welcome to nephi

we went down to nephi yesterday...would you like a tour??

{town sign}

{just some friendly neighborhood buffalo. no big deal.}

{juab high school. home of the wasps.}

and there you have it! welcome to nephi. after that amazing tour...anybody want to come and visit???

was that mean???

we apologize for not posting the much anticipated place of employment until....now.

it has been a crazy day filled of driving to salt lake, signing of contracts, visiting the bank, getting happy/scared/nervous/excited/worried/sad. {i didn't realize all of these emotions were possible at the same time. but they are.}

we are headed to....

drum roll please...

NEPHI, UTAH.

ever heard of it???? it's a tiny little town, 4o miles south of provo. population 4,733 {as of the year 2000}. one cool fact for you: sister hinckley was born there. pretty awesome. danny is going to be a juab wasp. {kind of a tongue twister if you ask us!}

we are headed there tomorrow to get a feel for our new home. wish us luck.

the call came

i now know what it feels like to get that white envelope in the mail with a mission call inside. ours just came in a slightly different form, and it isn't quite a mission {however it feels very similar!}

danny got the call tonight as we were getting ready to attend our ward bbq. it came as a complete shock/surprise/you name it, we felt it.

would you like to guess where we will be moving??

hint: it is in the state of utah, and its a small town {population > 10,000}

we are super pumped. but also a little nervous, scared, etc...

danny starts teaching on MONDAY. craziness.

we are excited, though, for this big adventure. and are so very glad that the lord is in charge.

p.s. we'll reveal where we are headed tomorrow. thought you might enjoy a little suspense...

first family vacation

for spring break {and to celebrate both of our birthdays} we took off to vegas for a little r&r. it was fabulous. danny's grandpa was so kind to let us stay in one of his time shares, which was absolutely beauuutiful. we brought my little bro along for the ride {and to babysit max while we went to the temple} but i think it's safe to say that he didn't feel used at all.

we left tuesday, right after my class, and drove all the way to cedar before stopping. we pulled into a little gas station, feed max, changed him into his jammies, read him a story, said prayers, and tucked him into his carseat/crib. he slept right up until we got to the time share. what a little champ. the rest of the night was a little chaotic...but we survived and woke up to a beautiful, blue sky.

we got settled in, went grocery shopping, played at the pool, and then in the afternoon headed down to the strip. we rediscovered how much we hate vegas, but we did have a good time at the bellagio. the gardens are amazing and the flowers smelled sooooo good.

he couldn't have been prouder of his nemo swim bottoms.

he kicked the ENTIRE time while in the water. that boy has got crazy strong legs.

apparently, all of the swimming wore him right out. he took a MEGA nap after we swam, and after patiently waiting...we decided to go in and wake him up.

{the gardens}

the most amazing nutella banana crepe that i have ever had in my life.

waiting for the water show to start. love that.

thursday we started out by going to the ethel m chocolate factory. supposedly, it's a great tourist attraction...but let's just say we were glad they at least gave us a free piece of chocolate. the cactus gardens outside were cool though. after that we went hiking in red rock canyon. it was the perfect temperature, and max was loving the pack. we lathered him up in sunscreen and had a great hike. that afternoon, we swam, then headed out to walk around the temple grounds and hit up the outlet mall. we also ate at this delicious restaurant, bj's. it was great.

such cute little stubby arms max has!

the vegas temple is beautiful!

friday morning we packed up our stuff, said good-bye to vegas, and headed to st. george. we checked into our hotel, then went to orange peel for smoothies, and snow canyon for some more hiking. we discovered this humongous cave that danny and bri thought was pretty awesome. that night, we put max to bed and left bri to listen for him while we did a session in the st. george temple. we had a wonderful time. that temple is absolutely breath taking. i love it.

and saturday {on danny's birthday} we headed home. before we left, we stopped to see my cousin curt, and his cute family. he is a seminary teacher down there and we would love to follow in their steps! on our way out, we stopped at kolob canyon and did one more great hike. we got to cross tons of little streams...we were feeling pretty adventurous. we even saw some wild turkeys.

though it was a great trip, we were so glad to pull into our driveway friday night!

claymation

my little brother is one talented guy. he has made hundreds of claymation videos...and they are GOOD! he has recently entered a video contest at his bank and needs your vote!

go here to give it five stars.

i have a feeling, one day he is going to help the guys who made wallice and gromit.

p.s. the video is called "the grass is always greener"

thank you!

news

so we have known about this so-called "day in april" for about two years now, wondering what that day would bring us. it was the day that my seminary trainers would call with either good news or bad news. they called. they didn't have news. they wanted to meet with us. isn't that a bad sign? they would probably show up with tissues for us! so we met them by the football stadium... odd, yeah we already know. you gotta know that my two trainers are the two greatest people EVER and whatever the news was we would still admire them and be grateful for their help. we were hoping for a yes but were confident that God is in charge and would take care of things, even if the answer was no.

long story short: they hugged us both, we cried, and then walked home.

clarification: they hugged us in celebration, we cried b/c we were SO happy, and we walked home in total gratitude floating on air. they said YES!

thank you all for the support and love and prayers. we don't know where we will be teaching in the fall, we will keep you posted.

we cannot express our gratitude and love for our Father in heaven and His wonderful plan. He is indeed in charge.

swings

when i was in high school my sister fini and i loved the song swing swing by the all-american rejects. but we never really knew all of the words so we would sing something like "swing swing swing from the tabletops, my heart..." we were sooo cool in high school!! ha ha.

anyways, speaking of swings, we went to the park the other day just hoping that there would be a baby seat on one of the swings... booyah! he seriously swung from the tabletops for more than 10 minutes! i did a few underdogs until jessie had a heart attack and made me stop, but he loves loves loves the underdog!

