Lexi Is Almost 15 Months!

***Before I talk about my little Lexi, I need to talk about Dark Knight Rises. Derek and I went on a date night to see it last week and OMG! Anyone that knows me knows that The Dark Knight is one of my favorite movies, and I had been looking forward to the new movie for so long. Well it definitely did not disappoint! It was amazing. I still have a special place in my heart for The Dark Knight, but this one was even better than that one. Nolan is amazing and I definitely want to go see it again.

So...

August 14th, Alexis will be 15 months! I can't believe it has almost been 3 months since her 1st birthday. Time really does fly when you have a little baby. I am so looking forward to Lexi's 15 month appointment with her doctor. I am hoping her weight has picked up alot. Alexis has been eating 3 big meals a day and snacking in between so I know she is eating the right amount of food. I also love finding out what the next steps are for her eating habits and her developmental stages. Alexis has been drinking from soft spout sippy cups for the last 3 months. Alexis at daycare has 2 soft spout sippy cups and a hard spout one. I'm not sure if she drinks a lot from the hard one; I know she didn't like it at first but I'm wondering if we should move her to exclusively the hard ones or not. I'm also curious to know when we can move her to the straw sippy cups.

I also need to make a dental appointment for Alexis. At her 1 year visit her doctor let me know that we could set up a dental appointment for her. I need to go in for a check up as well, so it will work out well for us to go in together.

Alexis took her first 2 steps last week. I don't really count it as her first two though because Derek was holding her and let her go for two seconds and she took the steps. For me it will only count when she stands on her own and takes the steps. But it was nice to see that she can do it. I think Alexis just doesn't want to yet, but I definitely think she is ready. I love watching Alexis walk around everything all over the house. I think she is going to start walking on her own really soon. I am really excited about her starting to walk especially because she is getting so close to 18 months.

We are going to put Alexis in baby ballet and tumbling classes. The youngest you can be is 18 months for ballet. The classes are mom and tot, or dad and tot I guess lol, I am excited to do this with Alexis on my days off. I remember in high school telling one of my best friends, Amandalyn, that when I had a girl I wanted to do baby ballet and now I get to actually do it :) I know Alexis will have natural athletic abilities, including dance ;) I found a program through SLC Ballet and a tumbling class through another center. Alexis will be 18 months in November so we'll probably wait till January, after all the holidays are over and when a new session of classes starts. I'm excited!

We are trying to decide if we are going down to Southern California in August or September. We were planning on going the weekend of Derek's birthday but my brother, his gf, and little Harlow won't be there; They are going to Green Bay for a football game. I really want to see the little baby so we're thinking of going at the end of August instead.

I'm trying to think of what we have been up to lately. Alexis is doing amazing in daycare. Work is going really well for both me and Derek. We did go to Derek's summer work party this past Thursday. It was fun but really hot. We ate some yummy food and got a gift card to the movies. I got to see someone that I knew from my old ward in San Francisco. Small world she works as the HR person at Derek's job, so that was nice to catch up. We saw Madagascar 3 and Alexis really liked it, she fall asleep for the last part lol but she loved it.

Well I think that's it for now :)

Monday, Monday, Monday!

So today is my Sunday; I go back to work tomorrow till Saturday. Work has been consuming my life for the last 5 weeks it feels like. I had training for 4 weeks and just had my first week off of training. I go in at 6am-2:30pm. For the last week of training and this past week I have been picking up a ton of extra hours. Since Derek and I carpool because we have only his car, I have to wait for him to get out of work at 5, so I figured there are extra hours I'm going to be here anyway I might as well take them.

The cool thing about the extra hours is I get $5 extra for every hour I pick up, and on top of that depending on when the hours are, certain extra hours come with points. At work they have the normal vacation hours that you would get any where and they also have this awesome points system that you can use to take PTO or just time off. Well I've been picking up a ton of hours and getting extra points for ever hour which is going to make it easy for me to take paid time off in the fall, which I plan to do a bit of. On top of all of that all the extra hours I picked up pushed me into overtime so I will be getting time and a half for those hours that I went over. I am very excited for my check this week. I'm planning on picking up a ton of hours through mid August to try and get us all caught up.

