Potty Training

The joys of potty training has begun.

As we've watched Emma over the last two months, she has been using her wagon from her birthday as a bathroom. Yes, her wagon. She will climb into her wagon, close the door, and then turn away from anyone looking. If you look at her she will say "No, look!" and shake a finger at you. So, this has been going on for quite awhile and happening more and more often. We decided that because she knows when she needs to go potty, that it was time to get her a real potty.

What is so cool is that Emma has really taken to it. She is such a smarty pants. Most of the time we have to ask her if she needs to use the potty (usually when we see the signs that she is going to go in her diaper). Then there are those times that she pulls on our pants or fingers and says "Potty!" We are excited, but know that it will take lots of time. But we are also so proud of Emma for trying.

Family

During this season, we are constantly reminded of those things that we are thankful for. We are first and foremost grateful for our Heavenly Father and our Savior. They are the great givers of all our blessings. We are thankful for the plan of happiness.

We are grateful for our family. There is such joy in having a family of your own, and watching it grow. Emma has been an angel (even with the difficult moments) in our lives. It is by having each other that truly motivates one to be better. We are thankful for our home. Home is truly where your family is, and heaven is where your home is. We are also thankful for extended family. They are such a big support and comfort in life.

There are so many things to be grateful for that we could go on indefinitely. The amazing thing is that there are so many blessing in our lives that we don't even recognize and see. We are grateful that the Lord is always mindful us. We are so excited to see what comes in the future. We know that there are going to be hard times, but we are grateful those growing experiences. Life is so wonderful.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween Everyone!!!!

Emma really seemed to get the hand of trick-or-treating. At first she was shy, and would hesitantly grab a treat. But from door to door she began to hold her bucket, then grab a handful of candy, and wave bye-bye. Toward the end she began knocking on the doors herself. We only hit 10 houses, but she came away with a haul. Now it's time for daddy to impose his "Daddy Tax". This was really fun.

Snowbird

We love Snowbird. Especially during the summer. It is so nice to escape the summer heat, and relax in the beauty of nature. It was so nice to relax there after a long three months of Justin's graduate program. It's fun to just spend time together as a family without homework coming into the equation.

We had fun at the new mining rock shifter activity that they had there for children.

The flowers were beautiful. There were fields upon fields of flowers.

We did a lot around the lodge, but we also went for a hike. We took the tram up the mountain and hiked down. It was fun, but tiring. I think it took us four hours to get down because of wrong directions from other hikers that led us to taking the longest way down. Needless to say Emma was sick of hiking in the backpack, and we were very sore. But all in all Snowbird was the rejuvenation that we needed before school starts again. Thank you Grandma and Papa for the letting us use the last bit of your week.

Favorite Things

Here are a few of Emma's favorite things.

Banana's! Yep, and when we run out we have to go to the store to get more. We have to limit banana's to only one a day. Otherwise, she would eat them every meal, and nothing else.

Going to the zoo. Here we are at the zoo with Nana, Jenny, Blaine and Eli. The new baby giraffe was born, and we had to go see it. They say that giraffe's can grow up to an inch every day (at least that's what the keeper said).

The park! Oh, how we love going to the park. We love swings, slides, and sand. It's hard to say which is her most favorite out of the three. She does like to turn boxes at home into slides, and will say "whee" as she slides down.

New Cousin

Yeah!!!! Baby Jade Spencer Cross is finally here. New babies are always fun. We were lucky he was born this week, otherwise we would only have seen pictures of him. Jade was 8 lbs 1 oz, 20 inches long, and healthy. He has two loving older sisters (Mikayla, 5, Natalia, 3) and two proud parents. They are moving to New Hampshire in two weeks. So here is our chance to meet and hold Jade.

Happy Birthday Emma

It's strange how time seems to fly. I can remember so clearly when the doctor told me that they were going to induce me that night because she had stopped growing in the womb. That was all a big shock. I guess that must be kind of how other women feel when they go into labor unexpectedly. Since Emma loves the zoo so much we (okay me) decided to go with a jungle theme.

It was fun to decorate for her birthday. I think the hardest part was just trying to find a cake recipe or mix that was gluten free. (Yeah, Emma seems to have gluten/wheat sensitivities) For her birthday she got way too much stuff. The nice thing was just having everyone there to show their love and support of Emma. It's so nice to see children loved and celebrated. It was such a good day.