Pretty butterfly!

Halloween is so fun with a child! The costumes are so cute, and so practical, these days! Taylor and Syd were matching butterflies this year. I love how everything just works our perfectly and we got our costumes the day before Grandma Baird's party for super cheap!



Grandma's party was fun, she had the table set with take home Halloween cups for all the kids. The babies didn't stay for games, but I was so happy that we could at least make it for pictures this year. Tay was really sick last year and throwing up. :(

We were planning to go and take tons of pictures at the pumpkin patch before Halloween but then it snowed. Luckily, it warmed up enough for us to go get pictures and pumpkins just before the trick-or-treaters started. Tay was not a fan of pictures but we managed to get one or two, good thing she just always looks cute!

It was so fun watching her cling to the wheel-barrel as Russ wheeled her around looking for the perfect pumpkins.

It was even more fun watching her walk beside him, helping him steer.

Oh, then it got even better when she stood behind him to help him left it.


We decided to just camp out on the porch and see everyone as the came around for candy. With Tay still being too young to understand we just had a blast on the porch chasing her around, again trying for a good picture!

While Russ was trying to carve pumpkins Tay looked over to him and said, "pa-keen". I can't believe she is picking up now! She says so many words, my favorite right now is "I got you", she says it while she is growling at Russ. It's the best!

Memories...

Yes, I have been there and this pic doesn't even do it justice. I started feeling a bit nostalgic tonight when a picture on the sidebar of my Facebook caught my eye. It was a picture of Jost Van Dyke in the Virgin Islands. I have never see a more beautiful place or had such a memorable day in my life. Pure pleasure.

We took a boat out all day guided by two locals, we were so lucky! Check out http://www.lionindasun.com/ We went to the Baths, anchored the boat and had to swim to shore. We army crawled through the sand in our swim suits, climbed all over the rocks, and jumped off a very large one to swim back to the boat.

After that we cruised to the Soggy Dollar Bar on Jost Van Dyke. You have to again anchor the boat, jump off holding your belongings overhead, and walk to shore. There we ate great food, relaxed in the hammocks for every, and played the ring game. What is the ring game? Well, easy enough, there is a hook screwed into a tree and you stand back with a rope and a ring, and try to get the ring on the hook. We played for ever!

I have been itching to go back for a couple of months now and I think it's time. I would move there if I could!

My 30th Birthday Surprise!

That's right I turned the big 30 this year! I didn't really have a chance to be bothered by the thought of how old I am actually getting because Russ was going crazy making big plans for the celebration.

His number one surprise was this

That's right he and my best friend Janna had been planning for months to get here her to surprise me for the big day. After I saw her I told Russ to call off all his other plans, I didn't need anything else, my Janna was here!

Of course he didn't listen. The night Janna got in we went for sushi which was amazing! The rest of the weekend was filled with things like going to Silver Lake, couples massage (for me and Janna of course!), pedicures, shopping, delicious breakfasts and the list goes on and on. I was totally pampered and spoiled for 4 days.

I loved having Janna here, you would never know that we have not actually seen each other for four years! The first night she was here she gave me my birthday present, card first. The card was so sweet and summed up what it means to have a best friend in life. On the inside she wrote me a little note then at the bottom it had an arrow to turn the card over. I did and she had written me another note that said "Will you be my bridesmaid?" I just started crying like a girl! I am so excited to for her wedding and am so lucky to be part of it, not to mention the dress I get to wear is AMAZING!!!

If you didn't get a chance to meet Janna while she was here I'm sorry. I should have had a party just to show her off. She is of the strongest, most amazing people I know. I have lots more pics but for some reason they won't load so I'll try for more later!

September is OVER?!?

I can not believe September is over, it makes me sad. It seems like we have been so, so busy these past 5 weeks with Russ home from work. We got lucky with his recovery and had a lot of time to do whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted. There have been many walks, days at the park, trips to Silver Lake and playing at home. I miss September but it's nice to have all the pictures to look back on and remember what we did!

Tay loves Daisy. They are usually playing but every now and then they just chill.

She also loves her phone. She holds it just like us and yells HEELLLO?

We took the kids to the elephant walk down at the Gateway when the circus was in town. This is lunch after when the girls were free to play.

I just love this picture. This is Grandpa Baird's birthday just before we went to celebrate.



We spent a lot of time at the park behind our house. Tay learned to climb all the way up the playground and go down the slide on her own.



Scary bedtime picture!

Back to the slide, she doesn't need dad's help!

Did I mention how much she loves the slide?

Benefit Concert and Silent Auction

Hey everyone, there is an amazing woman up in Layton who needs some help. She has ovarian cancer and after a long hard fight is facing her last few months here. With high medical costs she and her family could use a lot of help. There will be a concert and silent auction tomorrow night up in Layton at Northridge High School.

If you would like to read more about her please visit this blog: smilesforsuzi.blogspot.com

Our prayers are with her and her family.

Summer

I just wanted to put up a few pictures of Tay from this last month. I keep putting off telling myself I will do it when I have more time but that NEVER happens! She is getting so big I just had to get a few up for everyone to see.


The girls loved playing in the little pool Auntie Amy bought them!




This is her favorite chair, her princess chair. If we try to use it she gets very mad and pulls us out. I think we need to work on sharing!

2 Week Check Up

These are so cool! Russ had his 2 week post-surgery appointment yesterday and these are the x-rays. They wanted to take a look and make sure everything was still where they had put it, and that he was healing well. The doc was very pleased with his recovery and said he was ahead of schedule. Whooo Hoooo!!! He even told him he would let Russ get back to 100% of the activity he was doing before. Most people only get to go 75% to 80%.

This is a front shot of the rods and screws holding his spine together.

This is a side shot of the screws holding the rods into place. You can barely see the little white lines of the spacers they put in between the vertebrate.