One Fine Day

Wow it is the last day of July! Already! Marlee is 6 months and Allie is close to being 3, such a big girl. Yesterday she said, "When I get bigger after my birthday then I can get big hands and arms like you and daddy, huh." She says some pretty funny stuff, but you really can't deny her logic ever. Here is a picture of the girls in their "little sister, big sister" shirts. Not very good smilers today, are we?

We just had ourselves a fun day, while Brad was busy at work trying to save his spot in a competition, mom and the girls went out. We met Grandma Bonnie and the girls for some fun shopping!

First we went to Gardener Village in Salt Lake. We checked out the quilt store and furniture store and of course all the "princess stores". We had a sandwich and cookie at the Bakery, and then took some pictures:

Mom and Allie went to all the princess stores.

Grandma and Chelsy on the porch.

Mom with Marlee this time, she is such a good baby to let us drag her all over today.

All the sisters, hey, we're all girls!!

Aunt Britt with Mars.

Next we went to Taffy Town! It is the factory but they just have a movie on that shows how they make it, they don't do tours. But they do have a little store and so we got a sample of taffy, you think 2 pounds is enough?

Mom's family had a meeting this weekend for a Wool Growers meeting in Park City. So next we went to Park City for a little pre-meeting shopping. The factory stores are always an all-day affair. But we didn't go to all of the stores. Just went to a few stores and then Allie wanted to go on the Merry-Go-Round. How can I really say no when she says, "Pretty Please??" and the puppy dog eyes:

So she got on the Merry-Go-Round. Aunt Kytie and Aunt Brittany wanted to get on too. Okay, aren't you a little too big?

And then Allie Bear had to ride in the car next. She looks great in that!

We had a pretty great day although Daddy didn't win his trip to New York. We feel bad because of all of the stress that he had and it was his dream trip to go on to see the Yankees play. He does a great job at his work and it was just a lot of pressure to put on him all at once.

Brad has a birthday coming up next week, we've got some planning to do........

Pink Cowgirl

Allie got some pink boots and hat. She loves them! She was singing all the way home from the store "I love my boots, and my hat" Now she is a real cowgirl and she will be all ready for the fair! Grandma Bonnie and Chelsy got them for her on Saturday while I was finishing painting at their house. My family had a flood in their basement so I volunteered to do all of the painting. I think I have a lot of patience for it. I painted our other 2 houses pretty much by myself and I really like to do it.

Here is Marlee eating some cereal, she really loves it. She wasn't so sure about it for a while but now I mix a little squash or sweet potatoes in it and she loves it. She hates it when its all gone. She is doing great at opening her mouth and dealing with the spoon now. It takes a little bit for babies to learn that it isn't a nipple or bottle. But she is doing great!

If I or anyone tries to hold her while eating it is a disaster though. Marlee tries to grab at everything and holds her mouth open like you are going to put the spoon to her mouth instead of yours. Popsicles is the worst! Yesterday I was eating a creamie and she was getting so mad at me so I let her try it a little and she grabbed the whole thing on the sides like it was her bottle and put it in her mouth! She didn't get hardly any because it was so cold but she really wanted to.

And of course she gets it all over her face:

I love my girls.

Kayli

Marry Me Today

I came across this picture the other day, it is absolutely one of my favorite! Let me explain:

Brad and I officially met at church. We grew up in the same ward pretty much all of my life. We went to different schools, and he is 4 years older, so we didn't really know each other. When he returned home from his mission in 2002 he was my sunday school teacher when I was 17. (thanks Bishop)


It was Christmas Day of 2002. In the late morning Brad came to my house and gave me a present, a framed tile picture of the Savior. I had taken him brownies the night before because he was going to have surgery the day after Christmas. We invited him in for a bit and my sisters wanted to show off what they had got in their presents. One of my sisters got a karaoke machine/music player. My sisters wanted to perform a song and dance that we had coreographed. It was to an Avril Lavigne song called "Things I'll Never Say". Its the 3rd song on my playlist if you want to skip to it and hear it. The part that goes "if I could say what I want to see, I want to see you go down on one knee, Marry Me Tody..." We all knelt down on one knee and sang, "Marry Me Today!" (And by the look on his face he was okay with that.)





I love that we got that picture, and I'm so thankful to whoever took it, it means a lot to me.



