Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Celebrate The Weekend!
We had a pretty busy weekend, and most of it fit into a theme of celebration. Who doesn't like to celebrate?Friday was my mom's birthday, so on Thursday Baylee and I went to lunch with my mom, Grandma Higgins, Aunt Patti, and Aunt Melissa to celebrate during my mom's lunch break. We ate at Paradise Bakery in a cute shopping area in Tempe. Thursday night I went with my sister, Annie, to see Rent. Rent is no longer on Broadway, so they taped the last performance and this past weekend you could see it in some movie theatres. Not as cheap as a normal movie, but not as expensive as Broadway. Annie is pretty bummed it's not on Broadway anymore, so she was dying to go and at least see it on screen, but not the movie version that she already has. It was fun to see and to go with her-she is very knowledgable on Rent.
Friday we took my parents for a quick birthday dinner at Costa Vida for my mom's birthday and then headed to Glendale for a wedding reception. Ben's cousin got married here on Friday, and since we missed the ceremony and luncheon, we wanted to at least make it to the reception. Ben had fun talking with cousins, while I spent the whole 1-1 1/2 hours we were there chasing Baylee around and trying to keep her out of the bride's parent's house. So, fun for Ben, not the greatest time I've ever had for me. But it was still nice to go, even if we did have to miss the baseball game Ben had won tickets to for it. :) We had fun seeing everyone. After the reception, we came home and sang (well, at least my dad and I) to my mom, and had some of the cake I made her for her birthday. It was a yummy Mexican Chocolate cake with Carmelized Sugar frosting. I think she liked it (she said she did).
Saturday morning Ben spent trying to fix the fridge and finding us a new rental that will do a month to month. We found a guy that is considering a month to month, and we went and saw the house, which looked nice. So keep your fingers crossed for us-I am so sick of looking for houses (rental and buys). Saturday night we had dinner with my brother, Scott. After dinner we went with him, my parents, and my Aunt Melissa, Uncle Doug, and cousin Ryan for ice cream at Streamers, to once again celebrate my mom's bday. Ben and I shared their seasonal Skookie, which was a huge Snickerdoodle cooked in a skillet, with Pumpkin ice cream. Yum!
I had to get this picture of Baylee trying to eat what was left (like the nice mess of it down her shirt?). She was loving playing with Ryan and sitting on Doug's lap so much that she didn't want any until right when we were leaving. After Streamers, Ben and I took Baylee to Freestone Park, even though it was 10 pm. They had a So Long To Summer celebration that night, and we made it just in time for fireworks. Baylee had fallen asleep in the car (she didn't take her nap that day either), but woke up to see them. Luckily she fell right to sleep on the way home.
Baylee loved the fireworks! Next year we will have to go for the other things too. Yesterday my cousin Parker had his mission farewell at church, so we went and saw him speak. He did a great job, and will be a great missionary. I know he will definetly be missed though! Later we went over to my grandparents house for dinner. They were so great to feed us while we are still trying to figure out our fridge situation! Baylee loved finding the chickens and playing in the huge yard, too. It was fun to go to their house-I always love going there.
So there you have our weekend! Sorry I don't have more pictures.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
High School Flashback
Ok, here's my tag from Katie. It's a flashback from my days at ThunderRidge High School.
1. Did you date someone from your school? Only one of my high school boyfriends was from my school- Steve C.
2. What kind of car did you drive? My senior year I drove a Jeep Wrangler.
3. What was the most embarrassing moment of HS? I'm sure I have a lot, but one of the only ones I remember was falling down the stairs and flashing everyone. I had one a barely below the knee light blue skirt with slits on both sides and those tall black platformish Steve Madden shoes. Yeah, people were talking about it all over school that day. Glad I could be of some entertainment.
4. Were you a party animal? I didn't drink or anything, but I knew how to have fun (like dnacing and doing cartwheels on the bowling lane and almost getting kicked out). My friends and I could get kinda crazy.
5. Were you considered a flirt? Yeah, I could be.
6. Were you in band, orchestra, or choir? Band. I played percussion. At my school it wasn't considered geeky to be in band, but I didn't do marching band (it wasn't offered until my senior year, and I was too little to carry anything anyways. The few times we did it in class I had to play the cow bell).
7. Were you a nerd? Nope.
8. Were you on any varsity teams? I lettered in Soccer (but as the Boy's Soccer Manager), band, and theatre.
9. Did you get suspended/expelled? Nope, but I did get in trouble for my clothes a time or two. I don't think it was ever bad enough that I had to wear the "I Love My Principal" shirt, though.
