Belly Comparison

So here's how different I am carrying this little boy.  On the left, I was pregnant with Kyla and the right is the current one.  I am a little farther out but lower it seems this time around. These pics are both taken at around 33 weeks.  What do you think...can anyone but me see the difference?  What differences do you see?

Will it EVER end?!

I'd like to go to bed but there's one small problem....

Will the laundry EVER end?!

Coloring Book

So this is the coolest kids site ever!  You can download and print coloring book pages from every disney movie you could think of for free!  They have thousands of pages so the amount is endless. CLICK HERE to visit the site!

Surprise Visit!

My grandma and grandpa live in Canada so we don't get to see them as often as we like.  We got a phone call from them Tues night and said they were in town!  We were so excited and surprised to see them.  Kyla absolutely loved them and showed off for them like it was nothing.  She sang songs, danced, showed them her cool toys, gave lots of hugs and kisses and even showed them how she knew all of her letters of the alphabet!  She definitely had a lot of energy that night so it was cute.

On Wednesday, we went out to lunch with them and they came over later in the evening to spend some more time before they headed back home.  They spoiled us with hugs, clothes for Kyla and Tayven, lots of love and so much more!  It was so wonderful to see them!  We definitely have missed seeing their smiling faces and hope it won't be so long before we see them again!

Color Collection Learning Time

Recently Kyla and I have been having a time everyday to sit down and learn something new or learn something fun.  We call it "Learning Time".  One day we focused on the letters H and U and thought of everything we could think of with those letters, drew them on a piece of paper and hung them up in her room.  Another day we did what's called a Color Collection (which is on one of her Barney Movies) and collected some of her toys of the same color and put them in a pile next to each other and talked about the different shades.  On other days, we learn numbers, lower case letters, play a fun learning game, or spell words together, etc.  It is so much fun and I think she has been benefiting a lot from it.

In other news, we built a tent or a fort for fun this week and she played in it for awhile.  She had fun and it gave me some extra time to make lunch without little hands wanting to be picked up and held while cooking.  :)

You know you're getting old when...

....you get really excited to buy a deep freezer to broaden your food storage supply!

So this is what we used some of our tax return money on.  haha...you can laugh all you want, we know it's nothing too exciting but at least we feel prepared!  And we really are excited about it!  I know we're getting to be old married folks now which is why this is so funny (and the reason why I made this pic black and white).  Who spends their tax return money on something like a deep freeze besides your grandmother? Shouldn't we be spending it on something like a new flatscreen TV, laptop or car?  It seems like that's what a lot of the young people our age are doing.  :)   Well luckily, we got a REALLY good deal on this and we can save a little for a couple small fun things and put the rest away in savings.  It sounds great to me...although Hyrum thinks all I'm going to fill it with is frozen pizzas and ice cream.  He might be right.....maybe a little.....:)

Daddy Daughter Date

 

Haha!  Kyla's such a goof!

 

 Playing on the toys

Hyrum and Kyla went on a daddy daughter date Thursday night while I was out visiting teaching.  They had so much fun!  First, they went to Arctic Circle and got free ice cream baby cones and french fries.  Then Kyla played on the toys there for awhile.  Afterwards, they went to DI (Kyla's favorite store ever!) and Kyla showed Daddy everything that she wanted to look at...books, toys, movies, etc.  Then he bought her a little toy that she wanted.  She loved spending so much time with her "best friend".  She is such a daddy's girl.  In fact, she's so much of a daddy's girl that since we've put her in her toddler bed, he's the only one that can get her to stay IN her bed.  No matter what I do or how hard I try, she just doesn't like me doing it but once Daddy gets in there she stays asleep...even though he does the same things I do!!  That girl.....Sigh...I'm definitely glad she loves her Dad so much though!

Typical Toddlerhood Picture

I don't know if it's just me, but it seems like every kid has at least one of these pictures.  The other night Kyla fell asleep by the door of her room.  We went in to check on her before we went to bed for the night and this is what we found.  We could bairly get the door open!  We thought it was such a priceless and sweet moment so of course we had to take a picture.  She's still getting used to her bed and still gets out of it instead of going right to sleep but it's getting better so hopefully she'll be fully used to it by next week!  What do you think...do you have a picture of your kids sleeping on the floor in their room and just think it's so adorable?!

Celebrating 4 years

Yesterday marked our official 4 year anniversary!  We celebrated it about a month ago so didn't do much on the actual day but Hyrum did surprise me with a beautiful corsage! I was definitely excited seeing as I only recieved corsage's in High School for dances.  It means so much more coming from someone you love!

The last 4 years truly have been the best 4 years of my life and I can't wait to see what the next 50+ years bring.  I am so grateful for a husband who is always so kind, loving, understanding, and helpful.  I have definitely married someone above me and who has far passed my dreams of anything I ever imagined in a future husband.  I am so grateful that we were able to be sealed and married in the temple for eternity and that the Gospel is a part of our every day lives.  Thank you sweetheart, for the best 4 years of my life!!!  I love you!

Kyla's Newest Sayings

Kyla's newest sayings these days are...

"What's up Pops?"
"Just Kidding!"
"Actually..."
"Oh (insert name), you're trouble!"
"Sure" (in response to asking her a question)
"Look, I'm cute!" (after getting all dressed) 
"I'll see ya later honey"
"Woah, that's awesome!"

Of course there are more but those are the ones I can actually remember right now. Where does she get these things anyway?

Blog Giveaways

I don't know why I always post blog giveaways on my blog because I never win but I usually only post them if I really really really want them and if I know that other people will really really really want them too! :)  So there's 2 giveaways. 

