Merry Christmas Eve Update!

I can't believe it is Christmas Eve today! The holidays really came on fast. I also can't believe that I haven't blogged since the end of September; I kept meaning to but just kept getting busy. Here is a lengthy update of what's been going on.

October:
In mid October we moved into a new apartment in Lehi. We live right behind the Outlets in Traverse Mountain. It's a 3 bd 2 bath apartment, my two brothers and their friend are living with us. The apartment is huge and has an attached garage which is really nice, especially now that it is snowing. Towards the end of October I started my new job at Cardon Outreach. They had just moved to a new building from Sandy to Draper, so it is much closer to us now that we live in Traverse. I've been working there for 2 months now and I really like it, it's not what i want to do forever, but for now it's a really good job and i love my coworkers. Alexis also started a new daycare in Draper that is very close to my job. This new daycare is still not my favorite but definitely better than the last one. Alexis' daycare teacher is Mexican so she speaks to Alexis in Spanish which is nice and she always tells me that Lexi loves to dance when she plays music and that she's a really good girl at daycare, which makes me happy.

We took Lexi to Cornbelly's again this year. She wasn't as happy about it as she was last year lol but she still had a good time. Here are some pictures:











I made Lexi's costume this year again. I decided on a peacock costume and i made the tutu and the headband and bought her a blue shirt to complete the costume. She loved it and looked so freaking cute. We went trick or treating at Derek's grandma's and Lexi got some good candy. Lexi only got to eat some of the candy, as we don't really like to give her too many sweets. We were going to put her in the Halloween pageant but last minute decided not to; I'm sure Lexi would have won but there is always next time. Here are some pictures from Halloween.






November:
My favorite month! I love November and usually I have a lot going on during but this year November was not too busy. Derek went to Green Bay for a Packers game and I was so very jealous! Being a Green Bay fan all my life I haven't been to Lambeau yet but lucky Derek got to go on a work trip. That weekend he was gone was my fist weekend off in a long time since I am still working at Olive Garden on the weekends and certain nights a week. It was nice to have a girls weekend with Lexi. Derek bought me a cute little badger from the University of Wisconsin, my favorite animal is a badger :) he went to a football game at the University of Wisconsin, he also bought Lexi a cheese head!



December
This month has been a busy month. Alexis had the year end finals pageant but we've been so busy we decided not to do it. I've been working a ton this month and planning for Christmas. I had my work Christmas Party last week, my company rented out a movie theater and we had an ice cream social where they gave out some awards and everyone got to watch a movie; I didn't stay for the movie since Derek had his work party that same night. We had another unofficial Christmas party at a bar downtown on Friday, that was fun to get to hang out with my coworkers outside of work. We had our Christmas pictures taken on Friday and we decided to go with Purple as our colors; I know purple is hardly a Christmas color but Derek picked out a purple sweater so we decided to go with that. We decided not to send out Christmas cards this year, but here are some of our Christmas pictures.
















We have our tree with our color coordinating purple ornaments with all of Alexis' gifts under the tree. Derek and I didn't get each other any gifts since we both got the new iPhone, but we did do our stockings as well as Alexis'. I got Alexis a Minnie Mouse ornament since Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Minnie's Boutique have been her favorite shows this year. Here are some pictures:






I don't work today or tomorrow at Cardon but i do work tonight at OG, but we close early so hopefully it won't be too bad. I am excited for Lexi to open her gifts :) We let her open one gift at midnight and the rest she will open tomorrow morning. She gets to open her pajamas tonight, I hope she likes them :) We always go to the movies on Christmas Day so we're going to watch The Wolf of Wall Street, those of you that know me know I love Leo and Scorsese :) I will be sure to blog more regularly. Merry Christmas!

It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year :)

Fall is finally here! I love love love this time of the year. Fall has always been my favorite season :)I just realized I haven't blogged since July, woah. I have just been working nonstop and every time I say I'm going to blog I end up getting busy. So a lot has been going on since I last posted.

