Parks For Days

 When the sun comes out, we head to the park and we especially love going to the park with our awesome cousin!!! Maklyn wouldn't have it any other way!

 Maklyn and Jeter... how cute can they get!! Yes, they bang heads when fighting over toys or trying to get under each others skin, but man are they cute when they're playing or wrestling or chatting.  I cannot wait to watch these two grow up together and with Quincey and Brigs coming quickly behind, we're going to have quite the lil crew to keep us entertained!

 Every night and every nap, Mak says she's gonna dream about Jeter and going to the park or swimming with Jeter.  I'm so glad the Tolman's have lived close to us so that our kids could build a budding cousin relationship that will last forever.

 Oh and Maddox... I think he's been Mak's favorite since the beginning. There's something about him that she just loves and he can always make her laugh!  He's such a great big cousin and I'm so grateful for his willingness to hang out with his little cousin!

 We biked through Indian Battle park this past Tuesday and it was a beautiful day!  I had never biked down there before, but I ran in the moonlight run this past weekend and we ran down there and I thought it looked like a really neat place to take the fam.

 We threw rocks in the river and even found a park for the kidlets.  Brigs still isn't too sure about the whole park thing and he's definitely not a fan of the slide yet, but this summer we'll get him loving it :)

I can't believe how fast these kids are growing. Mak is just over 2 years old and Brigs will be 11 months in just under 2 weeks.  Mak loves hugging and sometimes likes to play a lil too rough with her lil brother, but he's a tough lil man and loves the attention she gives him!  Brigs is 23.6 lbs and I think he's gonna catch Mak soon. She's 28 lbs and seems to just be lengthening, but who knows. I am so in love with these two lil munchkins and can't wait for the warmer weather to keep coming!!  Spring is great and summer is even better!!!

California Christmas

 Mak's first hair trim was a hit. We turned on a lil Paw Patrol and she just sat nicely and let me do my thing.

 Don't mind my face in the back haha but Maklyn has mastered the attitude look and we find it hilarious. Probably won't be as funny as she continues to grow up and uses it on us in a more serious manner rather than joking around. :)  She sure has some spunk.

 This Christmas Eve Maklyn had her first try at dipping chocolates and she wasn't sure at first, but by the end she was dipping her hand in and licking it off and loving it!!!  I love that she's been able to have this memory with her Grandma just like we did with our mom and grandma.  It's one of our favorite traditions... even though I usually perch myself on the freezer and support by eating Christmas oranges and singing along with the music playing :)

 We had Christmas Eve and morning at the Hill house and boy did we have fun... especially watching the littles playing together.  They made gingerbread houses and danced with Nana.  We went and looked at Christmas lights all in one van... that's right 15 individuals in a 7 passenger van... and we rocked it :)

 Maklyn was a lot more fun this Christmas as she understood more that she had gifts and could open them and keep them haha  I think the horse took the prize though. She was SOOOO excited when she saw what was under the wrapping paper!

 We headed to California on the 26th of December and boy did we love the weather change!!!  First things first... the Hollywood sign.  It was actually quite a hike up, but we enjoyed the weather and scenery.

 Our place was literally a block from the beach and it was sooooo fun to be able to walk down each day.  Sadly Brigs caught the flu the second day we got there and he was pretty much sick the whole week, but he sucked it up and came to the beach with us :)  Mak loved playing in the sand, but wasn't so sure of the cold water.  The weather wasn't fantastic for California weather. They said it was the coldest week they'd had yet, but still was nice for us.

 We also got to celebrate this cutie's 2nd birthday.  She brings so much happiness to our family.  Her laugh is contagious. She is creative, smart, protective, loving and so full of energy.  She keeps us on our toes and makes us smile daily. 

 Oh the zoo.... it was a rainy and dreary day but we loved seeing the animals.  Mak was exhausted by the end of the day, but she could watch animals all day every day. Brigs was fascinated by the colors and sounds, but he mostly just chilled in the stroller.

 We did a little San Diego temple stop and it was soooo worth it. It is a beautiful temple and one of my favorites!  We finally got a picture with all the adults as all the kiddos were sleeping in the cars.

 These lil beach babes had so much fun. When I see these pics, I think... why the heck do we live in southern Alberta. Don't get me wrong, I love the mountains and people, but how do you compare to sun and beach every day!?!?!

All in all... it was a fabulous Christmas and vacation! Next time, we'll stay longer and have healthy kiddos when we go! :)

Year Catch Up

First some random pictures... Here's mak with her bazillion 'buddies' she has to sleep with lol

Christmas Tree shopping ;)

 Halloween 2014

 Mak 'helping' with renos in the basement

 Ward Christmas party fun with Renne :)

Welp it's, again, been a while. I was reminded what a great idea this blog is and has been as it's a great way of keeping a journal and documenting our awesome life, so I'm at it again.  This last year has been a busy one.  We had another baby to start things off. Brigs DeWayne Sheen was born on August 22, 2014 and he quickly became our Brigsy Boy and has blessed our life so much these past 8 months!

 

When he was born, I was expecting another Sheen look alike as Maklyn just was so dominate Sheen, but Brigs definitely was not. He came out looking like his mama.  He has been a very different baby then Maklyn.  He had silent acid reflex and needed a lot of attention... like I couldn't put him down... ever haha  We 'brilliantly' decided to have him right before Dustin's big summer work with Vivint and this summer we were heading to Grande Prairie first.  Lucky he came a little early cuz he wasn't due till April 27th. 

