Brown Town Times

What A Week!

2011-12-21T19:21:00.000-07:00

Last week was amazing, crazy but amazing! Last Monday we took off to Salt Lake to see the lights, go shopping, rest, and spend time with family.

We spent 2 nights and 3 days at the Kimball with my parents and had so much fun. On Tuesday we went shopping at the South Town Mall. Well my Mom went shopping and we played. The girls so Santa, rode on a train that goes across the mall, and rode on the carousel. Then my sister Wendy came to see us and we all went to see the lights. Bailey kept saying "This is the best Christmas ever!" She also loved holding Aunt Wendy's hand and dragging her all over temple square.

On Wednesday we loaded up and came home. Ben went to work and I attacked the laundry. On Thursday we took off for my parents house in Idaho. We had to drop some stuff off at my brother Todd's house and he invited us to dinner so we had a good dinner with him and Brenda.

On Friday I got my nails done and we got ready to take off to Boise to see my brothers. We stopped at my brother Scott's house for awhile and then went and had dinner with my brother Eric. It was awesome to see all of my brothers and sisters in a 4 day period.

Saturday was Bailey's birthday and we had a party at Scott's house and then most of the boys in the family went to the Idaho Famous Potato Bowl. They had lots of fun. Sommers and I went shopping with our kids who are basically the same age so it was like having 2 sets of twins.

Sunday we left Boise around 10am and with a stop at my parents made it home around 7pm. It was a good week with 4 different destinations. Bailey slept in 5 different houses. We had an amazing, crazy week, but it was so good to see everyone.

A few highlights

2011-12-20T20:24:00.000-07:00

So I haven't blogged in a LONG time and I've decided I'm not going to catch up, but just do the highlights.

We made our yearly trip to the Hogle Zoo in September.

My parents and my sister Wendy joined us for the day.

We had so much fun.

We carved our first pumpkins this year.

Bailey kept playing in the pumpkin gutts and saying

"This is disgusting!"

Bailey was a ladybug for Halloween this year and Hinkley was a bee!

I don't have any picture from Thanksgiving, I guess I'm not really sure where November went! Hoping to do better at keeping up on my blog!

New York Part 2

2011-09-11T10:11:00.000-06:00

I wasn't in the States when 9/11 happened. I was on my mission in Guatemala. My companion and I were walking past an electronic store and I saw a TV in the window that was showing the first tower had been hit.

I remember thinking it could not be real, it had to be for a movie, but as I kept watching I realized I was watching a news show and knew it must be happening, but I couldn't believe it. I told my companion I needed to go back to the apartment. They pulled all the missionaries in and had zone meetings. But I just couldn't believe how the towers could really have been hit.

Since I wasn't in the States when 9/11 happened, I have tried to learn about the events of that day. When we were in New York, our hotel was literally right next to Ground Zero. We were able to see and hear the construction from our hotel room and see the corner of the fountains.

This is the new Trade Center Building. In New York, we were able to see the 9/11 Museum. It was very emotional.

This is "The Survivor" he sits right off of Ground Zero. He was there before 9/11 but was blown off of his seat. They found him and put him back where he belongs. He now has marks and scratches from that day, but he survived.

All the fire trucks in New York now have all the names of the fireman on their trucks that were lost from their stations.

The City view of where the Twin Towers used to be and were the new Trade Tower is. Our last day in New York we went to the Miracle Church that is right across the street from Ground Zero, where the rescue teams rested and got their meals. It was the only building around Ground Zero that did not have any structural damage.

I still remember hearing from a news show someone said, "We were running out as the rescuers were running in."

NEW YORK! Part 1

2011-08-25T10:43:00.000-06:00

Ben had his yearly training early this year and in NEW YORK! How cool is that? We took a red eye out on Saturday night, OUCH, and landed in New York about 6am the next day. The girls had been shipped home with my niece Lyndsie to stay with her, Todd, & Brenda. Brace yourself for a lot of pictures, I'm going to break the trip up into three parts.

The subway! I was way nervous about the whole subway thing at first, but Ben and I actually got pretty good at finding our way, yes we got lost but it was all good. It was really hot and humid in NYC while we were there and the subway was always at least 10 degrees hotter and it smelled really bad.

Turtle Pond at Central Park

The Clock Tower at the Central Park Zoo. I was kind of bummed because they didn't have a giraffe, lion, hippo, zebra, like in Madagascar! I'm a dork, but that's what I expected!

Belvedere Castle in the Shakespeare Garden part of Central Park. It's huge and awesome!

Times Square where they film Good Morning America, I almost cried! I watch GMA almost every morning.

Times Square, it was so awesome, unreal and amazing to be there, with about a million and one other people!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art! I went one day while Ben was in trainings. I got lost on the way cutting through Central Park and in the Subway on the way back. I spent over 3 hours just on the main floor. It was amazing and getting lost wasn't bad, just made a memory!

A New York Tax and just like Buddy the Elf says in the movie Elf "The Yellow ones don't stop!"

25 again!

2011-08-23T20:34:00.000-06:00

I had a great birthday we didn't get any pictures except for the cake!

My niece Lyndsie made the cake it was a 2 layer cake

The bottom layer was chocolate chunk surprise, it had rollos in it!

Lyndsie had planned to do lunch with the girls and I, but when we got to the restaurant my sister in law, Brenda and driven 2 hours just to have lunch with us and do some shopping and then she drove 2 hours back home! We all got Cafe Sabor take out for dinner and had a great day with my family!

Bear Lake

2011-08-04T11:56:00.000-06:00

Ben's sister called one Saturday morning and said she was at a cabin in Bear lake and asked it we wanted to come and hang out, so we did.

My super cool baby, on the trip there.

She didn't know her treat opened!

Bailey and Corbie ordering ice cream and fries, so cute!

Bailey, Aunt Misti, and Jack. A fun trip!

Oh what do you do in the summer time?

2011-08-03T16:23:00.000-06:00

WE SWIM...

By ourselves

Yes, they both have a pool, one had a ton of holes in it, so we bought a new one, but I was able to do some amazing work with some duck tape and now we have 2!

They swim together,

And with friends!

We do a lot of swimming!

Special Delivery

2011-08-02T21:42:00.000-06:00

We had to go to Idaho, awhile ago, so Ben could help his brother. We stayed at my parents house and had a wonderful time. While we were there they opened one of the boxes that they had shipped from Germany and the girls had so much fun!

This was what the box looked like after my mom had unpacked everything but the package peanuts. Hinkley hasn't found a food she doesn't like, so of course she tried eating the packaging and wasn't happy when we didn't let her!

I love my girls but there are some moments when I think I would like to put them back in that box and ship it back to Germany!

My Tiny Dancer

2011-06-21T20:14:00.000-06:00

Bailey started dance class in January, she had to be 3 to start so I got her in as soon as I could. She loves going to class and being with other kids. She is one of the youngest in the class, which totally stresses me out. The other little girls try to pick her up and they have dropped her a couple of times and of course they try to mother her too, but she still loves it.

She loved getting dressed up and getting her hair done. I don't have any make up so we got to skip that, but thank heavens for cousin Katie, she let us borrow some lip gloss!

She did really well the night of her performance! I was so proud of her, the dance was super cute and I was so happy that she only had 1 dance and it was at the beginning of the program.

A huge thank you to my amazing family, my parents, my sister Wendy, my brother Todd and his wife Brenda for driving 2 hours to watch Bailey dance for 3 minutes and gave her 2 groups of flowers, had dinner and than drove 2 hours back home. Thanks to Lyndsie for being there for all the special moments. As you can see from the picture Bailey does not lack attention from any one!

Hinkley's Birthday

2011-06-20T17:43:00.000-06:00

Hinkley's Birthday was about 2 months ago, but since life got really crazy after Easter I'm just posting it, oh well, better late than never.

First of all I can't believe she is a year old! She is the cutest little monkey, anyway back to the point. A HUGE thanks to my neice Lyndsie for making the cake, she usually makes the cakes for the girls and she did an amazing job for Hinkley.

Lyndsie will kill me for putting this picture on but the cake took a couple of days and stages to make and of course as you can see, Bailey was a huge help. The cake was 3 layers of cupcakes, 1 layer of real cake, with flowers and pearls.

A HUGE thanks to my brother Todd and his wife Brenda for driving 2 hours one ways to have pizza and cake and watch Hinkley open presents and Bailey blow out the candle and than drive another 2 hours home. Thanks for all of your love and support.

At her 1 year appointment, she didn't quite weight 20lbs and was a little under average on her height, the Dr. says that's totally understandable considering her mom's practically a hobit! She is crawling like crazy, starting to pull herself up and starting to imitate words. She is super snuggly especially right after the tub, loves story time and laughs constantly. If it is a little too quiet for her she just starts to giggle. She adores Bailey, her Daddy, and her Papa. We are so grateful for her chunky little self.

Together Again...

2011-05-18T12:26:00.000-06:00

On Thursday the 12th, my grandmother passed away. She was an amazing woman, when she was born she weighed about 3lbs and 92 years ago it is a miracle that she lived. She had 8 children and 54 grandchildren, and some great grandchildren and 1 great great grandchild. One of the things I always knew about my grandma was how much she loved my Grandpa and of course her children and grandchildren.

My grandparents influenced my life so much and not just like most grandparents. For those of you who don't know, I was adopted. I was born in Guatemala and my biological mother died less than 24 hours after I was born. My grandparents were serving an LDS service mission in Guatemala and knew my biological father, he asked them to help get my biological mother's body back to the village they were from to bury her the next day. After arriving my grandparents asked one of the Elders who spoke the Indian dialect to go and tell the family that they would help in any way they could. The Elder did and came back with me. I hadn't been cleaned from being born, was wrapped in rags, and probably not a pleasant baby. But they took me for the night and cared for me the best they could and making diapers for me from a t-shirt. The next day my biological father came to them and asked them to keep me as their own. Telling them I would die with out a mother to take care of me. After a lot of discussion they decided they would take me for 2 weeks for the family to adjust and decide what to do with me.

After 2 weeks they took me back and it was decided that I would be adopted. After that this amazing couple called their daughter and her husband in Idaho to tell them they had a daughter for them waiting to be adopted. It took 2 months for the adoption to be completed. My grandparents could have told my biological father that they couldn't do it, to find another family, or to put me in an orphanage. But instead after raising their 8 children, being in a 3rd world country, not having disposable diapers, any baby supplies, and not having clean water they decided to take care of me. They had no idea if I would have health issues and they had many other responsibilities to continue to take care of. I didn't even have a name. But they lovingly and happily took care of a new born and they hand picked who my parents would be. And as all of you who known me, know that I have been raised by amazing parents and I have always felt I had a special relationship with my grandparents.

My grandpa died over 20 years ago, my grandmother has missed him so much. A few years after my grandpa died, my grandma moved across the street from my parents so she has been very close to our family for many years. I have been very blessed to have my life turn out the way it did all because of the decisions and sacrifices of some amazing people.

My Grandma's funeral was yesterday and so many people came to the viewing and funeral to honor such an amazing woman. It was hard to say goodbye for now and it is such a huge loss to our family. The only thing that makes it easier for me is to know that she is once again with my Grandpa. I love and miss them both terribly but I am and will forever be grateful for all they did for me.

Swimming!

2011-05-01T20:06:00.000-06:00

All the Browns came to Logan when Ben's little brother got married and they all stayed at Hotels with swimming pools. So with the weather being bad we all went to the Holiday Inn Express and went swimming. Bailey was in heaven, ever since going swimming last year at my brother Eric's house she has loved swimming. Thanks Yvonne for the floaties!

Hinkley wasn't sure she liked the whole swimming idea. She clung to Ben and cried and when I got in she clung to me and cried and just when I was about ready to give up she decided that it wasn't so bad and enjoyed it for the rest of the time.

Uncle Matt forgot his swim suite so he took all the pictures for us that night, Thanks Matt Man.

The Hair Cut

2011-04-24T15:33:00.000-06:00

My mom always trimmed Bailey's hair and after she left we took her to Cookie Cutters for a trim when she needed it. Well I took the dogs to the groomer for their haircut and for a week after that Bailey kept asking to get her hair cut. Ben and Lyndsie tried to talk her out of it, but she was pretty sure she wanted to cut her hair.

She was really excited to get it cut, Ben was a little nervous that we had cut off all of her hair. But she was a good girl and loved getting her balloon after she was all done. In fact a few days later she asked if she could get her hair cut again. When I was a little hesitant and started talking to her about it she said she just wanted another balloon! Maybe next time we will just get her a balloon and not get her hair cut!

Plugs and Princess Dresses

2011-04-12T17:52:00.000-06:00

Ever since the girls were little we have called thier pacifiers "plugs." It just makes sense, it "plugs" up thier hole!

I tried a couple of times to break Bailey of her plug when she was younger, but she didn't understand why I was taking it away and just looked at me like I was the meanest person on the earth. I couldn't take it. So I decided that there were worse things than her having a "plug".

In November before she turned 3 we stared talking about her getting rid of her "plug." Some of her friends had princess dresses and even though I am SO NOT a fan of princess crap, we decided to brib her. We asked her if she wanted a princess dress, of course she said yes, so we told her to throw her plug away and we'd buy her a princess dress. She looked at us like we were crazy!

We brought it up a few times, but never pushed it, that way it could be her idea. Well in March she was playing with some friends and they were all dressed up in princess dresses. I reminded her that when she threw her plug away I'd buy her a princess dress.

The next day when I walked into her room to put her down for a nap, she kept talking about her garbage can. I finally went over to look in it and this is what I saw. Excuse the "trashy" picture, hahaha!

We gave her two days to see how she would do, it was a little bit of an adjustment for her and one of the reasons we let her have her plug is because she grinds her teeth, a little gift she got from her father. After her two day trial run we went and got her a princess dress!

I love this picture she is all about busting a move, she gets some of her dancing skills from her dad too! The dress is a little big, but its all good. She no longer has a plug, she doesn't wear her princess dress every day, and we have one beautiful little princess!

Crazy Bed Head Hair

2011-04-10T11:39:00.000-06:00

Hinkley has had some really bad bed head hair.

She has bad hair in the morning

And after nap time

But she is always super cute!

Valentines Day

2011-03-03T16:00:00.006-07:00

The weekend before Valentines Day we had to get some new tires on Ben's pickup. So we needed to do that in Idaho. My niece went down on Friday and took the girls home with her, so Ben and I had a little time to ourselves! :) Ok Ben's in tax season so not really and I cleaned the house all day on Friday. P-A-R-T-Y. We did go out and have an amazing dinner at Texas Road House, which is in my top 10. On Saturday Ben when to work and I got ready to head to Idaho as soon as he got home. Thanks Lyndsie for taking them home with you!

On Monday we got Bailey a movie and Hinkley some toys, they each got a little toy from Todd and Brenda and a BOX full of goodies from my sister. Wendy likes to spoil the kids. She also sent a couple boxes to Idaho too! We had candy, pencils, hair bows and bands, towels, note bookes, toys, straws, candy, and I think some candy! Thanks Aunt Wendy for being so sweet and sending the package! Thanks Brenda for the braking talking puppies too. The girls are so lucky to have aunts, uncles and cousins who spoil and help take care of them!

Bailey also had a party at preschool and we went to the neighborhood Valentines party, so we have a ton of candy if any of you have a shortage we'd be more than happy to share!

Super Bowl

2011-03-02T14:55:00.004-07:00

Ok, this year I didn't really like either of the teams playing at the Super Bowl, the National Anthem was a good talking point and some of commercials were pretty funny, but other than that it was just an excuse to have some good food!

My sister-in-law Yvonne sent me and Lyndsie some oreos! I thought they were so cute and were a must for our Super Bowl party. Ben thought that it was way crazy to have Oreos shipped from Idaho but they were cute and Oreos, enough said. Thanks Yvonne for mailing those to us! :)

We also had Ben's amazing 7 layer dip, meatballs (Thanks Cara for the recipe), cookie bars, wings, and Lynsdie made some amazing chicken Nachos. We were so full by the 2nd quarter I think we were all ready to throw up!

Check up

2011-02-25T17:45:00.006-07:00

Bailey's 3 year check up and Hinkley's 9 month were close enough to each other that I was able to take them together, which was so nice not to have to go twice. Anyway they are doing great! Bailey is just under her peers in height and weighs 30lbs. Hinkley is growing all the time! She is a little chunk, she is a pound heavier and an inch taller than Bailey was at her age. Hinkley weighs 18lbs and I can't wait until she hits the 1 year and 20lb mark so we can turn her car seat around.

It kills me how big Bailey is! She is still a sweet sister and an amazing help, sometimes a little too much! She loves to help me cook, clean, and take care of Hinkley. She loves singing, dancing, pretending to play the piano, playing with friends, preschool, Sunbeams, having her nails painted by Lyndsie, seeing family, playing her leapster, and spending as much time as I let her in the tub. She misses her dad like crazy and has started to ask him to please not go to work the next day and to stay home with her! She loves Skyping with Grammy, Papa, and cousins Shaydon and baby Slater.

Hinkley has been rolling ever where for a while and has just started doing the army crawl and now she is really every where. She loves being able to come and find Bailey and I. She just barley broke her first tooth about two weeks ago and now has her two bottom teeth. She LOVES Bailey, loves to try to dance and sing with her, loves splashing Bailey in the tub, loves to have her picture taken. She has the cutest giggle and makes the craziest faces. She hates to have her clothes changed, have her cover on her car seat so she can't see, she hates to have me put her hair in piggys, she hits my hand away and tries to wiggle away from me. She is totally breaking my heart with how big she is getting. She loves her dad and smiles like crazy when he comes home and gets really irritated if he doesn't pick her up right away.

We love our girls and are so grateful for them. They keep us entertained, laughing, up at night, paranoid, and we can't imagine our lives with out them.

