Christmas on the Prado

This little girl was NOT afraid of Santa. We'll see how she is next year.

Check out Santa's belt buckle and red cowboy boots. AWESOME!

She was just checking him out.

She loved the music.
We are imitating Mary and Baby Jesus. It was Amelia's idea.

Apples

A before and after shot of the apple Amelia ate. The little things that amaze us.

I cannot get this picture to turn. It's turned right when I add it, then blogspot turns it. ugh. Maybe I can fix it later. It's worth twisting your neck to check out.

Merry Christmas

Wishing you and your loved ones a MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Ocean Beach, CA

Thanksgiving Time

Amelia LOVES the carousel. She was waving and petting the horse the whole time. We love it when Daddy gets to play with us.

Halloween

A SCARY DRAGON

Amelia and her besties

Pretty as a Peacock

Pumpkin Patch

We went to Oma's Pumpkin Patch on Saturday. I have never been to one before and it was quite nice. Next year will be better when Amelia can actually play on the structures and pet the animals. We got our pictures, looked like all the other crazy parents trying to get her to smile. I think we will go back to this pumpkin patch next year. I like the idea they have to get measured every year.

Activities at the pumpkin patch:

Pick out a "Jack" pumpkin. This was a small pumpkin that all kids 1 and up picked out with their admission fee. We got a pretty big pumpkin for $13. I feel like that was a good price. But you have to take in to consideration that we paid a $6 admission.

The goats to pet were in the middle of the patch. I think there was a fee to pet them. They had good sanitation stations. We'll do this next year.

After the goats was a cotton hill. Yes, it was cotton. It was sloped up about 20 feet. There were boards and other stuff for the kids to "slide" down the cotton hill. I thought it was pretty cool.

Then there were two little playgrounds. One for 5 and under and a big kid one. I like that they split them up. My one complaint was there weren't enough baby swings. But I haven't been to a playground where there has been more than 2.

There were a couple picnic areas. It looked like one was for parties and another for individual families to eat lunch.

And there were diaper changing stations.

The whole place was very stroller friendly.

The worst thing about the patch was the hornets and flies EVERYWHERE! On the way in Jared got stung. You can probably see some in the pictures. But I can't really complain because I don't know what they can do about it.

Hopefully more pictures to come with a carved pumpkin.

Sleep Tight

I didn't like this sleeping position but thought it was a good photo op.

Amelia LOVES her Daddy

Ok, so I wanted a picture of her crying so I could get a picture of her teeth. And I think crying pictures are funny. Jared thinks so too... look at him laughing!

Daddy's leg tastes YUMMY! Jared has been laid up for the past 9 days. His back went out. Last week he went to the doctor and the doctor said... haha. Ok really, he will probably be laid up for two weeks. Good thing we still have some paternity time saved up. I went from having two babies in Idaho to take care of to having... two babies in San Diego to take care of!

Two scary MONSTERS!

Amelia was so cute (when is she not) when she saw her Daddy at the airport. She just snuggled right up to him. I was worried after two + weeks with no one but me and Leslie playing with her that she would be afraid to go to other people. Not my girl! She is as much of a people person as ever. I have to get her out of the house so she can be social. She loves lil ol' ladies at the grocery store. Don't worry young ladies, she loves you too. It's funny how the older ladies will come up and talk to her, while younger girls will just talk about her. You know what I mean?

Idaho

My two week+ trip to Idaho was........ how do I say it Les? I can just say honestly I am glad I was there. But it was frustrating, emotionally. We had a good drive there. Then it all started.

(1)We got to Leslie's apartment and it was a MESS. There was food on the wall in the kitchen, the walls needed to be painted. The shades were messed up. The carpet was all stained. It just felt dirty. Come to find out they pay the girls that clean like $12/hour (I think Les?) and they have to buy their own cleaning supplies. The manager said that usually they did a good job when they first get hired but after that start slacking. YEAH!!! I would start slacking if that was my job too. What a RIP! We couldn't stay there the night. So Teresa (Les's Mom) got us all a hotel for the night. By the time we got settled it was pretty late.... too late for two little girls.

Then (2) we are driving back to the apartment and we pass brandly new constructed apartments. We stop in, check them out, and Leslie decided to rent from them instead. This apartment was so nice! It had a big living room, nice kitchen with granite countertop, a washer/drying in the kitchen (no coin op like the old apt), stainless steel appliances. After the hassle of changing apartments we finally get to start moving in. We were so exhausted. That was Wednesday. School starts the next day. We had no internet. Supposedly it was going to be running by that Friday. That was about the 8th of September and it is now the 4th of October and they still have no internet.

Then (3) Amelia started cutting FOUR teeth! So the whole purpose of me being there was to help Leslie move into the apartment and to watch Hallie while Leslie was going to school. Usually Amelia is THE happiest little girl ever. But with the four teeth coming in all at once she was so clingy and sad and miserable.

Leslie, at one point in all this and missing Jake after not seeing him for over a month, said "What's next? Could it get any worse?" Well it did....

(4) The mouse. HAHA. That was actually pretty funny. We were visiting in the living room. The couch is angled toward the kitchen and I could see, out of the corner of my eye, something run under the stove!!! A MOUSE! Then it ran from the stove to under the fridge. EEKS!!! Feet were off the floor. We had to act before it got out of the kitchen. So Leslie has this shelf that is about 5 feet long. We made a "coral" from the corner of the wall to the front door. We had to use a few picture frames, the stroller, and a chair to make it work. So then the mouse ran from under the fridge to under the door to the washer/dryer. So we opened the doors, turned on the washing machine to "scare" the thing... and it was a fat mouse. It wouldn't come out so I grabbed a broom and started hitting the machines. Eventually it ran out through the coral and out the door. I had to scare it along with the broom. We thought there might be more because there was a hole behind the stove. I stuffed it with some cardboard and we decided to go to bed. Leslie did not like the idea of sleeping on her bed on the floor in Hallie's room. She's a brave one though. She decided she was just going to get over it and go to sleep. And she did.

