Clothes Picker Girl

Yesterday Taeya informed me that she was going to be Anastyns clothes picker girl, she would choose her clothes for her everyday. I left the room and about 10 minutes later she called me name and wanted me to come look. She had laid out all sorts of outfits, including leggings and shoes for Anastyn to wear. She went through each outfit and said, "these is for the next day, these is for the next day, these is for the next day........" until she got to the end of the line! She sure does love clothes.

Yard Work Helpers

Anastyn enjoyed helping me out in the yard on a few days ago. She had a great time playing in the dirt and with Alayna.

Alyson is a saint and always helps me with the weeds which are in abundance at my house. We figured she has to help since she does own about 6 inches of the dirt in between our houses! Alayna was a good girl for me during a little weeding break Alyson took to pick up her girls from school.

Anastyn got her first taste of dirt. She didn't seem to mind it! It seems like she might follow in the footsteps of her sister, Taeya was always eating dirt.

Daddy's Girl

Taeya is definitely a "Daddy's Girl" right now. Gordon does such fun things with her and really enjoys spending time with her. A month or so ago they started having "Friday Night Sleepovers" together. Taeya gets to choose where they sleep, they usually end up sleeping in the basement, but Friday night Gordon set up the tent with hopes of sleeping outside. He probably should have checked the weather report because it was really windy and cold. They lasted about 30 minutes before coming in and sleeping on the family room floor.

I had to go to work for a few hours Saturday morning so Gordon played Mister Mom and Taeya always loves that! She is usually in a crazy outfit with her hair undone. Most of the time Anastyn is still in her pajamas playing on the floor, but the kids have fun and I guess that's all that matters! At least Anastyn looks happy.....

Taeya looked great in her outfit too. I saw her walking down the street as I was coming home from work and I had to just laugh at this cute girl! She thinks because she is out of school it's summer, but I keep telling her it's not warm enough to be summer. She doesn't listen and still wants to wear her swimsuit all the time!

Sunday afternoon Taeya and Gordon walked down to the river and played for a while during Anastyn's nap. Taeya learned that if she finds a dandelion and blows on it she gets to make a wish. Lately her wish is "to fly." On their walk to the river Taeya found a dandelion, picked it up and blew on it. The fluffy stuff didn't come off so she quickly grabbed it with her hand and pulled them off. Then she started flapping her wings, got a disappointed look on her face and snapped her fingers and said, "darnit!"
Taeya is always sad on Monday morning when she wakes up and Dad has already left to go to work. We all love the weekend, and we love having Dad home. He is such a great dad. I am so thankful.

A little sidenote story about Taeya........Gordon has been working late a lot lately and last week Taeya was having a hard time going to sleep so Gordon told her he would leave a suprise under her pillow for her if she went to sleep. The next morning she ran in and showed me the fortune cookies that he had left. She was so disappointed because she wanted her suprise to be a baby elephant!??

Fingers and Toes

Taeya always has a hard time going to bed at night. The girl goes and goes all day long but for whatever reason has a hard time settling down to go to sleep. This is what I saw the other night when she was supposed to be sleeping, it made me laugh!

School Program

Taeya had her end of school year program on March 18th. Gordon and I got to watch her little class perform some of the songs they have been working on during the year. It was so fun to watch her sing and dance. She has had a fun year. I can't say that she has loved they year but she did seem to enjoy it. She has learned so much. She can write her name (sometimes she spells it T-A-Y-E-A), she knows most of her shapes and colors (she knew her colors before school started), she knows the days of the week, she can count to 30, (she often has a hard time with 13 and 14, she used to skip 13 and now she sometimes says 13 twice instead of 14), she knows her numbers and letters and what the letters say, she is a good matcher and recognizes patterns.

She has really loved Miss Jennifer and Miss Amber

Taeya and Ashlynn have carpooled all year long, they have become little friends even though they often argue about who gets to sit in the booster seat! I would drive both ways on Thursdays, and about 1/2 way through the school year they got silly on me. I would ask them what the did at school and they would always say "nothing," then they would go off on a big long story about how they didn't do anything and the teacher was gone and the story would just go on and on. Cute little girls, it has been fun to watch them learn and have fun together.

Shortly before we went to Disneyland Taeya came home and told me that Mitchell was her boyfriend because they were both going to Disneyland. Gordon had a big talk with her about how he was the only "boyfriend" she could have. Shortly before school ended Taeya said to me, "Mitchell's not my boyfriend anymore, Daddy is!"