Tiny Dancer

2011-01-28T16:01:00.008-07:00

Now that Bailey is 3 she is old enough to start taking dance classes. I started bugging my cousin Katie for information on where she takes her girls and I signed Bailey up for the 3 year old dance class at the Smithfield Rec Center. She is SO cute and it is SO funny to watch her! She has only gone twice and in her first class there were over 20 little girls ages 3and 4. Some of the older girls got moved to another class and with 2 teachers it is still the funniest thing I do once a week. There are little girls every where, it's awesome.

Christmas '10

2011-01-24T17:29:00.007-07:00

It was our year to be with Ben's family for Christmas this year, so we headed back to Idaho on the 23rd and was there until the 26th. We stayed with my brother Todd and his family because there just isn't enough room for all of us at Ben's mom's house.

Of course Ben had to get in a little sports with his family so on Christmas Eve he went and played basketball and than after the game we all went over for the Big Brown Party. We start out with a big amazing meal, we clean up and then the kids get ready to go. All the little kids get in about 10 cars because of all the car seats, than they sing carols, look at lights, and go see if they can find Santa. It was Bailey's first year going and she loved it. I stayed with Hinkley at the house to feed her face before the party really got going.

The kids are gone for about 20 to 30 minutes and when they come back Santa has magically come while they were gone! Its crazy but true and it happens every year. So we had a great time, Ben's little brother proposed to his girlfriend, everyone got spoiled, and its so awesome to just be together. Ben's mom got the girls the coolest bouncy horse. It holds about 300lbs so the uncles thought it would be fun to race them too, it was so funny.

We saved 3 gifts for the girls for Christmas morning just to have a little fun with them and my family the next day. Bailey had to play Santa and she was such a good helper, helping everyone open their presents! We had our traditional Christmas breakfast at Todd's, still amazaing after all these years! We were able to Skype with my parents, always good to talk to them. We had a great Chritmas holiday and it was great to be with family.

Californai & Happy Days

2011-01-23T17:55:00.008-07:00

Every year Ben has an exciting week of training for work somewhere out of town. I have gone with him every year but once. We really enjoy getting away, but it is SO VERY HARD to leave Bailey, this year I almost died because I wasn't just leaving Bailey I was leaving Hinkley for the 1st time!

This year his training was in San Ramon, California, about 45 minutes away from San Fransisco. Well our regular babysitter were all MIA this year, my parents in Germany and my brother Todd and his wife Brenda were in Jamaica, how rude. Well Ben's sister Bethany did a study abroad thing for school during the first part of the semester and couldn't go back to school for classes because it would be the middle of the semester so we hit her up to watch the girls. We took the girls to Idaho and they stayed at Ben's mom's house. We stayed the night with them and than left for the airport at 6:00am! I'm so not a morning person, not even for California.

It was really hard but I only cried for about 30 minutes, than I tried to stop because I didn't want Ben to think I wasn't excited to spend the free time with him!
I was planning on being in the hotel the whole time, sleeping, watching movies, sleeping, reading, sleeping, and sleeping. But another guy from Ben's work and his wife drove to California for the same training. Britt asked me if I wanted to go shopping with her and shopping in California, kid free, how do you say no? So she drove and planned out the shopping trips. So for three days I went shopping and hung out with Britt. I did little sleeping but had a ton of fun and took ZERO pictures!

We flew in at night and got home around 11:30pm the night before Bailey turned 3! We had Bethany bring the girls home that afternoon so they were here before we got here and I was so excited to see them. I had everything ready before we left so when she woke up it was all about Bailey. She had her preschool Christmas party that day and she was able to see Santa, we had her favorite dinner of pizza, cake, and ice cream. Ben took off a little early from work to be with her. Bailey calls birthdays - happy days, she loves them, hers or anyone elses.

I made her a cake but I forgot to spray the pan with pam before I put in the batter and we had major issues so it was such a disaster that it was basically to that point that I just handed out forks and let them attack the cake that way. I'm so not a cook! So sad, but Bailey didn't know any different and was happy as could be.

The Best Gift

2010-12-19T10:11:00.010-07:00

The Best Gift
By Barbra Streisand

The best gift
That I ever got
Didn't really weigh a lot
It didn't have a ribbon 'round
And it sometimes made a terrible sound

The best of all it seems to me
It wasn't 'neath the Christmas tree
And yet I guess I'd have to say
That it made all the other presents twice as nice

The best gift that I've ever known
I'd always wanted most to own
Yet in my dreams of sugar and spice
I never thought it could be so nice

The best gift that I'll ever get
Was sometimes dry and sometimes wet
Was usually pink but oftentimes red
As it lay so innocently in its bed

The best gift of the year to me
The one I hold most dear to me
The gift that simply drove me wild
Was a tiny new born child...

Thanksgiving '10

2010-12-18T18:54:00.009-07:00

It was a Gerratt year for Thanksgiving and we still all got together. It was weird wtihout my parents there but the next time its a Gerratt year they will be back.

A lot of the work and stress went to Todd and Brenda. They offered to have dinner at their house! There was a lot of us, but it was so much fun and great to see my family. We stayed with them and the rest of the family stayed at my parents house.

Brenda went above and beyond, she had craft projects for the kids, turkey hats and snow man tree ornaments. She also had a snow man pinata for the kids. She and Lyndsie filled the pinata with candy and little numbered bouncy balls. Each kid got a ball and after they gave the ball to Brenda she gave them a prize. All the boys got remote control cars and the girls got little Fur Real animals. They all loved them!

Dinner was awesome! We had SO MUCH food it was comical. We had turkey, prime rib, salads, home made rolls, vegetables, and so many pies that we didn't have enough room on the table for them all! It was so much fun to watch the kids play, eat, watch football, eat, be together, and eat!

I also love that the girls were able to spend time with thier Aunts, Uncles, and cousins. Eric's kids are older but so amazing with their younger cousins. Hinkley and Slater are only a month apart and so cute together. Slater has always been longer than Hinkley. She, as you can see, is much chubbier! Thanks Todd and Brenda for hosting Thanksgiving. It was awesome to see everyone, it makes me wish that we could see everyone more often.

Little piggy, little piggy

2010-12-09T19:05:00.005-07:00

Hinkley does not have as much hair as Bailed did at her age. My sister in law, Yvonne put Bailey's hair in piggys when she was 5 1/2 months old and my little Hinkley is 7 months old and piggys just aren't there yet. I think her hair is as thick but at the her crown and its not as long as Bailey's was. There is a tiny center piggy in this 1st picture.

But I tried to put her hair in piggys and this is what I got! She is so dang cute and was really photogenic the day I took these. We don't put piggys in except for special occasions but her hair will get there so I'm not worried! Besides I love accessorizing with head bands.

Daddy Time and Turkey Painting

2010-12-08T14:57:00.006-07:00

We were all home just hanging out and playing with the girls. I went to change laundry and while I was upstairs sorting clothes Bailey came up stairs and found the laundry basket and told me that she was taking it down stairs. When I came back down this is where I found the girls. Hinkley was in Bailey's jumbo blocks box and was loving it. I guess she thought she was pretty cool.
Bailey put some blocks in on top of her and Hinkley was totally happy to hang out and play with the blocks. When Bailey saw how much fun Hinkley was having I guess she thought she needed to try it too! Hinkley has now learned to scoot so there is no confining her to anything!

My sister sent Bailey this little turkey to paint. Bailey was so excited and couldn't wait to piant it. I didn't know what the paint would do to the table but it came right off of everything that it should have. Bailey had an awesome time and felt so grown up. She even put it in a special box when the the Thanksgiving decorations went down. Thanks Aunt Wendy for the awesome memeory, we wished you could have been here for the painting party! I thought I had a picture of the finished product but apparently not!

Little Bailey goes to school!

2010-11-21T17:30:00.004-07:00

We have been concerned with Bailey and her pronunciation of words for awhile. I talked to her Doctor and he kept telling me to give it some time. Well its almost been a year and we still have concerns. I called the Up to 3 Program and they came out to the house to do some general testing. She tests great in all areas and her vocabulary came back that she tests higher than her age. But her dang pronunciation struggles. So after being tested by a speech therapist she qualified for their program. So now in the Up to 3 program she goes to preschool twice a week, a speech group once a week and meets one on one with a speech therapist once every other week. She is loving preschool, but it is really hard for me to leave her. She is only 2! I leave her for 2 hours and she does very well. I met with the teachers, watch her through the viewing window but I can't believe she is going to preschool. When she turns 3 she will be out of their program, but has already qualified for another program that will help with her pronunciation. Where did the time go? How can she be old enough to be in preschool? How did we get here already?

Halloween '10

2010-11-10T11:24:00.007-07:00

Halloween was a party this year. Its so much fun to have Bailey getting old enough to understand, get excited, and enjoy the holidays. I'm a little sad that she is getting older and such a big girl!

We decided to take her to the Halloween ward party. The youth put on a party for the primary. Bailey had fun playing games, seeing her friends, she hung out with her friends Megan and Ellie pretty much the whole time, and loved winning the prizes. She was so excited. We didn't have her costume yet because I hired Ben's sister to make it for her this year. So we kind of had to improvise on her costume for this party because her real one was in Idaho. We borrowed the wings from Megan and Ellie, the skirt from my cousin Katie. We only half dressed up Hinkley she could have cared less!

For real Trick or Treating Bailey was an Indian and Hinkley was a Skunk. Bailey wore the skunk costume at 10 months and it was getting pretty tight on her. Hinkley wore it at 6 months and it was pretty baggy for her, but still way cute! Hinkley was really good she just kind of puts up with us. Bailey was way excited. We stopped at Uncle Todd's and Aunt Brenda's first and than headed to Ben's mom's ward party. Bailey was having to much fun to eat but had a ton of fun Trunk or treating with her cousins. We left Hinkley with Brenda she was all partied out. After the ward party we went back to hang out with Todd and his family. When ever the door bell would ring she would run and open the door the little kids on the other side would say "trick or treat" and Bailey would say it right back to them. Todd and Brenda would have to be close behind to hand out the candy. That fun come to a quick stop when she ran to open the door, the kids yelled trick or treat and Bailey took one at them and screamed and ran! By the time she got to me she was hysterical! One of the little boys had a skeleton mask on. It took me a few minutes to calm her down and she didn't want to play with the trick or treaters any more after that.

She still loves to play trick or treating and loves to dress up now. She kind of always did, I think she gets it from her Uncle Eric! I think Hinkley is just glad we aren't putting her back in the costume and is our sweet baby.

My baby...

2010-11-07T16:41:00.006-07:00

Before Halloween Hinkley turned 6 months old! Holy crazy! I can't believe she is already that old.

She is a beautiful little girl. She is really calm and mellow, except when she is hungry or really sleepy. She smiles and giggles and is amazing. She is doing well with her baby food and is good at eating her veggies. At 6 months we moved her out of her cradle in our room at night and into her crib in her room. A very emotional night for me. She has done pretty good in her own room, its still weird because she has been in our room since we have been in this house.

She is sitting up, very observant, and puts up with all of mine and Bailey's crap! She loves Bailey, loves to watch the dog, loves to roll around the floor, and like to sing and talk. At her 6 month appointment she weighed 15lbs and is little lower in weight and height than her peers, but is healthy and doing great.

Her skin is a little bit darker than Bailey's and her hair has stayed black. So we have started calling her Cocoa Bean. Its so cute to hear Bailey say it too and it seems to fit her. She makes some of the best faces in pictures. We love you little Cocoa Bean and we can't imagine our lives with out you

The Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-18T08:44:00.006-06:00

So over the past few years it has been tradition for us to go home and go to a pumpkin patch in Idaho with my mom. Well since my parents bailed on us we had to find another one. Ben thought it was a little silly for us to go to Idaho just to get some pumpkins! Silly boy! I love our pumpkin patch in Idaho because its home, so I think its the best and I LOVE it!

After talking to our neighbors we found one here that worked for us pretty well. We took the girls and had a great time. It was the first time Ben had joined us, he is usually doing something really important, like watching football, and doesn't come with us. It was also a first for Hinkley. She of course was amazing! She did her usual thing and slept the entire time! I love her to pieces!

Bailey loved helping me pick and hold all of the pumpkins and gourdes, while Ben kept a running total in his head. Silly accountant! We took Bailey over to the big pumpkins and told her to pick whatever one she wanted. It only took her a few minutes to decide and than she was really bummed because it was to heavy for her to carry on her own! Bailey looks grumpy in her picture, but I promise she had fun.

Rise and Shout the Cougars are out!

2010-10-17T12:46:00.006-06:00

Ok so when I married Ben I knew that he was a die hard BYU fan. I was raised as a friendly BYU fan, and when we were married was more of a BSU fan. Well after living with Ben for 8 years I'm now a very big BYU fan. Every year Ben buys us all new BYU shirts, this year Bailey got an entire outfit! We usually try and go to at least 1 BYU home game a year and I love it, the atmosphere in Provo is Awesome.

Anyway this year BYU was playing USU here in Logan. Yes, I know USU won. The FIRST time USU has won against BYU in 17 YEARS, I'm still a huge BYU fan and so not a USU fan. Ben took the whole day off the day of the game. He went golfing that morning and than we all headed to the Jones Simkins tailgate party. There were a ton of people at the stadium for the game. Ben had to go in his pickup with the grill so Lyndsie met me to help get the girls over to the party.

After the tailgate party I took the girls home to meet my niece Lexie. She came down just to take care of the girls and hang out for the weekend. We had a ton of fun at the game and with Lexie. She kind of came to say goodbye. She is amazing with little kids and is going to nanny in New Jersey for a WHOLE YEAR! We will miss you so much Lexie, thank you so much for coming to watch the girls and to hang out. Love you!!

Outing to the Zoo

2010-10-15T18:44:00.008-06:00

So we took Bailey to the zoo last year and decided that she was a little young and we would'nt go again for a couple of years. Not to mention the day we went was the first day in weeks that it hadn't rained, the zoo was packed, and it was HOT!! That may have been a part of our decision to wait.

Well Bailey is growing up way to fast and she is so cute about everything new and gets so excited that how could we deny her a trip to the zoo. My niece Lyndsie is back in Logan and a trip to the zoo couldn't take place without her and one of Ben's brother's friends Eric moved to Logan recently to go to school so he came too. Neither one of them had ever been to the Hogle Zoo before! What!!! I didn't know that was possible. But they probably just wanted to be with Ben and I, we are pretty cool to hang out with, two old people with two little girls, what a party.

On the way to the zoo Ben asked where the directions were...ok not a great start to the trip, but I reminded him that I was trying to get the girls ready and out the door and since he was driving the directions were his responsibility. Luckily for us we have a navigation app on our phones so we did make it with out any issues!

We had so much fun! Bailey loved all the animals, being with everyone, riding the carousel, the train and a surprise visit from Aunt Wendy! And on a random side note Ben and I ran into a childhood friend, yep love the Hogle Zoo. Hinkley was amazing! She was such a good baby, she didn't cry once all day. We were on the road by 10:30am and weren't home till about 10 that night and the only time she cried was around 9:00pm. I love that little monkey.

My sister met us at the zoo and than we headed to her house to relax and let Hinkley stretch, she had been strapped in her car seat or stroller all day. Than we all went out to eat with my sister, her husband, and my niece Lexie. Than we had a little issue, I changed Hinkley's diaper 3 times at my sisters house and with the other 2 changes before that I was totally out of diapers, so dang it, we had to make a quick stop at Target! Oh darn! I got the cutest winter pajamas for Bailey and diapers for Hinkley. What a day!

Well Hogle Zoo can't wait until next year to see you again!

LOTOJA

2010-09-26T17:43:00.000-06:00

So my brother-in-law is amazing. He did LOTOJA (Logan To Jackson) last year and wanted to do it again this year. I think we were out of town last year because they didn't stay with us, but this year we were here so they came to hang out.

They showed up around 10:30 pm the night before the race. Dave went off to bed first and they rest of us didn't go to bed until after midnight! I am way to old to stay up late, but I had a great time talking to my sister, Wendy, my nephew, Jason, and my niece, Lexie.

We all went to bed for a few hours. Wendy and Jason were driving to Dave's check points and would be meeting him in Jackson. Lexie would stay to hang out with us for the day. Dave had to be at the starting line at 5:45am and so they were awake around 4:00am that morning. CRAZY! Well my little Bailey decided to join them that early. Apparently she woke up, walked into the guest room, looked at Dave and asked him "Where's Mommy?" He told her I was still in bed. She looked at him again and asked "Who are you?" He told her he was Lexie's daddy, she seemed ok with that and kept them company until about 4:45am when I heard her little voice and FLEW out of bed. I was so embarrassed that I hadn't heard her sooner! They left around 5:00am and Bailey went back to sleep after that, thank heavens.

The next day Lexie and I went shopping! Ben had the girls and I had so much fun with Lexie. I don't get to see her much and it is always great to have a shopping buddy. We went to the Shade Shirt sale, Old Navy, the mall, Hobby Lobby, and had a great time. I love hats and Bailey has always been really good at wearing them and I bought this hat while we were shopping.

We had a great day and another late night. Dave finished the race and beat his time from last year and than they headed back to Utah. They got to Logan at 1:00am Sunday morning and left! They headed back home which is about another 2 hour drive! I'm way to old to stay up late 2 nights in a row, but I had a wonderful time and loved seeing them!

Thanks for staying with us, hopefully we can make it a yearly tradition! Also thanks for the pajamas, teddy bear, and little bunny Aunt Wendy!

A bike for Bailey

2010-09-25T21:34:00.008-06:00

All summer long I have been trying to get Ben to buy Bailey a bike. But either we weren't together to look for one or he didn't like the ones we found. When it was finally his idea he started looking on line and found one he liked. He showed me and I ordered it about 10 minutes later before he could change his mind.

