Fun On the Mountain

We love going up to visit Grandma and Papa and today was a great day to go. We had so much fun!

Tillin' the garden with Papa

We picked tons of apples. 5 boxes just off this one tree

And my favorite part was picking the walnuts. Walnuts have a soft green shell over the actual shell shell of the nut.

They were way up on the very ends of all the branches so my dad had to climb up in the tree and shake all the limbs. I was in charge of keeping track of where they fell and gathering them up. Not often you get the opportunity to pick and shuck walnuts

Our walnut spoils...so not a lot of nuts but my parents actually grew this tree from a seed almost 20 years ago and this is it's first harvest, so pretty exciting

Evelyn swung all by her ownself. She has the leg motions backwards but she got going.

Busy Busy

It seems like we are so busy all the time, but at the end of the day I think, What did we even do? By the time we get Evelyn bathed, go to the gym, clean up, have lunch, nap, read some books, the days over. I wish I had time to craft. Really though I do. Steven's only home Tuesday and Friday evenings, but has school work on Tuesday, so I could do my own things Mon-Thurs evenings after Evelyn goes to bed...but instead I waist time. Well, I've been catching up on my reading. Getting ready to start Water for Elephants.


But Evelyn keeps us really busy. I swear I clean the living room at least 3 times a day but it makes no difference. She can tear things apart faster than I can put them together.We finally got around to getting her to her 15 month apt at 15 and a half months. Close enough. She is 23lbs (60th %) and 31 1/2 in (75th %). And these are her 15 month pictures.
(actually taken at 15 month unlike her dr visit)

I now teach the sunbeam class and Steven teaches Elders Quorum, so Evelyn gets to go to nursery at just 15 months. She does really well. Since we go to the gym every day, she's used to a daycare type setting. I'm not feeling like a word-smith tonight so I'm going to do a new blog segment called, ' Our month in cell phone pictures'

Evelyn fell between the couch and ottoman

It doesn't look like it in this picture really, but she had been crying fro near 2 hrs straight.

We found out this month that Evelyn is allergic to my parents cats (most likely all cats...) and gets this really nasty thick snot that will stay in a bubble until you wipe her nose. Very awesome

Cutest thing ever. Evelyn likes to look at herself so I moved my full length mirror into the living room to keep her busy, and this is her feeding her reflection cookies. She would open her mouth SO wide and then try and put the cookie in the open mouth of her reflection

just being cute

We gave her a harmonica. She's getting pretty good

This was right after a nap and she got mauled by daisy

Kung Pao. So good. It's a Weight Watchers recipe, so not even bad for you. If you like your food spicy though, I added some red pepper flakes in addition to the small peppers because it really didn't have any Pao to it. Click HERE for recipe.

She's teething. Getting two molars and both her bottom eye teeth, so we spend a lot of our day like this.

Eskimo kisses!

As soon as I turn my back, Evelyn runs to the computer room and tries to run the mouse.

Still giving open mouth kisses

She got her first fat lip this month

Evelyn's first make over. We painted her tow nails, put on eye shadow and curled her hair. I think her hair is going to be like mine though. Even with a 1/4 in barrel, it just went stick straight.

Wearing green on green for her Papa

Steven first day of school in his MBA program. This is second quarter, but his first actually in the program.

Blowing kisses bye bye to daddy

The best seat in the house. Our kitchen is a little small so we have a rolling counter and she sits next to the toaster and hangs out.

The last few days Evelyn's been waking up between 4 and 5AM, so to try and fix this, I've been trying to keep her up later. This is at 7:45 this evening. She just laid down on the kitchen floor and lat Daisy run circles around her

This morning was another 4AM morning but instead of crying, she just played in her crib of an hour or so and I let her be and when she finally fell back asleep, she slept until 7:30. An excellent morning. Come about 6:15 if she's not up I start to worry, cuase that's what I do, so this is us letting Steven know all is well and we got a nice sleep in.

Photo Book

Click here to view this photo book larger

Long Time, No Blog

Well it's been a few months and a lot has happened. Evelyn is now one whole year old. She started walking two weeks before her first birthday and hasn't slowed down since. In fact that is one of the main reasons I haven't been able to blog. She loves to pound on the computer, or when I'm on our desk top, cry until I put her on my lap and then pound on the key board. She can say all sorts of words, and can understand and follow directions really well....when she wants. She's all sorts of independent. She can nod yes and shake her head no so now I actually know what she wants and she seems a lot less frusterated all the time. It's so fun watching her learn. She also loves cheese. Not just a little, a lot.

We're also in a house now and loving it. We're currently renting but the plan is to buy a house in the next couple years (not this house) and I'm so excited. But this house, we even have a back yard for Daisy and that makes a huge difference. I think she really likes it.

Evelyn likes to vacuum with her popcorn popper while I vacuum.

The tiny 'half bedroom' in our house. It's going to be my craft room/ computer room

Me and Steven made these shelves for our library.

This is Evelyn's room completely lined with toys. We swore we were not going to be one of those families who had more toys that they're kids will ever know what to do with but people just give us stuff. I really like her giant frame on the wall though. That's where we hang her art work.

Other than the moving into a house thing and Evelyn being one, we've been super busy but I can't think of what we've been up to... I go to the gym a lot and am loving it...most days. Some days are a little overwhelming and it just seems like on more thing I have to do, but it's always worth it. I feel pretty good these days.

I've also been going the a lot of yard sales and decided that I love them! I've been obsessed with this Just Between Friends sale because you can get really cheap baby stuff. Well my friends, you haven't seen marked down prices until you've been to a really good yard sale. I got all of this for ten dollars. Seriously, there are like 10 shirts, 5 dresses, 3 pants, some jammies, sweaters, shoes. So AWESOME! I love saving money.

Stevens completed his first quarter at Eastern and starts his MBA program in two weeks. He had a month between quarters and it's been really nice actually seeing him around. Given it'll start back up in two weeks and he'll be even busier than before, we're enjoying the now.
I got two more moles removed...one was just a 'hey put a band aid on it' kinda deal, the other was 14 stitches...14. It's no walk in the park let me tell you. I was allergic to the cream they gave me and also to the bandages so it freaking hurts. Its on my stomach so Evelyn's always kicking and touching it (when I hold her, it's right where her shoes are) and the day I was sliced open, I must have smelled like the iodine or something because I was on the couch and Daisy came up to me, smelled it and then bit it. Needless to say it's been an ordeal. I just took the stitches out and it's going to be quite an ugly scar.

We're still going strong on the no gluten thing...and by we I mean mostly me. Steven's been really supportive though. He even switched to corn tortillas and will eat my gluten free concoctions. I've only done one purposefully gluten free recipe so far. It's pretty easy to be gluten free without recipes. Just a lot of potatoes and brown rice. I did made Zucchini lasagna that was fantastic. I also find I have a lot of omelets.
I never got around to putting up Evelyn's one year pictures yet and we also took a family picture in July, so here are the pictures.