You know the routine...

36 Weeks

2012-02-13T12:16:00.000-08:00

36 Weeks people. Whew. That's a lot of baby in there! Now that I know she has such long legs I try to not get so mad when she pokes her knee 5 inches out of my belly, ouch!

In other news. Sydney's lip is all better.

Before

After

I could not get a real good view. But you really can't tell it was even split open anymore.

Baby Shower

2012-02-09T20:32:00.000-08:00

My friend and I threw a baby shower last night for our cute friend Jenny who is having her first baby. It was fun. It was fun to decorate, it was fun to have people over, it was fun to only eat veggies at the party. Oh. Wait. That part was not fun. Don't worry I put some cream puffs and cake balls in the freezer. 36 weeks tomorrow!

All of the cute clothes she got:)

The game

The food

The decor. I love pinterest. All of my ideas game from there. See the "shower" hahaha

I had everyone write advice on a diaper

Went to the Dr. today and had a big ultrasound. 36 weeks tomorrow. The baby is measuring a little big, but nothing to be worried about. EXCEPT (thank you Neil) her head is measuring 38 weeks 2 days. And her legs are suuuuper long. I think he femur measured almost 38 weeks. But Syd had a big head too. I didn't have many ultrasounds with her, so for all I know she was measuring the same as this baby. I texted Neil and said "This baby has a big head and looooong legs" he replied "I wonder where she got that from? :) " ha. Anyway. I love love love my Dr. he is great. I had a whole list of questions to ask him today and he answered every single one to my satisfaction.
Yay!

Latest Garbage Finds

2012-02-05T22:42:00.000-08:00

Water Table- Which may become a sand table. We'll see.

Today we went for a walk after Church. Down the street we saw this cute doll bed. Coincidentally it is the exact same bed we almost bought for Christmas, but opted for the trike instead. There were no garbage cans by it, so we were not 100% sure if it was really free for the taking. Plus, it looked brand new, were they really getting rid of it? So I walked up and knocked on their front door:) They were indeed getting rid of it. We snatched it up, hosed it down to get some dog hair off...and....

One happy little girl:) The best part is that since we didn't buy this at Christmas we were thinking of getting it or something similar as a gift for when the baby is born, so Syd can play mommy too. Now we don't have to! $25 saved:)

35 Weeks. Worst picture ever. That is all.

GD update. Things are going pretty good. Last week my numbers were off all week, but I am pretty sure a lot of it was caused by stress. I had two times where my blood sugar dropped really fast because I had such an adrenaline rush. The first was when Syd dropped a cracker on the master bathroom tile and later on we came home to a billion ants. Ahhhhhh!! I hate ants. I don't mind spiders or other bugs but for some reason I can't handle Ants. Luckily they were teeny tiny. I tried to not freak out so Syd would not be scarred for life. I vacuumed them up and mopped. About 10 minutes later I was really shaking so I checked my blood sugar, yep super low. I asked the nurse the next day and she said that an adrenaline rush like that can indeed make my blood sugar drop. Then a few days later Syd fell and cut her lip open. By the time we got home from the park I was super shaky. Luckily the bleeding had stopped and she was doing okay so I could take care of it. Phew. I am so ready to be done with this! I have been feeling super hungry lately. I am on a 2000 calorie a day diet and I don't think it's cutting it anymore. But I can't have more carbs or my blood sugar will skyrocket. So I guess I need more protein. How much nuts and cheese can a person eat, bleh. I am not really a huge meat eater. I need to find some good protein sources, any suggestions?

Syd's ER visit

2012-02-04T09:31:00.000-08:00

Here is a cute little Sydney all ready to go play at a friends house while I go to the doctor. I am SO blessed to have such wonderful friends! I have had so many people helping me out with Syd while I go to so many doctors appointments.

This is her new thing. I call it her version of planking. She does this on every raised surface she can find, chairs, stairs, the bed, the couch. It cracks me up. I think her arms must be pretty strong.

Before Neil and I had kids we always thought it was funny how many kids wore their shoes on the wrong feet. I mean, they have a 50/50 chance of getting it right...right? The other day Syd was insistent on wearing her shoes on the wrong feet. I kept trying to correct her but she would have nothing to do with it. I guess Neil and I were wrong. Some kids just flat out want to wear their shoes on the wrong feet.

Yesterday we went to play at the park and Syd fell while she was climbing up the slide. It gushed blood but then calmed down. I wasn't sure what to do, so I took some pics to send to Andrea for her opinion. She has had a lot of split lips among her kids. Well, I took this pic and looked at it and just decided it needed stitches. I didn't want her to have a horrible horrible scar on her cute little face!

We called Neil and he met us at the Pediatric ER at St. Rose Sienna Hospital. It was packed! I am used to St. George where there are maybe 3 other people in the waiting room. Syd was sure happy to see her dad, she just wouldn't smile for a picture. They got us right back to a curtain room. The Dr. wanted to partially sedate her with Ketamine so that she wouldn't thrash around while he did the stitches. But that meant she couldn't have anything in her System. It was 1:30 and she had eaten lunch at 12:00. He told us we would wait until 3:30 to sedate her. So we waited...

And waited...

And waited. Every time it was our turn a really serious case would come through the door. And keep in mind, this was children only! Luckily there was a tv and they brought us toys and games. Everyone was super nice and helpful and apologetic that we had to wait so long. The hardest part was that she couldn't eat or drink until the sutures were in and she came to, it was a long time for a hungry and thirsty little girl.

Finally around 7 pm it was our turn, yay! They came in with all of the people that are necessary (respiratory therapist, nurses, etc) gave her an IV (which she hated, of course) gave her the Ketamine and about 30 seconds later she was out. Well, her eyes were still open but she was totally out of it, it was weirrrrd. We had to stand back and they covered her face up and injected some numbing stuff in her lip and started stitching. She made a sad moaning sound a few times, it didn't even sound like her:( They were done in about 5 min. She only needed 3 stitches. Neil went to get some food so I wouldn't pass out;) She just laid there on her back and looked around. The nurse said she could probably see 3 of me. After about 40 min she was responsive, if I would ask her questions she would nod. Finally she started to try to sit up and said "I fell off the slide" the nurse thought was so cute and smart (hello, of course she is;) After that she woke up pretty fast. As soon as she could drink some juice they took the IV and all of the monitors off and sent us on our way. She fell asleep in the car and we go home around 8:30 or 9:00. We knew she would be hungry in the morning but put her in bed and she slept hard all night long.

This morning she did not want a picture

Here is one where you can kind of see her little stitches. She seems to be just fine this morning:) Phew!

Good news!

2012-02-02T17:50:00.000-08:00

I went to the perinatologist today and they said they would take me as a patient! Yaaaaaay I am so happy. This is such an answer to prayers. I have been worried sick all week about what I was going to do. Whew. That is all.

I am having my baby at home.

2012-02-01T21:35:00.000-08:00

No I'm not.

But I want to.

The Dr. appt. didn't go that great today. I talked to her about what happened but didn't feel like she really cared or felt that sorry. Of course she apologized but what else could she do? She was listening saying "uh huh, yeah, okay" etc. Then she said "well, we aren't running a free clinic here, we have to get paid" SERIOUSLY? I told her "THAT IS NOT THE POINT, I will pay you, I just hate the way I was treated by your staff!" blah. Then I dropped it and let her listen to the babies heartbeat and left. Then I got home and the perinatologists office called and told me they could not take me as a full time patient because they get most of their business from referals and can't risk making Dr.'s mad. She was really nice and I could tell she really felt bad telling me. She said she really pushed my case, but they just said nope. I cried. I am so sick of crying. So my last hope is that when I go tomorrow I can make one last plea to the perinatologist. Because then at least I know I tried every last option. If he says no there is one Dr. I will call to see if she will take me. In the end I know that my current dr. will be fine. I just hate the idea of being angry at the person who is delivering my baby. Sigh. Anyway, moving on.

Tonight I went out with some friends and ate Cafe Rio and saw "One for the money". It made me laugh, I needed it. I love Katherine Heigl, did you know she is LDS? It's true, I heard she is teaching the new member discussions to Christina Aguilera.

Aren't we darling?

