More Leah

My niece, Nickell, is a great photographer and she took some really fun pictures of Leah last night. The last one is my favorite, I think, but the one where she is puckering her lips is so cute!

Shannon Meets Her Sister

Shannon came home last night from her Aunt Kate's house just after we had gotten home from the hospital. She didn't really know what to think about Leah at first, but she very quickly warmed up to her (it helps that she loves babies). She wanted to hold her and look at her.

Today Shannon has been hugging Leah and even got to hold her for a bit. She leaned down to kiss her and, without any prompting from us, said, "I love you." She frequently talks in the third person, so she has told me many times today that "she loves her Leah." It's pretty much the cutest thing ever.

Wait...this might be the cutest thing ever. Are those the skinniest legs you have ever seen, or what? They are very long and thin. Good thing she likes to eat!

Baby Leah

I actually went into labor! I woke up this morning at about 7 feeling some pretty good contractions every ten minutes or so. I waited for a bit, then called the doctor to see if they wanted me to go to the hospital. They did, so we got here at about 1:00 and had a labor evaluation. I was dilated to 4 centimeters, so they decided to keep me. I got my epidural at 5:30 or so, started pushing around 7, and Leah was born at 7:33. She weighs only 6 pounds 9 ounces (4 ounces more than Shannon) and is almost 21 inches long. She is just as cute as can be, very well mannered so far, and eats like a champ! She has lots of brown hair (though her eyelashes look very light, so there is hope still that she will be a redhead). I will post more pictures when I get them, but for now I need to get some sleep.

Busy Weekend!

I haven't ever done two posts in one day, but I have had quite the weekend that I would like to share. It all started last Thursday night when Matt's tooth pain went from a dull ache to being so bad he couldn't sleep. We called the dentist on Friday, but it was his daughter's birthday, so he called in a prescription and told us to come in on Monday. We got in my 8:30 on Monday and Matt got a root canal, but the dentist was unable to finish it because it was too deep or something. He referred us to an endodontist (did I mention that our dental insurance is a joke?) and we got an appointment for December 10th. Merry Christmas to us! Because of this, my mother-in-law was generous enough to take Shannon for a few days so that I could get Matt to the dentist and go to the doctor for my check-up (yes, I'm still pregnant). She came and got Shannon Monday morning. Well, on Monday night around 11:00 we got a phone call. I didn't get alarmed until Matt shot up and said, "WHAT?!" Then my heart stopped. We raced down to American Fork because my in-laws' house was on fire! We got there and everyone was standing outside freezing and watching the fire trucks and rescue vehicles. We quickly found out that everyone got out safely, thanks to a neighbor who saw the fire and went and banged on the front door to wake them up. Shannon was scared to death at a neighbor's house, and she was very happy to see us. Somehow the fire started in a garbage can along the side of the house, spread up the side of the garage, and went into the attic all the way up the direction of the vault. Most of the damage is from smoke and water, but it will be months before everything is repaired. The kitchen, dining room, mud room, and one bathroom will all need new floors and they will have to get a new roof, of course. In the mean time, their insurance company is renting them a furnished house and taking good care of them. We held Shannon very closely that night. It is really amazing that nobody was injured and nothing of real value was destroyed. I am grateful for a caring Heavenly Father who really watches out for us.

Baby Shower

My friend and neighbor, Ann, gave me a fantastic baby shower. This is a bouquet of diaper roses that she made. I thought it was very creative and cute!

This is how well I made out. I got a diaper genie, lots of diapers, and some very cute clothes, so I think we're set for a while. Very nice!

This is the game where you try to guess what kind of melted candy bar is in the diaper. Ann even microwaved them briefly so that it would be extra gross. I love chocolate, but for some reason I always lose at this game.

The guests were 3 of my young women, 2 young women leaders, my sister-in-law, Kate, my mother-in-law, my friend, Paula, and Ann and her son. Here everyone is trying to think of the ending of a nursery rhyme. I did very poorly at this game. You can kind of see the food on the table in the background. We had a very nice spread! Thanks Ann and everyone who came!

Gingerbread Festival

I'm finally posting about our day last Saturday! I took Shannon and met my sister, Jeny, and my nieces and nephew at Thanksgiving Point for the annual Gingerbread Festival. Jeny and I went last year, just out of curiosity, and some of the houses were so impressive that we had to go back this year. Anyone can submit a gingerbread house and people bid on them and buy them. The proceeds go to a charity. Here are some of my favorite entries:

There were 6 birdhouses like this. I couldn't believe the detail, and every bit is candy! They were very pretty.

This one was a compilation of buildings from around the world. The frozen pond is melted candy. The clock on Big Ben is handpainted with chocolate on white frosting.

This was a scene under the ocean. There is a dragon behind it, if you can tell. Not a whole lot of gingerbread in this one, but lots and lots of candy!

