2012 aka my year of being 28

It's so weird to be 29. Next year is the big 3-0. That will be weeeeeird! It sounds old, but I don't feel old. It's weird to look at my friends that are 25 and think, oh they are so young! Ha ha ha, life is weird. How many times do you think I can say "weird" in one paragraph? I think I need to go to bed...

Anyway, I better post my list of highlights from the past year since it's become kind of a tradition. I wasn't very good at blogging in 2012 so this list might be a little smaller than the norm since my memory is not the best. I guess I really am getting old! I swear birthing a child seriously diminishes brain cells. It's hard work people! :)

-At the beginning of the year we found out Ruby was a girl! I was super excited to be able to use all Lucy's old clothes and girly things again.

-Me and Lucy became pros at Just Dance 3. That's how we survived the cold, gloomy winter months.

-We started our co-op preschool with some of Lucy's friends and their moms and loooved it! It was just once a week but with a bunch of 2-year-olds, it was perfect. I loved hosting and coming up with fun craft projects for the kiddos.

-The potty training! Probably the hardest thing I've gone through as a mom thus far because it was such a drawn out process with Lucy. I'm talking like a year! It feels so good to be done with that. Holy cow, it was rough.

-Partied at the Niehoffs for Easter. Lucy loved "camping" with Daddy in the backyard in a tent. We sure love our east coast family.

-Enjoyed all my neighbor friends being pregnant with me. It was so fun getting together and talking about our pregnant lady woes and comparing how we were all feeling. We were all due within a month of each other. So crazy! Now all our babes are 7-8 months old!

-I gave birth to Ruby! And it was a quick labor! And Trey almost missed it! And I kept my head and actually used the hypnobirthing techniques I practiced! And I did it naturally!!! And I didn't die! And I might actually do it again! Well, maybe. :)

-Our summer was pretty mellow. We made it to Hershey Park a few times. My parents came out to help with Lucy while I recovered and took care of my newborn. Trey's parents came out over the 4th of July with cousin Morgan and the Mylers came down too. That was so fun. Lucy was in heaven with all her cousin friends.

-Trey finished his 3rd year (wahoo!), rocked Step 2, and applied for residency programs all over the country. He was invited to interview with most of them and he's had 11 interviews. It's going to be so hard to rank them because all the programs are so great. Wish us luck! :)

-We went to Utah in October and then again in December and surprised both of our parents for Christmas. Both sets of parents were completely surprised, it was perfect.

-Lucy started preschool in September. She goes every Tuesday and Thursday and absolutely loooves it! Her best friend Stockton is in her class.

-We took a road trip up to Ithaca, NY to stay with the Mylers over Thanksgiving break. We had such a great time! And the girls did great on the 3.5 hour drive.

-We took another road trip to Charlottesville, VA to go on an interview with Trey. Virginia is so beautiful! I could totally live there.

-We partied at a cabin in Eden, UT for New Years Eve with my fam. We were able to be together with my whole fam over the Christmas holiday and almost all of Trey's too. We had such a great time and Lucy and Ruby had fun playing with their cousins.

-I got released as a primary teacher and got called to be a librarian at church. Best calling ever! Especially when you have a baby. As long as you have awesome fellow librarians to help you out, which I do. :)

It's been a good year. It's so crazy to think that by this time next year we will probably be in a new place with new neighbors and friends. Trey will be a real doctor man and will be making real money!! Ahhh! So exciting! I'm so done with loans. Oh man. I try not to think about how in debt we are right now. Ha! I laugh so I don't cry. :)

Here is a pic of our little family of 4. We had pictures taken of all my fam since we were all together over the holidays and then each family had a few taken and this was the best of the few they took. It's not my fave but we'll take it since we haven't had family pictures taken since Lucy was 1. Luce was super excited about taking posed pictures, as per usual. :)

{8 months!}

Has it really been 8 months since our little Miss Ruby made her grand debut?! I can't believe how fast time has gone! My wee babe is so big these days. Especially in this picture in little jeans! You're killing me girl. Way too much cuteness going on here!

