Happy Birthday Levi

Today (the 27th) is my adorable nephew's 3rd birthday! I can't believe how fast time flies...especially when you live 1000 miles away (literally)!

Anyway, I just wanted to take a second to say happy birthday Levi! We love you and can't wait to see you next month.

A few weeks ago Levi and his little brother Cabot had their pictures taken. As an aunt, I must brag and say they turned out so adorably! My absolute favorite is this first one. He just looks like such a little man. I love it!

On another note, our stake had a blood drive and I went and donated a pint. I haven't donated in over two years so it felt good to finally do it again. Did you know that when you donate blood you save/help up to three lives? But only 5% of eligible Americans donate? Sad huh? I used to go with my friend Michelle all the time and got to the point where I could watch them insert the needle. But not this time...I was actually a little nervous. And what do you know, it took the girl 3 tries to find my vein. Ouch! That stung a little :) So when you see a huge bruise on my left arm, you know why!

Movies, Flips and Swimming!

The past few days have been pretty crazy for us. We're not used to all this running around. Helping Lydia to be more social is very tiring! On Thursday Lydia and I took Lizzy to the Clark Planetarium to look around. We also went and saw the new 3D "Under the Sea" movie. It was so cute and the girls actually sat the whole time to watch it. There was one point though, that I thought to myself, "Why the crap did I bring two two year olds to a movie?" because they got a little crazy. For about ten minutes I wanted to pull my hair out due to my daughter acting like a wild child. All she wanted to do was run up and down the stairs. When I made her sit down, she had a melt down and started screaming right in the middle of the theater. When I finally calmed her down, she had already upset Lizzy to point where she started crying and wanted her mommy. I leaned over to take care of her and Lydia lost her balance off my lap and hit her head on a hard, metal bar. Of course she started screaming again. I calmed her down and back to the stairs she wanted to go. So what did I do? I threatened to throw her beloved bunny in the trash if she didn't stay on my lap and be quiet. Oh yeah, I'm a bad mom. I had just had it and I would've done anything to keep her still. So anyway, besides that ten minutes of chaos, we had a great time :)

They we so cute with their glasses. During the movie they kept trying to reach out and grab the fish that were swimming by their heads!

Since the weather has been so nice lately I've let Lydia go outside and play and I watch from inside while cleaning my kitchen. I looked outside and saw this. 99% of the time Lydia is either teasing or hurting Larry so it was nice to see her just enjoying his company with no fighting or crying (Larry is the one that cries by the way...she's so mean to him). I went outside to take the pictures and I said, "You love Larry huh?" and Lydia's response, "Yeah, we're best friends huh?" I love it!
On Friday Jules invited Aimee, Brock, Lyd's and I to Flips to experience what Izee does each week. It was AMAZING. I love that place. They have the cutest mommy and me class. I can't get over how cute, friendly and fun everyone was. Lydia got to swing on bars, jump on different tramps, walk across the high beams and play with the big parachute. She had a great time. We'll have to go back there for sure. I think I was more impressed than Lydia was!
Tonight we were invited to Madelyn's 4th birthday party. Lynette and Joey rented out the rec center pool and had friends and family come swim to celebrate Maddie's b-day. We had so much fun. Lydia was doing fine until Daddy made her go down the BIG slide and she went under the water. She was glued to my side after that. She's sensitive just like her mommy, what can I say?!
We've loved getting to know Madds the past year. She's become quite a big part of Lydia's life. She talks about her all the time and is always wanting to know what she's doing. Thanks Madelyn for inviting us. You are hilarious and we love you tons.

Social Skillz

Lydia is definitely getting to the age where she needs to socialize more. She gets so bored at home with me that I can just see her eyes telling me to get her out of the house. So this is my goal, to get Lydia into as many activities as possible this year so she doesn't become the social outcast (although, how could that be possible with a daddy like Jake)!

On Tuesday I took Lydia to her very first dance class and her friends Izee, Millie and Grace were happy to come along. We went to the new Dancin' It Up studio on Redwood Rd that I've heard so much about. They let you do one free trial class to see if it's something your child would be interested in and to see what that class is all about. Well, let me tell you, Lydia had the BEST time. She loved it. She participated, danced, jumped around and sang. It was great. Her favorite part was staring at herself in the wall of mirrors as she ran back and forth, back and forth. She didn't take her eyes off of herself as she ran, it was so cute. I was very impressed with Lydia. She definitely exceeded my expectations. She's usually the VERY shy one.

Earlier this year I got together with my friends' Jules and Aimee to discuss starting a Joy School for our kids. Us moms finally got our act together and had our first class today! Our curriculum is the alphabet and each week, for those of you that don't know what it is, a mom will take a turn teaching the children a letter of the alphabet, have song time, do a craft, basically have a mini school in our home. The biggest positive for me is the chance Lydia gets to be around other kids, hence the developing of the social skills. Aimee taught the first class today and said it went perfectly. They played perfectly together, listened and were overall good kids so I am so excited. Let the socializing begin :)

P.S. An even better plus to this is that the past 2 days Lydia has taken great naps. She just had too much energy to take naps before and now all of this socializing about is taking the energy right out of her!

Valentine's Weekend!

I finally did it...

40+ hours of hard work

1 1/2 years of journaling (158 posts)

867 pictures and

23 days later, I finally finished my 262 page journal that I made from my blog and

I LOVE IT! I'm so proud of it and oddly enough, very protective of it. I think it turned out way cute. I went to blurb.com and they take your blog and convert it to a book for you. So now we have our family journal for the past year and a half.

