The Craven Family

Where to start?

2012-02-10T21:48:00.000-06:00

We're back in blogland (only 3 months since my last post). I don't know if I have a good excuse. We've just had other stuff going on. Two busy little kids, another one on the way, etc. But now I'm back and ready to start posting again. I was going to go back and catch up on everything that's been happening since last October when we went to Disneyland, but that may take a while. We went to Disneyland, we went to Utah for Andy's grandpa's funeral and Thanksgiving, we went to Utah again for the week before Christmas, and I went to Utah again for a few days last month for a baby shower (I love living closer to family now. It's so much easier to make a quick (or not so quick) trips to Utah). So in case I never get around to going into details of the past few months, here are a few pictures:

Christmas Eve with the girls in their new jammies:

The only picture I managed to get of Rachel in her Christmas dress.

Rachel loves the Curious George book she got for Christmas

And Eden loves her Lion King movie. She'd been begging for that for months.

Rachel loved to stand on ALL the boxes. They were as much fun as the presents.

Eden got a new doll and I made some princess dresses to go with it.

Rachel has changed so much since our last post. About a week after she learned how to walk, she learned how to run, and I don't think she has stopped since. Her favorite thing to say is "GO, GO, GO". I have a hard time getting a good picture of this girl because she is moving all the time. She's so different from Eden when Eden was this age (only partly because Eden wasn't even walking yet). Talking is something she is only mildly interested in, but she loves to climb and explore and I sometimes feel like I spend all day just chasing her around the house. She totally wears me out, but I can't complain because she is so darling. I just can't resist this face!

Climbing...

And climbing some more....

This is a typical Saturday morning in our house: The girls on their pillows with their cereal, watching the Sprout channel while mommy catches a couple more minutes of sleep on the couch. This is the only time of day when Rachel is awake and holding still (and it never lasts very long).

Rachel loves to walk

2011-11-12T14:57:00.000-06:00

More catching up to do! Rachel had her first birthday on October 15, and I'm just now getting around to blogging about it. My parents came to visit for her birthday and it was really nice to have them here. Rachel had a lot of fun opening presents (she's a pro- we're not going to be able to put any under our Christmas tree). She got some fun toys that still entertain her a month later. She also got a cute dress from Grandma Sha-sha and Grandpa Bruce. I made her a cake based on the book The Very Hungry Caterpillar and I thought it was delicious. Rachel seemed to as well. She ate all of her piece and then part of Eden's as well. We wanted to take my parents somewhere fun while they were here so that evening we went to the Tournament of Kings at the Excalibur. It was a lot of fun and I was surprised how much Rachel liked it. She clapped her hands and squealed and really had a good time. Apparently she has a thing for jousting, or maybe she just liked having a meal where she wasn't the only one eating with her fingers. Who knows. I know she won't remember her first birthday, but she sure had a lot of fun.

I couldn't get a very good picture of the cake. That's what I get for putting foil under it... All that matters is that it was good.

De-licious!

What I wouldn't give for those eyelashes!

I can't believe how fast this girl is growing up! She loves to read books and tease her sister. She's definitely not the talker that Eden was at this age, but she has a few words she says, when she feels like it. She likes to say BOO to people when they walk in the room and she likes to say Meow when I ask her what a cat says. She can also say duck, dog, cat and quack (although they all sound about the same). She's a very happy baby and we love having her in our family!

The day after her birthday she started taking some tentative steps around the house and would stand herself up in the middle of the room instead of pulling herself up to something. We thought she would start walking right away, but she didn't get the hang of it for a couple more weeks and would only take a couple steps at a time. On Halloween night she finally started walking a little more and once she figured out how to keep her balance, she was unstoppable. Now she walks everywhere (or runs, if she can) and it is a lot of fun to watch her toddle around. She always has a big grin on her face and I can tell she is so proud of herself. This video was taken about a week ago. I think she's gotten faster since then!

October Update

2011-10-14T15:01:00.003-05:00

So, it's been a little while (once again) since our last update. Here's what we've been up to:
Rachel turned 11 months old way back a month ago and is growing and changing like crazy. She's the busiest baby I know and she keeps us constantly going (and laughing). She's not big into talking yet, but she does like to tell people, "Boo" and she likes to say "Tiger".

Eden turned 5 years old on September 16 and for her birthday she wanted to go to the Rainforest Cafe and the M&M store downtown on the strip. She had a lot of fun at both places. I can't believe how big she is getting. She's a really good reader and is having a lot of fun in kindergarten, making new friends and doing new things. She's still tall for her age (her pediatrician said she is the height of the average 7 year old) and she is the youngest and the tallest kid in her class. Her teacher is really impressed with a smart girl she is, especially for being so young.

We've had a few days of hard rain here (which was really nice) and Eden fully took advantage of it. These pictures were taken outside our house. She went out to see how hold the water was and ended up totally soaking herself, pouring little buckets of water over her head. We should have just had her put her bathing suit on.

Andy promised to take Eden hiking in Red Rock Canyon for a date and they did that earlier this week. The weather was really nice and they had a lot of fun. Eden is a good hiker and she kept up with Andy really well. They had a lot of other people tell them on the hike that they were surprised at how well she was doing.

The little girls and I took a quick trip to Utah at the end of September when Andy was working to see my family for a few days. It was a nice little getaway from the heat (still in the high 90's at the end of September) and we had a lot of fun. I just forgot to take any pictures...
Andy's having a lot of fun a work. He really enjoys it and comes home with some interesting stories pretty much every day. I stay home with the kiddos and have been devoting a lot of energy to my latest project which should be finished sometime in April:

The Eden Post

2011-08-29T15:33:00.000-05:00

Eden has grown up so much in the past couple months. She started Kindergarten today and we were so proud of her. She was nervous to go, but she got to meet her teacher and see her classroom last Friday so she knew a little better what to expect. We found out yesterday that one of the girls in her primary class would also be in her school class and I think she was excited for that. Andy had the morning off of work so we all got to take her to school and pick her up. Despite being nervous, she lined up with her class and smiled and waved to us as she walked in. After school, she was all smiles and she told us she couldn't wait to go back again tomorrow!

Silly Girl!

Lining up with the rest of Mrs. Peacock's class.

A special after school treat for making through the first day of school.

I'm still trying to figure out how Eden grew up so fast. How did she go from this:

to this:

and how long is going to be before she can legally drive one of these?

The Rachel Post

2011-08-29T15:10:00.000-05:00

I've been a little behind in blogging about the girls and I need to get these posted before I forget. Rachel turned 9 months in July while we were in Utah. She changed so much during the 5 weeks we were in Utah and learned so many new things. She learned to feed herself (finally!) which made things a lot easier for me because I could give her some cheerios and she would eat them herself, instead of sitting with her mouth open waiting for me to give them to her like a baby bird. She also learned to push herself into the sitting position when she was laying down and she started to army crawl to toys she wanted. She also learned to say 'dog', 'cat' and 'bubble bath' (crazy, but so cute). She also started doing a fake cough to get attention. She's such a cutie!

A couple weeks ago she turned 10 months and she's still learning and growing so fast. She's a super fast army crawler now and she loves to crawl toward things she knows she's not supposed to have and wait for someone to chase her down. She is getting good at pulling herself up on her knees and I know it won't be too much longer before she pulls herself to standing. She has learned to say 'duck' (which sounds a lot like 'dog' and 'cat') but I can't ger her to say it very often. She's very vocal, but most of what she says is not English. She seems to have no interest at all at saying 'mama' although 'dada' is a common phrase. She's really good at pattycake and dancing when she hears music. Over the past month or so she has also completely rejected baby food. She will only eat food she sees us eating (and she isn't fooled by us pretending to eat baby food) so she's turned into a regular little kid, eating mac and cheese, chicken nuggets, cheese sticks, yogurt, and Mexican food (it's a favorite of hers- even if it is a little spicy). Eating with the big people has helped her chunk up again a little- for a while she turned into quite the skinny gal.
She's also sleeping through the night (usually about 12 hours straight) with a long nap or two during the day. She loves watching Eden and following her around. Eden has even taught her how to do a really girlie shreik (which I'm sure our neighbors love to hear). We love having our Rachel around. She keeps me busy every day but I enjoy it.

Getting her to hold still for pictures is getting tricky. Actually, getting her to hold still ever is a little tricky.

This is Eden's astronaut helmut she wore in her empty box rocket. We couldn't resist putting it on Rachel.

I'm a little bit obsessed with Rachel's eyelashes. They are so long, but so light that I can only see them when the light is shining on them. I had to snap this picture one day while I was feeding her lunch. The next two pictures just make me laugh. I love this girl and her cheeks.

Settling In

2011-08-29T14:49:00.000-05:00

We're currently living in a townhouse we are renting until we have found the perfect house to buy. It's a nice place, although it is a little smaller than our house in Omaha so I don't have room for all our stuff (some of my fabric is sitting in a storage unit wondering why I don't love it anymore). Hopefully within a year we'll be in our own place once again.
We've really enjoyed Las Vegas so far. It is hot, but doesn't seem as sweltering as we thought it would, even with the temperature up above 110 for a few days. I think the dryness has made all the difference. It was so humid in Omaha that this doesn't seem so bad. We had some time before Andy started working to do a little exploring and getting to know our new city. We took a drive to the temple (on the complete opposite side of the city from us) and visited Red Rock Canyon, which is gorgeous (although I don't recommend visiting it in the middle of the day in August). We've had a chance to visit the strip and show Eden the fountain at the Bellagio and "the castle" (Excalibur). She also wanted to visit the 'Pawn Stars' store (yes, she's seen Pawn Stars. Is that bad?) and so we took a trip there. She also wanted to see the Pirate show at Treasure Island so we went to that for part of our family night last week (and the show is not that great, so don't feel like you're missing anything!).
Andy is really enjoying working again, and I can tell he's going to come home with some quite... interesting...stories- the benefits of working in the ER just a couple blocks off the strip!
I think we're settling in quite nicely. I've located the closest Target, Costco, library and quilt store so I'm pretty much set! We've found our ward and I think we'll really like it. Eden already volunteered to give a talk in Primary and she did that today. We've been swimming just about every day since we moved in. It's a great way to wind down in the evening and Eden is getting braver and better in the water each day. Life is going pretty great for us right now!

Eden loved the giant gila monster at Red Rock Canyon.

Rachel was not so impressed.

Red Rock Canyon was beautiful. These pictures don't do it justice. Eden had a ton of fun and has asked to go back pretty much every day since we went.

If you look really closely, you can see Las Vegas in the background.

Eden loves to pose.

Swimmin'

Pirate Show at Treasure Island. After this, we went to the Mirage to watch the volcano. Eden didn't like the volcano because it shot out a lot of hot fire, but the Japanese tourists next to us abolutely loved Rachel. They just couldn't resist her white-blonde hair and big blue eyes. She's going to end up in more than one Japanese photo album.

Back in the game

2011-08-14T19:08:00.000-05:00

Well, we're finally back in the blogging world and I have a ton of catching up to do. I'm going to have to break this up into a few posts! To keep you in the loop- Andy finished residency on June 23 and we packed up and left Omaha on June 25. The next 5 weeks were filled with lots of fun and craziness (and a whole lot of miles on our car!). We headed to Salt Lake to spend some time with Andy's family (but not before a detour to Las Vegas to find a suitable place to live). Then we headed up to my parent's home in Tremonton. Then we went back to Salt Lake, then up to Bear Lake, then back to SL, back to Tremonton, back to SL, back to Las Vegas. Whew. Needless to say, we were more than ready to be out of the car and in our own beds by the time we moved in! Here are a few of my favorite pictures from our extended vacation:

Ben being a good uncle and carrying sleepy Rachel around Las Vegas for us.

Fourth of July concert and fireworks. I love my girlies!

Eden had so much fun playing at Bear Lake with her cousins- well, most of the time anyway!

Rachel also loved Bear Lake!

We went boating on the lake and Eden was brave enough to try tubing for the first time.