I didn't end up getting that job that I really wanted :( they called me and told me they thought I would be perfect for the job but they had another candidate who actually had experience in that position so of course they had to give it to him. He did say that if they had another position open up they would call me, but those are hard to come across so we'll see. I am still working at the school as a teacher in training but I just don't know if that is what I want to do right now especially for what they are paying me. I really wanted to get that other position and I actually applied with a another company for a similar position and got a phone interview and have an in person interview with them on Wednesday so I'm excited for that and hoping it works out well. I am still working at OG on the weekends and I pick up shifts every once in a while during the week as well. You can imagine working everyday of the week gets very exhausting. But I am doing it for the extra money, especially with the holidays coming up, if I get this other position I am not going to continue working at OG for much longer.

Yesterday I had my first Saturday off since like July. I had originally requested it off because there was a pageant we were going to put Alexis in, but last minute we decided not too. We ended up going up to Snowbird for Oktoberfest :) I went to Oktoberfest when I was 18, when I first moved to San Francisco for college, and I loved it! If you know me, you know that I love anything German, so we had a good time eating some yummy German food. We took Lexi with us and she had so much fun, there was a little bit of snow up there so it was really pretty. We came home that afternoon and took a nap and wanted to go to the movies but couldn't find a babysitter so we went to Rodizio Grill for dinner and came home and relaxed the rest of the night. It was so nice to get out and do something on my one day off. We also went to a BYU football game Friday, since Derek got free tickets from his boss, so that was fun, even though of I am not a BYU fan ;)

As I mentioned earlier. I love love Fall. My favorite month is November but I have grown very fond of October, ever since I had Lexi. Halloween time is so fun when you have a little one, I'm pretty sure it's a tie between Halloween and Christmas. Last year was so fun because we took her to a pumpkin patch, I made her Boo costume, we had my work trunk or treat, and the picture contest which she won ;) and we did our trick or treating. Well this year we have a fun packed month as well. We're taking her to Cornbelly's again to pick out her pumpkin, there is a costume pageant at the end of the month, I am making her costume again this year, she is going to be a peacock :) Derek knows someone who owns a peacock farm so he is going to try to get me real feathers, and I would also love to take Lexi to a corn maze.

Side Note: I have to mention this because I think it's crazy how man hits my post,How To Make A Monsters Inc Boo Costume, has gotten; I'm almost at 20,000 and it's not even October yet! I've been pinned a gagillion times and have had some people leave such sweet comments about it. It makes me happy that so many people are using my tutorial to make the costume, because I remember when I was trying to make the costume and how little info there was out there. Plus it always feels good to know that your good at something you only had a small amount of experience in.

I mentioned before that I disliked Alexis' daycare; Well I put in her 30 day notice and her last day there will be the 17th. I am wanting to put her back in at one of the two daycare's she was at before, but just a closer location. I am working in Draper now and if I get the other position I will still be in Draper so I am looking in that area. Lexi has a dentist appointment this month that I am looking forward to. Lexi is getting bigger everyday and her hair is getting longer and longer, which keeps prompting Derek to ask if we can cut it, to which I always answer no lol. I love Lexi's long hair and want to keep it that way; Once it gets down to her waist I will probably give in but for now it is right around her mid-back, so I think we'll keep it long through winter.

Speaking of Winter... I don't think it'll be too long before it starts snowing. The top of the mountains are already covered in snow so this be be a very early winter, which is bittersweet for me. I love the cold whether because I love dressing myself and Lexi for Fall, and love the snow, but I hate driving in the snow. I guess we'll see how early it decides to make it's appearance.

I think that is all I have for now. Hopefully I will have time to update in the following weeks. Enjoy.

