I can, and work hard to not let this effect me even though every day I am jealous, hurt, adore, envy everyone I see that has an awesome relationship with their family. You can never get a mothers love (or sisters in this case) from anyone but your mother. I hope in my life I am choosing the things that are right for me. At this moment I doubt myself but give me a few days and I wont. I will never be as good as her, as beautiful as her, as smart as her, or as fast as her. Now I guess the one thing I am doubting, can I open the door for just a bit longer for my family to come around? That I do not know and I don't know if I am willing to risk that but for right now I can honestly say that I am proud of my sister! (even if we don't get along)



** Post note, this did not come across as I wanted it to but I cant explain everything that is in my head on this subject, please be understanding.

Italian Chicken Pasta - For Katie

1 package of Penne Noodles
1 Rotisserie Chicken (or 1 pound of chicken cooked to your preference)
3 to 5 garlic Cloves, minced
1/2 onion chopped
1 cup Cherri tomatoes
1 jar of pizza sauce
1 green pepper or zucchini chopped
1 cup of mushrooms, sliced
1 cup of mozzarella cheese
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp of italian seasoning

Cook your noodles, A Le Dante. Heat up your wok on medium heat. add oil, garlic, zucchini, mushroom and onion. Cook for 3 minutes until almost soft. Add noodles, pizza sauce, tomatoes, italian seasoning and chicken. Heat. add cheese and serve.

(you could add in the raw chicken with the oil, garlic, and onion and cook the majority of the way then add in the zucchini and mushroom)

I got this recipe from my sister in law and it was YUMMY. Bryce loved it, I love it and it is something I will use many times in the future.

* if you don't have a wok a normal pot will work, it just may take a bit longer

Ward Family Reunion II

Now that I have more time I thought I would tell you about the reunion.

Friday morning we got up and packed up the car to head up to Green Canyon Hot springs, Idaho. I decided to take my brothers kids so they could have some fun with the rest of us too. I also thought that this would be a great way to keep Bryce entertained seems how he didn't know anyone. Having 3 kids is work!
Cam rode with my mom, Chad and Julia came with me. We left at 10:30 in the morning and stopped off at my favorite place in Roy called Berger Bar. If you are ever in Roy stop there! I have fond memories growing up and always stopping there on our twice a year trips to Idaho. good times.
We also stopped in Idaho Falls to do some grocery shopping so we could get things that the kids would eat. By the time we got up there is was after 5 at night, alot later than I planned. We are cruising down the highway following google maps direction and our direction come to a complete halt in the middle of no mans land. We try to keep going but we are just not finding this place and it has been years since I had been there last. Memories were vague. So we decided to head back to the nearest town to get help. On the way back I hit a huge rock probably the size of a soccer ball. Oh did I mention I got new tires on Thurs night?? No worries I didn't hear anything and it didn't sound like it popped. When we got our directions and looks at the tire, the rim was bent and the tire had a bulged. just my luck. We were not far off and made it to camp safely. We traded our tire out for the spare and broke off one of the nuts, clean. looks like we were making the trip back on 3. We got camp all set up and my mom was nice enough to make us all dinner. It was yummy.
Sat we woke up to early morning breakfast and went swimming. We had the kids and all enjoyed ourselves. Soon the family started to arrive. I will be honest and say that I am a bit disappointed in the number of people who showed up. Our family made up half of the group alone. My one uncle has 11.. yes 11 kids and they are all married and have kids themselves and none of them came. I was looking forward to catching up with some of my cousins (and by cousin I mean my cousin kids in which I grew up with because they are all way older than me). After a nice lunch and an auction to raise money for next year we had to say our see you laters. I hate this part and I usually cry because for some this may be the last time I will see them. I tried to keep myself busy by cleaning up. After everyone had left we took the kids once again to the pool and after a few hours of playing around in the water we headed back to camp (did I mention it was FREEZING???) for dinner, fire and a good nights rest for we had a lots of packing to do and a long drive ahead of us.
Sunday we woke up, had a good breakfast, packed up and headed home. We also stopped in poci. for lunch. Now I am at home trying to catch up the laundry and un/re packing we have to do for our next camping adventure. I am sad it is over but I hope to able to return to Idaho soon to see some of my family. Sorry that was so long.. now here is a long list of pictures!

My dad's family: Bruce, Dean, Joyce, Harvey (He looks exactly like my g-pa) and my dad. They are missing their brother Clayton who passed away 7 years ago.


Bryce, Chad and Cam Climbing up to the cave above the campground


My sister Aimee, I am doing her hair.. go figure.