We also went camping on Hyrum Lake with my family and Eden loved playing with her other cousins (which I didn't get any pictures of) and playing in the lake. She's quite the little fish!

This is the beautiful view from our campsite in Hyrum. I don't entirely dislike camping if this is what I get to see when I wake up in the morning. Plus I got to be with my whole entire family, which doesn't happen very often and it was great!

More pictures to come....

House hunting in Las Vegas

2011-06-29T16:13:00.001-05:00

Hello all. I know that it has been over three years since I (Andy) have posted something on this blog, but I felt that it was time that I contribute again. I finally finished residency last week. My parents came out for graduation and while they were there, they were nice enough to help us pack the house and drive all of our stuff half way across the country. We took all of our stuff to Las Vegas. Jill and I then spent a couple of days looking for a place to live there. Here are a couple of pictures of places that we looked at:

(Too french)

(Too many naked women statues)

(Too many rats in the dungeons)

Since none of those places actually worked out, we'll have to keep looking... Eden is very excited about having a pool since it is hot in Las Vegas. So we had to make sure that we found a good pool for us. Rachel also seemed to like the pool option.

We are also looking forward to getting to know our new neighbors! I can't wait until they bring over some house warming gifts!!

We will also need to furnish our place, so we went out to try and find some cool stuff for us. We had seen that this place had a lot of cool things!!

We had a lot of fun and are now back in Utah for a vacation before I start my job. We are very excited to get back down to Las Vegas though and see what all the desert has in store for us!!!

The perfect picture

2011-06-21T22:49:00.000-05:00

I am amazed by those professional pictures with 30 people in them and everyone is looking at the camera and smiling. I was trying to take a good picture of the girls earlier this week. This is the one that turned out the best.

These are a few of the "not so perfect" attempts before I got a good picture:

Looking at these again, I realize that they may not have turned out perfect, but they show the personality of the girls so much more than the first picture. I think I love them just as much. They make me laugh and remind me what each day is like in our house. Perfection doesn't always have to be the goal!

Eden and Rachel, but mostly Rachel

2011-06-21T22:38:00.000-05:00

I just wanted to do a couple quick posts of some pictures of the girls. Eden is such a great big sister. She loves Rachel so much and helps me out with her so much. One of Eden's favorite things to do is to try to "match" Rachel when I get her dressed. She tries to wear the same colors and patterns. So she was very excited when we got the girls matching jammies. She wants to wear them every night. Rachel doesn't seem to care whether she matches her sister or not, but as you can tell from the pictures, she does like to be by Eden. Eden can always make her smile.

Rachel fell asleep on the couch one night leaning up against Andy and she looked so sweet I just had to snap a picture (or two or three...).

Rachel is now officially 8 months old. She got her first tooth (bottom right front) the day before she turned 8 months. We're still waiting for the other front bottom tooth to make an appearance. She is getting really good at rolling and loves to be on the floor rolling around exploring. All the rolling has thinned her out quite a bit too. She's by no means skinny, but she's lost a couple chins and some of the folds in her thighs. She's also sprouting some new hair on top. She's got a great mohawk going on- we try to curl it a little bit. She's recently discovered that we have a cat and it has caught her attention enough that she tries to say "cat" when she sees it. So far, it sounds a lot like "dad" but we're working on it. My mom says that "cat" was my first word, so maybe it runs in the family. She just figured out clapping and signing "more" when she wants a snack. Now if only I could get her to feed herself... She's my little baby bird and will only hold her mouth open for food- she won't pick it up and put it in herself. I also got her to start sleeping through the night this past month- it was a lot easier to do than I was expecting. I just stopped feeding her when she cried and would instead give her back her binkie and walk out. I thought she would cry for hours the first few nights, but she just went right back to sleep. If I had known it would be that easy I would have done it months ago! That's our little Rachel at 8 months old. We sure love having her in our family!

Utah

2011-05-30T21:28:00.015-05:00

We've had a busy couple weeks at our house. My mom came out for a visit and to help us get ready to put our house on the market. She was incredibly helpful, and I don't think I could have done everything without her. The girls had a great time with Grammy (and unfortunately I didn't get any pictures!). Rachel also turned seven months while she was here. I can't believe she is getting so big! time has just been flying by and it seems like every time I look at her she is learning new things and getting older. We love having her in our family.

Three days after she left, we flew to Utah for a week for Andy's brothers wedding. We had a good time with Andy's family- and this time Rachel didn't cry every time Grandma Sha Sha looked at her, so that's definitely some progress!

Ben and Ashley's wedding was beautiful and Eden loved being a flower girl. She took her title very seriously and was so excited to have a new dress to match her cousins'. We're very happy to have Ashley in the family now and we hope she enjoys being a Craven!
The big girls at the temple.

The bride and groom.

Our own happy little family.

The big girls with Grandpa. They had such a good time playing together!

Happy Mom's Day!

2011-05-08T11:39:00.000-05:00

Happy Mothers Day to all you moms out there. Here's a special shout out to my own mom, who is the best mom a person could ask for. She is a wonderful example to me and I hope I can be a good of a mom to my girls as she is to me. A shout out to my mom-in-law as well, who is the best mother-in-law a person could ask for. She's also a great example to me and did a fantastic job of raising her son to be a great husband. I couldn't ask for better women in my life.
Yesterday was a gorgeous day here in Omaha. The weather was perfect and we had to get outside to enjoy it, even though we should have been inside packing boxes. Andy had the day off and we had to get outside on the grass enjoying the breez and spending time together as a family. As any proud mother would, I have pictures of my cute girls to show off. I just can't resist these two! I'm so glad to be their mommy and they have blessed my life so much!

Giggles

2011-05-03T15:18:00.000-05:00

I was feeding Rachel the other night and she got a case of the giggles. I wasn't doing anything unusual but she seemed to think I was very funny and was laughing at everything I was doing. I had to take this little video of her because I love to hear her laugh. Please excuse the baby food all over her face!

May Day

2011-05-01T17:22:00.000-05:00

Happy May to everyone! It's nice and sunny today (although still a little chilly) and our flowers are cheerful and blooming. Sunshine, flowers and little girls dressed up for church are too much for me to resist so I had to take a few more pictures today.

I had a great birthday this week. Andy and Eden surprised me with breakfast and I was once again spoiled with gifts and love. Andy surprised me by getting a babysitter for the girls (thanks again Howards!) and taking me to see Les Miserables that evening. It was a lot of fun and I don't mind turning a year older if that's how it's going to be!

Today in church someone was telling a story about a little girl who told her dad that he was her best friend. Eden looked at Andy and said, "They must be talking about you and me!" It was really sweet.

Not much else going on here right now. We met with a realtor this week and are probably going to be putting our house on the market on May 19th (3 years to the day of when we closed on our house). If any of you know someone in the Omaha area looking for a house, point them in our direction. We've loved living here and hate to leave this house that's been so good to us. We started packing up a couple boxes this week as well- things we aren't going to be using for the next few months. We're looking forward to moving on, but sad to be leaving so much behind. Hope everyone is doing well today!

Happy Easter!

2011-04-24T18:29:00.000-05:00

I hope all of you are having a wonderful springy Easter. We took some pictures this afternoon of our girlies all dressed up for church and we thought they were cute enough to send out into the blogging world. Spring is trying to make it's way to us this week. We've finally got a few daffodils blooming in our garden (Eden has been checking on them every day for weeks now) and she was so happy to see them today. I hope you all have a warm and happy week ahead of you!

Randomness from this week

2011-04-13T13:40:00.000-05:00

Just a few pictures from this past week. We've had some really great weather so we've been outside playing at the park and having a good time while it lasts. Rachel is finally getting the chance to spend time outside (the weather hasn't been good since she was born!) and she loves it. She's such a happy girl and she loves to sit in her stroller and watch Eden play at the park.

Rachel is our little night owl. She won't sleep in her crib until some time after 10:30 at night. She'll sleep fine on the couch but if we try to lay her in the crib she wakes up. She loves her little softie blankie and when we give it to her she gets so excited. She bites it and rubs her face in it and then snuggles up with it. She falls asleep faster if she has her softie to hug. It's really been a hit. Thanks Karla!

Just another cute Rachel pic. She 's such a smiley girl but I can't seem to catch those smiles on camera. As soon as she sees the camera, she stops smiling. Maybe I've taken too many pictures...

Yesterday afternoon we were the napping house. Andy had worked the night shift the day before so he was home sleeping. We'd spent the morning at the park and we were all worn out. Rachel fell asleep and I decided to take a little nap while Eden was in quiet time. Eden fell asleep too (a rare and welcome event) and it was so nice and peaceful. Eden woke up after a while and crawled up next to me on the couch and fell asleep again. It was so nice to cuddle with her because she is usually so busy and won't hold still long enough for me to cuddle with her. After a little while she moved to the floor and fell asleep again. I wanted to take her picture because she looked so sweet but she woke up before I could take it. She's still a cutie though!

Artificial Sunshine

2011-03-29T16:53:00.006-05:00

March has not been kind to Omaha this year. We have had a few days of sunshine and warm weather but for the most part, it has been cold and gray. Eden and I have been checking our garden for green shoots from the bulbs that were planted last fall but so far there is nothing. A few days ago I noticed we are finally getting some green grass pushing up through the brown, but that night it snowed, and it has snowed every day since. The girls have both been sick for over a week so we haven't gotten out much at all. We have some cabin fever to go with the coughs and stuffy noses. Today is another gloomy day and I have had to find something to keep it bright. Spring may still be weeks away outside, but I can try to keep things sunny and happy inside my house. I made this wreath to replace the winter one I've had on my door since December. Some fun eggies in our kitchen. The easter bunny is just warming up for the big day. Too bad they aren't all filled with candy... We have already gone through two bags of Cadbury chocolate eggs. And of course these two are always the sunshine of my life. Rachel is such a trooper- even when she's sick she is smiley and happy. These girls keep me laughing and smiling every day!

On Sunday Eden sang me two new songs she is learning in Primary. She just started learning "My Heavenly Father Loves Me" and it was so sweet to hear her singing it. She loves Primary and is always telling me about her class and what she got to do. I still can't believe she is a CTR 5 now. She's growing up so fast!

I guess March is going to go out like a lion this year. Hopefully April will be kinder to us and spring will make an appearance soon! And until then, we just have to keep reminding ourselves that spring will be much warmer for us next year. Sunny days in Las Vegas are ahead!

2011-03-19T21:40:00.007-05:00

For those of you who don't keep up on this kind of thing, today is National Quilting Day. So I decided to do a non-child related post for a change and post some of the quilts I have made in the past year. So far, I've pretty much stuck with baby quilts (although you may note that these quilts vary quite a bit in size). In fact, Rachel's quilt is big enough for three or four babies. I guess she'll be able to use it until she's a teenager. Quilting is something I love doing, but never seem to have much time to do. I'm looking forward to having a house with a sewing room/playroom that I can work in while the kiddos play.

And since I can't do a post that is totally free of children, here's a picture of Rachel showing off her quilt and her chunky little thighs. She's 5 months old already!

February Fun

2011-03-03T16:15:00.004-06:00

February was a pretty busy month for us. Andy had to do a rural rotation in North Platte which didn't sound like much fun for us girls so we decided to go to Utah for a few weeks and visit with family. We really had a good time, but we missed Andy and our Omaha friends so it was nice to come back too!

Eden got to decorate Valentine cupcakes and cookies with her grandmas. She definitely loved the frosting!

Rachel is just such a cutie I had to add a couple pictures of her. She turned 4 months while we were in Utah. She's growing so fast she seems to change daily. She is very vocal now and loves to squeal and chatter and chew on her fists. I just melt when I look at her pretty blue eyes and bald little head. After our trip, I can tell she has a lot of people wrapped around her chubby little finger!

I thought I would include this video of Rachel trying her first rice cereal. She wasn't so sure about it. We've tried it a couple times since this was taken and she still isn't too impressed with it. We'll keep trying!

