December

December has been such a great month! We have had so much fun doing things and spending time together. We started the month off with our ward Christmas party. Unfortunately, Trevor was at drill that weekend. I swear, he misses everything because of drill. Luckily, he only has 3 more drills left and we'll be done with the ARMY for good! Anyway, Santa came to the party and Kaydance was so excited to get to see him until we actually went to see him. Once she caught a glimpse of him, she was pretty hesitant. I'm surprised she was even smiling in this picture. She told him she wanted "toys and presents" for Christmas.



Later that evening, it was the annual Electric Light Parade. All the businesses on Main Street turn off their lights for the parade. It was fun to take Kaydance to that, but it was so cold.



A few days later we put up our tree and decorated it. Kaydance loved helping put the bulbs on. We couldn't stop laughing because everytime she said bulb, it sounded like "boob." She's too cute!


Christmas day was a long one and we were running non-stop from 8 am until 11 pm. Kaydance was such a trooper, even without a nap. She was so excited to see what Santa Claus had brought her and loved opening all her presents. She got spoiled, like always. We had a great day together as a family, though.



We went on a hike a few days after Christmas with my sister and her soon-to-be-husband. The weather was beautiful, but I remember the hike being a bit easier last year. Then again, I wasn't 7 months pregnant last year. Trevor packed Kaydance around in a backpack and I felt kind of bad for him carrying all that extra weight until I remembered I was packing around 35 extra pounds too! I haven't been great at taking pictures during my pregnancies, but this one will have to do. I'm 30 weeks here.


I think that's about all. What a great couple of weeks to wrap up the year. Bring on 2012!

Fun in the desert

Just to catch up a little We had a great Thanksgiving. All of Sarah's family came home and we had dinner with them on Thursday. We had some great appetizers and played ping-pong until dinner was ready. It was very relaxing and delicious. Since most of Sarah's family had to leave on Friday, we had dinner with my family then. All my bros and their families were here too. On Saturday since the weather was so beautiful we decided to go on a little hike. More of a drive, actually, cause Jordan wanted to get his new Expedition off road. It was really fun. We went to a really cool place called Tusher Tunnel. It is a cave that goes all the way through a giant rock in the middle of the desert. Great place to take the kids.

Back and better than ever

Many of you might remember a few years ago on Halloween when Trevor and I dressed up as gothic people. To refresh your memories, click here. This Halloween, we didn't really get creative, and just decided to do the same again, but with more accessories. Trevor won best costume at our party this year too.




This year Kaydance wanted to be Snow White. I prepped her all about getting dressed up and trick-or-treating and whole bit for a couple weeks. She was so excited about it all until the day was here. She didn't want to be in her costume at all or have anything to do with it. But the minute I mentioned she would get to wear makeup she was all over the idea. (She LOVES when I "put makeup on her") She ended up being such a cute Snow White.

We went to the trunk-or-treat and she caught on pretty quick to the idea of getting candy. And since we didn't want to scare all the kids away with our goth costumes, we changed to something a little more family friendly.

Better late than never

I guess it's about time that we announce this officially. We are having a baby. There, I said it. Ya happy? I feel like a little bit of a "bad" mom being so laid back about it. With Kaydance, we could hardly wait a month to tell everyone; and we had it all planned out. With this one, it's kind of been more of whenever the topic of babies comes up, we say something. It's not that I'm not excited about this baby, because believe me, I AM EXCITED!! I guess life just gets in the way. So if you haven't already heard the news, consider yourself in the loop now. And please accept our apologies for not filling you in earlier.

To date, I'm 21 weeks, know there is a baby boy growing inside of me, not feeling sick, feeling really tired and unmotivated, and loving being pregnant again! Time is just flying by this time. I can't believe I'm already closer to my due date than finding out I was pregnant. Our official due date is March 3rd, 2012; just in time for Trevor to get out of the ARMY. So, we're looking forward to March for a couple of reasons now!

I'm not going to post any ultrasound pics (mostly because you can't really tell what you're looking at) or belly pics (because I haven't taken any yet), but I plan to put some up the further along I get.

Cardboard Boat Race

It was the 2nd annual cardboard boat race in Moab this year and Trevor and the rest of the Elder's Quorum in our ward decided to make a boat to compete. They spent so many hours working on it and they all had so much fun. It did pretty well in the race too...2nd place. They had 8 men in there, altogether weighing over 2,000 pounds. That's a lot of cardboard.

TWO!

Kaydance turned 2 this month. She is such a little person, and we absolutely LOVE it. She has (mostly) learned how sing Happy Birthday and was so excited that her birthday was coming.


She loved helping me make her cake, and especially loved the cleaning up...


And she got spoiled, as usual, with all her presents.




We just can't believe our little baby is two years old now. And speaking of two and babies....

catch up

We've been pretty busy since I last posted. I think I'll mostly let the pictures do the talking. Trevor and I got to go to Park City for a week for bus training/anniversary celebrating. Four years down, an eternity to go. We got in lots of shopping, eating, movie watching, playing, and SPENDING MONEY! We did get to hike to Timpanogas Cave on our way home- a first for me. Trevor had been before, but afterwards we figured it had been about 10 years ago. He didn't remember the cave being that small.


Fourth of July was lots of fun. Trevor's cousins came down and we spent time on the mountains with them. When it came time for fireworks, we just stayed home and did some of our own. Kaydance loved doing the sparklers and the poppers (even though she didn't have great success.)






