Summer Fairs

Lyla and I were lucky enough to attend a couple fairs this summer with Grandparents. First up was the Davis county fair with Mimi and Papa, Liz, Owen, and Mya. The Sonoma County Fair had just happened, and I was feeling a little homesick for it, so it was nice to be able to attend some kind of fair. I was a little shocked by how tiny it was, but it was fun to pet the animals, ride a few rides, and watch the horse riding.

Lyla was pretty hesitant about the petting zoo

Lyla and Mimi

Longest ride I've ever been on

We also got to go to the Utah State Fair with my mom and dad, Ashley and kids, and Des and kids. Since I was still feeling a tiny bit homesick for the Sonoma County Fair, it was fun to go to a fair with my parents, like we used to do. The "Little Hands on the Farm" was lots of fun, and Lyla and I also had a lot of fun ditching the rest of the crowd and wandering around with my Dad. Lyla's strength is definitely not following the crowd. Lyla really took to Grandpa, and I love seeing them together.

Lyla loving the tractors

She took the "apple picking" very literally

I felt a little bad about the damage...Also, I just noticed the nice view of baby Hudson, just a few days before he was born :)

Grandpa and Lyla hanging out...how bout the calves on that old guy?

My cute parents and 1/3 or their current grandchildren

Grandma, Grandpa, Lyla, and Cambria

Lyla and Grandpa checking out the fly fishing

4th Wedding Anniversary

Todd and I got really lucky because my mom was in town around our wedding anniversary, so we got to do another overnighter this year. I was also glad that Lyla and my mom got to spend some quality time together. We were in a pretty great position this summer, where Lyla was old enough to leave, and no pregnancies or babies, and I'm glad we could take advantage of it a few times.

We started off our date by going to the Salt Lake temple to do sealings. This is our second year in a row doing this on our anniversary, and both times have been really special experiences for us. After that, we checked into our hotel room, then went to the Copper Onion for dinner. It was a perfect evening, and we got to sit on the patio. It was fun to try something new and a little fancier than we usually do. After that, we walked down to City Creek, which seems to be our default, but it was great to just be together and chat. We picked up some delicious chocolate cake at the Cheesecake Factory, and headed back to the hotel to hang out. We just relaxed and watched Jimmy Fallon, and it was really nice. We had reserved a garden room, but got upgraded to a tower, so that was great too!

The next day, I woke up early, like I always seem to do when we get a chance to sleep in. We ate the rest of that chocolate cake for breakfast, checked out of the hotel, and then went walking again. We ended up going to the Cathedral of the Madeleine, which was really cool to explore. We ended our time out with lunch at Maxwell's pizza, and came home to see our girl.

It was such a fun time, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to get away and reconnect as a couple. So grateful to my mom for watching Lyla, and making me feel like things were awesome every time I called to check in. I know Lyla had a ton of fun spending time with her!

Lyla was hoping for a family photo

Halloween 2014

Halloween was a lot of fun this year! Lyla was finally old enough to kind of get it, so that was awesome. We kicked things off a few days before Halloween by visiting Grandma and Grandpa Barfuss, with Lyla, Mya, and Owen dressed up in costume. Lyla and I got a fun suprise when Grandpa opened the door dressed up as a pumpkin! I've never seen a 90+ year old dressed up, and it did not disappoint! Unfortunately, it freaked Lyla out a little bit and it took a good 10 minutes or so for her to even look at Grandpa.

Grandpa opening the door

I snapped this picture of Lyla after seeing Grandpa

Lyla, Owen, Mya, and Grandpa

After Grandma and Grandpa's, we went to Gardner Village to see the witches. The kids had a great time running around together.

Mya and Lyla are great friends. I love that Mya will play with Lyla, even though she's so much younger.

Cute kids and Mimi

The kids were loving sitting on the wagon, but snapping a good picture was a challenge!

Friday was Halloween, and Todd and I took Lyla to a few houses in our neighborhood. Mostly we'd get to the door, ask Lyla "what do you say?", and she would answer with her classic "peeeeaaase". I think there was maybe one house where she actually said "a treat" on her own. She was darling though, and Todd and I really enjoyed walking around our neighborhood and showing her off. It reminded us of how much we like where we live, and the people we have grown to love.

Our cute little leopard. Her bag says "Julianna" because I got it at Downeast for 74 cents that morning. I figured she can't read anyway :).

A little blurry...I love this girl!

