It's A...

GIRL!

Today we had our ultrasound and we found out Alli will have a little sister, sometime in the middle/beginning of November. She's excited for her big plans (to rock her, hold her on her lap, take her to church, tickle her, play with her, dress her in flowers, put bows in her hair, and I'm sure many other things) and we're excited. We would have been excited either way obviously, but I'm happy to have another little girl to dress up, for Alli to have a sister and friend, and Ryan's just happy we can re-use a lot of our stuff from Alli! I'm a little over 18 weeks (when I called to schedule my appt. they gifted me an extra week so I'm back to what I was originally planning which is fine) feeling good, haven't gained much weight (if any, we don't have a scale so I don't really know what I started at, I just know it's less than a pound since the last appt.) and the nausea is getting better all the time. The last couple weeks I just get nauseous when I eat which is weird, but other than that I'm good! I'll post a picture after we take one. I want to do a better job of recording things about this pregnancy because with Alli I didn't take really any pictures and write much down so when I'm curious about it, I don't have anything to look at or read. So I know it isn't the most interesting to read about, but o/well this is the best place for me to record it.

Elder Phillip Palmer

This guy:


went into the MTC to serve a mission in the Arizona Tucson mission. We will miss him lots, but are so glad he is where he is. Last Sunday during his "farewell" talk in church he definitely seemed ready to go. I think he's grown up a lot getting ready to go, and I know he'll grow a ton on his mission. He'll be a great missionary just because he has truly gained a strong testimony of the gospel and he wants to share the joy he had with others (I'm sure this is true with any missionary!). It was all great dropping him off until Alli realized she wouldn't be going in with him (he's pretty much one of her very favorite people). She said "with him?" I said "No you can't go with him" and she responded "I want to see him" and I thought "well how bout in two years?" but she's been great with the fact that he's on a mission and he's teaching the kids about Jesus. I think knowing where he is and what he is doing is helping. That and she has fun drawing him pictures. If you want other updates I'll post them on his blog elderphillippalmer.blogspot.com so hopefully that will stay a little more updated on how he's doing. BUT funny thing is today Alli was talking about "each ids bout Jesus" so I started listening to what she was saying. She said "say bye bye to parents" so I asked her who she was saying bye to-her parents. I asked where she was going-teach kids about Jesus- and I asked who she was going with. She thought for a second and then said-"my Phillip." I asked if she missed him and she said yes, but I think she is also okay with what he is doing so that makes it much better. :) I'm just glad she understands that it is a good thing he's doing and that she will always have that example to follow!

Disneyland

This post is a little overwhelming (and there are so many pictures! I'm sorry!). Good thing it was at the end of our trip so I could put it off for just a little longer. We had so much fun, Alli loved it (and it was great cause we didn't have to pay for her!) and because we had her we waited in virtually NO lines! It was so nice! We used fast passes and then the child switch passes so two people would watch her and take her on a ride and the other group would go and then we'd swap. She loved the parade (sadly she missed the best one because she was sleeping and it wasn't "showing" again til after we were leaving Friday and we didn't want to wait for it), but she got to be in the one she saw so she thought that was pretty darn cool. I love that no matter how old you are, there is still a "magical feeling" at Disneyland/California Adventure. It is such a happy, fun place! I also was very appreciative of the fact that the big kid rides and the little kid stuff is mostly mixed together.
We did CA Adventure first and went into A Bug's Life 4-D movie thing and Alli was a little nervous, but then thought everything was hilarious! Then we went on some rides-California Screamin' and the Malliboomer (?) for us big kids and the carousel (about 6 times for her-she never got sick of it!) and the ferris wheel-waste of time and made me more nauseous than any of the other rides. She got a Minnie Mouse cell phone and bracelet and pretty much the rest of the time she loved talking to Minnie on her phone. She was super careful to know where both of these were at ALL times to make sure they were "safe" in a special pocket in mama's purse. We were able to go on so many things in not much time with our little system we had figured out. Alli met Minnie Mouse, Mickey Mouse, and Cinderella.





