Pendleton

bad luck

2012-01-26T14:15:00.000-07:00

We have had the worst luck with cars recently! I know we aren't the only ones, but "when it rains, it pours" is an accurate description for us lately! We bought a used car for Justin in Aug. or Sept. and I think we have now had it in the shop 4 or 5 times already :( We had it checked out before we bought it, so we aren't sure if they didn't catch these things or if they happened after and they couldn't tell. We've put snow tires on, taken it in for the check engine light, taken it back in for the check engine light, fixed what they told us and now it's in the shop getting a new timing belt (yikes they are pricy!) and something else done. This is just Justin's car.

I've been driving my parents wonderful '97 expedition. It just had to get new ball joints put on about a month ago and about 2 weeks ago it made a crazy noise, so they fixed whatever that was. THEN...I know, it continues!! Yesterday I was driving and heard a really loud noise from the back that sounded like air. I had no clue what it was until I could feel the car was driving funny and I knew it was the tire!! So I pulled over and sure enough, I had a bad flat tire. I pretty much just started to laugh! What else could you do? Luckily I was just a block from Big O Tires who had put the tires on just a year before and a guy came over and put the spare on and we bought a new tire. My mom came and picked me and the girls up in her car. Luckily she was home! Justin was at school and I had dropped him off since his car is in the shop!! Aren't cars the worst? I really hate them most of the time. They are a necessary evil. I guess I ran over a pen! There was about 2 inches of a pen sticking out of the tire. Crazy. If you have a reliable car, please tell me what it is and it will be put on the list of future cars for us :)

Grandpa Galbraith

2012-01-21T10:05:00.004-07:00

Marlin C. Galbraith

1915 ~ 2012
Marlin Comran Galbraith died peacefully January 19, 2012, in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was born July 5, 1915, in Lyman, Idaho, to Archibald and Selma Galbraith.
Dad graduated from Madison High School in Rexburg, Idaho, and from the University of Idaho in Moscow with a degree in Forestry. He married Ethel Briggs of Teton, Idaho, on May 29, 1939, in the Salt Lake LDS Temple. Dad worked briefly with the Immigration Service in Montana and taught at Utah State University before joining the U.S. Navy in 1943. After completing his officer training, Dad was transferred to Pearl Harbor where he spent the remainder of WW II as a communications officer.
After the war, Dad was hired by the U.S. Forest Service where he spent the rest of his career. He had many transfers within Idaho and Montana as well as to Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Albuquerque. His last transfer was to the Ogden regional office where he served as the Assistant Regional Forester until his retirement in 1975.
Dad was very active in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and served as branch president, high councilor, member of several bishoprics and wherever he was asked to serve. He had an unwavering testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He also taught us as his sons the importance of hard work and honesty. Dad always set a great example for us to emulate. Dad was also involved in community service; he spent many years delivering for Meals on Wheels and was one of the oldest volunteers of the 2002 Winter Olympics.
In retirement, Mom and Dad divided their time between their cabin at Mack's Inn, Idaho, and a winter home in Mesa, Arizona. They also visited their children and grandchildren in England, Japan and Hawaii. After their children relocated to the SLC area, they sold their Mesa home and moved to Salt Lake to be closer to the family. Dad loved Yellowstone National Park and always enjoyed taking family and friends on excursions through the Park. Coupled with his knowledge of forestry, he had a truly in-depth understanding of the Park. Vacationing at Mack's Inn was always a highlight for our entire family.
Dad is survived by his youngest brother Keith; four sons: Jim (Dixie), currently serving a mission to Tokyo, Japan, Randy (Bonnie), Bruce (Marie) and Kim (Glenda); as well as 16 grandchildren and 21 great-children. He was preceded in death by his wife of 59 years, his parents, two sisters, four brothers, and one grandson, Brian.
Funeral services will be held at Jenkins-Soffe Mortuary (4760 South State Street, Murray, Utah) on Monday, January 23rd at 1:00 p.m. A viewing prior to the service will be at noon. Interment will be in the Teton-Newdale Cemetery in Idaho on Tuesday at 1:00 p.m.
Online condolences may be shared at www.jenkins-soffe.com

Granpda Galbraith passed away this week at 96. We have so many fun memories with grandpa and he will be missed!

Here are a few pictures of us with grandpa.

Grandpa called Justin and I the night before our wedding and sang, "I'm Getting Married in the Morning." It was the cutest thing! What a sweet grandpa! So thoughtful and fun.

When Ali was in the nicu the rules were that only parents and grandparents could visit because the swine flu was so bad. We brought grandpa over to visit one day.

At Ali's blessing

We were lucky to have grandpa so close to us. He only lived about 10-15 minutes away in Sandy. We often had him over for Sunday dinner with our family and on Saturdays we would sometimes go on a hike or walk with him when the weather was nice. He always loved the great grandkids and loved to play with them.

Molly loves great grandpa! She would often go with my dad on Saturdays to his place to visit him. They actually just went last Saturday to visit but grandpa was sleeping! Grandpa was very witty and always kind. He loved the outdoors and recently on a hike this summer he went up and told everyone he was 96 years old (he probably told at least 10 different people)! It was so funny. He has always been friendly with EVERYONE. He will go up and talk to anyone, no matter who they are or what they look like.

Another fun memory is going up to grandma and grandpa's cabin in Island Park. Grandpa would take us through Yellowstone and he knew all about the kinds of trees and animals around. We loved to take up 4 wheelers in the summer or snowmobile in the winter. We loved roasting hot dogs out back and making smores.

We are so lucky to have had grandpa in our lives! We love you grandpa! We are so glad you are with grandma again and we know we will see you again too.

half way

2012-01-12T14:04:00.001-07:00

Here we are at 21 weeks! I feel great and everything is going as it should. Even though I'm in my 2nd trimester, I still feel like I have a bit less energy than normal, but that's all part of the fun and games I guess!

I have gotten 2 comments so far on my belly from 2 different girls at the gym. And they were good comments. Like, look at your cute belly! So I guess I can deal with that :)

This last picture is to show you my new cute scarf! And see, you can't tell I'm pregnant when I wear it :) ha ha. Not like I'm trying to cover it up. I've had to pull my maternity stuff out, but luckily I can still wear some of my "normal" clothes. I kind of gave up on my pants because even though the elastic trick works for some of them, my pants always seem to fall down, and then you can see the fly down and well, that's just not cool. So I gave in to maternity pants so I don't have to think about that.

My ultrasound revealed that my cervix was right up by my placenta, so at my next appointment they will have me schedule another ultrasound to make sure my cervix has moved away from the placenta. The complication would be if it is attached, then I would have bleeding come delivery which is obviously not good. The doctor seems pretty sure that it will move, so I'm excited to have another shot at seeing this little guy!!

I have to add that Molly wants to name the baby drummer boy or Prince Phillip. Justin is pretty stuck on Jackson, which I like, but it's sooo popular. So we are working on the name. We'll see what happens.

Happy 2nd Birthday Alison!

2012-01-10T13:37:00.000-07:00

Today Ali is 2! We had a fun party over the weekend to celebrate. I borrowed all of the cute decorations from my sister Emily, so she gets all the credit! She had a banner and tons of stuff left over from Elise's party and she was very nice to share with us.

Instead of cake, we did cupcakes with a circus animal on top.

Have you tried cotton candy recently? Wow. I can't believe I ever ate the stuff!!

I don't think Ali realized the party was for her until we started singing Happy Birthday. She looked around and realized we were singing to her! It was so cute.

She needed a little bit of help from daddy to blow out the candles :)

A very happy birthday girl!

Cute cousin Laney.

We played pin the nose on the clown. We only had Molly, Ali and Laney, but they LOVED it! It was totally worth the $1 I paid for it! And they each had several turns.

The party attendees! We didn't quite get everyone in the family, but we had a nice sized group that worked out well.

All of the kids were very helpful opening the gifts!

My mom gave Ali another kitty. It's identical to the one she has, only this one doesn't look like it has been run over by a car several times and washed! I forgot to take a picture of both kitties. It's pretty funny to see the difference.

She got a pretty dress from her other grandparents and we got her a little people fairy treehouse.

It's hard to believe that 2 years ago I was in the hospital having a baby 6 weeks early! I was so calm, yet had no idea the fun roller coaster ride we would be on early in Ali's life. After 3 weeks in the nicu she came home to us and we were so excited! Then after 3 weeks at home we rode in an ambulance from the doctor's to primary children's hospital for her to be treated for rsv. She was there for 5 days and then came home on oxygen, which she quickly got off of. She was so small, starting at 5 lbs. 3 oz. but after about 4-6 months, the doctor would just laugh when we brought her in, she looked so great, healthy and strong! And not like a preemie. Ever since she has been so healthy and has caught right up to what is normal for her age.

Dear Alison,
We are so grateful to have you in our family!! You are such a happy girl and you are so quick to smile! We love your happy, cheery disposition. You are a singer! You pick up on the songs Molly sings and you sing them as well. The other day we were out shopping, just you and me, and you were just singing the whole time, making up words. It was so cute! You love apple juice, your kitty and bunny blanket, and treats, which you request almost every day! In the past few months you have really started to talk and it has been so fun to understand and communicate better with you. You love chapstick and lip gloss and are willing to share it with everyone. You tell us, "Say mmmmm," and then you put it on! You recently have started to answer by saying, "Yeah, sure." When we ask you something or tell you to do something, you say "ok!" in the happiest voice ever. You are an obedient little girl. You love to be chased and you are in love with your daddy! You love animals and look out as we drive in the car to see if you spot any and then you point them out to us. You love shoes and socks and take them on and off all day, including anyone's shoes you can find! When I come to pick you up at the gym you are usually wearing someone else's sock and/or shoes! You are a great nap taker and still love your binky, although pretty soon we will probably be taking it away. You can be feisty and sassy, and we love that about you. When you take a bath you are last to get out and wait on your tummy until all the water has drained out and even then I have to convince you to get out! You bring us so much joy!

Love, Mom and Dad

Playdoh fun

2012-01-04T17:23:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we pulled out the playdoh and the girls were entertained for about 45 minutes. Which is pretty good! (Not sure why this picture is so grainy. It looks great in iphoto! Sorry about that.)

My mom had some fun things for them to play with, including these little trays.

The girls were pretending that this drawer was the oven. It was so cute watching them "bake" their cookies.

Why do kids think it will taste good? I will never know. I even warned her!

I hope you enjoyed some of my "artistic" shots here at the end :) One of my goals this year is to be a better photographer. I'm hoping to get a new lens too and that should definitely help things improve!

Happy New Year

2011-12-31T22:49:00.000-07:00

Happy New Year everyone! Last year I showed you a calendar I made here, using a cd case and scrap fabric. I wanted another calendar for this year and found the same lady has made a free 2012 downloadable cd calendar! Yay! I plan on making another one for this year. I'll show you when I'm done :)

Oh and I had to share a bit from Molly's prayer last night. She said she was grateful that BYU got a touchdown! Love her. We were so proud!! We watched the game earlier in the day (which was pretty pathetic actually) but hadn't talked about it since. She sure has a good memory! Much better than mine!

Snowmobiling

2011-12-29T22:14:00.000-07:00

My parents took the family to a fun lodge near Evanston where we stayed overnight and went snowmobiling! Unfortunately the snow hasn't been quite as awesome this year as it was last year, but we still managed to have a lot of fun!

The cabin/lodge we stayed in had 3 floors and the top floor had a loft with 3 very large lovesacs. The kids LOVED them and had so much fun jumping into them. Great entertainment!

A view of what the boys were doing...watching ESPN. What else?

We celebrated my niece, Elise's 1st birthday (Emily's)! Molly was watching Emily make her cake.

The cute birthday girl! She had fun eating the large gumballs and her cake! We love you Elise! Her birthday was a carnival theme and Emily went all out. There was cotton candy, cracker jacks, lollipops, coloring books and she even made crayons in the shape of animals! It was a lot of fun and the kids loved it.

Here we are getting ready to head out on the snowmobiles!

Molly wasn't a fan of her helmet :( or snowmobiling either really!

We took the girls out for one ride and they were pretty much done! Ali didn't seem to care one way or the other, but Molly was done!