President Spencer W. Kimball said:
"I urge all of the people of this church to give serious attention to their family histories, to encourage their parents and grandparents to write their journals, and let no family go into eternity without having left their memoirs for their children, their grandchildren, and their posterity. This is a duty and a responsibility, and I urge every person to start the children out writing a personal history and journal."

So now I know that all of those hours spent blogging weren't done in vein!

Now onto our weekend. I've decided a new tradition that Lyd's and I are going to continue is making homemade Valentine's cards. My mom was out here last year and we made little puppy dog valentine's for everyone. This year we made flowers. I learned how to make them in like 6th grade and I've remembered all these years later. But by the time you cut, color, make your design and create the flower, each one took about 10-15 minutes. Needless to say we only made a few this year.

So I decided that we'd make 6 to give to all the kids that were at Lynette and Joey's Valentine's party that they invited us to on Friday night. Lynette had it set up so cute for all the girls. I think they had a really good time. Thanks Lynette for the invite. Too bad I didn't get any pictures.

On the actual V-Day, we went as a family and ate sushi at Happy Sumo. The wait was 1 1/2 hours so we went to the Discovery Center to pass the time. Because I didn't want to spend 30 bucks to get in, we just played in the DC store for free. I know, I'm cheap! Lydia didn't mind...she had a great time anyway. Here she is in the V-day dress G-ma Frandsen got her!

Man, let me tell you...the sushi was SOOO good this time at HS. One of the specials was the Scarlet Lady and it was one of the best rolls I've ever had. It had this yummy spicy crab on top of it. Jake always orders the rolls because I'm too much of a wuss to try anything different but every time I eat what he orders, I always love them. We got four rolls and they were all fabulous! So we had a great V-day. Love you honey! Glad you're my valentine!

Lydia Goes to the Dentist!

It has been way too long since I've written anything down so here we go:

Last week we went to the church museum. Lydia just loves that place and I especially love it because it's free. Lydia did a bit of coloring then off to the babies where she spent the remainder of the time. I can't get over the motherly instinct that little girls have at such a young age. She held the baby, fed her and rocked her. Lyd's is such a sweet, kind-hearted little girl and it's so adorable to see her acting so gently toward the little fake babies. She is definately ready to be a big sis ;)

I have two big battles that I deal with multiple times a day, every day...1) keeping Lydia from teasing Larry and 2) getting her to take a nap. Let's delve into number 2...she will not lay down to nap. She doesn't fight me when I put her in her room; she's happy to go in there, then she plays for 2 hours by herself. It's the actually falling asleep that's the hard part. Oh well, at least I get my alone time and Lydia gets her quiet time in her room. When she's ready to come out, I hear, "Mama!" So I go upstairs and this is what I ALWAYS see...
She's decided to play hide and seek with me. She's so proud of herself when I say,"Where's Lydia?" as she's laying under the covers giggling with excitement. It's seriously the best feeling knowing how happy this little game is making her. How can you be mad at that face for not taking a nap?
Ahh, Valentine's Day is just around the corner and the gifts are starting to come in. Note to self: NEVER buy Lydia anything for V-day because the family spoils her with enough gifts. She LOVES he huge sucker and that's all she wanted for breakfast. Sure why not? Great thing to eat just before going to the dentist for the first time!

Yesterday, Lydia had a playdate with her cousins and I have to say that I am so happy that Lydia has Lizzy to play with. They get along so well. All they do is laugh and giggle together as if they're teenagers talking about the cute guy across the room. I love it and one of the reasons I love it so much is that I didn't have a sister growing up. My best friend when I was a kid was my cousin Melissa. I have SO many memories of us together. We were always laughing together, trying to find a way to talk our mom's into letting us do one silly thing or another. I loved that we played cars in the dirt, took pictures of ourselves with our scrunchie's and banana clips thinking we were hot, and laughing in our bedroom until we literally peed our pants. Oh, those were the days! Those memories will forever be in my mind and I hope that's what Lyd's and Lizzy grow up to have as well.

Well, Lydia had her very first dentist appt. They don't do much at this young of an age but everything checked out perfectly. She was an angel and did exactly what the dentist asked, yet another example of how lucky Jake and I are to have such a great, well behaved little girl to raise. Afterward they gave her a polka dotted dinosaur toothbrush and let her pick a toy from the goody bag. Trip #1: success!

Sanpete Up in the Hizzouse!

Last week Lydia and I made our first snowman of the winter season. It was pretty cold so I didn't make it very tall. The plan was to go big but due to my lack of cold tolerance we made one just about Lydia's size. She was so happy and the edible chocolate eyes were gone within 10 minutes of attachment :)

We spent this weekend down in San Pete County with our friends' the Pehrson's. It's a bit of a drive so we try and stay the night to extend the quality time! So we drove down on Friday afternoon and just got back tonight. We hung out, played games and on Saturday we went snowmobiling. I've never been before and I have to say it was pretty fun...the tubing part anyway. I didn't care too much for the actual riding on the snowmobile. Too fast for me. That's ok, you can call me a wuss. And Lydia was in the worst mood ever. She cried the whole time.
Lydia refused to get on the tube. So what did we do? We forced her on. And of course (that word is for you Ben, spelling bee champ) mommy and daddy know best... she loved it and didn't want to get off.

It was hilarious to see Jake on the tube. He is NEVER prepared for cold weather activities (look who's talking, I wore my high heel boots). But he wore tennis shoes with ankle socks. So as you can see in the picture, the whole bottom half of his leg was exposed. He said it was like shards of glass hitting his legs. I was laughing so hard.

Thanks for hosting Ben and Em. You guys are the best! We had lots of fun and can't wait to do it again soon...with the vacuum lady :)