2012-01-31T21:26:00.000-08:00

2008

2011

2012

Yesterday was possibly the worst day of this whole pregnancy. I went to the perinatologist and everything was great. Then I went over to my OB office for my check up. Which seems pointless to me, but thats just how things are. I was waiting for the dr. when the front office girl asked me to come see the billing girl. Billing girl then proceeds to tell me that I need to pay money toward my balance. I say "what balance". She then proceeds to tell me that I have to pay $1000 dollars toward my end balance or I can't see the Dr. that day. I tried to tell her that when I signed my contract they told me I would be paying at the end. She didn't believe me and said I was supposed to have been making payments. I asked why then did they not ever ask me to make a payment, hello, I am 35 weeks pregnant! I think they just realized that they had never asked me and didn't want to get fired. Well, we'll see about that. I am seeing the dr. tomorrow (after leaving yesterday because I couldn't pay the money, and therefore could not see the doctor, don't worry I slammed the door pretty hard on my way out, haha). I can't wait to see what she has to say about her jerk staff people. I was so upset. I came home and cried the rest of the day and then had braxton hicks all night long. I am now in the process of getting the perinatologist to take me as a regular patient and deliver me. I am firing the ob.

Almost ready...

2012-01-27T22:41:00.000-08:00

I finally hit nesting mode this week and have been getting lots done. I did some crafty stuff for the girls room. Syds new twin bedding came, see below.

I know! So cute. It matches the crib bedding exactly. It came with a bedspread, dust ruffle, pillow sham and window valence. The valence matches the curtains that I made last year. I almost cried for joy when I saw how well everything went together. Of course that could be my medication talking too, ha. My blood sugar levels can't stay where they need to be after dinner so I have to take more medication in the afternoon. The doctor said no matter what I do, eat, drink, follow my diet like a gestational diabetes nazi, it's normal for this to happen as your pregnancy progresses. The placenta just keeps putting out more and more hormones that affect blood sugar the more the baby grows. As soon as the placenta is delivered I should be back to normal. I have to go back in 3 months and do another 3 hour fasting glucose test just to make sure, and I am at risk of getting this in future pregnancies. Right now I take half of a tablet in the morning and now I take a quarter of a tablet in the afternoon as well. Have you ever tried quartering a small pill? So frustrating! Today was not a great day after I took the afternoon dose. And of course today was the day that Syd would not take a nap. I laid in her bed for an hour while she jumped around and talked and pulled my hair. I dozed off a few times. Finally she got out of bed so I got up too. I was so cranky! I don't think I have ever been that frustrated with her. I hate feeling like that. Hopefully in the next few days my body will adjust to this new dosage. It is being hard to stick to my diet this week. So far I have been fine to stay away from sweets because I simply don't keep them around. Neil is not a cake and cookies eater so that really helps. Last night at relief society they served chocolate pudding, it about killed me to stand there and watch people eat it, and now I have been craving cookies all day....6 more weeks to go!

34 weeks, ready to pop.

2012-01-26T13:02:00.001-08:00

Okay Andrea. You win. I AM huge!

Here I am at the USU homecoming parade when I was 36 weeks pregnant with Sydney. Not too bad.

Here I am at 38 weeks with Sydney. She was born one week later.

This is me about 5 minutes ago. Um, huge! I am freaking out that GD is going to make my baby weigh 10 lbs. I just want a nice little 6 pounder again! And I don't just look huge, I feel huge too. Last night I thought for sure my belly would just burst like a balloon, it hurt so bad!! Several times a day she kicks so hard that I cry out and Syd runs to see if I am okay and brings me a tissue (even though I don't cry). Then she tells the baby "that's not nice".

I don't have another measurement ultrasound until Feb. 9th. I wish they would measure her today to put my mind at ease!

More Garbage Finds

2012-01-25T08:48:00.000-08:00

Look what I found in the garbage!

Psych!
My mom made them (but are you glad I said psych?)

When Syd was a newborn she was so skinny and tiny that all baby nightgowns drowned her except one. My mom used to make these little skinny nightgowns for the little skinny babies in our family. There was one left, I think from when Sara Wilde was a baby. It fit perfect and I wished I had more. So I decided to be more prepared this time. I got the fabric and we went to SG this weekend. My mom sewed the body together with her serger and then I brought them home and sewed up the front and added the elastic and added the bows. I can't wait to see our little girl in them:)

Okay, but seriously Neil did find these in the garbage one day a week ago. He saw them when he was leaving the neighborhood to go to work and brought them home with him. Syd loves them! We can't seems to get enough little chairs around here (we now have 4). Also you can see her new little haircut. I keep thinking I will let it grow, but it grows out all stringy still. I think she looks much better with her Justin Beiber haircut;)

Garbage, garbage, garbage

2012-01-23T22:29:00.000-08:00

I love my neighborhood! Here is a picture of Syd playing in Becky's excersaucer that we borrowed. The other night we were on a walk and guess what our neighbors had put out next to their garbage can? Yep, this exact same excersaucer, in perfect condition! I took it all apart, washed everything in bleach in the tub, washed the cloth toys and seat in the washer. It looks fab. I love garbage finds.

Update on GD. I think that my body is finally adjusting to the medication because everything has been looking great, whew:) 34 weeks on Friday!

New baby smell

2012-01-19T11:03:00.000-08:00

I got some Dreft yesterday. My good friend Natalie got me some when she went to Walmart, I was so excited to start washing baby clothes and then Target didn't have powdered dreft, so thanks Natalie:)

I love Dreft. I love the way it makes your house smell like a new baby. I love the way it makes your new baby smell. When Lindsey Brown was a baby I used to do my laundry at Andrea's house in Logan. I had a tv watching blanket that Andrea would let me wash in Dreft. What a good sister:) Best smell ever.

My blood sugar was way low yesterday, like 65 after I ate lunch. That can't be right. Lame. But at least when I woke up in the night feeling weird and checked my blood sugar it was normal. Phew. Also while I was trying to go to sleep last night I had the worst braxton hicks contraction I have ever had, yikes. Luckily there was just the one.

Yo Yo Mama

2012-01-18T08:21:00.000-08:00

I love this shot, even though by this time her hair do was totally shot. I love the colors and lighting and location.

I feel like my body is a yo yo. Yesterday was fairly normal, right before lunch I almost crashed, but I hurried and snarfed a cheeseburger so I would not.

If you don't want to read about my GD, I don't blame you, at least read the funny highlighted story.

Speaking of cheeseburgers here is a funny story. We go to the same McDonalds near our house quite a lot, and usually the same people are working. One man in particular. I think he may be the owner. Anyway, yesterday we went through the drive through at 10:00 am for a Diet Coke (me not Syd). Then we went to one bank to pay off our car loan. Oh yes, we sold the CRV to Rachel, we bought a mini van! Love it. Will post pics soon. Then it got close to 11:00 and I was feeling shaky and I realized I was pushing it. We still had errands to run so we went through the drive through again. Of course the workers were so happy to see me back (haha). We ate and then went to a different bank to deposit Neil's paycheck. We were standing in line and who should walk in? The McDonalds guy. We said hello and laughed. Okay I promise it was funny at the time.

Anyway. I ate lunch and checked my blood about 20 min later and it was fine. Then I checked it at the 1 hour mark and it was too high, arrgh. Anyway, we ate dinner (roast, mashed potatoes, veggies, salad). I decided to use all my carb points to have the mashed potatoes. I may have eaten about 1/4 cup more then I should have. One hour later I was at 175, yikes I will have to check, but I am pretty sure a teeny bit more carbs would not make it that high. I am supposed to be at 120 or below an hour after a meal. I have never been that high before. Then I checked it before my bedtime snack and it was back down to a good level. Then after my snack I was at 69. WTH?! I was so tired but could not go to bed when it was that low. So I ate the glucose tablets, ate another snack and waited an hour. I was at 89 when I went to bed. I am supposed to be at 90- 120 but I figured it was close enough. Then I woke up all night long....not sure why. I know if my blood sugar drops when I sleep I am supposed to wake up all shaky, but I was so out of it and didn't feel awful, just awake and nervous and sweaty. Okay, so I did feel awful. Hmmmm. Bring on today.

Update

2012-01-17T17:34:00.000-08:00

Neil's brother Chad has a super cool camera and took some awesome pictures of Syd over Christmas break. This is my favorite:)

I went to the Dr. yesterday. I did not have a crash all morning so they felt okay keeping me on the 1/2 dose of my medication. I didn't crash today either, but the medication does make me feel cranky and depressed, so hopefully that passes. However my afternoon and evening numbers are still high, so it seems like the medication only works in the morning. Grrrr. We'll see. I hope I don't have a 19 lb baby like this lady.

