My incredibly talented friend came over a few weeks ago to take some pictures of the kids - mainly Amy. She did such an awesome job capturing her sweet personality - hope you enjoy pictures of our little angel. The blue rose clip and the brown and pink headband were made by Robert's sister, Lisa and I am determined to figure out how to make these one day when I have some time to myself to work with the hot glue gun.
Amy reached her first major milestone today - she rolled over!!! She may have done this earlier in the week, but I wasn't completely sure if she had started on her back or not and I didn't see her do it. But tonight I had run to get the camera to take pictures of Sam's face (below) and on my way back in to the kitchen she was lying on the blanket on her back. When I came back to her after taking two pictures of Sam, she had rolled over onto her tummy! This has taken her a while because she HATES being on the floor and Sam is usually pretty rough with her, making me even less inclined to put her down. But hey, she did it and she is learning to enjoy floor time slowly but surely.
And here is Sam licking the beater from our cookies we made for dessert tonight to help pass the time until bedtime since Daddy had to go back to work. The evenings are always tough when Daddy isn't home. Hope everyone enjoyed their "day of rest" and pictures to come soon of Sam on his new Strider bike!
Here are the family pictures we had done at the beginning of July with my family at the vacation house we rented in Swan Valley. Gorgeous area, let me tell you! First, a picture of Robert and me - it's been five years!
Ok, don't know why these are small, but this one is of my mom and most of my sisters - we are missing the youngest girl.
I had to post this picture of Camilla because when it was her turn for individual pictures, she would NOT smile for the photographer (who is my good friend BTW) but then as she was leaving the picture spot with her family, she totally lit up when who showed up? Yes, ME! It melted my heart that she would give such sweet smiles for her Auntie Christine :)
The Whatcott clan
Me and Sam playin around
My sweet boy
Mommy and Amy - don't you just love the soft purple flowers in the background?
Total personality picture
My handsome boys
Not quite sure what to do with a screaming baby. As sad as it is that she is screaming, I also think it is so cute!
Daddy's little girl, or is it little girl's Daddy? Probably both!
Story is below, but here is the cake that I found to base my cake off of.
A close-up of the palm trees made from gumpaste/fondant blend.
So this cake has a story, are you ready? My little niece Lucy has been planning what she wanted for her birthday cake for a while. Since her sisters' birthdays back in June (her birthday is the end of August). The plan was to do a waterfall cake. This sounded quite daunting to me, but once I started looking at other people's ideas, I found one I wanted to base mine off of. But then my sister's family had to move back to Washington at the beginning of August. So then we were thinking that maybe I could come over a day or two beforehand and still do the cake. But as things got closer, it wasn't looking like it would be able to happen for many reasons, but the biggest being I just wasn't sure if I could do the 10-12 hour trip with two kids alone. But then we had it! Daddy (who is here finishing his last semester of his MBA) was going home to visit the weekend after her birthday, so we plotted a surprise birthday cake to arrive with him!
I honestly cannot believe how well this cake turned out. I love the vibrant colors that match Lucy's outgoing personality and it is the first time that I have had an image in my head for a cake that has actually come out on the cake the same. Oftentimes I am sorely disappointed in what the cake actually looks like, but this is one I can honestly say I am proud of! I definitely need to work on my writing skills, but other than that it turned out great and it was so fun to play around with the colors and learn how to make palm trees and hibiscus (hawaiian) flowers! Happy Birthday to Lu-Lu - I really hope you love your cake sweet girl and I wish I could be there to deliver it to you and give you a big hug with it!
I know, all our pictures of Amy are of her sleeping. But she is such a beautiful sleeper and once she gets up my hands are so full with two kids that I don't usually think to bring out the camera.
This is Amy's preferred sleeping position - arms raised above her head
Daddy has been working many, many hours with grain harvest and it has been taking its toll on all of us. Lately Amy has refused to be put down anywhere. Even if I am sitting right next to her on the floor she isn't happy. So when she was crying yet again about being left out during breakfast I decided to try putting her in the highchair which was still out because I had watched my friend's kids the other night.
What a great idea! She LOVES being able to sit up with us during meals and I have both hands free to eat and help Sam with his food. As you can see in this picture, we take extra precautions and stuff towels on either side of her to help her stay sitting up, but at least she can do it and she is happy.
Sam wanted his picture taken, too with his "Sammy cup" Grandma got for him when we went to Bear World during one of her visits. (He STILL asks to go on the train every time we pass Bear World)
Sleeping on our bed. Amy loves to sleep on our bed and though she sleeps better and longer when here, I am trying my best to resist the urge so that she will learn to sleep in her crib.
Don't ask me how this is comfortable, but he's asleep so it can't be too awkward :)
Amy fell asleep while having some floor time today. She was actually kind of happy (which is a huge relief) because she was able to turn from flat on her back to her side. Not too long before she will be able to turn completely over! My little baby is getting so big!I don't know why it took me so long to take a video of Amy, but here she is laughing the best I have heard yet. This is quite an accomplishment for me to get laughs out of her - usually she only laughs for Daddy or big brother.
