Mother's Day

Mother's Day was nice and relaxing. Saturday Gabe let me get a new shirt and skirt for church. It wasn't really what he was planning on getting me but since I really needed a new skirt instead of just my one white one and black one, he let me get it. Plus we needed to use the Kohls Cash we had anyway that day.

Saturday night Gabe brough me some deep pink roses! :) You may have counted that there are only 11 pink roses. There is always a meaning to everything Gabe does, so I looked up what pink roses symbolize and then I looked up what 11 roses symbolize. Pink roses signify Love, Gratitude and Appreciation. They also can mean grace and elegance, as well as sweetness and a poetic romance! Pretty nice huh? And then the 11 roses means that in this 1 lifetime, I am the only 1 for him! After I looked it up, we started quoting "Kate & Leopold" and how Hugh Jackman knows all the meanings of different type of flowers. I think that is the only chick flick Gabe will actually watch with me. He actually likes it alot. At least Hugh Jackman's character and the way he speaks.
Sunday we got ready for church and when we got in the car, the 12th rose was on the front passenger seat for me. Church was nice. The men in the ward got all the women a red rose, and then the RS Presidency make vanilla cake with strawberries and cream on top. It looked delishes but I didn't have any. When we got home, and while Mom was away at church, I finished the gift I had started making for her.

Its a flip calender and I put all the us kids, our spouses, their kids, and wedding aniversaries as pictures in the calender. I didn't glue them in well so that I could change them out for Mom when they needed to be updated or if she wanted to put in color pictures. But I thought it was a ton of fun! And I think she liked it!

Sunday night we went to grandma's for dinner and let the kids play for a little while. It was a nice relaxing day... except for the part where Sophie exploded in her carseat, but since it was Mother's Day, Gabe took care of it and let me have the day off!

Thanks Gabe! I love you! Especially when I walk out of the room late at night and find you chowing down on watermellon straight from the rind!

Can You Believe It's December Yet Again?

Its December 1st already?? I don't know where all the month of November went. I felt soo busy. Like one minute I was standing there with Sydney and Gabe at our ward's Trunk or Treat, and then I was eating Thanksgiving Dinner, and now its December!
I can't believe Its already here! I turn 26 in 30 days! Isn't that crazy? I remember being back in my parents house thinking Kiel was an old goat when he turned 26. And we will have Sophie this month! And celebrate Christmas, with my mom, dad, my oldest sister, my youngest sister, all here with us in our home. What a party we're going to have this year, haha! It just seems like such a busy month again, but I'm sure it will fly by all too quickly like the past couple months.
Well, since I wanted to make sure all the decorations were up early so that I could participate in the fun, we started well before Thanksgiving this year. We put the tree up and decided to go with different ornaments than the ones we used last year. Ross was great to find new ones that weren't expensive and also shatter proof. Here is the tree so far. I finished putting up the candy canes and bows last night at like 11:30. Don't know where this burst of energy came from. I'm always in bed by 10:30 lately and no later.

We left the bottom 3rd of the tree undecorated because Sydney was just pulling everything off.

I didn't know what to do with the stockings since we don't have a fireplace. So I improvised, with a little hesitation on the idea from Gabe. But I think he is warming up to the idea.

I just finished sewing some of the stockings together, with a few minor adjustments still to be made to them, but here are the stockings over the "fireplace".

And I finally put up this vinyl saying that we had found at Ross for 5 bucks. Sorry about the glare from the window.

Consignment and Thrift Shopping

We have a consignment shop that opened less than 6 months ago right across the street from us by the Ross and Fresh &Easy and I never even knew it was there. Its called "Here I Grow" and a friend of mine in the ward told me about it because I was saying how I wanted to buy a rocking chair or a glider sometime to have for the girls room for us to relax in while sitting in their room. So Gabe and I went and took a look at it. Its actually had tons of neat NEW stuff there, and of course used stuff too. I know, some of you are probably thinking, "Brittany is buying something used?". Yes I am a germaphobe, and I hate thinking about where things that have been used have been previously, but ever since we bought our jogging stroller for 20 bucks and I actually washed all the material and we cleaned it, I have been getting over my "used things" phobia.