Anyway, I have too much to catch up on... so in short, the summer was crazy. We moved like 10 times... moving from grande prairie to fort mac, home then back to grande prairie then back home.  Gong show! haha But we made it through and it turned out to be a pretty good summer. We got to live at home with all of Lyndsey's family for a few weeks and it was sooo fun!  When Dust finished the summer we moved in with the parents as we were looking for a house to buy!!!

And we found one and we love it!!! Our first home!! We shopped around quite a bit but the big selling feature for us was the bonus room above the garage.  Perfect playroom for the littles!!  We've been renovating the basement because we're going to suite it out which will be nice, but boy is renovating a lot of work!  It's starting to really feel like home as we're finally getting some pictures up and stuff, but still has a lot of work to do.

Lastly and mostly for my dad's request I will tell you my first off buck story.  Dustin has been wanting to get me to go out hunting with him for a while, but it just hadn't worked out, so we knew we were heading out to Cardston for his alumni tourney and it was the last weekend of deer season, so we decided to take advantage and it was a stinking cold and windy day... like -30 people! Oh and we had both kids in the back seat... :)  Long story short... after hiking up a hill and only finding lady deer, while army crawling in lululemon pants and a pink jacket... I was feeling very down and done with being in the cold.

We drove around a bit more and saw nothing!!! Finally on our way back... Dust all of a sudden spotted something in the foggy distance... a buck and it looked to be pretty good size.  He was over a couple hills but seemed to be heading straight for us, so dust drove up one of the hills and had me run up the second up and see if I could get a shot.  Back out in the cold I went... I started sneaking up once I got close to the top and I was expecting the buck to be to my left. I looked and looked and couldn't see a thing.. then i turned to the right.... he was standing this broad side staring right at me about 30 yards away.  He took a couple lil hops and then just jogged a few steps and started walking.  I ran back to the truck told Dust he was huge and which way he'd went. Dust decided to try to get ahead of him and see if I could get a shot.

We drove over a lil hill and saw him just strolling on the fence line.  I jumped out and ran 20 yards and got on the ground and took my shot.  One shot and he dropped!  It was so exhilarating!  Dustin started whooping in the truck and I started whooping outside and it was such a cool lil family moment.  I felt on top of the world and I could tell my hubby was so dang proud of me lol  Fun times with the Sheen clan :)

New Move: Grande Prairie

At the end of May it was time for us to move again to our new selling place: Grande Prairie.  Mak was pretty stinkin cute snuggling with her lil giraffe on our trip there!

I got to be reunited with my Aunt Sheila who I haven't seen in a long time!  There was only one ward in GP and surprisingly lots of people from southern AB that we got to know.

We hooked up our Cruiser stroller to our bike and absolutely loved it.  Mak enjoys the ride quite a bit too, so we've spent a lot of time on the bikes this summer!  It's fun having Carson around too to hang out with every now and then.  Mak loves her uncle Cars!

Throughout the summer, the wives have had numerous competition with other office wives and we did really well with all the competition. We won a dinner in GP and had a blast relaxing and just chillin and chatting as wives.  We were party animals and didn't get home till 1:30 a.m.  Our husbands were probably wondering what the heck happened to us, but most of them were sound asleep when we got there haha

Also lil Mak sat up on her own for the first time in Grande Prairie!  She's growing up so quickly and each stage gets funner and funner.

First Half

So a few weeks after I had baby Maklyn, my motivated and 'inspired' older sis called me up with an idea.  She wanted me to commit to running a half marathon in Canmore with her.  She had just had a baby 3 months earlier than me.  I was super nervous, but have always wanted to do one and who better to do one with than my own sista.  So I committed.

The next day, I thought 'oh crap, what have I done'.  Lynz was inspiring.  She was sticking to her running schedule and kickin butt.  I was a lil slower to jump on the training wagon, but was determined that somehow I was going to make it through the race!

Mak and I flew home from Fort McMurray and met mom and Lynz in Calgary where we met up with Lacey Poy and the running girls headed to Canmore to settle for the night before our race.  I felt very unprepared, but knew I'd have my bestie beside me pushing me and that's exactly what she did.

We ran awesome!  We ran our first 7 miles straight with no walking and took only a few walking breaks but pushed each other and both felt so good about what we had just accomplished!  Mom and Mak were waiting at the end to cheer us on!  Oh and did I mention that we found out after the race that it was the hardest half in all of Alberta (i think it was AB) and it was soooooo hilly!!!  We just had to focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

It was such a great accomplishment and I was so glad to have my 3 month preggo sis right beside me.  That's right.. she's amazing!! Lacey also kicked butt and left us in the dust.  She's a killer runner!  I said after that I didn't feel like I ever needed to run one again, but now that it's been a few months haha I feel like I do want to do another one sometime in the near future!  We'll see what happens :)

 

We got to go home after and spend some time with the fam.  Lots of snuggles with Mak, went to visit Granny and Grandpa Hill's graves on Mother's Day and go to go visit Grandpa and Grandma Sheen too :)  We love visits with family!!!