A Week of Firsts...

Lexie just turned 7 months old and has had a week of firsts.

• She finally can sit without falling over
• She started putting herself into the sitting position from the crawling position
• She started crawling really well out of nowhere
• We fed her finger foods for the first time and she loved it

It's like all of a sudden she decided she was sick of being a baby and decided to be a big girl. Last weekend we drove to Houston for a wedding and since there was bad traffic we ended up being in the car for 6 hours! Needless to say Lexie was not happy and as soon as we got to the hotel I put her on the ground and all of a sudden she got up on her hands and knees and just crawled across the room. It was almost like she was saying "if you promise never to put me in the car seat again, I'll start crawling". Here are some recent pictures of Lexie and a couple from the wedding.This picture is a little goofy, but I think it shows off her cute personality

This is at the wedding we went to. It was an Indian wedding so all the women were wearing their beautiful Indian dresses (I don't know what they're called).

Katy will no longer give us a real smile for pictures. As long as her eyes are open I consider it a good picture.

Vacation...

We decided to go on our first "real" vacation as a family before Jared started his new job. Orlando seemed like the perfect destination with plenty of activities to keep Katy happy. We spent an entire week in Orlando and didn't even come close to seeing half the attractions. It's hard to sum up everything we did, but here are the highlights!

Monday: SeaWorld / Arabian Nights Dinner Theater

That huge thing in the middle is a walrus. They are massive! My jaw dropped when he waddled out.

The Arabian Nights dinner theatre was my favorite. Food, not so good; show, totally amazing.

Tuesday: Magic Kingdom

In the gift shop Katy picked out several things she wanted, but when she saw this purse she dropped everything on the floor and ran to it. It was love at first sight! This is at the end of the day.

Wednesday: St. Petersburg Beach

The beaches here were great for little kids. Very mild waves, white sand and clear blue water.

Thursday: Animal Kingdom

I loved Disney's Animal Kingdom. They have a really cool safari in the park.Hippos are my favorite animal. They're just so funny looking.

Friday: SeaWorld

Saturday: Shopping at the outlets & swimming at the resort

Pictures of the House...

Here are a few pictures of the house now that I found my camera.

I've been waiting a long time for these babies! =)

Lulu turns 6 months...

Whenever I write Lexie's name I usually call her "Alexis" or "Lexie" but we actually call her "Lulu" most of the time. When she was born I started calling her Lexie Lu and then Jared shortened it to Lulu and now that's what we call her 90% of the time. Anyway, our little Lulu turned 6 months old this week and I can't believe it. She is seriously a little ball of joy with the cutest cheeks and thighs I've ever seen. It makes me so happy to see how well Katy and Lexie get along and how their little relationship is developing. It reminds me of how close I was with my little sister, but then I remember how much we fought when we were little and I start to worry about what's in store for us! Here are a few pics of our little Lulu.

I put Lexie under her little play gym and left the room. When I came back Katy had built a tent around them. (Yes, Katy is finally potty trained - well mostly potty trained =)

Try to guess what book Katy is reading

Bloom Where You're Planted...

Sorry I haven't posted since we moved, but we've been extremely busy. I have to say that having movers was so nice especially when you have two small kids running around. I'm definitely looking forward to never having to move ourselves again! So far we love the house and can't believe how nice it is to finally spread out! The girls finally have their own rooms, which I would have liked 6 months ago when Alexis was born! I eventually want them to share a room, but unfortunately Lexie still wakes up in the middle of the night and I don't want her waking up her sister. One of my favorite things is the backyard. I love letting Katy run around outside while I'm cooking or cleaning. The whole back of the house is windows so I can pretty much see her anywhere in the yard from the kitchen or living room. My second favorite thing is that I get to park in a garage. This might not seem like a big deal, but for the past five years I've had to park in a parking lot and trek all the way to my apartment and then climb stairs (all with groceries and small children in tow). Now I can just pull into the garage let Katy out and carry everything straight into the kitchen. It's fabulous! One of the hard parts about buying our first house is we didn't realize how much you have to buy just to move in. For example, in the last couple of weeks we have purchased a fridge, a washer, a dryer, blinds for the whole house, drapes/rods, a twin bed, a lawn mower, hoses, sprinklers and about a billion other things! Moving is expensive! We're pretty much unpacked, but we're not all the way organized yet if that makes sense. I was going to post some pictures, but I can't find my camera, so those will have to come later.

So far we really like the area we live in. There are a lot of parks and shopping. We just enrolled Katy in a sports class at Gymboree and are trying to get her into swimming lessons (I'll let you know how that goes). We went to church last Sunday and that was quite interesting. I kept being reminded of what a coworker told me when she found out I was moving to Baton Rouge. She knew I wasn't that excited (to say the least), but she told me, "you know, you just have to bloom where you're planted". I really thought about that and it's really changed my attitude about where we live. We feel so blessed that Jared had the opportunity to go back to school and that he finished with a great job in a struggling economy. I'm also so grateful that I get to stay home with my two precious girls and be a full time mommy!

Congratulations Jared!

Happy Graduation Day! He finally did it! Jared graduated with his MBA on Friday and we are thrilled beyond words. It's been a long two years, but definitely worth all the pain. We're just glad to be done with school forever. Congratulations honey on all the hard work and on you're awesome achievement! Here are a few pics from the big day!

Here's Dean Glick putting the hood around Jared's neck.

The only "happy" family photo

Katy watched "Lightning McClean" throughout the ceremony. She was an angel!

Here is the amazing cake Jared's mom made for him.


The proud parents

Teaching Kids is Always Fun

So, Jared was teaching Kaitlyn the name of our church the other day and I thought I'd share their dialogue.

Jared:  "Katy, can you say, 'The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints?'"

Katy: "Amen"

I guess I can see how she would think he was ending a prayer. :)

Here's a pic of Katy wearing Jared's graduation cap also!