4 Years of Marriage and Other Tidbits...

At the beginning of the year, I set a goal to try and blog once a week. I've missed a few weeks here and there, but overall I blogged much more this year then I did previous years. Woo hoo! Our home computer has been run over by an annoying virus of some sort...the windows applications won't even come up anymore. That's my excuse for missing a couple of weeks! Luckily I had just backed up all the pictures we had saved on there a few days before it started doing weird things. phew! So, since Jake is home tonight with his trusty school laptop, I thought I'd do one last post of the year. Tomorrow I fly with the kiddos to AZ, and Jake will come out on Friday to be with us! Crazy that Christmas is here already.
Before Christmas though... our anniversary is Thursday! Happy 4 years Jake! I love you. Since I'll be in AZ and Jake will be in TX, we're going to celebrate next weekend in AZ. We're taking advantage of the grandparents for babysitting! :) It has been a great 4 years, and they feel like they've flown by. At the same time though, so much has happened since. I couldn't ask for a better husband. Here are a couple pics from our wedding day! It was the coldest day ever! But the best day ever too. The first two are actually pictures of pictures... hence the not so great quality on here. Oh well.

So.. some highlights of the last couple of weeks include...

*Jake took half of the natl. boards today! The other half is tomorrow. It will be nice when he is done with this! Hopefully it will be the end of picking him up late at night at the school library.

* My little sister is engaged now! She and Chris are so cute together... he proposed last weekend. We're so excited for them! You guys, before you know it... 4 years will have passed since your wedding day and you might have little munchkins hanging around your house! crazy.
aren't they cute?!

*We took Luke and Ella to see Santa. Luke had been looking forward to it, but once he saw the creepy old guy sitting there, wasn't so sure he wanted to sit on his lap. I don't blame him... I remember being a little afraid of Santa myself. He didn't say anything to Santa except for "I want some toys"... as we were walking away. Let's hope Santa heard!
*Our last trip to Sea World. We always get our money out of our season passes! It was sort of sad realizing that it was our final trip there since we'll be moving in the spring.
Luke and Jake on the Texas Splashdown...

* We put up our Christmas decorations at the beginning of the month. I was hesitant to do it since we're just going to be here for a couple weeks, but I'm glad we did! It wouldn't have felt like December without them.

*We have gone on a few car rides so Luke could see the lights. So magical to a 2 year old!

*I got Christmas cards off today! I love paper... and stationary... and hearing from old friends and relatives I don't see often... and getting cards in the mail.... which is why I've been doing it every year. I figure there are other people out there that like these things, too. Maybe someday in the future, I'll just post a Merry Christmas message to everyone on my blog and hope they see it. For now though, I like real cards :)

* We've gotten some fun packages in the mail and so many treats from friends, family, and neighbors. It all started with Kristen's yummy marshmallowy chocolate and peanuts, and we've been digging into other stuff since. Luckily I've been running, so I still fit into my clothes. Haha.

Some pictures from tonight. Luke was having fun pushing Ella around in his wagon. She seemed to like it too!

Low lights of the last couple of weeks...

* Luke is NEVER going to go with me to the store again. Well, as long as he is 2 years old and doing naughty things anyway. Over the past month, he's discovered that he likes pushing stacks of folded clothes onto the floor, yanking jewelry off of the little hanger things onto the ground, and running around like a mad man just to make his mom chase him. Bah! As a former Gap employee... it bugs to see freshly folded clothes messed up like that! So, Mr. Luke, you'll be staying home with your dad from now on when I go shopping.
In addition to his store behavior, he has been obsessed with my cell phone. He's always telling me to "stop it mom... I need my phone! Give it to me!" Lots of times I will put my phone on the charger and then not be able to find it... Luke has it. He even took it to church without my knowing it. I guess he was marching around nursery acting like he was talking on the phone. He's called my mom a few times on accident and some other people too. Sorry guys! He's quite the little prankster. Not that I let him have my phone every time he wants it.. .usually he is sneaky and manages somehow to swipe it when I'm not looking.

*Jake went to the Dr. and found out that his finger he hurt while playing flag football really is messed up. He has what's called "mallet finger"... and it's going to take a long time in a splint to heal.

* Another trip to the testing center was a bust. Boo! I'm not in the mood to elaborate this time...

