11 months!

In less than one short month little Chloe will be 1 year old! No longer a "zero" as our friend's kid used to call Karson. I can't believe it... time flies too fast! She is still as cute as ever and is so full of personality. Within the last week she has gotten brave and tried walking short distances. So exciting! Cris gives me a hard time because I wouldn't "let him teach her sooner," but it was for good reasons. Having a 9/10 month old that is crawling is enough work, walking would be so much more trouble!

Other than that, Chloe is just growing up and changing all the time. She is doing cute things like clapping with a big grin on her face, chasing Karson around, and eating anything she can get her hands on (not excluding chicken poop...yuck!). I'm working on planning her first birthday party, and it should be lots of fun! I've decided to do a mermaid theme which should be pretty cute! Here's some fun pictures of what Chloe's been up to :)

Standing up in her highchair... of course!

Troublemakers, squeezed their way past the stool to mess with the TV

Playing in a Gi-normous ball

Scooping sand with the fish face ;)

Playing in the pool with Karson

Goofin' around with Karson after he got her dressed

Karson the Soccer Stud

We decided to sign Karson up for soccer this year (after meaning to do so for the last year or 2 or 3...oops!). He had his first practice last Friday, followed by his first game Saturday morning. We went to Play It Again and got him some shin guards and socks, then found some sweet tennis shoes at the Nike store by our house. Lucky for me, the soccer ball I bought him for his birthday last year was the right size... score! I had to work the night of his practice, but Cris said he did pretty good. His only problem (of course!) was listening to his coach. I guess at one point he was running around with his hands in his pockets. Cris thought he was trying to touch the ball too much so maybe the coach told him to put his hands in his pockets to avoid temptation...but that wasn't the case. Nope, it was just another episode of Karson being his wild little self! Gotta love him :)

I was excited to be able to make it to his first game... even though it was right after I got off my last night of work. We signed him up on the indoor soccer league. The playing field was pretty cool... I have never been to an indoor soccer game before. It reminded me of an ice rink with turf on it, and not so cold LOL. Karson put on his new Orange Fireball jersey/t-shirt and was ready to play. His coach stayed up late the night before and printed/ironed all the kids names onto their shirts...so fun!



Of course parents need to be reminded of these fun facts :)



Karson played forward for awhile, then got tired so decided to try his hand at goalie for a bit. I'm not gonna say that being a goalie is his calling in life, but he had fun. I think his team only scored on him once, and the other team maybe got a couple past him LOL. It is so fun to watch a big herd of 4-6 year olds running around chasing a soccer ball with no real concept of what they are doing. There was a cute little girl with blonde pigtails that was running around energetically with the biggest smile on her face the whole time... adorable! When I played soccer back in the day I hated almost every second of it because I have never liked to run... I almost always played defense to minimize the amount of running I had to do. But Karson seemed to enjoy it, and I am excited to watch the rest of his games! Go Orange Fireballs! :)



Snacks: the best part of playing soccer



Go Brother, Go!

TeN mOnThS oLd!

Here we go again... Chloe is ten months old already! She is a super fast crawler, avid explorer, and all around busy body. She absolutely LOVES making messes. I'm pretty sure she has a need to take everything out of its container as fast as possible and is constantly working on setting new records. It has become quite entertaining. So far this month she has had a couple fun experiences. She went to her friend's first birthday party and met lots of really nice strangers, played in a sandbox and enjoyed a cake ball...

We went for a drive through the mountains up by Blacks Creek... it took 4 hours which we didn't expect but it was fun. We followed the Snake River around and took some fun pictures (on my camera which I'm too lazy to upload at this point). The kids were sooooo sick of being in the car by the time we got home!

mmmm Cheetos!

On Saturday we drove over to meet my parents and brothers in City of Rocks. That place is just amazing! Chloe spent the afternoon watching the boys climb Taco Boulder, and Karson made a little dam in the stream that ran down the hill. After the boys had had enough of climbing we hiked back down to the cars. Chloe fell asleep in the backpack I was carrying her in... and we left just in time for the snow to start falling!

We have also been giving Chloe some fun foods to experiment with and she loves it!

Frozen mango

Yogurt covered pretzel= mess!

Spaghetti...oops! This is what Mom gets for trying to take a picture instead of helping her with her dinner.

Blueberry waffles are definitely an acceptable breakfast at our house.

Who doesn't like frozen Go-Gurt?!

Oh yes and she is now working on her third tooth! It's so cute, it's a little pokey nub on the top gum. She looks so goofy when she does her big squinty-eyed smile (...you know, the one she got from her dad!), but I LOVE it! We can't believe how fast she is growing...and it is already time for me to start thinking about 1st birthday party plans... WHAT?! We think that she will start walking soon...but we will see!

Pinspired DIY Headbands

Yesterday I had the urge to do something... anything crafty. I have been not so motivated lately so after I put Chloe to bed I made some headbands out of some old, way too tight t-shirts that I never should have bought in the first place... but hey at least I'm getting some use out of them :) There are lots of tutorials out there for this type of headband and they are super easy to make. Here is what I did. ..

Start by laying out your shirt and cutting off the bottom hem

Cut a strip as thick as you want. Mine were about 3-4"

Twist into a figure 8

Twist again...