It came the day we headed to Idaho for Labor day and of course we didn't have time to pick it up. So I went to pick it up the day we got back into town. I took Bailey with me to get it and she was so excited it was the cutest thing! She kept smiling and saying "My bike?"

I tried to put the bike together on Tuesday, but I was struggling so Ben put it together that night and we hid it in the bathroom for the whole day so Ben could be here when we gave it to her.

She loves it and rides it in the house, the garage, and outside. She picked up on the pedals, but unless she has her tennis shoes on has a hard time reaching them! She is so excited and has to tell everyone I talk to on the phone about her new bike.

The Brown Reunion

2010-09-19T11:42:00.010-06:00

For Labor Day we were in Burley for Ben's immediate family reunion. It was only with Ben's brothers and sisters, but because there are 10 kids, who most are married, and most have kids there are a lot of us when we get together! Because there are too many of us to stay in one place we stayed with my brother Todd and his wife.

We started the reunion out at the Declo Highschool football game. Ben's baby brother Nic is a senior this year so we went to watch him play. His baby sister Jana is also on the dance team so we were able to watch her dance.

The girls did really well. Bailey loved the dance team and the cheerleaders. Hinkley was really good and just hung out in her car seat for the 1st quarter and with Grandma Brown for the 2nd quarter. It got pretty chilly after the half so the girls and I took off.

On Saturday we all headed to the church for the Traditional Brown flag football game. I hung out on the side lines with the girls and the rest of the little kids. Bailey just loved the open space and ran, and ran, and ran. Hinkley and I didn't stay for the whole game they were there for 3 hours. And of course we had to leave the reunion early for the BYU game.

On Sunday Ben's big brother blessed their new baby and two boys they just adopted. So we headed to Oakley for the blessings. On the way home the girls fell asleep so we had a little rest before heading back for lunch and games. Brenda, my sister-in-law, took Hinkley for the afternoon while we played games it was just a little to windy for her to be outside.

On Monday we were able to hang out a little bit before heading home. It was great to be able to see everyone. There were 34 of us there all together and we were still missing April's husband Cody! We always have a lot of fun and Bailey loves playing with all of her cousins

New Experiences

2010-09-08T21:22:00.007-06:00

Well its been a crazy week and a half! I took Hinkley to her 4 month check and she is doing really well. She is healthy and a little taller and heavier than Bailey was at this point. She is also what the doctor calls advanced socially, which means she does not like him! Bailey was the same way, I think its just his nice way of calling her a mamma's girl! Bailey had a really hard time again, Hinkley was crying when the doctor was looking at her and so it made Bailey really nervous and she started to cry too. That was fun trying to console both of them at the same time!

This check up caused a lot of stress because we don't immunize the girls until they are older and the doctor told me that whooping cough is a growing concern and the number of children that have it are higher this year than last year. So after A LOT of stress, counsel, and tears, we got her immunized for whooping cough. I was re-immunized when I had her and Bailey is current but it was so hard to do that to her!

But on a happy note Hinkley is starting to roll over more and more and is still her cute self with lots of smiles! She is so cute when she talks and sometimes gets really loud! I love her cute personality and honestly I can't imagine life without her. I know that I used the word "cute" a lot in that paragraph but she is just that cute!

Ben got me a gift certificate for an hour massage at K salon and spas, where I get my hair cut. Which I was so excited to use and did a few days after Hinkley's appointment. It was awesome, when she got to my shoulders she kept saying how tight they were! It was a great gift and so relaxing. Thanks Ben

I decided that Bailey's hair was getting a little to long. My mom has cut and trimmed Bailey's hair since she was about 6 months old, but since we won't be seeing her for awhile I had to figure out where to take her now. I started growing out her bangs awhile ago, because they are just to curly and get out of control! Anyway I was talking to a friend of mine and she mentioned that a little shop called Cookie cutters had opened that was just for kids. I was so excited because that's exactly what I was looking for. I was still a little nervous and Ben didn't help. While I was sitting there waiting for Bailey's turn I get a text from Ben saying that he loves her hair and doesn't think we should cut it. All things that would have been useful to know 30 minutes earlier! Bailey did really well, she didn't have any issues at all and they did a good job and I will be going back as needed until my mom gets back! Hinkley was a little trooper to hang out in her car seat the whole time!

Also my friend Angie came to see Hinkley and the new house. I see her about once a year and even though the visit was short and sweet it was great to see her! Hope to see you again soon!

Oh the county fairs!

2010-08-27T21:21:00.007-06:00

I love this time of year! Ok let me clarify, I hate the hot weather, but I love going to the fair! The Cache county fair is nice and its fun to get out and we did, but its not like the Cassia county fair, because that is home and what I grew up with.

Any way we went to the Cache County fair and it was SO hot! The girls did really well though. We walked around and bought a few things here and there. Than we took Bailey over to the pony rides. I was on a horse when I was about 3, not alone, but I have grown up with horses and I love riding. Anyway my dad has a couple horses and one of their names is Poco, Bailey calls him Gato, which is cat in Spanish! Anyway as soon as she saw the pony's she wanted to ride them and kept calling them Papa's Gato. So for $3.00 she got to sit on a horse and go in a circle three times. It was kind of a rip off, but she LOVED it! I can't wait until my dad gets back and can take her for all the rides she wants and do it for free! After the ride we went and got dinner and than headed home.

The next weekend we went home for the Cassia County Fair. I haven't missed a fair since my mission and even though it wasn't the same because hardly any of my family was there we didn't miss it. Usually all of my brothers and sisters come home for the fair, I go to the Fat Stock Sale with my dad, and we all go to the rodeo together on Saturday night. Not this year. Anyway we got into town on Friday night and, my sister-in-law, Brenda kept Hinkley while we took Bailey into the fair to see all the animals. When we got there a couple of Turkey's were getting washed, she was totally fascinated! She wouldn't touch the lambs, loved the goats, liked the bunnies, and had a great time! Ben and I also saw some friends, its always good to go home.

On Saturday Todd and Brenda took Bailey to the fat stock sale while Ben, Hinkley, and I finished getting ready. We met up with them and Brenda kept Hinkley again while Ben and I took Bailey and Shaydon (Scott and Sommers son) over to the carnival to ride on the rides. Talk about a rip off! It cost us $6.00 for the two of them to ride one single ride. They only got to ride a few rides because unfortunately neither one of them was tall enough to ride any of the others. But we bought them hats, they were together and they had a great time. We had lunch with Todd and Brenda and then traded Bailey for Hinkley and went to Twin to pick up Scott.

We had a great time the doughnuts and scones were amazing as usual and it is so fun to have Bailey old enough to have and enjoy new experiences. We missed the rest of the family that couldn't be there it wasn't the same with out you!

Tick Tock

2010-08-18T14:31:00.008-06:00

Well, I'm another year older! My birthday was a couple of weeks ago and I can't believe how fast this last year went. I have been so blessed to have had another wonderful year with so many blessings. My biggest blessing is of course that I was able to carry Hinkley for a full 9 months, that she was born healthy, and that she is a beautiful baby! I'm so grateful to have spent another year of my life with Benjamin, he is everything to me. I'm so blessed to be Bailey's mother. She doesn't say "I love you" she says "you to" and I love it when she randomly says "you to" to me! And I'm so grateful to my family and for their support, love, and the example of my parents. My parents mission hasn't been easy for me, but my life from the very beginning was touched my missionary work and I have such a testimony of the gospel that even though I hate them being away I know that they are doing what the Lord wants and needs them to do.

Ok enough being emotional! So the day before my birthday Lyndsie and Brenda came to Logan. Lou had to take care of some arrangements for school and attend some classes so they were able to be here with me. Ben usually tries to take a half a day off for my birthday, but wasn't able to this year so it was really nice to have the company. Brenda helped me start to hang all of my decorations, I really struggle at decorating, so it was nice to have her help.

I got two cakes, like I really needed 2, because Brenda bought one and Ben bought one. Brenda's was a cute water melon cake with 2 plastic ants on it and Bailey about had a melt down. She kept saying "EWWW Bug" and they had her almost in tears! Of course Bailey had to help me blow out the candles and was a little excited we had a hard time lighting them because she kept blowing on our matches. We had pizza and both cakes and it was nice to be with family since the parental units are M.I.A.

Ben got me a gift certificate for a massage! I can hardly wait to use it! He tried to be here as much as he could, he also got me a mirror that I wanted, a movie, and chocolate, some itunes songs, and his cake was a Cold Stone cake, I get one once a year and love them.

Also Hinkley will be four months old this week! I'm really having stress that my baby is growing up so fast!!! She is sitting in her bumbo and enjoys it, she is taking and yelling more and more, she is starting to roll, and has grown out of her new born clothes! I still rock her to sleep and I just try not to cry about how fast she is changing! She is such a happy baby and such a blessing to me. Bailey tries to get Hinkley to play with her, hold toys, wear hats, etc. Bailey has been such a sweet heart with her and is still very possessive of her. In fact she and I argue about whose baby Hinkley is!

Thank you to everyone who has been apart of my life this past year! It has been a crazy year, but a good one.

Family Time!

2010-08-13T21:20:00.008-06:00

A couple weeks ago my brother Scott blessed his baby, Slater. Slater was born a month after Hinkley and is such a cute little boy. We wanted to be there for the blessing and so we headed back to Idaho. We spent the first night at my brother Todd's house, we had to drop off the dogs and by the time we got there I had spent enough time in the car. My sister-in-law Brenda had made the girls the cutest skirts, hair accessories and bought them onezies to match. Thanks Brenda!

On Saturday my brother-in-law, Dave, ran, swam, and biked the Spud Man. Congratulations Dave for finishing the Spud Man! After he was done we all had an amazing breakfast at Todd's then we loaded up the girls and headed on to my brother Eric's house.

We hung out for awhile there and than we all got ready and went swimming. Wendy and her family were staying with Scott and they all came swimming too. Bailey was a little nervous about the water, but after awhile she was pushing Ben away. Thanks Yvonne for those amazing floaties!

On Sunday Scott blessed Slater and did a great job. All five of us were there and it was hard not to miss my parents when we are all together! After the blessing we went to Scott's house for an amazing luncheon. Sommers and Scott had worked hard to make it really nice. Mom called to say hello to everyone while we were together and it was great to hear from her.

We tried to leave soon after we ate and I was SO not looking forward to the 5 1/2 hour drive back to Logan. We had to stop midway and pick up the dogs and Todd and Brenda fed us and sent us on our way. It was a great weekend, I loved being with everyone and I loved getting out of the car after that long drive!

The Browns VS The Yard

2010-08-06T15:38:00.011-06:00

So when we bought our old house 4 years ago we had to do all the landscaping, which we did. It wasn't easy, fun, or cheap! So afterwards Ben promised me that if we ever moved (because he told me that we were going to be in the last house for at least 10 years, and we weren't even in it 4) and the landscaping had to be done that we were going to pay to have it ALL done. Well he lied! This is a picture of what we had to deal with. The dirt was pushed back the legal amount from the house and we had to do the rest. We were told we would need a 7 foot retaining wall! If my kids were to fall off of that they would seriously injure themselves. We weren't told about our landscaping issues until the house was well underway so all we could do was deal with it!

In March my brother Todd came down with a semi hauling a loader to move dirt around to see what he could do for us. Thank heavens for Todd and that he loves my kids. He wasn't happy with the landscaping issue and knew that it wasn't kid friendly. He spent two days leveling and moving dirt and when he was done we only had to have a 3 foot retaining wall! He saved us a ton of money and I'm sure several trips to the ER.

So since we moved in, at the begining of May, we have been dealing with a LOT of dirt! We have worked with landscape people designing plans for sprinkler systems, curbing, fences, top soil, sod, and everything else that goes with a yard. For Memorial day we had some of Ben's family here helping to install the sprinkler system, which we later learned had been designed wrong! The guy had measured the yard wrong which totally screwed up everything! He admitted he had done it wrong, but said he didn't have time to fix it and we were basically on our own!

Ben worked on the yard constanly! We had a ton of help from our neighbors, especially Tyler. Tyler helped Ben in our yard every night even nights when Ben worked late Tyler came over and worked with out Ben even being here! We really appreciate Tyler paying a landscape company to do ALL of his yard so he could help us with ours!

So two weekends ago we were finally to the point of laying sod! Yea for us! So we called all of our family and anyone who was silly enough to say that they would help us. Ben had his older brother Daniel here with two of his boys, his brother Jacob, sister Suzy, and his sister Kat, to watch our girls. Ben learned from Tyler's landscape guy that we would need to install a pump to boost our water pressue that would cost us over $1000! So we bought one here and had Jacob install it and saved us a ton of money. Thanks Jacob. Jacob also worked on the sprinklers to make sure that all the grass would get water and so by the time we were done he was soaking wet!

I called my nephew Jason, who offered to help. He ended up coming from Sandy with my sister Wendy, her husband, Jason's wife, my nephew Logan, and my neice Lexie, who also helped watch the girls. It was a party! We laid over 13 thousand square feet of sod and were done before noon. We were a little short so we ordered some more and finished the sod last week.

A huge thank you to everyone! We couldn't have done it with out all of your help. I thought the sod would take us all day. Thanks again it took almost 3 months but we finally won the war against the yard!

Than they were gone...

2010-07-27T08:15:00.010-06:00

Two weeks ago we had my mom's family reunion in Heber and Scott, Sommers and the Boys drove down to come to it. They made it to Logan on Thursday night at midnight. They put the boys to bed and we talked for a little bit and got up to play the next day. Bailey and Shaydon had fun playing, fighting and being together and the babies were good. We hung around the house for the morning and than went to Gossners. Sommers likes to go there and Scott likes to get the squeaky cheese. After that we took the kids to McDonald's for a gourmet lunch! We played there for awhile and than they took off. It was great to have them here and now Scott is on Bailey's top 10 favorite people list. She calls him "My Scott." We loved seeing them and hope they can come back soon!

On my way back from McDonald's I got a call from Ben's mom and they were just about to Logan. We had invited them to stay with us Friday night and they were almost here! Ben's brother Daniel was having the two boys they adopted sealed to them in Ogden on Saturday morning. Ann, Grandma Snow, and Kat did some shopping while the girls napped. Then we were all supposed to meet in town for dinner. Ben was working on the yard and helping our neighbors lay their sod so just the girls and I went. We had a great dinner at Olive Garden and than came back and chatted. I put the girls to bed and went and helped a little with the laying of the sod while Grandma and Ann napped and Kat watched a movie and listened for the girls monitors. After that Kat and I went to get everyone a treat and we talked and hung out for awhile.

The next morning everyone got up and ready to go. Ann, Grandma, and Kat headed for Ogden, Ben went to lay sod again and I got the girls ready to go to the reunion. My parents were able to leave the MTC to come to the reunion to see everyone and say goodbye. It was great to see the extended family and spend some time with my parents. Bailey and Shaydon were so cute when they saw my dad. They saw him at the same time because they are hardly apart they both yelled "Papa" and ran to him and didn't let go until we left the reunion.

After the reunion we headed to my sisters house. She only lives about an hour away and it gave us more time to be with mom and dad. They and Scott all stayed with her Saturday night. We talked, had supper and than around 10 pm Ben and I decided it was time to head home. It was really hard to say goodbye. Of course the girls didn't know what was going on and it was probably better that way. I didn't have my camera So these pictures are from my niece Lexie. We will really miss you mom and dad and our so proud of you for going when it isn't easy to say goodbye and leave your grand kids.

The 4th

2010-07-15T10:56:00.010-06:00

The week between my parents farewell and the 4th of July the girls and I stayed in Burley. We helped my parents get ready to go and just hung out. Then on Friday my brother Scott and his family came to Burley to hang out and see some of Sommers' family that was coming into town.

Bailey and Shaydon of course had a ton of fun together! They played, fought, wrestled, bathed, ate, went to the farm, saw baby cows, and kept Grandpa very busy! They are 4 months apart, but in this picture Shaydon insisted on holding Bailey. I found them in the hall and Shaydon was trying to pick her up, we decided it was safer if he held her on the couch!

On the 3rd my brother Todd got out his boat and offered to take the kids for a ride. Bailey has only ever been on Uncle Todd's boat and had a great time. She and Shaydon of course had a little issue over who got to help Uncle Todd drive so Todd got them both on his lap to help him. The babies slept most of time we were on our ride. It was kind of a cold day that's why we aren't in our swim suites.

Afterwards Todd and Brenda invited us all back to have a bbq and to watch some fireworks. Bailey had never really seen any fireworks, we always put her to bed before they started. She thought they were pretty and knew that they were hot so she tried to blow them out like a candle when she saw them in the sky. We had a great time, the food was great and I loved being with everyone. I especailly loved when Bailey got Uncle Todd to jump on the tramp with her.

We had a great weekend and I loved spending time with family and having the girls spend time with Scott, Sommers and thier boys. This is all four of the babies from my family. Bailey wasn't to thrilled to sit and play nice while we took the pictures if you can't tell. Gotta love those terrible two's!

A Blessing & A Farewell

2010-07-12T08:18:00.010-06:00

My parents got their mission call to Frankfurt Germany and had their farewell on June 27th. It has been hard to think of them gone for that long and to see them get ready to go. I know that I was gone for 18 months on my own mission but that was me leaving them not them leaving me. They both did a great job on their talks of course. Dad talked on temples and mom talked on prayer. We had a lot of friends and family show up to support them which is always great to know that so many people care about your family. We had the luncheon at my brother Todd's house, one less thing for my mom to worry about. We had so much fun and great food! The food was so good and we were all so full, but couldn't stop eating. Thank you to everyone who came to support my parents and who helped with the food.

