Becca spent her first night in her big girl bed on Saturday! Well, it's hard to call it a big girl bed because it's so tiny. When Emma was 18 months old, we switched her out of her crib, but we never got her a toddler bed and instead just got her a twin size one. But this time around, we thought it would be best to get the toddler size since we'll be wanting the two to share a room when the new baby comes and I think a toddler bed is the only thing that would fit in there. But Becca seems to be adjusting well. The first night she hopped out of her bed a few times to play with her toys before finally getting back in herself to fall asleep. What a clever girl! In the past few nights she's fallen out of the bed a few times and we've had to go in and get her and put her back in. It has little railings on the top half, so she must be flipping around a lot in her sleep and still falling off. I suspect she'll get better at staying put in the next few weeks. I just think she's so cute sleeping in a bed. :)
I took this video this morning of Becca playing the harmonica. Am I the only one that thinks this is funny? Well, it really shows her weird sense of humor... she's just so goofy and gives us those crooked toothy smiles all the time. I just love her.
We're back home after a great week in Utah. I can't believe how busy we were! Being still morning sick I wasn't sure I'd be able to do much during the week, but I really started to feel much better during my stay there. After getting back home, I'm still feeling pretty darn good - it's nice to know I'm on the upswing of getting better and reaching more pleasant times in this pregnancy. So, my parents came on Thursday in the early afternoon - we chatted for a while and gave them the tour of the house - since this was their first time seeing it. They got the lucky privilege of sleeping on the air mattress in Becca's bedroom (while Becca spent the night in the playpen in our big closet). We took a little outing to Trader Joes while they were here. I talk about the place all the time, because it's one of my favorite places to buy great food. They were glad to finally see what all the fuss was about and it was a good excuse to stock up on car snacks for our drive to Utah the next day. The drive went well - I didn't even throw up... however, Becca did! We only had about 10 minutes left till home when she threw up all over herself and the carseat. The poor girl is known for this - we suspect she gets really motion sick and car rides can be rough for her. I guess it was good that we were so close to home, or that would have made for a really miserable trip. We stopped a lot on our drive up - which was much needed considering we each had to take turns sitting in between the two car seats - it was a tight fit, but we made it! We did a lot of fun stuff while in Utah - I'll make a list of our happenings:
Farmer's Market- They have a great farmer's market in downtown Salt Lake every Saturday. The best part were all the samples! Even better than Costco! Mom and Dad loaded up on produce for the week (peaches, apples, corn, watermelon, salsa, etc) - so yummy. We also bought an eggplant - it reminded me of myself (wearing a purple shirt and feeling rather wide around the middle), so I had my picture taken with it.
Park visits - We spent a couple afternoons at local parks, playing tennis, walking, and letting the kids play. I really was trying to soak in the cooler weather while I could!
Children's Museum- As is tradition, we spent a morning at the Discovery Center at the Gateway. What a great place! This was the first time that Becca really got something out of it as well. It's fun to see her grow up and really be able to play.
IKEA- We may have an IKEA in Arizona, but we don't make it there very often since it's about a 30 minute drive away. So, it's always nice to make an visit there while in Utah with it only about 10 minutes from the house. Emma enjoys the play area and it's a nice inexpensive lunch outing. We even bought a few things, including some yummy chocolate.
So You Think You Can Dance!!! - Totally AWESOME! My sister and I got tickets a couple months ago. She's actually never watched the show, but I couldn't go alone! Now she says she'll watch next season, since it was so awesome! The top 12 dancers from this past season performed all the most popular dances from the show. I was just in awe the whole time. 3 of the dancers were from Utah, so there was lots of screaming and plenty of support for the hometown faves. :) It may not be David Archuleta, but c'mon, isn't Gev just so cute! My favorite dance was the Bleeding Love performance with Chelsea and Mark. It was amazing and even cooler to see it live! My other fave was the hip hop dance by Comfort and Twitch - amazing!! The video below is not from the tour show, of course, but one I pulled off of You Tube from the show itself. I wish I could dance! Could that be a show? So You Wish You Could Dance?!
