Nursery Time!

It has happened. Isabel is 18 months and is in the Nursery at church. It started out great. We let her wander down the hall at church until she found the room with all the toys and she went in all by herself. David had to sub in nursery because all the women needed to be in Relief Society for the Visiting Teaching Conference Lesson. So she did great with him in there to have as moral support.

Well after Relief Society, silly Mommy had to go and ruin things by poking her head in to see how her sweet daughter was doing. Isabel saw me and instantly jumped up off the floor and bee-lined for the door. I tried to close it and she instantly started screaming, afraid of me leaving her. Don't try and tell her she was fine without me cause she won't believe it. So I stayed for a minute and she wandered off to go play again. So I snuck out and went to Sunday School. About 15 minutes later, David and Isabel came and got me out of S.S. He said she noticed I had left again and went nuts. She wasn't content anymore, so he came to switch with me. I took her back and she played fine, as long as she knew where I was at all times. If I moved while she was playing, she would look up to where I had been and would start crying, thinking I had left her. Woops on my part! We will see how it goes next week. Now I know what NOT to do. I think I will just have to send David and butt out myself!

She has really grown up a lot in the last few months. Here are some of the things she has learned and been up to lately:

-She is expanding her vocabulary. She doesn't say a ton of words, but she tries things that you say to her. Her common words are: please, mama, night night, baby, doggie, cheese, hot, swing, up, and sippy. She signs eat, water, more, please and waves and says night night when she is tired

-She is in love with babies. If she sees a little baby, she runs up to them, points at them and says baby and giggles and gets so excited. I am hoping this enthusiasm is still around in a few months.

-Isabel still loves music. If there is a beat, she will bounce to it and dance around. She does a head bob when we are listening to music in the car. She has started to try and sing along with us. She will start doing jibber jabber singing that she will try and mimmick to what the song sounds like.

-Playing outside is one of her favorite things to do. With Fall and Winter approaching, I am a little nervous about what we will do all winter, especially with a newborn keeping us indoors a lot. She loves the swings and sprints towards them when we go to the playground. She likes to climb up the stairs on the toys and slide down the twirly slide. I get a little nervous because the stairs are really steep and she is so high up there, but she has done great so far.

Here's some amusement for the Fam!

Well family, I thought I would post a pregnancy pic of me at 26 weeks, since you don't get to see me balloon up in person! I have actually been feeling great so far, no Carpel Tunnel Syndrome yet! I was talking to my mom a few days ago, and I just want to say that I am glad I wasn't pregnant 25 years ago. She said the dr.'s encouraged her to gain just 20 pounds with her pregnancies, and let's just say I would not fit into that category. It feels great to be nearing the end of my second trimester, but at they same time I get nervous that it is coming up so fast. I have been having insane hotflashes the last few weeks, I guess I have a preview for what is coming in 20 more years:) I have also been having the strangest dreams, they make total sense while I am having them, but then I wake up and think of explaining them to David and don't because I realize he would think I have gone completely nuts. So I just forget about it and look forward to the next night of crazy dreams.

I love feeling the baby move. Not knowing the gender is great because I always have something to daydream about and try and picture what it would be like to have either gender join our family. On the other hand I am a bit anxious because I can't get some of the things I want to be prepared. I will just have to go shopping over Christmas break when David is home.

We can't wait for this baby to come and see how Isabel interacts with her sibling. We feel so blessed that Heavenly Father is sending another little spirit to join our family.

I'll get it!

Isabel loves to play on the stairs. I was cleaning up breakfast and she wandered off. I heard her over by the stairs. Then I heard a clicking noise and kept seeing the stairway light go on and off, on and off, etc. I went to see what she was doing and this is what I found with a big grin and a giggle because she was so proud of herself. I am just glad she didn't fall!

We were sitting on the porch, enjoying a nice yummy popsicle after dinner. We had the sprinkler on and she was having fun with the water. She is so much fun and brings David and I so much joy. We are very excited for her sibling to come and bring even more love and joy in our family. I love watching her learn and grow and just hope I am doing the best job that I can with her. She just melts my heart!

More Utah Pics

All the grandkids, except for Camille. They had a blast running around in this field with their glow bracelets at night.

