Holiday Parade

Holbrook has a Holiday Parade that I sold bows this year. During the day they had vendors and such and that evening they had the Parade of Lights. The girls stayed at Grandmas most of the day because it was too cold, but around noon it warmed up so we brought them out. In these pictures London is 3 months old. I can't believe how much she has changed since then! Kyle took Macy to see Santa while he was there and he said Macy got closer to him and more and more nervous at they got closer to Santa. :) They look so happy huh?

Macy Girl!

I can't believe how fast Macy has learned to talk. When London came she could say about 20 words and now there are too many to name. Some of the fun things about Macy since I last posted about her:

She LOVES processed cheese. This girl will stop doing anything for cheese. When I asked her what she wants for lunch or if she's hungry the answer is always "Cheese!".

She has recently learned that after we pray, it's her bedtime. While my parents were here we asked her to come say family prayer and she started crying and saying NO PRAY! as she ran away from us. She knew she had to go to bed when we were done.

She has learned when to say "Bless You" and it's adorable. London sneezes pretty often and so Macy always says "Bwess you Wondon"- adorable.

She loves to sing. In church a few Sunday's ago she took the hymn book out and just started goin' to town. It would have been fine if it was durin the song and not during someone's testimony.

She can't say Grandma. She calls all her grandparents Grandpa.

She knows exactly where the candy and cookies are at Grandma Gardners house and always heads right to them when she goes over there. Grandma Gardner only has oreo cookies and for some reason Macy really doesn't like them- she wants to like them, but doesn't. She will keeping getting an oreo hoping it will taste different then the last one.

Everything is Milk. Just because she says "Want milk" it doesn't mean she wants milk.

She loves books and story time at the Library. This girl could be read books all day long if she could have her way.

She loves her baby sister. When London cries she says "Wondon's sad" and always tries to give London her paci. She's a sweetheart.

She is very polite and always tried to make you think your jokes are funny. She is the biggest fake laugher EVER. She fake laughs over EVERYTHING.

Macy surprises us every day with how much she is learning and understands. She is such a sweet little girl and loves hugs and kisses. She's our Macy Girl.

2010 Pumpkin Patch!

Last year we took our first visit to the pumpkin patch and decided we should make it a tradition! Here is this years visit to the pumpkin patch with the Larsons.
Macy was obsessed with pushing the wheelbarrow.
London just chilled and slept :) Oh the life of a newborn.
Kyle, Macy, and Lorin looking for a pumpkin.

London Newborn Pictures

Cindy Carroll took some awesome pictures of Macy, London, and I when London was about 3 weeks old. I think they pretty much speak for themselves.

Meeting London

My mom went back to Holbrook about an hour after London was born and came back later that morning with Miss Macy to meet her little sister. She wasn't too sure what to think of her at first- and that didn't really change until recently. Enjoy the pictures!

I love this picture of Kyle and London. He really does love his little girls.

We asked Dr. Tindall to take a picture with us and his response was "In this shirt?!" - It was 2 in the morning and he had just thrown on some jeans and an Aeropostale shirt. Ya, my doctor's cool.

Grandma Carbonneau and baby London.

Kyle, Macy, and London

Our little family.

Zeusers

I know- I promised pictures of London 2 months ago and I haven't updated. Please forgive me, there's a reason for that.

The day we came home from the hospital, somehow the dogs got out of the backyard and Zeus was unfortunately hit by a car. I couldn't move on in my blog without saying something about him, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it yet. Kyle and I got Zeus when he was 6 months old- about a month after we got married. He was part of our family from the very start of it. One of our "firsts" together. When we moved to Holbrook, as most of you know, I had a really hard time here but it was always comforting to have Zeus to cuddle with when Kyle was at the school late.

Zeus used to sit by the window and watch for Kyle to come home- it was the cutest thing. Once he saw one of our vehicles he would go CRAZY and we always knew some one was home.

He loved ice cream and canned dog food- and getting into mischief. I remember one time he had gotten out at Kyle's mom's house and when he came home his face was FULL of stickers. He was a little guy and there were probably 50-60 stickers just on his eye. At first I thought we were going to find stickers in his actual eye because it was completely covered, but luckily there wasn't- it was just so knotted you couldn't see anything under the stickers. Crazy guy.

He slept in bed with us and would keep our feet warm during the winter. When we first got him Kyle refused to let him sleep with us- until one night I fell asleep watching a movie in the bedroom and had forgotten to put Zeus in his crate so Zeus just slept with me. Kyle got home after I had fallen asleep and just crawled into bed. In the morning I asked Kyle if he noticed Zeus was with us and he said nope- and that's when I talked him into letting him sleep with us, he didn't even notice he was in the bed!

I guess if you've never had an animal so special to you, you probably won't understand, but that's okay. He was my baby before I had any and our family will never forget Zeus.