Alexis' 2 Year Appointment

Alexis was supposed to have her 2 year appointment back in May but because back in March Derek and I had both changed jobs his insurance took 90 days to kick in so we had to push her appointment back a little. Dr. Nagle was out of the office this week and didn't have any appointments until August but we got another pediatrician there to squeeze us in yesterday :)

Alexis came in at 23 lbs and her height is 32 1/4". She is obviously still on the small side: 3rd percentile for weight and 7th percentile for height. Of course her weight has always been a concern for me; I constantly feel like she is too small. I am so thankful that she has had such amazing pediatricians; Dr. Blackburn let me know that aslong as she is eating healthy foods and is growing at her own rate, which she is, that if anything we are lucky that she is so small, since so many kids now are overweight that of course in comparison Lexi looks really small. Anyone can attest to how much Lexi eats, she is just so active that she burns it off. I didn't realize the average weight for a 2 year old is only 27 lbs, so she is really not that far off. He said that Lexi will probably be 5'4 so she will be small, but I'm 5'4 and I think that is a perfect height for a girl ;) I kept thinking she was going to be much shorter but he seems to think that will be how tall she ends up being. She has great eye contact and reflexes and she is perfectly healthy. She got 1 shot and won't need anymore until she goes into kindergarten :) She also won't need another visit until she's 3!

That is all for now :)

Past Couple of Weeks

The past couple of weeks have been busy. On the 7th we headed to Las Vegas just for a couple of hours. We were picking up my brother's friend who was moving out to Utah; He happened to be in Vegas that day so we planned to drive down to pick him up. It just so happened that my friend Michelle was going to be in Vegas that weekend so of course I was excited to meet up with her. We got to Vegas at around 4pm, it was sooo hot atleast 110 degrees. We picked up my brother's friend at New York, New York and headed to Encore to meet up with Chelle. We stayed at the Wynn for my 21st Birthday, they were building Encore when we were there so I had never been. Encore is very similar to the Wynn and was just as beautiful; We meet up with Chelle and ate at a cafe there. It was nice to catch up since I hadn't seen her since right after Alexis was born when we went down to San Francisco. Alexis was being a little diva, the first 10 minutes we were there I had a least a dozen people come up and tell us how cute she was or just plain staring lol, she does love the attention. After our yummy lunch, Chelle had to go back to her hotel so we said our goodbyes and my brother and his friend meet up with us and watched Lexi for us while we gambled a little ;) We played the slots and didn't make any money on the first couple of times but we decided to give it one last chance. I found a slot machine and put in $3 and two vouchers for like 10 and 17 cents and we won $44 dollars! It was a nice little trip :)



This past Saturday we had Alexis' first pageant. The pageant was through Beehive Beauties and it was their American Summer pageant which is an all natural beauty pageant. I'm not into the whole make up thing so I was happy about that. There was a beachwear and themewear segment; For the beachwear we went with a pink bathing suit that had a little tutu on it, she wore pink and green flip flops and her sunglasses I put here hair in pony tails. For the formal wear segment the dress has to be red, white, and blue so we found this cute dress at Gymboree, she wore her white sandals, and I ordered a red, white, and blue headband from etsy with a little rhinestone piece in the middle. This being Lexi's first pageant I was obviously new to everything well you can pay for just the basic entry or you can add or buy a package with additional options, for example they have a program that you can buy and they have a front cover, back cover winner, calendar girl, themewear photo, etc. So if you want you can pay and submit a picture for those and if she wins they put her picture in the program, aside from the picture they already put in, and you get a trophy for that. We decided not to enter her into all of those because it can get expensive and since this was her first pageant we didn't know if she would like it. Well Lexi definitely loved it so next time we will probably opt for those optional prizes.

There were several age groups and Lexi won 1st place in her age group! I went on stage with her during both of her walks and Derek told me she did the best out of the other girls in her group but of course I couldn't see the other girls because we were backstage but he was right! They had some participation trophies for the girls that didn't place and for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd they had bigger trophies, sashes, and tiaras. Alexis got a "Queen" sash, a tiara, a big trophy, and an elephant stuffed animal with a pageant t-shirt on it, the stuffed animal was her favorite part. Since Lexi placed at this pageant she qualifies to be in the year end final pageant in December! We are so proud of our little girl. Derek is so funny, now that he knows she had fun and that she did so well, he is wanting us to find more to put her in before the one in December so she has more practice. I've found a couple but most of them are not all natural and I am completely against putting make up, hair spray and using curling irons and all that. I gotta say there were a lot of wack jobs at this pageant; Moms that were waving and dancing around trying to tell their little ones when to do every move. I saw moms using curling irons on their little 2-5 year olds and to me that is just ridiculous; Way to start ruining your daughter's hair this early. I am fine with using curlers, without the hard plastic, on little girls, but curling irons is too much. Even if we put her in pageants that are not all natural we definitely will not be using make up on Lexi. Here are some pictures of her at the pageant.











