Happy Birthday Madison!

I can't believe our baby is already 1! This has been the fastest year ever by far, but we are so glad to have this little girl in our home and can't remember what life was like without her! Madison is such a funny little personality...she is relatively easy-going and very tolerant of all of the torture her big sisters put her through, but is also very opinionated about what she likes and doesn't like. She is incredibly wiggly and does not like sitting still at all, but she loves to give snuggles and kisses which is so much fun for all of us.

A few things about Madison at age 1:

-she growls when you ask her what a bear says

-she loves to bonk heads...she does it pretty softly but only with people she loves so it's kind of like a hug!
-she has 7 teeth, 4 on the top, 3 on the bottom
-she has been taking a couple steps here and there for a while but just in the last week or two, she has really figured out the walking thing and is now walking more than crawling
-she is very picky about food but mostly likes toast, bananas, cheese, strawberries, green beans, olives, corn and a taste of anything sweet!
-she can wave hi and bye
-she says dada and mama and has started saying "doh" a lot but we haven't figured out what that means
-she loves looking at books and playing peek-a-boo
-she absolutely adores her big sisters and lights up when she sees them, especially when they get home from school
-she is a great sleeper most of the time....usually sleeps 12 hours at night and still takes 2 naps that are about 2-2.5 hours each!
-her official stats: 23.13 pounds, 29.5 inches

Madison has brought all of us so much joy this year and we love our little one-year old! We had a small party with family and Daddy made her a butterfly cake for her birthday. We gave her a cupcake and I think the whole thing was gone in less than a minute! That's our girl!

Christmas Sunday

The girls were all sick the Sunday before Christmas so these pictures were actually taken the following Sunday, but close enough. It was pretty much impossible to get a decent picture with all of them, but I thought they were pretty cute anyways!

Christmas 2010

This year we actually decided to do a quick vacation right before Christmas and we took the girls to Las Vegas for a few days. Unfortunately we forgot the camera, so we don't have any pictures, but we had a great time on our little family trip. The drive there was a little nerve-wracking...we had really bad snow for the first couple of hours and then lots of rain, so the drive took about 8 hours instead of 5, but we got there safely! We stayed at the MGM Grand hotel and the girls were very impressed with the Strip and all of the lights! We spent one morning at the Children's Museum in Vegas and had a great time there with all of the exhibits. Another highlight of the trip was the M&M store....the girls were thrilled to be able to get pink and purple M&Ms. Madison had a pretty bad cough/cold the whole time which was less fun for her, but she was still a trooper and we appreciated the excuse for lots of relaxing time in the hotel room so that she could take some decent naps! We got home on Christmas Eve, just in time to get ready for Christmas. I forgot to take an official shot of all 3 girls in their pajamas, but Christmas morning was still a success! The girls didn't have any "big" wishes this year, just lots of little presents, but they were thrilled with all of the princess, fairy and Strawberry Shortcake stuff that they got! I was very spoiled with a new pregnancy pillow, new coat, gift certificates for house cleaning and lots of books that I wanted. Daddy had Christmas come early this year when he got new scuba gear and a new gun, but he also was surprised with a new Blu-Ray player on Christmas morning....we all lucked out this year!

10 months old!

I've gotten behind on Madison's monthly updates, but she is now 10 months old and as cute as ever! At her 9 month appointment she weighed in at 21 pounds, 5 ounces and was 26.5 inches tall. She is still crawling everywhere and pulling up on everything and will walk as long as she is behind her push toys or holding on to someone, but has not yet started walking independently. She now has 7 teeth (4 on top, 3 on bottom) and has pretty much decided she does not like baby food anymore or anything that she can not pick up and feed to herself. Her diet these days consists mostly of crackers, cereal, bananas, green beans (her absolute favorite), cheese, blueberries, toast, strawberries and peas! She says 'ma-ma' and 'da-da' a lot, although not always at the appropriate times so I'm not sure she knows exactly what they mean but we can pretend! One of the cutest things she does is give kisses! Every morning I let her wake her daddy up....I put her on the bed and she crawls over to him and gives him a big slobbery kiss on his face! Any time someone is laying down, they are in for kisses and she also like to bonk foreheads with the people that she loves the most...pretty sweet! Madison is still not much of a laugher but still has a fabulous smile and she still has those adorable dimples too!