10. Can you still sing the fight song? I'm going to have to say yes, but only because they drilled it into us sooooo much. You would have had to go there to understand. We were also the first graduating class, so it was kinda different. Rachel understands.
11. Who were your favorite teachers? I can't really remember teachers very well. Mr. Snell (band) was pretty cool.
12. Where did you sit during lunch? Inside the lunch room, unless the school let us eat outside. I changed lunch groups a lot. I hung out with different people all the time.
13. School mascot? We were the ThunderRidge Grizzlies.
14. Did you go to homecoming, and with who? I think I went all 4 years. The three of the years I think I just went with friends, and then one year I went with one of Jim's friends, Kelly. He came down from Colorado Springs to go with me.
15. If you could go back and do it again, would you? Probably not. Although it might have been fun to go to a normal high school. Mine opened my freshman year and we were always the oldest class, so high school was kinda weird. There were some good times though.
16. What do you remember most about graduation? We were only allowed to have a certain amount of people come because it was at Boettcher Hall. Andrew had me be his picture buddy, and that was kinda weird. We had to wear nice clothes under our gowns, so I had on a blue American Eagle dress that was pretty cute and I think I still have. We sat with our homerooms, which I hated because I wasn't friends with anyone in my homeroom. It was long and we carpooled from our school to Denver and had to be there really early in the morning and then hang out in a little room until graduation started.
17. Where did you go senior skip day? We all went to Chatfeild Reservior. Don't ask me what we did there because I don't really remember.
18. Were you in any clubs? I did cheerleading my freshman year, boys soccer manager my sophmore and junior year, and theatre and band throughout high school. I might have done other things, but I can't remember.
19. Have you gained some weight since then? I'm going to have to say yes, considering my junior year I only weighed about 85 pounds.
20. Who was your prom date? Junior year I went with Steve C., senior year I didn't have a date. A few guys told me after that they wanted to ask me, but they thought I already had a date or were scared I would say no or wished they had asked me. I don't reccommend going dateless when all of your friends but you have a date (and boyfriends). Not very fun.
21. Are you planning on going to your 10 year reunion? Probably not.
22. Looking back, what advice would you give yourself? Just have fun, which I tried to do.
Ok, so I want to tag Wendy, Laura, Rachel, both Brooke's, Heather, Maegan, Natalie, and anyone else for this one. It's kinda fun to read how other people were in high school. If I tagged you for the other one, you could just pick one if you want.
And these are basically my school colors. Haha.
1. Did you date someone from your school? Only one of my high school boyfriends was from my school- Steve C.
2. What kind of car did you drive? My senior year I drove a Jeep Wrangler.
3. What was the most embarrassing moment of HS? I'm sure I have a lot, but one of the only ones I remember was falling down the stairs and flashing everyone. I had one a barely below the knee light blue skirt with slits on both sides and those tall black platformish Steve Madden shoes. Yeah, people were talking about it all over school that day. Glad I could be of some entertainment.
4. Were you a party animal? I didn't drink or anything, but I knew how to have fun (like dnacing and doing cartwheels on the bowling lane and almost getting kicked out). My friends and I could get kinda crazy.
5. Were you considered a flirt? Yeah, I could be.
6. Were you in band, orchestra, or choir? Band. I played percussion. At my school it wasn't considered geeky to be in band, but I didn't do marching band (it wasn't offered until my senior year, and I was too little to carry anything anyways. The few times we did it in class I had to play the cow bell).
7. Were you a nerd? Nope.
8. Were you on any varsity teams? I lettered in Soccer (but as the Boy's Soccer Manager), band, and theatre.
9. Did you get suspended/expelled? Nope, but I did get in trouble for my clothes a time or two. I don't think it was ever bad enough that I had to wear the "I Love My Principal" shirt, though.
10. Can you still sing the fight song? I'm going to have to say yes, but only because they drilled it into us sooooo much. You would have had to go there to understand. We were also the first graduating class, so it was kinda different. Rachel understands.
11. Who were your favorite teachers? I can't really remember teachers very well. Mr. Snell (band) was pretty cool.
12. Where did you sit during lunch? Inside the lunch room, unless the school let us eat outside. I changed lunch groups a lot. I hung out with different people all the time.
13. School mascot? We were the ThunderRidge Grizzlies.
14. Did you go to homecoming, and with who? I think I went all 4 years. The three of the years I think I just went with friends, and then one year I went with one of Jim's friends, Kelly. He came down from Colorado Springs to go with me.
