4 years

Yesterday, Matt and I celebrated our 4-year anniversary. It was fantastic. Matt did a great job of making me feel loved and spoiled. He even got up early and made cinnamon rolls for breakfast!

After he came home from work, he gave me some pretty flowers and got me some sparklers (since I really wanted some at our wedding, but couldn't have them) and he got some of my jewelry fixed that Emmy had broken. It was very thoughtful. And then we celebrated by having a really yummy dinner at the Melting Pot.

It was a fun time. I am such a lucky girl to be married to Matt!

Parade

Emmy and I went to the Pioneer Day parade downtown. It was great! My brother lives really close to the parade route and scored us a great spot. Emily liked the parade I think. Except the police sirens.

This was the float that was built by our neighbors a few houses down. We would constantly see pieces of it in their driveway for the past few months every time we would leave the neighborhood.

Rivers was waving at all the princesses! Ha!

Em loved watching the horsies.

And laughing at her cousin. Em thinks Rivers is pretty much the funniest person in the world. She laughs more at him than anyone (or anything) else. It's great!

There was a clown who Scott and Mystie knew. He made a balloon hat. Emily didn't like to wear it.

Neither did Rivers.

But he liked waving it at the floats.

It was a fun time! Thanks to Scott who got up early to get a spot!

Emily's Elmo Party

We had a little family birthday party for Emily this weekend. I was SO glad she was feeling happier. All day she kept asking, "Have a Elmo party now?" It was so stinkin' cute.  She loves Elmo so that was her party theme. I made some Elmo cupcakes.

An Elmo cake.

An Elmo vegetable tray.

And an Elmo fruit tray. I swear these things always look much cuter on Pintrest than they do when I actually attempt to make them.

After having some snacks, we opened presents! She got some really great presents from her grandmas, grandpas, aunts, uncles, and cousins. What a spoiled little girl. She loved opening presents.
She thought the cards were books, and was so excited to open and look at her new "gooks".

Her auntie Melissa gave her these cute pink sandals and she insisted on putting them on right away. Then she insisted on wearing her "pretty pink shoes with hearts" to church this morning. She also wanted to take everything she got out of the box or packaging right away. It was so cute! And she was so excited about every present. She would exclaim, "It's a shirt!" (or whatever).

Her cousin Derek was very interested in her presents. He didn't even try to open them, he just enjoyed watching her. Then when she opened his present, he said, "That's from me!" It was pretty cute.

She loved throwing the paper in the air.

She was so excited about these princess balls. She loves balls of any type, and exclaimed, "It's a football!" when she opened her present. It made her daddy proud.

She got lots of fun presents. She got some fun books, clothes, and toys. My mom made her this cute quiet book, which I was so excited about because remember how I slaved over making her one for Christmas and then lost it? I'm sure she will love playing with this one and I will love taking it to church to keep her occupied.

Then it was time for cake! I love how Rivers looks like he is "ooo-ing" at the cake.

Emily loved her Elmo cupcake and then when she got up this morning, she asked if she could have Elmo cake for breakfast. I couldn't stop laughing because I'd ask her if she wanted eggs or cereal or strawberries, and she said, "Or Elmo cake!" Ha!

After her guests left, she had lots of fun playing with her new dollhouse from Grandma Lively.

And with her fishy game from her cousins Kyle and Derek. It is so nice to have new toys around here! She was getting bored with the few that she had before.

Thank you everyone for coming to share Emmy's special day! I had a lot of fun seeing her so excited about everything and having a good time.

Emily's Birthday

Emily has been such an ornery crank this week that I was really worried she wouldn't enjoy her birthday. She was mostly happy in the morning. We made some pancakes for breakfast and we did some of her favorite things like go to the library and the park and we went to McDonald's for lunch. I think she had fun and enjoyed it. After her nap, however, she was back to being a crank.

When she's really cranky, she sometimes will run to a corner and lay down like this. (This is on our back steps.)

We tried to play outside for awhile, which she normally loves and do some bubbles, but she was not very happy about it.

Then she got a popsicle, which she was happy about only after she got to hold it herself.

Daddy came home early from work so we could do some fun things before bed. But she didn't want to do any of the things we tried. So we opened her presents.

She got some Elmo jammies, which she insisted on putting on right away. She really liked tearing the paper off the presents.