Sitting in front of the lodge.

It was really a lot of fun. We just wish we had another day or two!!

Christmas 2011

2011-12-29T21:58:00.000-07:00

Christmas Eve. Wearing the jammies Grandma and Grandpa Galbraith got them.

Christmas morning. Opening up stockings!

Ali's favorite gift. Chapstick. Her other favorite? The candy in her stocking :)

I finished Alison's stocking the day before! But hey, I got it DONE! And I love it. It turned out so darling. Now I get to do another ;)

Fun princess blocks for the girls.

Molly and Ali both got a princess baby. Ali got Tinkerbell and Molly got Ariel. Molly has LOVED hers.

We were so lucky to have ALL of our family over for Christmas this year! Lexie and Shay got some fun Lala Loopsy tattoos and here they are showing them off! As you can see, they were a big hit!

Part of the crowd opening presents.

Molly behind her gift from grandma and grandpa. We opened all of our family gifts in the morning. Had a very nice meeting at church, then opened the gifts from grandma and grandpa after when all the family was over.

Emily, Zack and Elise in from Wisconsin

Ryan, Becky, Lexie and Shay in from Colorado

Molly opening her aqua doodle.

Ali loved her Little People bus!

The cute kiddo table! We had a wonderful Christmas and were so spoiled. We loved being with family!

The moment you've all been waiting for!

2011-12-24T13:52:00.001-07:00

Frogs and snails and puppy dogs' tails, that's what little boys are made of!! About 5-10 seconds into the ultrasound our tech says, "It's a boy!" Justin reply was, "You just made my Christmas!" We are THRILLED to be having a little boy!

Cute little profile

The legs with feet crossed

Giving dad the thumbs up!

The ultrasound was yesterday at 11 am and then late that afternoon my family went to the temple to do sealings together. It was a really neat and fun experience for us! We made my family wait until we had dinner after to reveal the gender!

After our appointment we went and bought a little boy's outfit and we had Molly open it up in front of the family. We had everyone vote for girl or boy before she opened it and with 9 adults it was about even boy vs. girl.

Everything with the baby looked great, so we are most happy about that! He was quite the little mover, and was not shy at all!

We are really excited to have a little more blue around with all the pink we are used to!

Alison- almost 2!

2011-12-19T15:49:00.003-07:00

Here is our spunky little Alison! I bought this dress (and a similar one for Molly) in January of this year (yep, as in 11 months ago!)! I found them on clearance at Babies 'R Us and they ended up being about $11 each. I really needed some new pictures of the girls and I'm glad there was a day that finally had some good light to take these! The girls were good sports even though it was a bit cold outside!

Molly- 4 years

2011-12-19T15:32:00.000-07:00

I wanted to take some pictures of Molly when she turned 4, but I never made it happen! I pulled out these Christmas dresses and decided I would do it with their dresses. I'm so proud of myself that I actually took the time to do it! Lately Molly is into pulling some really funny faces when I pull out the camera. You can definitely see her personality in these! I think this last one might be my favorite.

Molly's recital

2011-12-17T17:04:00.000-07:00

Thursday night was Molly's recital. She is in a singing and dancing class once a week. She loves it! It has been a fun thing for her. There are only 3 girls in her class, including Molly! Sorry about the pictures, we were on the back row :( Here is her class, she's on the far right.

Singing her solo! Each girl had a solo. Molly sang the 3rd verse of "Deck the Halls". She did a great job!

Here she is dancing to "Silent Night" with the other preschool class.

I love this picture! Look at her smiling face :)

Molly with her friend Carly at the end of the performance.

All of the TRIO performers with their teacher Miss Tricia! It was really cute and fun. The girls all knew their solos and did a great job!

After Molly took her costume off and came out she was being so funny about getting pictures taken! She didn't want us to take ANY! Silly girl! So this was the best we got.

Holiday Treat

2011-12-15T21:24:00.000-07:00

Does this look yummy or what? Do you like peppermint? White chocolate? Popcorn? Then this is for you!

Here's all you need! Microwave popcorn, Andes peppermint baking chips and white chocolate chips.
Pop 2 bags of popcorn. Place a sheet of wax paper over a cookie sheet and lay out popcorn evenly on the cookie sheet. Melt the peppermint chips. I put them in the microwave and stirred every 30 seconds.

Then put the melted chips in a ziploc bag, cut one corner and drizzle evenly over popcorn.

Repeat with the white chocolate chips if desired. I was going to just do the peppermint, then decided it would only be better with white chocolate!

Let the popcorn sit until it dries (about 15-20 minutes or so), then break up and put in bags or in a bowl!

My mom actually found this bag topper on Shindig Parties to go, found here. She also has some little circles that you can put on the bottom of hershey kisses. My mom printed out some and put them in a jar and it turned out darling!

I made a few for gifts and the rest I ate :) Enjoy!

Christmas Lights

2011-12-13T13:39:00.002-07:00

Last night for FHE we went to see the lights at Temple Square. Clearly we weren't the only ones with the idea :) But it actually wasn't too bad. No matter when you go, its crowded. We had fun! This was the first spot I was going to take a picture and a lady offered to take it for us! Sure! Then I had my one picture of all of us. Done.

The temple looked beautiful, as always!

Here's Ali checking out the reflecting pool.

And when I pointed the camera at Molly, here's what I got...

Isn't she a lovely child?!

Molly wanted to walk up and go inside the temple, but she was satisfied with touching the doors.

Here's Ali wanting to go up the stairs with Molly and daddy! We are glad we threw in the stroller at the last minute. They took turns riding in it. If our double stroller hadn't been all the way downstairs, we probably would've grabbed that! Oh well. It worked out fine.

After we went into the Nauvoo Cafe to enjoy some boiling hot chocolate! Man was it hot! We had to get ice cubes to cool it down.

Not gonna lie, it was not the best hot chocolate ever. But I knew that going in :)

O Christmas Tree!

2011-12-10T12:25:00.001-07:00

We went to pick out a Christmas tree with my parents this morning! My parents buy a real tree every year. Justin is a bit of a scrooge and doesn't want us to put one up since my parents do one upstairs. Oh well I guess! One day. Ali didn't want to be put down when we got there (I guess she was nervous or claustrophobic?) but Molly was telling us which ones she thought we should buy. "We should buy this one!"

We finally convinced Ali it was ok and she walked around with us for awhile.

Giving hugs.

It was quite the adventure! I think the girls had fun!

Here's the tree!

It was a successful outing! Justin was playing football with some friends this morning, so that's why you don't see him.

Just for fun, here's a few things I love about this time of year:

Baking
Sweater time and layering
Fires and blankets
Hot chocolate
Peppermint ice cream (well, peppermint anything!)
Chocolate covered cinnamon bears
Snow
Christmas decorations
Being with family and friends
Focusing on the Savior

I saw on someone's blog their list of favorite Christmas movies. Here's mine in no particular order:

Home Alone (it's just a classic)
While You Were Sleeping (ok so maybe it's not really a Xmas movie, but to me it is!)
The Holiday
Elf
Christmas Vacation

What are your favorites?!

Girl time

2011-12-05T12:58:00.001-07:00

Today we went to the library and the girls picked out some books. On the way home Molly was reading her book out loud. We got home and Molly asked Ali if she wanted her to read the book to her. Of course she said yes! Molly is usually a really good big sister.

Molly just looked at the pages and made up the book. It was so cute. I had to get my camera out!

Then they wanted to play with something. So we pulled out the strawberry shortcake dolls and house.

I don't always think of documenting the day to day events, but today I thought it would be fun to have a little snapshot of what they do on a typical day! My girls are pretty good at playing with each other these days. It's so nice! Molly even let Ali have 3 dolls and she has 1! That's big for her.

I went to my doctor appointment this morning and it took some convincing, but the nurse allowed me to get my ultrasound before Christmas!! Yay!! I was so excited. I would have been seriously bummed if she didn't since I will be out of town the week after. So that would be like waiting 2 more weeks. You can't do that to a pregnant lady!! And I guess I have my dates wrong. I'm actually 16 weeks tomorrow. I thought I was 16 weeks this past Thursday. So I will technically be 18 1/2 weeks when I get my ultrasound, but hopefully that will be just fine! I'm scheduled for Friday, Dec. 23rd! I got the last appointment at my doctor's office (although I could have had it done at radiology in the hospital like I did last time). Merry Christmas to me! I hope baby isn't shy!

Today I'm working on getting our Christmas cards ready to be sent out. I hope to get them out this week! Tonight we are very lucky to get to see "A Christmas Carol" at the Hale Center Theatre. My friend Sara is in it and we are excited to see the show! We've never been and hear that everyone loves it.

The Proof...

2011-12-02T15:44:00.001-07:00

is in the pooch! Here I am at 16 weeks. This is right after the gym today and there's no way I was gonna let you see my face! I have always been bad at taking pics of myself while pregnant, so this is my attempt at being better! I have been so unmotivated this pregnancy. I have just wanted to be lazy! Everything seems like a lot of work (sewing, crafts, etc). I think the 2nd trimester is going better though. I have more energy and don't want to just sleep all day (at least not all day anyway)!

Today Molly and I went to the Festival of Trees and my mom listened while Ali took her nap. I haven't been for a few years and it seemed like every other tree was for a child or baby who had passed away. I felt like I had to hold back tears, even though I didn't even know them or their stories. I was glad we could attend and help support Primary Children's Medical Center.

This was a tree Molly requested I take a picture of. Surprise, it's pink!

When we came to this one, Molly asked if she could go and play with the toys. Um, sorry! But she wanted a picture by it.

This was a fun tree that I thought of as "crafty". I loved the rosette wreaths and the banners hung all around the tree.

A close up. Isn't it cute?

Ok check out this gingerbread house!! Wow!! Seriously impressive!!

This lodge was awesome too I thought.

For $1 I bought Molly 3 tickets so she could do a little craft. She got to make a Christmas tree picture (what she's doing here) and a caterpillar. She had a lot of fun. We only made it through about 10 rows at the festival, but that's pretty good for a 4 yr. old! She also liked the dancers and performers. We watched them for a while. It was a fun little date for us. Thanks for watching Ali, mom! I think tomorrow is the last day, so if you live around here and haven't been, you should go!

Spilling the beans

2011-11-27T20:15:00.001-07:00

I'm pregnant with #3!

A few details:

I'm 15 weeks
Due May 22nd
I was sick the first 6 weeks or so. Just nauseous on and off every day and I had to eat every 2 hours around the clock which makes me think it might be a boy because I was never sick with my girls. Since then I've been feeling great.
I've been to 2 appointments, heard the heartbeat, and everything looks good so far.
At my next appointment I get to schedule my ultrasound and I'm crossing my fingers I can find out just before Christmas, but I'm technically not 20 weeks til the week after.
Molly is excited and thinks it's a baby brother :)
We're excited too! And nervous!
And please don't say you knew. I hate that. It's a big pet peeve of mine. My baby is almost 2 so I realize it's not a huge surprise! Thank you in advance :)

Thanksgiving recap

2011-11-27T20:00:00.001-07:00

We survived Vegas and now we are home. I was extremely bad when it came to taking pictures. I did catch these silly girls on the couch, however. The girls had a fun time until poor Laney (my niece in the pic) got sick. Darn it! Luckily no one else caught her bug. We felt so bad!

Scott and Brooke brought Just Dance 3 and that was entertaining! Here's Brooke on the left and Ashley on the right.

The boys took a turn dancing to "It's Halloween". Pretty funny. Left to right: Val, Brad, Mark and Scott.

Look, even my fil liked it! Look at his face!

To prove we were in Vegas, here's the famous sign!! It was just a few blocks from our hotel. We were at the mercy of the security guy who was also taking pictures. Apparently he didn't hear where to zoom. Oh well!

We didn't actually come here since part of the group had already been before we arrived and bought some m&ms! Maybe next time.