Lyla's 2nd Birthday

Lyla turned two this week! I really wanted to keep the day low key, but fun for her. We kicked things off the day before her birthday by making her birthday cake together. She loved baking with me, and kept saying "mmm, yummy badder", as she repeatedly dipped her finger into the mixer and helped herself to cake batter.

On the day of her birthday, we ended up going to chick fil-a in the late morning to play in the play place and have lunch. They even sang happy birthday to her and gave her a little ice cream sundae, which she loved!

My girl is two!

We went home for a nap and Emme and Eliza stopped by later in the afternoon and gave her the cutest little doll stroller. Daddy got off work a little early and we celebrated with Little Caesar's pizza. Then we went outside and waited for Mimi and Papa to show up. They pulled up and Lyla was so excited to see them, and even more excited when they pulled a shiny red balance bike out of Papa's trunk! She was in heaven getting pushed around by Mimi, Papa, and Daddy!

After riding her bike for a while, Todd suggested that we go inside and have ice cream. Lyla was pretty excited about that and wouldn't stop talking about it. It was a little early, but we sang "Happy Birthday" and lit her candles and she had a lot of fun trying to blow them out. She didn't eat a bite of her cake but reeeeallly loved the ice cream!

After dessert, we gave her our present, which was a baby doll. I have been looking forward to giving her a doll for months now, and I was so happy that she loved it. She pulled it out of the bag and immediately gave it hugs and kisses and pats on the back. Shortly after we came inside, Lyla was requesting her bike again, so Papa decided to bring it inside. Once she got her baby, she wanted to combine her presents, so the baby got rides on her new bike too. You get away with a lot on your birthday!

Right after pulling her doll out of the bag

It was such a great night, and it was so fun for Todd and I to spend some time with our cute two year old and her grandparents. We love our girl so much, and are so glad Lyla came to our family two years ago!

Lyla's First Haircut

In the middle of September, I took Lyla to get her first real haircut. I had trimmed the bottom of her hair lots of times, but had been toying with the idea of cutting bangs for a while. Her hair in the front always fell right into her eyes unless she was wearing a bow. One day I finally got so frustrated with the hair in the face, that I decided to take her in.

We went to Cookie Cutters and it was really great! They let Lyla choose the little car she wanted to sit in. There were a few cute fire engine style chairs that were made out of metal, and a little more realistic, but she went straight for the little plastic car in the back. I just thought it was the sweetest thing because it reminded me that she is just my little baby girl still. Her hair turned out so cute and it hurts my heart a little looking at these pictures because she has pulled out so much of her hair since then. She finally had a hairstyle, but now she has a bald patch on the left side of her head. We're hoping to get that worked out soon...

Lyla getting her haircut in the cute little car she picked

Getting styled

The finished product

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Summer Boating 2014

We got to go out on Papa's boat three or four times this summer. It was so awesome! Lyla had a really hard time the first we went (new experience/runny nose made her pretty cranky), but she absolutely loved it the other times. We talked Todd into going with us twice and it was so much fun to spend some time with him. Pineview is so beautiful, and hanging out with the Barfuss clan is always fun. I got to wake-board a bunch of times and I even got the tiniest bit of air on my last run. No one saw it, of course, but that was my goal for the summer and it totally happened! Seeing these pictures makes me so sad that summer is over. Boating was definitely a highlight this year!

Isn't the lake so beautiful?

We went early one morning and Lyla got to cuddle with Mimi and Papa to stay warm

Lyla loves jumping in with her dad

The captain's chair ended up being Lyla's favorite spot on the boat 

Lyla Lately

Some things about Lyla the last few months:

For a while, Lyla wasn't very interested in her stuffed animals. Now she LOVES them. She sleeps with three of them--Eeyore, Puppy, and Bristow. She puts them all in her arms and wraps them in a big bear hug. They mostly stay in her crib, but once in a while when she wakes up, she insists on carrying them all out of the crib in her little arms.

She calls her paci her "papees". And is far too obsessed with that thing. I am really dreading having to take it away from her, but the more she asks/begs for it, the more I think the time needs to be sooner rather than later.

She used to hate nursery, but it has improved a ton the last few weeks! She has really taken to one of the male nursery workers. One week when we picked her up and I asked the leaders how she did, the leaders told me the following story: They were talking about smiley faces and frowns during the lesson and the person teaching was having them make smiley faces and then frowny faces. They said that Lyla was fine during the smiley faces, but once they started making frowny faces, she burst into tears. haha. We thought it was so funny.

Loves keys. One morning she sat in the driver's seat of my car and demanded "keys!".