Sheesh... such a long post. Well, I think that's it for now! See ya in 2009. :)

Such a Brother

Luke is always asking to hold Ella lately... well, he likes the idea of holding her, or of her sitting by him. But, when I put her next to him or on his lap, he changes his mind pretty quick. He either forgets she's there, or his arm gets kind of tired and he lets her fall down. I thought it was funny that it always happens like this so a couple days ago when he asked for Ella to sit by him, I got the camera out.
Luke's baby holding skills...
Luke: "Ella needs to watch Bob the Builder with me. I NEED to hold her." (If you've been around him lately, you know how much he NEEDS things. Haha)
Here we go... He's pretty attentive at first.
Watching Bob is more interesting though...

He remembers she's there...

After I sit her up again for him, he decides to lay on her.

Had enough sister stuff. Back to the show.

Thanksgiving 08

Thanksgiving was nice and relaxing this year! We hung out with friends and ate way to much good food at the Jessop's house. Thanks guys for a fun time! The Baldwins and Woods were there too. We stuffed ourselves, then played some games, watched some football, and the kids played. Luke loves hanging out with Dylan, and I don't think he ate more then a few bites of food so he wouldn't miss a second with his buddy.
Jake and the kids before heading over for Thanksgiving dinner!
Sherry, you should be proud of your son! :) I know he's been a good chef for a while, but who knew he would be so good at making his mother's rolls? They turned out great! Here's the baker at work. Oh, and I've decided that every recipe with mammoth amounts of butter is just the best. This one is no exception.

The guys watching a game...

Even baby Matilda liked the food!

Way too much pie. All of it was so good though. I think we divided it out and took home 90% of what was there since we were all so full.

Travis entertained Luke and Dylan with a remote control helicopter. They were loving it!

Ok, so this does not have anything to do with Thanksgiving, but I thought it was funny. Lately, Luke insists on doing just about everything himself. He will throw a tantrum if you help him put on his shoes, brush his teeth, buckle his car seat, pretty much everything. Must be what the terrible twos are all about... fighting for independence... aaa! Drives me nuts. Anyway, Jake told him to go get some clothes for the day since he didn't want to wear what I got out for him. This is what he picked. Haha. Don't be jealous.

Thankful...

I'm usually bad about actually doing these forward email things, but a friend emailed this one to me, and I thought it was good one! Only 2 days till Thanksgiving! Woo hoo! Here we go... 5 things in no particular order.

5 Little/Silly Things I'm Thankful For...

1. Dreyer's Fruit Bars. They're so good. I'm actually eating a tropical one as we speak. Love these...

2. Getting unexpected fun mail. Letters, cards, or package make my day :)

3. The return of 24! I have a hard time getting "into" TV shows so I don't watch much, but I always like this one! I'm excited it's back.

4. Text messaging... it's short, to the point, and can be done anywhere... and unlike a normal phone conversation, the receiver doesn't get their ear blown out if you're holding a crying baby.

5. Gym dates. Jake humors me and comes along to things like cycle class... even though he doesn't love it. Thanks Jake!

5 Big Things I'm Thankful For...

1. My family. This includes a lot of people. My amazing husband, our cute kiddos that I get to hang out with every day, my parents, brothers, sister, grandparents, in-laws, all of our extended family... I have the best.

2. This country.

3. My education.

4. My Faith. 5. My health... and my family's!

5 Things I'm Thankful for Today...

1. Sunshine and beautiful weather!

2. The park... and friends being there unexpected!

3. The Library/Books! So glad that we can go get more books for free since Luke loves reading whatever books are around over and over and over again. At least the library lets us change it up every once in a while! Today we brought home a bunch. He was super excited to get one of his favorites that we checked out a few times before... No David! by David Shannon. Read it if you haven't. It's cute!

4. Smiles from my kids :)

5. Gas was only $1.75/gal. when I filled up the car. I don't remember the last time it was less to fill up! (well, since I've been driving anyway...)

TEsTing bLuEs...

Never thought I'd say that I missed this place.