Because my family would all be together that Sunday we made arrangements to bless Hinkley that same day in their ward. Ben did an amazing job and it was great to have all my brothers and brother in laws there to bless her. She was an angel and didn't cry once. Like Bailey she was blessed with her plug in her mouth! Hinkley's did fall out but she still didn't cry! Thanks Lou for letting me borrow your shirt and for taking the picture.

It was also the first time that we had all been together since Hinkley was born so she got to meet a lot of the family for the first time. Everyone is so cute with her and the girls had so much fun being with family. Hinkley and Slater are only a month apart. Slater is as long or longer than Hinkley but Hinkley is more chubby!

My brother Eric's kids are so cute with Bailey and Shaydon! They play with them and love to be with them which is so awesome since they are older. Lily is especailly cute with Bailey and will be her closest girl cousin, Lily is about 3 years older than Bailey but is a great cousin and friend and I really hope that they will always have fun together.

We are kind of worried about how Bailey will handle going to Papa and Grammy's for the first time and find that they are not there. Bailey worships her Papa and can get him to play dolls, kitchen, cars, horsey and about anything else she can think of. I also feel bad that Hinkley won't have that relationship with my parents, but they won't be gone forever. Its really hard not to be selfish and not want my parents to go. I know what they are doing is important and way, way, WAY, deep down some where I am excited for them to be going on this adventure and know that they will love it. We will miss you Mom and Dad, a.k.a Papa and Grammy

Growing too fast!

2010-06-24T08:10:00.008-06:00

Hinkley turned 2 months old this week! She is growing way too fast. She is a great sleeper at night and loves to be held and snuggled when she sleeps during the day, which makes it hard to get anything done but what can you do! She smiles a lot which I love and is starting to talk to us more and more. She has the cutest personality. At her two month check up we were told that she is healthy and doing great! She already weighs 11 lbs and we can't imagine our lives without her!

Bailey has done amazing with her she hasn't been upset with Hinkley once! She also is such a big help from bathing, getting clothes, putting back in and finding her pacifier, holding her, and trying to play with and feed her! Hinkley also adores Bailey she can just sit and watch her big sister for a long time! I love to watch the two of them together! Bailey is still very protective of Hinkley and when anyone gets to close to the baby that Bailey isn't comfortable with she lets them know that Hinkley is off limits. Bailey had a hard time at Hinkley's 2 month appointment and did not apprectiate the nurses and doctors looking at her at all!

I know its a little late, but this month we celebrated my dads birthday and fathers day. I was blessed to be adopted by such great parents. My dad has always worked hard to support our family and has been a great man. He spent the past 18 years in the stake presidency, more than half of my life, which showed his love and dedication to the gospel. He has always been such a great example to me and I don't know how I will get along without him for the next 18 months!

And Ben, he is a great father who also works hard to support us. He loves his daughters and they have him wrapped around their fingers and can get away with anything. I love to watch him dance with Bailey, read to her, feed her, and she loves him. I love to watch him hold Hinkley, kiss her goodbye every morning, and tell her how beautiful she is. He is such a softy!

I feel blessed to have known my father-in-law and can only pray that he approves of me marrying one of his sons. Don was an amazing man, who had a hard childhood but was determined to make a good life for himself and his family. He wasn't afraid to be himself and I hope my daughters will get that from him too. Don worked hard and played hard. Thanks to Don and Ann for raising the amazing man I married.

My parents are getting closer to going on their mission which is really hard but everyone keeps telling me how fast 18 months will go by. Ben told me just to think of it as they will only be gone for 1 tax season!

And we're back!

2010-06-03T20:05:00.008-06:00

It has been a busy two months. We moved into scary house and I HATED it. A big thanks to everyone who helped us move though.

We were only in scary house a few weeks when Hinkley was born. She arrived as scheduled, the only thing not planned was her size, she was 8lbs 1oz and 19 inches long! My dad's comment was "No wonder Alisa was so big!" She has more hair than Bailey did and her skin is a little darker. She is definitely her own little person. Neither Ben nor I think she looks at all like Bailey did. Thanks to all the family and friends who came, called, emailed, sent text messages, etc. We appreciate your thoughtfulness. I was in the hospital for 4 days and was happy to get released.

Bailey was so cute with Hinkley when they first brought her into to see Hinkley and I. She sat on the bed with me and she and I both had to be holding Hinkley. Whenever anyone, even Ben or Grandparents, tried to take or touch Hinkley Bailey just cried and cried. She has done great with her and is such a little helper. Actually Bailey has done amazing with all of the changes in her life since March. Three houses, tax season, and a new little sister.

Two weeks after Hinkley was born we moved into our new house. I don't have a picture of the finished product, sorry. This picture was taken a month before it was done. Thanks once again to everyone who helped us move. Especially those who helped us move all THREE TIMES! We were in three house in three months something I don't advise. We are loving our new home, we are still not settled in, but with a new born and still recovering from surgery it's as good as it can be.

Hinkley is doing great and growing WAY to fast! Sometimes I can't believe she is here and she is already a month old! She does amazing at night only wakes up once or twice. She LOVES to cuddle and its so hard not to cuddle with her constantly, which may explain why there are still boxes all over the house! I love her little smiles and she is a mommas girl which I love too!

To all who didn't know my parents got their mission call to Frankfurt Germany. I'm trying to be happy about it. Just hard to think of them gone for so long and so far away. And Congratulations to Scott and Sommers on thier new baby boy!

Hope to catch up some more but Hinkley is paging me

Moving!

2010-04-02T17:14:00.009-06:00

Well this last weekend we moved out of our first house! Kind of emotional, but I am also 9 months pregnant, we had shipped Bailey and Obi to Idaho with my parents so it could have been a lot of different things. Ben's mom Ann came up with two of his little brothers and little sister. I can't tell you how much help that they were we couldn't have done it without them! Ben has an amazing mom who always helps us, I feel bad because she doesn't come to visit often, but when we need help she is always there for us. We also had some awesome friends who showed up to help. Tyler, Jake, and Patrick all guys who Ben works with. Thanks for taking time off from work to help.

So our old house is sold, we closed on Friday, moved on Saturday and the funding went through on Monday so here we are renting again. I also realized Wednesday night that the drawer under the oven/stove still had pans in it! So we called the realtor and made arrangements for the guy who owns our house now to just leave my pans outside on the door step. That was a little weird picking up my pans from my old front step!

We are in Scary house and I'm still not happy about it, but I'm just trying to accept the things I can't change and that is about the best I can do and try to keep Bailey in a clean little bubble until we move!

Our new house is moving along, it just will never be fast enough. But they are texturing and mudding the walls, dry wall is hung, wiring is done, and they have started to hang siding. I am way excited for the house to be done, not just because I will get to leave scary house, but we won't have to move for a very long time, its nice to be able to have some say as to the lay out of your house, and it will be perfect for us in so many ways.

As for me and the baby we are doing well, besides living in scary house, I have started to dilate and efface, but I'm not holding my breath it will be a lot less stressing if she can stay put until after tax season. This is one of the only pictures of my pregnancy with #2 I think including this one there are 3 all together. I am HUGE!

To all my fellow tax season wives -Cara and Tiffany- we have almost made it! Only 13 days left! Yea for us now after the 15th we can have husbands and our children will have fathers!

We're alive, but we're dead!

2010-03-21T16:27:00.011-06:00

Ok, so here we go playing catch up for the last month.

My sister in law (Lyndsie's) mom came to visit for a weekend. We had a great time! The girls went shopping, out to eat, watched movies, hung out, laughed, talked, and spoiled Bailey. Brenda and Lyndsie don't ever tell her no! And Ben worked - Love tax season!

The week after that Bailey came down with a cold. She started coughing Tuesday night and by Wednesday morning it sounded like croup. By Thursday I had caught her cold and by that weekend so had Ben. That Wednesday Ben's little brother Nathan came home from his mission. We headed to Idaho Saturday spent very little time with his family because we were all sick and Bailey was getting worse. We didn't spend a lot of time with my parents because they were watching my brothers 3 kids and no one wanted to get them sick. So we stayed at my brother Todd's. Saturday night Bailey had stopped eating and had a fever. By Sunday morning she was worse! Her cough was bad, her fever was higher and she would wake up for only about an hour and want to go back to sleep. We left her with Brenda while we went to Nathan's homecoming and took off for home after that.

I got her into the Dr's office Monday morning and they told me she had her 1st ear infection. Poor little monkey, so we got her some medicine and did a lot of cuddling and moving watching. On Wednesday I was having enough problems breathing from the cold and being pregnant that they wanted to have my lungs checked so I went back to the Dr's. Thank goodness for Lyndsie who came to watch Bailey. By Friday Bailey was starting to improve still not eating normally and clingy. But things got worse. I woke up Friday morning at 2:30am with a horrible ear infection. I was done getting sleep that night! I called my mom in tears and she headed down and Ben came home while I went to the Dr. again and got medicine for my ear. Mom stayed until Sunday and took Bailey home with her. I had a pregnancy appointment Monday morning and took off that afternoon to Idaho. So in the words of Dash from the Incredibles "we're alive, but we're dead."

We stayed with my parents until Thursday and came back to a house full of Boys! There was a USU game on and Ben had invited a few friends over. We also had some old friends from Burley staying at our house that week, but they left on Friday.

On Saturday Todd and Brenda came up. We have had some serious issues with landscaping at the house we are building. So my amazing big brother drove down with one of our farms semi's hauling a loader and spent 2 days moving dirt around. It is so much better than it was and it looks great. I can never thank Todd enough. We also had Ben's little brother Jacob come down for the night, he needed Ben's help. We had a fun, but busy weekend!

This last week we are all healthier and doing well. We have had a lot of stress finding a decent place that would rent to us for 2 to 3 months! So we are renting a scary house in Smithfield and are planning on closing on our old house this Friday and moving out this weekend. Brenda brought Lyndsie back yesterday after USU's spring break. I'm so happy to have her back because if the baby decided to come in the middle of the night Lyndsie is on call to stay with Bailey so it always makes me nervous of what we would do when Lyndsie is out of town.

The baby and I are fine, I have started falling about once a week! Not really sure how I manage it, Ben says he's sorry I'm a clutz! Bailey keeps us busy and laughing! Ben is working hard at Tax season. Yea tax season! We are just praying that the baby will stay put till after the move and than until tax season is over. The new house is moving along, it is framed and mostly wired and they are hoping to start dry walling this week.

House Update

2010-02-22T17:36:00.004-07:00

Day 1: February 2nd Sign goes up

Day 11: First showing

Day 17: Received offer on the house

Day 18: Submitted counter offer

Day 19: Counter offer accepted!

Now if everything can just go great we can close and have our house sold!!

Where did February go?

2010-02-20T20:54:00.005-07:00

So we have been so focused on getting the house ready to put up for sale that I haven't really been a good mom, wife, friend, or blogger!

The first week in February we were really just finishing up all the little details of cleaning and getting the house ready. We finally got every thing worked out with the realtors and got a for sale sign up and that was stressful!

The second week Bailey and I took off for five days to Idaho. Ben gets to put in all the hours that he needs to for work and not feel guilty about never coming home. Yea tax season. We had fun in Idaho and of course I forgot my camera there, which is another reason that I haven't blogged.

This last week we have been dealing with house crap. Lyndsie (my niece) watched Bailey a lot for me while I got the house ready to sale and now all I have to do is just maintain the house and keep it clean. So I feel like I have been a little better of a mom lately. Bailey has been AMAZING with this whole thing and I hope I can make it up to her.

Ben did a lot of work on the house every night after putting in a long day at the office and has been amazing too. Now if we can just sale our house!!

House Stress

2010-01-24T13:00:00.005-07:00

Last week we had some of Ben's family come into town. They were coming to discuss some investment options and of course since they were here we put them to work! I love Ben's family, they have always been so good to help us with whatever we need and they seem not to mind always bailing us out.

We had Jacob, Breawna and Ben's sister Misti, her husband Cannon, and their son Corbyn. They all came into town on Friday night, we had dinner, talked, had our investment meeting, and let Corbyn and Bailey play. We all stayed up WAY to late!! On Saturday we got up had breakfast and than put everyone to work.

I had a pregnancy scare a couple of weeks ago and have been told to try and take it easy! Right...low stress, no heavy lifting, and try to get enough rest! Ok well in reality I have a two year old, a husband, house preparations, and I'm not sleeping well at night.

Anyway we are getting ready to put our house up for sale and we decided to move a lot of stuff to storage just to get it out of the way and hey less to keep clean! So we had Jacob and Ben making storage unit runs, Cannon hanging closet doors in our new 4th bedroom, Misit helping the guys, me helping Ben, directing traffic and keeping track of Bailey and Breawna helping keep track of Bailey and Corbyn.

We had a lot of fun with everyone, a lot of late night Wii playing, and Ben and I are so grateful for all of the help, we couldn't have done it without you.

And a HUGE thanks to Jacob, our wonderful mechanic, who fixed Ben's pickup and brought it back down to us!!

Holiday Recap

2010-01-10T16:47:00.016-07:00

Now for the holidays!! We headed home to Idaho and had a family birthday party for Bailey. It just seemed to make sense, to wait a week, and move three people instead of 20! So my parents were awesome and let us all invade their house for the party. We ordered pizza and had a great time.

My niece Lyndsie decorated Bailey's birthday cake last year and for those of you who haven't spent 3 seconds with Bailey this winter - she LOVES Frosty the Snowman so when Lyndsie and Brenda found this cake it was perfect! They bought bowls to make the body and hand made this amazing frosting! Thanks Lou and Brenda for all of your work we love you!

We had my parents, Todd, Brenda, Jake, Kristi, Lou, Ben's Mom and Grandma, his little sister Kat, his sister Misti and her family, and of course Eric Todd Webb. We made another little cake to blow out candles and laughed, talked and played.

Thanks to both of our families for all of their love, support and for being a part of Bailey's life. She wouldn't be the amazing little girl with out all of you.

The day after Bailey's party was Christmas Eve and Ben's parents were both raised that Santa came to their houses first on Christmas Eve. So after a huge wonderful dinner the kids all go for a drive and look for Santa and when they get back he's already been to the house. So we open presents and play all night long. We have a great time being together, but we wore Bailey out!
She lasted till about 8:00pm and then kept saying "night, night!" So thanks to my amazing parents we took her back to their house and put her to bed and they kept an ear on the monitor and Ben and I went back to play. Also a huge thanks to Jacob for entertaining all of us while playing with Bailey, Corbyn, and Addison!

For Christmas Ben's Mom and Grandma got Bailey a little kitchen set and love them both to pieces they didn't make us take it home. We bought it in Layton and hid it from her until the day before we went to Idaho. She loves it, she is an excellent cook and cleaner! We get served lemons and pineapple in ice cream dishes usually with a knife or spoon. She knows that everything in the oven is "hot" and so the little hot pad gets some good use!

On Christmas morning we got Bailey some milk and then she wanted "bubbles!" She is a creature of habit, there were no presents to even be looked at until she had had her bath! So after her bath we got started with Christmas morning. She loved playing Santa and handing Papa, Grammy, and Daddy presents and of course she had to "help" them all open their gifts!

For her very last present at my parents she got her horse. My parents got one for Bailey and Shaydon and they both LOVE their horses. Bailey cried when we made her get off for breakfast. Our little horse had a little malfunction for a few days and didn't work and it was almost heart breaking she knew it wasn't working and there was nothing we didn't try to get it going. Thanks to our AMAZING neighbor Rick, who we knew if any one could or would fix it it would be Rick! I bought a BRAND NEW pack of batters and one of the batteries in the horse had a reverse voltage! Any way it was the first thing Rick checked and now horse is doing amazing!

After we finally got Bailey off of her horse it was off to Ben's Mom's for Christmas stockings and then off to my brother Todd's for our Traditional Christmas Breakfast. I think the only time I haven't had Christmas breakfast at Todd's was when I was on my mission. We have egg mcmuffins, fruit and chocolate milk, but it wouldn't be Christmas with out it. Of course there were more presents to open over there Bailey had to play Santa again and had to help everyone open their gifts!

And then it was off to Boise to see my other two brothers. Scott and his family met us at Eric's house and yep more food and presents! All the little kids drew names and exchanged gifts they were so cute about it. They were excited to see how their cousins would like their gifts and play with each others gifts and help everyone open their gifts! Eric's kids are so cute to play with their two younger cousins, Bailey and Shaydon. Bailey and Shaydon get along really well Shaydon is such a cutie, there are a few punches thrown and screaming but that's what makes it funny! We had a great time, we ate, played, went to bed late and the next morning Ben and I got up and went to buy a few things we need for Hinkley and then headed back to my parents house that night.

For New Years all five of us came to my parents. Actually Ben left me there and went home to work for a few days. Todd lives about 10 minutes away from my parents and so Eric, Scott, and Wendy came home to play with us. We all had a great time, thanks Todd and Brenda for letting us crash at your house and to Ann for letting me borrow my old car so I wouldn't be stranded!

From the Brown famiy to all of you - We hope that you all had a wonderful safe holiday and wish you a wonderful, amazing new year! Also sorry for the minute by minute recap we just had such a wonderful time I couldn't leave anything out!!

Starting to Recap

2010-01-06T20:29:00.009-07:00

So the week we found out that the baby was a girl we flew out to Las Vegas. Ben had an exciting tax training down there! Anything to do with accounting is exciting! We were there a little less than a week. My parents who came down for the "big baby appointment" took Bailey back home with them so I didn't see my munchkin for a week.

We flew into to Vegas and stayed at the Flamingo, that's where Ben's classes were. Then we moved to the Excalibur and hit that end of the strip. His brother Jacob and wife Breawna flew in for a few days also. We went to shows, walked the strip, ate A LOT and had a really good time. Breawna and I get along really well and the boys can hardly go a day without talking on the phone to each other so we had a great time. I almost had Ben talked into taking me to Cher too which I would have loved just for the experience. Sorry that I look like a pregnant fat girl in my pictures, but I can't hide it or fight it!