Isabel found this chair that is David's cousins, and she fell in love. She loves anything that is miniature so she can get in it. Now I am on a mission to find a small chair for her.

David's mom was having her driveway done while we were there, and she wanted all the grandkids' handprints in the cement. Camille was gone, so we had Isabel do her hand twice for both of them. They are 6 months apart, but pretty close to the same size:)

All the grandkids, and Rachel. On the very far right, you can see two little footprints that we did for Liz and my babies that are due this fall.

David's youngest sister Rachel, competed in Miss Sanpete County pageant. She had to do it because she won Miss Ephraim for her city. She did such a fabulous job, we were all blown away. The pictures weren't turning out because it was so dark in the auditorium, but I got this good one from our sis, Jen. Isn't she gorgeous? David ooohed and awed each time she came out. I know it is kind of hard for him to see her growing up, but he thought she did a great job! She is such an amazing person. I am so glad Isabel has examples like her of what kind of person she should strive to be. Rachel is so Christlike. She didn't win the pageant, but I know she had fun. It was great to help her get prepared for the pageant! She was our winner! We love you Rach!

Camping in Utah

We had so much fun in Utah! It was nice to have David not worrying about studying for the boards. We had a great time with his family and enjoyed camping in the mountains. Here are some pictures. I have been slacking on getting these pictures up. It seems everytime I try and sit down to post them, Isabel gets into a little mishap. She is so much fun and is growing up way too fast! Enjoy the pics and I will post the rest when I can:)

Smelling and trying to eat the mountain flowers with Grandma

She thinks she is so funny, and she is!

Riding on the mountain with Daddy

Fishing at the Beaver Dam's with Daddy

She caught her first fish and was so intrigued by it!

She enjoyed splashing in Blue Lake

Enjoying the beautiful scenery

Trying to walk around the campsite. She fell so much because of the uneven ground, but she did so good and got much better at walking over the week. Isabel also really enjoyed her candy bracelet and had orange drool all over herself, she was in HEAVEN!

Waking up after a nap in the tent. She loved the tent and got so excited trying to walk in and out. Of course she kept tripping because of the little lip that is at the bottom of the door. She would get mad, thinking someone was making her fall! She slept very good in the tent and she stayed bundled up pretty good.

Isabel enjoyed the dogs, as long as they didn't slobber in her face. She would walk up to them all the time, give them a little poke and then giggle and try and say 'dog'.

She really enjoyed having all the space to wander around. After spending all summer inside our little townhouse with just her mommy, she loved being able to wander wherever she wanted and having attention from lots of people.

Eating steak and veggies! She loved the meat. She would give a really loud, 'mmmm' with every bite of meat. We had such yummy food while camping, I think it always tastes better up on the mountain.

playing with some cousins

Riding the 4-wheeler. I didn't even have to show her, and her hand went straight for the gas. She enjoyed taking some rides around the camp and didn't want to get off.

A bunch of the family found walking sticks and were whittling on them. She found this little stick all on her own and started walking around with it, she is too funny!

This is her cousin Hailey. These girls were so cute with each other. They played really good together and would always give hugs and kisses to each other.

David is taking the Boards as I type. I am so excited! I can't wait for him to come home, because it won't be hanging over his head and stressing him out thinking about studying anymore, yay! I know he will do great. We are going to visit his family tomorrow and we are excited to get out of the humidity and away from school for a while and go camping and hang out with the family.
We weren't able to go to his Grandma's funeral. The testing center didn't have any availability for him to reschedule his test, and it would have cost $500 just to change the plane ticket dates. We are sad we missed it, but know we did what we had to do. I know she understands, because she has always been so happy with David and how hard he works in school.
Isabel is as cute as ever. I have been a slacker with the camera, but will have more pics after our trip. We are working on getting the binky usage down to just naps and night time. She gets pretty mad when you take it away, but she did better today. If she gets upset, it is really hard to calm her down without the binky, so I have used all my magical powers to distract her from thinking about it while she is upset. She loves to wave at people. The minute she sees someone at the store or in the parking lot, she starts waving, it doesn't matter if they see her or not. But if you show her someone and tell her to say hi, she gets shy and cuddles into my shoulder and doesn't do it very much.
We were at Cabela's last night looking for shoes, and there was a 4-wheeler in the store. I sat on it with Isabel in front and she grabbed right onto the handlebars and tried to steer it side to side. She's a natural:) I think she will have lots of fun when we go camping!
I better go finish packing. We will return with pictures and fun stories.