And at the end of July we got to go to an AWESOME concert with our parents. Journey, Foreigner, and Night Ranger. It doesn't get much better than Jukebox Hero live.


And now for a few random points. My dad has his own little zoo in the backyard. Currently, he has goats, a turkey, pigeons, and doves. At least, that's all I'm aware of. Every time we even mention Papa Rusty's house, Kaydance immediately wants to feed the animals. Papa is so good to let her feed them. She absolutely loves it!!



And here's just another picture of the red head. It's not often that she falls asleep just anywhere. She has a routine for nap time, which is wonderful, but it's always so cute when she falls asleep somewhere random.

Growing Up

Our little Kaydance has been doing a lot of growing up these past few months. First, she has started sleeping in a big girl bed and she loves it. She doesn't sleep as long as she did when she was in her crib, but it is a lot easier getting her to go to bed. She gets really excited to get to sleep in her new bed, instead of screaming because she has to get in a crib.


Every night before bed we say family prayers. Kaydance has always had a hard time holding still with her arms folded. Most of the time she just lays down on the floor and plays while either Trevor or I say it. But lately she has wanted to say the prayer. It is the cutest thing. She copies us word for word and loves to have her turn every 3 days to say it.

One big step that she has taken is her interest in the toilet. She is only 21 months, but has started potty training herself. I'm not sure that I'm really ready for that, but I'm trying to do my best. She tells us all the time that she has to "poop in the potty", and more often than not it actually happens.




When she started having success, I wanted to reward her. I know that candy is not the best option, but that's what I went with. She caught on really quick that every time she went potty she got a piece of chocolate. Pretty soon, she just started saying she needed to go so she could get some chocolate. Luckily, we've worked our way out of that one, and we just do a silly/happy/celebration song and dance when she goes. She likes that well enough I guess, because she hasn't asked for chocolate after going in about a week.


We still have her in diapers most of the time, but I've put on some panties a few times and she loves wearing them around. She was so excited to help me pick out some princess ones at the store.


This little red head of ours is getting so big and so smart. Speaking of red hair, hers is getting pretty long now. I actually tried to do a pony tail today, instead of the pigtails on top, and it looked so cute.




We're so glad that this beautiful little girl is ours forever. WE LOVE YOU Kaydance!!

Got Milk?

Let me just start by saying that Trevor drinks a lot of milk. I mean A LOT. I go to the store about twice a week, and each time I pick up at least 4 gallons of milk. It is because of this that the idea of getting another fridge/freezer for the garage has come up. I need a fridge just for milk. SERIOUSLY.

We were talking to our friends about this, and all the boys started talking about the "gallon challenge." Most of the them had tried to do it, but none had ever succeeded. Trevor had never tried it, and so we picked a day that we would all be together for dinner for him to do it.

The whole challenge is to drink a gallon of milk within an hour and hold it down until the hour is up. He started out strong, drinking about a third of the gallon at once. (This is a pretty usual amount for him to drink at a meal.) He kept it nice and cold in the fridge and drank a little more about every 10 minutes or so. He was getting pretty full, but never felt like he was going to throw up. He had about 10 minutes left of the hour and he decided to just finish what was left (about 1/8 of the gallon) so there would be no questioning as to whether it was within the hour or not. He had 3 people timing him, and he finished the gallon with 6 minutes to spare.

I'm proud to say that my husband successfully drank a full gallon of 1% milk in 54 minutes (equating to about 1600 calories. YIKES) and gained the respect and recognition from his fellow men, or should I say boys. They were all envious of him and in awe to see such a sight. He never did throw up, but missed out on the delicious navajo tacos we had that night because he was so full.

Winter

I'm a bad blogger... what can I say? It's been almost a whole SEASON since I last posted. So, instead of trying to write multiple entries to fill you all in, I decided to combine everything and just make one post with LOTS of pictures.

Thanksgiving is always awesome in Moab, since we are both from here and both of our families are still here. We spent Thursday with Trevor's family and then Friday with my family. It's so great having two days of feasting followed by about a week of leftovers. Since our parents still do all the cooking, ( I'm a little nervous for the day to come when I have to make the Thanksgiving dinner myself) I decided to make a creative dessert. It didn't end up looking quite like the picture, but still tasted just as good.








Christmas, again, was spent trying to divide our time between both our families. Thanksgiving is a little easier since we do two different days, but there's only one Christmas Day. Plus, all of our siblings on both sides were here over the holidays.





It only took Kaydance a few minutes to get the hang of opening her presents, and she had plenty to open. She got spoiled; we started at our own house, then moved on to Grandma Knutson's house, then to Grandma Merrie and Grandpa David's house, and then finally to Grandma and Grandpa Tangren's house. It was a long day filled with opening presents, playing with presents, visiting, and eating lots of junk food. I love Christmas!





This winter was also Kaydance's first real time being out in the snow. I think we took her out for a few minutes last year, but she was only about 4 months old then, so that doesn't count. She loved being out there and building a snowman with us. She loves snowmen now. We taught her how to sing "The Snowman Song" and she sings it all the time now... so cute! (I need to get a video of her singing it.)





We did, however, get to go on a hike a few days after Christmas when it was a little warmer. It was actually really nice weather and some of us were in shorts and t-shirts. Kaydance loved being outside. I guess I've been keeping her inside most of the winter because I HATE the cold. I know that shouldn't keep her inside, but I'm still learning that, I guess.





All in all, we had a great winter, minus the snow. We loved spending so much time with all of our family eating way too much food and staying up way too late.






I love this little girl!