Catching Up

We haven't been very good at keeping up on our blog in the past few months. But we finally got around to doing 6 posts below. Enjoy!

Santa Claus

Last week, our ward had a Primary party with Santa Claus. Both girls were happy to sit on Santa's lap, and Clara told him what she wanted for Christmas.

Windstorm

On December 1 - 2, we had a crazy windstorm in Davis County. Wind speeds were nearly 100 miles per hour. Unfortunately, our house suffered some damage. We lost two big trees, a lot of shingles, part of a fence, pieces of rain gutter, and had a lot of garbage blow into our yard.

Anniversary Trip to Vegas

For our 9th wedding anniversary, we took a trip to Las Vegas. Jeff's mom was nice enough to watch our girls for three days so that we could go. We didn't take a lot of pictures, but we sure had a lot of fun.

On the first day, we flew down to Vegas and checked into our hotel. We stayed at the Aria Resort, which was AMAZING! We ate at the Aria buffet, and ate so much crab, lobster, and other delicious food that we could hardly move.

The second day we went to the M&M store, the Coca-Cola store, an arcade, and walked around a few hotels. At the Coca-Cola store, we did the "Around the World" soda tasting, where you get 16 different sodas from around the world. Some of them were really good, but some were terrible. There was one drink from Italy that was by far the worst. It was fun to watch other people around us take a drink of it and almost throw up. That night, we ate at a really nice Spanish restaurant in our hotel, then we went to the Venetian and saw "The Phantom of the Opera."

A Jelly Belly Statute of Liberty at the New York, New York hotel

The "Around the World" soda tasting at the Coca-Cola store

Outside our hotel

Of course, we had to stop by the Bellagio for the fountain show

On the third day, we walked around some more hotels, went shopping, and ate lunch at Bobby Flay's restaurant Mesa Grill. It was amazing! That night we saw Cirque de Soleil's "Ka" at the MGM Grand. It was a spectacular production.

Halloween

We had a great Halloween. Ashlyn dressed up as a ladybug, and Clara was a "poodle skirt dancer" (as she told people). Luckily, we had good weather this year, so we were able to go trick-or-treating around the neighborhood for over an hour. Clara was really loving trick-or-treating, and was sad when we finally had to quit.

The girls went trick-or-treating at Jeff's work

Pumpkins

We continued our tradition of going to the Pack Farms Pumpkin Patch. It's fun to pick out your own pumpkin, plus they have a hay maze and some other activities.

Finding our way through the hay maze

Ashlyn wasn't real excited about the hay maze, but she loved the stairs

Looking for the perfect pumpkin

Too big to take home, but just right for sitting on

The finished product

Hogle Zoo

In October, we took the girls to Hogle Zoo. They loved it! Their favorite things were watching the monkeys play, watching the elephants eat, playing on the playground at the zoo, and climbing on the statues.

Ashlyn Turns One

Okay, I'm a month late, but better now than never.

My baby is one! It's gone so fast. It's a bit different having Ashlyn turn one because with Clara I was already pregnant with Ashlyn so it almost seemed better at the time that she was getting a little bit older and more able.

We went to the doctor and here's where she's at:

weight: 19.6 lbs - 25%
height: 30 inches - 88%
BMI: 15.28 - 10%
Head circ: 18 inches 60%

Ashlyn is changing every day. Some words that she sometimes says:

Mama
Dada
Uh or Ara = Clara
Uh (then blows air) = Uh-Oh
chs = cheese
whasa = What's that?
She also will sometimes repeat things after you ask her to, but she doesn't really say much else on her own right now.

She's walking very well at this point. She walks with her knees wide and lifts them high with each step. It's really cute. Her and Clara are the best of friends. Clara is a friendly girl and doesn't have a problem making friends, but one day when we could hear Ashlyn on the baby monitor that she was awake, Clara said "Let's go get my best friend, Ashlyn!". This makes me very happy. I'm not saying that they don't fight some, but that's to be expected.

We did an animal theme for her birthday because whenever we go to Lagoon, Ashlyn loves riding the train. When we're standing in line and we're holding her, she will lean her body toward the train to try to get us to go. She loves to look at the animals and she will reach out to them when we pass them. She also has loved seeing cats at family members houses.

Raspberry lemonade and double chocolate cupcakes!

Ashlyn had no problem with the concept of opening presents. Christmas is going to be a blast!

Very small nibbles at first.

Oh but it didn't take long for her to get the idea. She wouldn't let me take it away! She was at it for about 20 minutes. She also had a couple of other little girls to help (Clara and Cambree):).

Stopping to pose for the camera.

A quick clean-up in the kitchen sink.

Birthday rasperries from Grandma.

My silly girls

I haven't blogged a lot lately and I have so many fun pictures that I would just put all in one post.

Ashlyn loves bananas...

and yogurt.

Scary Ashlyn (I know I'm a mean mom for even taking this picture, let alone thinking it's funny.)...

Cute Ashlyn.

We had so much fun at Jeff's sister's ranch.

The girls have had lots of fun playing with the new water table.

My little mommy.

Clara's owie from burning herself on a sparkler :(

Heeeyyy!

Cute matching outfits.