It's a......

tiny toe'd:


thumb sucking:


sweet little, 12 ounce baby.....

BOY!!!

We couldn't be more thrilled! After finding out the day after Kate turned one that we were going to be welcoming another little monkey to our family, we both hoped for but never expected a boy! What a sweet little surprise! We can't wait to meet him on April 15, 2009 (give or take a few weeks, preferably take)!

Halloween 2008!

This year for Halloween we went to our church's "Trunk or Treat". Kate was dressed as a peacock and Jason and I were peacock ranchers! Kate has LOVED her costume from the moment we got it, and anytime she sees it, she HAS to put it on, she especially loves the hat!


My proud peacock!




They had dinner followed by carnival games, prizes and cotton candy and then onto the trunk or treat part! Jason and I were in charge of one of the booth's for the first half hour, but Kate liked it so much, we spent almost the whole night there! Look out Tiger Woods, you've got some serious competition!



But I think Kate's favorite part of the night had to be either the cotton candy or helping me eat some MilkyWays! Ah....I've trained her so well!

Happy Halloween!

I'll post more pictures of our day later, but I just had to post this awesome pumpkin that Jason "sculpted" last night! We just watched a program on pumpkin carving/sculpting and I guess it inspired Jason! Happy Halloween everyone!

PAT PAT PAT!

Kate's new favorite show is Little Einsteins. And her favorite part is when they give their rocket power by patting their laps and then raising their arms for BLAST OFF! She's got the moves down!

She also answers the "phone"

Happy Birthday Baby!

It's hard to believe a whole year has gone by since Kate was born! I guess time really does fly when you're having fun! We feel so blessed to have that little bug in our family! She is so much fun to have around and gets more fun every day! She is truly the light of our lives!

We celebrated her birthday on Sunday, while we were up in Washington with family. Here's a few photos of the shindig:

Kate's cake experience

PRESENTS!!!!

Here is what our one year old Kate is up to these days:

*Giving "loves" (hugs with pats) to everything, including the watermelon in our grocery cart today!

*Putting any toy she can find up to her ear, she thinks everything is a telephone!

*Practicing to become the next Dancing Queen, she LOVES music and never lets a tune slip by without gettin' jiggy with it first! Favorite singer? I guess she takes after her Aunt Rebecca, she LOVES James Taylor!

*Loving anything Elmo! She spots that dude a mile away and points and grunts!

*Jibber-Jabbering all day long, nothing coherent yet, but she sure tries. She also is just starting to really love squealing super loud! Fun for us!!!

*Baby signing like a maniac, she surprises us with new signs every day!

*Becoming a professional destructo baby, she loves to help me "fold" clothes!

*Clapping at anything anyone else claps at, including people clapping on T.V.

*Copy cat coughing. If she hears a sneeze, sniff, cough, or someone clear their throat, she has to let everyone know she is sick too, by coughing!

Happy Birthday sweet baby Kate! We love you!!!

Nothing much to say...

If a picture is worth a thousand words, then here are a few thousand!







How many words is a video worth?

Visit From My Mom!

Last week my Mom came down to visit and help watch Kate while I went into to Jason's school to be his first patient! It was so good to have her here, and we had so much fun! Her birthday was on May 11th (also Mother's Day) so we celebrated a late birthday for her, with a delicious cake I got at a bakery just down the road from us. It was a boston creme cake! SO YUMMY!


(would you believe my mom was here a whole week and I only took two pictures the entire time?!?!?! The other one is basically the same shot!)

We got her a puzzle for her birthday, and had fun putting it together with her, even though it was a Halloween puzzle. My mom is the queen of Halloween and puzzles! While she was here we also went out to dinner a few times, took her to Pops, (a fun little restaurant Jason discovered) went shopping and just hung out and had fun!

Kate loved having company and started jabbering a lot while Grandma was here! The first day Grandma babysat Kate, I expected to come home to a sweet baby excited to see her mommy, but was very surprised when Kate took one look at me, looked back at Grandma and started boo-hooing! I guess she was just having too much fun with Grandma and wasn't ready for me to come home yet!

And I know you are all wondering how Jason did on his first patient. Well, I'm pleased to say, he did an amazing job, my teeth have never been better! He had to take x-rays, do impressions, measure my gum depths, polish my teeth and a few other things that I have never had done before, so I don't know what they are called!

All in all it was a great week! We had so much fun having my Mom out here and can't wait to go up to Washington in a few weeks to see her and the rest of the family at my little brother's graduation!!!