Alli's favorites were-the carousels-in Disney and CA adventure, the Playhouse Disney show (so fun for little kids!), It's A Small World, the teacups, and the Dumbo ride. Her NOT favorites-the Matterhorn (one extremely smart parent thought that since she was tall enough she should ride it-the other thought perhaps the dark, fast, and BEARS would scare her-yep she still tells us about the scary bears), The Finding Nemo submarine (because it got dark and the speaker was super loud), and the little kids' rollercoaster in ToonTown. We took her on it after it was dark and it was surprisingly fast, but other than that she thought it was okay. She doesn't continue to tell us about that one. :)





We found a cool thing that we took full advantage of with Splash Mountain-the Single Rider line so we went on in three or four times super fast with that. And my mom seriously has the worst luck with water rides-the water ride in CA for example- the other three of us got somewhat wet, not too bad-she got SOAKED (took til after we walked back to the hotel like 6 hours later for her to be completely dry). On Splash Mountain-the three of us went a couple times and were splattered at best. She (seeing our un-wetness) thinks maybe she'll give it a try with a different outcome than the previous water ride-she got wetter on her one ride than any of us with all of our rides together. At least she was a good sport about it :)
Hollywood Tower of Terrer was awesome-At one point I wasn't sure if I was going up or down.









This little outfit was super cute, but the juicy suit was 98 and the flip flops were 60 too. Seriously 60 for flip flops with a ribbon bow on them??? It was a fun store in DownTown Disney, but super expensive!

The second parade was so fun because there were different dancers (I think it was the Celebrate Parade?) anyway, Alli got picked to go out and dance two different times so it was fun watching her and the dancers all interacted so cutely with the kids! And as we were leaving we saw a friend from high school who is working there as a photographer so she took some pictures for us! It was fun seeing her!

Hollywood

We went to Universal Studios after San Diego (we bought a City Pass so it had all of these things included) and had a lot of fun. Alli and I played in the Curious George play area while everyone else went on a different ride. She had a lot of fun, they have some really cool areas for kids. I was pretty impressed. We didn't take too many pictures, but it was pretty cool. We went on the studio tour through a bunch of the sets. It's crazy all the things they can do to make things seem different than they are-height of doors to make girls look smaller and guys look bigger, re-creating plane crashes, simulated floods/fires/train wrecks. One part you go into a "hot set" where it's all set up for filming and there is a whole sequence of disasters. We went on Jurassic Park, but our favorite was by far the Mummy ride. It was so much fun! With the whole child switch thing I think Ryan and I each went about 5 times. We saw the Shrek 4-D show they have, and the Waterworld show. The cool thing with the Waterworld show is they have some well-known actors/actresses who are just on a break with their show. The main director of SVU from Law & Order was in the show as well as the main actor on Castle, some guys from CSI NY, and a girl from Grey's Anatomy among a few others. One thing I definitely took for granted before this trip that I appreciate much more now is clean air! It seemed like (ironically enough though the tour guide on the train was commenting how you can't smoke anywhere in California anymore) we were smelling cigarette smoke so often. I just hate the fact that you smell it from so far away so you smell the smoke and then find the smoker and figure out a way to get farther away. Well how is that for a random tangent! :) Another fun show at Universal was the Animal Actors show. It is so amazing the personalities of these animals and how they come out in the funny things they do. The dogs were pretty cool, but our favorite (and Alli's for sure-she wanted to watch the whole show again to see it) was the chimpanzee!

Reflection

** Clarification: In the bottom part of this post I was not very clear about something. It would make more logical sense to put this at the end of the post, but I would like to make sure this is very visible. In discussing modest swimming suits, that does not solely mean a "one-piece" suit. There are many one piece swimming suits that are just as revealing and classless as any skimpy bikini and likewise there are many bikini or tankini style swimming suits that are tasteful and classy. So my point is with the swimming suits not necessarily how many pieces it is, but the style, revealing nature (or lack of) and how it is worn.
* I am sorry if anything in this post offends anyone in any way. It is not intended to do so, so please do not take it as "pointing fingers" or as an insult. I'm guessing if you are reading this, we're probably family or a good friend which means that I love you for who you are.