• Ruby grew another tooth! And this is the best part, it is her top right fang. Vampire baby!
• Her hair really filled in this past month and it looks darker.
• She took her first bath with sissy in Gma Robin's awesome yellow tub.
• She's very ticklish pretty much everywhere.
• She has a cute little cackle, but she saves her best belly laughs for Lucy of course. Ruby sure loves her big sis.
• Hair, eyelashes, and noses are fun to grab!
• She's started scooting! Crawling next? Nooooooo!
• Total daddy's girl. She always lights up when she see's him.
• This girl loves nibbling on apples. There is one way to make this girl mad and that is taking an apple slice away from her.
• She really enjoyed playing with her cousins in Utah this past month. She was in heaven being passed around and held and played with all the time.
• She got her first sickness in Utah, an eye infection, which then moved to the other eye when we got home. Poor thing.
• Loves peek-a-boo and playing airplane with mama
• Loves looking at herself in the mirror
• Lays on her side a lot
• Loves to stand and dance. Whenever music comes on she sways and bounces and flings her arms and legs around. Silly Ru!
• This girl gets so excited when Wheel of Fortune comes on.
• She loves when daddy throws her in the air and holds her upside down.

Happy 8 months sweetie pie!

P.S. We really do love our Lucy too, I've just been a huge slacker with blogging and have just done Ruby's monthly posts because they are easy and quick. I'll do a Lucy post real soon. She deserves it. She is one silly goose. Also, I need to do my annual "year in review" post I do on my birthday. That will be coming soon too...maybe. :)

Here are a few pics from the past month (in Utah)...

Rubes with her fellow baby cousins born in 2012 (from the Brenchley crew)

I love this one with Adam putting his hand on Sierra.

Ruby looks huge compared to little Sierra. So sweet!

 Ruby and cousin Reagan (from the Banbury crew)

 Reagan was looking for  Ruby's belly button.

 Heath and Helen's wedding!

 Back home again, trying to recover from having 2 eye infections. That little medicine bottle in one of her favorite things to chew on.

{7 months!}

Ruby's sweet little personality is shining through more and more everyday and I just love it. We can't get enough of this girl. She almost always has a smile on her face. Whenever you catch her eye she gives you a cute little toothy grin. She's pretty content to just chill and watch people and smile. And sway. This girl has herself a little dance. You know she's happy when she does the "Ruby sway". She basically just rocks back and forth. She learned it from her favorite thing ever, the jumperoo! She'll alternate back and forth from jumping to swaying. If you put her on the ground, watch out! She will steamroll you. She is our little rolly polly these days. And she's fast! And strong! If she has something in her hand, good luck getting it from her. Girl's got a kung fu grip!
Here are some more 7-month-old Ruby-isms...

• She's starting to like baby food more which is nice. Still loves her puffs and yogurt melts.
• She loves to drink water out of my cup.
• She is a very distracted nurser. I call her "the snacker" these days.
• She loves people and being out and about.
• She has a fascination with mouths.
• She prefers to roll around rather than sit up on her own. She can do it okay but she'll tip over after a few minutes. Her little bum must be too round I guess. :)
• She loves to blow bubbles.
• She figured out how to click her tongue and does it often.
• She will usually give me kisses if I ask her for them. They are big, sloppy, open-mouthed kisses and it makes me laugh every time she lays one on me. She usually won't stop at one. I get them on both cheeks, my nose, my mouth, and my chin. :)
• Her hair is laying down a lot more. It still sticks up on the top. I'm kind of sad the fuzz head isn't so fuzzy anymore.
• She naps like a champ.
• She loves to chew on everything.
• She has a strange fascination with the remotes.
• Her happy dance is wild. She always does it when I read books to her on the ground.

Love these light blue jammies on her.

Playing with her friend Bella. They were born exactly 1 month apart.

 Her favorite! She's mid-sway right here.

 Look at that cheeser! Just as happy as could be. 

 Ruby's first Christmas!!!

Love you Rubes!!! You are such a ray of sunshine.

{6 months!}

Ruby's half-year birthday was on Thanksgiving! And her first tooth popped through that day too! Her 2nd tooth followed soon after(Nov. 30). She's getting so big! I can't believe it. We just went to her 6-month check-up last week and here are her stats:

Height: 27.6 in - 95%

Weight: 16.9 lb - 50%

She's our tall little lady! A few other new things about her...