What a way to start the new year!

2011-01-20T16:08:00.005-06:00

I can't think of a better way to start a new year than with these two cuties. They make me smile and laugh every day and I just can't resist them!

Eden is now almost 4 1/2 and is such a little smartie. She likes to read books and tell jokes and play pretend and be a big sister. Princesses and 'House' are her current favorite things to play. She also loves to color and do crafts.

Rachel is 3 months old now and is growing so fast. I love to kiss her chubby little cheeks and see her smile and stick out her tongue. She is getting quite vocal and loves to

make noises and coo at us. She loves to be around people and will smile at anyone who will smile at her!

The End of 2010

2011-01-20T15:41:00.007-06:00

It's been a little while, once again, since I blogged. I realize Christmas was weeks ago, but I thought I would post a few pictures from the last part of December before I move on to this year. On Christmas Even morning Eden helped Andy shovel some snow and then came in to get warm and have some hot chocolate. I did some more baking of goodies (even though I had decided I was not going to bake as much this year...) and somehow managed to throw my back out putting something in the fridge. I couldn't even stand up straight for a while. A few ibuprofin and a heating pad later, we were on our way to our friends house for dinner. Later that evening, we let Eden and Rachel open their new jammies and leave a treat for Santa (he really likes brownies) and went to bed. I have to say that as a parent, I think I get just as excited for Christmas as I did when I was a kid, only now I am looking forward to watching my own kids open their gifts and feeling the magic that only Christmas morning brings.

When Eden was a baby we bought this huge stocking to put her in and so we had to see how Rachel looked in it as well.
Our girlies in front of the tree. Note the slightly terrified look Rachel gets on her face when Eden is holding her. You can also see Eden's contribution to the tree in the background. She got creative with her pipe cleaners a few days earlier.

Time for jammies- Santa is coming soon...
Christmas Morning: Eden was kind enough to wait until about 8:00 to wake us.

Rachel got a new headband and a Bumbo seat, both of which she was excited about.
Eden got her very own Wii game- princesses, of course.

One of the other big hits of the day- Squinkies. She's been begging for these for months.

Rachel was all worn out watching Eden open her gifts for her. Life can be so rough when you are a baby.

We hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas season. We sure had a great holiday and are so thankful to have all of you as our family and friends.

December

2010-12-20T14:33:00.005-06:00

Here's a few pictures we've taken this month. We've been pretty busy getting ready for Christmas and trying to stay warm. Eden is a great big sister and helps me out a lot and Rachel is getting chubby and smiley. Andy has had most of the month off so we've been having a lot of fun with him as well. We hope you enjoy!

Rachel's Blessing

2010-12-03T14:59:00.005-06:00

Andy's parents were here visiting for Thanksgiving so we decided to bless Rachel while they were here. Rachel didn't cry at all and Andy did a good job and didn't surprise me by changing her name at the last minute.

My mom made my blessing dress and I have always thought that was really special so I wanted to make a dress for Rachel. I thought it turned out pretty good, considering I have never made a blessing dress before. It was pretty long and Andy had trouble finding where Rachel ended and the dress kept going. Marcia made the pretty afghan for Rachel and we used it when she was blessed as well. We love our little Rachel Elizabeth!

More Pictures

2010-11-22T19:05:00.005-06:00

Rachel is already five weeks old and the time is just flying by. We're having so much fun with her in our home. Eden is a great big sister and loves to hold Rachel and give her kisses and take care of her.

Rachel is a pretty good sleeper (on most nights) and when she is awake she is very alert and studies what is going on around her. The past few days she has also started to smile at us when we are talking to her. It is so fun to see those smiles (although we haven't been able to catch them on camera yet). She is also gaining weight and getting a double chin and chubby cheeks. She's so much fun to hold and snuggle with.

On the 15th I took pictures of Rachel at one month, sitting on the quilt I made for her. I thought the pictures turned out pretty cute, although I couldn't get Rachel to look at the camera. I hope you enjoy the pictures!

New Baby

2010-11-04T19:57:00.005-05:00

I know some of you have been waiting a while to see these pictures- 20 days to be exact. On October 15 we welcomed our second little girl into the world. Rachel Elizabeth was born at 11:33 am, weighing in at a whopping 6 pounds 10 ounces. I had a really easy delivery- just a couple hours of labor- and I'm feeling great now. Rachel is quite a cutie and we are really enjoying having her in our famiy. Eden loves having a little sister (as long as she isn't crying) and we love it when she sleeps for more than an hour at night. We'll try to be better about posting pictures in the future. Rachel has already changed so much since she was born- she's put on some weight and is getting chubby cheeks and a second chin. We hope you enjoy these pics!

This picture was taken right after we told Eden she had a little sister. She was so excited because that is what she had wished for. I love the look on her face.

Our two girlies. Eden is a great big sister.
More pictures to come when we have a chance....

Birthdays

2010-10-08T13:13:00.009-05:00

Warning: Picture Overload!

In September we got to celebrate Andy and Eden's birthdays. The day before Andy's birthday was our ward campout. He and Eden decided to go to it (and I opted to stay home). They had a lot of fun.

Eden loved the s'mores!

The only unfortunate part of the trip was the bug bites. Eden got 16 of them- all on her face. She looked like she had the chicken pox and we had to keep reassuring people at church that she wasn't contagious!

Eden turned 4 years old a few days later. We can hardly believe it's been four years since she was born. Andy had the day off and Eden wanted us to take her to the zoo. Andy and I loved watching the new tiger cub.

Eden's favorite part was the butterfly exhibit

Eden got a new scooter for her birthday (along with a lot of other gifts - she sure is loved!) but I think her favorite gift this year was the pillow pet she's been drooling over for months. She got a unicorn pillow pet and named it Uni. It has hardly left her side since.

Eden asked for a princess birthday party with her friends this year. We had a lot of fun planning it and getting decorations. It was fun to watch 6 little princesses dancing around our house.

Summer Part 3

2010-10-08T12:58:00.005-05:00

After we go back from Utah Eden decided to try washing her doll clothes the old fashioned way and was the cutest little domestic darling I've ever seen. She loved every minute of it!

She even hung them up to dry after they were washed.

She also got in some quality time in her swimming pool. The end of the summer was unbearably hot and humid (in the high 90's with 80% humidity) so cooling off in the pool was a must. And swimming is always more fun with a friend- especially one who is willing to share her brother's goggles!

I can't believe how big my little girl is getting! One of her favorite church dresses this summer was one I used to wear when I was a little girl (although I was 4 or 5 when I wore it and Eden was only 3). It was fun to see Eden wearing it too. I had to take a picture of her wearing it on one of the rare days she let me curl her hair.

Summer Part 2

2010-10-08T12:46:00.005-05:00

I have been so terrible about blogging lately and I have so much catching up to do! Here's a mostly photographic summary of what we did the rest of the summer.
We had a lot of fun with Andy's family at This is the Place Park (or whatever they call it now). Eden wanted to spend the whole day in between Abbie and Ashley (sorry about that Ashley!)

Andy caught a chicken for Eden to pet and she thought that was a lot of fun. I personally think watching Andy catch the chicken was more fun than the petting of the chicken...
Eden learned how to wash clothes the old fashioned way and loved it. I learned to appreciate my washing machine a little bit more than I already did.

We also got do bull riding (well, not me since I'm pregnant) and it was fun to see everyone hang on. Abbie did a great job. Even Sha-Sha gave it a try......

.....for a moment anyway.

What we've been doing all summer: Part 1

2010-09-02T16:52:00.009-05:00

So, it's been quite a while since I updated our blog. Our camera has not been communicating well with our computer and who wants to read a blog without pictures? Not me. Also we've been busy. And tired. Well, that last one might just be me...

We spent all of June and half of July out and about in the western US. Andy worked in Scottsbluff NE for 3 weeks and then we spent about 3 weeks in Utah with our families. It was really a lot of fun and we wish we could have spent more time there and seen a lot more people. As proof that we've been busy, here's a little photographic tour of what we were doing.

Scottsbluff is on the western edge of Nebraska, about 12 miles west of Chimney Rock. It is really quite a pretty little place. If it weren't in the middle of nowhere, I would recommend visiting it. Here is a view from the bluff.

While in western Nebraska, one must stop to visit Alliance- home to Carhenge.
It's arranged just like Stonehenge but it's made with spraypainted Cadillacs instead of stones. This is what people do for fun in Nebraska. All while wearing these hats:

We also went to the zoo in Scottsbluff and Eden had a lot of fun feeding ducks and smelling the flowers and eating Sno Cones and posing for the camera.

That concludes the first three weeks of our trip. Stay tuned for What we did this summer: Part 2- UTAH. It's still in post-production.

A Picture's Worth a Thousand Words

2010-05-28T10:20:00.003-05:00

Final Four!

2010-05-08T16:43:00.004-05:00

If you haven't been following the two previous posts, Andy's brother Ben is in a blogging competition for Mormontimes.com. The contest started with a ton of applicants but it is now down to the final four contestants, and Ben is one of them (the best one, I might add). If you go to www. mormontimes.com and click on the Blogger Brawl icon you can read Ben's blog about single life as a Mormon and you can also VOTE for him. The voting closes Sunday night at midnight. We would love to have as many votes as we can for Ben. Thanks!

Ben Again

2010-04-29T10:02:00.004-05:00

Hello Folks,
We do not currently have the ability to take pictures off our camera and put them on our computer, so that is the main reason for the lack of blog posts lately. However, I can't be lax about posting this- Ben won the last round of the blogger brawl (thank you for all your votes) and he is in the running again today! Please go to www. mormontimes.com and click on blogger brawl to vote for Ben again. The voting ends tomorrow (Friday) at midnight and we can't bear to see Ben's talent go to waste when you could be enjoying a weekly blog from him. Thanks for all your support! Go Ben!

Vote for Ben

2010-04-12T21:15:00.007-05:00

I know, I know. It's been months since I last updated the blog. I promise, more is soon to come. But important things first:

Andy's brother Ben is really witty and funny and talented and is also in a contest on MormonTimes.com to become a regular blogger/ columnist. And he needs YOUR votes. He has made it to the second round of the contest which means the competition is getting fierce. We know he's the best but you can find this out for yourself by going to http://www.mormontimes.com/ and clicking on the Blogger Brawl icon at the top of the page. Click on the listing for Ben Craven and read his ingenious thoughts- and then vote for him! We'd love to see Ben go all the way in this competition and be able to read his column every week. And we'd love to have you help him get there. You DO need to hurry, as voting for this round of the competition ends Wednesday (the 14th) at midnight. So what are you waiting for? Have fun! And tell all your family and friends!

Cold

2009-12-27T11:52:00.008-06:00

I know what you're thinking- two posts in one day?! It turns out I have some extra time today because church was cancelled. It's too snowy and cold to get to church safely. We've had crazy weather here for the past few weeks. Earlier this week we had some freezing rain that encased everything in ice and made everything slick and then it started snowing Thursday afternoon and didn't stop until late Saturday night. Andy has already shoveled three or four times since Christmas and we're running out of places to put the snow. One of the unusual things about Omaha (or maybe just the area where we live) is that we get very strong winds and we're at the top of a hill so we have nothing below us to block the wind. We get some huge snow drifts when it snows because the wind blows it around so much. Here's a few pictures we've taken this week.

This is Andy standing at the end of our driveway. It snowed some more after this was taken.

This is our neighbor's house. You can see how the wind has blown huge drifts around. It snowed quite a bit more after we took this and the snow completely covered the porch. They are out of town and Andy was nice enough to go out and shovel their driveway and porch so they could get in when they get home. He's so thoughtful.

Ice on our Christmas lights. Everything was encased in ice.

I don't think our tomato plants are going to make it. What do you think?

