Sawyer turns 3!

I can't believe Sawyer is already three!  Where has all the time gone?  He really enjoyed his presents this year.  It was funny to watch him open them.  He would get excited about the present he opened, then ask me to take the plastic packaging off, and I'd tell him he had to wait and needed to open another one.  He seemed confused.  Wondering why he got to open a present just to look at it, only to have to put it to the side and do it all over again.  However, when he was all done, he really enjoyed playing with ALL his toys at once.  What a special little boy we have been blessed to have in our lives.  Sawyer, we love you so much and our lives would never be the same without you!  Happy birthday buddy!

Sawyer and Brooklyn enjoying licking the bowl

My first attempt at making a cake at home

Mmmm.... Tasty!

Present time!

Cutest kids ever!

Easter 2012

Brooklyn's 1st Birthday

For Brooklyn's birthday we decided to have a big family party at our house and watch her smash cake in her face.  Tons of my family came and we all had a great time!

 She has no idea what is about to happen.  

 Mmmmm.... spaghetti with meatballs.  Doesn't get much messier than that!

 Her cute cake

 Aunty Carolyn gets the award for bringing the BIGGEST present, we couldn't even see her behind that thing!

 Brooklyn loves the new book she got from her Great Nana

 So excited to have new toys!

 Her own personal cake!  This girl is in heaven, but was generous enough to open her mouth so we could share in the joy as well.

"Best day of my life!"

 "Ta-da" I made a huge mess!

 Had to get one of her in her birthday hat

 The end result, pre-bath

All cleaned up and ready to play with her new toys

All in all I think it was a success.  She slept well that night, and the next day she suffered from a major sugar coma and took a 6 hour nap.  We sure love this little girl. She brings so much happiness and joy into our lives. Happy birthday Brooklyn, our lives wouldn't be complete without you.

Brooklyn: 12 months

That's right!  Our beautiful little girl is now 12 months old.  Here is a little video slideshow of our little angel over the past year.  Enjoy!

Brooklyn turns 9 months

Ok, so like always, I am WAY behind on the whole blogging thing.  Brooklyn is actually going to be one NEXT WEEK! Time goes by way too fast!  Anyway, since she will be one, I figured I better get her 9 month stats on here now so there is at least something to compare them to in a week when she turns one.  

Her nine month check up went really well.  Her doctor was out of the office so she saw the PA instead.  The PA LOVED her and was laughing at her the whole time.  Brooklyn may just be the most flexible baby I have ever seen.  I often have people say to me, "Look! your baby is sitting in the splits position!" And I always respond, "That is the ONLY way she sits."  She is funny because whenever we pick her up and try to put her down to try and get her to stand on her feet, both legs go straight out to the side in the splits position.  The PA kept trying to get her to stand, and every time, she just kept doing air splits. The PA was laughing at her so hard, it was really funny.  Then she gave Sawyer a flavored tongue depressor to keep him occupied, and went to give Brooklyn one as well, but Brooklyn just leaned forward, sitting in the splits position, with her mouth wide open waiting for the PA to just put it in her mouth instead of just grabbing it with her hand.  Once again the PA laughed and laughed.  I think she is just lazy.  She thinks, "I'm cute, I don't need to stand up or work for anything, someone will get it for me."  Anyway, she was always the same with crawling.  I'd put something in front of her, and she'd just get mad and want it but never try to move her body towards it.  About 2 weeks after she turned 9 months, she finally started crawling.  Her is a video that doesn't show much, but it was the only one I have of her first few crawling attempts.  Enjoy!

And here are her stats from her 9 month check up:

Height: 27 inches-40th percentile

Weight: 16 lbs- 11th percentile

Head Circumference: 17.5 inches- 70th percentile

So she is still quite small.  16 lbs seems so little to me for a nine month old, but I am sure Sawyer was a much bigger baby.  She has always been in clothes an age level lower than where she's at.  I think Sawyer was always at least one ahead of his age.  She is our little peanut though and we all love her SO much!  She is still a very happy and loving baby- let's hope she always stays that way.  Stay tuned for more updates here soon on her 1st birthday!

