Girls TRIP!

This last weekend I had the chance to go to Vegas with a group of my girlfriends! This was my first time leaving both Jason and the kids......and lets just say Jason got a little taste of what its like to be a "stay at home mom"! Jason knew that my job wasn't easy, but I don't think he was prepared for what he was getting himself into, but I must say, he did a dang good job....we also has some wonderful help from my parents, Jason still needed to work, so they stepped in and took over for a couple days as well. So thank you! So, last Thursday, me and my girlfriends headed to vegas, we had the time of our life staying up till the wee hours laughing and talking, going shopping and eating all that yummy food vegas has to offer! But I do admit after 3 nights and 4 days I missed my hubby and kids terribly, but this was a much needed trip for me, life gets so hectic with taking care of kids, making sure the house is clean and running the house that I sometimes forget to do things for myself, so thank you Jason for letting me take this time to hang out with my girls, go shopping and just relax for a few days!

5 1/2 years ago me rose and amber were standing right here....we had to do it again for old times sake.

Crystal, Rosie and Nicole at breakfast just before heading home

our whole crew of girls!

me, Nicole and Becky

the girls at the coke factory

me and Rosie

Our first night we stayed at the Planet Hollywood....this was our view, how perfect!

Well, another month has passed, and cute little Brielle is now 6 Months. And boy has it been a busy and fun month for her, she is now loving her baby food and rice cereal, and today I tried the little gerber bitter biscuits and she LOVED it, she just chowed down on it! She has become more and more vocal, she loves to say ba ba ba, and on occasion I hear ma ma, and she loves to squeal at us and giggle at her silly big brother who she just adores! We still have our good night and our bad night as far as sleeping, but thankfully we have more good ones lately. We took her to her 6 month check up today and this little girl is growing like crazy, as they were taking her measurments they kept double checking and going back to make sure what they had were right, as of today our little peanut weighs 17 lbs 9 oz(79th percentile) and is 28 inches long(98th percentile), I was shocked! Her doctor was very pleased with how she is growing and she is progressing very well.

mmmmm....so good!

and here she is after her bath after her nice little snack....once again making faces at me!

nope, i'm not gonna smile for you mom!

Brielle absolutely loves Daniel, and for the most part I think Daniel feels that same way about her.

I tried and tried to get a picture of her smiling, and this is what happened, her funny faces, she did everything but smile, she blew bubbles at me, squinted her eyes, and well I give up, here Brielle is almost 6 months and I have maybe a handful of pictures of her smiling at me, she is a very smiley baby, but for some reason when she sees the flash or the camera she goes stiff......oh well, what do you do.

As I was getting ready to try and take a picture of the two of them, Daniel had a better idea, and as you can tell by Brielle's face she wasn't to thrilled with it.

Is he cute or what!

another attempt to get her to smile, and this is what she gave me.

Not much

Well, this week has been pretty much your typical week in January, not much going on, and well, not really much to blog about. Daniel went back to pre-school this week, and Jason started school as well again. We have been spending the week inside where its warm. I have been really terrible at taking pictures of the kids this week, but I blame this nasty cold I have for that. One thing we did find out though is Daniel has to get tubes in his ears and possibly his adenoids out, they won't know for sure until they go to put the tubes in about his adenoids, but the Doctor said he had quite a bit of fluid in his ears, and that could possibly be delaying his talking, so I'm crossing my fingers that this will help. He goes in on the 26th of this month, so we'll keep you all updated. So here are the couple pictures I took this week, I promise I'll do better next week!

I just love this boy....I could be having the worse day ever and the minute I see him with his huge grin and laughing I can't help but forget whatever is bugging me and smile.
what is it about mom and dads bed......she sleeps fairly well in her own, but the minute we put her down in ours she is out, and I mean sound asleep, there is no waking this girl up.

Playtime

Brielle has become very sturdy sitting, she is now able to play with toys and reach for things out of reach without falling. I can't believe how fast she is growing!

I thought this was just to cute....I put Brielle down on her tummy while I got Daniel ready for bed, and after I was done I went to put his dirty clothes in the hamper and clean up a bit, and when I came back out I found this! Daniel on his belly with baby sister and sharing his book with her. Lately they have really been interacting and I'm just loving it, and boy does Brielle just adore Daniel, she just looks at him and smiles and coo's and just laughs at him. And of course by her doing this, Daniel in return become very entertaining for her.

Happy New Year!

New Years was very low key for us this year, but at the same time it was so much fun....my parents were kind enough to take the kids for the night and Jason and I enjoyed a nice night out. I was in no mood to be outside in the freezing cold, so we decided on dinner and a movie.....I know, probably not what you imagine doing on New Years, but considering we have a toddler and a infant, we really don't get out to very many movies, and well....dinner is always adventure with these two, so it was nice to have one on one time with Jason. Plus the added bonus....staying up and being able to sleep in uninterrupted. So thanks mom and dad for taking our little ones so we could enjoy a nice night out! Happy 2009 to everyone!

