Creation by Sarah

My sister-in-law, Sarah, has started such a cool new blog. It is called Create Everyday. She shows some of the great things she has created such as art smocks, bibs, foods, etc. She is so good at coming up with fun things to make. I wanted to show what she made for me!

Sarah had my name for Christmas. I had asked Scott for a diaper bag for Christmas, especially one that we could use for church for all the snacks, books and toys. I even chose the one he "gave" me, but in the end didn't like it all that much. Then Sarah came over with my Christmas gift and it was a diaper bag that she MADE!! It is so cute. It's the coolest material and the best size to carry everything. It even has pockets inside and out. I absolutely love it.Here I am coming home from church on Sunday with my diaper bag full of goods. The women at church certainly oooohhh and awwwww over my bag (and my blanket made by Laura). Good thing for talented family huh?

Cheers! Cherries!

I've mentioned before how Brielle does "Cheers!" to anything that is matching. My mom got Brie and Ava matching little cherry outfits. They are both finally fitting into them, so they got to be matching sisters the other day. You can bet Ava got body bumped a few times when Brie did "Cheers!" to her.

This really is best picture I got out of them before Brie jumped down and ran away and Ava started sliding off of the couch. Thank you mom, for the cute cherry clothes.

Swimmer or Gymnast?

What will Brie be? Scott has always thought it would be cool if she wanted to do gymnastics and be a gymnast. But, she might just choose to be a swimmer.

We took Brie to "The Little Gym" for a trial class to see how she liked it. Of course, she LOVED it. She ran and jumped and played with all the other kids. She had a great time on all the gymnastics equipment. And I must say, she was really good. I was in the lobby area with other parents and I overheard a group of parents saying how surprised and amazed they were that "that little girl" could walk the balance beam like that with no problem. The teacher was shocked when he put her on the monkey bar and she could hang there for a long time and then do chin ups when he told her to. She is now enrolled in "The Little Gym" until June. She goes every Tuesday evening and comes home with all kinds of new things she learned. The latest one that she and Scott show me is the "donkey kick". Hilarious.

On Saturday we decided we would go to the rec center and go swimming. We had to wait until after naps because they weren't open in the morning. I made the mistake of telling Brie that we were going swimming after her nap when I put her down. She was WAY too excited then. She couldn't sleep and kept saying, "I so excited!" and "I need my swim suit and swim diaper." I left her alone for a little while to see if she would sleep. When I went to check on her the above picture is what I found. She had taken off her dress, shirt, and tights and put on a swim diaper (over her other one), her swim suit, her shoes and one of Ava's knit hats. We were laughing so hard that we gave up on the nap and went swimming.

P.S. Brie has never seen a swim cap or heard of a swim cap, so I have no idea why she chose to wear one other than maybe a true swimmers intuition??? But, then I have no explanation for her choice in shoes. And I absolutely did not tell her to pose that way. It made me a little nervous.

Snow Canyon

I wanted to post pictures of our President's Day in Snow Canyon. Grandma and Ada took us to Snow Canyon, right outside of St. George. It was a gorgeous day. We did a couple easy and quick hikes while the girls slept in the car with Grandma and Ada. We also had a small snack picnic and got to climb some red rock. It was such a nice day to be outside roaming around.

After Snow Canyon we took Grandma and Ada out for sushi (California rolls), miso soup, edamame and mango sticky rice dessert. Most of it was a first for them and Bryce, but I think they liked it. Maybe? We then got in the car for our 4 hour ride home and the both girls slept 3 of those 4 hours! It was a great trip.

We went walking out into this flat area and found some volcano caves. We started just wandering around the black volcanic rock and next thing I know Scott is climbing into a dark hole. Bryce followed and they were able to keep going down and down and down into a cave. They recruited some kids to stick with them because they had a light. Crazy.

They reappear. Our picnic with Grandma and Ada. There were rocks all over this area to climb.

Our next little hike was to Jenny's Canyon. It was really gorgeous. I love the way the sunlight reflects off of the red rock. So pretty.

Brie is saving Bryce from the rock ceiling.

Over the river and through the woods . . .

