"How"

Trying to pack and keep Annabelle entertained has been quite a feat so the other day, I got some new movies from the library. One of them is Peter Pan and she instantly loved it. In the show, there are some Indians that are constantly holding up their right hand and saying, "How". Annabelle loves to copy this and she'll walk around the house and whenever she sees me, she'll greet me Indian-style with her hand held up high and a loud, "How".



And here's my tower of boxes that Annabelle loves to try and knock over.

Counting to 11

Annabelle has been able to count to 10 for awhile and it occurred to me the other day that I should probably move on to new numbers. So, as we were driving home from the store, we counted and when we reached 10, I introduced 11 to her. She caught on very quickly and by the end of the day, 11 was as easy for her to remember as the rest of the numbers. Now she counts to herself all the time and never forgets her newest number. And after she finishes, she always gives herself a round of applause.

Crazy Rexburg

I changed my background to an Easter theme. I can't believe Easter is only 2 weeks away. We will be completely moved into our house by then (I'm sure we'll still have boxes everywhere) and I am really excited to have an Easter egg hunt with Annabelle and make rabbit-shaped sugar cookies. The only problem is the weather. It is absolutely miserable outside and I'm afriad it might not feel like Spring in time for Easter. I would not usually post about the weather. That's a boring topic. But now, I've written two weather entries in a row. YIKES!

It is snowing like crazy and the wind is making it much worse. Winds are blowing between 30 and 40 mph and the snow is piling up. I can't even see the white fence that stands 30 yards from our back door. On our way home from church, we saw a green sign that sits on the highway for a Rexburg exit that had nearly been blown in half.

On a more interesting note, everything seems to be in order for the closing of our house on Friday. Today is our last Sunday in our current ward (although I will be returning once more to accompany the choir as they sing their Eater songs) and I had people telling me goodbye and saying how much they'll miss our family and I didn't even know who they were. Our ward's so big that I think it is impossible to get to know everyone by name. But it was a nice gesture and I'll miss this ward.

"It's freezing!"

After absolutely gorgeous weather last week, we are back in winter weather now. Yesterday, we got a couple of inches of snow, and today even more. The wind is blowing hard and the temperature is 23 degrees, but feels like 12. I'm sure in about 5 years, I will not be surprised when this happens, but for now, I am not happy. I thought perhaps spring was on the way. The only nice thing about bad weather is I can pack without wishing I was outside. Annabelle can also tell that it's very cold and so she has not been bugging me to go outside. Instead, she is helping me pack by putting everything she can grab in the open boxes that are lying around. This makes things a little more difficult for me, but being a good helper is something I want to encourage so we're trying to work together and pack. We close a week from tomorrow. Yea!

Wall coloring

This past Thursday evening, I attended an enrichment class and left Annabelle home with Michael. I had a great time at my event and even came home bearing a delicious cinnamon roll for Michael. Once home, I heard the drama of what had gone on while I had been out. Michael, being tired from a long, hard day's work, accidentally fell asleep for about 10 minutes and Annabelle took advantage of this brief time of no supervision. She took 2 crayons up to her room and began drawing a masterpiece on her walls. Upon waking up and not hearing Annabelle or knowing where she was, Michael set off in search of her, finding her in her room that was now newly decorated. In just 10 minutes' time, Annabelle managed to completely cover 2 walls, her window sill, window, and other various places in the room.The worst part was our landlady was showing our apartment to 2 different prospective renters the next day. The next morning, I called the landlady to tell her of the fiasco and asked if she wanted to reschedule the appointments, giving us a few days to cover Anna's artwork, beautiful as it was. She said that she didn't want to reschedule and that it shouldn't be a problem. I guess we'll see if it turned people away because indeed we did have a couple of families come look at our place and as far as I know, the landlady hasn't heard back from either of them.

Tea Party

Annabelle received a tea set for her birthday and it has become one of her favorite things to play with She loves to have a tea party with herself. She sits on the couch and I bring her a tray of 4 tea cups each filled with water. She then sits there and proceeds to slowly drink the water from each cup and gently set it back on it's matching plate. And then she tells me to bring her some more. It's really cute. Now we just need a play kitchen and table to make the tea party complete.

Sunny Day

Yesterday was such a nice day that Annabelle and I spent most of it outside. It's been warming up in the past week, but usually it's really, really windy or overcast. All of the sudden, the sun was out and it was a gorgeous, beautiful day. I even got a little sunburned.

Our neighbor invited Annabelle to play with sidewalk chalk with her two kids and it turned into an afternoon full of fun. Towards the end, Annabelle and our 3-year-old neighbor started rubbing their hands in the chalk on the sidewalk and rubbing it all over their faces and hair. At that point, I figured maybe it was time to go inside and get cleaned up. It was probably one of Annabelle's favorite days.Make sure when you watch this video, you have the sound on. I added some music to this one.

Talking and cute pics

We have pretty busy around here, slowly getting prepared for the move in a few weeks. The house is coming along nicely, and it looks like everything will be ready for closing on April 3. We are very excited.

