A Little Vegas Getaway

We decided to go on a little family getaway since Jake is out of school for the summer. Plus, we wanted to take a mini-vacation before the baby comes and before I get too big :) So we headed down to Vegas for a few days for some fun in the sun!

We got to stay at the Venetian. We got the room for only $95/night on Hotwire! We were so excited! Otherwise, we'd probably never stay there, too pricey for us. It was one of the nicest hotels we've stayed in! The room was huge (I posted pics at the end of this post) and they had a great pool area - three pools. Emmy definitely approved of that! She is our little amphibian - she absolutely LOVES the water. The room also had electronic blinds/curtains. With the push of a button they would open or close - awesome!

We swam, slept, ate, saw the free outdoor Treasure Island show, Sirens (we told Emmy the girls forgot to put their clothes on - it was definitely a Vegas show!) shopped and took a gondola ride. We had a blast! It was the relaxing trip that we were looking for.

Here are some highlights from our trip:

I was trying to take a pic of all three of us and someone nicely offered to take a pic of us in front of the Venetian.

Watching the show at Treasure Island. Emmy loved it because of the big pirate ships and the pirates!

The Phantom of the Opera is showing at the Venetian. Emmy loved all of the posters and commercials/ads for the show. They had the music playing all the time around and inside the hotel. While we were waiting for our gondola ride, we could hear the music playing. Emmy put her had to her ear (see pic above) and said, "Can you hear it?! It's the Phantom!" She kept doing it after that, it was so funny. And she still does it! We've been watching the Phantom (good thing Papa gave us the movie a little while ago) since we came home. This girl loves anything with music!

Jake enjoying the gondola ride

Emmy and I enjoying the gondola ride. We even got serenaded by the gondolier!

Our room! This was our bed and then there was a sunken living room w/ a sectional sofa that also had a pull-out bed, so Emmy didn't have to squish in the bed w/ us.

The sunken living room. There were three flat-screens in our room! One in the bathroom, one in front of our bed and one in the living room.

Sunken living room from another view

Grand view of the room! I didn't get a pic of the bathroom, but it was big and really nice, too!

Let's go fly a kite!

Jake helping Emmy get the kite up. Isn't Cedar City beautiful?

A couple of weeks ago we let Emmy pick out her very own kite. She picked a Barbie kite and she loves flying it! We've only been out to fly it a couple of times, but she loves holding the string and running around with the kite.

Emmy is getting to be such a "big girl," wanting to do things all by herself. I'm glad she's getting more and more independent, since the baby is coming, but I just can't believe she's already two and a half! She has made being a mommy so wonderful (and challenging!). I never knew I could feel this fulfilled in life. Of course, life isn't perfect (who has the "perfect" two year old? Want to swap for a day???). She's been testing her limits with me, getting away with as much as she can, but life sure is fun!

Here are some highlights of our latest kite-flying extravaganza:

She didn't want any help holding the string!

What a cute girl!

Running to keep the kite flying high in the air

First haircut!

If you noticed the title of this post, you might think it's a little weird that Emmy is almost two and a half and is just barely getting her first haircut.  Well, she didn't really need one until now!  I'm growing out her hair, but I could tell the ends were ready for a little trim.  So yesterday, we took Emmy to my friend, McCall, to get her first hair cut!  

Emmy wasn't too excited, can you tell?  And McCall was just spraying her hair to get it wet!

Emmy got a sucker and decided that getting her hair cut wasn't too bad

This is the only pic I took of the "after".  She sat on Jake's lap during the haircut.  Overall, Emmy did great :)

I had to get a pic of the little curls that got cut off.

Sprinkler fun!

Last week the weather was so nice! At least at the beginning of the week . . . We never know what the weather will bring. We decided to take advantage of the beautiful sunny day.  Emmy and her friend, Max, had some fun in the sun with Emmy's Nemo sprinkler! It shoots out water while it spins around.  What could be more fun than that?

Emmy and Max running through the water.  Max didn't really like getting wet that much so most of the time, he was doing this:

Holding the sprinkler so it wouldn't spin and get him wet!  What a funny boy :)

Family Easter Pics

I think Easter Sunday is always a good day to get some family pics. Here are our attempts at a "good family pic" . . .

Take 1 . . . good one of Emmy but Jake is cheesing it a little and my hair was blowing all around my face

Take 5 . . . now Emmy's cheesing it and Jake and I aren't looking at the camera

Take 10 . . . we finally realized we weren't going to get a perfect picture of all three of us

Emmy and mommy - she'd rather be running around, can you tell?

It was time for a baby bump picture. This is at 28 weeks.

Close-up on the baby bump

It's easier to get a picture of her back than it is to get one of her front :)

Showing us her flower

Emmy and her daddy . . . sweet kisses!

