rudolph

who else gets so sad when the sun goes down at 4:30?  

this afternoon after naps, we delayed our snacks and headed straight to our neighborhood playground.  we had a lot of fun although baby's mood fell along with the sun and temps.  she had on about four layers of clothes, and babylegs under her jeans and fur boots on her little toes, but all of that did nothing for her itty bitty nose.  poor baby.

have you ever seen a redder little nose?

our friends are back in town!

i am sure you have to know which friends i am speaking of because we all know i do not have many.  

kirstyn and michaela got back from their looooong ten day trip to utah last night so we celebrated by going to the park today.

baby girl wanted to swing because michaela was swinging, but as you can tell from the picture, she wasn't really loving it.  mostly just trying to fit in with the cool kids.

she was much happier running around.  of course.  do not contain this child.  she looooves slides so we went down this slide several times.  baby girl kept crawling to the top of the playset, turning around, and sliding down the slide on her belly.  i didn't want her to bump her chin on the bottom or fall off from landing too fast, so i kept grabbing her (just barely!) and one time managed to go down head first (on my stomach no less) while holding on her her arm.  there are no pictures of this because as kirstyn said "if i had a camera on me i would have taken a picture of this, but you got lucky."

as i was yelling, "look at me!  look at me!"

and then when i gave up and said "fine, DON'T look at me!"

ohmygoodness i love my baby so much.

today was kinda lonely

i even called my mom to tell her i really really really miss her.

it's official!

such a happy news feed!

my only brother, walter is engaged!!! i love that facebook picked three messed up pictures to post along with announcing their engagement. i looked through all of their facebook pictures and could not find a decent picture of them myself. but how appropriate because really, this is just very true to life for them.

i am soooo insanely excited for both of them and for myself that i'll be getting such an awesome new sister in law! i can't wait!

ps- how cute are they in their matching braves t-shirts? they're going to have the most gorgeous blonde hair, blue eyed children ever.

pps- if you couldn't tell, that very first picture is creepy and photoshopped.  i love love love that that's the main picture facebook displays for this happy event!  awesome.

these will get captions later

our day

in the safari section of the wildlife museum.  mom and dad said these guys looked just like the real masai men.  and it's true.  i saw pictures.

everyone kept posing and looking like they had no neck.  and their friends taking the pictures wouldn't even tell them.  so my christopher needed a no-neck picture too.  

check it out!  i'm a hockey player!  with a neck!  looks real huh?  tell me it does.  tell me.

and the helmet that looks like a spider built a web on my face.

they were announcing the stanford/oregon score and chistopher covered his ears since he had it recording at home.

check it out.  we're both wearing the same thing we wore last time we saw the avs play.  at air force for the preseason burgundy and white game.

with my parents.  their second ever nhl game.  now we know why the thrashers left atlanta.

i love this guy.  when honey and i were dating we used to play hockey on xbox and anytime the puck was passed to this guy the announcer would say "TO TANGUAY!" but because of the way his name is pronounce it's like "to-tane-gay" really fast and run together.  guess ya had to be there.

and i actually got captions up!  and less than a week later!  who would've guessed?!?!

the blind strike again

believe it or not. we had another gender mixup today. the sweet old woman sitting behind our booth during lunch was smiling at baby girl the entire meal. she paid and was leaving when she stopped by our table to tell us how nice our baby is. "HE WAS SOOOO GOOD AND WELL BEHAVED!" "HE IS SUCH A GOOD BOY!!!" "YES YOU ARE! YOU'RE A GOOD BOY!" none of us bothered to correct her. the funniest part was that much to my mother's dismay, my dad went so far as to go along with it, agreeing "yes, he is really cute. he did a great job sitting so nicely during lunch!"

apparently a pink sweater, pink shirt, pink boots, and ponytail are just not enough. i'm curious if this woman really just didn't notice all the pink or if she's just downright blind. she was alone so she either walked or drove herself so really we don't know. but my mom said she's positive the lady had to be completely blind.

oh my gosh it was hilarious.

testing balloons

honey went to minnesota on wednesday.  just for the day.  that's the best kind of trip.  flew out in the morning.  flew back that night.  anyways, one of his clients does a whole hodgepodge of things and one of the things they do is make balloons and then sell them to grocery stores.  well, they're trying out some new things and they needed to see if the balloons would still work even in high altitude.  so my honey was sent home with balloons.  thursday on his way home from work he took them by the grocery store to get filled up.  one worked.  one didn't.  baby was delighted with both.