Dance Recital

The girls had a dance recital with all of the songs they had been learning for Christmas and although I was nervous that at least one of them would not cooperate, both girls did an amazing job! They got to show us the different floor work that they practice and then they got to perform all of their dances, complete with a bunch of adorable costume changes! The whole thing was one of the cutest things I have ever seen and I was so proud of how well they did!

12 weeks

Well, I am 12 weeks pregnant as of today and am very grateful that the morning sickness and tiredness and all that yucky stuff are almost completely behind me. It's been about 2 months now since I found out I was pregnant and I am still a little bit in shock and a little bit in denial for the most part, which I think is kind of good, because when I start to think about the reality of it all, I get kind of overwhelmed.

We had honestly almost officially decided that our family was complete with 3, when I found out that I was pregnant. I got pregnant at a time I never should have been able to and the whole thing has been crazy timing wise, so we figure it was definitely meant to happen this way, especially given my history of so many miscarriages. I have already had an ultrasound and just heard the heartbeat last week...so far everything is going perfectly. I'm just trying to figure out exactly how I am going to manage it! Having Savannah and Paris so close together (16 months apart) was difficult but now that they are older, I love having them so close in age. Madison and this baby will be barely 15 months apart and while I'm sure it is going to be absolutely nuts with all these little children, I'm sure that these two will love having such a close buddy as they grow older as well. I feel like the jump to 3 kids has not been too bad, mostly because there is more than 3 years between Paris and Madison. The older two are old enough to be helpful and independent while I need to be taking care of the baby and they love playing with her which has been so nice. But even loading all of them in the car and going anywhere and working around nap schedules and preschool and school schedules and everything else has been a little bit nuts, and I can't even imagine leaving my house with all 4! Especially these days with Madison all over the place and getting into everything....yep, that partial denial thing is a good thing!

Even though I am a little freaked out right now, I am grateful for the opportunity I have to have another baby and am grateful to have all the children I have...even though a lot of times it is hard and exhausting, I wouldn't trade it for anything! So now we are just anxiously waiting for January so we can find out if we are going to be an all girl family or if Bubba will finally get a buddy around here!

Paris is 4!

I can't believe this little girl is 4 already! Paris continues to be quite the little personality! This year Paris started preschool which she absolutely loves, except for some reason she has decided that she doesn't like finger painting and refuses to get any paint on her hands. Quite the change from the little girl who loves making messes! Paris loves all things princess and Strawberry Shortcake and loves playing with Savannah...those two keep each other entertained constantly which is so nice for me! Paris is pretty shy when she first meets people but once she gets warmed up she loves to talk and is pretty dramatic in nearly all of her statements which is pretty entertaining for all of us. She loves dance class and she is always singing at home as long as she thinks no one is really listening! Paris is super smart and has continues to surprise us with how many words she can read...we've been working with Savannah on reading and I think Paris has just picked up a lot of it...she can read a ton and loves books which I love! She continues to be very stubborn and headstrong, but I'm sure that in the future that will serve her well...it just makes for good lessons in patience for her parents! We love this little girl so much and are so happy to have her in our family...Happy Birthday Par!

We had a family party the night before her birthday...it was my first ever experience with fondant and was kind of stressful, but I thought it turned out ok for my first try!

Birthday morning-opening presents!

She wanted to go swimming for her birthday so we went to the rec center in Lehi and had a great time, especially since Uncle Landon, Aunt Melissa, Austin and Cody got to come too!