Aunt Hillie

We've always thought that Sophie looked a little like my sister Hilary when she was a baby. We grabbed a picture off the shelf of Hilary when she was 10 months old and held it next to Sophie.

Wow.

Facebook

There are reasons why you shouldn't be on the Internet late at night. For some it's porn, others it's online shopping. For me, it's signing up on websites. I was up late blogging last night and started to wander around. The next thing I knew I was signed up for Facebook. Oh great, like I don't already have enough online to keep me busy!

I tried the MySpace thing for a while, but I thought it was lame. Facebook seems to be more tame and no one's profile is public, which is nice. I even let it search my gmail address book. Little did I know almost all of my friends are already on Facebook. I feel like the last one to walk into a party.

That's all.

Progress Report

A lot has happened in the past two days. In an attempt to keep this post as skim-able as possible, I've broken it down into sections.

Well, except for this part. I should probably explain that we're not in California right now. Steve has a break from school and has to put in some days with the National Guard in Utah. We flew to Salt Lake Monday night, stayed with my grandparents, then Sophie and I took off for Idaho Tuesday morning. Steve will hopefully be up here tomorrow.

The Trip to Utah: C-

Report:

• Because I got a cold the day before we left, my ears didn't pop the whole time and my head felt like it was going to explode.
• Sophie was squirmy and didn't sleep the whole flight, although it was way past her bedtime.
• Our suitcase was searched by security, who was nice enough to lock it up when they finished. That would have been fine except we didn't have it locked in the first place. We've never used the keys. In fact, they're still attached to the inside of the suitcase. My grandpa, who's a locksmith, couldn't even get it open, so we had to resort to drilling the lock out.
• Didn't make it to bed until midnight because my contact solution was in said suitcase.
  

Grandpa and Steve drilling in to save my captive belongings. Yes, only my stuff was in there.

Why it's not an D:

• Sophie didn't make a scene on the airplane, and we all arrived safely.
• The suitcase is still usable despite the big, nasty hole in the top.
  

My Trip to the Dentist: A+

Report:

• I hadn't been to the dentist in two years. That plus having a baby made me expect a mouth full of cavities, hours of drilling and depletion of funds. Much to my surprise, I didn't have a single cavity.
• My hygienist was great. We had some good laughs, which included a story she told me about Martha Stewart trying to convince her viewers they should buy a ginormous wheel of Parmesan cheese. "It's only a thousand dollars and it will last forever!"
  
• I'd like to say that I have impeccable oral hygiene, but the truth is, I really don't floss that often (ew, I know), and I owe much to this little guy down here. I've been using him for three years now, and is probably the best Christmas present I have ever gotten.

Health of the Household: C

Report:

• My mom is recovering from a sinus infection.
• I'm recovering from a stupid cold that has settled in my chest.
• My dad woke up this morning feeling icky.
• Sophie's nose is running like crazy, which could be contributed to either a cold or teething

Weather Conditions: D

I'd say this is pretty self-explanatory. Oh, and there's still a pile of snow in front of the house that's taller than me. At least we still have power.

Wow, summing it all up like that makes it look like we're not enjoying ourselves at all, which is pretty far from the truth. We love it here, and Mom and Dad are loving the time with Sophie. Oh yeah, and me.

I have some errands to run tomorrow, so I'm going to have to bundle up, put some socks on my bare feet and reintroduce my body to the weather I grew up in. California has already turned me into a pansy.

Easter

On Saturday we went to Sacramento to spend Easter with Steve's family. It was the first time I'd been there for Easter and the first time in about 9 years that Steve had been there, too.

Sophie had fun on her "egg hunt", which was basically throwing a bunch of eggs in the grass and letting her crawl around and grab them. She caught on really quickly and put them all in her basket. After she licked them all, of course.

Here are a few pics from the weekend:

Mmm. . . plastic eggs.


Putting eggs in the basket.


This is by far my most favorite picture of the weekend. She makes that face a lot lately when she's excited about something.


All dressed up for church!

Etiquette

It's never polite to crawl over someone to get where you want to go. It's a good thing little Edmund was so forgiving.

