Zane is Three!!

Three years ago this cute boy came into the world! He was the best baby and probably one of the cutest too. He is so incredible active and so full of energy...by the time 6:00 rolls around I am exhausted! This past year has been a tough one...the terrible twos are a real thing and no one can deny it! He was full of fits and tantrums which lead to time outs...I am not going to tiptoe around that because it is my reality...he was a hard two year old. But in spite of the crying and hitting and screaming "NOOO!" he can be the sweetest kid ever. His smile melts my heart! And his laugh (real or fake) always makes me laugh as well. We have grown out of the two stage and are now getting into the whiney three year old stage which can be hard as well but we have more good days than bad. 

Zane is so fun to sit and watch. He loves to play but he also loves his movies (yes we let him watch movies...Nick and I both love movies so it was bound to happen). He loves making friends and will become friends with anyone who looks at him. We will be anywhere and someone will stand by him and he will say "Mom, this is my friend!" He loves his sister and always wants to play with her. He is very protective as well. 

Zane loves his food! Every morning he wants "Jam and bread" (peanut butter and jelly sandwich). He LOVES carrots and peas. Really he will eat any vegetable you put in front of him. He isn't a picky eater that's for sure!

Zane loves to learn. His new interest is dinosaurs. He will pull out Nick's big college book on dinosaurs and ask so many questions about them. He also has the best memory I have ever seen in a little boy...he can tell us the way to his grandparents' houses and he will always remember what happened at certain places. It's amazing. 

One thing I love about this boy is how he still loves to cuddle, usually before bed to put off going to sleep for a bit; but he will usually stop in the day to sit with me for 20 seconds and cuddle. 

There are so many things I can say about this boy...he is so much fun and we love him so so much. I am so lucky to be his mom and we are so blessed to have him in our family. 

I made a video as a day in the life of Zane. Really it took more then a day because 1) being a mom and filming is really hard and 2) he told me "Ugh Mom! You're such a pain...put the camera down." Hahaha He was getting sick of me following him around with the camera. Follow the link to Vimeo to watch it! Enjoy!

Zane is Three!!

Payson Temple Open House

We had the opportunity to go to the Payson Temple open house. Zane has started to recognize temples more and loves to see Moroni on top; so when I saw that tickets were available to go I jumped on the opportunity. It was so much fun to see his excitement. He thought the "pool" {baptismal font} and the sealing rooms were the coolest part. He didn't love the booties they put over his shoes though ha Couldn't walk normal. And Stella...she is just always happy. It was a fun day and I'm glad we had the chance to go and teach Zane about that special place. 

I am so thankful for temples and the knowledge that I have of eternal families though the sealing ordinances that take place this this sacred building. I love my family and I love this gospel. 

Families are forever

Handsome boy

Cute smiley girl

Love this family of mine

For more information on what we believe and temples click here!

Nick's Graduation

This past Friday, Nick GRADUATED!!  Although he is not done yet, this was still a big step to get to and now we have two more years till we are done completely!  I don't think people really understand how hard the architecture program is...I never did till my husband became a student.  It's hard work you guys.  I have said that it is as much work as a doctorate but you don't get a PhD and I guessing when I say that people who do have the doctorate or been a spouse to one of those are rolling their eyes saying "yeah right" but seriously...this degree is a tough one.  Nick starts pulling all nighters about four weeks into the semester.  And those all nighters continue through the entire semester.  And if he isn't pulling an all nighter he is leaving at 3:00 in the morning often times and not getting home till 9:00 or later.   When they have assignments, they can't do them at home because they need the shop with the laser cutter or power tools to build models and plotters to print off their presentation boards.  They study for the tests some time in the midst of all those projects and write the papers as well.  Architecture is hard and very time consuming.  So getting through these past two years is a major accomplishment and I am so proud of all his hard work.

Utah Ute Graduate

These guys have too much fun...I think they secretly like the all nighters

University of Utah College of Architecture

Love this guy

The Family

He is just too cute

Two more years to go!

