100th post! And a great two weeks

WARNING LONG POST!(but there will be lots of cute pics!!)

So In my defense to what is sure to be a very long post it has been two weeks since my last post, and we've had lots of fun since then so...

We'll start a couple weekends ago, Saturday we did some shopping in the morning, our 2nd to last stop was the funniest and oh say ironic one. We went to RC Willey to pay off our credit on the dishwasher, but then Tony mentioned looking at their chest freezers as we've been throwing around the idea of getting one(our freezer is stuffed to the gills) well of course they had a great one and it was of course on sale, and Tony's buddy who works there in the end sold it to us, but it has been so nice to have! So we went in to pay off a dishwasher and came out with a freezer, but we didn't have to put it on credit, so I guess it's a step up. Sunday we had a St. Patty's dinner/party with Tony's family which was fun, it's always nice to get together. Then Wednesday a week ago we had our niece Melina over for the first time again since Lizabeth's surgery and they had such a great time! And Alicia and I had a good visit as well. Here are some fun pics of the girls playing.








Then last Friday Tony took the day off and spent some time doing some last minute studying for his big 8 hour test that was on Saturday, but he did take a break in the morning and we took Elizabeth to The Aquarium, she had such a good time! She loved seeing all the fish swimming in the water, as usual she liked it much more than I thought she would, we had a really really good time! Her favorite part was the little boat thing...go figure!


















That evening we headed up to my parents house to spend the night as Tony's test was up at Weber early Saturday morning. My parent's got a nice little toddler bed to replace the crib she's now outgrown :( She did really well being in a true toddler bed that to boot was not in her room! I was proud of her. Tony took his test in about 6 1/2 hours and I know he did great as he was very prepared, and is such a natural genius when it comes to construction stuff. My parents took my brother Liz and me to Farr Ice cream where they were celebrating 90 years so they had really cheap ice cream. By the time we got back Tony was already there. I had picked up some plastic eggs from the dollar store and filled them with Elizabeth's treats (goldfish, animal crackers and such) and put them out in their front yard for her own little "egg find" I only filled 12 eggs thinking she wouldn't really care for it but boy was I wrong! Afterward I wish I'd put out all 16 eggs, she loved it she did so good and was so happy and proud of herself! Maybe we'll do it again this Saturday?! Then my parents brought out her Bunny Day gift from them(as both Tony's paernts and my parents will be gone this weekend, together actually!) They got her the nicest wagon ever! And a fun learning bear with buttons, zipper, Velcro and such, oh and a great touch and feel Peter Rabbit book! Thanks mom and dad so much she really really LOVES her gifts!! I got a super nice sterling silver watch, that I can't wait to get sized so I can wear a watch again it's been so long, and Tony got a funny singing construction monkey which he and Lizabeth both enjoy! It was a great pre-Bunny Day!! (sorry all the pictures are in reverse order and I'm too lazy to move them all around)
















Last night I had the great opportunity to go with our presidency to the Relief Society General Auxiliary Meeting, it was amazing! I love Sister Beck she is so inspired, but I have to say that I really connect with Sister Thompson, I love listening to her I just relate so well to all her talks, with all the recent changes to the Relief Society(and more are coming) it was great to hear direction directly from them. They truly are amazing women!

I'll end with a picture that I'm sure will put a smile on your face as I can't look at it without laughing!