Matt and Ellen

I just realized I posted about Matt and Ellen's wedding without including a picture of Matt and Ellen. Sheesh...

Altop's on the left. Gianelli's on the right.

Wedding Weekend

Steve's best friend Matt got married in Sacramento on Saturday, and my parents came out for it, too. Matt has been a great friend of my family's since Steve and I got married. I think the time he spent on the ranch with my dad convinced him that he wants to move to Idaho. Personally, I think he just wants to ride four-wheelers. You really don't need to move to Idaho for that. Unless you want to ride for about 25 miles without seeing signs of civilization. (Dubois doesn't count.)

Anyway, here are some pics from the weekend courtesy of my dad. He's definitely the photojournalist of family occasions.

The temple ceremony was beautiful. I don't think there's one that isn't though. I love attending marriage sealings because it reminds me of when Steve and I got married and the covenants we made. Maybe that's why I always cry. :)

Nice shot of Moroni, Dad!

My family outside the temple. (My sister, Hillie, me, Steve, my dad, my mom, and Sophie-loaf.)

Sophie and her grandmas! She's still the only one on both sides until this summer, then she'll have two little cousins!

I like her face in this one.

After we got back to the Bay Area, we went halfway across the Bay Bridge and got off on Treasure Island. What's that fly doing back there? Oh wait, that's my sister.

I don't think there's anything as gorgeous around here as San Francisco and the bridges at sunset. This one's the Bay Bridge.

And here's Golden Gate!

Twelve Inches

(By the way, I'm sorry I had to turn the comment moderation back on. I kept getting comment spam.)

That bunch of hair down there is no trick. I've been wanting to chop my hair off for the past 6 months, but because I was so close to having enough for Locks of Love, I decided to stick it out until spring. (My 16-year-old cousin is recovering from cancer and had lost all of her hair at one point. That made me want to do it, too.)

I don't think I'll miss those 12 inches. Or picking it off the floor, the sink, my back, the baby, the drain. Or spending way too much time fixing it and end up pulling it back in a pony tail by 2:00 anyway. Or getting it caught in the seatbelt, the car door, my wedding ring. Need I go on?

The only redeeming quality those 12 inches had was giving me a long, bouncy ponytail. I liked that.

I threw more pics of Sophie in. Her new favorite play area is the bathroom. Notice how she bangs on the door with determination to get in. She's not fussing though... she was happy-yelling.

Chelsea, I think we're twins. I looked back at your blog because I couldn't remember how short you'd gone and we're pretty darn close to having the same hair. Haha.

And I learned from my cousin Mary that you need a kiss-face shot everytime you model new hair. So here's mine.

Snip Snip

Bums Up

Doesn't every kid have a baby picture like this? I think the three of us did as babies. Sophie finally has hers now.

Pigtails

I've been itching to put pigtails in Sophie's hair since before she was born. I finally found elastics that were small enough and decided that she finally had enough hair to make it worth while.

The first day I was lucky to get one on top of her head. She was so squirmy.

The second and third days I managed to get two in. She was a little more tolerant that time.

Wow, those pics up there look really washed out compared to this one. I was trying to be artsy, but I think I ended up making them look weird. Oh well.

A couple more updates... Sophie has finally started crawling for real. Knees and all. She still does her mermaid flopping, too. It's about half and half. Now that she's doing this, a pillow will no longer keep her from entering a room. Not even two pillows. Dang.

I got a baby gate over the weekend to keep her from wandering around the kitchen. Every time she came out, she'd have crumbs and fuzzies stuck to her hands. She even fished an AWOL binkie out from under the fridge. Ugh.

Oh and happy 200th post!

One More Giveaway

I'm doing another giveaway! I signed up for this one over a month ago, and I sort of forgot about it until last week. :)

This one is hosted by I Love Giveaways. It's a newer giveaway site organized by an incredibly nice woman named Robyn. This one won't have nearly the volume of entrants as the last one did (It got up to about 880... WOW.), so if you enter, your chances of winning are better.

