What we have been up to this Summer!

This spring we sold our home and began a BIG, BIG project. We began building a new home. It has consumed a lot of our time, but will be worth it. More pictures to come soon.

  

Our summer has been full of Play, Play, Play!!!! Leah is finally big enough to go outside and enjoy the warm weather on her own. These are the things we enjoyed all summer long.......

Sand Box -- best thing in the world. Hours and hours have been spent outside playing in the sand. Leah loves it, even though I HATE it. It is so messy, but it keeps Leah occupied for hours.

 Lots of time playing outside in the water with cousins. Leah loved playing in the house and squirting Jaxson. He was so good to let her do it even though the water was freezing.

Leah's cousin Jaxson loves to ride bikes outside with his friends. Leah found her own bike so she could go outside and play too. All Leah has wanted to do all summer was play outside and ride bikes.

We discovered Herriman Beach and went often. Leah loved the sand and water!

The park is one of Leah's favorites. Every time we drive by a park Leah says "play park" or "Slide, Slide". So glad that there are a lot of fun parks around.

We got a Seven Peaks pass and it was so worth it. Leah loves the water.

 We went to a TON of parades, carnivals, and fairs this summer. Leah loved the rides!


Places we have visited this summer.....

We stayed up at the cabin one weekend and played with Cousins. Leah LOVES her cousins.
 
 We celebrated the 24th of July in St. George with Grandpa and Grandma Furner. We had so much fun swimming and boating.
 
 We went to Arches just the 3 of us. Leah LOVED it. She enjoyed running around and exploring new things.

 We went to Whitney lake and went camping and fishing with our friends the England's. Leah loved playing with her new friend Taylee.

 We went camping up Logan canyon with Dan & Bobbi and their kids. The kids had so much fun playing in the dirt and on the fourwheeler.

We stayed at Palisade State Park with the Gardiner Family. Leah missed has missed her friend Kenzie since we moved from our old house, it was a great weekend with them.

We went to Bearlake for Labor day. Leah LOVED the water. I was surprised to see how brave she was on the tube. She was standing up dancing and leaning over the side touching the water. She is a dare devil. 


We had an AMAZING summer. Leah keeping getting funner and funner, can't wait for next summer. Hopefully we can find some things to do in the horrible, cold, winter.

Family Pictures

It's time for Family Pictures again, can't believe it's been a year since the last ones. Leah has gotten so big. Thanks to Kim for doing an amazing job, as always.

Here's our little family.....

 Love the pictures of Leah, I wanted to post them all, but I didn't. They really showed her personality. In all the pictures Leah has a peach or a dandelion thing. Who want's to take pictures when there is so much stuff to explore and play with?

 All Leah wanted to do was run around. There was way too much open space and freedom!

I can't not believe Leah is almost 2 years old, time has gone by so fast. She is so so BIG!

Sick Day

This little face is what gets me through the day. Leah and I have both been sick this weekend, so I have had the wonderful experience of taking a nap with her and hanging out on the couch watching movies with her. For a sick day it has been an absolutely wonderful day!!!

Swimming

We went swimming today for play group and it was so so much fun. I had Brad blow up Leah's floater on Sunday and Leah was thrilled. She spent all day playing in it.

 First thing this morning, Leah wanted to play in her "fishy" instead of eating breakfast.

 Finally we got to the pool. At first Leah did not want to get in the water, she was terrified. I was shocked, she loved the pool and the lake last year and she LOVES the bath tub. Fortunately it didn't take her long to figure out how much fun the water is.

 Leah climbing up the slide. She had a hard time climbing up, she would climb up a few stairs and then try and climb back down. All the other kids were climbing up and sliding down, so I am not sure why she didn't want to do it.

 The few times she did go down the slide she was very scared, she wouldn't even go down by herself. She goes down our slide at home all the time, weird.

 Leah loved that she could walk around in the water and lay by the water fountains. So much more fun then sitting in her "fishy" and me carrying her around.

 Leah in her fishy. She still loves the fishy and still wanted to play with it at home, out of the water.

 Had to share a few more pictures. Leah reading her "stories".

Helping Daddy pack. She had so much fun taking the clothes that Brad was packing out of the suitcase so she could climb in. She wanted to go with her daddy. Look how cute her little skirt is, my Mom made it for her cause I had nothing to go with the sweater.

Work is getting busier and busier with tax season, so I am trying to take every opportunity to play with Leah and take pictures. She is seriously so much fun.