The day after we flew in Bailey had a Dr.s appointment and got some more shots! Luckily they didn't bother her and she is healthy and doing well. A little shorter than average, but hey that's basically a given.

Also that week our little monkey had her 2nd birthday!!! We kept it pretty quite this year. It was just the three of us and we got pizza, I made a cake, Ben tried and failed to come home early, and she loved all of her presents. When I was about 3 my parents got me a wooden doll furniture set. It includes a high chair, bunk beds and a changing table. Well an amazing neighbor of my parents re-furnished them for free and Ben's sister Bethany, who is so dang crafty, made baby blankets, pillows, and pads for the seat and back of the high chair!! That was Bailey's big present.

She was way cute about her cake too, as soon as I lit her candle she started saying "hot, hot" and trying to blow it out! We love her to pieces and can't imagine how we ever lived without her! I can't believe she is already two, time has gone by so fast and I can't believe I am actually in the process of the doing it again! what was I thinking?

Announcing...

2009-12-15T20:47:00.003-07:00

Last week we had our big doctors appointment! My parents came up, Dad watched Bailey and Mom, Ben, Lyndsie and I all went to the big ultra sound. So we are having a baby girl and WE are way excited. We are so happy for Bailey to be having a little sister! She is healthy and very shy! She covered her face and hid the entire time! We are way excited and I am WAY big.

Catching Up!

2009-12-05T17:16:00.004-07:00

Ok- all I know is that it has been a long time since I have blogged so I am just going to do a catch up on the things that I can remember!

I went to the JJ Coles sale and spent a ton of money! Luckily most of it was for other people! Had fun and I got a lot of cute stuff.

My brother Todd came up with his wife, my nephew and his wife, and with Lyndsie we all went to the BSU/USU game. We had a lot of fun, didn't freeze and stayed up way too late.

The day after the game we all headed to Idaho. My dad has been in the Stake Presidency for 18 years, not kidding. He was called as the first counselor and when his 9 years were over they called him to be the Stake President. Any way his 9 years as Stake President were up and all five of my brothers and sisters and their families went home to be there. Well we were all there except for one of my nephews, we missed you Brandon! Elder Dallin H. Oaks came to Idaho to release my dad and call the new Stake President. He and his wife stayed at my parents house for the weekend. We all stayed at my brother Todds. Thanks for putting up with all of us Todd and Brenda. Dad did a great job on his talk on Sunday and it has been a real change for him. After 18 years of meetings it would be a change for anyone! We were all able to meet Elder Oaks and his wife on Sunday after lunch. They were very nice to take the time to meet all of us. Elder Oaks is a very powerful speaker but very warm and loving.

Thanksgiving was great. After Dad's release Bailey and I stayed in Idaho instead of coming home for two days and heading right back. We spent time with the Browns and Gerratts ate a ton of food and enjoyed spending time with one another!

As a first Ben and I hit the Day after Thanksgiving sales! He had me awake way to early! We got to Wal-Mart before 5:00am, but they had opened their doors before 5 so no crazy maddness getting it, but getting out was hard. We were in the check out line for over 30 minutes! We got a new computer, my Christmas, and picked up toys for Bailey. Ben wanted to go for the computer and for the experience, I'll probably never do it again.

After Thanksgiving Todd and Brenda wanted to keep Bailey for two nights and three days! Yes, I let them and it was hard, but I was able to get Christmas up, the laundry done, and most of the house clean while she was gone.

I also went to the Nutcracker with Lyndsie, she had to go for a class. It was fun to spend time with her, but very different from the Nutcracker we danced in when we were younger.

And NO pictures. I took my camera, but it just didn't ever make it out of its case! So sorry for the very boring blog. I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

An Awesome Weekend

2009-11-13T21:30:00.006-07:00

Ok, Ok so I know that today is Friday but once again I'm behind so we are talking about last weekend.

On Friday, of last week, I went to a craft fair with my friend Krista. We haven't hung out for a while so it was great to see her, talk, hang out and of course shop! Hopefully we can get together again sometime soon.

On Saturday Ben and Bailey took me to Brigham City to meet my sister-in-law Brenda, my niece Lyndsie, my nephews wife Kristi, and Brenda's mom Kenna. I said goodbye to Ben and Bailey and we headed to Salt Lake for the weekend. We had great food and went to Tai Pan, IKEA, Target, and the mall. Our main purpose was not for shopping but for a show. Lyndsie and I danced most of our lives and we love to watch "So You Think You Can Dance" so we all got tickets and went Saturday night to see the tour they do of the top 12 dancers of their last show. We had an awesome time together, it was so much fun. Our original seats were on the floor of the E Center but that put us level with everyone else who had seats on the floor. So Brenda was amazing and after the show started talked to an usher and got Lyndsie, myself and Kristi moved to a box on the side of the stage that put us so close to the dancers and the stage that our chairs shook! After the intermission Brenda and Kenna were able to move seats and be next to us too. The dancing was awesome and it was so much fun. I spent way to much money and needed the whole day on Monday to recuperate! I missed Bailey and Ben, but it was good just to get out and play.

Fall!

2009-11-04T12:33:00.004-07:00

Ok, so I know that I'm back to two weeks again. Sorry. I love this time of year! I love the weather, the colors and the activities that come with fall.

So two weeks ago my brother Todd and his wife Brenda came to Logan. They are Lyndsie's parents and they came down to go to a play with her. They went to Sweeny Todd and brought some neighbors with them whose son was in the play. So we all met for dinner. Whenever dinner, Logan, and my brother Todd are involved we can plan on eating at Iggy's. He loves that place. So we all went to Iggy's, there were about 12 of us. We had a great dinner and talked for awhile after dinner. After that we left and headed to Chili's for dessert. Yep we hit two different restaurants in one night right after the other. After that Ben and I took Bailey home and the rest all went to the play. Lyndsie said it was a good play, but it started at 7:30 and didn't end until 11:30!

On Friday of that week we went to the Pumpkin Walk. I love going and seeing how creative other people can be. Lyndsie was doing laundry here so she and Eric (photo guy) came with us. We all had a great time and the weather wasn't too cold.

On Saturday our neighbor had a Halloween carnival for the kids in the neighborhood. She had games, food, and coloring. It was really cute and of course Bailey just kind of did her own thing! But it was fun, I dressed up like an oven and had a bun in the oven window and we bought Ben a chiefs hat and he wore his cooking apron. A lot of people whispered and were wondering if I was really pregnant.

This last week our friend Eric Webb broke his leg and had to have surgery. We all went up to the ER to see him. Bailey couldn't go in the ER so Ben and I took turns staying with her. We got her a little mask to play with and she loved the hand sanitizer. Eric can't put any pressure on his leg for 6 months and has had to go to the hospital everyday and Lyndsie has been giving him blood thinner shots every night. She is such a trooper and really loves medical stuff.

For Halloween we went home to Idaho. My parents were watching Shaydon while Scott and Sommers had an amazing week in Hawaii! So we went down as soon as we could so the two of them could spend some time together. They are really cute and got along really well. Every time Bailey got out of Shaydon's eyesight he would run around yelling her name until he found her. He is so cute!

On Saturday Ben and I went to Pocatello to help Jacob with his computer. Ok Ben helped while Breawna and I went shopping and hung out. We had a great time. We left and went to be with Bailey who spent the day with my sister-in-law Brenda. We got Bailey dressed up and headed back to Brenda's for Trick or Treating. Bailey decided she needed one of every kind of candy she had! We went to see both of Bailey's great Grandmas and some of my parents neighbors. She knew what to do, but has only had a little candy! I just can't bring my self to let her eat a lot of candy yet.

Since my last blog!

2009-10-19T13:13:00.010-06:00

Well I know it's been about 2 weeks so here goes on trying to update our lives!

General Conference was AWESOME! I love General Conference and Ben was great about watching conference and not football! What was probably the cutest thing was that Bailey was soo sick of being with us cooped up in the house that when Eric (our amazing picture guy) came over to give me the proofs of our family pictures Bailey had to get as close to him as she could! I think she was just so happy to have someone new to hang out with. Eric is so sweet with her that he just snuggled her back!

We also celebrated Ben's 30th birthday in the past two weeks. I got him to leave work early that day and we went out to dinner at Texas Road House with our friends Tyler and Tiffany - Cara :) I promise we WOULD have invited you and MitChell, but I was told you were already going that same night. Lyndsie was great to babysit while we went to dinner and when Ben and I could eat again we had Banana Cream Pie, Ben isn't a fan of cake, with Bailey, Lyndsie, and Eric. Happy Birthday Ben, we love you!

Ben's sister Misti come into town and spent a Thursday night with us. She had training in Ogden and we were closer than home. It was great to see her and I wish she could of had her son Corbyn with her so he could play with Bailey, but maybe next time. The very next night my sister-in-law Brenda (Lyndsie's mom) came into town. We did some shopping and they went to Tap Dogs together and came back to talk. On Saturday morning we had breakfast got ready and went shopping again! I loved it and Ben and one of Lyndsie's friends came with us this time too. After shopping we met Eric at Firehouse for a wonderful lunch. After lunch Brenda headed back home, but we all had a great time.

Ben and I also celebrated our 7th Anniversary. I can't believe it's been 7 years, since we knew each other 18 years before we got married I really can't imagine my life with out him. He is a wonderful Husband and father. He works so hard so I can stay home and be with Bailey which is a huge blessing. He is my perfect match in every way. And after 7 years I still love that we can laugh together and enjoy spending as much time as we can together. I love you Ben.

Sometime during this time frame, Bailey got a package in the mail from Shaydon. I have the most amazing sister-in-law. When Sommers and Scott came to Utah they went shopping at IKEA and I had mentioned one time that I wanted these bibs that Shaydon had and Sommers remembered and not only bought us some but mailed them to us. After Bailey opened the package she had to put on her bib and wouldn't take it off for the rest of the day! Sommers is a wonderful sister-in-law, mother, wife, and aunt. Thank you Sommers and Shaydon!

I also went to Menopause the Musical with Lyndsie. We really didn't enjoy it as much as most of the older women that were in the crowd, but it was fun to spend time with Lyndsie. I have LOVED having her in Logan this year. After the show we went to Caspers Ice Cream and we both got a Hot Shot. It was soo good.

This last Saturday Ben decided that we needed to really enjoy college Football. So we got tickets and went to the USU game at 1:00pm. Bailey decided that a nap just wasn't going to happen for her that morning so we took a napless child to the game. She did pretty dang good until about half time. She was hot, tired, and really frustrated that she just couldn't move very far. So we went home to we get out of the sun and get some rest. Ben got a ride home from Tyler, thanks for bringing him home! :) There was a BYU game on that afternoon also so after the game we woke Bailey up (a little crazy) and headed to Shawn's house, he works with Ben. For the BYU game which started at 4:00 but thank heaven's for DVR we got there at 6:00 and were still able to see the whole game. Lucky us, and lucky us that BYU won! After the game we got pizza and Eric brought over the Proposal which I have been dying to see, so thanks Eric for hooking us up!

Wow, I think that's about it. Sorry if this blog is a little long, but I honestly haven't been on the internet for about 2 weeks, just haven't had a lot of time!

Food, Food, & other things!

2009-10-08T20:16:00.007-06:00

On Monday night (of last week) Ben mowed the lawn and after neither one of us felt like cooking so we went out to eat!

On Tuesday I cut Bailey's bangs! My Mom has cut Bailey's hair for over a year now, but she really needed a trim and No Mom. So I called a friend got some advice and went at it and THANK HEAVENS they turned out all right! I cut her bangs because we got family pictures taken that night by our good friend Eric Webb. He took the pics of Bailey and Shaydon. We haven't had family pictures done ever so it was time. Eric did a wonderful job and was awesome with Bailey, who didn't like the idea of being outside and not being able to run and play. Lyndsie came with us and was able to help control and make Bailey smile which was awesome! After pictures we all went out for pizza.

On Wednesday I went out to eat with my cousins Katie and Avery who live here in Logan. We went to Olive Garden and had some great food!

On Thursday my friend Angie, from high school who I haven't seen in a year, came to Logan for the day. She had some appointments and than after that she and her daughter came over. We went out to lunch and talked for a few hours. It was awesome to see her and the girls were so cute together.

On Friday I went out to eat with some friends from where I worked before the Bailey days. We went to FireHouse and had a great lunch. It was great to see them and keep in touch with them.

More time with Family and Friends

2009-10-01T19:54:00.007-06:00

On Monday (last week) we met the Tyler & Tiffany A. Family for dessert and time at the park. We had a great time, it was a little cold, so we didn't stay as long as the kids would have liked. Their son was so cute with Bailey and their daughter and Bailey had fun on the swings.

On Thursday Scott, Sommers, and Shaydon came to visit. They showed up around 11:30pm, crazy kids! We talked for a little bit and than went to bed. Friday we did some shopping, had lunch, and than I talked a family friend Eric T. W. into taking pictures of Bailey and Shaydon and they turned out amazing! THanks so much Eric!

After pictures Scott and Co. headed out to my sisters in Sandy. About 2 hours after this we headed out to Burley! I know we were just there, but we were able to go to Ben's little brothers football game on Friday night, the Pumpkin Patch on Saturday and Ben was able to watch the BYU football game that afternoon. After the game was over on Saturday night we headed back to Logan! I was exhausted! But we had sharing time on Sunday!

I love that the weather has gotten cooler! I absolutely love this time of year, I love the decorating too. So I was so excited when I was able to go to the Pumpkin Patch with my Mom. I was able to come home with all of this and Bailey loved walking around with all of the pumpkins!

Time with Family

2009-09-24T20:59:00.006-06:00

We got back from our trip to Boise on Sunday and we were short one person. We took Lyndsie home when we went, but my brother wanted her to stay until Monday and he and my sister-in-law Brenda would bring her back to Logan on Monday. So we were able to all go out to dinner at Firehouse. We had great food, dessert, and so much fun just being together. Well Lyndsie hung out at our house after her parents left and then went back to her apartment. We she got there, there were some major issues going on so she came back to our house and lived with us until Thursday when we could get her into a new apartment. It was great to have her and I'm soo soo happy that we could be here when she needs us. She is in a new apartment with a lot less drama.

On Thursday Ben had a flag football game that Bailey and I were able to go to. It was a good game and soo crazy trying to chase Bailey everywhere. My cousin's daughter Brookie was there with her uncle, who is a partner at Ben's accounting firm. She was so cute with Bailey, I don't know if Bailey even remembers her but she helped keep an eye on Bailey for me which was really nice.

On Friday we had our last gymnastics class. Bailey was a lot braver about the horse, tramps, etc, than she was when we started and she had a ton of fun so I am happy that we took the class.

The afternoon my parents came into town. My Mom and I had tickets to Time Out For Women for Friday night and Saturday. The speakers were awesome and we had such a great time together! On Saturday Ben, Dad, and Bailey, picked up lunch, picked us up and we headed to the park. Bailey loved running around and I loved spending time with some of my FAVORITE people. The meetings lasted until about 4:00pm and than my parents had to rush home for a stake meeting my Dad had. It was great to be with them and I am so grateful for the wonderful people who raised me!

Trip to Boise

2009-09-17T13:41:00.007-06:00

Last week one of Ben's friends got married in Boise it is about a 5 hour drive and made for a very crazy Friday.

Bailey and I left gymnastics early and headed home. Ben and Lyndsie (my niece) were already here when we arrived. We made it out in good time, but because we hurried so fast we didn't get time to grab lunch so we stopped in Tremonton at a Burger King. It's usually fast but we had to wait for 20 minutes for our lunch which slowed us down. My parents had a funeral to go to and they were keeping Bailey so we dropped Bailey and Lyndsie off at Lyndsie's house and hurried to my parents house to drop off bags and the dog.

We made it to Boise about an hour and a half before the wedding. We dropped all of our bags off at my brothers house, chatted with his wife and kids for a few minutes, changed our clothes and off we went. The wedding was nice and we knew some people from home. After the wedding it was back to Eric's to change clothes again and head over to my other brother Scott's house. We hung out with Scott, Sommers, and Shaydon until around midnight and headed back to Eric's.

On Saturday two of Eric's kids had soccer games that morning so we hung out with them and then headed out to meet Scott and family for breakfast at the Cracker Barrel. Breakfast was good and it was so much fun to hang out with my brothers and their families.

After breakfast we headed back on the road to my parents. Watched the BYU game, hung out, went to church the next day and were back on the road for home sweet home.

And of course no pictures so these two pictures are some old ones from this summer of my nieces and nephews!

Labor Day Weekend

2009-09-16T20:11:00.008-06:00

Ok, Ok, so I know that I am way behind, but better late than never.

So for Labor day weekend we headed back to Idaho for Ben's family reunion. We left Logan in pretty good time, but we had to stop in Pocatello (Ben's 2nd home) to help Jacob out. It was soo great to see Breawna just to talk and hang out. After the stop in Pocatello Bailey DID NOT enjoy getting back into her car seat and we enjoyed the hour drive home with her screaming! We got her ready for bed and then fought with my parents about putting her down. They won, kicked us out to go and get some dinner and they put her down.

We hung out at Ben's mom's house until late Friday night and decided for the family service project to head back to Pocatello to help Jacob with his shop. I was totally ok (honestly) with going back, but not with the time. Ben was waking me up at 6:45AM to get ready to head out! So not cool. But we had a really fun time Breawna and I on the roof painting the side of the building. What a memory! :) We headed back just in time to watch the BYU game with Ben's Grandma and she loved laughing at Ben and how excited he gets about his BYU games.

