Reds Baseball 2018

Jackson played baseball this year - advancing from t-ball, which he played the last two years. Their schedule was pretty intense - 3 games a week for 7 weeks - but he improved so much over the course of the season.

We started the season with a pizza dinner at the park on a beautiful spring evening practicing his swing. 

Season kick-off parade

As the season progressed, his batting average increased and he even got a few runs. He was so excited every time he hit the ball!

He played on the same team as his cousin Ricky and his mom and aunt Paula were coaches.

End-of-Season Pizza Party

Distinguished Alum

My grandma was honored this year as a Distinguished Alum at Hauser/Hope High School. We attended the alumni banquet where she received her award. I am so proud to have her as my grandmother. She is an extremely strong woman who has shown simple faith and obedience her whole life and has blessed hundreds of people, many of whom are her own posterity. She's amazing, and I'm so grateful we were able to be there with her that night!

Mother's Day

My grandma gave a talk in her ward on Mother's Day, so Brandon and I went to their ward for church, then Tessa and her kids came down and we all had lunch together. 

I have been blessed with an incredible mother and a faithful, inspiring grandmother. I'm grateful to come from a legacy of strong, faithful women.

Spring 2018

Spring is my favorite season, but it got skipped this year. It went straight from winter weather to summer weather. Ugh. But we still had some fun times!

Brandon and I hit up the last Pacers home game of the season. Unfortunately, the results didn't really matter at that point in the season so they played all their second-string guys and it was a pitiful showing. But I had the hottest date in the house!

One night we decided to have an at-home movie date night. Brandon was out, so I asked him to pick up a snack for movie night, thinking a candy bar or something. Instead, he came home with a trash bag full of movie theater popcorn - a large tub and its refill. The man knows me so well!

I saw online that someone had made a DIY Angry Birds game, so we tried it by stacking cups and using a slingshot to shoot Peeps at the stack. Unfortunately, the cups were too heavy for the Peeps so it didn't work very well. And the Peeps left their sugar crystals all over the floor. But it was a fun idea!

Snow in April. SO STUPID.

Family movie date to see Ferdinand

Jackson can curl his tongue. I cannot.

Jackson got Guess Who in his Easter basket, so the whole weekend was a Guess Who tournament. The kid is the luckiest guesser!

He's very into "Hey, watch this!" right now. About everything he does. :)

Brandon and I went to Louisville to see Dave Ramsey live in the biggest church I've ever seen. It was fun, but not really any new information and didn't feel quite worth it when we were driving home for 2 hours at midnight.

Youth temple trip. Brandon came to help, too. The young women can help in the baptistry now, so there's really not much for me to do anymore. Just sit and enjoy the feeling of the temple!

Easter 2018

General Conference fell on Easter Sunday this year, so Tessa hosted lunch for us in between sessions. Mom made cute Easter-themed food, of course, and I made a bomb spring salad.

Justin in Chicago

After 6 years, Justin finally released a new album and went on tour! Initially, the closest he was scheduled to come was to Chicago, so I coordinated with a couple of friends from work who live in Chicago to plan a quick trip!

I drove up earlier that day and worked in our Chicago office for a couple hours then hung out with Meaghan, Marissa, and Sabina before going to the show.

Of course Justin was amazing! He's such a great entertainer - the stage was really cool and his performance was so fun. 

I crashed in Marissa's spare bedroom that night then drove back the next day, hitting a few schools on the way. It was so nice to be able to work the trip into some visits I had to do for work anyway!