The other 2 girls Taeya often talked about were Emma and Kennady. One day on the way home she said sadly, "Emma and Kennady aren't teamwork." She was really sad about it, I think she meant that they wouldn't play with her, so we went through some of the other girls in her class and talked about how maybe they would be teamwork! It was cute. It's fun to hear how their little minds are working.

Now that school is out she thinks it's summertime and she can wear swimsuits, and skirts and tanktops all the time! Maybe it will be nice in June? We can always hope.

Swim Lessons - Day 5

She is starting to float really well on her own!!

And she is all smiles when she is done!

Lawni's Birthday

Lawni's birthday was April 26th, but it took us a few weeks to get our schedules cleared so we could all go out. On Saturday, May 15th, Lawni, Heather, Alyson, Mary, and I went to Chili's and to the movie "Letters to Juliet." We had such a fun night, it's always nice to go out with the girls. No one brought their camera so we jumped in the photo booth at Thanksgiving Point to get these great shots!! We never knew when the photo was being taken so some of these are pretty funny, the title at the top is pretty great too, "besties!" I'm so glad that Lawni had a birthday so we could go out without the kids!

8 Months Old

My baby is 8 months old and I still am wondering where the time has gone. Didn't I just have her last month? She is becoming quite the big girl. Here are a few things about her as of May 15th:

-She is crawling (she started crawling on mothers day - May 9th).

-She has 2 teeth, but 1 of her top teeth is almost in.

-She LOVES food still, she still hasn't turned down anything I have given her, and she gets really excited when she sees it.

-She wakes up at least once, and sometimes twice during the night :(

-She wishes she could be rocked to sleep each night and for naps, and secretly I love it, but I know it's not a good thing so I try to make her cry it out.

-She goes to sleep around 8:30 pm and is up for the day around 8:00 am.

-I nurse her about 5 times a day.

-She gets milk, half a jar of baby food and about 2-3 tlbs of cereal before bed (this is her only consistent meal of the day). If we are home I will usually feed her something in the afternoon like yogurt, baby food, sweet potato - something like that. If we're not home she snacks on whatever Taeya and I are eating.

-She is quite the momma's girl, she cries quite hard if she is tired and I'm not around.

-She just started swim lessons and is doing really well.

-She loves taking baths.

-She sleeps on her tummy - by her own choice. I lay her on her back and when I check on her she is always on her tummy.

-She is happy and smiles at anyone who will smile at her.

-And she really loves her sister Taeya (wink, wink). This picture sums up their relationship nicely! Life wouldn't be complete without my Anastyn, sure do love her......still!

Dad and Anastyn

This girl sure lights up our days! We love having her in our family and we love her so much!

Bowling

I have been wanting to take Taeya bowling for while now and we finally found a weekend to do it (Friday, May 14th). We talked the Bailey's into coming with us. I think we all have a great time.

The girls thought it was fun to put the bowling shoes on - thank goodness we remembered socks!

Brynn, Kira and Seth

Taeya had a hard time being patient and waiting for her turn.

Taeya, Brynn (not in the picture) and Kira loved watching for the balls to come back.
Gordon helped Taeya most of the time and he would tell her to "lean" the direction the ball needed to go. I think Taeya got the ball rolling at a high speed of 3 mph.
The adults went every other time so the kids could have more turns, that gave us down time to chat, hold babies, and watch the girls have a some fun!

Taeya found a fun sitting spot while waiting for her turn!

This is Taeya's new face when I tell her to smile, isn't it beautiful?

Anastyn was happy with her Daddy!

She was also all smiles for her Mom!

Taeya tried to roll the ball underhand a few times, it went really slow when she did it this way but it was cute to watch her try.

We really did have a fun time bowling, this is an activity we will definitely try again. Maybe next time the adults can actually beat the kids, but if not we can always try leaving the bumpers up the whole time!

Swim Lessons - Day 4

Anastyn started swim lessons on Monday, May 10, 2010. I was a little nervous about it because she is still so little but you just never know when a water accident might happen and with the summer months ahead I want to be prepared. She has done great so far, the first day she cried a little when she did the bobs and when Jodee (swim instructor) put her on the kick board, but she floated for 16 seconds on her own and she calmed herself down so easily that we were all impressed! I couldn't find my camera for the first few days of lessons but on day 4 I finally got some shots.