Our little beauty!

All about the eggs . . .

Ok, I finally gave up and decided to just come over to my parent's house to do this post! Our computers are still having problems and all the pics are on my parent's computer . . .

Anyways, we had so much fun at Lindsey's last Saturday! It was a combined birthday party for me and Easter celebration. We had a BBQ, the kids swam and we all ate! The kids had an Easter egg hunt in Lindsey's backyard and then we came inside to decorate eggs. It was Emmy's first Easter egg hunt and egg decorating experience and she loved it!

Here are some highlights:

Emmy helped me blow out my candle . . . and yes, that is a delicious cake from Costco (love that cheesecake mousse filling!)

My mom, sister and Dylan :) Thanks for hosting the party, Linds!

Even my Grandma and Aunt Shelley came to celebrate with us! We usually only see Shelley at Thanksgiving and Christmas (she lives on her own and usually only comes home on holidays), so it was a treat to have her there

Running out to find the hidden eggs!

We showed her where the eggs were and she'd run and get them (they weren't easy to find for a two-year-old)

She was so proud of her eggs!

Decorating eggs . . .

She loved stirring the eggs around in the dye

The three kiddos! Emmy absolutely adores these two :)

Easter Morning

We had a great Easter Sunday today! It started bright and early (we have 9:00 church so we did the Easter egg hunt and Easter basket before since Jake's calling keeps him at church for a while after church gets out). Emmy had a lot of fun going through her basket and then finding the eggs the Easter Bunny hid for her around the house. Then she got to put on her pretty new Easter dress! I'll put those pics in another post since my dad took them on his camera and I don't have them yet.

We talked to Emmy about the Resurrection, which she totally didn't understand, but she kept saying "Resurrection" to us after. And we ate yummy food - ham, funeral potatoes, homemade rolls and a yummy salad. Mm mm good!

Yesterday we went to St. George and had a big Easter egg hunt at my sister's. Again, my dad has the pics on his camera so I will post them when I get them.

Here are the highlights of this morning:

Emmy looking at her basket before she dug in

The Easter Bunny brought her "Mamma Mia!"  She absolutely LOVES the music in that movie!

Finding the hidden eggs and eating candy - yes, we let her eat it before breakfast :)

More candy in her mouth!  And still finding eggs!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yesterday was my birthday, and what a great day it was!  

As I get older, birthdays lose their appeal.  Maybe because I'm getting closer to 30 . . .  But all I wanted for my birthday this year was to spend it with my family.  My parents were out of town and Jake works late on Tuesdays.  But Jake surprised me and took the night off!  

Here's how my day went . . . Emmy woke up early (for her, that's 8:00) and Jake made us breakfast!  I requested pancakes (with the homemade strawberry freezer jam I made two weeks ago) and eggs (scrambled w/ cheese, just the way I like 'em).  Yummy!  I went to the gym (just because it's my birthday doesn't mean I get the day off) and then went to the park w/ some friends and let the kids play.  Thanks, Jess, for getting my lunch!  After coming home, putting Emmy down for a nap and showering, I took a nap.  Since Jake didn't have to work he made me dinner - Chicken Marsala.  So yummy!  Jake cleaned up, gave Emmy a bath and then we put her to bed.  We decided not to do a big cake since it's just the two of us (Emmy can't eat cake . . . it has eggs in it) so we made Chocolate Lava cake.  I love the gooey goodness of that delectable, delightful treat.  It was such a nice and relaxed day, I couldn't have asked for anything better!  Here are some highlights . . .

When I got home from the park, there were a dozen beautiful red roses waiting for me.  What a wonderful husband I have!

My handsome husband making me a seriously delicious dinner

I wish you could all have a bite.  It was so good I couldn't stop eating it!

My very own birthday cake!  This isn't the best picture, but I'm sure your mouths are watering anyways . . .

Oh, and Jake had Emmy singing "Happy Birthday" to me all day long.  She had a big smile on her face every time she sang it.  Jake got me Twilight, the movie (yahoo!) and those beautiful flowers.  What more could a girl ask for?  :)  Thanks for such a great birthday, honey.  I love you!

Fun in the snow!

The weather has been so crazy lately!  One day we go to the park because it's warm and sunny, the next we're playing in the snow.  

Lindsey and the kids came up to Cedar last weekend and the kids bundled up and had fun in the snow!

Here are some highlights:

Emmy kept running up to throw a snowball at me, then she'd laugh!

We tried to stage a picture w/ all the kids, but Emmy was not happy to be taken away from her snowball throwing fun

Ella threw a snowball at her own face, and then started panicking because it was so cold.  What a funny girl!