Happy Mother's Day!

I just wanted to take a minute to let my Mom know how much I love her! She is such an amazing woman, and I look up to her more than anyone! She is one of my best friends and I love knowing I can call her up anytime, day or night and she is there to listen and give advice! She is the epitome of self sacrifice, I can't remember a time when her needs came before ANYONE else's! She is so loving, understanding, beautiful and strong. I am so blessed to have such an amazing example in my life of what a true mother is. I cherish all the memories I have with you, Mom, from playing Memory, watching "Days" while folding laundry, going to Winchell's Donuts after doctor's appointments, all the field trips and class parties you helped with, my many fancy birthday cakes, chocolate chip cookies in bed, to the long talks after I moved out about "needs and wants" and just about life in general. I was beyond grateful to have your help when Kate was born, I would have been lost without you! You are the BEST Mom in the world and I can only hope I will be half the mother to Kate that you are to me! Thanks for being so wonderful! I love you Mom! Happy Mother's Day, and BIRTHDAY!!!

A Month Of Milestones!

I don't know what made her decide that April was the month, but Kate has finally started doing some things! It feels like everyday there is something new! Here are a few of the accomplishments she has had this month:

-She did her first baby sign: more (still the only one she does, what a greedy little baby!)

-She got her first tooth on April 7th

-Her hair is finally long enough to put into a little clippy!

-She has learned to play peek-a-boo
(not the best video, she usually gets excited when she plays)


-She started to crawl on April 24th (well, more like a scoot)

-She finally figured out her Johnny Jumper is for more than just "hangin' out"

-She LOVES when you sing, her favorite songs are: "Popcorn Popping", "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and "Pat-a-cake".

-And finally, she has stared to pull herself up on things, the bookshelf, the bathtub, Dad, Mom, etc.

It's so fun to see her grow and change! We love her so much; she is such a blessing in our lives!

There's Been a Mix Up!!!

Apparently Gene Simmons and his wife were having a baby in the same hospital as us the day Kate was born. Looks like we took off with the wrong one. OOOPS!









All she needs now is some black and white face paint!

More Please???

We have been working on teaching Kate baby signs for a few months now, and a few weeks ago we got a little payoff! She started signing "more". She has gotten kinda lazy with it, she is supposed to continuously put her hands together, but she just does it once now. At first I wasn't sure if she was just clapping or if she was signing, but she has proven to us that she knows what it means!

To Mollie:

Happy Birthday! Here you go, a picture just for you from the two bird beaks!

SPRING HAS SPRUNG!

Despite the occasional INSANE thunder/lightning storms we are having, the weather here is beautiful and our backyard is in full bloom! Even with all the wind sweeping down the plains, we are loving it!

BONJOUR!

You can call me Pepe GREEN BEAN!

Jason has too much fun when he feeds Kate.

Spring Break!

What a wild week we had! The week started with my 25th birthday! I can't believe my 20's are already half way done! Yikes! Jason surprised me with a pearl necklace and matching earrings! I absolutely love them!



He also got pretty creative and made me a three tier cake! DELICIOUS!



The next few days were spent SPRING CLEANING! I was in heaven! I love cleaning, mostly because I love the feeling of making sense out of chaos. Jason did a lot of yard work while I spent my time scrubbing and organizing the inside of the house. We also cleaned up our back porch or sun room, which took up most of our time, it needed a lot of TLC, but was well worth it, we are really enjoying that space now! After putting Jason to work for the first half of his spring break, I figured I should let him get some actual relaxation in as well, and we got plenty of it while my Mother in law came out to visit the last part of the week!

We had so much fun with Diane! Jason took us to a fun restaurant he discovered called Pops. It is in an all glass building with glass shelves lining the walls and the shelves are loaded with any flavor of soda pop you can imagine! I even saw a chocolate flavored one! They sell almost 500 different flavors! We got ourselves a six pack and enjoyed sampling them for the rest of Diane's visit while relaxing in our new, clean sun room and watching all the birdies in our back yard. We had a great time just chatting, and Kate loved getting to know her Grandma better! Diane also brought along two movies I have been wanting to see, Bee Movie and Enchanted, both very cute!



Our Easter Sunday was pretty laid back, we just went to church and had some ham for dinner....mmmmm! The Easter bunny visited and left Kate some fun stuff! Here she is in her Easter dress enjoying her basket!





Hope everyone had a very happy Easter!

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY!

AND THE WINNER IS.......