Lately I've had all these random thoughts tumbling through my mind and I needed somewhere for them to tumble out to. The first thing is that Alli had her first dance class today. I figured she would like it since she dances around our house most of the time, but I wasn't sure if a class would be the best right now so after reading the studios' strict policies I was pretty apprehensive when I was taking her. I didn't want her to be in some serious class right now, just something for fun! Well this class was awesome! They did a little "ballet" which consisted of plies (or pi-lay to alli) and stretches, a little tap-not sure what they did that was specific to tap dancing, and then mostly creative/free dance/fun random things with ribbons, stuffed animals, etc. etc. So since I wasn't going to go buy shoes without knowing if she actually liked the class we need to go get tap shoes and ballet shoes. :) I kept some of my old dance outfits and surprisingly enough (since I woke up slightly panicked that I hadn't checked what she was supposed to wear to class) I had a couple black leotards for her to pick from to wear! She absolutely loved the class, even though she's among the youngest. She was so good to watch for a second and then start doing whatever they were doing. She was a little concerned that she didn't have ballet shoes when she saw another girl putting hers on, but was really wondering what was wrong with her mother when it came time to change into her tap shoes. She came over to where I was watching and asked for them. I felt like such a disappointing mom to have not brought her prepared, but she wore her sparkly princess shoes and it all worked out okay-after I promised her that we would go buy some for her next class. She was so excited and was such a good listener and obedient student the entire 45 minutes! So the point of that is 1-record how her first dance class was and 2- because it made me think so much about parenting in general and about how Heavenly Father is with us in particular.

As I sat and watched her dance and enjoy it so much, it made me soo happy. I was completely content sitting and watching her random, sometimes coordinated, small/imperfect movements. I love watching her do whatever she is doing-singing her songs during the day, looking at a book, playing with her dolls etc. etc. and I KNOW Heavenly Father feels the same way about us. I know He loves each of us more than we can comprehend so if I love my little girl enough to just want to watch her all the time, He wants to be even more involved and is even more interested in what we are doing-no matter how disjointed our actions may seem at times. I am so thankful for such a loving, caring, involved Father who although is the creator of the universe, still cares for ME. He watches with joy at the things I do and is happy with me when I am happy, and is sad with me when I am hurting, even when it is because I "bonked my own head" or because "someone took my toy away." He wants to reason with us and teach us even more than we want to with our own children. I am so thankful for the opportunity to be a mom because of the love that grows and for the things I learn about myself and about Heavenly Father who is the perfect parent.