Loves Tiger Lily, the kitty next door. When we pull up in the car she will say "llleeellly" (she says her "L's" really well, and it really sounds like their are extra when she says it) or "meow, meow" to go see the cats.

Probably 2 months ago I was counting something in my head out loud and I was saying "one, one, etc" to myself. Then I hear Lyla who I didn't know was listening say "dtwoo". I was so surprised because I had no idea that she would know anything about counting! Now she knows a lot more numbers, and varies in which ones she likes best. For a while two was her favorite and it was the only one she would say. Now she always skips one and two, but I often hear her saying "three, four, five, yay!" to herself. Seven is probably her new favorite number, and sometimes she will count 3,4,5, and then every other with me to 10. When we get to 10 she usually says "yay!" and claps. It is pretty fun to watch her learn.

This girl loves to dance now. A few months ago, she would do absolutely nothing when a good beat would come on, but now she loves to dance and jumping is her favorite. She just recently has started to get some air when she jumps. When she's in her carseat and a song she likes comes on, she will start nodding her head to the beat. We get a kick out of the head banging.

One of her very favorite things is the phone. She loves to talk to Daddy and Grandma, and she also loves to pretend that other objects are phones. This week she used both a pretzel, and a wet, crumpled paper towel as a phone. When she held the paper towel up to her ear I heard her say, "Hi...mmhmm...oquay...byebye".

I'm so sad that this picture is blurry because otherwise it might be my favorite picture of all time

A Snippet of Mischief

Lyla is a busy little girl. She is a ton of fun, but she is definitely not a "chill" child. She keeps us on our toes, that's for sure! Here's a little sample of some of  the trouble she's gotten into over the last few months:

Sticking green beans up her nose

Ran downstairs for just a sec, and came back to her taking a foot bath and brushing her teeth. Can't even tell you how close this was to overflowing when I showed up.

And one more

Climbed up the dresser (using the drawers as stairs), found some mascara, and worked her magic

And sometimes she likes to remove her diaper in random places. Like the dinner table.

Or the couch. Yes that wet spot is what you think it is.

And sometimes you strip her down for a bath, just to find a random tattoo that she's given herself.

Summer Birthdays 2014

We celebrated Todd's 30th this summer! About a week before the big day, I realized that his birthday had totally snuck up on me. And then I remembered that he was turning 30. Since the beginning of the year, I had been planning on doing something special for his 30th, but it had just slipped my mind the closer it got. I was suddenly feeling a little panicked--I toyed with a surprise party, big family party, etc., but I decided they weren't quite Todd's style. That's when I thought of doing a surprise overnight staycation with just the two of us!

Thanks to some help from Todd's best friend Bryce, I booked a room at Little American (Bryce works for the Grand) for the Friday before Todd's birthday.Todd's parents were so nice to agree to watch Lyla for us. The transmission on Todd's car had recently gone out, so Todd had been taking trax home from work. This worked into my plan perfectly because I told Todd that I had to run some errands at Fashion Place and could just pick him up after work that day.

When I pulled up to Epic to get Todd, I was trying not to let him see my big grin, but I was so excited to finally be able to pull the surprise--I had been dying to tell him all week! He noticed that Lyla was not in the back and asked if I had left her with my sister so that I could do some shopping by myself. I told him that she was with his parents and he was pretty confused. Then I told him that I had his bag packed and we were going away for the evening! He was so completely surprised and I loved it because he's not a big one for surprises. I loved that moment just watching him process it all and he was so excited and so was I!

We went to Red Rock for dinner and sat on the patio. It was such a great evening and we loved the food, and it was just so nice. That was our favorite part of the night. Later we checked into our hotel and then walked down to city creek to pick up some cheesecake to go. We caught a little water fountain/music show and it was a nice little time. We slept in in the morning and had breakfast at the coffee shop and then went to Farmington to pick up our girl. It was a great little getaway and I'm so glad that Andy and Julie made it happen! It was a blast doing something a little special for Todd's 30th and I'm glad that he seemed to enjoy his birthday.

The two of us at Red Rock

Lyla helping Daddy open his present on Todd's actual birthday

Lyla and Daddy on Todd's 30th birthday

We also celebrated my 26th birthday last month. We had a nice lowkey evening with dinner at the Cheesecake factory, followed by shopping for my birthday present. It was fun to celebrate and I officially feel old--how can it really be that I've been dating and driving for 10 years?

Before my birthday date

Really not sure what's going on here

My delicious cheesecake