Sunday we all went to church and some of the newer members of the ward couldn't believe how many Brown's there were! Ben's mom headed to nursery with three of her grandkids just to be with them! I did feel better about dropping Bailey off knowing Grandma was there to protect her! I know I'm a little out of control! That night we all went outside and sat together as a family and all the kids told a story about Don. We all laughed and remembered a great man.

On Monday we went golfing and had a great time with everyone. There was a lot of us and the people who ran the course were really nice and gave us clubs to borrow for free, free carts, and a bucket of free balls. I think the guy was just trying to hit on Ben's sister Bethany, but it was really nice of him anyway.

Thanks to my parents for watching Bailey for us as much as they did and thanks to all the Browns for the great weekend. Yes I forgot my camera on all the days except for the family service project day! Sorry.

A Little Behind!

2009-09-03T20:47:00.007-06:00

Last week we started GYMNASTICS! Yep, Bailey and I are now in a Parent/Tot class and she loves it. After class and Bailey's nap we headed to Jamba Juice for a treat for Bailey and I and to thank Lyndsie for all of her help that day and to introduce her to Jamba!

We sort of had an interesting weekend, on Friday Ben headed to Idaho to help his brother Jacob. He left that morning around 6:30am with my car. He wasn't sure that his pickup would make it (or so he said) I think he just didn't want to put the miles on it and it doesn't have any A/C. It was also the first time that I have been at the house alone with Bailey over night since she was born. Ben is usually gone for several days so we head home to Idaho, but it was just over night and I feel that sometimes it is easier to just be at home so we stayed,and I slept like a Baby!

My niece Lyndsie is living in Logan for school and I am sooo happy that she is. She played chauffeur for the day and so she was able to take pictures of our first gymnastics class. Thanks Lou for all of your help. This picture is of Lyndsie and Bailey during class while I fixed the camera.

This is a big round cushion they have to crawl over and after helping Bailey get over it she leaned over and gave me a kiss. That is a way to melt my heart!

Kind of Boring

2009-08-23T11:35:00.003-06:00

Well the past few weeks have been exciting, with swimming lessons and traveling, but this last week was kind of boring.

Monday thru Thursday afternoon were all about cleaning my house and running errands. Ben took Bailey and I out to lunch on Wednesday which was nice to get out of the house. On Thursday afternoon Brenda (my sister-in-law) came up with Lyndsie (my niece) to move her into her apartments. She will start classes on Tuesday. We are really excited to have Lyndsie here, Ben so he can play more with his friends, me so I can have one more person to have an adult conversation with, and Bailey so she can have one more person to spoil her. After Lyndsie got moved in we went to Fire house for a very late lunch. Lyndsie came over for a few hours on Friday morning, we went for a walk and talked.

On Friday We also found out that the canceled church on Sunday for the Temple dedication, some how Ben and I missed that announcement, but it was nice not to have to worry about our primary lesson.

Saturday we were supposed to go to Aggie day up on campus, Ben was excited to see an kind of football. But he had gone to play basketball that morning and had gotten hit pretty hard in the head, so after mowing the lawn he decided a nap was what he needed and not football.

Keepin' Busy

2009-08-17T16:51:00.011-06:00

Last week Bailey and I still had four days of swimming lessons. I am really glad that we signed her up for the classes, but I was ready to be done smelling like chlorine and ready to get back on our regular schedule. This picture is before class on the last day - she closes her eyes in a lot of pictures just like her father.

On Wednesday of last week Lyndsie and Brenda (my niece and sister-in-law) came to finish making arrangements for Lou to move up here. Bailey and I were able to have lunch with them at Cafe Sabor (Yummy) and they left that afternoon to go back home. Of course I didn't have my camera with me so no pictures.

On Thursday Bailey decided she would try to step off the top of our outside cement steps. Her nose didn't look to bad that day, but when she woke up on Friday morning her little nose wasn't pretty.

On Friday we headed to Idaho. It was the big county fair and it's tradition for my whole family to head home and we all go to the fair/rodeo together. Thanks Dad for buying all the tickets and thanks to Brenda for watching Bailey.

On Saturday we met with Kelby O. he was a good friend of ours from High School. He came over to my mom's with his wife and family, Ben and I haven't seen them since their wedding. They have two cute little boys and it was great to see them for a little while. Bailey also decided that she needed to try on the football gear that my brothers and I had when we were little, she's cute in them, but I was thinking ballet shoes instead of football pads. Also not a big Cowboy's fan.

My AMAZING sister-in-law Sommers also made Bailey a cute skirt and flower that matched a onezee for Shaydon, we never got pictures which is way sad. But I will put her in the outfit and take pictures. Thank you Sommers for always thinking of Bailey and for being so darn crafty!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

2009-08-09T17:39:00.010-06:00

We had a really fun, busy week. On Monday Bailey and I started swimming lessons. They are four days a week for 40 minutes and she loves them. I don't have any pictures because 1- No one needs to see me in a swimsuit and 2- I'm in the pool with her so I don't have a way to take the pictures.

On Tuesday Ben took half a day off, took me to Cafe Sabor for lunch, and we hung out and had a great time. I was serenaded by two of our neighbors; Nicole, Elli, and Megan sang to me and gave me a package of Oreos, the whole Hofland family sang and brought by a box of Creamies, Jon, Sherri and girls came by that night with a whole banana cream pie! My friends like to make sure that I weigh more than they do. Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes - they were appreciated.

Ben and I bought a car a few months ago and decided that the car was going to be our birthdays and he bought me a new ipod Nano which was supposed to be part of my b-day. But when it came right down to it he had a hard time that we were turning 30 (he won't be 30 for a couple of months, but it still struck him a little hard :) So I got the shoes I have been wanting for a while now, he bought me a Cold Stone cake and some other great gifts, I love my Star Wars Chewbacca bobble head! I had a great Birthday - thanks for everything Ben.

On Wednesday Ben was asked by one of the partners at work (we'll call him Brett) to help the firm out that night. I would have been fine with that except that Brett wanted Ben to play on the firms softball team! Ben had decided that he wasn't going to play this year so when he came home at 5:00pm and announced that the game started at 7:00pm we quickly ate and headed to the park for a little while before the game. Well lucky for me the 7:00 game was canceled because the other team didn't show up and since it was the play offs the firm automatically won and would play again at 9:00pm! So Ben took us home and he went back a little before 9:00, at 10:20pm I got a call saying that they had won the 9:00 game and would be playing again at 10:30!! I was thrilled and Ben didn't come home until after 11:30pm! But they came in second so congratulations Jones Simkins.

On Thursday we went to the Cache County Fair. It just isn't the same as our home town fair so we just can't really get to excited, but we got dinner there and Ben enjoyed his immensely. :)

Friday was Ben's firm Summer Party. They rented a theater and took us all to the movie. We saw Ice Age 3 and we took Bailey - it was free so hey why not. Thank heavens Nicole saw us walk in and came and got us and we sat with them. It was great, Bailey and Megan played with each other, ate each other snacks, sat in the same chair, and entertained each other. They are only 3 months apart and I SO wanted a picture of them sitting in the same chair together, but I don't think my flash would have been appreciated in the middle of a movie. After the movie we went to a park for dinner and to play on the park toys. Bailey was ever so grateful that her mommy is under 5'0 so that I could fit on the kiddy slide with her!

Saturday we took off to Pocatello to see Jacob and Breawna, because you know it had been two weeks since the boys had seen each other. Jacob is thinking about starting a mechanic shop and found a building so he wanted Ben to look at it. So we had a fun, rain filled day in Pocatello. We love spending time with J & B so it was great to see them and the boys will only have to wait 5 or 6 days before they see each other again, whew!

And on a side note sometimes when I'm on my cell I sit on the steps and talk. Bailey has obviously seen me do this and now thinks that it is normal to do this and when she is pretending to talk on her cell she hangs out on the bottom step too! I'm already screwing up my kid! Ok I'm sure I started long before now.

My Next 30 Years

2009-08-04T10:51:00.007-06:00

In the words of a wise man (Tim McGraw) quote "I think I'll take a moment and celebrate my age." Today is my birthday and I usually don't tell people or make a huge deal of it but after spending some time listening to said wise man this morning I decided to spend a moment thinking about my last 30 years. And yes I am 30 today.

I was raised by AMAZING parents who, even though they were told that it probably wasn't a good idea to adopt a girl of such a different race (remember this was 30 years ago in a tiny town in Idaho) did any way. They were wonderful, loving parents who treated me just like the rest of their kids. I had amazing brothers and sisters who married amazing people who have all helped to shape my life.

Wendy taught me it was ok to be girly!
Todd has the biggest heart and always helps others.
Eric gave me a love for 80's music and Star Wars.
Scott has always been my best friend and even though he has always been a little shy is one of the funniest people I know.
All of my older nieces and nephews were more like my little brothers and sisters and my younger ones more like nieces and nephews that I love to spend time with.

I married an amazing man, who for some reason chose me to fall in love with and marry. He works hard to support his family and is the perfect man for me. He loves me when I am emotional and can't tell him why I am crying and he even watches chick flicks with me (only once but at least he does)!

We have beautiful, healthy daughter who has us both wrapped around her finger. And I wouldn't trade all the crazy late nights and bad weeks of being a mother for anything.

I married into a wonderful family who have accepted me (maybe because they were afraid of Ben :) I have an amazing mother-in-law who with Don raised a wonderful son. She is an amazing grandmother. And I am so thankful that I got to know Don before he passed way.

So in the words of the above mentioned wise man, quote "Lord have mercy on my next 30 years." unquote.

3 Weeks in a Row

2009-08-02T19:53:00.006-06:00

Two weeks ago was Bailey's bad week, last week was just a crazy/busy week and this week was a stressful week.

We arrived home on Sunday night from Idaho, Ben got Bailey out of the car seat and handed her to me. As soon as I took her I could tell something was wrong, she had a fever over 101 degrees. We gave her some medicine which didn't do anything for the fever at all. She woke up at 11:30pm and her fever was over 103 and being the paranoid mother that I am I decided that she and I should sleep in the guest room. I hate sleeping in the same bed with Bailey and this was no exception, but I was too worried about her to let her sleep alone. Her fever was so high she was delirious which was pretty scary to me. I got about 3 hours of sleep that night. Ben was awesome and came home at noon on Monday to help out and let me get some sleep.

She had a fever Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. By Tuesday I had called the Dr.'s twice and they told me to bring her in Tuesday morning. So I did and the Dr. couldn't find anything wrong with her except her fever. He told me that it was probably Roseola which is that she would have a fever for 3-5 days and than break out in a rash. Which she finally did on Thursday. She is doing much better and Ben was awesome to help out with anything and everything. I am so thankful for an awesome husband, it was his idea to come home on Monday and help. We also did not want to send her to nursery today so Ben stayed home with her. I wanted to make sure she was healthy for our swim classes that start tomorrow!

I am crossing my fingers for a normal, nice week this week! I promise that Bailey doesn't always look like a little homeless girl!

Whew! What a week!

2009-07-27T20:29:00.008-06:00

I honestly can't remember what happened on Monday or Tuesday. I know that this week was better than last week where Bailey was concerned, but not back to her usual self.
Anyway on Wednesday Bailey and I went to Story time at the library. I love story time because I get to see Sherri and her girls. It also makes me feel better because Sherri is usually chasing after Kara and so I don't feel like the only mother who's child won't sit still! :) Wednesday afternoon my niece Lexie came to visit. We had a great time. We went shopping, I bought the cutest gray shirt and we bought Bailey a new yellow shirt -Thanks to a request from Sommers:) I love shopping for Bailey. Lex also needed some flip flops and they were two for $5.00 and so she bought me a pair too. Thanks for the sandals Lex I hardly took them off today. And of course we had dinner at Firehouse. We hope you come back soon Lexie it was great to spend some time with you.

Lex spent the night and headed back Thursday morning. After she left Bailey and I started to pack for our little trip. Ben and I decided that we should try camping! What was I thinking? Ben came home from work early and we headed for Idaho. We dropped Bailey and Obi off at my mom's and met Jacob and Breawna (Ben's brother and his wife) and headed to Lake Cleavland. The Lake was sooo crowed so we found another camping site a little further south. We set up camp and camped until Saturday morning. Breawna bought a game called Botchi (sp?) which we enjoyed. Jacob cooked dutch oven and we played games, talked, laughed and had a lot of fun. Ben and I just really aren't people that like to get dirty and we really like to shower at least once a day so we decided that camping is nice and all, but a little too dirty for our liking.

My brother-in-law Dave participated in the Spudman which was the same weekend and he did well. So my sister and her family were there and we were able to see them for a little while when we came home for camping. My mom didn't want to have to worry about Bailey during the race so Bailey went to my brother's house on Friday and we went to get her on Saturday. We were able to spend time with Ben's mom and his sister April, who came home Saturday evening. We didn't see her but were able to see her girls who were so cute with Bailey. April has three girls and it was soo cute to see them all holding hands playing in Ann's raspberry bushes - and of course I left my camera at my mom's so I have no pictures.

We had a great weekend. Thanks to my family for watching and taking care of Bailey and putting up with my calling two or three times a day to check on her! Thanks to Jacob and Breawna for coming camping with us. And after a busy week on only had 4 pictures to show for it!

A Bad Week

2009-07-21T15:42:00.005-06:00

Last week was one of those weeks that I spent wondering every day why the good Lord thought that I could/should have children! Bailey decided that she didn't like food last week. Now I know I'm not the smartest person/mother in the world, but I'm pretty dang sure that we all as humans are supposed to eat! So after many tears -mine and Bailey's - and after having meal times last about an hour one of us finally gave up. Either she would eat or I would get her out of her high chair feeling like the worlds worst mother because my child was not fed. Bailey isn't the worlds best eater anyway, but she loves vegetables (at the reunion she was eating raw pea pods and loving them) she loves broccoli, peas, carrots, bananas, and some melons, but she wouldn't eat anything.

So after one really bad day Ben came home and took us to the park. It was a new park we hadn't been to before and she loved it. She was brave enough to go down the slide by herself. She is still playing with the glow in the dark necklace (toys) my sister-in-law Yvonne gave her after two weeks and they still glow in the dark. As you can see she has to take them everywhere - from the bathtub to the pool.

Because last week was a bad week I let her watch a lot more movies than I usually do - I had to get some sanity in somewhere. I usually let Bailey watch the beginning of a movie while I do my hair and this is what I saw while I was curling my hair one morning. Bailey just relaxing watching a show! :)

Family Reunion

2009-07-14T20:14:00.011-06:00

This last week was busy, but fun and it went by fast. On Monday we celebrated Jon's birthday-it was the week before, but Monday was as soon as we could all get together. We had a great time and the girls played great together. On Tuesday Sherri and the girls came over for a little while in the morning and in the afternoon we met at one of Logan's gyms. Her two oldest are taking swimming lessons there and I went to sign up Bailey for a Mommy and Me swim class. On Wednesday Bailey and I had Story hour and had Tyler over for dinner. On Thursday we ran errands.

On Friday was my Mom's extended family reunion at Bear Lake. All but my brother Todd (and family), my sister-in-Law Sommers, and nephew Brandon came. They all arrived in the afternoon so after we hit the sidewalk sales we headed up. We had fun seeing everyone. We came home Friday and Saturday night to get some sleep and allow everyone else to sleep. We were a little worried about Bailey. On Saturday we headed to the lake and play on the beach. Bailey loved the water! She hated coming in, but the older kids were so cold from the water their lips were blue! Bailey got Grandma and Papa to take her on rides frequently and had a blast playing with Zach, Lily, Nic, and Shaydon. All play really well together and the older kids are soo good with Bailey. Bailey also learned that Lexie is fun to hang out with and was constantly grabbing a hold of her finger. My sister-in-law Yvonne bought some toys for her kids and of course hooked up Bailey with the toys, which Bailey has to sleep with, take to church, and everywhere else.
We had a great time and everyone made it home safe. A huge thank you to everyone who helped/played with Bailey.

On Sunday Dad, Mom, Scott, and Shaydon stopped by for a quick bite to eat and a little nap. Mom brought the lunch - food she had packed for the reunion. And since everyone was traveling home Ben and I took the kids outside to play while the rest slept. They are hanging out in the empty pool and Shaydon's hat was buried in the trunk so he is wearing one of Bailey's. Ben and I have both said how much we would love to live closer to Zach, Lily, Nic, and Shaydon so that Bailey could be with them more.

My Bailey Girl

2009-07-09T12:48:00.009-06:00

On Monday Bailey had a really BAD night. We usually put her down between 7:45 and 8:00pm, which we did Monday night. She woke up at 11:00pm, 4:00am, 5:45am, and Ben finally brought her into our room at 6:15am and no one slept any more after that. Ben got ready and left for work around 7:30am and Bailey fell back to sleep at 8:00am in my bed. We just snuggled and talked until then. She woke up at 10:30am and while I was running her bath water found her swimming suit and insisted on wearing it. So I just slipped on her arms over her pj's and she was happy. She has bed head her and both the pj's and swimming suit are some more hand-me-downs from Lily! The outfit is a little crazy, but hey she was happy.

Wednesday morning Bailey had found my sun glasses before she got in the tub. I was able to get them away from her long enough to give her a bath (not always easy to get those pre-bath toys away from her). As soon as she was out of the tub she had to have them back. She just likes taking them off and putting them back on. She has her own glasses, but someone else's are much more fun. She has crazy wet head hair and she broke the ear piece off my glasses about 5 seconds after I took this picture.

