Cousins!

We had a visit today from Bryce's bro and sis-in-law and they brought their babies, Kyleigh's favorite cousins, mostly because she sees them often and knows who they are. Moses LOVES her! She's half his weight and he still wants to hold her and attempt to carry her around, which usually ends up with them both toppled onto the floor giggling :) So much fun!

This is cousin Moses with Kyleigh after one such toppling to the floor. Good thing she thinks its fun! :) It's pretty darn entertaining to the rest of us, ha ha :)




This is the first pic of Kyleigh with Moses and Megan. Meg is such a doll! She's 5 months younger than Ky, and is kindof a miracle baby being born about 5 weeks early. She was just barely over 4 lbs when she was born, and now at 3 months she is finally up to 9 lbs and totally healthy. Ky at this point thinks Megan is a little dolly, but she is so sweet with her and so gentle. Its fun to have 2 girlies so close so we can share clothes and toys and playtime and everything!

Cute, cute! :)

8 months old, ALREADY!

I know this might be getting old, but so is my baby! She's growing so fast, and so happy, and I love her guts (and the rest of her too :) )

She now has 2 teeth on the bottom, and we're waiting for a top one to pop out at any time. Her little ponytail is about an inch and a 1/2 long now! Wahoo! And she's decided, all by herself, that she likes to sleep on her tummy with a beanie baby dog my grandma gave me while they were living in Japan. Kyleigh loves it, and I do too because I'm getting a full nights sleep again because of that little puppy!

She's figured out how to scoot....backwards. We have yet to move forwards, but she's pretty good at getting around with her little roll-and-twist action. She can get just about anywhere she wants, with a little time and patience. She's been able to get into the crawling postion and back to sitting, so any day now she is going to figure crawling out, and then we'll be in big trouble! Also, this past week she's figured out how to feed herself cereal. She started out just playing with it, then she progressed to 2 hands to the mouth, and after about 5 pieces she decided she was ready to do it one handed. She's a genius!

She loves to go on walks, and the swings at the park. She loves swimming in the tub, and we can't wait to get to a pool! She loves the baby and the other mommy in the mirror, and once in a while another daddy is there too. She loves to "fly" with daddy, and to sing with mom. She loves to make friends and has lots of them.

She's the best :) We are so lucky we got her! :)

Kyleigh's newest friend (and mine too!) Thanks Grandma!

Gettin' in some practice...

What a fun day! We went for a walk with Jordan and Naomi and her little boy Tegan (what a doll-face!) Its so great to have good girlfriends to talk to, and who want to do things together. We had so much fun.

After Kyleigh and I got home, we were both so hot (it got warm today! I'm so excited about it!) But we didn't have a pool, at least not one that we would have to pay to use. Luckily, I am brilliant sometimes.

Christmas of '06 we had a big crack down the middle of our old tub, and so my brother-in-law bought us a new tub that is deeper and wider and awesome to take a bath in. Kyleigh is still small, and so I thought for her it would be the perfect "practice pool". That was fun, and she had a ball :)

I put her in her little swim suit, blew up her floatie, filled the tub as deep as it would go with cooler water (not cold though, it had a little warmth in it, like a real pool would. No freezie babies!) She talked and giggled the whole time, I think we were in there for about 40 minutes. She loved it, and it was so fun to watch her love it!

Yay for warm weather and swimmin' pools! I can't wait to get to a real one so I can swim too! Woohoo!! :)

Happy Mother's Day!

A little late in the day, but I'm getting it!

We had a fun day yesterday. My mom got to come down for a big Brown Family picnic in the park for Mom's day, and we got some way cute pictures.

I love my mom, and I love being a mom. What a blessing to have so many amazing women in my life who have set the perfect examples for me. They wouldn't say perfect, but they taught me exactly what to do, and to their credit, sometimes what not to do, and I learned. I'm still learning, and I hope that as she grows, Kyleigh will be patient with me as I continue to figure things out. My greatest hope for her is that I will be able to set the same kind of example of what a truely great mom is, and that she will be able to become one too.

Yay for moms!

This pic is so cute. I was trying to get a closeup, and couldn't get it. So Grandma took the camera and captured this! Great picture, Grandma!

