Williams First Time With a Spoon

William started eating rice cereal for the first time and apparently it's hilarious.  Kayla was really excited to finally feed him solid foods because that might mean that he will sleep a little more soundly at night.  So when she got the chance to start dishin' up the rice cereal she was on that like white on rice (get it).  However, what we didn't realize is how funny rice cereal can be.  Please enjoy this awkwardly taken video of William eating rice cereal (apparently Daddy doesn't know how to use his camera phone and wants people to strain a neck muscle while watching videos of his son).  Ok so maybe I am one of those annoying parents who posts a video every single time their child does something mildly entertaining or funny. Enjoy.

Grandpa Inspired Laugh

So my Dad does this monkey thing with babies where he acts like a monkey and makes noises like a monkey. For the longest time I didn't really believe that babies liked this (I even thought that it was probably even a little frightening). However I was proven wrong when I tried it with my own son (must be genetic). Here is a video of William laughing at his Daddy. Disclaimer: I had already been doing this for a while before the video so he doesn't laugh as much as he was earlier( I swear okay. I'm not one of those parents that posts every little thing their child does). I like his courtesy laugh at the end, like "yeah Dad, we're done".

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Mobile Blogging

I'm just trying out the new blogger app on my Droid Motorola phone. I love this phone. I have so many cool apps that make my life easier (g-mail, rss reader, runkeeper, google maps, tetris) and much more. I can even post pictures I take on my phone. Cool.

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Our Humble Abode

For those who don't know Kayla and I moved into Kayla's grandpa's house (we call him Paude, don't ask me why).  It has been a huge blessing for us.  However Kayla in her nesting mode has found some things to improve upon.  One is the extra bedroom that was painted a horrific pinkish/brown/vomit color.  So we decided to paint it a cute little baby blue for our baby boy (I think we decided on William as a name, but don't tell Kayla I said so).  She has also fallen in love with some of the elements of the house (insert sarcastic voice). 

The Baby's Room

Kayla's Throne

Kayla loves the chandeliers

and the gold-trimmed mirror

Really we love it and enjoy having a place to live where we don't have to pay rent.  Also, Paude has reverse mortgaged the house so he doesn't mind too much what we change or experiment with.  We have already learned a lot about home improvement and hope to learn a whole lot more.  Here is what some of the rest of the house looks like.

The Living Room

The Kitchen

The small eating area (Kayla loves the wallpaper)

The desk where I am sitting right now typing this

A Little Bit of Catching Up

As stated before Kayla and I are now living in Arizona and I thought I'd do a little bit of catching up on past events. 

May: My grandpa, John Taylor, died of cancer.  His funeral was held in Florence, Oregon on May 7th.  My grandpa was a very quiet man who worked very hard his entire life.  We never talked much but I always knew that he loved me.  Here are some pictures of the trip.

My Grandma

Kayla: She was a little cold.

A couple of cool pictures I took.

June: Pretty uneventful, although I did get a job (A New Baby, A New Job, A New Car). 

Good Things to Come

I absolutely love this video and I love Elder Holland even more.  If you need a quick pick me up watch this video.  I'm so grateful to be have a loving and devoted wife and with a little one on the way I feel the weight of being a father starting to bear down on me.  I feel so blessed to have the things that I have in my life and I know everything will work out for me and my little family.

A New Baby, A New Job, A New Car!

So about writing in my blog more often, it didn’t really work out the way I planned it. Anywho, Kayla and I have been getting along just fine and dandy. We are expecting in October and we are very excited for the baby. Right now she has started nesting (early) and all of the small branches and twigs she brings into the house drive me crazy (just kidding). She has started cleaning everything (which is really nice) and buying things for the baby. She nags me about a lot of things-painting the baby’s room, setting up the crib, etc. (which I don’t mind all that much). We are well on our way to parenthoodom (just made that up).


I also got a job! Woo Woo! When Kayla and I got down here I started searching frantically for a job (teaching, temporary, long term, whatever) and it was very discouraging at first. I had a couple of interviews lined up but those weren’t too promising. One was with a charter school in Maricopa (a city out in the middle of nowhere) and another with Mesa School District. I was excited about the Mesa interview but they didn’t sound very optimistic about having openings come fall. The charter school was far from enticing. To start off it was too far away and I really didn’t want to move or commute and cut my generous teacher’s salary in half with traveling expenses. Second, they had a policy against teaching evolution. Being a biology major (and also having a blog about biology) I couldn’t bring myself to teach a subject and leave out the MOST important principle of the subject. That’s like trying to teach physics and leave out or skirt around Newtonian physics. Needless to say I was very hesitant to even consider that job. So as my job search continued I got the bright idea to recheck the area school districts’ websites (Gilbert, Chandler, Tempe, etc.) which I hadn’t done in about 3 months (duh). There were several job openings which I applied for immediately and then I waited…and waited…and waited…for about a month (it seemed like an eternity). Then I got a call from Power Ranch Elementary (Higley School District) and Tempe High School (Tempe Union High School District) so I went to a couple more interviews. I was extremely impressed by Tempe High School and the several programs they have set up in the science department (International Baccalaureate, H.O.P. E.) and was excited to hear back from them. A couple days after my interview I got another call from them for a second interview. I got all spiffied up and headed over for the second time. I was very nervous and I didn’t want to say anything stupid like “Interviewer: Thank you for coming out for a second interview. Me: Thanks. You too…for interviewing me.” After a very tense four hours they offered me the job. I’m really excited to be teaching at Tempe High School and to be a buffalo (I had to find a mascot that was equal to me in weight capacity).

As for the new car we didn’t really get a “new” car but Kayla’s grandma gave her a 96 Honda Civic. However it only had 34,000 miles. When we took the car to be inspected for emissions the quick witted oriental man helping us said “you no drive this car, this car sit in garage for long time”. Kayla and I feel so blessed and can’t believe we will be parents. So our life adventure continues to unfold. Hopefully we can continue to roll with the punches and come out on top or maybe just somewhere towards the upper middle section.