Other parts of BYU campus and student life? Ya, of course. But this place?? Never. The BYU testing center. Site of so much anxiety, anticipation, and as they say, the most prayers on campus. But, today I realized I DO miss this place. No matter how daunting the test I was taking there was, it was ALWAYS there for me to take. I'll explain. I spent pretty much all of yesterday... and my Friday night... ALL NIGHT and into the wee hours of this morning studying for a midterm. I stuck Luke in front of his Little Einsteins and Blues Clues shows over and over again to get ready for this test, and pretty much ignored Ella as she chilled in my lap for hours at a time. See, all this studying was supposed to be for the test I was going to take this morning, right? Anyway, I got to the testing center at the local community college a few hours ago... expecting my test from BYU to be waiting for me. Apparently, they lost my test. It was there a few days ago, but has since disappeared. Maybe they accidentally sent it back to BYU with another independent study person's test... maybe it's lost among the piles of unorganized clutter in their office... the test administrator wasn't quite sure why it wasn't there anymore. Few things really bug me, but this did. Now, I get to request the test to be sent out here again... wait for it to crawl through the mail....and review all the stuff I already went over AGAIN. The joys of Independent Study. Aaaa! BYU testing center, I miss you. Haha. Just when I was starting to think school couldn't be going any slower right now. Maybe someone is trying to teach my a lesson in patience...

GiRL TimE And a 2 MoNth Old

The past few days have been fun. I don't think I've done so much stuff in so little time since before Ella was born. Woo hoo! Jenni came into town and she, Kristen, and I got to play. We had some family hangout time with everyone (thanks Aaron and Kristen for sacrificing your house and for the tasty dinners) and the boys were able to babysit yesterday so the three of us could get away to do some shopping, get massages (hence our greasy hair in the picture), and eat out! Aaahh... if only she could come play more often. We'll take what we can get though. We're glad you came, Jenni!
Another highlight of the week... Ella is now 2 months old! Her little personality is starting to come out more and she's started smiling a little bit and cooing. She's already chunking out too... Really, my stuff must rival Haagen Dazs in calories and fat. Haha. At her 2 mo. Dr. appointment on Monday she weighed 13 lbs and was 22 1/2 inches long. Looks like all our babies are going to be little chunkies. :) Here are some pics of the little cutie from this morning!

Every Friday Morning,

something incredibly AWESOME happens. We anxiously wait for...



the garbage truck. I love little boys.

HaLLoWeEn

I love Halloween, but this year was especially fun just because Luke was so excited about it! He was ready to trick-or-treat and dress up! He's been into Toy Story for months now, so he was Buzz Lightyear. Jake and I were slackers and didn't dress up ... maybe next year. We did a few festive things over the past week. Here are some of our Halloween happenings!

Miss Ella in her Halloween onesie. (She wasn't a big fan of Halloween this year :)
Luke as Buzz Lightyear!

He had a great time trick-or-treating with Gunnar and Lily on Halloween, and got to run around in his costume again at the ward trunk-or-treat tonight . Gunnar made the cutest little Clark Kent, and Lily was a fairy princess. Between trick-or-treating and the trunk-or-treat he got tons of candy. I'm already getting bugged by soo much candy around... finding wrappers and licked on suckers in weird places. I'm thinking of using sis-in-law Melanie's candy disposal technique soon... like maybe tomorrow (check it out here).

Cuties trick-or-treating and trunk-or-treat pics...

Jake didn't have to go to school on Halloween, so we headed over to Sea World to check out the Howl-o-Scream stuff. They always do a good job decorating the park! I finally got to go on the roller coasters since I'm not pregnant anymore! Yay! We always spend a lot of time over by the flamingos and birds when we're there since Luke's a big fan... this time the birds were psycho though.. a few came over snapped at Luke and Jake with their beaks! Aaa!
Luke loves Shamu...

Sea World stuff!

On Monday night, for our FHE activity we made a gingerbread haunted house. Luke did a great job decorating it! He likes reading the book Bony Legs which is about a witch that eats kids. Anyway, he was excited and kept saying that we were making Bony Leg's house. So cute. He and Jake had fun making their tongues black with the frosting and thought they were funny putting frosting on Ella's forehead. Check out our creation... I'm sure you are all going to want a bite ;)
Working on it...

To end on a gross/scary Halloween note, one of the best parts of the week was finally catching this nasty little guy that has been living in our garage. Nice work, Jake. :) He took like ten pictures of the dead mouse, so here's one for your viewing pleasure. Ya, super gross.