Pictures are in reverse order again and since I only got pictures during Sea World, enjoy snippets of the story in between pictures. We flew from Idaho Falls to Mesa Monday night. This was SOOO nice to not spend 14 hours driving. I think I might kiss whoever came up with the idea! ;) Then we stopped off for dinner with my friend Renee and her husband Nick, who we haven't seen in a long time and it was so good to catch up.
Then we got up relatively early Tuesday morning and headed out for San Diego. The drive over went pretty well with the kids, considering we had been traveling the day before. We did family pictures with the Skousens at a beautiful college campus that I now cannot remember the name of, but it was beautiful. Then we enjoyed swimming at the hotel.
The next morning (Wednesday) we set out to spend our day at Sea World. It was fun to get to see several of the shows including the whales, sea lions and dolphins. Sam had a wonderful time seeing all the animals. Amy, however, had a really difficult day. Which made for a rough day for Mommy as well. Looking back, we realize that maybe the double stroller wasn't as helpful as first thought and that maybe a baby backpack/carrier would have been more beneficial .... but oh well. It will make for a great story years down the road.
Thursday was the wedding at the San Diego Temple. It was gorgeous!! I am extremely grateful to Shanna and Kurtis for watching ALL the kids so all the adults could go in for the sealing and be there to support Jake and Stacey. After the sealing everyone waited two hours for the bride and groom to come out. By the time it was our family's turn for pictures, the kids had had it. I am really looking forward to seeing the picture of all the kids from Jake's side with the bride and groom: Sam is standing out in front wailing, Stacey is holding Amy who is screaming, and Caiden is running out of the picture towards his Daddy. After the luncheon we all headed back to Hyder.
Friday was spent not really doing a whole lot. Just enjoying each other's company, snoozing and gearing up for the reception the next day. I was finally able to go bunny bashing with the guys, which was so much fun and I am glad I didn't miss out.
Saturday was a day of disasters but ended up ok. First the strawberries for the filling hadn't completely defrosted. Then the filling wouldn't thicken up properly. We had made the icing ahead of time and had thought we had done the math right and that a one and a half gallon tub would be enough for the 31 dozen cupcakes. It wasn't. So we had to run to the store and buy more ingredients to make double what we originally had made. We were also running into problems with the icing getting too hot and not keeping the shape. It finally did all come together and even if the cupcakes weren't perfect, they looked great. But needing to get the food for Sunday's dinner we were to plan, we left the reception during what we thought would be a good time. Turns out we missed the cutting of the cake, the dancing and the throwing of the garter and flowers. Oh well. After all the cleanup we still had a 2 hour drive home. Thankfully the kids fell asleep and didn't scream the whole way home.
Sunday we went to church where we doubled the number of attendees. Then spent the afternoon prepping food for an army. We did a mini Thanksgiving meal of turkey breast, rolls, corn, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, watermelon and apple crisp with vanilla ice cream for dessert. It was a great last meal together. Then Monday afternoon we drove back to take our two hour flight back home to Idaho. Sam loved the plane both ways, although he started having a meltdown during the last half an hour of our flight and fell asleep ten minutes before landing. Ugh! Amy did pretty well on both flights, but after each she spent some time spitting up and being fussy, so I think it took its toll on her.
But now we are home and Robert is starting grain harvest, which means late nights for a while so me and the kids are just kind of taking it easy not really doing much. We really enjoyed our time in Arizona and will not be taking 80 degree heat for granted anymore! :) Thanks to everyone who made our trip possible!
The whale show was freaking awesome!!
The only picture I got of Jake and Stacey the whole week.
Waiting for the whale show
Going down the big hill. In front is Shanna and Emma. Then Lisa and Kurtis. The Adam and Kayla. In back are Jake and Robert.
Most of the adults going on the Atlantis ride.
So today I entered the county fair's Death by Chocolate contest. I chose to make my Almost Too Much Chocolate cake with a few new twists and see how it went. When I dropped the cake off I wasn't too optimistic about a real contest because there was only one other entry in the entire adult division (there were three categories and then the adult and jr divisions). But when I came back for the awards part there were quite a few entries and I began to doubt because the others looked pretty darn good. To my delight (and as no surprise to Robert) I won first prize in the adult division and overall winner!! That earned me a total of $60 (it didn't cost anything to enter). Now I just need to decide how I am going to spend the money - probably on more cake decorating stuff :)
And an updated picture of my super happy little girl. She is three months old today!! She smiles more than ever now and laughs occasionally. Last night she slept for 10 hours - it was amazing! She fell asleep around 9 and I woke her up to feed her at 10 so I could go to bed, but she went right back to sleep until 8 this morning. I just hope this sleeping through the night is going to become habit because I love getting to sleep again! This week has been nice and busy with family dinner on Sunday, girl time for pedicures, dinner and frozen yogurt on Monday, swimming lessons everyday (which are now done thank goodness), helping the Potters pack up and get ready to move, the cake contest, and getting ready to fly to Arizona on Monday for Jake and Stacey's wedding in San Diego. Whew! So we will be MIA for a while, but loads of pictures of the special day, the 300 cupcakes I'm making, and Sea World will be coming soon thereafter!