Merry Christmas

2009-12-27T11:37:00.008-06:00

We hope all of you had a very merry Christmas. We certainly had a great day. Andy is working hard in the ICU this month and we've missed having him around more often. He was able to get off early on Christmas Eve and doesn't have to go back until Monday, so it has been nice to spend time with him. We stayed in Omaha for Christmas this year and it has been nice and relaxing. We miss our families more this time of year, but it has been nice to not have to worry about traveling in the bad weather.

Eden was very excited to get lots of "Princess Stuff" for Christmas. Santa really came through for her this year. He took good care of Andy and I as well. One of Eden's favorite gifts this year was a small tent that she loves so much we had to move it into her bedroom so she could sleep in it.

Andy wins the prize for "Biggest Present" this year a couple times over. Eden gave him an air hockey table and he also got a ladder (now he doesn't have to borrow the neighbors to take the Christmas lights down). He also got a new leather jacket and a remote controlled helicopter which has been buzzing around our kitchen for a couple days now. Thank goodness for vaulted ceilings!

Santa brought me some beautiful new dishes, a digital picture frame, a new coat and a fun Wii Fit game. For those of you who think that exercise isn't fun (as did I until recently) you should try out Wii Fit. It's been a lot of fun.

Christmas was wonderful and we were sad to see it go, but he're looking forward to another great year to come. We hope the rest of the year is peaceful and safe for you and that next year brings new joys. Have a Happy New Year~

One more week until Christmas!

2009-12-18T15:18:00.010-06:00

Guess who's getting excited!
I guess it is about time to post another blog. We've been so busy lately getting ready for Christmas, it just hasn't happened. We've had some requests from family lately to post some pictures of our house decorated for Christmas and so for those of you who care, here they are.

Our living room with the tree. For those of you who heard about her huge Sleeping Beauty ornament, it is the big pink thing on the tree.

Andy put up lights this year. They look really great. I just wish he hadn't done it in the dark on a windy day. BTW, this is not what our yard looks like anymore. We now have 4 and 5 foot piles of snow everywhere.

The shelf by our stairs. We love those nutcrackers!

Eden has been asking how many days until Christmas since the day after Thanksgiving so I decided to make her an advent calendar so she could see for herself. I found this idea from a blog I love called allsorts and started to make it the last couple days in November. Each pocket has a number and inside is a chocolate and a little tag to hang off the pocket. Eden loves doing her calendar every day. She doesn't like sharing the chocolate.

Eden was very excited for our ward Christmas party this year. If any of you remember last year, "Santa" was not well liked by Eden, despite him being almost a fatherly figure for her. This year, we talked about Santa for weeks ahead of time to prepare her to sit on his lap. She was a little afraid but she wanted to be sure he knew what she wanted for Christmas. She waited patiently in line and was only a little afraid to sit down. She made sure to tell Santa what she wanted ("Princess Stuff") and was super excited to get a candy cane when she was done. It may just be a small thing, but we're really proud of her for doing this all by herself. We love our cute little bug. She is such a fun girl.

Where has the time gone? Part 3

2009-11-14T12:39:00.008-06:00

Five days after Eden and I got back from Utah we were packed again and loading up the car with Andy to drive to Houston to visit Matt, Karla, Alex and Noah. The drive is about 14 hours so we stopped in Oklahoma City overnight. I was anticipating a really boring drive (Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas don't sound like the most exciting part of the country) but I was surprised how interesting most of it was. There was a part of Kansas that was so bleak it made Wyoming seem interesting (I know!) but other than that, it was pretty fun. Houston was really nice and we were more than happy to leave the Omaha autumn weather to go to 70 degrees.

Eden and Alex picked things up like they had seen each other the day before and for the most part, they played really well together. Andy and Matt spent a lot of time playing Rock Band together (sorry again, Karla). I had a lot of fun talking with Karla and holding little Noah. We played some fun games and stayed up way too late every night eating junk food and laughing. We got to visit the zoo and the children's museum.

We also went to NASA and saw the Saturn V rocket (these pictures don't do it justice- it's absolutely huge) and see the Gulf of Mexico as well.

As we were leaving Houston we stopped briefly to see the Houston temple. It was really pretty.

On our way home we stopped for the night in Oklahoma City again and before we left in the morning we stopped at the Federal Building memorial. That was really interesting and touching. I'm glad we were able to see it.

Reflecting pool where the street in front of the Federal Building was.

You can see in the background a bunch of chairs. They are set up where the Federal building was and there is a chair representing each of the people who was killed in the bombing (some of the chairs were smaller than others, representing the children).

We got home about 5:30 on Halloween night. Eden had just enough time to get her costume on and Andy took her trick-or-treating. She had a blast and raked in the candy.

Where has the time gone? Part 2

2009-11-14T12:11:00.007-06:00

After pumpkin patching, Eden and I took a quick trip to Utah for my friends wedding. We were there for just over a week and it was a lot of fun. The day we left Omaha, it was snowing and we had been told Utah was quite cold. When we got there, it was really nice and we had great weather the whole time we were there.

Eden had a lot of fun playing tea party with Grammy (and I didn't get a single picture of it!) and I had a lot of fun shopping with my mom and sister. I love seeing my family and I miss them when we leave.

Visiting with Andy's family is always an adventure. The kids love playing together and they are so fun to watch. Eden always loves jumping on Sha-sha's couch (something she doesn't get to do at home).

But the real fun begins when the kids go to bed...

Trying to get 4 children and 2 adults to look at the same camera at the same time while smiling is an almost impossible task- but we try it everytime we all get together.

Arica and I had fun walking around Gardner Village and looking at all the witches. Eden had fun, but would not let me take pictures of her. This is the best I could get...

However, I have been told I need to get in front of the camera more often and post pictures of myself on the blog so here are a couple pictues of me for your viewing pleasure:

Just a couple of witches- I'm the one on the right.

I got a much needed haircut while visiting with my parents. Eden was eager to take my picture when I was done.

We had a really fun time but we were missing Andy so we headed back home...

Where has the time gone? Part 1

2009-11-14T11:51:00.007-06:00

We've been pretty busy the past month or so and I haven't gotten around to blogging for a while. I have to play catch up now. I'm thinking this is going to take a few different posts- I have a lot of pictures!

We took a trip to Vala's Pumpkin Patch in October. We were told it is THE place to be if you want a great pumpkin patch experience (and we did, I guess). They had tricycle races, pig races, rabbit town, hay rides, storybook villages, an old mine, a teepee, campfires, camels, goats a couple of unidentified smelly animals, and a pumpkin smashing dragon. It was really a lot of fun, although we went on a really cold evening and I think we would have frozen were it not for the campfires and the hot cider. Eden had a lot of fun looking around but her favorite thing was the Sleeping Beauty display in the storybook village (no surprise).

We even managed to get a pumpkin or two!

Eden isn't so sure she wants to be here...

Really big rocking chair- really hard to get out of!
Ernie!!!

We met a few famous people...

Happy Birthday!

2009-09-17T10:23:00.007-05:00

This past week has been busy for us, but also a lot of fun. Andy's parents flew in last Thursday to spend a long weekend with us. Andy's birthday was on the 11th and we had a good time. We spend the weekend playing Beatles Rock Band and looking at animals at the zoo and the wildlife safari. We had an interesting experience with some large dive-bomber bats and some girly screams. We drank Sprechers root beer and ate cotton candy, played games and cheered for the Utes (go UTES!) and we laughed until we cried. A good time was had by all.

Eden's birthday was yesterday and she was all about the princesses this year. She asked for pretty much everything she could see that had a Disney princess on it, and she's so loved (aka spoiled) that she got most of it too. She played at the park with some of her friends in the morning and then opened her gifts after lunch. In the evening we had cake and ice cream and wanted to watch a princess movie she got for her birthday.

Eden shows us how old she is

Belle!

I can't believe my little baby is already 3 years old. How does the time go by so fast? It seems like I was just getting used to her being 2...

Last hurrah of summer

2009-08-23T14:07:00.005-05:00

Last weekend Andy had a few days off so we decided to go to on a mini vacation in central Nebraska. Andy and Eden wanted to go camping and I'm more of a hotel girl. We decided to compromise and get a little cabin at a KOA. This ended up being a much better idea than a tent as it was extremely rainy both nights we were there and I think we would have been washed away in our tent.

We spent Friday in Grand Island looking around and found a really neat park with a playground called Kid's Kingdom. It was huge and had a castle, a pirate ship, a tree house, a fort, a barn and probably some other things as well. Eden really had a lot of fun playing there.

On Saturday we went to Hastings to celebrate the town's Kool-Aid Days. Hastings is the original birthplace of Kool-Aid, which is Andy's beverage of choice most of the time (unless there's a Dr. Pepper close by). We really had a lot of fun. We got to visit the World's Largest Kool-Aid Stand (with over 14 flavors of kool-aid) and play carnival games and meet the Kool-Aid man. Eden got to play in a bounce house and get her face painted too. In the evening they had a classic car show and then a band called Yesterday and Today played Beatles music and they set off fireworks. We had a good time.

(That's part of the Kool-Aid stand in the background) They had every flavor of Kool-Aid imaginable. My personal favorite is Mango, but it's hard to find in stores.

Of course, after that, it was back to work for Andy. I've only seen him briefly a few times since then. We're hoping to go back next year!

The Primary Colors

2009-07-17T18:00:00.006-05:00

This is one of Eden's favorite songs right now. She sings it over and over again and I wanted to catch it on video before she stops singing it. I'm pretty sure she doesn't know some of the words she's singing, but that has never stopped her before.

Catching Up Part 2

2009-07-17T17:08:00.009-05:00

My niece, Emily, who is 11, decided to come to Omaha with us for 6 weeks or so and we're having a lot of fun playing with her. Eden is having so much fun and it makes it easier for me to get everything done. I'm trying to convince her she should stay for the full year, but she's not going for that. I'm really glad she is here this month because Andy has a horrible schedule in July and I have hardly seen him at all. He's working 14 or 15 hour shifts and has been on call every other day doing neurosurgery, so it is nice to have Emily here for to keep me sane.

Emily generously shared her Nintendo DS with Eden on the long drive to Omaha.

She also threw Eden a 'Princess Party' one day, complete with princess snacks, appropriate music, princess coloring pages, and they made their own crowns. Emily is always willing to dress up with Eden and pull her around the house in her "coach".

Andy had the afternoon and evening off on the 4th of July so we set off a few fireworks. Eden loved the smoke bombs and they snappers but wasn't a fan of anything that whistled or was loud. She also liked the sparklers until she dropped one on her bare foot (she's okay).

For those of you who were interested in our landscaping, you can kind of see it here. I still need to take some better pictures. Also you can kind of see what the weather was like on the 4th. I think it was the coldest 4th of July I've experienced. We got rained on a couple times.

The biggest news of the month is this:

Eden is a princess! But it's more than that- she's a POTTY TRAINED princess. I wasn't sure she was ready for it, but we just started in one day and she's done great. She's only had a couple accidents and can do the whole thing from turning on the light to washing her hands all by herself. She's really surprised me with how enthusiastic she has been. I made her a potty chart that she could put stickers on and she gets a smartie for going. It was really much easier than I was expecting it to be and I'm really proud of her.

Catching Up Part 1

2009-07-17T16:56:00.008-05:00

We've had quite a lot happen since the last time I blogged so I have a lot of catching up to do. Here's a quick run down:

Our budding artist drew her first family picture that had human forms in it. Unfortunately, I have since cleaned the bathroom and this picture is now gone. Andy is the top right, I'm the top left and Eden is below Andy. Cat is on the bottom. Eden is obviously very proud of herself.

We took a quick trip to Utah to see our families. We got to go to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house with Andy's parents and sister and the cousins. It was a beautiful temple and we had a nice time there.

We went bowling with Andy's family and had a good time. Eden got to bowl for the first time and did a pretty good job with her ramp!

Eden had a lot of fun playing with her cousins! I hope we can move closer to them some time so she can play more often.

Happy May!

2009-05-26T14:18:00.009-05:00

Here's what we've been doing in May:
Eden is still our little artist and one of her specialty mediums is bathtub walls.

She also continues to have a unique style that is all her own.

