Ilener Beaner

This little girl just had her 18 month check up and I wanted to record some things about her right now.  She is soo soo much fun!!  She brings so much joy to everyone around her-me, Ryan, Alli, other family members, neighbors, strangers at every single store we go to :).  When we walk through stores she waves and says "hi" to so many people.  I love seeing their faces light up even though it is just a random toddler.  Right after she gets their attention she will hide her giant smiley face in my shoulder.  She is such a ham and she loves to make people laugh.  She nods her head yes and no and often will do opposite on purpose to make you laugh.  She LOVES to play tag/chase and will laugh so loudly the whole time, I love her laugh! She is one tough little girl and will often run from place to place but if she bumps or falls she just picks up and keeps going, it is a rare thing that she lets it stop her from doing whatever it is she wants.  If you take something from her or if Leo (the neighbor's dog) gets away from her on his leash-those are things worth crying about :).  She says hi, mama, dada, gama, A-i (Alli), uh-oh, whoa, bonk, bum, giddy-up, quack quack, backpack (like from Dora even though she hasn't seen it much), does the sign for more/again and milk, and can't say thank you but she makes the pitches for it.  She LOVES to dance whenever their is music and will just come take my hand and walk me where she wants to go/to whatever she needs.  She knows lots of animals, she loves to play this Old MacDonald game on the ipad that tells her animals and she picks the right one-I am surprised by how many she recognizes!!! She is so so smart.  At her dr appt today we found out she is 23.9 lbs (40th percentile), her head is the 25th percentile, and her length is 34.25 inches-off the charts! So we have a tall, skinny girl.  She does this "big" smile where she squints her eyes, scrunches her nose, and smiles so big-I LOVE it.  Even if it is in the middle of the night (or 5 am) when she has randomly woken up ready to play.  This happened earlier this week and after a few of those I was happy to be awake with her.  I wish there was some way for me to capture how fun she is so I could remember forever.  I just love her smiles, her silly personality, the way she nods her head so big when you ask her questions.

Leo & Buttercup

 So both of our girls have a serious love affair with horses-and dogs too for that matter-and any time we are driving or walking and see one of either kind I hear about it.  Alli will tell me all about them and Ilene just makes sounds-giddyup for horse or oo oo (woof woof missing some consonants) for a dog :).  They are not afraid and love petting and playing with animals.  Lucky for us our neighbors behind us and across the street from us have Shih tzus (sp??? all I know is hearing Alli say it is comical-think proper pronunciation with a giant gap between the spaces resulting in a mix of a swear word and a sneeze) and Doug across the street is a widower so he is happy to have visitors and Shea (his dog) loves the girls almost as much as he does and our back neighbors are seriously like an additional set of grandparents! They both work and their daughter moved out so they asked if they could hire Alli to take Leo out during the day.  Umm pretty sure she doesn't need to be paid (which is what I told them) but they were insistent that she be paid since it is kind of a pain at times.  But she is probably one of the most content employees anywhere! Ilene looks out our kitchen window and starts "barking" and pointing and trying to get me to take her to get Leo so she is thrilled with the arrangement as well.  And as for me it works great because they have the perks of a dog without all of the responsibility and I don't have a dog in my house! He is a cute little dog though for the most part. 

We are so lucky with our neighbors, seriously behind us and next door Alli and Ilene have two extra sets of grandparents that probably love them almost as much as they love their own grandchildren! These last few weeks Alli and Ilene have had quite a few opportunities to ride horses as well which they have both loved.  We went to a horse show at the fairgrounds a few weeks ago and the next week went to a high school rodeo there (yeah we are pretty bigtime, but they love it and it is free so it is great entertainment!).  The lady sitting next to us had us watch her Italian Mastiff (GIANT dog!) for a few minutes after we become friends and it ended up her daughter was participating in the rodeo (I know, odd that most people at the rodeo were actually watching a certain person...haha) and she offered to let the girls ride her horse.  Well obviously Alli was super excited at the chance so out behind the barn we went.