• She is a rolling queen now. It finally clicked and now she rolls from her back to her belly and then to her back again like it's nothing. You can tell she's pretty proud of her new skill.
• She still has reflux but it's pretty well controlled with the liquid Zantac.
• Her hair is starting to lay down a little in the front.
• She's starting to say "ma ma ma".
• Ru is no longer digging mushy baby food. She only likes the food we're eating. Oh and those little puffs. She is in love with those. Hopefully more of her teeth come in soon so we can feed her stuff that she can chew.
• She is taking better naps these days. She'll usually sleep for an hour or more! Yay!
• We're still working on the sleeping through the night. Some nights are great, others are a little rough. :)
• Lucy is a little rough with Ruby when she plays with her and Ruby loooves it! She just giggles and giggles.
• She gets super distracted when she's nursing these days. She always has to see what Lucy is doing, which makes feeding time a little longer than it used to be.

I was going to post some pictures but apparently I've used all my storage space with Google so I can't. Lame! Do I really have to pay the $5 to buy more storage? Blerg.

Back to the Beehive

Our trip to Utah in October was loverly! 12 days, saw a lot of family, hung out with a few friends, drove a lot, ate at all our favorite restaurants, felt quite nostalgic, gorgeous weather and fall foliage. Wow, I'm totally speaking in #hashtag now. But yeah, that pretty much sums up our trip.
Commencing photo dump...now! Actually, I wasn't very good at taking pictures of all the stuff we did so there isn't a ton. Anyway...

We went to Afton, WY to visit Trey's grandparents. It was so great to see them and catch up. Gma Bobby showed me boxes and boxes of things she made out of plastic canvas and yarn. It was crazy!! She tried to get me to take a bunch of it so I ended up with 2 small boxes for Lucy to play with.
The girls had fun. Lucy loved to follow Gpa Bill around and ask him questions. She also thought it was fun to follow Gma Bobby around and see all her "treasures".

Lucy took this one of Gma Bobby. I loved her house slippers.

 Our kid hates posed pictures. She was not happy about it at all as you can see.

  Lucy took this one. I love how everyone's head is tilted to the side.

We stopped in Logan on the way back from Afton. I miss that place so much. We went to Merlin Olsen Park, a place that we used to go play at a lot. It was so strange but fun to go back with our 2 kids. Ruby loved being out of the car. :)

Lucy had a blast in the little stream throwing rocks and apples.

We met Traci, my ex-coworker, at Charlie's for some ice cream. Miss that place. Miss that Traci.
We also stopped in Wellsville to see Grandma Darley and Aunt Brenda and Uncle Dave.
We stayed in Centerville with my parents for a few days and went to the zoo and randomly ran into my friend Callie and her two cute girlies. They were our good friends in Logan.

It took Luce a little while to warm up to her cousins but after a little while they were giggling and having a great time together.

Laughing at the monkeys. Love Ruby's face here.

Luce said her favorite animals at the zoo were the seals. They were pretty fun to watch.

We also went to Gardner's Village and Trey went to a BYU game. We also ate at some yummy places(Pei Wei, Zupas, In-N-Out, Orange Leaf) and hung out with the fam. Mel, Scott, and Ben even came by to say hi.
Then we went to Tooele for a few days. We went to the Gateway Mall, Blue Iguana, and then checked out the new City Creek Shopping Center. Holy moly, that place was amazing!!! We met up with Matt and Kristy and Heath and Helen (our soon to be sister-in-law).
We checked out the new Sheels, complete with indoor ferris wheel! Lucy wanted to ride in it so bad so we waited in line for an hour to ride on it for 5 minutes. We went to Thanksgiving Point to the Barnyard Boo. Luce loved all the farm animals and rode a pony for her first time. She loved it!

We went on a little hayride.

We also hung out with Trey's high school friends and their wivies a few times and had a bonfire. It was a pretty busy trip but we had such a great time catching up with family and friends.

Here we are on the plane ride back home. Ruby was getting a little restless the last hour of our flight. She did so awesome the rest of the time though. Such a rockstar.