Every Year I make New Years Resolutions, and every year they get left undone, or I do it for about a month and then well....it somehow just gets forgotten, so instead this year I have decided that I'm not going to make any New Years Resolutions in hope that maybe I can stick to the things I should be doing anyways, and the things I have already started and hope by some miracle I can actually stick to it and continue it all year. So I guess it is a New Years Resolution, I'm just in denial about it because I don't want to once again have a resolution that I don't stick to. I guess its worth a try...Right? So here is to a happy and healthy New Year!

A Shout out to Tracy and Alex!

I have to give a shout out to my sweet sister-in-law Tracy....she had her baby girl yesterday. Isn't she adorable! She delivered via c-section and little Sophie weighed 8 lbs 14 oz and she was 2 weeks early! Holy COW! And I thought little Brielle was big. So, congratulations Tracy and Alex, we love you and you are going to make an amazing mother! We can't wait to meet her!

INJURED

Its happened, we had our first injury with Daniel. On Friday afternoon I was going about my day, and as always Daniel loves to follow me around, and sometimes not knowing it I turn around and he's right there under my feet, but this time we were both caught off guard, Daniel was walking around like usual with all of his toys in his hands (I swear this kid needs 5 hands to carry everything around) but as I turned around I didn't notice he was right there and I don't know how it happened, but he just fell right over, but usually if this ever happens he gets right back up, but this time he just started to cry, and with him not talking I wasn't sure what exactly was wrong, was it his arm, his wrist, his leg, or his foot, so after going through every body part and trying to figure it out, we figured out it was his foot, but to me the fall didn't seem so bad, I just thought it maybe scared him, so after holding him and getting him to calm down I thought he would be okay, well that wasn't the case, and when your 3 year old just sits on the couch and watches an entire movie and doesn't budge you know something is up, so after a couple hours I tried to get him to walk on it, and he refused, he would just cry every time I stood him up, so thats when I decided we better be safe and take him in, by then the dr's office was closed, so we took him to the ER, after waiting forever and having some x-rays, we were relieved to hear it wasn't broken, he just sprained or twisted it. PHEW....what a relief, I was a little worrie because this was the foot he had surgery on earlier in the ear, and that foot is already weak. So we were sent home and told to keep him off it, and here I am thinking how on earth do you keep a 3 year old off there feet, well I guess he listened because the rest of the night he just lounged and cuddled with me, today he still wouldn't walk on it, he was crawling around with the injured foot in the air and his other leg dragging behind, but as the day went on, he seemed to be doing a little better, he would walk every once in awhile, but he was limping quite a bit, and you could tell he was still in quite a bit of pain. I'm just glad it wasn't anything serious, this was bad enough for me, I seriously just hate seeing my kids in pain, especially when I know I can't do anything about it. So for now we are spending the weekened in and trying to get this little guy better and walking!I was trying so hard to get a smile out of him, but he just wouldn't budge

finally, I got a half smile!

Christmas 2008

Although Christmas time is always chaotic and I feel like the days leading up to it I'm running around like a chicken with its head cut off, its always worth it when the day finally comes and things come together. We had such a great time opening presents with the kids as Brielle tried to eat all the wrapping paper, and Daniel going from toy to toy playing and be overwhelmed with excitement, and then sitting back with Jason as we reflect on this time of year, and having a overwhelming feeling of gratitude for all the blessings we have in our life, and how grateful we are to have such an amazing family and friends. We love you all and hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Christmas Eve

We had a great Christmas Eve, my parents came down to our house and we had a casual dinner, we watched The Santa Clause with the kids, and lounged around in our jammies. What more could you ask for?

our attempt to get a family picture.....I think I just have to face the fact that getting a good family picture just isn't going to happen with a 3 year old and 5 month old.

first attempt to get the two of them in front of the treewell....at least they are both sitting down now

Daniel took off, while Brielle was still in the same spot....oh isn't it nice when they can't move yet!

Merry Christmas!

5 Months!

I remember with Daniel I just couldn't wait for him to get older and to learn and start doing new things, but this time around I almost want to freeze time, because it is going way to fast. It seems every day Brielle is learning and doing something new, her latest trick is sitting up on her own. As she gets older her personality is really starting to show, and boy does she have a little attitude! I don't know how else to put it, but she is all girl, she is very particular with the way she is held, to the way you hold her bottle, or the way she holds her own bottle, and she loves to be held, but you have to be standing(honestly what is about infants that you can be walking with them holding them, and the minute you sit down they scream! I don't get it!), she also has this little squeal she does when she wants your attention, and boy is it loud and high pitch, there is no way I could ignore it, an I guess something we are also going to have to get use to is she is very sensitive, I can't even count how many times Daniel makes her cry, not because he's being mean or rough with her, he's just trying to play with her. But either way, we just adore her and yes....she has us wrapped around her little finger!
Everything still goes right to the mouth

She was getting so upset because she couldn't get the whole thing in her mouth.

just a little randomness

Bonding Time....I love these moments!