We (us and Bryce) spent last weekend with "Grandma Great" in St. George. It was so nice to be there. Grandma was very good to us. She made us cookies and cinnamon rolls (with pecans that Scott is deathly allergic to) and bread and roast. She let us rearrange her furniture. She took us around St. George and Snow canyon. She let us nap. It was great!

It was also wonderful to be somewhere warmer! There was no snow on the ground and the sun was shining. I think St. George is beautiful. The first day there we got to go shopping and then to the park for a picnic and to let Brie play outside. It felt so good to be outside.

Ava LOVED this jumbo dill pickle.Here is Brie with arms outstreached ready to "catch daddy". And she did.

That evening Scott made us a delicious dinner of salmon over spinach, tomatoes and cucumbers with balsamic vinegar dressing.

We loved getting to play with Uncle Bryce and Grandma and just lounge around. Sunday afternoon nap.Grandma and Brie read lots of books together. Here they are reading one to a couple dolls and bear too.And, of course, our Sunday walk was to climb the red rock behind grandma's house.

The happy couple swinging Brie all the way home.

Couples Skate

A doctor checked Brie out after her tumble out of the shopping cart and she is fine. She doesn't even have a bump. So, we got to continue with our Valentine's day festivities. Scott made the plans for the evening and it was yet another fun date. We've got pics and video to prove it, of course.

He started out the evening with a very romantic dinner with our two girls and the babysitter. It was cute. He got the heart shaped pizza from Papa Murphy's and root beer! Delicious. He also made an amazing (diet friendly) treat for before and after. He drizzled chocolate on pretzels. I was in heaven with all that saltiness and sweetness.

Then the main event began. Ava was asleep in bed, Brie was playing dress up with the babysitter (who was the prince and had to dance with her) and Scott took me ice skating! I was really nervous putting my skates on and heading out on the ice. I've only been ice skating once in my life and I was about 14 years old. I remember falling down the WHOLE time. I was excited to try it again.

We got onto the rink for sweethearts couples ice skating night and found ourselves surrounded by high school kids. It was just like at the mall. They were all in little groups talking and watching the other groups and showing off for each other. Hilarious. It made it that much more fun to watch the high schoolers. I think we were the oldest couple there. Scott did very well on his ice hockey skates and I managed to make my way around the rink. I got faster and faster and more confident in my skills. I was actually so excited that I had learned to go backwards, kind of learned to stop and had gone around the rink many times and hadn't fallen once. And here is my grand finale finish. We decided to go around one more time and then head home. Scott started video taping me though. It made me so nervous. I turned around to say something to him and just as he was turning off the camera . . . I bit it. I can't believe I'm sharing this video.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day from Brie and Ava.

Here is little Ava on her first Valentine's day. She is all smiles and very happy. I'm sure it's because of the candy she'll be getting through me later :) She's wearing the shirt that Brie wore her first Valentine's day. Ava is just filling it out a lot more. Such a cute girl. The day started out great for Brielle. She came downstairs and found some Valentine's presents, candy, balloon and cards. She was totally excited and kept saying that Santa came. Well, kind of. The presents were some books that I bought and wrapped for Christmas. When I saw how much she was getting that morning though I put them away in a closet for another celebration. Perfect! Brie's Valentine's day got bad from there. I took the girls shopping. Ava was in the baby bjorn and Brie was sitting in the back of the shopping cart. I stopped to look at something and when I turned back I saw (it felt like in slow motion) Brie reaching for something from the back end of the cart. She flipped out of the cart onto the cement floor. I've always been afraid of this happening and now it did! It was so sad and scary. I took Ava and laid her on the bjorn in the back of the cart and held Brie and tried to make sure she was ok. She calmed down pretty easily and only complained of her finger hurting. She has a little bump on her forehead. She's sleeping now, but we are debating on taking her to be checked out. A head landing on a cement floor is a scary thing.

Hopefully things get better from here. If all is well with Brie, Scott and I are leaving the girls with a babysitter and going ice skating for the sweetheart couples ice skating night. Sounds fun, but I wouldn't be surprised if I end up with the same bump on my head as Brie and needing to be taken to be x-rayed as well.

We hope you have a nice Valentine's day! Much love from us to you!