Christmas

This year we exchanged presents with my family the weekend before Christmas. Here are a few things that Izzy got.

She got a doctor kit from my brother and spent a good 20 minutes trying to doctor up her cousin Nathaniel. Boy was he a good sport. However, after about 15 minutes he was done and tried to get up and Izzy try to keep him laying down so she could look at his eyes.

She also got a doll house from my mother. After she unwrapped it she started to say something over and over again that we just couldn't understand. That was until she went and got the train Nathaniel got from Grandma and put it in her CHO CHO house.

Here is my girl on the Sunday before Christmas in her new dress. Don't you just love that smile.

Well, Court insisted that we make cookies this year. I was so tired, that we made the cookies one day and frosted them the next. But Izzy really seemed to enjoy decorating them. Probably because she ate more of the candies then what actually got on the cookies.

On to Christmas morning. She really enjoyed running up and down on her new big 6 foot piano she got from Mom and Dad. It is quite cool. It will play different instruments and you can also have it play songs by itself.

But her most favorite toy has to be her new vanity. She has hauled it into every room of the house to sit and play on it. Right now it is in Mom and Dad's bedroom right next to Mom's vanity. Hopefully we will get her new room together soon (Mikey has finished all the painting) so it has a permanent place to stay. Pictures to come as we get her settled in.

We had a really great Christmas week filled with family and friends. We hope you all had a great one as well.

It's snowing

Isabel's new favorite saying is it's snowing. Anytime she sees it snowing outside she goes and grabs her boots and asks to go outside. She loves this weather. Don't ask where she gets that from. I do love how beautiful it makes everything especially on days when I don't have anywhere to go but I really don't enjoy being out in the snow. It's so cold, makes you wet but worse of all it makes the roads so horrible to drive on.

However, Izzy doesn't seem to mind being out in it. In fact sometimes I have a hard time getting her to go in. Of course she also has to help anytime me or daddy are out shoveling. So this is her helping. "Izzy's shovel, i do it". Boy has she become independent.

Romance tag

Tagged!
Here's a gooey, romantic game of tag. Thanks Erin for Tagging me.

What is your husband's name? Court
How long have you guys been married? 3 years
How long did you date? 6 months (yep that fast)
How old is he? 25 - much younger then me.
Who is taller? Him of course
Who can sing the best? Neither one of us can
Who is smarter? Probably him
Who pays the bills? Me
Who does the laundry? Me
Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Him
Who mows the lawn? Court
Who cooks dinner? Mostly me
Who is the first to admit when they're wrong? Mostly me, he doesn't mind the silence and it bugs me so I apologize first just to get out of the silent treatment.
Who kissed who first? He kissed me
Who wears the pants? Both of us. It depends on who is more passionate about the issue and if it really matters.

It's beginning to feel like Christmas

Every year I normally get all the Christmas stuff up the day after Thanksgiving. But this year with Isabel's birthday, my family in town for the weekend and being pregnant we just got the tree up this week. It never quite seems like the holidays until I get my tree up. I still have all the other decorations including my village to put out. I don't think we will get to the outside decorated but oh well. Isabel is really getting into the season as she yells Santa anytime she sees anything that even remotely resembles a Santa.

Isabel really liked decorating the tree. She had one favorite place on the tree to put all her ornaments. However, she got tired after about 15 minutes and spent the rest of the evening trying to get a Santa hat to stay on the dog.

Here is the completed project. I am just glad that it is finally done. I forgot how much work it is to get it out of storage, unpacked, put together, fanned out and then get the large number ornaments on the tree. I guess we should have gotten a smaller tree then this 9 foot one but any other just won't have looked right in our foyer with the huge ceilings.

My baby girl in her gingerbread dress.

Izzy's second birthday

Wow I can't believe my little girl is two. It feels like just yesterday we brought her home from the hospital. And yet I feel like she has been with us forever. She has a way of making me forget all my worries and just be grateful to be a mom. I love how she gets so excited about the smallest things: reading a book, drinking juice or just getting to cuddle with mom on the couch. She loves to dance to whatever music is on the radio. And she will talk your head off if you let her, yet she can be extremely shy too. She truly is my joy.

