New Life.........New Blog......

'Nuff said! :)

http://jadeshappylilfamily.blogspot.com

Happy 20 months Miles & Sandy!!!

Congratulations on reaching this milestone! ~ Almost 2 whole years!!!

Just a quick note to let you know that Miles was telling me about your anniversary today and he starting crying.......... (because we were talking about how hard it is for him to be away from you)......how sweet girl.....it must be l o v e !!! :) Hope you are having a great day! :)

P.S. Miles wants more letters....he said he hasn't received one all week...... :)

Guess who's THREE today?????

O L I V I A P A I G E.

Yep my baby turned the big 3 today. Can you believe it? I can't. I don't have a baby anymore....WAH!!! :( Just kidding...I'll live!

The three things I love about Olivia right now are:

1) Her sweet laugh....

2) Her angelic demeanor....

3) How she's always soo happy when she wakes up in the morning....

She had a party today at the aquatic center with her friends. Thanks to all of you who came to make her day special! (I'd post the pictures, but they are on my mom's camera.)

So here's to you Olivia......

H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y B A B Y D O L L!!!!!

ALSO.......

The other day she said the cutest thing ever. You've all seen the commercials for Ice Age 3 right? Well the theme song goes like this... "I like to move it, move it." Olivia's version goes like this...."I like to moob it, moob it" It's stinkin adorable!

This post is for Sandy K

So your silly missionary told me about your blog and so we decided to do a post for you so you can see what Miles has been up to. Enjoy!!! Elder Colton is a wonderful MC by the way.....

Aren't they hilarious? (I don't know, maybe you had to be there.)

I'll post more pictures later. I have dial up, so you can just imagine how long it took me to upload this video!!! :)

A Must Have!

I bought some Sally Hansen's Insta-Dri nail polish the other day and tried it. Man am I impressed. It really does dry quickly as long as you don't overcoat your nails. This stuff is amazing, especially when I paint Halie and Olivia's nails. It dries before they even have a chance to smudge it. Also, the brush has a rounded tip. So it covers your nail in practically one stroke without all the mess. How cool is that? So I give it a two thumbs up and recommend it to all you mommies out there! I am going to stock up on more colors next time I go to Walmart.

(If I get enough courage to go after all that gang related talk lately!)

JAY LENO!!!!!!

On Saturday night, I had the pleasure of attending a comedy performance of Jay Leno. It was at the Northern Quest Casino in Spokane. Man I got carded too many times to count and all I wanted to do was see Jay Leno!!! I went with my mom and we had a wonderful time. Jay Leno sure is funny! It was totally surreal seeing him live too. Sorry for the blurry pictures, but I took them with my flash off because you weren't supposed to take pictures! Oops! :)


(Does my mom's chin show any resemblence to Jay's?)

AN UPDATE!

I am elated to report that Olivia is now a full-time chonie wearing girl!!! That's right she is now pottytrained!!!! I still keep her in a diaper at night (just incase) and so far so good. I am amazed at how quickly she learned. She even goes to the bathroom by herself without asking for help. YAY!!! Think about how much money I will be saving now!!!! :)

She finally went potty!!!

I cannot believe it! Olivia finally peed in the toilet!! She is almost 27 months old for crying out loud!! I have been trying to potty train her for months with no success. We started when she was 20 months by just having her sit on the toilet in the morning. She would sit on it no problem, but would never go potty. So we continued all summer and nope, she never went potty, not even once. So I just gave up and decided to let her show me when she was ready. (BTW: Halie was completely potty trained at 22 months). Well this morning, she had a really nasty diaper and I told her "YUCK, you need to go in the potty already." Then proceeded to tell her to go get some chonies (underwear) on, because she is going to be a big girl now!

After about 2 hours of sporting them Tinkerbell chonies, I told her its time to go potty. She put her little Dora seat on the big toilet and climbed on up. Immediately I noticed she had a 'deeper concentration face' on than usual, so I told her "I don't hear anything...." and then lo and behold "tinkle, tinkle, tinkle" I couldn't believe it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! She really went pee!!! How exciting huh??? Olivia was so proud of herself. I think she is finally getting what I have been trying to tell her for months now! We'll see huh? Maybe we will beat Beck and Piper!!!

(And of course I didn't have the camera handy)

Oh yeah....the dog...

Sorry for those faithful readers of mine that have been hanging on since June to see updated pictures and a name for our dog. I really procrastinated over the summer didn't I? Well anyhow, her name is Macie and she next week she will be 5 months old!!! It's hard to think that she is still so young, yet she looks so big. Her favorite things to do at this age are playing fetch, chewing up anything she finds on the floor (i.e. my kid's toys!!!), and jumping on people. She is sooo full of energy and excitement that when she sees anyone she jumps up on them. Slightly annoying, but we are working on it. Other than that, she has been a great dog. Halie enjoys getting her fresh water and food when we wake up in the morning. Unfortunately, I have been the lucky one taking care of most of the poop scoopin' duty!! YAY ME!!!

As a reminder this is what she looked like at about 6 weeks old......

(in the pink collar)

Olivia's First (Official) Gymnastics Class!!

Olivia is a Mini Hot Shot now!!! She was so excited to be in her very own class this year! On the first day there was only two girls and now the class is close to 10 kids! There ages range from 2-3. So we'll see how many of them end up at the Olympics!!!

That "determined" look

I cried watching this!!! :)

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Halie's First Day of School!