More GD

2012-01-16T09:08:00.000-08:00

I am recording this so I can remember for my next pregnancy. Yesterday was Sunday we are on the 9 am schedule. We were at 1pm for 2 years so we were pretty excited, but now we get home at noon and feel like "what the heck are we going to do with the rest of this day?!" haha. Anyway. I ate breakfast and my after breakfast levels were fine. Then about halfway through the sacrament (9:20ish) I started feeling kind of yucky, not shaky or lightheaded, kind of nauseaus. I waited until the sacrament was over and went to check my blood. It was 40, yikes! So I ate my glucose tablets and 15 min later I was at about 80. I texted my D.C. Donna. She said to eat right away, even though I was not due for my morning snack until 10:30. So I sat in the foyer eating my PB sandwich. I was feeling much better by then but I knew that Sunbeams would be a no go. I found my co teacher who is so great:) She would find a helper and we headed home since Syd has a cold and can't go to nursery and I was not up to taking her home alone while Neil stayed at church. We went home and I ate again and then slept for 3 hours. When I woke up my BG was 56, yikes again. I ate a snack and things looked better 20 min later. The rest of the night went okay and before bed I was at 96, whew. Before I went to bed Neil and our friend gave me a blessing, so that was wonderful and helped me feel more at peace. I go to the dr. today so I will be interested to see what he recommends.

A picture of my big fat belly

2012-01-14T21:43:00.000-08:00

32 weeks. I think I kind of look huge. Today we went shopping. We were at the DI and I started to feel a little light headed. I ate some pretzels but still wasn't feeling well so I went into the bathroom to check my blood sugar. It was 45, reallllly low. No wonder I felt like I wanted to pass out. So I ate some glucose tablets that the diabetic counselor gave me. They tasted like smarties, but are 10 times bigger, I had to eat four of them. After not having sugar for so long, oh my word, they tasted amazing!! Within 15 minutes my blood had gone back up to 145, whew. It was not fun. The diabetic counselor said it is most likely because of the medication I just started, I guess it's doing its job and then some. Hopefully my body will adjust soon!

Syd likes to touch my belly. But sometimes when I ask her where the baby is she puts her hands on my boobs. When I try to tell her that the baby is down in my tummy she insists, "no, up here mom". The other day I was sitting by her and she was playing with her doll. She asked the doll "wanna touch mama's baby?" And took the dolls little hand and stuck it on my boob. I laughed pretty hard. She loves babies whenever we see one, but when I ask her if we should have a baby at our house she says no....tooooo late.

She loves to wear Neil's socks. After her bath she will get a diaper on and then find a pair of his socks and put them on and wear them all day and sometimes to bed.

I baked rolls from scratch for the first time ever. I wanted them to be big for sandwiches. Then they rose. Whoa! But they tasted really good!

32 Weeks

2012-01-12T17:26:00.000-08:00

32 weeks tomorrow. I went to the perinatologist today. My blood sugar is not low enough after meals so I have to start taking medication, not insulin, that will be the next step. This is an oral medication. I have to go twice a week until she is born for non stress tests and ultrasounds. I am feeling pretty discouraged, but happy that this baby is doing well.

One plus is getting to see her alot! Look at those lips:) I think this baby.....

Is going to look a lot like this baby! :)

(this is Neil by the way)

We can't wait to meet her!

Christmas Morning

2012-01-04T10:09:00.001-08:00

We had a great Christmas:)

Syd got a trike

Here she is on her first ride

Besides the cute stockings, Aunt Lindsay sent this Dora backpack she made! Syd loves it:)

Here is a little thank you video for you Lindsay

Yum, orange.

Sara:
Something I want- Miche Bag
Something I need- New boots
Something to wear- New dress
Something to read- New book
Plus some stocking stuffers:)

Neil:
Something I want- Ipod
Something I need- New drill
Something to wear- PJ pants
Something to read- New book

Syd:
Something I want- Bike
Something I need- New game to play
Something to wear- Christmas dress
Something to read- Book
The doll stroller was from Santa and yes that white thing is a tiny potty for a tiny doll:)

We got dressed up all cute and went to church.

The end

Big News!

2011-12-22T14:32:00.000-08:00

Made you look! Haha.

We attempted to take Syd to her first movie. Arthur Christmas. I enjoyed it, Neil and Syd enjoyed bits and pieces and enjoyed running around the hallway and arcade. Guess we'll give it another year.

We made pizzeles the night before I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes. At least I got to eat a few!

Look at what I found at TraderJoe's! Yum yum yum:) I can eat as much cheese as I want, so I was super happy to find this!

26 Months- 28 Weeks

My super talented sister-in-law made these for us for Christmas, I can't even explain how excited I was! Aren't they so cute?! She even made one for baby girl for next year:)

LOVE them!

Ultrasound

2011-12-08T16:19:00.000-08:00

I had to have an ultrasound today to check my fluid levels. They gave me a CD with pictures this time:) Here she is.

Profile

Look at that little smile "hi mom and dad" :) That is her leg above her head, she is folded in half.

The Dr. says she weighs about 2 lbs 2 oz. The same as Gracie when she was born! Amazing. \

Santa...maybe not.

2011-12-04T20:51:00.000-08:00

On Friday night we went to our ward Christmas party. Here are my cute people. I love them:)

We saw Santa.

Remember last year?

Apparently absence did not make the heart grow fonder.

Better luck next year Santa.

A new title and what we have been up to.

2011-11-29T20:45:00.000-08:00

You may have noticed that my blog has a new title. If you don't care to know why I changed the title please feel free to skip to the pictures below. When I created this blog a few years ago I wanted it to have a creative and catchy name. Since I could not come up with anything I settled for "To dream costs nothing" in Latin. Don't make fun of me, I took Latin in college. Anyway. The other night we came home from Thanksgiving at my parents house. We pulled into the garage and I had a flash back of growing up. Whenever we came home from a vacation (usually late at night) as we pulled in the garage my dad would say "you know the routine guys" which meant we all helped unload the car until every last thing was in the house. We would sit in the back of the car, whether it be station wagon or Astro Van, and silently pray that he would NOT say it this time. No such luck. Over the last few years my life has become pretty routine. And so has my blog. So there you have it. You're welcome.

A week before Thanksgiving Emily Brown came for a visit. Andrea was pretty sick, but she is doing better now. We had fun and Syd LOVED her. Emily was the best playmate ever:)

She set up a house on the different landings on the stairs. The boxes are baby cribs.

One day I was telling Emily about all of the great stuff we get from our neighbors trash. She was intrigued and sure enough on Sunday night someone had put out these trees. She snatched them up and took them home with her:)

Here's me 24 weeks pregnant. While Em was here we all got the stomach flu. Except her, lucky!

On Wed. we all headed to St. George for Thanksgiving. I was too tired to take pictures, but it pretty much looked like this.

Now we are home and Syd has taken up a new hobby. Cooking!

Italian seasoning on every cutting board we have. Later she dumped parmesan cheese on the floor. I guess she wanted to make spaghetti.

Cinnamon toast crunch on dirty dishes. At least the bowls match the plates. That means she is super brilliant, right?

Our friends have a Christmas tree farm in Ca. and got us this amazing tree. It smells SO GOOD. It has been quite a few years since I have had a real tree at Christmas, it is fun!

Tonight Neil and Syd put the finishing touches on. Pretty sure she will pull them all off tomorrow.

Grandma sent Syd this little people nativity. She loves it! I told her grandma sent her a present and she sang happy birthday for the rest of the night. And yes, I realize that I have very few pictures of her wearing both pants AND a shirt. Oh well.

Springs Preserve

2011-11-14T10:02:00.001-08:00

Last week we went to Las Vegas Springs Preserve with some friends. It was really fun! There was a lot to see and we walked around for a looong time.

Syd with a big turtle

Syd with a big bunny.

Oh, before we left Syd made me breakfast. Yum.

One of the museums had an exhibit called "the scoop on poop" the kids loved it, it was really interesting. Here is Syd in the outhouse.

There was a great playground. Sydney loves trains, she played on this one for a long time:)

Happiness is falling asleep with your arm in the pringles can.

We were tired that night! I don't know if you can tell but she is eating 3 suckers. Almost done with the Halloween candy!

Horsies and other things

2011-11-08T15:46:00.000-08:00

For Syd's birthday Grandma Sherry made her this cute skirt. It is made out of Syd's Great Grandma Arminta's fabric, so special! Here she is wearing it to church:) The purple socks were her idea, and she would not be talked out of it. Lovely.

I decided I needed to start sorting through the baby girl clothes. Holy Cow. Seriously this kid will never want for clothing. You can't really see but on the other side of the couch there is a box with about 30 outfits in it. It was like a baby store threw up in my living room. By the way, this is not even all of it. There are two more Rubbermaids in the garage full of newborn and 0-3 month. Yikes!