KATE!!!!



We entered Kate in a cute baby contest at our Wal-Mart, and she won first place! We were so excited, and surprised; there was some pretty tough competition!!! She won a basket full of baby goodies and a $50.00 gift cart to Wal-Mart! The picture above is the one we entered and here are some pictures of Kate with her loot!

THE GOOD...THE BAD...AND THE UGLY!

Ok, I have put off posting long enough!!! Time for an update! Last post, I was just leaving for Utah. So here's the good...we had a great time visiting both of our families and all of our friends! Kate loved spending time with her cousins and seemed especially interested in her cousin Nicole, who is just about 3 months older than her! It was so fun to see them interact and "play" together, and it made me even sadder that we aren't living close to family!



My friend Sadee's wedding was amazing! She looked BEAUTIFUL and so in love! We were so glad we were able to be there for it! We had my friend Tristyn watch Kate while we were in the temple, and I'm sad to say that she screamed the whole time, Kate...not Tristyn, although I'm sure Tristyn wanted to scream by the time she was done! All said and done, it was great to see everyone again! Here are some pictures of the beautiful bride, I LOVED her dress!





Ok, now the bad. Upon arriving home, we discovered we were all sick! Kate had a cold and Jason and I had tummy troubles! Since I am new to this whole "mom" thing, I was on the phone everyday with my own mom, seeking advice about what to do for my stuffy nosed, croupy cough, up-chucking baby. After a few days of misery, Kate threw up some blood, so we took her in to the E.R. Apparently this bug has been going around; there was an 8 month old there with the same exact problems. After a little waiting and some assurance from the nurse that Kate was going to live, we headed home....with the new found knowledge that we could give Kate Benadryl! Heaven in a bottle if you have a sick baby! We are all feeling much better now!

Kate has developed a real talent for blowing snot bubbles! :)




Now we get to the Ugly!



Jason rolled his ankle playing basketball last week, right at the peak of all of our sicknesses!

AND WE'RE OFF!

Kate and I are about to embark on our first plane trip together without the assistance of Daddy, wish us luck!

SIX MONTHS OLD!!!

I can't believe it has already been 6 months since the doctor placed my sweet, brand new baby in my arms! It amazes me how much she has grown and changed! She becomes more fun every day, and I can't imagine how we ever lived without our little Katers. She truly is the light of our lives!


Just for fun, here is Kate the day we brought her home from the hospital:



And this was taken today:

Barfing Baby!

This weekend Kate woke up from a nap with a temperature of 101 degrees. Of course I called my Mom right away, hoping it could just be a fever from teething or something. Much to my dismay, my Mom said 101 was pretty high for just teething, so I called the doctor. They said to just keep and eye on it and if she had a rough night to bring her into the ER the next day. Well, she was up all night, so Sunday morning we headed into the children's ER. After waiting around for 45 minutes, they called us back to get us checked in and then informed us it would be AT LEAST a 5 hour wait. The nurse said, if she were us she wouldn't wait around and expose Kate to all the germs there. She said one more night wouldn't really hurt if it was just and ear infection. So we headed back home, Kate seemed to be doing better anyway. She slept fine Sunday night, but I still took her to the doctor Monday morning just in case. The doctor said her ears were fine, and her fever was gone, so it was probably just a little virus or something. Feeling good, I went back home and got on with my day, pretty pleased that Kate had plowed through her first real sickness. We had a great evening, the weather was a beautiful 78 degrees and we went on a 2 mile walk. Kate went down for her little evening nap and woke kind of fussy. I went to feed her and she threw up all over! Of course I called my Mom AGAIN, and then called the doctor, as Kate kept it coming about every 5 minutes for the next half hour or so, and then she was so exhausted, she passed out. It was the saddest thing to see, and Jason and I felt so helpless! We took the nurses advice and fed her 2 teaspoons of milk every 5 minutes for the first four hours and then upped the amount to 4 teaspoons for the next four hours. Luckily she kept all that down and is now back to eating as much as she wants (which hasn't been that much) and she has been passed out all morning! I really hope this is the end of the bug this time!

Some More Videos

Not a whole lot going on around here lately, so I decided to just post some more videos. Kate absolutely loves bath time. I swear she would stay in there all night if we let her.



A few nights ago I tried mixing her rice cereal with formula, and she did not like it. Apparently she was still hungry though....




That's all for now!

RICEKATE

Kate started eating rice cereal this weekend!













We're so proud of our big girl!