And a random picture on the strip as we were driving out. We managed to do some quality shopping and had Thanksgiving dinner at Maggiano's (my sil was the only one with a camera, but I don't have a a picture yet!). It was yummy, but it's hard to beat homemade and plan your own menu! The weather was nice, but unfortunately not quite warm enough for us to take advantage of the giant pool at our hotel :( so that was a bit of a bummer. Justin was able to get in some golf too, of course. Did I tell you the Pendleton's plan vacations around golf? Because they do. Overall we had a nice time and enjoyed being with family!

kay and huh

2011-11-21T17:38:00.001-07:00

Ali is starting to put words into small sentences and using more words lately. It's always fun when they say new things or start to really "get" things! Lately she has learned to say uh huh, but she has shortened it to "huh" meaning, yes. She also says um before starting to say things sometimes and she says kay, as in okay. She makes me tired, just watching her! Today I was vacuuming and cleaning the bathroom. I know she thinks she's so helpful, but she is like a tornado and now I'm too tired to clean up the aftermath she has left!! At least the floor and toilet are clean ;)

Tomorrow we are headed to Vegas after Justin's afternoon class is over. We will be leaving late, but we hope the girls will sleep in the car. We are planning to get there around midnight, but then we will be there! Justin's parents have used their timeshare there, and most of the family will be there. We have reservations for Thanksgiving dinner while we are there. We have a few things we think we will do, but mostly I'm looking forward to a change of scenery and a little break from the norm!! Hope you have a Happy Thanksgiving too!

Molly says

2011-11-16T07:50:00.001-07:00

Molly has been a chatterbox these days. She will talk and talk and talk! Sometimes I have to turn on the radio or a cd in the car so I can get a break! She is so funny. Here are a few of the things she's told me lately.

Molly: Mommy, I don't want you to be a grandma.
Me: Why?
Molly: Because I want you to be my mommy always.
So cute.

Molly got out of bed like 4 times the other night and came upstairs. The last time she said this.
Molly: Ali is crying! Really hard.
Me: Oh really? Why do you think she's crying?
Molly: Because she has snot!
Me: You don't think it's because you keep getting up out of bed and making noise?
Molly: No.

Molly: Let's buy some more money!
Me: That would be a great idea.
Molly: Then we can buy all the things we want!
Aren't kids so smart? They think through things so well!

Sick

2011-11-10T12:15:00.001-07:00

I guess it's safe to say that it's that time of year when everyone starts getting sick! Molly came into our room a couple times last night and then threw up this morning about 4 times. No fun! Poor girl. Of course it happens to be the very day when we are headed up to my sister's to watch her kids for 24 hours while they are on a mini vacation! I guess now that Molly is in preschool I should expect her to get sick more often. It's just the reality I think!

She is doing better now. I went and bought some pedialyte for her since she has the vomit/diarrhea combo and that has seemed to help and she's had some crackers and toast! I think we are through the worst at this point! She got a flu shot at her yearly check up a couple weeks ago, but I know a girl was sick in her class this week. Luckily today is the last day of the week for her and she has no school Monday, so we have plenty of time for her to get better before she goes back.

Have your kids been sick yet? I just hope Ali doesn't get it! Or my niece and nephews!!

It's November

2011-11-06T09:32:00.001-07:00

I feel like my blog has been so blah these days. Sorry. I really wish I had some exciting stuff going on, but we are just doing the day-to-day, nothing terribly exciting to report thing, as of late. And, to be honest, I've been a lazy crafter, without any motivation. I did make a table runner for an exchange my sister did on her blog. I'll have to share that! I also made a couple baby gifts. But did I take pics? Nope!

Onto more positive things!! I did switch out my Halloween for Thanksgiving yesterday. I got out my Halloween a bit late this year. But yesterday Justin and I were in Project Organize and Clean mode. I started with my decorations since I knew they would make me happy! I like that it's pretty simple. Nothing over the top (well, at least in my book!).

My mom bought me these pilgrims last year from a cute little place called Randee and Company in Holladay. She bought them after Thanksgiving and they were 50% off! I had told her I wanted some pilgrims like hers, and sure enough, she found some!

On a side note, if you need a personal shopper, my mom is the best. I don't think she's taken more than a week to find something! She gets around, I'm telling you!

My mom bought this stitchery pattern and had me make one up for her several years ago. I decided to make one up for myself as well! I had it framed when at BYU, so it has been around for a while. I really like it. It's just classic for fall.

My mom also had a hand in the wagon here and the ceramic bowl with lid (? what do you call this?!!). I think both came from DI or Savers. I didn't even ask for them, yet she picked them up for me! How nice. I still need to add some ribbon to the candles (maybe some tulle?) and I want a plant to go in the white pot coming out. Then it will all feel complete!

You may remember me saying that I finished this last year after the holiday was over, but hey, I was so excited it was all done when I pulled it out this year!! That's kind of how I feel these days...a day late and a dollar short on a lot of things! (Like I cut out everything for a halloween runner and it's still in pieces. I never got it done! And I bought a yummy snack to make for the girls for halloween. Yep, we never did that either. Oops!) I do need to steam this, obviously! Get those wrinkles out of the turkey!

I bought this table runner last year after Thanksgiving at Roberts for half off. I'm so sad to report that this Roberts by me is closed. Boo. Hobby Lobby came in, and well, they didn't really have a chance. Their location wasn't the greatest, but Hobby Lobby and Michael's are both closer to me. Roberts has the best fake flowers of any craft store in my opinion. They are so great for little girl's bows! They also had a 40% off coupon any time you went in, without having the coupon itself. I miss them.

I found these plates with the runner. I think I bought the whole set for less than $20, which is an awesome price.

I love the colors and the design going around the plates. I hope you enjoyed my little tour!!

After I decorated, Justin and I spent several hours cleaning and organizing the girl's room and the rest of the basement. We were seriously going almost all day! It was exhausting, but it feels and looks so good! The girl's room is so tricky since we have no closets, so it always looks messy, even though we have lots of things in containers and boxes. We moved a few things, so now it feels so open. We want to be better about having the girls clean up after they have played. We'll see how long it stays the way it is!!

Trick or Treat

2011-11-01T20:36:00.000-06:00

Like we've done for the past 3 years, we began our trick-or-treating at the law school. Here we have Princess Aurora, a cowgirl, and Cinderella. I watched my niece, Laney, for the day, so lucky her, a little extra trick-or-treating!

Laney was Aurora (if you asked, that's what she said....p.s. someone passing out candy at the law school asked who Aurora was. What?! How did she not know? I realize she does have 3 different names in the movie, but still! I was shocked. Clearly she has no kids!)

Ali pretty much tried to eat the candy the second she got it.

Molly did sometimes too, but she mostly put everything into her bag.

I think I've shown the decorated doors at the law school before, but it's kind of entertaining :)

The girls and I actually helped Justin decorate this door for the federalist society on a Saturday morning because we are so nice!

I love how they set the candy out on a stool or chair. This is a seat with feet underneath. Pretty clever!

Everyone commented on all of the pink! I guess it's true. 3 girls = pink!

Here we are ready to hit our neighborhood. "Yee-

ha!" We went over to a neighbor's for a little before party and Molly walked in telling everyone, "Yee -ha!" It was hilarious. We never discussed it with her either!

Ali loved trick-or-treating we only took her around to our street, then I came home with her. We were so lucky to have such a beautiful day! It was warm and so pretty! Today it snowed, so we clearly were very lucky this year.

I bought the girl's costumes last year, two or three days after Halloween, at Target for about $6 each. I think they were 75% off! They have been sitting in my storage room for a year. This past Friday I went over to Old Navy and scored two costumes for the girls for next year for $3.75 each!! I figure even if they don't want to wear them, they can play dress up and it's worth the price.

Witches

2011-10-28T14:04:00.001-06:00

We finally made it to Gardner Village this week to see the witches!!

Molly thought this witch was so silly with her hot dog :)

I don't remember this many witches last year. Do you? I think they add more every year.

Molly liked the witches but Ali was scared. I think they just looked huge to Ali and since some of them moved, she wasn't a big fan! But Molly knew they weren't real.

I love this picture! In the back is a firefighter witch! She sprays her hose. This was as close as Ali got to one!

Molly checking the witch out.

Ali was, however, a fan of the ducks! It was so fun having Justin with us. Luckily he had a class that was cancelled, so he got to come and enjoy the fun this time!

Molly was excited that she found some little duck feathers.

Ali was not interested in a picture at this point. Ha.

Now I feel fulfilled that we've been. I've seen several blogs where they've been to see the witches and we finally made it too! We haven't been to a pumpkin patch yet though. We really don't have one near, so it makes it a bit tricky. I know of one sort of close, but it's just off of State Street. Nothing super cute like a real pumpkin patch. They just bring them over from somewhere. So we may not go! We'll see. Have a fun Halloween weekend!

Sleep tight

2011-10-25T20:54:00.001-06:00

Last night as we were getting into bed I noticed Ali's bunny and her binky laying nicely on Justin's pillow! I had to give him a hard time of course ;) ha ha!! Some people get a mint on their pillow.... others a bunny and binky!

Fall pictures

2011-10-19T13:08:00.003-06:00

I'm pretty late on putting these up, but we took some pictures with my sister at Murray Park about a month ago or so. We had no idea it would be such a happening place! There were people getting pictures taken everywhere there!

Doesn't Ali look so cute here?! Molly is gazing into space...

I love this one.

I really like this one because it doesn't happen all the time! Ali is such a daddy's girl. Really. She gets SO excited when he comes home.

Justin prefers this picture.

I prefer this one! Why is it that we hardly ever agree on anything?!! Are you like that? He'll say to me, "Sometimes I just wish you'd agree with me once in a while!" I feel the same way!! :)

Molly has been such a sweetheart lately. She aims to please and is so helpful to us and her sister. She is very good at sharing and she knows when she does right and wrong. Ali is kind of in stinker mode these days. We went to the library for story time today and we had to leave the room! She wouldn't sit down and she wanted to take all the props from the story lady! Geez! She loves to make a mess and can make one out of anything it seems! I'm hoping she will chill out soon! She is busy. And she's learning sass. She'll say NO! And she knows she's being a punk! She takes off her shoes about 2 minutes after you put them on, so we put them on all day long. When it gets cold I hope she figures it out!

Anyway, a big thanks to Nat for helping take most of these!! I made the bows for the girls and all of our necklaces. They were so easy. The tutorial is here.

Dino Park Halloween fun

2011-10-15T15:42:00.002-06:00

We went last night with my sister and our families to the Ogden Dinosaur Park for a little Halloween adventure. They had scary music, trick or treating, and it was all decorated for Halloween with skeletons, cobwebs, spiders and more scary stuff! It was a lot of fun.

We had never been before, so it was fun to see all the dinosaurs!

One of many blow-up decorations they had.

Our cute kiddos. Cowgirl, Cinderella, dragon, witch and skeleton!

The kids were checking out the lizards. They had two and it was sooo warm by them! We were fans of this area!

All of their carved pumpkins with the flash.

How we really saw them, except not as blurry (another reason why I should get a tripod!!).

They had a little open classroom where the kids could color masks.

Ali has just started trying to color.

Molly and Mitt working on their masks.

Also, Justin and I had a very fun 28 hours. Thursday night we dropped off our girls to Natalie and she watched them for us until we met up for the dino park on Friday night!! She was so nice to offer an over-nighter for my birthday, so we had to take her up on it!!

Thursday night we ate at Tepanyaki and used a gift card we got last Christmas! It was yummy and so peaceful, just the two of us!! Friday we had breakfast at Einstein's, shopped and saw The Help. I finally read the book a few weeks ago and loved it. If you haven't read it, you would like it! And the movie was excellent as well. Justin even said the film was better than he thought it would be. So thank you, thank you Natalie and Preston!! We had a great time and it was nice to be just the two of us for a while!

Chair before and after

2011-10-13T13:35:00.001-06:00

Here is the before of my sewing chair.

Ta-da! The after. Much better, right?!

I love it! I think it turned out so well!

Feel free to click on any picture to see it bigger.

A huge thanks to my MIL, Shelley, for all of her help! She practically did 95% of it!!

The back

With the cushions!

They are double sided so when I need a change, I just flip them! Pretty fun since I am a variety type of girl! I'm really happy with how it turned out!