We found this cute little toy for Sydney and she just LOVES it. After we bought it, she was hooked on that toy the whole time we were running errands, having fun going through the alphabet and singing along to the alphabet song. When it gets to the end of the song she will sing"...Y, Z!". At home she starts off singing it "A, C, D, E, M, Y, Z!" and then will say "Me" at the end of the song. Since she knows half her alphabet and numbers and colors, this will help her in a fun way instead of us just asking her what different letters are in her books. It also sounds out each letter for her too, which is fantastic if she were to learn that soon. Gabe says that children who learn to read very early on, around 3 yrs, tend to have better and quicker cognitive development throughout their elementary years and do better in school. I remember Shelley having a couple of these little toys for Mariah and Jack when we were at their house last. Anyway, we got it for $10 and its like new. 

This one is purple but the one we bought is orange, which I can't seem to find anywhere online, so I had to pick a purple picture.

Then we went over to the thrift store and browsed for a Turkey serving dish. We don't have a serving dish that is big enough to hold a turkey on so instead of buying one at Ross for $15, I thought we might have some luck at the thrift store. And yes, I had to get over the fact that these dishes were used by other people. I am getting over it people! Look at this plate we found!

Of course I went home and washed it best I could and also put it through a cycle in the dishwasher, but now we have a serving plate for the Turkey, since we are having guests over for Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday. And we bout it for $4.

I am really liking shopping at that thrift store. That is where we got our china cabinet also, and soon we want to get a wine rack that will hold all the different Sparkling ciders and drinks that we like to buy. Its always nice to mix it up at dinner with a fun drink once in a while. So maybe we will get one soon so we have a place to put all our Martinelli's, Clementine, Blueberry, Cranberry, Pomegranite, Grape and other sparkling drink flavors we have, on. I think it will be fun to walk up and ask Gabe what kind of sparkling drink he would like to have with dinner during the week and walk over to the rack and grab a bottle from the many we have to chose from. I guess its just one of those small things we enjoy together... some good sparkling waters and drinks. If you haven't bought the big case of Pellegrino sparkling water from Costco, then you should give a try. Its one of our favorite brands of sparkling water. Along with Italy Blue from trader Joe's. They have a milder bubble than the ones that cost a dollar and are SUPER bubbly.

Anyway, enough about drinks and turkey... I need to sleep instead of make myself all hungry right before bed. Night!

Home, Sweet Home and Ringing in the New Year!

The morning of the 18th Gabe had a basketball game which was mandatory for him to be at and ended up being rather I guess you'd say exciting and terrible at the same time. Luckily all those involved in the incident are just fine. Then we went to the Farmer's Market, which is mandatory, and then we always go to the temple on Saturdays, which is of course mandatory also. Then we had a choir practice that afternoon for our Christmas Program, which was the following day in church, from 12-3pm. Then I needed to practice a song with my sister that we sang for church the next day, which was mandatory, lol, because you don't just whipped out a duet without practicing and that was our only practice before we sang it. We also had to do all our laundry and pack our bags, which was mandatory, for our trip! Unfortunately we got everything checked off our list except the 3 hour choir practice. But, we were packed and ready to go so we didnt have to pack anything on a day which is not ours; Sunday. We finished our last minute errands on Monday and headed off to West Virginia via San Jose Airport at 3pm.
This was the first time we have traveled on a plane with Sydney and I was a little frightened I'll admit about how she would handle it, but rather how I would handle it. Two flights with a layover in Dallas. I was very happy that San Jose was not using the scanners, because no way was Sydney going through one of those and I was going to opt for the pat down. But I didn't want Sydney to get the pat down either, so I was very glad that they were only using the metal detectors and we didn't have to worry about all the inconveniences.
The first flight Sydney slept most of the way. The layover in Dallas was just fine. The second flight... well, the first half she was crying and the last 45 minutes she was passed out from the crying. She just didn't want to go to sleep until the light was turned off in the cabin, and yes, they were left on until the last 45 minutes of the 2 hour 35 minute flight.
We arrived at Reagan International at 1:15 am Eastern time, and arrived at Gabe's parents house around 4 in the morning and went straight to bed. All of us. Poor Blanca, Gabe's mother, picked us up and drove us to their house probably totally her time in the car to around 5 hours in the late and early hours of the night.

