Hello, is anyone there?

Yeah, so not so good with keeping up this blog, am I? So now I get to play catch up, really exciting. In August, Taylor started preschool, and turned 4. I was going to do a big post about his birthday, but I just was unmotivated. He is also officially potty trained. Everything just sort of clicked for him right when he had his birthday. He even started to stand up to pee, which I really didn't think would happen for a long time. So, now he is officially a big boy, which he really enjoys telling me. He's pretty proud of himself for that fact. I am proud of him too. He is such a good big brother to Celeste. They have started to play together very well, and Celeste really wants to go to preschool with him. She gets really mad at me when I take her away after dropping him off. But almost every day, without fail, when we pick him up, she runs to give him a hug. It's very cute. Both kids really enjoyed Halloween this year. Celeste was a natural, she would go right up to the door and patiently wait for someone to put candy in her pumpkin. Then she would start to go in their house. Almost every time. Very trusting little girl, I think she was cold.

I have been singing with a girl's a cappella group called Treblelicious. It has really been a lot of fun singing again. I didn't realize how much I missed it. We performed a lot during the Summer. But our biggest show, and the reason we got together, was opening for Acappellastock 2010 in Ogden. It's a concert that T minus 5 puts on every year. They get really great groups to sing at this show. My favorite was a group called Mosaic. They were amazing, and really nice guys. It was a really fun day. Wow, my life is really not very exciting. I can't think of much else big that has happened. So, I think I will end this here. I'll post some pics when I have some time. I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving.

Potty Training Woes

A few months ago, I got fed up with buying pull-ups. Don't ask me why I bought them ever in the first place, they are literally glorified diapers. But anyway, I told Taylor that I was not going to buy anymore, and that was that. And I didn't. I am still quite proud of myself, actually. Potty training has probably been the worst part of raising children...so far. By this time, Taylor already knew the ins and outs of the potty, he knew how to do it, he just preferred using his diaper. I actually think I'm going to just skip the pull-ups with Celeste(and I already think she will be so much easier than Taylor). So, we seriously began potty training, underwear and all. Taylor had quite a few accidents, I almost gave up many times, but we did it. Taylor started to figure it all out, well at least the peeing part. We still are having issues with #2. I've heard that sometimes that can take a lot longer, and I really don't think I'm up for that. I have tried bribery, making threats, giving him toys for going in the potty and then taking them away when he has an accident. Nothing has worked. He will have a success and will be so proud of himself, we will praise him and get our hopes up. Then the next day, he will go in his underwear again. And he will do this for about 2 weeks until he has another success. It's really been getting frustrating for us, so yesterday I got on the internet and googled "how can I get my 3 year old to poop in the potty?" And there it was, I found some advice that I'd never been given before. The child the person is talking about sounds exactly like Taylor, so I read the answer the doctor gave and I seriously think it might work. Basically, if you don't go and read it, it talks about toilet training resistance and how to handle it. This was Taylor. This is my answer on how to handle him. So, I told Taylor this morning that I was sorry for getting mad at him for pooping in his underwear and that is was his job from now on to go to the bathroom. I was not even going to say anything about it anymore. He has gone(not #2 yet) 3 times today all on his own without me having to ask him if he had to, or reminding him to go. So far, so good. I will let you know in a month if it worked.

1 Year Old!!!

I'm a few weeks late, but I had to get this post in anyway. My baby turned one a few weeks ago, I can hardly believe a year has gone by since we were in the hospital waiting to be induced. And a mere 8 hours later, she was in my arms. Maybe because I was in the hospital for a day and a half before Taylor finally made an appearance, 8 hours seems like nothing at all. And Celeste was so tiny too. She really has changed so much, but she still has the same cute dimple in her chin, and about the same length of hair. It hasn't grown much in a year. Oh well, before I know it she'll be fighting me while I'm trying to get the snarls out of her hair.
Anyway, to start out the day, we had a yard sale at our friend's house, and before it was over, Celeste had a low grade fever. We're still not sure what was wrong, but she was listless and clingy for most of the rest of the day. It is so sad to see your child sick on their birthday, but I'm sure many a parent has gone through it. We had her party at a brother and sister's house, since our house is just too small to fit the family and friends. She seemed to perk up a little when the party started, and even was brave enough to dig into the cake a little. But after a few bites of mostly frosting, she looked to me like she was going to pass out, so we cleaned her up and got her ready for present opening.
She wore a cute tutu that her Aunt Alisha made for her birthday. She did not want to open anything, as soon as she got a look at a toy, she would only want to play with that one toy, and we'd have to drag her back to look at the next present. Even with the fever, it was a fun, busy day. We are so blessed to have such a sweet little girl join our family.


