18 month part two and St. Patty's Day

We had a great weekend even getting out of the house for a bit! We had our niece Caitlin's birthday party Sat afternoon, which was a blast, she is such a fun girl! We sure love her! Then after that we went up to my parents house as we were already halfway there, and spent the evening with them, and my brother was even there so that was great. Tony and my dad changed Eric's breaks for him, Tony actually enjoyed it...maybe a little too much! JK It was actually kinda nice cause Eric has a Focus as well so Tony figured he'd learn on his car so that when the breaks go on our Focus he'll already know what to do! Sunday was our stake conference, which was all the more reason to keep Elizabeth home...even more people and babies with even more bugs, and it just kinda impromptu turned out to be a pajama day as none of us made it out of our pj's! It was a fun day spent together all three of us, and we really enjoyed it.
Tuesday I took Lizabeth to her 18 month check up and her stats were as follows: weight just over 23 pounds, which is awesome considering she just had surgery a little over a week ago! That was like the 25th percentile. Height was 33 inches!! Ya that is the 90th percentile! That was quite the growth spurt! And her head remains in the 10%. She is as she always has been too smart for her own good! Dr. Sandvig was amazed at her vocabulary, and loved seeing all her signs! My favorite part was when Sandvig was checking her heart and lungs and such Liz kept saying "all done" and pushing her away. And when Sandvig asked Liz if she could look in her ears Liz told her "no" rather firmly! She laughed and did it anyway. But most importantly Liz got a clean bill of health. Dr. Sandvig is having me take Liz up to a dermatologist at Primary's to take a look at her birth mark as she thinks the shape may be changing, and it looked to her like the color is a bit darker so we just want to be safe. I told her I'm going to stop coming to these wellness visits if every time I do I end up in a new part of Primary's!! JK I'm sure it's nothing but we need to know it's nothing.
Yesterday was of course St. Patty's day and though Liz has absolutely no clue or care about it at all, I at least had her in a St. Patty's shirt, and she did paint with green, which I'm going to cut clovers out of for the grandparents and our fridge. And the weather was amazing! So we'd spent alot of time outside playing...it was so nice! Oh I almost forgot! Tuesday night we converted Liz's crib into a toddler bed! She's done real good with it too! That first night I just kept putting her back in bed over and over and over for an hour and a half til she finally got too tired to fight anymore and passed out! The next day for naptime I only had to put her in her bed 4 times! And that night Tony only spent about 10 minutes fighting her, so it's definitely getting better all the time! Our little girl is growing up so fast! It kinda makes me sad she'd not in a crib anymore, but I'm glad she's doing so good in her "big girl bed"!
Well that's about it with us here are some pics.
18 month pics part 2(her diaper leaked all over her butterfly outfit so I had to change her before nap and since it was such a nice day out I decided on this pretty spring dress!)









Helping daddy get ready to put the castle climber outside!

Such a silly girl! (really a silly daddy since he's the one who put it on her head!)

St Patty's Day painting!


Playing outside in the morning





Baby Einstein time!

Back outside after naptime! It was so nice and warm!


The looks I get!!

She started playing this game it was so cute!

Surgery and 18 months!

Well I guess I'll start from last Thursday, that evening my and Tony's parents came over to give Elizabeth a blessing before her surgery. That night I got very little sleep, we got up at 6 am and got ready got Lizabeth up at 6:30 and headed to Riverton. We got all checked in and tagged then went upstairs to wait, my mom was already there waiting for us. I'm so grateful to have had her support during this! I must mention that I really had no sense of time during the whole thing, I'm sure it was my Father in Heaven's way of helping me through this, but anyway Lizabeth played for what seemed like only a few minutes but I'm sure it was longer, then they called us back, and got Liz's stats, and then had us put her in her "hospital clothes", then a nurse came in and talked with us then we went to another waiting room where Dr. Larson came and spoke with us and marked her eye. Then a nurse brought some medicine to make Liz drowsy and kinda out of it so she wouldn't freak when she left us, shortly thereafter the..."sleep dr"...I haven't the foggiest how to spell that big word, came and talked to us and gave Liz a mask like the one he'd put on her to put her to sleep and she went to town biting on it. Then far too soon he came back and said it was time, I've never wanted to cling to my little girl so badly! It took every ounce of will I had to let her go. Amazingly the "sleep dr" as we got to the end of the hall as I was giving her loves barked like a dog, yup he sure did, he asked Liz if she liked dogs! Little did he know! She went to him probably thinking he was taking her to see a doggie! The surgery only took an hour but somehow to me it only felt like ten minutes or so...the whole time leading up to that day I was convinced it was going to seem like a lifetime, but I'm truly blessed, I had my mother and mother in law to visit with and keep me slightly preoccupied. Tony and his dad went to herriman real fast to finish up our taxes which Tony's brother Matt so kindly did for us, and Elizabeth's surgery got done just before they got back so I had to sit in the consultation room by myself for a few minutes luckily Tony got there before Dr. Larson did he told us everything went great, and gave us the run down of what to expect and look out for and such then told us when she woke up we could see her. Well she sure took her sweet time with that! The little girl that was taken to surgery after Liz was leaving before we got to go back and see her! But soon enough the nurse came out and said one of us could go back and see her I was halfway to the door before she even finished! When I got back there my heart nearly shattered at what I saw. Lizabeth looked so pale and swollen, the moment I said her name she grabbed up Lovey and reached for me, and without even asking I swooped her up! They did their final checks of her in my arms, she was so limp, she just buried her head into my chest and lay there. I didn't let go of her after that..I even walked behind her bed carrying her to post-op, the wonderful nurses there totally understood though and just let me do it. She slowly drank the apple juice they gave her and didn't throw up so they then discharged us. She slept pretty much the rest of the day, she didn't really care for lunch or dinner, or even playing a whole lot, but that was gone by Sat. She did have some hand eye coordination issues for the first few days but has quickly figured things out again. She is one smart cookie! Now I'm sure none of you are wondering how you keep an 18 month old from rubbing her eyes when she'd in bed and your not there...well the answer is "no-no's" basically they are arm immobilizers, she of course figured out how to get them off within a day but they still helped while she wasn't allowed to put pressure on her eye. She did have an annoying low grade fever from Sat to Tue so I called her dr and he had me email...yes email him pictures I took of her eye and from that determined that her eye was not infected and told me that if her fever wasn't gone by the next morning to get her looked over by her pediatrician...well of course Wed morning the fever was gone! I'm so so soooo thankful things so far have gone as good as they have! She is totally back to herself and having lots of fun inside. But we managed to really bring outside fun in! You see we bought Liz a Little Tikes swing and slide play thing, that we set up inside for her to play with! Finally a slide she can actually go down, and swing whenever she wants to! She also LOVES looking through the little telescope.

