Family Photos

We had some family photos taken last month, but its taken me a while to get them up- sorry to anyone who was waiting!  Originally we were going to get them taken up on Cedar Mountain, but the on the weekend we'd scheduled them, the leaves hadn't changed colors too much, so we went down to St. George where our photographer was and had them taken there instead.  Anna (Prince) Williams from Panaca did them, and overall I think they turned out great!  She's just getting started with her photography, but I'd recommend her to anyone!

I will say, it was quite the chore getting Sadie to cooperate for photos- most of the time she was trying to get out of my lap or otherwise run away and play.  But Anna still captured some really good moments with her and all of us together :)

She took over 400 photos, and obviously I couldn't post all of them here ;)  So here are just a few of my favorites.  She did some with us as a family, some with just Brian and I, and some with just Sadie.  

Here are my top four family photos

Sadie was trying to squirm out of my lap in the one above- can you tell, haha!

These next four are just of Sadie.  I think this first one turned out really cool!

She looks like a little model in this one ;)

Doing the "Itsy-bitsy Spider"

These next two are (obviously) just Brian and I- these were a lot easier to take than the ones with Sadie :)

And finally, these ones just made me laugh, so I wanted to include them

LOL, Sadie looks so bored...

Our kid can multi-task

future geologist- she looks so studious :)

The New Place!

Today we did our inspection on the townhome we're buying. Because its new, we got to mark any "imperfections" we saw and they'll fix them before we move in, so thats why you see blue tape on the walls in the kitchen. It was so fun to see the home again and to think that in less than a month, we'll be moving in! I went a little picture crazy, so I just posted the ones I thought showed the house the best. Enjoy!

I LOVE the kitchen. I think its absolutely beautiful! They'll be installing a black fridge before we move in, so that will take up the space Brian's standing in.

You can't see it, but we've got a dishwasher too, thank goodness- I'm so spoiled, I couldn't live without one of those!


Here's the living room




This is the hall upstairs. The door on the left is a linen closet, then the two doors on the end are bedrooms. On the right is the bathroom.


This is the upstairs bathroom. All of them have the same fixtures, which we think are pretty nice :)


This is the master bedroom. We're not sure what we'll use the cubbyhole for, since we don't want a t.v. in the bedroom, but we'll think of something. The closet is nice and big too :)



We're seriously so so so so so so SO SO SO SO excited to finally have a place of our own! I can't wait!

Soon-to-be HOMEOWNERS!!!!

For a few months we've been thinking "gosh, house prices have fallen a ton, we should think about buying a house." So about a month ago I went to a broker and got all our financing and everything.....and then we didn't do anything. Well, a couple of weeks ago our broker called to tell us interest rates had dropped a whole percentage from the time I'd gone in and so we decided to call a real estate agent and start looking at homes. We put an offer on one we really wanted last week, but sadly, someone else got it. Then this week our realtor showed us some really nice townhomes. Now, we'd been pretty anti-townhome before seeing these, but thought "what the heck" so I went and looked at a few in this new subdivision and WOW!!! Granite countertops, oil-rubbed bronze fixtures, double the required soundproofing between houses!!!! I was pretty much sold as soon as I walked through them. We showed Brian the next day, took a night to think it over and made an offer yesterday morning which was accepted TODAY!!!!

Next week we're going through to do our inspection and I'll take pictures then to post. We're really so excited- finally homeowners!!!! The only thing that sucks is interest rates went back up while we were looking, but we can lock in the rate any time before we finalize everything at the end of this month, so hopefully they'll come down in the next couple of weeks.

Anyway, I just wanted to share the good news! I can't wait to have some pictures to post- YAY!!!!!!!!!

Finally Fall!!!

Fall is my favorite season- I LOOOOOOOVE going up the mountain when the leaves change colors and driving and hiking around. The leaves are just starting to change here, but we decided to take a trip up the mountain to see them anyway. Next week we're having some family photos taken up there, and it should be even more beautiful then!

We usually drive up to the big "C" on Cedar Mountain because there are alot of bushes that turn bright red and orange- I'm not sure what they are, but they're so pretty. Plus its fun to go to the lookout over Cedar City. We tried to take a family picture with the camera on the car, but it didn't really turn out too great :) Oh well....

In this one you can kind of see the leaves changing on the mountain- there's still alot of green, but orange, yellow, and a little bit of red is starting to show up.


After the "C" we drove up to Cedar Breaks. There are alot of Aspens up there (my favorite trees!) so we wanted to see how they're doing with the color change. Still alot of green there too, but there are a couple of areas where all the trees are completely gold! So beautiful! While we were driving around we found a pretty little creek so we got out to take some pictures and let Sadie play for a little bit. I tried to keep her out of the water for as long as possible, because the water was FREEZING, but she eventually got in it anyway. Of course, we have a ton of pictures of her throwing rocks in the water, but since I've had a few posts with water-rock-throwing pictures, I thought I'd exclude most of them from this one ;)

This first picture reminds me of Sasquatch emerging from the woods, LOL :) Its not a great photo, it just made me laugh

This one would have been soooooo cute if we could have gotten her to take her eyes off the water ...

