Easter

From April-June, life has been full of buying a house and moving, and I've gotten sadly behind on my blogging.  So here's to catching up!

For Easter this year, we went down to Provo to be with my parents.  I came down with the girls during the week, and DJ joined us on the weekend.  It was nice to be able to be with family and just relax!

I got Easter dresses for the girls in Nikki's wedding colors, since the wedding was later that same week.  I loved the dresses I was able to find!

Easter dresses and baskets for the girls:

Lex in her Easter dress:

Mia in her Easter dress:

My cute babies:

A real-life shot:

And the traditional family on the front porch Easter shot:

Goodbye, Granny House!

Ever since we've been married, I've made a point of doing a blog post with a "tour" of each home we lived in.  I never got around to doing it with my Ogden house while I actually lived there, cause I pretty much hated it.  However, I did live there for nearly 10 months, so it deserves to be documented.

Here is the girls' room.  it was pretty crowded, but it was okay.  I decorated in here because I wanted Lexsi to feel comfortable as soon as we moved in.  It's really the only room in the house that ever got decorated.

Our bedroom.  It was so tiny that all we could fit was our king-sized bed.  Seriously.  And yes, I had blankets up in the windows.  it helped block the sun better, and I didn't want to have to buy more curtains and curtain rods that I'd never use again.  So we went with this ridiculous look.  

Here's our bedroom again, after we moved and it was all clean.  Now do you see why I originally decided we should live in this house?  When it's empty, it looks decent.  Not awesome, but livable.  But pictures don't accurately portray the size.  Or the lack of circulation/insane heat (there was no AC, no swamp cooler and no screens in the windows).  Or the smell.

This was the closet in our bedroom.  It's not any bigger than what you can see here... literally the width of a standard door.  And no rod in it to hang anything on... it was bad.

This is the third bedroom, which we turned into our closet.  We had dressers in here, bought cheap clothes racks for our hanging clothes, and also had storage in here.  It wasn't awesome.  Mia also slept in this room for a while in the Pack and Play.

Upstairs bathroom.  It wasn't terrible, but again-- no screen in the window and no fan or ventilation, so it got super hot.  And I HATED the tiled counter.  

The stairs going down to the main level of the house.  Let's take a moment to recognize the lack of hand rail on a steep flight of stairs.  And that purple carpet.  I'd like to believe it was on an insane clearance, not that  someone ever really thought it was a beautiful choice.  It's so purple. And hotel-quality.  Also, imagine my concern that these are these steep, railing-less stairs are the ones Lexsi learned to walk down on.  And picture me at 9 months pregnant, carrying a 19-month-old Lex on my hip with nothing to hold onto as I walked downstairs. Yikes.

Okay now we're down on the main level of the house.  This is the view when you walked in the "front" door, which was technically on the side of the house.  We used the closet on the left as a pantry, the closet on the right as storage mainly for tools.

This room is to the right of the closets in the previous picture.  The floor is totally uneven, the carpet is gross... BUT it was nice to have the big space as a toy room.  We put down a big carpet we had that was leftover from our Spanish Fork house, and it covered the majority of the yucky carpet.  The closet in the back of this room was a pretty big size, and was good for storage.

The utility room was in the toy room, and it just deserves to be documented simply because of it's ridiculously small size.  The water heater is BEHIND the furnace, and to get to it you have to turn sideways, step over a pipe, duck under another pipe... it's stupid.  And our water had issues lots of times there, so we were back there far more often than we should have been.

Thr view of the kitchen/living room from the entry way.

Here is the tiny tiny living room.  I should have taken pictures before the furniture was all moved out.  It is SO SMALL.  And the weird, blocked off fireplace with one tile glued to the front is a particularly nice touch, don't you think?

View from the living room by the fireplace back toward the entry way.

Here's the kitchen.  The cabinets are decent.  The counter top is tiled and done terribly.  It's totally uneven.  Also the floor tiles were uneven and broken in some areas.  All in all, not the worst room of the house.

Laundry nook off of the kitchen.

Teeny tiny half bath by the kitchen.  Notice how low that mirror is hung.  I had to stand all the way back in the kitchen before I was able to see my head in it.  HA!

One last view from the entryway.  This space was one of the most frustrating of the house.  The space between the kitchen counter and the wall with the windows on it was just small enough that you couldn't fit a table in it, but big enough that it was too big to be just a walkway... it's just an awkward space.  Also that door on the back wall is technically the front door of the house, but we never used it because our living room furniture was in front of it most of the time.

And finally, here's the exterior of the house.