And on a fun note, just thought I'd share that Molly got to be in a little photoshoot for DownEast today! My dad works there and suggested Molly would be cute for a picture with these adorable little upholstered chairs they have for kids. So we went over, they picked out some clothes for her to wear, and she got to sit in the chair and they snapped away! She was a really good sport and just sat there and answered our questions! They showed me the one they liked best and it was really cute! Of course I am a biased mother, though! Anyway, I have no idea what they will be doing with it (if anything) but I'll let you know if it happens to show up anywhere!!

Yesterday...

2011-10-11T13:49:00.000-06:00

My very kind MIL came over yesterday while she was in town and helped me paint my sewing chair!! So here is a before picture. It was given to me for free by a friend of my mom's who was cleaning house. You may remember that I made some cushions for it a while back. Anyway, my MIL and SIL have been painting up a storm and have become pros at this, so I was so glad she said she would help me!

Here is the stuff we used. It is Annie Sloan paint, wax, and not pictured is the brown stain we used at the end (right Shelley?). If you want to see someone who uses this stuff, it's amazing! Check out this blog: Miss Mustard Seed.

You will have to wait to see the final reveal! I still need to buff the chair, but everything else is done!! And in the words of my MIL, Shelley, "It looks a thousand times better!" Ha ha! It really does!

Ok and then because I am not the best planner in advance for FHE (meaning more than 10 minutes before), I decided to try a bit harder this week and decided to make some caramel apples. We had Molly help us and they turned out really yummy!

We used m&ms and a snickers bar.

Molly was a good helper!

Ali saw us unwrapping the caramels and thought we weren't sharing, so she was either eating the candy or whining that she wanted some most of the time :) We had a fun time!

Birthday part 2

2011-10-10T20:20:00.001-06:00

Justin's parents came to celebrate Molly's birthday on Saturday so my parents joined in as well on the fun for day 2 of Molly's birthday (lucky girl!!). Here she is blowing out her candle since I didn't give her one at her party (oops, I know bad!). When Justin had her "make a wish" she said, "I wish that mommy and daddy will get married!" Ha ha! The family requested that I record that, so there you go! What a sweetie!

Of course Ali had lots of fun with the presents too!

Molly was being hilarious. She would pull something out and throw it and go on to the next thing! So silly.

Grandma and Grandpa Pendleton got her this adorable skirt and a cute pink shirt to go with it!

And this darling little necklace! Isn't it cute? My parents got her an outfit and some small lala loopsy dolls. Thanks everyone!!

Trying on the chef's hat and apron!

Ali was loving them too! She was so excited and happy when we put them on her!!

Part of the family. The other pic had a problem loading, but here's who was here: grandma and grandpas (both sides), Scott, Brooke, Laney and Reese, and Uncle Brad.

Here's Reese with her usual little scowl! She's a cutie! Ali kept taking all of her baby toys. Silly! Thanks to everyone who came to her parties!! Molly had such a great birthday!

Molly turns 4

2011-10-07T21:10:00.002-06:00

We celebrated Molly's 4th birthday today! For breakfast we went to McDonald's, her choice. My sister and her kids came over and we had a fun time. We had a little friend party for Molly and I think it went well!

The theme was Strawberry Shortcake, but I don't love the new Strawberry Shortcake especially, so I found a free download with invites and other printables for a strawberry party. Found here. I made these bean bags for a little bean bag toss.

My mom had this cute tray! We also used some of my mom's strawberry shortcake glasses to drink from. I don't think I took a close up of them.

Molly helped me with the party favors.

I pulled out a sign I made a couple years ago to hang up.

Here's how the party went. When the girls first came they could color some Strawberry Shortcake pages. We then served some food. Then we played a bunch of games. We started with a bean bag toss, then hot and cold, duck duck goose, ring around the rosy, and red light green light. Then we had cupcakes and ice cream followed by presents. Then the girls just played until they went home.

We served sandwiches, strawberries, strawberry lemonade and cupcakes and ice cream.

Molly enjoying her cupcake.

The cute party girls.

Ready to open presents!!

Trying on her gifts :)

She opened a nightgown from us.

Dear Molly,

We love you so much! You are such a happy, kind girl and we love having you around. You are so creative and love to imagine things. You love to draw and make pictures with stickers. You still talk about Mimi and your other imaginary friends and it's so funny to hear you talk about what she's doing. You are a good sister. You are very good at sharing with Ali and you love her so much. She looks up to you and wants to be like you. You are such a sweetheart and are always worried about others. You never want anyone to be hurt or unhappy. You are a good friend and love to play with other kids and family members. You are obedient and want to do what is right. You like to ask every morning what we are doing and where we are going. You love to read books and play games. We are so happy you are part of our family.

Love,
Mom and Dad

Fall leaves

2011-10-04T20:48:00.000-06:00

The leaves are starting to change! The mountains look beautiful here!

My dad, Grandpa Galbraith, Justin, Molly and I drove up Sunday towards East Canyon where my dad had been on a hike the day before to show us the leaves.

Grandpa is a big fan of Molly. She is so cute with him!

It was a bit windy, but the colors were beautiful.

And of course Molly and grandpa had to try out the trail.

The pioneers came through this way when they came to the Salt Lake Valley. I'm sure they wish it would have been during the beautiful fall with these leaves.

Birthday recap

2011-10-03T13:32:00.002-06:00

Last Tuesday I turned 28! I woke up to these beautiful flowers in the kitchen, some chocolate, and a sweet card from Justin and the girls.

I have such a sweet husband who loves to spoil me with flowers.

That was a surprise too. Justin has a 7:30 am class (yikes, right?) on Mondays and Tuesdays, but he had someone take notes and let me sleep in! Happy Birthday to me! That was lovely.

Justin went and picked us up some doughnuts for breakfast. Then we pretty much did the daily routine. But my parents were nice and watched our girls that night so we could go to dinner together. We ate at the Blue Lemon in Salt Lake. It is yummy!! We would definitely recommend it! We are getting one close to us, so we thought we would try it out.

I'm getting a light scoop (yay!) for my camera, but it's not here yet :( and my sister Natalie was very nice and has offered us a day to watch our girls so we can go and do whatever-shop, eat, see a movie, who knows. So we will be taking her up on that and I will be enjoying the rest then :) Thanks to those who called or texted! It was a fun day. Now we get to celebrate Molly's on Friday!!

Apron and chef hat

2011-09-26T13:43:00.002-06:00

I finished a couple gifts I've been making for Molly's birthday next week! Yay. Cross it off the list! Now back to the party planning :)

Isn't this a fun little apron? My mom bought the pattern and let me borrow it :) I thought it was so cute and girly. The necktie has velcro on the strap and on the back of the apron to connect the two. The pattern had you use buttons, but I thought it would be nice to have it adjust. So I sewed in some velcro.

I bought the fabric probably a year or so ago and am finally just finishing it! I thought the fabric was so cute and would work so well for an apron.

And then I found a cute chef hat tutorial and since I had so much left over fabric of the coordinating fabric, I figured why not? I will complete the ensemble!!

It velcro's in the back so you can adjust it however you like. To view the tutorial, go here. The directions were simple and it made up very quickly.

It would have been cute to add a few more embellishments, but I just wanted to be finished!

So hang it wherever you want...

Find some tools and get your little one working in that apron! Hmmm...maybe Molly can learn to make me cookies?!!!

Here is the pattern I used for the apron. Sassy Little Sisters is the company and it's called Child's Apron. It has 3 sizes, small, medium and large. I made a small (size 3-4 I think).

Backpack before and after

2011-09-22T13:09:00.000-06:00

Here's Molly's backpack that we bought (again, at DownEast for $4.99) that needed to be fixed. I was planning on having it done before she started school....but that didn't happen. Well I finally got it done! Yay!

My other problem with getting around to this project was that I had a bunch of different ideas for this. At first I wanted to have it say Molly instead. I called my mom's friend about her embroidery machine, but sadly it was broken. Well my machine does have embroidery. I tried it, but it was too small and it wouldn't let me make the letters any bigger.

This is finally what I came up with. I decided who needs it to say her name? My backpack never did!

I already had all the stuff in my stash, so after a few other ideas didn't pan out, I went with this! Now I can look at her bag and be happy since someone else's name isn't on it! Even though Molly doesn't know that :)

P.S. Back to pinterest for one last time, then I will be quiet! I didn't' realize you have to use a facebook or twitter account to sign up. I don't have either of those and to be honest, I don't really want them! I'm not into social networking except for blogs. I start and end there. I waste enough time online with blogs and my email. So I'm wondering which is the lesser evil. What do you think? I think I might go with twitter. Then I won't get harassed by people on facebook...I'm just kinda anti-facebook. Sorry to everyone who loves it. I see good things with it, but I'm just not interested right now!

I'm in

2011-09-21T10:57:00.000-06:00

No worries, everyone! I got my invite to Pinterest this morning. Haven't done anything about it, but I feel much better about the situation :)

I can't wait to delete some of the tabs on my computer and "pin" them instead!! I still don't really get all of it but I'm sure I'll figure it out!

Didn't know

2011-09-20T20:08:00.000-06:00

Today I thought I would join the bandwagon and join Pinterest! So I got on the website and tried to register. Well there was only a spot to login. I also saw "Request an Invite". So I did just that. I checked my inbox thinking they would automatically give me the info I needed to login. But no! The email said, "thank you for joining the Pinterest waiting list." What?! Since when is there a waiting list? And why? Anyway, I just thought that was odd. I'm not totally familiar with their website, but I think the idea behind it is really cool. I hope they let me in soon!! Are you on Pinterest?

Keeping it Real

2011-09-19T20:42:00.000-06:00

I have been thinking about blogging, but haven't really felt like anything is going on. So this might be a really boring post, but here's what we've been doing lately.

Molly is pretty funny these days. She is quite particular that you call it "preschool" and not "school." We will ask, "Molly, how's school?" And she will say, "It's not SCHOOL, it's PRESCHOOL!!" Ok! Today we were outside and she said "I just went into the mud. That was a little awkward." I'm thinking, what?! How does she know that word? It was pretty funny. Then she kept saying, "That's a little awkward." So silly.

I've been getting used to Molly's preschool schedule. It's amazing how quickly my day seems to go by now! Here's the daily schedule: we have breakfast in the morning, go over to a neighbor's house that I clean (laundry, dishes, making beds), go to the gym, come home and have a snack, take Molly to preschool, put Ali down for a nap, personal time/cleaning/whatever needs to be done, pick up Molly and by the time we get home it's about 4 pm! It's crazy! But it's kind of nice. Molly has been in dance class for a few weeks and sadly her class is only her and one other girl right now! There were a few more, but they dropped out for very legit reasons. So the teacher is hoping to get more girls. I'm fine with it, but I hope more will add so she won't have to drop the class! I kind of planned preschool around her dance class not thinking that she offers an afternoon class, but now that she's going afternoons, I really like how it's all worked out!

Ali has been waking up at 5:30 am for the past week or so. I'm not totally sure why, but I think it's because she gets uncovered. She's a totally crazy sleeper. We cover her when we check on her before we go to bed, but there's no way she stays still! She usually has her binky in, so we know it's not that. But we can't really let her cry it out since she's in the same room as Molly. I think she would HATE one of those sleep sack things because her legs wouldn't be free. Any suggestions?!! Justin gets up around 6 so if I take her with me to my bed, she might fall asleep, but there's no guarantee I do!

Another question. We keep our diapers in an open trash can in the room with the water heater and ac unit, etc. So we can't smell anything until we open the door and whoa! Totally smelly. I even tried the febreeze trash bags but they only work for like the first day, then the yummy smell is gone. We also put the poopy diapers in a plastic bag before going in the trash can. What do you do? I've thought maybe a trash that has a lid might not make the room smell bad, but it still would once you open the trash obviously.

My sister and I have considered another tri, but as of yet we haven't signed up (or maybe I should say I haven't...maybe she has and hasn't told me!). She doesn't have the luxury of a gym with a swimming pool or babysitters like I do so it's a bit harder for her. But I still train in a way. I try to keep up all the stuff I worked really hard on. I go to a cycle class on Wednesdays, I swim when Molly's at her dance class (it's down the street, how convenient!) since I only have an hour, then the other days I run/jog/do whatever.