What I should be doing aside from picking up more hours is working out at the gym at work, but I haven't had the money to buy work out clothes and shoes. All of my yoga pants have holes in them and my one pair of running shoes that fit are back in Southern California. I guess the extra hours will help in that department too. Aside from all that, my first week has been pretty good. I love my team and my manager and I'm excited for our upcoming office Olympic events. I swear my job has the coolest contests and events.

Speaking of cool. Last weekend was my work party and it was pretty awesome, sadly though I didn't win anything. I wasn't too surprised because I had won during the health fair. Also at work there is this cool points system called Life 360, where you win $25 gift cards for every 5,000 points you get; The points are for working out, carpooling, eating healthy, checking your credit..etc. Well I got over 5,000 so I got my first $25 gift card last week. Pretty awesome :) Well on top of that I found out last week that I was one of the winners for the Fun in The Sun contest which was the top 15 associates who got the most amount of points between June 18-July 18. I was #14 :) with 6,500 points. So I'm going to get a gift card, not sure for what yet, but I'm pretty stoked. I really love working somewhere that makes working so fun!

Oh yes! Let's talk about Daycare! So Alexis had her first week (4 days) of daycare; She loves it! Derek dropped her off on her first day, since I work at 6am and Derek doesn't go in till 8, he is the one that drops her off and picks her up. Well he sent me a text after he dropped her off that first day and told me how it broke his heart to leave her but that she loved it. It was hard for me that first day to not just be thinking about Alexis the whole day. I asked Derek to pick me up first that day so we could get her together. We walked up to her classroom door and looked in at her and she was so happy, but once she saw us she got all anxious :) Everyday they have this little paper they give us with how many diapers she had changed, how many naps she took and at what time and what she ate and at what time. They also write on there anything we may need to bring in to her, like diapers and such, and if she was happy, sleepy, sad, or fussy that day. She has been perfect all week just super happy to be there. I am so glad that she loves it there.

It's so cute Alexis has come home twice this past week with cute little hairstyles that the teachers have put her in. We always put a clip in her hair so Derek thinks they just like playing with her hair because it's so long. I've been telling Derek I wanted to buy some hair ties so I can start putting her hair up, now that he's seen how cute it is he is into it lol. Alexis won't be going to daycare tomorrow because of Pioneer Day here in Utah, so Derek will be working from home so he can stay home with her.

I found a pediatrician for Alexis! My insurance kicks in August 1st and she is supposed to be having her 15 month appointment at the end of August so I looked up the different pediatricians at the hospital I was looking into and looked up some reviews for a pediatrician I think would be great and I just set up her appointment today! I am so glad that is out of the way because it was stressing me out, not having her appointment ready.

I am getting really excited for the fall. I know it is still July but I can't help but think that fall will be here before we know it. We are planning on going down to Southern California in September. We need to bring all of our stuff up and we want to visit my new little niece :) One of my best friends is also going to be having her baby at the end of August and I can't wait to see her. We are planning on going for Derek's birthday around September 10th, which is also my mom's birthday!

Thinking about Fall coming up has got me thinking about the holidays. I love love love Fall and the holidays being all squished together only makes it that much better. I am excited for Halloween, to dress Alexis up :) I'm hoping we can go down to Southern California for Thanksgiving, there is no one for us to spend Thanksgiving with her and I'd love to be with my family and the new baby :) We are already planning on going to Disneyland for Christmas. I am hoping to stay at a hotel near by and spend a couple of days going to both parks and just hanging out in downtown Disney. I wanted to take Alexis to Disneyland for the first time in October but I am thinking we should just wait till Christmas.

Derek and I have been working our butts off to catch up financially and get everything paid back, hence the extra hours I've been putting in. I think we deserve a break after getting everything paid back so that's where Disneyland comes in :) We are thinking of being here for Christmas Eve, because of course we'll have a tree and I'm going to do a ton of decorating so we'd like to spend Christmas Eve at home we're thinking of either leaving that night or Christmas Day after we open presents that morning. The great thing about flying on Christmas Day is that flights are usually cheap and no one flies on that day; I've had to do it once or twice.

I feel like I should have more to say but right now that's all I can think of. Enjoy!

