Lizzie is 23 months!!

Paul sent me this pic of him and Lizzie playing with the foam letters and shapes in the basement.  I love it!  Because it shows Lizzie in motion.  She loves to play with them and loves to take off her clothes and just keep a onesie on.  Lizzie is really really developing this month.  It's truly incredible.  I can't believe she'll be 2 in a month!!  Here are some things she is doing:

• She is starting to show concern and care for others - at such a young age!  For example, she bonked her head yesterday and I cried and I got pretty worried, so worried that I began to cry.  When she saw my tears, she stopped crying and grabbed a kleenex to help me dry mine.  So touching.  Also, later that day, I was coughing and she looked and me concerned and said "you otay"?  How cute is that?
• She knows what she wants and what she doesn't.  When she really doesn't want something she says "nononononono" in the cutest way.
• She is not a pushover in the playground but she is not a bully either.  I enjoy observing that about her.
• She does like to imitate the "big kids" and loves that attention
• She says "yuv you"
• She has gotten out of and into her crib a couple of times by herself.  Egads!!
• She has no idea a baby is coming.  Not sure how to explain that to her but she does love babies.
• She says a lot more words now.  Sadly more in English than Spanish.  It's hard to do Spanish in an English-speaking word but I'm still plugging along.
• She likes to play in her crib and says "sleepy" when she's tired.

Of course, I can't think of many more when I need to but suffice it to say she's a love and we love this age she's in.  Here are some more pics.

First real haircut at cookie cutters

Once she got a lollipop she was a-ok

Running to daddy when he picked us up after our trip to Colorado

Her favorite cubby at the library

Lizzie with her bestie daddy

She loves her stuffed animals

Minimoon for Valentine's Day!!

So we went on one more minimoon before we have our next baby boy.  We went down to St. George and just had a wonderful time!  We left the day before Valentine's day and came back the day after and stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn for two days.  Simply lovely!

One thing about minimoons, it's like we have a minimoon angel watching over us.  We often run into little blessings and just fun stuff and free stuff like I hit my 10 meal mark with Cafe Rio so I got a free meal, yay!  We also happened to be there during the Parade of Homes which was a ball.  And we got to go to the temple, and go hiking in Snow Canyon, and Paul even brought his bike so he could go for a ride.  We slept in and ate well.  We discovered this yummy place in town called the Riverwalk Grill, pretty fancy but perfect for Valentine's Day and we also ate at the Brick Oven, yummy.  The weather was perfect, a balmy 65 during the day.  Just the weather we needed to have a fun getaway.  Now, we want to own a condo there so we can return a lot and return with our kiddos.  Here are some pics.

What a stud huh!

Snow canyon

Valentine's Day - our gifts to each other

That's right!  Paul agreed to get a pedicure with me for V-Day.  He LOVED it lol!

Parade of homes fancy schmancy shower

Most amazing pool ever!

In front of a 2.6 million dollar home

There's that pool again

Paul loved the design

We wanna get a place around here so bad!

Dinner at the Riverwalk grill, so nice!

Handsome hubby

Snow canyon

Pedicure Paco - a real man does this

Week 31

 Feeling pretty groovy.  Looking forward to meeting a cute lil boy!

My daddy turns 80!

So Lizzie and I went to visit my dearest father for his 80th birthday.  We spent a week in Colorado and it was really nice.  I was happy to be celebrating this special occasion with him.  I did a really fun thing too.  I spent the month emailing all of his friends and asking them to send me any special notes, memories, or pictures of him.  They did!  And it was really fun and special to compile it all together in a book.  I was sooooo excited to show it to him and he loved it.  He said it was a really great surprise.  Here are some pics of our time there.

Here he is getting our traditional breakfast in bed surprise

There he is getting his book

Mami Vicki and Lizzie cuddling. They love each other a lot!  Makes me happy.

Checking out his book together

A moment with Lizzie

Squirmy Lizzie haha

We went to the Praha Inn for his birthday dinner, yum spaetzle

Lizzie loves going to Mami Vicki and Opi's home

 Lil Lizzie of course had a ball.  She spent the week with the daycare kids and learned a lot with them and from them.  So glad we had that time there.

Jared got married!!

Oh dear bloggity blog, I love writing in you but I just get far behind sometimes.  So much fun stuff to report, bye the way!  So first of all Jared and Alyson got married on Groundhog Day, Feb 2 at the Brigham City Temple.  It was a really special and wonderful reception, temple sealing, and wedding luncheon afterwards.  None of it was what I would have desired for our wedding (which was perfectly perfect in every way) but it was absolutely perfect in it's own way.  Hope that doesn't sound condescending because it's not.  What I'm saying is that my brain just thinks of things differently and I wouldn't have thought of a wedding the way they did it but I LOVED it.

Alyson had the most lovely dress.  It was an ivory tulle confection and her hair was pinned up so prettily.  The reception was at this lovely greenhouse place in Holladay so it was just covered in the prettiest flowers and they had a hot chocolate and doughnut bar.  Lizzie loved running around the whole place with her cute little girl cousins who just adore her.  It makes me so happy.  She often gets whisked away by them at family events.  The temple sealing at the Brigham City temple was in all actuality divine.  I felt raised to a higher frequency while I was there and I just knew there were others there whom we couldn't see.  The luncheon afterwards was at Maddux, down the street from the temple.  So fun and yummy.

A week before, Paul threw Jared a bachelor party (laser tag and watching Star Trek) and I threw Alyson a bridal shower at Paul's mom's home.  That was so fun and turned out lovely.  Well here are some pics of the whole lovely thing (I really like the word lovely lately).  It reminds me of my British cousins who say it quite a bit and makes me think of them fondly.

The shower

Alyson surrounded by a bevy of beauties

Paul's mom helped me make the presentation lovely

Paul came back really excited after Jared's bachelor party.  Since Paul was Jared's best man, he got to be the witness at the temple.  That was really special.

Lizzie with Bethany

The cake matched Alyson's dress. And how cool is Jared's cake?

No naps for Lizzie that day except on grandma

I love this pic with Caroline!

I just love Alyson's dress

Yummy Maddox lunch - the rolls were exquisite!