I've also been working on some projects. I have a few things I'm working on for Molly's birthday and I have some Halloween fabric I bought last year and I'm working on making it into a table runner. I've been making plans for Molly's birthday party and go from wanting to go all out to keeping it simple. We are doing a friend party for her this year and I know she will love it! I'm gonna do a strawberry shortcake party.

Justin is just busy, busy, busy!! We are lucky to see him for a few hours at night. This semester is probably his worst, so hopefully next semester will be better. He won't have as many classes and he won't have to worry about applying for jobs (well, hopefully!!). He's working on that right now. Anyway, it's kind of crazy that this whole school business is almost over, but I know he is counting down the days!

If you read all of this, congrats! Hopefully I will have some of my projects to share soon!

1st day of Preschool!

2011-09-13T16:12:00.000-06:00

Yesterday Molly started preschool!! She has been so excited to go!

Molly is in the afternoon class. She goes M-Th from 12:15-3:30 and she gets lunch and a snack! She attends headstart at a local elementary school.

She has been really excited about her backpack. We found it at DownEast for $4.99. It does say someone else's name on it, but I'm getting around to fixing that!!

Here's how her first day went. We got there and I have to sign her in. She puts away her backpack and the kids wash their hands. We were waiting for a sink. There are 15 kids in her class but add parents and it was a lot of people! And kind of overwhelming for 3 and 4 yr olds! While we wait Molly starts freaking out and crying. I'm trying to figure out what the problem is but I can't understand anything she's saying. We finally get her hands washed and she calms down.

Then they get to play for a few minutes. I'm not sure if Molly was more excited or Ali! Ali loved the classroom!

This is the "house" area. So cute.

The rest of the classroom. After a few minutes they had the kids line up and hold onto a long line with circles on it so they could all walk down to the cafeteria. I walked with her and helped her with lunch.

She has a spot for her backpack of course!

Here she is at lunch! She finally let me go at this point. So we left! I came home and put Ali down for a nap and enjoyed a few hours to myself! Of course I did exciting things like laundry and cleaning :)

When I picked her up she said she had fun! She said she played on the playground and played with her friend Windsor. The teacher told me that she cut her lip by accident with her name tag (it's laminated) and she was a bit sad about that, but other than that she was good!

Today I took her and we did okay with the hand washing part. I kept asking if we could leave a bit earlier today than we did yesterday, but she said no! Ali booked it out of the classroom at one point, so I had to go over and get her and when I came back Molly was in tears. Poor girl. She thought we had left! So we went to lunch again with her and then left. When I picked her up she said she had fun and that they had purple plums for a snack. "I love purple plums!" she said. Ha ha. She told me her friend didn't like her plum so she ate it for her. So nice :)

I think the main thing is getting to know the kids and getting used to the routine! Then we can leave within a couple minutes and she won't be nervous. But so far so good!

Have you been?

2011-09-12T14:23:00.000-06:00

Last week we went to a little beach in Herriman! Yep, you heard me! I just recently found out about this place. I think it's technically a reservoir but they dumped sand around it. So viola! It's a beach! We went with our friends and had a fun time!

The water was a bit cold. You won't find me in there! Ha. But my girls went in a little ways.

Here's a picture of what it looks like. It's kinda pretty! They even have port-a-potties. So nice!

Ali seemed to be more into the snacks than the beach at times....

We brought some stacking cups. They tried to build a sandcastle with them!

They also found some nasty bug that they were playing with. Thanks to Kati and her boys for taking us!! We had fun!

Favorites?

2011-09-09T15:07:00.000-06:00

We jumped ship from Sam's Club to Costco and I'm wondering, what are your favorite things from Costco?? Obviously we are purchasing wipes and diapers. But I'm wondering if you have something you love there that's always on your list. My brother loves the Johnny's garlic seasoning stuff. My sister buys their breadsticks that are like Olive Gardens (Nat, what are they called? Or what brand?). So what do you buy that you can't live without? I just need to know about these things!! I do like their Hanna Andersson jammies!! How can anyone resist those?! Ok so let me know if you are a frequent shopper!

Passed

2011-09-08T08:10:00.000-06:00

Justin found out that he passed the MPRE! I have no idea what it stands for, but it's the ethics section of the bar. You can take it whenever you want. He took the class spring semester and took the test about a month ago. 5 weeks later he got the results and he passed!! Yay! It's pretty much a pass/fail thing, but people often have to take it again. We are so glad he won't have to! He will take the rest of the bar after school ends in the spring.

Justin has started school and is really busy! He is still working at the same firm part time, has a very full class load and is president of the Federalist Society. Oh and on top of that now is the time he will start applying for jobs!! I'm glad to be playing the role of supportive wife :) ha! He is planning on applying in Utah and Colorado. He hasn't heard either way from the firm he is working at if they have any future plans for him, but I'm sure they will address it sometime between now and January or February probably. The area of law he hopes to practice is civil litigation. This means no criminal law, no family law (too sad), but things like companies breaking contracts, malpractice of any sort, etc. Wish us luck!

Labor Day Weekend

2011-09-06T14:37:00.002-06:00

We went to Star Valley this weekend and visited Murphy Creek and Murphy Lake on Saturday. It was so beautiful!

The water was so clear. So pretty!

Molly was brave and tested the water out.

Molly wanted a picture with Grandma!

Ali had a fun time too. She was excited to see a few dogs in the area.

All of us that came! Scott, Brooke and girls, Val and Shelley, Mark and Ashley, and us!

We took up a picnic and 2 four wheelers and all took turns. It was a fun afternoon!!

Grandma and Grandpa had a new bubble blower and the girls had a fun time with it.

Ali loves these rocks! She throws them out and then puts them back.

We also got to celebrate Laney's 3rd birthday! My girls loved watching to see what she got! Molly even got to open an early birthday present from Mark and Ashley!

We had a great weekend! The weather was beautiful and we had a fun time! Thanks Val and Shelley!

New look

2011-09-01T14:46:00.001-06:00

Sorry, I didn't get a new look, but my bed did! I know. You are thinking that I'm crazy because I just showed you my new bedding a few months ago. But the really fun thing about this quilt is that it's so easy to mix it up! Honestly it was really cheap. Justin couldn't even complain!

Ok let's start in the back. I have 3 euro shams. I already had the two green ones. I switched out the cream one that was in the middle for this houndstooth one. I saw the houndstooth sham at the Village Quilt Shop where my quilt is from and it was on clearance for $16 down from $80! And since I'm kinda obsessed, I knew I had to have it! It worked well with my fall color theme, so it was easy. I didn't get the best picture of it so sorry about that. I tried to use manual mode on my camera for these pics but since we are in the basement there wasn't much so up came my flash!

By the way, I really want a light scoop! http://lightscoop.com/index.html It will totally fix my problems with the flash! Check it out. Back to the pillows...

The regular shams are next. I bought two brown quilted shams at the Village Quilt Shop. I actually bought 3, but when I came home I remembered that I had 2 red ones that match the quilt my mom made us for our wedding, so I pulled it out and I liked it better than 3 brown. So one is going back!

They had a bunch of cute toss pillows at their store but they are really pricy. I'm talking $40 to $50 for one (or more)! So silly, in my opinion. I checked out a bunch of fabric stores and found this orange and cream print at Hobby Lobby and knew it should be worked in!

The flower pillow was also something I was really excited about. I found a great tutorial that I used to make the burlap pillow with the red flower using felt. The pictures don't do it justice, sorry, but I am really happy with how it all turned out!

Flower Pillow Tutorial

The brown throw I bought about 2 months ago at the Village Quilt Shop. It was on clearance for $10 and I had an inkling that I just might want to do this, so now it works perfectly!

I should tell you that the 3 toss pillows in front (the pillow forms actually) I found at Bed Bath and Beyond on clearance for $3 each! I just pulled their covers off and made these new ones! Pillow forms can be expensive, so I was really happy to find them! If you are looking to do the same thing, you can do just that. Make your own covers and use cheap pillow forms. You could also check at a thrift store and take off their covers!

I also used the same tutorial for making the orange pillow covers. I just didn't make flowers on those, obviously.

I pretty much love it! I'm ready for fall now :) Do you decorate for fall and Halloween? Or just one? I usually just throw out my Halloween once September hits (although I haven't done it yet!) and then after Halloween, I bring out my Thanksgiving/Fall. Now go and make yourself a cute flower pillow! You can put it on your bed or couch. Or as decor somewhere!

Family resemblance?

2011-08-30T10:18:00.000-06:00

I scanned in a picture of me as a baby, so I thought it would be fun to compare Justin and I with our girls!! I think Molly was around 18 mos. in this family picture.

Ali at 18-19 months here

Justin with his siblings and mom. I'm not sure how old Justin is here. But I do love his pink jammies!!

Who knew what I was getting myself into?!

Another picture of Molly. She is probably closer to 2 here.

Summer of '84, so I was almost a year.

Molly, about 8 months

Well, what do you think? Everyone says that my girls look like Justin! Do you still think so?!!

Visit to the cabin

2011-08-29T13:55:00.000-06:00

We headed up to the Provo cabin last night for dinner with Grandpa. My parents, our little fam, my brother Todd and Grandpa Watkins came. Here's Molly checking out the doll. Sitting on the table...? Ok!

My cute grandpa!!

Ali checking out the toy stash!

Playing with the "new" toys. Grandpa remarked, "It's like Christmas for them!" So true! They certainly thought so!

We played a bit outside too while waiting for dinner to be ready.

Ali thinks she is such a big girl. She doesn't really want to have much to do with her high chair except for at breakfast. She wants to spoon feed herself which she isn't very good at yet, but she's learning!

Daddy and his girls on the back porch looking at the creek behind.

It felt so great up there! The temperature was nice and cool and it felt like fall, which I LOVE!! I love the smell that is so distinct once you are there--pinecones, pine, and sap is pretty much what I smell!! We really should try to get up there more often. It seems like we are good if we make it once a year but it really is so beautiful and fun we should try harder to get up there more often!

Fun in the Sun!

2011-08-25T15:19:00.001-06:00

We went to the petting zoo at Thanksgiving Point this week for another $2 Tuesday with some friends! My girls loved the animals. It was definitely hot, but it wasn't as crowded as when I've been in the past, so that was a bonus.

Ali loves animals and gets so excited!

Ali was trying to pet all the animals and Molly was definitely more hesitant, but she got into it as time went on.

A girl gave us her extra food so we got to feed it to some animals! I was helping Ali feed this guy.

I forgot the name of this animal, but he is a descendant of the camel. They came right up once they saw our food! Then they licked it off!

So excited to move on and see new animals!

They had some of the prettiest horses!! Molly was brave and pet them.

Ali got in on the petting too!

Checking out the ducks.

And the bunnies.

Going for a wagon ride.

I love this little room where they can play. They had a lot of fun.

Ali was just happy sitting on the floor, kicking her legs!

Riding on the tractor.

Sitting on the cow bench!

See, I told you they were pretty!

Then my friend knew of a fun splash park in Alpine so we headed there. The water felt AMAZING!! We were so hot from the farm. It was so refreshing.

Molly loved it!

I liked that it is so natural looking too.

Isn't it pretty? You can see a fountain in the back. There is a whole area over there with tons of fountains that shoot up that some of the braver kids were running through!

Ali loved the water too. It was perfect for her since the water wasn't deep and she didn't have to go through any fountains if she didn't want to. (It makes her nervous!)

If you live close to this one, you should definitely check it out!! It's free, so it made for a cheap day of fun! This was one of our most fun days this summer!

Colorado!

2011-08-19T13:49:00.000-06:00

We took a last minute road trip to Colorado last week to visit my brother Ryan and his wife Becky and their two girls! We are so glad we decided to go. We had a blast! R and B thanks so much for having us come and for all the fun!! Unfortunately Justin was too busy with work and school stuff, so it was just us girls.

First off I should explain that there is a reason you buy a filter for your lens! So you don't get smudges on it!! Of course my cleaner was at home, so sorry you have to deal with the smudge right in the center on every picture! It makes me so mad but I guess any picture is better than none, right? I think Ali got her nose right up on it. Oops!

The girls had all sorts of fun with this water table!

We went to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo (near Colorado Springs) and it was a really neat zoo. We all had a great time! The giraffes were first up and you could feed them! I have never seen that at a zoo!

