I received the Charm Voxbox in the mail a few weeks ago from Influenster! Me and my family have loved trying everything in the box. I received everything for free from Influenster, but my opinions are my own.

 The taco seasoning from McCormicks was delicious, the perfume samples from VeraWang smelled great, I prefer the green one! The peeps were a new experience. I'm not a peeps fan, but I love dark chocolate and coconut, so it was totally up my alley. Easton loved the applesauce. It's a great go-to snack. Danika and I have loved doing pedicures with the Wet N Wild nail polish. It's beautiful and staying on great. I wasn't a huge fan of the Eva NYC shampoo and conditioner - it just doesn't work well with my hair type. But all in all it was an awesome box! Thank you Influenster!!

Summer 2011

We're still here....I just haven't updated our blog in a looooong time. Here's a quick update:
Caden is talking nonstop, climbing and jumping off everything, and basically keeping us on our toes. He loves singing - we hear him singing "Baby I like it" -Enrique Iglesias, Twinkle Twinkle, Tonight Tonight, and the "booty song" in the car. :) He's got some amazing dance moves too. He's really into playing frisbee, baseball and golf. And he's getting really good at making us laugh. He's been saying "Yoink" after doing something really good (he got that from Bolt). And he's pretty funny at his timing when he says "boing", like when he saw a really pretty girl crossing the street. haha It has given me sanity to be able to have conversations with him now. He makes me laugh so hard!

Danika has been giving us quite the scare lately. She held her breath this past weekend until she turned completely blue, fainted, and started twitching (seizure-like). It took us at least a minute before we got her to come to again. It was the scariest moment of my life. We thought we were going to lose her. We're testing her for seizures this week to make sure everything is ok. It might just be Breath holding spells, but either way I wanted to rule out seizures for sure. She's being so fun lately. She turns 1 next week. It's crazy. She loves singing at church (her idea of singing is just making one loud noise for the whole song). She also loves exploring every cupboard right now. She's extremely fast at crawling and walking around furniture. She's also very brave at getting off beds and couches by herself. She's a BIG talker and talks our ears off. It doesn't make any sense but it's super cute. Especially when she thinks she's talking on the phone. Lately we've noticed when she's around kids her age, she's super social and talkative.

She loves Caden and keeping up with him. It'll be interesting to see them once Danika gets the confidence to let go of furniture and start walking. She's still super sweet and a big mama's girl. I love it!

Brandon is still working hard at Fidelity and he's started taking a GMAT class to start preparing to go back to school for his MBA. It's been keeping him very busy. I'm working from home part time right now as an Executive Assistant for the fire department's Leadership Coach. It's nice to make my own hours and work from home when the kids give me a spare minute. I recently started playing piano again too. It's a very relaxing thing for me and I enjoy it. I've been wanting to play again but haven't until just recently when I got called as the Primary pianist in my ward.

Doug, my brother in law, did our family pictures last month. I think they turned out super cute! Check these out:

There's a quick update on our family. It's been a fun, busy summer. We went to Colorado this month to throw my mom a surprise 50th birthday party, which turned out amazing. We also went to Omaha for my sister's baby blessing - which I was pleasantly surprised with how beautiful it was there, and we did some fun camping/boating trips. We've been finding all the splash pads and parks in Utah and enjoying the summer.
Feels like there'll be a lot of changes in the next couple months with our contract running out and Brandon going back to school. It'll be interesting to see where we end up. Meanwhile, I just try to keep up with the laundry, keep the house somewhat clean, the fridge somewhat full and the kids and husband happy! Shoot, this sounds more like an annoying Christmas card now. haha sorry! :)

Caden's Birthday

Caden had a great birthday this month. He's 2 now and definitely following suit with the "Terrible Two's", but he makes us smile and laugh a lot to make up for it. :)

For his birthday we went to the Dinosaur Museum at Thanksgiving Point and then we had dinner at Pirate Island then came home for cake and ice-cream. All of Brandon's family came, Jamie and Doug, and Chris and Emily were all there. We had a blast and Caden loved every minute of his big day!

Emelia Fae Clarke

My new niece was born on May 7th at 11:55pm. She was only 4.88lbs and 17 1/2 inches long. She was 6 weeks early. It looks like she'll be in the NICU for at least a week but she's doing great. I told Annie that one thing that'll be nice is she can go home and rest and get all healed and recovered before baby comes home. Wouldn't that have been nice?! She looks like a cutie! We're all excited and very proud.

MAY?!?!?! Really?

I can't believe we are already in May! What's crazier is Caden turns 2 in a week! It's been crazy the last couple of months. We moved out of my in-laws basement in March and now we live in Lindon. It's been working out great for us. We are in another basement apartment. The kids that live above us love Caden. Anytime Caden hears them outside he runs to the door and shouts PLAY! They have a great backyard and we're lucky that we get to take advantage of it.
Danika is getting big. She sits up on her own and grabs things. She's starting to say dada, which is cute but it would be way cuter if she said mama! She's getting more hair, which makes me happy! :) It's coming in very blonde. So I guess we have blonde hair, blue eye babies! So to adjust to Utah and stay busy we got season passes to the Hogle Zoo and to Thanksgiving Point. We've gone twice to both now. I'm sure we'll go a lot this summer to really make it worth it.