Our friend gave us a bunch of clothes for Syd and this Minnie Mouse dress was in the bag. Syd loves it. She wore it for about 3 days straight. I had to hide it so I could wash it!

I bought this hat 10 years ago. I used to wear it all the time, it is a siz 2t. I pulled it out this winter and thought, hey, now I have a toddler to wear it! haha:) She loves it and cracks up when I wear it.

Syd loves to sing twinkle twinkle little star, so I wanted to capture it on video, enjoy why don't you:)

Sometimes Syd sings this little tune about horsies, I told Rachel about it and finally caught it on video. Fun:)

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T16:19:00.000-07:00

Happy Halloween! We drug the holiday out for about a week this year. We went to two ward trunk or treats, the rec center trick or treat and we are going trick or treating in our neighborhood, yay! Today Syd had her 2 year check up. She in the 75th percentile for height, 60th for weight and only 40th for her head! Her body is finally catching up to her head size:) I had her wear her costume to the dr. and then we ran some errands. Then it was almost lunch time so we texted Neil to see if he would like to take Snow White and her wicked stepmother out for lunch. He of course said yes so we headed down town and enchanted his office and then went to lunch at Macayo's.

Here we are on our way to trunk or treat. Snow White, Clark Kent and a cowgirl.

Video #1- Syd saying cute things, in her costume. Video #2 Neil came home wearing his creepy teeth, this is her reaction:)

Also, one more story after you seen the teeth. The first time my parents met Neil was on Halloween. He came trick or treating with us and the Browns. He wore DI clothes and the creepy teeth and had not shaved for a few days. Afterwards my dad was like "um, so that guy was interesting..." I said "Dad! That was a Halloween costume, that is not what he looks like all the time!" haha nice first impression honey:)

Happy Birthday Dear Sydney...

2011-10-26T20:18:00.000-07:00

Syd turned 2! We wanted to get her a little kitchen. Then we saw this one in our neighbors garbage pile. Yes please! We cleaned it up and replaced a few small things. After we took this picture Grandpa Rocky helped Neil replace the plexi glass in the microwave and oven and they rigged up an oven rack made out of a fridge rack. Did I mention I found the fridge rack in another neighbors garbage pile? Yep. I can't help it if my neighbors keep throwing away great stuff! The table and chairs we already had but I repainted them.

Cute little dishes

She was so excited and has not stopped playing with it. When we leave the house she says "bye bye kitchen!"

We set everything up the night before. I told Neil to pretend to be Syd. I wanted to set the camera to capture her reaction, she tends to be camera shy if she knows you are taping.

Thank Heaven...

2011-10-22T18:00:00.000-07:00

For little girls...

For little girls get bigger every day!

Thank heaven...

For little girls...

They grow up in the most delightful way!
Sydney really has been such a delight these last two years. We love her so much and enjoy every minute we have with her! We asked her what she would like for her birthday...

She told us she would like a little sister...

We told her that would be okay, but she would have to wait until March for her present!

Thank heaven for one more little girl in our family:)

Lindsey Brown comes for a visit.

2011-10-17T16:26:00.000-07:00

Lindsey came to visit for her fall break. Isn't she cute? She loves escalators. They do not have escalators in St. George so we rode every one we could find:)

Indoor rainstorm at Planet Hollywood

Went to Venice

I love Sydney in this picture. She looks so bored.

Pinks hot dogs. We did not eat there. I will one day though!

The Mirage

The conservatory at the Bellagio

This one is for Aunt Rachel

They had some gigantic pumpkins!

A painting made out of flowers

An apple made of red roses

Dancing fountains

She was waving at everyone:)

We had fun! Thanks for coming for a visit cute girl:)

Oi with the poodles already!

2011-10-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

Syd loves to wash the dishes.

18 Weeks. And I promise that Syd does wear pants...sometimes.

I saw this idea on Our Best Bites. I wanted a fall wreath so I made one!

Good thing Syd is getting a kitchen for her birthday, this is what she does while I cook. She says "Mom look, I make chips!" haha it cracks me up:)

I put up all of our Halloween decor. The talking witch picture is my favorite! When we showed Syd for the first time I decided to video her in case she had a great reaction either way.

I had to take it down and put it away. She wouldn't come near Neil or the picture for the rest of the night. We felt like the WORST parents on the planet!

Dora

2011-10-07T22:39:00.000-07:00

Sydney is a quiet girl in public places. Quite often strangers ask me if she ever smiles or if she is in a bad mood. I would love to say mean things to them like "no, she just doesn't like ugly people", but I bite my tongue. She is really slow to warm up to people. At home she is hilarious, she gets really really excited about two things every day. The first is Dora. She doesn't even really watch it, but when the opening credits come on she freaks out, it is so so funny! I decided to try to capture the excitement. This is not even half of how she usually acts when Dora comes on, but it is still fun to watch:)

By the way, the second thing that gets her really excited is when Neil comes home. I will have to capture that one sometime soon.

Baby love

2011-09-29T21:27:00.000-07:00

Sydney loves her babies. She loves it more when her dad plays babies with her, it cracks me up!

She takes really good care of them. If you look really close you can see a tiny baby inside of that diaper.

Neil thought he would help her out by making a to scale diaper out of toilet paper. Not so much dad. Not so much.

Postcards from Vegas

2011-09-27T11:34:00.001-07:00

Hi mom and dad. In case you were wondering what I did with Syd while you were at Disneyland...

Ate lots

Went on walks

Hugged (well I did, Syd not so much)

Aren't we charming?

Went to the park

Watched Dora and Sponge Bob

Went to the splash pad. Syd didn't like it. I told her to not cry about it.

It sure was fun!

Silly Sydney

2011-09-20T09:01:00.000-07:00

We love going for walks. Sydney loves pockets. If she has pockets she has to have a penny to put in her pocket, then she walks around with her hands in her pockets. I am sure it is entertaining to our neighbors to watch her walk down the street like this:)

She thought she was hilarious hiding in this suitcase one day. She would say "Hi! It's Sydney!" and then laugh hysterically.

Here I am at 16 weeks. I looked back at my pregnancy with Syd and didn't record a whole lot so I am trying to do better. I feel pretty good now but for the first 14 or so weeks I was pretty sick all day long. Except for first thing in the morning. I felt great and got a lot done from about 7-10. Then I spent the rest of the day on the couch. I crave salty stuff, most sweets don't sound good at all and for the first 12 weeks Diet Coke was disgusting. Which is a good thing! haha. Also for the first 12 weeks I had the WEIRDEST dreams every time I slept. It got to the point that I would hardly want to go to sleep because I knew I would have a really vivid, super intense dream. Luckily that has stopped. I feel like I am just getting back to a good place. We are staring to walk at night which I think is helping. With Syd I exercised a ton and I really think it helped me feel really good so I am happy to get exercising! I know I am only 31 but I am feeling super creaky and stiff and old, I think my body needs exercise. I found out that the hospital my insurance covers is 25 miles away. Yikes. Luckily it's all freeway, but I hope I don't have the baby in the car!

For the first 12 weeks I felt for sure it was a boy. Now....not so sure. We'll see in a month!

The Wilkey's take a holiday

2011-09-16T12:15:00.000-07:00

Over Labour Day Weekend we had a Wilkey holiday. We don't say reunion because it freaks us all out. And we spell it "Labour" because of our half Canadian upbringing. We went to Heber Valley Girls Camp. During the week it is a Young Women's camp, and on the weekends families use it. It was such a great place!

Syd was in heaven in the dirt and outdoors. I said to Neil at one point "doesn't it feel weird to be able to be outside in the middle of the day?!" It was such a nice escape from the heat!

These are the cabins, we had three, so we really spread out. We had a baby in each cabin. Perfect:)

Syd had to climb on every bunk bed. Poor Neil was busy keeping up with her.

Here's our little spot, it was so pretty:)

These boys are the greatest, they just played and played and played. No drama. I hope I have a few boys.

We took a family photo, which I won't reveal because my mom is using it for a Christmas card. Here is a practice shot of cute Becky and Rachel.

10 Grandkids! Lindsey-10, Sara-9, Emily-8, Robbie-7, Tyler-7, Eliza-5, Evie-4, Grace-2, Randy-2, Sydney 22 moths.

Syd was in heaven, Neil didn't get a break the whole weekend!

We did a challenge course

Can you guess which car belongs to which family?

The Lake. Really it is used for irrigation and is usually drained dry by Sept, but since it was a wet year we got lucky!