Shay was the only brave one. Check out her face! The giraffes have the longest tongues!! We were feeding them lettuce.

They were this close to you!

They had the most giraffes too. I couldn't believe they had so many!

Look at these cute monkeys hanging out!

Taking it all in.

Lexie is the cutest. She poses for everything! It's so adorable.

I loved this owl bench!

Grandma and Grandpa came on Saturday. My dad left Sunday but my mom is still there! I was so glad she came. Ali was so clingy the first few days and I pretty much had to hold her the whole time! She wouldn't go to Ryan or Becky (and they definitely tried) so when my mom came she was really excited! And I got some relief :)

The zoo is located right next to the mountain and there was such a beautiful view at the top! You can ride the chair lift up, but our girls are too young we thought.

Ali was in the stroller for the first half and once we got her out she couldn't have been happier!!

Thank you smudged lens!! Ahh!!

Ali wanted to walk everywhere all by herself.

The girls all wanted to ride the carousel. This was the first time that Ali and Molly rode by themselves! Molly didn't want me to touch her! She wanted to do it all on her own. I was a bit nervous with Ali, so I held onto her, but she loved it!

When our turn was over I practically had to drag Ali away! She wanted to go again and again.

They had chickens too. They had a ton of animals including bears, elephants, a moose, tigers, lions, hippos, tamirs, wallabies, alligators, cranes, etc. and some that I had never seen before!! I'm really glad we went. It was a really fun zoo! The girls loved it.

Becky and I also made some jewelry for our girls!! She is the master mind behind these darling gumball necklaces!! If you would like to buy your own, visit her blog and/or etsy shop here! http://jujubstash.blogspot.com/ and jujubstash.

We also made bows. This was the damage we made in her craft room. Do you think we had fun?!!! We totally did!

Unfortunately I didn't take my camera with us to everything, but we also went swimming at a really fun place. They have two shallow pools that are 1 foot and 1 1/2 feet deep with a slide going from one to the other. My girls loved these pools! Remember that Molly has been so afraid of swimming? Well she had NO problem here. She is clearly afraid of deep water. Anyway, we had a blast that day!

We also hit up Target for a few things and I bought like 6 pairs of shoes/sandals for me and the girls on clearance! It's hard to pass up $2 and $3 when they are so cute! I will keep them for next summer.

We also went to the Antique Barn in Castle Rock that is a really fun boutique. We went to the outlets one day as well. We let the girls play and we watched some fun movies at night and of course we had EXCELLENT food!

The drive was 8 1/2 hours but it was well worth it. We stayed just short of a week. A lot of people thought I was crazy going by myself, but it's all freeway and the weather was perfect. I forgot to put the picture on here, but we had one meltdown on the way there in Denver, so about 40 minutes before we reached their house. I had given the girls some fruity marshmallows and Ali had spread them all over her face, hands and feet and was so mad about it! I had to pull over and wipe her down. For the long drive they really were so good! I was lucky! Ryan and Becky are in a brand new house so it was fun to see it plus we haven't seen them in months! Molly is right in between their girls and loves them so she was so excited we were going and she had a great time. We were really happy with how well the girls played and got along with each other. Every time it gets better and better as they get older and learn to share better! Thanks again R and B!!

Museum of Ancient Life

2011-08-19T12:56:00.000-06:00

Two weeks ago we went to Thanksgiving Point's Dinosaur Museum for $2 Tuesday! Through the month of August on Tuesdays you can get into any event for only $2! Adult or child. We had never been to the dinosaur museum and Molly wanted to go. We went when Justin got off work.

Checking out the different fossils.

Some of the dinosaurs were massive!! Standing next to his leg.

Ali wanted to get in on the fun too!

The girls and Justin climbed through a little cave.

They even had Jaws! Ha ha.

Molly got to look for artifacts with a paint brush in the sand. She loved it. We tried to convince Ali. We aren't quite sure why she didn't want to do it. After all she loves making any mess!

Who can pass up a 50 cent cone? Not us!

We are teaching Ali to lick ice cream cones! She tries to eat them! It's pretty funny.

Alison at 18 mos.

2011-08-09T21:11:00.000-06:00

I wanted to record some things about Ali at this age. I was also going to put some new pictures up but I can't find my connector cord! This is my second cord so I better find it!!

Anyway, Ali is talking and can probably say about 15 words or so (maybe more??). She can tell you many animal sounds like the cow, horse, kitty, dog, lion, tiger, owl, duck and more. If she wants something she says "anana". I have no idea where she picked it up and what it's supposed to mean (as in what word she is trying to say) but that's what it sounds like and if we hear that we know she wants something we have or she sees! She loves vegetables. It sounds weird, but it's true! Last night for dinner that's pretty much what she ate! She likes peas, carrots, green beans, and broccoli. It's awesome! If she doesn't want something she just nods her head forcefully! She doesn't say "no" actually, just shakes her head! It's pretty funny.

She says: doggy, kitty, bunny, bear, all done, all gone, sister (sissy), nose, ears, eyes, mama, dada, bye bye, grandma and grandpa (which sounds like ga ga), and a few others I'm sure I'm missing.

Lately she is jealous of what Molly does/says/has/who's holding her. The past week or so she will be all upset if Molly gets something and she wants it. Whether it's a toy or food, she is all jealous! Even if Molly has the object first. So we are getting through that!

She loves to climb on everything and make a mess. Molly is such a girl and wants clean hands and Ali goes and pulls out the dirt in my mom's potted flowers! She's into the toilet and anything that will make a mess. I have to watch her or else I will for sure be cleaning something!

This morning she slept in the longest to date (at least that I can think of!)--8:30! She is usually up between 6:45-7:15 am give or take every morning. She has all her teeth. Her fangs on top are poking in but everything else is in. She HATES us brushing her teeth even though we do it twice a day! You'd think she'd get over it since we aren't giving up, but nope!

She loves to pick up headbands and put them around her neck like a collar. No clue why. Then she leans her head down to hold it in place I guess? So silly!

She still loves her binky and bunny blanket/pink kitty/cougar. She will take any of them. She loves to take the kitty's tail or her bunny's ear and she rubs them under her nose! It is so silly! We think she smells them and it's comforting to her or something! I need to get a picture because it's pretty funny.

We love our Ali Bug!

Flirty Skirts

2011-08-03T13:46:00.000-06:00

My mom likes to pick up quilting and crafting magazines and I saw these skirts featured in one of her magazines and I knew I wanted to make them for my girls!! I found this cute fabric called "love" by Amy Butler and it was on sale for half off! Woo hoo! (For those who don't sew or quilt, it's hard to come by a famous designer like Amy and find her fabric for half off so I was pretty excited.)

I loved that the skirts were two tiers. And they looked pretty simple if I could just sit down and actually cut the pieces out and sew them together! That seems to be the hardest part for me lately!

After looking for a top to match Ali's skirt for a month or so, I found this little tank top at Old Navy on clearance for $1.99 and I was pretty sure the peachy pink was the perfect shade to match the skirt!

Molly's top was on clearance at Gap Kids and was just too adorable not to buy!

Since Ali's top wasn't as "fancy" as Molly's, I made up a rosette and put a pin on the back so I can pin it on the shirt. That way I can take it off when I wash the tank top and not worry about it.

These skirts are perfect for a tea party

Or just playing

The bottom tier of the skirts is the same on both.

And they work for twirling too!

Layton Triathlon

2011-07-31T18:16:00.000-06:00

Yesterday we participated in the Layton mini sprint triathlon. This time we added my dad and Natalie's husband, Preston, to the race! It was the perfect day-overcast and not too hot! We felt pretty lucky.

Transition area was a bit crazy!

Justin, the girls and my mom came as we were running, so we don't have any pics of us crossing the finish line, although they did see us and cheer us on! Actually, they parked right by where the run starts and noticed me and cheered me on! It was perfect timing!

Look at my dad! He rode on his bike once before this race and didn't even swim. 60 years old! Of course it did help that he is a trail runner/marathoner!! He is definitely in good shape and that's why he did so well!

Go dad! We are so proud of you!

My mom and the girls wrote a little sign for us!

With our fans ;) Justin is taking the picture.

Here's my dad holding his timing card. He finished #1 in his age category!! Isn't that awesome?! His first time ever!

If you don't have these shoes, you aren't cool. Just kidding! Nat bought these first, then I did and my mom followed after. We've told Emily they are the only way to go but she still hasn't felt the need I guess :)

The swim part was at Layton's Surf N Swim.

Here's what it looked like. You went up and down each lane, then switched lanes.

After me, Nat and my dad finished our mini sprint, we went over to watch Preston swim. The girls helped themselves to the pool. Of course this is as much pool as Molly likes!

My dad on the podium! #1 in Men's Mini Sprint age 60-64! Woo hoo dad!

I made it on the podium too! I was 1st in my age category!! My girls were pretty interested in my new "necklace"! I have to say that I owe it to a girl that I will call my pacer! When I started out on the run she was in front of me and was keeping a good pace. I stayed behind her until the last little bit. She actually started to walk so I ended up passing her at the end, but I know I would have walked way more than the few times I did without her!!

Natalie made it on the podium as well! She took 3rd in her age group! Go Nat!! You are awesome!

Here we are with our medals. Do we have awesome genes or what?! Ha ha. Go Galbraiths!

All done!! Me, Preston, Natalie and my dad. It was a really fun triathlon and we all had a good time. I was happy that the distances were shorter (except the swim was the same: 300 m. swim, 5.5 mile bike, 1.5 mile run). Most of the people were first timers and it was smaller, which I liked. I thought it would bother me to have men doing it along side me, but it didn't at all. I actually passed a guy in the pool! And two older men on the run :) Anyway, thanks Nat for talking me into another one! Of course she's already emailed me about one in September! Ha ha. My time was about 47 minutes, which I felt good about.

"Outie" braid

2011-07-31T11:37:00.000-06:00

I've been having fun learning new ways to do Molly's hair. I figure if I have two girls, I might as well learn! I hadn't tried this braid before, but I knew to make it, you have to take the strands under the hair, not over like you would a french braid. So here's the result.

When I started the braid I didn't really know what I was going to do with it in the end, but I decided to take it all the way around her head.

I love this picture of her looking at herself in the mirror!

Family Reunion

2011-07-25T22:01:00.002-06:00

We had a family reunion with the Pendletons this weekend in Wyoming. It was a full house and we had lots of people over!! Justin's grandparents live across the street so we put half in one house and half at the other. All of my FIL's siblings were there (minus one on a mission) and their family members who could come.

Justin reading to the girls before they went to bed.

On the left is Justin's uncle Dave. He had the brilliant idea to rent a karaoke machine! It was pretty intense! It had 18,000 songs! It provided many, many hours of entertainment.

Justin's brothers, Mark and Brad.

Some of the audience watching.

Justin's grandparents sang too!

Molly enjoyed playing with all of her cousins and second cousins!

Yes, even I got up. But only in a big group! I am definitely not a soloist!!

Molly and her cousin Laney loved dancing with each other.

Justin's parents singing.

And Justin got up with his sister Sunny.

We were pretty exhausted as you can see!

Ali was busy as usual checking everything out.

Justin's dad and brother built this pergola (spelling?) just this past month or so!! Very impressive!

We had a fun time. We never get enough sleep when we go up! Everyone wants to stay up. I was lucky to get some naps in though! We went to Jackson Hole one afternoon and brought a picnic and that was fun. The girls both slept on the drive. They are about an hour or so away, so it's not too bad. Thanks for all the fun Val and Shelley!!

Splash pad and park

2011-07-21T08:32:00.001-06:00

Yesterday my sister Emily and I went to Liberty Park in Salt Lake to check out their splash pad. We had never really been to the park and we were pleasantly surprised how fun it was and how much there was to do!! There were a lot of kids, but there also was tons to do.

Emily and the kids.

My girls especially liked the sandbox.

They had this cool swing so we thought we'd try Ali out in it!

Molly really liked this slide.

Ali really liked this little girl! She just stood there and let Ali look at her! It was so funny.

They also liked crawling through this tunnel.

The splash pad. Of course my girls weren't too interested in what we came for! One day they will get over the fear of water I guess!