He he, love her face in this one.

And just like that we were back home in Hershey.

{5 months!}

Ahhh! The 5th month has been the golden month for Miss Ruby. It seems like she's growing out of all her "newborness" and all the issues she had with her G.I. tract. She can now get her own toots out (which is huge--she's so much happier), her reflux is so much better, and she is a much happier traveler (she magically doesn't hate her car seat anymore!!!). Go girl! It's so fun having a low maintenance baby right now. I feel like I can kind of get back on top of things...sort of. :)
Ruby has been such a treat. Seriously, I just want to eat her up. She is such a yummy baby. I really love this age on her. A few things about our little 5-month-old munchkin...

• She's always super happy to see you and gives you a great big open mouth grin whenever you talk to her.
• She makes all sorts of funny little girl noises these days.
• She gives huge, slobbery open mouth kisses and I love them!
• We discovered she is ticklish on the inside of her thighs, her collar bone, her armpits, her sides, her neck, and her feet. We are loving all the giggles we get out of her.
• She isn't scared of other people(yet), which is fun. She'll smile at most people. Everyone at church gets a kick out of her. 
• She is such a content and pretty chill baby for the most part, except when she's hungry. :)
• Ruby digs rice cereal and baby oatmeal. She is always grabbing at our food. I was eating pizza one time and holding her and she grabbed my hand and pulled it toward her mouth. I barely caught it before the crust reached her mouth. She is definitely wanting the food. 
• She loves to grab and pull Lucy's and my hair. Not cool Rubes. She has a death grip! She pulled out a huge chunk of my hair the other day.
• Still teething and no teeth to show for it. She always has to have something in her mouth, a toy, binky, a finger(hers or someone elses), hair, blanket, etc.
• She loves to kick her chubby little legs when she's excited, especially when we read books.
• She still doesn't have much interest in the rolling thing. She did roll from her back to her belly today. Go girl!
• Her hair is longer and still as fuzzy as ever and she has some nice rosy cheeks. Her face gets so red after she eats and when she gets upset.
• She is still taking only 2 to 3 catnaps a day. I figured she sleeps from 8pm to 5am, eats, and sleeps until about 10:30am most days so she gets most of the sleep she needs in that big chunk of time. But it's enough to drive a mama lady crazy some days! Let us pray she learns to take longer naps as she gets older. :)
• She really is such a blessing to our family. She is our little ray of sunshine. Miss Lucy just adores her and loves to make her laugh. And you can tell Ruby loves her big sissy to pieces. It melts my heart to see my babies love each other so much.
• Lucy can get the best belly laughs out of Ruby that neither Trey or I can. It is just too stinkin' adorable. The other day I was holding Ruby and Lucy came up to her and gave her a big hug and very quietly said, "I love you." I about died. It was so precious. These are the moments that make all those not-so-great moments/days/weeks soooo worth it. :)

Trey and I always talk about how we just want to munch on her all day long. It sounds weird but if you're a parent you totally get what I mean. She just keeps getting more and more squishy and lovable the older she gets and the more her personality shines through. I'm pretty sure I kiss her cheeks 100+ times a day. Can you tell I'm obsessed with my baby? :) Okay, enough mama gushing.

Happy 5 months little monkey!!! We sure heart you baby girl.

elizabethtown fair

The whole time we've lived here I've heard great things about the e-town fair so we decided to hit it up this year. I had some awesome pulled pork, Trey had a cheesesteak, and Luce chowed down on the fries. Mmm fair food. I was tempted to try a deep fried oreo or chocolate covered bacon but never did in the end. Next time perhaps. I snapped a few pics of our adventure...

 Luce admiring the sheep. They also had a little area where you could pet a bunch of bunnies, calves, and goats. You could also watch a bunch of chicks hatching out of their eggs. Lucy loved the bunnies but didn't dare hold one.

 I love the look of the freshly sheered sheep.

 They had the biggest cows I'd ever seen there. They were monsters!

Tractors. Yep.

 They had a bunch of little rides so we told Lucy she could pick one to ride on and she chose this funny little balloon ride which was very similar to the balloon ride at Hershey Park(which happens to be her favorite).