For the next couple days we lounged ad recovered from our travel. I think that was the first time I can remember feeling jet lag. Usually I adjust to the time change pretty well. Then Sydney started teething and our 3rd night there, we didn't sleep, and I am pretty sure Gabe's brother Alex, and buddy Michael, got little sleep that night also, being closest to our room where Sydney was probably heard crying for most the night. Then the Stomach Flu started making its rounds. Christmas Eve dinner was delicious and Christmas morning was wonderful! Here is a little recording of some of the festivities:

Gabe and I woke up Sunday morning feeling sick, Gabe more than me, so I stayed home with him to help him out and also to make sure Sydney wasn't exposed to anything that might be at church. By Tuesday Gabe was feeling much better, but then Sydney got it. Lets just says that when we woke up that morning, the legs of Sydney's sleeper seems to be eeking a strange color. She had it for a couple days and was fine by Friday. Thursday we went to visit the Amish communities up in Pennsylvania. It was a 2 hour drive up there and Sydney tolerated the drive well. We went to several shops and a restaruant all run by the Amish. We had lunch, we went to a bookstore. I bought two Amish Children's devotional readers that they use in school. We went to a bakery, and a hat shop that sold the Amish mens' hats. We saw them riding in their carriages and the children walking home from school in their traditional clothing that they wear. The married men all had beards and rode in covered carriages. The single men and women rode in open carriages. We also went to a little zoo that one Amish family had on their property. They had a little pond that could fit about 100 people for ice skating they said. There was a Llama, a Bisen looking animal, a Kangaroo or something similar, rabbits, pigs, goats, donkeys... birds... and more that I can't remember. Well here is a little video of our adventure there:

Gabe and I and Sydney stopped in Lancaster to shop for my birthday gift; we went to Hollister at the mall and got me 2 new pairs of jeans, and we got them for a great price since the entire store was having a 40% off sale. And we had a Visa gift card from Christie. Thank you Christie!

Sydney has started standing up and grabbing onto things. She is also walking along the couch so she will be walking in no time. She has been saying a whole ton more and will say Ma-ma and and da-da, although I don't think she knows what they mean quite yet, maybe she does. She responds to "no" when she is told most of the time. She hears is enough that she now hesitates when she is going near something she knows she shouldn't. Everything is going by so quickly. I was thinking about how she will never been this small and cuddly again and how much I'm going to miss it. And how much she is going to hate hearing about it when she is a teenager. =P

Thanksgiving Break

Monday and Tuesday of Thanksgiving break, we were just preparing for our departure to take place on Wednesday morning for Shelley and Steve's house.
Wednesday we left our home at 5:45am and picked up dad. We were off by 6am.
We got to Shelley's around 1:15pm. It was great. Sydney was a trooper and for some reason it slipped our mind to changed her diaper on the way down, so her seat was slightly damp when we got there. Poor girl.
We made a quick trip to Trader Joe's in Redlands with Brigitte and got our sparkling drinks for dinner. We love the Clementine sparkling drink they have. Tastes just like orange soda.
Thursday there was a ton of baking and cooking all day long. Nick, Gabe's brother, arrived and catching up was way fun. 
Dinner was awesome! Gabe and I made bread for dinner and green beans. There was turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, corn pudding? and deviled eggs. There was pumkin pie, apple pie, and a oreo cookies and cream pie, and chocolate delight. I broke my rule once and had a little chocolate delight. It was oh so yummy and my sister in law Melissa made it! Thanks Melissa!
Friday we went to the Apple Cider and Apple Butter Festival up in Oak Glenn I think it was, near Shelley's house. We walked around and some of us bought a few things and then we took some pictures. I think they turned out great! 

Bruce and Sydney

 The family minus Tyler who had to work. I will photo-shop him in. He was missed!

My little family. I love this picture.

Kiel and Melissa and Bruce

Brigitte and Tyler's little boy Logan watching the animals at the festival

Opa and Omi

My parent and all of us kids

Opa and Omi again... Logan wanted to be in the picture too.