 Last fall we went to a fundraiser for some of the girls in our neighborhood who are cheerleaders.  They had a silent auction (and it wasn't quite like the recent Office episode with Dwight and the silent auction :)  ).  and we got some crazy deals on stuff! We got a dental visit (cleaning, exam, x-rays, and whitening) for $11 and Alli a horse riding lesson for 12-15$.  I finally got it all set up and last Saturday we took her for her lesson.  She LOVED it, a whole hour just being around and riding a horse! First they got the horse out of the pasture and brushed it, picked its hooves, and put the saddle etc. on.  Then Alli helped walk it up to the arena.  Her teacher was super nice and the pony she was on was fabulous.  Alli got to ride her (Buttercup) all around the arena and the teacher taught her how to "steer" with the reins and about half way through she was riding the pony all by herself telling it where to go.  Her teacher would point a direction or walk and have Alli go there.  Then Alli walked it around the other end of the arena around a chair and different "routes" while her teacher stayed back by us.  Alli was just so attentive and was loving it.  Ilene just loved being able to pat the horse often throughout the time :).    Then Alli walked Buttercup back down to the stable all by herself.  I was so proud of her! At the end she told me they should leave the house so we could live there with the horses. 

Mammoth

 So happy-just dancing on the giant box some of the stuff came in and playing on the blanket we were sitting on.

 the helper crew

Ryan has had this dream since he was a young teenager so at least 15 years.  That dream is to have a "Mammoth" basketball hoop.  I remember hearing about this years ago, but we put it off because these things are not cheap! Well last November he finally decided it was time to get one for our driveway and luckily since he was the TOP sales guy at his work for 2011, his work paid for the hoop!! So all we paid for was the concrete foundation for it-which Ryan dug out all by himself.  He is seriously the most hardworking, dedicated guy I know! If he sets his mind to something he will definitely accomplish it-be it doing 1 million dollars in sales in a year (and don't be thinking we made the 1 million dollars because it was total sales not his personal earnings) before anyone else at his work so we could qualify to buy into ownership or digging out a 4 foot deep 20 x 20 hole through ridiculous rocks so he and my brother Jason could pour cement for the footings for his dream hoop.  When he heard how much the assembly/set up of the hoop would cost he decided to do it himself-hence the digging! He worked for days-probably a solid week and a half before work, if he came home for lunch and then after dinner until dark digging in his hole.  He would pour water in after he finished each time so it would soften up the mud so he could use a weird sharp pole to pry rocks loose and scoop them out.  Then after the cement (22 bags!) was poured he put everything together with help from me when it truly required more than he could do alone.  Finally the cement was ready and cured so he and some of our neighbors hoisted it onto the anchors.  He was soo happy and excited!! And there is just something about a 'project' especially a heavy project that makes men so happy because all of these guys were just thrilled to help put this giant thing up in our driveway :).  Now it has been up and seriously I think for a few minutes most (not as often recently since we have both been swamped and he has been out of town so much) days he shoots some hoops and oftentimes it is being used by a few of the boys in our neighborhood.  Alli and Ilene though are thinking it is pretty darn cool to play out there with it-even if Ryan is not home.  Ilene loves carrying the mini basketball around and Alli just likes to chuck the ball up in the air :).  It is so fun having it out there and being able to sit outside on the warm nights watching everyone play!

Birthday Princess

Our internet has been down the last week and has not been the greatest the last few weeks so hopefully it is up and running for good now.... So now that I have finally uploaded the "draft" posts that I didn't realize were sitting in my folder I can start trying to get everything else caught up!
So next up in March was Alli's birthday and it was so much fun.  Ryan was actually in California on her birthday at another expo (it has been a crazy few months of not many weeks/weekends totally home for him, but luckily we are finally at the end!) so we really had a birthday weekend-all the better if you ask me! And seeing as she got to celebrate in Ohio too it really was like a week long celebration.

 First she was excited to take her birthday treats to pre-school and she wanted cowgirl treats so we did sugar cookies.