California Trip: Part 3

After we left my Grandmother's, we traveled up the coast.  Tyler has always wanted to drive on the Pacific Coast Highway, so even though it was a longer drive, we thought it would be worth it.  And boy was it! It was so incredibly beautiful!  Here are some pictures of the drive. 

We later drove down to that road as climbed on those rocks. 

 Breath taking!

 Tyler and Sawyer are really small on the rocks above, but this is off the road from the earlier picture

 After the trip up the coast, we stopped at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  I have been to Monterey before but never got to go to the Aquarium. We got there only one hour before it closed, so we did a speed site seeing, but it was really cool. 

 Blurry, but a huge octopus

 Sea Turtle- love them!

The view from the back side of the Aquarium

We then stayed the night in Santa Cruz with Tyler's buddy Barnard over night.  (He was there for work, so it was lucky for us that Tyler could visit him).  The next day we headed up to San Francisco to see the Redwoods on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge.   We forgot the camera for the Redwoods (I know, right? Tyler didn't hear the end of it, I promise) but we did get one picture of the Golden Gate Bridge!

After the redwoods, we hit the road again for our trip home.  We stopped in Reno for a all you can eat Lobster buffet at a casino and stayed the night.  The next day we drove to Provo to eat at Nicoitalians Pizza (Tyler and I's favorite Pizza place from when we were dating) and then stayed in Alpine with my friend Jessie and her family.  The last day we drove through Wyoming for the very last leg of our trip.  Right when we crossed the Colorado/Wyoming border, Sawyer decided he wasn't feeling well and threw up all over himself.  We pulled the car over, cleaned him up, and kept driving home.  Right as we passed the Broncos stadium, Tebow threw the pass that was run all the way down field to win the game against the Steelers.  This was the game the first game of the playoffs, so it was pretty exciting they had gotten that far. An hour and a half later, we were home.  The kids jumped in the bath and had a great time being out of the car.

Aren't they so stinkin' cute!

We immediately got thrown back into our crazy life and schedule but really enjoyed the time we had to get "away from it all".  Turns out the reason Sawyer was throwing up was because of all the congestion he had.  He then passed that sickness off to Brooklyn and mommy.  Brooklyn ended up getting her first cough and ear infection.  Poor little girl.

Not our usual happy baby.

After driving over 3000 miles in one week and then getting sick when we got home we still had a great time and felt it was worth it! I wish we could go back like tomorrow, but I'm afraid it will probably be a few years.  Next time maybe the kids will be big enough to go to Disneyland!

California Trip: Part 2

After leaving Southern California, we traveled up the coast a little to visit my 92 year old grandmother.  She lives in beautiful Grover Beach, CA.  This beach allows you to drive onto it and camp or have bonfires or whatever.  In fact, when we left the beach that night, I got our car stuck in the sand.  It was hard to see because it was getting dark, and I am obviously inexperienced driving on sand, and sure enough I got us so stuck someone had to come rescue us.  Oh well, lesson learned!

 The kids and I on Grover Beach

 Daddy and Sawyer playing in the water during sunset.

While we were visiting my Grandmother we went about an hour north of her house to see Hearst castle. On our drive up, we stopped in Cambria for lunch.  It has a beautiful park right on the beach that we ate at. 

Then we went and saw the elephant seals.  It is impossible to describe how this looked, but there were hundreds of them spread out all over the beach.  It was really cool to see. 

 We then went to Hearst castle.  What a beautiful place!  I wouldn't mind living there!

 Major selling point- the enormous pool!

 Oh, and an indoor pool also

That night we went to dinner with my Grandmother.  At the restaurant they have servers stand on chairs with blindfolds on and poor water into a glass on someones head.  It was funny to watch!

Here is my beautiful grandmother

 Can you believe she is 92?  I have great longevity in my family!

It was so great to see her.  I wish we could have stayed longer!