Happy Halloween!

For Halloween this year we decided to keep it simple. We went to the Joseph City Carnival and just played some of the games and let Macy run around. This year Macy was a cute little kitty and London was a little monster. I loved their costumes.

London Allison Gardner

She's Here!

Here's the down low...

It started out as a typical Sunday, watching Disney movies and getting ready for church. After sacrament meeting (12:00) my back started to hurt but I didn't think it was contractions. Kyle asked me if we needed to go home and I said nope- just need to sit down or something. I'm the primary chorister and since I was there- I needed to go to primary. During the next hour they started to get a little stronger but nothing too bad.

After church every Sunday we go and have an awesome roast dinner with Kyle's mom at her house, so we headed over there and the back pain just kept coming. I didn't really know if they were contractions or not because they were different then with Macy- they weren't just in my tummy. The radiated from my back, to my front, and down my hips/thighs- not fun, but I don't know a type of contraction that IS fun :)

At about 3:30 I called my mom and let her know that my contractions were about 5 minutes apart lasting for a minute. She packed the car and started heading up. I still hadn't packed a bag for the hospital yet so we headed back to our house and packed our bags, put the car seat in the car, and headed back to Kyle's mom to drop off the dogs and stuff for Macy. I didn't want to go to the hospital too soon, so we hung out at Kyle's mom's until about 6:30 and decided since I was going to have an epidural and I need my antibiotics for GBS we should probably just go.

We got to Snowflake and I was little nervous because the contractions had calmed down a little bit- so we hoped out of the car at a park and walked around and swung on the swings- that lasted a whole 10 minutes and I decided we needed to go.

We got to the hospital at around 8 and I was 3 cm almost 4 and 100% effaced. The admitted me because I had progressed from my doctors appointment earlier in the week and they could see that the contractions were doing something. I'm not sure about the exact times from here on out but I got my epidural as soon as I could and I was about a 5-6. I went from a 6-10 in about 2 hours or so. At around 1:30ish-1:45ish the doctor came in, broke my water, and started doing his thing. After 2 1/2 contractions and about 4 pushes and at 2:11 am Baby Girl came into the world! (MUCH quicker and MUCH easier then labor with Macy). She weighed in at 7 pounds 4 ounces and 19 3/4 inches long. Perfect.

Baby Girl has some major lungs on her, a very sharp cry and she lets you know exactly when she likes something and exactly when she doesn't. She has 10 fingers and ten un-webbed toes (Macy inherited some her Dad's webbed toes). I'm doing great and I'm just excited to not be pregnant anymore and have this little one in our family. I'll post pictures when Kyle wakes up (figures that he's the one sleepin' right?- it's alright though, he had a long night too) :) because they are on his phone and I'm not sure how to do that :)

Sugar. Yummy.

I've been much better with weight gain this pregnancy then I did with Macy- at this same point in the pregnancy with Macy I had gained a little less then twice as much. I think it's starting to catch up with me though because all I can think about lately is ...

Peach Cobbler. Hmm- Heaven. The warmth with some cold ice cream. Yum.

I would love to eat sleeves and sleeves of this perfect, delicious cracker!

Luckily for my bank account and arteries there is no In-N-Out in Holbrook.

Oh goodness. How I crave the fluffliness of this beautiful doughnut. How the freshness melts in your mouth.

Pineapple upside down cake. I googled you to find out how to make you- but you seem way too complicated. I still crave you none the less.

And a nice- quiet beach where I can relax as I hear the water crash on the sand and feel the warmth of the sun on my skin.

It would have to be empty like this though because I will probably look like a white-beached whale after I fulfill all my cravings.

It's Love

I just love my little girl.

I love when she's tired and just wants her blankie and her mom.

I love when she asks for a drink by handing me a cup and going into the kitchen.

I think it's adorable how much she loves pickles.

I love how I usually know what she wants, even though she doesn't know how to talk yet.

I love when my phone beeps and she grabs it and gives it to me.

I think it's cute when she sees her Daddy after a long day and her eyes light up.

I love how in the mornings when I go in to get her she always grabs her blankie and gives me a big smile.

I love how she dances to any music, no matter whose watching or where she's at.

I love that she is currently trying to get on the couch to sit with me but she's just not big enough yet to pull herself so she reaches for my hand to help her.

I love my little girl :)

I'm a Big Girl now!

The stars are aligned in the Gardner house tonight! I have my computer, camera, the camera cord, and my memory all at the same time!! Updating WITH pictures. I know- shocker, you can breathe now.

Here are some new things Macy has been up to...

Miss Macy is getting such a little mind of her own. She already wants her own computer. I told her it's going to have to wait till she can at least say "computer" but good thing we're teaching her the difference between Mac and PC now :)

The dogs have taken a new liking to laying on Macy while we travel. Good thing she doesn't really mind.