Annabelle's communication skills seemed to have improved very quickly just in the last week. Last night as I was leaving her room after putting her to bed, she called out, "Hey you, come back". I walked back to her crib and asked her what she needed and she responded with her very first complete sentence. "I want to build a tower please." I was most pleasantly shocked. She's been able to repeat short sentences that I say, but she has never said a sentence completely on her own (other than something simple like, "I love you, Daddy.") I am also starting to get to the point where I understand almost everything she says, at least when she is talking to me. She loves to talk on the phone, and when she does that, she still mostly jabbers and I don't know what she's saying.

I've included some new pictures. The first one is of Annabelle in a cute dress she got for her birthday. I'm sorry the picture is blurry. I took 2 pictures and they both turned out fuzzy and I'm not sure why. But she looked so cute that I had to post it anyway.Sunday, I came home from choir practice to find Annabelle wearing her winter coat in the house. I then saw Michael lying on the couch, so I knew he wasn't taking her anywhere outside. I asked why she had it on. He said she asked for it and wanted to wear it. So, for the rest of the afternoon, she walked around the house with her coat on.This is just such a cute smile from Annabelle it had to go on the blog. I think this has become one of my favorite pictures of her.

St Patrick's Day

Where has the time gone? Happy St. Patrick's Day! I didn't even realize it was today until I heard someone talking about it on the radio when I was on my way to the store. Totally by accident, I happened to be wearing a green shirt underneath a sweat shirt. Annabelle, however, didn't have any green on. When I got to Walmart, it was amazing to see what some moms had done to their kids to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. There were kids with green pants and green shirts, kids with green face paint on their cheeks, and I even saw a little girl with dyed green hair. Unbelievable.

One year mark

Today marks the one year anniversary of our arrival in Rexburg. At this exact time one year ago, I was making my way from Salt Lake to my new home of Rexburg, ID. Michael had left early that morning with the moving van and Annabelle and I followed several hours later. I can still remember some thoughts that I had when I was just a few miles away. The first thing I remember was seeing the Rexburg temple set up on the hill. It was visible several miles before you even came close to the Rexburg exit. I have seen seen it dozens of times since and it never ceases to amaze me how beautiful it is, especially at night when it's lit up. The second and probably most prominent thought was I couldn't believe how much snow was on the ground. It was March 10 and there was still several feet of snow everywhere.

The transition from moving to Denver, CO to Rexburg, ID was a little difficult at first. There was so much to do in Denver and so many places I could take Annabelle to to keep her occupied. In Rexburg, we had been pretty much everywhere there was to go in the first two weeks.

However, I feel like I belong here now. This is a great place to raise a family. We have moved so often in the past few years that I am excited for this last big move to our house, at least for a long, long time. A house really makes Rexburg feel like our permanent home. And who knows, I might even learn to love having winter 8-9 months of the year.

Leisure Sunday

After getting spiritually fed at church this morning and a good nap in the afternoon, our family spent a nice Sunday evening together as a family. Michael and I did some well-overdue filing of some papers while Annabelle entertained herself and us with her masterful acrobatics on our bed. She's pretty coordinated and very daring. I believe with all the exercise she got, she'll be able to fall asleep relatively quickly tonight.

Go BYU!

As many of you know, the BYU mens basketball team managed to pull out a victory over Air Force Saturday night, which put them in a three-way tie for the Mountain West conference title, and no one was more excited than Annabelle.

Bath time

Who knew that having water poured on your head could be so much fun? Annabelle sure enjoys it.

Busy week

It's so funny how fast a week can go by. We have been very busy over the last several days. Firstly, I decided that it's time to start potty training Annabelle. For the last few weeks, she's been showing interest in the bathroom and loves to flush the toilet and put the lid down after I've gone. But what really got me thinking that she's ready is that she wanted to sit on the toilet last week. She's never wanted to do that before. She was pretty scared once she was sitting on it because it was an adult toilet and of course the seat is way too big for her. She had to hold on to me or fall in. Tomorrow we are getting a potty seat for her. The day after she sat on the toilet, I asked her if she needed to go potty and she said yes. So, I led her into the bathroom, removed her diaper, and sat her down. What I didn't realize was that she had positioned her feet so that they went right into the toilet water. Once her feet were wet, she didn't want to sit on the toilet again until they were dry. While I was drying them, she peed on the floor. I was so happy because if it hadn't been for her feet getting wet, she would have actually gone the bathroom in the toilet. The sad thing is I think her feet going in scared her enough that hasn't wanted to sit on it since. But I think once she had a potty that is her size, she'll be fine. I also got a big bag of m&m's for a reward. She gets one if she just sits on the toilet, two if she goes no.1 and three if she goes no. 2. We'll see how it goes.

Yesterday, we spent the morning in Idaho Falls. We met Michael there after his basketball game with his fellow attorneys. Then, we went from store to store, getting groceries, picking out appliances for our house, and picking out the lighting fixtures. When we got home, we were all exhausted, but glad that we were so productive.