Here is a picture of the cake Mikey made. He did such an amazing job don't you think? Since Izzy's birthday landed on Thanksgiving this year we just had family over for cake and ice cream on Friday night.

My birthday girl! We love ya Izzy.

Blue, red and neigh

We have been talking to Izzy about her birthday that is coming up on Thursday and she is way excited. Even though I am sure she doesn't quite understand what it all means she still goes around talking about her birf day. She tells you she will be two while holding up all 5 fingers of course. It is really hard to put up only two fingers you know. Anyways we have been asking what she wants on her cake and her response is blue, red and neigh (meaning horses). In fact, today she was telling grandma about blue, red and neighs. She just forgot to mention the cake part. So there you go aren't you excited to see how it all turns out. Me too. Good luck with that one Mikey.

Isabel's halloween

I figured I had better get pictures from Halloween up on the blog. In fact, earlier this week Izzy was sitting on my lap as I was checking out my email and I decided to go to my blog and show her pictures that were posted. As we got to the bottom of the last entry (the picture of Court and I dressed up) she kept asking Izzy? Where Izzy? So I guess that was her way of telling me I left her off.


Here is my little Belle. She absolutely loved the crown. In fact that is how I got her to sit still so I could curl a few of her locks. I just told her that she had to sit still so I could get her crown to stay on her hair.

The dress of course is a Mikey original. I keep telling myself that I should really just sit down, get to know my sewing machine, and sew something really cute for my daughter. But want is the use Izzy has Uncle Mikey wrapped around her little finger. Besides he does an amazing job, I am afraid of what any creation of mine with a sewing machine might look like.

This is the three of us at the ward "truck or treat". At first Izzy was a bit shy to go up to people but as she realized that she got candy she got over her nerves quickly.

Here is the little one again. This time posing for the camera at Grandma and Grandpas. She is such a model.

After a long day of dressing up and eating candy. The picture looks as if she is on a sugar high but I think it was more out of exhaustion.

Our Annual Halloween Party

We had our annual Halloween Party a couple of weeks ago. I would have had pictures up sooner but for some reason I have a hard time uploading pictures to blogger from my computer. So I have to do it through Court's laptop. And then it loads pictures backwards. Crazy I tell you.

Here was the treat bar. This is one of my favorite things about the party. I love trying new recipes and of course I have a large group of people to try them out on.

Here are some pictures of our regulars (too many pictures to upload them all). I love to see what everyone comes as.

My friend Jess who came as the witch who got hurt falling off of her broom.

Our close friends who love dressing up as much as we do. Supergirl and Superman. Thanks Erin and Brian for dressing up and acting like kids with us.

Stacia and Tim who we are just glad are willing to come even though they aren't really into dressing up.

Emily and Devin. This was Devin's first year and he was a good sport.

Mikey and Brooke (aka Mr and Mrs Santa) our co-hosts. Who were wonderful this year and did much of the planning and hosting. I was feeling all that great up to the party so it was nice to know they were to help out so much.

And us. We are the candlestick and feather duster from Beauty and the Beast if you can't tell. (Isabel went as Belle but you will see those pictures later.) Thanks to all those who came; we had a fun time.

Tag - 8 things

Rachel tagged me. Here goes

8 TV shows that I love to watch (in no particular order)

1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Brothers & Sisters
3. NCIS
4. Numbers
5. The View
6. Cartoons with Izzy
7. Food Network Challenge (the ones where they make cakes into characters)
8. Frasier (Court is addicted and we have to watch the reruns on tv before bed)

8 Favorite Restaurants

1. Red Robin
2. El Matador
3. The Roof
4. Johnny Carinos
5. Wingers
6. Iceburg - for their health shakes of course
7. Cafe Rio
8. Yamasaki