Fold it in half and the top should look like this

And thats it!

I made 5 total in about 10 minutes

Hiking, Biking, Swimming and Sunshine in the Beautiful Saint George

Spring Break 2013



Karson showing Chloe his ladybug

Spring break was a success :) We had a great time and enjoyed some really nice weather. Our adventure started off on Sunday as we drove down to my mom and dad's place. The drive was long and Chloe hardly slept, but Karson did well. We rented Hotel Transylvania and Karson watched it twice! By the time we got into town I couldn't wait to get out of the car...Chloe had been screaming at me for way too long and my nerves were pretty much shot. Apparently Chloe doesn't travel as well as Karson did at this age. But we made it, so that's all that matters!



Karson and Chloe at the hotel

On Wednesday morning, we headed for Saint George....hello sunshine! We checked into our hotel and as we were getting ready to go check out the pool Cris found a cockroach in our bathroom... Gross!!! The manager offered to let us change rooms, but also said it was an ongoing problem so we decided not to move unless we came across another one. Thankfully that was the only one we encountered.

Chloe and Karson LOVED the pool. They both had so much fun swimming, and the weather was so nice! My mom bought Karson some sweet blow up airplanes with squirt guns attached to them that were a huge hit among all the kids in the pool. After swimming, we went out to lunch and then hiked up this cool crack. What a neat place! You had to shimmy sideways through most of it and then pull yourself out (with arm strength that I am lacking!) at the end. Luckily my brothers were coaching me through it and warned me about the narrowest parts. Looking at the pictures it seems like there is no way adults could squeeze through there!

Thursday Chloe and I did our own thing while everyone else went for a fun little bike ride... which reminds me, we really need to get another bike (Craigslist, here I come!).  Mom, Chloe and I went out thrift shoppin' with my grandma that evening, then stopped at this neat little water park and let Chloe play. The "water park" had some stone steps with little waterfalls flowing from them into a pond with small red rock boulders in it for the kiddos to crawl around on. Chloe loved playing in the waterfalls...tooo cute!

Meanwhile....the boys were rock climbing at Chuckwalla. Dad bought Karson a harness at the Desert Rat and when we got there Dalton was belaying him up a huge red rock wall. He seemed to really like it, but I think his favorite part was just clipping in with the carabiners. He looked so cool in his climbing harness! That night Riley, Mom and I went to a Kundalini yoga class at Downtown Yoga. It was all about the full moon, and it was a very unique class. I was lost half the time and pushed to my physical limit the rest of the time, but it was definitely worth it just to experience this type of yoga.



 Friday was the beginning of our mini family reunion at Coral Springs Resort right outside of St. George. The condos were gorgeous! Both of our condos had 2 queen beds, 2 sets of bunk beds, a kitchen, laundry room and 2 bathrooms. The master bathroom had a walk in shower and a jacuzzi tub... which Chloe and Karson had a nice bath in.

Saturday we started off with a nice yoga class taught by Mom. When we were done, the kids went on an Easter egg hunt. Karson was lucky enough to find the egg with a $5 bill in it! Cris carried Chloe around and got her to pick up eggs, but she wouldn't put them in the basket. She chose to shake them and/or try to open them instead.

That afternoon we went to Red Cliffs Campground and hiked up a nice trail to some waterfalls. We took turns jumping into the freezing pool at the bottom of the first waterfall. What a rush! The water was soooooo cold, but it was probably about 80 degrees outside so that helped. Chloe was a little explorer like always and walked around on the red rock with Gramps :) When we got home we ended the night with some dinner and a family talent show... which was actually pretty cool. We have some talented people in our family.


We ended our family reunion Sunday morning. My mom, my aunts and I hiked up the hill behind the condos and did some yoga with the sunrise. It was so amazing! There aren't many places with a view like that! What a great vacation!

Hike up the crack

Climbing at Chuckwalla

Gooseberry Mesa

Gramps and Chloe at Red Cliffs

Second waterfall at Red Cliffs Campground

Family picture...Karson was pouting about not being able to catch a lizard

Dalton supervising Karson and Chloe in the Jacuzzi tub

Coral Springs Condos

9 Months Old!

Chloe is now 9 months old! How did time go by so fast?! She is growing so fast and accomplishes new exciting things all the time! I think it is just about as difficult keeping up with her as it was with Karson...which took me by surprise. I thought my little girl would be a sweet little angel and never give me any trouble! At least not until she was a teenager LOL. So much for that naive dream...I guess I knew better. She is crawling over things, getting into everything, screaming at us for not paying enough attention to her, and so many other troublesome behaviors... but we are loving [almost] every minute of it! She is still working on getting her little tooth to come all the way through...and maybe that's been playing into her attitude. But who knows... Cris took her for her first bike ride ever yesterday, and she seemed to enjoy it. I also found an adorable little Disney Princess umbrella stroller that she seems to be a big fan of. With the nice weather this week, I took her for a little stroll around the block in her cute new Croc wannabes and she just kicked her little feet the whole way... toooo CUTE!!!

Little rockstar princess :)

Chloe's first bike ride!

Look at that cute new stroller!

... and ADORABLE shoes haha

What a happy girl

Giving Bear dog loves

Karson pushing Chloe in her new stroller...good times!