Well, sometimes all her own...

My parents came out for a visit and we took a day trip to see Adam-Ondi-Ahman. The weather was really beautiful and the trip was a lot of fun.

Eden loves to make dandelion wishes.

Eden loves Grammy and always wants to have picnics with her, even in windy weather.

Happy April

2009-04-19T17:40:00.008-05:00

Easter was a week ago but I guess it isn't too late to post a few pictures. The Easter bunny stopped by while we were sleeping and hid some eggs and peeps for Eden and she had a lot of fun finding all her treats (and eating them too). She asks for "eggs" every day now and I don't think she would be too thrilled if I fried up the real thing.

It's been a busy week for Andy. He's working noon to midnight from last Monday to the coming Tuesday with only Friday off. We get to see him for a couple hours each morning but not as much as we would like. Thankfully, after that he gets a 5 day break. I think we're all looking forward to that. Here's a few random pictures from the last week or so for your enjoyment.
Also included is a video of Eden dancing. I think it's a mixture of ballet and rain dancing...

Eden's alter-ego: Her Royal Highness SuperBallerina Riding Hood. Get used to seeing pictures of Eden in this dress (with the sparkly pink skirt under it). She puts in on over everything she wears.

PEEPS!!!

Happy Easter!

Sleepy Girl. She's so sweet.

March Madness

2009-03-31T11:47:00.009-05:00

March is almost over and we're all excited for April to get here. It's been a busy month for all of us and April is looking promising. Andy is doing an internal medicine rotation this month and it has kept him pretty busy. Next month he is going back to the ER where he is happiest so that will be great. We're hoping the weather starts warming up for spring. We haven't had any snow for a while, but the temperature has been pretty cold and last Monday we had the first tornado warning of the season (fortunately, it didn't touch down here). We did get a lot of rain and wind and after the storm blew over, Eden was really excited to go outside and play in her puddle jumpers. She jumped in a "river" in front of our neighbors house and got soaking wet, but loved every minute of it.

We were lucky enough to have good weather a couple Saturdays ago so we went to the zoo. It was a lot of fun. As we were leaving, we asked Eden what her favorite part was and she said she liked the waterfall best, followed by the fish and the ducks. Sometimes I wonder why we take her to the zoo for that...

Eden set her own table all by herself (tablecloth included) the other day and she looked so proud of herself, I had to take a picture. She's done this about 10 times since then.

And for your enjoyment, some more Eden-isms:

Eden made me some juice in her kitchen and told me it was "Lemonaid Molecule Juice"

She put her backpack on and told me she was going to "assembly". I didn't know she knew about assemblies so I asked her where she learned it and and she told me she learned it from "my friends at school". I don't think she has any friends that are in school.

She thinks she can tell time. If we ask her what time it is she looks at the second hand on the clock and says whatever number it is closest to. So it can go from four o'clock to eight o'clock in 20 seconds.

Andy was watchin basketball the other night and she told him she wanted to watch something girls watch, not boys.

This was our conversation Sunday morning:
E: "Mommy, do you want to hear a joke?"
J: "Okay..."
E: "What kind of bunny lives in a cup?"
J: "I don't know"
E: "A carrot bunny" (Lots of laughing) "What do you climb in a tree"
J: "I don't know"
E "Tree stairs" (Lots more laughing)
Now she just needs to come up with some jokes that are funny...

Let's get dressed up!

2009-03-13T12:54:00.005-05:00

Eden has recently realized she can dress herself and it is such a novel idea that she does it multiple times a day. Layering is the style of choice for her at the moment. She likes to raid her dress up bin (and sometimes her closet) and add her own personal touch to whatever she has on. It's not unusual for her to disappear to her room and come down a few minutes later wearing any combination of skirts, sweaters and dresses over her clothes. A lot of them involve a sparkly pink skirt she got for Christmas (usually combined with some fuzzy duck slippers) or some of the dresses in her closet that aren't meant to be dress ups at all. She always has such a proud look on her face that I have to take her picture. Here are just a sampling of some of her latest outfits.

This next outfit is my personal favorite. She put on a button-up sweater while the top button was still done up - no easy achievement. Still- something doesn't seem right...

One day, three posts!

2009-02-18T17:16:00.005-06:00

Super Eden

I meant to post some Eden-ism's a couple weeks ago and I forgot. So for those of you who have been asking (Mom), here they are:

Eden didn't want to say family prayer a few nights ago and when I asked her why not, she said, "My prayers are boring."

Eden was playing with her doctor kit the other day and was checking her heart with her "telescope"

Eden loves to say something is "Sweet as candy"

Eden confused a picture of Brigham Young with Raffi, a children's singer who happens to have a beard.

We tell Eden that during her prayers she should thank Heavenly Father things that make her happy so she said she was thankful for suckers and bananas.

I had the hiccups the other day and Eden was trying to make them go away by giving me hugs and kisses. I told Eden they were gone and she said, "And I'm not even a doctor!"

Eden told me she was going to her room to put on a sweater because she was a little bit sweaty.

Eden asked me out of the blue if we could make ghost cookies. I asked her why she wanted ghost cookies and she said "For Valentines Day!"

Eden is working on memorizing the First Article of Faith and when we get to the end, she informs me she "doesn't like ghost-es".

That's about all I can think of right now but there's more where those came from. Just give her time.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day

2009-02-18T15:56:00.006-06:00

Hello to all we love (and all strangers reading this blog)
February 14th has come and gone, but Valentine's Day lives on in our house. We've been celebrating it for almost a week now. Eden enjoyed the day so much she has been insisting every day this week is Valentine's Day. She keeps making me valentines and asking for candy and telling me she loves me. So for those of you that still have that Valentine spirit, here's a message from Eden:

Eden got some gummy bears and fun hair accessories for Valentine's Day.
All dressed up for church. Bea and Ernie complete every outfit.

Your Lucky Day

2009-02-18T15:52:00.004-06:00

Here's how it works: The first five people to leave me a comment get something made by me just for them. It can be anything I want, I get to choose. It can be silly or serious, edible or not, but don't plan on anything alive. There are a few rules involved (aren't there always?):

1- I make no guarantees that you will like what I make! (but hopefully you will)

2- What I create will be just for you.

3- It will be done sometime this year. That's as specific as I'm going to get.

4- You have no clue what it's going to be.

5- I reserve the right to do something extremely strange and/or silly.

The catch is that you must repost this on your blog and offer the same to the first 5 people who do the same on your blog. The first 5 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they've posted on their blog win a hand made, super creative, possibly lovely whatever in the heck I decide! And it WILL be good. Be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it!

If you leave a comment and don't repost this on your blog, I may still make you something anyways, just to be nice. That's just the kind of person I am sometimes.

Good News

2009-01-30T12:09:00.005-06:00

Well, I haven't been blogging like I wanted to but hopefully that will change now. Our computer has been really slow and just to post a blog took hours. We were having some other problems with it as well so we went out on Andy's last day off and bought a new computer. It is super fast and we're both happy to have it. So with that, I can now blog in just a few minutes.

It's been a pretty crazy month for us. Andy is doing another month in the ER, which he enjoys, but he is working crazy schedules with lots of weekends and nights working so I feel like we haven't seen him very much at all. Fortunately, today is his last day on this rotation and we get him for the whole weekend. On Monday he starts doing a Trauma rotation, which probably won't have a great schedule either, but we'll see.

Eden is growing up so fast and moved into her "big girl bed" at the beginning of the year. Her crib converts into a toddler bed and she is so proud of it. She has a new pillowcase with the Disney Princesses on it (her choice) and she loves being able to get in and out of bed by herself. She is big into painting and coloring and cooking in her kitchen (and my kitchen). She got some 'dress ups' for Christmas and loves to walk around wearing them with various hats. She talks my ear off and is really funny sometimes. I'll add some Eden-isms in this post. The list on the side isn't working out the way I wanted it to. Here are a few fun pictures from the month.

Eden climbed up on her little red table to read John Grisham while I made breakfast one morning.

Eden loves to snuggle with the cat (and Bea and Ernie of course).

Eden wearing a dress up skirt and my slippers. Silly girl!

Eden with one of her latest masterpieces. I think this one is a study in lines.

Eden's ducky slippers. Thanks Jeffi and co.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-01T12:28:00.005-06:00

Well, I didn't get to blogging in December like I thought I would. It was an extremely busy month and we have a very slow computer. Two things that don't go together. Hopefully January will be slower and we can get some more blogging done.

Andy is on the activities committee for our ward and so he helped out with planning our ward Christmas party and made sure Santa was there safe. It went really well and Eden even told us she would sit on Santa's lap and tell him what she wanted for Christmas. We really hyped Santa up so she would be excited for this. Once we got up to see Santa, Eden did not want anything to do with him and she cried when I tried to put her on his lap. Fortunately, Santa already knew what she wanted because he had been told many times at our house already.

Andy got the week of Christmas off, which was really nice, so we decided to go to Utah for a week and be with our families. The driving was long and we still don't have anything good to say about Wyoming but it was nice to have a little vacation. Eden got the "Thomas Train Set" she's been asking for, as well as a tricycle she is learning to pedal on the concrete floor of our basement.

We had a great Christmas and hope all of you did too. Now we're ready for 2009!

Happy December

2008-12-07T18:21:00.004-06:00

I realize it's been a month since my last post. Sorry about that. There wasn't a whole lot to blog about for most of the month of November. Not that I only blog when I have something interesting to say...
We had a great Thanksgiving. My parents came out to visit us and it was a lot of fun. Eden was sad to see Grammy and Grumpy (and Prince) go. She told me she wanted to go with them. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of the week, so you'll just have to take my word for it.
I'm having trouble getting pictures and videos to upload today so you'll have to be content with my promise to post things when I get a chance. Just wanted to let you all know we're still alive. I'll try to be better about blogging this month. At least until we go to Utah on the 19th....

A couple tags

2008-11-08T14:42:00.008-06:00

I have a couple different tags I've been meaning to do lately and haven't gotten around to so I thought I would take care of both on them on one post today.

Eight T.V. Shows I Love to Watch:
1. The Office
2. That's really the only show I make time to watch.
3. I don't really have anything else I love to watch on tv.
4. Sometimes we watch America's Funniest Home Videos. Eden calls it the 'Silly Show'
5. Oh, I do like to watch reruns of the Cosby Show. And Friends
6. I usually watch 'Max and Ruby' with Eden, although I wouldn't say I love it.
7. I sometimes watch football and basketball with Andy, although I wouldn't say I love it either.
8. I just remembered, I love to watch General Conference.

Eight Favorite Places to Eat:
1. My parent's house/Andy's parent's house
2. Olive Garden
3. Newman's Pasta
4. Morelia
5. Sweet Tomatoes
6. Cold Stone
7. Disneyland :)
8. Anywhere I don't have to cook!

Eight Things that Happened Yesterday:
1. I went to the library
2. I drank some yummy hot chocolate
3. I made yummy pasta for dinner with Andy's favorite biscuits
4. I started a new book
5. I got to wake up to my Eden alarm clock which goes off later than my regular alarm clock
6. Andy and I read trivia questions to each other
7. I pet the cat
8. I ate 2 Little Debbie oatmeal cream cookies

Eight Things I Look Forward To:
1. Weekends
2. Eden being potty trained
3. Christmas
4. Living in Utah
5. Bedtimes
6. Vacations
7. Monthly book club
8. Thanksgiving

Eight Things I Love About the Fall:
1. All the pretty colors of foliage
2. Cool air
3. The urge I get to buy school supplies
4. I have an increased desire to bake.
5. Sweaters
6. Turning on our fireplace
7. Snuggling up with a good book
8. Soup and fresh bread

Eight Things on My Wish List:
1. More time to scrapbook and sew
2. A non-primary calling
3. A baby
4. A new wardrobe
5. A finished basement
6. A piano
7. A nice tropical vacation
8. I want to live in Sleeping Beauty's castle in Disneyland

For my other tag, I was to open my fourth picture folder and post the 4th picture in that folder. Here it is: This is Eden and "Grendpeppy" Bruce at the Betty Ford Memorial Gardens, which is next to the Gerald Ford birthsite in Omaha. We took it this past July.