A couple of weeks ago I applied for a position that I really want. I had a phone interview and have scheduled a final interview in a couple of weeks. I really really want this job; So hopefully I will have more to say on that in a couple of weeks.

I mentioned last time that I wasn't sure how I felt about Alexis' new daycare. Well I have decided I don't like it very much. I would consider myself to be a daycare veteran at this point, Alexis has been going to daycare for over a year now and she's been to 3 different ones so I am used to things being a certain way. All of the daycares she has been at always gave us a note at the end of the day with what she ate, when she napped, how many times she was changed, if she was happy or not, etc... This daycare doesn't give you any information, they always have a different teacher in her classroom and the classroom set up is kind of all over the place. I loved her last day care the way the classroom was set up all of the kids ate breakfast together at the table, instead of in the kitchen in a high chair. Also her other daycare had a separate playground for the younger kids that was very age appropriate, her new daycare's playground doesn't seem age appropriate. We will definitely be putting her at another daycare once we move to our new place.

Well that is all for now. Enjoy!

We Are Officially Half Way Trough 2013!

Can you believe today is July 1st!?!? I can't. The year has gone by so fast. I guess the older you get the faster time seems to pass. I can't believe I am 26, though it doesn't really feel any different than 25, it still feels weird to think that I am closer to 30 now.

This last week has been very busy and exhausting. I was training most of last week and it was a breeze, since I have worked at the OG before it was really just a refresher. We got to eat lots of food and try some yummy drinks :) Usually when you start serving you get started on 2 tables but myself and another girl that also has served at the OG got to start right away on 3, so that was nice it made a real difference on how I did today. I work dinner shifts the rest of the week and I'm off Friday and Saturday which is nice I just wish that I wasn't working a dinner shift on 4th of July :( but being new that's what happens. I am hoping that it will be really slow and they will phase me out early so that we can go watch some fireworks. Lexi absolutely loves fireworks so I really want to go with her to watch them.

We started Lexi at a new daycare today that is in between our apartment and work since I am not going to be working at the campus in West Valley this coming school year we took her out of the daycare she was at near to that campus. I am going to be at the Draper campus so that's why we were looking for a daycare nearer to where I am going to be. This daycare is smaller and I don't know how I feel about it quite yet since she was just there today but so far it seems pretty nice. For now Lexi will be going there 3 days a week once August rolls around and I have to do training for the school she will be going full time to that same campus or we may find something closer to where we end up moving.

Our lease at this apartment is up in July, we are paying month to month till August so that we can have time to find another place. We keep going back and forth on whether we want to try to buy a house or not. We don't plan to stay here for very long, just long enough for Derek to finish school so part of me thinks that we should still buy a house and not throw our money away but Derek feels like that won't be enough time to make it worth the hassle. Regardless right now we know we are not ready so we are planning on renting a home. Since Derek's company got moved to a building farther south unfortunately we have to move into Utah county, I like Salt Lake County ;), fortunately we are looking in Lehi which is barely into Utah county. Renting a home is going to cost us just as much as our 2 bedroom apartment and we are going to get so much more room and have a yard for Alexis, which is much needed. I am excited to start looking more towards the end of this month.

It has been so ridiculously hot! I hate the heat with a passion. I love the cold. I miss the wonderful San Francisco weather on days like today were it is over 100 degrees. I get off work after the car has been parked in the hot sun and feel like I'm going to melt the second I get in. We kept the apartment nice and cool though ;)and always have ice cold water so it gives me some relief.

My adorable little niece Harlow is turning 1 on the 4th :) I can't believe it! It feels like she was born just yesterday. I am so bummed we can't be there for her birthday; I am happy we got to see her and my family for Lexi's birthday. Hopefully we will be able to make it down there maybe in September.