15. If you could go back and do it again, would you? Probably not. Although it might have been fun to go to a normal high school. Mine opened my freshman year and we were always the oldest class, so high school was kinda weird. There were some good times though.
16. What do you remember most about graduation? We were only allowed to have a certain amount of people come because it was at Boettcher Hall. Andrew had me be his picture buddy, and that was kinda weird. We had to wear nice clothes under our gowns, so I had on a blue American Eagle dress that was pretty cute and I think I still have. We sat with our homerooms, which I hated because I wasn't friends with anyone in my homeroom. It was long and we carpooled from our school to Denver and had to be there really early in the morning and then hang out in a little room until graduation started.
17. Where did you go senior skip day? We all went to Chatfeild Reservior. Don't ask me what we did there because I don't really remember.
18. Were you in any clubs? I did cheerleading my freshman year, boys soccer manager my sophmore and junior year, and theatre and band throughout high school. I might have done other things, but I can't remember.
19. Have you gained some weight since then? I'm going to have to say yes, considering my junior year I only weighed about 85 pounds.
20. Who was your prom date? Junior year I went with Steve C., senior year I didn't have a date. A few guys told me after that they wanted to ask me, but they thought I already had a date or were scared I would say no or wished they had asked me. I don't reccommend going dateless when all of your friends but you have a date (and boyfriends). Not very fun.
21. Are you planning on going to your 10 year reunion? Probably not.
22. Looking back, what advice would you give yourself? Just have fun, which I tried to do.
Ok, so I want to tag Wendy, Laura, Rachel, both Brooke's, Heather, Maegan, Natalie, and anyone else for this one. It's kinda fun to read how other people were in high school. If I tagged you for the other one, you could just pick one if you want.
And these are basically my school colors. Haha.
Double Tagged
Katie and Rachel ganged up on me (although they don't know each other) and I got double tagged! :) So, here we go. Here's Rachel's tag since it is harder:
I am: Alone home with Baylee and no car for the first time in awhile (and being in AZ).
I think: It's going to be a lazy day.
Everything in life: Happens for a reason.
I want: To be happy with how things are going in my life. I want to be able to make friends here in AZ; Baylee and Ben to be happy.
I have: The best family!
I dislike: Baylee not listening and me having to get upset with her about things.
I miss: Green grass. Not that there isn't any here, but I'm not much into the desert landscaping a lot of people have; Trees too; Being closer to the ocean; Working.
I fear: Bad things happening to anyone I'm close to.
I feel: Tired right now, but in a pretty good mood.
I hear: My loud computer, Baylee wanting me to fix her ripped coloring book page, and Baylee's Disney channel cartoons.
I smell: The pumpkin bread Baylee and I had for breakfast. The smell is still on my fingertips.
I crave: Sweets!
I cry: Hardly ever-I don't like to. Unless it's a bad day or I really got my feelings hurt.
I search: Houses to buy and rent a lot right now.
I wonder: What's going to happen with everything that is going on right now.
I regret: Bad decisions that I made in the past.
I wish: My refrigerator worked.
I love: My family so much.
I care: About my family and friends.
I always: Do bascially the same routine in the morning and getting ready.
I am not: Looking forward to Baylee's shots tomorrow.
I remember: A lot of things.
I believe: A lot of things.
I sing: Only when I have to or to Baylee for the sake of everyone's ears.
I don’t always: Give Baylee enough attention at home, but she's pretty needy.
I argue: When I think I'm right.
I write: Not a lot.
I win: The stupid games on the computer when I am bored.
I lose: My mind sometimes?
I listen: To people pretty well, even Ben when he talks about things I don't really care about too much.
I don’t understand: A lot.
I can usually be found: With Baylee, and Ben when he's not at work.
I need: A lot of things. A fridge that works, a car, a new place to live.
I forget: Not very much.
I am happy: Just being with my family and being able to stay home with Baylee.
I tag: Katie, Heather, Wendy, Laura, Brookes, and whoever else wants to do this one. It's a thinker!
Katie's will be fun, so I will try to get that one done soon!
I am: Alone home with Baylee and no car for the first time in awhile (and being in AZ).
I think: It's going to be a lazy day.
Everything in life: Happens for a reason.
I want: To be happy with how things are going in my life. I want to be able to make friends here in AZ; Baylee and Ben to be happy.
I have: The best family!
I dislike: Baylee not listening and me having to get upset with her about things.