I tag anyone who feels like doing either of these things.

Cookie, Cookie, Cookie starts with C

2008-11-06T22:04:00.004-06:00

Last week we had an evening where we were all home and had nowhere to go. We decided cookie dough sounded really yummy and if there was leftover, we could make some cookies. Eden had a new cute apron Grammy made for her and I had a new cute apron Grammy made to match Eden's and Andy had a fairly new apron Grammy made for him to BBQ in so we donned our aprons and broke out the mixer (and the camera).

Eden loves to stand on a stool and help me do things in the kitchen. This is usually not helpful to me, but she loves it. She helped me scoop out all the dry ingredients and insisted on licking her finger to taste them all (it turns out she's not a fan of baking soda). She wanted her turn to crack an egg into the bowl (or as she says, "Bang it on the table and squish it in the bowl- which is exactly what she did). Then Andy and I picked egg shell out of the batter.

After that she got bored and decided to do her second favorite thing in the kitchen- wipe things off. She wiped off the counters and the floor and the table and me and the cat...

Once we were ready to pour the chocolate chips in, she was interested again. It was time to snitch cookie dough! She pulls it right off the mixer. You may notice the two packages of cookies in the background of this picture. Those cookies aren't homemade. It's totally different.

The dough turned out great. Oh, the cookies did too. Even with all our dough tasting we ended up with about 50 cookies. And sadly, they're about all gone. Good things never last...

Halloween Night

2008-11-01T22:21:00.009-05:00

It's been a little while since we posted, but we're back online again and I have a few posts to do in the next few days. To begin with: Halloween. Eden wanted to dress up like Olivia, a pig from one of her favorite books. She didn't go for the pig snout and ears but she still looks adorable. I thought it turned out really well. Thanks again, Grammy, for making her cute dress. It was a big hit. For those of you who have read the Olivia books, you can kind of get an idea what Eden's personality is like. And she does know at least 40 Very Loud Songs.

We weren't sure how Eden would take to trick or treating so we talked about it for a few days in advance so we could prepare her. She was so excited when Halloween actually came she spent all day asking when she could go trick or treating. She ran up to every house we visited and held out her bag for candy and always said 'Thank you'. Then she would run up to us and tell us she wanted to go to another house. We were out for about an hour and she raked in the candy. She didn't want to take her dress off last night and she was disappointed when we told her we couldn't go again today. By the way, does anyone know how to get a two year old off a sugar high? She's been buzzing all day.

On another note, we finally got some furniture for our living room. We actually got it about a month ago but I just took the pictures. Here's our sofa and part of the love seat. We don't have pictures hanging up yet or a coffee table, but for those of you who wanted to see them, here they are. They aren't quite as pink as they look in the pictures. We're really happy to have them.

In Our Kitchen

2008-10-12T18:19:00.005-05:00

Our kitchen is one of the main areas of our house and a lot of stuff happens in there. Here's what's been going on in our kitchen this week:

Eden decided to feed the cat. By herself. She's very independent. It's very messy sometimes. Oh, and just so you don't wonder, the "beer" you can see in the upper left corner of this picture is actually "root beer". So don't worry...

The Suspect

The Crime (with the victim, who is getting fat)

While we talked about the letter D this week, Eden became aware of doughnuts and wanted to try one. So this is what we had for breakfast Saturday morning. YUMMY!

If you didn't already know, I babysit for some friends of ours during the day (Brian and Yohanna Vernon for those of you who know them). Sweet Mia is so fun to watch and Eden loves to play with her. The other day she got Mia to laugh and I grabbed the camera to see if I could catch some of the giggles on tape. What cute little girls!

Yesterday I baked a pie. Razzleberry, fresh out of the oven with whipped cream melting all over the top. VERY YUMMY. In fact, I think I'll go have some leftovers. Hope you all have a great week in your kitchens!

3 Confessions... maybe 4

2008-09-25T21:12:00.007-05:00

1. I might have recently watched the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Wait! that's not the confession part!) movie for the first time. And I might have cried in it. But just once. or maybe two little times.

2. I don't like the song I am a Child of God. Gasp! I realize I may be the only person in the world who feels this way. I don't think this makes me a bad person. I just realized after about the 9,000th time I had played in in primary that I find the music a little boring. And overdone. But I still taught it to Eden and when she sings it, I don't mind.

3. I also watched the Land Before Time a few years ago and I cried in it too. (that's two confessions in one!) But to save some face, I will say I have not seen any of the sequels to the Land Before Time. What are they up to now, 15?

4. I have an irrational fear of refrigerator biscuits. You know the ones I'm talking about- they're cans that have paper on the outside you twist off and they 'pop' open and you get the dough to make biscuits and breadsticks and stuff. Who came up with that idea? I cannot open things that I know are going to blow up in my face. I've tried and I just can't do it. Don't get me wrong, I still buy them. But I only use them when Andy is home to open them. I think he finds it an endearing quality of mine. Well, I hope so anyway.

Look at that. 5 confesssions. I feel so much better. You should try it too. Especially YOU, Candice, Katie, Courtney, Mandy and Jessie :) Five confessions, five people. Speaking of five...
Eden loves headbands. Today she was wearing 5 of them. The only way I could get her to let me take her picture is I promised her I would post it on the blog. Here you go Eden.

Look out world! Eden is TWO!

2008-09-17T21:29:00.024-05:00

Eden had her second birthday on Tuesday and we decided to take her to the zoo for the day. We had heard Omaha has a really really good zoo and we wanted to check it out. It was a lot of fun and we ended up spending more time there than we were expecting to. We were all pretty worn out by the time we got to the car to head home but it was worth the trip. Eden loved all the animals and had a lot of fun. Here are some of the neat things we saw at the zoo.

In the Jungle

If you are interested, you can go to the Omaha Zoo website and find a webcam to watch these penguins play. They were a lot of fun.

The zoo has a lot of different gorillas to look at. Eden liked the "gorilla-la's" a lot but they were moving a lot and I had a hard time getting a picture of one. WE were sitting on a bench resting by an outdoor cage with a gorilla and when we weren't looking, he came right up behind us and startled us. I didn't get a good picture before he left, but you can see how big he is. It was pretty cool. I think he liked Eden. That's the gorilla on the left. :)

Eden is TWO: Part 2

2008-09-17T21:29:00.022-05:00

Every time we asked Eden what she wanted for her birthday, she would say, "Balloons, cake, hats, balloons, cupcakes, balloons..." so we surprised her in the morning with balloons all over her chair and the stairs and the floor. We also baked her a cake with pink frosting and what she calls "sparkles" all over it (they're flower shaped sprinkles). We got party hats with "Doa d'Sploa" on them (translation: Dora the Explorer). I guess we could have stopped there and she would have been happy. However, she's our sweet little girl and we couldn't help spoiling her a little bit more. Every gift was a hit (and thanks to the relatives for helping spoil her) but the icing on the cake, so to speak, was her own little kitchen (which I don't have a good picture of right now). She got some food to go with it and I gave her the dishes I had used in my kitchen when I was a little girl (which are amazingly all still intact and are not missing any pieces, despite them being 25 years old). She loves to play with it and I've been fed more "meals" today than I can count. It keeps her quiet and entertained. I think I'm going to enjoy this kitchen as much as she does.
She's still our Eden girl. We tried to take her milestone picture and these are what we got:

We love our Eden girl! There's never a dull moment at our house, thanks to her. Every day is fun and we're so glad she's a part of our family. What would we do without our sweetheart?

Eden Sings

2008-09-17T21:29:00.005-05:00

A few weeks ago I took this video of Eden singing and forgot to post it on the blog. She is starting to learn how to carry a tune and it's fun to listen to her. She spent a good portion of this Sunday singing this song. Eden loves nursery in our ward and each week they sing this song to get singing time started. They name all the kids in the nursery and Eden talks about some the kids now that she knows their names. It's pretty clear but in case you don't understand, here's the transcript:

Heeere we are together in our nursery

There's Jenna and Destiny and.... Eden

Heeere we are together in our nursery

September 11- A Remembrance

2008-09-11T16:06:00.008-05:00

Today is that fateful day when people put their flags at half mast in remembrance of things past. That's right. 29 years ago today, Andy was born. Happy Birthday Sweetie! Andy took a vacation day today so he could stay home from work, but he had a conference to go to until 1pm anyway. We're happy to have him home this afternoon and evening. He' s such a great guy he stayed up until 10:00 last night baking cookies to take to work for his birthday.

I just have to take a moment and brag about what a great guy Andy is. He's funny and sweet and patient and kind. He's a great daddy and Eden loves to be with him. He puts his all into everything he does. He loves his job and is hard working and honest. He's strong, but gentle. He's a worthy priesthood holder and a great family man. He's an excellent bug squasher and he never complains when I have odd jobs for him to do. He takes care of me when I'm sick (like right now) and is always thinking about others. He's always willing to sacrifice what he wants for what others want. He knows when to be serious and when to have fun and I always love to be around him. This list could go on and on. How did I get to be lucky enough to get him to fall in love with me? I'll never know, but I'm glad he did! Happy Birthday!

Curly Shirley

2008-08-25T15:28:00.006-05:00

Eden had her hair in twisty pigtails the other day and when we took them out at night her hair was curly. It looked so cute I had to take some pictures. Eden calls herself Curly Shirley when she sees herself like this. I can't believe how old she looks in these pictures (especially the second one). I can hardly believe she isn't even two yet!

For those of you who always ask what funny things Eden has said lately (and you know I can never remember them all) I have created a list of Eden-isms on the right side of the blog. I'll try to keep it updated with the latest quotes from our wee one. There's never a dull moment when she's around.

Car Wash

2008-08-22T15:16:00.006-05:00

I've had a few people ask me to post more pictures of our house so I took a couple pictures last weekend while Andy and Eden were washing the car. Eden proved to be more fun to take pictures of so I ended up with more pictures of her than of the house. She was also a challenge because if I got close enough, she tried to get me wet. I should have put her in her swimsuit for this endeavor...

Anyhow, I got a few pictures of the house too. I realized I didn't take any pictures inside the house though. Those will have to wait for another post. Back in June while I was in Utah we had a HUGE storm blow through Omaha. Andy was at home that day and called to tell me about it right after it happened and I'm SO glad I wasn't here for it. Our bishop said he's lived here for 11 years and that was the worst storm he's seen so it's comforting to know that isn't normal weather. I don't believe it was an actual tornado, but it blew over fences and power lines and stop lights and flooded our neighborhood. It also hailed really hard. We live on a bit of a hill so we didn't have anyone in front of us or behind us for shelter. We had all the screens on the back of our house ripped from the windows and the hail broke one of the basement windows. We also had the hail punch holes in the framing around the windows. It also did some damage to our roof and slid our a/c unit off it's pad and damaged the side of it. A lot of other houses had even more damage, so we're thankful that this is all we had to deal with. If you look at the pictures from the back of our house, you can see our screens hanging off some of the windows. We're in the process of getting everything put back together. Thankfully our home owners insurance will cover most of the damage, but it is still crazy to think our house isn't even a year old and it is getting a new roof and new windows. Gotta love the Midwest!

Do you want milk or water? Ummm, juice.

2008-08-09T17:00:00.008-05:00

Something Eden said back in December. It's still funny.

One of the many things we really love about Eden is how funny she is. Some of this is unintentional. However, she really has a sense of humor and she knows when she's being funny. These pictures were taken back in May. We were eating at Culver's one day (mmmmm.... frozen custard :) and she was in one of her silly moods so she started making every face she knows to get us to laugh. Andy's parents and my mom were there too and she had us all laughing for quite a while. Fortunately, Sha-sha had her camera and snapped some pictures. She still makes faces like this once in a while but she's already moved on to bigger and better things so I'm glad we captured this moment.