The first part of the lesson is "bobs" she does about 3 or so with her. Then she puts her arms and chest on a kick board and puts a noodle under her legs and helps her kick/float to the other end of the pool.

At the other end of the pool she works on her "back" and rolling over when she touches the wall. She needs her to float on her back for a full minute before she can work hard on other skills. This is Anastyn's least favorite part. If she would just stop kicking her legs she would float perfectly.
As soon as Jodee rolls her over Anastyn seems totally content and wants to play with anything she can touch! She has her float on her back for a few minutes, then she to try and get some of the water she just swallowed out of her tummy. Then she practices floating again.

Anastyn loves Jodee's necklack and is always reaching for it, it's cute. Jodee is really calm with her and talks to her and encourages her the whole time.

During the last 5 minutes of the lessons, Jodee sits her on the side of the wall, pulls her into the pool, turns her around and helps her practice grabbing onto the side of the wall. Then she floats on her back to the other end of the pool and she gets to play with diving sticks. She knows she is done and is as happy as can be.

On Day 4 of Anastyn's lesson, Taeya had a lesson also. During February, March, and April Taeya was on a little swim team. She would swim on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1:00 - 1:40. This wasn't her favorite thing, she complained that it was too long, she did love the extra diving she was able to do, but otherwise she started to regress in her swimming abilities. So now she just has a swim lesson for 20 minutes once a week, and she loves it. Below are a few shots I took of Taeya.

At the beginning of her lesson she practices "side breathing" with the kick board. Next she adds her arms with the kick board. Then she does "front crawl" without the kickboard. Doggy bone is next for a few lengths of the pool. Then she kicks on her back with no arms, next she adds her arms. At the end she usually does a few more laps of front crawl before practicing her dives. It's so fun to watch her swim and see how confident she is in the water. I love it!

I sure love my little fishies!

Mother's Day

Mother's Day was a great day. After church Gordon took the kids for a nice long walk while I worked on sewing Anastyn's bedding (the bumper pads are done now, yea!) That night we ate dinner with the family at my moms house. As my gift I got my window boxes planted and I get to take a fondue cooking class at Thanksgiving point.

I am so grateful for my wonderful mother and her great example to me, and I feel so lucky to have the beautiful daughters I have, I am honored to be their mother.

1st Week of May

The first week of May was an exciting one! Not really, but for whatever reason I took a ton of photos and instead of doing a million posts, I thought I would just show you the highlights from the week.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

We woke up to quite a bit of snow. Taeya was excited to put her snow clothes on and play in the snow. She had to bring her stuffed "Frosty the Snowman" with her (he is in the backpack she's wearing). This snow adventure lasted a whole 5 minutes. Of course the snow was melted by the time we got home from church, and Monday was beautiful and kindof warm! (I just love Utah in the spring).

Monday, May 3, 2010
For Family Home Evening we ran a few errands and then got Ice Cream at Maggie Moos. Taeya got the Cotton Candy flavored ice cream and Anastyn loved it. She loves ice cream, before we paid for it she could see it sitting on the counter and started reaching and kicking for it! Sadly she probably ate as much as Taeya did. The girls blue mouths made me laugh.

Anastyn is so close to crawling. She can get on all 4's but can't quite move her legs, she does go into a great "downward dog" yoga position though!

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

A few friends came over and we made some yummy garlic bread and hung out while the kids played. Taeya and Brielle ended up with some nice artwork on their faces, thanks to Taeya. Later that day Gordon talked to her about our rule of only drawing on paper and she told Gordon that she was pretending to be at Disneyland getting her face painted! Thank goodness she used washable markers.

Anastyn found a dumb dumb sucker that the kids had left on the floor. I didn't really think that she could get the wrapper off but she did and she ate the whole sucker! (I think she is going to end up with quite the sweet tooth at the rate were going!) She was just so happy with herself that I didn't want to take the sucker away. What's worse is that the next day I wanted to go on a walk and lately about half way through she starts getting fussy, so I brought a sucker along, it worked and we got through the walk with only minimal crying.


Thursday, May 6, 2010
We had a nice evening at the Lehi pool, both girls sure love to swim, its much nicer now that Anastyn can sit up.


Friday, May 7, 2010
Anastyn had her first ponytail, and doesn't she look so cute! It makes her look like a big girl.

Taeya created quite the lineup of animals. (The strings you can see hanging down from some of the animals are their leashes, according to Taeya)!

So far May has been a great month and we are really looking forward to the summertime!