Tiffany and Brock's Wedding

On January 27th Tiffany, my sister, got married.  We are so excited to add Brock to our family.  The day could not have been more perfect.  The weather worked out perfectly for them. It was so beautiful.  Here are a few pictures I snapped in between professional pictures.

 Tiffany wore yellow tights and grey boots.  Her colors were yellow, green and grey.

 My dad wanted in to show off his sweet new argyle socks.

 

 Before we left for the wedding ceremony we had to youtube how to fold a pocket square and Blake discovered his new favorite website "the art of manliness."  Therefore we had to take pictures of his new dapper look :)

 

Kenlee didn't feel like taking pictures so she wandered around and hung out with Courtney.

 The Bride and Groom

All the guys in their awesome green argyle socks.

Congrats guys!! We are sooo happy for you and wish you the best! Love you!

32 Weeks

Today is my 32 week mark and we also had our doctors appointment.  Everything is still looking great.  Baby girls heart beat is great and she is healthy.  I am also measuring correctly so that was great news for me.  I have finally hit the point in the last week or so that I feel HUGE and uncomfortable.  My hip condition can no longer be controlled by simply watching how much I stand or walk but I am so grateful that I have made it this far without too much pain.  Sleep has also started to elude me but I got permission today to use Tylenol PM or Unisom to help me catch some sleep so hopefully things will improve a little there.

Kenlee is getting so excited to have her sister.  She kisses the baby good night and talks to her a lot through out the day.  Sometimes when she sits on my lap she will all of a sudden turn around and say "baby touch me." Sometimes baby girl really has kicked at her but is so dang cute to hear her start talking to the baby after that.  All day today she wanted to go find that baby.  We kept telling her that we were going to the doctor so that we could hear the babies heart beat and she was super excited.  After the appointment she told anyone that would listen that she heard the babies heart beat.  Everyday she asks me if baby can come home to her house and I have to tell her not for a few more weeks.  She is always a little sad by that news but I am so glad that she is excited for "her baby" to come.

I was curious about how much I have grown round the middle the last few months so I decided to gather all the pictures together in one post so that we could see the change and I have to admit it made me fill really big......

12 WEEKS

16 WEEKS

 20 WEEKS

24 WEEKS 

28 WEEKS 

32 WEEKS

Our Holiday Weeks

 We have really been enjoying the three week break that Blake had between semesters.  We have tried to catch up on some movies we have wanted to see and had a lot of lazy mornings.  Our Christmas weekend started out on the 23rd with our annual sleep under the Christmas tree.  We had our homemade pizza dinner. I made a fajita pizza for everyone again.  It is a hit at our house. Unfortunately Blake had to close that night so he came when he got off and had to be back up and to work by 9.  We all crowded into the family room and sleep under the floor that the tree was on because there was no way to fit us in the living room anymore.  The next morning my mom feed us all red velvet cake for breakfast.  She had promised Blake the cake for his awesome grades so she made sure he got some before work.

While Blake was at work, Kenlee and I went with my family to visit my Aunt Debbie in Preston.  She has several horses so she took Kenlee out to see them and even convinced her to ride one with her.  It was pretty cool considering the last time we had her near a horse she wouldn't even pet it.  It was so good to visit with there family.  Our Christmas Eve tradition is to spend the evening with Blake's family.  First we had a homemade pork salads for dinner.  Then we all watched The Muppet Christmas Carol which was way fun.  After the movie Brian read the Christmas Story from the bible.  Then we opened some presents since they won't see us on Christmas.  Kenlee loved to open the "parties"(that's what she calls presents).

After we got home from Blake's parents house we opened our Christmas PJ's.  Kenlee loved her hot coco jammies.

 Blake and I just did pj pants because we have so many t-shirts and they're the most comfortable to sleep in.

 Christmas morning was pretty casual for us.  We decided to not have Santa come til after we went to Church, so we just spent the morning getting ready.  This is Kenlee's new dress.

After church Kenlee and Daddy went in to her bedroom to get out of her dress and Santa came while they played.  She was confused and excited.  I had been telling her for days that she could not open her presents til Christmas and because she didn't know when that would be she was sure it was a trick that the presents were spread out.  After she realized it was truly ok to open them she went CRAZY and opened every present she could get her hands on including some of Daddy and Mommys. It was pretty cute and as parents we really weren't too upset that we didn't get to unwrap them.  She will have to share better next year with sister though.

After we had opened all our gifts we went over to my parents house for more gifts and a wonderful dinner with the family.One of the fun gifts that my family got was the WII game Wipe Out.  We spent the night taking turns playing and laughing at the hilarious game. It was so fun to spend time with all our families this holiday seasons.