A Little Update

The Just thought I would give a little update on all of us.

Stella:

Stella girl is now 10 months old and so fun. She can say a few words like "Dada" and "Mama" and "Uh oh" and "Oh Wow!" and then the normal gibberish.  She is telling really good stories, just with we understood them.  She can wave (which is the cutest thing in the world) and does it with both hands right in front of her face. Also she gives kisses!  Everything she does is cute haha Last month she started to stand a little bit and then last week she took her first steps!!!  She only takes a few and then sits down usually.  But we have gotten her to take quite a few across the room.  Guess I need to get ready to be chasing her all over the place soon.  She loves her brother so much. Loves it when he will play with her. Even if he hurts her, within 30 seconds she is laughing at him again. She hates baby food and will only eat what we are eating. Usually I don't feed her fast enough so I just put the food on her tray and she will gobble it up, getting it all over herself.  She loves making noise and pulling her clips and ponytails out of her hair. She has switched to formula and is now sleeping through the night! Woohoo! She loves to shake her head and do things she knows she's not suppose. When we tell her to stop she just looks at us, gives us her adorable little smile and keeps doing it. She is also obsessed with anything little like babies...her new cousin Cole needs a fence around him to protect him from her potential squeezes. She is so dang cute! We just love her so much. 

(She was mad because we took dirt out of her mouth...)

Zane:

This boy is growin up so fast. I think when you spend all day every day with your kids you don't realize it. Nick's sister lives in Cedar City and so she doesn't see us as much as we would like but she was up a bit ago. We were just sitting around at Nick's parents house and Zane went up to see the goldfish in McKynlee's room. Well the goldfish had died so he came walking down the stairs, all big boy like, and says "Mom, the goldfish isn't there." Well this caught Chellcee off guard and she kind of got teary and goes "he is just so big!" And it's true! He is so grown up. He is talking so well. And he will tell you all kinds of things. He loves to play outside. He loves school and his friends there. He's really good at making up words to songs which usually includes something about Santa Claus. It's especially funny at church. He is OBSESSED with carrots. I have to limit him to one a day. We noticed the bottom of his feet started getting a tinge orange ha. He took swimming lessons and did really well. I think we are coming out of the two year phase and more into the whiney three year old stage. He is really good at fake crying and pointing out Stella's fake cry (even when it isn't fake). His favorite phrases are "oh my  josh!" And "yes sir" (complete with a salute). Oh and we still aren't potty trained. We have definitely had our hard days full of timeouts and tears but in the end of the day, I sure do love this boy and he can always make me smile. He is so funny and loving. 

Me:

I have been working on our garden a lot lately. Getting ready to plant soon. So that's fun. I have also done a few video projects.  Like I said before I have been loving doing videography!  Nick has noticed it too.  He says that he can see how happy I am and loves that I am doing something that I love.  Other then that I just hang out with the kids which I love!

Nick:

This guy has been working as always. He had a good spring break full of outside projects. But the most exciting news is that he got into the Master's ofArchitecture program at the University of Utah!!! We are so relieved and excited. He has definitely earned it. He graduates next week and then we have two more years till we are done! He is looking forward to his summer break and we are hoping to do some fun things on top of working. He loves being home with us and playing.

Ducks:

So I have discovered that I am not a pet person right now it this phase of my life haha  The ducks are gone.  We had them for seven weeks and then decided to give them to another family.  They were outside and I would stress over them being cold or eaten or something and yet I didn't care about them enough to bring them inside {they stink so bad} and so I thought it would be better for them to just go to a new home that can handle animals better.  They went to a farm with other ducks and chickens and horses and a happy owner.  It was fun while they were little and cute...then not so much ha  I don't think I ever told the story of our cat...We adopted a cat a bit ago, like in October, and we had to keep him inside for a bit to get him use to living here.  So I did that and it killed me {again, not a pet inside type of person} and so then he finally got to go outside.  I took him to the vet to get his shots and then the next day he ran away........ So we are done with pets for a bit ha Lesson learned.