Cars, blessing, & the 4th

2009-07-08T13:29:00.008-06:00

Well Ben and I had decided not to go home for the 4th- a hard decision we ALWAYS go home for the 4th. Any way on Tuesday June 30th I got a call from Ben's Mom Ann. I love my mother-in-law, I couldn't ask for a better mother-in-law and grandmother to Bailey. Ok moving on, so I get a call from Ann on Tuesday afternoon. She was calling to tell me she had been in a car accident and the car had rolled and was totaled. She had flown in from Hawaii and was almost home, seriously almost to the exit. She had Ben's baby sister and youngest brother and one of his friends, all were in seat belts, Nic has a few cuts on his face and all are very stiff. The ambulance came and they were all looked over and sent home. I asked her what Ben's response had been (making sure he wasn't insensitive or any thing) and she said that she hadn't called him because she didn't want to bother him at work! I got off the phone with her and called Ben. We bought a new car a few months ago and still had the little car and so we decided to take it down to Ann. After looking at her car we have no idea how she wasn't hurt, the roof is totally caved in on the drivers side.

So Bailey and I headed home on Thursday morning and Ben came after work. We went to see his Grandma and Mom and had a wonderful visit with them. On Friday morning Ben went golfing with his brothers Matt and Nic. He came home for a couple of hours and went golfing again. This time with me, his brothers Matt, Nic, Jacob and his wife Breawna. It was my first time on a golf course, I have been to the driving range before, but I didn't totally humiliate Ben. After that it was off to Taco Bandito (Yummy) for dinner, home to check on Bailey, and off to the movie. Bailey was going out on the town with my parents (a wedding reception). On Saturday we got up and came home. Ben mowed the lawn, I unpacked, after that it was Little Ceasars for dinner and a movie. None of us saw one firework!

We are so grateful that Ann and the kids are ok and so happy that we live close enough to head home when we need to.

The Zoo and Other Adventures

2009-06-29T20:04:00.014-06:00

Ok - So I know that it's been awhile again! Two weeks ago I went to lunch with some friends from Head Start - where I used to work. Alicia, Susie, Cami, Cassie, and I (with Bailey) met at Fire House. We had good food -Cami was awesome and ordered her dessert first which I loved. It was awesome to see everyone. I love being a stay-at-home-mom, but I do miss seeing my friends and having adult conversation during the day. I hope we can all get together and have lunch again soon before another year and a half goes by.

We also went to Summerfest with Tyler and Tiffany last week. It is always great to hang out with them and their kids. Maddie was so cute and giggly! Tiffany and I saw some cute pictures and I still feel bad we had to leave early! We left early because Jacob and Breawna came to spend the night. And it was back to Fire House for dinner. We played the Wii, talked, and laughed ALOT. We love spending time with them and hope they come back soon.

Last Saturday Ben was AMAZING! The crazy rain was starting to get old so Ben took us to Layton for lunch, shopping at the mall and shopping at the amazing store of Target! I love Target!

Bailey also became 18 months old. She went in for her appointment and had a wonderful time - she got three shots, but stopped crying as soon as the nurse gave her a Dum Dum Sucker. She is healthy and doing well and weights 23lbs. She is also in the 74% for her height which I was happy to hear, but I guess I didn't stop growing until I was about 4!! :) Ok not really, I never hit my ideal height of 5'2. After her appointment we had some friends over to do some swimming which was fun.

This last week my niece Lyndsie came to visit me (ok really Bailey). I love it when she comes to visit, we went to lunch at Olive Garden and Ben loves that Lou likes Cafe Rio (not my favorite place)so the two of them always get take out and I eat from a different place. She played with Bailey, saw some friends from HS, and I took her around campus to try and talk her into coming here. Lyndsie is worse than Ben and give Bailey whatever she wants. We taught Bailey how to say "please" in sign language and she gets what she wants every time with Lyndsie!

Also Bailey has been old enough to go to nursery for a couple of weeks now, but I have had a hard time letting go. So I didn't take her until last week. She saw her friend Lucy in there and walked right in and started playing with the toys. She was a very big girl. She didn't cry at all when I left - she might have been embarrassed that I stayed so long! :) I went and checked on her three times and I had to open the door each time, the doors do have windows for parents, but like I said before I didn't reach my ideal height and the windows were too high. Bailey did great though and we hung her handout on the fridge. But we will see if I can be a big girl next week and let her go again.

So this last Saturday we went to the zoo. It was my summer goal to take Bailey to the zoo. Ben was a good sport and humored me. Bailey slept on the way there and it was the first Saturday that we didn't get rained on and so there were a million and one people there. Bailey was an awe of the camels and loved the giraffes, but her favorite part of the whole bloody zoo was the carousel! I took her once because Ben had a headache we rode on the giraffe and NO I couldn't reach the foot straps and if I couldn't no little kid could. She loved it so much Ben took her again. And I have decided that we probably won't take her back again until she is three so that she really knows why we are there!

And again Ben and I would like to thank my sister-in-law Yvonne for Lily's hand me downs 99% of what Bailey has on in these pictures and all of her wardrobe this summer are from them so thank you SOOO much. Also the first two pictures are ones Ben took. She looked so grown up in the first one nibbling on her pen sitting on her own couch and in the second one 5 seconds later she is throwing a fit!

Lexie's Graduation

2009-06-10T12:24:00.006-06:00

This last week Bailey and I met my parents in Brigham City and headed down with them to my sisters for my nieces graduation. We met them on Wednesday night and her graduation was on Thursday morning.

Bailey was about an hour late for bed, but loved playing with Lexie outside. She found a little step that she could go up and down without any help and thought she was pretty cool. She also decided to get up at 6:30am which she never does so we hung out in my bed until 7:00am then went and woke up Grandma and Papa.The graduation was down at Thanksgiving Point which was really neat. I haven't ever really been there, but Leslie (my nephew's wife) told me about some of the cool things there.

Lexie worked really hard and was able to graduate with her associates, and was on the Presidents list for having a 3.75 or higher gpa. She is going to school to be a NICU nurse and will be amazing. She has such a love for children. After the graduation we went to Macaroni Grill. It was the first time I had been there and was soo good.

After that it was back to my sisters to pack up. My cousin also got married that day so we stopped off in Ogden to the reception. Bailey slept for about 15 minutes from the graduation to Macaroni Grill and for about 30 minutes to Ogden. But she was an amazing little girl, she was going on little sleep, a ton of people, new places, and a stressed out mom (I kept waiting for a melt down). She was exhausted when she and I finally pulled into our garage around 10:00pm but was soo good. I love her to pieces.

Just the girls

2009-06-10T12:10:00.006-06:00

A few weeks ago I posted that we had gone to the park with some friends, but had yet to down load the pictures. Well the two babies Cara and Bailey are in the swings and the two oldest girls are swinging them. The two oldest are amazing with Bailey and have been part of our lives for about 4 1/2 years now. Bailey loves the swings and Melynne was so good to push her.

After the park we went back to our house. I don't know where Jon got these glasses but the little girls loved playing with them.

Bailey found some of the laundry yet to be put away -one of my shirts. She decided that she really needed to wear it and did until she went to bed that day. I pinned the back so that it would stay on for her.

Swimming

2009-06-10T12:04:00.004-06:00

We bought Bailey this pool a few weeks ago before all the rain began. She has really loved playing in the water. I fill the pool with water in the morning and let it sit in the sun to warm the water and put her in - in the afternoon (a little trick I learned from my mom). So the water is perfect and she has toys and loves to splash us and the dog.

A week of fun

2009-05-26T16:49:00.007-06:00

Last week Ben had a soft ball game. Guys from his work play on a city league team, Ben played last year, but this year has decided to only play when there isn't enough players for a team. So this week was his first game, which started at 8:00pm - bed time. So we decided to take Bailey to the park before the game, stay for a little bit of the game and then leave. In this picture she is giving Ben kisses between the bars!

This is Bailey's first time to really enjoy the park. She couldn't really do much last year so she had a WONDERFUL TIME. She loves the swings and spending time with Ben. This is one of those tube that kids can crawl through. She got about half way through with Ben at the end coaxing her on, but only made it to the middle.

On Friday we met Jon, Sherri, and girls at the park for pizza. Jon and Ben enjoyed talking and after Sherri and I got tired of running after the girls I decided it was time for all of us to go back to our house and let the girls run in the yard. So we did, the parents played games -we brought out a card table and watched the girls. There were games of soccer and volleyball and we had a great time.

On Saturday night we had a BBQ with Tyler, Tiffany, and kids. After we were done eating Tyler mentioned that there was a Finals game on. So Tiffany mentioned that the guys watch the kids and we go out shopping. I bought some scrapbook paper and Tiffany bought a new shirt. It was a nice break and great purchases.

Thanks for the great weekend everyone.

My Nieces

2009-05-22T15:42:00.014-06:00

Last week we went to a soccer game. One of our friends daughters played, Ben and I have wanted to go to a game for a while now, but haven't been able to. Well Ben had to go to Afton Wyoming for work last week and was gone for the day and I decided that was the perfect day for Bailey and I to go. As you can see from the picture Bailey was very supportive of her friend Anna.

Bailey and I also took a small road trip to Layton to have lunch with my niece Lexie. My mom left a bag in their car last week and asked me to go and get it from Lex. Well we also had to meet some guy to do some installation work on the new car and he was coming from Draper and Layton is closer than Logan so it was a productive trip. I was really glad Lexie was there I was a little nervous to meet some random guy with just me and Bailey. Lex and I had lunch at Red Robin and we just talked and laughed. I loved seeing and spending time with her. Well the installation guy left two doors open and my radio on the whole time he was working on the car. So by the time Lexie and I were getting ready to leave my battery was completely dead! :)Now usually I would just call Ben, but being in Layton that didn't work to well. Once again THANK HEAVENS for Lexie. She said she knew how to jump start a car, but didn't have any jumper cables. Well a long time ago, my wonderful father gave me a road side emergency bag that had jumper cables. So with Lexie's know how, my cables, and two calls to Ben- we jumped my car! Thanks for the adventure Lexie-I love you and we should get together more often.

My other niece Lyndsie graduated from her Radiology Tech program. In the picture she is the one in the flowered dress on the end. So we headed home to be there for that. We all went out to eat before her graduation, the food was great and we loved seeing everyone. Lou has had a busy, rough year so far, but she worked really hard no matter what. She was actually the youngest in her program and we are so proud of her and love her a lot. Congratulations Lyndsie!

While we were there we (Ben, Bailey, and I) took a ride with my dad. We went to check on some cattle in a Rhino borrowed from Sommers dad. Dad actually had to change the battery on one of the fences. We checked for new calves, went to see the basketball court my brother Todd made, and went to see Jake (my nephew) and Kristie's house that is having a make over.
We had a great time seeing family and friends this last week. It was a great week to be able to see two out of the three of my nieces (on my side). Thanks to my family for helping with Bailey during the graduation.

Little Drummer Girl

2009-05-22T12:34:00.004-06:00

This video was taken last time Jacob and Breawna were here visiting. One of Breawna's favorite things to do when she is here is to play Rock Band and so Bailey has been taking drumming lesson from her. Bailey also had the hiccups (not something new) while she was showing off her mad drumming skills. You can also hear/see Ben and Jacob playing tennis in the background.Sorry the video is a little blurry. The drums weren't hooked up, but it totally amazes me how much she picks up just from watching us. Oh and sorry about the hair it always gets ruined after a nap.

And We're Back!

2009-05-12T20:43:00.007-06:00

Well after I got over someone flagging my blog Ben and I talked over whether we should go private or not. And we decided not to go private unless something else happens. Thank you to everyone who got in touch with us about going private. We heard from people we knew were following our blog and some that we didn't but were happy that they were. I heard from a cousin who I was really close to when we were little girls and friends from Ben and I's high school -crazy enough the cousin and this specific friend have the same initials K.H.- I have gotten in touch with more friends from my past from having a blog than any other way so crazies or not here we are.

I hope to all the mothers that I know that everyone had a wonderful Mothers Day. There is a poem that I have about adopted children that says"...there were two women who never knew each other, one you do not remember the other you call mother, two different lives shaped to make yours one." That is so true. The women who I call mother and IS my mother is an amazing women who has done and still does so much for me. And to my mother-in-law, she raised an amazing son, is a wonderful grandmother and mother-in-law. Ben and Bailey made my Mothers Day AMAZING - and I still think it's crazy that I am a mother!

Well we've had a fun few weeks. Thanks Jacob and Breawna for coming down to see us, for all you help, advice, being Bailey's nannies, and playing with us. Jacob is our mechanic, he's amazing with cars and went all over SLC helping in the crazy car buying process.

NOT HAPPY

2009-04-30T12:20:00.002-06:00

On Wednesday I received a comment from someone I'm really not sure who it is and I have tried to find out who this person is. A few months ago I received a comment from someone who I know, but I wasn't totally sure who it was. I didn't know that they had looked at my blog, which was fine, but come on people if you are going to leave a comment on someones blog IDENTIFY your self if you aren't 100% sure that the person will know who you are. Some of my friends have made their blogs private for that very reason, which I have considered.

Yesterday (Thursday) someone FLAGGED my blog. In doing so they have said that my blog has "OBJECTIONABLE CONTENTS.". Which has now screwed up my whole blog. My blog has been totally clean and mainly just for family and friends to keep in touch. I was a little concerned about the unidentified person who left a comment on my blog, but I am really very angry about someone flagging my blog, and not just leaving a comment if they were offended by something. Now I am trying to decided whether to delete my entire blog or to just make it private.

To our family and friends if I do decided to make it private, please e-mail or contact me in some way and let me know if you would like to have access to my blog. As for posting - I will be putting that on hold for awhile.

Good times

2009-04-28T12:45:00.009-06:00

Last Sunday Bailey wore the skirt that my sister-in-law Sommers made her. The skirt is soo cute, the whole out fit was a little big for her, but that is ok because than she can just grow into it. I love that flower since she doesn't fit into the skirt yet I am going to put the flower on her white sweater until she does.

Lately we have been having really crazy weather. Some days it is unnecessarily way to hot, some days snow, some days rain. Whatever. Anyway on one of the hot days Bailey and I didn't really go anywhere so we had a comfortable clothes day and after her nap her little head was kind of sweaty so I pulled up her hair. I went out into the garage to get something and she followed and found her fathers pop stash! This is the result. The pop was NOT open and I promise I usually take better care of her hair and don't let her run around in her onezee all day but she was happy and that's all the matters.

Also last week JJ Coles had another big warehouse sale. A huge thank you to my friend Tiffany for the phone call. As soon as she received an e-mail about the sale she called me. It is only the third one that they have had. This first one was pre-Bailey and I went with friends. The second one was post-Bailey and my sister-in-law Sommers, her mom, Shaydon, and my Mom came down for the sale. Well last Friday I had to go alone. Her is a little shopping history about me. I don't do a lot of shopping-unless it if for Bailey or something specific for Ben. I can usually be an and out of a store in 20 minutes and I can't even honestly think of the last time I was in any mall. I DON'T do the after Thanksgiving or Christmas sales. I'm not a morning person and getting up to fight the crowds for shopping isn't really my thing. BUT I do shop the JJ Coles sale. The sale started at 9:00am I was standing in line at 7:45am. I made Ben miss work to stay home and take care of Bailey!:)I was 7th in line and really missing Sommers when I first got there. A police man arrived at 8:15am and stayed for as long as I was there. By the time the door opened I was 14th in line and still missing Sommers. And true to the past I was in and out of the store/chaos and in my car calling Ben at 9:20am. Was it all worth standing in line in 45 degree weather in the rain for an hour and 15 minutes to do 20 minutes of shopping - YES! Sommers I missed having you there with me and hope you can come next time.

My neighbor makes hair bows and she showed me how around Christmas time. Well I haven't been able to find the color of bows I want for Bailey and I have been willing to mortgage my house to pay for the ones I have found and liked. My cousins threw a hair bow party and I went to be supportive, but when I left I decided it was time for me to start making Bailey's bows. Sommers sent me home with some ribbon she wanted to for bows and so I have made some for her, Bailey, and Miss Lily. But I really hope that they will all remember that I am still a newbie at this, and here is a picture of the ones I have made so far.

As a side note it was my Friend Sherri's birthday on Sunday, so on Saturday we took her a cake and a box of ice cream, but on our way there I dropped the cake! It had a lid on it, but the frosting was now on the lid. It's the thought that counts right? We hope you had a great birthday Sherri.

Catching Up... again!

2009-04-23T12:17:00.013-06:00

This blog will probably be a jumble of pictures and words, but here goes.

Maid for Hire: Very portable, cute, and fun, but usually causes more of mess! Bailey loves to wipe anything down with her rag and sweeps every surface she can reach even me!

Easter-A religious moment- I am so grateful for the whole purpose of Easter and all that the Savior did for me. Now a spoiled child moment-with the end of tax season I get more and more stir crazy so Bailey and I did a lot of shopping the week before Easter which means her Easter surprises where a bit much, but she's so dang cute I couldn't help myself. I DON'T know why the hat had to be on, when she woke up Ben went to get her and she spotted the hat and had it on ALL morning. She got her own broom from the Easter Bunny and sweeps 3-4 times a day!

Ben was awesome that morning, took care of Bailey when she woke up (fed and changed diaper) let me sleep a little longer, made breakfast for us, and I found an IPOD Nano in my Easter Basket. My old MP3 player died, but I am still trying to figure out how to work the new one, any help would be nice! This picture is on our way out the door to church.

On Thursday Ben's sister called and said that they were on their way through Logan and would be at my house in about 20 minutes. We went for some ice cream before they headed on to Ben's brother's house. This is Bailey and Corbyn, he is a cutie.

On Saturday the USU Football team was having a spring game and of course anything sports related Ben had to go. It was a nice day and great to be together even at a USU football game. Bailey loves having Ben home more often. I thought the picture was so cute, she looks so little.

Ben also attacked his list of "Honey Do's" on Saturday! After 5 months of not having a husband he had a lot of things to do. Some he ignored, others took little time and some he hated! Bailey has been getting into drawers and cupboards since February and Ben said that HE would put on clips to stop her from emptying every cupboard I have so that was the one he hated. I stayed by his side for moral support and tried not to giggle to much!