I love watching these two interact, she is completely entertained watching Daniel run around the house, and he loves giving her hugs and kisses! I can't wait until she's a little older and they can actually play together.

I just love the face she's giving me!

I put her in the middle of the floor to play while I cleaned up a little, and I come back in the room and she had rolled over to her saucer, either she was giving it kisses, or just like everything else, she was trying to put it in her mouth, needless to say its a little big for her mouth.

Almost! She is almost sitting, without the boppy she can sit for about 5-10 seconds, with the boppy she can stay sitting for a few minutes, she's getting stronger everyday!

Christmas Tag

(I have even started wrapping my presents! Not quite done yet, but I'm ahead of where I was last year at this time!)
Christmas Tag: I've been tagged by Niki

1. Egg nog or hot chocolate? Hot Chocolate all the way



2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? We have a little bit of both, the big presents that are hard to wrap get put under the tree unwrapped



3. Colored lights on a tree/house or white? our tree has white lights



4. Do I hang mistletoe? no



5. When do I put up my decorations? Usually the day after Thanksgiving, but I was anxious this year and we had our tree up the week before



6. What is my favorite holiday dish? the honey smoked ham on Christmas day, plus I love the tradition on the Carroll side where Jasons dad wakes up Christmas morning and makes a huge delicious breakfast for everyone, and boy does he go all out! YUMMY!



7. Favorite holiday memory as a child? I always looked forward to going to Grandma and Grandpa's house on Christmas Eve and spending time with all the cousins and family



8. When and how did I learn the truth about Santa? I actually don't remember how old I was, I just remember snooping one year and found a bunch of presents and then when I woke up Christmas morning my mom and dad tried to tell me they were from Santa, and thats when I realized it was really mom and dad!



9. Do we open a Christmas gift on Christmas Eve? Now we open one gift on Christmas Eve and then the rest Christmas morning, and growing up we always opened our gifts from Grandma and Grandpa Christmas Eve and the ones from mom and dad on Christmas morning.



10. How do I decorate our tree? This year I have red christmas balls with white bells and well I have yet to find a tree skirt I like, its pretty simple, but thats the way I like it



11. Can I ice skate? Yeah...I took lessons for awhile as a kid, but I haven't been in years



12. Can I remember my favorite gift? My Favorite gift growing up was when my parents got all of us our ski's and we had passes up at Park City, since being married my favorite gift is my anniversary band that jason got me to go with my ring.



13. What is the most important thing about he holidays for me?To remember the true meaning of Christmas, and spending time with Family.



14. What is my favorite holiday dessert? I'm pretty basic when it comes to desert, nothing beats warm brownies with vanilla ice cream, all the other christmas deserts I'm not really a fan of, so I stick to what I enjoy.



15. What is my favorite holiday tradition? i love going to Temple Square to see the lights



16. What tops my tree? nothing at the moment, our tree touches the sealing, so there isn't any room to put anything on top



17. What do I prefer - Giving or receiving? giving!



18. What is my favorite Christmas song? Santa Claus is coming to town and on a more spiritual side of Christmas I love Away in a Manger



19. Candy Canes? there okay, not my favorite though

Now I tag......Anyone who wants to do it!

Out with the old and in with the new, the hangers have been replaced, its now his blocks. This kid cracks me up, every night we have to have tigger, pooh, his sponge bob pillow and his blocks. Its almost as if I need a list to check off to make sure we have everything, but hey he sleeps soundly, so thats really all that matters!
It seems I have been finding this more often since he started Pre-school he comes home just exhausted. As much as he loves it and is having so much fun its been a little hard on him as well, he is on the afternoon schedule so that cuts right into nap time and so he when he gets off the bus at 3:45 he's more than ready for a nap. His schedule right now has him going Tuesday - Friday, but I may cut one of those days out, after seeing how things went his first week, I think it may be to much for him, I'm gonna try it out for another week and see how he does.

First day of school!!

Yesterday was a very emotional as well as exciting day in our house. It was Daniels first day of Pre-school, and not only was it his first day of school, but he rides the BUS to and from school! I can't believe it.....my little boy is riding the BUS! I honestly thought he was going to be scared or start crying, but he was just as happy as ever, the aide on the bus helped him get on, and get him to his seat, and as we stood outside the bus waving at him, he just smiled and waved and off he went. He will usually ride the bus every day but considering I was already overwhelmed with the idea of Daniel going to Pre-school I decided he would ride the bus to school and I would pick him up, I just needed to ease my mind that he is okay there. And he was, when I picked him up he didn't want to leave, I guess he was just having to much fun! His teacher said he did really well, and for being his first day she was shocked at how calm and easy going he was, but really that is his personality, he adjusts to situations really well, and he's not hard to please. Way to go Daniel on great first day and we hope you continue to enjoy it!

Daniel sporting his new backpack!




He's ready to go! Pre-school here we come!