You'll notice the lovely 'hairstyle' she's sporting. This is a common look for Eden. We call it "I had pigtails earlier today, but I pulled them out." I think she does it on purpose, just because she knows it enhances the goofy factor.

Enjoy :)

Okay, and I had to throw this one in too. We've trained her well. Any time she sees the U emblem, she yells "GO UTES!" We're so proud.

More about Utah

2008-08-04T15:00:00.008-05:00

We took Eden to Wheeler Farm in June with the Craven Clan (minus Kevin, Scotty and Ben) and she really had fun. She loved feeding the ducks and looking at all the animals. We went on a ride in a trailer being pulled by a tractor (I think they called it a hay ride, but I didn't see any hay). Eden wore her pig tails special that day but we didn't see any pigs (they were all sleeping in their house). Luckily, all the other animals were being quite social. Eden liked the treehouse and we had a hard time getting her out of it. It was a fun afternoon for her.

Riding on the saddle

Peeking through the treehouse window

More to come...

Back and ready to blog!

2008-07-28T21:56:00.005-05:00

It's been a long time. But we're back. We've spent quite a while in Utah visiting with family and friends and it's been a lot of fun. I took a lot of pictures, which I will blog about over the next few days. The computer is running slow tonight (and so am I) so I'll just start with a few pictures.

The main reason for the vacation: Family! Eden loved spending time with her cousins.

The Craven Family cousins: Abbie, Lexi, Sammy and Eden

Sometimes they got a little silly.

Eden's first french braids. Grandma Sha-sha was patient enough to put them in while Eden watched SuperWhy. They only lasted about 15 minutes, but she looked so cute while it lasted.

Tag with non-related picture

2008-07-02T19:42:00.005-05:00

So, I'm in Utah and I haven't blogged for a long time. I plan on doing a lot of blogging when I get back to Omaha and I can get my pictures to load onto my computer. However, I have been tagged by a lot of people lately (all the same tag too) so I am going to answer the tag so that people know I am still alive. If you're a relative or friend who doesn't care about this, just ignore it.

Five things on my to do list:

Enjoy the rest of vacation
Go back to Omaha
Download some pictures and blog
Finish some books I am working on
Start up family scripture study again (cuz it's been a while...)

Places I have lived:

Salt Lake City UT
Midvale UT
Wauwatosa WI
Milwaukee WI
Omaha NE

I don't have any recent pictures but blogs without pictures are boring so here is a picture from last summer for your viewing enjoyment.

Why I didn't blog last week

2008-05-29T13:50:00.011-05:00

Another grad pic because I'm a proud wiffey :)

We were moving into the house, but I also was having too much fun doing things with the family (not that I only blog when I'm bored, but my family doesn't come out to visit that often). We took a day trip and went to Winter Quarters (which is only about 20 minutes away) and went through the visitors center. It was pouring rain so we didn't walk through the old cemetary they have or get up close to the temple but it was still a nice experience.

Eden is more than willing to push a handcart. What a good pioneer!

One of the highlights of the trip for me was seeing the piano Victor Borge donated to the museum. It was his first piano and also one of his favorites. Don't know who Victor Borge is (well, was)? Shame on you! Go to the library and get a video of him! Go Now! Hurry. He's so funny. It will make your day.
The whole trip was really interesting. The drive was pretty and when we got home my dad made refurgefuripheth. Okay, he made red pudding with cream but in Danish, I swear that's how it sounds. Fortunately, it tastes better than it sounds....

Hubba hubba!

Dr. Craven, MD (and other things)

2008-05-27T13:21:00.010-05:00

I know I haven't blogged for over three weeks but hopefully we've had a good excuse. Or a lot of good excuses. Here's an update of what's been going on since our last blog.

The biggest news is that Andy GRADUATED! My mom came out to visit/help and Andy's parents were also here for a couple days and we went to the commencement exercises on May 16 (thanks again Browns for taking Eden to the zoo. We already really miss you). The ceremony was really nice and Andy walked out with that really really expensive piece of paper we've been waiting on for four years. I'm really proud of him for all the hard work and dedication he has put into med school and I know he's going to be a great doctor. Thanks to Christina for taking this great picture of Andy and our other graduating friends. You're the best. To see more graduation pics you can go to Tina's blog here.

The day after graduation we packed up a large Penske truck to move to Omaha where Andy is going to do his residency in Emergency Medicine at UNMC. I don't know what I would have done if my mom and Marcia and Bruce weren't there to help out. They were all so willing to watch Eden and help with the final packing. Eden really wanted to drive the moving truck and was so excited when we let her sit behind the wheel.

We got to Omaha Sunday night and the next morning we did our final walk through and then closed on our house. That was quite a nerve-wracking and exciting moment all rolled into one. We had some of the elders from our new ward came over to help us move in and they were very helpful. That evening my dad and my sister came out to see the new house and help us unpack. Eden got to be the center of attention for the next few days and she is really missing them all.

Andy was grilling some chicken for dinner out on the deck a couple days after we moved in. He set up a camp chair and was drinking a soda when Eden came out. She wanted a chair just like him and after he got it, she asked for her drink as well. She is such a little daddy's girl. It's so cute to see her growing up.

We live just a few minutes away from our church now, which is very nice because we used to live about 20 minutes away. This church only has one nursery with 4 or 5 other little girls in it so I think Eden will have a good time once she gets used to it. Here's a picture of our little ham on Sunday.

So now we're pretty much moved in. We still have a few boxes that aren't totally unpacked but I think we're getting back into the swing of things. Eden loves the new house and has been very busy exploring everything and running around in all the space she has now. We're going to be going out to Utah on Friday so we may not post again for a few weeks after that, but I'll try to post again before we leave. It's been a busy month. We're all a little worn out!

Our Flying Ace

2008-05-05T16:13:00.005-05:00

This past week has been pretty busy for us. We've been trying to squeeze in a few last things before we move and we've started packing up boxes in preparation for the move. On Saturday we went to the zoo with the Browns and the kids had a really good time. It was pouring rain but they didn't seem to mind much. Eden loved the elephants and the "gorillallas". However, she was equally fascinated with the seagulls and the ducks so I'm not sure why we pay money to take her to the zoo. By the time we left, the rain was really coming down hard and both Eden and Alex were pretty soaked, but still having fun.

We also went to Oshkosh this week to go to the EAA air museum. It was quite interesting as well. Eden loved to run around and tell us the colors on all the planes. They have a kids area with some different activities for kids to enjoy and Eden loved it. She got to sit in the cockpit of an F22 that has lots of lit up buttons and switches and it makes noise. She was just in heaven. She spent so much time pushing buttons and pulling levers and saying "Eight, Nine, Ten, ZOOM!" She asks us all the time if she can drive the car and we say no, but I guess flying airplanes is okay. We could have left her in the cockpit and gone through the rest of the museum and I don't think she would have noticed we were gone. So if you want ideas for her birthday, an F22 would be a good idea. Do you know where we could buy one, Brian?

Pilgrimage to Mecca

2008-04-30T10:47:00.006-05:00

Well, I know that Jill usually is the one to run this blog, but on the off chance that there are some people that want to see what we do other than with Eden, I will tell of one such adventure... My friend, Micah, and I have been talking about making the trip down to Chicago to see a baseball game at Wrigley Field since we moved here almost four years ago. We finally buckled down and did it. (How can you live so close to such a historic place and not visit it at least once?) So, we found a nice afternoon game and went down for the day. It ended up being a great day even though there was a 50% of rain. I just wish that the ivy would have been growing so that the wall would have been green instead of a bunch of dead-looking twigs.

We had tons of fun. We had loud and abnoxious Met fans on our left and a couple that couldn't keep their hands off of each other the whole time on our right. Micah even got beer sloshed on him. The Cubs beat the Mets 8-1 much to the dismay of our fellow row mates. If any of you get the chance to catch a game at Wrigley, I would highly recommend it. It is a great experience, even if you don't like the Cubs!!

Here's Stinkerbell

2008-04-28T20:31:00.005-05:00

Eden loves to eat spaghetti. She's really patient about it too (a trait she is severely lacking most of the time). She'll spend an hour picking up one noodle at a time and putting it in her mouth. The problem is, by the time she is almost done, she is getting tired and she rubs her eyes. And her cheeks. And sometimes she twirls her hair. This is the end result.

I've been doing patty-cake with her since she was just a baby and last week she started saying it all by herself. It was really cute so we had to get a video. Once again, the sound is pretty quiet and you have to turn it way up but it is fun to hear. What a smarty she can be.

We sure are going to miss being so close to the lake here. It is fun to go down during the summer because there is so much to do. We won't miss all of the snow that it brings in the winter though. This picture was taken this past week on one of the few nice days that we have had. We went to the art museum and then went to the lake so that Eden could "run around outside." This is currently her favorite thing to do and ask to do it every five minutes or so.

Weekend Fun

2008-04-22T11:22:00.010-05:00

I know, it's been a whole week since my last post, but we've been busy doing things to blog about. We have been living in Wisconsin for almost 4 years now and we had never ventured to the Dells or to Madison so we decided to take a trip this past weekend with our friends the Browns. Our first stop was to Madison to look at the state capitol building and go to the zoo. Eden had a lot of fun looking at the otters and we all got rained on, which Eden also thought was fun.

After that we headed up to the Dells. If you've never heard of Wisconsin Dells, it is the Waterpark Capitol of the World. I'm probably not the only one who finds it strange that this title goes to a city in the middle of Wisconsin, but there you have it. They have probably at least 20 big resort/hotels with indoor and outdoor waterparks and some of them are pretty elaborate. We stayed at the Polynesian and had a good time. It took Eden a while to warm up to the water but she did eventually get in and play and splash. She loved the big toys that had steering wheels.

Andy and Matt had a lot of fun going down the waterslides and seeing how wet they could get the lifeguards. I think they may have regressed about 15 years, but they had a good time too. We put Alex and Eden's pack and plays next to each other at night and they stayed up past 10:00 playing together. Alex would get down low and then jump up and say 'Peek' to Eden and she would laugh and then Eden would hold out her hand and say 'Gimme Five' and Alex would give her five and laugh. It was so fun to see them playing together. They sure are going to miss each other when we move.

We also ate lunch one day at a really good place in the dells called Moosejaw Lodge. They have excellent pizza and homemade root beer. Also, they have lots of antlers.

We finished off the trip with a stop at Circus World, the original winter quarters of the Ringling Bros./Barnum & Bailey Circus. It was fun to look around at all the circus stuff they have. It would have been fun to go during 'the season' because they do circus performances but we still had a pretty good time. The weather was beautiful and warm. You can see Eden hollering in this picture. This is how Eden acted during most of the time we were at the museum. We were about ready to close the door on her and leave her in there. Well, not really....

Despite the way she looks, we all had a really fun weekend. It was fun to do a last hurrah with the Browns before we go to Omaha and they go to Houston. We're so glad we have them as our friends.

Butterflies!

2008-04-15T11:06:00.007-05:00

Yesterday was a nice day outside (finally!) so we decided to go downtown to the Milwaukee Public Museum. We hadn't been there before and it was something we wanted to do before we moved. Eden was pretty good through most of the museum. She wasn't too thrilled with looking at pottery and armor but she did like the dioramas with animals. Our main problem was keeping her in the stroller or close to us. She kept trying to run away.

By far, Eden's favorite thing at the museum was the butterflies. They have a room filled with live butterflies that you can go in and walk around. There are tons of butterflies flying all over the room and landing on plants and fingers. She loved watching them fly around and she would hold out her finger for them and try to touch them. We stayed in the room until we were all sticky and sweaty (they keep the humidity at around 80%) and then we had to get some fresh air. Eden cried when we left so we told her we would go back after we saw the rest of the museum. We snapped lots of pictures and took a video too. She was just enthralled.

I love this picture of Eden. She is watching the butterflies and she just looks so sweet and happy. At her age, everything is interesting and new. Butterflies are something she had never encountered before and she was amazed. It was fun to see her discover something new. It's one of my favorite parts of being a parent.