My Baby is not a Baby Anymore

 I absolutely love Leah getting older. In my opinion, this toddler stuff is by far more fun then the newborn stuff. Brad and I say all the time that our next kid just needs to come out a toddler instead of a newborn. Leah as a newborn was tough, lots of crying and sleep less nights. Now she sleeps all night and wakes up excited for a new day. She is constantly reminding me that she is not a baby anymore. 

 Today when she woke up from her nap she saw her necklaces hanging on her shelf and she insisted that she wore all of her bracelets and necklace. I would put one on and she would point and say more in sign language until she finally had them all on. Then she had a major fit when I took the bracelets off for dinner. All day she walked around showing off her "pretty, pretty".

 This is pretty much what we do all day. Leah destroys everything that she comes in contact with and climbs in every box, basket, bin she can find, even if it is way too small for her. She also carries her baby around everywhere. Leah got a grocery cart for her birthday and she always puts her purse on her shoulder and puts her baby in the basket and pushes the grocery cart around. She loves it!!!

 I "taught" Leah how to color last week, thanks to Amy's suggestion. I thought Leah was way to young and would not care for it at all. I was completely wrong. She LOVED it. She likes to have more than one color though.

 We took Leah to the park the other weekend and she loved it. However, all she wanted to do was walk around in the snow, silly girl!

 Here is me and Leah. I love that leah says "WEEEE" when we go down the slide!

 Leah loves to have her picture taken, most of the time. She either gets excited or tries to grab the camera. Today though everytime I got the camera out she came and sat on my lap. Leah likes to look at the pictures on the camera right after we take them, so maybe that is why she kept doing it. Oh and Leah's hair is finally growing, her are her pathetic pig tails.

 Guess who this is??? This is what happens when I wash Leah's blankets. Before I can even grab them out of the laundry basket she already has ALL of them and is all cuddled up.

 

So today Leah decided that she is way too big for her high chairs. For the past week or so she has fought me to sit in her high chairs cause she knows that there is a big girl chair at the table, until today I have been able to convince her to sit in her high chair. Today I would put her in her chair and she would get as stiff as she could and scream and point to her big girl seat. When I said, "Let's eat", she would immediately run to her big girl seat. Man I am going to miss the highchair, it is so much cleaner. 

 To celebrate my Grandma's birthday and my Grandpa's retirement the whole family went bowling. It was a lot of fun. Sad that these are the only two pictures I took.

 "Jaxson" was one of Leah's first words. She loves her cousin Jaxson. When ever we go to Nana's she says "Jaxson" as we get out of the car, when we pulled up to Jaxson's house, she says "Jaxson". She loves him so much and follows him around like crazy. Leah was lucky enough to go outside and play with Jaxson one day. Jaxson was dying to go out and play and Leah was not about to let him go out alone. So Jaxson collected sand toys and they went outside to build "snow castles", they had so much fun. Ever since that day, Leah ALWAYS wants to go outside. She pounds at the back door and says "out". Whenever we come in from the car she tries to run to the front yard. I can't wait til it is warmer, so I actually want to go outside with her.

Tonight Leah's friend, Eden, came over to play for a few minutes. I had no idea how much fun they have together. Leah gets to play with Eden 2 times a week and is always so excited to go over there. It was so funny to see Leah giggle at everything Eden did and follow her around. I was amazed how nice Leah was to her too.

I bought this costume for Leah off the clearance racks a while ago. Leah found it in her closet and insisted that I put it on. She had so much fun wobbling around in it. She is such a girl.

 This is all we do lately, read stories. Leah is totally obsessed. All day long she brings me stories and insists that I sit down and read them too her. She also spends a lot of time reading them to herself. I wish I knew what she was saying when she reads them, she goes on and on. My dad made her a rocking chair for Christmas and Leah sits in it and I sit in my rocking chair and we each read books; unfortunately, I HAVE to read whatever she gives me. It is so cute. I hope she always loves reading.

One last thing. My mom came over the other night and Leah came to the door when I answered it. Today when the UPS man rang the door bell, Leah ran to the door screaming "Nana, Nana". She was so disappointed when I opened the door and there was no Nana. I shut the door and Leah just cried. I can't believe she remembered that Nana was at the door a few days earlier. 

Leah is so much fun. I can't believe how girly she is already. I love every minute of being a Mom!

I am so sad I didn't ever post anything about Christmas and New Years, they were awesome. But at least I finally posted about what we have been doing in 2011!