The first is HERE.  VERY cute little girl capris, belt and bag.  C'mon, wouldn't you say any girl would look adorable in this?

The second is HERE.  I absolutely love scrapbooking; however, my supplies are very limited so this would just add to my small yet growing collection! 

You must admit...those are pretty great blog giveaways!  Try to enter to win yourself....you never know, you could be the lucky one!

I'm a Big Kid Now...

We decided to switch Kyla to a toddler bed last night and she did soooo good! It's perfect timing too. Here's a funny story about that:

I went to Walmart yesterday morning to get a side railing (the white thing in the picture) for her crib (her crib converts into a toddler bed.)  We were going to set it up when she woke up from her nap.  Well, when Hyrum went in to get Kyla from her afternoon nap she was straddling the crib and almost climbed completely out!  She's never once attempted to climb out of her crib (except when she was really little and then we just lowered the crib) except for today!  It was amazing how perfect the timing was on deciding to switch her into a big girl bed before she started hurting herself by climbing out!

Anyway, we got Kyla all excited for switching her into her "Big Girl Bed" and she loved it!  She was so excited to sleep on a pillow and she couldn't wait to actually get to bed for once!  She only got up once about 10 minutes after we laid her in there.  She was standing right by the door and it kinda startled me since I'm definitely not used to having her any where but in her crib but I laid her back down and she slept the rest of the night fine. Her afternoon nap today wasn't as easy but it only took her 1/2 an hr of playing and us going in there to lay her back down 3 times for her to be completely zonked out.  I guess we'll see how well she does tonight!  What a big girl!

10 Weeks left and counting...

I'm 30 weeks!!  I seriously have felt like Tayven has grown in the last 2 days because I feel huge!!  I know, I know...I may not even look that big yet. I was actually looking at pictures recently when I was pregnant with Kyla around this same time and I don't look as big as I was with her (I'll post comparison pictures later)...it's so interesting how each pregnancy is so different and how you can carry a baby so different each time.  I haven't been able to see my toes for awhile and putting shoes on has seemed to be a lot more difficult than it should be lately.  Oh well, it's all exciting as it keeps getting closer to the due date!

Only about 10 weeks left until he arrives!

New Stroller

Here's our most recent purchase:

 

 

A DOUBLE STROLLER

It's lightly used...we got it off the bulletin board at BYU-Idaho (thanks to my wonderful sis in law Heidi for finding it!)....but it was only $60 (originally the double strollers like this cost about $140), in almost perfect condition, and it fits in our extraordinarily small trunk...bairly! :)

I'm soooooo happy because I've been wanting a double stroller for a really long time and with this kind of deal (even though it's used), it makes all the waiting worth it!

Let me just go off and brag about my new purchase for a minute.  It has a lot of really cool features!

1. It has a convertible car seat adapter which means that even though my car seat is an Evenflo brand, it will still fit into this Eddy Bauer stroller....perfect!
 
2. The front seat can be facing either forward or backward, like toward the back seat....and you can completely remove the front seat if you don't need it....awesome!

3. The back seat has many different recline settings.  Example:  all the way back, 1/2 way, all the way forward, etc. and also the front seat can recline or sit straight up....extraordinary!

4. It has snack trays for each seat...heavenly!

5. You can remove almost everything and throw it in the wash....sweet!

6. It's so easy to maneuver and move around....although I must admit it's pretty heavy to lift and carry by itself but once it's being pushed on the ground, it's great!

7. It seems to be very comfy.....amazing!

8. It has a 3 lock harness for extra safety...a relief for a paranoid mom!

9. The storage space underneath is huge and will definitely hold multiple toys, diaper bags, coats, snacks, and all the necessities of having 2 kids....incredible!

10. It has a drink and snack tray for Mom as well as pockets to store her things in without having to worry about bringing a purse...super!

Maybe I just love it so much because we had a very used/old stroller for Kyla that didn't have ANY of these things...except for the seat reclining all the way back.  So I must say, we have quite the upgrade and it's been exactly what I've been looking for.

Here's to Tayven being born in the Spring and getting to take walks at the park everyday with 2 kids in the summer!  YAY!!  Now...if only it'll warm up a bit...

A Complete Turnaround

So yesterday Kyla slept a ton.  She got a 12 hour nights sleep (she usually only needs about 10 hrs at night), a 3 hour nap, and slept another 12 hours last night!  It was much needed for both of us.  As a result, she's almost completely better today!  She woke up a totally different person...meaning back to her normal happy self.  She hasn't coughed too much, I've only had to wipe her nose twice so far (compared to 100 times a day the last couple days), her fever is gone, and her appetite is back.  I must say that I didn't expect such a drastic change of getting betterness (haha...i know that's not even a word but it seemed to fit the best!).  Anyway, I'm glad she's happy again and hope that she really is feeling better.  We'll see what tonight brings I guess.

As for all of you who commented on the last post...thanks so much for your sympathy, prayers and kindness!  It really has helped!  And thanks for everyone who offered to make us dinner.  We haven't really needed it yet, but I hope the offer will still be available when Tayven joins our family?  I'm sure I'll definitely need some help then!  Thanks again everyone.  I really do love you all!

Sick Kids = Tired Parents

I definitely do not like having a sick kid!  Although it's fun to have more bonding and cuddle time, the coughing that this girl is doing right now just makes me so sad!  I feel so helpless when Kyla is sick because I can't really do much to help it go away.  Plus, it doesn't help when I'm starting to get sick too.  On top of being pregnant, being sick with a cold just totally drains my energy so I'm SUPER exhausted all the time!  When your kids are sick don't you just feel like this?

 

OR this?

I know I do!