We love you Grandma Great!

David's Grandma, Izola Blackham, passed away today. We knew it would be coming in the next few weeks, but it was still a sad day. We were hoping we could make it home to Utah to see her in time, but Heavenly Father had a different timeline. We love her so much. She was as much a grandma to me as my biological ones. She has been so loving and caring to me since before I married David. She was a true example of a Christlike person. She treated all her grandkids as if they were the favorite, and we all felt that way.

What a special woman. All of David's nieces and nephews called her Grandma Great (instead of great-grandma) It was so cute. She loved Isabel so much and it makes me sad to think that Isabel won't remember her grandma-great. Everytime we talked to her, she was only interested in how "her Isabel" was doing.

As sad as a time this is, we know it is not the end. We know we will see her again, along with all our other family members that have passed on. We are so grateful to have a knowledge of Heavenly Father's plan and to know that we are an eternal family.

I think we will bump up our plane tickets to this week so we can be there for the funeral. David will try and take the boards in Utah instead of here in Nebraska.

We love you Grandma and will always remember what a special person you are!

Randomness

• David is neck deep in studying for the boards. He takes them on the 29th and he is getting a little stressed out. Some of his friends have taken it already and they said it is HARD, so that is great to hear:) I know he will do great, he works so hard for our family, I wish I could help him out a little more, but all the stuff he is studying is like Chinese to me.
• Isabel is growing and learning so much. She is 16 months and makes us laugh everyday. She is walking really good now and with that has come a newfound independence. If she knows where she wants to walk to, she will not let me hold her hand.
• Isabel likes to interrupt me when I am doing dishes in the sink. She steps in front of me and pushes against the cabinets to try and push me away from the sink so I will come play with her. It is so hard to not just drop everything that minute and go play, but I guess someone needs to try and keep our house clean.
• Isabel's favorite game to play is run around the house laughing and then come into the living room and scare us. She loves it and will continue to go back into the kitchen and come out the other way and scare us again. She makes this low, breathy humming noise when she gets excited that sounds so funny.
• Isabel is now so easy to put to bed. A lot of the times she will let us know when she wants to go to bed by waving at us (her way of saying "night night" to daddy). She sleeps through the night, but still wakes up around 6 or 6:30 am.
• She is learning to try and say a lot of new words. She gets such a big grin on her face when she tries to say a word we are teaching her and comes within the general ballpark of sounds.
• Isabel also loves to walk around with a blanket over her head. She thinks it is so funny to throw a blanket over her head so she looks like a ghost and then just walk anywhere. She runs into the wall, furniture, closet doors and trips over her toys. Each time, she takes the blanket off and has the biggest grin on her face. She gives a chuckle, stands up and throws the blanket on again and takes off. Now where in the world did she learn that from?
• I am feeling good. The baby is starting to move a lot, which I actually love. It helps remind me of what a special miracle I have growing inside of me. I have to admit that it is hard for me to comprehend how I can love someone else like I do Isabel. It will be amazing to have 2 little munchkins that I can't get enough of and bring me such great blessings.

My little jewelry thief!

As you can see, Isabel has figured out how to open my jewelry box. Luckily she has just played with the drawer that has some cheap bracelets in it. I heard hear go upstairs while I cleaned up breakfast and then I heard some noise that sounded like the handles on my armoire. Wondering what she was up to, I tiptoed upstairs and found her with her head in the drawer, three bracelets on her arm, just digging for more. I cleared my throat and she was startled and turned around with a look that said, "uh, oh, busted! Maybe I'll just pretend that nothing is happening and she will leave me alone." Then she turned back around and continued her jewelry heist like it was all fine and dandy.

I think this girl is gonna be a jewerly-aholic like David's mother, sisters, aunts, grandma and cousins. She is a Blackham by blood! At least I know of one thing I can get her for Christmas. She had fun bringing me all the jewerly with such a proud look on her face and now I can't keep her out of there. I closed my bedroom door that afternoon and she climbed up the stairs, sat in front of my door and just started sobbing!