A Moment...

2009-04-22T12:51:00.003-06:00

Ok, I am having a tender moment :) I usually don't share these because anyone close to me knows that I am normally very emotional, but here goes. I put Bailey down for her nap at 10:45am, she went right down like a little champ, I then proceeded to check my e-mail and than forced myself away from the computer to clean the bathrooms. I love cleaning (my house doesn't always show it though) but not the bathrooms. But today is clean the bathroom day and yes I did clean both bathrooms and am done. Bailey usually wakes up when I have about 5-10 minutes left, but didn't this time so I went and checked on her and she is still out plug in mouth and huggies on each side of her. I was very grateful that she slept the whole time and grateful when I checked on her for just having her little self all together. And than I had a random thought of how grateful I am for Ben for not EVER arguing with me when I do or buy something for Bailey that he may not understand, but that I feel very strongly about. I am also grateful for a very hard working husband and SOOO grateful that the dreaded tax season is over!

I also realize that I have not posted about last week, but I have yet to down load last weeks pictures-on my to do list maybe for Bailey's next nap!

Home Again

2009-04-16T11:22:00.007-06:00

Well last week, the week before Easter, my sister and brothers all had plans to go to my parents for Easter, like we did. But with Tax Season being what it is Ben didn't know if he would be able to get off work in time on Saturday to make the trip even worth it. So when my Mom called asking that Bailey and I come down a little early to help her we decided to go. We headed down on Thursday morning and Bailey slept all the way until Obi sneezed and scared her. When we got there my Dad decided to take Bailey and I on a little ride on the Gator.

We were able to spend time with a lot of family which is always fun and Bailey was able to see most of her cousins. I stayed at my brother's house which is nice because Brenda (my sister-in-law) is always willing to watch and help with Bailey. Thanks for letting us stay. Poor Brandon, my oldest nephew is under the four youngest grandkids, it's so cute to see them altogether.

Bailey and I left on Saturday afternoon so that we could spend Easter with Ben. But before we left my wonderful family gave Bailey her Easter surprises. My sister-in-law Sommers gave Bailey a bag of candy, toys, headbands and she MADE Bailey the cutest denim skirt, she's so crafty! Yvonne gave Bailey the cutest Tea Set which Bailey loves and we get fed spoon fulls of food constantly. My sister gave Bailey this amazing picture of Jesus holding hands with the cutest little girl holding her doll I love it but since it's for Bailey it's in her room.

I love being with family and the support and love that they have for me and my little family always amazes me. Thank you to my amazing family.

Another week down

2009-04-05T12:27:00.004-06:00

Well this week Bailey had her 15 month appointment. She passed her 15 month date awhile ago, but the doctor was gone so we just barely had it. Anyway Bailey is healthy and slowly growing. She weights 21 lbs and is 30 inches long. The doctor said that her growth wasn't anything to worry about because that just wasn't the genes that she was given :)!! She is doing great. This is a picture of Bailey right before Easter last year! Where in the crap has the time gone!

After spending time with my nephew Shaydon, who Sommers has taught some sign language to, I decided I needed to teach Bailey how to say please. Now when she is screaming at me when she wants something at least she will now scream at me politely! But now that she knows it will get her what she wants it's really hard not to give her everything, it's especially hard for Ben because he is such a softy toward her.

This week was also General Conference. I love Conference, I think my love for Conference really grew while I was on my mission. First -because it was in English and Second - because Salt Lake was close to home. While we were watching the Sunday morning session at the closing song "We Thank Thee Oh God For a Prophet" the showed pictures of President Monson and My Dad was in one of the pictures! As soon as it was over I called him and he hadn't seen himself!

I hope everyone has a great week and a wonderful Easter. And to all the Tax Season wives- we've almost made it!!

New old toys and cleaning

2009-03-28T16:51:00.005-06:00

Last year my sister-in-law Yvonne got Bailey this cute toy. She wasn't old enough to do much with it, but after I changed the batteries and gave it to her it's her new favorite toy! She carried it like a baby until I turned it on and now she loves to hear it sing and I can't get the song out of my head.

Also here is a video of Bailey cleaning. She found my niece Lily's broom and swept the back porch for about 30 minutes! Also every time she finds a towel, washcloth, or rag she cleans everything in reach. I'm not really sure where she picked that up because I'm not OCD about my cleaning or anything :)!I have tried to take a video of that, but every time I do she goes after the camera.

Home Sweet Home

2009-03-27T21:22:00.010-06:00

Ok well it's time for another two week update! First though I would like to add a picture of Bailey and I coloring. My parents got her a giant coloring book for Christmas and she is to the point where she isn't eating her crayons any more so we are doing a little more coloring. Actually I just color and Bailey holds the crayon the right way but just high enough that the point of the crayon is in her fist and never touches the paper. It's pretty cute and it makes her happy so it's all good. As you can tell by the look on her face she is a pretty serious about her coloring!

Now for the update... Last week on Tuesday (St.Patrick's day) Bailey and I took off to my parents house. I love spending time in Idaho and with my family, BUT it is still Tax Season (YUCK) so we went alone.

I got into town, had lunch with my mom, went to see my sister-in-law and drop Bailey off with her for a little bit while I went to see my cousin Brooke. Brooke had a scheduled c-section that day and I was able to see her and new baby Davnie. She was a cute little girl - congratulations Brooke and Jon. I was also able to see my Grandma, Bailey and I went to see Ben's mom and his Grandma. And we were able to see my niece before her radiation treatment. We are SOO glad that my niece is feeling better and that life is almost back to normal for her. We love you Lou!

On Thursday my parents, Bailey and I headed for the two hour drive to my brothers house. My brothers were able to get tickets to the NCAA games in Boise for them and my Dad. They had tickets for Friday and Sunday, but since my Dad had to be back home for Sunday we bought his tickets and Ben came up on Friday night. We played on Saturday and the boys went to the games on Sunday. Ben loved it and had a great time. Thanks Eric for hooking us up with the tickets.

While we were there we went to story time with Sommers and Shaydon, shopped at Costco. I love Costco, ate way to much, went shopping at Target (Thanks Yvonne)that was one of the highlights of my trip! Had a day of great weather (74 degrees) so we played on the tramp, in the sandbox, with the toys and Bailey did some cleaning. We celebrated my mom's birthday and Bailey, Ben, and I had a great time seeing everyone.

Zach-thanks for being so sweet to Bailey. Lily, thanks for letting her play with all of your toys. Nic thanks for letting Bailey have your room. Eric and Yvonne thanks for letting us invade your house we really appreciate it and for putting up with us and Bailey getting sick! Scott, Sommers, Shaydon, thank you for spending time with us and for letting Shaydon skip naps and go to bed late! We love you all!

A busy week

2009-03-14T16:11:00.008-06:00

This week was a busy week, but it also made the days go by faster. Which is always nice during tax season - another week down.

On Monday we (Bailey and I) went visiting teaching. Bailey was a good girl and that was nice. On Tuesday we had lunch with my cousins Katie, her two daughters, and my cousin Avery. It was nice to see them. On Wednesday library books were due so it was off to the library. On Thursday we had some work done on the house and Obi had a hair appointment, it is so nice to have a clean dog! On Friday we went to lunch with my friend Krista, it was great to see her. On Saturday morning we were off to Primary activity day were once again Bailey was a very good girl and just hung out in her stroller most of the time.

Bailey has also broke a couple of teeth her upper right one and her upper left two! So now my almost 15 month old has almost 5 teeth!

The video was taken at my parents house. Bailey is going around the base of their kitchen table! I thought it was pretty cute and Ben thought it was pretty funny so we thought we would share.

New Hair Do and to All my Friends

2009-03-06T11:33:00.005-07:00

Bailey's hair is just getting longer and I am starting to try new things. If any of you have any suggestions I would happily take them. Know that I am not very coordinated or creative(my own hair for example). But I am willing to try and way we tried a new hair do a few weeks ago and I thought it was so cute I had to share.

To all of you who are pregnant (which is about 95% of everyone I know) and to Angie congratulations! To all of you who know what you are having I am soo happy for you and I hope you are all feeling great and that things are going well. Ashlee I think about you often (even though you would never know from my lack of phone calls) and I really hope everything is going well and can't wait to hear what you are going to name Little Eav #3. Angie congratulations on your new little girl! I really need to talk to you and learn how you take care of two little ones, a brand new baby, and still have time to stay current on your blog and comment on mine when I can't! Know that I am thinking about you all :)!!!

Let's not do that again!

2009-03-04T14:53:00.005-07:00

Two weeks ago Bailey and I had a play date with a neighbor and her two cute kids. It was Wednesday morning and we had a really good time. Her husband works a lot and with it being tax season...enough said. On Thursday we had a play date with Sherri and Cara. Sherri and I had our usual lunch and cookie, Bailey slept and Cara just hung out, but Sherri and I had a great time. And of course I don't have pictures of any one!

On Saturday of that week Ben decided to we needed to head to Pocatello for a Brown Family meeting with some of his brothers and sisters. Well with it being Tax season he worked on Saturday and we took off after work. Bailey did well for about 30 minutes and the rest of the ride wasn't enjoyable for any of us. She was supposed to take a nap and I did try to schedule nap time around the drive, but it didn't happen. By the time she was so exhausted and would have fallen asleep we had arrived in Pocatello and I was car sick from turning around trying to make her happy. She didn't sleep the whole time we were there and finally fell asleep as we were going through the drive thru on our way out of town! Of course she woke up, but did manage to go back to sleep after a little while. So that was our Pocatello adventure that I hope we don't have to do again. And of course no pictures!

Last week my brother and his wife were out of town and I was sick of being a tax season widow so I took off to stay with my niece and my parents. Bailey was AWESOME for the drive she slept the whole way and only woke up when we were in Idaho at the drive through for some lunch 5 minutes away from my parents house. Anyway I had a great week with my niece we hung out, talked, went to the movie, and it was great to spend some time with her after all her surgeries, etc. My niece is a workaholic and she worked during the days and I spent time with my parents which was great I love being at home and having someone to talk to besides Bailey and the dog all day. I was also able to spend time with my nephew who tore all the ligaments in his ankle while I was there. He needed a chauffeur and someone to yell at him when he tried to walk with out his crutches and I did a very good job! We also went and spent some time with my Grandma which is always great.

I came back to Logan on Friday afternoon just in time for Ben's brother Jacob and his wife to come into town and hang out with us. Jacob had a doctor's appointment on Saturday. We had a fun night and they left on Saturday morning.

That night Ben and I ordered some pizza and just decided to hang out. About an hour after eating neither one of us felt great. Ben had an upset stomach that night and I spent the night and next day throwing up. Let's not do that again.

On Sunday Ben was amazing. He took care of Bailey, bathed her, got them both ready for church, went to church, gave a lesson while controlling Bailey on his own and came back took care of me! He was so awesome, he didn't complain once about anything just took care of us both even though I had kept him up all night too. Thanks for being an amazing husband. I love you and appreciate you SO much.

A Fun Week

2009-02-15T16:43:00.007-07:00

This week we got some new snow in Logan. So I decided it was time to dress Bailey up and introduce her to snow. Thanks to my sister-in-law Yvonne we have some wonderful hand-me down snow pants and boots. Bailey wasn't sure how she felt about snow in the at first and wouldn't walk in it, but she got used to it and eventually started playing with Obi in the snow.

We have also been dog sitting these past two weeks. About three days after my Dad's heart procedure he and my Mom took off for Hawaii for a couple of weeks and we got to watch their dog. He does really well (he's 11 years old) and they stopped by to pick him up on Thursday. They had an awesome trip, came back well rested and it was great to spend a little time with them.
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On Friday my brother Scott, his wife and their son were on their way to spend the long weekend with my sister and met Bailey and I for lunch. Sommers had never eaten at Maddox so we decided to eat their. We will have to try again because Sommers was sick with the flu and couldn't eat anything! I felt so sorry for her. It was nice to see them and for Bailey to spend time with Shaydon. They are only four months apart and I wish we lived closer so they could see more of each other. Sommers had also scrap booked some pages for me. They are from Bailey's Idaho baby shower and they are awesome. Because of the previous miscarriages Ben and I were trying not to get to excited about Bailey in case we lost her and so we only have one picture of me pregnant with her and with Sommers' pages I now have more! I was so excited to have more and the pages are perfect! Thank you so much Sommers!

When my Dad was taking care of the hole in his heart he had some time to spend while he was in the hospital. So he took a stroll through the gift shop and found this puppy for Bailey. The puppy looks a lot like Obi and Bailey loves him. When we get her ready for bed she has to have him, when we change to jammies, change her diaper, top her off with a bottle, rock her, and lay her down, her puppy has to be there. It's pretty cute, so thanks Dad for the new puppy!

Niece Update

2009-02-10T16:25:00.004-07:00

Thank you to those who have contacted me (in someway or another)about my families medical issues. I appreciate your support and thoughtfulness.

As for an update a week ago on Monday my niece received the results from her biopsy after her surgery. The results were that the growth was malignant. For her being so young it was hard to take. Thyroid cancer (caught early) is very treatable, but she was back in for surgery on Wednesday to have her thyroid removed. She did well during surgery and was scheduled to leave the hospital on Thursday morning, but because her calcium levels were so low she wasn't released until that afternoon. The doctors did another biopsy on her lymph nodes and her parathyroid (I have no clue what that is). The results for those came back clean! The cancer has not spread and we are all very excited. She will have a doctors appointment at the end of this week to have her stitches removed and get more information and details on her radiation treatment. We are just glad that after two surgeries, three biopsies and a lot of doctor visits that she is going to be ok.

Head Accesories

2009-02-08T18:35:00.005-07:00

My sister got Bailey a shape sorter toy for her birthday and what do you know the top fits her head perfect. She also has two little piggy tails sticking out of two of the holes.

Friends Forever

2009-02-08T18:29:00.004-07:00

Last week I babysat one of our neighbors daughters. Megan is about 3 months younger than Bailey and they are so cute. They like to hang out at church and share toys and always smile when they see each other. Anyway they are so cute together and here are a few pictures of them together.

Trials, Blessings, and Miracles

2009-02-01T18:08:00.007-07:00

For those of you who know my family, know that we are pretty close to one another and we LOVE being together so it was kind of a hard week for my family.

On Wednesday one of my nieces had surgery to remove a growth that was in her throat. For her age and the way it was growing the doctors decided it had to come out ASAP. The doctors also braced us for the worse saying that Yes there was a chance it was cancerous. Her surgery went well, she had to spend the night in the hospital and although the biopsy will come back on Monday the doctor said he thought that the growth was NOT cancerous. My niece hasn't told a lot of people because it's not like it's good news. But we all love her and hope she feels better soon and I'll buy you a DQ Cherry Dilly Bar next time I see you! :)

Also this week my Dad had an appointment on Wednesday in SLC which confirmed that he had a LARGE hole in his heart. Thursday they did a procedure to close his whole and of course any thing done to the heart makes one a little nervous. Bailey and I took off on Wednesday to be there with him and my Mom. He did really well and the doctor said that is was a miracle that he was alive. Because of the size of the hole and my Dad's age he should have either died a long time ago or should be a vegetable because of all the strokes he should have had. We all headed home on Friday and Dad is doing great and of course he hasn't told hardly anyone about this because that's just the way he is. I am grateful that my family's ok. This is a picture of my oldest nephew Brandon (he's a cute one). He drove Bailey and I down to the hospital. This is when we were one a little Golf Cart being driven to the Heart & Lung part of the hospital. He was so cute with Bailey, she loved him.

In the hospital it was only supposed to be my Mom and one other person. My sister Wendy was with my Mom during the surgery and after he was out Bailey and I went with my nephew Brnadon, my other nephew Jason showed up and my brother-in-law came too. It was a party and Bailey was such a good girl to spend 4 hours in the hospital with zero meltdowns.

Another week passed

2009-01-25T17:41:00.003-07:00

Well this week wasn't the best. I was sick with a cold for most of this week not pleasant, but at least I'm on the tail of it. Anyway Ben's brother Jacob and his wife came to visit again this weekend. Once again we played A LOT of the Wii and stayed up way to late. Bailey also is loving her new car seat. Tax season still STINKS, but like I said before another week passed.

Few Of my Favorite Relatives

2009-01-20T15:21:00.007-07:00

This last week my niece Lyndsie came to visit me, we are only 8 years apart and I love that I am still cool enough to hang out with a 21 year old! :)We had a great time. Ben is in tax season and so we never see him. He is usually gone by 5:45am and doesn't get home until about 7:00pm. Yea tax season. Anyway so it was a perfect time for Lyndsie to come and see me, we had great food, Muddy Buddies, Fire House, stayed up way late, talked and watched movies. Thanks Lyndsie we love you and hope you come and visit again soon. These are pictures from our Gerratt family trip to Mexico.

Also this week Ben's brother Jacob wanted us to go to Pocatello to look at some more houses with him. It worked out great because Lyndsie had to get back home to work (she works at 3 different hospitals) and so she was able to take Bailey to my parents. Well that was the plan but her dad (my brother Todd and his wife) actually kept her Saturday night. Anyway we looked at houses, ate lunch and dinner, went to the movie and played games and had a good Saturday. But we missed Bailey, it is just SO hard to leave her. Below is a picture of the new dress the Todd and family got here when they were in Mexico a few weeks ago.

We got to my parents late Saturday night and Sunday afternoon some of my Aunts showed up just to hang out. My Aunt Louise has always lived pretty close to us and when we were little we used to get her and my mom confused! My Aunt Carol has always lived in Idaho and I actually lived with her for a summer when I was going to college. And of course my grandma, she is the one who took care of me from the day I was born until I was 2 months old when my adoption was final. I love seeing them and they have always been a great example to me.