Here are some things that Celeste is doing now.
Walking! She has been doing this for about a month and a half now, she loves it. She acts like it the most wonderful thing in the world to be able to have her hands free. She carries things to all parts of the house so I have to go looking for them.
She loves her baby dolls, she will hug and cuddle them forever. She does this to Taylor's Batman toy as well, it's small so it looks kind of funny, she just loves to hug I guess. She is still a very cuddly little girl. I thought she would grow out of this, but she hasn't, thank goodness. When she meets a stranger, if they hold out their hands to her, she will usually go right to them and give them a hug. Very cute. She also does this to people she knows.
She still sleeps on her tummy, but now she will hold a doll while she's sleeping. Sometimes if she wakes up and starts to cry, she will see her dolly and get a hold of it and go right back to sleep.
She is a major daddy's girl. She is so cute with her daddy, I love to watch her with him. She is also a momma's girl, when daddy is not around.
She already tries to carry my purse around like I do. She is such a girl.
Sometimes, she will be chattering to herself and will just start to laugh like she said something really funny. She still hasn't said any words really, but it certainly sounds like she is having a conversation with you, even though you can't understand one word.
She absolutely loves other babies, she will immediately go to them and get down and try to hug them, even if they are trying to push her away. She especially loves her two cousins that are really close to her in age.

We are so lucky to have such an adorable, funny little girlie girl in our presence. And it has been so fun to watch her grow. I'm excited to find out what the future holds for our beautiful little Celeste.

Here are some pictures from the day she was born so you can see what a difference a year makes:)

Dreaming

I really want one of these.

It doesn't necessarily have to be this big, but you get the idea.
And if it wouldn't be too much to ask, I'd really like to have a couple of these on the outside.

And these on the inside.


I want a house and I love bay windows. And the window seat that sometimes comes with it.
A girl can dream, can't she?

Hiya Papaya

One of my friends is a photographer and is doing this fun giveaway for a photo shoot. And she is amazing, so of course I'm going to enter the contest. And you should to. Just go here.

9 Months

My little girl is growing up so fast, I can't believe she is already 9 months old, and only 3 months short of a year. Yeah, that's gonna go fast and be over before I know it. Celeste is a very social, happy, and active baby. She is crawling and pulling herself up on furniture, cruising like crazy and can stand on her own pretty confidently. She hasn't tried walking so much yet. If you leave her standing in the middle of a room, she will lower herself to the ground pretty fast. She has tried to step a couple of times and fallen, so I think she is happy just to crawl for now. Which is perfectly fine with me. She is completely obsessed with her brother, anywhere he goes, she has to be. She almost follows him around more than she follows me. She loves to take baths, so one day I finally put her in the bath with her brother. I was a little nervous, cause he is a bit crazy in there, but he actually was pretty gentle while she was in. She loved it. I had to take a picture cause who doesn't have a picture in the bathtub with their sibling? Oh wait, I don't. But that's okay, it was fun anyway.

They were both in this box right before I took this picture, but of course she got out before I could get the camera.
Beautiful girl. I just love her eyes and cheeks and chin. Okay, I love everything about her.

Had to include this one of his cheesy grin. He turned 3 1/2 almost exactly the same time as she turned 9 months.

Brother hogging the camera, but I love the devoted look on her face.

Completely covering her up. This is pretty normal for him. He's a total camera hog.

Life from a 3 year old's point of view

I've really wanted to post some of the pictures Taylor has taken on the camera he got from my parents for Christmas. He got it because he loves nothing more than to run around taking pictures with our camera, and it was a little scary sometimes. The camera he got is very child proof. And the pictures even turned out pretty good. So here they are. Enjoy.

Aunt Melinda

Mommy, of course

This is rotated. He likes to turn the camera upside-down and take pictures of himself.

A cousin, I'm not sure which one.

The Batman car he got from Aunt Shannon.

Cousin Jaiden.

Grandpa

Up the nose shot

One of his favorite subjects, besides himself, of course

That one was a little too close

This is a view up at our light fixture from the floor. There a several of these.

I believe this is the top of our friend, Davin's head

Inside the refrigerator. We have a lot of these too.

The wreath outside our front door during Christmas.

A blurry wall

Celeste trying very hard to get the camera from him.

We have a ton of pictures of Taylor's feet. These are just a couple.

When Justin downloaded these, there were over 400 pictures. I think, after deleting all the ones that were of nothing, we got just over a hundred. I wouldn't call him a photographer yet, but he's getting there. Right now, his photography consists of running all over the house and clicking the camera at whatever he can, usually he's way too close. But he'll get the hang of it, I'm sure.