After seeing these pictures, you may think I'm a total snob.  I really don't think I am.  The space was decent I suppose.  It worked for us for 10 months.  The biggest problems are that the space is cut up in choppy, weird ways that make it hard to use, and it's quite obvious that the owner doesn't care much about the property.  The walls are plaster and have about a billion holes in them.  Even if the holes were filled and a fresh coat of paint was put everywhere it would make a huge difference.  The smell of this place was just... disgusting.  Even after we had lived in it for a long time, the house smelled so gross.  It was a combination of musty carpet, cats, and just plain oldness.  Bad.  And there were serious bug issues.  Ants were all over the tile in the kitchen and I killed SO many spiders. The outside doors weren't tight in their frames, so bugs came in all the time.  I sprayed bug spray around the doors, windows and base boards every few days.  Not cool.  I never really wanted people to come to my house, cause I wasn't comfortable in it.  There wasn't space for entertaining.  I usually LOVE having people come over!  I love having parties.  I became a hermit in this house because of it's weirdness.  And I also was always worried when people smelled it, they would think it was MY fault it smelled bad.  It's not.  I mopped the floor at least once a day with bleach.  I kept it clean.  It's just a yucky house.

The house is on a really busy street, which is not awesome.  It's also not in a good neighborhood.  I've been very vocal about not liking to live in Ogden, and this is the main reason why.  I never went outside with my girls cause I didn't feel safe, even in my own yard.  Within a couple of weeks of moving to Brigham City, there was a drive-by shooting at the house next door to my Ogden house.  You will never ever convince me that it's a safe place to live.  Do I think there are better places in Ogden that you could live?  Absolutely.  Do I think you're a bad person if you love living in Ogden and want to raise your kids there and be there forever?  Not at all!  I don't like being in a big city.  I LOVE Brigham City, mostly because it's nice and small.  I recognize that this is a matter of personal preference.  There are plenty of people (my own parents and siblings being at the top of the list) that joke about small-town life and wouldn't want to live in a small town.  I'm fine with that.  It's not for everyone, just like big cities are not for everyone, and that's fine.

This house really never felt like home.  Any excuse I had to leave Ogden and go stay at my mom's for a few days I took.  I always dreaded coming back to Ogden.  I always knew that it was a temporary thing, so I didn't make a huge effort to make it my home.  I'm grateful for experiences that I had while living there, but I'm so very very grateful to have moved to a place that feels comfortable, and most importantly, like home.

All about Lex

Life is so busy, it seems like I really only blog when it's time to do Mia's monthly updates.  I want to remember some of the awesome things Lexsi is doing as well!

- First of all-- 2 years old?  I love it.  It's such an awesome age!  Does it come with fits?  Yes. (Lex is throwing a fit as I type this because she doesn't want to pray before bed.  I mean... really?  So silly).  BUT I love this age so so much!  Lexsi is learning so much and she's so funny!

- Lexsi's vocabulary is so big!  She can say anything she wants in English, and her Spanish is coming along really well too!  If you've never heard a toddler speak Spanish, you're totally missing out!  It's pretty much the cutest thing ever!

- Lex can pray all by herself in English {SO cute!}.  She can start and end her prayers by herself in Spanish.

- She is obsessed with playing outside.  She loves jumping on the trampoline and climbing the rocks in our back yard.  She also loves going on walks, particularly to the park!

- She has started attending Nursery at church alone (I was the Nursery leader in our previous ward), and is doing well with it.  She still cries when we leave her (it's only been 3 times now), but it doesn't last long and she's happy as can be when we come pick her up!

- Any time someone sneezes, she promptly responds, "Bless you!" and then fake coughs, expecting you to say "Bless you!" back to her.  She also says "Bless you!" to herself when she sneezes.

- She is getting very social, and always waves and says hi to other kids at the park.  She also really enjoys playing with other kids.

- She is so good at puzzles!  We have a few, and she likes to do them in Nursery as well.

- She is a really great big sister!  She loves Mia so much, and usually lets her play alongside her.  Also when we eat meals, I feed Mia and in between bites Lex is always asking, "You want some more, Mia?"  It's so cute.

- Since moving to Brigham City, the girls have been sharing a room.  At first I was putting Mia to bed before Lexsi and then if Mia cried Lexsi would cry too and be angry that Mia was making noise so I'd end up pulling Mia back out and rocking her back to sleep and then trying to sneak in and get her back in bed without waking either girl up... it was pretty exhausting.  After about a week of that, we bit the bullet and made them figure it out one night.  One would cry and the other would scream, then one would start to finally calm down and the other would cry again and restart the whole ordeal.  It took about an hour that first night, but since then they've been really good about going to bed and neither of them cry.  If one does happen to cry it usually doesn't last long and doesn't make the other cry any more.  I'm not a "cry it out" person, but this situation was a little different to me, since they were both crying simply because they were angry that the other was making noise, not because they needed anything from me.

- When Lex gets frustrated, she runs into her room and closes the door and read books or climbs into bed and snuggles her kitty to calm down.  I'm impressed with her for figuring this out all on her own.  She realizes she's upset and rather than hit or throw fits, she just removes herself from the situation.  It's pretty great!

- Lexsi is 100% in love with Disney Princesses.  She knows all their names, what songs they sing, what prince they marry, what colors their dresses are, etc.  If I ever want her to wear something that she doesn't necessarily want to, all I have to say is that it's a princess article of clothing and she'll promptly wear it.  Like today before church I gave her two options of dresses and initially she wasn't wanting either one, but when I told her they were Belle and Aurora dresses, she quickly agreed to wear the "Belle" dress.  It may seem silly, but whatever works, right?