HE IS AWESOME!!!

month six

as mentioned below, max had his six month check up on my birthday. it went well {besides the fact that he had to get three shots...} but the doctor was a little disappointed with his weight. this is how he measured up:

weight: 2.71 percentile {yes, there is a period between the two and the seven}

length: 35.17 percentile

head circumference: 55.19 percentile

what i want to know is...who are the babies that they base this percentile scale around??? max seems like a decent sized baby but according to the charts, he is a little shrimp! i want to see a baby in the ninetieth percentile for weight!

the doc told me to up his feedings to twice a day instead of just once. last week we gave him mango's for the first time and let's just say he LOVED them. every single bite. after each spoonful he would follow it with "mmmmmmmm" in that cute little voice of his. i love him!

we had a little bit of a scare last week {the day after his shots} when he woke up with a fever of 103. conference weekend he just wasn't acting himself, but we just assumed it was the shots. on sunday night, when he woke up hotter than i have EVER felt {104} we decided it was time to go to the doctor. so early monday morning we took him in and found out that he had an ear infection. so sad. but luckily, they just got him on amoxicillin and he was back to his normal self within a matter of days. having a sick baby is no fun!

lately he has been fascinated with:

strings/ribbons/anything that dangles

textured surfaces

{he does the funniest little thing each time he feels something new. i'll get a video of it tomorrow and post it soon!}

cups

books

{basically he just tries to eat or attack them}

his two bottom teeth are getting bigger every day and i am almost positive that he has more coming in. he has been gnawing on just about everything in sight.

{sneek peek of our little vacay to vegas}

we love our little bubba. he is such a happy baby! every night when we lay him in his crib we say goodnight to the animals that are hanging in his mobile. he gets the bigggggest smile on his face and it is pretty much the cutest thing ever.

and is this picture not incredible?

{photo taken by dayna at our weekly mommy's lunch}

have you ever seen such cute little babes?? i love them all.

good day

today was a good day.

i finished up the last of my winter semester classes!! wooooohoooo. i seriously couldn't be happier. this semester was tough. now, only five classes left until graduation.

in my business class we made our goal of $1500...just barely! thanks to all of you who helped me out. {if you haven't received your first aid kit in the mail, it is coming!}

and glee started. i love that show.

p.s. we find out on FRIDAY what is happening with the rest of our lives. scary??? yes. but we are excited. please keep us in your prayers!

one year older

april is a favored month in the mckinley residence. two out of the three of us have birthday's in the month of april. on the second, it was my turn to have my special day. and thanks to my amazing husband, and loving family + friends, it was just that.

basically the entire week of my birthday was a party. on wednesday and thursday, max and i visited danny at work. oh my goodness!! those high school girls were ready to eat max up. even the boys loved him. we forgot to take clothes for him to change into, so he was in his footie pj's showing off to danny's classes. they loved it...and basically every girl in seminary wanted to hold him. it was so much fun to meet his students; they really are great kids. we sang a duet together in each of his classes and the spirit was always so strong. perfect activity to get us pumped for conference.

we've also been eating out {for FREE} the past few days thanks to e.birthday coupons. i love food...and it is ten times better when it is free! yoasis, red mango, noodles & co, fuddruckers, red robin, cold stone, baskin robbins, rubio's are some of the places that we've cashed in our coupons. i'm probably going to regret it when i step on the scale, but it was so nice to be able to go out and not have to worry about cooking when finals are coming up!

on my actual birthday, i woke up to find balloons and a little gift outside on the porch from my family. they are the sweetest. at ten, max and i walked to his six month doctor's appt. {stats to come soon...} he did great, until he got his shots. it seriously breaks my heart to see him scrrrrream like that, but it's for his own good {just like they talked about in conference!} danny picked us up and when i got home i found he had made the bed and placed birthday cards from his students all over. they were the sweetest cards, and so much fun to read. i love his students!

then...he sent me to the SPA. it was amazing. in one of my classes at byu, women from around the valley who have started successful businesses come speak to us. one lady started up a spa, primrose retreat. she gave us a fifty percent off coupon and i kept it up on the fridge hoping that one day i would find the time to use it. i haven't yet...and probably never would have had it not been for my husband! he scheduled the appt all by himself and told me not to worry about a thing. after a bath soak {greatest thing ever!}, massage, facial, and pedicure i was feeling like a queen.

when i got home, {more relaxed than i have been in a looooong time} we headed to my parents for a little birthday party. bekah {my sweet sister-in-law} was in town for her brother's wedding, so we got to catch up with her, which is always nice. we had yummy treats, and my mom made me the cutest abc scrapbook. i love it.

that night, we went to danny's mission reunion, where i got to meet his mission president who had traveled all the way from argentina! he is such a sweet, humble man so that was really neat.

it was a wonderful day, and to top it all off, the day after my birthday was conference...which of course was fantastic! thank you for all of the birthday wishes, and cards. i loved them all.