Mommy-Daughter Mondays :)

I start my new work schedule this week; I will be working Tuesday-Saturday from 6am-2:30pm starting tomorrow. Alexis will also be starting daycare tomorrow. From now on Alexis and I will have Mommy-Daughter Monday.

I have high hopes for Mommy-Daughter Mondays. For now though we will be keeping it small and just hanging out at home, since we are a one car family, but I am hoping to having little outings planned for our future Mondays. Today we have had a dance party, climbed up the stairs together, played with her toys, and talked with grandma ;) I had my mom on speaker and told Alexis to say "Hola" and Alexis start smiling and waving at the phone, it was the cutest thing :) I think we're going to go outside and have some pool time for Alexis, she loves loves loves being in her pool!

So this weekend was my company summer party. The theme was Rip Roarin' Roundup, so all about cowboys and the wild west. It was so fun. They had a ton of cool booths set up. I had our tickets and they also gave us slips for guest prizes and some old west money. So when we got there we put Derek, Alexis, and Holly's names on their guest prize tickets and put them into some drawing for prizes, we went to this cool bank booth were they handed us these cool sacks of coins in exchange for our money :) Inside the little baggies there were coins for food, snacks, drinks, and all of the activities to do there. We took Alexis over to the petting zoo and apparently one of the little baby goats, or something like that, came over to her and was just staring at her. Alexis got to ride her first pony there too!

That was really fun! We also got our picture taken for a "Most Wanted" poster.

We had our Tug O War competition. My team got to the championship round but we lost :( We lost in the first round but won two more rounds and then lost in the championship round. My arms are so sore and i have a bruise on my right side from where the rope was against my body. Even though we lost it was awesome and fun competing.

We didn't win any prizes, but it's ok I figured I won during the health fair so it probably wasn't going to be my turn to win again.I was hoping Derek, Holly,or Alexis would win something but it didn't work out that way. It was still tons of fun though so I'm glad we went. Also, here is a picture of Alexis and Holly while we were waiting for the prizes to be announced.

Derek has his company dinner thing either this Thursday or next, I'm not sure, but that will be fun.

This week is going to be exhausting but I am excited to be out of training and on my regular schedule! I will be sure to updated next Monday about how Alexis' first week of daycare goes and about how my first week on my regular schedule goes. Enjoy!

Alexis Off To Daycare...

...well not quite yet ;)

We finally found a daycare for her today. We were looking to find a daycare by my work in Draper, because we will be moving to that area soon and would love to have her daycare as close as possible, well the one in Draper did not have availability for a 14 month old, which Alexis will be this Saturday :) They also have locations in Riverton, Sandy and soon to come one in South Jordan. Turns out the one in Sandy did have room for her so we went today and signed her up. I have bittersweet feelings about this; Alexis has always been babysat by someone close whether it be family or friends and I loved that individual attention she got, especially when my mom would watch her, so now going into a class of 8 kids that's going to be a little hard. However, I do think she will love being around the other kids, she loves being around other babies. Plus it will be really great for her social skills.

We got to tour the daycare and see the different rooms. One thing I was afraid of was that Alexis was going to have to be in the 1-2 age group since she is almost 14 months, the reason I was afraid of this is because even though she does walk along things all the time, she is still not walking on her own and I don't want her getting trampled on by other kids. The lady at the center asked us if she was walking and I let her know that she isn't doing it on her own so she told me we would put her in the infant room, which they so dearly call the "snuggle bunnies", until she starts walking and then they can move her. The other great things is she let me know that if I wanted to move her to their center in Draper, once they have an opening, they can put her on the waitlist and that she would get priority being already enrolled in one of their centers, which is awesome because once we move to Draper we really want her to be close to were we live and my work.

We got to see where Alexis would be napping, eating, and playing. I'm excited for her to have this new experience and I am happy with what I've seen from the daycare; Everyone there is CPR/First Aid certified as well as have their food handler's card and go through on going training so I feel confident in them.

The one upside to having to put her in daycare is that she won't need to be there all week, just Tuesday-Friday since my work schedule will be Tuesday-Saturday, so Derek will be able to be with her on Saturday and Monday I won't be working so I'll be able to be with her all day and have mommy-daughter day :) I'm starting this schedule on Tuesday of next week, thank god for a 3 day weekend, so Alexis will be starting on Tuesday.

