A Few of My Favorite Things

Today is my 23rd birthday, and when Jason was asking what I wanted to do, all I could really think of is to spend time all together as a family. Spending the afternoon with both my girls and my husband is my idea of the perfect birthday! So for my birthday entry, I am going to post a few of my "favorite things"--my little girls, Tempe and Helena!

Helena on her two-month birthday (yesterday)... this is the classic complaining "hold me" face she makes when she just needs a cuddle!

Daddy's little girl (dressed like a boy!). Tempe is wearing Jason's old BYU sweatshirt in this picture, one of my new favorites of her!

This is the very first picture I ever got of Helena smiling! She smiles all the time now. She is a very happy girl!

This is how I found Tempe after her nap one afternoon. She found the bulb syringe and decided to clean out her nose, just like we clean out Helena's!

a Day at the Zoo

Tempe and Maddy on the tiger statues.

Libby and Helena... Libby wasn't too excited to hold her baby cousin.

" Grash! Grash!" said Tempe

All six of us at the bird show--you can kind of see Tempe behind Maddy.

Today Tempe, Helena, and I went to the zoo with my sister-in-law Rachel and her two girls, Maddy and Libby. We have been trying to go all week, but it was hard to find a day where we could both use our cars, the weather was nice, the girls weren't sick, and so on... trying to plan any outing with four girls two years and under is hard! Today was a perfect day to go, though! It was about 72 degrees, breezy with blue skies... perfect for walking around the zoo, especially because the Hogle Zoo is very hilly and double strollers are pretty heavy! We had so much fun seeing all of the animals and riding on the train. Tempe was especially excited to see the giraffes (of course!) We have a membership, so I am looking forward to going a lot over the next year. It's so nice to live somewhere where there are things to do and places to go!

Oh, and I have to add... poor Helena got sunburnt. Yikes! I feel so bad. I tried really hard to keep her out of the sun, but somehow her poor little cheeks got burnt. Poor baby!

Juris Doctorate

Goodbye, Laramie

We left Laramie on Saturday, May 17th, after three years of law school at UW. I may have complained a lot while we were there, but I really did grow to love Wyoming (in a way). One of the reasons that I loved it is all the wonderful friends we made. We will truly miss them!
My friend Jeanne and I decided to have a graduation party for our husbands. Steve and Jeanne were the first friends we made in Laramie and we shared our law school experience with them, so it seemed appropriate to celebrate with them. Here are some pictures from the party!

A group shot of many of our great WY friends!

Jason and Steve cutting their graduation cake.

Me and Jen

Joni and Macy, Jamie and Isaac, and me and Tempe--we worked together at The Open School, and then all had babies within 4 months of each other!

Tempe playing with Caleb, Jeanne and Steve's oldest son and her very first friend. Someday maybe they will get married...

30 before 30

I watched an episode of Scrubs the other day where JD realized that it was almost his 30th birthday and he hadn't done any of the things on his "30 before 30" list. That got me thinking... what kind of goals do I have for myself?

1. Natural childbirth--DONE!
2. Graduate from college
3. Buy a house
4. Build up our year's supply of food
5. Get married in the temple--DONE!
6. Learn how to sew
7. Go on a family vacation
8. 100% Visiting Teaching for at least one year!
9. Complete an up-to-date life history
10. Watch "Gone With the Wind" from start to finish
11. Get my ears pierced and keep them from getting infected
12. Hike the Y--DONE!
13. Grow a vegetable garden
14. Grow a flower garden
15. Learn to bake bread
16. Finally see Brand New in concert--I'll be too old after I turn 30
17. Go on a vacation just with Jason
18. See "The Little Mermaid" on Broadway!
19. Vote in a presidental election (sorry, I haven't been a good citizen up to this point)
20. Start recycling
21. Have a nice family portrait taken
22. Start saving for our kids' educations and missions
23. Attend at least 10 different temples--so far, I've been to Provo, Salt Lake, Bountiful, Nashville, and Denver
24. Get back into shape
25. Learn how to bake and decorate really cool cakes
26. Spend quality time with my children every day
27. Have a weekly date night
28. Watch every episode of LOST
29. Keep in touch with old friends
30. Finally be able to touch my toes!