This was the best, in my opinion. Each one of the narrow little windows is made of melted candy, and they had lights on the inside. Jeny and I couldn't even begin to imagine the time it would have taken to make all of those icicles and other details. It was just amazing!

There was music, so of course Shannon really enjoyed herself. That's my niece, Kelsey, who stepped into the picture.Aunt Jeny was nice enough to pay the dollar for everyone to decorate a cookie. Shannon did a great job spreading the icing, but decided the candies belonged in her mouth, not on the cookie.
Shannon loves her cousin, Spencer, but she can barely reach his hand. He is a very tall boy (I think around 6 foot 5). They both had a really good time walking around together and looking at the Christmas trees.

Happy Halloween!

Here's Annie! I tried to find some orange spray for her hair, but the only thing I could find was neon orange, and that would have looked funny. I promise she wasn't sad when I took this picture. My camera is just really slow, so she had already said cheese and smiled before it finally took the picture.

Here she is with the big pumpkins we got. I have to say, Halloween was a little disappointing this year. Shannon refused to take a nap, so she was very grumpy. She didn't go trick-or-treating (which I don't really care about), but the saddest part for me is that she went to bed before we got any trick-or-treaters, so she didnt' get to see any other kids dressed up. We went to a trunk-or-treat last week that was pretty fun.
Here is a terrible picture of our carved pumpkins glowing in the dark. Mine is the ghosts in the window (I always cheat and use a pattern) and Matt's is Wonder Woman. She even has a lasso, but you can't see it in the picture.

Baby Bump

I have had a few requests from people to see my baby bump, but I'm afraid most of you are going to be disappointed. See, I don't show very much when I am pregnant. I am due in 6 weeks and there are still people at church who are just now finding out that I am pregnant!

Grape Juice

Yesterday I took my niece, Nickell, and met my sister, Jeny at our Aunt Julie's house to harvest her grapes. She has a fence with probably a good 50 yards of grape vines (mostly Concord), and this year's crop was one of the best I have seen! Here we are busy picking.

Nickell was pretty funny because the spider webs were creeping her out and she doesn't like to get her hands very dirty. It took us about 2 hours to pick them all, but I think we cleaned those vines pretty well.

I picked one and popped it into Shannon's mouth to see what she thought, and of course she loved them. She had her own little bucket and put a little bunch in it and carried it around, then went to pick flowers and look at the horses. She had a great time!

Here is our haul. I wish I could post a link to the wonderful smell. We juiced all day long at Jeny's house and got 21 quarts from 4 of the buckets. Not bad at all! While we steamed them we played Wii Fit. It was so fun and I am really sore today! Shannon and I were so exhausted by the time we got home last night that we both went right to bed and slept until 10:30 this morning.

Kisses?

I hope you aren't all tired of posts about Shannon, but that is my life right now, and she keeps doing funny things! You may think that she is kissing her baby in this picture, but she isn't. When I first saw her she had the baby on the floor and was bent over it doing this. I thought for a moment that she was doing mouth-to-mouth! Then I figured it all out. Shannon found a chocolate chip on the floor and decided to share it with her baby. Then she wanted it back, but it wouldn't come out of the baby's mouth, so she improvised! I had a hard time getting the picture because I was laughing so hard.

Warning: Viewer Discretion Advised!

Shannon was supposed to be taking a nap yesterday, but was instead singing and playing. After a while of this I heard her start crying. She does that sometimes because she can't get her shirt off or whatever, so I just ignored her. Then she got hysterical and started screaming, "Are you stuck!" (which, in her language meant that she was stuck). I decided to go see what the problem was, and when I found her I couldn't stop laughing. Maybe I'm a bad mom because instead of helping my crying child I ran and got the camera. Don't worry, it didn't take me very long to take the picture then rescue her, and she wasn't in any immediate danger. You can't see her face because she wouldn't dare move to look at me, but she was screaming, I promise. Anyway, sorry about the nudity, but again, she hates to wear clothes.

More Funny Girl

I don't really have anything to post, but for the benefit of my sister who gets bored at work, I have some cute pictures for her to look at. This is our neighbor across the hall, River. As you can probably tell, Shannon absolutely adores him. She calls him "Ribber." They were watching "Annie" together.

Ahh, the phases our children go through! Shannon now loves to dress herself. I had already gotten her dressed, but she went through her drawers (pulling out everything and spreading it around the room, of course) and found this lovely outfit. She likes to put a shirt on over the shirt she is wearing, but never puts her arms in the sleeves. I purposely positioned the camera so that nobody would be offended, because another of her favorite fashion statements is taking off her diaper. That's right, she has nothing on except for the shirts. My favorite is when she comes out of her bedroom without a stitch of clothing on, with the exception on an unmatched pair of shoes.