I gotta say, I am so in love with Alexis. Everyday I am blown away by how much I adore her and how amazing and intelligent she is. I am so humbled by her love for me. There is no feeling in the world that compares to hearing her say "mami" and hearing that love in her voice. I always think back on that first moment we laid eyes on each other and I took a mental photo of it and can still remember how we stared at each other and I knew that she knew who I was. Love at first sight really does exist <3

P.S. Derek and I took Lexi to see Monsters University and she loved it; She kept yelling at the screen lol Really cute movie made me miss college life.

Nuevo

I can't believe it's been almost a month since I blogged.

Well there are a ton of new things going on. The school year ended on the 13th so I have been relaxing this past week or so and it's been so nice not to have to get up early to go to work. I miss all the kids but it's nice to have a break from the craziness. Lexi is not in daycare at the moment, since I haven't been working for the last week but that may change here pretty soon.

I have my orientation tomorrow at the OG (Olive Garden) I figured I needed a summer job, so I'm going to be a server at the Olive Garden in South Jordan. I was a server at the OG in San Francisco which was like 5 1/2 years ago, I really loved being a server so I'm excited. I will be at the Draper 2 campus in the fall continuing to be a teacher in training. I was asked to change over to the West Valley campus, not the one I was at this year, but we are probably going to be renting a home in the Lehi area since our lease is up in August and Derek's company is moving to a new building in Pleasant Grove. I really didn't want to move into Utah county but unfortunately we don't have a choice so that is why I asked to be at the Draper campus. I am hoping to continue to work part time at the OG once the fall starts.

My birthday was yesterday on the 21st, first day of summer, and longest day of the year :)I got a massage yesterday which was amazing but painful all at the same time. I have the worst knots on my back and am in constant discomfort/pain. The masseuse worked out a lot of my knots so I am in some pain but overall my back feels so much better; I really need to make getting a massage a regular thing. After the massage I got some yummy lunch at In n Out, it was soooo good. Later that night Derek and I went out for dinner and some drinks. I got this amazing strawberry mojito. Being 26 really doesn't feel any different than being 25.

Random off topic, but my brother was making fun of me the other day because I told him Derek and I are going to put Alexis in the Beehive Beauties Pageant next month. He thinks pageants are weird/bad so he was making fun; While he was strolling Alexis around while I was getting my massage the other day a lady told him how cute Alexis was (assuming it was his baby) the lady told him she should be in a pageant, when he told me this of course I had to laugh. So many people tell us to put her in commercials/pageants it would be a disgrace to keep her beauty all to ourselves ;) The pageant is July 20th at Weber State there is a beachwear and formal wear category. I hope she has fun with the whole pageant thing; I will definitely update once it gets closer.

Alexis had pink eye about 2 weeks ago, it took about 7 days for it to actually go away. I am almost positive that she got it from someone at daycare. When we picked her up from daycare is when I first noticed it and it only got worse. None of us got it, just her, but now it's all gone. Even with having pink eye she was just smiling and happy :) she's such a trooper. Alexis has been so wild lately and such a fun little girl. She has gotten in the habit of calling everything "mine" and is extra sassy! We haven't had Alexis' 2 year appointment yet; Derek's insurance is delayed a couple of weeks from kicking in so I am hoping within the next 2 weeks we can get her in because I am dying to know what all of her measurements are.

Random: I actually started driving Derek's car. We drove down to Southern California 2 weeks ago to pick up my brothers, we were briefly there for a day. On the way back I drove a lot of the way and once we got back drove myself to work for the last week and caught on really fast so now I am able to drive it :) I am sure I could have gotten a better hang of it before but I just didn't take the time, but I'm glad I did. On another random topic, there is a golf course right across the street from us and there is a trial that goes through it that I never really knew about. My brothers would take that trail to work everyday but I didn't know it goes as far as it actually does. Well today we decided to take a walk on the trail, Lexi came along in her stroller, well the trail is pretty awesome it's about 3 miles long. It was such a hot day but it was so nice to go on a walk and much needed, we walked 2 miles there and back so 4 miles total :)

I am in need of a vacation we are planning a trip to San Francisco mid August to see my friends :) I miss them, the city, and I know they really want to see Lexi. I feel like there is more I needed to say but it is getting late and I need to be up early so I guess we will stop here.