Emi and Bed head.. yes that is me and yes I just woke up


My Nephew, Jayce


Chad and Jayce 'Rolling on the tent' to get the air out.


Emi, she is just so dang cute and 100% my sisters kid. My sister wasn't able to come because she had finales. She is graduating with her nursing degree this Friday. Amazing.


Bryce, me my Aunt Joyce and my cousin (2nd) Rusty


My Cousin Melissa (2nd) me my cousin Jan and my cousin Dan (2nd) Jan is dan's mother and Melissa Mother in law. Does that make sense? See I told you all of my 'cousins' are actually my cousins kids


My nephew Kaleb. He is cute too


My Aunt leona


Emi again, so photogenic

Ward Family Reunion 2009

This weekend we found ourselves making the 5 hours trek to no-mans-land Idaho for my Ward (dad's) Family Reunion. I have tons of good memories of my family and some of the only memories of my grandmother at the family reunions. This reunion is Celebrating the life and descendants of Wilford and Stella Ward (my dad's parent). I never knew my grandfather, he passed away before I even knew how to walk and my grandmother left us to join him when I was 12 years old. It is great to get together and see my cousins, sadly throughout the years it is getting harder and harder on my dad's siblings to camp. My dad is the last of his line and I am the last of my parents line.
I have to say I was very excited to learn there was a family reunion this year, the last time I was in Idaho was 4 years ago. I am sad to say that only 1/8 of the family was able to attend. This was Bryce's chance to meet my family. We had good food, good conversation and all around a good time. I also got a chance to spend some time with my nieces and nephews that I don't see very much and I was also able to get some pictures seems how in their short lives I have never been able to get one. Overall the weekend was great and even with the family problems, we were able to put those aside for the weekend. It has now taken me and hour to upload these photos so throughout the week I will upload a few more to share what we did throughout weekend along with some stories. Here we go.. enjoy!

Camping Isn't camping without s'mores.. you want some?? (sister, Aimee)


This is such a cute picture of my niece Emi


Keeping the kids entertained with bubbles, Kaleb LOVED these! (Chad)


Getting the fire going. Did I mention it was FREEZING up there??? (Cam)

Classic


Leave it up to my dad to make us laugh. Yes that is a purple Tinkerbell hat and yes it is Emi's

Such a cute kid, very photogenic (Kaleb, my nephew)

More Yummy food, our favorite meal... hobo dinners


Cousins, Emi and lolly (real names Emily and Julia) They were two peas in a pod

Busy, Busy, Busy

This weekend we found ourselves busy. Friday I had to work late and came home to our last day of having the house to ourselves. Bryce's mom was out of town so we have enjoyed the week of being home alone.
Saturday morning I get an early morning nudge by my wonderful man. He found our 'baby'. He also had a paintball game that he was heading up to so I figured I would hit up a few stores. That was a mistake, I was LATE to everything on Sat. oops.
My cute nephew Garrett was baptised in the afternoon. I was late to arrive, early to leave. My brother was a bit disappointed that I didn't stay for the lunch (I did, but it took them 40 minutes to even get it going, I had to leave!). Every time my family bails on him and this time was no different. It was only me and my other Brother who stayed. I took my camera out to get pics but I was so busy trying to help with the food that I failed miserably!
I got home and we got ready to head over to Destiny's wedding. This would be my new found friend, Brittany's sister. I have become quite fond of her sister and am looking forward to the new friendship that I have found. She is so very different than Brittany but just in the same in other ways. We completely missed the ceremony but were able to have dinner and hit up the dance floor. The bride was beautiful, the food was awesome, the toast was AMAZING.. sniff sniff, I am sad that these things don't happen often enough. It is so hard to think that a year ago Bryce's sister had her reception and we found ourselves in our wedding attire once again that we had wore only a short year ago. we boogied the night away.

Brittany, Destiny, and Me

Eddie, Brittany, Me and Bryce.. we matched her colors!

Once we got home, it was late and we were tired but we had to go pick up our new baby. We are a bit disappointed that we wont be able to take this thing out for a few weeks but we are counting down the days that we do! I present to you baby Hardman.

As of right now, Bryce's mom is home, the house is cleaned, Make-up is worn off, shoes put away, and the dressed pressed in the closet for the next time that I will be able to pull it out again. I am exhausted and now I have to think of the next weeks events.. 2 teenagers, 1 sassy 8 year old girl going on 18, 1 partner in crime, 4 hours drive, equals me with 4 'kids' and insanity... I think I am going to go CRAZY..