And today she is 18 months old!! I can't believe how big she's getting! Here's some pics to enjoy!

Eating her last meal before surgery.


Adorable even in a hospital gown!


Home after surgery


Grandma Linda gets the prize for favorite post surgery gift!


"Helping" daddy


18 Months old!!



Signing and saying please for Baby Einstein

Playing on our new climber!

Long Week

Ok so I'm way over due on this post so much for every Thursday, but it was great while it lasted! Not a whole lot has been going on the past week, we've pretty much been under house arrest because Elizabeth CANNOT get sick before her surgery...it won't prevent it from happening it will just needlessly complicate it, so we've just stayed at home and when the weather is nasty and cold I've done my best to bring the outside in, praises to our tent and tunnel for hours of entertainment! And her Jump and Spin Pony lets her get alot of wiggles out! Our niece Melina has come to play a couple times so that's helped too! And lately the weather has been nice enough that I feel ok bundling her up and taking her out to play for a bit. And so far so good, cause she's as healthy as a horse...ok maybe not that good but she's not sick and that's what counts! I've pulled out all the stops! We've played with bubbles...lots of bubbles! I I think she gets more enjoyment out of watching Shadow biting them out of the air then popping them herself! We've pulled out play dough, and crayons, and finger paint, anything I can think of to help her forget she hasn't seen the outside world in weeks! And sometimes it works and sometimes I just deal with the temper caused by cabin fever.
Something super cute she's been doing lately is she's learned the sign for "please" and she says it as "peaz", it's so cute and I'm so glad she's learned an important manners word, BUT she only seems to say it when she wants something she can't have! Not always but most the time. Like she'll sign and say please while pointing to cookies while I'm fixing her breakfast...or she'll say it while pointing at the finger paints as we're getting ready to head up for nap time. You see she's under the assumption that as long as you say please you can have whatever you want whenever you want it, and when I bust that bubble she has a total meltdown...I never thought the word please would haunt me! Speaking of her signing she did the cutest thing the other day...I was laying on the couch with a headache being very lazy, and she went into the kitchen and started hitting the fridge it was then I realized her milk was in there, but not wanting to get up kinda ignored her as she did have a full sippy cup of water on the floor. She then started whining hoping this would get my attention but alas I ignored that as well, so finally she came marching..and I mean marching, over to me and signed "milk" in vigorously right in my face! And when I sat up and looked at her she then signed "please" with puppy dog eyes. I couldn't help but laugh.
Well we only have three more days til her surgery, that I'm doing my best not to stress too much about. We'll keep you posted how it goes.
As always here are some pictures of Elizabeth taken the past few weeks.









this picture perfectly illustrates why she is having surgery.(notice her right eye)