The second thing I have thought a lot about lately is how people present themselves. As we went to Seven Peaks today and as we had some friends over last night I've seen so many different examples of how people feel/think/act. It seems that how people dress is often a statement of some sort. This is definitely not always the case, and really I am not making a "final judgment" of the person based on their swimsuit choice, but it seems like a lot of times you can tell quite a bit about someone based on their appearance and their chosen attire. By the way of appearance I am talking about obvious plastic surgeries for females or extremely tan skin. As I "people watched" from the wave pool with Alli today some of the most attractive women I saw (since I am obviously such a fabulous judge of female attractiveness-haha!) were not the ones with uber tan skin or lots of (typically fake) cleavage showing in their skimpy bikini, but others. There was one group of girls in particular that while I didn't interact directly with them as I watched them interact with each other they seemed like such nice, fun, beautiful girls. They wore modest swimming suits that were also very stylish -one probably had the cutest swimming suit I've ever seen- and although they were beautiful on the outside, they also had a beauty that came from within. They radiated the fact that they respect themselves and that they aren't dressing to get some man to come on to them or trying to "flaunt what they've got." There was another lady, who was very feminine, in a very cute, flattering swimming suit with her children and her husband. She was so comfortable and made me want to be around her. As I talked with her I thought of the contrast in how she behaved compared to others there at the pool. She knows that she has a purpose that goes far beyond physical things, but she still can take care of herself and be attractive. She knows that while it is very important to look nice, that isn't the only important thing. I think a lot of times women get caught up in the worldly roles women are supposed to play, and forget about our true purpose here and what we are working toward. I hope that as I raise my little girl in an increasingly wicked world, I can teach her that it is necessary to respect yourself enough and love yourself enough that you don't need to fall into the worldly roles where women are degraded and become more of a "sex symbol" of lust and self-fulfillment. I hope I can instill in her the belief that she is beautiful and help her remember that beauty is more than just outward appearance although many times those who are truly beautiful on the inside are equally beautiful on the outside as their inner beauty and kind character shows through. I want her to be able to stand strong for what is right and not feel like she needs to dress a certain way to impress a boy or fit in. It was sad to see girls and women who were dressed in ways that clearly made them feel uncomfortable, but it seemed they felt that if they wore that certain swimming suit and acted a certain way they would be "sexier" and be better than others, but in reality they have suppressed their true identity and diminished their beauty.

Sea World / Wild Animal Park

After the beach we headed to Sea World and the Wild Animal Park, and considering we wanted to do a lot of things in not a lot of days we did both in the same day-we were exhausted by the end! We started at the Wild Animal Park and went down to the train ride. We saw a bunch of different animals-White and Black Rhinos, giraffes, a huge flock of flamingos, lion, tiger, zebras (which surprisingly aren't very good at living with other animals), cape buffalo, and a whole bunch of different relatives of the antelope (and I am sure more that I have forgotten!). Alli loved riding the train and seeing all the different animals-I loved seeing the animals without having to walk everywhere!.





They had a cool little Lorikeet feeding area so Ryan and Phil held the nectar cups and worried they were going to spend the rest of the day walking around with little presents from the birds. :) Alli preferred observing from a close (or not so close) distance and I was glad I didn't have the nectar because I still had birds landing on my shoulders and "chirping" right in my ear and that was plenty for me. There was a really cool Kraal (African word for corral) petting zoo area with a couple different breeds of animals from the "deer" family. Their elephant herd was the best one I've ever seen. There were 2 tiny baby elephants, 2 slightly larger, and 2 "young teenage" elephants in with the adults. I've never seen such a small baby before so it was fun to watch.
Alli's favorite part of the wild animal park was the "Conservation Carousel" that we were fortunate enough to ride a couple times :) She wanted to ride a "horse" so she's on the animal that looks the most like the horse. The second time we were not so smart and went in the nest that we could spin. Spinning and morning sickness nausea=sickest I've ever been on a ride, and most my head has hurt for quite some time. Not the best decision on my part, but Alli wanted to go in it so I took her.

There were a couple of Hispanic kids in there with us and I felt bad because half way through we had to be done spinning or I was definitely going to lose it, so for the rest of the ride and I just kept my eyes closed and hoped everything would "stay put."

After that we went to SeaWorld and Alli took a nap on the drive and through part of Seaworld which worked out great because then we went on the rides first. It was nice everywhere we went with rides because we could do a "child switch" so one person would watch Alli and everyone else would go and then someone else would stay with Alli and everyone else would go and just jump to the front of the line. So it definitely cut down on the wait time. Phil & Ryan took full advantage of this while waiting for me to go on a ride with Alli [which by the way was the ONLY time I got asked if I was expecting on the entire trip- I said no. I was wearing a baggy shirt, not showing at all, going on a ride with a two year old??? My doctor had said I was fine to go on most things, so I did:) ] and said they had a kid. They were in the child pass line and the lady asked if they had a kid. Phil said, "yeah we have a kid." Then quickly added "well not together, he has a kid." haha the two of them make me laugh. This video was the result of that ride, and although it's exaggerated, it still is probably one of my favorite things from the trip.


