25 Random Things

My friend Calie tagged me and since I am bored and also have nothing to blog about, I thought I would do this. Here are 25 random, un-inspiring, useless bits of information about me: (If you knew all of these before, I am going to have to say either you know me too well or you are a stalker).

1. I hate, hate, hate feet.
2. I one time drove my mom's minivan right into a dumpster with 6 girls in the car with me right after I got my driver's license. And I will never live it down.
3. I have had 5 surgeries.
4. I used to live on a road named Barney Dairy Road.
5. When I was young, I had a bad habit of saying inappropriate things, so my kind aunt Linda assigned me the motto, "When in doubt, don't shout it out!"
6. I met Devin at Jamba Juice
7. I have been skydiving
8. 2 of my co-workers from LA Weightloss came up with Hallie's name
9. I have been pulled over 8 times and never gotten a ticket
10. I have always been a huge fan of the Atlanta Braves. When we were younger, my siblings and I would make charts and keep track of all sorts of statistics, along with attempts to "call" homeruns.
11. Devin and I wrote his whole mission- thought not seriously
12. I lived with my friend Camille for my entire college career, that is until I got married.
13. I am a mustard freak, but hate mayo
14. I also hate milk, rootbeer, and grape juice
15. I don't really know how to iron. Devin does it.
16. I used to have to scrub my bathroom weekly with a toothbrush. My mom was hard core!
17. I have dressed up as a bag lady and paraded around town with a wagon full of treasures.
18. I worked helping a girl with Down Syndrome all through high school. I would go to her house two days a week and help get her ready for school, then help after school until 6. I loved it and I miss her so much.
19. I was never a rebellious teenager, but I did get kicked out of my physics class a number of times.
20. In junior high, I begged my dad to hire me as his professional "shredder" at his job.
21. I once fell asleep with my head on a random man's lap when I was on a plane ride home from EFY in Virginia when I was 14. None of the 3 friends that I was with woke me up, but let me spend the whole flight like that.
22. Devin and I sometimes play "Memory", you know the kids game, after Hallie is asleep.
23. My dad was a travel agent while I was growing up, so we got to go lots of fun places.
24. I had a pen-pal from Slovakia that I wrote to for years.
25. My favorite meal is turkey and mashed potatoes.

I tag anyone who is having blogger's block!

Chit Chat

Since Grandma and Grandpa P. are on a mission in Russia and have never met Hallie, here are some videos of Hallie talking and laughing for them (and for all you who want to see too, since of course, it's pretty cute).


Don't mind our obnoxious ha ha ha's. Devin and I were just trying to get the child to laugh, ok?

It's Been Three Years...

...And I still miss it like crazy.

Smiles

Nothing is more fun and exciting than seeing Hallie smile and giggle at this point in her life. She is smiling and laughing a lot lately, but we have not been able to get any pictures of it, of course. But today we did!!! I just love her. When she smiles, it makes me think that I am doing an okay job. At least she is not depressed, right?





And because she is funny, here are some bonus pictures. She loves her bouncy chair, so we sit her in there quite a bit. She got this crab toy from my dad and Sharon for Christmas that counts in Spanish that we attached to the chair for her to look at. Well, she loves it. One day, I left the room for a second and I came back to find that she had manuevered herself from a vertical position into a horizontal position and that she was licking the crab incessantly. It was hilarious. I told Devin about it later and his comment was, "oh no, she already has expensive taste!"

A Blow Out Story

This is what you get when you are at Albertson's, your child has a HUGE blowout, and you removed the extra clothes you had sitting in her diaper bag for forever THIS MORNING. Not a good combination. Poor child.

