Playing Catch-Up December 2011

December was pretty busy, with Erin's birthday, Christmas and out-of-town family. We had a great time celebrating Erin's birthday, I can't believe she's three already!!!


Actual Christmas was pretty low-key. We had been so busy leading up to it I didn't even finish decorating until Christmas eve! The girls got their Christmas jammies on Christmas eve and were so excited to wear them to bed. Christmas morning was so much fun watching the girls open their presents. They loved everything they got, but especially their lalaloopsy dolls; they each got a big one from grandma and grandpa Standage and a small one from mom and dad. I got a Blendtec (mostly from my parents), something I had been wanting for a very long time. I absolutely adore it. Paigey slept through the whole thing, on my lap and daddy helped clean up as we went.


A month later and the girls STILL love their baby sister. Shelby asks to hold Paige any chance she gets and they both dote on her all the time.


We had so much fun with cousins over the two weeks my brother and his family were here. I'm sad I didn't take any pictures. My sister and I brought our families over to my parents several time to just hang out, let the kids play together and eat yummy food...SO much yummy food. It was wonderful.

Playing Catch-Up November 2011

Well OBVIOUSLY the biggest thing that happened this month (and year) was the birth of our third daughter. Paige Elise was born on November 11th, weighing 5 lbs 11 oz and measuring 17 1/2 inches long (a little peanut just like Erin).

Birth story in a nutshell, I started and stopped labor almost nightly the three weeks before Paige was born. By the end, it was totally driving me crazy and I wanted her here so badly! I had anticipated her arrival since about 37-38 weeks, especially since Erin was 3 1/2 weeks early. But she came right around 40 weeks. The day of, I finally decided to just go in, even though at the time we left to drop the kids at grandma's I was still unsure. 30 minutes later, dropping the kids at grandma's I knew I should have already been at the hospital. Dang, this was turning out like Erin's birth all over again (I cannot get the hyperlink to work so if you want to read Erin's birth story, look back at December 2008). Luckily the hospital was only another 5 minutes to get there. Getting out of the car and walking in to the hospital was so HARD. I had to stop and grab onto Ben during an intense contraction and this guy took pity on me and ran and got me a wheel chair. He said he had just done it the day before with his wife so he knew what we were going through.

Well, we got checked in and everything was fast and furious from there. Paige was born shortly thereafter and all was well. We had lots of family visit, we loved seeing you!




While I was in the hospital, Shelby and Erin got to stay with grandma the whole weekend!!! Their favorite part was helping grandma with the apples she picked from the orchard. They got to help peel them, make applesauce and dried apples.



I'm sure their other favorite part was playing with Aunt Laura. She's the best auntie ever and ALL the cousins favorite!!!


Later in November we got back to potty training, since Erin had relapsed just before Paige was born. (I'm glad the stress of that is mostly over now).

Playing Catch-Up - October 2011

Not much was happening around here in October. Although, I was nesting a ton, trying to get everything ready for baby's arrival. I also completed a few sewing projects, mainly the girl's Halloween costumes.


Shelby wanted to be Rapunzel so we found a great pattern for the dress and a tutorial on the internet for the wig. I think it turned out pretty good. That dress was probably the most complex pattern I have ever sewn. Actually half way through cutting it out, was thinking this is way to much fabric for a kid's dress! I realized that I had got the misses size instead of the children's size. So, I basically had to make my own pattern pieces off the ones I had. Oh well, thankfully it worked. I made sure to take my time so the dress would look presentable. It took a lot of time and effort but it was totally worth it. Shelby loves it so much and wore it EVERY day for the longest time. She still wears it when her friends come over to play dress-up.


Erin wanted to be a witch. I just kept it simple since I had spent so much time on Shelby's dress. I just made a tunic-type dress and got her leggings and her little hat headband.



I just had to throw this picture in. My family should appreciate this. I reminded me of a similar picture of my sister and I when we were around that age.

CHARACTERS!!! Love 'em though.

Playing Catch-up - August and September 2011

So, August was pretty much filled with soccer, soccer and more soccer. You can read my one and only post on that here.

Another fun highlight was going to the Sweets Candy Factory. We met Grandma and Grandpa Heiner, Parson and Josh up there, along with Uncle Dan and Aunt Melissa and Olivia, Aunt MaryAnn and baby Cordelia. We all had lots of fun and remarkably enough, the girls were very good and didn't run of.





September we had more soccer. I also got to go to Time Out For Women in Logan, my second year in a row. I loved being able to go with my mom, sister and Aunt Janet. We got to spend the night this time so we had lots of fun girl time.



I did a little garage sale-ing (like 2 or 3 times), looking for baby items and possible Christmas gifts for the girls. My most successful trip I came home with a baby car seat, baby bath, new Cinderella dress-up dress, some kid games and my best purchase....this bike trailer. Ben got a new bike last February and tried to buy a trailer but it didn't fit so he had to take it back. I was pretty sure this was going to fit on his bike to I took a chance and it payed off!! Both Ben and the girls were sooooo thrilled about the new trailer, it became a great source of fun for them the rest of the summer and into fall.

Playing Catch-Up July 2011

Ohhhhh, it has been so long since I've updated. I have really needed to but just kept putting it off and it kept getting harder and harder to want to do it as the time passed. So, in an effort to keep things brief, I'll just do the highlights from each month, starting in July. Then, maybe I can keep this up a little better.

JULY 2011
Probably the most exciting thing we did in July was go to Idaho for the Thomas Family reunion (Ben's Parker side of the family). We went camping and the girls were so excited to sleep in a tent. Luckily, I had just barely gotten over my morning sickness, so that didn't stop us from going. We went to the reunion last year, held in Oregon, and had so much fun with the family, we couldn't wait to go again.

We went to this tiny part of Idaho, about 7 hours away, near the city of Council. It was still the hot part of the summer, so the days were pretty intense but the evenings got nice and cool, and actually pretty cold during the middle of the night.

When camping, s'mores and a camp fire are a must-have!! We didn't to do a camp fire until the second night and the girls had lots of fun helping dad build the fire and roast the marshmallows.







The girls loved being in the tent and getting to sleep in it at night.

Look at that face!!!! What a cutie. I can't believe how little she looks only 6 months ago.


Shelby, of course, eating a pb&j and very proudly showing off her necklace she and daddy made at the kids craft table earlier.




By the end of our time there, we were all pretty tuckered out!


Another fun thing July brought was a new (to us) bike for Shelby. I got it pretty cheap off KSL just around the corner from our house. The girls went out riding and had a blast. I wanted Shelby to be proficient enough to ride so that she could ride her bike when I go walking and the two little girls could go in the double jogger. I think we're going to have to work on it more, come spring; I don't think she rode it quite enough to last on a walk.



Erin since has taken over the scooter and is very good at it. She loves it too!



Ok, more to come....