Sydney only felt comfortable in the bow of the boat. She really liked it!

The deer that live there are totally comfortable just hanging out. On the first day Rach was in the cabin and opened the door and there was the deer! She jumped and screamed and so did the deer! Then it ran away really fast, and so did she.

Syd did pretty good on the trip. This is her very first all on her own ice cream cone, so I had to document it. Usually she does not love ice cream because its so cold, but she liked this one!

After we were done in Heber City we went to Becky and Jeff's house in Salt Lake for a few days. We had a great time, watched a movie in the backyard, stayed up late etc. We also played a game called "so you think you know your cola" Jeff bought about 15 different kinds of cola drinks and we had a blind taste test. We all boast so much about our love of Diet Coke he thought he would test us. I am ashamed to admit that the one I picked as D.C. was actually Big K Diet Cola. I am so ashamed. Andrea got 5 right for the win. I got 3. I guess we are not as smart as we think!

Coming soon...

2011-09-08T22:16:00.000-07:00

Wilkey Family Holiday

"I'm the king of the world!"

New tile

2011-09-06T09:25:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago Rocky, Sherry and Ethan came down and spent the whole weekend with us, Rocky and Neil tiled two bathrooms, yay! They look great!

Ripping up the carpet, yay!

Half way

Guest bathroom

Almost done!

Finishing touch

Now we need to do the grout. It is going to look so great! Yay! It is so fun to do home improvement projects...especially since I did all of my hard work from the comfort of the couch;)

A while ago

2011-08-22T21:19:00.000-07:00

Our laptop has been sick. But now it's all better. I think. Here are some old pictures I found.

In June Syd and I went to Denver for a cousins wedding. We went with my parents and had a great trip. I had never been to CO. I love going to new places!

Here is Syd going through the airport. Everyone we saw thought she was so darling with her little purse.

In Denver, the bathrooms were also tornado shelters. Scary! And pretend that I have a cuter look on my face. K?

Syd had a nice time at the temple, it was a beautiful day:)

Check out that wild hair!

We visited my cousin. She lives in THE cutest neighborhood I have ever seen. Why don't they build houses like this in Las Vegas? I want one!

This is my Father-In-Law Rocky. He rocks. Seriously. Look at these amazing shelves he built for our garage! They are amazing!

He even measured everything to make sure our Rubbermaid containers would fit. And the best part, look at our little trailer, he made a spot for it too! Woo hoo! It is so great to have an organized garage! Pretty sure when we eventually move from this house I am taking the shelves with me...

Thanks Grandpa Rocky! :)

Backyardigans

2011-08-15T19:13:00.000-07:00

Since it was only 100 degrees at 6:30 tonight, Neil thought he would put together our new lawn mower.

We thought that it was time for Syd to start pulling her weight around here ;)

Working with dad

I was busy relaxing on my lawn chair.

Good job dad!

Good job Syd:)

Congratualtions!

2011-08-06T20:29:00.000-07:00

Congrats Chad and Kelcie! Thanks for a wonderful day!

Panorama-banana-fofana

2011-08-01T21:29:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a boring post. Be prepared.

My new camera has a panoramic setting. Since I have not been to Hawaii or the Grand Canyon lately I have had to find other ways to use it.

Back Yard

House

More back yard.

Giant sleeping baby.

Love and Stuff (if you ever read Lurlene McDaniel books you will get that)
Sara

Yeah, we know.

2011-07-25T19:58:00.000-07:00

After Sydney was born...

everyone kept saying what a good job we did...

for our "first try"

and now that we see...

how well she is growing up...

we thought...

we just might...

give it another "try"

Our next baby should "March Forth" in the spring:)

Get it? March 4th? Haha I am so clever...I know.

Family pics on the beach

2011-07-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

The Big Hole

2011-07-18T09:06:00.000-07:00

Hi Folks Syd here.
One day on the beach Uncle Chad dug me a big hole to play in, it was awesome! He is a great Uncle:)

My mom said it was like having a little playpen on the beach! I wanted to stay in there all day and dig with my beach tools.

I still miss the beach, whenever I see sand I ask my mom "beach?" I can't wait to go back!

The Beach

2011-07-15T15:35:00.000-07:00

Here is the house we stayed in. Yes, I know. It was amazing. Here are some random beach photos from the week.

View from our house

My toes enjoying the view

Uncle Ethan and Syd walking on the beach one morning.

Syd loved the sand. After we got home she kept saying "beach beach" whenever she saw sand.

Here I am reading my trashy magazine on the beach.

This girl has no fear, seriously, we rode some big waves together, it was so much fun!!

Neil and the boys playing frisbee

Morning walk on the beach

Building sandcastles. Uncle Chad also dug Syd a hole taller than her and she sat in there and played for a really long time, it was the best play pen! haha I will have to find the pics.

My toes enjoying the beach

Hanging out with my hubby wubby

Bye bye!

Blaaaah

2011-07-11T22:19:00.000-07:00

I have not posted anything about our vacation. The first reason is that I can't find the disk of pictures in my messy house. The second reason is that now that I do everything on the desktop Syd gets mad when I sit down and get on the computer and turns it off, grrr. Her finger just loves that little button! The third is that whenever Syd is napping I am napping. But mostly it's because I can't find the pictures. I did take pictures on the 4th of July with our NEW camera! Woooo hoooo! On Saturday the 2nd I bought Syd a cute 4th of July outfit. Then I came home and was sad and told Neil that there is no point in having a cute outfit if there is no camera to take a picture:( I know, right? So he went to Walmart and bought a new camera. It is hot pink, need I say more. One day I will blog again. Right now I am too tired. Good Night.
PS you should check out my sister Andrea's blog. She did a new post;)

Coming soon....

2011-07-03T11:08:00.000-07:00

We went on THE most amazing vacation to the beach. My camera got broken by a dolphin, but I still have pictures to share. Neils office got new computers so we got his old one, score! The only problem is that all of the pictures are on the laptop and our wireless internet is not working. Stay tuned! But here are a few pictures that I stole from my SIL's blog, thanks Lindsay, hope you don't mind! PS, she has a super fancy expensive camera so try to not be dissapointed when I upload my own pictures, haha..

On our way to San Diego we stopped at Leisure World to visit Grandpa Howard. Sydney fell in love with baby Aly.

We stayed in the most amazing beach house! Don't ask how we got it... if I told you I might have to kill you. Here is the view from the patio.

The spacious inside. There was plenty of room for everyone to relax, rest and spend time together. (plus a smiley volleyball to make you feel right at home!)

Postcards from Moonlight Beach

2011-06-23T20:24:00.000-07:00

Dear Grandma-

Today I joined the army!

Postcards from Moonlight Beach

2011-06-20T20:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Grandma-
I am having a great time at the beach with Grandma and Grandpa Schmalz!

Thanks for the fun beach toys!

Daddy and Uncle Chad built a sandcastle and I tore it down for them.

Then my dad took me out in the water to get my feet wet...

He was not counting on such a big wave!

I did not like being under water!

Don't worry I am okay now.

Love Syd J.

You might get this if....

2011-06-18T22:16:00.000-07:00

You are a Gilmore Girls fan. This one is for you Rach. My mom and I went to the Clark County Museum. It was awesome! It only costs $2 to get in and there is so much to see. There is a street of old houses you can walk through, they were all set up, some with people...

Fishies!

2011-06-14T08:24:00.000-07:00

Good Morning! Today I will tell you all about our trip to the aquarium!

I rode in the backpack, it was really fun to be in the jungle!

Here I am with mom and Auntie Rachey, aren't we cute? I couldn't look because I was eying a big shark. My mom told me about a movie called Jaws...scary.

Hello fishies...

I could not stop looking!

I hope he doesn't try to eat us!

That is my moms hairy arm, she is touching a sting ray, she said it was slimy.

Someone did not want to get her picture taken. (me)

Silly Rachel

It was so fun to have her come visit us! Yay!

Speaking of Muppets...

2011-06-08T16:30:00.000-07:00

Muppet Baby

2011-06-05T21:56:00.000-07:00

Aren't we so lucky to wake up to this little Muppet every morning?

She takes good care of her mom

Then we told her it was time for bed.

"Oh, wait. Mom is taking my picture? Cheese!"

This is Syd waving hi to Grandma Sherry. Thanks for the new dress! Don't I look pretty?

Total Muppet face again.

All ready for our first swim at the community pool. She loved it, even though it was a little chilly.

Hot fun in the summertime

2011-05-31T21:17:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday we went to the Washington City Rec Center with the Browns. It is such a great pool!