Then Saturday on her birthday my mom bought her this cute mini birthday cake since we weren't having her cake until Sunday and Monday, she got a new birthday outfit and balloons, we went to Provo Beach resort so she could do the games, carousel, and the "big" kid playplace-seriously underwhelming but she and Ilene had fun playing in it so that worked.  Then we went to Joe Bandidos for some fried ice cream and her favorite enchiladas for dinner :).

Opening her presents Saturday morning.  A birthday outfit from me and a talking rabbit stuffed animal (that responds to parts of its special book when you read it) from my mom. 

         Snuggling her special talking rabbit stuffed animal-talking Abigail and her book went everywhere with us!

Sunday morning Ryan was home and he had brought her a special surprise from his trip-a super cute Minnie Mouse who lights up and talks.  She opened her presents from us (scriptures with her name on them-just a mini Book of Mormon- since every week she wants to take scriptures to church, a cowgirl dress up outfit and some new bedding since you are getting a bunkbed-or "bump bed" as you sooo excitedly call it) and after church we had a family party for dinner and cake and ice cream.  She picked meatballs "with the sweet sauce" as she calls it (random I know, but anytime I asked what she wants for dinner that is her pick...), go-gurts, Pink lemonade, yummy rainbow jello and a few other favorite foods of hers that I don't remember now that it is two months later!  Luckily it worked out that Ryan's mom was here visiting Erin and her cute new baby so she was able to join us for the party!

Monday Ilene had an appointment with a pediatric cardiologist because her pediatrician was concerned about an "abnormal" heart murmur she has.  So they did an EKG and when that came back that her heart is functioning fine :) they did a chest x-ray because it still doesn't sound right so they wanted to see if she had an enlarged heart and luckily everything came back normal on the size so they know nothing is seriously wrong.  So we are all hoping that when we go back in six months it will be gone or not as prevalent.  I wasn't super worried because she hasn't had any symptoms of a heart defect and I have a heart murmur, but it is classified as "innocent".   So after that appointment at the hospital we let Alli pick where she wanted to go for lunch and she picked her favorite-Rubios.  That afternoon was her friend birthday party with a few of her friends in our neighborhood and she wanted a "Cowgirl Pinkalicious" birthday-sweet.  It was a lot of fun though! We had the kids decorate vests, do a horse toss-to get a little stuffed horse, pin the tail on the horse-to get their handkerchief, do a horse race around the house-to get their hat, and then they had what Alli deemed "cowgirl food"-nachos with their cowgirl cupcakes.

This is a whole lot of things about you right now because I want to try to remember what you are like-the random, funny things you do!

You take care of Leo during the day while Dave & Karen are at work.  You love to get the keys and go let him out and play with him.
 You love music and singing.
 You love jumping off things-stools, your bunkbed,  tables etc.
You are mostly happy, but you can have a serious grumpy attitude at times :).  You get VERY excited about things.  Today we are going to Las Vegas since daddy has been traveling so much we are going with him this time :).  The first thing you said when you woke up is "Now we can go to Las Vegas" because yesterday you asked if it was 'after this day'.
Instead of yesterday, today, and tomorrow you will say-before this day, right now/today, and after this day.
Oh my Alli girl-Alli Balli, you are so much fun! We have so much fun every single day! I LOVE hearing you tell me stories or anything-how you are feeling and especially what you are thinking.  You are so smart and observant and intuitive and you think about soo soo many things! You have a great imagination and you absolutely love to learn! Your favorite things to learn about right now are animals-you love dolphins, horses, and oddly enough dinosaurs-although you are very glad they are "extinct because they are all dead".  You always take me to the non-fiction section at the library to get at least one book about animals.  You love to read and be read to.  Some of your favorites are anything Fancy-Fancy Nancy, Pinkalicious, and Katy Duck.  You also like the If You Give a..... books.  You love helping me do projects and especially love helping your daddy do projects! I love seeing your concentration! You even know how to use a drill :).  You still love pretending to be a doctor or dentist, but usually it is an animal doctor or veterinarian.  You have such a tender heart and you hate to see anything/anyone sad be it animal or person so watching movies is interesting at times.  You don't like movies with "meaners" or any bad person!  You like to watch Barney, Wonder Pets, and some Dora and occasionally still Backyardigans.  Often though you will find random Netflix shows (cartoons or animal shows) you love.  You love playing on the Ipad, doing puzzles, coloring, and anything "crafty".   You love your little sister and are usually soo helpful with her.  You guys definitely fight-some days a lot-but there are a lot of days you share soo good with her and help her do things.  She loves you and most of the time wants to be right with you doing whatever you are doing.  You really like to sit in the back of the car and you can buckle your seatbelt :)
I wanted to hear some of your answers so here they are: When you grow up you want to be a- veterinarian.  What does a veterinarian do? It does helping animals.
What is your favorite animal? horses and dolphins
What is your favorite color? mm pink
What is your favorite food? Meatballs and Macaroni and Cheese
What is your favorite treat? any treat-I really like mm cotton candy and suckers and tootsie rolls
TV show? Barney and Backyardiganst (as you say it)
What is your favorite primary song? Teach Me to Walk in the Light
Who is the prophet? Mom can yo help me with this one? I said president and she said Monson.
What is your favorite thing to do? go to the beach resort.
Favorite friend? mmm  Haven and Ruby.