101 Things in 1001 Days

I am sure some of you have seen this on other blogs, but I thought I would do it too. I am not good at keeping New Year's Resolutions, but I like this method, because usually it is just a one-time something to accomplish. And hey, no better way to make good use of my time! I am determined to accomplish everything on this list. I will keep you all posted on how it goes! Start Date: January 7th, 2009 End Date: October 5, 2011
1.Read every conference Ensign from cover to cover between now and then, including this past November's. (6/6) 9/21/11
2. Attend a Jazz game 2/11/11
3. Have five different couples over for dinner (5/5) 7/6/09
4. Make my own crossword puzzle with clues (it has to be solvable too) 6/21/09
5. Clean out my closet and send all unused clothes to the DI 1/14/09
6. Visit St. George (never been, pathetic huh?) 8/1/10
7. Get a picture of Hallie on Santa's lap 12/4/09
8. Walk around the Greenbelt in I.F. with Devin and Hallie
9. Track all spending for three months straight (3/3) 3/7/09
10. Attend all the adoption training classes in a cycle (5/5) 5/4/09 
11. Give blood 3/25/09
12. Go to a BYU football game 11/20/10
13. Finish Hallie's baby calendar 12/13/09
14. Participate in an intramural sport Softball, May 2009
15. Vote in a local election 11/3/09 
16. Index 10,000 names (10,000/10,000) 12/22/09
17. Pay off my student loan 2/24/10
18. Go to Five Guys to try their fries 5/22/09
19. Go to see the tulips at Thanksgiving Point 6/5/10
20. Have Family pictures taken 11/7/09
21. Donate money to charity 1/29/09
22. Take Hallie to the zoo 7/11/09
23. Send a letter to someone who has inspired me 3/9/10
24. Dress the whole family up for Halloween 10/30/10
25. Visit the Grand Canyon
26. Eat a traditional Portuguese meal that Devin cooks 7/5/09  
27. Compliment a complete stranger 10 times (4/10) 8/5/11 
28. Transfer childhood movies to DVD
29. Get a medium sized saucepan 12/24/09
30. Beat Devin at chess once 7/2/09
31. Make cinnamon rolls that actually taste good 5/20/09
32. Complete a book of Sodoku 3/2/09
33. Try 5 new Restaurants (5/5) Gormandise Bakery, Bombay House, Five Guys, Paradise Bakery, HuHot 7/25/09
34. Take Hallie sledding 12/24/09
35. Go for a drive up the canyon in the fall 9/3/10
36. Try 3 new flavors of drinks at Sonic (3/3) 4/20/09
37. Take Devin to Tucanos 10/3/09
38. Make Hallie a 72 hour kit 5/21/09
39. Finish current journal and start a new one 2/17/09
40. Move out of Provo! (Okay, so we didn't actually move out of Provo, but we moved out of student housing and we don't plan on moving again until this list is complete, so it will have to do!) 7/18/09
41. Watch "Split Infinity" 2/18/09
42. Obtain my medical records 6/19/09
43. Make homemade eggrolls 8/19/09
44. Hike the Y (Devin's idea. I hate hiking!!) 9/7/09
45. Go ice skating as a family
46. Ride the Front Runner into Salt Lake
47. Complete 2008 Photo albums 3/7/09
48. Sell old textbooks on Ebay 8/10/09
49. Approve 20 couples to adopt (20/20) 5/5/10
50. Attend a family reunion 7/22/09
51. Go to a taping of "Good Things Utah" 12/7/09
52. Watch Devin graduate!! 4/22/11
53. Make our wedding album 2/25/09
54. Attend all the temples in Utah that we have not been to (Logan, Ogden, Bountiful, Draper, Vernal, Monticello, St. George, Manti, Oquirrh Mountain) (5/9)
55. Get a will for Devin and I
56. Go to Lagoon
57. Fill up Hallie's piggy bank 11/5/09
58. Make our bed everyday for 3 months straight(3/3) 3/7/09
59. Go visit a nursing home
60. Finish 3 full coloring books (3/3) 6/1/10  
61. Do something different to my hair 4/21/09
62. Finish Hallie's baby book 5/6/10
63. Visit Las Vegas (also never been there...)
64. Make the overnight rice pudding that we have had sitting in our cupboard for forever 1/25/08 65. Plant a garden 5/7/09
66. Work at a soup kitchen
67. Go to "Music and the Spoken Word" 12/13/09
68. Go to a BYU basketball game 1/31/09
69. Load Christmas and Church music onto the IPOD 1/15/09
70. Float the Snake River 7/23/09
71. Write my life history thus far (I'm halfway!)
72. Bake 10 new desserts (10/10) 7/5/09
73. Write Devin a love note 2/17/09  
74. See 10 movies at the dollar theater (10/10) 7/14/11
75. Play tennis with Devin  
76. Shop at the DI in American Fork for clothes for Hallie 2/18/09
77. Own a washer and a dryer 7/18/09  
78. Give Hallie a sibling 3/1/11
79. Rent a tandem bike and ride it with Devin
80. Do 100 sealings (100/100) 10/23/10
81. Take Hallie to ride the Heber Creeper
82. Try 5 new recipes involving wheat (5/5) 10/2/09
83. Go on a family picnic in the park 5/21/09
84. Own the game "Ticket to Ride" 5/27/09
85. Send messages to 2 important people in my life telling them what they mean to me 5/10/09
86. Make gingerbread houses 12/14/10
87. Attend a Relief Society General Broadcast 9/26/09
88. Read Devin's mission journal 3/6/09
89. Add 20 recipes to the recipe blog (20/20) 11/7/09  
90. Use the popcorn maker we got for our wedding 6/14/10
91. Read from the manual before Relief Society 15 times (10/15)
92. Have a bonfire to roast marshmallows, etc. 7/23/09
93. Have a reunion with high school friends 1/13/09
94. Take Hallie and Sadie to McDonalds to eat fries and play (okay how about Wendy's and swimming?) 5/3/10 95. Visit the 4 corners
96. Go to a play at the Desert Star Theater 3/11/09
97. Take Hallie swimming 4/18/09
98. Reach 250 blogposts 1/4/10
99. Go to Witchapalooza at least once more 10/17/09
100. Read 50 books (50/50) 3/16/10
101. Make an avacado milkshake 5/7/09 