Halie & Miss Alexie

Halie started her second year of preschool on Tuesday, September 3rd! She went to class no problem too! (Usually she puts up a fight) Ever since I went school shopping for her and got her a new backpack she has been dying to go to school. She'd wake up in the morning and ask, "It is school today?". So when she finally got to go to school she had a smile from ear to ear!~

But now that she has started school again, she says she just wants to be in Kindergarten. So we'll start the countdown for Kindergarten early I guess. :) When I picked her up she was very excited to share all the papers in her backpack with me! I must say I love that time we get to share together, and honestly I have been looking forward to helping her with her "homework"!

Halie & Miss Candace

(And yes, I save almost all her papers she brings home. But, we have to give some to Grandma)

(That "hurry up and get out of my class, you're embarrasing me look")

New Puppy!

Here is a picture of our new puppy! (the one with the hot pink collar) We went up to see her in Okanogan. She is such a sweetie. She was raised in a really nice area. The owners are really great too! She is purebred Golden Retriever. She has papers and is good hip certified. She also comes from a good bloodline of champion hunting dogs! Her parents are pictured below. Their names are Tipper and Chase. Halie had a great time playing fetch with those dogs. I think she is going to love having a big dog! (Our first) YEAH! We are so excited! We didn't want to leave her, but she'll be home with us in 10 days, when she is 6 weeks old~I need help with names. Any ideas???

NEW PICS!

Here are some recent pics of Halie at the Flip Flop Finale! She did so well! She even vaulted by herself and the crowd went wild! The other pic is of Halie and Olivia in the beginning of May. All these photos are courtesy of J Olson Photography! Thanks Jenn!

Rascal Flatts!

So Mario and I got to see our first concert together since having kids! Whew! Who knew it would take so long to get out and away from the kids. Let's just say I am attatched to my children. This is only the 2nd time Olivia has stayed with someone else overnight. My friend watched the girls overnight and then my mother-in-law picked them up this morning so I had time to stop at the wonderful outlet mall in Northbend! Thanks grandma! Mario and I stayed overnight at his uncle Jaime's place. They live in this cool little penthouse right on the Puget Sound. Amazing! We also got to tour their yacht. We are already making plans to come back and visit again with our girls! It was so weird waking up this morning and not having to look after my kids and make sure they weren't getting into trouble. I must say it was nice, but definately not a feeling I want to get used to.

Oh and the concert? Freakin unbelievable!!! I have been dying to see Rascal Flatts for years now. Everytime they come into town, I am either way pregnant or breastfeeding. (I know I have the best luck!) We'll this time they came I wasn't either of the two!! Yippee!! So my wonderful mom bought our tickets! We sat right by them during the concert too! My mom brought her binoculars so we could see up close. Damn! Joe Don is a hottie! I would marry him anyday!! JK! Taylor swift sounded great too! I can't wait til they come back again because we've decided that we are going to buy the super up close tickets next time so we can get high 5's and autographs! (That is if I am not pregnant or breastfeeding...haha)

Not to toot my own horn but....

I finally got a haircut and a brow wax! It's been long overdue and let me tell ya "I feel great!" This is the first time I have had a brow wax! I will never go back to tweezing again. Waxing was soooo much easier and faster. I thought it was going to hurt like a "biawatchhhhh". But surprisingly, it wasn't that bad. It definately feels a lot better than pulling each hair out one at a time! So I have another appt set up in June for high-lights and another brow wax. If you haven't had your brow's waxed before, I suggest you get on it because you don't know what you're missing!

OMSI!

So about two weeks ago, the girls and I took off on a great endeavor. We drove to Portland all by ourselves. My husband had to stay and work. But let me tell ya.....he didn't think I could make it there on my own. I PROVED HIM WRONG!! Yay! Girl power!

So the 4 1/2 hr drive really took us 6 hours because of potty/food breaks and Olivia puked (She had that nasty stomach bug). I didn't want to take Olivia on such a long car drive, but I had to watch my neice and nephew (12 & 8) over the weekend, because their parents went to Washington D.C. I couldn't leave them parentless, so away I went. Olivia puked 3 more times throughout that weekend :(

We did however make a special trip to OMSI. I had never been there before, but my uncle recommended that I take the kids. Wow! It was so cool. It's like one of those hands on science centers for kids. They had such cool exhibits. (This was the part were I needed my husband.) They watched a movie about Dolphins in an IMAX theatre, they had tons of exhibits about dinosaurs. Including real fossils, and moving dinosaurs with simulated movements and sounds. They also had a bug/reptile/bird center where you could actually hold the bugs! EWW!

Halie also rode on one of those simulator rides were it makes it look like you are falling or going to run into something. She was barely tall enough to ride on it and I thought she would be terrified during the whole thing. I told her that once that door closes that she would be stuck on the ride for four minutes and that they wouldn't stop it if she cried. She didn't seem to care and got on anyways! During the whole ride I hear someone screaming. I immediately assume it was Halie. Boy was I wrong!! She came off that ride with a smile beaming from ear to ear! She wanted to ride it again! I couldn't believe this brave little four year old!! I mean I have been on these rides before and they scare the crap out of me!

One of my favorite parts was a prenatal development exhibit. It shows what a baby looks like inside the womb during every week of pregnancy. It was WAY cool! I have never seen anything like it.

This dino was still "under construction"

Where's Halie?

Hands on craft room

Water exhibit

I couldn't fit the dinosaurs head in.

Trying to get it to balance

Do you see the snake?

The simulator

Week 36 if I can remember correctly

Real fossils

This one actually moved and made noises!

Trying to put the dino puzzle together

Gotta take one of these shots!

Olivia, Halie, Cameron, Riley

I could post 100 more pictures...but I think that's enough! What do you think?