8 things that happened yesterday

1. checked email & blog
2. cleaned up the family room
3. went to the temple with the young women
4. cleaned out my car
5. vacuumed it too
6. about 7 loads of laundry
7. hung out with Izzy
8. Court brought me home dinner so I didn't have to cook. (hooray)

8 things on my wish list

1. new couch for upstairs
2. a maid
3. new computer (can you say sloooooooow)
4. start on my christmas lists
5. getting my house organized
6. date night with my hubby
7. more energy to get more done
8. To finally get over this cold

8 things that I am looking forward to

1. Halloween
2. getting family pictures this year
3. Isabel turning 2
4. day after Thanksgiving shopping
5. going away with Court for a weekend before the baby is born
6. our new addition to the family
7. shopping for the baby
8. seeing the amazing job Mikey is going to do in Izzy's new room

I tag

1. Mikey
2. Erin
3. Jessica
4. Guiver
5. Heather O
6. Michelle
7. And anyone else who hasn't been tagged.

Enjoy!

Em's wedding

Court's sister Emily got married two weeks. Boy I can't believe how fast time flies by. She was of course a beautiful bride. The whole day was wonderful. Devin, welcome to the family.

Here is a picture of Emily and Izzy taken before the reception. Isabel sure loves her aunt.

Note: Sorry Em, that I didn't get any other pictures then these. I couldn't find my camera the morning of the wedding. (See what happens when you hide the camera from a toddler, you get so good at it, you can't find it either.) And then we were so busy chasing after Izzy during the reception, I totally forgot about the camera the rest of the night. Oh, well.

Congratulations. We love ya.

Excuse me?

At 20 weeks we went for the normal ultrasound and the technician (who was new and I had never seen before) told us she was pretty sure we were having a girl. I was unsure because it was difficult to tell but Court even felt confident.

Yesterday we went in for another ultrasound (number 5). They wanted to get a closer look at the baby's heartbeat because last time they were unable to get a good look because of the way it was laying.

Here are a couple of pictures (they didn't give me any last time - I am not so sure about that technician for more then one reason).

Here is the picture of the face. The funny thing is that it looks almost identical to the one that was taken of Izzy at her 20 week ultrasound.

Yup!, you guessed it we are really having a boy. Ok so the technician (the one we normally get and love) put this picture up on the screen and asked if we wanted to know the gender. I looked at it and said that is a boy right? It was so noticeable that even I couldn't miss it. I was speechless. Here we were planning for a girl even had a name picked out and everything.

Court was excited from the first moment. And I am coming around. It isn't that I didn't want a boy I just had so many plans (and much clothing) for another girl. Darn - I guess I will have to go shopping. Most importantly the baby is doing great and is very healthy. HOORAY!

San Diego

Disclaimer: Since it has been a while this will be a long post.

Well has been almost a month since we went on our trip to San Diego. We had so much fun. We arrived on a Monday afternoon so our first stop off was to see the ocean of course.

Izzy loves the water and so this was a huge hit. I am sure we could have stayed all day at the beach. She loved to feel the sand between her toes. And she made it a game to run away from the waves.

It took much effort on Court and my behalf to make sure she didn't actually go swimming on us. However she was still soaked from the waist down.

Day 2:Tuesday morning it was off to Sea World. This is a favorite of Court's family so I think he was more excited then all of us.

We purchased tickets to have breakfast with Shamu and that is probably the smartest thing we could have done. As you can see from the picture our table was right in front of the pool. And the trainers worked with the whale the whole time we ate. It was amazing to see this creature so close up.

I don't think Isabel ate much at breakfast. Izzy spent the whole breakfast either watching the whale or trying to take pictures. You can't tell but she held the camera backwards so I am sure we have many pictures of just her eye.

After spending most of the day at the shows it was off to see the Budweiser horses. Isabel's favorite animal is a horse so she was so excited to be up close and personal with it. It was a struggle to get her to leave that day.

Day 3: It was off to the animal kingdom park. I wasn't that impressed with it. The idea is quite exciting to see animals in their on habitat but unless you had quite a bit of money to burn to go on the outback safari rides you only got to see the animals at a distance. However, the one shining part of the day was their petting zoo. Which Isabel really enjoyed.