This is as close as Molly got! Ha ha. We had a lot of fun. We wish we would have checked it out sooner so we could get more out of this summer!

We are going to miss Emily, Zack and baby Elise! Zack has been accepted to medical school in Wisconsin and they are moving two weeks from today! We are really excited for them but have had so much fun with them this summer!!

Justin goes to Washington

2011-07-20T08:51:00.000-06:00

The Capitol Building.

Proving I was actually there.

The Rotunda of the Capitol Building.

The Old House of Representatives Room. The Curved roof allows you to hear what other people on the opposite side of the room are saying as if they are standing right by you.

Space and Air Museum.

Washington Memorial.

WWII Memorial. Utah represent!

Lincoln Memorial.

Vietnam Memorial.

Korean Memorial.

Jefferson Memorial.

Some guy lives here. President something or other.

Arlington Cemetery. A truly humbling experience.

Changing of the guard at Arlington Cemetery.

Justin wrote the captions here if you couldn't tell!! He will be the chapter president next year at the University of Utah for the Federalist Society. He was flown out with all of the other chapter presidents to attend some workshops and trainings. He was able to fly out a day early, stay with his aunt and uncle who are serving a mission there and get to see all the tourist sights before the workshops began. He was there Thursday to Sunday night. He had a great time and learned a lot to help his chapter. A highlight for him was meeting Justice Thomas of the Supreme Court!

Wanna tri?!!

2011-07-15T08:33:00.000-06:00

I just recently signed up for Layton city's mini sprint triathlon July 30th. If you have wanted to try a triathlon, this would be perfect for you!! You can still sign up and it's actually a pretty cheap one-$45. The mini sprint is short: 300 yd. swim, 6 mile bike, 1.5 mile run!! They also have a regular sprint triathlon, a relay team and a kids triathlon! My sister and I signed up and we convinced my dad too! It should be fun! For more info, go here: http://laytontriathlon.com

Park City!

2011-07-14T13:37:00.000-06:00

We went with the family to Park City for a couple days this week and stayed at the Marriott Mountainside Hotel. It was really nice! Too bad it wasn't longer! My parents used their time share but remember, they just came back from Europe. So it was nice they thought of the rest of us too :)

Caught red handed!! Just kidding. Having snacks by the pool. This is the resort with a pool and like 6 hot tubs. Nice!!

Little Elise taking a nap.

My mom was a big help withe the grandkids!

Major and Molly finished with swimming and snacks. Some big clouds rolled in, but we got about an hour in of swim time. Molly isn't crazy about swimming still, so it worked out fine for her!

My niece Emery. So happy always!!

The alpine slides were next door. We went in 2 different groups so we could take turns watching the kids.

We took our girls on the carousel. Molly wasn't interested in the alpine slide even though we tried and tried for about 15 minutes to convince her!

Molly also got to ride on the little airplanes.

Alison hanging out with Uncle Todd.

Justin on the left and me on the right. He couldn't believe that I could keep up with him! I would have won if he wasn't twice as big as me!!

Grandpa with Mitt.

Grandma even went! We had a fun time and decided next time we need to stay for a week! It was nice going somewhere close, but still resort-y with pools and other fun places close by. We also went to a Farmer's Market and bought a few things there like bread, fresh tomatoes, cherries and ice cream! Ryan and Becky, we missed you! But obviously a new house and unpacking would take precedence over a two day trip!

Popsicles and 18 months

2011-07-10T17:48:00.000-06:00

Today this girl is 18 months! Ali is into everything these days and is trying new words all the time. She has been a daddy's girl recently and loves to say, "hi dada!" She just figured out "all gone", "Jesus", and "uh oh" to name a few.

The girls found popsicles in grandma's freezer the other day so we took them outside and here's what we got...

Ali lately loves to flip her sippy cups upside down and shake them. So you know, most sippy cups do leak! We find this out on a daily basis usually!! Here she was experimenting with her popsicle by shaking it on the patio.

And then she would take her hand and make the mess bigger!!

So happy!

Molly is of the cleaner type. She has never liked her hands messy or dirty and Ali is totally opposite! She loves to make a mess whenever and wherever she can.

Sisterly love! Well, most of the time :)

4th of July

2011-07-06T08:15:00.000-06:00

I wanted to do something fun for Molly's hair for the holiday and I thought this twisty star would be fun. Here is the site: http://www.princesshairstyles.com/

We went to breakfast at the Belgian Waffle (yummy) and after we went to Sandy city. They had a bunch of free activities and we thought Molly would have a lot of fun.

They had a bunch of different crafts for the kids to do. One was coloring masks.

Alison had fun too. She wanted to walk around everywhere and she was really interested in the big blog up slides.

Molly was afraid of the big slides but we got her to go into this bounce house.

We put Ali in but she wasn't a big fan!

The day was perfect-overcast! We had a bit of rain later in the day, so it was a good thing they had tents, but it was nice not to have the full sun out!

Another cute thing she made was a cup that had coloring these pictures that you could put in a cup and see.

She made a lion magnet too!

We found the balloon lady!

My mom bought some horseshoes for the kids to play with and Ali thinks they are necklaces I guess! She is so funny with them! She puts them around her neck and puts her chin down to hold them. We had a yummy bbq with homemade potato salad and a strawberry banana trifle and homemade ice cream for dessert! Doesn't get much better than that!!

The extent of our fireworks. I bought 8 flowers. I couldn't find sparklers at the store I was at, so this was all I got!

Molly's reaction to the fireworks! She thought they were neat! Justin, me and my brother Todd watched Sandy city's fireworks later that night after we put the girls to bed and my parents listened. We had decent seats and we were quick getting there and getting home, so a win win!!

last week

2011-06-27T15:47:00.000-06:00

Last week was hot and so we put on our suits and attached the hose to this little water thing my mom bought for the grandkids. Check out my sassy girl!

Still sassy.

This one was a bit curious!

Yes, she did eat something chocolate.

They weren't crazy about sitting on it but kind of sat on the sides.

Yummy water.

Check out this worm!! It is probably one of the longest ones I've ever seen!

Ali is into everything these days! So busy!!

Who doesn't love ruffles on the bum?

I also went to youth conference with the young women last Friday and Saturday. We had five girls which was a lot for us! We joined with another ward's ym and yw (as well as our ym) and went boating at Deer Creek then headed up to Heber Valley Camp. I had never been. It was absolutely beautiful! I decided not to bring my camera so it wouldn't get ruined but now I wish I would've had it!! We played lots of games, listened to a talk by Thurl Bailey (way cool! former NBA player and now member of the church), went on a ropes course there and ate yummy food! Everyone had a great time.

Alison is in love with my brother Todd's dog Cheeto. I really think it was her first word, "che che". She says, "hi che che" whenever she hears/sees him. Alison also has been into carrying everything on her arm like a purse and loves babies. Real ones and dolls. She also loves to say, "hi baby!" My family came home from Europe last night and had a great time! Now I really want to go to France and England!

Conversation

2011-06-23T12:47:00.000-06:00

Today I overheard the following from Molly.

Molly (holding her phone in her hand): I'm gonna call heaven and see what Cici is doing. (Cici is another imaginary friend. She has LOTS.) Jesus? What you doing with Cici? You are? You're saving her?

I love it.

Father's Day

2011-06-20T13:04:00.000-06:00

We had a lot of fun celebrating our fathers yesterday. We spoiled daddy rotten!!

Notice Ali's binky is in here.

And 2 seconds after that picture was taken, it was out and she put a starburst in paper and all! Silly girl! Luckily Justin was on the ball and noticed.

I found this cute idea on the blog, Our Best Bites, here: Pop Top. It was really easy to make!

Opening our card...

And his other gift.

It's a grilling apron. With his favorite things--byu and the girl's handprints!

Side note here. I have been wanting to get some new cute hair styles for Molly since her hair is so long and I'm not especially creative when it comes to hair! So here is the site I used and I have used it before a time or two....Adopt a 'Do. I love that they have videos showing how to do everything since I'm not great at just reading and figuring it out always! This is how she wore her hair yesterday for church.

The spoiling continued with a yummy Coldstone cake!

Justin's favorite: red velvet cake with sweet cream ice cream. And the rest of us didn't mind it either :) I even made a roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls and broccoli for dinner. We tried to make the day really special for Justin. Happy Father's Day to my dad, FIL and grandpas too! Hope you had fun spoiling your husbands and dads too!

Pretty

2011-06-17T12:25:00.000-06:00

Half of my family left a week ago for Europe. Unfortunately, I'm not part of that group! But I can't complain because my turn was 5 years ago. While my mom is gone, I'm in charge of watering her pots and flowers. She has so many flowers this year that it probably takes me a good 10-15 minutes a day (doesn't sound like much, but add it to my normal morning routine and you get the idea!).

Today our street is being re-paved or slurried (whatever they call it) and so we had to park in the church parking lot and we are walking to the house. Not so fun. Especially with groceries! Anyway, I passed a neighbors house and saw her beautiful peonies!! I had to go back and take some pictures. Aren't they beautiful?!

These are straight out of the camera.

Gorgeous!! Then I also took a couple pics of some of my mom's flowers.

These delphiniums are just starting to bloom.

Every year my mom takes her 2 giant pots to a nursery and they plant flowers and she goes back a couple months later and picks them up and they are beautiful!!

A couple days ago we went to Raging Waters (now Seven Peaks Salt Lake). Justin and I bought passes for the season that were really cheap and the girls are free. Molly loved the water, no fear, last year. This year she's afraid! She didn't even want to go to the kid area and play. The water was cold, so I can't totally blame her. We did spend some time at the back of the wave pool playing with toys. Ali especially thought that was great! My sister Emily and her baby came along too, so with 3 adults, we were able to switch each other out and go on some of the bigger rides. It was a lot of fun! I'm thinking I might put Molly in swimming lessons this year. We'll see. I have to look into it!

Best part of the water park was the girls sleeping ALL night long. I didn't see or hear from them all night and they both slept in until 8 am!! I think that is a first for them and it was HEAVEN for us!! We are definitely going back there again! Hope you are enjoying the flowers and the sun too.

baby gifts

2011-06-10T11:13:00.000-06:00

I went to a baby shower this past week and here's what I came up with. First, a blanket. Minky on one side, satin-y on the back! With a white satin binding. I was tempted to keep it myself! But it's a bit small for me.

My sister Emily made an adorable owl last week, so I had to give it a go. Especially with the free pattern, found here: Snuggly owl pattern

And then because it's her first and a GIRL, I had to make some bows.

I got some elastic in the mail last week from pick your plum so it had to be used!

Growth and the zoo

2011-06-05T14:48:00.000-06:00

I just wanted to record some of the things Alison is up to these days. She is at such a fun age. She is 17 months this week. She is getting pretty good at walking! She loves to explore and she learned to crawl down the stairs last week when we were in WY. So that's huge! We have 2 flights of stairs here.

She loves to talk! She even tries to sing. It's so cute. She says: Mama, Dada, kitty, hi, ba-bye, Che Che (for Todd's dog Cheeto), go go go, doggy.

She still is often found carrying her little bunny blankie and also her kitty (that was actually a gift for Molly but Alison loves it!). She is only missing about 4 teeth in her mouth, so she's almost got a full set. She is so happy and friendly. She loves food and she lets you know when she wants something! Either she screams at you until she gets it, or she brings it to you to give to her. She loves her grandparents and aunts and uncles and anybody familiar. She will even go to strangers though.

She still doesn't like TV or movies. She loves to push things around-chairs, toys, whatever. She loves to be outside. Anytime she sees the door open, she goes for it! She loves to swing on the swings and to sit while bounced on the trampoline. I can tell she's gonna love roller coasters like her mama! She seems to be a thrill seeker! She loves books and lately really likes the Karen Katz books where she can lift the flaps. She also loves the touchy feely books. She still likes to be held, but not as much as before when she wasn't walking. She is a sweetheart and we love her!

Molly is still spunky and sassy. We went through a week long period of pure SASS! But the next week she was the sweetest girl around. She lately has gotten up out of bed after we put her down, so we have gone about different ways to stop that! She goes through a few dresses or outfits a day. She still loves pink.