it's the simple things in life.  

why bows are non-optional

from a month or two ago:

walmart greeter man making friendly small talk with me as i got my baby buckled in the stroller slipped in "a girl?" i just smiled and told him to have a good day, not sure if i heard him correctly. well, apparently he really needed to know. "a girl? is it a girl?" so i told him "yes, she's a girl." to which he said "i thought so!"

yes, you thought so, but apparently not enough that you could refrain from asking. ;-)

old people are so cute.

ps-  my mom is here!!!  we're having so much fun!!!!

story time

come shopping with me!

first, i just have to say thank you for the sympathetic and helpful comments and texts about baby!  she improved as the day went on and then went to sleep happy, slept through the night, and woke up happy.  she did well this morning but cried herself to sleep for her nap.  not sure what the deal is but i'll watch out for more teeth/growth spurts!

_________________________________________

i have many faults.  one of my most annoying is that i can not make decisions.  not in a timely manner or ever. it is a terrible thing indeed.  combine this with my hatred of shoe shopping and my dislike of spending money and we've got a big problem on our hands.  because i am in need of boots.

eventually, i'll probably need a pair of black boots as well as a pair of brown boots.  this is difficult for me because i do not like black but i love everything brown.  hence my wall to wall brown home.  but i know as far as clothes go, black is necessary.  so i will just have to suck it up and put on my big girl booties.

my dreams and aspirations for these future boots of mine would be that these boots would be comfortable, look good with jeans and skirts, and preferably be nice enough for church, without looking out of place at story time, the park, or walmart.  y'know, our usual hangouts.  also, since i'm obsessed with brown, that's the color scheme i follow everyday.  except for wintertime sunday clothes... which unfortunately seems to follow a black sort of scheme.  so if we much choose, the black boots need to be dressier and the brown boots more comfortable and casual.

anyways, on to shopping.  after story time at the library, i dragged my baby to target.  i had originally had my eye on these boots from kohls but the shaft of the boot is surprisingly tall and wide.  so it comes to the middle of my knee, feels a little awkward, and would be impossible to wear without jeans because it would make my baby calves looks like tiny toothpicks.  and i'm already self conscious about my calves, even without giant boots.  so i tried on most every tall boot target had available, which was difficult considering almost none of them were in my size.  the sizes ranged from 7 to 11 so if you think "don't get that pair of boots... they make your feet look enormous!!!" then you might be looking at the size 11.

introducing the brown boots!

and the black boots!

need a closer look?  in no particular order, here are their individual head [foot] shots.

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

and then my baby was yelling at me like she wanted to punch my face.  so i grabbed a few gallons of milk and we went home for lunch.  i know it would have been really great to be able to grab a skirt and haul all those boots to a dressing room to see how they look with my skinny calves but with a kid, there was just no way that was gonna happen.

so what do you think?  i think one is my favorite because i like the color and the buckles and the slouchiness.  but they're not as comfortable because of the heel and i do wish they were taller.  two was the most comfortable and the most expensive at $45.  it also comes in a not so useful brownish gray color.  i wish they came in straight up gray.  and for what it's worth, when i was trying on three, some lady was walking by and stopped to tell me that the boots looked fabulous.  and also that she liked my jeans.  and that she liked baby's pink boots as well.  now that i think about it, she was very complimentary!

k, walk me through it.  rationalize with me.

something is wrong with my baby

because i'm in my bed right now.  and so is my baby.  passed out.  like this.

last night, completely out of the blue, she had a hard time falling asleep.  she's been doing awesome lately, never crying or fussing before bedtime or naps.  so last night was really weird when she cried.  for more than five minutes.  more than ten.  and even when it was muffled like she was about to fall asleep, she just couldn't and would start wailing again.  so i got her and held her and it was a heavenly experience for both of us... or at least me.  anyways.  she woke up three times last night.  THREE!  at 10 something, 1 something, and 3 something.  and then she didn't wake up again until 10 am this morning.  all very weird.  i got her out of her crib and she was insanely cuddly again.  laid her head on my shoulder and didn't move a bit.  this went on for at least 15 minutes.  i was treasuring the time with her and it was so sweet i won't even lie.  it brought tears to my eyes.  i love her so much.  but then i thought about how very unusual this all was and got a little worried.  took her temp (as best i could) and no fever.  didn't feel feverish either.  i got her dressed and gave her oatmeal for breakfast which she gobbled down for a while and then screamed and wouldn't touch.  i walked around with her and calmed her down.  i gave her a pacifier and it was same as before.  she put her head down and didn't move.  so i just held her while i finished reading through an old conference talk (i have to speak in sacrament meeting in two weeks and i've already been freaking out about it for three.) and by about half way through she was out.  she has been getting more cuddly in her old age, but this is downright wrong.  i'll have to keep watching her symptoms and actions when she wakes up but in the mean time i got on babycenter.