(5) Jake gets his shoulder CHOPPED to the bone by the airboat prop out moose hunting with my Dad on the 14th (or was it the 13th?). It was a terrible experience not only for him obviously, but for us to be so far away. I can't imagine how miserable Les was from missing him so much, looking forward to him coming home, then having that moment postphoned because he was in the hospital due to a horrible accident. He is back in Rexburg now and doing pretty good it sounds like. He is taking care of Hallie one armed while Les is in school. I know that Les has to work pretty hard to run the house and go to school but she sounds so much happier to have her husband home. I talked to her today and she thinks he will have full recovery eventually. She was so strong through the whole ordeal. At one point I remember her saying, "I feel that he's going to be ok."

So never ask "Can it get worse?" Because it can.

FYI: Donations for Jake's many hospital and medivac bills can be deposited at a Wells Fargo Bank. They should be able to look up Jacob Songer Donations or something like that.

The girls had fun together. I know Amelia is missing her cousin. I loved having them both on my lap reading to them. The both LOVE books. They loved taking baths together (minus the poop). Some days I tried to have them both on the same nap schedule. But other days when they needed one on one time I would spend time with one while the other one slept. Hallie missed her mommy when she was at school. I tried to make her happy, and succeeded most of the time. It was so cute to see her face light up when her Mommy came home. I loved it.

Auntie Leslie tickling Amelia. Amelia's first haircut was in Rexburg. I cut a little over an inch off the back. She was starting to get a rattail. I should have taken a before and after picture.

Sweet little Hallie. I can't believe she's already one. She is so good about leaving ribbons and hair clips in her hair.
She is quite the character. She was making the funniest faces. I hope Leslie puts some pics up on her blog of these faces. She was so good to Amelia. Sometimes when Amelia was crying she would go over to her, make a face, and Amelia would start laughing.
Note the yellow Care Bear... FunShine? Hallie LOVES this Bear. I repeat LOVES it. If you wanna see her face light up you just give this thing to her and she is immediately happy.

Fun At The Park With Auntie Leslie and Cousin Hallie

Once upon a time it was a beautiful day in Rexburg, Idaho. A beautiful princess named Leslie sat upon the swing and swang higher and higher and higher.

She pumped her legs back

and forth.....

And had the most wonderful time.

Meanwhile, two little princess cousins were having the most marvelous time togther swinging.

Smiles were everywhere.

The two little girls love being together. They are best friends.

Princess Amelia says, "I love my cousin Hallie"

I should have made a post before this one but I don't know how to "squeeze" one in. Usually I make the posts around a picture. But I don't have any pictures of the "before Idaho" part of our venture. So I'll just tell you about it right here.

When Leslie and Hallie picked us up from the airport we went to Hunstville to see my second (I mean third now that I'm married) family: The Huntsville Songers.

Insert fun music HERE.

And we didn't get lost on the way PROMISE. Our dear Aunt Pat invited her favorite kids and grandkids over (I guess the other ones aren't so cool) and made peach crepes. My favorite dish at her home. While the food was delicious the company was even better. AWWWW. Really it was so good to see the cousins. I swear they all look the same as the last time I saw them. The kids were being so good and CAREFUL around Amelia and Hallie. Well, I needed my girl to get some good interaction. So I told them she loves to be scared. Like the BOO kind of scared. Not boo. But BOOOOOO! They looked at me like I was strange but one of them decided to give it a try. BOOOOO! in Amelia's face. She started cracking up. So then they were all taking turns scaring my baby girl and it was a good time.

We were barely there for a minute and Clint (my brotha) called to say he was a half hour from Ogden....what the ??!!!?!!? OK? A little odd and chances of that? So we got a quick tour of the studio then we were on the road to meet up with Clint at Studio 9, Uncle Steve's Art Studio in Ogden. We met up with my brotha and had a nice time. He woke up the girls so he could meet them. They liked him and I think he liked them.

So it was a rush rush rush through Huntsville and Ogden. We had a very nice time. It was wierd to be in Huntsville and not stay for a while. Usually I feel like I'm at home when I am there. But for the first time, with all the rushing, I felt like a guest. I mean, I didn't even get to help with the dishes!!! Good memories there in ol' Huntsville.

Alaska Visit

We are having a blast in Alaska. Amelia loves playing with her cousin Hallie every day. She is really going to miss her.

I got these carharts for the girls. Thought if they were in Alaska they had to do as the Alaskans do. I think we took about 100 pictures of this between me, mom, and Leslie.

My brother Shane is always in his Carharts. We had to plan for the girls to be wearing the carharts when we knew Shane would be around. As for planning his outfit.... we knew what he would be wearing already.

Besties!


Can I say AWESOME PICTURE!!!

Orangutans and Gorillas

We were out and about shopping for pajamas on Saturday and we found ourselves at the zoo. It was a great day. Good weather, nice walk, happy baby. What more could we want?

I was surprised that Amelia had no problem with sitting on this weird groundage. She didn't like the grass at the park so I was doubtful. But she kept smiling and we got some good pictures.

Park Poses

Ok Mom, are you ready to take some more pictures? Classic pose

Happy pose

Unhappy pose

Momma, I don't like the grass pose