Enjoy!

We Have a 2 Year Old On Our Hands!

Our Lexi turned 2 on May 14th; I can't believe she is 2 already! We celebrated her birthday the weekend before with Derek's grandma/aunts/uncles and the week after her birthday, last Saturday the 18th we celebrated with my friends and family. My parents and brothers came out last Friday, we had a packed apartment. That night we went out to eat while my dad watched the girls (Lexi and Harlow). That night i had started baking cupcakes for the party, we ordered a jumbo one for Lexi from a cute little bakery near by. I forgot to take a picture of the ones I made for everyone else but they were strawberry and some vanilla ones with pink frosting and white pearls :) Saturday morning I did some last minute shopping for the party. We had sandwiches, potato salad, chips, and watermelon. 

We had Lexi's birthday at a nearby park; it had been raining the night before and even that morning. Lucky for us the weather cleared up and we didn't get any rain the whole time we had Alexis' party. We had the party in a covered pavilion, but there was a playground we were afraid we wouldn't be able to use, since it didn't rain the kids were able to play in it. Unfortunately Harlow had a cold the whole weekend so she didn't get to do much :( Derek's friend and his wife came with their little boy Gavin and Lexi had a blast playing with him. BTW Gavin was our choice for a boy name when we thought Lexi might be a boy, love the name! My good friend from work and her husband came so that was nice. 

I put together a "photobooth" i wish I would have had more paper because it didn't look as good as I had hoped, but it was fun to take some silly pictures with the props. The paper kept falling off because of the uneven surface, but we figured it out. Lexi wasn't a big fan of the photobooth but I feel like the balloons behind us may have been distracting her. Lexi did seem to like posing more with my mom lol she smiled for their picture together. 

Alexis is such a diva! I don't know if it was because it was past her nap time or what, but she was a real sass ass lol. All she wanted to do was play on the playground and all she wanted to eat was pickles. Lexi is probably the best eater I've ever seen and this time she did not care for anything but pickles. When it came time to eat her cupcake, she took a couple of bites but didn't eat very much of it. Lexi opened up her presents and I think her favorite was all the clothes she got. She tried to put on almost every outfit she got. Lately she has been doing that a lot, trying to put her shoes and socks on. My dad bought her a ton of clothes, my mom bought her a dress, my brother and his gf bought her a big wheel, Derek's friend got her a cute Disney princess drawing board/DVD/bubbles, we bought her an outfit, some musical instrument toys, and her new princess potty :) 

We want to start potty training next week, hopefully it goes well. Alexis looked so cute in her birthday outfit, especially with the little crown. I know she had a great time at her party :) The rest of the weekend we just hung out. Derek, myself, Angelique, and my brothers all went to City Creek downtown. City Creek was just being built when I graduated from the U and left so when we moved back and it was done I really wanted to go but just never got around to it. It is a beautiful mall, reminded me of Rockefeller Center on a warm summer day. We came back home Saturday night and played Fact or Crap till about 2am. The next day my dad left so we said goodbye and since my brother and mom were staying till Monday we went out to breakfast and in the afternoon went to nickelcade to play some games. We watched tv that night and went to bed early. Monday morning we said goodbye and they left. It made me really sad to see them go, we had such a fun weekend. 

This week seemed to drag but now that it's Thursday night it actually feels like it went by faster after all. For our 4th grade we had a culminating event of poems and songs that our students had learned throughout the year. We had our performance last night and I was on campus all day from before 8am till 8:30pm, I got caught up on a ton of grading so it was nice. I got so teary eyed when the kids performed; I think of Alexis performing once she gets into school and it makes me so emotional. Plus I love my kids and I love seeing how excited they get about performing. I am so thankful that I have Monday off; it is much needed. 

I am sure I have more to say but I think this will do for now. Enjoy!