 Feel free to do it too, if you want!

Happy 2009!

We hope everyone had a Happy New Year! We sure did. New Year's Eve was a great day. While Devin worked, I got to go to lunch at the Gateway with my friends Kim and Ashley. I worked with both of them at LA Weightloss and Kim has since moved to Kansas with her husband while he goes to school. We went to Rumbi Grill, which was awesome because we used to eat that a lot for lunch while we worked. I had a good time laughing with them and cathing up as well as reminiscing about the good ol' days at LA. Isn't it so great to have good friends? Here is a cute picture of us.Don't worry, I didn't abandon Hallie, she came along too.

Later that night, we volunteered to help at Provo's "First Night", which was luckily held indoors at the Provo Town Center Mall, since it was approximately 100 below that night. Devin and I sat at a door taking people's money as they entered. We got to wear these adorable circus outfits too. Our door was extremely slow, as you can see by Devin's face. Don't worry, we got creative in entertaining ourselves.



Here is what Hallie did the whole night:

She was an angel and slept the whole time.
Here is what we did to entertain ourselves for the first little bit. However, taking ugly pictures of yourself gets old after a while and we were there for three hours, so we had to move on to something else.



So then we moved onto drawing. These are our versions of mountain scenes.


These are our versions of dogs and trucks.


One of us is okay at drawing and one of us is quite terrible. Any guesses which is which?
We had a wonderful 2008 and here is to hoping that 2009 is just as good, if not better!!!

Dos Meses

Hallie is two months old now! (Well on the 4th she will be, but we already had her doctor's appointment, so we thought we would post the latest stats).
Hallie is 10 lbs. 8 oz (exactly three pounds heavier than her birth weight) which is the 50th percentile
She is 23 inches long now which is the 90th percentile. Tall. Are we surprised?
Here are some pictures to enjoy. We think she is pretty cute.


Sitting up like a big girl.

Daddy likes to balance her like this and she just sits there like nothing is going on.

We also got shots at the doctor. Here are her bandaged wounds. She only cried for maybe 30 seconds and then she was done. It wasn't too bad at all. Doesn't she just look so chubby in this picture?

She has a half smile just like her dad. She busts out the half grin when she is somewhat amused, but not amused enough to fully smile. Devin does the SAME thing.

Just cute.

She LOVES her bath times. When we start getting her undressed at night to get into the bathtub, she knows what's coming and she gets so excited!

SLEEP UPDATE: As I am sure you are all DYING to know, Hallie's sleep has improved dramatically!! Devin always had this theory that the bigger she was when she was born, the sooner she would start sleeping through the night. So he wished a ten pound baby upon me. While I am glad that didn't happen, his theory seems to be coming true now. Hallie will sleep 6-7 hours per night now. YAY!!!!! We didn't really change anything, we just kept our routine the same. The unfortunate thing is that the 6-7 hour span is not ideal for me still, but we will take it. She usually goes to bed by 8, which means she is up at 3 ish to be fed. But once per night is okay and she is going right back to sleep, so we are much happier. Yay for sleeping babies!!!

Here's what we did this Christmas

We did the traditional nativity...

We gave a few ugly sweaters...

We had to have help in opening all of Hallie's presents from her grandparents and other relatives who spoiled her rotten (Thanks Lando...)

We played a few games...*Sidenote. Devin and I are incredible at the game Spades, if I do say so myself.*

We took quite a few naps...

We got to know each other a little better...

We did a lot of off key singing...

And of course we did some hula dancing!

We hope your Christmas was as merry as ours!!