WINNEMUCCA NEVADA

 

This past year has come with many challenges, but has also brought a lot of good things to our little family.   After 15 years, Devin has received a transfer and promotion from Cardwell Distributing.  Over the course of the next month, we'll be moving to the city of Winnemucca, NV.   We are super excited for this opportunity for him, but not only that, it will give him (us) the chance to move back to the small town atmosphere like where he grew up.  

We have begun packing and had a going away party for Kodi and her friends, but we are glad to be able to spend Christmas here in Utah before we take off and head west.  I found a home in Winnemucca for us over Thanksgiving so we are just waiting for Cardwell to finalize the lease on the warehouse and office building before we embark on the official move.  It will be nice to have the slower paced lifestyle that a small town brings; but I am a little worried about adjusting to a town with no "BIG" cities in any direction for at least 120 miles (West: Reno, East Elko).  We are lucky enough to have a McDonalds, a new little Walmart (yes, it's little by Walmart standards), and a couple local grocery stores.   

I'm going to have to learn how to plan better or just plan to order everything online. Our house in Nevada is about 10 miles outside of the main city, we will border a turf farm, but there is a lot of open space for Devin and his motorbike, and Kodi and bow.   We are super excited for this new adventure!

 

2013

This years started out with an AWESOME trip to Talledega Superspeedway, this was one of Devin's "Bucket List" wishes, so we used some of my frequent flyer miles and took the family to Alabama.  

It rained nearly the entire weekend.   But it was totally worth it and all hope to go back again soon!

Kodi was a Brownie in Girl Scouts in 2013, she sold cookies in January and went to girl scout camp this summer with her best little buddy Morgan.  It was a 6 day 5 night "Horse Lovers" camp, where the girls all had a horse to take care of and ride for the week.  She slept in an army tent with a cement floor and they all slept on cots.  She had a good time, but I think 5 nights was too many nights for her first girl scout camp. She was very glad to see daddy when he picked her up!

Kodi and I did our first 5K together.   We did the Color Me Rad run at UVU.   We started out all in white, and ended up painted up with every color of the rainbow. 

We had a blast and Kodi was an good sport, 

especially when I made her strip down to her undies for the ride home! 

For the first time in several years I decided to do family pictures for Christmas presents.   Kodi thought she was at a photo-shoot for her!  She loved it, the lady took a lot of great pictures of Kodi standing, sitting, kneeling and posing in various positions.   

Luckily we were able to get a few really good pictures of the rest of us too.   Devin wanted a picture of us all in camo, so we took one and believe it or not, it was one of the best one of the bunch!  This is a picture of a picture, but it was all I had on hand so I wanted to be sure to add it in for this post. 

Winter to Spring...now its winter again!

We have been so busy the past few months, but thinking about it now, I'm having a hard time thinking of the things we've done!

Kodi's birthday party...some were invited, some just showed up!

Mattie, Kodi, Alissa, Kaycee, Geneveve,Brynnlee, Ashton-left side, Rogan-right side, 

Kwinncee, Mackayla, Kaitlyn, Chiara, Alexis. 

We had a fairy birthday party for Kodi,  Devin was driving and didn't make it home till late that night so he wasn't able to be there, but my friend Dawn and her son Jaden were a big help to me that day.

Kodi has been growing and getting taller, we have her back in Gymnastics and next week she's going to start horse riding lessons with her older cousin Ashlee.  She loves horses and reminds me that she is a real cowgirl.  (because she was bucked off of a horse when she was 6 and to get her to stop crying her Aunt told her that only real cowgirls have been bucked off horses.)   Devin's working as a dispatcher at Cardwell.  We are all happy he is no longer driving on a regular basis.   He has somewhat set hours and instead of working each weekend, he is only on call every 3rd weekend. He gets calls at all hours of the day and night, Kodi and I joke we're going to flush his phone down the toilet.  I told Devin that Kodi is making me nuts today.  I told her to stop fooling around and get dressed because we were running late and had already missed the bus.  She said she was dressed, so I dress and join her in the living room to find her in her pajamas.  I started to get mad at her and asked her if she was planning to wear those to school and she looked at me almost crying and said. "you asked if I was fully dressed, all I did was say yes - so don't get mad at me"  In the future I will be more specific. 

I'm going as a helper Mom with Kodi and her school class to the Zoo this Friday.  I am super excited.  She is still at the age where having me around is "fun".   I am taking full advantage of this while I can.  I know it won't last forever!