These little bouncy swings were so fun. Andrea, check out Gracie's shy face, haaahaaa

Liza and Syd were twiners

The weather has been so nice and cool. We spent some time in the yard tonight. Syd is obsessed with belly buttons. Hers and everyone else's, haha...

I planted a few things along the back wall. I don't know if they will live but they are nice to look at!

Two squash plants. The tiny one was growing in the garden but I moved it because the other plant was doing so much better by the back wall.

Look! Tiny squashies!

Some purple flowers and some cool ones that close up at night and open in the day.

These flowers are really thriving! I guess I will plant more of them.

This one also blooms really nice in the day but closes up at night.

Daisies. Story time. Once when I was younger I thought I would do a really nice thing and weed my mom's flower beds. She came home and said I had pulled up all of her daisies! haha. Um, yeah, I was like 17. Embarrassing.

Lavender. Not doing so well. I love lavender though. I may have to plant it somewhere else if I want it to live.

Our tomatoes are growing like crazy! I am so thrilled:)

Tiny little basil plant. I wonder if it will ever be big enough to eat?

Wheeee!

Look, our grass is green! Neil mowed it for the first time tonight! Yes, we laid the sod in March, ha ha.

Here is my shelf with my diaper boxes all fixed up cute:)

Crafty McCrafterson

2011-05-29T21:46:00.000-07:00

I have been noticing that all day long stuff from upstairs accumulates downstairs and it drives me crazy. I read in BHAG to put a basket on your stairs to put those things in and then every once in a while take it up and unload it. I saw this idea to make cute containers out of diaper boxes and decided to try it!

I made 3 sizes of baskets.

The top one still needs some ribbon, I made two button holes on the liner to tie the ribbon through, it was so fun to learn to use the button holer on my sewing machine! As soon as we mount the TV on the bedroom wall I will move the shelf downstairs and put my baskets to use! The top one is just a small cardboard box, the next two are different sized diaper boxes.

Here is a link to a tutorial on my SIL Lindsay's craft blog. It is really not as hard as you might think! The trick is trying to find heavy duty fabric that is not too pricey. I shopped on the clearance aisle at Joanne's and used coupons to help out:) I am pretty proud of myself!

Potty time

2011-05-23T01:39:00.001-07:00

Proof that your kids really do watch what you do.

"Do do do do, I sure like this book"

"Um, excuse me mom, can I get some privacy?!"

"Okay fine, one picture"

Sydney and a tomato

2011-05-21T16:38:00.000-07:00

Sydney has been enjoying gogurt lately. So has her hair.

I think it's kind of stylin!

We have been spending lots of time at the park enjoying the awesome cooler than normal weather!

Cute little Mormon girl. She loves nursery!

Our tomatoes are growing like crazy! 3 have started turning red, I am so excited to eat them!

Happy Birthaversary

2011-05-19T08:06:00.000-07:00

Yes thank you. We did have a nice anniversary:) Neil left me some presents when he went to work in the morning. They all involve an inside joke, it was fun for me:)

We went to dinner

And a movie

We really enjoyed Olive Garden and "Soul Surfer". I think it's the first time we've been to a movie in about a year.

Yesterday was Neil's birthday. We went to the temple and Aunt Rachel babysat, it was great:) Then we had leftover cake from my birthday and opened presents.

New shoes!
Wall mount for the tv in our bedroom! He opened it and said "yay! Just what you wanted!" haha, funny dear. He then admitted that he gave me the really nice 600 thread count sheets for my birthday because that's what he wanted. We're even.

But this was the best present of all...

First watch the commercial. It makes us laugh so hard:)

The Big 3-0

2011-05-18T08:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday honey! Your mom says you were the nicest calmest baby, thanks for passing your genes on to our child:) Look how cute you were!

And you know what they say Thirty, Flirty, and Thriving! haha love you:) Thanks for being a wonderful husband and father!

Little Bug

2011-05-17T08:27:00.001-07:00

Sometimes I put Syds hair in two pigtails. She looks so cute, like a little bug. She makes me think of ...

These Muppet bugs, of course my child would remind me of a Muppet!

Or these little bugs that sing with the map on Dora. Hee hee:)

I have so many things I want to blog about but of course I can't find the cord that connects the computer and my camera. Grrrr.

FHE

2011-05-12T14:43:00.000-07:00

We have been trying to have FHE lately. Usually it consists of us playing primary songs on the computer while Syd dances and we laugh our heads off. Then we have a prayer because it is so cute to see Syd pray, she folds her arms and pulls them up to cover her eyes:) Here she is dancing.

Best three years...

2011-05-10T10:20:00.000-07:00

Three years seems like a long time but it has gone by fast! Even faster since Syd was born. I can honestly say it has been the best three years of my life:) I waited a long time for Neil to find me and he was worth the wait!

I looked through my email to find some wedding pics since ours are somewhere on the portable hard drive.

PS Thanks for being my prince charming honey. I am pretty sure our wedding was totally better then theirs! ha!

Birthday birthday coming to earth day, pink and wrinkled and small

2011-05-08T20:51:00.000-07:00

If anyone can name where my title came from I will be very impressed!

I had a great birthday. My mom took the shuttle down on Friday morning and Syd and I picked her up at the airport. We went to breakfast and shopping at Costco. Then we came home and hung out and got ready for the party that night.

Here's Syd and I in our matching aprons from Auntie Corinne. SO cute!

Syd all ready for the party
I love entertaining and using all of my cute serving dishes:)

It was a housewarming/ Birthday party. We had about 50 people come, it was great! We got a yummy cake at Costco. Yes I am wearing a different apron, my friend Carly gave me this apron when she got there so I put it on, LOVE it!

The wind blew out all of the candles! Oh well. I love this picture. Look at all of the kids waiting so expectantly, even the little girl on the tramp next door is excited!

We are so blessed to have so many wonderful friends! They all brought the nicest gifts, they are so thoughtful:)

Syd is sure quiet, but she has the most expressive face, it cracks us up!

Yes, yes I did get the princess cake. It's not like there's a rule that it's only for kids!

Yummy food:)

Neil did a good job with presents, cute sandals, purse some 500 thread count sheets and two new t-shirts!

It was a great day:)

Happy Week to You!

2011-05-06T09:35:00.000-07:00

May is a busy month in the Schmalz home. Chances are that I will not post on Sara's blog multiple times during the month, therefore, I thought I would let you know about all celebrations we will be having in the next few days.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARA! Today, May 6th is Sara's birthday. I would like to honor Sara's birth with the words of a birthday anthem that was the favorite of one of my seventh grade teachers:

(Morosely)

Happy birthday, happy birthday,
fighting and despair people dying everywhere,
happy birthday, happy birthday.

Happy birthday, happy birthday,
one year closer to the grave think of all the food we'll save,
happy birthday, happy birthday.

I have no idea why that song has stuck with me all these years, do you think I might be a little pessimistic?

In an effort to avoid pessimism: Woo Hoo! It is your birthday! Party! (Fact: we are going to party tonight at our house. Fact: pictures of the soiree will be on this blog in the coming days. Faaaaccct!)

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY SARA! Thanks for being the beautiful mother of our beautiful daughter. We definately appreciate all that you do for us. We love you!

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY SARA! On May 10th Sara and I will celebrate our 3rd anniversary. Once, as a missionary, I was at a family's house on the parent's anniversary. I asked, "how long have you been married?" The response from the husband, "ten years, but it only feels like five minutes...under water". I don't think at our 10th anniversary I will feel like it has been five minutes under water, and I definately don't feel that way now.

I have had a great three years and I hope that you have too Sara. Thanks for putting up with me so far. I think I have learned a little bit about being a husband and I am sure I have a whole lot more to learn, but thanks for letting me learn with you. I love you and want the best for you.

HAPPY WEEK SARA! May it be all thay you hope for and more, you deserve it.

Birthday Bash

2011-05-03T08:23:00.000-07:00

Last Thursday we headed to Seal Beach to celebrate Grandpa Howards 90th birthday.

Syd did really well in the car. She had her first lunchable yum:)

We ALL stayed at Julie and Dewey's house. Some people even slept in the backyard in tents, it was so fun to be together:)

Syd got a balloon at the party and I rubbed it on her head.

"Hey Uncle Ethan can I try your sunglasses?"

"Thanks dude"

Grandpa LOVES to dance. Some Hawaiian dancers came to entertain us and they had him get up and dance with his girlfriend Brenda.

Sydney and Grandma Sherry

This picture cracks me up because my head looks like a teacup!