The one we took away from the creek turned out a little better :)

In this one she's standing on a rock that's in the creek. She kept picking up smaller rocks out of the water and throwing them back in, which is why I'm holding onto her arm- I didn't want throwing herself in the creek too! I think this picture turned out really cool though- it looks like we've got some kind of ethereal glow!


On the other side of the road the creek was a little more shallow and she actually made it into the water on that side- it was inevitable! So we just let her play for a while, then headed home.

Weekend with Grandma, part II

To finish off Brian's mom's visit, we took a little walk up the Canyon Park trail (its a beautiful walk, for those of you who haven't done it, I highly recommend it!) and then a little family photo shoot at the park. Some of them turned out pretty cute I think :)
Sadie and Grandma!


Three generations of McNeel's


And one with just the girls. We didn't manage to get one with all of us in it, which would have been nice, but I still think these turned out pretty cute :)

Weekend with Grandma!

Brian's mom came down from Salt Lake this weekend to spend some time with us- well, probably more to spend some time with Sadie :) We had alot of fun, and Saturday afternoon we decided to take her up the mountain to Navajo Lake- which I guess is our favorite mountain hangout since we always end up there. So we relaxed out in nature while Sadie (as usual) played in the lake.


Sadie of course went straight for the water and started throwing rocks, which is a pretty standard activity for her.


This time, she also got a kick out of playing with my shoe when it floated off my foot.



So we made a little boat with it for her giraffe :)


And after a while, we decided she needed to lose the pants- I don't know why I don't carry her swimsuit on me all the time. She always ends up soaked!

I title this photo "Happy Mom- Carefree Baby"


And last, but certainly not least, Brian and Sadie showing his mom which lures are sure-fire winners! Like father, like daughter :)


So Brian's mom got to see some of our beautiful nature, and we got to have a fun and relaxing day at one of our favorite spots!

Maiden Voyage!

Brian recently bought a raft-type boat to replace his poor old Seahawk that gave out on him earlier this summer. He was so sad when it finally died, but now that he has a new boat he has been sooooooooo excited to get Sadie and I out on it, especially since we never actually joined him on any of his Seahawk fishing excursions. Not that I don't like getting out on the lake, but his Seahawk didn't have any seats-we would have been stuck in the wet bottom of his little boat, and that never really appealed to me. But his new boat has some nice seats, more space, and I figured we'd be alot more comfortable and have alot more fun in this one. :) So here are some pictures of our little boating trip up at Navajo Lake.

While Brian set everything up, Sadie played in the water




And finally, on the boat!


Sadie's favorite part was splashing in the water, of course! :)



Putting along....


And finally, back on shore and in some dry clothes!



All in all, a really fun day! Oh, and just a little side note. Brian just got his wisdom teeth out the day before- I couldn't believe he actually wanted to go boating! But he did, and we had alot of fun!

Keith Shumway

We found out last night that a friend of ours, Keith Shumway, died in the Moab plane crash on Friday. I've known him for several years, and one of the first things I noticed about him was how happy and positive he always was. He could always brighten up a room with his big smile and joking nature. We'll really miss him.

My main reason for posting this was, first, to say something about such a wonderful person to those who didn't know him. But I also wanted to let people know that he has a wife, Lisa, and three-month old son, Landon. A memorial fund has been set up in his name for them at Wells Fargo and Mountain American Credit Union. We will be donating, and ask anyone else who can help to donate as well, even if its just a small amount. His family faces a tough time ahead, and they shouldn't have to worry about something like money right now. Ask for the Keith Shumway memorial or you can also call (800) 869-3557 for Wells Fargo.

Our prayers are with Keith's family, and with all those who lost loved ones in this tragedy.

Water Baby- Part II

Further proof that we can't keep her out of the water- it rained a bunch today and after it stopped we went outside to get out of the house for a bit and of course, Sadie heads straight for the puddles! She was having so much fun splashing around, I had to take her shoes off and get the camera! :)

Checking out the array of puddle fun our parking lot provides...



Splashing through the puddles was a big hit :)





Also popular was picking up little leaves and rocks (really, whatever she could find) and throwing them into the water



John and Lindsay Cumming came home while we were outside (they're our neighbors) and we chatted for a bit while Sadie continued to entertain herself with the water :) Then John, the angel that he is, started telling Sadie to sit down >:| ......

and finally, after they went inside, she did :-O


We went inside shortly after that ;)