I would love to hear any advice from anybody that has experience with having a little one in daycare, definitely will be looking to The Bump for some tips :) Well that is all for now. I probably will not be blogging till Monday after the fun work festivities of the weekend, hopefully I will be back to write about my team winning the Tug O War competition and me winning tons of prizes at my summer company party lol. Enjoy!

Blogging Therapy

I have had the longest day ever so I decided to blog. Blogging always makes me feel better. I tossed and turn all night last night. I went to bed early but for some reason did not get a good nights sleep. I was tired and today at work kind of sucked for me numbers wise, but work is always fun so it wasn't too bad.

This is my last week of training. Yay for graduating training this Friday! I love my training class and all our trainers we've had so far. My manager is also pretty awesome :)

The other awesome thing is that Saturday is our Rip Roarin' Roundup, which is our summer company party, the theme this year is cowboys and the wild west lol. It is going to be at Electric Park at Thanksgiving Point. There are a ton of competitions; I signed up for the Tug O War which is going to be awesome :) They have a gambling room, a concert at the end of the night and a ton of fun stuff for kids, so I know Alexis is going to love it, and they have tons of cool prizes and a grand prize trip. 1 800 Contacts is awesome and I am excited to be working there.

Some exciting news, I am an aunt :) My brother and Angelique had their little girl. Her name is Harlow Alana(sp?). I'm really sad I couldn't be there. She was born on 4th of July and he sent me pictures of her; From what I've seen I think she looks like him, but I don't know what Angelique looked like when she was a baby. I'm hoping he sends me some more pictures. She is cute and I am excited to be an aunt :) Best aunt ever, granted I am the only one ;) I can't wait for Alexis to meet her as well as Aubrey (my good friend Amandalyn is due with her baby at the end of August) and also can't wait for her to meet Lily, my friends baby. Love all these little girls that are coming along :)

After only 2 days my brother was already calling asking me for baby advice :) It makes me feel good to be a resource for him as well as some of my other friends who are pregnant or just had babies. Hopefully my blog is also a good resource for people to go to.

So we won't be going home to visit until the end of August because we won't have the money to till then, which makes me kind of sad but I know we have a lot of things going on right now so it'll be better that way. I really miss my family and I know Alexis misses her grandparents and uncles too.

Oh my gosh! I love my little Lexi! The older my little girl gets the more beautiful, smart, and amazing she gets. She is walking along everything she can find so I know she definitely wants to walk but she's not quite there yet. Lexi's personality is so sassy and I love it! She reminds me so much of me, based on everything that my mom has told me, I was a pretty sassy baby. Alexis loves attention and she has started some funny habits, shrugging her shoulders at us and she dances all the time, mostly shaking her butt ;) she's got her mommas dance moves.

Alexis' hair is so long now, it's past her shoulders. She has always had a lot of hair but it has gotten so thick and is just beautiful :) Yes, we still have not cut it and don't think we will for a long time.

Alexis is having 3 big meals a day: breakfast, lunch, and dinner. She is drinking less milk though I still try to get at least 15oz in her a day, because I know she really needs the vitamin D. Alexis loves fruit, specifically she loves berries: blueberries, raspberries, blackberries...you name it. Alexis also really loves yogurt :)

So Alexis had been with a baby sitter since I started working but last weekend she got swollen bags under her eyes and turns out she had an allergy to dog dander. At her babysitter there were several dogs as well as other pets so it looks like it was too much for Alexis. Apparently it is pretty mild so I'm happy about that because we definitely want a little puppy and soon :) I am really sad thought because I know Alexis loved being there playing with Emma and she loved her babysitter. But because of that we had to look for another daycare situation. So we started looking for a daycare today and we found one in Sandy. We wanted to take her to the one in Draper by my work but they don't have room in their toddler room so their location in Sandy does. I'm excited to sign her up tomorrow and get her started for next Tuesday :) It's nice because my schedule after training is going to be Tuesday-Saturday so she will only have to be in daycare 4 days out of the week. I know Alexis is going to love having all the other kids to play with.

I felt like there was more I had to say but I think this is it for now. I will be sure to update more later. Enjoy :)