I miss: Green grass. Not that there isn't any here, but I'm not much into the desert landscaping a lot of people have; Trees too; Being closer to the ocean; Working.
I fear: Bad things happening to anyone I'm close to.
I feel: Tired right now, but in a pretty good mood.
I hear: My loud computer, Baylee wanting me to fix her ripped coloring book page, and Baylee's Disney channel cartoons.
I smell: The pumpkin bread Baylee and I had for breakfast. The smell is still on my fingertips.
I crave: Sweets!
I cry: Hardly ever-I don't like to. Unless it's a bad day or I really got my feelings hurt.
I search: Houses to buy and rent a lot right now.
I wonder: What's going to happen with everything that is going on right now.
I regret: Bad decisions that I made in the past.
I wish: My refrigerator worked.
I love: My family so much.
I care: About my family and friends.
I always: Do bascially the same routine in the morning and getting ready.
I am not: Looking forward to Baylee's shots tomorrow.
I remember: A lot of things.
I believe: A lot of things.
I sing: Only when I have to or to Baylee for the sake of everyone's ears.
I don’t always: Give Baylee enough attention at home, but she's pretty needy.
I argue: When I think I'm right.
I write: Not a lot.
I win: The stupid games on the computer when I am bored.
I lose: My mind sometimes?
I listen: To people pretty well, even Ben when he talks about things I don't really care about too much.
I don’t understand: A lot.
I can usually be found: With Baylee, and Ben when he's not at work.
I need: A lot of things. A fridge that works, a car, a new place to live.
I forget: Not very much.
I am happy: Just being with my family and being able to stay home with Baylee.
I tag: Katie, Heather, Wendy, Laura, Brookes, and whoever else wants to do this one. It's a thinker!
Katie's will be fun, so I will try to get that one done soon!
Monday, September 22, 2008
Putting Pieces Back Together and Zoo Fun
It started with the vacuum breaking. Then Baylee's movie player decided not to work (with a little help from Ben trying to fix the squeak). Next the fridge decided not to work on the refrigerator side. My crock pot lid decided to shatter while I had dinner nicely cooking in it. Finally, our internet went down. And to top it all off, the house we are currently renting is being auctioned on the 10th, so now we are getting to find a new place to live until we find a house. So, my mom and I went and found a new vacuum. Ben ordered a new part for the fridge which will be here in 7-10 days (we've been eating out a lot), and three modems and multiple wonderful conversations with Cox later, he finally got our internet working again. So to the two people that tagged me, sorry, I will get to that soon. We are starting to get things back together. But, why is it that when something breaks everything else has to break with it?
With all the stress I've been feeling with everything (yes, I am an easily stressed out person), we decided we needed a little fun. So, we used our free zoo passes we got from the 4th of July Diamondbacks game, and delt with the heat. It was fun, but we all needed a shower by the time we got home. Here's a few pictures from the zoo (ok, a lot):
With all the stress I've been feeling with everything (yes, I am an easily stressed out person), we decided we needed a little fun. So, we used our free zoo passes we got from the 4th of July Diamondbacks game, and delt with the heat. It was fun, but we all needed a shower by the time we got home. Here's a few pictures from the zoo (ok, a lot):
Here's what Baylee would look like if she was a joey. Although they don't have kangaroos at the Phoenix Zoo, they have wallabys. Are baby wallabys also called joeys? I guess I should have read the differences between kangaroos and wallabys better. 
Here's what Baylee and I would look like if we were standing under an elephant. This zoo doesn't let you that close to the elephants though, so just in case you couldn't tell these are fake.
Here is Ben and Baylee on another fake animal. Obviously I didn't take a very good picture since you can't tell what animal it is. Does it really matter though since it's not real?
We did eventually find the real elephants. Baylee demonstrated her animal calling skills that she picked up from watching Go Diego Go. However, as loud as she tried to call, the elephants didn't want to come. They were a little too into eating.
As I stated before, it was pretty warm outside. This was Baylee's solution to that problem. The little rod that holds it up broke, so she just hid under it until we came to something she wanted to look at.
We finally came across a little area for kids to play in water, and some kids sure were going crazy. Baylee was just happy to be able to get out and cool down. I guess there are two slides inside the little cave thing behind her, but she was happy with just the water outside.