apparently babies that wake up during the night and are sleepy the next morning have lead poisoning.  who knew?!?!  thanks babycenter.

anyways, she's been asleep for an hour and i'm just really thankful we didn't have anything pressing going on today because we're probably not gonna get too much done.  

but really, does anyone have any ideas what the issue could be?  there really is nothing else unusual besides crying when i put her down, waking up three times during the night, sleeping in, and being really cuddly.  

is she just having an off morning?!  am i overreacting?

glam up

today was a good day.  

we slept in til our usual time.  but then, because of daylight savings, we got an extra hour.  so i wasn't pressed for time on making phone calls for my calling, practicing my hymns for sacrament meeting, or getting baby fed and ready.  also, since it was my first time fasting in TWO WHOLE YEARS (pregnancy plus nursing really takes you out of the game for a while) i didn't have to take the time to feed myself.  anyways, all of this meant that we all hung out, played around, set up a christmas tree out of boredom (i'll explain later... maybe), and got baby a nap and had a fantastically leisurely time doing it.

also, i was asked to sub in nursery today so baby and i spent the second two hours of church hanging out and playing with other kids and moms (they're going through a nursery transition so there were a number of adults) which was a nice change to trying to chase, wrangle, feed, etc my precious mobile bundle of terror joy.  i love my baby more than words can say, but honestly, she puts me through the wringer at church with how fast she is when she runs for the exit anytime she finds an open door.  anyways, baby loved nursery and i'm really excited for her that she'll get to go starting in january.  and 2012 will be double delicious because not only will baby get to go to nursery, but we'll also have morning church so baby can still get her afternoon nap.  i look forward to this part immensely.

anyways, tonight we were hanging out and turns out, baby loves to sit on my bathroom counter (go figure because my bathroom is by faaaaarrrr her favorite room in the house) and put on makeup with me.  or just lip gloss because she tends to break and hide all other makeup.  she's looking to her left in all those pictures because that's where our big mirror is.  and who puts on makeup without looking in the mirror?!?!  not us, that's for sure.

disclaimer:  her hair is not actually yellow.  it's just the intense bathroom lighting.  thank goodness.

and as if my day wasn't good enough.  i rocked my baby to sleep tonight for the first time since i don't even know when.  i'll write a novel on it another time, because it's so worth recording.  it. was. heaven.

ps- baby's newest word?  "church"  the hilarious part is that she says it with absolute exactness.  like everything spiritual should be.

happy monday!

a picture

caught!

don't worry. it's just the wrapper. that chocolate was long gone thanks to my bad eating habits and lack of self control.

ps- i made this crockpot creamy chicken and wild rice soup tonight and it was delicious.

way better than last night's spaghetti squash disappointment.  and i even made modifications to make it healthier and heartier and it still hit the spot as a fall dinner comfort food.  try it!

tonight

here are just a few of the things we did tonight...

1.  telephone.  which i only have terrible pictures of... which won't be posted.  but if you need a visual, baby girl was holding honey's blackberry which was plugged into it's charger... and the outlet plug part was what chris was using for his phone.  so they were connected by the cord while they were having their conversation and it was precious.  okay fine.  i take it back.  enjoy some terrible pictures for all i care.

2.  played with outlet covers.  for a very long time.

3. practiced our scary faces

4.  disagreed about taking pictures.  baby kept asking me for the lens cap and then immediately putting it on the camera.

5.  read our favorite book at least 12 (literally) times.

she's so good at turning the pages and flipping and returning the flaps

6.  did this.  which i have no words for.

ps- i made spaghetti squash with grilled chicken and sun-dried tomatoes tonight because i found it on pinterest during nap time and happened to have everything on hand.  

anyways, it's healthy.  and it tasted healthy... even with my unhealthy modifications.  so although it looked pretty, honey and i very unanimously decided this would not make an appearance in our house again!