Gallavanting in Idaho Falls

So first off I wanted to say thanks for everyone's input about law schools. Right now Cody is trying to get on a Veteran's program that will help pay for school so that would open up some more expensive options. For all you University of Utah fans I have sad news. They decided not to take us so their loss. Jerks. Anyway- we had a great time with the family this weekend. Spending time with Regan and Pete was great and I also loved seeing Chilly and Dad. Cody's Dad had a retirement party on Wed and it was fun to be a part of him becoming a senior judge. Gage is doing great. Yesterday he weighted in at 13 pounds and 23 inches. Still a bit big for his age but really- have you seen his dad :) ! We are heading to San Francisco this next weekend to stay with Steve and Leah and also to see how life in SF would be. Actually I'm doing this when I should be working so I'll post some Gage and Noelle pictures later tonight. See ya!

8 weeks old!!!

Happy 8 weeks old! Gage is growing so fast and is starting to show a lot of expression in his face. We got some priceless pictures today and a video of one of his biggest burp yet. Mom bought this brown and white striped onesie and I believe it is the cutest thing that has every graced his wardrobe. Cody and I also sat down and made a huge list that broke down all of the law schools that we are considering. There is one in Dayton Ohio that starts in May and they need to know tomorrow if we are going. We decided to take it out of the run just because I'm not that excited about Cody taking off soon to start and I would have to stay behind with Gage to close things up at work for a couple of months. I know Cody would love to get going on his law education but I'm just not ready for our hang out time to end. Our list today was packed with pro's and con's of each law school and the break down was as follows:

University of Denver
Tuition: $35,500 a year
Scholarship: $17,000 a year
Living Expenses: 17,400 a year
Total 3 year cost: $107,700
Info: best ranked, cheap housing, horses can come, great area, only 16 hrs from LA and 9 hrs from Montpelier.
Golden Gate University
Tuition: $38,100 a year
Scholarship: $30,000 a year
Living Expenses: $24,000
Total 3 year cost: $96,000
Info: Close to Leah and Steve, beautiful city, expensive apartments (so no home), cost of living high, 6 hrs from LA and 14 hrs from Montpelier, horses can't come, great honors program
University of Idaho
Tuition: $11,800 a year
Scholarship: $4,000 a year
Living Expenses: $10,742
Total 3 year cost: $55,700
Info: Beautiful area, cheap housing, no family nearby :( , fast track program that graduates 6 months earlier, 20 hrs from LA and 14 hrs from Montpelier
University of Dayton
Tuition: $32,400 a year
Scholarship: $5,000 a year
Living Expenses: $15,000 a year
Total 2 year cost: $86,000
Info: 2 year program, very friendly staff and professors, totally new area w/ new adventures, starts in May 2010, needs to know by March 15th... tomorrow, 1 day and 11 hrs from LA and 1 day and 2 hrs from Montpelier.

So you can see that we have some cheap options and some pretty expensive options also. University of Denver is the best ranked school of the whole list but is also the most expensive while Dayton is only 2 years instead of 3 but it starts in May which is frankly just a little too soon. Today I think we decided that Dayton probably isn't going to happen which leaves us with Denver, Moscow Idaho or San Francisco. That isn't even counting Pepperdine, UC Davis or U of U because we haven't heard from them yet. We were a little off about San Francisco thinking that it was a full ride but we had been looking at tuition projections that were 2 years old. Still just $8,000 a year isn't bad! It sure is hard making a decision like this cause the prudent Mormon's in us would just go for the cheaper option of U of I. Think about it- that's $30,000 we could put towards a house payment rather than sinking into law school. But then again we would really like to try living in another state just for the adventure of it all. So yeah- we have a lot of very hard decisions coming up. Anyway- if anyone has any suggestions please feel free to call me and tell me.

Month and a Half!

So here are some much needed pictures to show how much Gage has grown. He went to the doctors this morning and weighted in at 11.5- I know. Huge. And he is filling his clothes so well. I look back at the first couple of outfits we had him in and they seem so tiny! We took him to the doctor cause he was so congested that he couldn't breath and would just spit out his milk when he tried to eat. Poor little baby. You just can't watch a baby hurting and not feel like it's ripping your heart out. But we got a spray and cleared his nose out and he's much happier now. His blessing was on Sunday and I'm ashamed to say that I forgot to take any pictures of him in his outfit because he peed all over it the moment the blessing was said so I got him changed right when we got home. Cody did a great job letting the spirit tell him what to say. And miracles of miracles he didn't scream the whole time. In fact he didn't even squeak the whole time. So that means that I lost the bet I had with Cody. Oh well. Anyway, my favorite part about the whole blessing was Cody telling Gage that I am the greatest blessing in his life. I thought that was pretty cool. In other news Cody got a huge scollarship from Golden Gate in San Francisco so we are heading there April 8-11 and staying with Leah and Steve. Pray that Gage makes the trip well! Still no news from U of U or any of the other Cali schools so I'll update when the time comes. The pictures above of Gage with the TV show his early fascination with lights and sounds. I can barley get him to realize when I'm right in front of his face but I guess I can't compete with a box that has lots of lights and sounds. I think we have a future TV lover. I even tried turning the TV off to make sure that he was watching it and every time I did he would turn his head away and not pay attention anymore. Such a funny little guy!