After Alli woke up we went through the animal exhibits which were really cool. I love how big the "habitats" are for most of the animals. They had an Arctic exhibit that was awesome with a walrus that was being fed as we went through, polar bear that Ryan and Alli saw playing a ton, and 2 active Beluga Whales. We saw the penguins or "pengoes" which Alli thought were really cool. They had one area that had 8-10 different species in together so it was neat to compare sizes and personalities.





We saw the shows- Dolphins & Whales, Sea Lions (which are so hilarious, they are definitely one of my favorite animals), and of course the Shamu show. It amazes me the stadiums they have for those shows, especially Shamu-it's huge and it's practically full EVERY night!

Vegas & Beach Baby

-Picture overload-
This last week we got to go on a vacation. Ryan had a work expo (love how our trips typically involve his work somehow???) in Vegas so we decided that since we were already halfway to California and since our last trip out was mostly work and a little play that we would go again and enjoy ourselves this time. We invited one of my brothers (I wish the other two lived close enough that I thought they'd be interested in going) and his family, but with his work schedule it didn't work out to go now, and my mom and Phil. Since my mom just finished up the school year and Phil is about to leave on his mission they said they wanted to go with us so off we went. We drove to Vegas and Ryan worked most of Friday and went through the expo. We walked through some of the casinos/hotels to see their displays and mostly rode the monorail from the MGM Grand to Excalibur since Alli thought the train was cool (she loves this song about a train called "shiny dinah" so anything that is shiny dinah is awesome). After he finished we hung out at the pool which was really nice. There was a wave pool, a lazy river, and then just a regular pool and hot tub. When Alli woke up from her nap and had her fill of swimming we headed out to go see all the cool free things to see and get some dinner. Sadly we missed the lions in the MGM Grand by a few minutes, but the restaurant in there has a really cool display so it wasn't a total loss. The M & M store was disappointing, and then we walked down and saw the flamingoes at another place. We were too late for the sharks and white tigers in the Mirage (I know I should have planned a little better, guess there is always next time), but we did see the cool fish/shark tank and amazing frescos in Caesar's Palace, and the volcano show outside the Mirage. We bagged the circus and the animals at Circus Circus since they were clear on the other end of the strip and we'd already walked soo far and still had to go all the way back up-those addresses and distances are a little deceiving. :) But next time there will be plenty for us to see.




Saturday we headed to San Diego since Ryan was finished up with the expo-it was smaller than he had expected, but still worth the trip :) and got there fairly late in the evening so we just played in the pool (it was beautiful, with a waterfall right next to it, and some cool cabana areas and hammocks) with the pool toys the hotel provided and got yummy dinner. Sunday we went to church and picked up a bunch of beach stuff we were borrowing from one of the owners at Brandmakers' parents house and went to the beach. The first one we went to was La Jolla Cove and in one part of it there are a bunch (at least 100 or so) of Seal Lions and Harbor Seals just hanging out on a section of the beach so you could get really close on a certain walkway. Then we had a little picnic lunch and went to the actual La Jolla Cove part where you can snorkel. Ryan and Phil went out snorkeling and I would have except the water was FREEZING, and Ryan and Phil both said the fish they saw weren't cool enough to make it worth it. So-I took their word for it and buried my legs in the sand on the beach and built sand castles with Alli. Parts of the sand were too wet, and parts were too dry so Phil created a "perfect mix" for the little princes to have her castles. After that beach we went to a different beach a couple miles away with better waves for bodyboarding and skinboarding. It was pretty funny watching them! Alli was sleeping so we utilized the beach chairs and the huge umbrella they lent us and hung out under that napping.
* We love our little "sassy pants" Alli. Sometimes her poses she does are so comical. They are definitely her own, I don't know where she has seen them before because they certainly don't come from me or Ryan!