Zayne and Micah had the cutest little Hawaiian shirts

Cute Corinne and Sherry

Neil, Grandpa, Chad

The menfolk. Chad, I am glad you were so excited to be there! ;)

After the party we headed back to Julie and Dewey's via the Pacific Coast Hwy. It was so beautiful! I love scenic drives:) We stopped in Malibu at Point Dume Beach and played for a little bit. Sydney loved the sand, she will have so much fun in San Diego in June!

Grandpa Rocky became of favorite of Sydney's on this trip

Every little girl needs a grandpa who will follow her all over the beach:)

Seagull tracks

Zayne (2) had the best time running on the beach with the stick he found:) Every time the water got his feet he would say "Coldy coldy coldy!" and run around, haha, it was cracking us up!

Trying to get our feet wet we almost lost Syd. Luckily Uncle Ethan saved the day!

Happy Easter

2011-04-24T16:41:00.000-07:00

Here is our cute little Easter girl.

You may wonder why she is always standing on a chair to get her picture taken. That is the only way I can get her to stand there and be still! Today should have been her first day of nursery, she turned 18 months on the 22nd. But she has a cold so we will wait till next time I guess:)

When my parents were in Costa Rica they went to church and all of the little girl were wearing shoes like this, so my mom found some at a store. Aren't they adorable?

The Easter bunny found Sydney.

This was after church. Sydney was not interested in sitting still and having her picture taken. Good thing I got a few before church!

She wanted to go for a walk in the trailer. She took a nap instead.

Right after a trip down the slide:)

This is a little video of Sydney looking at her Easter basket. Happy Easter!

Pedicures

2011-04-21T21:26:00.000-07:00

I gave Syd her first pedicure today. Then we went swimming for the first time this season. It was pretty much the perfect day:)

Freckles

2011-04-18T23:50:00.000-07:00

If you look reeeaaaallly close you can see a few tiny brown dots on her face. They are the cutest freckles I have ever seen:)

Funny story about freckles. The other day I was in St. George and I was visiting the Browns. I was helping Eliza who is 5 wash ice cream off her face. Here is how our conversation went:

Me: (Scrubbing her nose and cheeks which are covered in freckles) "Eliza, there is something all over your face right here! I can't get it off!"

Eliza: (pulls away and looks at me very seriously) "Aunt Sara, are they like little brown dots?" "Those are just freckles".

I cracked up and so did she. What a sweet girl:)

Haircute

2011-04-08T17:05:00.001-07:00

Syd's mullet was growing out, so I gave her a little haircut this morning. I tried to get a picture of her. Here is what I got.

I might die of lock jaw so you should probably read this post.

2011-04-06T20:25:00.000-07:00

First off, I stayed up waaaay to late last night reading this book. It was good, but also I was like "how can I not take advantage of this uninterrupted reading time?!"

Sydney has a 6th sense for when Neil is up so of course she wants to get up at 6:30 too, I get her up and she runs right into our room where Neil is shaving and says "Daddy! Ba? (bath)" Since I had about 5 hours of sleep (I know I am a baby) I went downstairs and fell asleep on the couch. Pretty soon Neil came and said "okay, I am going to work now" I stood up and hugged him and he started talking. Then I passed out on the couch, literally. I came to and Neil was looking at me funny. I said "sorry, I didn't hear anything you just said because I passed out, for real" haha. Then he went to work. Don't worry I did not pass out again. About 8:30 I made Syd take a nap and I went to sleep. We woke up all refreshed and got dressed and headed to the park. I love this park. It has a fence all around it so Syd can wander to her hearts content. My old ward has playgroup there and I love to go and catch up with my friends:)

Then, since I was in the area I needed to go to the mall to pick up some pants that we had ordered online for Neil because they never have his size because he has looooong legs. I almost said freakishly long but I just ran it by him and he said "that is not very nice". Then I realized that the stroller was not in the car and I was not about to carry Sydney around the mall. I remembered that Target had umbrella strollers on sale for 10 bucks. Woohoo! Since we needed one anyway we went and got one. And some little shirts for 2 bucks each.

We stopped by this store at the mall and got a few more shirts. Sydney has a lot of summer shirts, but they keep getting stained and ruined. Mom, before you say anything I have tried everything to get the stains out, I promise! I soaked them in biz and scratched them with my fingernail!

We got home and I put Syd out to pasture in the backyard, her favorite place. I started cooking dinner, homemade mac and cheese . I noticed that Syd was bringing flowers in that she was pulling off my plant so I went out to stop her. I cut my foot on a rusty nail. Ahhhh! I was slightly freaking out inside. One semester when I worked for USU Audio Visual I had to show slides every Tuesday to a communicable diseases class. I only remembered a little bit about tetanus, but I was pretty sure I was going to die. But dinner was cooking so I pulled the nail out of the wood and hobbled in on my bleeding foot. Then I remembered that Sydney had a chiropractor appointment in like 15 minutes. So I rinsed my foot off and put dinner in the fridge to cook later. Of course we have no band-aids so I had to use a cotton ball and scotch tape, that's right, scotch tape, I know, awesome. While I drove I tried calling the doctor to see if I should come and get a tetanus shot, but I could NOT get through. We went to the chiropractor (I am hoping it will help Syds chronic ear infections.) At this point Neil was trying to call the doctor but could not get through so I told him I was just going to drive to the doctors office and ask what I should do. They said I should get a tetanus shot and the receptionist whispered that I should just go to the health department so I wouldn't have to pay for a dr. visit etc. Whew. Of course, I drove by and they close at 4:30. The nurse had said I have a 2 day window before tetanus would set in. Lets hope.

Animal sounds

2011-03-31T20:40:00.000-07:00

First things first. Thanks Auntie Corinne for this cute outfit! Today was the perfect weather for it, plus I have not done the laundry and she was naked until I remembered it was in the closet! Coincidence? I think not;)

She loves to play in our new yard. Loves loves loves it! She wants to be out there all of the time. Woohoo! Also I cut her bangs and layered her hair a little bit. Neil said "try to not make her look too Dumb and Dumber" oops, sorry honey. It will grow.

Checking out the little flower/veggie garden. I planted some flowers around the veggies, we'll see how they grow.
Okay you guys. Our baby is a freaking genius. Well, maybe not. But this morning she brought me this book and I read it and said "what does the goat say?" She said "Baa baa". I almost died. Then I cried. Then we practiced all day until Neil came home. Here it is for your viewing pleasure.

Hair

2011-03-31T07:59:00.000-07:00

Syd loves to bring me bows and flowers to put in her hair, this one cracked me up:)

She has pretty crazy hair when she wakes up!

The yard

2011-03-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

When we moved in no one had been living in our house for over a year. The yard was totally dead. Then it rained for 3 days straight before Christmas and we got weeds, lots and lots of weeds. It finally got to a point that I could not stand it anymore so I started pulling them out of the lawn. By the time I was done the yard was pretty much all dirt. We had tried to fertilize and water to see if the lawn had any hope. Nope. I am pretty sure at least half of the garbage can was full of weeds by the time I was done pulling them!

Sydney loved being outside and helping me:)

I love these little dimples she gets when she smiles!

Two Saturdays ago we rented a rototiller and Neil got to work! It made him feel pretty manly;)

Then something got stuck in one of the blades and he leaned down to check...
ahhhh! Just kidding, his face did not get caught in the rototiller. When we were returning it the handle somehow smacked him in the face, ouch! On the plus side, he felt even more manly after this injury! But sadly it is all healed now and didn't leave a cool scar or anything:(

After that we needed to get all of the big rocks out of the soil, there were soooo many! The Browns were visiting for Spring break so to give the kids an activity I told the kids that I would pay them 1 penny for each rock that they picked up. I wish I could have found my camera to take pictures! Emily picked up 900 Tyler picked up 300 and Eliza picked up 150. The rocks had to be a certain size to count, they really did a good job! We had a fun trip to the gas station to spend some of their money.

A week later we had sod delivered. Becky and Jeff were here and Jeff helped to put it in, thanks Jeff! It only took about an hour.

All done! I just love how green and pretty it looks:)

Here is my little garden of tomatoes and squash. I hope I didn't plant too late. They say to plant tomatoes on Valentines day and I was about a week and a half later. We'll see! I planted the squash seeds and one day went out to see that my seeds had grown! I almost cried. For real. I really did not know if they would grow, it was a faith building experience for me.

All done! I hope now we can keep it alive! Sydney went out yesterday and ran around on it and giggled the whole time:)

Sisters, sisters, there were never such devoted sisters...and a mom.