We got her this baby doll that comes with a bathtub and all the bath accessories so she could practice giving it a bath. I thought this might help with her bath phobia and help her to learn to like the bath. She loved giving her baby a bath!

And she got this fun princess tent. Instead of crawling inside like you're supposed to, she lifted it up and put it over her head. Ha!

She also got a car track. I know it's a boy thing, but she really loves cars! She has even started pointing out all the cars and trucks as we drive down the road and telling what color they are and if they're big or little.

Then we had some birthday dinner. We made some pizza, thinking she would love it, but she said she wanted a taco, so she got a quesadilla. But then after she ate her quesadilla and she saw us eating the pizza, she wanted some too.

And then for her birthday cake!

I hope that she at least somewhat enjoyed her birthday. I'm kind of sad that she was so ornery, but I'm glad that she had fun doing some of the special things I had planned for her. Maybe this just isn't the year of birthdays. We sure do love you, Emmy, and hope you had a special day! We're having a little party for her on Saturday with family, so hopefully she will be happy again by then.

Emily turns TWO!

Since I couldn't sleep last night, I was reminded of the night 2 years ago when I also couldn't sleep. Matt and I had been out for an early anniversary celebration, and I thought something weird was going on. I put it off, tried to go to bed, but couldn't sleep. I wasn't due for another week, and my doctor was pretty sure I was going to go over my due date, so I didn't think I was going into labor.

After trying to (unsuccessfully) sleep, trying to read a book, and looking up on Google what contractions and labor felt like, I finally woke Matt up around 1 a.m. and told him I thought we might need to go to the hospital. He kind of freaked out and started rushing around the closet packing some things and sped me off to the hospital. 7 1/2 hours later, Emily was born and our lives were changed forever.

I am so grateful to have this little girl in our lives. Although I complain a lot about my struggles with motherhood (I really thought that by 2 years into it, I'd have it figured out, but not so), I am grateful to be Emily's mom. That little smile melts my heart.

At 2 years old, Emily...


-loves pancakes, waffles, cereal, all types of fruit, yogurt, popsicles, french fries, chicken nuggets, pizza, hash browns, teddy grahams, and oatmeal.
-is starting to tolerate baths (finally!)
-loves to go to the library and loves books.
-likes to sing Primary songs
-hates to go to bed
-can fold her arms for the prayer
-has learned she can go get a stool to climb up and reach the lights to turn them off
-has recently started liking to change her baby doll's diaper and clothes
-doesn't like TV
-likes to go outside
-loves to blow bubbles
-is obsessed with taking the wrappers off the crayons
-likes to go to the zoo, the farm, and the aquarium (and will tell you everything we saw at each place.)
-thinks that anything we did in the past was yesterday
-loves to go to the temple and see the flowers
-is quite the chatterbox, but is very shy around people she doesn't know very well
-speaks in sentences (some of them like 7-8 words long)
-can be bossy
-loves her daddy and runs to the door whenever she hears the garage
-likes to go for bike rides in her "yellow stroller" (the bike trailer)

Happy Birthday Emmy! We sure do love you!

Cousin Party

Every year instead of birthday presents, my grandma throws a big birthday party for all her grandkids. This year she rented one of those big inflatable slides. Emily was content to stay on the tiny little baby slide instead.

She did get brave enough to get in the kiddie pool and slide down into it. (This is major progress considering her water phobia.)

She loved pouring out the water from this bucket.

She was the most stylish girl there with her new sunglasses.

Everyone thought it would be a good idea to make the big inflatable slide a waterslide. And then go down it on inflatable alligators and other inflatable things and see who could get the most air and the funniest picture of them flying over the edge. (Yes, my family is crazy.) That wall at the bottom didn't stop many people from going right over it.

Michael tried surfing down the slide.

Olivia slept through the whole thing.

There were many acrobatics (some on purpose and some not on purpose). Kyle worked on his landings.

It's kind of amazing that no one broke anything throughout the course of the day.

Charlotte was HILARIOUS eating this ice cream cone.

And Emmy loved this inflatable hippo. I'm pretty sure that hippo went down the slide a few times with people much older than Emmy. :)

She also loved the snow cones.

Although I was not able to go down the slide, it was pretty entertaining watching everyone else go down it.

Until next year....