Dear Bahar,

Thank you for my cute Juicy outfit. It is sooo comfy and soft. Mom is jealous... she wishes she could fit into it. She says she loves holding me when I wear this because I'm even more snugly and squishy.

Check out how cute my little bum is in these pants.

Thanks again,

Ella

Love, Marriage, and a Baby Blessing!

My younger brother, Todd, is a married man now! This past weekend Todd and Jenny got married in the Mesa temple. It was a short and sweet trip for us, but busy! Flew out on Wednesday morning and back on Sunday night. (well, technically not home until Monday morning!...late flight!) I was nervous about flying with 2 kids, but they both did great on the plane rides. Luke had been counting down to when he could fly on an airplane for months, so he was just excited to be there! El slept the whole time both flights... didn't make a peep! We had a great time with family that came into town for the wedding (all my grandparents and aunt Carol) and with the Smith side of the fam too. The only one that had met baby Ella before this was my mom, so Ella got to meet lots of new faces! The first day we were there we hung out with mom and dad Smith, and then went to dinner with everybody... Mel, Joe and their kiddos, Daniel, Marci, and Davey. Thursday we hung out with my side of the family. Abby came down from Flagstaff, we went shopping with mom for last minute wedding things, went through the temple with Jenny and family, and then to Dak's football game (which btw... happened to be televised and he was awesome :) Friday we had a little luncheon/shower with the girls for Jenny, Jake took Luke to hang out with cousins at the park, we hung out with everyone at my parents house, Fred and Ron made the trip down from Prescott to see everyone, and Luke got to play with Betsy (Todd and Jenny's cute new beagle puppy). Saturday was full of fun wedding stuff! They were sealed in the morning, took lots of pictures, ate at their Carrabas luncheon, and then headed off to their reception. Fun times.
Here are the newlyweds!!! So cute together...
Jake, Me, Ella... (Luke was hating pictures on wedding day... jumping in puddles, and running in sprinklers is so much more fun on temple grounds!)

the Mesa temple...

Davey, Ella, Daniel, and Jake

Jenny and bridesmaids...

Dak chillen with Don ( a friend from Todd's mission) in the visitor center...

Abby, Aunt Carol, Me, Lukester

Mom and Dad

Luke pulling leaves and tree stuff onto Dak... btw, Dak and Chris are great babysitters, if anyone needs some :)

Grandma Nan holding Ella...

Luke found a good hangout spot at the visitors center...

Luke and Abby's man, Chris! (Luke fully endorses this guy!) He was a great sport helping out... and looked great sporting the diaper bag. haha

Weird side pic of our fam... Jake is behind Dak

"I'm sooo thirsty mom!!... .I'm too hot!!" It was pretty hot outside... like high 90s

Grandpa Arnie sporten grandma's purse... haha

Jenny and the guys...

Cute couple at the reception...

The Fam... Dad, Me, Todd, Abby, Dak, Mom. 2 kids married now, 2 to go!
Luke had a good snooze on great grandpa's lap...

Grandma Fran and Carol...

Jake and Luke...

Todd and Jenny dancing! They're pros... really. Me and my hubbie...

Boon and Marci!

Yeah Rachel! She caught the bouquet...

Davey made sure he got the garter! Ryan and Daniel made a good effort though!

Ella snoozing through everything as usual...

Grandpa Rick with Ella...

Cute Abby and Chris...

The girls! back to front... Jenny's mom, Aunt Carol, mom, Jenny, Grandma Fran, Ab, Grandma Nan, me, & Ella

Ron on the piano...

Todd, Dad, Grandpa John, & Don out by the trains. I should have gotten Lukes pic with them. He loves grandpas trains!

Meet Aunt Abby!

Ella was always being held. So nice to have so many babysitters!

Luke being gross with Dak...

Everyone climb on Uncle Davey!

Meet the cousins!

Ella was blessed Sunday at my parent's ward since so much family was in town. She was lucky to have her dad, two great grandpas, both grandpas, and some uncles there!
Ella with Jake...

I wanted to get pictures after the blessing in front of the church with everyone that was there, but Ella POOPED OUT her dress. Seriously, it was pooped. All up and down the back of her dress, and all over me. Nice timing. At least it didn't happen before the blessing though! Jake's mom and his sister, Melanie, organized a dinner for everyone afterward at Mel and Joe's house. Super tasty, and fun to hang out with everyone!