When I ask you to pick which book first (or many other choices) you will often have me pick and then when I pick you will happily say-that was my plan! Or that was what I wanted!
 You often surprise me with words you use and know the meaning for.
You are "slightly" dramatic and the smallest scratch is a BIG deal for you!!

Moab

In the middle of March we went down to Moab with part of my family.  It was such a fun, short trip! Everybody else went down Friday morning, but we didn't leave til late Friday afternoon because of a training I had to film for the music class I teach.  So they did some 4-wheeling and other cool stuff before we even got there, but o/well!    Last November we signed up to run the Moab half marathon and we (my
mom,
 Ryan, and I) all got in! Well then found out I was pregnant and I was
so sick and exhausted that I pretty well quite exercising except for
teaching spin.  Ryan was playing basketball and that was it.  So
although I tried to pick up the training a bit for the last month or two
 before and thought maybe I would just run/walk the half when Ryan
thought maybe (seeing as I was 24 weeks pregnant) we should switch to the 5 mile it sounded great to me!  So
 Ryan and I happily switched to the 5 mile run. 





Pre-run before we split up for our buses to the starts/post run-also a big thanks to Phil & Kacie for taking care of our girls while we ran and to Jason & Christie for making sure Phil & Kacie made it to the finish!



 It was great going up to the start of the run up the canyon,  Ryan and I hiked
around a bit (meaning we were CLEAR up the cliff since we kept going cutting back and forth just a little higher each time all the way up)  on the rocks while we waited at the start and it was just
fun running and hanging out with Ryan.  He was quite the guy and stayed with me the
whole time-even though I tried to convince him before and during the run to just run
however fast he wanted to instead of staying with me seeing as he is obviously much faster! So we had a great
time talking and just enjoying the run.  We (I) were not fast at all and
 this whole baby thing really makes the bathroom situation just all that
 more fun with running so I stopped and any time I felt my stomach
getting tight or anything I would walk until it went away.  My mom did
the half and she was soo sick with a terrible cold and
on a bunch of cold medicine, but she still did great! After the runs we
got some lunch and went to Arches.  Our neighbor had told us about their
 favorite arch-the Sand Dune Arch- so we went there and it was perfect
for kids-and grown up kids! SOFT sand and plenty of things to climb on
and jump off.  Ryan was of course climbing like a crazy person with
Phil.  Jason was the only adult male with enough sense to stay down so
he didn't end up with a broken ankle or something :). 

 My crazy husband thought it was a great idea to climb up onto the tallest of rocks/arches and jump off-and Phil went right along with it!

 Me with all of the kids-a few were slightly nervous so I got to sit in for the pic.

 After the Sand Dune Arch we walked to the "Broken Arch".   And we opted to see the rest of everything from the car as we drove past :) so it was a great time at Arches! Then it was pizza and some hang out time in the hot tub.  

Sunday was rainy so we headed to Sacrament meeting and then drove out to a cool little beach on the river, but it was too muddy and still raining to get out so we headed back home and got home Sunday afternoon.