Another fun thing we have done during the holiday was bowling.  Blake's sister was still up for the holiday and decided they were going bowling so they invited us.  If I hadn't been so big around the middle I would have played but instead I was the cheer leader.  Kenlee got to play her first round of bowling and she loved it.

She even got to play with a purple ball.  She did pretty good for her first time and being so excited.  She got a 84.

We spent New Years Eve in Idaho with all my extended family on my mom side.  It was so good to see them.  I hadn't been up to see everyone for months.  We had soup and desserts for  lunch and then everyone played games or shot hoops.  It was so fun but I was silly and did not get my camera out to record the activities.

We are so sad to have the free time with Blake coming to an end but it has been so nice to have him around and thanks to his wonderful motivation we have gotten a lot of projects done in between the playing too.  Next project, the girls bedroom........

A Fun Christmas Craft

Yesterday while we were on potty training kitchen restriction we did a fun Christmas craft.  I had seen several people do this hand paint Christmas tree and decided to try it with Kenlee.  She loved it.  I was originally only going to have Kenlee make one but she insisted that I join in on the fun so I made more of a bush then a tree with my big hands.

Here are some of the few good shots I got when I got a chance to snap one or two:

 The finished projects, they turned out so cute and now our fridge has its own festive decorations.

28 Weeks

Well we are all most down to the single digit count down, yep only 12 weeks left til Baby Girl Daines should be here. The last week and a half I have started to feel really big.  I had my appointment yesterday and she is a really healthy and happy baby.  I am now measuring at 31 weeks but my doctor laughed and said it was probably because she had her foot shoved into my rib and stretching things so we shall see what I measure next time.  I was supposed start the two week rotations for appointments but that would put me right in the middle of the holidays so she said where she was such a healthy baby and there were no worries that we would do one more four week.

This pregnancy has been really different in a lot of ways, one obvious thing is that fact that I haven't been sick this time.  But another one is that this little girl is a lot different in her movements too.  Kenlee was always punching and kicking me and so I felt a lot of sharp hits.  This one has been more about rolling and pushing so that I just get weird bumps but very little pain.  

Also in preparation for babies arrival we have started the lovely task of potty training Kenlee.  I wasn't sure I really wanted to push the issue during the holidays with all the ins and outs of parties and family time but her interest peeked again and I wasn't going to miss another opportunity. She did really well for a couple of days and only had two accidents on Sunday and that included the fact that I felt silly going into nursery to ask her if she needed to go potty.  So that one was my fault.  Then all of a sudden Monday she lost total interest.  I tried and tried all day with her and she would not cooperate at all.  Tuesday and Wednesday was about the same and I was about ready to through in the towel till January when I decided to try one last tactic.  We went straight to panties, she wasn't aloud to wear diapers or pull-ups, which meant spending all our time in the kitchen so that we didn't have to clean carpets. Thursday afternoon it clicked, she has fallen in love with some puppy panties and now she goes all the time.  We haven't had an accident (minus night time which I will deal with after we get good at day) since 4:30 yesterday.  I am so proud of her, I have even given up the kitchen restriction. I hope things keep going well and that we can get her potty trained in the next few weeks.

Meeting Santa

This year I really wanted to try the whole meeting Santa thing.  I had considered it the last two years but never really had a good opportunity to do so and didn't really force it.  My parents were planning on watching Kenlee so that Blake and I could got the The Christmas Carol that was put on by the Four Seasons Theater Company but the had there ward party that same night.  They were totally willing to take her with them but one of the other advantages was that Santa was making an appearance before the party began.  Blake and I took Kenlee over early to meet my parents and so that we could witness this occasion. Knowing Kenlee's personality I completely expected her to cry and crawl up the persons face who was trying to introduce them.  I was pleased that she at least talked to him.  He was not aloud to touch her but she had been practicing all day what she wanted to ask him for and she was able to do it.  She got really excited when he gave her a candy cane too. 

                                       

All in all it was not a bad experience and we will definitely be trying again next year and maybe eventually getting her to sit on his lap and take a good picture.

Gingerbread Houses

As a tradition, we all got together and decorated gingerbread houses with Blake's family agian.  This year Kenlee was really into decorating the gingerbread houses. She and daddy made a great team.  Kenlee would tell him where to put the frosting and then Blake would help her make sure the candy she had chosen would stick to the frosting.  It was so cute to watch her face light up every time she put a new piece on the house.  She really focused on the roof, which makes sense since that is what everyone could see.  We really had to talk fast to get her to put any on the sides of the house and even then only got two decorated.  I think she ate more candy then she actually put on the house but I guess that's all part of the experience.  

 I got so many of these cute shoots that I didn't know which ones to use.  They are so photogenic.

The finished produced, isn't it just the most wonderful house you have ever seen.  She has quite the artistic eye........or maybe she is just two, only time will tell.