Kyleigh and Grandma (my mom) at the picnic. What a beautiful day to celebrate Mom's, even though it was a day early. Every day should be Mother's Day!

With (my) cousins Sammie and Kamryn on Great-Grandma's swing. I'm the oldest grandchild too, so I have a lot of really young cousins, the youngest are a day younger than Kyleigh, their 2nd cousin! Fun to have so many close to her age, though. They love it!

Cheering for BYU-Idaho with Uncle Jeff (my bro. :) and her best friend!)

On the swings with Uncle Jared (my youngest bro, and her other best friend :)

On Great-Grandma's swing with the Stoddards! From left to right my cousin Morgan, Aunt Becka, Kyleigh, Sammie, and Teagan. Too much fun!

Things we learned today...

As I'm watching Kyleigh learn as she grows, I decided to really take the day and realize everything that I am learning, too. This is what we learned today.

1. 4 hour naps are a blessing, especially after not getting a whole lot of sleep the night before.

2. It doesn't matter how big the bib is, baby food can fly everywhere!

3. It's okay to answer a knock at the door sometimes...you might just sell one of your extra junker cars, and who couldn't use a little extra cash when you are broke and need to pay some bills? Plus, I was planning on putting a "please steal me" sign on that car this week, so I'm glad this guy wanted it :)

4. Turning your regular walk into a nature walk is really fun, and collecting stuff you find for a scrapbook page later is funner.

5. This tree is crazy cool!






6. Springtime leaves are way better than fall leaves! They are still shiny, they are small, and bugs haven't had a chance to chew holes in them yet.


7. Going to the park is much more fun when you get to swing next to someone your own age and giggle the whole time! Yay for new friends!


8. Walking, and swinging, and giggling, and picnicing can really wear you out.



9. The world is full of crazy people! Thank goodness we weren't walking across that intersection when one of them drove through it and around the corner without slowing down at about 60 mph!


10. All babies have ADD, especially when they are anywhere but home. Its really fun when you go out to dinner and try to feed them liquified pears and there are people and new things everywhere. About half of it got where it was supposed to...


11. Mowing the lawn is a dirty job. Our lawn isn't very big, but it has patches of dirt that made me look like the kid with the cloud around him in the Charlie Brown comics. Good thing Aunt Gail was there so I could take a shower!


12. Baby teeth are very sharp, especially when there is only one. Thank goodness I'm not nursing!


13. This is something we've known for a while, but it still cracks me up. We love bathtime, but getting dressed is torture!


14. Pee flows faster than baby lotion....you really have to hurry faster with the lotion if you don't want to clean her up again afterwords.


15. Baby powder is faster than baby lotion, too. Especially when you squeeze the bottle...that was fun :)


16. We like bubbles, and cats, and birds, especially ducks, but we don't like bees, and car horns, and running water, and drunk people (you should see her glare at those drunk people, its kinda funny...)


17. The hour between 8:00 pm and 9:00 pm is a really long time!


18. Before I forget, we also learned how to clap today! She won't clap if it's pat-a-cake, but if you clap and say "Yay!" she's right in there with ya :)


19. The couch is no longer a safe place, although, it really never was. And the floor is not as soft as it looks. :(


20. My friends are the best. I love you guys, thanks for checking up on me today :) I really am feeling better :)


21. Our day was full of ups and downs, as every day is, but going through this list helps me realize just how blessed we really are.


And last but not least...


22. I could have had a V8!

First trip to the park!

We had a pretty fun day today, although the funness didn't occur until about 4:00 this afternoon. We decided to go for a walk, which we do frequently, but Kyleigh hadn't been to the park yet, and the weather was perfect, so we figured it was about dang time! It was busy in the park today, but it was so much fun! I didn't think she would like it as much as she did, but she loved it, especially the swings.

Kyleigh loved the swings. Just kicked back and let the wind blow through her hair. We were only there for about 20 minutes, but she was about asleep by the time we left.

Swingin' with dad.

I got a smile in this one. What a sweetheart :) We should do the park more often, especially now that the weather is so much nicer!

Me and Kyleigh at the swings. She kinda looks like a Kewpi Doll in this huh?