It seems like so long ago when Brad and I first got together, I don't really even know those people anymore. It has been almost 5 years married and 6 1/2 since we started dating.
We have changed a lot and grew up a lot together but we are still so happy and in love. Our love is stronger I think and we have a great family now.

Kayli

Stop Growing Please

Marlee Alice. I feel like we waited a long time for this baby. All of the stressing about getting pregnant and it finally happened after a year of trying and paying all of the extra maternity insurance. I was worried to, that it would ruin my relationship with Allie when I had a second child. But it was actually the coolest experience and feeling ever. I love the feeling you have when you know that you have two healthy beautiful children and you love them both so unexplainably much.

I know everyone feels differently about what is their favorite stage of a baby. I love love love the newborn stage. I enjoy it so much, I wish I could always go back to those moments and just pause. . . I wish time could stand still for those best times of your life. The best times of my life is when I have a newborn baby.

She is growing up so fast, she is almost 6 months old now. It seems like it is going twice as fast this time around.

She is already learning so much. I can tell that her brain is drinking it all in, in the way that she looks at things and touches things and the way she expresses herself.

It is such a joy to be a parent I can't even really explain it, I seriously get butterflies all day long thinking about them and looking at them and seeing what they do and say. I enjoy every second of the day with Allie and Marlee and I can't believe how fast it goes.



Kayli

Great Parenting

We went to Chili's tonight for the 3 courses for 20 bucks. These type of deals are our favorite although it really isnt good for my diet right now. Our girls are very well behaved at restaurants. Allie loves to color the kids menus, and Marlee usually sleeps or just looks around as she sits in her carseat.

This time I brought a bottle for Mars but I forgot her binkie. Now that she drinks bottles she really likes her binkie so this really was a problem. I gave her a little bottle and she finished it off and looked like she really needed the binkie. Then she started grunting and turning her head side to side like she does when she is tired. So brilliant me I handed her one of those cardboard coasters that they have on the tables. 'That will keep her entertained' I thought to myself.

Brad and I were 'engrossed in deep conversation' and the chips and dip that we ordered for our appetizer. Brad was sitting across from me aside Allie, and Marlee was beside me on the bench seats. So a few minutes went by before I looked at Mars again but when I did, I was shocked. I don't know why neither of us was watching her or how she did this with no teeth but here it is:

I immediately tried to finger out any peices still in her mouth that she might be choking on, but there was nothing in there. She had swallowed all of the peices she managed to gum off of there. Wow I can't believe it. Brad and I both said, "We are bad parents."

But Marlee was alright and these were her thoughts:

Brad sometimes eats paper when he has an upset stomach because he thinks it settles it. So maybe thats what she was thinking. Well I think she is going to have some interesting diapers tomorrow.

Meanwhile Alaina keeps asking when they are going to bring the Chocolate Volcano Cake, she asked it even before we ordered our food. Secretly I was thinking the same thing. But I guess the American thing is to eat your dinner first. So of course we saved room and I think it was the best part of the night. I should of took the rest home that we didn't finish but I can still think about it, mmmmmmmmmmm..

July 9th Outing

Thursday July 9th we had a family outing! It was our whole family and Curtis, Jackie, Cassie and Colton. Everyone took the day off of work or had the day off so we could do a few things in Salt Lake.
Allie has been wanting to go to the temple. Whenever she sees Brad and I's wedding pictures she talks about the temple and my pretty white dress and dad was a prince. She says that the temple is where you go to see Jesus and get married. She also says that when mom and dad got married she was there watching. I'm sure that she was, her and Marlee and maybe our other kids were there cheering us on from heaven. I love the things that kids say. They are so much closer to the veil and the spirit than us so I love to ask her questions like how many more kids are we going to have and if she knew Grandma Alice.







So we went to the new Temple's open house. She says she saw Jesus there because there were lots of pictures of him. We all loved the chandeliers and the windows and all of the decoration. The granite on the outside came from China and everything the Temple is made of is of the best quality. Of course because it is Heavenly Father's house. It was a really neat experience and we are so blessed that we can walk through the Temple and to have Temples that are so close to home.

Our next stop was The Cheesecake Factory! It was really yummy food and a lot of selection. I like to go for the Tex Mex eggrolls and of course the Cheesecake. This is an experience everyone should have. Brad and I have been so privledged to have had the experience about 4 or 5 times. We have gone there for 2 of our anniversaries and went twice when I lived in Arizona. And since we were in the neighborhood...