2011-03-11T13:00:00.000-08:00

On March 3rd our baby Rachel turned 25, to celebrate we all met in SLC for a fun weekend!

We stayed on the 16th (top) floor of the Marriott. It was fabulous!

View from our balcony, this is the Salt Palace.

Andrea's view from her deck chair.

After we checked into our hotel on Friday night we walked a block to Temple Square to eat at The Roof. Yum:)
Rachel decided she couldn't keep up with us in her stilettos

The beautiful birthday girl:) Our waitress brought this dessert over and then the pianist played happy birthday. Then she play 100 years by five for fighting and we all cried. Isn't crying with your sisters the best? :)

On Saturday morning Becky made us get up and exercise, it was awesome. I watched Selena whilst running on the elliptical. We got dressed and headed over to the Lion House Pantry to eat lunch. I love that place!

We saw Hairspray at the Hale Center Theatre in Orem. If you live nearby go see it! Totally worth it. The tickets are only like 12 dollars and it was so fun and so well done! We grew up going to plays at the Hale Center Theatre, so it will always have a special place in our hearts:)

After eating at Zupas with moms brother and sisters we decided to run into IKEA. We only had about 20 minutes to shop. This was Rachel's first time at IKEA, Rach, how is that possible?

I pretty much wanted to buy everything in the childrens section. I settle on some plastic dishes and some cute finger puppets. I can't wait to pull them out for church!

On Sunday morning we walked over to Temple Square. Rachel stayed at the hotel with a headache :(

We watched "Music and the Spoken Word". It was so so beautiful. If I lived downtown I would go every Sunday!

I love Temple Square!

Raise your hand if you have ever gone to the SLC Temple quarry with my mom. It really is a great place. Here is mom reminiscing about the good old days at the quarry:)

I love Jimmy Johns! And I loved Snelgroves, back when this building used to be a Snelgroves.

Favorite high school hangout:)

Rachel's first time ordering at our favorite high school hang out. Not moms first time with jazz hands.

After we ate lunch we went to see Grandma Wilkey. She was just waking up from a nap and getting ready for lunch. She sat up and visited with us. We asked how she was feeling she said "well I am okay except I am so nauseous. And I am NOT pregnant!" haha oh grandma. It was good to see her. Then we sang her some songs, it was so fun to sing with my sisters! Then we dropped Becky off, kissed the kiddies and drove home to St. George. Then I went and got Neil and Syd and drove to Las Vegas. Then we were FINALLY home.

It's all about the food.

2011-03-07T21:48:00.000-08:00

These little piggies went to Salt Lake.

So did these little piggies

Friday Night:

The Roof at Temple Square. Only buffet I have ever enjoyed.

This little piggy ate both of the above plates of dessert as well as 6 eclairs throughout the rest of the meal.

Saturday Afternoon:

Lion House Pantry. Who knew that eating in Brigham Young's basement could be so fun?

This little piggy worked down to two desserts, the blueberry pie and chocolate cake. Yum, at 1.50 each how could she not?

Saturday night:

Zupas. Only one dessert.

It looks fake. I assure you it is not. Mango creme brulee. Mmmmm

Sunday afternoon:

Cheese fries at The Training Table. No dessert.

Fries just taste better when you order them over the phone.

This little piggy cried whaaa whaaaa whaaaa all the way home.

Just kidding, she was happy to get back to her baby and Husband.

Stay tuned for more adventures from the best girls weekend ever!

Some pictures for the grandparents

2011-03-02T09:10:00.000-08:00

I don't really have anything funny or witty to say, just enjoy some pictures of your darling granddaughter.
This was kind of a weird shot but I like it because it really shows her eyes, er, eye. People always comment on how unusual they are. They are the exact same color as mine, so I never realized they were so different! haha

This is what she does if we ask "where is your mouth?"

She is suddenly getting a ton of teeth!

This is her favorite new face, she gives kisses and says "Muwah!"

Bye bye!

Mah na mah na.....

2011-02-28T21:46:00.000-08:00

Doo doo do do do

Spring is coming how do I know?

2011-02-22T20:54:00.000-08:00

The weather has been fabulous! We love to go outside and play on our very sad grass. Neil built me a little planter box so I can plant some tomatoes, yay!

After I took this picture I realized that the tree had blossoms! I guess I never go in the front door do I?

She loves to climb up the rocks and slide down on her belly. Poor child needs a slide:(

The sun feels so good on my back

Happy Spring!

You're all I need my love my Valentine.

2011-02-19T20:33:00.000-08:00

Sydney and I had a great Valentines Day.

aren't we lucky....

to have this guy for our Valentine?

Tutu cute

2011-02-09T17:34:00.000-08:00

Get it, because she is too too cute, but she is wearing a tutu? I kill myself.

Hi Aunt Julie! Thanks for the cute tutu, I love it! Here are some pictures of me wearing it:)

Love,
Syd J.

2011-02-07T13:11:00.000-08:00

Sydney loves her sunglasses and I think she looks so cute in them:)

I gave her a little haircut that sometimes makes her look like Justin Beiber. Yesterday she realllllly looked like him, today, not so much. Sorry Rachel.

She is really into oral hygiene

She loves to play with balls. Also she said some new words, ball, and dog. She attempted to make her first animal sound when she heard the neighbors dog barking! Now every time we see a dog she gets REALLY excited and says "Dog"! She is also getting very spiritual. She folded her arms and bowed her head for a prayer for the first time last week. For about 2 seconds. Sounds like she takes after her mom, haha.

Now, don't freak out, but I have done a few more crafty things in my house. I made these book holders. I bought some cardboard magazine holders from the Target dollar aisle and covered them in cute paper. Now I can put books that don't look so nice on my bookshelf in them:)

I made this felt rosette wreath for my front door

I am happy with how it turned out, except that the red clashes with my front door. Oh well.

Since my house looks like Christmas and Valentines pretty much all year round, I just had to add a few little things to really get festive.

This is the best. I have been teaching Sydney how to do a somersault. Enjoy!

Craigslist always comes through.

2011-01-30T19:16:00.000-08:00

We got a new table and chairs on Craigslist last night! We had been shopping at RC Willey earlier and found something we liked but could not afford, bummer:( Then when we got home Neil looked on Craigslist and there was almost he exact same set! It was fate. So I called and told the lady we would come and get it. We drove up to Summerlin (like 45 minutes away) and took the legs off and tied the table on top of the CRV, the chairs fit in the back, whew! We are pretty excited, it is perfect!

Lately Sydney has been making this face a lot it cracks us up!

I call this her "Bitter beer face"

I gave her bangs for church today, so cute:)

Here is what our finished bedroom looks like.

I got all sorts of crafty with these wall hangings.

The end.

Finally

2011-01-26T21:16:00.000-08:00

I have not blogged because I am having trouble with my computer, it is so irritating! I have TWO that's right, two bro-in-laws who are computer experts, I need to make some calls. Anyway. Some pictures of the house. But first you have to ooh and ahh over my baby. She is 15 months! I know. I can't believe it either. We went to the doctor for her check up. It turned out she had an ear infection, sad. I had no idea, she did not have a fever. She was cranky but she is cutting some molars so I thought that is what was up. Apparantly she does not say enough words. The doctor asked what words she says and I was like "hmmm shoot, not a lot" Mom, Daddy, hi." ... silence. She said that she should know 5-6 words and 20 by the time she is 18 months! Then I got home and remembered that she says baby, Uh oh and I swear that when I put her down to change her she says Poo poo. Maybe I should call the doctor. haha. Oh well, I am not too worried.

I looked over one morning and she was doing this, so funny:)
Then I was washing the dishes and she was being so quiet. I looked down and there she was sitting in the frying pan, playing with some spoons.

Nothing like a good Sunday nap

Waiting for the cookies to bake. Thank you Aunt Andrea for introducing her to cookies...

Albert Einstein

15 Months Old. All ready for church. She is all Neil's since I got called to teach the 5 year olds. He got called to be the Elders Quorum secretary.

She will not stand or sit still or smile for pictures. I hope it's a phase. Julie, look how cute the dress looks! I love it:)

Okay here is the house (I know, finally, but don't tell me you did not enjoy my child)

This is Syds little toy corner. She loves to bop up and down in front of the mirror.

Living Room Before

Living Room After

Kitchen Before

After

Why yes, that is a Gone With the Wind quote on my back door! I'll think about it tomorrow...oh Scarlett.

I sewed the curtains myself...I know.

Ta Da! I LOVE my house. We are so happy here:)