I'm giving away a $30 gift certificate to my Etsy store. All you have to do is go here and leave a comment saying what your favorite item in my store is!

Happy Monday everyone!

Thread Me Please

Has anyone outside of our little neighborhood heard of eyebrow threading? The girls down the street introduced me to it yesterday. For those who have trouble keeping their eyebrows contained to their alloted space above the eyes, this method of hair removal is heaven sent.

Before:

After:

Ya, it just looks like I had my eyebrows waxed or something, but this is cheaper, it hurts a lot less and they're able to do it with more accuracy. I had my upper lip done, too. That, however, hurt like the Dickens.

(Yes, I'll publicly admit that I'm able to grow a mustache of some sort. Possibly even a goatee. I have no shame. But please don't examine me closely because I told you that.)

It's hard to explain how they do it. I grabbed a piece of string and tried to show Steve what it looked like. He just gave me a funny look. They somehow wrap a piece of cotton thread around their fingers and make a few twists in it.

Here's a website that explains it better (and shows a picture). Here's another website that lists locations around the world that offer eyebrow threading.

Mom is a Pansy

I took Sophie to the doctor for a check-up today. She hadn't had a check up since we left Provo, so I guess this was her 6-month? Ha. I'm probably a terrible mom for being three months late, but it was a combination of forgetting to make an appointment and trying to decide how or if we wanted to continue immunizing her.

She's 29 inches long and weighed in at just under 17 pounds. That puts her in the 80th percentile for height and the 12th for weight. I promise I feed her. She's just growing vertically and not horizontally!

She got two shots and cried as usual. Then I had to go to the lab next door so they could get a blood sample from her. I thought it was going to be a prick on a heel or a finger. Nope.

I sat in the chair with Sophie on my lap and the tech put the padded bar over us. She put the rubber band thing over her upper arm and felt the inside of her elbow. By this time I was freaking out because I knew Sophie was going to freak out. I hate getting blood drawn, and sometimes if it hurts enough I'll cry a little.

So, as I held Sophie's little arm still, the tech comes over with the needle and goes in for the kill. I couldn't bear to look, so I turned my head, waited for the screaming to start, and tried to suppress the tears forming in my eyes.

I didn't hear anything. I looked back to see if she'd poked her and there was the needle, sticking in her arm. And there was Sophie, quietly watching. Not a peep out of her. I was floored. She didn't whimper or try to pull away; she just sat there and watched.

The tech pulled the needle out, wrapped some gauze around Sophie's elbow, and put a sticker on her.

My little girl is a lot braver than her mama.

Girls Will Have Phones

I was hoping I wouldn't have the "Mom, can I have a cell phone?" conversation with Sophie until she was at least in Jr. High. She LOVES playing with our cell phones, and I'm afraid that conversation might come as soon as she figures out how to ask.

I admit, we're not really helping the situation. :)

Pulling the Plug

This week Sophie discovered mobility in the bathtub. I used to set her in the tub and let her play for a couple of minutes while I go tinker around online in the other room. (...which faces the bathroom, and I can see the top of her head from where I sit.)

One night I heard the usual babbling and splashing around, then I heard the tub begin to drain. "What the . . ." I thought as I glanced over. I still saw her head, but it was at the opposite end of the tub from where I put her. And she had drain plug in her mouth. ACK! GROSS!!

I put her back at the other end and got this little clip:

When I took the plug away and laid her down to wash her, she pitched a fit. When I got done, I pulled the drain and let her scoot back over there. She stuck her fingers down the drain. Inside of a drain, in my opinion, is one of the most vile places in the entire house. We won't be doing that again.

The same thing happened the next night. So instead of the joyful, carefree bathtimes of the past, we have the struggle of getting the baby clean versus her absolute need to pull the drain plug and suck on it. She never wins, which really makes her mad.

On a side note, Sophie doesn't crawl around in the tub because she hasn't figured out how to go from sitting to crawling. I think it's because she doesn't use her knees when she crawls. (She goes from yoga planks to belly flops across the room. Hey, it gets her where she wants to go. :)) We're working on that, though.