The Couple

This is my best friend. Jed, I constantly think about how wonderful it is to be your wife--to be the one who gets to spend the most time with you and gets to hear all your thoughts, your jokes, your epiphanies, your awesome ideas, your perfect reading voice bringing Harry Potter and Joby to life, your "I love you's" and "Can I hold you?'s." I love being the one who gets to do exciting new things with you and our children, and the one who gets to love you on the days when one of us is just off. I love it that you're the one I get to spend every evening with, and that we never seem to have enough time to do all the things we enjoy doing together!

I just love you. (Isn't that the way I snuck it in the very first time? ;) ... I think you knew what I meant then, and I'm sure you know now!)

Finding things we both like to do and making time to do them together has been so much fun! It really has made a difference in our relationship: We really look forward to spending time together, and we know how important it is to make that quality time. One of the things we brainstormed about doing together was puzzles (we were a bit limited since at the time, Jed's right hand was pretty much out of commission), and although we didn't have any, lots of friends lent us fun (and challenging!) puzzles to do! It got Taggert interested, too: He's enjoyed playing with Gabi's 100 piece Shrek puzzle ever since!

Yeah, great relationships take great effort. But nothing is more worth it.

The Iron Man

So, Jedediah broke his hand on July 9th. We went straight to the emergency room, and after an amazingly cheerful 3-hour-long wait in the waiting room, he began the healing process. They took him to the hospital that night, where he slept (with the help of a morphine drip) and went into surgery the next day. Tagg & I went to the hospital that afternoon before his surgery and got to see him before he went in, which was so comforting! After the surgery (which went very well and included putting pins and wires around his broken bones), Jed only stayed in the hospital for a few hours but was sharing a room, and his tiny section of the room was not conducive to a 1-year-old enjoying himself at the same time as the other patient enjoyed himself... so we spent the whole day wandering around the hospital. Tagg was really good that whole time, and we made some fun memories! We went outside into a courtyard to eat and Tagg was delighted to see a ton of pigeons all over the place. He began to chase them, but his glee turned into what the heck?!-ness when he actually got his hands on one... it didn't hurt him at all, I guess he just didn't expect to actually make contact and didn't know what to do when he did! We were exploring another courtyard when Tagg spontaneously transformed into a great giant (see top-right picture) ... actually that optical illusion was completely unintentional (but nevertheless celebrated :) By this time, Jed has just had his second surgery, in which they removed all the metal from his hand (sadly, I now have no justification for calling him Iron Man ;) and therefore removed the pain. That hardware was so uncomfortable that we are both quite relieved to have that behind him! He has great range of motion and the doctor is really happy with how his healing is progressing!

The Soccer Team

On July 4th, Jed brought Taggert and I along to a soccer game! We had a great time! We drove about twenty minutes west so he could play with Elders Sweeney and Tallman, missionaries who used to serve in our ward. It was a pretty hot morning, but there was a playground right next to the field that had a great water feature, which just about every single one of us took advantage of! I brought Taggert's throne of a carseat out and we shared it as a chair while we were watching the game (see top-right picture of Taggert). Tagg (who finds it just a bit hard to stay on the sidelines during the game now) even got a little ball action with Elder Sweeney after the game!

Here are the star player's highlights... the picture that's second from the right on the top row is our favorite!

This is a collage I made for Osvaldo, Jed's soccer friend that came along.

...and one for Elder Sweeney.

Speaking of missionaries, we have really had some great ones in our area. Jed's calling as a ward missionary has really been a good chance for us to get to know the missionaries better, and I would like to record the fact that the Elders (yeah, all of them :) come over all the time just to learn things from my wonderful Jed. They listen to him expound the scriptures for hours! And, on the side, they think Tagg is cool and want pictures with him before they get transferred. :) I've really chosen/created some stinkin great men!

Mommy & Brigham

The Brigham has always been such a good friend to all of us! He can always be counted to be a cuddy guy to chill out with...

Or, slightly less often, an energetic pal to roll around with!
Speaking of rolling around, I love love wrestling around with the Taggert! ...Maybe I like it because the only kind of wrestling I'm good at is the very gentle kind :)
Grandma and Grandpa Klaiss sent Tagg a balloon art kit, and my attempts produced many many popped balloons ("pop-ba-doon" in Tagg speak) and this "flower." After all those popbadoons I was a little bummed that the flower didn't look at all like the picture in the instructional book, but my spirits sure lifted when Tagg came into the room and, upon being presented with my creation, exclaimed, "FWOWIE!" (aka "flower" :)


Tagg is so sweet--he likes playing the parent and taking care of me the way I take care of him :)


Sometimes Tagg plays with my hair, which I love of course!

I've never seen what it's like on his end before, though, cuz you can't really look at someone's face while they're playing with your hair... I guess I always figured he had some sweet "I adore my Mommy" look in his eyes, but turns out he's got more of a "This hair is ticklish and knotty!" look :)

Jed Rocks!

Can I just say hallelujah for men who understand and soothe pms-y wives?!

Enough said :)