The big girl turned 3! (March 2010)

Our baby girl turned three on March 4th. What a milestone! She's completely potty trained (finally!) and is now allowed to crack eggs. After we fished out the shells, we had scrambled eggs for breakfast to celebrate this new skill. :)

Then, we had friends over for lunch and a play date. Since we weren't having her party until the weekend, we got cupcakes at the grocery store as a sweet treat. You can tell she really enjoyed the frosting.She got a tricycle from Memaw and Poppy, which she still can't quite pedal. She practices with Daddy by going to get the mail. She'll figure it out soon enough, and then I'll have trouble keeping her close to the house.

Then, on Saturday some of her friends came over for a real party. We had a cowgirl theme, so they started by decorating cowboy hats. Then we played pin the tail on the donkey and toss the beanbags into the hat.

And of course what party is complete without a really cool cake. Matt helped me with the construction of this. It has chocolate twizzlers for the mane and fruit by the foot, jelly beans and junior mints for the other parts. Pretty cool if I do say so myself.

The love of a child

I just went in to get Zoe from her nap. She was sitting in her bed with her children's Bible looking at the pictures. I asked her what she was doing and her response was, "I'm reading my Bible because I really love God." How precious.

6 months old!

How the time is flying. Where has the past half year gone to? Aspen is growing like a weed. At her appointment she weighed 16 lbs. 2 oz. and was 27 3/4 inches long. She's off the chart for her height and about the 50% mark for her weight.

So we started solids after her appointment. I can't find the picture from her first food, but here she is sporting peas I think.

And here's Zoe just being plain silly. She insisted on having a bow in her hair, then she put on the goofy hat.

Zoe's sandwich project. Wish I had a picture of what it looked like after she ate it. All the chocolate chips were gone, but the bread and peanut butter were still there. Fun stuff!

Valentine's Day

Here are a couple of pictures of the girls from Valentine's Day. Aspen enjoyed eating her new doll. :)

And Zoe liked her rubber stamps from Meemaw.

Happy smiley kiddos. :)

I think these pictures are from some time in February. Most of the snow had melted, but we still had a pile in a shady corner of the yard. So, since it was sunny and not too cold, Zoe and I ventured into the back yard. She had some toys that had been buried in the snow for the past month or so that we could now find, so she decided to build snow castles. Here she is filling her bucket with snow.

And here she is decorating each castle with a leaf flag.

New Milestone

I have officially gazed upon the last gummy smile. Aspen's first tooth broke through today. She's been on and off incredibly happy and then screaming all day today. When I was getting her ready for bed tonight I ran my finger over her lower gums and found that the bottom left front tooth has broken through. Happy and sad. My baby is changing so quickly. Hopefully I'll be able to get a picture of her new smile soon.

The time is flying by...

Making up stories

Zoe has been making up her own stories and songs lately. Matt caught this one on Christmas morning. It's something about a king living in a castle and buying a queen from the queen store. Very cute.

Photoshop.com Album: Winter fun

The Atlanta Ocean :)

While we were in Alabama visiting my parents, Matt had to go to London on business. Zoe talked to him on the phone and he told her he was across the Atlantic ocean. So, she turned a laundry basket into a boat so she could sail across the Atlanta ocean to see her Daddy. :) Too cute!

Photoshop.com Album: Alabama trip, 2009

Zoo fun

Before it got too cold to be outside we took a trip to the zoo. We've had a bunch of baby animals born this year, so it was neat to see them out and about. There were tiger triplets, baby snow leopard, baby elephant, giraffe, and orangutan. I think the coolest part of the day was being able to feed the giraffes.

Halloween fun

Yes, I'm way behind. Here are a few pictures of the family having fun with out holiday traditions.

This year was Matt's turn to clean out the pumpkin and I got to carve the face. I found this really cool stencil for the face, but of course it was a failure, so I had to resort to the triangle eyes and goofy grin. I didn't take a picture of this year's creation. :)

Our neighborhood has a common area that we line up in while the kids come around to collect candy. It keeps them from going door to door. Zoe was a princess. It was pretty cold, so we all had to bundle up. Being the forgetful mommy I am, I didn't even take a picture of Aspen all bundled up. Oh well. She was wrapped warmly and pushed around in the stroller. We went to a few houses in the neighborhood for Zoe to trick-or-treat. One lady had a glow stick in her candy bucket so Zoe sweetly asked "Can I have that?" I don't think the lady intended on giving it away, but how can you resist such a sweet request. She used it as a guide to find the rest of the houses we visited that evening.