Eden says, "Yay for butterflies!"

Some Pictures

2008-04-12T17:15:00.006-05:00

We haven't been able to get very many pictures of Eden lately because she won't hold still long enough. It seems like the camera gives her extra energy. It's not that she runs away when we try to take her picture. She usually runs toward the camera and I end up taking a picture of her stomach. However, I know her adoring fans (aka relatives) are going through withdrawls so we've managed to get a couple of pictures of her. For those of you who have heard about her excited face but haven't seen it, this is a pretty good shot of it.

Eden wakes us up every morning by opening her door and yelling for us. I wake up to her sweet voice yelling (and I mean yelling) "Mama... Daddy....GIT UP!" And if we don't get up right away, she uses our first names. "Jiiillll..... GIT UP!" She means business. It's so funny to hear that I have to admit I occasionally stay in bed just to hear her yelling for a minute.

She's also been singing lots of songs lately and one of her favorite songs to sing is the alphabet. I managed to pin her down the other day and get her to sing the ABC's for me. You have to turn the sound up pretty loud to hear her because she prefers to whisper the song, but it's pretty cute. I think you can also hear me telling her I'll give her a treat if she sings. We're not above bribery in this house.

Calling All Super Readers

2008-04-07T11:29:00.003-05:00

I just finished a book that was really good, which is something that doesn't happen as often as I wish it did. It was called 'The Eight' by Katherine Neville. It's a sort of Indiana Jones/Robert Langdon story except the main character is a woman (and overall I don't think it's quite as violent and gory). Anyway, the main reason I bring this up is because I finished it and now I need something else good to read. I have a book list a mile long but nothing on it sounds good at the moment or I can't find it at the library. So tell me what to read next! What do you like?

Oh, I also recently read a book called 'Portrait of an Unknown Woman' and that was really good too. So now you have two new books to read. Leave me a comment! What should I read?

Home Sweet Home

2008-04-04T12:10:00.005-05:00

It's been a week since the last post but we haven't fallen off the face of the earth. We were just in Omaha (close, but not the same). We figured if we are going to be living there, we should probably find a place to live. We had a good time and are thankful to the Vernons for letting us stay with them. House shopping in Omaha (Split-level Capitol of the World) was quite an adventure, especially for us ranch-style people. After 5 days of looking, we did find a house that we really love that actually has rooms at entry level. We were hoping to find a house that was fairly new and in good condition but we ended up getting a house that is brand new. It was just finished a few weeks ago and is ready and waiting for us to move in. It's a pretty two story house (they call the outside color 'Harvest Wheat' but I think 'Dead Grass' is more appropriate.). We're hoping it looks better when the grass is green...

The kitchen has a dishwasher, which I am really excited about and it also has a double garage which I'm sure Andy is excited about. We feel really blessed to find this house and we can't wait for six more weeks until we can move in! Some of you have already asked for pictures so here's a few. These pictures in no way excuse you from visiting us to see the rest of the house. We are up on a hill and will have beautiful sunsets from our deck so you need to come and see that. Also, I am decoration impared so those of you that have style are welcom to give me some tips on what to do with all these bare walls!

2008-03-28T10:51:00.006-05:00

I've been tagged with the 123 book tag! I can't resist posting anything about books so here I go:

Here are the rules:
*Find the book closest to you with at least 123 pages.*Turn to page 123.
*Find the fifth sentence.*Post the next 3 sentences.

"Like Lily, there were certain things I found hard to face on an empty stomach, and Con Ed was one of them. La Galette was the local French bistro, half a block from my apartment at the end of Tudor Place. It had checkered tablecloths and pink geraniums in pots." From 'The Eight' by Katherine Neville. So far, it's a pretty good book. And I'm sure after reading those lines, you are just dying to read it too.

I tag Stephanie B., Stephanie S. and any other people who read this blog and are named Stephanie. :)

Speaking of tags, picture of the day is Eden when she was just a couple minutes old. Obviously this is before they removed her tag.

Under penalty of law, this tag is not to be removed except by consumer. 100% Baby. Hand wash warm, towel dry. Do not iron.

Did your baby come with a tag?

Random Photos from the week

2008-03-24T10:35:00.008-05:00

Well, we have had a busy week going on, what with finding out we are moving to Nebraska and all that. Eden had a doctor's appointment on Monday and she weighs in at 26 pounds 9 oz. which is in the 80% for weight and she is 33 inches long which is in the 85% for height. So we know we aren't starving her despite the fact that she is always asking to eat. And now I know why my arms are always sore after I've been lugging her around. Her doctor was also impressed that she knows all her letters and they had a nice little discussion about Ernie vs. Elmo. It was all going well until the doctor took her diaper off and then wanted to poke her belly and look in her mouth and nose. It all went downhill from there and Dr. Wegner is probably glad we're moving and won't have to see Eden again.
So far Andy's residency is treating us very well. Andy got a call from the program director just a few hours after we got home on Match Day to welcome him to the program. The next day we (okay, Andy,) got a big 'candy bouquet' delivered from a florist shop that was from the ER residency program in Omaha. He's also gotten at least one email from them as well. It makes us feel good to know that they are excited to work with us because we are excited to be there.

As far as the other pictures go, Eden loves her Ernie and the other night she decided she needed to change his diaper and got all set up to do it with stuff she pulled out of her diaper bag. She was even thoughtful enough to put down the changing pad first. She hardly shows any interest in the baby doll she got for her birthday, but she's a great mommy to Ernie. She even takes him for rides in her little car.

The Easter bunny came to our house yesterday morning and Eden thought that was really cool. She got another Pez dispenser, which she loves (and please don't tell her they come with candy) and a little book about a duck. She also got her very first Peeps (to share with mommy). So we had to take a picture of her first peep experience. She loves them and she keeps asking for "more marshmallow rabbits". She also looked super cute in her Easter outfit. She looked nice and springy. Too bad there are 18 inches of snow outside.

Eden also gave herself a new nickname this week. I told her she was a stinker for not taking a nap and when I told her to tell daddy what she is, she said "Stinkerbell". So Stinkerbell she became. She makes me laugh so much. I don't know what I did before she came around.

Residency!

2008-03-20T13:39:00.005-05:00

Well, after numerous sleepless nights, we have finally found out where we are committing the next 3 years of our lives. Today was Match Day at the med school. It was fun to go and see where we are going and where all of our friends are going. Andy matched at the University of Nebraska in Omaha in the Emergency Medicine program. We're really excited to go there. The program is really nice and although we didn't make it to Utah, we got closer. We're going to continue to miss being close to our families but we're excited to start this new adventure! Look out Omaha, here we come!

Our Big Girl

2008-03-17T12:37:00.010-05:00

Yesterday Eden turned 18 months old. I can't believe how fast the past year and a half has gone. It seems like Eden is still al little baby but she isn't anymore. In a way it is sad to see her growing up so fast, but it is so fun to see her learning and growing each day. She continually amazes me with things she knows and says. Every day with her is a new adventure. The most exciting part of being 18 months is that Eden got to go to nursery yesterday. She seemed a little hesitant when I dropped her off but once they brought out the toys she was enthralled and she hardly noticed when I left. When I picked her up after church she didn't want to leave. She talked about nursery the whole way home and told me what she had done. Then she asked to go again next week. It was a success! Now we're both happier in church!

Here's a little trip down memory lane...

Ode to Bea

2008-03-12T11:04:00.010-05:00

We have a history of pink blankets in my family. Each one had it's own special name, from Blankie to Pinky the 'Loved. Eden got her blanket from aunt Jeffi for Christmas in 2006 and was excited from the get go. She named it Bea and she loves it so much I had to do a post about it.

Bea is always there for nap time and bedtime and any time Eden is feeling sad. She's supposed to leave Bea in the crib (or at least her bedroom) but lately she's been sneaking Bea out of the room to cuddle. She tried to smuggle Bea to church with her last Sunday. We have a Mini Bea to take around with us but it just isn't quite the same.
Eden gets worried every time Bea has to take a 'bath' and she asks about her constantly while she is in the washer and dryer. Fortunately, there is always a happy reunion when she is done, and just like Eden, she is cleaner and softer and smells better. What would we do without Bea?

Miss Potato Head does a Sommersault

2008-03-10T11:26:00.006-05:00

Yesterday we had mashed potatoes for dinner. Eden is usually a pretty tidy eater but we looked over at her and this is what we saw:

I don't know why she felt the need to smash dinner onto her forehead but she acted like nothing was wrong. It was funny but we were trying not to laugh because we don't want to encourage this. Taking pictures probably didn't help. She had crunchy hair for the rest of the night.

She also learned how to do a sommersault this week. She's been practicing for a while and she finally was able to do it without help from us. We're so proud. She's obviously proud of herself too.

On another note- we found out this winter is the fourth worst winter Milwaukee has had since they started keeping records. We've had over 85 inches of snow. So far. With more on the way. We're accepting offers for tropic vacations.

Always winter and never Christmas

2008-03-07T10:27:00.007-06:00

I really shouldn't be complaining today because the sun is out but I'm really sick of winter. I feel like we live in pre-Aslan Narnia. I'm so tired of ice and snow. And right now, I'm really really hoping we are not going to go to Minnesota for residency. I don't think I could handle their winters right now. I don't have a good wintery picture that is recent but I found this one from last winter. Eden isn't as enthusiastic about going out this winter. She doesn't like her coat. So we stay inside a lot. I don't like being cold.

The big news from WI right now is that Brett Favre is FINALLY retiring. He's been promising to do it for a while now. This is a HUGE deal to 99.9% of the people in Wisconsin. Out here the Packers are a religion and Favre seems to be their god. It's really pretty sad. The local news channels have even interviewed grief counselors to help the fans through this time. Seriously. Nothing more to say on that, except to say, GO 49ers!

This week I found out that Eden knows all her letters. She's learning behind my back again. She also tried to get out of going to bed by saying she had to go potty. We didn't buy it.

She's such a hoot.

How to Dress (or not to) and Major Accomplishments

2008-03-03T11:12:00.002-06:00

Eden loves beads. They're sparkly and they swing when she walks. They're also fun to put on and take off over and over again. She has accessorizing down to an art form. She is rarely without her jewelry on and it is the first thing she asks for after naps. Clothing seems to be optional, but accessories are a necessity.

Big Accomplishment #1

Eden has enough hair for pigtails. Not just little ones on top like whale spouts, but pigtails that involve all her hair. This is a big deal. Partly because that means she is outgrowing her mullet but mostly because it makes her about 10 times cuter than she already was. Her cuteness factor is off the charts. I just can't say no to her now. Well, usually.

Big Accomplishment #2

Walking. She's been decidedly against it for the last 16 1/2 months but then she decided it was okay after all. So now she doesn't stop moving. Ring around the Rosies all the time. She tells me she wants to run around. She pushes the stroller through the library (I wish I could get in and relax). The video highlights 3 things she loves:

Walking (Especially "Rosies")

Her Bea (and she loves big pink Bea even more than yellow Mini Bea)

Her books (you see them spread all over the floor behind her)

You can also hear her say her name at the end "Eda Crava"

Various other accomplishments include saying nursery rhymes with me, singing songs and learning the alphabet (she knows well over half the letters now). Pretty soon she'll be reading to me!

Blog the First

2008-02-26T10:25:00.000-06:00

Well, here we are. Finally jumping on the bandwagon and ready to blog away! I'm always keeping up with others on their blogs and so I thought I 'd better make my own for any of you who want to keep up with us. I'm not particularly computer savvy and I don't claim to be a great writer but hopefully this will turn out okay. This is just a site to keep you updated on what is going on with us or whatever is on my mind (and of course pictures of Eden). Hopefully I'll be better about updating this than I am at sending emails.

If you have any helpful tips on how to blog I'd love to hear them. I'm still trying to figure out how to post pictures :)

If you have a blog and I don't know about it- tell me!