Hogle Zoo - The weather was so great the day we went to the zoo; it just felt so nice to be outside! Becca loved riding the train and even exhibited her skills in signing train. When we were heading into the zoo, I asked Emma what animals she wanted to see and she said, "Dolphins!". I was sorry to disappoint her with the fact that there were no dolphins at the zoo. But there were penguins and she liked that. :)
Provo time!- It's never a complete Utah visit until we've spent sometime in lovely Provo. :) So many memories. Since my brother Aaron is going to BYU right now, we had a good excuse to drive down for a visit. We met up with Aaron after his workday was over and drove over Gandolfo's for dinner (we call it "creepy basement Gandolfos"... the one on center street.. but it's the best one!) and then we mini-golfed at Cascade. What a great night!
Wheeler Farm- Another favorite place to visit. We fed the ducks (despite the all the crazy scary geese attacking us for bread!), ate a picnic lunch, rode the wagon, visited the animals, and Emma rode a pony. A lovely afternoon indeed.
Great-grandma's house- We love to see my grandma and grandpa in Salt Lake while we're there. Emma loves swinging in their backyard and she helped great-grandpa pick tomatoes and beans from their garden.
Picnic in the canyon- The leaves are starting to change to fall colors up in the mountains and it was definitely nice to see. We ate our picnic lunch and then walked through the trails a bit.
Corn Maze!- We did this maze last year at Thanksgiving Point. It's a really great event. They have a ton of kids activities in addition to the big corn maze. We let the kids play first. Emma got to dress up like a princess, jump on the giant inflatable pillow, ride the cow train, and slide down some huge slides. We totally got lost in the maze. Aaron and Sarah split up from us and got out in like 20 minutes, but it took the rest of us an hour I think - and we chose the easy maze. Apparently from above, the maze is shaped like David Archuletta - funny! After the maze we went to Cafe Rio for dinner... mmmm...
Anyway, it was a great week - the kids did well on the flight home. There were extra seats on the plane, so Becca got to have her own seat - she enjoyed not being in a car seat and Emma loved watching out the window and drinking apple juice. I loved that the flight was only 1hr and 30 minutes. :)
My parents are coming for a quick visit tomorrow. They've been in Palm Springs this week at a resort vacationing - how nice! So, since they're only 4 hours away from us (as opposed to 10-12), they are going to come see us tomorrow after checking out of their hotel. They'll be spending the night and then the next morning we (the kids and I) will drive to Utah with them to spend the week. At the end of the week we will fly home. So - there's the plan for the next week and half. I'm really excited! I'm hoping I'll do okay on the drive to Utah - I'm still nauseous (not horribly, and I am having many good days intermixed with bad). Today was a little worse, which is probably a good thing, because I don't usually have 2 bad days in a row. Well, seeing as my parents are coming to visit, I needed to make sure my house was clean. Ben's been doing much of the cleaning lately, but mopping and cleaning the bathrooms and such have been more neglected. Ben's rotation this month has been at Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale and they have him on a pretty rough schedule. He's spending the night at the hospital every fourth day - he doesn't have weekends off even. Anyway, he's at the hospital tonight which means I needed to really get down to cleaning despite that I am husband-less. Well, I got a lot done and now I don't think I'll be embarrassed by having my mom and dad see my house. I don't really know how I did it, considering I was feeling so cruddy - I must be really motivated. :) I even got Emma's room organized yesterday (or mostly organized - there are still some things to do). I got some great advice from the previous post about my cluttery Emma room woes. One thing that was suggested was to put the toys and such in clear storage boxes and keep them up high. So, the idea now is that most of her stuff is up where she has to ask to get it down. Today for quiet time I told her she could pick one box to play with during the hour - she picked her art/craft box. So, she made a bit of a mess with the stuff in there, but at least it was all easily cleaned up - later in the afternoon she was able to toss all her markers and coloring books and such back into the box and back up on the shelf in her closet it went. Wonderful!! No more scary messes that are too disorganized to tame. So, right now she has boxes for the following: legos, art stuff, make up/princess stuff, dvd's (lately she's figured out how to put her own dvd's in and start movies without asking, so now she can't), and dress up clothes. I still want to box up her musical instruments, puzzles, and a few other things. I'd like the only things left out to be her books and her kitchen stuff, so she at least has a couple things that she can get to easily without bugging mommy. Anyway, I've rambled way too long about this - but I'm just thrilled!