Here's a picture of Aspen for posterity, and one of the girls in their matching pj's. Aspen isn't too happy about this picture. :)

Photoshop.com Album: October 2009

Photoshop.com Album

Introducing...

Aspen Elizabeth Crill!! She was born at 6:33 pm on August 17, 2009, at Davis Medical Center in Layton, UT. She weighed 8 lbs. 6 oz. and was 20 inches long. After going to the nursery to get a bath, her nurse noticed that her lips were turning dusky and she was having some difficulty breathing. So, they ended up putting her in the NICU for the rest of the week. We are thankful that God blessed us with such good nurses and doctors to take care of us while in the hospital. She was able to be weaned off the oxygen in just a couple of days and was given a clean bill of health on Friday the 21st.

We're now going through the adjustment phase of having two children. Sadly my parents leave on Sunday for Alabama, so we'll be on our own. Zoe's going to miss her Meemaw and Poppy being around to play with her. We miss Nana and Papa too. What a blessing to have such wonderful family.

I'll try to keep up somewhat with pictures at least on our postings. My quiet time is limited at the moment. :)

Photoshop.com Album

Photoshop.com Album

Summer fun

We've been doing our best to enjoy the summer despite my lagging energy. Today my friend Melissa and her two girls went with us to the Weber County fair. It was hot, and I'm beyond the waddling stage, but we managed to have a good time. Zoe really enjoyed getting to see and pet the animals. We watched some miniature horse events and wandered around the fairgrounds for a few hours. My doctor told me to do more walking, so I fulfilled that request today. :)

Zoe also recently went on a fishing trip with her Daddy to one of our local ponds. She didn't use any bait, but had a ton of fun casting and pretending to catch a fish. Matt's been enjoying spending more time with her doing outside things. She loves his attention and looks forward to playing with her daddy when he gets home from work.

Our congregation threw us a diaper shower after evening services the other night. It was in combination with a yummy ice cream fellowship. Zoe tried to run off with the balloon bouquet. We looked over and the balloons started moving off the table. She sure does love balloons. We got enough diapers to last us a couple of months and a new diaper genie. We're so blessed to have a Christian family that takes care of us.

We're almost finished with the basement construction project. This week has been the painting phase. Next week the carpet will be installed and we can move the furniture in. We're moving Matt's office space down there along with the guest bedroom. He's going to be starting a master's program shortly after the baby arrives, so he needs a quiet workspace. I'll post pictures when things are a little neater.

So, now we're down to 10 days till I'm induced and our lives change yet again. We're excited about our growing family and can't wait to share her with everyone.

I think the pictures to go with this post are in their own post. I'm still working out the kinks. :)

35 weeks

Wow, time is flying! In just a few short weeks Aspen Elizabeth will make her appearance. Are we ready? Not really. :) I've gone through Zoe's old clothes and washed what we can reuse at least.

We're in the middle of basement construction to add a bedroom and office space. It's coming along and will hopefully be done the week before the baby arrives. Then maybe we can get Zoe's new room painted and get her moved over so Aspen can have the nursery. Zoe's excited to have the new room and a new sister.

Matt's 32nd birthday

I'm pretty sure Matt has had a good birthday week. It started with cinnamon rolls for breakfast on Monday. Unfortunately he had to go to work early that morning, but that's life.

We discovered that someone (we still don't know who) attempted to tp the house. Thankfully it was only one string of streamer attached right above the garage. We don't have a ladder, so it would have been difficult to clean things up. Thanks whoever you are!

I attempted to make another cake. This time it was an orange jello cake, and yet again it was somewhat of a failure. It tasted good, but it stuck in the pan. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong. Zoe didn't care, she just wanted to help blow out the candles and have a piece.

Then I grilled shrimp for the first time. Matt said it turned out great. I don't like them, so I'll have to take his word for it.

Wednesday company descended on the house. Our good friend Brian from Ft. Worth, TX and Matt's sister Rhianna and her husband Clayton and Ainsley from Colorado came. The guys went out for a 3 day camping/fishing trip while us girls hung around town. They all caught fish, saw some wildlife, and got thoroughly exhausted together. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of their trip.

Now we're back to life as usual. We're getting ready for the arrival of Aspen in 5 weeks. Time is flying by and we're nowhere near ready for a new baby in the house. Lots to do!

Check back later for pictures of what the girls did over the weekend.