Whew, it was hard to think of 30 goals. Of course, I have goals like have a happy marriage and raise happy, well-adjusted children, but those are sort of vague. I guess some of my other goals (#26 and #27, for example) will help me attain my vaguer goals.

So there you have it!

My new name lists

You may notice that I have two new lists on the right side of the blog--Names with an X, and Color names. Believe me, we are not even thinking of number 3, but I didn't want to forget those names, and I thought it would be fun to post them here. If you have any other ideas, leave a comment and I will add them to my list. When we were thinking of names for Helena, I decided that I someday want a child with and X in their name, and a child named after a color. These are my favorites so far! Oh, and I won't be offended if no one else likes them... they are all pretty different names, and that is why I like them!

Springfield's First Family

(My parent's will be appalled if they read this)

Tempe has a new "favorite" show--The Simpsons! She doesn't actually sit down and watch it, but she seems to like the characters. Today we were at Walmart looking at greeting cards, and there were a few with Simpsons characters on them. Tempe saw them from across the aisle, where she was standing with Daddy, and starting pointing at them and smiling. Jason took her over to see them and she was very excited! Then, this afternoon, we were watching tv while dinner was cooking and she saw a commercial for the Simpsons. Tempe was excited again to see her favorite characters!

We just thought it was funny that she likes the Simpsons so much. I think it's probably more that she recognizes them and likes that--like I said, she really doesn't actually watch the show! She is around when it is on, but she is usually just playing with her toys or reading books and not paying attention to the tv.
I haven't written about Helena in a few days. She started smiling the day after her one month birthday, which was about a week ago. She is a very happy girl immediately after eating and that is when she smiles the most! We are yet to get a picture of it, though. She's not like Tempe--she doesn't have big gummy grins all the time like Tempe did--but she has her own sweet little smiles. She has also started to coo. I love this age! I forgot how babies "come alive" after a few months and seem to be little people instead of just helpless beings. It's so fun to watch her little personality develop!

Springtime in Laramie

Every traveler's worst nightmare...

Last week we had some beautiful weather here in Laramie, Wyoming. If you consider 25 degrees and snow blowing sideways beautiful, that is. I took advantage of the weather to take some pictures that I have been meaning to take since we moved here almost three years ago! First is a picture of the "return to Laramie" sign on I-80. Seeing those flashing lights and the gate across the freeway is the most horrible feeling in the world! We have seen it several times in our years here--once in Rawlins, once in Cheyenne, once in Rock Springs... ugh! The other picture is of the trucks lining the highway on-ramp. I couldn't get a great shot (I took these while driving!) but the on-ramp and the shoulder of I-80 for several miles were lined by trucks. The parking lot at Wal-Mart was also packed! That is how I can tell if the road is open or closed. I counted trucks in the parking lot and I lost track at 48... it was pretty crowded.
We will not miss the road closures here!!

Jamaican me crazy!

Tempe is such a good big sister--she always makes sure that Helena has her paci in her mouth! She's actually gotten pretty good at putting it in for her.

Jason's family recently went to Jamaica to help his brother Jonathon and his family move back after an internship, and they brought these cute dresses back for our girls! Tempe especially loved the fact that Helena had a dress just like hers. Unfortunately, the weather here is not cooperating, so they had to wear their island dresses over long-sleeved shirts. In fact, today--May 1st!--it is snowing and soooo windy. It's days like this that make me so ready to leave Laramie for some nicer weather! Of course, we have lots of wonderful friends here that we will miss so much :( I never thought leaving would be hard, but now that it's actually in sight, I do!
Yesterday I got a letter from BYU Independent Study awarding me a scholarship to take a 3-credit class. Yes! I got one last year, and I was so happy that I got one again. So now I need to buckle down and finally take Physical Science 100. Yuck. I've been dreading it! Besides 4 religion credits, it's the last of my general education requirements. I just want to get it out of the way, so I can concentrate on the classes that I really need and that will be a little more interesting for me. Hopefully I will do ok in it--science has never been my strongest subject!