Anniversary Date Night

Saturday night Jason and I went out! out...alone...at night! mmmhmmm! We had a yummy, free (gotta love gift cards and the wonderful friends who give them!) dinner at the....

one of my favorite places to eat. I, of course, had my two favs- Thai lettuce wraps and Tuxedo Cream cheesecake! We had a great time and spent the rest of the night at my new favorite bookstore...Half Price Books! I got Olive several books, some will be birthday, some christmas, to add to our collection. And they really were Half Price! I was in heaven!

This pic will only load sideways for some reason but hopefully you can still see the beauty of the flowers Jason brought home to me Tuesday the 22nd, our actual anniversary.

There is a very sweet tale of how we met involving a shared frisco melt from Steak N'Shake....so to commemorate the occasion, my romantic, sweet husband brought one home to share! We later snuck out to grab some Rita's! If you are not blessed to have a Rita's close to you...I am so sorry! Fantastic custard and Gelatis! Mmmmm!

Sometimes I wonder why I am so blessed and what I am doing and/or did to merit it. In those moments, my testimony burns with confirmation of how much my heavenly father knows and loves me. Jason and I were sealed together in a beautiful temple of God for time and ALL ETERNITY. Could there be any greater blessing than that? And yet, life gets sweeter everyday as we grow, learn, love, serve, and even repent to start again better than we were. I am grateful for the daily serenity the gospel of Jesus Christ gives me and even tuxedo cream cheesecake and gelatis cant beat that. But.... the combo is pretty spectacular!

For the Love of Pancakes...and my husband!

We celebrated our sixth year of marital bliss this past week. :) No, really, it has been quite blissful! I've heard some say that having kids can have put stress on your relationship... we dont have "kids" yet, just "kid" singular, but so far I feel its done the opposite for us. Seeing Jason unfold as a father, his love for Olive and his concern for her and my happiness has made me fall in love with him over and over again this past year. We started the celebration with blueberry wheat pancakes...you decide, were they enjoyed?

The work is so worth it! I love being a mom!

6 YEARS!

Wow, as of today, Jason and I have been married for six years! It's gone quickly but we've had some great times and I love that there are more to come! Will post pics from our Anniversary date this coming Saturday....and yes, that will be our third date since Olive was born eleven months ago. Cant wait!

Visit with Grandma Marge

Olive met her Great Grandma Marge for the first time on Saturday. She is here visiting from Florida. We really enjoyed our visit!
Smile! I had already changed Olive into her Jammies for our drive home so she looks a little under-dressed but she really wasent in her PJs all day!

Great Grandma, Olive, and Aunt Marian

Mommy, Olive, and Grandma. Olive loved Great Grandma's top with six buttons to play with!

Mommy, Olive, Great Grandma, Aunt Jean, and Aunt Marian

We had a great visit. It has been four years since we have seen Grandma so it was great to catch up!

Weekend getaway

We snuck away for a quick weekend trip to Newport, Ky with our bestest friends! We got a hotel and enjoyed the swimming pool and free breakfast and spent Saturday at the Newport Aquarium. We had such a great time! (We need to do it again Palmers!)Olive wasent sure about the swimming pool right away. She alternated between smiles and whimpers for the first five minutes but then totally loved it!

My first Swim!

i love my papa!

Dylann and Olive had matching jammies on! They thought it was great! Such sweet girls!

Saturday we headed to the Aquarium. Olive was mesmerized!

Check out this ugly creature. I really have something against spiders so this spider crab really creeped me out. Ugh!

I loved this Starfish just chillin on the glass!

We were attacked by a gigantic Octopus!

They had these really neat tunnels that went right through the aquarium!

There was an amazing display of jellyfish-They are so beautiful!

This Great White Shark swam just a few feet above us in a tunnel! Wow!

With my papa's help, I'm as big as this shark!

Overlooking the Ohio river!

We had such a great time! Every moment of joy and discovery little Olive experiences brings me to my knees in gratitude. I am so grateful I get to be a part of her growth and learning. I am so extremely blessed. Such an awesome and wonderful husband and an amazing and beautiful daughter of my heavenly father both sent to me...

wow. that's just about all I can say. wow.

P.S. Check out this awesome wreath I made with some crafty friends out of paper bags! Its fun to get your craft on...and very therapeutic too!

We hope everyone had a great Memorial Day. Our thoughts were definitely turned to our loved ones and everyone who we have temporarily lost and for the beauty of the hope and oppurtunities we were given! We had a wonderful outdoor bbq in the few hours of sunshine mother nature gave us yesterday! Papa's girl!

Meryn made these delicious and adorable "Pie cakes", cupcakes decorated to look like pie!

Olive and the bumble bee @ grandma and grandpa R's!

Gettin Papa pushes!

Olive wants to walk! She's trying out a new walking toy and doing pretty well...I just didnt manage to get any pics of her standing up!

She walked pretty far with this little contraption. I have a cute video but blogger wont let me post it... ( I have to figure out why!)

Memorial Day also brought with it.....

A new tooth and another on its way!

A stair climbing adventure!

Good food, friends, and family!

AND THIS...
Olive's first painted toes...........LIFE IS SWEET!

Memorial Day Weekend!

You might want to grab a snack...this will be a long multiple-post post! So many exciting things happened on our long Memorial Day weekend! I'll start with my weekend project. Meryn had the awesome idea to attempt to make a bookshelf out of a wood pallet. Her sweet husband Danny took a mallett to a few and brought us home some wood. The pictures tell everything else....

Pretty cool. huh? Great Idea Meryn! Thanks for the wood and tools Danny!