As proven to be a yearly event, I again caught Pneumonia early this year.  Luckily I went to the doctor early enough that I didn't have to go back for a hospital stay.  A good friend of mine recently told me that it was okay to be happy with my circumstances and to give up any guilt or thoughts that we aren't where we're supposed to be.  Since this time I've been able to look at things with a lighter heart, and a better sense of humor.  With this in mind, it helps me deal with having my jaw dislocate 6 times in the past month...and laugh about it or grunt since I can't really open my mouth very wide.

All is well on the home front, and the Easter Bunny came over the weekend.   Kodi doesn't care much for candy but if its chocolate (the good kind) and caramel, or a ring pop, it is usually a success.  The Easter Bunny did good this year- she seemed pleased with her delivery.  Oh and yes, there is still snow in the forcast.

Kodi and her Friends

Kodi and Mattie building a snowman in the front yard

Kodi is in 1st grade and LOVES all her new Eagle Mountain friends. 

We live close enough to have Mattie Sue from Fairfield come over and play.  

Brynlee, Ashton, Kodi and Kwyncee

Today Kodi came home from school and a little while later Ashton knocked on the door.   About 30 minutes later Brynlee and Kwyncee joined the party.   They are good kids and I'm so glad Kodi has friends close by.  

Merry Christmas!

Temple Square Christmas 2010

Devin's mom came into town for the weekend and we thought it would be fun to go up to Temple Square to show Kodi the lights.   We drove around looking for a place to park for nearly as long as we walked around to sight see. We saw the lights, drank hot cocoa, looked at the beautiful Temple and took her up to the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. 
We haven't visited Temple Square at Christmas time before, everyone had a good time, Kodi got tired and Dev ended up packing her around. 

Devin and Kodi

It was fun to be in Salt Lake at Christmas time.   We loved seeing the tall decorated buildings and everything looked so fun and Christmas-ey decorated in lights. 

Merry Christmas!

Birthday and Christmas...

Today we celebrated Devin's birthday.  We went to church, came home and took naps, put up the Christmas tree and relaxed,  watched movies together as a family and ate 

Pumpkin pie and icecream.   

Kodi wearing Dev's Birthday present

We went down to Spring City yesterday to cut a Christmas tree.  I love this time of year but to be honest I don't love hiking all over the Manti LaSal forest looking for the "perfect tree".   Kodi ended up riding on Dev's back as we hiked uphill through the snow without any luck.  Kodi decided she wasn't going to walk any further so Devin kept going while Kodi and I sat on a log and waited.  Devin found the perfect tree at the top of a huge hill.   We decorated it with 800 lights (red and white) it is beautiful!

DOG JAIL

The past few weeks have been some of the hardest times Devin and I have lived through.  We have a great family and a wonderful daughter that has helped us with our struggles.   We hoped that December would bring a brighter and more hopeful month.

I'll just start by saying....December 1st wasn't so bad...till we were going to bed.  

This is my dog Aspen, or at least I used to refer to her as my dog.    Now, she's Devin's

ASPEN a couple months old

I picked her out when she was a pupply, Devin and Kodi help out but I am the one that takes care of her 

(for the most part)  

I've never had my own pet before.  Kodi LOVES her.  We named her Aspen after a little girl at Kodi's old sitter who was terribly mean to Kodi. (yep, this was my idea...at least this way hearing the name makes us think of our dog, not the mean little brat in Springville)

It has been below freezing conditions out here during the night.  (for example:  it was -4 degrees this past Monday night)   We've been letting Aspen sleep in the garage on cold nights, but when it started getting this cold, we moved her kennel to the basement.  She is great and sleeps all night, she doesn't make a noise until I take her out when I leave for work each morning.

On December 1st, Devin went out to bring her in for the night and she was no where to be found.   Her pen was open and apparently (from our limited investigating skills) she had jumped against the door of her chain link dog run until she had loosened the latch and was able to ESCAPE.   Trying to be good pet owners, we never letter her out of her dog pen unless we are outside with her.  So, as you can imagine, she must have bolted like a bat out of hell at her first sign of true freedom.  Devin drove the streets of our neighborhood and I sat on the porch calling her name and whistling till well after 10:30PM.   We couldn't find her.  I dropped Kodi off at school and drove the neighborhood some more before work- she was gone.   We found out later Wednesday that someone on the next street to the south found her and called animal control to turn her into the Utah County Animal Shelter.   Kodi didn't know she was ever lost, I didn't tell her before I dropped her off at school.  I still can't believe Aspen made it through the night - it was cold!  I picked Kodi up from school to drive to the animal shelter to claim her and Kodi said, "I can't believe Aspen is in DOG JAIL."

So after paying $85 dollars in impound and licensing fees (bail), and a "dog at large" citation...we got her home.  She slept from the time we got home till we left for work this morning.  Devin says he is going to figure out a way for her to earn/pay us back the money.   I think if she takes off again, we won't be picking her up.