A few more random thoughts - I'm getting mosquito bites like crazy lately! I've hardly been leaving the house, so I must be getting bit during the night or something. I keep waking up and discovering 2 or 3 more itchy mosquito bites. I hate it! I currently have one right on my face - lovely - and a couple on my legs and one on my foot. I'm an itchy mess - as if I don't already have enough issues. On a nicer note, after the kids bath this morning I plopped them on the couch in their towels while I went to gather their clothes - they looked so cute all wet and wrapped up, so I took a picture.
We're also getting ready to put Becca in a toddler bed (which we'll be moving in with Emma closer to when the baby comes) - We decided to put a pillow in her crib to sleep on for the next few weeks before we throw her in a bed so she can get used to using one. She seriously loves it and I'm really surprised at how well she stays on it - when I check on her before going to bed myself, she's usually still snuggled in on her pillow. Last night was really funny - she lately really likes her baby dolls and this random squirrel friend, so she took them to bed with her. Well, when I checked her a few hours later, she had them nicely placed on the pillow beside her - so funny. I had to take a picture and she shielded her eyes from the flash when I did so. :) And another very random thing - I saw this video this morning. I thought it was so amusing - I really don't enjoy cats (or dogs for that matter), but this just made me giggle, and kind of creeped me out. :)
Well, the time has come to finally post about the fact that I'm prego with number 3! Most of the people that live around me and see me often already know this, but for all my lovely friends that live elsewhere that I don't get to see much, this should be new news for you. :) We are very excited about the idea of having a 3rd little one to terrorize our house... honestly I get a little overwhelmed if I think about it too much, but I just love our girls so much, how can I not be anxious to have another! Not to say that this one will be another girl - I'm holding out hope, for Ben's sake, that this will be a boy - but I really would be thrilled to have 3 girls. I love girls! Either way, I'll be pretty excited. We should be finding out the gender around the beginning of November - the due date is April 10th (according to the most recent ultrasound I got). So this puts me 10 weeks today. I've been anxious to blab about this on my blog, so that I can stop pretending that I feel great and everything is super. I've been feeling pretty crappy lately and very tired. My nice hubby has been doing all the cleaning for the past month. I'm truly blessed... and also very anxious to be feeling myself again. And I guess the best part of officially announcing this is that now I can put a baby countdown on my blog! Hooray! ;) I've opted against the floating fetus one and will try out a cute one I've seen around lately of a rather shapely mommy-to-be. I wish I really did look like that!
And even though I've been feeling blecky lately, Becca's been staying rather chipper - her latest love is bananas, and they make her very happy indeed. :)
My blogging has become rather irregular - sorry! I've been pretty lame lately. But, I have some fun pictures on my camera, so I have a good excuse to post something. Happy Belated Birthday Jodi! Lovely Jodi turned 30 on Monday - woohoo! We had a fun little swim party at Taya's house in honor of the big day. Jodi was lucky to get to blow out her own candles... she had a lot of competition! Now, I only hope I look as good as you when I turn 30. :)
On Tuesday, we went to the new Phoenix Children's Museum. We met up with Taya, Trevi, and Ezra to play. It was a fun morning. There's still construction going on with several exhibits still to be opened in the coming year, but there was plenty to keep the kids busy. Emma, of course, loved shopping for groceries. This seems to be a staple attraction at any children's museum I've ever been to. Becca joined in and picked out some of her favorite foods - popsicles and macaroni and cheese. Such a clever girl. Emma was a little more practical and grabbed plenty of milk and Bisquick. :) At the end of our visit, we went ahead and purchased a year-long membership. This will be in place of the zoo this time around. Three years of a zoo pass and I guess it's time to try something else - at least the children's museum is nice and cool!
In an effort to not let too much time pass between posts, I'm currently avoiding getting ready for the day while I put up some cute pics of my Becca. She's been so funny lately - she LOVES shoes and is often trying to get everyone to put on their shoes so we can go somewhere. She likes to bring me my shoes in the morning as well as her own for help in putting them on. This morning she found these random red boots in her shoe box and she very excitedly handed them to me to put them on her, so I did - even though she wasn't dressed yet. So cute! She's also started smiling on command (when she's in the mood, that is). She gives the funniest crooked teeth/scrunched nose smiles. Anyway, I asked her to smile for the camera and she gave me a few of these priceless grins. I also discovered that her hair is long enough finally to put it into some little pigtails - she has so little hair, but I think she looks so cute with her piggytails... they match her personality splendidly. And I also think she's super cute naked - a little ribby, but huggable nonetheless. ;)
