A Little Cabin Fever

I think winter has finally left us alone. yay! But with spring still comes some rainy days that require us to continue to stay inside. So we are continually trying to find things to keep us busy. As this pregnancy gets nearer and nearer to the end (only 8 more weeks!!) I find myself a little more exhausted every day. So some days I'm a little less ambitious than others, but I try to find fun, good activities to entertain this very busy toddler. This particular day was painting. It went great until she dumped the whole thing of paint out...haha. Then it was just a mess. 

Another day, playdough. She still plays with this about every day. 

We spend lots and lots and lots of time reading. I LOVE that she loves to read, and loves books. She is constantly bringing books and asking me to read to her. We visit the library very often to pick up new books, because let's face it, I get kind of sick of the same books over and over ;) We just picked up another load of about 12 books from the library today. I'm pretty excited to have a new books for a few days!

This particular day was finger painting. Which did NOT go as planned. At all. Not my finest mommy moment. So in the spirit of full disclosure, and an effort to keep this blog "real". I'll start from the top. Emery is busy, busy, busy. Constantly into every thing, and has absolutely no problems making messes all over the house. But these messes include, coloring on furniture, ripping up paper, pulling out bowls, lids, DVDs, anything, etc...A kind of mess that this poor girl cannot handle is being dirty. She HATES it, she hates to have dirty things on her hands, her feet, anything. But I figured I would give the paints a try. So I made some finger paints, laid out wax paper, I was ready. I tried to show her what to do, but she wouldn't touch them! The picture on the above left is when took some paint and put it on her hand. She just started at it. Not quite sure what to do. Well time went on, I tried and tried to get her to paint, but she wouldn't. Just just kept asking me to wash her hands. After a while of this I got a little frustrated....I know it's stupid...but here I was trying to have fun and she didn't want anything to do with it! I took the yellow paint, poured it out on the paper, and took some and smeared it on her belly. Trying to show her that it was okay! It was okay to get a little messy. But what I was missing thinking I was being a "good mom" with this great activity, was that this poor little girl just does not like being dirty. Instantly her little bottom lip puckered up, and her tiny mouth turned into the saddest little frown you've ever seen. Her eyes teared up and she just stood there. She was stunned. She was very dirty, and she was very sad. Instantly I felt like the world's worst mom. She never really started to cry, but she walked to me and just wanted to be hugged. I felt terrible. But once again this sweet little girl taught me a lesson. Man I love her. After a big hug, and deciding that it was okay to be dirty. For a little while at least. She posed for some "pity" pictures. That's all I can assume that they were. She still wouldn't touch the paints, even though she was already covered in them, but she just stood there and kept giving me these huge, beautiful smiles. After a few minutes of trying "appease mom", she packed up the tupperware and brought it to me. She really wanted to be done I think. And I had definitely learned my lesson. I promptly took her to the bath tub and got her really clean. Then I got some real smiles. And a giant kiss. 

Man alive am I glad she is a forgiving little sweetie. 

And it's going to be a while before we trying finger painting again...

Big Helper

Emery's favorite thing right now is to help. Oh she is such a "helper", haha. But when she wants to help me cook I can't help but let her. She is actually a good stirrer, and at putting in ingredients. It's just too cute. This particular day she helped me make some french bread for dinner. She stirred and stirred that bread. She wasn't too happy when we were done. 

One night when Jake was working late we had eaten dinner and cleaned up and I thought some Snickerdoodles sounded yummy. So Emery helped me whip some up. As you can see, this girl likes cookies...haha

Just waiting patiently for them to cook.

"num, num" (said while nodding her head up and down)

Colton and Haley's Wedding

  Last Thursday was my little brother Colton's wedding. He married a wonderful girl that we all love, Haley. It was such a great day! They were married in the Salt Lake Temple. We started off the day, obviously, with their sealing. Emery hung out at City Creek with my sister and Haley's little brothers while we were inside. After the sealing we just wandered around the beautiful Temple Square grounds and Emery had fun smelling all of the flowers ;) 

And getting chased by Dad. 

Showing me the "lellow" flower. She would walk around to all of the yellow ones and saw "lellow, lellow" 

After waiting for little while, ya know how it goes waiting for those brides ;) haha. Haley was ready! No one was exactly sure what was going on but the photographer wouldn't let Colton walk her out, he made him some stand down with all of us with his back turned so that he couldn't see her...he hadn't seen her dress yet, and so we guessed that he was trying to get a picture of that, but still it seemed a little odd. They were good sports and just went with whatever.

Emery finally got to go see Colton. She had been trying to get to him since he came out but Jake was holding her and making her wait until Haley was out and they were all ready. haha. Little stinker loves her uncle. 

 The sealing started at exactly Emery's nap time. So by the time it was over, and they came out, and we took pictures, she was BEAT. She just laid down in the middle of temple square, told us all "nigh, nigh" and wanted to take a nap, haha. Jake picked her up and she fell asleep on his shoulder and slept through the whole luncheon. Which we were not disappointed about. We have been thinking for months what we were going to do with her during that. I didn't get one picture at the luncheon...well I did, but it was blurry...But they had their luncheon at the Lion House. It was so yummy. 

Getting ready to leave! They aren't having their reception until tonight (May 4th), so after the luncheon they headed to their hotel, the Anniversary Inn, for the weekend. 

They got this really cool old car to take them to their hotel.

Congratulations Colton and Haley! We love you! Can't wait for your reception tonight!