- Lex knows her colors really well (in English and Spanish).

- Just a little bit about her Spanish--  She clearly comprehends everything in Spanish.  DJ can tell her anything and she responds.  She plays games on his iPad in Spanish and understands them.  If she ever watches movies, it's in Spanish.  She obviously hears more English since I'm the one home with her all the time, but now that DJ is home for the summer she's definitely speaking more Spanish.  A couple weeks ago she was out on the trampoline and burst out singing the chorus to "The Wise Man and the Foolish Man" in Spanish.  Just imagine our surprise and amusement to hear her belting out, "La lluvia cayo!  La lluvia cayo!" as she ran around dancing.  SO cute!

-The other night in the bath tub, Lex leaned toward Mia, who had a messy face, and exclaimed, "Tan sucio!"

- If she wants something really badly, she knows that if she says "please" she's likely to get it.  Today she came up to me and said, "Mama, go the trampoline together please?" And of course I went.  How could I resist?

- She wears her princess dress ups every day.  I love it!

- Lex gets to choose her own clothes, and after she chooses her shirt I always ask if she wants to wear pants, shorts or a skirt.  Without fail, her response is, "A skirt!"  She's such a girly girl, which I think is awesome!

- She has recently fallen in love with Vocal Point and Alex Boye music videos.  She sings along and dances and it's so cute!

- She is an excellent singer.  She especially loves, "Itsy 'Ditzy' Spider" {Ha!}, "Wheels on the Bus," "I am a Child of God," "Once There Was a Snowman," "Do as I'm Doing," and of course, anything Disney!

- Lex doesn't say her "f" sound.  Instead, when it's a "fl" sound like in "flower,"  she says, "Plower." When it stands along, she substitutes an "h."  I can't tell you how often she says, "Mama, help you hind it!"  when she wants me to help her look for something.  Pretty funny.

- Rather than saying "yes," she says, "Yeppy!"  Hilarious.

This girl is just all-around amazing!  She keeps us laughing and smiling all day.  She has such a funny, sassy little personality and is so smart.  We love our Lex so much!

Here she is looking at the Angel Moroni on the temple.  She LOVES taking walks to the temple!

 This girl loves her pop!  

She is kind of obsessed with sunglasses.  She came out of her room like this one morning:

Just dancing with Daddy (this happens a lot around here!)

Another walk to the temple, this time in her Cinderella dress:

She got to choose a new swimming suit, and naturally she picked this hot pink tutu one!  I love her :)

Enjoying a little chocolate and playing princesses:

She wears my shoes all the time and requested that I take a picture of her like this one evening:

Just a typical day with Lex, out for a walk:

I love her style!

Her cousins came up to play one day last week, and she had the time of her life!

Here she is wearing a dress that my mom made for my older sister when she was little. 

8 Months!

Mia Mae is 8 months old today-- where is the time going?

- Mia has learned how to scoot/army crawl VERY efficiently!  I definitely have to keep a closer eye on her now.  Lexsi doesn't love that Mia can get into her stuff really easily, either!

- Her favorite foods are spaghetti, pizza and bananas.  She eats any fruits or vegetables I give her.  The only food she really doesn't love is yogurt.  If I'm ever eating chocolate or DJ is eating a Popsicle she gets SO excited because she wants to share with us!

- She thinks DJ is the funniest!  Whenever she sees him she starts fake laughing to get his attention in hopes that he'll play with her.

- Lexsi is her best friend!  They play together really well most of the time, and when one starts giggling the other starts too and it just goes on and on and it's hilarious!

- She is super attached to me still.  She'll be fine without me for about an hour at a time and then she's over it and wants me.

- Mia goes to bed between 6:30-7:00 pm, and wakes up for the day around 7:30 am. She still wakes up in the night to eat, usually around 10:30 pm and 2 am.  She eats frequently throughout the day {table food}, and I'm not surprised she wants to do the same at night.  I'm okay with it.  Also she only nurses when she's going to sleep now, at nap times and bed time.  Other than that she's only eating table food.

- She is just so little!  I had to take in all the shorts that I bought for Lexsi the summer after she was born when she was only 4-5 months old.  Mia was too skinny for them!  She is still mostly in 0-3 month clothes, but wears 3-6 month PJ's and dresses so they're long enough.

- Her hair is coming in much lighter than Lexsi's.  She might even turn blonde!

Mia playing with water on the trampoline... she wasn't impressed:

Crazy sleeper:

Crinkly nose!  We love playing outside!

She always puts her feet up on the table and she thinks she's so tricky!

This night I was so frustrated cause Mia would NOT go to sleep and she kept crying and waking up Lexsi, so I just laid her on the floor in the living room so I could take a quick shower and she promptly rolled over and went to sleep.  Such a stinker!

Outside the temple:

Cutest little piggies!  It's funny cause her hair rubbed off in the middle of the back and is growing back in now, but the bottom is super long and so is the top.  So we have some funny looking business going on right now:

8 Months old with her zebra-- she's so pretty!

I love her curls SO much!

And for kicks, both girls at 8 months old.  Lex was chubbier, but their eye shape and noses are so similar!