Happy Birthday Shannon!!

Last night we had a few friends over for cake and ice cream for Shannon's birthday. She turned 2, so it was actually really fun this year. Since her favorite thing right now is "mukis," I made her a music cake. She blew out one of the candles herself! She isn't wearing any clothes because she was eating cake and ice cream.

The little thing made out like a bandit. We especially loved the Victoria's Secret bag that Paula brought her presents in. She got a doll stroller (which she is pushing her teddy bear around the house in as I type), fridge phonics, some music and movies (musicals, of course), dress-up shoes, a Disney Princess toy CD player, a Play-doh kit, toy drums, a tiara, and a really cute dress.

She really loves her fridge phonics. It sings a song for every letter, but her favorite is the button that sings the alphabet song. She sings along very enthusiastically!

There is no sound for the video, so don't bother with your volume. She opened all of her presents this year, mostly by herself. It was very cute.

Funny Girl

Shannon has been in the habit lately of taking all of her clothes off when I put her down for a nap. This means that I have to check on her regularly, because she is known to fingerpaint her entire crib if she messes her pants. I have tried potty training, briefly, but she didn't have a clue what she was supposed to do, so I'm putting it off for a few more weeks and we'll try again. Anyway, today I went to check on her and she had taken off her shorts and put them on her head. I thought it was hilarious! She was just sitting there reading to her stuffed animals, looking like a chef!

My New Purse

Last time I saw my sister, Heidi, she had this cute purse that she had crocheted. I am not as good as she is, so I asked her to make me a pattern so that I could try to figure it out. It was very fun to make, and I think it's really cute. I may have to make a green one now! I even made a cell phone pocket.

Topaz Mountain

This week has been a very busy one for me. On Tuesday I went up to a campground in Little Cottonwood Canyon with the young women in our ward for their annual Girls' Camp. I helped set up the tents and stuff, and stayed the night with them. We had a lot of fun! I got home Wednesday night, then Thursday I washed everything and packed the car to go camping again, this time with my family. Matt and I dropped Shannon off at her Aunt Kate's house (we didn't want to take her camping in the desert--too hot for babies) and went to meet my sister, Jeny, and her family. We drove out to Topaz Mountain and got our camp set up just as it was getting dark.This is our campground. It doesn't do justice to the actual area we were in because this picture makes it look like there were trees there. These were just some junipers that were very sparse. We were lucky to put our campsite here to get a little bit of shade because Topaz Mountain is in Utah's west desert. The tent in full view is ours. We slept without the fly on because it was warm enough, and the view of the stars was very beautiful.This is a picture of the "hump" with Jeny and family hiking up. Topaz is Utah's state jewel, because this is where it is found in abundance. The sand sparkled in the sunlight, but to find the sherry-colored semi-precious jewel we had to hike up the hump and use a hammer and chisel to dig. Matt was helping me up the hill when a man told us that we wouldn't find anything better up there than down in the wash. Matt told him that since I was pregnant he didn't want me to do much climbing. We found a good spot and started digging. Only a few minutes passed before the man came back with a beautiful topaz. He gave it to us and said it was for the baby. I thought that was the nicest thing! Matt was really good at just looking for a really sparkly rock and he found most of the bigger crystals that we found.
While sitting and digging we kept getting confronted by this little friend. He was a very light brown chipmunk with a fluffy white tail and he wasn't afraid of us at all. I'm pretty sure he was begging for food, but we didn't have anything to feed him.

Here are our treasures. The one on the left on the top is the one that nice man gave us. It's a really pretty color, and will make a nice necklace or something. The rest of them are pretty much worthless, but they are nice to look at!

After the sun went down we went for a little hike up the hill from our campsite. The view from the top was great! We could see how isolated we actually were (the nearest town is 50 miles away). On the ridge you can see Jeny, Mark, and Tara. I forgot to take my camera up there with me, but Jeny took hers, so I will get a picture of the view later.

It's a Girl!

We went for my ultrasound today and even though the baby was in the worst position possible and was very wiggly, the technician was patient and able to find out for us that it is a girl. I tried to scan the picture of her girl parts, but our scanner is old and not very good, and it didn't look like anything. These ones turned out pretty well. This one is her cute little nose and lips, and the one below is her little foot (the white blob to the right). On my copy of the picture you can actually see the toes and everything. It was really fun! We are very excited for Shannon to have a sister.

My Little Fish

There are certainly benefits to apartment living. One of the biggest for me is having a big swimming pool and hottub right outside my back door. Shannon and I have gone almost every day since the pool opened for the season, and she loves it as much as I do. She has started to kick, realizing that she moves when she does it. I have also gotten her to put her face under and blow bubbles. She is probably ready to get some arm floaties or something so that she can swim on her own, but this little baby raft has sure been neat. She almost falls asleep in it sometimes!