So that is what we are up to. We are all loving the warm weather so we can be outside more. Life is good :)  Sorry there are no pictures...I will get some up soon.

Facelift!

So I gave my blog a facelift....can you tell :)  If you notice up at the top there are now buttons that go to other places.  One of those buttons say "MEK WOOD FILM"...yup, I have a website you guys!  As I said here I started a videography business!!  I am LOVING it!  I have had the opportunity to do a birth story for my sister {you guys don't get to see that video...too personal...you get it :)} and a promo film for my dear friend Jami at Photography by Jami Leavitt that I am touching up a few things and that one will be up and running.  I just finished up a wedding and I have another this weekend.  Those videos are on the website now!  I have a few in the works that you should watch for.  Anyway...just wanted to point out the new blog and website!  Hope you all enjoy!  I will do a family update soon.  Lots is happening in the household!  Stay tuned.

Our new pets.

I'm When I was pregnant with Stella, Zane would only call her "Baby Duck". We could never get him to say her name till she was born. And ever since he called her that some of Nick's family insisted we get ducks for the kids. So with spring in the air and eggs hatching, Grandma Bulkley and Uncle Bob surprised the kids with some baby ducks!

 The minimum they could purchase was 4 so that's how many we got :) they are so cute! We haven't decided on names yet because 1) we can't tell them apart yet ha and 2) we don't know if they are boys or girls yet.

The kids love them though. Zane likes to pet them and watch them but will not hold them. Stella just wants to squeeze them! She gets so excited when they get by her she seriously shakes. But when the nibble on her toes she tries to get away from them. They follow Zane around too which he thinks is cool. 

The next animal I want to get for our small "farm" (it's not really a farm) is a goat. We have a small pasture that grows weeds ALL summer and so I think a goat would be great to put out there for weed control. And they are pretty fun too. We just need to find one :)

So there you have it...we own ducks ha Stay tuned for a picture of them grown and their pond and living area to come soon!

A dream of mine coming to reality...

Well I am finally doing one of my resolutions that has been on my goals list for quite a few years now...I am starting to do something that I love...videography. You guys I am so excited for this! But at the same time I am pretty nervous about it...putting yourself out there like this and starting something new is a scary thing because I don't know how it is going to work out. And I feel like so often these days anyone with a camera considers themselves a professional photographer and I do not want to be put in that category. If you have known me for long you have known that I have always been one with a video camera in my hand. It began in sixth grade when I took a technology class from Ms. Hillard. We had to do movies and I did mine and I loved it. I would even volunteer to film other groups videos for them (I was never one to be in front of the camera...I had gorgeous friends for that role). After that class I told my mom of my new found passion and she informed me of the high school class that was taught by my backyard neighbor Mr. Moss that was all about video and film. He even let me start coming to his classroom even before I was in high school to let me play around and get familiar with programs and equient. I was so excited for high school! Not the fact that I was going to be with older people who intimidated me but because I had a passion and there was a class to feed that passion. I knew where I was going to thrive. I had found my "spot" before I even got to high school. So high school came around and that was the first class I registered for. And to make it all even better, my parents got me my first video camera! That thing came with me everywhere. "Girl's Night Out" was full of filming and fun. I loved video stuff. I went to college and again, I always had my camera in my hand. When I graduated college in Elementary Educaion and got married and started having kids and I still had my cameras close by but life got busy and I wasn't able to do much with video stuff. Now that I am staying at home, my life is still busy with my family but I have decided that it is time to get back to my passion and actually do something with it. Thanks to my wonderful husband who has encouraged me and help make this possible and some great friends who let me tag along with them to film and use them and their families as my geunie pigs, I am starting to get serious about this video stuff. And I could not be more anxious! So if you have a want/need for a video (wedding, baby, promo for a business, lifestyle...you name it) let me know because I am wanting some practice and it will be free!  Stay tuned! Something big is going to happen here (I hope :))