An aunt again!

Today my little sis Michelle had her precious little baby girl. I was so glad to not only be able to be in Utah to see the little bundle of joy, but also to be in the room when she made her way into this crazy world. She is sooo precious. I love her a ton. (it doesn't hurt that she is named after me.) If you get a sec... go check out my sister's blog and see her adorable little girl!

missing you x 2

This last little while has been crazy. Andy is now done with finals, but is still finishing up his 30-50 page paper. The kids and I have packed up and made an unexpected visit to Utah. My Sister is past due to have her little baby girl, and we are looking forward to a trip to Colorado for Andy's sis's wedding. Throw Christmas into the mix, and it gets really hairy.


My mom called me on Dec. 4th and told me that my sweet Grandma Lund wasn't doing to well. She was unresponsive, and they thought it could be hours, maybe days. We had heard she wasn't doing well before, she often struggled, but always managed to pull through (against her will). This time, I somehow knew it was probably it. Maybe an hour later I got the call that she had passed on. My Grandma Lund was the sweetest person ever. She was so genuine, caring, and humerous. We all loved her so much. We are sad we don't get to have her around anymore, but I am truly happy for her. She is where she wants to be. With her sweetheart, my Grandpa LaMar. Unfortunately Andy was right in the middle of finals, and had to stay behind while the kids and I flew out to Utah to see her one last time, and be with Family as we celebrated her.

Despite coming out here for a funeral, we are really having a good time. We have been able to see lots of family and friends. The timing worked out so that we should be able to see my sis Michelle's baby ... which was somthing I was really going to be sad to miss. ( now if the babe would just come... we are ready and waiting. ) If only Andy could be with me. I HATE being away from him. And I'm pretty sure our kids do as well. It feels kind of lonely to be in a place where we made so many memories ... without him by my side. Plus, he is the one in the family who would really appreciate all the snow we've been getting.

I finally got to meet my best friend Rashel's little boy Cooper. If only our kiddos could play together more. Maybe one day!

Sterling

This little man is all boy.


He can throw a fit like nobody else. He's shouting out to the west-side here... saying hey to all our friends and family out there.

He is loving his mobility, and still not sleeping through the night consistently. What a little bugger!

But he sure is fun.

And we love his stinky boy guts. And his curly mo-hawk.

Thankful

( I know what your thinking... this is the picture she decided to post when talking about Thanksgiving??? I'm just still too full to post pictures of food... but there is always a little room for something carbonated...)

Thanksgiving was special this year. I know, I know, thanksgiving is special every year... but this year it was really special. For me at least. It was the first year we spent the whole day... alone. Just our little family. It was also the first year I felt Stella could have some understanding of a "holiday". Andy did a big chunk of the cooking, (a bigger chunk than I did at least) which is how he likes it. (right babe?) We spent the day doing some things around the house, with Christmas music playing as our soundtrack. Then we moved onto cooking the things we hadn't already prepared. We made turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, the most yummy sweet potatoes you could imagine, collard greens (a signiture southern thing... and very, very tasty if you can cook them right... which of course Andy can!) cranberries (we bought 4 bags... we can get a little crazy with the cranberries) stuffing, and rolls. Then we had cherry chocolate cake (Andy's birthday cake) and Apple pie. So delish! After dinner, Andy loaded the kiddos up in the car to go get vanilla ice cream. (Can you believe we forgot to get ice cream to go with that pie???) This also gave me a little time to prepare our gingerbread house for decorating. As soon as Stella walked in the door from getting the ice cream, she ran over to the table and "helped" me really decorate the house up. As she was carefully (well, as carefully as a two year old can) placing candy all over the roof of the little house, she proudly exclaimed..., "I like sugar!". Well, there you have it, she is me - reincarnated. I have a paper, "all about me" saved from elementary school. I listed my two favorite foods as "watermelon" and "sugar". Suprisingly, that hasn't changed either. The sparkling grape juice we drank was a big hit with Stella also. She kept asking to drink her "special drink".

I (we) did of course miss our Family and Friends... but I thouroughly enjoyed being surrounded by the three other people who I'm surrounded by all the time. I was just able to take the time to reflect and remember how lucky I am to be with them all the time. The three people I share my days with are three of the funniest, most thoughtful, precious, beautiful, and best people there are. I heart them soo much. I loved our little thanksgiving, eating in our sweatshirts and unbrushed hair with our not so classy serving trays and all. I feel thankful!

nine

Silver is 9 months... has been now for a while... thought I'd better post about it.

Sterling is growing up. He now has quite the little temper. He is a true boy. He loves to explore.

His head circumference and height are in the 90th percentile, and his weight is in the 40th.

Silver doesn't quite "crawl" yet, but he rolls around a bunch, and does this little manuver where he "crawls with his legs on his toes, and uses his shoulder (with his head cocked to one side) instead of his arms. Pretty soon he will be crawling all over - but until then, there will be rug burns on his neck.