Finally all Healthy Again

This was a much better week now that everyone is healthy again. They are both happy and all smiles again. Here's a picture of Caden bringing Dani for a ride in his little car.

I LOVE this picture!!! Mainly cause it's such a big smile on Dani. She's so funny with Caden. He smacks her and squeezes her too tight and I wish she'd cry so he'd understand he needs to be gentle but she just smiles and coos at him. They are the best of buds already!

Sickos

This week has been the longest week of my life!! Both kids have been so miserably sick. They both wanted to be held 24/7 and my arms are so jelloie and tired now. This makes me appreciate their healthy days 100x more! But why couldn't being sick slow Caden down at all? That's my big question. I wish he was more mellow, but he was just as crazy and busy. I got him to rest for a little bit and snapped these photos!



Last week when the sun came out for a couple days, we took advantage and walked to the park. This may be the reason both kids got sick!!! oops

Life as I Know it...

Life is getting easier and I feel like I'm starting to get things down pretty good with 2 kids. I still got to watch Caden closely with Danika but now it's because he likes to try to pick her up on his own. He picks her up great, both hands under her armpits. The problem is as soon as he lifts her he drops her down. I don't know if it's cause she's heavy or if he doesn't want to get in trouble for picking her up.

Danika is getting very smily and happy. She loves kicking and splashing in the bath tub, watching Caden, and singing patty cake with mommy. She also really enjoys our down comforter and I'm trying to think of ways for her to like her own bed.

Caden enjoys our wii more than we do! He loves playing basketball and Just Dance. His dancing has gotten pretty amazing! Soon he'll keep up with Uncle Doug! He's also gained a new love for horses and Mickey Mouse...we are sad that it started AFTER we moved away from Disneyland. :( He's starting to get a little more comfortable in nursery but daddy still has to accompany him. Hopefully that won't last too much longer.

We moved to Utah in November and we're living with Brandon's parents. It's nice being close to family. I especially love having Jamie and Annie close by. I'm loving being near them and watching their pregnant belly's grow!! Hopefully I'm not messing up any announcements for them. They are due a month apart. Annie in June and Jamie in July. Annie's having a girl and I think Jamie will have a boy....we'll see!

Hopefully we'll have news of a new car soon... I'm praying we'll get one by February.

Our New Addition: Danika Avery

Facade Quartet Pink Birth Announcement

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She's finally arrived! Our little sweet pea! Life has been so wonderful with her these past 3 weeks. We're still trying to get used to waking up in the middle of the night and we're getting really good at jumping up to save her from Caden's tight squeezes and loves. He sure loves his little sister. He loves to run to check on her if she makes any little peep or squeek. It's been a fun month. And I'm excited to be able to get out of the house again, although I haven't gone out too much since it's a hassle with a little one and Caden. I'm working on that. But at least I can walk around my house and dance and do things without having problems! :)

Long needed update

So I noticed it's been a VERY long time since I've updated our blog. We've had Annie and Jamie&Doug visit us, so I actually have cute pics to post, I just haven't gotten around to it.
I've been on bed rest with this pregnancy for the last month now and its only getting harder and more boring...
The RS has really been saving my life the past couple weeks. Someone comes everyday and takes Caden for a couple hours. He loves getting out of the house and it makes him much happier. I feel indebted to a lot of people now!
I'm pretty much at 34 weeks now. The doctor wants me to try to get to 35 weeks and then he says I can be off bed rest and I can start to do whatever I want. Maybe Caden and I will go swimming and shopping and do things together that we won't be able to do just the 2 of us after baby comes. Who knows maybe I'll really venture out and try to go to Disneyland!! But then if baby was born at Disneyland, it might lose it's 'happiest place on earth' feel to me. :)
I'll post pics of Annie and James' visits soon...

Memorial Day Weekend in Vegas

For the past couple years, Brandon has gotten together with all his old apartment buddies. Last year we all went camping at Zion's National Park and this year we all went to Vegas. Everyone was able to come except for Greg, who's going to school in Chicago and couldn't make it.
We had a lot of fun! We stayed at the Embassy Suites and played games, talked, saw Prince of Persia, went to the Bodies Exhibit, walked around the strip, and had a lot of fun. Since I was on "bed rest", Brandon rented me a wheelchair and pushed me around. I had fun with it, even though I felt stupid.

At Cheesecake Factory

Statue of Liberty made entirely of jelly beans!

Chris, Brandon, Caden, Royce, Micah, and Jason

The whole gang!

My boys were all worn out!

Caden's Birthday

We had a lot of fun with sweet Caden. He totally knew it was a special day for him because he woke up especially hyper and excited. He was happy to be sung to because he loves the birthday song and got to hear it all day long! He also liked that I put a candle in all of his meals.
The big celebrating was after dad got home from work. We ate dinner together, opened gifts and then ate cake. I made an Elmo cake for him and he really liked it. He kept wanting to look at it all day. He was hesitant at first to eat it and then I think he liked our reactions and started going crazy with the cake. It was a long clean up afterwards, but it was hilarious and totally worth it!!!