Elizabeth Paige’s Blessing

Cute cousins Lincoln and Lizzy

We got to do Elizabeth’s baby blessing on Sunday April 14th. It was a last minute decision to do it, while Sherrie was still in town.  We called up the relatives in town on Saturday and on Sunday we got to here the sweet words of her blessing. It was very different from the other kid’s blessings.  We usually have a ton of family and friends over to help us celebrate, but this was so last minute that it was just the family.  She didn’t make a peep the whole Sacrament and blessing.  She of course is wearing the dress that I wore, when I was a baby and had my blessing.  Maggie wore it as well for hers.  I love having it to pass it on to all my girls. 

It was such a great day! Sacrament meeting was so uplifting.  Her blessing talked a lot about Elizabeth’s love and compassion for others.  It also said she would have a lot of patience.  It was just the sweetest blessing and very moving.  We are so glad to have her in our family and it amazes me how early their personalities shine through.

Mom’s Visit and Gabe’s Birthday

Luckily my mom was able to come out to help with Elizabeth! She came out from Wednesday, April 3 through Thursday April 11th.  It was so nice to have her here so long to help.  She did the cooking, cleaning and taking care of the 3 older kids, while I fed and rested with Elizabeth.  We did a little shopping and let her get out on her own, so she wouldn’t go crazy, but most of the time she had one of the kids asking her to do stuff with them.  Gabe and Molly came down for conference weekend and we did a little birthday celebration for Gabe’s birthday.  I made him a cookie cake and we voted on what to put on the cake and “eat it” won!   It is always fun to have family visiting.  We had 10 of us in the house for a few days, but I loved it! There were more people to help with the cooking, cleaning and holding little Lizzy.  David’s mom and Grandma were also in town, since Giselle had her baby, Lincoln, just a couple of days after us.  We were so glad to have David’s grandma stay with us and do lots of games and laughing. Throughout the week Sherrie would come over  to hang out with us at night. It was weird not having her here the whole time, but we were glad to see her when we did.  It was one of the first times that we had both of our moms here at the same time.  It was great to have 3 grandmas at one time and fun to play games with all of them.  Mom headed back to Arkansas at 6:15 on Thursday morning.  Luckily my family will be coming back out west in July for Gabe and Molly’s baby blessing.  I’m so glad we will have the chance to see them so much! Thanks mom so much for coming and helping with everything! The kids and Biscuit definitely got spoiled with you here!  Between the balloon fights, late late snacks and all the yummy meals and outings, they have had some withdrawals this past week at not getting presents or treats from anyone!

Parker Turns 2

Parker turned 2 on April 11.  We were so excited that both my mom and David’s mom were going to be in town at the same time around Parker’s birthday, so we just had to have it with them here.  We had it on Saturday, April 6.  Parker is really into Sesame Street, so that is what we did his party with.  So Saturday between General Conference sessions we had a fun little party for our Parker Scott.  It was mostly family and a few friends from church.  We of course had to have some good food to go with it.  We had some food, then opened presents and then did cupcakes.  He wasn’t able to get a nap that day and was trying to go in his room to lay down and did not want to come out until we showed him a present that he could open.  He came running out and started going crazy opening those presents.  He got some great stuff from everyone.  He got a water table for outside from Deedah, a basketball goal and huge dump truck from Meme, bubbles from great Grandma Turnbull, Elmo books from Aunt Trish, a lawn mower that makes bubbles from Maggie and David, and David and I got him a little 4 wheeler.  The theme was outside toys…my kids have so many inside toys, but barely any outside toys.  He was so cute with all of his new toys.  Our favorite part was when he started running over his dad’s feet on purpose with the 4 wheeler. He kept backing up and doing it over and over again. 