He loves his Sister so so much... she can always make him laugh, stop crying, (or start crying) and keep him entertained on car rides. He is a bit of a mamma's boy, so I feel lucky for that, but he mostly likes it when all of the family is together... in the same room. If anyone even simply walks down the hall, he can burst into tears on the spot. His eating is sporadic. He is enjoying getting to eat some "solid" food now, but enjoys exploring a little more - so often times his meals are only snacks, and I spend a lot of my time trying to force food down him. (I'm guessing this will change in about 12 years).

Peek-a-boo is his favorite right now. He loves to pull things over his face, and when you ask where Sterling has gone, he will belly laugh.

He has slept through the night a total of 6 times since he was born... he is finally out of our room, but now Stella is in our room, because she can't sleep with him and all of his screaming. We are hoping (and praying) he will soon see the light and realize that sleep really is a good thing. Even his naps are tragically short. He will get though it... soon too... at least thats what I keep saying, so I don't have a major meltdown.

Sterling loves to "talk". He can roll his tongue all the way around, and spends a bunch of time experimenting with all of the different sounds he can make. He now has 3 teeth in his little mouth. Two on bottom and his right one up top. (the fourth is right there... should be here soon)

He is so adorable, and we get a lot of... he looks just like daddy.

Can't wait to see what the next 9 months have to bring. If they are anything like the last, plenty of laughs, smiles, and sleepless nights? Uh oh.

Little angel

Stella is such an angel. Music is one of her current LOVE'S. She sings constantly; the store, the car, the bathroom...Everywhere!!! and we love to listen to her sweet little voice.

(sorry - it is actually a short video... once the picture fades to black, the video is done... I am editing on Andy's computer, and it keeps shutting down, so I decided not to fix it... )

"Trunk Or Treat"

Halloween was very exciting for me this year. I had grand ideas for costumes, 4 pumpkins to carve, and my mom around beforehand to help me prepare. The costumes ended up working out (for the kiddos at least) and the pumpkins, well...

Stella was excited to help carve pumpkins so I decided to carve hers first. I was going to try to be super cool and carve our faces from "cartoon" drawings of pictures of each of us on our own pumpkin, but then got realistic and decided to carve our first initial onto each pumpkin. Its a good thing I started with Stella's, because what started out as standing for her turned into standing for "S"mith since we only made it through one pumpkin before running out of time.

Stella was all about helping, until she reached her hand in and felt what was inside. Then she just wanted to watch and kept saying, "I can't pull seeds out". This picture was taken right after she reached inside - you can see it on her face that she felt tricked. She was obviously not expecting all the gooey stuff.

(This is Stella's "shy" face. She makes it a lot these days.)

Because my mom was in town and could help wrangle children while I tried my hand at the sewing machine, I was able to successfully and super quickly make the kids costumes. I decided a while ago that I wanted Stella to be a flapper this year. I thought it was the perfect thing for her because of her hair right now- so decided I'd better do it while I could. We also had a cowboy hat for Sterling that I thought wouldn't fit him for a while. I tried it on a few months ago to see if it might be able to work, and it was almost too small. So I decided then that he was a cowboy this year - and crossed my fingers that his head would't grow too rapidly. My mom had the awesome idea of having me go as a cowgirl, and Andy as a 20's gangster - so that we could partner with our kids, and we planned on that for a while, but then Andy decided he didn't want to wear one of his suits to the trunk or treat complete with neon cotton candy and chili cook off contest, so we both ended up being cowboy's. Stella was odd man out - but she looked adorable, so it didn't matter.

Sterling had the whole ticked off cowboy look down for all the pictures. He was actually a really good sport - wore his hat almost all night long and everything.

Stella came with me to buy the candy to pass out, and I told her it was for the trunk or treat. From that moment on she started saying she wanted to trunk or treat "right now" and becasme super excited for the whole thing to go down. She said trunk or treat at every car we went to, and told everyone thank you using sign language (everyone thought she was blowing them kisses) which got her even more candy.

We couldn't find Stella's pumpkin (candy holder) so she used her little Louis Vuitton ... She tried to zip it up between each car... I guess she wanted to make absolutely positive not one piece of precious candy would fall out.

Stella thought she was so cool holding the pumpkin. I think it may have weighed as much as she did.

(Look closely, you can see Sterlings teeth)

This next picture is of my friend Shalene and her costume partner in crime Jill. Stella was freaked out by Shalene. (the clown fish) She hid under the table the entire time she was around talking with all of us. I was impressed that this was the only costume she was afraid of. (funny thing is, Stella knows Shalene well, she is in the Young Womens presidency with me, so we spend a fair amount of time together - but in Stella's defense, I didn't ever recognize her at first!)

Stella's precious loot. Not bad!