Christmas at Opryland

Right before my parents got into town, we met Auntie Doris and her husband Clarke for breakfast at the Opryland Hotel. It was so fun to visit and to walk around for a bit. Here are a couple pictures from that visit.

Ruby loves to climb and sit in chairs, laundry baskets, anything. The other day Rob found her in the play shopping cart. She somehow climbed in and sat herself down without tipping it over. Kudos, Ruby!

Here's a picture of our cute, and independent little dresser, Gracie! I'd like to send a special shout out to her Auntie Emily for the groovy pants...they make for a sweet, bright, floral ensemble, no?

Thanksgiving

We were so lucky to have my parents and brother and girlfriend, Eila, join us for Thanksgiving Break.

We started out eating at the Loveless Cafe. Oh yum. You guys have to come visit us and we'll eat there. Just don't be on a diet :) Out front they had an old tractor. Grandpa showed Grace the tractor-driving ropes from his youth, and she was off.


We had a delicious Thanksgiving dinner. Just one the many wonderful things about having my parents in town was not having to stress over doing a turkey on our own :) We showed the fam our beautiful Warner Parks on a little hike/geocaching adventure after dinner to work off some of that delicousness.


Through school, Rob had heard about a company called Stray Boots that does text message scavenger hunts in different cities. They just started one in Nashville, so we went. They text you clues and where to go and you text in your answers and then get another clue. It was so cool to learn about Nashville history and walk through downtown this way.






Grace doing what Grace does best...taking hundreds of pictures of minutiae with my iPod. Oh how I love sorting through the pictures after she's played with it for a while! :)

Of course we had to get some family pictures in while we were all together.






By the end of the week, we were all tired and happy!


Thanks everyone for making the trek to Nashville! It was so fun to have everyone here!

Nutcracker

Grace and I went to see the mini-Nutcracker put on by the city ballet league. All the performers are under 18, and they did a great job! One of Grace's friends had older sisters performing in it. Grace was great and sat on my lap the whole time, completely enamored with the beautiful ballerinas on stage. She even got her program signed by the Sugar Plum Fairy!

Fall Hiking

While it was warmer, the girls and I would go hiking with our friends the Meeks once a week or so. Katie has two boys whose birthdays are just weeks apart from my girls', so it's really fun for everyone. Luckily, Katie remembered to bring her camera on one of the more spectacular Fall days.

This day was so cute because Eli and Grace were playing Grandpa and Grandma. They'd call each other Grandpa and Grandma. Grace would say "hey Grandpa, can you help me over this log?" and Grandpa would come running to the rescue and help Grace. The whole time they called each other Grandpa and Grandma and Grandma would always be in need of some help and the ever-chivalrous Grandpa would run to poor Grandma's aid. It was so cute. They really get along well with each other!






How cute are Grandma and Grandpa posing together? They were cracking us up the whole time!








Obviously a kid took this one. See Katie's smile? She is one of my favorite friends because we always laugh on our hikes even when the kids are exhausted and we're what seems like miles from the car. I think it was this day that we took a reaaaaaaaly long route and the kids were tired halfway through. We ended up running most of the way to the car (even with kiddos on our backs!). The only way to get the kids moving was to pretend to get on our starting blocks and yell "on your mark, get set, go!" and we'd all run for 100 yards or so, then do it again. Even that was fun with Katie to laugh through it with!

Baby MacGyver

Ruby is so funny these days, she's been having a tough time napping and is often just playing in her crib. We think she throws all her blankets and stuff out of the crib, then tries to escape with them. It's really funny to watch her on the monitor trying to climb out of her crib. Yikes...can't wait for the day she actually can....not.

There's a trash can in her room behind the rocking chair that is often knocked over and the trash is in her crib when we go to get her up. We could not figure out how this was even possible because we would move the trash can way out of arm's reach for every nap. One day Rob happened to be watching Ruby on the monitor and caught her doing it. Baby MacGyver would hold on to one end of her blanket and toss the other end at the trash can until it would catch, then she would pull the blanket so it would knock the trash can towards her crib and she could reach her little arms down and pick stuff up. I was blown away that she figured out how to do it, and only with what she had in the crib!

She is also a dare devil. She is walking a lot now, but isn't too sure on her feet. Often, if Grace runs out of a room, she'll run after her and more often than not end up on her face :( She gets really excited and lunges and things and people with no regard for bodily safety.


Yesterday, she was walking around near the coffee table and ate it on the edge of the table and was bleeding a lot from her nose and mouth, talk about scary! I'm so glad Rob was home, because I freaked out. After a call to the Ped, a little Tylenol, and some cuddling, she was walking around again and everything seemed okay with a minimum of blood on everyone. What a trooper!

Here's my "trying to be not freaked out and smile at the same time" look :)

so much to be thankful for

I love thinking about all of my blessings this time of year. I am grateful for my wonderful, amazing husband. I am grateful for my sweet, loving and helpful little Gracie. I am grateful for my sweet and stubborn little Ruby. I am also so grateful to have wonderful parents, in-laws, brothers and sisters (in-laws and "regular"), nieces, nephews, cousins, everyone. I love family and am so grateful to have so much family that I adore spending time with. I am grateful for my own health and my family's health. Despite being a bit heavier than I'd like to be, I am grateful that I can run and play and roll on the floor with my kids and can cook and clean my home and do pretty much anything that I want to without pain or discomfort. I am grateful that Rob has been offered a great job that he has accepted with HP. While I may have been a bit happier to be moving to the West, I am excited to be headed to Plano, TX and for the adventure that awaits us there.

Most of all, I am grateful for my belief in God and Jesus Christ and the sacrifice that was made for me that I can return to live with God again. I am grateful for a living prophet and scriptures to give guidance to my life. I am also grateful for temples where I can be sealed to my family for time and all eternity.

I have been blessed so bountifully and am thankful for a special time to reflect upon my blessings and to thank God for them. I hope that I will remember more of this stuff that matters coming into the Christmas season, and not get so wrapped up in the fluff.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Birthday Bubles!

(Bubles rhymes with Rubles (roo-bulls))


One year ago, we welcomed our sweet and gigantic baby Ruby into our family. What a blessing she has been to us. She is so sweet and stubborn. We sure do love her! Grace is especially happy to have a little sister to love on, boss around and be a little mommy and friend to.










The classic "bib" cake. Ruby got one little mini cake and Grace got the other :)


Ruby dug right in to the cake. By the end she had decimated it and loved every moment!







Happy Birthday Sweet Baby Girl! We love you!