Then on his actual birthday we took him and David and Maggie to Build a Bear.  The kids have been begging us to take them to this for about a year. They were all so cute picking out their animals. They had a great time filling them and naming them. Parker picked out a blue teddy bear, Maggie picked out a Hello Kitty and David picked out a blue My little Pony…against his dad’s advise.  It was pretty funny.  He even named her Rainbow. He kept saying, “She is a girl and that is her name, duh!”  Someday we will have a good time telling him this story!  They all gave their animals baths and then named them and got them a birth certificate.  David named his rainbow, Maggie named hers kitty and Parker names his Aieha…his father helped him with this name. Isn’t he sweet?!  We were glad to have Meme with us for Parker’s birthday too.  One funny story, Meme got Parker all of the Sesame Street toys for his birthday and one of them was Count Von Count.  He was carrying around all of the other ones except that one and we wanted to see if it was an accident or not. So while he set up all of his other ones we put the Count one with them. He walked over and saw the Count von Count picked it up and threw it on the floor under the table.  It was hilarious.  We did this to him a few more times and each time he saw him with his other toys he would grab it, yell and throw it.  What a goofy kid.  He had a great 2nd birthday!

He also had his 2 year check up that day and is a completely healthy kid…minus all the eczema and diaper rashes.  He is 27 pounds which is in the 45th percentile.  He is 33 & 1/4 inches tall, which is the 20th percentile.  He is just so little! He is such a fun little kid and loves to make people laugh. He loves to wear his Elmo and Cookie Monster socks on his hands as gloves.  He will put pants on his head as a hat and make us all laugh.  He loves playing outside and if we let him he would play out there all day.  He loves swinging on the swing. He just goes and swings on his tummy around and around.  Any day he can’t go outside because of bad weather, he gets very grumpy.  He loves to talk and mimic whatever we say.  He loves being a big brother and just can’t hold Lizzy enough.  He is very athletic. He can jump great especially for a two year old.  He loves jumping off of things and has no fear.  He loves to climb.  He still loves taking baths and loves his crib still.  He loves to eat and wants to try whatever everyone else has.  He loves wrestling and if you are sitting on the floor, that is clearly an invitation for him to come and wrestle with you. He has the prettiest blue eyes that just sparkle all the time and his face lights up, whenever someone talks to him. He loves nursery. He is a fast runner, but usually falls or runs into something multiple times a day.  He is such a great little boy and has come so far in 2 years.   He may have been a very very very challenging baby, but he is a fun and great little toddler.  We are so blessed to have him in our family!

Here is a picture with Parker and his “mittens” which are actually socks!

Elizabeth 2 weeks old

First bath!

These 2 weeks have gone by so fast! Elizabeth is the best little baby. She is just very easy going and happy.  At 2 days old she had gotten down to 7 pounds 6 ounces. By 2 weeks old she was 8 pounds 15 ounces!  She is in the 85th percentile for height and weight. She is a great little eater.  She loves to be held, but also loves her alone time and gets a little fussy, if she hasn’t had time to lay on her own.  She liked her first bath after she lost her umbilical cord at 6 days.  She is very patient with the kids, when they hold her.  She has the funniest little cry. Her little voice just gets shaky and it makes me laugh every time.  She smiles all the time, when she is sleeping.  She is just a great little baby so far and we have loved having her to our little family. 

Easter 2013

We had a great Easter this year! With Elizabeth being only about a week old I was lucky to have Trish cook Easter dinner for us.  We started the morning out with the kids seeing their Easter Baskets from the Easter bunny and then hunting for real eggs in the living room.  Then we had a yummy breakfast that Meme made for us.  Everyone but Elizabeth and I headed to church and had a great time.  Then everyone came home and we had the Easter Bunny visit and out they all went for the Easter Egg hunt.  Parker found I think 3 eggs and was done. He was more interested in eating the candy in them and I think he was confused why the other kids were not sitting and eating their candy like he did. We had a tearless hunt, which is always a big success for us.  We had a delicious roast with all the fixings and it was delicious! It was a great day and although I was sad that I couldn’t take my sweet Lizzy to church to show her off, I still loved having alone time with her to snuggle.