June

Well it's officially boiling here in Utah, hitting a hundred degrees today! Emma and I are currently car-less during the day, so unless we get out for a walk before noon, it just ain't happening. We are getting good at being entertained by playing with plastic cups, our piano keyboard, and looking at ourselves in the mirror. Who doesn't love that?

Emma is rocking on her knees like a pro. I've been so excited for her to get to that stage of crawling and see her gain a little independence that I didn't think enough about how my life would change! She's lunging for cords and sharp edges on our furniture, things I didn't have to worry about before, bah! I can tell she's bored and wants to get a-moving. Let me have time to baby proof first baby girl!

We said good-bye to our besties Steph, Clark and baby Calvin last week. They're moved on out of Utah to go to med school. We made sure to hang out with them as much as we could fit in before they left. We miss you guys already!!!

Party up the canyon!

Love all these guys!

These little babies together are too adorable!!

Some splash pad fun

Also, my Aunt Nancy let us swim in her pool last Saturday which was so much fun. She took this cute little family picture of us. Thanks Aunt Nancy! Em and I don"t get out much so it was kind of a big deal:)

With 4th of July coming up, I'll try to get some good photos. I did get a smartphone after all for my birthday (yay!) so I better use that great camera on it!

A great 2 years!

I am so terrible at documenting anniversaries or holiday's! I find myself caught up in the moment which I guess is a good thing. But I really need to get better at just taking some quick pics to remember those special times. Another life goal!

We had our 2 year anniversary and it was great. Not super crazy, but just fun and relaxing.  Last year we went to beautiful Mackinaw Island in Michigan which was tons of fun and a splurge, but this year we had Emma so we just played it pretty low key. It was honestly great to enjoy the day with her too, because every time we looked at her sweet happy face, it reminded us how great and beautiful marriage really is.

Putting on the sap here, I feel so blessed and lucky everyday to be with this guy forever. He puts up with my quirkiness and all my blonde moments and makes me laugh everyday. He really is the kindest, most caring man I know. He always puts God and our family first. Everyday he rushes home from work so he can spend as much time with us as possible!   Marrying him was the best decision I ever made. We always tell each other we're not perfect people, but we're perfect for each other:)

Life Lately!

It's summertime! I love this time of year. The heat, the smell of sunscreen and chlorine, family vacations, I love it all! Well except when the heat gets about 95 degrees:)

We've had a good few past months and I haven't written about them at all. Emma is already turning 7 months this week. Where does the time go? She's saying "mama" and "dada" and we're eating it up. I think I need to just post some pictures to show what we did the last few months. We went to California with Josh's family at the end of April and we went up to Idaho for the last two weekends.

She fell asleep on the floor like this:)

My mission reunion with my trainer and our little babies!  

Easter! Isn't Emma's outfit adorable?!?

 

  

We went with some of Josh's family to Orange County and stayed there for a week. Josh's sister and brother-in-law were nice enough to let us tag along on their vacation. It was a well needed trip. We swam a lot (which Emma loved!), went to Laguna Beach, the Santa Monica Pier, and Beverly Hills. Don't you just love babies in sunglasses? Love! I cut my hair spur of the moment right before the trip. Just chopped it off without thinking! But it's so easy now:)

    

We went to Arches National Park for a day trip with our besties Steph, Clark and baby Calvin. It was beautiful and the babies did pretty well in the car. We failed on getting good pictures with us in it, as you can tell. This is probably our best one haha! We saw a ton of people with selfie sticks, and it was the one time I wanted one! It was a fun time.

   


                

Here's some pics of Emma I couldn't resist putting up. Isn't she the cutest?! Josh loves the picture of us sleeping:)



I did my own little photo shoot of Emma in our living room to give my mom and mother-in-law pictures for mothers day. These are just some super cute ones!



We went to Mackay, ID for Memorial Day weekend to visit my grandparents and see family. My parents bought a cabin up there and it was our first time seeing it. It is beautiful up there, and there's a river right on our property. Talk about awesome!!!



Josh was getting schooled by the nieces and nephews at UNO;)  We had a fun time celebrating my little sister's high school graduation. I'm so proud of her and the awesome person she's become! It was great to hang out with family so much.

Vegas Weekend!

I know it's more than a week past but I forgot to write about Valentine's Day! I convinced Josh to take me to Las Vegas to visit my sister and her family for the long weekend. Minus the car trip down and back, it was so much fun! And a much needed break from Provo. Emma found her voice somewhere along the way and now sounds like a screaming toddler. Before, it was just cute squeals. Now she just screams out loud and talks a lot. It's still pretty cute but she's only 3 months so we're a little nervous for her screaming abilities later. We drove down Friday night and went to the strip with Jean, Brenoch and their family Saturday morning. It was ridiculously warm down there! We were in t-shirts and shorts and still sweating. Emma did surprisingly well and fell asleep in her baby carrier for half of it. She missed out on the M&M factory but that's ok. She'll appreciate the beauty of that later. Sadly our trip got cut short since some of the Jean's kids got strep throat. So we took an early exit on Sunday to avoid getting sick. We still haven't gotten it so I'm thinking we're safe:) It turned out o.k. too since Josh had a ton of schoolwork still to do on Monday. 