Then, the original reason that Jackie and I planned this outing, The Living Planet Aquarium! It was so cool! They had a lot of exibits and I think we got lucky that they had extra displays out while we were there. You walk down the hallways and I swear we spent 5 minutes looking at every glass case. Sometimes you couldn't see the animal for a while because you didn't really know what you were looking for at first. Brad and I stared at some rock display for a while then all the sudden we were like- WOW, theres some eyes! There were these fish that looked just like the rocks or coral or whatever its called! It was really cool seeing some things in real life that Allie watches on Go Diego Go.

Some of the coolest things we looked at were: The giant pacific octopus:

Allie really liked watching the SHARK! It was a white-tip reef shark:


The green Anaconda! Wow I can't believe how many poisinous and deadly things that they had there- who had to catch all these things?

There was also a Caiman- a small alligator, a red pirahna, frogs including a poisinous yellow frog, spiders, turtles, stingrays, jellyfish, seahorse, and really cool starfish. It was really cool to see things that you never even knew existed.

The aquarium is in Sandy and I think it was so worth the 8 dollar admission. Allie really loved it and even Marlee's eyes got really big when she was looking at all the fish swimming around.



I couldn't find my camera before we left so I got these pictures off of the internet. I really wish I would have brought my camera.

July 4th weekend, Bear Lake

Friday night the girls and I went to the Logan fireworks. We left Brad home because he was still sick and had to work Saturday morning. At midnight we went to Bear Lake thankfully following Brads mom Jackie because I can only see deer if they are right in front of me.

We arrived at Uncle Terry's house at 10 minutes to 1:00, and my girls went right to bed and slept till almost 10. We went on a 4 mile walk then had lunch with Terry, Sandy, Carly, and Joanna Bingham and Grandma Jackie and us girls.

We tried to go to a sand castle competition at north beach but it was pretty lame, we just got to see half naked people and cigarette smoke blown at us. Uck! But there were about 3 sand creations that were cool- one being a giant octopus.

When we got back others had arrived and we went to the beach. Alaina's and Marlee's first experience with sand and the lake. Allie loved all the seashells! Meanwhile Brad was on his way and arrived around 8 for a barbeque at the house. Then the fireworks were good, a lot of people were doing them we didn't really know where the official Bear Lake one's were going to be for a while. Marlee fell asleep during them again and slept till 8:30! Wow another "10 hourer" I'm so happy! Breakfast was really good- it is the best place for waffles and bacon. Thank you to the cooks.

Terry, Brad, Cassie, Colton, Nate and Rindy went on a "rhino" ride while Great Grandma and Allie watched Toy Story and Marlee and I napped. When the movie was over Allie was worried because the house was empty and "all the people are gone!, Grandma Jackie is LOST!!!". Jackie went on a walk again-she is so good.

After a lunch of sandwiches and salads everyone went to the beach. Brad has been really in to snorkeling lately-so he found a snorkel at the house to use. He feels like he swims a lot better when he can breathe and see where he's going.

We rented a floating trampoline for an hour but it was really awkward and didn't really work. I jumped off one time on the wrong side and hit my foot on the ladder coming down. Ouch! It felt like maybe it was broken but I didn't want to look at it for fear it would hurt worse. It didn't hurt right at first too bad.

When we got done on the trampoline, they started burying people in the sand. Here is Cassie the mermaid.

And Brad buryied up to his head.

I tried to have a really cute photo op, but it just turned out kind of weird.

We had a really good time and I love going up there now. The girls had a lot of fun and Marlee loved having everyone hold her all the time. Well that sums it all up. We packed up and cleaned up after the beach and had a 2 hour drive home and went to bed!

Our New Jogging Stroller

Here I am! I've started a blog, I thought I would never do it. I am just in time for the 4th of July, hence my appropriate layout. I guess I should start with the newest thing in our family. We have a new addition. It is a double jogging stroller! I love that it's pink! It is the smoothest ride for the girls and they love sitting by each other. Allie will be calling it our "brand new stroller" for a long time I'm sure, as she does everything else. She was the most excited about it when we got it, she wanted to help put it together and she kept giggling and then she said, "Wow mom, we are going to LOVE it!" I'm so happy about it, it wasn't too expensive (as far as these type of strollers go) and it has a lot of features and it will fit through doorways. Well I guess I've got to use it a lot and make the purchase worthwhile!