Nice and cooled off. Looking at myself in this picture I wish I had the excuse that I had just been in the water with her. Unfortunately I just look bad. After the water I think we looked at a few more animals and then gave up on the walking in the heat and rode the "train". I don't know why they call it a train becuse it's really a tram like the ones you ride at Disneyland when they make you park really far away. Well, that basically concludes our day at the zoo. We didn't stop to take too many pictures of the animals, but if you want some we probably have any animal from previous zoo trips.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Old Fashioned
We have done extremely bad at getting Baylee any sort of professional pictures taken. So, as you may already know, we got some Antique Photos taken of her a few weeks ago at the mall. We picked them up last week, but I've been waiting for Ben to scan them. I guess he took a picture of one of them and fixed the glare? So here's this one for now:
We did their "special" of one 13x10 for $20. I thought they were going to let us pick which picture it would be, but we didn't get to. So, this is the one we got. It's cute, but not the one I would have chosen. Additional sheets were $25 (they had a 5x7 with like 4 wallets or an 8x10). Not the best deal, so we just picked one. I will post that one when Ben scans it. It was a fun experience, though. I just wish their prices had been a little better so we could have gotten more. They were all so stinkin cute, it was hard to choose just one.
We did their "special" of one 13x10 for $20. I thought they were going to let us pick which picture it would be, but we didn't get to. So, this is the one we got. It's cute, but not the one I would have chosen. Additional sheets were $25 (they had a 5x7 with like 4 wallets or an 8x10). Not the best deal, so we just picked one. I will post that one when Ben scans it. It was a fun experience, though. I just wish their prices had been a little better so we could have gotten more. They were all so stinkin cute, it was hard to choose just one.
Monday, September 8, 2008
Horsin' Around
We had a fun weekend! Here's a little of what we were up to:
Friday night we went to Ra Sushi. Baylee was kinda cranky, but as soon as we said we were going to get sushi she stopped and was so excited. 
Baylee getting her chopsticks ready-can you tell she's been a few times? Kinda funny that she's only 2 and loves sushi so much!
Saturday we went to the park and rode the merry-go round.
This video is kinda funny.
We also went on the train and fed the ducks. The train was cute and went around some of the park.
Sunday I made meatloaf in the shape of Mickey Mouse just for fun. Baylee loved it, and she actually ate a lot of it! She even asked for and ate seconds!
Here's one thing we did to keep Baylee entertained last night.
Today I am making Sweet Pork enchiladas for dinner. The pork cooks in the crockpot all day. I bought Adobo to make the sauce, and the label was in Spanish. It took a lot of time, kitchen utensils and the help of my mom to finally get the lid open. I can read Spanish, just the instructions for opening the lid didn't work very well. We now have a lidless jar of Adobo, and my mom and I now know what to use if we ever want to look dark orange. During the whole Adobo ordeal, Baylee has decided she doesn't want to wear a diaper today. My mom suggested her princess panties, so I'm hoping that idea doesn't blow up in my face and that I won't be cleaning up too many "accidents". Wish me luck!
We also get to go look at her pictures today!
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Elephant Ride
So, we haven't really been up to much lately. My cousin, Heather, and her husband, Matt, and son, Ezra, were in town for Labor Day weekend, so we got to spend a little time with extended family while they were here. We went to pizza for lunch on Saturday, and then later a BBQ and swimming for dinner. It was bring your own meat, and we ended up with Port O Subs for ours since Ben's turkey burgers didn't quite turn out. Monday we all went out to eat at Logan's Steakhouse and it took almost 3 hours(there were 25 of us). The food was really good, but it took the server and her manager about 30-45 minutes to get the checks all figures out, even though she had a "system" when she took our order.
Tuesday we got a new neice! Ben's sister Wendy had her baby at like 3:30 in the morning. They named her Cambri Kathlyn Knight, and she is too cute! We can't wait to meet her! Congratulations to all of them!
That's about all we've been up to, besides random sicknesses. Last night Baylee did decide to ride her elephant in the middle of a pillow fight. I don't know why, but she always seems to be half naked! I'll put clothes on her, and then next time I turn around she has no shirt and a lot of times no bottoms as well. Silly girl!
It's slowly cooling down here and then we should be able to start having some real fun again!
Tuesday we got a new neice! Ben's sister Wendy had her baby at like 3:30 in the morning. They named her Cambri Kathlyn Knight, and she is too cute! We can't wait to meet her! Congratulations to all of them!
That's about all we've been up to, besides random sicknesses. Last night Baylee did decide to ride her elephant in the middle of a pillow fight. I don't know why, but she always seems to be half naked! I'll put clothes on her, and then next time I turn around she has no shirt and a lot of times no bottoms as well. Silly girl!
It's slowly cooling down here and then we should be able to start having some real fun again!
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