To celebrate our love and our love for food, Josh and I went to Chili's on Saturday night for a Valentine's Day dinner. Emma accompanied us and fell asleep when we got our food so that worked out well. For gifts, Josh got me a baster and a wire wisk for cooking, which I really did love! I'm trying to get better at cooking so I was pretty excited. And I... bought him a water bottle. He really wanted it guys!!! And we're still in college and have a baby, so what can we say?




Last year's Valentine's Day was a little sappier since it was our first one married. We made an awesome fort and Josh bought me red roses. We ate chocolates in our fort and watched the Office. We had just found out we were pregnant so we were floating on air. The year before that, I got an engagement ring. But this year I just really enjoyed being with family and the people I love most.

Last year's Valentine's Day

2 years ago Valentine's Day

I'm pretty happy with how this year's Valentine's Day turned out. It always seems to be a pretty great day for us and I'll love spending each one with this guy:)

Hope you all had a great one!

Emma's 3 months! Already?!?

Emma's 3 months old today! Cra-zy!! Josh and I have been going back through all the pictures we have of Emma (there's a lot). Most of them are her looking solemnly at the camera while we wait for her to crack a smile. I swear, she smiles and squeals all the time! But when she sees the camera or our phone, she goes American Gothic on us. We don't think she's on the track to become a model...but that's o.k with us:)

So here's a few things about Emma you probably don't know:

• She's hilarious! She squeals and talks all the time to us in her own little language
• She's a morning person and usually wakes up smiling. Didn't get that from us...
• She's sucking her thumb like a pro
• She HATES tummy time
• She LOVES having blowouts and seeing us clean it up
• She TOLERATES bath-time
• She sleeps through the night on select days
• She really likes beat-boxing, especially when her dad does it
• She holds her head up like a little adult
• Her boyfriend's name is Calvin
• She hates chocolate milk and won't let me drink it...saddest day of my life
• She likes to cuddle for naps, which means few naps in the crib... also sad
• She's starting to grab her toys, but mostly just stares and coos at them with big eyes
• She loves to eat...alot! 
• And she thinks her parents are the coolest...at least that's what we think she's saying

And now a few pics of course:

At 1 month

3 months! She grew so much!!! Especially the cheeks:)

Adorable

Christmas

I forgot to recap what we did for Christmas and New Years's. Seriously, every time I try to write on this thing, Emma poops or cries or something! But that's life:) So we went up to Idaho for Christmas and New Year's for a relaxing 2 week vacation. It was a blast! The best thing of my life was to have a washing machine close by and not have to walk to a far off laundromat every time Emma had a blowout or a spit-up fiasco. It was a beautiful thing.

Emma hit her 6 week mark the day we drove to Idaho and I was so excited to take her out into the world! I was kind of paranoid those first few weeks after she was born and didn't want to take her anywhere. Good thing too I guess. Anyone hear about the measles coming to Utah over Christmas break? Yep, that's real...at the Walmart where we shop no less. Ridiculous! Vaccinate your kids people! Anyway, when we got to Boise, we went shopping, out to eat, etc. We were living it up. Good thing too, cause i was going just a little stir-crazy! Josh can confirm that. Spending the winter in a tiny apartment is not ideal.

Emma during the trip. Those cheeks!

We mostly hung out with family the whole break, but I did get to catch up with some of my best friends, Brianna and Bethany. I miss them! During the break my mom and I caught a nasty cold. I  was achy and exhausted for a few days which was awesome. But by some stroke of luck it was the same time Emma was going through a growth spurt. She seriously slept for 2 days straight. At first I was worried she was sick too, but when she was awake, she was totally alert and happy. So I just counted myself lucky. After those 2 days, she woke up an older baby. She smiled more, made new babbling sounds and started to sleep through the night. It was like magic! The most magical thing was that she started breastfeeding. I'd been pumping and feeding her bottles constantly before that because she never got the hang of breastfeeding. Not even close.  But after her two day hibernation period, she did it perfectly. Yay!

Baby's first Christmas outfit. Thanks Grandma Groen!

Christmas day was fun pretty chill. We did a nativity scene on Christmas Eve and since Emma was the newest baby, we were the lucky couple to play Mary and Joseph. That was always the coveted role when I was younger. Dad played the donkey, like always. But, I must have gained a few pounds or something because when he was carrying me to "Bethlehem" he sounded that like this was the last trip this donkey was ever going to make...when Mom, who was the narrator, heard the donkey's howl she just lost it. The little girls were solemnly trying to be angels, but Mom was laughing/crying and couldn't get a word out and then we all lost it. The whole scene was pretty hilarious and memorable.

We had the classic and infamous Christmas breakfast...wheat buds. I was so excited to see Josh's face when he ate it for the first time! For those of you who don't know, wheat buds are whole grain kernels cooked in water. My mom makes it in a crock pot over night. In my opinion, they are best served with lots of honey and milk. For Josh, this is his worst nightmare. He hates whole wheat, honey and milk. I instinctively loaded on the honey and milk for him and it didn't go over well. But like a trooper he ate it all. Next time we'll skip the embellishments for him;)

Emma's Blessing and Thanksgiving

We stayed in Utah for Thanksgiving and Josh's parents came out here to celebrate with us and his sister's family. It was really fun! It was nice since Emma was only 2 weeks old and we really didn't want to travel with her yet, at least I didn't. We decided to bless her around the same time since both of our families could be there.

Isn't she precious?

Josh gave Emma a beautiful blessing. It was an amazing experience to have so many family members from both sides there. We've felt so much love, support and encouragement from everyone.

Family!