Macy is in love with coloring. I think it's adorable how she holds the pencil like a big person!

Aw- and this is just a super cute one. Our big 16 month old :)

She is into climbing. On. Everything. She found out how to climb up on Grandma Gardners couch and get the cookie jar from the table. And how to climb on the kitchen counter to get to the basket of candy. Must be her father's daughter.

She absolutely LOVES to be outside with the dogs. The big dog is Buck. We were dog sitting him.
Cute lil' Rockstar.

This is from the cruise- thought I'd throw one of those in for ya.

I can do anything better than You!

I have found something out about myself that I will blame on my pregnancy that I'm not really proud of, but I'll learn to handle it better.

I get irritated with dumb people really easily.

Not really dumb people, but dumb things they say.

I say "dumb" and not "stupid" because I really believe that they don't know any better, and I think that's more irritating then anything.

I hate when someone has something happy to say, or simply a comment- and some one else has to top it.

For example- if I said "I ate 5 hamburgers, I'm full" this type of person would respond "I had 10 hamburgers." Quite frankly- I don't care if you had 10 hamburgers! You probably don't care that I had 5- but it doesn't matter because we're talking about me- not you- and 5 is a big deal for me!

I just don't like it when people knock down other peoples accomplishments to someone make them seem less important. I actually had someone tell me that me graduating with 1 child wasn't that big of a deal because they did it with 4.

It bugs me.

Kyle and I call them I-walked-on-the-moon-people. (If you've seen Brian Regean it makes it even better). I can't wait for the day that I'm really irritated and someone tries to top me so I can give them a good, loud, probably kinda rude but nonetheless

"Oh ya?! Well I walked on the moon!"

The College Graduate

I graduated from Northern Arizona University with my
Bachelors Degree in Applied Science: Early Childhood

Guess what that means?! No more homework!! No more assignments !! No more tests!! No more textbooks!! No more stress!!

It definitely wasn't easy. I couldn't have done this without the help of Kyle watching Macy while I went to night classes and all the support he gave me in helping me with homework when I was stressed BUT most of all, I couldn't have done it without my parents. Between Biology and a new baby there were a few times when I really thought I was going to stop. I would tell Kyle "I'm done, I'm so done- I can't pass biology!!" and he would say "Yeah right, are you going to tell your Dad?" then I was say "Ugh- no, I'm just gonna stop and not tell him" then Kyle would laugh and say "Sure- you're not gonna stop going because you'd be too scared to tell your Dad." I always knew I was expected to go to college and to be honest I don't think I would have if there wasn't that expectation. I think it's a very good thing that my parents held high expectations because it helped me accomplish something that I didn't realize was that important. Even though I don't plan on working, there is such a good feeling knowing that if Kyle was unable to work, I have a degree to fall back on. Thanks Mom and Dad for all your hard work, energy, stress, and funds to get me through school! :) I really really really appreciate it.

What will I do?! Oh ya- CRAFT!

Graduation is Friday, and I have one final left. To be honest, I've kind of been putting off the final because it's weird to be that I'll be done after I take it. Bitter-sweet I suppose. What will I do after I graduate?! Well, besides add a new baby to the family. I love to make things and I've been searching Etsy for things to make that will keep me busy :) So far I am making a quilt that will match our front room so I can put it on the back of our brand spankin' new recliner that will be here on Saturday! Yay for a rocking/recliner, the one we currently have is.. well.. it's time for a new one :).

I found this SUPER cute diaper bag for a baby doll which will be PERFECT for a "I'm a big sister" present for Macy when the baby comes... and her Grandma C has already offered to make it :) It's a diaper bag, changing pad, burp cloths, diapers, bibs, and a wipy case with felt wipes that go into it. Adorable, I know.
Macy had a car seat canopy, but I'm thinking the Baby Girl will need her own :) Just like this one...
I've made 3 quiet books so far and we got the patterns for 10 more :) I have a feeling I won't make them all, but more quiet books are definitely in our future!
And my FAVORITE project! This will be Macy's Christmas present, a little far off I know, but there is nothing bad about planning ahead.
Isn't it ADORABLE?! I love it. It's a fort, it goes on a card table. I'm thinking we're going to do a kitchen and living room on the inside walls with a fridge that opens with food inside- Oh my goodness I'm so excited! Of course my mom will help with probably all of these projects :) Yay for crafty, awesome Mom's! Kyle is very excited for the fort and says that there has to be lots of secret compartments :) I think he wants his own :)

Our Baby is a...

We had our ultrasound the other day and they let us know that...We are super excited that Macy will be able to have a little sister and hopefully they will be great friends! I'm a little bummed that I don't get to decorate a nursery, but maybe I'll just redo Macy's room- or finally decorate our room ha ha. :)