Up in the mountains near Shelley's house

 All the grandkids

I love my family!

Give Thanks!

I am so thankful this year for so much. Life has certainly changed for us since last Thanksgiving and I would not take back any of it. Here are some things we are so very thankful for from this past year:

• Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ! Where would we be today without the constant flow of blessings we have received daily from our Heavenly Father and His Son? There are simply not enough words.

•The Temple- we have been trying to attend once a week and have been quite successful. I know that our lives have been blessed so much by attending and making it a priority instead of a chore in our home to go as often as we can. If we can't go together, one of us stays home and watches Sydney while the other goes to the Temple. Once a week. It is possible.

• Gabe- this man works, and works hard. There have been many days where he has come home later then expected just so that these young children and their parents can get the best care given to them from a Speech Therapist. Gabe works as a bilingual SLP for English and Spanish.
He also helped me so much with housework and cooking when I couldn't before Sydney came. He was running the entire show on his own basically and caring for me on probably 6 hours of sleep a night.
• Maternity Leave- I was able to still be paid half my salary when I went on bed-rest with Sydney almost a year ago this December. What a great help it was.
• Baby Showers and gifts from so many people who helped us get ready for Sydney's arrival. We did not need to buy clothes for quite a while.
• John Muir Hospital- best place to have a baby. Period.
• Sydney! Who can say that they have seen a cuter little girl than her? She is so well tempered. She is soo observant and absolutely loves other children. From the get-go she was an awesome sleeper and I am so grateful we were given her for our first because looking back it seemed a piece of cake. (crossing my fingers the next one isn't a total opposite.)
•  Our ward and callings- Gabe is now an Elder's Quorum Teacher, but for the past year and a half he has been the 8 years old teacher. I have been on the Relief Society Committee and both of us have been enjoying it. I am glad I have a calling that I can contribute my creative talents to and Gabe his teaching abilities to.
• Family- We have been very blessed with being able to visit Gabe's family out East at last year's Thanksgiving and also have most of my family so close by. Having a babysitter for Sydney has been great. Thanks you Mom and Dad.
• Knowledge- We love to look for better ways to improve our quality of life. Exercise, food, books, movies, games, the outdoors. I can say we have learned soo much this year and enjoy eating healthy and maintaining a healthy balance between work, family, church, and entertainment. We recently took up playing Soccer and Mom and Dad have let up borrow the Total Gym. We have learned the great benefit that you cant get anywhere else of eating right and avoiding prepackaged foods. Your body is soo important. It is a Temple and only the most healthy food are what we put into it. 
• Employment and Benefits- In these hard times we are so grateful for the work Gabe has. We are even more blessed with the news that Gabe can also make house calls and get extra hours if he so wishes, which is great! Especially during Summers when the programs are short.
•We are grateful for our home. I realized how much I love being in our small apartment when we were gone for only a few days and I missed it. We love our home and being here together.

We are so thankful and love you all!

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving! Drive safe!

Almost There!

She is almost there! See for yourself!

And here she is with her prize! Well... Daddy's watch.

And our tree that we finished decorating yesterday! So pretty!

Halloween and Christmas!

We went to our ward's Trunk o' Treat last night and helped at the Bean Bag Toss. I was surprised at how many kids actually wanted to do it. I don't think I ever found that game all that exciting. Ever. lol Gabe dressed up as a Doctor, for the ward party and for school. Sydney was a Ballerina. I was an Incredible. Here is my shirt that I sewed together Friday night.

After the ward party we went to our friends' place. Troy and Nicki were having a party. Tons of fun, but by the time 10 rolled around, we were beat and Sydney was telling us kindly that it was time for her to go to bed.

After dinner at mom and dad's this evening, we went home and we put up our tree. I think is it perfectly fine to put up your tree whenever you want. Its your home and you can do what you want. lol so we did. And I tried stringing some lights around by the kitchen and the wall above the TV. We'll get the ornaments and lights on the tree tomorrow.

Lisa, your ornaments are the ones on the tree right now. I didn't want to lose them. =P