She enjoys playing with toys and lately undresses all her dolls "because they are going swimming." She really wants to go swimming, so we are glad it has warmed up! We bought passes to Seven Peaks Salt Lake (former Raging Waters) so we are looking forward to going there as a family this summer.

The girls love their daddy! He is so fun and playful with them. But he also loves to cuddle with his girls.

The Zoo

We went to the zoo the other day and had a lot of fun! If you didn't know, right now at Hogle Zoo they have these dinosaurs throughout and they are so lifelike! I was really impressed. They move, make dinosaur sounds and some of them even squirt water at you!

I had Alison in her stroller for the first half and then she finally put up a big enough fight that I took her out. She was SO excited to see the monkeys!

We went with our friends Otis and Milly and their grandma Cherie since their mom is out of town. Cherie and I work in YW's together. We were glad we got a play date in!

The licorice was a huge success and so worth the $2 I paid for it!

All the kiddos on the big dinosaur!

They had fun at the playground.

Alison was most excited about the bark on the ground! Of course.

Sitting on the elephant that shoots out water. It was a crowded day (Friday) but it was a lot of fun!

Tent sale: my finds

2011-06-04T17:28:00.000-06:00

After grocery shopping yesterday morning, I walked out to the parking lot and noticed the large tent in DownEast's parking lot. Hmmm...I thought. Well of course I had to check it out! And I'm so glad I did. I'm even gonna show you what I got!

First off, I didn't spend more than five bucks on any item! Yahoo! That's my kind of sale. Ok the sweaters first. I should say, yes, I did take a photography class, but man, you can't tell with these pictures!! Sorry! Anyway, I got the sweater which is kind of a peachy/tan color and the embroidered cardigan that's more of a light minty green.

Then I found these four shirts! Cute, huh?! The bottom right shirt has pearls along the top if you can't tell (click on a pic if you want to see it bigger).

Cami's and tees were 2 for $5! So the top two are camis. Then I bought the pj bottoms on the bottom left to replace the pair on the bottom right. You probably can't tell, but they have holes by the elastic at the top and they used to say Jackson Hole on the bum! Yeah, I kinda liked them! Don't worry, I trashed them yesterday!!

I also bought a t shirt and cami for Molly in her size that were also 2 for $5. So my grand total for all of this, $45!! Not too shabby! And I felt so good about my purchase since my dad is now working there! I think today (Saturday) is the last day of the tent sale at the Sandy store where I went, but it will be moving to other locations next week I believe! So check it out!

Fabric Doll Carrier

2011-06-02T13:42:00.000-06:00

Yay! I found the cutest fabric doll line of fabric and needed some! I found the doll bodies sold as a little scrap bag at a quilting store for $1. So I picked up a couple! Then I headed to a different store where I found the clothes. I had to pay full price, but they are darling and sooo worth it! I knew Molly would love them.

I ironed the dolls and their clothes to some thick fusible fleece and cut them out. Then using an old simplicity pattern of my moms, I made a bag to carry the dolls in.

I used the clear vinyl on one side to hold the dolls and their clothes.

I used blue felt on the other side to "display" the dolls where they can sort of "stick".

She likes them! There are so many outfits to choose from! You can mix and match!

Aren't they so cute?!

I'm not sure what this face is, but I think she's happy.

I made a pocket on the outside. I think I will add a cute button at some point.

Fun huh? I cut a plastic folder in half and put it in each side to make it a bit sturdier, even though they don't take up the whole space. I think this will be fun for her to take to church and keep it all together so we won't lose too many pieces.

Memorial Day Weekend

2011-05-31T21:43:00.000-06:00

We headed up to Justin's parent's home for the weekend and the annual Pendleton Memorial Golf Tournament. This is one occasion where the entire family shows up! We arrived on Thursday, late afternoon, and enjoyed a weekend with more rain and even some snow. I'm not sure if we are from SLC or Seattle at this point?? Anyway...Molly and grandma enjoyed some cuddly time!

The girls enjoyed a four wheeler ride with daddy. They just had to have a blanket to stay warm.

I couldn't get a good picture with all of them looking, so this one is the best I had!

The girls did a bit of crafts (this is Brooke). We didn't quite plan ahead for another amazing craft like last year's yarn wreaths. But we made a bunch of fabric rosettes.

Baby Reese. She was such an angel! What a good baby. It took about 3 days before we heard her really cry! She smiled any time someone looked at her!

I have given my mom a lot of grief for making me and my younger sister Emily match in our outfits. But now I get it!! It just looks cute, doesn't it?! I am in love with these little capris. These outfits were on clearance at Carter's and I think I paid $3 for each piece. Not too shabby!

Alison and her cousin Mckenna. I wish I had my camera when the triplets first came to the house. Ali went over and just started saying all kinds of gibberish to them and they were staring at her like she was crazy! It was hilarious.

The triplets were loving throwing their sweaters, crawling with people's shoes on their feet and climbing up and down the stairs. Ali did learn to go "down" the stairs and I can't tell you how happy I am about that! Last time we were there she would climb up and cry until we came up for her!

How cute is this headband Brooke made for Reese? Darling! And she says she isn't crafty...Brooke!!

We tried something new...roasted pineapple! We made a rub of some sugar, cloves and cinnamon and slathered it on the pineapple. Then we put it on this skewer and grilled it! Then we put it over ice cream.

Here's Justin and his brother Brad dishing up. It was yummy! I am not a huge fan of ice cream with pineapple, so it wasn't the greatest combo for me, but the caramel sauce my MIL made was DELICIOUS!

Of course the girls got in on the ice cream too.

The final product! We also played a whole bunch of games, ate even more yummy food, and put together a puzzle that took about 4 hours! And heard some great news! Justin's brother Mark and his wife Ashley are expecting come January! Hooray! Congrats you guys! We are all hoping for a boy...7 granddaughters so far! Although we would take either of course!

Tri time

2011-05-22T21:56:00.000-06:00

Whew!! We did it!! Yeah! It turned out to be a really fun experience, even if it was a bit exhausting!
It definitely helped having my sisters there with me. Thanks Nat and Em!

It turned out to be such a beautiful day! You would have never known that it rained ALL week leading up to Saturday.

Here we all are getting ready to swim.

One leg down, two to go!

Justin reported that I had the worst bike out there! Ha. It's probably close to true (it's a lovely Schwinn mountain bike but I did have some road tires put on!). I could definitely tell that I was working MUCH harder than those riding road bikes. Maybe one day I'll have a nicer one? One girl that passed me on the bike told me I looked like a super hero with my jacket on!! ha ha. I had it unzipped, so I'm sure it looked like a cape ;)

One more lap! I tossed my jacket and asked the bystanders to put it on the grass. Luckily it was right there after I was done!

Transition to the run. This was definitely the hardest part. Jello legs for sure!! Wow.

Almost there!

Yay! They had a big red inflatable arch for the finish!

My fans!! Justin was so great to take care of both girls during the race. It was fun to see them while I transitioned and hear Justin and Molly cheer me on!

All done! It really felt great to accomplish something like this. I completed just under an hour and a half, which is what I was aiming for. I wanted all of my training to show and I was pleased with the end result, so I have no regrets at all! Everyone wants to know if I'd do another...probably. Natalie keeps finding more races for us, and there's a mini sprint in July which sounds enticing!

Thanks to Natalie and Emily for doing it with me! You are both amazing!

First Recital

2011-05-21T21:28:00.000-06:00

Last night we attended Molly's first singing/dancing recital! It was so cute. I don't think Molly totally understood what a "recital" meant, but she did quite well, although she was shy! Here she is with her darling teacher, Miss Tricia!

The theme was "Oh, What a Year!" Each song/dance was a month of the year.

Here is Molly singing her solo. "This is the way we sneak around, sneak around, sneak around..." She was really quiet, but she sang it!

Another dance was the baby bumble bee song. She is squishing up her baby bumble bee here :)

Ali was mainly trying to get to the stage the whole time until I found these stairs in the back corner! She had a great time going up and down these stairs while playing with my necklace.

Here are all the girls doing a little cheer at the end.

Molly was so excited about getting her picture taken after :)

Molly and her friend Carly.

What do you think?

2011-05-16T20:08:00.000-06:00

Just out of curiosity, what do you use in the shower? Bar soap or body wash? I am totally a bar soap person. I don't know why, but in my mind I think that it's cleaner than body wash! Ha, I know, silly. Anyway, I'm curious what you use. I know body wash has a million yummy scents but I just can't get myself to go that route.

Moving on. When you sleep, do you like the blankets in a big heap or you do you like them nice and straight? I'm quite particular about them being flat, straight, and perfect!! I had no idea I was so crazy about this until I got married and Justin is totally the opposite! He didn't even like sheets and I had to convince him that was THE ONLY WAY TO GO! So what do you prefer? Or are you somewhere in the middle? (Have I already talked about this? Sorry if I have!)

Last question. Do I have a seriously sensitive head? I cannot wear ANY kind of headband for longer than about an hour, max, unless it's fabric only. Is that weird? I wish that wasn't the case because I think there are so many cute headbands and I do own several, but I can only use them when I'm washing my face for a couple minutes! Grrr. I just wondered if I'm the only one!

2011-05-13T17:22:00.000-06:00

Six years ago on another Friday the 13th of May, we tied the knot! Happy Anniversary Justin! Here's hoping for many more happy years together. I love you!

Scottsdale, AZ

2011-05-10T21:08:00.000-06:00

We left Thursday for Scottsdale, AZ sans kids for our 6th anniversary, which is next week. We had a blast!! We stayed at the Hyatt Regency and enjoyed some warm weather, shopping, golfing, eating out, laying out and peaceful sleep!!

These two came with us (Justin's parents). When we told them we were heading to Arizona, they were totally on board. And who can blame them? They still had snow when we left last week! Plus, Shelley is from Mesa, so she was the navigator (actually she was the driver!) the whole time. And boy, it was nice having her drive. I was totally lost! I would never have been able to find all the places we went on my own!

We ate at an Italian restaurant at our hotel one night. The food was really yummy!

This was dessert. It's a little gondola boat that's dipped in chocolate. The oar is also chocolate and the bottom is creme brulee!

Thirty seconds later....

And who doesn't love a strawberry daiquiri? (virgin of course!) Delish!

More eating pics! For Mother's Day we had brunch at the hotel and boy, do they go ALL out! Wow! They had breakfast foods, a salad bar, quesadillas and mexican food, italian pastas, prime rib, ham, breads and dessert! I don't know if you can see the plate I'm holding, but yes, I tasted all of those! And they were so yummy. They also gave all the moms a rose. So sweet.

The guys enjoyed the dessert too (bananas foster anyone?!).

I learned that these are date trees, not palm trees! Who knew? My MIL did! They were gorgeous and all around the resort.

We enjoyed weather in the high 90s, which sounds hot, but there was a breeze so we thought it felt GREAT. It was really depressing to come home to rain! Really. It was sooooo nice laying out by the pool, soaking up the sun, reading my kindle! I highly recommend it!

One of the most fun things we did was go on a gondola boat ride. If you eat at the italian restaurant there, they give you complimentary tickets to go for a ride there at the resort. They have a lake behind the pool where they do the boat rides. It was so fun! It was quiet and calm and the guy sang us an italian love song and it was beautiful! The guy was really talented. (He told us he got his master's degree in vocal performance...very impressive!)

It really was perfect! I may have also bought several new things for my wardrobe (we pretty much hit every Marshall's in the valley! Yep, we are sick!! And we found Nordstrom's clearance store, Last Chance!) Of course we wish we would've had one more day, but we were pretty excited to come home and see our girls. A big, big thanks to my sister Natalie and my mom for watching our girls for us! We got home last night and I'll tell you, it was hard facing reality. Our girls got up several times last night (boo!). It was clear the vacation was OVER!! Anyway, if it has been a while since you and your hubby have gone for a few days on your own, it's definitely worth it!

Breaking News!

2011-05-10T20:27:00.000-06:00

Alison walks!! Today she is 16 months on the day (May 10th) and she made it a milestone by finally walking! She has been close for a couple weeks now and we are so glad she waited for us to come home (next post is our fun trip!) to walk on her own.

So pleased with herself! Great job Ali Bug!