Day 4: Off to Legoland. Once again Court was like a kid in a candy store. He spent much of Izzy's nap video taping all the cool things made out of legos. I was very impressed with the complete cities that they created.

Here is one of many pictures of court and Izzy on a ride. It was the first time Izzy had ever been on anything over then a carousel, so I was worried that she might be a bit scared. But she loved it. She pulled Court to all the plane and helicopter ones she could find. And that she was tall enough for.

Legoland has this cool water park area where the kids can just run around getting wet from all the foundations, waterfalls and slides. Izzy really seem to enjoy running around with some of the other kids her age.


This a picture of Izzy one night after a long day at one of the parks (not sure which one). I had just barely put on her pj's and got up to get something and came back to find this. I guess we wore her out.

Day 5: We flew home. It was a great trip and we all really enjoyed ourselves.

Has it been a month?

Sorry that I have been missing in action. This last month as been crazy with vacation and getting ready for Court's sister wedding. Which is tomorrow, hooray! Of course all this means, I have much to blog about and many pictures to share. Now I just have to get my computer to cooperate. Stay tune, as I hope to update this weekend.

Quirks

The Rules:-Link the Person who Tagged you-Mention rules on your blog-Tell about 6 quirks of yours-Tag 6 fellow bloggers to do the same-Leave a comment to let them know. Pay attention, as your name could be at the bottom of this post!!!

Okay, I have been tagged by Michele. So on for the fun.

1. I love a clean kitchen. The rest of the house could be a mess and I still feel like I am doing ok if the kitchen is clean. I am really not sure why but I just know that my day goes so much smoother if everything is where it is suppose to be.

2. Ok I have to say it. I am a planner. I hate to wait until the last minute to plan things. I am rather horrible at being spontaneous. For example, a girls night out I can't just plan the date I also need to know what we are doing. I drive many friends crazy with this quirk. Even Court has a hard time planning surprises because I sit and guess until I get it right. It drives me crazy not knowing what we are doing.

3. I absolutely hate the color pink. As many can attest to. I won't wear or decorate with any shade. The weird think is that since I have had izzy I am being to tolerate it. I still don't like it but when everyone calls your little girl a boy even in purple you kind of give in and allow her to wear pink. It actually looks cute on her.

4. I love the TV. Not necessarily for the content but just the background noise. Growing up I had to study with the tv on to drown out my brothers in the other room. To this day I still have it on as I am cleaning, doing laundry etc. However, over the last year I have tried to make more of an effort to not have it on around Izzy as much. So on to the radio but it just isn't the same.

5. Whether or not I am, I eat like I am pregnant all the time. Court says I eat the weirdest combinations of foods. I have even tried pickles and ice cream. It isn't that bad actually. And I have cravings quite frequently. In fact I have them more often when I am not pregnant then when I actually am. In addition, I love fry sauce, and not just on fries. It is great on burritos, chicken nuggets, hamburgers, etc. Crazy I know.

6. I love finding good deals on things. Whether it is getting it on sale, using a ton of coupons or purchasing it 2nd hand, I love to know that I got a good deal.

Ok how I do. Do you think I missed one? Let me know in my comments.

I tag Mikey, Jessica, Rachel D, Erin, Guiver and Greta.

News

As you can probably tell from the countdown, Court and I are expecting another baby. We are very excited. Here are a few answers to the many questions I have gotten:

1. I just entered my second trimester. Which puts the baby due sometime toward the middle of February.
2. There is only one! This was confirmed in an ultrasound as the tech spent an extra amount of time making sure there wasn't twins.
3. The baby is doing great. We have had three ultrasounds and all of them have been normal. Hooray.
4. I have been quite sick but things seem to be improving as I get farther into my pregnancy.
5. We should find out the gender of the baby sometime around the first of October.
6. We have taught Isabel to point to Mommy's stomach when asked where the baby is. She has also informed us that we are not having a boy or a girl. In fact the last time she was asked Izzy said we were having an elephant. Won't that go down in the record books.
7. Courty of course wants a boy but would also love a little girl. I don't really have a preference although it would be nice for Izzy to have a sister. At this point we just want a happy healthy baby.

My big girl

We have quite a few changes at our house the last 3 weeks. We first started off by giving up the binky. We sat her down and told her that as a big girl she didn't need the bink anymore and that we were going to throw it away. She was actually the one that throw it in the garbage can. She asked for three times and that was it. Sure she was the one that had to give it up but in some cases it has been hard for me then her. Although she mostly only used it at nap time, I would give it to her to calm her down if she got upset or was hurt. But over all I think she transitioned very well quite quickly.

Then it was on to the bed. She started climbing on everything including the crib. Although she never climbed out I caught her several times trying to shimmy her way up the bars. So we decided it was time to change out the crib for a toddler bed.

We purchased this second hand one for $20.00. (I love a bargain). Of course it needed a coat of paint.

And I thought it would be fun to have Izzy help. It was only a matter of minutes before she had it in her hair.


The finished project. Doesn't she look cute in it? It looks so great in the room. Izzy has really taken a shine to it. We have had to take the last week or so to teach her not to get out of bed after we put her in it. But she had handled it so well. It amazes me how well children really do adjust to change. I really need to learn that from her.

My Young Women

As you know I serve in the Young Women's with the MiaMaids. What an awesome calling. On Tuesday we had a leadership training for them. So we decided to kidnap them from their beds. I was in charge of picking up the MiaMaids. Of course the thought came to me what a great camera moment. So here are the pictures from that adventure.

Stephanie was the first to be woken up. She was way out of it as she thought I was her aunt. She pulled the covers up and over her head. Once she heard that we had others to kidnap she bolted out of bed and was ready to go in record time.

Then it was Makayla's turn. What a sweetie. I actually took this picture as we were trying to wake her up. I guess calling her by name wasn't enough she need to the flash from the camera.

Last but not least was Maria. As we opened her door to wake her up so she yelled for us to shut the door. So I didn't get a picture of her in bed. But this was when she came to the door to see who we were and what we wanted.

Ok, so this is the girls as we arrived at Rachel's house for breakfast. Much more awake and alert. The day was fun, and the food yummy.

Note: Those of you who are in the ward might notice we are missing a girl. Teagan was at EFY. We missed you girl!

The 4th of July

Ok, I know that I am a bit behind. Things have been so busy this month. Don't you just love the summer months?


This is Izzy eating her blueberry muffin sitting out for the Murray parade. Don't you just love the face?

Izzy was bored waiting for the parade to start so she decide to start her own. This is her running down State Street waving her flag at all the people on the sidelines. Where she gets all her energy I will never know.

That evening my mother came into town and we had a BBQ. Later we watched the fireworks from Murray High football stands. We just love living so close to the park. So we can see parade and the fireworks but don't have to deal with all the traffic getting home.

My sports girl

For those who have no idea Court is a sports nut. How you could not know that I am not sure. But anyways, one of his favorite things to do is dress izzy up in sports stuff. We have an agreement that he can dress her in whatever he wants (as long as there isn't anything special that day) on Saturday. Then I have make sure she has a bow or ponytail to make sure everyone knows she is a girl.

So this is what he bought her when he went to Denver last month for Fan Fair. In fact he got all of us matching jerseys. Izzy loves to dress up like her Dad.

Look at that smile on her face. She had us put that jersey on her like 5 times that day. And of course she had to get a hat to match her dad. Getting her to let me take it off for meals and bedtime was another story.

Well, the NBA draft was last week. And of course Izzy has to be dressed accordingly to watch it with Court. This is a Phoenix suns cheer leading outfit. I guess he couldn't find a jazz one. Don't feel bad for her she loves to dress up and watch sports with her dad.

I couldn't get her to stand still to get her picture taken. All she did was want to run around and dance. I guess she is getting into character.